"Batman:02"

Canary turned around. She stood in the cave, tired and irritated from waiting so long. He arms were crossed and her foot was tapping. "I called you over an hour ago. What took so long?"

As ussual, she got no response. Instead, Batman grunted and norrowed his eyes. "Why did you call me?"

There was an uncomfortable silence (to Canary's standards at least). She sighed nervously, then took in a breath. "The kids...They miss him."

Batman remained expressionless. "Him?"

She frowned. "You know exactly who HE is." Her face softened. "The kids deserve and explaination...I deserve an explaination."

Batman looked at her sternly. Canary looked right back. "I don't have an explaination for you."

The woman glared at him. If she didn't know better she would have thought she sent a chill down his back. "I KNOW you know where he is. I also know how secretive you are, but if I am also the...caretake of these kids and THOSE kids include YOUR kid." She stepped in front of him. " Now. Where. Is. Robin?" she said, poking his chest in between each word.

Batman stared at her, then the finger poking his chest. Immediately, he pushed Canary's hand away. "It's a long story."

He stormed into the room, slamming the door as he entered. He sighed, then took a seat in the only peice of furniture in the closet sized room, a vanity chest with a chair. He sat in front of the dusty mirror surrounded by lightbulbs, half of which were on and half which were blown out. Eversince it was given to him, the room was his sactuary. It was the only place where he didn't feel completely disgusted with himself. But today was an exception.

He could hear it now. On every news station in the state, maybe the country, was someone tellling people of the Injustice League's new incredibly crime, led by a gang of teenage delinquints. He could just imagine it. A woman, around her mid-thirties, a serious expression on her make-up covered face, microphone in hand, saying these exact words: "A group of young villains invaded Arkham Asylum yesterday, liberating frequent inmate the Joker and several other villains. It is also to our knowledge that they had kidnapped young superheroes Kid Flash, Zantanna, Atemis, Miss Martian, Aqualad, and Superboy. We will have more on this story in the upcoming hours. We recommend you lock your doors and stay inside for now."

He hated himself. He ripped off the blue and black feathery mask, revealing his face. He stared at himself, unsure of what he was. All those people he tried hard to put in jail, are now free because of him. Now his friends are the ones who were imprisoned. He stared at himself in the mirror. What was he? A hero on a mission, or a new villain. He sighed. "What's wrong with you Dick?" He leaned his hands against the mirror and dropped his head. "It's only a mission... It's only a mission." But why did he feel so guilty? Why was he tearing himself apart? "Just do this and it's over..."

He sat in silence, then suddenly, he jumped. He turned around. The door was open and in the doorway stood a girl about two years older than him. She leaned against the doorway, her black clothes covered in dirt and her orange fox mask in her hand, revealing her tan face, green, menacing eyes, and long, curly brown hair. She smirked and walked over to Dick.

"You did well newbie." Dick froze, then quickly went for his mask. She in turn, quickly gabbed his arm before he put the mask on. She shook her head. "No no. You're now part of this team. You don't have to be so formal." Her green, cat-like eyes studied him. "That is, unless you have something to hide."

Dick gulped.

"Give it a rest Angel." The two stopped and turned to face the new guest. It was a boy, Angle's age, wearing the same clothes as Dick. He had peachy, light skin, bright green eyes, and black and red faux-hawk hair. He leaned against the doorway, twirling a grey wolf mask on his finger.

"I was just talking to the newbie Grey." She slowly walked over to him, but kept her eyes on Dick. "Just wondering where his loyalties lay." She smirked at Dick, then left.

Grey watched her, then shook his head. He turned to Dick. "C'mon." He smiled and pointed his head out of the room. "Let me give you a tour."

"We were in Gotham a week ago at 2200 hours. There was a robbery. It was in an electronics warehouse two blocks away from City Hall. There were five robbers, two Caucasian, two African American, and one Native American. Two were out on guard. The warehouse had two entrances, one in-"

Canary silence him. "I apologize Bruce, but will you please get to the point?"

Batman grunted, then restarted his story. "So we were fighting the robbers. One had a crowe bar. He swing for my head, but I the crowe bar headed for Robin."

"Look out."

Robin perked his head, but it was too late. The crowe bar had hit his left side. He fell back.

"Looks like the Boy Wonder isn't so wonderful after all," the robber sneered.

With his right hand, he covered his aching side, groaning. Then, with his left hand, he lifted himself up and swung his leg under the robber's. Quickly, the robber jumped. He landed on his feet effortlessly, smiling, but just as the robber was on his feet, so was Robin. Robin smiled. "I got a little bit of wonder left in me." He threw a ounch at the robber, but his smile faded as the robber ducked, untouched by Robin's fist.

The robber smirked. It angered Robin intensely. It felt like a flame was lit. He could take down superpowered bad guys; this poser should be just a piece of cake. He threw another punch. It was dodged again. He threw another one, and another. Each time his punches were dodged, it angered him more and more. First Wally now this? He had had enough

Robin reached into his belt and took out two small explosives- not big enough to kill someone, but still packing a punch. "Woah," the robber stepped back smirking. "Let's not get testy now." He took two more steps back just as a puff of smoke formed around him.

Robin frowned, then threw both bombs into the smoke, which quickly became a mistake as the two small explosions became one big one which blew Robin off his feet and against a wooden crate, knocking him out.

Grey walked through the hallways, each covered with steel, tightly-bolted walls and white, polished tile floors. Dick followed close by, but looked around taking note of whatever he found uselful such as the not-so-hidden security cameras, the people with white lab coats and I.D. cards who walked past him, and the occasional window revealing some sort of lab experiment. Then suddenly one window caught his eye.

"So follow me and we can go get some lunch. The cafeteria is just down this hall. Come on Dick..." There was no response. "Dick. Dick." He turned around and saw a strange sight. Dick was leaning against a window, his eyes wide and studying the scene before him. Every second Dick's eyes were staring at a different scene,making them dart quickly from left to right.

Grey moved in closer. Dick stared blankly at the scene. He looked amazed...or scared to death. "Grey, is that-"

"A white matian? Yeah." He smiled as if it was an accomplishment of his.

Dick just stared. About ten feet below him was a white experiment room. In it were just two mean and a women in lab coats, a silver tray with tools, a strange machine Dick had never seen before, and a white martian chained up to the wall with wires which were hooked up to the machine. There was something about the martian. It was true that Dick had only seen white martians in pictures, but this one seemed...different. It seemed tired and hurt. "Where'd you get it?" he asked.

Grey laughed, but quickly muffled it. "Would you believe that it's that little green hottie Miss Martian? She looks different without her make-up, doesn't she?" He paused, waiting for the new guy to laugh at his joke.

Dick didn't care about what he said anymore. His eyes popped wide open. He closed his hands into fists. He wanted to scream. M'GANN!

"What are they doing to her?" he asked, trying to mask the nervousness in his voice.

Grey looked at the machine Miss Martian was hooked up to, then back to Dick. "I guess they're just testing the extent of her powers. I heard it was some sort of startling martian discovery or whatever."

Dick took a deep breath. He looked at Grey, rage in his eyes. "Where are the others?"

Grey laughed. "What?"

"Where are the others. Tell me now," he ordered.

"Gosh!" Grey took a step back. "Calm down man." He pointed to the right. "They're down this hallway. Look for room-" but he was cut short by Dick running past him and down the hall as fast as he could.

It was a silent ride back home in the Batmobile. Usually, Robin would have come on his motorcycle, but they were in such a hurry, and Batman did not want to take the time for him to get it. The two sat in silence, Batman at the wheel and Robin next to him, arms crossed, pouting. It was strange, Batman thought, usually the boy would go on and on about the mission they just did and about how it was such 'a piece of cake'. Batman glanced at the road, then the boy. Something really was wrong. The boy just sat there. He wasn't laughing, or talking, or even smiling, just sitting. As the car drove into the Batcave Batman sighed, getting ready to go into father figure mode. "Is everything alright Dick?"

"Huh?" Dick snapped out of his thoughts and flashed a smile for Bruce. "Yep! Perfect." He turned to the door and pulled the lever to open the car door, but it stayed shut. He rolled his eyes. "Really Bruce?" He turned around. "Locked?"

"Yes." Batman removed his cowl. "Now let's talk."

Dick sighed like the annoyed teenager he was. "Fine." He removed his mask in turn. "What do you want to talk about?"

"Today. You were off in your fighting skills. Your reflexes were slow. Your balance was shakey and-"

"I GET IT!" Robin yelled. He just couldn't take anymore. As if he hadn't had enough going on. Now Bruce was criticizing him? He wanted it to all end, for everyone to just go away. He wasnted to scream them away, starting with Bruce.

Bruce paused,shocked. Immediately, Dick froze. Maybe that outburst was a little too much. He was just so angry. Dick looked away. "Sorry. I-I don't know what come over me."

Bruce pushed it aside. "Is everything alright Dick? Did something happen at school?" Dick shook his head. He shied away so that Bruce wouldn't see him use his wrist watch to disable the lock. "Friends?" Dick shook his head again and continued to work on his wrist watch. "The team?" He froze. Bruce nodded. "So it is the team. What happened Dick?" Dick didn't listen. Bruce wouldn't help him. He wouldn't understand. So Dick just put his head back into his wrist watch. "You can trust me."

"Can I?"

Bruce's heart broke in way that Bruce would never breathe a word to to anyone. "What does that mean?"

Dick shook his head. He used the final code to unlock the door, then, he opened it. He stepped through the door and turned to Batman. There was a look on Dick's face that Bruce had only seen once when he was just a little nine year old boy. It was the look of a lost soul, unable to reach the surface of the world. "Nothing Bruce. I'm going to bed."

Bruce quickly got out of the car to catch up to the boy. Soon he was in front of him, staring eye to eye. "You can trust me...with whatever it is youre hiding. I won't judge Dick."

Dick looked down. He didn't even want to look at Batman when he said this. "I don't think I can do this Bats."

"Do what?" Bruce was puzzled.

The boy didn't say anything. He just lifted up his hand and pointed to the R on his chest.

This took a LONG time to write. I know where I wanted to go, it's just the writing that was so hard. If I could, I would make this chapter a lot longer. Oh well, I'll just save what I have for the next chapter. Anyway, about the new episode, Performance. Loved it! I was waiting for a Robin-centered episode for forever, but I do miss the old, jokester Robin that we were introduced to in the beginning of the series. I guess because of the circumstances of this episode, with Haley's Circus and all, a serious Robin was needed. Anyone else wondering where Aqualad was though?

PLEASE REVIEW! I can not stressed that enough. Every review influences me to write faster! And feel free to give me any critiques or ideas you have for the story. I am absolutely open to all you have to say...as long as appropriate language is used *wink*