JADE (young justice/robin)

4. shadows

GOTHAM CITY
AUGUST 8, 04:22 EDT

jade.

Finally, around four in the morning, the Batmobile wheeled back into the cave, finally done with patrol.

The canopy hissed open as the Bat sauntering towards his computer only for me to spin around in his chair. If he was shocked he didn't show it, he just stood there watching me. "How'd you figure it out?"

I turned back to the computer, hitting a key that pulled up an extensive algorithm that even I didn't really understand.

"You're in my seat."

I rolled my eyes, lifting myself out of his chair and taking a new seat on an empty spot of his desk. I felt like a little kid again, swinging my feet waiting for the word of an adult. But he just took my former seat, turned back to the computer, and scrolled through the algorithm. "You did this?"

I nodded up at Bubs who was asleep against one of the glass displays of an old Birdie uniform.

"Impressive," he hummed. It was. My whiz of a sister found the Batcave with a stolen computer. "Was the check not enough?"

I tilted my head at him. How did he..?

"I had a hunch," he explained, reading my reaction. "But then I ran the prints you left on my safe. When it didn't correspond to an existing identity, it confirmed my suspicions."

My eyes rolled again. All the attention is starting to make me blush, Bats. Then I tapped another key on his computer, pulling up images of our ruined door from the rink.

The eye slits of his cowl narrowed. "A League of Shadows mark," he recognized.

"I tried..." my voice rasped, "everything."

"That's why your identities were erased," the Bat said, piecing it together. "Why did they mark you?"

I shook my head, pointing back up to the girl asleep. Then he finally understood.

Pictures of the carvings on our door were now projected all over the Bat's computer. We stared at them for what felt like hours, while I gave him all the intel I could about our past. Anything that could help us figure out what to do next. The Bat didn't say anything for a while. He just brooded in his seat, thinking everything over.

"We can't relocate you," he finally said. "You need a sanctum that not even the League of Shadows know about — or at the least wouldn't dare to infiltrate."

I don't have any of those Bats.

He took another deep breath, still contemplating. "Sanctuary in the manor is all I can give her for now," he concluded.

I thought it over. It seemed to be our best possible option. The Shadows don't dare to touch the Bat and if they do, he has the entire Justice League on speed dial. It's more resources than I could ever muster.

"But I need you to do something in exchange," he spoke up again.

A million sinister thoughts raced through my mind, none of which he would want me to verbalize — I mean, it is Bruce Wayne under that mask after all.

"You keep the check; that should house and feed you for the next year. No more stealing."

I nodded right away.

"And," he started again. My enthusiasm dimmed realizing he was already asking me to give up my nighttime hijinks. It, selfishly, already felt like a stretch. "We have a covert team for League protégés. You would have to cooperate under the team's and my own instruction as a member."