Chalant Candlelight

Chapter 35

(Robin's POV)

"You've got Zatanna, in your bedroom?" Bruce whisper-yells at me at about eight in the morning. We stood facing each other outside my bedroom door the door cracked only a little. Hopefully, Zatanna was still asleep,

"Some jerk roofied her last night," I whisper-yell back,

"She could have figured out your identity, Dick,"

"Bruce," I look at him as he reads my face,

"She already knows?" Bruce was holding his hands back from strangling me, "and you didn't tell me, immediately?" 

"What difference would it make?"

"I could have her shipped off to the artic or like one of those rectangle states or something,"

"Oh, so your solution is to ship her off to an uninhabited region,"

"No, Dick, people live there,"

"Do they?"

"In the rectangle states? yes!" 

"Oh," I kind of felt stupid for a second, "What do they do there?" I ask after thinking about it for a little,

"I don't know, things? Ask Clark," Bruce shrugged, "That's beside the point, Zatanna knows you are Robin, and you didn't tell me,"

"She's not going to tell anyone," I roll my eyes,

"How do you know?"

"Because I trust her," I say causing Bruce to pause for a second,

"Are you insane?" He asked, "Have you lost your mind?"

"I'm serious, Bruce, I trust her," I say, fully convinced. Bruce winds back his arm as I flinch awaiting impact on my face but instead, he just stops. I open my eyes surprised he didn't hit me. He thought better of it lowering his hand and turning away. Before I knew it he changed his mind doing a full 180 turn and backhanding me into next week. I lift myself off the floor on my arms looking up at the man,

"We'll see where that trust gets you," He scoffed, shaking out his hand before walking away.

Once he's out of sight Zatanna opens the door, having been listening and watching seemingly the whole time. She ran to me, who was still on the floor, she grabbed my face looking at the obvious red marks,

"Are you okay?" She asked as I removed her from me,

"Just peachy," I sigh, picking myself off the floor and heading into my room to grab my keys and other odds and ends I needed, "If you want to rest more you can, I've got some appointments to meet. Alfred will see you out when you're ready. Your dress has been bagged up so feel free to take my clothes back with you. I don't care for them to be returned, thank you." I say more curtly than I attended, but still trying not to cry in pain because my cheek felt like it got a brick to the face. I put on a strong front leaving her just sitting there dumbfounded.

~~~~~~~

"Okay, Wally," I sit down rolling up my sleeve to reveal the yellowish-green bruising all over the inside of my elbow, "Hurry, dude, my skin feels like it's burning and I keep blacking out when I stand up,"

"Okay, okay, one minute," Wally comes out of his apartment's bedroom holding the syringe before stopping when looking at my arm then at the dark circles under my eyes and my pale skin, "Dude," He sighs,

"Just put the needle in, please," I beg. It had been maybe two weeks since we had started lowering my doses, and much to my hate, I often found myself weaker than normal and having more traumatic memories,