Behind the Mask

Chapter 6

Robin sighed in relief as he reached the well with a whole forty-five minutes until the party started. Sure Bruce was probably wondering where he was and would probably blow at him for cutting it so ‘close’, but at least he wasn’t late, like last time. Robin smirked at the memory of that particular evening as he pulled out his grappler and descended down the old well in the garden behind the mansion. It wasn’t an official entrance to the Batcave, but it was the how Bruce had first found it and, despite being boarded up, it was otherwise still accessible. If you were small and weren’t claustrophobic that is. Robin always used the well entrance whenever he was out late and wanted to get in without alerting Bruce by using the zeta-beam or the Batmobile’s entrance. Cause the Batmobile entrance was wet.

Once Robin was near the bottom of the well, he released his grappler and flipped to the ground, crouching down and crawling through the small cave entrance in the side of the well. He’d been through it enough to know how to avoid the sharp rocks, but the bats always managed to catch him by surprise. He swatted them away carefully as he army-crawled through the small tunnel. He could make it through with little difficulty, but knew it would be tight for a grown man, so he assumed it must have closed up a bit since Bruce had first discovered it.

Once he was at the end, Robin rolled out of the hole – right into Bruce’s legs. The Boy Wonder grinned up sheepishly as his mentor and guardian glared down at him. It wasn’t a Batglare, but it was a playboy Bruce Wayne-glare. Still rather unnerving. Robin got to his feet quickly.

“Hey, Bruce.”

“Not amused.”

“Um, never said you were.”

“Where were you?”

“Out getting some air before I suffocate at this party?”

“As Robin.” It wasn’t a question.

“Yeeees….”

“What happened to your face?”

Robin looked confused for a moment, then put a hand to his face and winced. One of Penguin’s men must have punched him.

“Cadmus?” Bruce asked, grabbing his chin and inspecting his face.

“Yeah, pretty sure,” Robin replied, involuntarily jerking his face away from his guardian’s hand as strong fingers ghosted over his bruised cheek. “Penguin this time.”

“Hmm,” Bruce hummed, moving over to the Batcomputer and sitting down, looking out of place in his fancy party suit and gelled back hair. Robin scurried over and stood next to him, watching as Bruce pulled up files he’d put together during his investigation into Cadmus. His eyes narrowed as he downloaded information on Penguin into the database, glancing to Robin and ordering:

“Go change. The guests will arrive in a half an hour.”

“What about you?”

“I’ll be right up.”

Robin sighed and began making his way towards the elevator, stopping before he went up and turning back towards Bruce.

“Have you found anything? Since last time, I mean?”

Bruce shook his head without turning from the computer.

“What do think it’s all about?”

Bruce sighed, running a hand through his hair. “All evidence points to Cadmus being at the bottom of this; what you told me about what they did to you in the pod, it makes sense. But the fact that every search I’ve conducted on Cadmus comes to a dead end makes me doubtful. Nearly everyone in Cadmus was controlled in some way by Dr. Desmond and his genomorphs. Now that he’s apprehended and Guardian’s taken over, all illegal experiments have been shut down. Of all the people I’ve talked to, none of them have any knowledge of any experiment involving a young boy. Whatever Desmond did to you, he kept a secret from the rest of the lab.”