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“Robin to Batman,” Tim tried for the third time. “Come in, Batman.” He tried to curb the panic leeching into his voice, but that meant curbing the panic leaking into his psyche, too.
His comm only gave him loud static in reply. Tim blinked hard, struggling to listen for any noise past it and the ringing in his ears. There had been unfamiliar footsteps outside his door, earlier, and Tim had had to hold his breath in hopes the intruder wouldn’t notice him, jammed beneath the computer desk he had been working on earlier.
No answer.
He adjusted his stance, wrapping his cape around his knees to keep himself warm. At least he had thought to modify the Robin costume; he couldn’t imagine doing this in shorts. “Is anybody there?”
There was a clang from the hallway, and Tim backed up further beneath the desk. He tried to convince himself it was the backup system kicking in, but he also knew that it should have turned on the second the main system went offline.
But whoever had attacked the Justice League Headquarters must have disabled them. The satellite was a sitting duck.
This wasn’t how Tim had thought the day would go. It was supposed to be a quick trip; a send-off for a few members of the League. Heck, Tim had math homework he was supposed to finish when he got home.
Batman had come to go over final details of the peace treaty with the League members who were leaving; Robin was there to help him do routine maintenance on the security afterward. Tim had just finished getting into the system when the entire satellite lurched, throwing him and everything on his desk to the side. He had definitely hit his head on something in his tumble.
By the time he had regained his balance and found his computer, he had had the honor of watching real-time as the security system, and the engine, and the communication system failed.
And then the power went out, leaving him in the dark.
“Robin to Justice League,” he whispered. His breath burned in his nose from the cold.
Dead silence.
“Batman to Robin.”
At the same time, the emergency lights kicked on, casting an eerie blue tint to the world.
Tim’s heart fluttered. The voice was quiet, probably whispered. Which meant that Bruce was either already caught and trying to hide it, or he was also hiding from their attackers. Neither option made him feel any better.
“I’m here, Batman,” he whispered back. He ducked further under the desk so he was less likely to be heard. “Where are you? What’s going on?”
There was silence long enough that Tim almost thought he had imagined it. He was really alone on this satellite, doomed to—
“The Vattirott lied to us. They attacked before we could make the deal.”
Tim sucked in a breath. The Vattirott were a species uninvolved in the peace treaty negotiations, though they had been considered as a third party because of their familiarity with both aliens’ cultures from their trades with them. They were dismissed as an option when the League realized they traded in unique war ship engines.
Nobody had thought that they would be so desperate for that profit they would actively break the peace.
But here they were.
Tim squared his shoulders. He knew a little about the Vattirott, even if it wasn’t much. Batman had made sure of it, just in case. They were a species native to the colder climate of an outer planet’s moon, so it was unsurprising they would risk cutting off the power. They had enough air here to get them through a few more hours. Most of the League would freeze to death before they suffocated.
Nope. Not thinking of that.
Heat. If the Vattirott liked the cold, then they were probably vulnerable to heat. If Tim could reach the engine room—
“Robin. Stop.”
Tim blinked. “Stop what?”
“It’s too dangerous.”
“Can you read my mind now?”
Tim imagined that, had the situation been any less tense, he may have gotten a grunt of humor-acknowledgement for that one. As it was, the voice on the other side of the comm hitched.
Tim froze. Ice flooded his veins. “Bruce?”
“Need to retreat.” His voice was definitely strained.
Tim steeled himself and risked peeking around the corner of the desk. The room was eerily quiet without the hum of the engines or air systems. Random objects were still strewn all over the floor from where they had been flung at the moment of impact. His breath fogged up in front of him, a cool blue haze.
The Vattirott war ships were designed to be sturdy enough to take a beating. The satellite had probably been hit by one of their ships. The ships were big.
In the privacy of the dim room, Tim gulped. The satellite could be swarming with them, by now. “Where are you?” he asked again.
“There is an escape pod off the third floor. I don’t think that the intruders have located it yet. When you get there, use the computer override to get in. I’m coming from the observatory. I’ll meet you there.”
“We should travel together so we can watch each other’s backs.”
“It’s too far.”
“But—”
“Robin.” His voice was stern now. It had risen in volume enough to make Tim wince at the difference, but it softened again with his next words. “I’ll be right behind you.”
Tim knew he was making a face, but nobody was here to see it. “Okay.”
There was a relieved sigh over the comm. “Make sure the hallway is clear before you go. They are still looking for survivors.”
Tim nodded, even though nobody was there to see it. He peeked around the corner of the desk again, and, finding and hearing nothing, rose to his feet and darted silently across the room. He plastered his back to the wall next to the door and strained his ears.
The Vattirott had six muscular tentacles for legs; he wouldn’t hear footsteps. But he didn’t hear breathing, either, so it was with muscles tensed that he pressed his hand to the hollo-pad that would open the door.
It opened. Tim let out a breath of relief. Clear. He repeated as much to his comms.
The hallway stretched out to either side, metal sliding doors at regular intervals along them. Luckily, Robin had been forced to memorize the blueprints of the satellite before being allowed to step foot on it, so it was with confidence that he started off to the left at a brisk pace.
The emergency lights flickered, and winked out. Tim slowed down to pull out his bo staff. “Batman?” he whispered. “The lights went out.”
“The power network is still trying to repair itself. Keep moving.”
Tim nodded.
The weight of the staff was comfortable and familiar, two things the dark, freezing hallways were not. It wasn’t long before he found himself skimming it along the ground, in order to avoid tripping over any obstacles. He knew he had reached the intersection of the next two hallways when the sound of his staff skimming along the ground grew suddenly louder, reflecting back at him from the wall in front of him.
“Report.”
Tim turned his head left and right, even though the gesture was pointless in the darkness. “I don’t think anybody’s—”
He turned left, and his staff hit something softer than the wall. Hot, acrid breath spilled down into Tim’s face. Oops. “Uh. Hi.”
“Run!”
Tim didn’t need to be told twice. He pivoted on his feet, feeling his cape react to a near-missed swoop of a tentacle. Without a second thought, he began to sprint in the opposite direction.
There was nothing to see ahead of him, so there was nothing to distract him from the hissing sound of the tentacles sliding along the floor behind him, much too closely for his comfort.
He blindly turned a corner, expecting to loop back around and get back on his way to the escape pod, and let out a loud oof as he met something solid where the hallway should have been. Before he could recover, long, flexible appendages wrapped around his body, squeezing tight enough it made it hard for him to breathe.
Crap. Crap crap crap.
“Robin?”
The tentacles lifted him off his feet. One of them twisted around his wrist and squeezed until he was forced to drop his bo staff. It clattered to the ground, and by the sounds of it, rolled away.
Had he said ‘crap’ yet?
The alien that had been chasing him caught up, by the sound of it. “It is smaller than the others.” Its voice was a quiet hiss.
If Tim had had more room to move, he may have jolted when they started to speak English. As it was, he managed to land a heavy kick to one of the cold appendages.
The alien holding him didn’t react more than to grab his leg, too, flipping him nearly upside-down in an effort to keep him still. “Yes, but it was armed for battle.” It had the gall to shake him.
Some of his things were knocked loose from his utility belt. “Hey!”
That earned another shake, helping his blood settle in his head and add pressure to his already-annoying headache.
“Take it to the ship with the others.”
The ship? He was supposed to be home by 9! “Wait—”
“The younglings are smaller in this species; it may be the child of one of the others.”
“Are they protective?”
“Usually.”
The world swayed as the tentacled alien started to move down the hallway. From the sound of things, the other one continued in the other direction.
“Robin. Come in, Robin.”
Tim licked his lips. “Uh, hey, B.”
“What happened?”
Tim tried his best to remain nonchalant, even as his stomach swooped with every slithery step the alien took. “Met an alien. We’re hanging out.”
There was a sound suspiciously close to a curse. “Hold on.”
Tim didn’t think there was much to hold on to, but he reached his hands as far as he could anyway.
His fingers could just barely brush his belt.
An idea struck Tim. With a little bit of extra strain, he was able to flip open a pocket on his belt. Items tumbled out past his face, but he paid it no mind. Instead, he pulled out the pack of matches he kept and dragged it along the length of the scaly tentacle holding him.
The alien screeched, recoiling from the heat and light. The wavering orange light illuminated a horrifying creature, pale white scales protecting the half-dozen tentacles spilling out of the lower half of its body like pasta from a pasta maker. It had a dozen large eyes set around its top half, and they all glistened with moisture in the light.
Tim only had a second to ‘admire’ the view before it dropped him to the floor. He nimbly rolled out of the fall, narrowly avoiding landing on his head. He couldn’t stop the grunt the effort took him, though. Without a moment to spare, he used his momentum to spring to his feet and took off running.
The alien screamed and followed.
“Robin?”
“On my way,” Tim huffed. Except there was an alien back down the hall. When they passed another hallway intersection, Tim ducked down it. The emergency lights here were back online, illuminating the length of clear hallway leading to the other side of the ship. If he reached the end and turned right. . .
“Rebreather.”
Without a second of hesitation, Tim hooked his rebreather around his face, thankful the clip had held it to his belt through his rough handling earlier. Not a moment after he had secured it, the vents around him kicked on and a cloud of white gas spewed out into the hallway.
The gas stung in his eyes, but from the sounds of it, it more literally burned the alien. It’s screech was garbled, and it fell behind.
Tim blinked reflexive tears from his eyes and redoubled his efforts. As he approached the end of the hallway, he let himself lament leaving his bo staff behind earlier. He had to slow down to check both ways before deciding the coast was clear.
He took the turn and glanced behind himself. Nobody was following him. “Batman?” he asked, suddenly unsure of something.
“What is it?” his voice wasn’t garbled by his rebreather. He wasn’t breathing hard from exertion.
The pieces began to fall into place, and Tim slowed down. “Where are you?”
There was a deafening silence from the other side of the comms.
Heart in his throat, Tim pivoted to go back. “Batman—”
“I’m right behind you. Keep going.”
Bull. “I’m not—”
“That’s an order.”
Tim’s eyes found the gleam of the nearest security camera. Bruce should have been working on them from the control room when the satellite had been hit. Tim pointed an accusatory finger into the lens. “You’re lying to me.”
“Get to the escape pod.”
Tim bit his tongue. Maybe it was the stress of trying to navigate a ship swarming with enemies blind, or maybe it was the anxiety that followed the realizing he would be travelling back to Earth alone, but he felt angry. “No.”
“One of us has to get back and warn the others. You had the greatest chance of making it.”
“No!”
“And you are wasting it.”
It was like a slap to the face. Tim reflexively straightened his posture. He took a deep breath, rebreather filter forcing him to take it slowly. “I—”
“Duck.”
Tim’s reaction was a little too late, and a heavy tentacle hit the top of his head. He stumbled sideways, shoulder hitting the cold wall of the hallway. The hit made the ringing in his ears louder.
It didn’t stop him from hearing the crash, from the other side of the comm.
Tim’s attention split, half focusing on leaping and dodging tentacles like the world’s most difficult game of Double Dutch, the other half listening to the grunts and crashes of a fight through his comm. He pulled his matches out and thought better of it, unsure which chemicals had been poured into the hallway earlier and unwilling to risk causing an explosion.
He would have to make a run for it.
When he saw an opening, he took it, flipping through a loop of tentacles and rolling back into a sprint. When he rounded the corner, light spilled out of an open hatch. Tim whooped, forcing his legs to move faster. “I have eyes on the pod.”
At the same time, a hissing voice sounded through his comm. “Put him with the others.”
Tim leapt through the doors of the pod, and Bruce must have overridden the security for him because they snapped closed behind him automatically. Tim tried not to dwell on the thought that Batman hadn’t even planned to escape with Robin.
The alien that had been chasing him screamed and beat against the other side of the door. Nothing would get through it; the hatch was sealed.
Tim had just enough sense to get buckled into one of the seats before the pod disengaged from the satellite.
As he shot through empty space, Tim’s resolve hardened. Screw his math homework.
“I’m coming for you, B.”