They smiled at him. Honest, reassuring smiles. The cheers from the crowd gave him confidence. So much, that it pushed his nervousness to the back of his mind, letting him forgett his recent worries for now. He waved at the many people below, preparing himself for his part of the act. His mother jumped. The crowd roared. But something wasn't right. He couldn't see his mother anymore. He stepped closer to the edge of the pole, carefully peering over it. His breathing stopped. His mother was down there. On the ground. Not moving, breathing. Dead. Dick began to panic. This wasn't right. Why would his mother want to kill herself? She would never leave him, or his dad... His dad! He whipped his head around to look at where he last stood, only to see Batman instead. But without his costume... so he was just Bruce Wayne. But to Dick, he was the same person anyway. Now where was his dad? And what was Bruce even doing here? He took another quick glance down, and froze. He had found his dad. Tears started forming in his eyes, as he fearfully backed away from the sight, bumping into Bruce. He was openly crying now, turning around while Bruce held him, rubbing his back soothingly.

Suddenly, Bruce pulled away, a hard look on his cowlless face, confusing Dick to no end. Bruce then let go of Dick completely, and stood up, standing too close to the edge for Dick's comfort. The circus noise was growing louder in the background, the audience seemingly still amazed by the 'show' they were wittnessing, but he was barely paying attention to it.

"You need to stop being so reckless! You'll get us both killed!" Bruce growled.

He didn't sound like the person Dick knew. Or at least, he didn't sound the way he did when talking to him, but the way he would talk with a cold hearted murderer. It made Dick want to get away from him as fast as the speedforce would allow him. He shook in fear as he stared in the man's accusing eyes. Dick reached out towards Bruce, carefully, hoping he would stop. Hoping he was just messing with him, and would pull him into his arms any moment now. But Bruce just gave him a sad, disappointed look.

"I thought you trusted me, Robin."

Then, he fell backwards. It felt like slow motion to Dick, as he reached out for his mentor, not being able to prevent him from falling to his death. With tears streaming down his face, he cried out.

"No! Dad!"

A sickening crack, and everything was gone.

° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° °

Dick woke with a start, gasping as he worked to get his hysterical breathing under control again. He closed his eyes, but quickly recoiled as the images only started to come back to him. Sighing, he pushed himself off his bed and went for the light switch, only to stumble over something and face plant into the floor. He groaned and slowly got up again, muttering incoherent words under his breath. When he finally got to turn on the lights in his self made home base, he narrowed his eyes at a stuffed elephant, that lay innocently on the floor. Walking over to pick up the toy, he briefly wondered how he had seriously managed to trip over his small, fluffy friend. He softly placed 'Peanut' on his pillow and cleaned up his bed. Then he started working on getting dressed so he could go somewhere else to distract hinself. He used his secret passageway to get to the closest zeta entrance, to transport him to the mountain.

Once there, he decided to go to the gym. Sadly, he couldn't have any trapeze equipment installed there, without Batman finding out his identity. So instead, he went for whatever practice he could pull off on the ground. The training, however, did little to keep his thoughts from returning to his most recent nightmare. He was somewhat used to the watching-his-parents-die kind of dreams, but on occasion, they would suddenly include Batman in some way. But what had startled him the most tonight, was the fact that he had called his mentor 'dad'. That was definitely something new. Sure, Batman was the person that had been there after his parents' death, if not immediately afterwards. And sure, Robin cared about him. But did he really think of him as his 'dad' somehow? He wanted to just brush it off, to just say "No, of course not.", but that didn't feel like the truth. He was just so confused at the moment.

"Wow! How did you do that? It looked really cool!"

Robin hadn't noticed the martian enter the room. Slightly startled, he turned around to face the awestruck, green skinned girl. The multiple flips he had pulled off after jumping down a simple vaulting horse must have seriously impressed his teammate. Resisting the urge to rub his arm he tried to look confident, and gave a small smile.

"Thanks, M'gann."

"Oh, no problem! But, really, how did you do that? And all the other cool things before that! I didn't notice much of what you can do yet, actually." she cheerfully explained.

Robin chuckled at her usual attitude. He thought it was kinda cute how she was either really shy, or really excited and cheerful. Don't get him wrong, he didn't like her like that, but she certainly was a very kind person, with a very big heart. Wanting to avoid her question, he offered her something else.

"Do you want to try? Maybe not what I just did, but we can start with a few basics."

If possible, M'gann's face lit up even more.

"Yes, please!"

Robin grinned, and the two of them got to work. He simply started showing her easy things like handstands, demonstrating everything first, then helping her do it herself, and giving advice on what to do better. He had to admit, teaching someone else his favourite 'hobby' was a lot of fun.
After a while, the young Martian got back to her earlier question, much to Robin's dismay.

"So, where did you learn all this?"

He hesitated. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to tell her a little.

"Promise you won't tell anyone? Especially not Batman?" he asked, a pleading look in his eyes.

"Promise."

He sighed.

"Okay then. Do you know what a circus is?"

She nodded.

"Well, I, we were part of one when I was younger. My parents and I, I mean."

"Really? Wow, that's so cool."

Robin smiled wistfully at the memory.

"Yeah, it was pretty cool. We used to perform on a trapeze. You know what a trapeze is?"

M'gann seemed to think it over for a moment.

"I believe I do, yes."

"Well, that's how I learned most of this. Although I did add a few things over the years and perfected what I already knew."

M'gann seemed intrigued by the fact that her teammate had lived with the circus. But there was something she did not understand.

"Why aren't you with the circus anymore? You're obviously not anymore with all the hero work in Gotham, and with the team, but it sounds as if you really liked it there." she asked curiously, but also carefully, since she did not know what kind of answer might be behind it.

Robin was silent for a while. M'gann detected the sadness in his features, and realized she must have said something bad.

"I-I'm sorry. I didn't mean to-"

"No, no, it's alright. You couldn't have known," he gave her a reassuring smile, indicating that he wasn't offended. "Since you promised not to tell anyone about this... I might as well tell you the rest. That is, if you really do want to know."

She smiled warmly, while moving to sit cross legged on the floor. Robin soon followed her lead and sat, with his ellbows on his legs, and his chin on his hands.

"My parents and I were known to perform without a safety net, which hadn't been a problem until that time.... I was eight back then. There was this man, Tony Zucco, that threatened our circus for money. When we refused, he decided to take his revenge. He and his men tempered with the trapeze wires, and nobody noticed until it was too late." He paused, waiting for M'gann to connect the dots, but he didn't see any indication that she did. Taking a deep breath, he continued. "We started the show, as usual, and when our act came, my parents jumped off the trapeze and started the performance, as we had practiced. I... didn't even get the chance to join them for the performance before the wires became loose and they... fell."

This time the girl understood. She had tears in her eyes. Slowly, carefully she crept over until she was directly next to her teammate, and pulled him into a hug. The thirteen year old was honestly surprised at the gesture, but he gratefully returned it.

"If you ever want to talk, I'm here, alright?" she informed him softly.

"Thanks M'gann. I appreciate it."

They had just pulled away and (in Robin's case, secretly) wiped away a few tears, when Conner came by the entrance of the gym. He stopped once he noticed two of his teammates sitting on the floor in the middle of the room. It also occurred to him, that normally he didn't see Robin at the cave at such an early hour on a random sunday morning. Something had to be up.

"Hey. What are you doing here?"

Despite the gruff way the words were spoken, Robin knew that the older boy was merely curious, and maybe a little jealous. M'gann, mistaking the question as referring to them being in the gym, proudly told him how Robin had taught her how to do handstands and a few other things, but that she wasn't so good at those yet.

"You did really good though. It takes a lot of practice to do the stuff I do. And considering this was your first time, you managed quite a lot."

Blushing lightly at the compliment, the martian stood up.

"I should make some cookies!" she then announced. Looking at the two boys, she asked, "Do you want to help?"

Conner shrugged, while Robin shook his head.

"I'm gonna do some more training. You two go bake. I will surely be up for some of your treats once I'm finished."

Agreeing, Conner and M'gann exited through the door and left down the hallway to get to the kitchen. Leaving Robin to his thoughts once more.

I called him 'dad'. He thought. Why did I call him 'dad'?

° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° °

I do not own Young Justice or any of the DC Universe characters.