Chapter 8

Followed

Grayson Apartment

Richard "Dick" Grayson formerly Nightwing and Robin, was asleep, shirtless in his bed, alone. It was 1:00 am and he had just gone to sleep at 12:00 am. The skies were darker than usual and Grayson couldn't sleep after all the deaths that happened that day, it was June 11, 2045, seven days before Father's Day.

Dick Grayson was barely asleep when he heard someone climb through a back window to his house. Grayson jumped out of his bed and grabbed his two electrical escrima sticks, that were on a brown dresser next to his bed.

After, Dick Grayson walked out the door and looked around for someone or something that broke into his house. He kicked down doors that led to bathrooms and closets and found nothing.

"Where are you?" Grayson questioned, then he heard a purr behind him and saw it was only a stray cat.

Grayson got some tuna out of his cabinets and gave it to the cat in a bowl, the cat looked starved. After the cat finished, Grayson gave the cat a giant fish he had bought at the supermarket two days ago. Then Grayson picked up the cat and let it go.

Right after Grayson let go of the cat, Dick was pinned against the wall by someone he couldn't see.

"You fell for the damn animal trick Dickie, one of the oldest freaking tricks in the book! Your getting damn old I must say." The man who pinned him against the wall said.

Grayson got out of the lock and threw the man through the window and onto the railings.

Grayson saw it was the Red Hood, "Joker." Grayson said.

"So old Brucie told you somethin' bout me that he had just found out." The Joker stated. "I thought you and him don't talk anymore."

"We don't. He only warned me about you. Bruce or I are going to take you down Joker, sooner or later." Grayson stated, he swung a punch at Joker but Joker grabbed Dick's arm and threw Dick across the counter that was connected to a wall.

"More like never Wingboy." The Joker said.

Grayson got up and grabbed an eight inch knife from his wooden knife rack and threw it at Joker who caught it.

Joker dropped the knife and charged at Grayson. Joker tackled Grayson and pointed a gun at his face. Joker moved the gun over near Grayson's ear but not pointing at Grayson's ear and shot. Grayson cupped his ear in pain, his ear was bleeding.

"Why are you here clown? Why'd you come back?" Grayson said in pain. Joker removed the metal eyepatch from Grayson's eye and saw a hole where Grayson's eye used to be.

"Hey, remember that day? The day you lost your eye?" Joker asked. "Or do you just remember being pulled out of ACE Chemicals by Batman, leaving good ol' James Gordon's body behind?"

Grayson pushed Joker off of his body and tried to get the red helmet off of Joker's face. After he decided he couldn't, Grayson started pounding on the helmet, trying to crack it. "We left your sick body behind too clown."

Grayson finally cracked the helmet just a little, after four more punched the helmet start to fall to pieces. Grayson couldn't see the Joker's face yet though, he kept punching until he broke the mask completely. He saw a ski mask covering Joker's face and removed it to find a computerized head that wasn't even the Joker's.

Grayson was surprised, "That's new." Finally, Joker came out of the shadows and jumped on Grayson.

"Oh Dick, you keep on getting stupider and stupider as you get older. But I'm not surprised, that trick may have fooled ol' Brucie, and he just gets smarter and wiser as he grows older." Joker had one foot on Dick's chest.

"Let me see your damn face, let me see how bad it looks, how bad it looks before I make it a lot damn worse." Dick said. They were near the broken window so Dick was able stab a piece of small glass into Joker's leg that was on his chest, causing him to fall off.

Grayson started pummeling Joker's real mask, "I swear, if this is another damn robot..."

"Oh, let me save you the trouble, Dickie." Joker said before Grayson was able to crack Joker's mask.

"Oh... God..." Grayson said shocked.

"Nope, not God, me."