Hey guys! Here's an update. Hope you enjoy.

Tim really concentrated the next day. He and Sari had gone down to the Cave to use the super computer while the others were distracted with whatever upstairs. Both Bruce and Dick were out and Alfred was doing who knew what. The only one he really trusted in the cave was Sari; she wasn’t as insane.

Tim pulled up the Book on the screen and together they went through it, page by page. It wasn’t long as it was actually pretty vague on some points and usually not in full sentences. When they’d finished the one hundred page nightmare, Sari let out a low whistle.

“Damn,” she said. “I’d forgotten about some of this stuff. We were terrible!”

“Yeah,” Tim said. “We were.”

“You okay Tim?” she asked noting his quiet demeanor.

“I was just thinking,” he said. “You know how Miki just went silent one day?”

“Um, kinda hard not to know,” she said while pinning him with a weird look.

“Well, did you ever know why? Cause I never got a straight answer.”

“No not really,” she said thoughtfully. “Why? You think it could have something to do with ‘A’?”

“Maybe,” he replied. “It could have nothing to do with it but I got the explanation from Toby.”

“He and Miki were really close,” Sari continued. “Toby might have lied about the whole mental health thing that runs through the family to cover up the real reason he went silent. What could be that bad?”

“Something Toby knew about,” Tim said. “Either about Miki or about the both of them. We know Toby has a tendency to lie to everyone and cover things up to save his own ass.”

“Ali?”

“I don’t know if he had a hand in her disappearance or not,” Tim said. “But it’s possible. Remember how Toby and Miki left right after she did?”

“We all left Tim,” Sari pointed out.

“They left first,” he argued. Sari just shook her head at him.

“It’s not good enough,” she said. “And you can’t confront Toby or Miki until you have more than a theory. If you’re right you don’t want to tip them off.” Tim had to agree. He hated this, how this case was causing him to make more mistakes than he usually would. How he didn’t want to dig into the past so he more or less left it alone until he had to cover his own ass from the others.

He didn’t like lying to Bruce and Dick but he couldn’t guarantee how they would react to his past. There were things they didn’t know and things he didn’t want to tell them. He didn’t want to talk about Ali or the book or the things that were left out of the book. Because things were left out. There had been and still were secrets within secrets in this group. Everyone was lying to each other about something and they were all lying to the outside world about everything else. Nothing was concrete with any of them.

It was frustrating and made his job that much harder. He was almost positive that to find ‘A’ he had to figure out what had happened to Ali. Hell, it was possible that it was Ali doing all this. He was worried and he didn’t think he‘d make his two week deadline. This wasn’t good.

“What now?” Sari asked breaking into his thoughts.

“We’ll just have to play the game,” he said and she smirked. This was, after all, her favorite pastime.

The two walked up the stairs to the Manor and into the hallway to find Dick leaning against the doorway to the living room the teenagers had taken over, arms crossed and a frown firmly in place. Tim heard screaming from Toby and Traci. The two of them were fighting and whatever it was about had Dick preferring to listen rather than stop it. Tim glanced at Sari and then the two joined the man at the doorway.

Miki was sitting on the couch face frozen in its usual blankness while Toby and Traci were on their feet shouting at each other.

“Can’t believe you would blame this entire thing on me!” he shouted.

“You were the one who started it!” she screamed at him.

“And you continued it! You let her walk out the door!”

“So did you!” They paused after that not entirely sure how to continue the fight and Miki took the silence as an opportunity to leave. Sari followed him. Toby and Traci glanced at the door finally realizing they had an audience.

“What happened that night?” Dick asked suddenly his face rather cold. When the two didn’t answer he turned towards Tim, who did.

“Toby and Traci got into it with Ali,” he said. “She left in a hurry and then everyone else left for home. The next day her mom called everyone saying she never came home.” Dick nodded and made a gesture for Tim to follow him. He led the teen to Bruce’s study, the closest room and shut the door.

“What else happened that night?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Tim said. Dick was searching for answers just as he was but was going for a different type.

“Don’t lie to me Tim,” he growled.

“I’m not,” he said defensively. “That’s what happened.”

“What were they fighting about?” he asked.

“I’m not sure. Sari and I walked in halfway through,” he said. “Miki, Toby, Tracy, and Ali are the only ones who know.”

“How’s your investigation going?” he asked switching gears. Tim gave a one shoulder shrug.

“All right,” he said.

“Bruce told me you haven’t really been working on it,” Dick told him and Tim suddenly found the floor real interesting. “Said he gave you a two week deadline before he stepped in and took over. Why aren’t you focusing Tim? It’s not like you to blow off a case.” Tim shrugged again.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“Seems like you don’t know a lot of things Timmy.” His head snapped up at that. He mustered a glare before ignoring it and looking away again.

“It’s just hard,” he said. “To drag it all up again.”

“Drag what up again?” Dick asked his voice going a bit softer. Tim paused to regain his senses. Dick was always pretty good at getting him to talk about what was going on with him. He knew how to play with younger boy’s feelings and pride to get him to spill, always with good intentions though.

“Just everything,” he said.

“Everything with your old friends?” Tim nodded.

“We weren’t the best of people.”

“Doesn’t matter what you were then Timmy,” Dick said laying a hand on the younger boy’s shoulder. “It only matters what you are now.”

“But the past does matter, Dick,” he argued.

“Maybe,” Dick said. “But you’ve put the past behind you once. And trust me, it’s a bit easier the second time.” Tim nodded, not entirely sure how to respond to that advice.

Dick and Bruce were searching for answers about what he was hiding. He was searching for the person blackmailing them and who was responsible for Ali’s disappearance. Hell, even the kids in the Manor screaming at each other and hiding in closets were searching for something. They were all searching for something.

And Tim knew why too. He wasn’t going to lie to himself. If Ali hadn’t disappeared he probably wouldn’t be Robin because there wouldn’t have been a reason for them to fall apart. Sure the relationships would have been strained, they probably wouldn’t trust each other at all but they would still be together. Would still be owning the school and tearing other people done. Would still be little monsters. Batman would still be nothing more than a hobby.

All of them together were a disaster waiting to happen because they all brought out the worst in each other. They felt invincible when they were together, even now to some extent. Sari and Traci probably wouldn’t have been that awful to Wonder Girl if he hadn’t been there. They knew they could get away with it while they attached themselves to him because he wouldn’t react. He was too used to it, accepting of it even.

The teens were all searching for something. Because they all had one very common thing between them. Guilt. They all held secrets from each other and with each other. They had all lied and destroyed other people. They’d even driven a girl to suicide once. They were all guilty. And they had all just let her leave that night. No one had gone after Ali after she’d stormed out. One had bothered to try to set things right. They’d just let her leave.