Robin had entered the cave and saw Batman working at a terminal.

"Did you find him?" Batman asked, already knowing the answer.

"No. But I have it narrowed down to a three-block area. There's only so many hotels around there that would take in someone his age," Shilo said taking off his mask.

Batman looked at his new partner. "Get some rest. I should have some more leads by the time you wake up."

Shilo yawned. Rest sounded really good to him right now.

"Okay," he said sleepily, and began trudged up the stairs to the house.

Batman turned back to the terminal and continued working.

He got up and turned on the television. There were reports of the Riddler being captured earlier that night. The weather report said that a storm moving through the area might bring a couple inches of rain to the city by tomorrow night.

He finally drifted off to sleep around three o'clock in the morning. He slept restlessly.

Andrew had dreams of a giant cloud in space approaching the sun. A bomb that was created to stop the sun from being eaten by the cloud. And a young group of heroes arguing over who would take the bomb. He dreamed of an explosion.

He dreamed of a monument for him on an asteroid for dead heroes.

He dreamed of a future world.

"Did you find out anything?" Shilo asked as he walked down the stairs towards Bruce.

"Yes," Bruce said. He did not look up towards Shilo, but motioned him to come over to the computer.

"Apparently Doctor 30 is really a scientist that works with badly deformed children. There have been some investigations lately into some of his practices, but apparently the good doctor has been one step ahead of the authorities. He's always worked out of a legitimate practice, and kept his real work hidden somewhere in another building."

"Like old warehouses in run down areas of town," Shilo interjected.

"Exactly. I was able to track the buildings ownership records. I found that the building was owned up until about two months ago by a Doctor Amos Love. It was sold in a cash deal according to the Gotham records, to a Mr. Eduardo Nigmatic. Which just goes to show that the Riddler is getting more and more sloppy."

Bruce turned towards Shilo. "Dr. Love is also under investigation for dubious practices. He's a doctor from overseas that's been trying to get a practice set up in the Malibu California area for a while. He likes to experiment on people, and see what he can produce through artificial means."

"Okay," Shilo said, trying to take everything in.

"Neither of them has ever been officially charged with any criminal wrongdoing. They've both been very good at covering their tracks so far. There are several agencies that are keeping their eye on them though. Doc 30's also been tied to a Dr. Helga Jace who operates out of Markovia. She's developed a way to grant certain individuals powers based on their genetic makeup. She worked with Dr.'s Love and 30 for a short time, but severed all ties to them about five years ago, before she made her breakthrough. She's been under the protection of the Markovian Royal Family for several years now, and in return has supposedly granted powers to the King's children."

"So where do we start?" Shilo asked.

"Right here in Gotham," Bruce said. "Oracle was able to pinpoint another building owned by a subsidiary company that Dr. Love owns a large stake in."

Bruce got up and walked towards the stairs. "Did you eat already?" He asked Shilo.

"Yes."

"Good. Get ready. Find our young friend again, you have the area narrowed already. Once you find him, gain his trust and bring him to this address by 7 P.M."

"What are you going to do until then?"

"I'll be busy," Bruce said as he went up the stairs.

He was able to iron up himself, as well as his tank top and biker shorts. He couldn't do much about his hooded sweatshirt yet, but he had a few in reserve. Just in case.

He looked at himself in the mirror and shook his head.

"Thank God I'm at least in good shape," he laughed to himself.

Andrew had stayed in his hotel until later in the afternoon when he figured most people would be done with their lunch hour, and most children would be home taking naps.

Robin watched as Andrew came out of the hotel and turned right, heading towards Exchange Street. Right before Andrew went into Joe's Deli, Robin swung down to the alley next to the building and tried to get his attention. "Psst."

Andrew looked over into the alley and saw Robin standing there. "You're that kid from last night. What do you want?" he asked.

"To help you. And some food. I'm hungry too," Robin said as he held out his hand with a twenty dollar bill in it. "Get me a Turkey and Swiss on wheat please. Then meet me up on that rooftop."

Robin was pointing to a building a few blocks down.

Andrew shrugged. "Sure . . . why not?"

Andrew took the money into Joe's Deli and bought a couple subs, two sodas, a juice, and a couple waters. He wasn't sure what Robin wanted to drink, and he could take the stuff with him later if they didn't drink it all.

Robin was sitting against the edge on the far side in the shade of a nearby water tower.

"Over here," he called, waving to Andrew.

"Wasn't sure what you wanted to drink, so I got a little of everything," he said as he handed the bag of drinks over to Robin.

Robin looked in and pulled out the juice. "Thanks. I figured this was in the shade so it'd be cooler to eat, and nobody will bother us up here."

The two started eating and were silent for a while.

"Why do you want to help me?" Andrew finally said, breaking the silence that the two had sat in eating.

"It's what I do," Robin said as he extended his hand out to the youth sitting in front of him. "I'm Robin."

"I'm Andrew," he said, tentatively taking Robin's gloved hand. "But I've been calling myself Ferro. Cause I can turn into metal. Which you, and the Riddler, found out last night."

"Nice to meet you, Ferro."

"Have you ever heard of the Broadway star Nancy Nolan?" Ferro asked.

Robin thought about it for a couple seconds. "The name sounds familiar."

Shilo thought about it for another second, and suddenly realized where he had seen that name before. She had been one of the presenters at the Student of the Year Award Ceremony that he had been at. The award ceremony that took the life of his mother, and led him to become Batman's partner. Nancy Nolan had been one of the unfortunate bystanders to be cut down by the Aerie.*

*(see Batman #25 for full details of the Aerie attack.)

"Yeah," Shilo said in a soft voice, "I've heard of her."

Andrew looked at him. "She was my mother."

It was getting later, and he would have to meet the boys soon.

One more thing to take care of, and then he would leave to meet them.

"I heard about what happened to her at that Award Ceremony. I wish I could have seen her before she died.

"See. Nancy Nolan is . . . was my mom. I'm a twin. My brother Douglas and I were born under a shroud of secrecy. There were complications from the start, and she didn't want anyone to know that she was pregnant at the time, so she took a year off of Broadway. I have no idea who our dad is.

"We were born pretty badly disfigured. So my mom gave us to a guy that called himself Doctor 30. He told her that he could help us, and that we would be good as new with some operations and a few years of rehabilitation. The thing was, he did operate on us and straighten us out a little . . . but he was more interested in the fact that we had a genetic imbalance that allowed us to turn to living metal."

Andrew stood up and concentrated. In an instant he was slightly bigger, and solid metal.

"I look pretty normal where you can see me. But under my hood is pretty messed up. My skull is a bit deformed, and I look like I have skeleton eye sockets. So, I keep a hood on, and wear dark glasses all of the time. So I don't scare people."

He switched his body to normal and sat down again.

"Anyway . . . My mom eventually resumed her career, and I guess she just kinda forgot about us. I eventually found a way out of Doctor 30's lab. Actually, it was more of a prison. That's what I call it anyway . . . he called it his recovery room. I tried to contact my mom, and she denied even knowing who I was, and totally denied ever having children.

"I lived on the streets in Northern Jersey for a while. Met some odd people, and found out a few months ago that Doc 30 had a "clinic" in Pittsburgh. I went there looking for my brother, but he had already moved out and it was empty. I did find a duffle bag with some money in it there, and an address here in Gotham, so that's why you saw me snooping around that warehouse.

"I've gotta find Doug soon. I have this weird feeling that he's in really big trouble."

Robin shook his head. He stood and looked at the sky. It was time to get moving to meet Batman.

"I've got some good news for you Ferro," Robin said. "Batman found another safehouse where the Doc might be hold up. We're not sure if Doug is there, but it might provide some leads."

"Where is it?" Ferro said bouncing to his feet.

"Follow me."

Ferro suddenly stopped. "Wait a minute. I have an idea."

He jumped off the building, changed into metal, and landed with a load thud. Robin followed, but landed with barely a noise.

"What are we doing?" Robin asked. "We have to be somewhere real soon."

"I have a bike in the parking lot on the corner. C'mon."

They ran to where Andrew had parked his bike the day before. Andrew unlocked the saddle bag and threw Robin the helmet.

"Wear this, it's an extra one," he said as he pulled his out of the other saddle bag. "The guy who sold me the bike gave me both of them."

Andrew stepped into the shadows and put his helmet on. Robin caught a brief glimpse of the back of his head. Even with the bandana that he wore over it, Shilo could see that it was slightly deformed. Not nearly as bad as Andrew apparently thought it was, but it was deformed.

They hopped on the bike, Andrew gave it some gas, and they were off.