A little five chapter or less story set after the 'Harley Quinn's Revenge' DLC of Batman: Arkham City. I decided to have this side piece after finishing the game and the DLC as a breath of fresh air from writing for OC's in my other B-Man Story, 'In The Grey'. I'm a Harley Quinn and Batman fan and this is just my 'What if' Alternate ending to the HQR DLC.

Enjoy Harley x Bruce Shippers :) R&R F&F

With Love ~Dresner

Batman stared into the burning remains of the Steel mill as it burned in the fiery explosion of the Joker's final joke, The Harlequin's revenge. The distraught, angry, and unstable Harley Quinn and her fit of mournful angst fueled by her insanity and her inability to even function with out the Joker was his final chest piece in his plans. Though it was not the Joker's mind and planning that made the siege, maybe in the Joker's final hours on earth he knew Harley would lose her mind and try to kill the Batman and herself.

After all, going to hell would be boring without his minx and Batsy to keep him company as he rotted in hell for his crimes. They were, for all intense purposes, his only 'Friends'. Sure their were Two-Face, penguin, and the others who he worked with or against in his years. But they did not know him like the Batman or Harley knew him.

The great flames spread toward near by living quarters like an over cook pot of rice, over flowing from the main mill and douching near by buildings with fire. The statues and monuments to the Joker stood outside melted together into a complex entanglement of deformed limbs and soul cracking smiles, their misshapen features stood as a testimony to the formlessness of modern art. Windows exploded from the intense heat and the crashing of joker based figures against the ground, sending shock waves across the mill, showering both the Dark Knight and the mourning Harley Quinn in melting glass.

"You should have left me to die!" The Harlequin shouted in pain as she sobbed on the snow and glass covered ground. "Then I could have been with- With.. MISTA J!" She yelled, throwing her fists on the ground with tears wiping away the rest of her black eye shadow and white face make up.

Batman turned to scold her, but paused momentarily and walked toward her throwing his cape around her to shield her from the snow and glass that rained from the sky. "Your not the only one to lose someone you cared for." He replied in his hard and stoic voice with a hint of compassion. Harley looked up with hate, fear, sadness, and in some ways compassion at the man who, in her twisted mind, killed her twisted beloved. His voice frighten her since he never spoke to her with any hint of compassion before. Memories of being with Mista J began to fill her destroyed mind with both remorse and terror as he would use this voice before planting her on the ground with a backhand or a sucker punch.

"Serves you right B-man!" Harley bit back, trying to fight the awkwardness of the situation. "Serves... You... Right." She spat as she broke into tears once more.

But the Batman didn't shrug off and picked her up off the ground until they were looking face to face. "I remember when I first saw you in Blackgate. I remember when you weren't this lost girl pandering to a mad man for approval. I remember when I saved you from him and the cold reception you gave me." Batman said in a calm and warmer tone than Harley could have ever expected out of the Dark Knight. "I knew somewhere in my mind that he had already dug into you and planted a seed that would soon grow into his Harley Quinn. It was inevitable, Harleen. But I should have stopped it then... But even after Blackgate, After the Asylum, and even now I should have saved you from him. Now I only wish I could have saved him from himself, and maybe then I could have saved you from yourself..."

His voice became tighter, as if he was trying to hold back something deep with in himself. He had to, The Batman never showed anything besides contempt for his enemies. Harley could sense it on his breath, in his words, that he was just as broke as she was about all that had transpired in the last few weeks following Arkham city and the death of the Joker.

"Ba.. bats.. Batsy?" Harley manages to spit out. "Are you- You? Sad about Mista J goin away?" She asks in a child like manor, as if she still believed in 'The clouds taking away her loved ones'.

Batman said nothing, only looking to the ground and away from Harley in shame.

But Harley knew that below his stone like appearance of Batman, Mista J was right about him. Batman cared for the Joker as some kind of twisted friend or partner in the professional sense. She knew the score: Without the Batman, their was no Joker. And maybe it is the same, but backwards. But what of herself? Without the Joker, Would their be no Harley Quinn?

Harley takes the knife out of her belt and throws it far away from her and Batman before rapping herself around him in a mournful embrace.

Maybe the Batman and the Jester understood each other after all...

The two soon disappeared into the darkness together, hand in hand, leaving Commissioner Gordon and the newly arrived Robin in a state of confusion.

"Is he alright?" Gordon asks as he and Robin watch them walk away from the destruction and turmoil of Arkham City.

"Yeah..." Robin remarked as GCPD collected their freed comrades from Harley's siege. "He's alright."