Time had slowed, hours turning into days. Then, just as quickly, after countless hospital machines had beeped in his ears and nurses had questioned him, time had quickened its pace once more. Every moment that had led up to then had all been for this one single moment.

"She has your nose," a nurse commented.

Edward looked down. Yes, he supposed that she did, though just barely. For the most part it was small, just like everything else about her. Even her eyes, a bright blue shade, were small and closed. Only after a few years would their resemblance really start to show.

Less than two pounds, barely heavier than some of his hardcover. She was so small, little in every possible way, her skin a bright red shade and her small hands locked together.

"We need her back now," another nurse said.

Edward nodded. He held her for a moment longer, if only to watch her. She moved slowly, not enough to make him think that there was something wrong with her, but enough to prove the doctor's words.

"Those machines that she'll be hooked up to," he said. "Exactly how long will she be hooked up to them?"

"We can't be sure," a blond nurse replied. She smiled at the child and took her from his arms. "Let's just hope that she doesn't need to be on them very long."

Edward looked back down to the small bundle in her arms, to the little girl wrapped in blankets. It was a miracle that she wasn't hooked up to the machines already, not with the way that the doctors and nurses had made such a fuss over her.

Answers, that was all he ever wanted. Why couldn't he get any then?

"She'll be okay, won't she?" he asked.

"It's nothing too serious so long as she's cared for. You know how it is; you always have to be careful."

Edward nodded.

The nurses left the room. Edward looked towards the bed. Jillian was still passed out, whether due to pure exhaustion or the medicine that she was hooked up to. She looked so different hooked up, more like an idea of a person than an actual one. Her hair was just too messy, her skin too pale, and her body too limp. If she saw a picture of herself she surely wouldn't recognize herself. That wasn't the look of who she wanted to be.

That was the look of an anybody.

Edward looked away from her. There was no point in worrying; they had worked out the arrangements long before she had ever arrived at the hospital nearly a day before. Once she recovered, she would be out the door. Perhaps Edward would be lucky as well; maybe he would get to go home soon rather than spending his next few days with his back glued to the hospital's hard plastic chair.

A nurse, a different one than the two before, came in holding a clipboard. She had pale skin and neat, wrinkle free clothing. Her black hair was pulled back into a tight ponytail, and her hands were held around a clipboard.

"Mister Nygma?"

Edward nodded. "Is something the matter?"

"No," she replied. "We just need to work out a few more details. It's legal matters, but nothing serious."

He nodded once more. "What do you need?"

"Information," she said. "About you and your daughter."

"What do you mean? I've already filled out countless forms."

"Well, for one thing we need the child's name. Everyone keeps trying to put down a first name and yet all we have is Nygma."

"Oh," he replied.

"Perhaps it's just a mistake, some problem with the system. Children have names after all." She smiled, her eyes twinkling. "They say that a name is the first step in determining what kind of a person a child will grow up to be."

Edward raised an eyebrow. "They do?" He had certainly never heard it before.

"Oh yes," she said, clicking the end of her pen. "What do you think that your daughter will be like?"

"I'm not sure yet." Hopefully she would lose the red tint to her skin and grow a few inches.

"Well then," the nurse replied, "who do you think that she'll be like?"

Edward absently looked to the hospital bed, his lap, and then back up at the nurse. "Good question."

In the five days that Edward Nygma had been at Arkham Asylum, he had memorized every inch of his holding cell. From the cracks in the ceiling to the smudges on the bulletproof glass, keeping him locked inside of a transparent cage like an animal at a zoo.

Maybe that was how the guards felt whenever they walked past. Edward just another one of the countless prisoners, waiting for a reformation that he doubted would ever come. Perhaps the guards sneered, safe from being trapped inside the confining walls.

He didn't need five days to memorize what was around him. It had taken him less than a day when he had first arrived and since then had noticed small differences - the slight wrinkling of his cot's mattress whenever he slept on it, the slight smudges in the otherwise shiny floor whenever he walked on it, the little marks that he had scratched into the wall. The room changed around him, because of him; he supposed that he should get used to the place. Though he had managed to get himself a light sentence, he still had to get good behavior if he wanted out anytime soon.

At least if he wanted to get out legally.

Already, he could notice flaws in the system, cracks that the guards couldn't notice - all he needed to do was exploit those and he would be out in no time.

Edward picked up a small crossword puzzle book, something that he had picked up earlier. It had been given to him by one of his doctors as a way to help pass the time; everyone got something, though many didn't use it like Edward did.

The Joker has probably already escaped by now, Edward thought. His pencil hung just above a row of boxes about a seven letter flightless bird.

Ostrich, he thought. Too easy.

He supposed he could escape within hours if he tried hard enough. It wasn't as if there was anyone there that could outsmart him, at least anyone that wasn't also locked away in a cell. Arkham was a bore anyway; why hadn't the place been torn down yet?

It's not as if it can actually hold me, he thought.

A six letter word that describes feeling of homeliness.

Quaint, he thought.

That hardly described Arkham.

There was a stirring outside of his cell, an echoing sound of footsteps. Edward looked up, his pencil still hovering over the book below him.

A few guards walked down the halls followed by a group of white clad nurses pushing a rolling cart.

So that's what they were talking about during recreation, Edward thought.

He had expected the mail cart to be smaller and a bit less obvious. Making its weekly rounds, the mail cart was in fact rather large, its wheels squeaking and the faded medal partially rusted. It was covered in envelopes that surprisingly hadn't all flown off yet.

The cart whizzed past him, never stopping.

Edward's frown deepened. Quickly, he grabbed his book up again.

Jonathan had warned him about Arkham; from horror stories fit to be told only by the self proclaimed master of fear, to warnings that it would be incredibly boring ("a waste of time," Jonathan had commented, "and the people running it know it"), he hadn't sugar coated anything. Still, being in it was different from what he had heard.

Quaint, no, but perhaps, if he was careful-

He shook his head. A few days inside would at least make it look like he was trying. If he ever did escape and then get thrown back in, a past early escape would hardly please the judge.

Be patient, he thought. After all, don't good things come to those who wait?

It was an unusually quiet night. Emily was silent for the longest time, never awakening with her usual cry. For once, Edward's muscles weren't cramped from running to the kitchen to get Emily's bottles and then back to her room. There were no diapers to clean, nor any rocking to be done.

The only way it could have been better were if Edward were actually able to get some sleep.

He sighed. As heavy as his eyes were, sleep had evaded him for hours. Now, deep into the night, it still seemed as if he wouldn't be getting any real shut eye anytime soon.

Just stay focused, he reminded himself, looking back down to the book that he was reading.

Hours of trying to sleep but failing had forced him awake. There were still things to be done.

Perhaps, he thought after finishing another chapter of the mystery novel that he was reading (though, judging at least by how easy it was to figure out which character had stolen the cash it could hardly be called a mystery) and placing in a bookmark, I should go check on her. Maybe something was wrong and he didn't realize it.

Standing up, he stretched out his arms and legs and yawned. Perhaps if he stood up a bit longer then he would finally tire himself out enough to allow himself to go to sleep again.

He took slow, careful steps down the hall until reaching the door at the far right end of the hall. His apartment was small, only having two bedrooms, enough for the both of them. Slowly, he pushed the door in and used the dim light from the hall to illuminate the room. Each step was careful and slow; though the floor was carpeted, some strange part of him, that part that worried (no matter how irrational the fear), made him walk carefully, lest a sound break through the thick silence.

Emily lay asleep beneath a pile of blankets, clutching at a teddy bear. In six months, she had gained a good deal of weight, as if to make up for how small she had been when she had first arrived in the world. Her skin had lost its red touch and a bits of red hair had started to pop up on her head, not much but enough that it was instantly noticeable.

She stirred slightly in her sleep, but not enough to indicate that anything was wrong. How long he stood and stared down at her, he couldn't be sure.

It was hard to believe that he had once been like that, so small and so vulnerable. Had he been anything like Emily, then he would have been picking his house apart and trying to touch every object in his eyesight and eating second helpings of baby food.

His hands leaned forward, almost involuntarily, and hovered just inches above her head. It would have been so simple, moving one red, curly lock from her forehead, but enough that the small child would have awoken. Noise bothered her and she was careful about what she touched; once she touched something new, she quickly dropped it if she didn't like how it felt.

There was no point in waking the only other person in the house.

Edward took one last look at her and then turned and walked out of the room, slowly shutting the door behind him. He yawned again and slowly walked towards his bedroom; if he was ever going to sleep that night, then it was likely right around then.

"Mr. Nygma," Dr. Martin said. She was a tall woman, with ebony brown skin and dark eyes which sat behind thick framed glasses. Her office was small and filled with books of varying lengths and a wide amount of subjects - everything from the typical psychologist handbooks to what looked to be romance and science fiction novels. She held her hand out. "I have heard quite a bit about you."

Edward took her hand and gave it a firm shake. "Yes, I suppose that you would."

She lowered her eyebrows but made no comment, merely gestured towards the door. "Come inside," she said. "We have a bit to discuss, along with some items that I believe belong to you."

Edward tightened his fists. He had been informed earlier that some of his items, pictures, a few books, and other small items had been kept with the police and he could only get them back under the approval of an Arkham supervisor's permission.

Good, he thought.

"Might I see some of the items now?" Edward asked. "I do not mean to take them from you, but I wish to see a few things."

"I suppose," she responded. She opened her desk. "What might you be wanting to see?"

"Oh, just some pictures," he said.

She nodded before pulling them from her desk and handing them over. "Your daughter, I presume."

Edward nodded.

"I've read quite a bit about her."

Edward stiffened. "How?"

"I phrased that incorrectly," she said, holding her hands up. "I apologize. She was just mentioned quite a few times near the end of your file. It seems that there was a controversy a few years back."

He chuckled. "Yes, doctor, I suppose that you could call it that."

"What do you mean?"

He liked this doctor. Not only had she given him his photos without question, she also didn't bother him with unnecessary questions. No asking about his crime or the motives behind it, no unnecessary practices passed down from founding psychologists long ago dead.

"It's actually quite a story, which happened just after my daughter was born. Had I had it my way, things would have been different."

She raised an eyebrow. "How exactly would you have changed things?"

"I own it," he began, waving his hand in the air, "but other people use it far more than I do."

She smirked. "I was told you were quite fond of riddles."

"Surely the name would have tipped you off."

She paused for a moment. "The answer?"

"You can't figure it out?"

"I could wait, but that would take away time from you getting your items."

"Your name." The words were out of his mouth almost as soon as she had finished speaking.

"Ah, I get it now."

"Had I had it my way," Edward said, taking in a breath and then letting it back out, "then Emily never would have had a name at all."

"But why?" Though her eyes locked on him, she lacked the hard look that Jillian had given him a few years prior. Even then, tired and exasperated in the hospital, she had managed to give him a look that made his bones quiver.

"I once heard a nurse say that a name helps to determine who a person is." He paused. "I'm E. Nygma, as is my daughter. Had things been different, then she would at most have had the last name of Nygma and nothing more, and even less if the last name had never been brought up. She wouldn't have been a nobody, but she wouldn't have had a name either. I suppose you could say that to others, at least to those who didn't know her such as myself, she would be a mystery."

"Interesting. But if you're so sure that giving her a name would partially determine who she was, wouldn't have not giving her one had done the same? You said it yourself that she would have been a mystery."

"I suppose that you are correct." He looked down to the photos, the ones that he kept with him at all times. Most depicted Emily still as a baby, though a few were more current. "I suppose that there's no way to raise a child and not leave some sort of stamp of yourself on them, especially in my case as a single parent. After all, fathers are what make a child who they are in the future." He paused. "I suppose that I just tried to do my best for her with what little I could do. Back then, it had seemed perfectly logical."

"Do you still believe that now?" Dr. Martin folded her hands on top of her desk. She lacked the judgment most had; if she was thinking harshly of him, her face hid it perfectly.

"Yes." He shrugged. "What's done is done I suppose. She's still E. Nygma, and though Emily is a common name, it is rather pretty. Did you know that it actually means 'to strive'? I would hardly call that a bad name for a girl."

"I never knew that." Dr. Martin smiled. "That is a wonderful name."

"Perhaps it will affect her," Edward commented. "Or maybe it already has."

Emily hugged the stuffed bear tighter to her chest. Across from her, Angela sat on her bed, waving a plastic doll around in the air as if it were a toy plane. Whatever game she was playing, it was obvious that she was not about to let Emily in on the details.

She looked back down to her bear. It was one of her oldest toys, something that she had owned since she was a baby, and the wear and tear showed. Stitches were coming loose, and patches that had to be repaired before would need a bit of extra work.

Absently, her eyes flashed up from her toy and back to the other girl across the room. She was still busy with whatever game she was playing, her eyes wide and arm moving quickly as she moved the doll throughout the air.

She's not my sister, Emily thought. The thought came out of nowhere, the words simply roaring through her mind.

It was true, wasn't it? Sisters weren't supposed to ignore you.

Emily placed her bear down and stood up from her bed. She walked over to her small nightstand and grabbed the worn book from where she had last left it - The Puzzler's Problem: Riddles, Enigmas, and Other Peculiar Problems. The book, though hardcover, was worn. The pages were yellow and some folded or slightly torn (nothing that tape couldn't fix). The spine had been cracked for as long as she could remember. Long before she had ever laid a finger on it, her father had gone through every page.

She sat back down on her bed and began to flip through it. Some of the questions she barely had to look at before solving the answer, ones that she had figured out long before, while others took time.

Though there is two of me I am worth only one. What am I?

Emily bit her lip. It wasn't that she didn't know how to answer it; she had a few ideas, but which could be the correct one?

She could always look at the answer in the back of course. It was the only part of the book that she had not looked through yet.

But you can't do that, she reminded herself. You have to figure it out yourself.

A knock came at the door, making Emily nearly drop her book. Angela wasn't as lucky and dropped her doll with a yelp. Emily had to hold back a laugh.

"Girls," came the voice from outside the hall.

"Yes, Ji-" Emily began before stopping herself. "Yes?"

"Dinner will be ready in five minutes. You two get washed up while I get Jasper out of his crib."

"Okay!" Angela called. She jumped off of her bed and ran towards the door. Within moments, she was outside and Emily could hear her the steady pounding of her feet, mixed with the creaking of wood, as she ran down the hallway.

Emily looked back down to her book, the question daunting on her. It was as if the very paper was looking at her, questioning her, trying to pry the answer from her brain.

"Emily!" Angela called. "Mommy says you have to wash your hands too!"

With a sigh, Emily closed her book.

The coin had to have landed on tails judging by the way that Harvey had started raving in the cell across from Edward's own. Edward could see him, a blur of black and white as he attacked at the meager belongings in his cell.

Looks like good behavior won't be getting him out any time soon, Edward thought. If Edward were to act even the tiniest bit like the man opposite him then his plans for early parole would slip through his finger like water or grains of sand.

Whatever Harvey saw in that coin, Edward had yet to understand. There was an answer, of course (wasn't there always an answer?), but until he found it then that would just be another riddle for him to try and solve, another way to pass the time in otherwise endless days.

He had heard about Harvey, of course, even voted for him a few years back. Back then, he had been on the news for things other than robberies and leading gangs.

Edward had heard about nearly everyone in his ward. This was the famous ward, the one that most every single one of Batman's foes was on. Perhaps they were segregated for special means, something to stir up the gossip around Arkham. Maybe it was part of Batman's doing - one single fight with him and Edward was stuck where all the rest of the rogues went.

But that didn't make sense, at least not from Batman's standing point. No, the bat was smarter than that. No, it had to have been Arkham which did that, Arkham which may as well have had no brain; Arkham merely did as it pleased.

In a way, it was not nearly as bad as Jonathan had originally described, though it might have simply been the newly decorated walls of Edward's cell making him think that. He looked over to some of the pictures and smiled.

It would be a few days before he would be allowed his phone call, but until then his photos would hold him over.