A/N: As an apology for all the late updates with Straw Bullets, here is a little one shot to tide you over. I promise I will try to update the other story as soon as possible. Life has just gotten in the way lately.
Disclaimer: I do not own Batman, only the idea for this little one shot.
The Scarecrow Riddle
By Matthew Zypher
It had started with the rain; the rain, the thunder, and the lightening that went with it. The roars caused by the hot air battling with the cold had awoken many inhabitants of the Gotham Narrows that night, Edward Nigma – now a detective supposedly working for the good guys – included. He had always liked the rain, it hid the tears of frustration caused by an abusive and neglecting father, it washed away the blood drawn by the same father's rage, and it had given him a safe haven outside of books and facts. The rain had been his protector and his comforter when he couldn't disappear into his books, and to sleep after it had woken him was impossible.
Memories of past times drifted forward from the locked area of his mind, memories of darker times in life that he had tried, and failed, to forget for years. Even the mere flashes of them he saw now were enough to make his body rigid with fear and hatred for the man who had tried to break the only thing he had ever truly owned – his mind. With a frustrated sigh he threw his sheets off and swung his legs over the edge of the bed, perhaps a walk would clear his mind.
It didn't take long for the young genius to dress in dark green pants and a matching rain coat, after all he was still very much able to do the things necessary to escape Arkham should he ever end up there again, and soon he found himself standing at the front door of his apartment complex. His green eyes stared out across the endless black plain of the parking lot – mostly abandoned due to a lack of tenants – and watched the rain spill from the sky and spatter against the cracked surface of the pavement. It was raining harder than it had in months, and in Gotham it always rained as if the ocean had been flipped upside down over your head.
With one last glance towards the hallway behind him, the red haired man pulled the hood of his fitted jacket up and over his head and pushed the door open. He didn't know where he was going to go, he never did at times like this, all he knew was that he needed to go somewhere, do something that wouldn't make him think of the past. The something that happened to work the best was walking aimlessly until he was to tired to think and then returning home to fall into an exhausted, dreamless sleep. Well, dreamless in the sense that he didn't remember the dreams, it was impossible not to dream.
Mere minutes later, or what felt like minutes to the distracted man, Edward Nigma found himself standing in an alley way under a roof no more than three feet wide. He wasn't there to get out of the rain though, no he wanted to feel the rain; he was there to examine the man, the all too familiar man, lying on the ground. The man's name was Jonathan Crane, a patient, and former administrator, of Arkham Asylum; also known as "The Scarecrow."
Crane had never been completely sane, no one who ran around intoxicating a city with fear toxin via water supply could be, but any true sanity he had held onto had been destroyed when Batman had attacked him with his own chemical. Every single victim in the narrows had received the antidote within the limited time it could be administered after exposure to the toxin except for one; Jonathan Crane had been left to rot in his cell at Arkham without the sanity saving solution. He now paid for it dearly; any extended amount of time without anti-psychotics left him a hallucinating, childish wreck.
This was the state that Nigma had found him in, huddled in the back of this alley under what appeared to be one of his old suit jackets – now even larger on him than it had originally been – sobbing about crows tearing his skin to shreds. Edward wasn't one for Psychology, but even he knew that trying to make the man remember him in this state wouldn't be worth the effort he would waist, leaving the option of comfort by recognition out of the question. This simply left to option of comfort by contact, if that didn't screw the man over further.
He wasn't sure why he was considering helping the man who, by law, he should be carting off to Arkham; but it felt right. It didn't matter that he was doing it for himself, too, no. If anyone asked he had found the Arkham escapee and was waiting out the rain to bring him back. With that thought in mind he crouched in front of the man and reached out a hand to tilt the man's chin up.
"Jonathan," he spoke softly, wanting the man's attention but not wanting to cause him more fear. "You are safe Jonathan, the crows won't get you while I'm here."
He didn't say that his memories wouldn't get him as long as Jonathan was there to keep his mind focused.
The dark haired man gave no sign of showing that he believed a word of what Edward had said, but he fell silent for a moment and the red headed Prince of Puzzles took the opportunity to seat himself next to the man on the damp pavement. Striking blue eyes clouded with fear snapped up and locked on vivid green ones and for a fleeting second there was a look of lucidness there, followed by a flash of recognition, but then it was gone and Jonathan started his endless mumbling about the crows once more.
With a hefty sigh and an uncertain feeling in the pit of his stomach, Edward wrapped his arms around the overly thin doctor and pulled him closer. The mumbling didn't stop, but the trembling lessoned. The memories weren't gone, but the rain and the warmth of another body made them seem much less important than they had been.
A/N: I hope you enjoyed! As always, reviews are loved!