Title: She Belongs to Him
Rating: M for Mature
Warnings: violence, use of alcohol, sexual themes
Summary: The Joker kidnapped a seventeen year old girl nearly three months ago. Batman and Gordon have had no luck finding her. When Batman finally catches her wandering the streets, can she finally tell them who the Joker is? Joker/Oc
A/N: Thanks for reading. Review please.
Chapter 1
The second Gordon entered the precinct, he was accosted by a young officer just barely out of the academy. "S-sir, you have a visitor. He needs you as soon as possible."
Gordon waited for the boy to continue, but he didn't. "Well, who is it, son?"
"Batman. And he's got a girl with him. I-I think it's that girl who disappeared almost three months ago. Amy or Ametha or something," he said. "They're in an interrogation room right now. I think she was afraid of all of these people."
Gordon shoved the box of donuts into the boy's hands and started towards the interrogation rooms immediately. He placed his coffee on Lacy's desk on his way there, brushing off the various people who greeted him on the way. Unlike the boy, he had no trouble remembering the girl's name. Amethyst Jade Danvers had been missing for three months, allegedly kidnapped by the Joker. To think that she was alive was a miracle in itself.
His lieutenant showed him the room. Batman was leaning against the wall, staring at her, expression hidden behind a leather cowl. She was simply sitting on a chair in the middle of the empty floor, scraped hands in her lap, eyes closed. Her breathing was barely noticeable.
The woman perched on the seat of that chair though was not the same woman in her high school picture. Her black hair was longer, matted with blood and grease, hanging in tendrils around her face. There was blood smeared along her neck, the hair sticking to her skin from it. Dark, scabbed lacerations stretched up the length of both forearms, consecutively placed. The worst cut of all was the hideous gash directly over her left eye, gored and dripping fluid. Bruises the shape of fingers and hands were prominent on her alabaster skin, much paler than her photo. A large, bleeding abrasion marred her left cheek as though her face had been grated on concrete. One knee was bandaged haphazardly, white tape contrasting greatly with the thin, filthy, black sweater over her top half.
"My God," Gordon exclaimed, feeling his stomach twist. "That's her. Kid's been through the ringer, hasn't she?"
The lieutenant nodded mutely, swallowing. "He brought her in about fifteen minutes ago, right after you left. Hasn't said a word, but she keeps singing to herself every now and then. I don't think you'll get much out of her, Sir."
"I agree," Gordon said. "But we've got to try." He left the lieutenant standing there, slipping outside and around to open the heavy door. Batman glanced up from the girl when Gordon entered, but Amethyst didn't react at all, simply continued swaying and staring forward. Up close, she looked even worse.
"Where did you find her?" he asked, tearing his eyes away.
"Down by the river, in the ruins of that old building on the west side," Batman rasped. "I recognized her instantly; she's in roughly the same state she was the first time I found her. She needs medical attention."
Gordon nodded, considering. "Has she spoken to you at all?"
"Not much," he admitted. "It's hard to get her attention, and she speaks in broken sentences. She only seems to respond when you say his name."
"The Joker's?" he questioned. In answer, the girl gasped as if suddenly doused with cold water and glanced up at him dazedly. Batman grunted. She stared at them both with one emerald green orb, head bobbing slightly. The left eye, the one with the horrible gash, was completely closed and terribly swollen. No doubt she couldn't even open it.
Gordon nodded at Batman and grabbed a chair from the wall, taking a seat directly across from her. There was no reaction other than the eerie mindlessness with which she followed his movements. "Miss Danvers, are you in any pain?"
"AJ," she mumbled, blinking her one eye.
"What?"
"My name is AJ," she explained, swaying slightly back and forth. He could see goose bumps on the tops of her arms and see the tattered state of her clothing. The entire room smelled of burnt hair and gasoline, gun smoke and blood.
"AJ," he repeated with a comforting smile, trying to mask the concern he felt more and more details popped into focus. "You're wounded, AJ. Can you feel it at all?"
She shook her head, staring at her hands which were pale pink and bleeding, as well.. "...feel it. Can't feel anything."
"My god, your leg." Gordon put a hand over his mouth as he saw, at last, what was her greatest injury of all. The knee was absolutely mangled, a mess of fractured bone, oozing pus and blood, bruised and torn muscles. The bandage was entirely soaked through with red, and Gordon was pretty sure he could see marrow and twisted cartilage poking through the ruptured skin. The whole wound was an angry red and jaundice yellow. How was she not in shock? How was that horrific injury not septic yet? She should be dizzy with fever! Perhaps she was.
Her hand waved at it absently. "Broken. Can't fix it. Can't walk."
"She needs medical attention," Gordon told Batman, getting out of the chair. He waved a hand in front of her damaged eye, feeling the furious heat radiating off brush against his palm. "Can you see out of this eye?" he asked her hopefully.
"No," she responded, voice dead, turning her head away.
Gordon felt his stomach drop. "This questioning will have to wait until later. She has to have medical attention. A psychiatrist wouldn't be a bad idea, either," he addressed Batman.
"Not crazy. I'm no-t," she mumbled balefully.
"You have to keep this under wraps, Commissioner. If the Joker knows we have her, he might come after her," Batman replied, ignoring the girl.
"I'm sure he knows by now that she's missing. Well," he glanced at her, "she is an orphan. It was the nuns at the orphanage that reported her disappearance. I suppose the press won't find out until we let them."
Batman nodded his agreement. Gordon turned to the glass, shouting orders. "I want a medic in here right away and a psychiatrist. And call an ambulance just in case. I want extra guards on every cell. I want this girl safe! Card anyone who comes into the building!"
Everyone scrambled away, and Gordon looked at AJ. She was humming to herself in a most haunting way.
AJ was in the hospital for two weeks before Gordon came down to see her. She was in the psych ward, bandaged and looking better than she had. He had been right in assuming the doctors would have to break her knee in order to fix it. The surgery had taken six hours, or so he'd been told. Her black hair had grown a little, wispy strands touching her bruised and battered face. She was completely blind in that left eye, the gash over it sewn up. It would still leave a scar. She didn't speak much. Sometimes she sang to Batman when he came. Gordon hadn't planned on visiting for a while, but the Joker had recently blown up another bank. He was at his wit's end. He had to get some answers from the girl.
The psychiatrist came out from AJ's room shaking her head. Gordon stopped her. "Um, so how is she doing?"
The woman glanced gloomily through the glass. "Not so good. She still won't speak in complete sentences and just sings to herself occasionally. She won't talk about the incident or the Joker at all. I'm afraid that her mind has simply been shattered. Poor little thing."
"What's the extent of her physical trauma?" he asked, regarding her. Wrapped up in more white bandages than he'd ever seen on a person, it was hard to see her face.
"The doctors explained a little bit to me," she said in a tone that was meant to remind him she wasn't a doctor in that sense. "Her knee was completely ruined. They think someone might have hit it with a sledgehammer. Her doctor thinks she'll be able to walk again eventually, but she'll never have complete use of it. Two broken ribs, hundreds of tiny lacerations and the big ones, blind in one eye, skull fractures, three broken fingers, one fractured toe, and minor frostbite on her fingers and toes. Plus that scar will never go away. And the mental trauma."
"My god, will she live?" he breathed.
"The doctors say she's doing fine physically. As well as could be expected. As for mentally, well," she put a hand on his arm, "it's probably best that they put her in a home." With a sad nod, she walked away, heels clicking.
The two officers he'd walked in with stationed themselves at the entrance to her room. Gordon went right on in. The room was nice enough. Completely private, there was a nice view of the gardens out back. Books were piled on a shelf opposite the bed. Two chairs sat next to the books, worn from worried friends or family. She was hooked up to a lot of hospital equipment, and her breathing was shallow. Asleep, she looked even more tiny and helpless. Gordon wondered in a fit of anger just how anyone could be so monstrous as to hurt her so badly. She was thin and lithe but tall at the same time. Her limbs were gangly, but each movement she made was made with grace and beauty. Her face was small, lips full. Long lashes caressed her cheeks as she blinked up at him. Deep green eyes, even the one that had lost its light, stared at him. He'd woken her up.
"Sorry to wake you," he said quickly, taking a seat on the chair beside her bed. He'd checked the records. Only one nun from the orphanage had visited. A sister Mary-Louise.
"Don't sleep," she answered, fingers wiggling pathetically mid-air out of the end of her cast.
"Nightmares?" he asked.
She didn't reply.
Better just get down to business, he thought, pulling out his pad of paper and a pen.
"AJ, I know it probably hurts to think about him, but I need you to tell me everything you can about the Joker," he said.
She sat up violently, pulling at the wires in her arms. "Joker?" she asked.
"Yes," he said hurriedly. "How did he kidnap you?"
"Kidnap?" she repeated in confusion. He watched as her eyes suddenly rolled back into her head. The machine monitoring her heart rate sped up. Gordon leaped to his feet and pressed the call button. She began to spasm. Instead of waiting, he ran out into the hall. A nurse caught sight of him and rushed into the room, shouting.
"I need a crash cart in here!"
The Joker?
She remembered him. Debris was piled around her. People were screaming, groaning, yelling in pain as the weight of the rock pressed down on them. Undeniable agony traveled up the length of her leg, dizzying her with its intensity. She was barely conscious, the occasional cough of life erupting from her battered lungs and broken body. She could smell fire, oil, blood. Sirens and screaming and maniacal laughter startled her awake every time she nearly fell asleep, fell into that comforting abyss. She just wanted to die. There were too many feelings. It hurt to breathe, to think, to exist. Feebly, she stretched her fingers. Lying on her back, the rock crushing her entire leg, she had a full view of the sky. It was dark, smoky, filled with lights. She couldn't remember what she had been doing, why she had been in the bank.
"Look, uh, here boys!" someone said giddily. "Little girl didn't die in the blast!"
He bent down. AJ smelled oil and leather and gasoline. Gunpowder. She glanced up through bleary, bloodied eyes at the face of a clown.
"And she's, uh, wearing a cross!" He bent down low, ripping the cross from her wrist. "Tell me, girly, do you, uh, do you believe in God?"
Using up all of her strength, she swallowed the blood in her mouth and rasped, "No." There was barely a sound to it, just a breath of air and a small shake of her head. He seemed to hear her, however, and something warm touched her head, removing the bloodied strands of hair out of her face. Sticky and sloppily, they moved like dead eels, hanging wetly from the side of her face. She turned her penetrating green eyes on him, breathing harsh. It was the Joker. She knew his face. A thousand different memories from passing the television store on the street, his face and voice blaring on the news.
He had blown up the building. It had been his bomb that obliterated the concrete into chunks like the one that covered her leg. She wiggled her fingers as though wanting to strangle the life out of him, his ghostly laugh echoing as he saw the realization dawning on her face. A cough built up in her lungs, more blood trickling in a small line down the side of her face, the smoke smothering her like a thick blanket wrapped around her face.
"Shameful, really," he remarked idly. "And you're such a pretty thing!" Low footsteps circled her head, boots clicking against the ground and upsetting a few pebbles that tumbled off debris and smacked against her shoulder. Dust and chalk rose up, clogging her lungs. She tried to follow him with her eyes, but the tiny, hot cells burned in protest. He kneeled again, his face upright this time and grinned down at her. Something hard and sharp pressed against her stomach. Pain erupted along the nerves in her arms as gloved hands lifted them and secured her bloodied fingers around the metal object. A gun.
To her right, a man mumbled something about not having enough time for her. She swallowed blood welling up on her tongue. Where was it coming from? She didn't know. The taste was sour and awful with a sharp, metallic tang to it.
His own hand was wrapped around the trigger, her fingers curling around the barrel that was aimed straight at her xiphoid process. If he pulled the trigger, it wouldn't even kill her, just cause her more pain. Though, she supposed, the bullet could break the xiphoid process so that the pointed bone could puncture a lung.
"Listen girly," his deep voice told her, "you, uh, get to choose, see? I could, um, shoot you now so that you can barely feel it because of all this, uh, pain."
He paused and fear flooded her soul. She gasped something, fingers tightening around the barrel and feeling the hard, cold reassurance that he could in fact do what he was saying. Somehow, she must have twisted her knee in that moment, trying feebly to move away but being unable to. A blinding, white-hot agony from the torn ligaments and broken bones of her knee and leg made her scream aloud. A purple glove clamped over her mouth as hot, salty tears gathered in her eyes and spilled over. She sobbed quietly as the pain dulled into a warm ache, pulsating comfortingly. Her other leg flopped to the ground uselessly, toes curling in the aftermath.
Gritting her teeth, she watched as he, curious, prodded the leg crushed beneath the piece of concrete with the barrel of his gun long removed from its place on her stomach. Again the same agony as he moved her thigh and twisted the patella unnaturally from beneath its crushed position. Fingernails dug into the palms of her hands, more tears spilled over her white cheeks, and she shook her head back and forth. Moments later as he was laughing, she begged:
"Please…please don't fucking do that again. Please."
It only made him laugh all the more.
"Back to business all the, uh, same," he chuckled, pressing the barrel to her throat instead, hot breath on her face, green-dyed hair tickling her cheeks. "Or I could kill you later, when you're all done up in the hospital. Your choice
"Later," she murmured, the fear making her tremble. His closeness alarmed her. "Later."
The point behind her choice was simple: she didn't really believe that he would harm her later. With his aims and objectives set in order, blowing up banks, and running from the police, she reasoned that there was no reason for him to remember some broken little high school girl with a crushed leg whom he had threatened to kill. Why should he? She wasn't that memorable, of average looks and average IQ. Even their meeting was probably mundane in comparison to the other ways he met his victims. Besides with the blood all over her face, what were the chances he would be able to recognize her?
Big, dark eyes met hers, and he chuckled again. The smell of gunpowder and smoke was nearly overwhelming, accompanied by the faint scent of blood coming from his clothes and hair. Cold and threatening, the barrel of the gun moved up the side of her face almost caressing, following the heart-shaped dip in her cheekbone and finally coming to stop at her temple. She was shaking in fear, his heat pressed against her injured body, bones crushed and throbbing. Fatigue suddenly flooded through her, and she wondered faintly if death wouldn't be a reprieve from all the world.
"And, uh, what's your name?" he demanded through a chuckle. "Tell the truth. I'll know if you lie."
"AJ," she whispered immediately in pain. His weight was forcing her into the ground where bits of broken glass and rubble buried deeply into her back.
Suddenly he was gone, the heat disappearing as another din of shouts from police officers echoed over the location. She could hear a great torrent of water, possibly dousing various fires from the explosion. Sirens shook the air with high-pitched whines, and she blinked, eyes burning like hot coals set into her skull.
Then something was touching her face, and it was a gloved hand again, but it was warmer and more affectionate. Someone was prying open her eyes, though she hadn't known she'd closed them, and asking her if she was all right in a deep and rasping voice. That same hand gripped the lower part of her thigh and heard her whimper in pain.
"…Batman?" she whispered inquiringly, fingers gripping a piece of rock on the ground, smearing her blood on it. Opening her eyes required an incredible amount of skill and willpower, but the relief she felt was worth it. Dark eyes stared down at her from a black mask made of leather and bullet-proof material. Aftershave emanated from his toned body. The exact opposite of the Joker in every way. She felt, for a moment at least, safe.
Commissioner Gordon was pacing outside her room, heavy footsteps resounding rhythmically as he covered the same five feet over and over again. Pagers beeped all over the hospital, voices talking, machinery whirring. A dark-skinned woman sat at the reception desk popping gum and twirling her hair around her pointer finger, scribbling on the clipboard erratically. The smell of coffee and perfume and disinfectant was pungent.
Lacy's Midnight Passion body spray hit his nose and made him cough as her heels clicked on the floor. She smiled and handed him a plastic cup full of bad coffee and then turned to sip her own while regarding the room.
"They still working on her?" she asked politely.
Swallowing a mouthful of what tasted like coffee with cinnamon in it, Gordon nodded.
Lacy shot him a glance out of the corner of her eye. "You don't have to stay, you know. They'll call when she's ready to talk."
He chuckled darkly. "Oh, I don't think she'll ever be ready to talk. The state of her…a human being shouldn't see that kind of suffering. But I have to question her. If there's a chance…even the slightest chance that she knows who he is, who we're dealing with, then I have to take it. Otherwise, I wouldn't even think about it."
"I know, Gordon."
They lapsed into silence for a while. Gordon's watch read noon, and he was beginning to feel the first pangs of hunger and fatigue. It had been three hours since AJ had went into cardiac arrest, but he refused to leave. No one would give him any news, either, as he wasn't family. That was the hard part. He had to sit and wait.
Gordon had always been a sympathetic and kind man. Even if AJ wasn't blood or family or even a friend, he felt as though in some way he knew her. They both had seen bad things. They both had endured bad things. And he wanted to help her in any way he could. Sniffing and taking another sip of his coffee, he cleared his throat and said:
"Lacy, why don't you head back and I'll keep an eye out?"
She turned her head sharply towards him. "Are you sure, boss? I mean, I can stay."
"No, you've done enough," Gordon said firmly, nodding. "It's just my obsession anyway that I'm here. I'll take care of it."
Raising her eyebrows once before pursing her lips and accepting that he wasn't going to leave and she had things to do, Lacy turned and patted him on the shoulder. "You've got a big heart, Gordon. You're a good man."
Lowering his eyes to the floor, he listened to her heels as they clicked toward the elevator and then disappeared altogether.
Sometimes he wondered.
"Commissioner Gordon?" a deep voice asked. His head snapped up, immediately taking in the exceptional form of the young doctor in front of him. The man had a finely chiseled jaw line and high cheekbones, curling brow hair that was cropped short on his head, and deep-set brown eyes. He was waiting expectantly for Gordon to answer him.
"Yes, that's me," Gordon replied, holding out his hand to shake. The doctor had a firm grip.
"You're waiting on Amethyst Danvers? We've just stabilized her. You can go in now and sit with her if you like, but we ask you not to question her anymore until the morning. She's heavily influenced by the drugs we've given her."
"She's awake?" Gordon asked in surprise.
"Yes, but she won't be for long. The body heals best when it has enough sleep, so we've given her a sedative to help," he explained calmly. "If you don't mind my asking Commissioner, what is your relationship with this young woman? It seems strange to me that a man in your position would—"
"She's a witness to a horrible crime," Gordon said, cutting him off as he normally did when people asked questions about his cases. Often he did it to the press. Holding up a hand, he started toward the door. "I want to be kept informed of her condition."
"Of course," replied the confused doctor. With a shake of his head, he started off in a different direction.
Gordon noticed that the room she was now in was much different. Instead of the homely calmness of the private room downstairs, the ICU was one of minimal decoration and urgency. The machines she was hooked up to covered the walls and both sides of her large bed. Some of the bandages had been removed to reveal the finger bruises and yellowed spots of skin. The lacerations had begun to bleed again, and a red-haired nurse was leaning over AJ and changing them. AJ's head was turned to the side, deep green eyes glazed over with the medication and staring at the wall, one pale wrist strapped to the bed railings. Her uninjured leg was crooked, so many wires coming from her that she appeared to be a mechanical human being. How anyone in such a state could be conscious baffled him.
Smiling briefly at the nurse who in turn smiled at him, Gordon took a seat on the side that AJ was facing and leaned back into the cushions. He watched as her thin throat swallowed slowly, eyes swirling in her head, and closed his eyes. The poor girl was never going to be sane again.
It wasn't long until the nurse left with a tentative goodbye and a wish for AJ to get well soon that Gordon fell asleep. Really, after so many nights without any real food and no sleep whatsoever, it was only a matter of time. He fell asleep in the chair, watching her fight to keep her eyes open, with his head on his palm deep in thought.
When he was awakened, it wasn't by a stranger friend of the nursing staff of the hospital; it was by the threatening but familiar presence of the town's vigilante who put a gloved hand on his shoulder and squeezed before leaving immediately. It was enough to jar the Commissioner awake. Gordon rubbed the sleep from his eyes to see the Batman standing silhouetted against the far wall.
"How is she doing?" the Batman rasped quietly.
"Not so good," Gordon replied, rubbing his face. "She went into cardiac arrest today, and I didn't get any answers before that. I'm afraid that we're going to have to wait."
"How is her state of mind? Will she be able to tell us anything useful?"
"I don't know."
They both looked at her, asleep for probably the first time in a long time. Really asleep, a drug induced coma, and Gordon hoped that it was the dreamless kind. She deserved at least one mercy, didn't she?
"The psychiatrist recommended putting her in a home," Gordon murmured quietly. "She doesn't have the insurance for that. With no one to look after her, she'll just end up on the street. Another crazy homeless person." Removing his glasses, he began buffing the glass with his dark silk shirt and then put them back on his face.
"The Joker won't let it end like that," Batman replied, taking a few steps away from the wall and allowing his gloved fingers to graze her face. "He sent a message in to your office." From his cape, he produced a crumpled envelope smeared with dark brown blood, the top torn open. Clearly Batman had already read it. Shooting him an inquisitive glance, Gordon removed a piece of paper from the envelope and unfolded it. There was a short paragraph in scrawling letters. Smeared blood and splotches of ink made the writing nearly illegible.
Dear Batsy,
You've got something of mine, something that I turned loose. The girl belongs to me, got that?
I want her back once you've sewn her together.
"'Turned loose'?" Gordon asked, looking up. "He let her go?"
"It seems that way," Batman growled, "but why?"
"Because she was injured?" he replied. "But if he wanted her to get proper medical attention, why did he do this to her in the first place?"
"Maybe he didn't."
Thanks for reading. Review please.