A/N: Hey, first fanfic I'm publishing. I know it's shit, but it would mean the world if you gave it a review. As a fan of the batfam, really love YJ season 3. Wish Tim got more screentime tho, but when I saw they made Dick/Babs canon onscreen, I screamed and threw my phone across the room XD. Anyway, this is set in the YJ universe, about Barbara becoming Oracle. I promise to put in more chapters with members of the team, but for now it's just Barb and her dad.

IMPORTANT: This is kind of like the Killing Joke, but not the part where Jim Gordon is pushed to the brink of insanity, mostly because I've never read the Killing Joke and never watched the movie (the Bruce/Barbara pairing freaks me out). I didn't really know how to fit into this story. There is a small hint tho.

Disclaimer: I don't own Young Justice, bc if I did Wally would be alive :/

Enjoy

How did things get here? How, why, what, where, why, how, what, where, what, hoW, WHY?

Simple questions that she desired an answer to but received none.

She remembered waking up, initially relief flooding her systems, and then came the emotions. Confusing, entangling emotions attached to memories that did not match up her environment: a comfortable mattress that threatened to swallow her whole, muscles that ached which seemed to connect with the somewhat horrible yet distant feeling that sat at the pit of her stomach, the smell of antiseptics and an unsettling taste in her mouth.

The room was stale, cold, with a blank, faux brightness that filled up the whole room. The light stabbed her eyes, so she kept them shut for a long moment until she made herself assess her situation in her bleary state.

Slowly but surely her eyes opened, taking notice of her dad was sitting next to her in what appeared to be his work clothes. He was dozing off, his coat as a makeshift blanket on top of him giving the impression that he could have been there for years, waiting.

Oh, wait a minute, a hospital. This was a hospital. Right?

"Dad?" she managed to get out and he looked up straight away, jumping out of his chair and throwing his trench coat to the ground, his face full of relief that did not register with her at all.

"Oh, Barbara, how- how do you feel pumpkin?" he asked slow and gentile, crouched low beside her.

He looked tired, as always, but even more so then. Strangely enough, she felt relief too at the sight of him. Something happened right before she fell unconscious.

Something to do with her dad's safety.

"Water"

"Yeah- yeah, of course." He muttered, swiveling around in a frantic kind of way. Pained muscles prevented her from moving any further, and the simple task of moving her mouth and turning her head to look around was almost overwhelming.

And then the delayed memories decided to make their appearance. She closed her eyes in frustration, remembering the why, the how, the when, the what, the who.

Who?

Her and the Joker.

How?

He caught her unawares outside of Gotham University, only to pull out a pistol from his trench coat.

What?

He shot her in the gut. Point blank.

The when-

how long was she out for?

"Do you remember anything Barbara?" he asked, gently cupping her chin and helping her take a sip of water from a plastic bottle. She hadn't realized how badly she needed the water to refresh her mind, and now the flashbacks were returning in sharp definition. But she willed herself to push them back. Not yet, she wouldn't confront whatever happened just yet, not until she could gain a profounder sense of being. It was all too much to remember, too much for her disoriented, half- drugged state of mind.

The door swung open revealing a nurse in scrubs. She stopped short at the sight of an awakened Barbara.

"Oh good, you're awake. How are you feeling hon? Can you speak, or are you too tired right now?" The nurse asked in a barrage of questions.

Her dad opened his mouth to answer but much to his surprise, she managed to croak out," Yeah, I think so."

"I'm gonna get the doctor, I'll be back in a minute, mkay? Sit tight, there's a lot that needs to be done." And with that, she exited the room.

"The Joker, do you remember what happened, at all?" her dad turned to face her. He peered intently through his glasses as if this was just him at work, questioning a witness or intimidating a criminal. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference, and sometimes her dad never really left work. Distant memories of her divulging all her little "crimes" as a kid resurfaced. All he needed to do was tilt his head knowingly and she would fess up immediately to staying out after school, or as he called it, "sneaking out."

But over time, as he taught her how to defend herself and she became an ace at lying, security became less lax.

"I- I think so." She cleared her throat. Get a grip Barbara, she thought sternly, you were trained better than this. Truth be told, she despised feeling helpless, to whatever extent. Ever since a young age she was taught to be alert, aware and prepared. The drugs in her system disoriented her, holding back the formulated thoughts and keeping the fragmented memories in a blender. Until….

Until now...

"I opened the door. It was late, I was heading home." It wasn't cold that night, per se, but it wasn't a a breath of warm air either, as was March in Jersey. Her body ached to get to her apartment and lay down to never wake up again. Her fingers felt disjointed from typing, and her eyes weren't doing her any favors either after a long day of squinting at screens. Most of her friends, including Dick, had left at this point. All of the girls that lived outside of the dorm had left hours earlier. Just her, opening that door.

"He was standing there. Right outside." Deep breath. She stopped short, alarmed at the sight of a strange tall man in a trench coat lurking outside the exit,"and I didn't... react. He just…. Shot me. Pulled out a pistol from his coat."

"He- he knelt down next to me. Whispered something about how he was gonna use this to get to you. He wanted to do something to you." She stared directly into her father's eyes, recalling the why now," He wanted to kill me, to get to you."

Was it a leap? Barbara was all about reaching far-fetched conclusions, that was her job after all. But now that the blender no longer churned, the night, and the Joker's words, came back in crisp definition.

Nightmarish and haunting, his grotesque expression of pure joy at the pain she felt, the cry she let out that rang synonymously with the sound of a bullet impacting her body burned her way into her brain. She remembered laying in a collapsed heap on the ground, not feeling anything at first. Then the searing pain of flesh. She pulled her hand away from clutching her stomach. Her vision blurred, staring at the hand dipped in a pool of her own blood. The hand that was her own hand. Oh, god she felt nauseous.

He knelt, his eerie green eyes staring the way she sometimes caught black pelted cats in alleyways with their soulless green eyes staring at her in her costume. In all her time as Batgirl, she'd never seen the Joker this close, the man that was personally responsible for so much chaos and destruction that had personally inflicted their lives.

In a fit of irony, she remembered joking around and making up creepypastas with Dick about Gotham and its inhabitants in an effort to enliven Jason after a particularly bad day at school. Before Jason's death, when they were young and naïve and considered themselves untouchable.

"You haven't actually seen the Joker up close…. right?" murmured Jason from under the blanket fort they erected at Dick's insistence that blanket forts were therapeutic. She assumed he was kidding and waited for Jason to argue with him on this like everything else, but to her surprise he agreed. She supposed there was a little kid in all of them, wanting to build a blanket fort.

"Of course we have," Dick said sharing a conspiratory glance with her,"he has green eyes, to match the hair, probably."

"Right," she cleared her throat and dropped her voice a half an octave," And get this, y'know, they say eyes are a window into the soul. But he has no soul."

"Quit shitting me," Jason laughed, shoving her and jumbling them all up under the blanket fort, leaving them in a pile of laughter.

At one point she stated she had seen the Joker face to face, and that his eyes contained no soul.

Why did that have to come true?

Because looking into the pupils of the man- no, he was no longer a man, no longer human. He had forfeited the right to be considered a living creature. His green irises were merely reflecting the scene surrounding him, not taking anything in. They no longer held the ability to absorb light, the soul within no longer subsisted. It diminished, until he was a shell, a shell of human bent on orderly destruction and chaos.

"Pumpkin," he started, using her dad's affectionate nickname for her, no longer staring at her but transfixed at the growing pool of blood at her side, "It's nothin' personal. This is to send a message to your daddy, you see." He began playing with her blood, swirling around his pinky in it like it was sand on the beach, "The commissioner is too good at his job, I daresay. He was around even before our dear little Batsy put on his cloak and decided to pick up a sword and fight." She could feel her consciousness ebbing away," I get it, I can see your losing it." He raised his pinky to her face, gently streaking the warm liquid down her cheek, "Send my love to Robin, would ya? The one who strayed a little too far from the nest."

She hadn't even realized her eyes were closed until her dad put his hand on her shoulder.

"Wait, did he do anything to you. Did he hurt you dad?" she asked, a little alarmed, her eyes wide open now.

"No, he didn't do anything. He sent pictures to the precinct, though. Pictures of you, shot."

"I could've died." she exhaled, leaning back on her dad's lap as he kissed her forehead," but I didn't. What happened exactly?"

"You're so lucky. They thought you wouldn't make it, but you pulled through. But Barbara" He pulled away, concern and what seemed like a hint of- guilt? etched on his face "you should know something."

"What?"

"I'll let the doctors explain it."

"Why can't you? Just tell me, what is it?"

Frustrated at receiving no reply except for a small head shake, she sat up. Or, at least, tried sitting up. Wait, why couldn't she sit up? Trying again to move her hips but to no avail, internal panic began to get the best of her. Move your legs Barbara she commanded in a firm internal voice attempting to hold down the panic spreading through her limbs.

It was so simple, so why wouldn't it happen?

Wiggle your toes Barbara.

No movement.

C'mon wiggle your toes.

Nothing.

Why can'y you wiggle your toes?

For some reason, the struggle brought tears streaming forth, streaking their way down her cheeks, and then drying up when she was hit head on with a realization.

Stunned, she raised her tear-stained face to her dad, "I can't feel my legs."

He engulfed her in a hug that seemed to say what he couldn't tell her.

And that horrible sinking feeling at the pit of her stomach was finally resolved, and instead the weight of the revelation was descending her deep, deep in the ground until she was freefalling.