It was pouring rain outside. Mother nature had unchained her anger on Gotham and sieged the city with violent winds, copious rain and thunderbolts that cracked the dark sky like ominous warnings of disasters to come. Dr. Pamela Isley watched the spectacle with satisfaction. Nature was beautiful in it's savageness; a smile tugged at the corner of her lips at the sight of a thunderbolt striking a house. Humans were careless and selfish, they destroyed nature and thought they would never have to pay for such actions. They didn't know what awaited them. Calamities had become the norm and it was only the beginning: mother nature would take back what was hers and wipe away the concrete buildings, tarmac roads and metal prisons humans had encased her in. She relished at the thought. Her entire life, she had worked with nature in an attempt to stop the rampant destruction but even her, with her connection to the green, her poisons and pheromones and her natural talent for botany, hadn't achieved the goals she had hoped for. Seeing nature rebel reminded her that her work hadn't been entirely vain and most importantly, that she had an almighty ally in her crusade. A knock on the door distracted her from her thoughts and her eyebrows furrowed with perplexity: it was late at night and she wasn't expecting anyone. Not many people visited her, she preferred the company of her plants and actively discouraged interactions with humans meaning she had few friends. With feline grace, she quit her window seat to open the door.
Her heart tightened when she saw her visitor. Harley Quinn stood on her doorstep, drenched in rain and chilled to the bone (why she went around in shorts and a top far too minimalist to be appropriate under any circumstance and especially in this weather was beyond her. But then again, there was hardly anything logical when it came to Harley). She had wrapped her slender arms around herself in a hopeless attempt to warm herself up and constellations of bruises bloomed across her pale skin, standing out like ink on parchment. Her top was stained with dried blood oozing from a split lip and a nasty cut on her cheekbone and the start of a black eye was appearing already.
"Harley what-"
The jester didn't give her time to finish, she moved into her arms with a grimace of pain and hid her face in Ivy's neck, clinging to her like she was her lifeline. The redhead stiffened with surprise and the faintest hint of nuisance at the gesture, physical contact wasn't something she was at ease with and Harley was making her slightly uncomfortable. That being said, the heartbroken sobs that shook the blonde girl hit home, appealing to what little humanity Ivy had left and prompting her to place a reassuring hand on Harley's bruised back.
"Mistah J got mad Pammy."
She sobbed. Ivy's features darkened. Of course she had expected it, only the Joker could turn Harley into this mess, and her hatred for the man begun boiling beneath the surface.
"Come on, Harl, I'll get you cleaned up. You can stay here."
She closed the door and attempted to lead the jester in the living room but Harley was clinging to her, refusing to let go as she trembled softly (whether due to fear or cold, Ivy couldn't tell). The botanist's hands closed around Harley's shoulders, pulling her away as gently as possible, careful not to press down on any of the angry bruises decorating her skin.
"Harley, I'm going to get something for the cuts okay?"
The blonde nodded, letting go reluctantly of Ivy and sitting on a nearby chair. There were times where she knew where she had gone wrong: sentences and actions that she knew had angered the joker and triggered the battering, but this time, Harley was clueless. One minute everything had been going fine, the Joker had been planning one of his latest crimes and appeared rather satisfied and the next, he had been hitting her. Why she didn't know, she hadn't spoken much, in fact not at all, as surprising as that was, and yet he had lost control. Sometimes she wondered if he beat her up just for the sake of it, if he took some sick pleasure in her pain. There were moments when she was at her weakest, where such a theory rang so true it hurt but deep down, she wanted to believe Mistah J truly loved her. Poison Ivy came back carrying a bottle of clear liquid Harley recognized as disinfectant. The jester didn't protest when it was applied to her cuts but a grimace of pain rapidly appeared on her face as the liquid begun stinging her wounds.
"It hurts Red."
"I know but it's good for you. Try to stay still."
With a wet cloth, Ivy cleaned the dried blood and took a mental sigh of relief upon seeing that the wounds were much less serious than she had feared. The Joker had done much worse to Harley and she knew him to be capable of killing her if he wanted to. She still remembered the time she had found Harley severely injured in the wrecks of the rocket The clown prince had locked her in with the intent of killing her. That's how their friendship had started, because of a murder attempt gone wrong. There were more romantic stories out there but this one was bound to catch people's attention.
"I don't know what I did wrong Red, one minute he's all happy go lucky and the next he's all bezerk and crazy."
There were tears lingering in Harley's eyes and acting on impulse, Poison Ivy wiped them away with her thumbs. The jester's makeup had run but her features remained as charming as ever. There was singular beauty to this human and Poison Ivy still pained to understand the effect she had on her. She cared about Harley, that much she understood, and she would kill the clown next time she crossed his path. She finished cleaning up Harley's wounds.
"He's psychotic Harl, he doesn't need a reason. He likes hurting you."
"Don't you say that Red. My Puddin' loves me, nah I did something wrong Pam and he got mad. And he's a psychopath, not psychotic, there's a difference."
Poison Ivy sighed. The vicious cycle of abuse never seemed to end. Harley was addicted to the joker and blind when it came to his true nature, she kept going back and he kept hurting her, it was a never ending story. Any attempt to pry Harley away from him had failed and Poison Ivy had promised herself she wouldn't try again.
"My head hurt Red. Everything hurts."
"Let's get you to bed. You need to lie down and rest."
She picked the jester up gently and carried her to the bedroom. The plants stationed there reached out to the intruder but sprung back at Ivy's command, peeling back the covers to make place for Harley instead. She helped her change out of her wet clothes ad into dry ones, noticing that a particularly nasty bruise covered part of her ribcage. She would have to make sure Harley didn't have broken ribs but that would come later, the blonde was half asleep in her arms already and she didn't want to wake her up. She tucked her in, allowing her fingers to linger on Harley's cheeks a beat too long before walking away.
"Pam, can you stay with me?"
Poison Ivy stiffened at the question, torn between her wish to return to her work (she was working on one of her eco mixtures, one that would make a handy weapon if she succeeded in finding the right dosage) and staying with Harley. One look at the jester and the decision was taken, driven by the human part of the animal/plant hybrid. She lied down next to Harley who cuddled up to her, fitting her slim body against Poison Ivy's in the search for warmth or the certainty of being secure.
"The Joker doesn't love you Harl. You can't keep going back to him."
She stroked Harley's hair softly, feeling a genuine pang of tenderness and concern for the joker's sidekick. Harley didn't answer, she was already sleeping, exhausted and worn out by the battering and quite possibly by the pain. She pressed a kiss to her forehead.
"Stay here with me Harley. He doesn't love you like I do."
She murmured, admitting what she would have never been able to say if Harley had been awake. The words sounded foreign to her own ears, unused as she was to human feelings and all their complications. With her face hidden against Ivy's shoulder, Harley smiled. Ivy was still partly human after all.