I do not own any part of the Batman franchise, just simply a fan with some sort of plan c: So Please Enjoy! 3
Sal Maroni was definitely not a man to be gossiped about for reasons concerning a poor taste in automobiles. In fact he had commissioned his entire Mercedes fleet to come and secretly retrieve us from the, now partially volcanic, imports building after our fantastic little birthday stunt. Looking out from the rear window it was easy to distinguish our effects on the already violently storming night sky. A fierce orange spread through the black nimbus like wildfire, engulfing every rain droplet and tainting it with acidic bile, which ate at the steel ceiling of the German auto.
The black leather that engulfed Jervis and I only provided a silent backdrop to the horribly stained fabric that was this sad little girl's dress. The browned apron felt damp between my cracking fingertips as I rolled the seams within my grasp, clenching and releasing with anxious pace. I was well aware that my companion's eyes had already surveyed the interior and had fixated themselves to the now ruined garment with an air of distaste combined with severe interest that my mind couldn't fully comprehend. In the headless scurry that was the walk to the waiting cars I had told Boss Maroni that he did not have to journey with Jervis and I partially because it would have forced him to travel in the complete opposite direction from his eventual destination, and partially because I did not really expect that a conflict, in any way perverse, would really be high up on the agenda. But as my fingertips pulled across the door handle beside me, I couldn't help but try desperately not to succumb to the curiosity that would persuade me to look to the left. I only wished that Boss Maroni had insisted on accompanying the two of us into the dripping mouth of the city. I hoped he would have warmed the bench seat across from my companion and I so that anxiety would not have a shadow of a chance to grow obese off of the feeling which was, without a doubt, radiating from the entire expanse of epidermis hidden beneath sad saturated fabric.
Even though the distance from the area surrounding Astylar to that of Ryan was not long it was common knowledge that at this hour of the night the ghetto streets would be newly paved with the freshly leaded bodies of the unfortunate; making the mudded cobblestone pregnant with mangled limbs. The image alone was enough to pain my heart in favour for the poor Mercedes suspension.
With every glance my fogging eyes stole from the vacant seat across before us the vision became more and more pained as dried spittle cracked, ripping at the immediate skin, slicing eyelashes straight from the follicle and planting sties like seeds along the way. There was no doubt that a question of being contagious passed through my rotting brain as I tried in the best of my ability to snake my newly shoeless foot through lazily arched handles of an Armani weekend bag that had been hiding underneath the wingtips bandaged to the feet of my companion, matte with the same yellowing spittle as was besieging my retinas.
"Allow me my dear," the breathless voice of my companion swayed in my ear as his fingertips swiftly found themselves enclosed about my quaking ankle, my lungs collapsing there after in the wake of such ill-founded surprise.
It was not as though his contact was anything to be taken seriously in the moment but of course I should have known better than to trust a man who bares a grin like the horizon when telling an obese woman she can, without a doubt, oil her porked flanks into an Antonio Berardi. Everyone knew he enjoyed a joke or two but statements like that were just doomed to be born ridiculous no matter which angle they were shot out from.
Jervis' crimson-spotted coat fell to the floor as he rolled it from his shoulders, white gloves flying into it's pockets, and took my reluctant leg into his newly exposed hands with a glaze of excitement blazing quickly from ear to ear. His skin was smooth, although I cannot say that I didn't expect it with them being always in seclusion, but the simplicity of contact with another was enough to send the neurons in my mind into a confused hell. It was as if every muscle had endured a winter nude for they were anything but mobile as he managed to remove both stockings with a criminal quickness and imprison my icicle fingertips within his uncomfortably warm palms.
"Jervis," was all that my voice could manage as every internal organ began its deterioration and his hands parted my own, placing them on either side of his collar, purposefully shackling me while his lips played upon my pulsating wrist. "Just calm down my dear," he said as though he had rehearsed this whole moment before, "if you shake any more furiously I'll have to think epilepsy contagious."
Dumbfounded, I watched in horror while Jervis moved swiftly and gathered my rigid legs about his waist shifting the two of us into quite the compromising position, wisps of his blonde hair hanging down and framing his face that glowed with a malicious intent. My chest felt as though it would give way at any moment under the forcible pressure of his body, causing my stomach to finally belch out its black acid of vulnerability, which I had tried so hard to ignore.
The shame burning in my face brought about a redness that no one could have been fond of as he carefully graced my ear with a gentlemanly touch, one that only made me all the more worried. "Wh-what are you doing Jervis? This doesn't make any sense," a weak smile formed – no doubt as a side effect of a collapsing trachea, "And you… a man of science surely doesn't do much of anything without considering at least some point of reason?" A new tear began to clear the fog from my eyes granting me the sick, morbid pleasure of catching a glimpse of anxiety, fat and happy with his ill announced dinner theatre, while Jervis' hand secured a more forward hold. "Don't be ridiculous, of course I listen to reason. It is just a simple matter of how well I choose to actually hear it."
A sharp inhale pierced my quickly shrinking throat, propping open the tissue like cavern beams supporting Earth, as nerves giggled and shied away from the rasp of his tongue against the sensitive skin which joined neck with quaking clavicle. I tried to hire every bit of strength to get him from me but as my hands met with his chest in force his simply took both within their free grasp, imprisoning them yet again above my head. "Jervis please," with every shift of his weight my voice lost clarity, "you told me that Dr. Crane had feelings for me, that you were… looking out for my safety for a friend. Do forgive me but I seem to lack a link in placing your actions in the category of a favour to him."
For a moment I thought some matter of sense had returned to him for he rose a brow and released to a slighter pressure about my wrists, but that all faded with another quick mischievous grin. "Eleanor," I wondered how his voice could stay so calm, "I didn't do this for your dear Doctor, I did it for myself," he nibbled my nervous ear as he continued on, "I remembered him from long ago, and when he came into that café, with his ever present pompous sneer, asking me to help him out of his self inflicted hole I will say in all honesty that I had no desire to help him at all. But then… then something sparked my interest." My eyes could hold no longer, streaming pathetic tears down my burning face, to pool about my head as his tone got sharper and more laboured. "He mentioned you. Eleanor Ryan, the proverbial jack pot for someone in his situation, what with him in constant need of a more prominent, not to mention worldwide, supplier. I will tell you this dear girl… how much effort it took for me to withhold my hilarity at the idea of him gaining you as an enabler, at him having you any which way all for himself," everything was spinning while he shifted his weight so that he could tower over me once again and forcibly relieve me of my futile bottoms, "Enlighten me… was he charming? Did he say all the right things? Is that how he bewitched you into giving him what he wanted… everything he wanted? They say he's quite the gentleman… when it's beneficial." His smile changed from mischievous and annoyed to one of a calm manner that did not help in restraining the black slime that was now creeping through my veins. "Please Jervis," I could vaguely hear myself plead while his free hand slid smoothly up my leg, burning a hole in my pale skin that I was never going to be able to rinse away, "you're better than this. You know it and I know it…" The telephone line from my mind to my mouth was brutally severed, abruptly ending my train of thought, by a shooting pain from betwixt my thighs. The grimace involuntarily twisting my expression served as the complete opposite to his wide eyes, which wrung out my cortex like a washcloth.
"He's never had sex with you?" his voice staggered with surprise as he studied the faint lines of blood following gravity down his fingertip, "no wonder he was so concerned about you." I felt lightheaded, either from the pain that refused to go away or from the confusion surrounding everything coming out of his mouth. One thing was for certain, I felt like nothing in the world could prevent me from vomiting. "Wh-what are you even talking about? You have your answer… just tell the driver to pull over, I can find my own way back from here."
I longed to just walk outside in the smog, even with all of its pollution Gotham's air was still by far superior to the stuffiness inside the car. One thing I could not understand was how this one detail could befuddle him to such an extent as would create a hold on his mind long enough for me to free one of my hands without his even knowing. "He was absolutely frantic when he was seated across from me," My ears strained to drown out his voice as he cleaned his finger off on the already ruined apron of the juvenile dress, "so distressed because he knew what could happen," obviously he noticed my panicked confusion. "Oh come now. If you put a white sheet out to dry in this city its going to get dirty there's no second thought about it. … How sweet it is that he would feel so guilty for throwing you out but convince himself not to go after you. What a fine gentleman that makes him, hmm?"
At once my mind sprang back to vivacity, whether in one last show or not, bringing my free hand across his ridiculous smile with an ease as though it had done so many times prior. One thing was for certain that was just one thing I would never get used to. Even though he asserted himself in a less than polite manner I still didn't wish to degrade to his horrid level. His height fell backward into a proper prone position, off of me, while he pressed and pulled his fingers from his cheek checking for imaginary blood. "So," he said with a faint smile, "kitty has claws."
If I had thought the pain in my abdomen was excruciating when I was lying down, the demon resurrected ten fold when I leaned forward to knock on the shield separating the driver from our cabin, signaling for him to pull over if he knew what was good for him, and let me out so that I could find my own way back to Ryan. It mattered not that his muffled voice yelled at me that it wasn't safe to run around in this area at night, and in this torrential storm no less, but I could have cared less. For the only thing I wanted was to get out with what little strength still resonated within my limbs so that I might have even the slightest chance of finishing the seventeen orders that had piled up over the past fortnight while I wallowed in self-pity and the deviously romantic gaze belonging to David Bowie.
When the car slowed to a crawl there was no hesitation to open the door and practically leap out into the darkness. It did not matter that the disembodied limbs hiding under the mud snapped at my shoeless ankles or that the city sky laughed as it doused my height in the most toxic of water. As luck should have it a glimpse from a familiar dilapidated brownstone assured me that I was only a few blocks from Ryan, the only luck of the entire evening aside from not blowing up on the train – but that just depended on who one sought to converse with. The driver, that poor dear that he was, stepped out of the car and held an umbrella aloft but it was obvious that I was already a victim of the elements. He nodded in acknowledgement when I simply requested the umbrella and for him to return to the safety of the car, taking Jervis to the nearest whorehouse, as a joke of course because the nearest one was full of men in drag, for I could easily reach my destination from here. It was nice however that as I continued down the jagged cement blocks, which floated as ice upon the thick tar, that he followed me to the best of the Mercedes ability.
The patter of the heavy rain on my personal synthetic awning could not drown out Jervis' reasoning. He used every excuse that I assumed a man knew to try and get me to return to the interior but every single one fell upon deaf, if not completely dead ears.
"You're disgusting," I spat back, stopping to try and gage the distance between two cement pedestals, "A vile, contemptible man I wish would just go to Hell." I knew that I couldn't possibly sound very threatening but the sound of his eerie laugh reverberating off of the shattered windows only confirmed my inability to be assertive.
It was a draw as I stood in the rain, averting my eyes from the Mercedes now pulling away, as Jervis leaned out the window, his head resting on his nested arms as the rain slowly saturated his hair, causing it to stick to his grinning face. "Now, now Eleanor there's no reason to be upset," in that moment I wished the driver would lose control of the vehicle so that the street urchins would have the prime opportunity to sack the car, "one day I will join you Hell, but you and your dear Doctor will have already been crowned king and queen. … Thanks for the date." He winked and blew me a diseased kiss, suggestively licking his finger as the tinted window shielded him from the underworld, enclosing him in his posh leather where he was no doubt laying along the seat and imagining what he could have only done.
I knew that I wasn't hurt beyond the dictionary definition of virginity, but that still did nothing for the feeling of un-cleansable filth that was climbing over the guard wall surrounding my heart.
And for the first time in my life I collapsed on the streets of the ghetto in tears, no different from any of the destitute citizens that watched from above in their molding shacks.
Flickering light immersed the ground level stairwell as my soaked back glued itself to the patent steel sheltering my ruined form from the unrelenting elemental attack. Never did I expect a time when being held up in this building's crumbling foundation would actually bring me relief. But that was exactly what swept over every muscle as my knees gave way and surrendered to the flooded floor. I knew that if I could just manage to close my eyes and breathe for a few moments that my head would stop its joyous circus ride but for the life of me nothing was posted on the inside of my eyelids except for Jervis' wicked face glaring over me and playing OB-GYN instead of sticking to his actual profession… which I should have assumed would be less than savoury.
I wished for an instant that humans had evolved a transparent eyelid, at least then I would have been able to sleep without sleeping, without any harrowing thoughts of creepy individuals – Jervis or otherwise. Instead my eyes simply lolled within their sockets until being captivated by a small water strider walking with ease across the oil slick cascading down the cement stairs into the only slightly less coagulated Gotham street run-off. The little thing had no idea that not a few moments later it would be introduced to the underside of an impressively gleaming black loafer.
"Miss Ryan thank the Lord!" I loathed that expression, mainly because I had no idea what it meant. "I was wondering where you had gone off too! Although I really think you should have stayed with your engagement longer," he slumped down and took hold of my dripping arm, "is it safe to assume that you already know what I'm hinting at?" His grip tightened which shocked me into coherence, that way I would be an easier companion for the trip upwards, less I get the same disease as divers who surface too quickly. It was no secret, it hadn't been for days now. My father knew exactly what I had been doing, not in any great detail but he was well aware that the demonic lab was producing no profit. That alone would have been enough for a customary Ryan severance package, but the lack of incoming revenue on top of the oh so inconvenient investigation by that loathsome inspector would have amounted to at least seven terminations, not only from employment but every single corresponding breath.
The ride in the lift from the second floor was anything but pleasant as the floor once again claimed dominance over my will to look elsewhere, combining with the annoying touch of Lucas' sympathetic pats. If anything the pressure he applied was just that of another from tonight and it only made matters worse when he decided to add commentary to our abysmal silent film. "Listen Miss," his tone was disgustingly bewail and I really harboured no patience for it, "whatever happens I have loved nothing more than to be at your aid these past few years, and should you survive I shall be honoured if you would have me a part of your service still." If any energy still clouded in the muscles, diseased with rigor, I would have growled and lashed out at myself in the reflection upon the gilded lift doors. His tone proved only that he was as insincere as he was daft.
Out of the corner of my, once again, fogging eye I could see him prod at the Windsor knot joining his head to throat, an undeniable sign that he was nervously awaiting the outcome of his employment. He had grown accustomed to living within the singeing stomach lining of Ryan, with the all night high alerts and the endless screams. After all as long as he stayed within these walls he had full amnesty, neither the police nor the harsh sting of reality could probe him. For years I was a toy for his paws to bat around incessantly but however small there was a change in him when he was demoted to my order. No doubt he feared I would have repaid him generously for his years of aggression, but I failed to see the importance in experimenting radioactive isotopes on him due to his obvious lack of a heart to test. Still there was a part of me which longed to believe that underneath every layer of hatred there was a piece, even as large as a gnat's eye, that felt something of a paternal affection towards my pathetic self. I wanted it so badly that my desire had managed to erase all feelings of rage against him.
Instead of wrath only pity remained, for in the end he was condemned to be only as happy as I was.
Never before had my father's office doors looked so hideously oversized. It was true for they always had retained an image of being rather large and over decorated for the given area available. But in this moment it was as though they had been injected with a hormone of some sort for they grew menacingly with every step closer. The heavy scent of tobacco fled to freedom from between the solid panels as they weren't completely shut.
I did not want to touch the doorknob but it was only too obvious that if I did or if I didn't, if I ran to hide under the sea of white in Dr. Crane's former residence to cry like the motherless child I was, every breathe I took would be one closer to the ending of bittersweet relief.
Through the hanging smoke I could see the outline of his broad stooped shoulders as he hung over the expanse of his ivory desk. Mounds of leather bound volumes which held the numbers from past years of business covered the polished grain moat about the base of the dying elephants which tried their best to jump from their chiseled prison. I had never really looked my father over before, mainly because of the blunt force grinding my neck into a bent arch. His face was heavily lined with irreversible pain and suffering that others would amount to age and his upper lip never faced the cold for it was sweatered by a twentieth century moustache. The ash tray beside him was the source of the smoke, as it tied together the updrafts of several cigarettes.
My mind was quick to order the door closed as so Lucas would not provide support for my father's wrath, which was going to be terrible no matter what I said or pleaded. Saliva evaporated for there was no sight more unnerving, not even the barely human creatures in the underdwelling of the laboratory, than the way Andrew Ryan's notoriously sunken yellow eyes peered at one from under the thick crests his skull created above the sockets. Veins crippled his irises long ago, after an intended accident by my uncle years before I was even a fathom, which caused him to be incredibly sensitive to light and his skin to become sallow after years of being denned up in his tower of prestige and prominence. It was no secret the other bosses and business partners shared stories about him after their deals closed and they were free from any repercussions, but no one had the courage to ever say it within his domain. I had always assumed that they attributed the dim light and boarded windows to that of a turn of the century slaughterhouse interior, which in hind sight wasn't exactly far off from the truth.
His thick sausage fingers waved a window in the smoke screen so that he could get a better view of that which he despised most of all.
"You," after twenty-four years under his oppression I wouldn't have been surprised if he actually had forgotten my name entirely, "you have been behaving in a most unbecoming fashion, for a servant-scientist AND as an off-off-offspring." The left fingers found their way into the cage of his right while he backed away from the desk and stood to full height, trying to scare what little fear still remained within my amygdala, which was starting to live on borrowed time. His dusted shoes poked out, their slick tongues wagging Satanist jargon on their way to meet my own shoeless feet. It was in that moment time stood still and I realized everything below my waist was just as bare as a new born, my face just as flaming red. He had the worst difficulty in acknowledging that I was his offspring, which explained the stutter on the very word, and the vivid hatred forming across his brow. "I see you have decided to adopt the fashions of those you're rumored to have been hanging around, hmm?" I stood on display as he circled me like a fierce emaciated hound. It only would have been more comfortable if I was suspended from one of the snaggletooth meat hooks above the stairs to the laboratory lower levels. I wanted to know who exactly he imagined me to be associating with but in this horrid outfit my first guess would have been a gang of toothless streetwalkers. No doubt my father and I shared the same thought, give or take the detail that I was without any sort of underwear. He didn't need to know about the mass amount of pain that still resonated within my lower abdomen, he would only get a twisted pleasure out of it.
"Now… girl… allow me to make this perfectly clear for the last time," with that he heavy palm grasped the entire rear of my skull, introducing my contortioned face to long overdue orders, "YOU"RE COSTING ME MONEY YOU LITTLE WRETCH!" his voice was thunderous within my ear canals and vicious on my drum, scraping its long nails down the soft tissue.
I was well aware that I had let orders pile up but never did I know that it had amounted to so great a number. They were like tiny refugees trying desperately to escape the tyranny and flee for the safety of test tubes and beakers. Apology after apology swarmed in my skull, buzzing to the point of a fit similar to the man on the train as my eyes flopped and followed my father's dusted shoes as they walked to the desk and turned around, slowly but strongly easing into a rhythm all too familiar. Words were worthless as my eyelids met in adaptation and my father's scratched voice calmly passed over the fierce current of rage radiating from his deep wrinkled forehead.
"You can understand why I'm upset."
The rest is merely blurred flashes of broken glass and ash.
The elevator doors were reluctant to let my swaying height free from their grasp and into the cold tiled corridor. I admit disorientation was high as my head twisted left and right trying to decipher bears from lions. With a giant step forward I decided to let gravity decide my direction and continued onward into the rapidly stretching hall.
Tile melted into ceiling, and ceiling to space as my occipital lobe bounced up and down against the less than spectacular suspension of my newly crimson- enameled soles. Chances are my skin held no colour, not even a vein shown blue for all available blood was being deported to deep cuts at my lower right side and temple, trying desperately to clot quickly and prevent death by letting out, and therefore giving a new meaning to "stained glass." The way everything had turned out this broken skeleton was a gift greater than any one's god for even in its state of heavy disrepair it was still functioning, which meant that I was still, in fact, living.
A heavy sigh escaped into audibility but not from my own lungs.
The lions stared at me through stern sympathetic eyes that looked along my height, glancing left and right to time with the sways. The doorknob didn't even have to be taunted. It was as though the prideful beasts had accepted me as a member during my extended stay and opened the door on their own. Of which I was eternally grateful because there were way too many knobs to choose from. Heck, I ran straight into the door frame because it too had so many doubles that I wouldn't been surprised if all of them were equally as impenetrable.
My feet were saviours, that was for sure, the feat of not tripping over each other was one to be rewarded as a hand groped about far out in front and the other provided a cast of sorts for my slowly scabbing forehead. As if misjudged bureaus and side tables weren't enough the entire residence had a different air about it, which one couldn't entirely blame on the shot depth perception. The gray walls were untouched except for that oh so grand spot which idolized one little fit of rage, which seemed to be mysteriously missing. Each step across the polished cherry floorboards felt like a bed of nails piercing my soles with their sub zero points… or at least they did until a fair distance into the sitting area.
Earlier in the evening the entire scape of things had been blanketed by a sheer fragile dust because without any majour clients there was no reason to waste the time cleaning, making everything just so and gleaming for no ones eyes but my own. Besides what did I care if there was a mountain of dust and cobwebs in the stupid sitting room? The little area I had sectioned off for myself was almost too great a responsibility, and I could walk across that in two steps. The sitting area was at least seventeen.
But now every single surface was immaculate as though not a minute had passed from the first time he ever walked through the door. It was obvious that the kitchen had been used because one of the burner control knobs was off its line and the atmosphere was thick with some sort of ganache scent that wafted about the dimmed recess lighting overhead. Although with the way my eyes were cloning things it seemed like an opera stage rather than a room for simple conversation.
It was as though my eyes were choking on the strong smell of Colombian what ever for they lowered onto the equally as confusing scape of the coffee table which had promoted itself to guard in front of the eight gray chaises. From one item to the next the mystery slowly solved itself. A green swooping neck, which lent itself to a rather chic champagne, then to a delicate dessert of some sort which I could have sworn had employed a nuclear facility to decorate it's top in place of a simple raspberry.
From the striking ruby of the non-existent fruit my throat found itself the victim of a sharp inhale once I laid eyes on the toe of a fabulously elegant Prada oxford. It was as though electric currents had fried every dendrite through out its cortex home for I had only known one person to enjoy wearing shoes so exceptionally beautiful that the immense pain which came from their leather would be worth suffering through. One I never assumed would haunt this miserable residence ever again. He could have been missing his nose and I never would have assumed him to be different. The expanse of his height, that which was free from underneath his suit, was still pale if not more so and his eyes still shown that eerie wondrous blue, which could never fail to rattle my spine, even greater than my father's thundering fists. It was this moment that made seeing double the greatest medical ailment, for he was graced with multiple sets of irises and multiple ways to make my chest implode.