Chapter 33

"Wally," Shayera said in a warning tone as she and Batman approached the zeta tube to beam down to Earth with the Flash so that they could investigate the swamp around the Legion of Doom's headquarters for clues as to John's mysterious battle with Sinestro.

"I trust you'll be calling me by my name on this mission," Shayera said with a deadly glare. "Instead of 'baby,'" she growled.

"Geez, Shayera, they say people start to look alike after they've been dating for awhile, but you're starting to sound like Bats!" the Flash observed with a grin.

Shayera raised an eyebrow and crossed her arms, but Batman's lips twitched.

"Don't call me baby," the Flash growled out in a low, rumbling voice deep in his chest, imitating Batman and Shayera, both.

"Not if you want to live," Bats added in his trademark gravel, making both Shayera and Wally start to giggle as Batman nodded to the tech to beam them down.

"You'll meet us in Gotham?" Batman asked the Flash as they re-materialized in the cornfields south of Central City.

"Sure things, Batsy!" Flash beamed. "Bet I can beat ya there!" he added, taking off with a zoom.

Shayera rolled her eyes as she picked her fiancé up and began flying towards Gotham.

"Bet he shits his pants if he has to wait around for us before we get there," Shayera laughed in Batman's ear. "Gotham is no Central City," she said, making Bats chuckle in appreciation.

"I love how quickly you've learned that," he said back to her as she flew quickly through the air.

"I love that I learned it within the first three minutes of being in town the day I came to visit you," Shayera laughed. "Did you know I had to beat off a mugger while I was talking on the phone to Alfred?" she said.

"Me! With my wings and mace clearly visible!" she said, shaking her head in what appeared to Batman to be both admiration and respect for the crooks in his town rather than disgust.

Which was only one of the many reasons why Shayera delighted him.

"John took the news of our engagement well," Bats said to her.

"I'll say," Shayera sighed in relief. "I'm sure he's upset, but at least he was able to keep that to himself. Probably helped that Mari was there," she said and Bats grunted his agreement.

"Mari's good for him," Bats observed. "Not that you weren't," he said, twisting his head to meet Shayera's eyes with kindness reflected in his own.

She gave him a sad smile.

"I could have been better," she said quietly. "He didn't deserve for me to be engaged behind his back," she said. "Even though I had been on Earth by myself for so long and even if I'd almost given up hope that my people would ever come. I shouldn't have done that to John," she said softly.

"I was weak," she muttered.

"You were lonely," Batman countered. "In a difficult situation that you were manipulated into by your fiancé."

"Still," Shayera said heavily. "I was wrong."

"Yes," Bats said, "but I think we both know that you were doing the best you could, Shy. I wouldn't be surprised if John knows that, too, despite how much it hurt him."

"Why are you so forgiving of me?" Shayera mused over her Bat's shoulder.

"You're not a bad person," Batman said to her. "Even if you did some bad things at a bad time in your life."

She sighed and rubbed her cheek against his, squeezing his chest a little tighter in a hug as she carried him through the air.

"I love you," Shy told Batman, resting her chin on his shoulder.

"Stop thinking that you don't deserve me," he answered her in his trademark growl.

"How did you know that's what I was thinking?" she burst out in shock, getting a smirk back from her Bat.

"Because I'm Batman," he said, almost playfully for him, making her chuckle.

"And, because I love you," Bats said more seriously, although his voice was still warm. "You're getting easier to read," he commented.

Shayera smiled.

"So are you," she said. "J'onn was concerned that I had developed telepathic powers because of how well I can translate your grunts now," she said, and that made her Bat actually laugh out loud.

Except it came out like a grunt.

Wally was nervously pacing back and forth when Shayera set down with Batman on the deserted road outside of town that led to the Batcave.

The Bat had directed the Flash to wait there for them when Wally had indeed beaten them to Gotham only to promptly call over the comms in a panic asking why he saw so many crimes being committed in broad daylight.

"Some town, Bats!" the Flash said with huge eyes as Bats and Shayera approached him.

"What's the deal?" Wally demanded. "This little old lady tried to rob me at gunpoint!"

"Gotham is like Thanagar," Shayera responded.

"If Thanagar was in the Wild West," Batman corrected gravely.

"True," Shy said, tipping her head to the side. "We had law and order in Thanagar."

Wally shivered.

"No wonder you're so grumpy all the time," he said to Batman, peering at the detective in wonder as if the outer layer of the Bat's personality suddenly made sense.

"Wait here for us," Batman instructed him. "We need to go get the Batwing."

"No! Don't leave me here alone!" Wally pleaded.

"There's no one out here, Wally!" Shayera scolded him.

"You're the Flash," Batman growled with disgust.

"I think you can handle an empty road," Shy said patronizingly.

Wally whimpered pathetically but Shy paid him no mind as she picked Bats back up and began flying towards one of the hidden entrances to the Batcave.

"The road better not win," Batman barked at the Flash from the air.

Shayera snorted.

"Reached your maximum capacity for visitors to the Batcave this week?" she teased him.

Bats groaned.

"If one more person tries to come into my cave," he grumbled. "Lois. Diana. Clark, but he's always been a pain in my ass," he complained. "That's nothing new."

Shayera hummed sympathetically.

"Good call to not let the Flash in," she said. "He's so much of a chatterbox, the whole League would know everything there is to know about the Batcave before he'd been back on the Watchtower for ten minutes."

"Exactly," Batman huffed. "And then he'd start giving secret tours during our patrols."

"No," Shayera said confidently. "He'd try, but everyone would be too scared of you to accept."

"As they should be," Batman muttered to her broad smile.

Wally had succeeded in outsmarting the dirt road and was still alive when they returned in the Batwing to pick him up, and it wasn't long before the heroes were heading towards the secluded Legion of Doom headquarters buried deep in a Louisiana swamp.

"So, you remember where you found John, right?" Shayera asked the Flash as they drew closer to their destination.

"Yep," he said. "Well," he paused, thinking it over. "Yep," he said again.

Batman gave him a side-eyed look.

"I remember, I remember," he protested.

"You'd better," Shayera said. "Because I'm not saying it would be impossible to find the spot based on John's memory that J'onn put in my head, but…"

"It would be almost impossible," Batman said, glaring at Wally.

"I can find it," the Flash promised. "It hasn't rained since yesterday," he said, "so we can retrace my trail."

"Retrace your trail?" Shayera said, turning to look at him.

"Sure," Wally said, chewing on his bubble gum. "When I ran at super speed through the swamp, it smashed the vegetation down to the ground. We can follow it back to where I found GL, because I know where the Princess and Green Arrow were waiting for us relative to the headquarters and I know where I came out of the swamp on my approach," he said.

"Trust me, it'll be a piece of cake," he said.

Batman looked thoughtful but didn't say anything else until they were in range.

"Batwing to Justice League-occupied LoD headquarters," he said into the comms. "We're on our approach."

"Well, howdy, pardner!" they heard back on the other end of the comms. "Vigilante here, keeping the peace at the L-o-D Corral. All quiet out on the range, y'all," he said. "You are cleared for landing."

"Copy that," Batman said, not managing to shut the comms off before Wally had let out a hearty "Yeeeeee-haw!" at the tail end of his transmission.

"Yipyipyip-aiiiiii," they heard back from Vig, making Batman groan and Shayera chuckle.

Vigilante was strolling out of the cloaked headquarters to meet them by the time they landed, followed by Supergirl.

"Hi, guys!" Kara said brightly. "Back so soon?" she said as Wally moved forward to give her a hug and Vigilante a high five that dissolved into an elaborate hand-clapping, thigh slapping salute.

"We need to investigate a few things out in the swamp," Shayera said when it looked like Batman was going to ignore Supergirl's chatty question as irrelevant to his mission of the day.

"Well, y'all need any help, just give us a holler," Vig said. "How's the green space sheriff doin'?" he asked.

"Better," Shayera said gratefully. "Conscious and resting. Just got knocked out," she said, not wanting to divulge too much information.

"Good," Kara said. "Tell him we're thinking of him," she smiled.

"Will do, Supergirl," the Flash beamed.

"We're wasting daylight," Batman grunted sourly, making Wally and Kara roll their eyes at each other while Vig let out a slow chuckle.

"You tell 'em, cowboy," Vig said, tipping his hat to the Bat. "Rope those strayin' doggies and bring 'em back to mama," he said.

Shayera looked at him blankly but refused to ask.

"Let's get started," she said to Wally, instead, gently pulling the Flash away from Supergirl who he looked ready to settle down into a long gossipy chat with.

"Ok, ok," Wally sighed.

"So," he said. "We were around the corner," he said, trotting around the side of the building at an actual human pace so that Batman and Shayera could keep up.

"We met up here where my team was stationed after the battle was over," he said, leading them to a small clearing.

"Wonder Woman's team came in from the north," he said, pointing, "and GL and Supergirl and the rest of their team were south, right across from the front door," he said.

"Their strategy was to flush any escapees towards me rather than let them get around the other side of the building," he explained. "And my team sent any overflow to Diana. The only one who broke the pattern was Sinestro who went straight for GL instead of trying to escape," he said.

"But with what motive?" Shayera frowned. "Revenge, or was it a deliberate plan?" she said and Batman nodded in approval of the question.

"I came out of the swamp… there," Wally said, motioning to the spot after briefly glancing around the clearing. "You can see where I went in over there," he added, pointing to his left.

Batman grunted but Shayera frowned.

"Where?" she asked.

The whole stretch of swamp looked the same to her without any obvious differences. Wally trotted over to point it out to her.

"Look down here on the ground," he said. "See how these weeds are flattened?" he asked her.

"That's a very narrow strip," Shy said in surprise. "I thought it would be more obvious."

"It is obvious," Wally shrugged. "To me, anyway," he grinned at her. "See, look," he said, lifting his hand to point further down the path.

"The weeds are flattened wherever my feet touched down," he said. "But it's spaced out the way my paces are when I'm running," he explained. "Once you start looking for it, it gets easier to notice," he said, patting Shy kindly on the shoulder.

She gave him a look of newfound respect, marveling at the speedster's attention to detail, which, frankly, she had never had an opportunity to notice before.

"Let's retrace your steps backwards," Batman said. "Where did you emerge from?" he said.

"Over here," Wally said, lightly running back over to the path. "See, Shayera," he said to the Thanagarian, "the blades are flattened in the opposite direction on this path," he said. "Towards us. Because I was running towards the clearing," he said.

"We just have to follow it back, but I'll probably remember sort of where it was once we get close," he said.

"Don't step on the path," he cautioned, moving off to the side.

Shy glanced at Batman, picked him up, and began slowly flying, following the Flash who was jogging through the swamp at a fairly quick pace, scanning ahead for his trail but seeming to find it without much trouble.

Shayera, for her part, couldn't tell what she was looking at from the air, but Batman had put binoculars up to his eyes and seemed to know what he was seeing.

At a few points Wally paused, circling around while looking for his marks, but then got his bearings and led them on. Once, Batman called to him from the air and pointed out the path, earning a cheerful thanks from the Speedster.

"We should be getting close," Wally called up some time later.

"How can you tell?" Shy yelled down to him before descending a little bit so they could hear each other better.

"I know about how many seconds I was running for," Wally said, "and how fast I was running. So I could calculate how far away GL was from the headquarters and I've been tracking our distance," he said, holding up his wrist that had a sports monitor around it.

Once again, Shayera found herself staring at Wally with a certain amount of surprise and wonder. It wasn't that she disrespected the Flash as a teammate or begrudged him his position as a Founding member of the Justice League; on the contrary, Shayera was fully aware of Wally's tactical capabilities in battle and appreciated the unique gifts that he brought to the team.

But as far as his brains went? Shy found herself feeling slightly ashamed. Wally was just so… silly, she thought to herself. He acted as if he had no brains. Yet he seemed to have this mission down, she realized, and had come prepared.

"Was the Green Lantern in the air when Sinestro launched the tree at him?" Batman asked Shayera, who nodded. "See if you can fly at about that height and keep your eyes peeled," he told her.

They had only gone a few hundred yards more before Wally was waving them over.

"This is it," he said with complete confidence. "You can see where GL was slumped down against the tree, here," he said, showing them the spot in the weeds.

"A lot of the more flexible weeds have already rebounded," Wally was explaining to Shayera, without being asked, "but see how some of the sharper stalks have snapped?" he said to her.

"And here's my trail leading up to GL," he said, motioning to his path, "those weeds are still flattened because of my speed," he said. "I basically killed them," he grinned.

And indeed, Shayera could finally see some of the differences that he was referencing. But how Wally could see everything so clearly and so quickly, she had no idea.

"The Flash is CSI," Batman murmured to her.

She turned to look at him.

"Crime Scene Investigation," the Bat said. "Forensics expert. It's his day job."

"Oh!" Shayera said, completely stunned now. "I didn't know that, Flash," she said slowly.

"Well, some of us were told to keep our identities secret," he fussed, pouting at Batman. "Until it turned out that Spooky here knew them all already. I still can't believe you're -" Batman slapped his hand over the Flash's mouth and glared at him furiously.

"Anyone could be listening," he snapped at him. "Which is exactly why we never discuss our identities in public."

"Sorry," Wally mumbled when Batman finally freed his mouth.

"Is there a downed tree?" Batman said, after a final glare, turning around in a circle. "And is it where it should be?" he added.

"There," Shayera said, pointing. "And…" she turned to her left, "that's where it was uprooted from."

"Same as the Lantern's memory?" Batman asked her, but she was frowning.

"No," she said, moving closer. "It's similar," she said, eyeing it. "But it's not exactly the right size. GL's was thicker," she said. "And… the leaves are wrong, I think," she added.

"Unless someone has a photographic memory, which the Green Lantern doesn't," Batman said, "memories are imperfect. Especially in situations of stress. Plus, he didn't get more than a few seconds to see the tree coming towards him and react to it before he was caught by Sinestro and knocked out. If that's what really happened," he said.

"So it may not be significant that there are some differences between his memory and the reality," Batman said. "Do you remember seeing the downed tree yesterday, Flash?" Batman asked him.

"I don't know," Wally admitted, chewing on his lip. "I was too caught up in looking for GL and then when I found him I was worried he was dead at first," he said, rubbing the back of his neck.

"All I cared about was finding him and getting him back to the base. I wasn't looking around at the time," he said.

Batman sighed but didn't chastise the speedster, because it wasn't like it was his fault that he'd been focused on the more important task at hand when he'd been searching for John.

"I can tell you this, though," Wally said, moving forward and looking at the tree trunk laying on the ground more intently before turning to look at where it had been pulled up from.

He hesitated for a moment.

"In GL's memory, Sinestro pulled this tree up and threw it at him with a lot of force, right?" he asked Shayera.

"Yes," she said. "Well, GL didn't see him pull it up, but it was hurled across his path with tremendous force and speed."

Wally shook his head.

"Then we got a mystery on our hands, Bats," he said, looking at the detective. "Because this tree wasn't thrown. It was placed here."

"What do you mean?" Batman said sharply.

"Look at this," Wally said, motioning him and Shayera forward. "If the tree had been thrown with a lot of force, all these lower branches would have been sharply snapped off when it landed," he said, motioning to the ones closest to the ground as he dropped numbered evidence markers next to the ones he saw as significant.

"And some of the smaller branches would have gone flying," he added as he slowly walked around the trunk.

"But these branches are more gently broken," he said, "and only on one side, as if the trunk was gently lowered to ground and then it rolled a little bit to accommodate the branches on the backside. You can tell because of the splinter pattern," he said, pointing it out as he dropped some more markers.

"Also, the ground would have been heavily indented from where the tree landed and it would have slid some, too, with as much as it weighs and as hard as you say Sinestro threw it. You can see that the ground is barely depressed," he said, indicating, "and there's not any skid marks anywhere."

"What the hell," Shayera muttered, staring at Bats and then at Wally before looking back at the tree in confusion.

"And," Wally said, "I don't know all the mechanics of the Lantern rings, but it's still physics," he said, "when they throw something. They need a wind-up of momentum in order to get the force and velocity they want."

"See where the trunk was pulled out of the ground?" the Flash said, walking them a little distance away to the gaping hole, which he also marked.

"It's a clean, even hole on all sides, meaning the tree was pulled straight up into the air. In the heat of battle, Sinestro would have had to yank the tree out to the left and then hurl it to the right in order for it to land as far away from the hole as it did," he explained.

"Conclusion? This tree was planted," he said with a wink and a smirk, making Shayera groan out loud at his pun.

But Batman clapped a hand on Wally's shoulder.

"Well done, Flash," he said sincerely, causing the Speedster to turn as red as his uniform at the Bat's rare words of praise.

"Yes, great job, Flash," Shayera echoed, staring at him in awe. "I'm very impressed."

"I give a whole new meaning to the term, 'don't quit your day job,'" Wally boasted, regaining a little bit of his bluster as he twirled around in place before lifting his camera up from where he had it strapped around his body so he could begin taking evidence photos.

"So, who placed the tree here as false evidence, then?" Shayera said, frowning again. "And why?"

"And who gave GL a fake memory?" Wally added as he snapped pictures. "J'onn said he should have had mental scars from a mind invasion and he doesn't."

"And given that the rest of his memory is a fake, he may not have been injected with sodium pentothal at all," Batman said. "Which means that something else knocked him out. We should have the bloodwork and urine test results by tonight so we'll know for sure if it was pentothal."

"Dr. Psycho is a possible suspect," Batman continued, "given that he could have both uprooted the tree with his telekinesis and planted a false memory, although how he managed to do so without scarring GL's mind, I don't know. Perhaps J'onn can provide us with more answers on that puzzle."

"Either Star Sapphire or Sinestro could have moved the tree, though," Shayera pointed out. "Since Star Sapphire was a no-show yesterday and Sinestro was on the loose fighting with John."

"Someone with magical abilities could have done both the telekinesis and the memory alteration as well," Batman said, thinking out loud. "Tala was the only magician in the Legion of Doom. But there's Enchantress and Faust to think about," he sighed. "Neither of whom are in Arkham at the moment."

"And there's probably some Greek beings with powers that Diana and the Amazons have dealt with who could be suspects," Shayera said.

"Also, Morgaine le Fey," Wally added. "She was in the past, but hey, we've been to the past before. And the future."

"We can't rule anyone out who has the powers to do even one of the tasks," Batman agreed, "since it could have been a team effort. We'll have to assemble a complete list of suspects back at home," Batman said to Shayera, who smiled at him and made Wally "Awwwwwww."

"You guys live together now?" he cooed over to them as he walked around picking up his evidence tags, having finished documenting his findings.

Shy caught Batman's eye and then said, "We're engaged, actually."

"What?" Wally gasped. "No way! Does Diana know? Does GL know? Does everybody know except me?"

"J'onn doesn't know yet," Shayera said. "And Clark was sleeping, but we told Lois."

"I know before Poppa and Daddy?" Wally squealed. "I am the favorite!" he crowed, doing a little happy dance.

"Favorite son," Batman muttered. "Not favorite Founder."

"Now, Bats, we both know I'm both," Wally beamed at him.

"Do you want an engagement photo?" he asked them. "I could take it right here," he offered. "You could sit on the tree!" he said, bouncing up and down.

"The detective and his assistant -" "Warrior," Shayera frowned - "Warrior Watson," Batman amended, kissing her cheek - "- working the case together," Wally finished, ignoring the couple's interruptions.

Batman was about to scoff and say no, but he hesitated when he saw the way that Shayera's eyes were lighting up a little bit as she considered Wally's offer while she looked over at the tree.

"Come on," Batman said to her, holding his hand out. "Let's do it."

"Really?" she said to him, looking startled but not at all displeased.

"Yes," he said, leaning forward to kiss her in lieu of breaking his Batman mold and accidentally smiling in front of the Flash.

"Yay!" Wally exclaimed. "Let's take a lot!"

"You said one," Batman tried to protest but the Flash was already tugging Shayera over to put her in position for the first shot.

"I have so many poses in mind that we can do!" Wally was beaming. "Shayera, you perch here like a little birdie -" "- what?" said Shayera, turning to stare at him, "and Bats, come here, stand on your head like you're hanging upside down from the branches," the Flash ordered him.

Batman and Shayera both slowly turned to stare at the Flash in a similarly frightening way.

He gulped.

"Or, um, you could just sit down next to each other," he mumbled.

"We'll do that," Batman snarked with twelve times more attitude than was strictly necessary.

"Yeah," said Shayera, glaring at Wally.

"Do… do you want to smile for the photos?" he whispered nervously as they sat down. "But posing angry is ok, too," he said quickly.

Shayera sighed and rolled her eyes as she looked over at her Bat to silently communicate some disdain towards Wally, not realizing that the Flash was surreptitiously snapping photos already as she and Batman made eye contact in a way that made Wally wonder if he had hallucinated their earlier compliments towards him.

But then Shayera was leaning in and kissing Bats, and that was awfully sweet, so he took some pictures of that, too, and then she turned to face the camera again and laid her head on his shoulder while he wrapped his arm around her waist under her wings.

And Batman wasn't exactly smiling, but he wasn't exactly frowning, either, and Shayera had a tiny smile on her face, so Wally dutifully took the not-as-cute shots.

"I'll email them to you later today," he said when they stood, deciding for him that the brief photo shoot had come to an end.

"And the evidence ones," Batman said, and Wally nodded.

"Did y'all find what you were lookin' for?" Vigilante asked the trio as they popped their heads inside the cloaked base to say good-bye before heading out.

"We got some useful information," Batman said. "Keep us posted of any activity here at the base," he said.

"Roger that, good buddy," Vig said, tossing off a salute.

"Come on, Wally," Shayera sighed.

"Bye, Kara," she added as she walked over to the pair so she could grab Wally's hand to literally tug him away from the teenager who he was talking a mile a minute to, apparently deep in the throes of a dramatic conversation despite having only just arrived back at base.

"Text me the rest!" Wally called as he allowed himself to be dragged off to the Batwing. "And tell Janet that Kurt is a no-good punk and she can do better!"

Kara nodded, her thumbs already flying over her phone almost as fast as she could fly through the air, making Wally's phone buzz with a flurry of incoming messages.

"Well, that was a productive mission, at least," Shayera said once the Batwing was back in the air and they were on their way back to Gotham. "Even if it left us with more questions."

"Can you drop me off at the zeta tube?" Wally asked them. "Or in Central City? Or Metropolis?"

Batman turned around to give him a look.

"What?" Wally said. "You're the one who doesn't like metas in Gotham, Bats, and from now on I will back you up on that one hundred percent," Wally said firmly.

"No metas in Gotham. Especially not speedsters. Nuh uh," he said. "Gotham is a no-speed zone. No-meta zone. Grumpy Bat only zone."

"Grumpy Bat and Gotham Gargoyle only zone," Shayera corrected. "Oh, you should see my new mask, Wally!" she said with excitement. "It's way scarier than my old one," she said cheerfully.

"And way hotter," Batman smirked with pride.

"Do I have to come to Gotham to see it?" Wally said.

"Yes," said Shayera.

"I'll pass," he said promptly. "Send me a selfie."

"Superheroes don't take selfies," Batman growled at him.

"They… don't?" Wally asked slowly.

"No," Batman growled.

"Is… that a Gotham City only rule?" Wally asked him even more hesitantly.

"No," Batman said, really turning around to look at him sharply. "Photos can compromise our identities," he said, like it should be obvious.

"The ones you took of me and Shayera are only for us," Batman said with a strongly implied threat in his voice. "In fact," he said, holding his hand out, "give me the data card," he said.

"They're expensive!" Wally protested.

"I'll buy you more," Batman said. "Card. Now," he said.

"I have other photos on there," Wally grumbled as he nonetheless obediently pulled the memory card out and handed it to Batman.

"Hopefully not nudes!" Shayera said cheerfully.

"No," Wally sulked.

"Good. Then I'll send you the rest," Batman said, unable to repress a slight shudder at the thought of stumbling across nudes of the Flash.

"And… we'll drop you in Central City," Batman sighed, not wanting to admit it but feeling the slightest bit bad about the sad puppy routine that Wally was now giving him.

"Here," the Bat added, flipping down a compartment on the Batwing dashboard and taking out a wad of cash, which he handed to Wally.

"Buy some new memory cards. And dinner," he added.

"And a Lamborghini," Wally said, lighting up at the amount of money that Batman had just handed him.

Batman sighed but he couldn't deny that he liked the soft way that Shayera was smiling over at him now. Or the fact that Wally was looking less melancholy and positively cheerful as he counted the cash that he'd just been handed.

"We'll see you later, Wally," Shayera said when they dropped him off a little later.

"Bye, guys!" Wally said with a grin, pleased to be safe and sound in Central City instead of shaking in his boots in Gotham.

Batman gave him a little nod before lifting the Batwing back up and into the air.

"Why did you say 'yes' to the engagement photos with Wally?" Shayera asked him gently once they were alone. "If you're that against taking photos in the masks?"

Batman looked at her.

"You wanted them," he said simply.

And as warmth flooded Shayera's heart and overflowed into her smile and her eyes as she gazed, awe-struck, at her Bat, she realized in that moment that she had never in her life been so loved - not by Hro and not even by John, who had one of the biggest hearts of anyone she'd known.

She still didn't think that she deserved any goodness in her life after the terrible things that she'd done - but she was beyond grateful that her grumpy Bat thought differently.