Part 7 The Lawyer

He was twenty and he had finagled himself into the head of cybersecurity division at the Gotham City Police Department six months prior. He'd thought it to be the perfect storm of opportunity: a city so riddled with crime and with such high turnover that he could get hired on the basis of his personal projects alone, since he had no degree nor even diploma, but the complexities of which would prove to be a challenge only someone such as himself could solve. And he had! He had solved the problem of the GCPD's tendency to 'lose' evidence, he had solved the problem of surveillance equipment failing in areas the cops were known to be dirty, and he had fixed the ridiculously shoddy code his moronic predecessor was using as an excuse for server security. He had spent an hour explaining it all to that dolt Commissioner Loeb, backed up with prototypes and data he had spent all of his work hours and then some collecting, and what he had done afterward had been worse than if he had laughed Edward out of his office. He had stared at Edward as though he had suddenly transformed into one of the drooling gibbons the GCPD usually hired, and then he had told Edward he was crazy.

He was sitting at his desk as he had been doing since then, head in his hands with only his monitor for light. The person who had left last had not noticed him there. Captain Gordon passed in front of him to collect his car keys from his desk and stood there for a moment. Edward could feel his eyes on him but he ignored them. That was, until Gordon said,

"Are you all right, son?"

It was as though a spike had been driven through his chest. He glared into his monitor. Jim Gordon was the most suspicious cop of all. Him and his daughter were too good to be true. They were both as dirty as they came, he knew it! Barbara roamed the GCPD at will and nobody stopped her because they thought her harmless, but Edward knew the truth. He'd seen her poking around with that laptop of hers. They were untrustworthy and this was a ploy by Gordon that he was not going to fall for. He could take his false kindness and shove it up his ass, followed promptly by his car keys.

"I'm fine," he said shortly.

Had he been fine? Was that the turning point that had led him to where he was now? If he had given Gordon a different answer, would he have ever become the Riddler at all?

I don't regret being the Riddler.

No. No, he didn't. While he could admit that large aspects of it were akin to… running in place, so to speak, he had still accomplished things no one ever had before and would never, ever come close to doing again. His was an incomparable life.

Any further thoughts he may have been about to have were interrupted by the clank of keys and the voice of an officer saying, "Your lawyer's here."

He nodded and followed the man to the designated interview room. Sabrina was standing inside already, arms folded, across from the door. "You need me to cuff him, ma'am?" the officer asked, to which Edward rolled his eyes. He was cooperating! He'd been cooperating this entire time!

"No," said Sabrina. "He won't be any trouble."

"If you say so," said the officer, but he did turn around and exit, closing the door behind him. Because he was being so cooperative, Edward sat down at the table without being prompted. Sabrina had never seemed to find him intimidating, but whomever was keeping an eye on the camera feed would no doubt take his choosing to stand as a physical power play and that would not reflect favourably on him later. Sabrina, still in her chosen corner, did not so much as remove her purse from her shoulder.

"You said you were leaving."

Edward folded his hands together politely. "I am. There's… some things I need to clear up first."

"That involve getting arrested? For kidnapping? Again?"

"She wasn't kidnapped," Edward said. "I merely prevented her from going anywhere and asked her nicely not to cause a fuss. I asked her to call the police on me."

"Give me a reason to defend you."

"You're my lawyer and it's what I pay you to do?"

"No," said Sabrina, pointing rather aggressively with one index finger. Her nails were a shade from lavender. "I was your lawyer. You paid my severance the last time. Remember?"

"Well, I have need of you again."

"No."

His brow creased of its own accord. "What do you mean, no?"

"I mean no." She folded her arms. "I only came here to see if you had, somehow, gotten caught up in someone else's crime, but no. Targeting the commissioner's daughter? Really?"

"I had to!" Edward protested. "I'm here for a reason, Sabrina! And it isn't because I intend to return to a life of dubiously illegal activities. But my success requires your help."

"Really," said Sabrina, looking unconvinced. "So why haven't you given me a reason yet?"

"I… can't," Edward said. "Too many eyes and ears here."

"Then no," said Sabrina. "I'm sorry, Edward, but I'm afraid I can't in good conscience put you back on the street."

"You're listening to your conscience now?" This was the worst possible timing!

"I used to believe," said Sabrina, "that it was better for you to keep you out of the penal system. Prison isn't going to rehabilitate you. A mental institution will just teach you even more ways to manipulate people. I honestly hoped that one day you would realise just how much of your own potential you've wasted and that you would quit to do something productive with your life. And when you told me you were doing it for the sake of your kids, I was happy for you. I was happy that my faith had paid off. And now you're here. Again." She shook her head. "I'm not helping you this time. Don't call me again."

Fine. Fine. He didn't need her. He would enlist some other lawyer, and have them help him, and then –

No. No, it had to be Sabrina. Not only would no other lawyer do, he couldn't even be certain he could acquire another one. Before her he had been shuffled between tired public defenders, none of which could be bothered to read his dossiers, much less keep him out of prison. Sabrina had fought for him. Several times. She must still care what happened to him.

The disrespect she had just shown him, though! He couldn't stand for that, couldn't let her get away with that! He had to –

No. That was wrong. It was the opposite. Sabrina had always shown him respect by telling him the truth. Always, all the way back to the day she had defended him in court based solely off the OCD he had denied having.

Sabrina had been naïve. He'd told her not to be, but she hadn't listened. And it was because of that refusal that she had kept showing up all these years, waiting for the day that he would prove to her that her loyalty had been worthwhile and he was not a lost cause who was willing to throw his life away in the pursuit of something he would never have.

Her hand was on the doorknob. She was leaving and he hadn't even noticed. "Sabrina!" he shouted, standing up. "Wait."

She sighed but did not turn the handle. "What."

"I told you the truth," he said. "I am leaving. But there truly are things I need to take care of first. One of those things only you can accomplish. I got myself arrested on purpose. I will tell you why, but not here."

"You want me to trust you," she said to the door.

"Have I given you a reason not to? Personally, I mean."

She turned around. She was frowning. "You have a point," she said. He leaned forward, palms planted firmly on the tabletop.

"I'm not staying in Gotham a minute longer than I need to," he insisted in a low voice, doing his best to hold her eyes. "But to get where I'm going, I need you to help me."

"And your kids?"

For some reason he was now staring down at the table. It was metal, burnished with what was probably years of fingerprints. The thought sent a wave of revulsion through him and he folded up his hands so that the tops of his fists were what was touching it. "Two of them are gone," he said quietly. Moreso than he'd meant to be. "The third I sent away to wait until it was time to leave."

"What do you mean by 'gone'?" Sabrina asked, a little more gently but not by much. "The mother took them? They left on their own?"

He shook his head.

"They're… dead?"

"I was… arranging to leave when my son was killed by the GCPD."

She sighed, somewhat resignedly this time. "Okay." She pulled the chair out and sat down. "What is this thing apparently only I can do for you?"

"I need you to clear my name."

She stared at him. He stared back so she would know he was completely serious. "Edward," she said after a minute, "I will admit that keeping you in as little trouble as possible has made me a damned good lawyer. But I'm not that good. You have priors. I can't just make them go away."

"Actually, you can," Edward told her. "I will give you what you need to do it."

She raised her eyebrows. "What, do you have blackmail on everyone in Gotham's legal system?"

He shook his head. "No blackmail. A loophole."

She tapped her thumbs together, thinning her lips. Her lipstick was also a shade from lavender, but in the opposite direction. "I won't lie to you," she said. "I am incredibly curious about this magic bullet of yours."

"You're the only one I can entrust it to," Edward said. "Anyone else will merely use it for their own purposes."

"But you can't tell me what it is."

"I can't tell you what it is here," Edward corrected. "I will once in your office."

"And your plan for getting into my office?"

"I will give you a phone number. The person on the other end can post my bail."

Sabrina removed her phone from the side pocket of her purse. "What is it?"

As she dialled, Edward sat back down. "Hello," Sabrina said into the handset. "I'm Sabrina, Edward Nygma's lawyer. He says you'll be able to post his bail?"

He tapped his third finger on the table impatiently before remembering he should be trying not to touch it.

"She says you owe her something for it."

"One half is in her post office box," he droned, annoyed she hadn't received it already, "and the other I will give to her once I am at home."

Sabrina relayed the message. "She'll post it once she checks her mail," she said, removing the phone from her ear and putting it away. "Looks like you'll have to sit tight in lockup until then."

"I know," said Edward. Sabrina stood up.

"If you are lying about your intentions to leave," she said, "or if I find out you're using your kids just to play on my sympathies, just remember: I have more than enough evidence to put you away for the rest of your life. All I have to do is give it to someone who has a vendetta against you which, trust me, is a lot of people."

He hesitated.

"I told my son we were leaving," Edward said to the table. "He was killed before we could do so, but there is still my daughter to think of."

"Where is she now?"

He was pressing his clasped hands into the tabletop. "I don't know. She left so I could… sort things out. I told I would come for her once I had."

"Did you mean it?"

Edward looked up at her, confused, but could glean nothing from her whatsoever. "Of course I did!"

"Fine," said Sabrina. "I'll help you. But this is the last time. If you call me again once this case is closed, I'm not answering."

"Understood," said Edward, and she got up again. "Thank you," he said, before she'd opened the door.

"Find your daughter, Mr Nygma."

"She may be better off where she is," he muttered bitterly, mostly to himself, but Sabrina, voice and expression even, said,

"Find her and ask her what she thinks."

/

"Nygma. Your bail's been posted," Commissioner Gordon said some hours later from somewhere above and behind him. He had no idea what time it was but he was exhausted. He was sitting on the floor with his back against the bars of the cage, eyes closed not because he'd been trying to sleep but because he had a terrible headache from the relentless fluorescent lights overhead. There was not one part of his body that did not want him to fix something about it right then and there.

"Thanks," said Edward, getting to his feet as Gordon opened the door. He stood in front of it so that Edward could not exit. He bit his tongue. He needed to play nice with these people now. His future success depended on it.

"Barbara isn't laying charges," Gordon told him. "Said you didn't really kidnap her. You happen to know what that's about?"

Oh yes, he'd convinced Barbara not to do so whilst he'd been sitting in lockup, listening to some drunkard retching in the corner. "I feel as though you should be asking her that question."

"Just curious." He stepped out of the way.

"That makes two of us," said Edward, though his own curiosity was cursory and automatic. He was not in the mood to solve any mysteries at the moment. "Excuse me, Commissioner, I have things to attend to."

He went first to retrieve his things. None of it had managed to disappear during his… he checked his phone. Twelve hours in lockup. He grimaced. So much time wasted. "Wait a minute," the desk clerk said. "We're letting you go?"

Edward shrugged, pocketing his wallet. "Apparently."

"Commissioner?" the clerk called, and Edward turned to see Gordon watching him from down the hall. He also shrugged.

"Someone posted his bail, son," he answered. "Not much we can do."

Edward smiled at the bewildered sop in front of him. "Isn't the legal system a wonder?" Without waiting for a response, he pulled on his jacket and left the building.

Now to make a phone call.

"Hello," he said without waiting for the person on the other end to respond. "I'm ready to be picked up."

"Sure thing," they said. "Ten minutes, tops."

So he would be home at about… three am. Not ideal, but it was out of his hands. Unfortunately, that thought only served to make him more uneasy. He was obviously not frightened, but strolling around in Gotham in the dead of night was just stupid. Any witnesses may even think him stupid for doing it.

The informant pulled into the parking lot within seven minutes, which should not have been a good sign but which he counted as being despite himself. The informant leaned across the seats to open the door. "It's in the backseat," the informant said, gesturing behind him as Edward fastened the seatbelt. He reached back to retrieve the box, about half the size of one which might be used to hold files. "Most of the stuff was under… uh… 'Nygma with an i', but there were a couple under the other spelling."

He shook his head a little, grimacing. Was no one ever going to spell his name right?" He had the box in his lap, about to be opened, when the informant handed him something. "Here," he said. Edward looked down at it. It was a cup of green tea from Starbucks. Glancing into the cupholder, he noted that the informant had himself a cup of what was probably coffee.

"Thank you," he said, with genuine gratitude.

"They keep it cold in lockup on purpose," the informant went on as Edward opened the door and threw the teabag into the parking lot. "And it's not tampered with or anything."

"Of course it isn't," Edward said, taking a drink. It had been steeping too long but the gesture had been thoughtful nonetheless. "That would have been incredibly stupid of you."

"I pushed my luck far enough today," said the informant. "Where're you headed?"

Edward gave him the address of an apartment building three blocks from his true location and, putting the drink into the free cupholder, lifted the lid off the box. The item on top gave him pause.

"They didn't get any of your fingerprints off that," the informant said, glancing over as he removed it from the box. "But better safe than sorry, right?"

"Indeed," said Edward, turning over the gun. It was Jonathan's Smith & Wesson. He'd be happy to have it back.

"All your clothes were gone." He squinted out the windshield at an indiscernible object on the road ahead of them. "I have no idea what happened to them."

"Someone takes them and sells them on eBay," Edward said, rifling through the rest of the box. Papers, mostly. A few samples of bodily fluids. He could feel the informant frowning at him.

"Really?"

"Mmhm." Honestly, that member of the GCPD was actually doing him a favour.

"What do you think people do with them?"

He shook his head. "That is one question I don't want an answer to."

The other man's eyes went wide. "You thinking like… a supervillain fetish? You think people do that with your clothes?"

"You must occupy a very sheltered alcove of the world." Edward replaced the lid of the box and picked up his cup. "Keep it that way."

"There was a cane on the evidence list, but that was missing too," said the informant. Edward nodded once. He'd expected that. They were the only things that sold faster on eBay than the trophies did. "How anyone got that thing out with no one noticing, I'll never know."

"They come apart," Edward said absently, his focus on the injunction Sabrina had filed against Cash for tasing him.

"You mean you make them in pieces and then screw them together?"

"Yes." After the lawsuit, why had the GCPD allowed Cash to go near him again? It was as though they liked being sued.

"I always wondered that," said the informant, and Edward had to stare at him a bit incredulously.

"Why?"

The informant shrugged. To his credit, he kept his eyes on the road. "I don't know. Just crossed my mind sometimes."

Edward shook his head. "Your mind must be an incredibly small place."

"That's what my wife tells me."

When they arrived at the address Edward had provided, he opened the door and moved to the right side of the chair, that foot positioned on the sidewalk and the box in a place for easy removal with his left hand for he stood up. He retrieved his drink and looked at it for a moment. Then he said, "You're going to want to get out of town. Within the next couple of days, ideally."

The informant looked uneasy for the first time. "Are you… turning me in?"

"Of course not," said Edward. "But I am about to do something that will spurn all sorts of people to start sniffing around. If you aren't here, you escape their scrutiny."

The informant took a long breath. "Okay. Next couple days, you said?"

"Ideally." And he got out with the tea and the box.

"Goodnight, Mr Nygma," said the informant. "Thanks for the warning."

"You're welcome." He closed the door with his foot and headed down the street.

After entering the apartment and putting the box down on the unoccupied portion of his desk, he sat down at the kitchen table and took a long drink of the tea. It was hedging lukewarm but he still wanted it. He was going to eat and then take a shower and go to bed.

He was exhausted, but sleep took hours to come and when it did it was not very restful. In the morning his glance at his phone told him he had managed a little under four hours. He considered staying in bed but reluctantly sat up. Routine was important. It was the foundation of ones' day. Exercise and then a shower and then breakfast.

After the shower, though, he needed a cigarette terribly, and he went outside to take care of that to find Selina lounging in one of his patio chairs, phone in one hand and espresso from the café down the street in the other. "How long have you been lying in wait for me?" he asked. She shrugged and sipped at her drink.

"You're not the only one with access to a police scanner, you know."

"Fair enough." He sat down on the edge of the table and lit the cigarette even though he couldn't smoke it now. "Is there a reason you waited for me to return and notice you as opposed to simply breaking in and searching for your missing document?"

"I wanted to give changing your mind a try." She put the cup into the crook of her crossed legs. Her jeans were very snug, but it was less effort than he had expected to look away. That didn't bode well for her likely plan of lowering his defenses until she could convince him to drop Jonathan for her. As much as he usually appreciated her combination of a turtleneck sweater, black parka, and white scarf, he doubted it was going to have the intended effect. Sure enough, she asked, "Where's Scarecrow?"

Watching the burning end of the cigarette, he allowed himself to toy with the idea of doing what she wanted. Just thinking about repairing things with Jonathan was making him tired. He and Selina more or less had a clean slate. They could start over as though nothing had ever happened between them. Friends with benefits once more.

"We're… on a break," he said finally, having to question why he was going to take grumpy old Jonathan Crane across the border with him when Selina was right here and willing. Oh, tabarnac. It was working.

"A break, huh," she said. "Here's an idea: let's you and me go, and if I'm that terrible you can come back and take him instead."

"I can't," he said, forcing his mind off of how fun and carefree those first few months with her had been. "I promised."

"Promised," she said, a teasing note in her voice. She was leaning forward a little but his imagination was behaving. "I didn't know you were big on those."

He tossed the end of the cigarette into the street. "I was when I made it."

"I know I let you down a long time ago," she said, "but that's what it was: a long time ago. Both of us are different now."

He almost laughed because it was true, though not in the hopeful way she seemed to mean it. Oh, sure, the road trip up north would be all fun and games, but she would drop him the second she realised he was even more of a broken-down mess than he'd been the first time. He knew that. He knew that hoping it would be any different when things were so much worse now was stupid and foolish. But she was sitting on the table next to him and her hand was on his leg and she was going to kiss him and he was going to let her because he wanted a reminder of a time he hadn't been beyond fixing. Of a time when he had not yet spent decades burning himself to the ground.

The jolt in his chest when their lips met was stronger than he had expected and it was… concerning. Just how stuck in the past was he? He shouldn't still be having these reactions to her! They were over and they had been over for years. And yet here he was, fighting the temptation to grip her around the shoulders and make this a whole lot more complicated than he could handle it being. He broke off the kiss and shook his head and stood up to get away from her. It was a damn good thing he was so tired. If he'd been firing on all cylinders she just might have gotten what she'd come there for. "You left," he said, turning away and silently requesting his lips cease their accursed tingling. "You made your choice."

"Eddie, come on," Selina said, and he could not say he did not deserve her exasperation. "You really can't get over it?"

"Name one time I've gotten over anything!" was what accidentally came out of his mouth, and before he said anything else as colossally idiotic he went inside and removed the side panel of the backup computer so he could retrieve the envelope hidden there. He returned to the patio and held it out to her without looking. "Your passport."

She took it slowly, as though she no longer wanted it. She stood up.

"Besides," Edward said, unable to keep the bitterness out of his words, "I'm not stupid. We both know you're only here because Wayne threw you away just as I said he would."

Selina looked up at him with something between shock and anger. Before his conscious mind really knew what was happening, his hand was catching her wrist because she had attempted to slap him. "I was the one who was going to hit you," he said, appalled at how much his free hand was shaking suddenly. He wanted to let go of her arm but he also wanted to grip it harder. His fingers seemed to be frozen in the state of doing neither. "Remember? That was what you said. That was why you left. And yet here we are. Explain this to me, Selina."

She opened her mouth but all she did was shake her head. Anger flooded his entire body. It was not fair. He had spent his entire life pushing the anger back down so that he would not do exactly what she had just tried to do. But she had given in at the first inkling of a thought. Why should he even bother? Perhaps he should just give up too, like she had and his father had. What was the point of trying so hard if nobody else could be bothered to make even a whisper of an attempt?

Because it was important. It was what ensured he did not become something he could not turn back from being. He was far too close already.

He let go of her wrist. Some part of him still wanted to push her away from him or to throw her arm aside so she would know not to dare try anything like that ever again, but it was small. He was all right. He was going to go inside and continue with his day and move on as though she had never been here.

"That's the only part you care about," Selina snapped. "You really have no idea the amount of bullshit I used to put up with from you every day, do you."

His legs were refusing to move all of a sudden.

"You remember the part where I left, but not the parts where you used to turn on a dime on me for no reason. The day before I left you blew up because I put my fucking shoes on the rack instead of in the closet where they 'belonged'."

Because she would have had three pair out and him one and that would have been four! And not only had he not needed a second pair out, there hadn't been space for them, so obviously –

"Yeah, I was afraid you were going to hit me. Because you would sit at your desk and break all your pencils and pens, and if I asked you what you were doing you would ignore me or tell me to shut up and leave you alone. How long was I supposed to wait to see if that was going to progress to you throwing things? To you throwing them at me? You always say you wouldn't have done it, but you don't know that. You don't know a damn thing about yourself."

A visceral fear that she was right coiled in the pit of his stomach.

"I wanted to believe that you having kids might've changed some things. Maybe forced you to understand how goddamn patient anyone has to be to be around you and how hard it is not to set you off. I was hoping that, I don't know, you'd started to think about how the people in your life don't exist just to further whatever crazy goals you've come up with this time. But I guess not. I guess you just want everyone to give up so you can be right about everyone failing you." Her boot was loud against the patio floor as she stepped forward. "I didn't just come here for my passport. I told someone I'd bring you something. You don't deserve it and I'd really rather not give it to you." There was a light shuffling of paper landing on the table behind him. "But I said I would. So there you go. Something else you can twist around in your memory to make yourself the victim and me the bad guy."

He didn't turn around until long after the sound of her footsteps had disappeared into the din of the city. When he did it was to find a slip of paper, folded in half, resting in about the middle of the table. He picked it up. Written on the inside was an address and that was all. He curled his fingers around it and sat down at the table with his head braced on his other hand. He had gotten… disproportionately upset about the shoes. Not just the shoes. That had been the worst time, but there had been the dishes, and the bedsheets, and the message written on the bathroom mirror in lipstick, and the coat she always threw on the couch instead of put in the closet, and…

Why on Earth had she ever lived with him at all? Almost every single day he had 'corrected' her about something she'd done which he had found unreasonable but which was, in most cases, perfectly fine. And she had put up with it. Until she couldn't. And he'd found that unreasonable too.

I want to give up.

What a stupid thought to keep having. And what a cop-out it would be if he could indulge it. He'd gotten himself into this mess and pushed everyone possible away while doing it, so he was going to have to figure out how to repair all of it.

But the threads tying Sabrina, Jonathan, and Selina to himself were doubtless frayed nearly to irreparable. Perhaps it was simply best to let them all go their separate ways. If he were the sinking ship, perhaps he should encourage them to man the lifeboats.

Or you can give them what they've been so patiently waiting for. A man worth believing in.

A tall order. He rubbed at his face.

Wouldn't you like to be that man?

Did he still have it in him?

Of course you do. You simply don't want it bad enough.

That was what Alan had thought.

He rubbed his eyes, then collected the slip of paper and went back inside. He tossed it in the general direction of his primary keyboard as he hoisted himself onto the corner of the desk where he had left the box. He needed to destroy the contents. Other than the Smith & Wesson, which he was now holding in both hands. Jonathan had taught him to fire it what felt like several lifetimes ago. When nothing had been as complicated. When the OCD had not been so difficult to handle. When it had been himself and Jonathan, two nobodies in a rented basement.

"Stay away from Jonathan Crane."

Oh, Lord.

"He's worse than you know. Remember, Edward. Your imprisonment is based on cybercrime. It's largely victimless. Crane has killed on a mass scale. Crane has tortured people for the sake of his twisted experiments."

"You should have told him to stay away from me."

That was the turning point. That was when he should have stopped. When Batman had told him to. It was so ironic he wanted to laugh. He couldn't, though. He was too tired.

All right. Enough about the past. He could deal with that later. The next step in his plans involved going to see Jonathan, though if he were lucky he would not actually have to see him. Jonathan had not ever made a big deal of Edward breaking up with him before, but he had been a bit… aggressive.

"He can't be mad at me for that," Edward said, dismounting from the desk. "And besides. He did hit me that one time, so really, we're even."

He apologised. Twice.

He grimaced. This probably was going to be complicated, then. Wonderful. Exactly what he needed right now.

One thing at a time, Eddie.

He picked up the gun and went into the bedroom to get dressed.

Author's note

Meta! Meta everywhere!

I don't have a good excuse for this delay other than the… 170 hours I spent playing American Truck Simulator during every minute of my free time. There was also the weekend I was going to write but I ended cleaning out my room instead. I sure do know how to have a good time.