She slid her chair around to the table opposite the counter along the west
wall and ran her hands over the strange metal machine that took up the
majority of the surface. Broken down into its simplest component, the
device was a blood analyzer that could also evaluate other types of fluids
and such. However that really was looking at it through a very narrow
scope. It was far more complex than that and as such; its result
definitively more accurate and telling.
As Barbara Gordon slid the small piece of cloth into the metal tray of the device, she prayed with everything in her for an easy answer. She feared otherwise however. For some reason or another, Harley had wanted her to find the stained fabric and that could only mean bad things.
"Barbara," Gibson mumbled from behind her. She blinked, having forgotten about the small young man who was such a dear friend to Helena. She turned and looked at him absently, with more than a hint of confusion in her green eyes. He seemed to understand quickly so for once he dispensed with the words and merely settled for pointing.
She followed his gesture downwards and saw that the phone sitting on the table was blinking. She purposely kept the ringer on the cordless in the lab silent in order to assure complete quiet when she was working. Right now, a strange rumbling in her gut told her she rather wished there wasn't a phone in the room at all.
"Right," she mumbled, reaching out for the black cordless phone. She paused just above it for a few moments and then finally, reluctantly grasped it. She punched a button on it and lifted it to her ear. "He..hello?"
"Barbara Gordon," the voice on the other side practically purred. "Oh I was so hoping you'd answer. Just never know these days. People are so rude." She laughed at her own joke and then waited for Barbara to speak. After a few moments, the insane former therapist pushed ahead. "Did you like my present? You know I've been taking a class in photography. How to make the largest impact possible."
Barbara reached her hand down and gripped the armrest of her chair. She pressed her nails into the leather pad, piercing the fabric. She grit her teeth hard, her muscles tensing and turning into hard controlled rock. Gibson saw the change in her demeanor and took a step towards her. She shook her head at him. "Harley," she growled, eyes turning into angry slits.
"Surprise," the blonde laughed. 'It's me."
Barbara swallowed hard and fought for control. She had gone up against more than her fair share of lunatics in her life but she had only ever wanted to kill two of them. The Joker. Harley. Both of them deserved the coldness of the afterlife but her hero's quest had refused her the ability to remove them from the planet.
She rather wished it hadn't.
"How is she?" Barbara demanded. She reached down to the table and picked up the two Polaroids that had been hand delivered to the Clocktower. She felt her stomach turn violently as she gazed down at the gory images.
"Why don't I leave that up to your imagination," Harley laughed. "I'm sure you have many wonderful images running through that oversized brain of yours."
"What...what is that thing?" Barbara asked, her voice dropping in pitch. She glanced up towards the doorway and saw that Dinah had appeared there. The girl was dressed in red and black flannel pants and one of Helena's gray Gotham Knights shirts. She looked groggy but otherwise awake.
"Don't call him a thing," Harley protested, faking annoyance. She actually sounded slightly put out. Of course with her, everything was some part of an act. All a delusion towards a wicked end. "You'll offend him. He does have feelings too you know. And he and Helena, they're so very close now. He likes her so much but I don't think she's quite come around yet. She makes him feel alive but I still sense trust issues with her."
"Harley," Barbara snapped. "Stop the games."
The therapist ignored her and decided to push on. "You know, Helena and I have been working quite hard for the last few days. Talk therapy of course. You'll be quite pleased to know that she's actively attacking her anger management issues." She sighed dramatically, as if disappointed. "I'm afraid we're still encountering some very serious behavioral issues however."
Dinah approached Barbara from behind and took the pictures from her. Almost immediately the color drained away from her cheeks, making her look very pale and young. She glanced at Gibson who answered her with a rather sickly half-smile.
Barbara looked at the two of them and closed her eyes. After a moment she whispered, "Please, stop this. Please."
Harley laughed. "I think I just heard the great Barbara Gordon beg. Did you beg Barbara Gordon?"
Barbara swallowed hard. She dug her nails deeper into the leather of the chair. Reaching out with her hand she punched the button on the base station that turned it into a speakerphone. She set the handset down and pressed her other hand into the armrest. "Yes," she finally admitted, her voice little more than a strained gasp. "Yes."
"Oh this is wonderful. I knew you had that whole rah rah family thing going but really you've exceeded my wildest expectations."
"Harley, what is it exactly that you want from me?" Barbara asked, exhaustion in her tone.
"Oh I want her," Harley assured her. "But right now I want you begging me for her life. Tell me what you'll do to keep her alive. Tell me, oh tell me."
"You know I'll do anything," Barbara replied between tightly clenched teeth.
"Will you trade your life for hers?"
"Do you need to even ask?"
"No, I didn't think so," Harley laughed.
Barbara sighed. She was quickly growing weary of the verbal spat and she wanted to move on to something more constructive. "These games are unnecessary. Tell me what you want."
"Always in control aren't you Barbara Gordon? Well maybe when we're done with Helena, we can work on these issues with you. I'd be happy to pencil you in."
"Another time perhaps," Barbara said dryly. She reached back and took the pictures away from Dinah. "Enough," she mouthed silently, her brow furrowing in concern. The look in both Dinah and Gibson's eyes horrified her.
"Very well," Harley replied. "Well if you would like to help and I know you'd like to, I have some very serious work to do. I killed Senator Pierce this evening. He annoyed me. I doubt that will be the last person I'll kill and I'd appreciate you staying out of it. And if you'd be so kind, keep those lovely stupid cops away from me as well."
"I'm a crime fighter not a criminal, Harley. I don't control the cops and I can't protect you."
"You mean you won't."
"I mean I can't," Barbara answered softly. "You removed my contact with the police department."
"Oh you mean the good Detective?" Harley giggled. "Yes that was fun. Quite bloody too. I'm sure Helena enjoyed the show."
Barbara swore beneath her breath, frustration bubbling to the surface. She had been afraid that Harley had forced Helena to witness Reese's stabbing and now she had confirmation. It was like goddamn déjà vu.
"I heard that," Harley sang out. "As I've told Helena repeatedly, I don't like that word. I'll let it pass just this once though. After all, you didn't know the rules. "She paused for effect. "Remember that I'm the one in charge now Barbara Gordon. I'm the one who decides how long she continues to breathe. You want to see her alive, well I think you'll cooperate. Now play nice and you may see her again. How she is when you do, that'll depend on you."
And with that she hung up the phone. Barbara let the line buzz idly for a few seconds before she punched it closed with her thumb. After a long moment she looked up at Gibson and Dinah. "You two both could use some sleep."
Before either of them could answer a loud beep sounded in the room, alerting them back to Barbara's strange machine. She spun her chair towards it. There was a long piece of paper there filled with numbers and letters, all of it coming together to form some string of data that presumably only Barbara could understand.
"What is that?" Dinah asked.
"It's something that was found in Reese's shirt. It's a blood sample," Barbara muttered.
"How did you get it?"
"Gibson went in for it."
"You sent Gibson in for field work over me?"
Both Barbara and Gibson glanced at Dinah's crutches. Finally the redhead replied, "You were in no condition. I needed stealthy."
"It's Helena," Dinah insisted. "I would have found a way."
"Dinah please...now is not the time. We got the sample. Does it really matter who or how?"
"No," Dinah said, shaking her head. "I just feel so useless." "I couldn't risk you like that," Barbara insisted. "Gibson was the best choice and he came through." She smiled up at the boy who was wisely staying silent, instead choosing to watch the conversation and catalogue it away in his brain for later evaluation.
"Risk?" Dinah asked, voice trembling. "Helena could be dead, I don't really care about the risks to me."
"I know," Barbara replied. She sighed. "She's not dead. Harley's not done with her yet. She's still playing whatever cracked game this is."
Dinah nodded slowly, angry with herself for the pain she could see in her mentor's green eyes. She hadn't meant to make it worse but in the condition she was in, she found that she lacked control. The frustration was nearly overwhelming in magnitude. "I'm sorry...I just..."
"I know," Barbara said again, reaching up to grasp Dinah's hand. "Sit."
Dinah did as she was told, dropping into the chair opposite Barbara. She wondered idly why Barbara's touch hadn't allowed her to see into the redheads mind but quickly dismissed it; Barbara was well trained in mental control and if she didn't want someone poking around in her skull, well then they were pretty much creeked.
"Dinah, this is worse than you can imagine. Harley has done something to Helena." She pointed at the pictures on the desk. "That thing has done something to her. It's infected her with some kind of disease."
"What's it doing to her?" Gibson asked, a slight tremor in his voice. He reached across and picked up the pictures. Without looking, he turned them over. Which considering his lock-box memory was really quite a futile thing to do.
"It's damaging her brain's frontal cortex. Look, a human brain is really a very fragile thing. It relies on sleep to function effectively. Insufficient rest adversely affects the frontal cortex's ability to control speech, access memory, and solve problems. Due to whatever this is, she might find sleep nearly impossible to come by and as such....anyway the symptoms of long-term sleep deprivation are pretty severe..."
"Exhaustion, fatigue, hallucinations, inability to control emotion and reason, lack of physical strength," Gibson mumbled, almost as if he were reading from a textbook.
"Oh God," Dinah muttered.
"It gets worse," Barbara said softly.
"How can it get worse?" Dinah demanded, panic in her pale blue eyes.
Barbara held up a hand as if to silent her young protégé. "I've also found signs of significant damage to her red cells. Especially the meta ones. "
"So she won't be able to heal herself," Gibson said plainly.
Barbara nodded. "Even the smallest cut might refuse to start healing."
"Barbara, we have to find her," Dinah stammered, standing up. She grabbed at her wooden crutches and leaned heavily against it.
"Don't you think I'm trying?" Barbara replied with a dry self-depreciating laugh. She looked up at the blonde and smiled slightly. "We will find her. I promise you that. For right now though, we all just need to be calm..."
"Calm?"
"Please," Barbara begged. "Please."
Dinah nodded slowly, as if to say she would do her best. After a few moments she looked up, her eyes suddenly wide and alert. "Reese," she gushed out, excitement clear in her tone.
"Still in a coma," Barbara replied, shaking her head in confusion. "I don't..."
"I could try going into his mind. He might know where Harley..."
"No," Barbara said quickly, perhaps a bit too harshly. "No, forget about it."
"Barbara..."
"You could get trapped in his mind," Gibson said quietly. "If he were to die while you were in there..."
"We're not taking that chance," the redhead snapped. "This discussion is over."
"Bar..."
"Over, Dinah," Barbara replied. She glanced back at the readout. "Look there's nothing else you can do tonight. Go to bed, both of you. Please."
"You need sleep as well," Gibson insisted.
She shook her head. "I want to look this over." She lifted the sheet of paper up. "Want to make sure I didn't miss anything."
Gibson nodded. "I'm gonna sleep up on the couch upstairs."
"Sure," Barbara said, her head already bent back over the readout.
Dinah watched her mentor for a few long moments, her heart breaking at the sight of the woman staring with so much focus at the paper. Like it held all the answers.
She smiled slightly.
Some risks were necessary.
"Night Barbara," she said.
The woman who called herself Oracle looked up and allowed a brief smile, thankful that the young girl had decided not to fight her any further. With Helena's life already in great peril, she wasn't about to risk Dinah as well.
Under any circumstances.
"Sleep well," she said to the blonde; just before she dropped her head back down.
Dinah watched Barbara for a few more moments, her mouth settling into a thin firm line of determination.
It was a risk worth taking and in the end, it was her risk.
And that was all that was to it.
*****
As Barbara Gordon slid the small piece of cloth into the metal tray of the device, she prayed with everything in her for an easy answer. She feared otherwise however. For some reason or another, Harley had wanted her to find the stained fabric and that could only mean bad things.
"Barbara," Gibson mumbled from behind her. She blinked, having forgotten about the small young man who was such a dear friend to Helena. She turned and looked at him absently, with more than a hint of confusion in her green eyes. He seemed to understand quickly so for once he dispensed with the words and merely settled for pointing.
She followed his gesture downwards and saw that the phone sitting on the table was blinking. She purposely kept the ringer on the cordless in the lab silent in order to assure complete quiet when she was working. Right now, a strange rumbling in her gut told her she rather wished there wasn't a phone in the room at all.
"Right," she mumbled, reaching out for the black cordless phone. She paused just above it for a few moments and then finally, reluctantly grasped it. She punched a button on it and lifted it to her ear. "He..hello?"
"Barbara Gordon," the voice on the other side practically purred. "Oh I was so hoping you'd answer. Just never know these days. People are so rude." She laughed at her own joke and then waited for Barbara to speak. After a few moments, the insane former therapist pushed ahead. "Did you like my present? You know I've been taking a class in photography. How to make the largest impact possible."
Barbara reached her hand down and gripped the armrest of her chair. She pressed her nails into the leather pad, piercing the fabric. She grit her teeth hard, her muscles tensing and turning into hard controlled rock. Gibson saw the change in her demeanor and took a step towards her. She shook her head at him. "Harley," she growled, eyes turning into angry slits.
"Surprise," the blonde laughed. 'It's me."
Barbara swallowed hard and fought for control. She had gone up against more than her fair share of lunatics in her life but she had only ever wanted to kill two of them. The Joker. Harley. Both of them deserved the coldness of the afterlife but her hero's quest had refused her the ability to remove them from the planet.
She rather wished it hadn't.
"How is she?" Barbara demanded. She reached down to the table and picked up the two Polaroids that had been hand delivered to the Clocktower. She felt her stomach turn violently as she gazed down at the gory images.
"Why don't I leave that up to your imagination," Harley laughed. "I'm sure you have many wonderful images running through that oversized brain of yours."
"What...what is that thing?" Barbara asked, her voice dropping in pitch. She glanced up towards the doorway and saw that Dinah had appeared there. The girl was dressed in red and black flannel pants and one of Helena's gray Gotham Knights shirts. She looked groggy but otherwise awake.
"Don't call him a thing," Harley protested, faking annoyance. She actually sounded slightly put out. Of course with her, everything was some part of an act. All a delusion towards a wicked end. "You'll offend him. He does have feelings too you know. And he and Helena, they're so very close now. He likes her so much but I don't think she's quite come around yet. She makes him feel alive but I still sense trust issues with her."
"Harley," Barbara snapped. "Stop the games."
The therapist ignored her and decided to push on. "You know, Helena and I have been working quite hard for the last few days. Talk therapy of course. You'll be quite pleased to know that she's actively attacking her anger management issues." She sighed dramatically, as if disappointed. "I'm afraid we're still encountering some very serious behavioral issues however."
Dinah approached Barbara from behind and took the pictures from her. Almost immediately the color drained away from her cheeks, making her look very pale and young. She glanced at Gibson who answered her with a rather sickly half-smile.
Barbara looked at the two of them and closed her eyes. After a moment she whispered, "Please, stop this. Please."
Harley laughed. "I think I just heard the great Barbara Gordon beg. Did you beg Barbara Gordon?"
Barbara swallowed hard. She dug her nails deeper into the leather of the chair. Reaching out with her hand she punched the button on the base station that turned it into a speakerphone. She set the handset down and pressed her other hand into the armrest. "Yes," she finally admitted, her voice little more than a strained gasp. "Yes."
"Oh this is wonderful. I knew you had that whole rah rah family thing going but really you've exceeded my wildest expectations."
"Harley, what is it exactly that you want from me?" Barbara asked, exhaustion in her tone.
"Oh I want her," Harley assured her. "But right now I want you begging me for her life. Tell me what you'll do to keep her alive. Tell me, oh tell me."
"You know I'll do anything," Barbara replied between tightly clenched teeth.
"Will you trade your life for hers?"
"Do you need to even ask?"
"No, I didn't think so," Harley laughed.
Barbara sighed. She was quickly growing weary of the verbal spat and she wanted to move on to something more constructive. "These games are unnecessary. Tell me what you want."
"Always in control aren't you Barbara Gordon? Well maybe when we're done with Helena, we can work on these issues with you. I'd be happy to pencil you in."
"Another time perhaps," Barbara said dryly. She reached back and took the pictures away from Dinah. "Enough," she mouthed silently, her brow furrowing in concern. The look in both Dinah and Gibson's eyes horrified her.
"Very well," Harley replied. "Well if you would like to help and I know you'd like to, I have some very serious work to do. I killed Senator Pierce this evening. He annoyed me. I doubt that will be the last person I'll kill and I'd appreciate you staying out of it. And if you'd be so kind, keep those lovely stupid cops away from me as well."
"I'm a crime fighter not a criminal, Harley. I don't control the cops and I can't protect you."
"You mean you won't."
"I mean I can't," Barbara answered softly. "You removed my contact with the police department."
"Oh you mean the good Detective?" Harley giggled. "Yes that was fun. Quite bloody too. I'm sure Helena enjoyed the show."
Barbara swore beneath her breath, frustration bubbling to the surface. She had been afraid that Harley had forced Helena to witness Reese's stabbing and now she had confirmation. It was like goddamn déjà vu.
"I heard that," Harley sang out. "As I've told Helena repeatedly, I don't like that word. I'll let it pass just this once though. After all, you didn't know the rules. "She paused for effect. "Remember that I'm the one in charge now Barbara Gordon. I'm the one who decides how long she continues to breathe. You want to see her alive, well I think you'll cooperate. Now play nice and you may see her again. How she is when you do, that'll depend on you."
And with that she hung up the phone. Barbara let the line buzz idly for a few seconds before she punched it closed with her thumb. After a long moment she looked up at Gibson and Dinah. "You two both could use some sleep."
Before either of them could answer a loud beep sounded in the room, alerting them back to Barbara's strange machine. She spun her chair towards it. There was a long piece of paper there filled with numbers and letters, all of it coming together to form some string of data that presumably only Barbara could understand.
"What is that?" Dinah asked.
"It's something that was found in Reese's shirt. It's a blood sample," Barbara muttered.
"How did you get it?"
"Gibson went in for it."
"You sent Gibson in for field work over me?"
Both Barbara and Gibson glanced at Dinah's crutches. Finally the redhead replied, "You were in no condition. I needed stealthy."
"It's Helena," Dinah insisted. "I would have found a way."
"Dinah please...now is not the time. We got the sample. Does it really matter who or how?"
"No," Dinah said, shaking her head. "I just feel so useless." "I couldn't risk you like that," Barbara insisted. "Gibson was the best choice and he came through." She smiled up at the boy who was wisely staying silent, instead choosing to watch the conversation and catalogue it away in his brain for later evaluation.
"Risk?" Dinah asked, voice trembling. "Helena could be dead, I don't really care about the risks to me."
"I know," Barbara replied. She sighed. "She's not dead. Harley's not done with her yet. She's still playing whatever cracked game this is."
Dinah nodded slowly, angry with herself for the pain she could see in her mentor's green eyes. She hadn't meant to make it worse but in the condition she was in, she found that she lacked control. The frustration was nearly overwhelming in magnitude. "I'm sorry...I just..."
"I know," Barbara said again, reaching up to grasp Dinah's hand. "Sit."
Dinah did as she was told, dropping into the chair opposite Barbara. She wondered idly why Barbara's touch hadn't allowed her to see into the redheads mind but quickly dismissed it; Barbara was well trained in mental control and if she didn't want someone poking around in her skull, well then they were pretty much creeked.
"Dinah, this is worse than you can imagine. Harley has done something to Helena." She pointed at the pictures on the desk. "That thing has done something to her. It's infected her with some kind of disease."
"What's it doing to her?" Gibson asked, a slight tremor in his voice. He reached across and picked up the pictures. Without looking, he turned them over. Which considering his lock-box memory was really quite a futile thing to do.
"It's damaging her brain's frontal cortex. Look, a human brain is really a very fragile thing. It relies on sleep to function effectively. Insufficient rest adversely affects the frontal cortex's ability to control speech, access memory, and solve problems. Due to whatever this is, she might find sleep nearly impossible to come by and as such....anyway the symptoms of long-term sleep deprivation are pretty severe..."
"Exhaustion, fatigue, hallucinations, inability to control emotion and reason, lack of physical strength," Gibson mumbled, almost as if he were reading from a textbook.
"Oh God," Dinah muttered.
"It gets worse," Barbara said softly.
"How can it get worse?" Dinah demanded, panic in her pale blue eyes.
Barbara held up a hand as if to silent her young protégé. "I've also found signs of significant damage to her red cells. Especially the meta ones. "
"So she won't be able to heal herself," Gibson said plainly.
Barbara nodded. "Even the smallest cut might refuse to start healing."
"Barbara, we have to find her," Dinah stammered, standing up. She grabbed at her wooden crutches and leaned heavily against it.
"Don't you think I'm trying?" Barbara replied with a dry self-depreciating laugh. She looked up at the blonde and smiled slightly. "We will find her. I promise you that. For right now though, we all just need to be calm..."
"Calm?"
"Please," Barbara begged. "Please."
Dinah nodded slowly, as if to say she would do her best. After a few moments she looked up, her eyes suddenly wide and alert. "Reese," she gushed out, excitement clear in her tone.
"Still in a coma," Barbara replied, shaking her head in confusion. "I don't..."
"I could try going into his mind. He might know where Harley..."
"No," Barbara said quickly, perhaps a bit too harshly. "No, forget about it."
"Barbara..."
"You could get trapped in his mind," Gibson said quietly. "If he were to die while you were in there..."
"We're not taking that chance," the redhead snapped. "This discussion is over."
"Bar..."
"Over, Dinah," Barbara replied. She glanced back at the readout. "Look there's nothing else you can do tonight. Go to bed, both of you. Please."
"You need sleep as well," Gibson insisted.
She shook her head. "I want to look this over." She lifted the sheet of paper up. "Want to make sure I didn't miss anything."
Gibson nodded. "I'm gonna sleep up on the couch upstairs."
"Sure," Barbara said, her head already bent back over the readout.
Dinah watched her mentor for a few long moments, her heart breaking at the sight of the woman staring with so much focus at the paper. Like it held all the answers.
She smiled slightly.
Some risks were necessary.
"Night Barbara," she said.
The woman who called herself Oracle looked up and allowed a brief smile, thankful that the young girl had decided not to fight her any further. With Helena's life already in great peril, she wasn't about to risk Dinah as well.
Under any circumstances.
"Sleep well," she said to the blonde; just before she dropped her head back down.
Dinah watched Barbara for a few more moments, her mouth settling into a thin firm line of determination.
It was a risk worth taking and in the end, it was her risk.
And that was all that was to it.
*****