Wicked – Chapter 12

By Christopher W. Blaine

DISCLAIMER: All of the characters and events portrayed in this work of fan fiction are ©2004 by DC Comics Inc. and are used without permission for fan-related entertainment purposes only. This original work of fiction is ©2004 by Christopher W. Blaine.

"Honestly, ma'am," Ben said in an exasperated tone, "I really am a local reporter."

Hal Jordan's aunt seemed skeptical when she took a hard listen to his accent and he continued to try to get her to believe him. A few feet away, a smug and cocksure Hal was being interviewed by the Black Canary.

They had lucked out in catching the woman and her nephew as they were exiting the police precinct, anxious it seemed to get back on the nearest road out of Gotham City. She did not blame them; Gotham City had as many dangers as it had sights to see, and they had unfortunately gotten more than they had bargained for.

"Yeah, I kicked his ass," Hal said with a tone that indicated he was trying to sound older. He had his chest puffed out a little bit and she noted with some mild amusement that he could not help but drop his eyes at her chest as he spoke to her. It was funny when young guys were faced with their first pair.

"Some people would call it stupid, others would call it brave," she remarked.

He shrugged and his answer was blatantly honest. "I wasn't scared, if that is what you're getting at." In that moment, she felt as if she got a glimpse at the real person inside the youthful shell of Hal Jordan. He was fearless. Very few people had such charisma that it manifested so early in life, but there was no doubting it; this was someone who simply did not know fear.

He tried to steer the conversation back to her, a feeble attempt at flirtation. "Must get kind of cold in that get-up."

"Yeah, listen, kid, where did the guy go after you whaled on him?"

He shook his head. "Nowhere. I left him on the ground rethinking his life. I don't take very kindly to guys trying to have their way with me. I'm into girls."

She fought back a mischievous grin. He was going to be a lady killer one day and he knew it, but there was still something about him that made the cockiness attractive. If he were only a few years older...

"Well, it doesn't sound like this person cared about your preferences," she reminded him. "Still, fighting back was the right thing, though your aunt was correct in getting you out of there."

He reluctantly agreed. "Yeah, but the entire trip is ruined; we were supposed to be heading further upstate to the air show. A friend of my dad's promised to take me up and my aunt agreed to come out east with me to do it. Gave her a chance to talk to relatives we hadn't seen in a long time."

Black Canary nodded. She had already gotten the lowdown on the Jordan's and was aware that young Hal's father was dead. "Confronting a kidnapper can put a damper on anything, you know what I mean?"

"I am a reporter!" Ben argued. "Fine! Don't help me!" he said, stomping away.

"Your boyfriend has some anger issues," Hal said with a chuckle. "I better go talk to my aunt." He took a final glance at her cleavage and then walked over to where Ben had stood. Biting her bottom lip, Black Canary turned and started to make her way back to the car. Ben was halfway there and he stopped to throw his notebook on the ground.

"The kid thinks you have some problems," she chided him.

Ben stooped over to pick up his property. "I do. There's a sick bastard running around killing kids and that...that bitch wants to argue over my credentials because of my accent!"

"I'm sympathetic, but face it, she justs wants to get her nephew out of here and back home," she replied. "He talked to me, though; it was Keates by the description."

He waved her to follow along as he began to move towards the car. "Of course he talked to you; everyone talks to you."

"I've told you before, I have a way with men."

He stopped and looked hard at her. A smile formed on his frowning face. "You are pretty to look at."

"Is that a crack in the 'I don't really worry about such things' armor of Ben Tinsley? I'm amazed. Maybe after all of this is over you might even get a personality."

"Ha ha," he replied as he got in his car and started it up. She plopped into the passenger seat and pulled out her cigarettes. "Oh, God," he started.

"Stuff it," she was quick to tell him. She pulled out one smoke, sniffed it as if it were a fine cigar and sighed. "These will be the death of me."

As she lit up, he rolled down his window and pulled out of the police parking lot. "From what I can tell, he's desperate," he said.

Black Canary agreed. "I've been reading up on killers like this. Chances are he feels compelled to finish his pattern; he needs a young boy. Maybe not to kill, just to rape."

"Comforting."

"I think he's heading towards Crime Alley," she said, calling up a mental map of the city.

"Great timing. Tonight," Ben added, "is the anniversary of the murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne."

"Yeah, I remember that. Really sad. They had a kid, right?"

Ben nodded and pushed down on the accelerator so they could speed through a yellow light. "Bruce Wayne. He's the heir to the entire fortune which some estimate will be in the billions when he takes full ownership of it. He's got no parents though, that has to suck."

"I figured that you would be more of the type to say that some kids are better off without their parents," she said, blowing out a lungful of smoke.

"I love my parents...I love my sister...I just hate...dislike the fact that I'm compared to their accomplishments instead of being recognized for my own." He nodded his head and cut in front of a taxi that began to honk at them. "Isn't that your problem?"

"Ha! My problem is that I compare myself too much to my father's expectations. Hell, we're all messed up a little, Ben." She turned to look out the window and saw that they were passing a station wagon that was full of smiling little children. "There are no perfect parents. I don't care if they are rich, famous, or a couple of farmers out in Kansas. Everyone has issues; I guess I've had a longer time to work mine through."

Ben looked both ways and ran a stop sign, a devilish grin on his face. Black Canary raised an eyebrow; was Ben actually breaking a few rules? There was hope for him. "Yeah, well, I think your dad would be proud of you."

She thought about some of the mistakes of her past, the villains that had gotten away or the times she may have used too much, or not enough force. Those early years, she told herself, would have gone a lot smoother had she been able to turn to her father for advice. Then a little voice would remind her that he had not believed her when she had gone to him about being molested.

Molested hell! She had been raped!

She pulled out another cigarette and lit it off the one she had nearly finished. "I hit a nerve or something?" Ben asked.

"No, just some bad thoughts that want to take up roost under this blond wig," she said. "But I suppose that nothing is quite as bad as having your parents shot to death right in front of you." She rolled the window down a little to let some of the smoke out. "God, this guy needs to be taken down. I wish you could have gotten a more recent picture." Ben had been able to obtain a photograph of Keates when he had graduated basic training.

"I'm doing the best I can. Maybe we should contact that Detective Corrigan..."

"No!" she snapped, throwing the cigarette out half-smoked. "Leave him out of this."

"You really have a problem with cops, don't you?"

"With Corrigan I do."

Ben hit the brakes and nearly spun in a circle as he remembered at the last instant to turn. His gaze strayed over to an alleyway where he thought he saw a four-wheeler parked. At the same time, Black Canary's eye fell on a car where she would have sworn she saw Ted Grant hoping into the back, two very young women in the front.

She shook it off as Ben fell in behind a bus. It would be a few blocks before he could pass it. "Corrigan is one of you guys, isn't he? Like Dr. Fate or Dr. Occult?"

She nodded. "Something like that. Let's just say his status is always in question." They were going at a snail's pace and she could see Ben's knuckles whitening on the steering wheel. "You sure know a lot about my teammates."

"I never said I wasn't a fan, I'm just not a rabid one. I knew who you were before you came into my..."

"Life?" she asked, batting her blue eyes.

He shook his head. "Office." He looked down at her left hand. "Do you ever wear a wedding band?"

"In costume, no; if a creep thinks you're single and dressed like this, you must be a dumb slut. The band would make me somehow legitimate and it wouldn't throw them off guard," she explained. "As I said, this costume has a real function. I wish it was bullet-proof, though."

She didn't bother to go into detail about how, regardless of her feelings for her husband, the idea of settling on one man was foreign to her. It was a secret shame and also her own personal triumph. Many women who were the victims of childhood sexual abuse withdrew, but she had not allowed it to consume her, had she? She now had the power.

Was that what drove Wicked? A chill ran down her spine. Was he after power? Had he been abused as a child? None of the information that Ben had been able to dig up had indicated anything like that, but maybe he never told anyone. She hadn't, after all. She had mentioned some of it to a few people, but the depths of madness she had been thrown into as a young girl was not something she wanted to talk about.

Remembering was hard enough.

Sometimes, at night, when she was alone, she could almost feel those cold hands slipping under her clothes, pulling at undergarments. She could still smell the breath of the old man, cigarettes and coffee; yellow stained teeth and a withered brown tongue. Then came the pain, the humiliation, then wanting to scrub herself with cleansing powder to remove his sweat and other fluids.

His wicked laugh when she threatened to tell her father. His lecherous smile when her father had not believed her. His knowing smirk when she was introduced to his friends.

She let out an expletive. "Get this damn car around the bus or move over, Tinsley!"

"I'm not going to get us killed getting there. Besides its a big area..."

"Just go!" she ordered.

The rest of the trip was made in silence, Ben noting that Black Canary was lost in some sort of waking nightmare. Again he wanted to help, to reach out, but he couldn't. Her problems were decades old and buried deep. This case had forced some of that to the surface. Hell, he thought, it was making him think as well. What he had said about his parents...his father...had been true. He loved the man. He was so happy he had been raised well, not growing up to be a psycho like Michael Keates.

He mentally went over a calendar in his mind, figuring out he was about due some vacation and promising himself, as he always did, that he was going to take it. Spend some time with his son. Maybe even try to get lucky.

All he had to do before hand was help a a semi-retired super-hero with deep-rooted anger issues and sexual hang-ups save Gotham City from the worst serial killer this side of Ted Bundy or Jack the Ripper.

"I'm not a super-hero," he whispered to himself. Why was he caught up in this? It was a compulsion that he could not explain. Is this what drove people like the Black Canary and Hawkman to do good despite the fact they probably had just as screwed up lives as anyone else?

Finally an opening materialized and Ben raced his car around the bus, never realizing that his prey was sitting in the back of it.