(((Not much spelling or grammar checking going on here. Just a rough draft for now but I want to see if I'm making any sense, so people please read and review.)))
Title: Into the Snake Pit (Subject to name change... a big one)
Author: Henri
Rating: anywhere from PG to R
Summary: Old friends pop up, snakes drop by and suddenly things don't seem so simple anymore.
"I still don't see why you agreed to this, how are we supposed to sweep and stop the bad guys with another teenager around the house?" Helena Kyle asked Barbara Gordon as they entered the New Gotham International Airport.
Barbara sighed heavily and continued to wheel her way towards the arrival gates. She'd already had this conversation with the brunette six times the day before then once more in the car on the way to the airport and – apparently -- Helena wasn't about to give up.
"How do we even know that she's not some psychotic evil person trying to infiltrate our security?"
"I've told you already Hel," Barbara said softly, "she's the daughter of one of my fathers cop buddies. I use to baby-sit her when she was a kid. It'll only be for a few weeks and you know how slow things have been."
"You haven't seen her for years, why now?" Helena asked again as she sneered at a security guard who dared to look over her leather.
"She's a good kid Helena, I'm sure you'll love having her around," Barbara said absentmindedly as she checked the arrivals screen and headed towards gate twelve.
Helena snorted as she followed the redhead, "sure, she was a good kid when you baby sat her….when she was what? Six? I was a good kid when I was six too Babs, look at me now?"
Barbara grinned, "You turned out alright, a little strange maybe, but genuine, or at least reasonably honest." Barbara knew that the brunette was only honest because she was a terrible liar and hated when people called her on her mistakes.
Helena sighed, "This is just another giant inconvenience, especially for me! GOD! Where the hell has Blondie gone? She just had to park the damn car."
Barbara craned her neck to try and see over the sea of people waiting by gate twelve. "She'll find us," she muttered as she watched people carrying bags and small children off the plane.
"You don't even know what she looks like," Helena snapped, leaning against a wall, staring out at the crowds. Barbara glared at Helena and rolled her eyes. "I'm sure we'll manage."
"Maybe we should get Alfred to hold a little sign," Helena suggested softly, "One that says, 'Barbara's father's cop friend's daught! Please meet the Huntress and the former Batgirl at the number two exit so they can let you in on all their secrets, show you their secret lair and possibly put you into mortal danger. Hey, then we can get dinner!"
"Oh shut up Hel," Dinah's cheerful voice said from over Barbara's shoulder, "this is gonna be fun. Someone who knows what Barbara was like when she was younger."
"Where the hell did you get to? I know what Barbara was like when she was younger," the brunette said indignantly, crossing her arms across her chest and glaring at the blonde who stood next to her then at Barbara looking expectantly at the growing crowd of people unloading from the plane.
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After fifteen minutes the crowds started to grow smaller but there was no sign of their guest and Barbara started to worry.
"Maybe I should call her father, make sure she made it onto the plane," Barbara suggested to the young blonde woman standing beside her. Dinah nodded, "Hel and I could wait here just in case."
Barbara agreed silently and started to push her manual wheelchair towards the closest payphone. She had moved no more than a few feet when a high pitched squeak, followed by an attack of long limbs and long blonde hair bombarded her.
"Oh god, Barbara, you look amazing! It's so great to see you! Sorry I kept you waiting, there was a problem with the customs or something, they let me go though….oh, you must be Dinah, I've heard so much about you! Jim goes on as if you were the best thing since sliced bread, really he does!...And Helena? Jeepers, I haven't seen you since you were seven! I love that jacket."
Barbara chuckled and pushed the newest blonde off of her, gripping her wrists to hold her still. "Let me look at you," she muttered as she ran her eyes over a long, lanky but well muscled body, modest clothes, sparkling green eyes and long, blonde hair.
"You've grown up," Barbara said softly. Alex grinned wickedly, "and you've grown up to. No more freckles?"
Barbara blushed and swatted at Alex's arm.
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"Why do you live in a clock?" Alex asked as she dropped her bag onto the floor next to the elevator and took in the spaces around her and the giant clock face in front of her.
"Don't worry you aren't the first person to ask that question," Dinah remarked with a smile.
"Good views," Barbara explained quickly as she looked nervously towards the computers, she was about to explain their presence but Alex beat her to it.
"Still testing things for Mr Wayne?" she asked as she looked over the equipment almost salivating. "You know, for a while there was childish little mind thought you two might get married, imagine my surprise when your Dad told me you were still single."
Barbara smacked her arm again, "oh please, if you're going to continue to tease me the entire time you're here I'm going to have to start cooking."
Alex spun on her heel with an abject look of horror on her face, "You're kidding right?" she looked towards Helena who had hardly said a word to her since she had arrived. "Right?"
Helena grinned, "Who knows? But I sure as hell won't be here if she tries."
Dinah laughed, "I think she learnt her lesson Alex, come on I'll show you your room."
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Alex wandered around the reasonable sized bedroom which would be hers for the next three weeks. "It's nice," she said to Dinah as the younger blonde whizzed around the room pulling out clean towels and showing which draws didn't have things in them.
"It used to be Helena's, but she moved out so now it's the guest room. But you know…sometimes she just can't be bothered heading home, so she uses it," Dinah said softly.
Alex smiled at her, "She doesn't like me very much does she?"
Dinah stopped, her mouth open to say something, but unsure of exactly what that should be. "Look," Dinah said softly, reaching out and touching the fabric of Alex's shirt, "She was a little unsure of me when I got here and well….if I'm honest she still is a little uncertain. But she'll get to know you and I'm sure she'll really like you."
Alex grinned, "I knew you'd be the peace maker."
"Sorry?"
The older blonde shook her head, sending long locks of hair flying around her, a small grin forming on her face. "It's just from what I remember and what I've been told, Barbara's the soul and strength, Helena's the wildcard…so it's sort of predictable that you'd be the one who stood between them when Barbara's sensible ideas clashed with Helena's wild, spontaneous ones."
Dinah's grin hid her grimace. "You've got us pretty well figured, don't you?"
Alex smiled and shrugged sheepishly. "I've had a few conversations with Mr Gordon, he ah…" she smiled again, "he wanted to…um, well, warn me about Helena." She shrugged again.
Dinah burst out laughing, "That's priceless…." Then she became serious, "Helena can never know."
Alex took a deep breath, drew her fingers across her lips and threw the imaginary key, over her shoulder.
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Barbara Gordon woke at three in the morning, her body covered in a fine layer of sweat, another dream, another nightmare. She took a deep breath and easily transferred herself to her chair.
She wheeled into the kitchen and started to pour herself a glass of orange juice but stopped when she heard a muffled scream come from the lounge area. She shrugged, finished pouring her drink then grabbed an extra from the fridge. If Barbara knew Helena, and she did, the young brunette was probably sprawled out on the couch watching the late night horror movie on some unknown TV channel.
She balanced the drinks between her legs and headed for the couch.
One long leg hung over the back of the black couch, perfectly manicured, but Barbara realised right away that the foot didn't belong to Helena.
"Alex?" she asked softly. A sleepy blonde head snapped up near the foot.
"Yeah?"
"Sweetheart, can't you sleep?" Barbara asked lightly.
Alex grimaced, "what about you?" she pointed out, quickly deflecting the focus of the conversation from herself to Barbara.
Barbara shrugged, "I had a dream, I was just getting a drink." Barbara took one of the glasses and handed it to Alex, who immediately sat straight up and placed the glass on the coffee table.
"Look at that, you even used a coaster," Barbara grinned, "I feel like I've spent half my life telling the other two to remember coasters."
Barbara placed her drink next to Alex's and easily manoeuvred from her chair to the couch next to the young girl. She felt green eyes on her the whole time.
"Does it still hurt?" the blonde suddenly burst out. The realising what she said her eyes went wide and mouth dropped open to apologise.
Barbara raised a hand and smiled gently, "no, not physically. Maybe a little emotionally."
Alex looked at her hand, "sorry."
"It's ok people have asked me worse things than that."
They sat in silence for a few minutes, watching the black and white figures on the screen run around in circles while the movie monster got closer and closer.
"What were you dreaming about?" Alex asked softly, reaching forward to pick up her drink so her hands would have something to do.
Barbara tried to smile but it came across as more of a pained grimace. "Helena."
Alex looked up with a grin.
"I think…she was on a motorcycle, speeding, which is actually not that strange a thing to dream about, but when I asked her slow down she sped up and told me to hang on because she was going to drive into the duck pond because one of the ducks was getting married to a squirrel."
"Really?"
Barbara grinned, "I've told you mine, now you tell me yours."
Alex shrugged and laughed lightly, "I've been studying so hard lately; usually from about nine until four or five in the morning, then getting a few hours sleep before school started again, guess my body clock's having a little trouble readjusting."
Barbara nodded, "Dad mentioned you were at Uni. He didn't say what you were doing though?"
"Well, honestly I haven't completely decided yet. I'm doing the classes on robotics and taking the computer science ones as well, it's going well but I don't know what I'm going to actually do with my life."
"Don't worry you'll figure it out."
Alex smiled and yawned suddenly, "Oh, guess I'd better go get some shut eye, want me to leave this on for you?"
Barbara shook her head, "Last day of school in the morning, I should try to sleep for a few more hours."
Alex flicked off the TV and headed towards her bedroom.
"Night Babar," Alex called softly, using the nickname she had for the redhead when she was six.
"Good night Alex," Barbara called back with a little grin, "and don't even try with the cute nicknames in front of the others, they might get jealous."
Alex grinned as she shut her door.
Barbara sat staring at the coffee machine sitting in front of her. Her dreams hadn't stopped after she had sent Alex off to bed. They plagued her for the rest of the night not letting her have even a few minutes of peaceful sleep.
"Morning Red," Helena yawned softly from behind the redhead.
"Coffee?" the older woman asked dully, resting her head on her hand and smiling softly at the brunette. "Hang on, why are you here?"
Helena grimaced, "I haven't gone to sleep yet. I went out for a while."
"Oh…a while?"
Helena shrugged and started to add heaped spoons of sugar to the mug of white coffee Barbara had put in front of her.
"Hel," Barbara said slyly as she turned her chair to face her friend, Helena looked up from her coffee, "Can you do me a favour?"
"No."
"Oh come on Helena, would you just do this one little thing, please? Pretty Please, Pretty please with cherries and sprinkles and," Barbara gushed.
"FINE! FUCK, get a life Babs."
Barbara grinned, "Good! Then as soon as she's up and you've slept or had large amounts of coffee then you can take her sight seeing….And Helena?"
The brunette looked up and smiled sweetly.
"Madam Humphries bordello? That's not a sight of New Gotham that I want Alex to visit," Barbara said seriously.
Helena's face fell, "OH COME ON! She'd probably like it. She looks the type to enjoy whips and barely dressed women!"
Barbara snorted into her coffee.
"Helena, Alex is a serious person, she seems very involved in her studies, from what her father's told me."
"Then maybe she needs to find the fun," Helena said, waving her hands around in the air.
"Who needs to find the fun?" Dinah asked as she slumped into the kitchen, her bag over her shoulder, and dropped into a kitchen chair.
"Alex."
"What about me?" a sweet, happy, carefree female voice asked from the doorway. Alex flew through the doorway, pulling wet locks of hair away from her face and into a long blonde pony tail at the back of her head.
Barbara glared at Helena before turning to Alex, "we were just talking about you, Helena's offered to take you around town for the official Helena Kyle tour of New Gotham," Barbara told her with a smile.
"Great," Alex said, clapping her hands together, "That should be wicked fun."
Helena lent back in her chair and ran her eyes over the blonde. "Nice pants," she finally settled on, noticing the beige leather pants and pointy black leather boots.
Alex grinned, "They're great aren't they, and my most prized possession." She ran her hands along the back of her pants then reached for the coffee pot.
"Nice colour," Dinah agreed, "Why knew cows came in beige….Helena doesn't? Right? I mean you're sure they just come in black and red? Right?"
Alex laughed and Dinah smiled at her. Helena put down her coffee, crossed her arms across her chest, leant back into her chair and scolded at the women in front of her.
"Come on Dinah," Barbara said lightly, unable to keep the grin from her face, "We're gonna be late."
Dinah grabbed a piece of toast, stuck it in her mouth and grabbed her bag. "Oh, oh, Alex," Dinah said around her toast. Barbara reached up and took the toast from her ward's mouth. "Thanks…anyways, Alex, do you wanna come out after school with me and my friend? We're sort of heading out for a burger, graduation celebration." Barbara shoved the toast back into Dinah's mouth and the young girl coughed.
Alex grinned brightly, "ok, sure. How about I pick you up at school?"
Dinah nodded quickly and smiled, then waved with the hand still holding onto her bag.
Alex leant against the huge Hummer Barbara had let her borrow.
At first she had been a little scared to drive the giant car but once she had been around New Gotham for a few hours she started to see what Barbara liked about the giant, powerful vehicle.
"Alex!" Dinah's voice called out from across the parking lot. Alex looked up from staring at the scuff marks on her boots and waved.
"Hi," Dinah said breathlessly as she finished running towards her new friend. "Hey," Alex offered and smiled brightly at the young curly haired girl running along behind Dinah.
"Oh, this is Gabby," Dinah said quickly and the two shook hands.
"Gabby, this is Alex, Barbara use to baby-sit her when she was younger."
Gabby grinned at the beautiful woman in front of her; the leather suited her in a New Gotham socialite kind of way. But, Gabby decided, she still liked Helena's leather better.
"It's nice to meet you," Gabby said quickly, shaking Alex's hand again.
Alex smiled, "Straight back at ya."
"So," Dinah asked as she opened the passenger door to the hummer, "How was your day with Helena?"
Alex stopped and stood very still, "Well, we went to lunch but before she could really show me anything she got a page from her boss or something? She said something about muffin tops. I showed myself around, funny place, it's changed so much since I lived here."
"Barbara," Alex asked softly as she came into the room, the redhead had been at her computers since she had entered the clocktower after school.
"Mmph," Barbara replied without stilling her fingers or looking up.
"Is it alright if I head out for a while tonight, Dinah's friend Gabby told me about some clubs around here that seem alright," Alex said quickly.
Barbara looked up and smiled, "Of course you can, you don't need to clear anything with me, just keep in contact, your father would kill me if I lost you!"
Alex laughed. "Are Helena or Dinah heading out with you?" Barbara asked as she turned back to the screen, even though she knew that neither girl would be going with Alex. There had been four Delphi alerts all in one afternoon. After such a low in criminal activity Barbara decided that the alerts merited investigation.
Alex shuffled from foot to foot, "No, they're busy I think. I don't mind heading out by myself, I'm use to it," she muttered.
"Ok, keep in contact," Barbara called as Alex headed for the lift.
"STAY OUT OF TROUBLE!" Barbara called out at the closing doors.
An evil smile passed over Alex's face, "Can't really promise that," she muttered to herself and sniggered.
"DINAH! STOP!"
"…and I was just standing there, watching the whole thing, I mean seriously Helena what was I supposed to do…"
"DIIIINNNAAAAHHH"
"…and when I tried to leave he just…"
"Barbara!"
"...come on Helena. Help me out here."
The Huntress swung her hands around and grabbed her young friend by the shoulders, "Dinah," the brunette smiled softly, "I don't know how to say this, but…well we've been practically living together for a long time now and I feel like I should tell you this…I mean as close as we've become this is a little hard."
"It's ok Hel," the blonde said softly, staring into deeply troubled blue eyes. Helena leaned towards her ear and whispered, "you…are…annoying the hell out of me right now."
Dinah smacked the brunette on the shoulder. Helena grinned sarcastically at her, "Why don't you go talk to your shorter, older twin for a while, huh? I mean, she probably won't hurt you if you annoy her." Helena suggested as she flopped down, exhausted, on the couch.
"Actually, I haven't seen much of Alex for a while, have you? She goes out a lot," Dinah said as she dropped next to her partner in crime fighting.
Helena shrugged, "Ask Barbara, it's not like I spend that much time looking out for the kid."
"She's only three years younger than you Hel," Dinah pointed out.
Helena shrugged.
"What are you two up to?" Barbara asked as she wheeled into the lounge room, settling her chair next to the couch and pulling her glasses from her face.
"We were talking about Alex," Dinah said quickly, straightening her posture and looking at Barbara seriously.
"What about Alex?" Barbara asked, "Have you seen her yet? She wasn't here for dinner and she hasn't called for a while."
"Actually we were just talking about just that," Helena said quickly, "We were worried."
Barbara rolled her eyes at the faux worry in her former wards voice. "I'm sure she's fine, probably just living up the college life while she can. All night keggers and such," the redhead said with a little laugh.
Helena saw the worry in her friends eyes and immediately any sarcasm or stupid comments went right out the window. She had seen the look in those beautiful green eyes on so many occasions when she herself had come home drunk, or battered from a fight. Barbara didn't deserve to have to worry so much about other people.
"If you're worried, then I could go out and have a look for her," Helena suggested softly, looking into Barbara's eyes.
The redhead smiled warmly, the pure love she got from Helena was amazing sometimes, "its ok sweetheart, I'm sure she's fine."
Just as an uneasy silence fell over the three women, the Delphi alarms began to blare. Helena jumped from her seat and Barbara started towards the computers.
"What is it?" Helena asked, leaning over Barbara's back to see the computer screen, even though she had no idea what she was looking at. Barbara squinted, her mouth fell open.
"A murder," she gasped.
Dinah joined the two other women and what she saw on the screen made her whimper. Helena looked at the blonde woman standing beside her. "That's not a murder Barbara," the blonde whispered, "that's a massacre."