My apologies for the long delay! I've had some very big developments in my life that have made writing time difficult to find.
"How long do we have?" Dick asked urgently over the comms as I monitored the intensifying situation from the roof.
"Not long. Just minutes before the inmates start rushing the police line," I answered.
"Batgirl, I'll be manning the computers in… eh, Red Hood's absence," Alfred said, which I took to mean that Jason was eagerly grabbing up his jacket and stealing a vehicle from Bruce's extensive collection.
"He better have an earpiece," I said, hoping he'd answer.
"Roger that," Jason answered, all too happy to be on the comms. "Just grabbing a bike now. I can be on the island in thirty minutes or less."
"Head this way, but listen for orders. Batman's on the island, it'd be a bad idea for him to run into Red Hood," I said.
"Then why did I suit up…" Jason began to whine, but my attention wandered as dozens of shouting men in orange jumpsuits began to rush out of the entrances to the other sides of the island. It was beginning.
"Because there will invariably be escapees," I said. "Start by monitoring the bridges. Discreetly. Stay out of the way of the police, but don't let anyone get past them."
"Same go for me?" Nightwing asked as I heard his bike rev in the background.
"For now, yes," I said, standing and watching as the special crimes unit landed a helicopter on the pad across the field from me. They'd arrived just in time… or perhaps too late. All officers, including the pilot, left the running helicopter in attempts to fortify the police line before inmates could break it.
The men sprinted down the hill at full force, straight for the police lines armed with riot shields and gear. I watched the unit's arms tighten, their stance split to brace them against the tide rolling towards them, threatening to barrel them over.
The waves collided, and the police held strong a moment before the crazies came out. Scarecrow had crouched low and secretively in the sprinting crowd, but now I could see him, leaping over the shoulders of inmates to stab his syringed fingers into the necks of police officers. I lunged forward to intervene, but stopped short when a rumble pierced through the shouts. Bane, fully juiced, had burst through a wall, lifted a police car, and threw it across the field like it was nothing more than shot put.
Smoke grenades had been thrown. Screams and shouts were muffled by the anonymity the smoke provided. I turned on my detective mode and watched the chaos, searching for where my intervention would be most useful.
I saw boomerangs flinging through the crowd, which meant Captain Boomerang wasn't far. The frozen and shattered corpse of an inmate told me Killer Frost was probably nearby as well. Officers were loosing fire on Bane, who looked annoyed yet unphased. But the gunfire stopped when something, some organic matter, began dragging the officers away. Poison Ivy. She had set up camp outside the asylum in a throne of nettles and brush and was turning officers and inmates alike to her cause. A small army was forming at her feet.
Ivy was perhaps the greatest threat, besides Joker. She had no interest in self-serving motives or mere escape from Arkham; she was set to complete her original mission. To end humanity and our poisonous tenure on this planet.
That had to be my target.
"Nightwing," I called into my comm unit as I sprinted away from the roof towards where my dad was stationed on the bridge. "Scarecrow will make it to the bridge. Stop him."
"On it!"
"What about me?" Jason called into the communicator.
"Get to the bridge- we've at least got Bane, Captain Boomerang, and Killer Frost, probably more, trying to breach the police line," I said, leaping from the roof and into a glide.
"Save some of the fun for me," Jason joked with a hint of honest desperation. But I didn't smile. This situation wasn't funny.
I landed beside my dad, whose gun was positioned over the door of his car as he called into his radio.
"We don't have enough manpower, call in Bludhaven, Metropolis, anyone!" he barked.
"Gordon," I demanded, feeling strange to say my own name in such a commanding tone. "Poison Ivy is poisoning your officers, convincing them to help her. It's only a few minutes until she has a small army to move against us."
"Christ," he mumbled, looking past me towards the crowd to see if he could find Ivy already. "How do we stop her?"
"We may need fire for the plants," I said, "but keep your distance. She can't turn you."
"You too," he said, and it almost felt like a fatherly moment. But it wasn't.
A crashing explosion from behind me forced my attention to the asylum buildings, where Bane must have thrown another police car. It thudded against a wall, rolled, and exploded.
"Damn it," my dad's voice growled. It may have sounded angry, but only I knew the true meaning of that tone: he was worried one of his men had been in that car.
That would be one more family he'd have to make a visit to tonight. One more conversation that would haunt him every night after.
"Hold the bridge," I reminded him. "No one gets off the island."
"All units, pull back to the bridge," my dad called into his walkie. "What are you going to do?" he called after me.
"Hold them off," I said, looking back at him once more over my shoulder. "Close the gates behind your men. If nothing else, you'll bottleneck them." I walked away as Gordon barked more instructions into his walkie, stepping into the dusky smoke. Perhaps it wasn't the most elaborate strategy, but sometimes the best place to start is exactly where you are.
I levelled one inmate with deranged excitement, knocking him out and leaving his unconscious body on the ground.
Then another.
And another.
The process easily could have continued, if I hadn't noticed that the special crimes unit helicopter was taking off. And jerking into a sudden spin. After a moment, it righted and departed quickly.
"Batgirl, who's in that chopper?" Nightwing asked over our comms a moment later as I levelled another inmate running at me.
"Not police," I answered. "Can we get a tracker on it?" I asked.
"It's moving too fast!" he called.
"I'm on it!" Jason responded, his bike revving in the background.
"Red Hood…"
"I've got a visual, I'll track its location," he insisted.
"Don't leave the city," I instructed him after a moment of thought and after I'd knocked another inmate to the ground. "Just track it. From a distance."
"Yes, ma'am!"
A clanging behind me signaled that the gate protecting police from inmates had been broken, and all at once. Bane.
"Batman!" I called into my comm, switching between channels so it was just me and him. "Bane's breaching police lines, I could use backup!" I shouted, sprinting back towards the bridge. Bane was moving fast, knocking police cars aside like they were mere inconveniences in his path.
Dad.
Any anxieties or fears I'd once had about facing someone of Bane's size by myself fell away as I watched his gargantuan form barrel towards my father. My sprint hastened and my body was moving as fast as it could towards my dad, flipping over and past inmates that were in my way as quickly as I could. But my fastest was not fast enough. I wasn't going to reach Dad in time. "Batman!" I called again, this time desperate for a response.
"Here!" he answered in a gust of breath, as if he were exerting a lot of effort. A small, localized explosion came from the bridge, and I assumed that was Batman with his explosive gel. I continued fighting my way towards him but forced myself to slow down and fight with clear intentionality rather than in a frantic panic. Glancing up between hits, I could see Batman standing atop Bane, pulling the tubes of his mask with all his might in an effort to disconnect them. A moment later, I heard thrashing and screeching metal across the bridge and prayed that Batman had it under control.
Then quiet. And a splash from the bay below the bridge.
Well… that's Bane dealt with for now. But he'd go free.
I didn't have long to sulk over Bane's escape as the screeching of something wholly unnatural rose up behind me. Poison Ivy's plants were sprawling towards me, ever faster, opening up to reveal her and her poisoned victims in their spores. She stood like a regal statue atop her plants as her minions shambled towards us like zombies.
The SCU gathered themselves and reformed into lines, shooting smoke and tear gas towards the inmates. While Poison Ivy wasn't totally deterred, she did hesitate as her minions lost their strength and many more inmates sprinted away from us and the bridge in fear of our wrath.
The chopper thudded past overhead and I looked down the bridge to see Batman, standing beside my father. Batman watched the helicopter carefully, his detective mode looking enabled. A moment later, he'd clicked something on his bracer that brought the Batwing to attention above him.
"Batgirl," he told me, "I'm going after Joker. Get the island under control."
"Got it," I answered with a nod. The police fired their guns at Ivy's plants while I tackled poisoned inmates and officers to the ground, subduing and knocking them out anyway I could. Unconscious was better than dead.
"Batgirl!" Red Hood clicked onto our private line. "The SCU chopper almost crashed into the Soder Cola building, something's going on with the pilot!"
"Batman's in pursuit!" I shouted. "Fall back!"
"I can't fall back, he'll lose them!"
"If they are crashing into buildings on Miagani island, I'm sure Batman will be able to spot them," I reassured him. "Get back to the bridge to Arkham Island, I'm sure some inmates got through when Bane made his escape attempt."
"But…"
"Hood," I barked at him, placing a finger on my earpiece. "I need you at the bridge. We aren't done yet."
"Yes ma'am," he grumbled back at me, discontent but obedient. I nodded to myself.
Look at that. He's growing.
"Nightwing, give me a status update on Scarecrow!" I demanded as I clothes-lined a sprinting inmate, the force of his head hitting the ground enough to knock him out.
"I've got a trail, I'm on him," Nightwing answered. Brief, curt, no pleasantries; he was closing in on Scarecrow. Best to leave him be and let him do his thing.
I lowered my hand from my communicator and focused on my own fight. Ivy's army was slowing down markedly, but I knew she didn't need these men at the end of the day. If they did manage to overtake the GCPD, Ivy would be thrilled, but she didn't need to defeat us to win. If her army were to fail, they would still be pawns, distractions to keep the focus off herself so she could escape. My father and his men were doing enough with tear gas and riot shields to subdue the army of soldiers at her feet; I needed to focus on the root of the problem.
I rolled my eyes at my own pun and rushed back to one of the few remaining police cars on the bridge.
"Hey! Wh-what are you doing?!" a nervous officer shouted at me as I slid through the open passenger seat door, looking through the center console.
"Does your car have a cigarette lighter?"
"A wha?"
"A cigarette lighter?" I asked again as I learned for myself: no, it did not. Most newer cars didn't. But there was a small pocket lighter tossed in one of the cup holders. I grabbed it as well as a loose magazine of bullets that sat on the driver's seat and bolted from the car, the young officer still confusedly shouting questions at me. I shot my batclaw up to the nearest roof and tried to be as discreet as possible as I rose above the chaos. Landing on the roof, I crouched low and laid my materials before me as quickly as I could.
I hurriedly unloaded the magazine, loose bullets tinkling on the concrete roof. With the help of the sharp edge of a Batarang, I hurriedly sliced the tip off each revealing their innards: gunpowder. I poured the collected gunpowder hurriedly into a vial off my toolbelt, always handy in case I needed to collect evidence, then grabbed up the lighter again and glided down behind Ivy, towards the thick of flora that supported her.
I drizzled the gunpowder carefully among the weeds, leaving a clear trail for the fire to follow, then tossed the vial aside, clicked the lighter to life, and mentally braced myself to run.
As soon as I'd lowered the lighter to the plants, a flame sparked and grew and travelled. A high-pitched shrieking followed, so high-pitched it felt like the plants themselves were screaming. As I felt Ivy's attention turning towards me, I launched myself towards a rooftop on the opposite side of the courtyard. I landed as she examined her flaming roots, the smoke a thick black cloud. I threw batarangs at her through the fog, some of which landed by the sounds of her cries. I moved to another rooftop and threw more batarangs, keeping her disoriented, distracted, frantic. In my peripheral vision, GCPD was moving closer, close enough they could start cutting at the roots themselves to get closer to cuffing Ivy.
"You can't stop me, Batman!" Ivy's booming, preternatural voice shouted at me as I swung to another roof. Just as she said it, I noticed a convenient root at her feet that looked strong enough for me to anchor on. I smiled and fired the batclaw, zipping towards her in an instant. My feet planted less than two feet in front of her own, my hand outstretched and grabbing her around her neck in a vice grip.
"I'm not Batman," I coolly corrected her, then connected my elbow with her temple, knocking her out. Her control seemed to immediately dampen over the inmates and officers she had poisoned; the men had stopped rushing the police and stood confused, disoriented, like they didn't know how they'd gotten there. The plants likewise didn't stop twitching and grasping, but between the loss of their leader and the fire burning through them, they seemed to wave a white flag. By the time the plants sighed an exhale of defeat, Ivy's small army lay unconscious at the base of her plants.
Ivy was taller than me, yet her body was light and flimsy in my arms as I glided her to the ground. Incarceration had not been kind on her, and a pang of pity rose unwarranted in me. I carried her body to the officer I had taken the magazine and lighter from, outstretching the body to him like it was a gift. My father was only ten feet away or so and watched as I delivered the limp body to his man.
"Wherever you keep her until the asylum is secure again," I instructed him, "ensure it's secure. No organic matter within a hundred feet, if you can help it." The officer stared back at me as if I were levying too high a responsibility on him. My father quickly approached and pushed the officer aside, grabbing Ivy from my arms. I avoided eye contact as much as possible, my dad too close for comfort.
"Thank you, Batgirl," he said, carrying Ivy towards the nearest squad car. "You should find Batman. There were plenty of prisoners that slipped past us; we'll have a long night hunting them down. And I still have no clue what happened with that bomb situation… any word?"
By the time my father had finished his sentence and turned back around to check for my answers, I was gone. I'd fired my batclaw at the nearest roof, making a quick exit before anyone could try to track me or pin me down. As I made my way back towards the medical facility, where I'd left my motorcycle, I clicked into my comms.
"Ivy is taken care of and the island is secure," I reported to Nightwing, Batman, and Alfred. "Nightwing?"
"Scarecrow is in custody. Taking him back to GCPD now," he said in a tired voice. I smiled with pride that he was safe and Scarecrow was dealt with. But my smile faded as Batman hesitated to respond.
"Batman?" I urged him.
"The bomb was defused," Batman said. "Quinn is incapacitated. Joker is…"
That heavy pause. That silence had me frozen, my jaw dropped in anticipation.
"Gone."
What the hell did that mean?
"He's dead?" I clarified.
"I don't think so," Batman answered, still too vague for my liking. "I'm investigating." Batman clicked off the comm, leaving me, Nightwing, and Alfred alone.
"Seems he's managed to slide out of our grips again," Alfred sighed heavily. It was a tale as old as time, one that Alfred, Dick, and Bruce had to be tired of hearing.
"At least we've got Quinn," Nightwing said.
"And the bomb," I continued.
"Batgirl, I've turned on Red Hood's communicator, should you like a status update?" Alfred asked.
"Hood," I said, failing to thank Alfred for the foresight. "Where are you?"
"Uh, North Gotham-ish," he said, his tone a little suspicious.
"The island is under control," I said, fully expecting to hear disappointment in his response.
"And the escapees?" he asked incredulously, urgently.
"We'll need to work with the police to determine who's escaped. By my count, we've got at least Bane…"
"Joker, apparently," Dick continued my thought.
"Probably Deadshot…"
"I think you're forgetting one," Hood said sing-songy into his communicator, his tone sounding busy, breathless… like he was mid-fight.
I picked up my pace, hurrying to my bike as I overheard through his comm, "hold still, ya wanker!"
Captain Boomerang.