A/N: Well here we are. The third and final installment of the Harlequin. If you're new here, you should probably read "The Harlequin" "Holiday" and "The Pantomime" but if that seems insane and daunting by all means, jump right in.
The Rabbit Hole takes place five years after the events of the Pantomime and will be posted in three parts. It opens with quite a world-building chapter. Let's have some fun.
The Rabbit Hole
Part 1 - Disorder
1.
The shape of power is always the same; it is the shape of a tree. Root to tip, central trunk branching and re-branching, spreading wider in ever-thinning, searching fingers. The shape of power is the outline of a living thing straining outward, sending its fine tendrils a little further, and a little further yet...
Like the rivers to the ocean, like the lightning strike, the power is obscene, and uncontainable…
- Naomi Alderman, 'The Power'
Theme: Sharon van Etten - 'Jupiter 4'
Harley -
It was mid-December, ten days before Christmas, and Gotham was covered in a fairy-tale-like blanket of snow. There were few things about Gotham that could be compared to a fairy tale. It was a corrupt playground for painted provocateurs and criminal masterminds; a city where a man dressed like a Bat was the one thing keeping total anarchy at bay, the one thing that gave everyday people hope.
In the back room of what was once a laundromat in Gotham's decrepit Eastside, a scowling, scraggly man of about sixty was zip-tied to a rickety chair, his bare feet submerged in a mop bucket of filthy water. His thinning yellow hair was combed over to hide a melanoma-ridden scalp, and his watery eyes were hidden behind a thick pair of Cazel glasses. And even though Jervis Tetch was supposed to be laying low, he'd chosen to wear an attention-grabbing teal-and-gold satin tracksuit that evening.
"You can't fuckin' do this!" Tetch raged, thrashing against his restraints. "You can't—"
Harley punched Tetch in the mouth, effectively cutting him off. He bared a set of rotting, pointed teeth, seething as he lifted his head to glare at her.
After a week of hunting down Tetch, Harley's exasperation was palatable. Her face was smeared in sweaty streaks of warpaint, and her silvery-blonde hair was greasy and scraped back off her face, her clothes—a black and red pinstripe suit and ruffled blouse— a mess after seven days of wear and tear. And her saddle-shoes, a gift from her dear friend Sofia Falcone, were soggy and ruined from trekking back and forth in the snow.
It had been a long week, and she was ready for this game with Tetch to be over.
Tetch roared indignantly when her gloved fist collided with his cheek again. He spat and cursed at her, but the hum of a car battery perched on one of the old washing machines quickly shut him up. His jaw snapped shut and his nostrils flared as the Joker sidled up to Harley, a pair of sparking jumper cables in hand.
The Joker appeared infinitely less tired than Harley felt, his greasepaint still mostly in place after two full days without reapplying. The green washout dye he used to stain his hair ran down the side of his face, mixing with snow and sweat and dripping down the violet lapel of his coat. He wore the same suit the tailor always made for him. It as rumpled, blood-stained and torn, the peach-colored lining of the overcoat ripped and dragging behind him.
Harley and the Joker peered down at Tetch together, like a two-headed dragon considering its prey.
"What the fuck are you gonna do!" Tetch yelped, getting nervous. He tried to push himself back in the chair, nearly tipping it over. "What are you gonna do!"
"Just giving you a little, ah..." the Joker glanced at Harley, his red lips curling into a smirk that she mirrored. "Motivation."
"What!" Tetch roared. "Hey, wha-aghh!"
J dropped the jumper cables into the mop bucket, making the water crackle and fizz. Tetch's eyes rolled back in his head as he twitched helplessly, his tongue flopping out of his mouth like a big red fish.
They stepped back to avoid the filthy water splashing out of the bucket, letting Tetch convulse for three, four, five, six… seven seconds before she turned off the car battery.
Tetch coughed and wheezed, doubling over as far as his restraints would allow. He lifted his head to glare at them, still hacking his lungs out as his hideous glasses slid down his hooked nose.
"See," the Joker flashed Tetch a wide, sinister smile, spreading his arms. "Motivation."
"What the hell d'ya want from me!" Tetch sputtered.
Harley dropped into a squat so she could look Tetch in the eye, ignoring the pervasive, sour smell coming off him as she leaned in close, searching his face so she would know if he was lying.
"Where's the Riddler?" she asked coldly.
"This is about—" Tetch sputtered incredulously. "This is about Nygma?"
The Joker flipped the car battery back on and Tetch immediately fell back into convulsions, his frail, sun-spotted hands rattling against the wooden arms of the chair.
Seven seconds passed. And then ten.
Tetch was a convicted pedophile who'd gone from sex-offender to sex-trafficker to mass-hysteria-inducing kidnapper with a penchant for stealing children out of their beds. He'd taken six children over the summer and early fall, and each case was the same — he assaulted them, murdered them, then staged their corpses in fairy-tale-esque tea parties.
The media called him The Mad Hatter.
"How'd ya find me, huh?" Tetch panted. He was trying to get them to talk, to buy himself some time. Harley didn't have the patience for it, but the Joker had other ideas. He loved to talk.
"Seems a former uh, associate of yours wasn't entirely thrilled with the whole, hmm," J flapped one gloved hand at Tetch like he was searching for the right word. "Kiddie-diddler gig," he settled on with a leer.
Two henchpeople wearing clown masks stomped into the small room then, dragging a man with a hood over his head between them. They let him fall to his knees on the wet concrete, then ripped off the hood to reveal the man beneath—a forgettable face and a receding hairline.
Tetch scowled like a rabid dog. "Moe! You sonofabitch!"
Moe Blum looked between The Joker and Harley, his eyes wide and frantic.
"You said you'd keep me safe!" he cried out, dismayed.
Harley scoffed impatiently.
"What the fuck gave you the impression you could trust us?" She reached into her coat for the revolver holstered at her side, whipping it out and shooting Blum in the head before he could finish a desperate, pleading wail.
The clowns dragged the body out of the room, and Harley turned back to Tetch, her expression stormy. She wiped a speck of blood from her forehead, revealing a peachy patch of skin.
"Let's try again," she pointed the revolver at Tetch and pulled back the hammer. "Where. Is. Ed."
The Joker turned the car battery back on with a snicker, and Tetch fell into convulsions as the jumper cables fizzled in the mop bucket.
Harley shot him a withering look for wasting time, but he just shrugged helplessly, offering her a lazy grin.
Clearly, he wasn't as sleep-deprived as she was.
The weeks before their hunt for Tetch had been similarly filled with a relentless but fruitless pursuit of Ed after they got word that he and his Sirens — three henchgirls who bore a striking resemblance to Harley and lived to do Ed's bidding — were stockpiling weapons. That could only mean one thing. Ed was planning something, and Harley had ample reason to suspect that he was probably in a vengeance-seeking kind of mood — vengeance with her name on it.
They'd had a heated altercation just after Halloween, one that left Ed with a bullet in his right butt cheek. It had been an accident, Harley obviously meant it as a warning shot, but it seemed her aim was better when she wasn't trying to hit her target.
Harley knew Ed. She knew how wildly his moods could fluctuate. His desire to avoid boredom drove most of his decision-making, frequently making him reckless and impulsive. Harley would never suggest someone should deny their impulses, but Ed's impulsiveness could sometimes be… self-destructive. She'd even saved his life on two separate, dire occasions.
Harley didn't want to see Ed get himself killed. He was far too much fun for that.
But after years of pushing each other's buttons, she sensed she may have pushed Ed just a little too far this time. She sensed that this time, for the crime of shooting Ed in the ass, she would face the full force of his wrath.
And she couldn't quite decide how things were going to go next.
Her gut told her something bad was coming — a feeling she couldn't shake.
So they needed to get ahead of Ed first.
Ed had a habit of making fleeting partnerships with people who fell under the purview of Detective Robert DeCarlo's "Rogue" Task Force, especially the ones who caused the Batman a significant amount of grief. That was what led Harley and the Joker to Tetch today. Those same whispers about the Sirens became whispers about Ed partnering with Tetch. So they pivoted from tracking down Ed to rooting out Gotham's most famous kiddie-lover for some answers.
The Joker turned off the car battery, and Tetch collapsed bonelessly, his restraints the only thing keeping him in the chair, his thin chest heaving beneath the teal tracksuit.
"Give us Ed," Harley said plainly.
"I don't know nothin'," Tetch wheezed.
Harley rolled her eyes. "I promise, Ed will not protect you. Don't protect him."
"I swear, I dun-fuckin'-know," Tetch insisted. "I just needed..." he shook his head, swallowing hard. "Some cover."
Harley felt a muscle in her jaw twitch. She stared at Tetch hard, understanding what he was saying.
"Some... cover?" the Joker growled, echoing Harley's thoughts.
"I got everyone in this fuckin' city after me!" Tetch huffed indignantly. "The Bat, the cops, the fuckin' Falcones. Can ya blame me? I needed to take some of the heat off!"
"So you told people you were working with the Riddler?" Harley snapped, frustration and exhaustion crackling in her veins.
She lashed out without thinking, grabbing her bigger gun from its holster and pistol-whipping Tetch across the face. She hit him so hard he went flailing sideways. The chair he was bound to tipped over on its side, sending him crashing to the floor and knocking over the mop bucket in the process. The filthy water slopped across the floor, breaking like a wave over Tetch's bloodied face as he wheezed and wriggled furiously.
Harley swung around to face the Joker, her painted face pinched with frustration.
"Fuck!" she shouted at him, throwing her hands up for lack of anything better to do.
He looked liable to say something snarky, but before he could there was a loud squawk from a handheld radio hidden in the depths of his coat.
"Boss," Johnny Frost's voice crackled. "Boss, you got the Bat on your tail. He's comin' up from the south. You got maybe three, four minutes tops."
"The fuckin' Batman?!" Tetch sputtered on the floor, struggling against his bonds with renewed vigor. "Fuck! Untie me! Fuckin' untie me!"
Harley and the Joker ignored him.
Harley swore and turned toward a row of old washing machines, searching for a quick means of escape. There was a narrow window running the room's length above the machines, with just enough space for a person to squeeze out onto a snowy ledge. She looked at the Joker, eyebrows raised, and he shrugged carelessly before hopping up onto one of the machines, with more grace than you'd think him capable of.
"Untie me, you clown fuckers!" Tetch raged, flopping around on the floor.
The Joker shoved his foot through the window, shattering the glass then using his arm to clear away the debris while Harley jumped up beside him.
"You fuckers!" Tetch howled as J disappeared out onto the snowy ledge with Harley following swiftly behind him.
It was well below freezing outside, with fresh snow flurries spiraling through the night sky. Harley climbed up from the laundromat's window ledge onto the roof, springing to her feet once she was up, her ears straining for signs that the Batman was nearby. It wasn't as easy as it used to be; the latest version of the Batpod didn't have that irritating whirring sound, which made him even harder to avoid.
Over the years, the Bat had become more and more relentless in his pursuit of them, frequently foiling their plans and showing up when he wasn't explicitly invited. It was only when freaks like Tetch popped up to distract him that they got a moment's peace to do some real work.
The Joker grunted something indecipherable before flinging himself off the roof across a narrow alley, his coat and its torn lining flaring out behind him. He landed on an old fire escape clinging to the taller brick building across from them, the whole structure rattling perilously under his weight.
Harley huffed out a frustrated breath and leaped after him, her bones aching from the cold and exhaustion and her teeth rattling when she slammed into the wrought iron bars. She shook it off and started to climb.
"Boss, he's comin' up on ya," Frost's disembodied voice informed them as they reached the top.
The rooftops of the Cauldron stretched out ahead of them, the pale moonlight pearly on freshly fallen snow. Harley took off at a sprint once she was on her feet, the Joker loping along beside her.
They jumped over another narrow alley onto a building of a similar height and then again a few minutes later, over a wider alley onto a lower structure. Harley ducked and rolled to absorb the shock. She leapt to her feet again, her breath puffing out in front of her as she ran, her lungs burned with the freezing air. But she didn't stop, not until she realized the Joker was no longer beside her.
She looked over her shoulder and skidded to a stop when she spotted him some twenty feet behind her, coughing a wet, rattly cough and slapping his chest.
He staggered forward a few feet, hacking up something disgusting and yellow that landed with a wet thwack in the snow. Then he shook his head like a dog trying to clear it and loped forward a few more feet.
"What did I tell you?" Harley snapped at him. "You have got to stop smoking!"
He flapped his hand at her like she was acting stupid and kept moving, but the coughing fit wouldn't quit.
There was a WOOSH-CLANK! behind them. Harley looked back in time to see a grappling hook latch onto the rooftop, less than ten feet from where they were standing.
History told her they had approximately fifteen seconds before the Batman arrived.
She felt an inexplicable urge to linger, but she fought it off and swung back around, searching for a new opportunity to escape. She spotted a long, bendy bus sliding down the street below them. It would be right under them within seconds, and it would be a big jump.
The Joker moved before she did, coming to the same conclusion. His breath was loud and wheezy as he grabbed her elbow, running for the ledge where the bus was moving past. It was only just beneath them when they leaped off the roof together, the Joker's hand vice-like around Harley's arm as they free fell for a few heart-stopping seconds, only losing his grip on her once they crashed onto the roof of the bus.
Harley rolled to absorb the shock again, but it was less effective from that height, sending painful pins and needles shooting up her legs and turning them to rubber. She fell onto her back, groaning.
"C'mon," the Joker grunted. He rolled sideways off the still-moving bus and disappeared out of her line of sight.
Harley took a deep breath, preparing herself, then followed him over the edge. She stumbled on her rubbery legs when she hit the concrete, but the Joker steadied her, pointing her toward Frost's Cadillac, which was waiting for them less than twenty feet ahead of them.
They raced toward the crummy old car, relief giving Harley one last burst of strength to make her escape.
Dinah -
In the winter, Gotham's Eastside always felt colder and more remote than the nicer parts of the city. The snow seemed to fall harder and stick around longer, turning gray and dirty in the long wait for snowplows that never came often enough.
Dinah reflected on that first winter after she ran away from the group home. She'd been twelve, and she nearly froze to death, forcing her to make common cause with a small colony of other homeless kids to get through it. Their Lord of the Flies-style politics had her running for the exit at the first sign of the snow melting, and it wasn't long after that she met her first Sensei, who gave her a place to sleep and taught her karate in exchange for cleaning his dojo.
Then he died two years later, and she was alone again.
She'd been thinking about him a lot lately now that she was back in Gotham, where she repeatedly had to face her past. At twenty-four, she was more self-possessed than most people her age, confident and clear-headed, no longer an anxiety-ridden teenager trying to repent for things she couldn't control. For years Dinah hid behind a wall of quiet severity to keep herself safe, but in the real world, where she could thrive and get to know herself, she learned to open up to people and enjoy her life.
Dinah had grown her hair out since leaving Gotham, no longer needing to keep it short because she was living on the streets or hiding it beneath a cowl. Her hair grew darker in her twenties, turning dirty blonde. Her roots were still dark, but the rest was flaxen, lightened from a year living under the California sun. She'd lost the baby fat in her face too, her cheekbones higher, her jaw sharper, her brown eyes wider. She went by Dinah Lance now, but that had been her name for years. Dinah Drake was a ghost, so removed from what she now knew, it nearly felt like it all happened to someone else.
"You payin' attention, kid?"
Montoya's voice drew Dinah out of her reverie. She glanced sideways to find her partner eyeing her curiously from the driver's seat of her crappy Buick. It was the GCPD's idea of an appropriate service vehicle for a less-than-popular detective like Renee Montoya and her rookie, the recently transferred Officer Dinah Lance.
"I'm always paying attention," Dinah promised, making Montoya snort as she unscrewed the cap of her flask and took a quick draught.
When she was first partnered with Montoya, Dinah found her surliness so off-putting she nearly requested another transfer. But after three months working together, she'd come to understand Montoya's black moods were the product of frustration with a corrupt system, one that rendered GCPD toothless. It was hard to be a good cop in Gotham, and Montoya's dedication was admirable, even if her habit of self-medicating with whisky was less than ideal.
"You're too serious for twenty-four, kid," Montoya observed, taking a drag off her Juul as she settled in to stare at the bar they were staking out. They'd been there three hours, waiting for a member of the Sullivan gang to emerge— a source called Freddi Two-Fingers, who supposedly had information on the location of Jervis Tetch.
The Mad Hatter case initially fell under the Rogue Task Force's purview, but with Tetch laying low and other Rogues like the Calendar Killer on the loose, the case arrived on Montoya's desk. This put Dinah in a position she knew she should have anticipated when she transferred to Gotham — working a case that grazed up against Bruce's… spelunking.
She'd seen him once in the three months she'd been back. An awkward dinner at the Manor, which required lying to her girlfriend of five years, Helena Bertinelli, about where she was, something Dinah didn't relish. Helena believed her relationship with Bruce consisted of a few handshakes when his foundation selected her for its scholarship program, but the truth was much more complicated than that.
At that dinner, Dinah had been taken aback by how old Bruce looked. He wasn't forty yet, but his hair was graying and the skin around his eyes had turned papery. Alfred confided that there was virtually no cartilage left in Bruce's knees and his brain was riddled with concussions, and under his clothes were gadgets to keep him on his feet. He was going to need a cane soon if he didn't slow down.
When Dinah took on the Tetch case, Bruce declined her invitation for coffee and a casual debriefing, claiming the evidence he'd collected and delivered to the MCU—despite their objections to working with him— was all he knew.
Because he was avoiding her.
Dinah would never feel guilty about leaving Gotham. It was what she'd needed to do to finally take care of herself. But she and Bruce had switched roles in the five years since. Now she was the one worrying and wishing he would find some relief from the burden he put on his shoulders.
"God, I hope this guy comes out soon," Montoya grumbled.
"They never do," Dinah pointed out drily.
"How'd you get so cynical after a year on the job, huh?" Montoya smirked. " Out in California, no less."
"You say that like there's no criminals in California," Dinah shot Montoya an amused look.
"You trying to tell me being a cop in LA is the same as being a cop in Gotham?" Montoya raised her eyebrows.
Dinah made a face. There was no possible metric to compare Los Angeles to Gotham.
"You may have a point," she conceded.
Becoming a cop had never been part of Dinah's plan. After graduating with a BA in Art History, her plan was to work at a gallery or an auction house. But after a few months of selling art to wealthy people in LA, she felt decidedly uninspired. So she turned to the only other kind of work that made sense to her: putting criminals behind bars.
That meant two years of law school or six months at the police academy. Eager to get into the workforce instead of spending her life in school or behind a desk, Dinah chose the Academy.
Helena had been less than thrilled. She hated cops, and she couldn't fathom how such a career move would fit into their liberal, arty little life in LA. But she accepted it eventually. Or she claimed she did, at least.
Returning to Gotham hadn't been part of the plan either, but almost six months to the day Dinah joined the LAPD, Helena was offered her dream job back east. Back in Gotham, where neither of them had ever intended to return. Where criminals with painted faces committed random acts of violence and organized crime controlled every facet of society, especially the police force. Good cops like Dinah were in short supply in Gotham, and even though the city held nothing but painful memories for her, that meant she had a purpose there0.
"What's Helena doing tonight?" Montoya asked mildly. "Is she out at one of her fancy events?"
"She's got early meetings tomorrow," Dinah brushed back a strand of hair that had come free from her messy ponytail. "At this rate, she'll be asleep by the time I get home," she added glumly.
"Nah," Montoy sniffed. "Freddi will come out of that bar in the next twenty minutes, I guarantee it."
Dinah raised an amused eyebrow. "You guarantee it?"
"I got a sixth sense about these things," Montoya explained smugly. "I'll bet you breakfast tomorrow if I'm right."
"Alright," Dinah grinned, settling back into her seat. "Deal."
"I gotta say," Montoya eyed Dinah's uniform warily. "You going around in your blues doesn't give us the kind of credibility we need with these low lives."
"Protocol says officers must wear their uniforms for at least five years," Dinah recited flatly. She was hardly a fan of the starchy dark blue shirt and ill-fitting pants, the clunky shoots and padded parka announcing her presence as a police officer.
"Yeah, if you're pickin' up fuckin' traffic cones," Montoya scoffed. "You're already a better detective than half the idiots who've been doing this job twenty years. What were you like, a cop in a past life or something?"
Dinah forced an awkward laugh, sliding down in her seat. "Yeah, right."
Her year-long stint as a masked vigilante did feel like a past life. She'd been little more than a child at the time, misguided and angry, filled with guilt and resentment. So she left. She moved on. She ignored the frantic national news stories about Harley Quinn and the Batman, knowing there was nothing she could do to stop either of them. Trying to help was an exercise in futility.
That didn't mean it was easy to lie to Montoya about her past.
Just like it killed Dinah a little bit inside when she thought about how she'd hid it from Helena. For years.
There had been so many opportunities to tell her the truth, but she'd never taken them. And now it was too late.
"There he is," Montoya pointed across the street at a man stumbling out of the pub. "Looks like you owe me breakfast," she flashed Dinah a smirk before her eyes swept over Dinah's uniform again. "Jesus, kid. We really gotta get you a suit."
Harley -
Frost dropped Harley and the Joker off at a safehouse downtown, their preferred place to lay low and sleep. It was a cramped one-bedroom walk-up over a computer repair store and previously served as a hideout for Falcone-enforcers after killing the original tenant. Then in the circle of life, Harley and the Joker killed those enforcers, and the apartment had been a regular safehouse for them ever since.
It was four flights up, and by the time they reached the top, the Joker was rubbing his chest and trying to hide a cough, clearing his throat and blinking hard.
Harley shot him a dubious look over her shoulder as she unlocked the front door.
"I'm leaving you behind next time," she promised, making him snort feebly as they stepped over the threshold, their combined exhaustion palatable.
After over a week without the heat on, the apartment was nearly as cold as outside. Harley hurried into the narrow, untidy kitchen and cranked the heating up, making the flat's radiators hum to life. A rush of exhaustion hit her so hard she had to brace both hands on the kitchen counter, making her feel like she'd been weightlessly flying through space and time and suddenly hit a brick wall. She took a deep breath and tried to remember the last time she slept adequately, not just micro naps in the back of Frost's car. Days, at least. Maybe the whole week. It was blurry.
She sighed and staggered down the hall into the bedroom. It was small and cramped like the rest of the apartment, with a few cheap pieces of furniture flanking a box spring mattress and an en suite bathroom with a coffin-like shower stall. It was as clean as could be expected, the floor covered in their belongings — discarded clothes, a duffle bag filled with cash, a second duffle bag of automatic rifles spilling across the carpet, the original owners' bedding wadded up and stuffed in the corner.
Harley obviously replaced the sheets the moment they moved in.
The Joker had thrown off his tattered overcoat and fallen down on the bed, flat on his back, his legs dangling over the side as he stared at the ceiling, looking as tired as Harley felt. Even when horrifically sleep-deprived, they were both pretty resilient, adrenaline and caffeine keeping them on their feet for as long as they needed to be. But the crash was more brutal than it used to be, and the recovery periods were longer and more intense.
Harley kicked off her destroyed saddle shoes and dropped her coat on the floor. She stumbled over to the bed, preparing to crash face-first into the mattress, but the Joker had other ideas. He sat up abruptly, yawning as he grabbed her and pulled her into his lap.
Harley's knees sank into the bed on either side of his hips, the soft mattress making her eyes feel heavy. She draped her arms over his shoulders and lowered her forehead to his, his low, satisfied hum making her crack a tired smile. Just being alone together felt novel after the last few weeks, let alone with a bed. How many weeks had it been?
Three?
Four?
She pulled back to look at him, her exhaustion melting a fraction when she met his heavy gaze. He licked his lips with a serpentine flick of his tongue, searching her face curiously.
The phone in her blazer began to ring, vibrating noisily as it rattled against her gun.
Sighing, Harley fished her phone out while the Joker watched sleepily. Her face lit up when she saw who was calling, prompting him to scowl as he correctly interpreted her expression and what it meant.
"I'll be right back," Harley promised, jumping out of his lap and ignoring his irritable muttering as she slipped into the bathroom and pushed the door shut behind her.
"Well, well, well," she answered, grinning. "Look who's back in Gotham."
"I always come back," Pam replied drily, a smirk in her voice. "I'm like herpes that way."
Harley laughed as she fought back a yawn. "When did you get back?"
"The plane literally just landed," Pam sighed. "I'm so fucking jetlagged I could sleep for a week."
"Mm," Harley agreed sleepily. "How was Cairo?"
"Very productive," Pam sounded pleased with herself. "Aaaaaand, I need your help with something."
Harley's eyebrows rose. "What kind of something?"
"A heist," Pam whispered, making Harley snort.
"A heist? Like you need my help to steal something?"
"I know it's a little below your pay grade," Pam deadpanned, making Harley laugh again. "But it's not something I can do in the middle of the day, so I need to be sneaky."
"Alright," Harley agreed with another yawn. "What're we stealing?"
"A mummified species of flora that's been extinct for over two-thousand years," Pam explained, getting all excited and nerdy like she always did. "The Anubis Rose. It was one of the Pharaohs' favorite flowers, so they filled his sarcophagus with them."
"Uh..." Harley's brow creased as she tried to follow. "So, where are we stealing these dead flowers from?"
"Mummified flora," Pam corrected her. "This Pharaoh's sarcophagus was pillaged by French colonialists a century ago and un-fucking-believably, it ended up in Gotham's History Museum. A gift from the Dumas family," she sneered.
"Right," Harley yawned. "Fucking colonialists"
"Jesus, you sound exhausted," Pam observed blithely. "Why don't you come over for dinner tomorrow? We can go through all the nitty-gritty details."
"I can try," Harley looked at herself in the mirror over the bathroom sink. "But things are a little up in the air at the moment."
"Like you might get killed up in the air, or you might kill someone up in the air?"
"Both," Harley sighed. "It's always both."
Pam snorted, and in the background, Harley heard what sounded like a stewardess announcing it was safe to disembark the aircraft.
"I gotta go through customs now," Pam sighed. "I'll see you tomorrow. And for fuck's sake, get some sleep."
"Okay," Harley agreed, yawning again.
Once they hung up, Harley set her phone down on the sink and ran the tap. She scrubbed at her face with the cold water, removing as much of the grime and paint as she could. She turned off the tap and dried her face with the sleeve of her black and red striped blazer, then lifted her head, frowning at how drawn her reflection looked in the mirror.
She forced her face to relax out of its steadfast frown, which she felt she'd been wearing for weeks, and was surprised to see two small lines remain between her eyebrows. She pitched forward so her nose was an inch from the glass, frowning to make the skin pucker, then raising her eyebrows high. The lines softened into two stubborn creases but didn't go away.
"Fuck," Harley whispered incredulously, rubbing the twin wrinkles with her thumb in a futile attempt to smooth them away. She raised her eyebrows again, tried pulling the skin of her forehead back, but the creases remained.
She scoffed at her reflection, shocked that she had wrinkles at thirty-five.
Did people get wrinkles at thirty-five?
Harley Quinn fearlessly courted death every day of her life, and she was hardly vain. But the idea of growing old and feeble? That struck an anxious note she'd never even considered before.
Harley huffed impatiently. Well, she would be damned if she let that happen anytime soon.
There was still too much work to be done.
Helena -
After three months, Helena was finally starting to feel at home on Gotham's run-down metro. The carriages were covered in graffiti, and every time the train took a sharp turn, there was a perilous squeal to remind riders just how poorly maintained the subway tracks were. But Helena didn't mind the grit and grime; she relished the opportunity to take public transport. Everyone drove in LA, and it was a relief not to be stuck behind the wheel of a car for three hours a day.
She could have never imagined moving back to Gotham a year earlier — the city was a crime-ridden shithole that carried horrible memories for both her and Dinah. But when she learned about Wayne Enterprises' Clean Energy Project, which was about to revolutionize energy consumption and turn Gotham into the green capital of the world, she jumped on the opportunity to be involved. And it had been a whirlwind three months of moving to Gotham and preparing to launch Wayne's reactor ever since.
But before they could save the world, they had to be able to turn the reactor on.
And thanks to Dr Leonid Pavel of Moscow University and his crackpot theories, there was a chance that would no longer be possible.
Helena sighed and pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes, trying to push away the stress of the day. Her hands smelled of gunpowder from her trip to the gun range in Otisburg, which had become a regular haunt of hers when she needed to blow off steam. The smell comforted her, calmed her. She'd taken up martial arts after her mother's death when she was shipped off to a Swiss boarding school for safekeeping. Then, after her father's gruesome demise a few years later, firearms seemed to be the only thing that could bring her a moment's peace.
Lucky for her, the Swiss were big gun nuts.
Peace of mind had been in short supply ever since Helena's boss, the outrageously wealthy philanthropist and investor Miranda Tate, casually informed her about Pavel's paper, which outlined how Wayne's reactor could be turned into a nuclear bomb. Miranda seemed convinced everything would be fine, but Helena had spent the past week scrambling to discredit Pavel before his paper could be published.
It didn't help that Dinah was so distracted with work. Yes, of course, Helena wanted her to hunt down a pedophile with Renee. But it would have been nice to get some time alone with her too. Dinah had had a good work-life balance in LA. In Gotham, she worked insane hours, especially since the MCU put her on the Tetch case. Sometimes Helena would go days without seeing her, then wake up to Dinah passed out in bed beside her, too tired to hold a conversation.
If that wasn't enough, Rupert Thorne, an old acquaintance of Helena's father had repeatedly tried to speak to her over the past week. Helena was doing her best to ignore him, not taking his calls and deleting his voicemails without listening to them. But it had her on edge. Her father's business, the family business, wasn't something she liked to think about, though being back in Gotham certainly shoved it in her face over and over again.
As she climbed off the metro at her stop Uptown, she reminded herself that this wasn't forever. Gotham was temporary. In a few years, she would move on from being Miranda's assistant. Then she and Dinah could move somewhere better suited to them. Providence, maybe, where they'd be part of a thriving community. Dinah could be the deputy sheriff and Helena could work remotely. They could live in the country and catch the train into Star City for events and meetings. That was the life she wanted for them, not the hectic hell-spiral that was Gotham.
For now, they were making the best of it, moving into the West-RoPa (West of Robinson Park) neighborhood Uptown, which was full of gay bars and small galleries and eateries and felt like a haven from Gotham's pervasive crime and corruption. They were renting a loft on the top floor of a pre-war brownstone, and though the winter months rendered it dark and dreary, it was sure to be full of light in the summer. Or so she and Dinah hoped when they signed the lease.
Too tired to climb four flights of stairs, Helena took the creaky elevator to the top floor, checking her phone in hopes of a message from Dinah, but only finding a swath of new work emails and a Snapchat from her brother Pino.
That was another bright spot to being back in Gotham, getting to see her brother more often. Once a week, they'd go for drinks at his favorite sports bar to watch Gotham's football team lose or out for dinner with Dinah on special occasions like her birthday.
It didn't take a genius to work out that Pino was involved in the 'family business.' While Helena was sent away, Pino remained in Gotham, trained by her father and then extended family in the ways of the business. They didn't talk about it, but Helena wasn't about to cut him off for doing exactly what their father taught him to do. And Dinah—thank God—seemed to realize that and kept her thoughts to herself.
She knew Pino was all Helena had left.
Helena sighed as she stepped into the loft, removing the black beret perched jauntily on her hair and tucking it in her coat. She hung her coat up beside the door and kicked off her heeled ankle boots before padding across the living room in stockinged feet. She squatted down in front of a mid-century stereo unit, a splurge-worthy investment paid for with their first grown-up paychecks out of college and beloved enough that they hauled it across the country from LA. She and Dinah had decorated the exposed brick wall around it with two large, lively paintings of flatware and flowers in primary colors from an artist friend in LA.
Helena turned on NPR and closed her eyes, lingering in front of the stereo as she listened to the anchor murmur about cultural mistranslations. She cranked up the volume and rose to her feet, heading straight for the wine rack in the kitchen to crack open a bottle of red.
She poured a healthy-sized glass of Chianti and pulled the elastic from her low bun, letting her dark hair tumble down her back. Her thoughts were melancholic and unfocused as they so often were of late. A few sips of wine helped ease some of the tension from her body, and one more generous swallow made her head swim pleasantly as she undid half the buttons of her cream-silk shirt, revealing a slim gold cross that hung beteem the black lace cups of her bra, directly over her heart.
Her father's cross. He'd been wearing it when he died, according to Thorne, who'd hand-delivered it to her when he flew to Switzerland to tell her the news of her father's death in person.
Helena hauled herself up onto a barstool at the kitchen's island, drinking and replying to emails on her phone. But she couldn't focus. She kept catching herself chewing on her nails, which were already bitten down to the quick, a nervous habit she couldn't shake. Dinah's nails were always neat and strong, and when she'd worked at the gallery in LA, she'd kept them manicured with maroon polish. Of course, manicures quickly stopped being something she indulged in once she turned around and announced she was quitting her job to join the police academy.
That conversation —that argument —was one Helena frequently revisited when she was feeling low. She'd been shocked. Their friends had been shocked. Dinah? Her girlfriend? Who loved art and music and food and traveling and people. Her queer girlfriend who wore fishnets and a spandex bodysuit to Pride every year? A cop? It made Helena wonder if she'd been sharing her life with a stranger.
Police work invited trauma. It required Dinah to carry a gun, and she hated guns, which was a shame because she was a great shot.
Helena topped up her wine glass and headed to the bedroom to change. She pulled on an oversized tee-shirt and a fluffy pair of socks, then took off her makeup and brushed her teeth. Her face looked tired in the mirror, her olive skin pale and her lips chapped, her high cheekbones too sharp, harsh even. Dinah used to say Helena's eyes reminded her of a Disney Princess, almond shaped with a thick fringe of lashes and a fine brow, but Helena thought that was a little sinister. Whenever she looked in the mirror, she thought there was something haunted-looking in her eyes, something dark and forever-sad.
She brushed her hair, which fell in long layers past her shoulders, and as knotting it back in a low, loose bun when she heard the front door open and shut.
A minute later, Dinah appeared behind her, beaming at their reflections in the bathroom mirror.
"Hey!" she grinned. She'd already removed her blue police shirt and was in the process of tugging off her white undershirt. She was obviously happy about something.
"Did you catch him?" Helena swung around, her heart leaping hopefully. "Tetch? Did you catch him?"
"Not quite," Dinah admitted, tossing her shirt in the hamper before she leaned against the door to tug off her socks. "But we got a really good lead from one of our sources. We're so close, I can feel it."
"You said that at Thanksgiving," Helena pointed out, reaching for her wine off the counter.
Dinah joined her at the bathroom sink, looping her arms around Helena's waist and giving her a knowing look as she drew her close. Helena didn't resist, distracted by how pretty she looked in her demi-cup bra, fringed with lace and the polar opposite to the hideous, ill-fitting cop trousers. Dinah had already taken her hair out of the ponytail she wore it in all day at work, leaving her flaxen hair with an uneven kink around her small, sweet face. Her body was petite and athletic, her skin still golden from the California sun, and her eyes were like warm honey. After all this time, Helena was still smitten.
"Hey," Dinah said softly, searching Helena's face as she tried to pull her closer. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing," Helena demurred, and Dinah cocked her head to the side and offered her a sympathetic smile.
"How about we have a date night this week?" she suggested gently. "Drea has that exhibition with the neon nipples you wanted to see.".
"Really?" Helena raised an eyebrow. "You won't run off in the middle of it because Renee needs you?"
"I promise," Dinah leaned up for a kiss, her lips soft and lingering before she pulled away and took Helena's hand, leading her back out to the kitchen.
Helena didn't fail to notice the gun safe blinking red beside the wardrobe on the bedroom floor—she'd already locked her gun up before even saying hello, and something about that irritated her.
"Are you still having problems with that Russian guy?" Dinah asked, pouring herself a glass of wine while Helena slid onto a barstool and nodded glumly.
"Yeah," she sighed. "If Wayne finds out about this paper, that's it. He'll shut us down before we can blink. He's completely inflexible when it comes to hiccups like this."
Dinah sipped her wine so Helena couldn't see her face.
"Well," she cleared her throat. "Surely, if the Russian guy is a quack, Bruce Wayne will see that."
"I know you have a soft spot for him because his foundation paid your tuition," Helena said. "But don't forget this is the guy who burnt his family's mansion down. He's not exactly known for being stable."
"That was eight years ago," Dinah pointed out, making Helena roll her eyes.
Dinah was always far too sympathetic to Wayne, a billionaire who did not need or deserve her compassion. Helena had little patience for his smug playboy schtick in board meetings, which he toned down when he was one-on-one with Miranda, or rather two-on-one with Helena hanging back taking notes.
"I know what he can be like," Dinah sighed. "I think it's a defense mechanism, you know? Like he doesn't know how to deal with normal people, so he falls into this act of what a billionaire should be."
"Yeah, well, your poor little billionaire may destroy the single best chance our species has to survive on this planet," Helena grumbled, making Dinah's face soften with sympathy.
She set down her wine and grabbed the arms of Helena's barstool, rotating her around to face her. She was still only wearing her bra and uniform pants. A huge part of Helena wanted to burn those hideous pants so she'd never have to see Dinah dressed up as a cop again. Instead, she looped her legs around Dinah's waist and drew her closer so she could bury her face in her soft neck, seeking solace there.
"You're working too hard," Dinah said, stroking Helena's hair. "It's not up to you to save the world by yourself."
Helena snorted and pulled back. "You're one to talk."
"I'm not trying to save the world," Dinah smiled. "I'm just trying to keep some kids safe."
"You'll catch him," Helena reassured her, smiling back. "Then in twenty years, there'll be a Netflix documentary about you and Renee stopping that creep."
"Noooo," Dinah laughed, her face lighting up.
Helena slid her hands around Dinah's slender waist, tugging her closer, and Dinah melted into her easily. She pulled out the elastic holding Helena's dark hair back, threading her fingers through it as she kissed her, and Helena's melancholy began to fade. She unclasped Dinah's bra and ran her hands up her back, her soft skin and the slide of her tongue making her body warm with desire.
"Let's go to bed," Dinah murmured, shrugging out of her bra before she tangled her hands in Helena's long hair and kissed her again.
They staggered across the living room with their mouths fused together, their hands roaming. Dinah's hideous trousers were discarded halfway to the bedroom, and Helena's sleep shirt landed beside them a second later. The bedroom suddenly seemed too far away, so Helena pushed Dinah up against the wall and slid a hand between her legs, their breath mingling as they gasped and rocked against each other.
This was what Helena needed. She needed to lose herself in the girl she loved, to wrap herself in the safety and calm only Dinah could give her. She needed her to distract her from the sadness of her past and the darkness swimming inside her. She needed Dinah to make her forget that no matter what she did, that darkness would never leave her, and one day, it might find its way out.
Lucy -
Lucy Falcone accomplished more in five years than Carmine Falcone did in twenty.
Gotham was chaotic, unstable like a nuclear reactor on the brink of melting down, and it took a careful hand to guide it as Lucy had done. Since taking the reins of power, she'd brought together the old Cosa Nostra families, forming a Commission to run the city from top to bottom efficiently.
Lucy encouraged the view that she was an equal member of the Commission. It was easier for men to follow her from the side than leading out front. But despite appearances, she was the one who made them all rich and powerful beyond their wildest dreams— and they all fuckin' knew it.
Power. It wasn't something Lucy had ever craved, but when given a chance to obtain it, she'd quickly learned how to wield it effectively.
She worked late at the Iceberg Lounge most nights, sequestered in her office with the brass band out in the club making the walls rattle. She could never work from home. It was too quiet at the Falcone penthouse, too distracting having Carmine Jr nearby, and too soft when Lucy needed to be focused, strategic, and cold as fucking ice.
Even when she was eight and a half months pregnant.
With twins.
She sighed and tried to concentrate on the iPad in front of her, running a distracted hand over her massive baby bump. She wore a floaty pink dress with an empire waist tied in a satin bow, which fell limply over her belly. Her fingers were too swollen for her wedding ring or other diamonds, so she wore the biggest, boldest earrings and necklaces in her collection, making her feel like a fat, rich, glittering pig ready for slaughter. Better a rich pig than a poor one.
Her first pregnancy with Carmine Jr had been almost effortless, but with the twins, Lucy was constantly exhausted and uncomfortable. She was swollen everywhere it was possible to be swollen, aching everywhere it was possible to ache. Her stomach was so huge she felt disconnected from her own body, the babies stretching her beyond what she'd thought possible. She hadn't been able to touch her feet in well over a month, needing her maid or Victor to put on her heels and take them off again for her.
And she constantly felt like she was about to piss herself.
The stress was giving her what the midwife called phantom contractions.
A knock on her office door prompted Lucy to look up from the iPad balanced on her belly.
"What?" she snapped, hearing the exhaustion in her voice.
Victor Zsasz poked his head in, offering Lucy a sympathetic smile. Victor was an imposing man, tall and unnerving with lashless, red-rimmed eyes and white skin that looked ghostly against his black-on-black suiting. Aside from Lucy's immediate family, which consisted of her husband Mario and four-year-old Carmine Jr, Victor was the only person she could completely trust. It was a comfort she didn't take for granted, even if Victor's unquestioning loyalty had manifested via the mystical powers of Poison Ivy.
It wasn't just loyalty—it was utter devotion. Victor was whatever Lucy needed him to be — secretary, bodyguard, dietician, Lamaze partner, assassin. Lucy didn't fully understand what Poison Ivy had done to change him fundamentally, but honestly, she was more than happy to leave it that way.
"Rupert Thorne just called," Victor explained cheerfully, stepping into the office. "He says he's five minutes away, and it's important."
"Important," Lucy pursed her lips. "Alright," she agreed, and Victor gestured to someone behind him to make the call before pushing the office door shut so they were alone.
Lucy kicked a pair of lizard-skin boots with six-inch heels out from under her desk, wincing as she attempted to wiggle one swollen foot inside while Victor watched with a bemused frown.
"Why don't you wear the shoes I got you?" he asked, planting his fists on his hips, his eyebrows raised expectantly.
"I can't wear Crocs," Lucy scoffed. "I have a reputation to maintain."
"It's just Thorne," Victor shot her a knowing look. "You should allow yourself to be comfortable, boss. Remember what the midwife said? Be kind to yourself."
"Fine," Lucy sighed, deflating into her chair while Victor lowered himself to his knees in front of her.
He flashed her another cheerful smile and retrieved a pair of bright pink Crocs from under the desk. He took Lucy's foot in hand and massaged the aching arches of her feet while she wallowed in the discomfort of her body. She closed her eyes, trying to be present in this brief moment of reprieve before she was thrown back in the deep end with whatever Rupert Thorne, mob lawyer and family friend, was bringing her way.
Then Victor paused to touch his earpiece. "He's here."
"Great," Lucy muttered, waiting for Victor to slide the pink crocs onto her feet before he stood to help her out of her chair.
She braced her hands on the desk to steady herself, wincing as she tried to ignore the painful pressure on her bladder. She reminded herself that it was just the babies and they would be there soon, and most importantly, that they would be worth all of this.
Family was worth everything.
There was a knock on the door, and Lucy arranged herself to look as dignified as possible behind her desk as Thorne squeezed into her office.
Thorne's most prominent physical quality was his morbid obesity, which Lucy glumly realized made her feel slightly better about herself. He was past seventy, and despite his size, he carried himself with grace, always wearing a pristine suit and pocket square, his thick white hair neatly swept back. He used to stink of cigar smoke constantly, but he'd since given up the habit.
"Rupert," Lucy offered Thorne a pinched smile. "What a nice surprise."
As the Falcone family's lawyer of over thirty years, Lucy had effectively inherited Thorne. He was loyal, efficient, level-headed, and a good source of advice. But most importantly, he was old-school Cosa Nostra. Thorne knew where all the bodies were buried, and he'd been crucial in helping her bring the Commission together. Hell, he probably knew more about the business than Mario, an actual Falcone, did.
But Lucy still didn't fully trust him.
"Mrs Falcone," Thorne greeted her with a sober nod. "Please accept my apologies for the hour, but I-"
"What happened?" Lucy cut him off impatiently.
Thorne glanced at Victor, who had taken his place at Lucy's side, his gloved hands clasped together in front of him.
Thorne cleared his throat uneasily.
"I have taken on a new client," he explained. "A client wishing to auction off… unique and particularly sensitive information. I believe it would benefit you to be involved, ma'am."
"What's the sensitive information?" Lucy raised her eyebrows, and Thorne hesitated.
"The Batman's identity," he said at length.
Lucy laughed before she could stop herself.
"Fair enough," she smirked. "So? Who's the big bad bat?"
"I'm not privy to that information, ma'am," Thorne demurred. "My client's terms are to bring in discrete buyers and hold an auction in 10 days' time."
"And who is your client?" Lucy pressed.
"I'm not at liberty to say," Thorne lifted his chin, making Lucy's face sour.
"Are you forgettin' who you're talking to, Mr Thorne?" She demanded, her eyes narrowing.
"No, ma'am," Thorne shook his head. "My client is no threat to you, Mrs Falcone, I assure you. I hope you know you can trust my word."
Lucy's mouth puckered as she examined Thorne's solemn face, then glanced sideways at Victor, who'd known the Falcones and Thorne longer.
He nodded, and Lucy sighed fitfully.
"Alright," she agreed. "How much cash are we talking about for the Bat's real name?"
"The bidding will start at 25 million.".
"Twenty-five million?" Lucy demanded incredulously. "Are you out of your fuckin' mind?"
"Mrs Falcone," Thorne attempted to appease her. "I advise you to see this as a long-term investment. One I believe you can afford without consent from the Commission."
"The Batman's real name as insurance," Victor mused, catching Lucy's eye. "Not a bad plan, boss."
Lucy ran her tongue over her bottom teeth. She valued fiscal responsibility. Parting with what would likely be over twenty-five million in exchange for leverage was a tough pill to swallow. But if Lucy had learned anything, it was always to play the long game and always be one step ahead of the pack.
The Batman's identity would give her an entirely different kind of power. A different type of leverage.
It would keep her family safe.
"Fine," Lucy agreed shortly, waving her hand. "Victor will act as my representative at the auction."
"I will keep you informed with the details," Thorne bowed his head, backing toward the door. "Good evening to you both."
But Lucy stopped him short.
"And how are you getting on with the other business we discussed?" She asked sharply.
Thorne hesitated, looking uneasy again.
"That good, huh?" Lucy sneered. "Ya know Rupert, it concerns me that you have such trouble gettin' Pino Bertinelli to back off."
"I have been unable to-"
"I gave you a month to take care of him nice-like," Lucy continued coldly. "As a personal favor to you. And now I got Mandragora on my ass about this kid causin' him problems. A kid whose dead father you were real good friends with back in the day, weren't you, Rupert."
Thorne rushed to defend himself. "Franco Bertinelli worked closely with Mr Falcone, and he was—"
Lucy held her hand up for silence, and Thorne promptly shut his mouth.
"I don't need a history lesson. I know Bertinelli was a Maroni guy — best man at his wedding and all, right? I know how things used to be with Carmine and his favorites… and his not so favorites." She pushed away from the desk and waddled around it to square off with Thorne. "That ain't how things are anymore, Rupert. Mandragora? He's a prick and a pain in the ass, but he knows how to sell smack and make money. The Bertinelli's? Most of them are in the fuckin' ground. Because they were weak."
Thorne's eyes dipped down to the zebra-print carpet, his expression solemn.
"And Pino Bertinelli?" Lucy sneered. "That kid's weak as baby shit. So like I said, Rupert, it concerns me that you can't get him to back the fuck off Mandragora's boys when you promised me you would."
"I will take care of it, Mrs Falcone," Thorne promised soberly. "And I understand what you must do if I fail."
"Well, that's just fuckin' great," Lucy's lip curled, her green eyes glittering dangerously. "How fuckin' lucky am I to get your approval, huh?"
Thorne didn't reply, and Lucy was building up to a rant about loyalty when she felt a tightening in her stomach, which quickly grew into a wash of pain that made red slice through her vision. Another phantom contraction. It was a bad one, the pain so sudden and intense her legs nearly gave out. She grabbed her desk and ground her teeth, refusing to show weakness as she turned to Victor.
"Escort Mr Thorne out," she ordered, her voice strained.
Victor did as she asked, and once the door to her office was shut again, Lucy fell back into her chair, gasping as she palmed her belly and tried to breathe through the lingering, unsettling pain.
"Jesus fuckin' Christ," she whispered, her heart racing as she smoothed a hand over her bulging stomach. "You girls better be smarter than your fuckin' brother."
The Joker -
The room was slowly warming up, making it harder to stay awake. The Joker couldn't have said when he last slept properly, but he estimated he'd need about fourteen hours to get back in fighting shape. They hadn't discussed it yet, but now that they knew Tetch was a lost cause, he and Harley were at another dead end in their search for Eddie. They would sleep and reevaluate once those fourteen hours were up —something would jump out and present itself to point them in the right direction. It always did.
Harley was rabid about finding Ed. She said it was a gut feeling — that something was coming and they needed to get ahead of it — but if the Joker didn't know her better, he would think it was because she felt guilty about their last encounter with the Riddler.
Oh, that had been a funny night—another tussle with Ed, one that ended with fireworks and the Batmobile splashing into the east river. In the milieu of escape, Harley tried to get Eddie's attention by firing a warning shot — a warning shot that clipped Ed and could have killed him if she'd got him in the leg instead of the ass.
At the time, J nearly pissed himself laughing at the look on Harley's face when she realized she'd really shot Ed, and he cracked a smile in the darkness of the bedroom thinking about it again.
It was more evidence that she wasn't just a terrible shot but that her vision was steadily getting worse. The Joker first realized it a year earlier when she went from squinting at things in the near distance to not seeing them at all. That explained why no matter how comfortable she was with a gun, she'd never gotten the hang of actually hitting things unless they were right in front of her or she had a machine gun to give her better odds. The Joker wasn't sure if she was lying to herself—an old habit she'd largely shaken—or if she didn't fully realize just how blind she was. Letting her drive was an exercise in courting death these days.
She was so funny.
They hadn't been able to trace Ed after that, and for a while there, they didn't know if he was dead or alive. Harley had been moody and anxious, not very fun to be around. She didn't want Ed to be dead. Neither did the Joker. Ed kept them on their toes—he kept things interesting.
But then they got word a couple of weeks earlier about Ed and his Sirens making moves—Eddie was back in the game, and the Joker had no doubt he had big plans for all of them.
The media called their littler rivalry the War of Jokes and Riddles, an ongoing conflict in which Harley and the Joker repeatedly antagonized Ed and vice-versa. It was precisely why the Joker encouraged Harley to break Ed out before he could be locked up in Arkham.
The war was always fought with the underlying understanding that this was a war no one would ever really win.
Why win the game when playing it was so much fun?
But this time, Harley seemed to think Ed was playing by different rules. Hence her rabid need to find him before he moved the first piece.
The Joker's eyelids fluttered as he listened to her talk to Red in the bathroom. An old twinge of resentment for her best pal flared up then died back down again, his mind switching gears to their most recent escape from the Batman.
J hadn't been entirely sure Harley wouldn't lose it when Tetch admitted he'd been spreading rumors to keep the heat off — that they'd wasted so much time.
But then, in a cosmic twist of fate, the Batman arrived.
Suddenly, the night didn't feel like a waste. Suddenly, instead of playing games with Jervis Tetch, they were locked in another battle of wills with the only force capable of keeping them in check. The only person— even more so than Ed—who was really worth their time.
The Dark Knight was getting closer and closer to them all the time, making the Joker reevaluate who was the immovable object and who was the unstoppable force. It was a constant push-pull, an indefinite dance.
But nothing was really indefinite.
Aside, of course, from death.
And death was always coming, just as sure as the Joker and the Batman were two sides of the same coin.
The bathroom door squeaked open as she stepped into the bedroom and turned off the light. J was still fully dressed, flat on his back beneath the bedding where it was overly warm. His eyes were heavy, but he hadn't permitted himself to sleep yet, waiting for her to cross the room and shuffle out of her clothes before she slipped into the bed beside him.
Fourteen hours, he thought, his hand finding her thigh beneath the sheet. Then they'd refuel and head back out into the world and do it all again.
Pam -
There was a small, private air hanger on the outskirts of the Palisades, north of Gotham proper. It was where the city's millionaires and billionaires kept their Gulfstreams and their Bombardiers, their pilots on constant standby should a last-minute trip to Paris or Hong Kong become necessary.
Miranda Tate's private jet taxied onto the runway just after midnight, carrying precious cargo back from Moscow. The plane could carry up to nineteen, but just five passengers and a stewardess on board that evening. At the front of the plane, two men and a woman sat in a bank of cream-leather seats, facing each other over a lacquered table. They were members of the League of Shadows, in charge of delivering that precious cargo to Gotham. He sat in the fourth chair, his gray hair wild, his eyes sunken from lack of sleep and a bruise on his cheek — Dr Leonard Pavlov of Moscow University.
Sitting alone at the back of the plane was Pamela Isley, the League of Shadows' leader in all but name—perhaps not so much a leader as their cherished deity. Her red hair was tied up in a high ponytail and she was dressed in her typically practical style—skinny blue jeans tucked into tan hiking boots and a patterned sweater beneath her olive green Barbour jacket, the brown corduroy collar stark against her pale face. She was nearly forty but could have passed for much younger, the apples of her cheeks still plump, her green eyes sparkling impishly even though she was bone tired. It had been a long few weeks abroad, and she didn't handle jet lag as well as she used to.
Pam gazed absently out at the darkened runway, her thoughts still on Moscow. She unlocked her phone and glanced at the screen, ignoring the emails and messages waiting for her as she pulled up Harley's number and held the phone to her ear.
"Well, well, well," Harley answered, a smirk in her voice. "Look who's back in Gotham."
For the first time in what felt like weeks, Pam felt a genuine smile split her lips.
"I'm like herpes that way," she replied drily. "I always come back."
Harley laughed, tired but happy, and they immediately slipped back into their usual banter.
It was a relief to return to something so familiar and grounding and just plain easy. Pam would never have thought that returning to Gotham would give her such peace of mind or that she'd find things to cherish there. Maybe she was getting older and wiser, appreciating things she'd never had the time or patience to enjoy before. Maybe Moscow had just been too crazy, even by Pam's standards.
"Things are a little up in the air right now," Harley admitted when Pam invited her for dinner.
Pam grinned, unsurprised. "Like you might get killed up in the air, or you might kill someone up in the air?"
"Both," Harley sighed. "It's always both."
Pam snorted, and as the plane rolled into the air hanger, the air-hostess she'd droned ducked out of the galley to inform the small group of passengers that it was safe to unfasten their seatbelts and prepare to disembark the plane.
"I gotta go through customs now," Pam lied, her attention shifting from Harley to members of the League of Shadows as they marched Pavel out of the cabin. "I'll see you tomorrow," she added, standing. "And for fuck's sake, get some sleep."
Miranda Tate's town car was waiting for her in the air hanger, and Talia al Ghul's ever-eager presence immediately swept over Pam like a cloying wave. Talia's constant neediness was an unfortunate side effect of being the drone Pam relied on the most. But without her, none of this would have been possible.
As the League of Shadows leader, Talia was able to deliver an army wholly devoted to Pam. One by one, they fell under Pam's spell, broadening what seemed like a painfully small operation by comparison to what she was now in charge of. She'd weeded out the bad seeds and imparted wisdom to the members that remained, changing their purposes to better suit hers and the world they inhabited.
Instead of seeking to destroy as they had under Ra's al Ghul, they now sought to preserve and grow as Pam had taught them.
They called her 'Mother.'
Pam thought it was a little goofy, but what else could you expect from a group of ninja-assassins with a hideout in the mountains of Tibet? Something fucking normal?
Pam slid into the back of the town car, and just as she'd anticipated, Talia was waiting for her there, emotional and desperate like she always was when they were separated for long periods. She was a diminutive woman, her figure willowy and face doll-like, with large brown eyes and full lips, her auburn hair curly around her shoulders, which she spent an hour everyday styling as part of her Miranda Tate costume.
Miranda Tate was a mirage. Talia was the face, the voice, but Pam was the brains.
She pulled the strings.
Pam pointedly ignored her, pulling out her phone and composing an email.
"Mother," Talia breathed. "I have news."
"Oh, yeah?" Pam drawled, her thumbs flying over the phone screen.
"I have heard from our well-informed friend, Mr Kuttler," Talia explained. "He says someone is selling the Batman's identity."
Pam's thumbs paused over the screen as she absorbed this information and what it meant. She pulled her top lip between her teeth and tucked the phone away, considering a few possible outcomes before her thoughts turned to that first night in Shanghai, when Talia had breathlessly explained that she was carrying out her father's mission and yadda, yadda, yadda.
Pam had downed a third of a bottle of tequila that night, waiting for Talia to get to the good part, which she eventually did. She revealed that Bruce Wayne had been a pupil of Ra's al Ghul and that he was, in fact, the Batman.
At the time, Pam had been shocked (and buzzed) but she ultimately decided to play the long-game with Bruce, which had turned out to be wise indeed.
Despite his proclivity for hunting Harley and treating himself like a sacrificial lamb, Bruce was a good man with good intentions, and in many ways his ideals for the world lined up with Pam's. She'd been tempted to drone those bad habits of him, but if she'd learned anything from her time with the League of Shadows, it was the value of self-determination.
Some people, like Bruce Wayne, deserved to be in charge of their destinies.
So long as their destinies aligned with Pam's needs.
His money and influence had been crucial to getting the energy reactor off the ground, and for that, Pam allowed him his ridiculous Bat-themed shenanigans. Similarly, she was allowing Harley and her idiot boyfriend to continue their game of cat-and-mouse with Bruce, which seemed to give all three of them—and Ed by extension—a great deal of joy and/or purpose.
But if Bruce's identity as the Batman was revealed, everything she'd worked for with the Energy Reactor could be destroyed.
Well, sugar, that's inconvenient, a voice whispered.
Pam's shoulders tensed as the voice came to her, unbidden.
She usually only heard it when she was tired or under stress. At first, it had scared her, made her think she was losing her mind. But eventually, she came to the conclusion that the voice was little more than her subconscious and had her best interests at heart.
It was usually playful and dry, a little wacky, and it spoke in an old-fashioned Mid-Atlantic accent that reminded Pam of her grandmother, who'd been a socialite in Boston in the 1930s. Pam couldn't have told you why it sounded that way, but the voice was as determined as she was to see her mission completed —to save the planet from an impending apocalypse in the form of the climate crisis.
And by extension, to save the humans who lived on the earth from extinction, too.
And as per usual, the voice wasn't wrong.
"That is inconvenient," Pam agreed, prompting Talia to nod eagerly, thinking Pam was speaking to her.
"Perhaps our friend Mr Kuttler could use some persuasion," Talia suggested slyly. "To put a stop to this auction for the Batman's identity."
Pam consulted the voice.
Sounds a little heavy-handed to me, honey, it shrugged.
Pam nodded slowly.
Find a creative solution, the voice suggested. You always do, old gal.
Pam glanced at Talia.
"We can't attract any unwanted attention with the reactor about to launch," she announced., "We'll bid like the others, and we'll win to protect Bruce. No one will be the wiser."
"Yes, Mother," Talia lowered her eyes, and the voice chuckled wryly.
Bruce Wayne, prince of Gotham. Talk about a man without a clue, right, sugar?
"He's a survivor," Pam replied, narrowing her eyes. "Even if he doesn't realize it."
Like I said, honey, the voice replied drily. A man without a clue.
A/N: Weeeeeew! That's a long first chapter. And LOTS of stories take in.
Thank you so much to those of you who have been so supportive and kind and excited about this. I hope it's everything you want and then a little bit more you didn't know you wanted.
I'm very interested in what people think of Helena & Dinah, who we will get to know better. It's a little weird to see Dinah getting laid, lol. But she's a grown up and her relationship with Helena is pretty central, and this is happening and it's too late to go back now, haha.
I invite you to share my fan-casting of Florence Pugh as Dinah. I found her quite inspiring as I was trying to find a more adult Dinah's voice/presence.
On an admin note, Part 1 is 17 chapters long and I will be updating every Sunday over the next few months, but I plan on taking a week off here or there for my sanity/schedule. I'll let you know in advance. Updates should come around midnight PST or a few hours later. My Asks are open on Tumblr (Knit-Wear-It) but I beg of you, do not send an anon ask instead of posting a review. I will not answer every Ask, but I will reply to every review/comment.
Next week: Catching up with Crane, Harley & J meet a new Rogue, Helena and Dinah go on a date that doesn't end well. This will be your trigger warning for gaslighting & homophobia. It's not awful but it's not nice.
Please review with your thoughts & comments - reader feedback is why this thing exists in the first place, so go ahead and give it. I'm serious. Review!
KW x