If I haven't scared you off with that last chapter, here we are again! also, this is the point where we should remember the main character death tag...

I'm taking some liberties with accessing the Batcave on Arkham Asylum, but at this point we need to, as Selina is not privy to swanky gear upgrades. I have also made up Pendersmith's Book of Psychiatric Protocol, because it sounded important.

Also I will remind you that so far Ivy has sent up massive vines through the floor twice prior to this chapter, in chapters 1 and 9.

Title came from a line of dialogue in an earlier chapter


Ch. 10: That Vast and Treacherous Ocean


July 7th, 20xx

Underground Tunnel System, 12:09 am

Day 17

In Selina's humble opinion, her escape plan was brilliant. And it worked brilliantly, even though it took Eddie almost two hours to actually set her free from the cell, and another hour to convince Victor she wouldn't die immediately, would get help, and, at the very end (so she could miss the manly sniffs and embarrassment) that if she lived, she was coming back for him.

(Not necessarily to free him, mind, because hello no cold suit, but she had meant it when she said he was her new favorite. She took care of her favorites. At least as well as she could. And being stuck down here out of the loop was the worst. Best case scenario she was installing him an Alexa filled chock full with playlists of Perry Como and Frank Sinatra because really, his singing was the best part of her incarceration. And at the very worst, the very least she'd come back to tell him what the hell was going on.)

She'd even remote-scheduled a notification to Joker to be sent the next morning: Feed Victor, because Wesker went nuts and killed Tetch and then himself. Oh, and I escaped in the melee. Count your days, fucko, because the New Bat is coming for you.

So, yeah. Everything was going well. Brilliant, as she said before. She even slept for a solid who knew how many hours down in a little hidden room down in the caves, which looked like maybe Scarecrow had been spending some quality alone time there. (She knew this because of the pictures. Johnny-boy had a polaroid, and the rare talent to take the most unflattering closeups of his victims ever. He also didn't believe in the importance of organization, because his papers were everywhere. Thankfully he believed in energy bars and water bottles, because she'd found two of each in the cell. She'd thank him, she really would, but then he'd gas her in the face and then she'd die and maybe it was best to avoid all this.)

So yeah, brilliant. But maybe . . . maybe there were a number of small hitches? Because apart from the recent bounty of energy bars she hadn't really been eating well, or drinking well, or working out quite as well as she could have in other situations, and it was really showing. She was light-headed as fuck, her stamina was a joke, her ankle was twinging . . . oh, and she found Killer Croc within ten minutes of leaving the tunnels which emptied out into the sewers, so, there was that.

Running for your life was somehow so much less fun when the damn beast would swim underwater and then pop up at random moments to scare the everliving shit out of you.

She was tempted to scream, but she needed to save her energy. She raced along the floating buoys (and WHY were they here? What purpose did they serve? Surely Croc hadn't fashioned them and then strung them along in little paths?) marginally keeping track of where she was by keeping her eyes out for the destroyed platforms. Killer Croc liked to pop up through them, or at least, he had the last three times. How she kept swerving/jumping/speeding up at the last minute was really beyond her. She was gassed, dizzy, and her lungs felt ready to explode.

And Croc was still yelling about food.

"I'm gonna eat you for dinner, Cats!"

I'm so fucking hungry, was all she could think in reply. The energy bars had not been enough. She jumped up over the corner of the platform which had begun to lift up, shoved up by water ripples. Ah. Water ripples. Probably important. Veer to the left—

"RAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGHHHHHH!" Killer Croc burst forth from the water, only a few feet from where she had just been. If she hadn't picked the left path, she would have been thrown into the water, and it would have been the actual end for her. As it was, she grimly powered through, wondering distantly what might kill her—lack of oxygen, a stumble, her ankle? Croc was the likely end, but what would deliver her straight into his gaping—

Shit was that a ledge? The door? Shit shit here was the way out! Selina pulled on her last reserves of strength to run over the last three platforms, hoping Croc would give her enough time to make it to dry land. She was so close. So close, but she could almost feel his breath on the back of her neck.

Nearly crying with desperation, she hurled herself toward the ledge. A tidal wave nearly beat her there, and as she rolled onto firm land, she was soaked by a deluge of water. She kept rolling, desperate to get as far away from the water as she could, and her back hit cold metal. Ah. The door. The door that was no doubt locked, and Killer Croc was right fucking there, pulling himself out of the water like the deranged, evil man-gator he was.

He laughed, and it was out of her worst nightmares. "Ah, Cats. What a good chase. Too bad it had to end here—"

The whole damn cavern quivered, and Selina, who'd spent a few terrible years in San Francisco, knew exactly what was happening. "Earthquake," she whispered, although it wasn't like that, not exactly. But the quiver was followed by a far more serious tremor, and the next thing she knew, huge vines ripped through the cavern, tearing through water, platform, and solid rock wall alike.

Selina, pressed as tightly as she could against the metal door, was safe. But one of the humongous vines tore through the scant space between her and the Croc, and the monster was thrown backwards into the water. Selina, seeing her chance, scrambled to her feet. The door itself was unmolested, but there was a promising looking crack to the right of it that she was (now) skinny enough to fit through . . .

She did so, wiggling, ripping through the butt of her uniform. Once on the other side she glanced back to see if there was enough flap to cover her butt, but just then Killer Croc threw himself against the wall, making the entire tunnel shake.

"I WILL EAT YOU, CATS!" He screamed, and Selina took that as her cue to skedaddle.

"No you goddamn will not," she hissed under her breath, as she hustled down the passageway. It was clearly a passageway other people had used, as it was bricked up and she could stand all the way up and it had the odd table and chair here and there. Did that mean she was in the asylum proper? Should she be hiding from people right about now?

Maybe not, though, as Ivy's vines were everywhere. Everywhere. It hadn't just been Croc's sewers. Girl must have had a meltdown, or maybe she was undertaking a one woman overthrow of the island, because everything was green and leafy and very likely dangerous.

Also, her ass was dripping. That was a concern, right? She craned her head to purvey the damage. Yes, that was blood. Oh, boo. "Well, that's unflattering," she murmured to herself, cleaning the bloody scrapes on her bare ass as well as she could. "Also prone to infection. Christ, let me find the Batcave soon. C'mon, Bruce. Spirit of Bruce. Help me out here."

The spirit of Bruce, not surprisingly, did no such thing.

"Breathe, Selina," she commanded herself, as she power walked away from Croc's underground sewer. Who knew when he would burst out into the hallway, roaring for her flanks for dinner? "Where would the most dour, fun-sucking man on the island build his secret base?" Somewhere only he could reach, obviously. So maybe someplace he'd have to fly? Or use a grapple gun? And only accessible by the sewers?

"But even that can't stay hidden forever," she mused, coming to a stop. "Someone must have seen something. Once. Maybe."

Something occurred to her. There had a been a story about a foiled suicide, something Harley had been told when she was a doctor here. The inmates had a popular suicide leap, with a bone shrine and everything (according to Harley, at least) but one had been plucked mid-jump by Batman, and taken back to his cell.

That overlook had been between the Mansion and the Greenhouse, on the eastern portion of the island. She had started out on the western side, but the tunnels from the E.I. had taken her over an hour to traverse, so maybe it was the breadth of the island? Augmented by her panicked run through Croc's sewers? Actually, it was extremely likely, if Ivy was sending vines up through the effing floor, it would probably be near the Greenhouse, because even she couldn't make something from nothing, and the only place she could get greenery to this degree was on the eastern portion of the island.

So Selina was under the mansion now? Or Greenhouse? Something. That meant she was near the shrine. And if the shrine was near the Batcave? Well, she had no idea. But she had to try it. She didn't have any other leads.

It took her two more hours, but she did in fact find the shrine. It was garish. Also, she was even more starving. Dizzier, even. And so thirsty she gave serious thought to licking the wet-looking algae on the walls.

She did not, but she thought about it. The thoughts were more palatable than she wanted them to be, however.

The shrine had been, before Ivy decided to redecorate, fairly simple. Once upon a time it had only been a deep, dry well, which offered no sounds of water when she dropped a stone down its depths. It had been decorated with a collection of skulls and femurs, while a surprising amount of bones had been affixed to the walls.

Now, however, it looked a little like a long lost temple in some jungle somewhere, because there was a disconcerting amount of greenery tearing through the room. Vines and moss and flowering things that might eat her, who knew. Ivy would have been in raptures. Selina was currently finding it morbid. Dinah Lance would have absolutely loved it, and Bruce would have said quit making it romantic and find my base already Selina.

Probably best to take Imaginary!Bruce's advice.

Might have helped if Imaginary!Bruce had been a little more specific, but she would take what she could get.

There was an overlook onto the ocean at the topmost point of the cave, and Selina had that terrible niggling feeling that was what Bruce used. Just spread his wing-things, leapt off the ledge, and hurtled into oblivion. If there was another cave entrance lower down the cliff, he could swing in there and no one would be the wiser. Or able to follow him.

Selina hopped back down off the ledge, coming to sit on the well. One leg dangled into the abyss, the other kicked against a skull decorating the outer stones. She was well and truly fucked now. How was she supposed to get to Bruce's cave—if it was in fact accessible by the leap—without the ability to fly? She was fucked. Boned, she amended, looking at the walls, wondering how on earth inmates got them to stick—

"YARGHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

The laugh-scream was her only warning. Yet it was also too loud, and echoed throughout the chamber so she couldn't immediately pinpoint where it came from. She froze, and the laughing looney burst from the shadows, knife upraised, straitjacket arms flopping uselessly at its sides.

It was too close. There was no time. Selina was stunned and freaked and for the first time since coming to Arkham, completely without her chill. All she could think of to do was avoid the goddamn knife, and somehow, her body took that as permission to slip down into the well.

Then she was screaming, because this was how she died.

"Yaaaaaaaa—oof!" She cut off with a grunt as about ten feet down, and completely hidden in darkness, she hit what felt like a metal platform. She almost rolled right off of it-it was only a few feet in diameter-but she scrabbled for it, grabbing onto the metal edges and pulling herself back up. Her weight dragged it down, although more slowly than she would have thought. Then she had the panicked thought: There was no rope or pulley system at the surface, nor any sign of a track for it to connect, so what was this thing connected to?

How was it held aloft? How was it moving? Initial panic melted away when she realized that it was really only one of two things: magic (unlikely) or Bruce's technological wizardry (ding ding ding). Bruce's slow-moving technological wizardry, she amended a moment later, when the snail's pace of the platform refused to go any faster. At least it felt like it was going slowly, it was difficult to tell when everything was pitch black, and she couldn't see a blessed thing. But descend it did, as slow as humanly possible, until Selina felt like she was slowly (slowly) making her way down to the center of the earth. But then it stopped, shivered, and turned sideways, and she fell off.

"Yarrrrr—oof." She yelled as she fell to what she thought was her death, but was really just being dumped on her ass. She took a moment to catch her breath before coming up to her knees. For one more moment everything was pitch dark, and then the emergency lights kicked on and she saw where she was.

It was a tiny node in the larger cave system, although the rock was differently colored and had different patterns than those near Croc's lair. Did that mean different part of the island, or was she deeper than before? More pressingly, there was no door out. Just a laminated placard that read: "Your attempt has been neutralized. Wait here for the proper authorities to rescue you."

Bruce writes like he's a robot, Selina thought, inconsequentially. Wrote.

Ah fuck.

Clearly, the proper authorities were not coming. Joker's takeover had seen to that. And judging by how secretive Bruce was about his presence on the island, she wasn't sure they would be contacted at all. Proper authorities probably meant him, especially if she was anywhere close to his cave, which she certainly hoped she was, because the only other way she wasn't starving to death in this little node was if that promising-looking crack in the wall led to a Chipotle's.

Spoiler alert: it would likely not lead to a Chipotle's.

Only one thing to do. She would have to find out.

She gave it a good once-over before squeezing through. There was no light inside the crack for obvious reasons, and once she was more than a few steps within she would be completely in the dark. She had no rope, no supplies, and her pants were split up the back. This was possibly the worst situation she'd ever been in, and she'd never once in her life been spelunking.

But she had to do this. For herself, and Victor, and anyone else worth saving on the island. If there was anyone left who was worth saving. Ok, maybe just for her and Vic, but that was enough, goddamn it. It was enough.

Selina took a deep breath and cautiously stepped through the crack. She had to walk sideways as the crack was barely big enough for her to scoot through, but the first few sideways, cautious steps were fine. And then the next few. And then the opening curved a bit, so that her light was cut in half. And then it curved some more and it was pitch flipping black.

Get here, Vin Diesel, she thought to herself. Because this is gonna' end just as badly as that movie did if—

She cut off her internal train of thought because a new light was beginning to suffuse the tunnel. It was blue-tinged and warm, not at all like the light in the BatCave, but it's existence spurred her on. She hustled through faster, ignoring the scuff of pain on her butt when it dragged across rock, and the light got brighter and closer.

The fissure ended abruptly, but as it opened up onto a familiar looking cavern, that was fine. "Oh, Bruce," she whispered, overcome. "You paranoid bastard. You paranoid, beautiful bastard."

The cavern before her was well-lit with the blue light, and thus she could make out the suspended, mechanical ramps leading to a center station that held a massive supercomputer, surrounded by boxes of gear. She had no doubt the boxes were filled with weapons and supplies, probably a batsuit or two. Off in the corner there was even a batbike.

She had found his base. She had made it.

Selina dropped from the fissure, landing on the fortified metal bridge below. It was a five foot drop, and upon landing she rolled to take the pressure off her still-dodgy ankle. This made the rest of her body protest, and she was sure she'd end up with lattices of bruises on her entire body, but right now she didn't care. She jogged down the pathway, not stopping until she reached the center platform. And then she did what she had to do. She ripped open boxes until she found dried food and nutrition tablets, and washed it down with orange astronaut drink (Oh Bruce, Tang? Tell me one of the boys made you pack this. Tell me it was Tim.). She went to the bathroom on a small, chemical toilet in the far corner, feeling oddly exposed but delighting in her ability to sit and rest while pooping (It was the small things . . .). She located the smallest 'batsuit' on the island, which was really one of Dick's Nightwing suits, but as they were the same height and he only a little broader than her, it felt oddly well (Note to self, thank Dick for telling me about the electroshock protection on the zipper, and how to circumvent it. Rescuing drunken batboys from nights of suited heartbreak for the win!).

There wasn't much by way of weapons, because this was Bruce here, but there was a grapple gun with claw attachment that would be a) useful, and b) might actually punch someone's head off if she set it off at close range. She didn't know, she'd never tried. Still, she experimented for a good ten minutes, trying to get the feel of it. It came more quickly than she expected, partly because she'd seen it used so many times by Bruce and the boys. It wasn't her whip and caltrops, but hey, she could improvise.

Fed, clothed, stocked, and refreshed, she turned her attention to battle. And the first order of business was to turn on the computer (which took some time in and of itself). Only then did she realize she didn't know any of Bruce's passcodes, nor what she could do if it say, self-destructed or something upon realizing a stranger was essentially trying to hack it.

"Well, shit," she muttered, just as the screen flickered on, and the beam of light from the sensors ranged over her from head to foot.

Yet even now her luck held. "Identified: Selina Kyle," the computer intoned in a pleasant, feminine alto. "Limited Access Allowed." And then the blank start up screen gave way to what looked disconcertingly like an apple desktop—clean and streamlined, with several folders helpfully labeled things like "Birds of Prey", "Personal", Get Back To Your Cell", and "EMERGENCY."

"Yeah, that's probably the one I'm going for," she muttered, hand over the holographic mouse. She was intrigued by Personal, wondered what the hell was in Get Back To Your Cell, but she double clicked (by tapping her forefinger and thumb together) EMERGENCY, and rather than the inside of a folder with documents, etc, she suddenly had a direct line to Oracle.

At least, she had a direct audio call to Oracle, but her screen was black and the little ching ching cha ching song kept playing over and over. Clearly the call wasn't connecting. That made Selina's blood chill. Oracle was one of the most amazing and terrifying women that she knew, and in no part because of her sheer and intimidating competency, her brilliance, her multi-tasking genius (the woman was fully capable of running through several missions concurrently, all while on a blind date) and her nose for information. She also tended to get only 3 hours of sleep on average, which Selina found most horrifying. She needed 6. At least.

Selina supposed there could be a good reasons for why Oracle wasn't answering now, (maybe her computer was down for repairs, maybe she was showering, maybe the world was ending) but with the way things were going, she was thinking option 3—

The song suddenly cut out, replaced by the same automated female voice from earlier. "We are sorry that we cannot answer your call. Please leave a message after the tone." Then there was a beep, and Selina had to scramble for a coherent voicemail, because all she could think, on repeat, was fuck this fuck this we are fuuuuckkkeddddddddd.

This was what she went with.

"Damn it Barbara we need you to pick up! We need help! Joker has had control of Arkham for over two weeks now, and I only just escaped from EI. Most of the guards and doctors are dead—hell, half of the Rogue's gallery is dead—but I can't sit and wait for backup. I'm taking Joker down, and if I die myself, then I know I'll be with Bruce afterwards. But for everyone else—especially Victor Fries, he's my new favorite, he has kept me sane—please Barbara. Help us. Help them. Otherwise they'll all die here."

Selina sat back in the chair, and then tried calling again. This time, she didn't even get the message signal. Ten minutes later, she tried another time. Nothing. So she left the computer, not bothering to turn it off. She fully assumed that she would be dead by the time Barbara checked her messages, but maybe it would be received in time to save some on the island. Maybe even one or two who deserved to be saved.

But this Selina knew for certain, and it hardened her resolve: there was something going on in Gotham, something so serious that it delayed even Barbara's superfast response time. Or maybe Barbara was injured? Missing? Dead?

God, what was happening out there?

July 7th, 20xx

Medical Center, 11:07 AM

Day 17

When Leland awoke, some unknowable amount of hours after her desperate attempt to warn Pamela, it was to Harley's apologetic face.

"I really thought about letting you stay hidden, Joan," she said quietly. "But you were in the Greenhouse, and I won't let her take the fall for hiding you."

Joan understood at once. Harley must have come to either console or mourn Pamela, and found her instead. It was a sliver of humanity Joan hadn't looked for, yet it would undoubtedly end badly for her, particularly when it was clear she'd been moved to—ah. One of the electroshock treatment rooms in the Medical Center. She knew this, of course, because she had been strapped to one of the treatment chairs.

This didn't bode well.

"Is Pamela dead?" Joan asked, swallowing what little moisture remained in her mouth. Focus on anything other than your imminent demise, Joan, she instructed herself. Focus.

"No. But maybe she wishes she was? I don't know. She won't see me," Harley admitted, looking miserable.

"Well did you watch?" Joan asked. "Because I imagine someone she cared for watching that display would upset her."

Harley looked furious, but didn't smack her, which was welcome. "No, I did not! I was waiting for her in the Greenhouse! And why were you even there?" She shrieked. "Why was she hiding you? You're just her shrink, you weren't her friend!"

At this moment, Joan felt the weight of her empathy keenly. All that it had cost her to care, to empathise, to love beings that barely understood the concept. To seek healing for those that hardly deserved it. To be fair and calm in the face of enraged irrationality. She felt it all but continued anyway, because she was Joan Leland, and that was what she did.

"I'm not her friend the way you are. Nor do I love her the way you do. But out of the two of us, Harley, I'm the one who risked everything to warn her, because she didn't deserve what happened to her. No one does, but especially not her."

Harley's face was pale underneath the face paint. There were clusters of acne around her jawline and her temples. She looked much younger than her 28 years, and for a moment, Joan could see neither the spunky young doctor nor the deranged criminal. Something else, something more fundamental, something young and lost and afraid.

There was the sound of footsteps in the hall, with a low yet notable heel. Yet as there were very few women left on the island—and none that wore heels—that left very few people. Both women knew it was the Joker.

"I think it didn't go the way Mistah J wanted," Harley whispered in a rush, looking like she barely knew what she was saying. "He played it off but he's upset and no one can find Crane. I think maybe . . . maybe she . . . to him . . ."

"She used her pheromones on him?"

Harley shook her head, just as the footsteps stopped. "One of our boys saw him after, running across the island. Not zombie'd. A little crazy maybe, but—"

The electronic door clicked before it opened, so they had a moment before Joker stepped in. They took their positions. Joan slumped back against the chair, right back to drowning in fear, anger, and an overwhelming sense of doom. Harley snapped into action, pulling on a perky, bubbly veneer that now, having seen beneath it, Joan could see was false.

"Puddin'!" She exclaimed, grinning and bounding over to him. "I was just telling Joan about the guest list. Not sure she's gonna' be in the bridal party any more, but I wanted to make sure she didn't miss out!"

Joker's answering grin was sharklike. "And you didn't think to ask her about why she was found in the Greenhouse, of all places?"

Harley froze. Clearly, she hadn't told her boyfriend where she'd found her.

"Or did you think I didn't know? Tsk tsk, pretty lady," The Joker continued, looking evil and dangerous and absolutely delighted.

"I went to warn Pamela," Joan said, not willing, even now, to watch the Joker walk Harley into an opportunity to be abused. "I overheard your men talk about your plan for the big show and the weedkiller, and put two and two together." She jutted her chin at Harley. "I thought I'd be safe there, but apparently not. You're lucky Harley found me. Most of your men wouldn't have been so considerate to bring me back in one, interrogatable piece."

Joker turned his considering, oddly reptilian gaze onto her. He moved forward and without warning, explanation, or hesitation, slapped Joan across the face. Before she could recover from the shock of it, he followed it up with an off-hand punch. Two more slaps and then a punch to the gut left Joan reeling, terrified, and with a bloody mouth from where she'd bitten her tongue.

Across the room, Harley was still and silent. She stood with an arm wrapped around her ribcage, an unconscious tell. She was in danger. She knew she was in danger. But Joan was in even more danger, and so she paid far more attention to the Joker.

"Do you know how I took over the Asylum, Joanie?" He said, quietly, intimately. His face was far too close to hers.

She got slapped for this non sequitur? Beaten? "You used the Riddler," she said slowly, steeling herself for more blows.

Joker rolled his eyes dramatically. "Well yes, obviously. And that's nothing new, we all did that, all the time. Too smart for his own good, really. But let me rephrase. Do you know why it happened when?"

She turned her head to the side to spit out some blood. It was too much, and she couldn't swallow it all. "You mean . . . the exact date?" She clarified, her tongue thick in her mouth.

"Bingo!"

"The solstice? It had some significance?"

Joker wiggled his fingers in front of her face. She flinched. Yet he caressed her cheek instead of hitting her again, and it was honestly no better. "Nooooot quite what I was looking for," he murmured. "But don't feel bad. Even Eddie didn't know all the deeeeetails. But uh, a little birdie told me that Gotham was gonna have quite a fiesta on the solstice. Or was it the entire Eastern Seaboard? The whole Disunited States of America? Ah, who knows. All I had to do was throw Batman a party on that specific date, get him all distracted . . . but Cash never invited him! What's the deal, Joanie? I mean, I'm enjoying myself immensely, but really, I'm feeling a bit stood up, here."

Joan couldn't make sense of it. After all that effort to isolate the island from the mainland, to sever all contact with the commissioner, using Clayface to continue the charade, and he was still trying to mind-fuck her?

He was going to hit her again, but she was already dead. Already dead. Why not get a little information, a minute amount of satisfaction before she went?

"You're lying," she said. "Why? Why would you lie now, about that?"

His fingers on her face tightened to a painful pinch. "Joanie—"

"No!" She said, channelling her anger. She didn't try to dislodge his fingers, but she did yell at him. "We did try to contact him! None of the options worked when you had Riddler cut all remote contact! Short of us scaling the damned belltower and setting the Batbeacon on actual fire, we had no way of contacting him! Even at the beginning we were fucked. And it wasn't even a good riddle!"

That made Joker pause. "A riddle? A riddle? Tell me the riddle, Joan."

Well, why the fuck not? She certainly remembered it in its entirety. "Riddle me this: what do you get when you remove a security guard from his everything? Answer: Wholesale Slaughter."

Joker sat back, looking cold and unreadable again. But there was something going on in his mind, a gleam to his eyes that she did not like. She could guess what well enough. The Riddler must have overstepped his bounds. He, not being an idiot, must not have wanted Batman there so soon, because he knew how Joker's games with Batman inevitably ended. And afterwards, Joker's regime had done their jobs too efficiently, played their parts too well. Batman wouldn't know to come until it was over, and they were all dead.

Harley reached the same conclusion, but unlike Joan, did not immediately see the value in holding her tongue. "Oh no," she breathed. "He's not gonna come, is he, Puddin'? What are we gonna do?"

Joker's answer to this was to turn and smack Harley. A big, open-handed smack right across her left cheek, which echoed in the chamber. Harley looked back at him, stunned, the red outline of a handprint already beginning to form. Joker pressed his tactical advantage before she could scurry away, and shoved her back against the wall, caging her in with his body.

"Mistah J, it's ok, we'll figure something out!" She consoled and pleaded together, desperately hopeful that disaster might yet be averted. "Please, let's just think for a minute. It's not too late to send out another message! Or maybe the resistance has sent out a message since then!"

How many times had Joan heard women, and the occasional man, plead with their partners in just those tones? Saying desperate words, knowing it would not be enough, never be enough, and that pain was the only way their partner could show love? God in heaven this was why she had started Project Empathy, why she had risked everything, why she was still here now. And now she'd be forced to watch Joker beat Harley? Her sense of justice rose up, as unquenchable and implacable as she was.

No. I will not.

Joan tugged at her bonds, furious at her helplessness. "Stop this, Joker! There's no point to it! You have all the power! Just let her go!"

He didn't even look back at her. "Why should I stop?" He crooned, reaching down and grabbing a pocket knife from his trousers. He flicked it open expertly and looked down into Harley's wide, frightened eyes. "You're pissing me off, Joany, and Pammy is too. So why don't I take it out on the one person you both like? Then I could punish both of you, all at once!"

He raised the knife high, adjusted his grip. Harley struggled again but it was ineffective against his strength and the emotional hold he had on her.

Joan took all this in, thinking very quickly. It was difficult, as her mind felt somewhat removed from her physical body. She was tired, hungry, lost. She was covered in grime and dirt, and she had to go to the bathroom very badly. There was the faint sense of relief that she had done her most serious business the last time she'd been at the bunker—and barely ate enough to warrant another one of those—but also a sense of childish glee that whoever removed her body from the chair would have to clean up her urine.

But most importantly, she was done. He was going to hurt her? Fine. He was going to kill her? Well a-o-fucking-k. She was about done, anyway. And besides, all the classic authors in antiquity—something of a quiet pleasure of hers—had talked of the dead knowing that which the living could not know.

She was between both worlds, now, and all she had was a gallows prophecy, like she was some kind of wise woman of old, about to be sacrificed on the altar of some foreign tribe. Her imminent demise was in their hands, but the truth was in hers. Knowledge was in hers. She knew, and she would speak.

It was all that she could and would give her friend, now. Hell, if she played her cards right, she might even scare him a little.

The knife glinted in the light, and she found the words, lying scripted on her tongue.

"Before he changed you, Harley, you asked me for my professional opinion on the Joker's past. I'll tell you now. It doesn't matter what he once was, not in any way we could measure. Suffice to say it cannot be what he is now. And when he changes again, becomes something new, it will and must be completely different. With every change, he must deny what came before—for our days, our choices, our every minute echoes within us all, and the destruction of our past is far more difficult than the destruction of simple matter."

The Joker had frozen, the knife still held high. Yet Harley was looking at her wide, terrified eyes, and Joan could hear the ghost of who she had been whisper, really, Joan? You're doing this now?

But this wasn't for her, not really. It was just to give her a chance to escape the room. All she had to do was make the Joker pause. Make him remember she was in the room. Make him see her.

"Yet I think he has learned that if he changes every aspect of his being, he can, for a time, withstand those echoes. Deny the ghosts in his empty rooms. Stave off the madness that is the payment for his changes.

"Somehow, Harley, you have become one of the stabilizing forces of his current existence. There was never anyone else like you in his life, and he clings to all the possibilities you represent. You are a pillar that keeps the room upright. Batman is the most powerful influence, of course, the load bearing beam in the center of the room, but if enough of those pillars fall, even Batman can't keep him up. The Joker will be forced to change once again. And he will have no choice but to kill off all reminders of his failures, and his new-past life."

The Joker lowered the knife. Joan suspected it would be lodged in some part of her body soon enough, but for now, she had just a little left.

"But the human mind is not capable of change forever. Nor is our psyche. It's a two-edged sword, isn't it? For when you die, Harley, when Batman dies, when enough of those pillars fall down whether he wants it or not, he will be forced to change again, fail again, and at that point he will learn if there is anything else he could become."

Harley sputtered and denied, but she also kept one eye on the exit. Smart girl. Yet she was still largely caged in by the Joker, who now stood preternaturally still, proving the lie in his every other extravagant motion. He was more a predator now than he ever was, but Joan knew the truth. Fast or slow, painful or merciful, she was dead. And the dead did not fear the living. Not even the mad. Not even the evil.

Joan looked him dead in the eye, and did not flinch.

"It's not love between you, Harley, and deep down you know that. But you are, for a time, necessary. And if that's enough for you? Well. Then you need look no further. But if you wanted more? Safety? Respect? Power over your own damn life? Well, you'll probably die first. Especially if you tell him any of this. That is my opinion," she finished. "Not that it matters, in the end. Unless you listen now, and see what I see. Then, maybe . . . someday it might just save your life."

Finally he moved away from Harley. She took the advantage immediately and was out the door so fast Joan missed moments of her movement. Joker didn't seem to mind, however. His focus was utterly on her, and he took another step in her direction, knife still unsheathed in his hand.

His eyes were dark and assessing. "You are a clever one, aren't you, Dr. Leland."

Somehow, his use of her title was more frightening than Joany moany pony. "I am a woman of education, yes."

"No, no. no. That's not what I'm saying at all. You're good at looking. At seeing. At knowing. But you're not the only one who can do all of thaaaaaaaaat."

"Of course not," she said quietly, reminding herself that she was dead dead dead and that it was far too late to fear. "And it's not just a gift given to psychologists, either, if that's where you're going."

"Now see, that," he snapped his fingers, "Is just why Cash likes you so much. That modesty. That open-mindedness. He uh, doesn't get a lot of that at home, now, does he?"

Joan froze, but realized immediately it was stupid. Cash was out of his hands. What did it matter if he wanted to talk about him now? "I suppose not," she said, noncommittal. "Not that I see how it matters."

"Oh, I think it matters to him," Joker crooned, taking another step closer. "Or haven't you seen how he looks at you?"

Joker doesn't know shit, she told herself, but she knew it was a lie. He was trying to hurt her. But it wasn't Aaron's feelings he was talking about. It was her own. Somehow he knew that she loved that man, and was roundabout trying to hurt her with it.

Well fuck that. "I think you mean how I look at him."

That made him stop dead in his tracks, and his eyes opened comically wide. "You mean it's reciprocal?" He said, voice high-pitched.

Her expression must have reassured him it was, because he tipped his head back and engaged in hyena-like laughter. It was jarring. It was loud. It also went on for about forty-five seconds, which was forty-five seconds too long.

"Oh, this is just beautiful," he said, wiping what may have been an actual tear from his eye. "Love is in the air. And this is Arkham Asylum! Shouldn't it be fear toxin or laughing gas instead? But no! We're all being felled by love. What an experience. What a joke."

He moved like a snake so that he was looming over her. Joan's throat and chest suddenly felt very unprotected, and she experienced almost tangible feelings of vulnerability.

"I wanna make a bet with you, Dr. Leland. See, you think I'm blowing smoke out my ass when I say that big bad Aaron Cash looks at you like you hung la luna. But I know I'm right. And you know how I'm going to prove it?"

Her brain started firing on forgotten cylinders, and a thought occurred to her. Oh lord. Oh no. He couldn't mean to use her as—

"By using you as bait," he whispered. "And when he stumbles into my trap, that'll be the end of the resistance!"

"No," she whispered. "Don't you fucking dare, Joker."

He raised his other hand, which held the controls to the chair. "Nighty night, Joany," he said, and then pressed the start button.

The chair beneath her started to hum, and with the scant seconds she had before the electricity built up, Joan spat on his face. He wiped it away, affecting a look of disdain, but then her body surged and jolted as the electricity tore through her.

There were no words for the pain. The fear. But her last coherent thoughts were of observing the ghastly blue striations of light on the wall, and thinking that's pretty. And then there was nothing at all for a long time.

July 7th, 20xx

Greenhouse, 3:12 PM

Day 17

Ivy understood the nature of orgasm, and what happened to the brain during. She knew that her brain had released oxytocin and dopamine in order to bond her to Jonathan. She also knew that it made no difference. Her desire to see him, to explain, to see if their tentative friendship had been lost was all-consuming and real, no matter what she told herself about brain chemistry.

It was also impossible. For one, she could not find him. No one could. When he went to ground he was untraceable, for he knew the escape holes and tunnels better than anyone—even though word on the island was that the blueprints for the tunnel system had been found.

Yet even if she knew just where he was, to seek him would be testament to weakness, and it could get them both killed. Now that they were on Joker's radar, the only way she had of keeping him safe—an endeavor she had usually exerted for Harley's behalf, and occasionally Selina's—was by leaving him alone.

She hated every minute of this, and wanted Joker dead more than ever before. Her resolve to strangle the murderous clown with her babies had not diminished in the slightest, and she'd only put it off for so long to see if she could trap Harley on some corner of the island, keeping her away from her painted paramour, or to see if Jonathan would . . . well, if he'd come to see her.

They could talk it out. She wouldn't behave badly at all. She just wanted . . . she just wanted to see him again. And explain. Apologize. Tell him that she wasn't like his grandmother, not really.

But she was, that was the kicker. She had . . . hurt him, hurt him badly, and now there was only one real way to make amends.

She had to kill the Joker. And since he had started announcing the date, time, and place of his wedding (today, 6:00 PM, the Mansion Great Hall) over the loudspeakers on repeat, she knew exactly when and where to enact her plan. So far, the plan possessed no real degree of finesse. It was go in, strangle every person present with her babies, personally kill the Joker, and then either leave or die. Maybe if she was feeling up to it, she could make a small battalion of zombie boyfriends to help with the takeover. She'd have to pick ones with guns.

Still, the formula was simple. Brain-dead men with guns, pheromone clouds to pacify, and big, strangling vines through the floor. As long as the Joker ended up dead, she no longer cared much about anyone else, save Jonathan. But he was hiding, licking his wounds. Surely he wouldn't be there. Not if any past pattern of his behaviour held. Not if he had any self-preservation at all.

Honestly, as long as he came out all right, she didn't even care if she died. She was tired and heartsick and plain sick of it all. Joker dead. That was it. Her big goal. She wanted nothing else, now.

So, to work. Time to scour the island. Look for the men with guns, she told herself. They'll be most useful . . .

Ivy wasn't sure what it said about her luck that the first man she found with a gun was Aaron Cash.

"Where's Joan?" Were the first words out of his mouth, which Ivy thought proved he had little sense of self preservation, even with his and several of his men's guns pointed on her. It also proved he had correspondingly little by way of social niceties. But as this dovetailed nicely with her own plans, she forgave him this once.

"Harley gave her to the Joker when I was . . . occupied," Ivy answered bitterly, her hands up to show she was not a threat. She was, of course, but it was the gesture that counted.

Aaron let out a truly scathing curse, which had one of the guards near him—Raoul, perhaps? Renato? He was Hispanic, and Ivy had trouble with rolling her r's—blanching.

"He won't have her long," she said. "This ends now. Tonight. At that ridiculous charade for a wedding."

"Do you know if Joan is alive?" Cash asked, the gun still trained on her.

"I do not," she said honestly. "But if she is, he'll have her at the wedding, just like he had her at the Joker Games. But I would recommend finding a way to spring her before then, because let me assure you, I will kill everyone in the mansion if I have to, just to make sure the Joker is dead."

Zach Franklin stepped up to Cash and murmured something low in his ear, while another guard, one who smelled faintly of a distillery asked, "All right. So what's your plan?"

"Louie!" North barked.

Louie shrugged. "What? She's got a plan, we've got a plan, let's see if they're compatible. Because heaven knows we all want the Joker dead and the doc saved!"

"My plan is nothing too taxing," Ivy said, who saw no reason not to tell them everything. "Zombie boyfriends, pheromone clouds, my babies. Make sure one of the latter strangles Joker. I might even survive the evening."

"Zombie boyfriends," Zach repeated, his tone dark. "Like Mike."

"To save Joan," she countered. "And if all Joker's men hadn't been enforcing one of his ridiculous games, I'd have used one of them."

There was a moment of tense silence. Ivy had forgotten entirely about the guard she'd zombified.

Whoops.

"I'd hold off on the zombie boyfriends," Cash said, in a manner that Harley would have described as 'throwing shade.' "It might muddy the waters. Particularly as there will already be men with guns at the party."

"Yes, and that's why I need meat shields—" She oh so patiently began to explain, but Cash interrupted.

"And they'll already be drawing Joker and White Shark's fire." He looked at her and lowered his gun. "Can you tell whose boy is whose?"

"To an extent, yes. Joker makes it easy with the facepaint."

"But Two-Face's? Black Mask's?"

She blinked. "Harvey is siding against the Joker? Good for him. And he got Roman to go along with him?"

Cash nodded. "And afterwards, Harvey's gonna' help us put the island to rights.
Things will be different, yeah, but they can't continue like this."

"Harvey's going to betray you," she pointed out, because it was too obvious not to be said.

Cash said nothing, simply put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a familiar coin.

Ivy glanced at it and her eyes widened. "He gave you—he gave you his coin?"

"Things are gonna change, Ivy," Cash said.

Ivy watched him for a long moment. It was difficult to think that a major boss in the Gotham Vigilante Crime Scene could work together willingly with law-enforcement, but over the last two weeks she had been forced to survive worse. Who was she to say it wouldn't work, just this once? Who was she to care when she knew there was only a 80/20 chance of her surviving until morning?

Hell, why lie to herself? This was a suicide run.

"Do what you must,' she said. "But leave me the Joker."

"If you tell us where he has Joan," Cash pressed. "Your plants are all over the island. Can't you find Joan?"

Ivy frowned. She had spent some time looking, but she'd had no success. EI was the obvious and largest blindspot on the island, but there were a few others. Anywhere that was connected to the electric grid, for instance, the floor of the penitentiary, or the rooms in the medical center that housed the electric chairs for shock treatment. Or he could have hung her from one of the morbid gargoyles that littered the mansion. With a little creative thinking she could be anywhere but the ground, really.

"She's either suspended in air, or someplace with strong electric cables running underneath," she said bluntly. "Or he's figured out the way I find people on the island, and he's found a way around it. I would guess Mansion or Medical, but I really don't know."

Cash nodded. "All right. We'll hit those two. Just remember, Sionis and Dent are, for now, on our side. Against the Joker. So if you have to make some boyfriends, maybe go for the other fuckers."

She nodded graciously, because she was always gracious, and he was not incorrect.

Eddie Burlow, the doe-eyed younger guard piped up, "Wait, shouldn't we tell her about Catwoman?"

"What about Selina?" Ivy asked, her gut dropped.

"You guys were friends, right?"

"Yes," Ivy said without thinking, and then was surprised at how quickly it came to her lips.

He looked uncomfortable, and there was a flare of panic. How interesting. She hadn't thought she had any room left in her for more worry.

"What? What happened? Tell me!"

Aaron pushed the young guard back and sighed. "We were down in the tunnels just outside of EI. That was where Joker had kept her, apparently, because we heard Wesker go down and shoot her. It was a little muffled—it kind of sounded like there might have been another voice—but the gunshots were unmistakable."

"Some of the guys in the tunnels were talking about how Wesker didn't know if he wanted to kill or fu—er, you know what with Catwoman," one of the young guards said, whose name Ivy did not know. "We're pretty sure she's gone."

"Selina is surprising," Ivy said. "One bullet or two might not be enough to stop her, especially if she could be gotten to the doctors in time—"

Cash shook his head again, the lines on his face deep and forbidding. "He had a machine gun, Ivy."

The back of her eyes prickled. How odd, to feel this way now, over Selina. Was it simply accumulative? She could only take so much loss? She hadn't thought about Selina in days, had thought she'd died at the very beginning, but to know that she'd survived this entire time only to be gunned down by that ridiculous puppeteer?

Ivy was furious, and Wesker was an easy kill. So she tilted back her head and sent her consciousness out through her darlings all over the island, looking, searching . . .

"I can't find him either," she said eventually. "Nor his puppet."

"Could still be in EI," Bill North said.

"For a full day?" Cash said.

"Didn't say he was alive," Bill grumped in return.

Ivy pursed her lips. EI was horrendous, but even had she known Selina was there, she probably wouldn't have helped spring her. Largely because she couldn't. She'd have to send scores of zombies in, as her plants were too leery of the electric wiring that ran below it, used to sedate the prisoners only meters away. And huge cavernous spaces were impossible for all but her largest, most enduring babies to traverse, let alone the meters of concrete to puncture.

But why was she even held there in the first place? Had she pissed off Joker? Ivy applauded her initiative. Or maybe—

"Bait for Batman," she breathed. "But he never came. Why did he never come? Batman." She clarified in a louder voice, interrupting Cash and Bill.

Cash looked furious. "We've been hailing him on all frequencies for the last 24 hours. Nothing. We can't even get Commissioner Gordon. I don't know what the hell is going on over on the mainland, but it's nothing good."

Ivy looked at him. His face was drawn and guarded, his body language tense. The pressure on him was enormous. Joan captured, likely to die, with no help coming from any outside quarter. Even if they succeeded in retaking the island, where would it leave them? With a handful of guards and even fewer doctors, only two vigilantes in their corner, against all that remained of Team Joker?

They were both suffering under unthinkable odds, and Ivy felt for him. Understood him. Empathized with him. With Aaron Cash.

Perhaps it is a good thing I am to die, she thought. Because I do not know who I am becoming.

July 7th, 20xx

Greenhouse, 5:22 PM

Day 17

Over the next few hours, Selina learned several important things. First, Oracle was officially on her shit list for not picking up the metaphorical phone. Second, Bruce really needed to update his contact list, because she couldn't get the Commissioner, either. Third, and in a far more positive vein, Bruce's computer would let her access the security camera feed if she asked nicely (or you know, at all). Last, that Joker was setting up something big in the mansion for this evening. It kind of looked like a wedding, but Selina really couldn't be sure. Particularly when she saw him trying on a white nightie and parading up the aisle.

Ok it was probably a wedding. Joker may or may not wear that nightie in all seriousness (and where the hell did it even come from? Sharp? Buhhhhhhhhh) and so therefore it was her solemn fucking duty to stop it. And hey, if she killed him while she was there? Worst guest ever, but no one would ever forget these nuptials.

And actually, speaking of guests . . .

She scrolled through the few functions she could access on Bruce's computer, looking for an emergency override of some kind. She'd cycled through all the feeds she could prior to finding Joker's wedding rehearsal, and was surprised to see more than a few men in cells. Calm looking men. Not raving loonies looking men. Political prisoners, maybe? Or just people that Joker didn't like? Either way, their incarceration on an inmate-run island intrigued her. She felt for them, she really did. Why hadn't they been invited to the wedding of the year?

Well, call her the Fairy Fucking Godmother, but she was here to get those men to the ball.

It took her almost an hour, but she finally did it. She still wasn't quite sure how, unless Bruce had put in an vocal override function tied to her voice saying "For fuck's sake goddamnit it, Bruce, these men need to be freed!" She doubted it, but she had been wrong before.

Regardless, it worked. The cages slid open, and initially no one moved, expecting a trick. Then, one by one they hesitantly stepped out into the corridor. And when no one died immediately, they began to escape en masse, and Selina's heart grew at least one size that day.

She had done all she could. Now, it was time to ensure her own arrival. So affixing the grapple gun to her belt, she straddled the Batbike and rode it to the elevator at the far end of the cave. Donning her helmet, she took one last look out at the cave. Then she reached out, pressed the elevator button, and whispered, "Bruce."

Spending weeks down in Extreme Isolation was bound to play tricks on the mind, and now that she was up on the surface, breathing free air (or whatever the saying was), she realized she had forgotten something. Something important.

It was this: there were a lot of guns on the island. And a lot of the goons had them. But she had bigger guns now, and she was allowed to use them.

It was invigorating.

"AAAAAHHHHAHAHAHAHHAHAA!" She screeched as she revved the bike, mowing down man after man as they came at her with said guns. She wasn't running them all down, of course, because she had more class and worry for her suspension than that. More so she was shooting them with her superior weaponry. And she didn't even feel bad about it, not when Bruce had left the gun racks on it. Clearly this had always been an option. It helped that Jason Todd was all about proper gun and motorcycle care, and was not averse to teaching his vigilante mom a thing or two, particularly if she fed him tiny tidbits of information about his batfamily, all disguised as gossip.

She loved her boys.

Another body went thump underneath her wheels, lifting her in the air. Yet the suspension was unreal, and she stayed seated and moving quickly over the uneven terrain. Hover technology, maybe? Straight up black magic?

Selina did not know, and was certainly not complaining. About anything. Because this was awesome.

Well, ok. She did have a quibble. Just a minor one. Because it was all fine and dandy to run down the odd goon or six, but where were the great roaming bands she'd seen on Bruce's computer monitors? They'd been moving en masse to the mansion, but there had been another group headed in the opposite direction . . .

Acting on impulse, Selina swung the bike around, fishtailing on the grass. Maybe her freedom was getting to her head, here, but she wasn't called Catwoman for nothing. Curiosity was pretty much her byword. Along with burglar. Wily. Agile. The-goddamn-best-in-bed. Yes, all these words were hers, obviously, but curiosity was at the top of that list. So she revved the bike, took off towards the other end of the island, and hoped she wouldn't have to look too hard.

Spoiler alert: she didn't.

The Graveyard was something of a morbid focal point of the island, set in place by the original inhabitants, the Arkham Family. Others had been buried there since, but generally not the prisoners who died on the island, whose bodies were almost always reclaimed by family, or cremated by the state. Now there were prisoner bodies aplenty littering the graveyard, the air heavy with their stench, flies buzzing madly around each individual corpse. But walking between the bodies were goons carrying what looked like a battering ram and several unmarked boxes. And coming out from the main mausoleum, wearing a triumphant grin, was Warden Sharp.

Selina narrowed her eyes. The Warden was a fatass bumbling jerk, but she hadn't thought him evil as well. Yet if he'd been supporting Joker, no wonder the overthrow had gone so smoothly.

Well, she was here to do something about that.

Time to go bowling—

"Hey FATASS," she screamed. "EAT THIS!"

She dug her heels into the ground and opened fire with the deadliest assault weapons on the rack before the Warden and his men turned around. So sue her, but she wasn't giving them time to shoot her back. Men fell before the spray of bullets, some dying quickly, others taking their sweet time. A few managed to dodge behind gravestones, but as the force of the gun inched the bike back by inches, the area of effect widened, and by the time she took her finger off the trigger-button on the console of the bike, there was only one man left standing.

A bullet-ridden Warden Sharp glared at her from the mausoleum's doorway. Oh, Selina thought. So Clayface.

"Joker has been far too lenient with you, Catwoman," Clayface said in Sharp's voice, even as he shed his skin. Soon he was standing there in all his Play-Doh glory, smiling evilly. "It's time to punish such good intentions."

"Oh what the fuck ever," she breathed, before punching another button on the console. This time, the font-mounted cannon activated, and the projectile was so powerful that, when it collided with Clayface's midsection, it tore him backwards along its flightpath, punching him back into the mausoleum. And now Selina had a choice to make. Run, knowing that she couldn't kill him? Or try to trap him in the rubble?

"SELINA!" He roared, his voice echoing in the chamber.

Bury him in rubble it was, then. She opened fire on the mausoleum walls, but they were of sturdier make than she'd hoped. And as she had no more ammo for the cannon, she was boned—

–And then the whole damn thing exploded. Even over 50 yards away, Selina was thrown backwards off the bike in an arcing tumble, high enough that she was able to focus on her legs flying over her head and thinking roll bitch before she hit the ground. Roll she did, but the impact was jarring, and it took her several long minutes to catch her breath and check for major injuries.

Well all her breathing and beating parts seemed to be doing ok, but yippee kay yay there went her ankle. Jesus it had just healed this was going to set her recovery back months!

But she had more immediate problems. Such as, what the hell had exploded, and was it enough to trap Clayface? The second issue was immediately answered with a resounding yes, as the Mausoleum had collapsed inwards on itself, the stones and brick packed so tightly that the inside would be dry in a monsoon. So Clayface was trapped, maybe forever, amen hallelujah. And as for the first mystery, the rising scent of explosives in the air was answer enough. Those unmarked boxes Clayface's boys were holding? Dynamite, apparently, and the gunfire was enough to shock it into exploding.

So that was one problem down, even though she had no idea why they were planning to blow up the graveyard in the first place. But she had re-injured her ankle in the process. Maybe even re-fractured it.

"Well, shit," she hissed, angry and in pain and Jesus, that freaking hurt. "Now what?"

July 7th, 20xx

The Mansion, 6:18 PM

Day 17

The explosion rocked the Mansion and the chair Joan was tied to tilted dangerously to the left. One of Joker's goons reached out to steady her after stumbling himself, and she learned that even now, when she was so deep in the valley of the shadow of death that she could no longer see daylight, that there was always room for new and exciting fears.

Thankfully Joker's men were not immune to fear either, and the one looked to the other and whispered, "What was that?"

The other shrugged. "I dunno, man. Probably one of the boss's wedding surprises. You know how he is about surprises."

"But doesn't he usually tell us about the surprises?" The first, more nervous one asked.

The other snorted. "You wanna know how we all can tell you're fresh meat? Questions like that. Joker doesn't tell us anything we don't need to know. The faster you learn that, the better your time here will be."

"But then how do we know to get out of the way? Of the blast, I mean."

The look he received was withering. "We don't."

"Absolutely you don't!" The Joker sing-songed as he strode in, his garish purple suit bedecked with several new touches. His bowtie was ostentatious and vaguely familiar, and after a moment of thought Joan placed it as one of Warden Sharp's. His hair was slicked back in a slightly different configuration, and around his waist was a scarlet cummerbund. It did not go with the outfit. Nor did it go with his final embellishment, his boutonnière. It was a white lily, so clean and new that it must have been plucked from the Greenhouse. With Ivy's permission? Likely not, and that didn't bode well for the horse Joan had backed.

Before his men could find their footing, he continued, "The Joker, he's just cuh-razy. You never know what he's gonna do next! For instance, I heard he was getting married today, but is he? Is he really? I think it's still up in the air. I mean, have you seen the groom?" He pshaw'ed. "Not to mention the bride. They're no Crasley, is what I'm saying. Know what I mean?"

Joan did not, nor did she care to. Neither did the goons, however, and Joker, having found himself playing to a rather dull house, dropped the charade.

"All right boys, scram," he said, gesturing to the door. "I have a few words for the lady doctor."

Joan tensed. She'd had no conscious interaction with him since he'd shocked her senseless, but she did remember what he'd told her just beforehand. Was she still being used as bait? Or was the explosion as she feared, and she was no longer needed?

The Joker began walking around her chair in a counter-clockwise circle. "You know, Joany, it's a funny position we're in here. I mean, I could just kill you. Well I'm clearly going to eventually, obviously, but you're also a clever lady, and I am the first to admit that it is uh, refreshing to hold an intelligent conversation every so often. And Harley would just be sooooo upset if you missed the wedding, so I think I'll wait until after, if you don't mind?"

He paused in front of her chair, eyebrows up, expression open and honest, as if he truly wanted to know if putting off her demise would be a bother.

She stared back at him for a moment, as if he had suddenly grown two more heads and one was speaking Norwegian. "It is your wedding," she said, voice faint. "I think that means it's up to you."

She could try begging for her life. He'd like that, probably, but it wouldn't do anything. So she'd hold onto her sense of self-dignity for a little while longer, at least. Besides, if it was Aaron in that explosion, she wasn't sure how much longer she wanted to remain on the mortal plane.

Joker slapped his knee. Rather than pace again, he leaned in close to her face, close enough that she could smell cologne. It was not Warden Sharp's, and that was interesting. Who else had cologne on the island? Or was it something similar? How did it make its way into Joker's hands?

"I'm going to tell you a secret, Doctor Leland," he said very seriously. "But only if you think you can take a bit of constructive criticism on an earlier hypothesis."

Joan blinked. "Which earlier hypothesis?" She asked, her mouth dry.

He leaned in closer to whisper in her ear, causing goosebumps to raise all down her back. "Batman—is—dead," he whispered, enunciating each word carefully. "And I'm still here. So I'm gonna have to call bullshit on your central beam chaos theory, Doc. Looks like you were wrong!"

No no no, this was just an eleventh hour ploy to wear down her strength. As any good Gothamite, she believed in Batman. And she would continue doing so until direct evidence of his demise smacked her across the face. "There are other reasons why he hasn't come yet, Joker. The fact that he's a worldwide phenomenon indicates travel outside the United States. He's gone off the grid for months, in the past. I've not given up on him yet."

The way you have went unsaid, but he was intelligent enough to pick up on it. Probably.

But he wasn't having it. "Oh no," he said, leaning back so she could see the rage building on his face. "A friend on the outside told me to watch the news. Someone unmasked him, because they are an enemy of fun, and then they killed him. BORING!" He screamed, suddenly incandescently furious. "BORING AND STUPID. Why would he waste himself on someone other than me? Why would he lose to someone other—than—ME?"

He tore himself away from her, kicking at the desk and cabinets at the opposite wall. In his rage, he threw papers until they rained like confetti, and lobbed pencils so hard one stuck and quivered in the far wall. He ripped open Pendersmith's Book of Psychiatric Protocol in quarters, and it was a book three times the size of the thickest phonebook.

It took him some time for his rage to burn out, and when it did, he stood there, panting. Then he smoothed his hair back, and like flipping a switch, was in control again. He turned to face her.

"You know, there's no need for a party if the guest of honor can't come," He said calmly, like that burst of rage (which rather illuminated her point, because some buildings took some time to collapse, even with dynamite) had never happened. "That means no wedding. Which is just too bad, so sad for Harley."

"You could call it off," Joan agreed. "You could even tell them why. No more Batman? A lot of people out there would like to hear that. Might even upstage the wedding entirely. What a celebration it could be."

He looked at her with such hatred, such evil in his eyes, it was like looking at the devil. "There is no need for a celebration, Joany. Not when Batman is gone."

"No," she replied. "Nor is there a need for the Joker. Not if Batman is gone."

He was going to kill her, she knew this. Maybe she'd even moved that timeframe up. But before he could move the door opened and a goon stuck his head in. "Uh, five minutes to showtime, boss. Unless you're getting cold feet?"

Distantly, Joan felt that this man was either very brave or very stupid, but it broke the moment. Joker pulled back, straightened his outfit, and did a preening little twirl. "How do I look?"

"Uh, good, boss? Better than Harley in that old lady's nightie thing."

"The late Lady Arkham would have words for you," Joker said. "It was the height of fashion in the 1610's! Now, you'll have to escort the doctor—and her chair—to the ceremony, but before you do . . . " He trailed off before leaning back down, hovering over her, his hands gripping her wrists to the arms of her chair like vises.

It hurt like hell, and Joan couldn't help the pained inhalation.

"You've lost your fear, Doc. And as a reward for your uh, bravery, I've got some great news for you. A real test of your fortitude. I had Play-Doh working on a little surprise for your boyyyyyfriend. That explosion you just heard? That was him wiping out the Resistance bunker in the graveyard. You know, the one that connects to the old Arkham Family Mausoleum? Do you think he was in there when it went off, Joany? Dooooo you?"

"No," whispered, her lips numb.

"Or maybe he's down in the tunnels which have already been sectioned off? There's lots of men down there . . . at least until I gas 'em. So which do you think will get him? The bomb, a bullet, or gas?"

"He's not dead," she whispered again. "And you can go right to Hell."

"Tsk tsk," he mocked. "That's no language for a lady. All right, I'm done. Put her in the front row," he said, stepping back and looking pleased with himself. "I want her to have a good view of everything." He tittered. "Maybe she'll even catch the bouquet!"

July 7th, 20xx

The Mansion (Great Hall), 7:19 PM

Day 17

It took Ivy several hours to prepare for her newest role as a wedding crasher, but it was time well spent. She'd found Harvey to let him know she was in on the plan—and all his men and Roman's now were easily identifiable by a strip of their orange jumpsuit material tied around their biceps—then tended the last of her lovelies, who really were so spent, so exhausted, that had she not been at the end of her own tether, she would have hated herself for what she was asking them to do. The roots of many would wither from excess movement, but it was a price she was forced to pay.

Now there was only a few feet between her and the door to the great hall, a score of mindless goons surrounding her to protect her from stray bullets, and one more deep breath, preparing to ruin Harley's wedding.

She wasn't sure if she should think of Harley or Jonathan now, it was too painful to contemplate either for long. So she thought of neither of them, thought only of the attainment of her vengeance. There was one crystalline clear moment of visualization of the Joker lying dead, of her triumph made real. And then she exhaled, threw open the doors, and unleashed hell on the room.

Her men began shooting only moments before Roman's men opened fire at the east. Harvey's were at the northwestern edge, and for a few moments, a hail of bullets tore into the attendants, lined up in haphazard rows of folding chairs. Yet they had all brought their guns, and those who could find shelter soon returned fire. At the altar, White Shark was officiating—which had to be a departure from the norm, as Joker had announced Clayface having the honors over a PA announcement just a few hours ago—Harley stood in a hideous white nightgown, and Joker stood next to her. Whether or not they had gotten to the exchange of rings Ivy did not know, because she was distracted by Joker's grabbing Harley and using her as a meatshield when the bullets began to fly.

Well, two could play that game. Ivy commanded her men to cluster around her, so that she could walk up the aisle that was littered with dead and dying bodies, while the henchmen waged war all around her. Two of her zombies died from concentrated shots, but a commotion at the eastern end of the hallway drew everyone's attention before she was more than halfway up the aisle.

A bestial roar rose above the roar of gunfire, and bodies went flying. Killer Croc had come. And it was a Killer Croc whose reptilian skin had—somehow—hardened to the point where it could repel bullets.

That's not right, Ivy thought, feeling a flare of panic. This much gunfire should take out even him. What's going on?

Killer Croc mowed through Black Mask's men like they were wheat before the scythe. Several of White Shark's men shared the same fate before they realized that Croc did not differentiate between friend and foe, and thus killed all in his path. Black Mask himself didn't stand a chance, not seeing the threat until too late. Within just a few minutes all were dead or had raced to the relative safety of the central part of the Great Hall.

Ivy threw up her vines, trapping many from reaching the altar, or worse yet, the western edge of the room. The wall was not quite complete, but it stemmed the tidal flow of men escaping Croc's wrath. Harvey had noticed the trap, and was retreating with his men. Many of the goons laughed, leaving them to run . . . before they were gunned down by Cash and his men, who had entered in through the upper level of the great hall, eastern side, so that they had clear, unimpeded shots at the backs of Joker's goons.

Their surprise attack was incredibly effective, and had the surviving men running after Harvey's, where, according to the echo of gunfire out in the hall, they were mowed down. In the space of 15 minutes they had thinned the crowd down to perhaps a tenth of what it once was, from 200 to 20. Yet as the vast majority of the survivors were premier supervillains from Gotham—and one was souped up to near invincibility—the fight was not yet over.

Especially not when Joker had let go of Harley in order to start a slow round of applause.

"Oh well done, Leafy! And here I was, thinking the only bit of fun left would be to terrorize Joany." He shook his head, gesturing at Dr. Leland, who had somehow survived the attack unscathed, sitting tied to her chair in the front row. The chair had tipped over either by her efforts or by accident, which may have been the only reason her head hadn't been blown off.

"Let her go, Joker!" Cash yelled from the second floor, every one of his boys now armed, and their aim on Joker.

"Cash!" He cried, looking utterly delighted. "Oh, what a reunion. The doctor was so worried when we heard that explosion. You must have as many lives as Catwoman, I swear. But uh, before you have your touching little moment with your lady friend, maybe you should say hello to Croc? Oh, he's just dying to shake your hand. Or eat it. Maybe both?"

This shifted attention back to Croc, who had taken the moment of detente to begin scaling the walls. Cash's men opened fire, but the bullets bounced off his flesh. He got close enough to grab one of them—Ivy couldn't tell who—and pulled him off the walkway, flinging him down to the floor. He hit it with a sickening crunch and did not move afterwards.

Ivy sent her vines after him, but none were strong enough to hold him. She had to settle for setting them in his path, and just as he reached up to hoist himself up onto the walkway, one of the more perspicacious guards shot his hand.

That was enough to sting, and he pulled back, screaming in pain. When he was off balance, she sent a strong vine up around his ankle to pull him down. Their combined efforts were enough, and Croc was floored.

Joker laughed and laughed. "Oh, he's still none too bright, even after Hush fixed him up with that T.I.T.A.N. formula. Brought Eddie back from the dead and turned Croc into a tank! Is there anything that stuff can't do?

"Maybe I should take some," he mused, tapping his chin theatrically. "Might be fun?"

"Red, stop this!" Harley cried out, finding her voice. "I don't know what you think you're doing, but—"

"I'm ending this, Harley," she snapped. "I'm sorry if it hurts your feelings, but I have had enough."

"This is my wedding, Red!" She cried, standing in front of Joker. "I can't let you kill him! I can't!"

"Then I will kill you too," Ivy said, quietly and coldly.

Harley was stunned. Joker must have believed her threat as well, because he straightened up and called out for the reinforcements Ivy had not expected. "Ohhhhh Johnnnyyyyyy! Get in here!"

Ivy froze. Everything was starting to go very badly. Croc was throwing himself bodily against her vines, she was down to only three zombie boyfriends, and Scarecrow had just stepped out from behind the massive statue of Jeremiah Arkham.

"Yes?" He asked, calmly, mildly. It was Crane's voice, but he wasn't looking at her, and Joker seemed to have no fear of him.

Joker shook his head sadly. "Your girlfriend is getting some dangerous ideas, Johnny. I'm gonna need you to address them. That is, if you think you can take her this time?" He leered, waggling his eyebrows.

Scarecrow wiggled his syringes. "Forgive me for pointing out the obvious, but it looks like Killer Croc is eager to do that job himself."

"I'll do it, boss," White Shark offered, glaring at her. He'd never liked her, and now that most of his men were dead? He took one step to the left, raised his gun . . . and then with a crack of gunfire, fell over dead. Ivy swung her head to the right where Zach Franklin extended half over the walkway, held in place by Eddie Burlow and Louie Green. Hanging half suspended was the only way he'd be able to hit anyone on the altar without hitting her vines first, and he had gone for an impossible shot. He aimed his pistol one-handedly, his focus the equal of any professional sniper.

"I got four left," he offered from his unsteady perch. "One's got your name on it, Scarecrow! And I'll save one for you too, Joker!"

Joker sneered, but recovered quickly. "That was a nice shot, credit where it's due. But uh, you might be forgetting about someone . . ." Quick as a flash, he bent down, appropriated Shark's gun, and then pointed it at Joan, who struggled against her bonds on the floor before him.

"One more shot in my direction and the doctor gets it. Actually, let's play it safe. Everyone, drop your guns. Drop them NOW or I shoot her RIGHT NOW."

There was a moment of silence before Aaron Cash dropped his gun, right down to the floor below. It went off in the stacks, and Ivy thought for sure Joker would fire . . . but he held his cool, and merely motioned for all the rest to drop them. One by one they did, the rest engaging the safeties before letting their weapons tumble down.

"Allllll righty, then," Joker said, cool as a cucumber. "I hope you enjoyed the break! Now, where were we?"

Seeing as how Ivy had spent that entire interlude trying desperately to keep Croc on the other side of her babies, she was not so much of a mind that it was a break. She was sweating again, and that never happened. Almost never happened. And Croc had, with animal single-mindedness, nearly broken through—

With another spine-chilling roar, he did. Flora flew left and right as he tore through her makeshift wall, and in desperation she directed her zombies to protect her. She sprinted to the far side of the chamber, but she was not so far away as to hear Joker croon to Scarecrow,

"You know, if it's not you, no one will ever respect you again, Johnny. You gotta be the one to shut her down, otherwise for the rest of your life, you'll just be another one of her boyfriends."

"Shut up, Joker!" Ivy yelled. "He's not so stupid to fall for that!"

But maybe he was, for Scarecrow considered them, watching closely as Croc tore through her last zombie. And when the man fell, he made his move. For one, heart-stopping moment Ivy thought he had chosen to side with the Joker, and would get to her before Croc did. But then he swerved, putting his body between her and Croc's incoming form, boxed her out and sprayed Croc right in his monstrous face with his fear toxin.

Where Croc's skin had become tough enough to repel bullets, the same could not be said of his respiratory system. Or perhaps whatever enhancements done to his system worked there as well, and was now super-effective in transporting the hallucinogenic qualities throughout his entire body in a matter of moments, for the effect was immediate. He screamed an almost human scream, shut his eyes, and flailed madly. Ivy, who had been pushed out of the way, was fine. Crane was not. He bore the brunt of one of Croc's wild swings, and was thrown against the closest wall—cement, and therefore not under Ivy's control—with enough force that his head knocked back audibly against it. He fell to the ground, leaving a large smear of blood behind.

He did not move afterwards, and Ivy lost her mind.

Someone else was screaming now, and she did not realize it was herself. Her body moved on its own accord, like she was a puppet on someone else's string. All she had was brought to bear on Croc. Every plant on the island reached for him, an instrument of her maddened will. Her plant wall collapsed, falling on the maddened mutant, too multitudinous to fight off, each with the tensile strength of human hair, too insidious to break. They brought him high into the air, and the most determined of them wrapped around his neck, slowly and surely cutting off his airflow.

Only when she was sure he was dead—he must be dead, it was minutes, he was dead—did Ivy turn to Crane. Now, finally, there was no more Harley in her mind. There was only Jonathan, and her failure, and this sickening sense of loss. It was not just herself she had lost. She had lost him, and she could barely comprehend it.

Not him, she thought, words coming disjointedly as she stepped slowly over to him. Not him. Because I-I can't. Because I. I lov—

From far away there was the crack of gunfire, and then there was nothing.

July 7th, 20xx

The Mansion (Great Hall), 7:52 PM

Day 17

Pamela fell to the floor, dead. Her body crumpled in a graceful heap, the red of her hair darkening with the green of her blood. One breathless moment, one masterful shot, and she was gone. There was only one person on the altar who could have made it.

Joan clenched her teeth before glancing over her shoulder at the Joker. He held White Shark's pistol lazily, dangling it from one finger. "So in the end I didn't go down with the good ship Crasley," Joker muttered. "And you know, I think I'm over it. There are better OTP's."

Before anyone else could get over their shock—Harley in particular looked close to disassociating—Killer Croc slowly and laboriously rose to his feet.

"Oh shit," Joan breathed, because she was under no delusions about how the next five minutes would go. Croc may have taken Aaron's hand, but she was the last tasty bit of bait to be dangled in front of the beast, and she had a feeling that by the end of the evening, Croc would take more from her than that.

"Oh Aaaaaaronnnnnn," the Joker sing-songed. "Croc looks like he has something to say to youuuuu!"

But Croc wasn't the only person moving in the room. For somehow, miraculously, Crane was still moving as well. He had slumped down to a sitting position after being thrown against the wall, but now was unsteadily pushing himself to his feet. Joker was facing the men up on the ramparts, but Harley had noticed him, as she gasped, eyes wide.

She did not notify the Joker, which was distantly quite interesting, and it also meant that the Joker only noticed Crane's desperate attempt when it was halfway done. He shoved himself off the wall in Croc's direction, too weak from blood loss to avoid Croc's grasping hands. He was caught up immediately, and Joan knew there was no way he'd survive the encounter.

Croc, no doubt in the throes of whatever fear-fueled delusion he was suffering under, swung Crane up and brought him right up to his massive jaws. Yet perhaps Crane's intellect had not yet failed him, because he took the opportunity to stab him in the face, ramming his syringes right through Croc's eyeballs.

Like punching a shark, Joan thought, as Croc screamed and dropped Crane. The man-gator toppled backwards like a felled tree, and the toxin must have been potent indeed, because the massive body twitched once, twice, and then did not move again. Joan hoped he really was dead this time, because they were already in Hell. Might as well deliver him to the front gates.

Crane had also fallen still as he was dropped, but now he crawled, inch by inch, the few feet that separated him from Ivy's body. Up on the altar Harley's breath hitched, but the Joker had a very different reaction.

"See, this?!" He laughed madly, skipping and twirling about. "This is the POWER OF LOVE! Oh, I was wrong to doubt you even for a second, Crasley! Well this was a show and no mistake. Best wedding ever!"

In his excitement he twirled around, capering gleefully. It was his moment of triumph, and he'd forgotten all about his new wife's affection for her old friend. As he spun, he let his arms reach out like he was a child on a playground. This put the gun within Harley's reach, and with a quickness that surprised Joan, she reached out and grabbed it.

"Harley?" Joker said, dumbfounded. "I'm still going to use that, you know."

But Harley had found resolve. She kept the pistol trained on him and backed away to the edge of the altar. "You killed her," she breathed. "You killed Red, Mistah J."

Joan could barely see Harley from where she was situated, but she had a good view of Crane. He had reached Ivy's body now, and was slumped over it. He rested his head on her stomach, his bare hand touched her face. She couldn't see his face, but she could read his body language. He was desperate to touch her, be near to her, even at the end. Perhaps especially because they were at the end.

Maybe I was wrong about him, Joan thought. And, what does that mean if I was?

More importantly, however, she also had a good view of the far corner of the upper ramparts, where Eddie Burlow was carefully climbing down one of Ivy's largest vines. He was moving oh so slowly as to not attract attention, but he'd be on the ground with her in just a matter of minutes . . as long as Harley didn't catch sight of him.

At the back of her mind, she wondered if Zach had thrown down both pistols, or if he had kept one.

"Harrrrleyyyyy, sweetheart," the Joker crooned. "Now, I know you're upset. But she was gonna kill me! And you! You heard that part right? I had to do it for both of us. It was self-defense."

"It'll be self-defense when he kills you too, Harley," Joan said, trying to keep attention from where Eddie Burlow had just lost one handhold, and had careened dangerously close to one of the railings. "If he can kill her, he can kill anyone."

She could feel his malice directed towards her, even if he was a little past her line of sight.

But Harley ignored both of them. "Professor?" She called out, half over her shoulder. "Why did you do it? Why'd you fight the Croc?"

Crane wheezed, his breath loud in his lungs. After a moment he gasped, "Ah— I tested the compounds of her serum when I escaped. Ah . . . I decided to try it." He coughed wetly. "It changed me. It made me connect with her."

Joan's eyes narrowed. On one hand, she had suspected as much, and it was nice to be vindicated. On the other, it shouldn't have had that kind of effect on him unless he let it. He was a phenomenal psychologist, and was easily disciplined enough to keep it from affecting him if he didn't want it to.

Perhaps he had been curious to see if it worked? And once it did, he hardly knew how to stop it? Maybe he didn't want to stop it?

Joker found the wherewithal to laugh, even with a gun pointed at him. He knew as well as Joan that Harley wouldn't actually shoot him, but he was barely cowed, even so. "Oh come on, Johnny. Just admit it: you, Master of Fear and all that crap, loved her. And you did it just like everybody else; it didn't take a magic potion to do it."

Crane slumped further, barely strong enough to hold himself up. He murmured, as if to himself, "How could I? I . . . she . . ." He exhaled and blood trickled out of his mouth. His accent was thicker as he continued, "Perhaps . . . insomuch as Ah can, Ah do."

Joan had thought she was past the point of being stunned. Or of feeling sympathy. But something about the sight of her broken ex-colleague made her breath catch. Had he ever loved before? Had he ever thought it was possible? Likely not, on both accounts. Nothing that had survived childhood, or perhaps the early teenage years.

And now, with everything he had done, everything he was, everything that was between them, he could admit it?

Joan blinked away the tears that obscured Eddie's descent down the last few feet of the vine.

"Yeah, well," Harley said, as she snapped the safety home, "I do too."

And then, with no warning or ado, she shot the Joker in the head. The silence that followed was profound. It held such presence that it seemed to echo in the great space, broken only by the muffled thump of the Joker's body falling to the floor.

Harley stared wide-eyed at her handiwork for a moment. Then she carefully set down the gun and turned to Crane, who was barely clinging to life. She dropped down to her knees on the other side of Ivy's body. She let her hand rest on her fallen friend's hair, smoothing the bloody strands away from her beautiful, vacant face.

"Professor?" She said quietly. "It's over, now. We can get you help, ok? Red would want that."

He attempted to laugh and it came out as more of a gurgle. "Ah think it's fah too late for that, Miss Quinn."

Someone came up from behind her, and Joan tensed, but it was just Eddie trying to cut through the ropes that bound her wrists.

"Shhh!" He mimed unnecessarily.

Joan nodded, but her focus was on Harley and Crane.

"She made me believe things could be different," he murmured, barely loud enough to hear. "That Ah could be different. Ah can't give that up." He coughed up more blood, tilting his head so that he didn't bloody his love's corpse. He glanced up at Harley. "She did it all fah you, ya know. The serum. And in the end, ya didn't even need it."

Harley began crying in earnest, great tears gobbing through the blood on her face.

Eddie had freed Joan's hands, and now set to work on her ankles. She rolled them, wincing at the cracks, but Crane was dying, and he would not be distracted.

He looked back at Ivy and leaned down, close to her ear. It looked as if he whispered something to her. Then, he pulled back and with a sigh, bent down to kiss her lips.

Ivy's poison worked quickly. In his current state, he barely had time to pull back from that last, gentle kiss before he slumped atop her, dead.

Harley rocked back on her knees, stunned, sobbing, alone. As soon as Eddie freed her other ankle Joan rolled herself up, fighting through the pins and needles from having not moved for hours. She stumbled towards Harley, ignoring Eddie's hissed warning. He may have gone for the gun on the altar, she wasn't sure. Joan collapsed next to Harley, pulling her into a hug.

Harley threw her arms around her and sobbed, and for the first time in years, Joan felt like she had her friend back.

"I was wrong. I was wrong. I was so wrong," Harley hiccuped through frame-wracking sobs.

"Not in the end, Harley," Joan murmured, as she clutched the back of Harley's head. "And Pamela always knew that you loved her."

"But he killed her. He killed her and I watched! I couldn't stop him!"

Joan swallowed. Never before had she empathized so strongly with Poison Ivy, but now she could see how their shared feelings and experiences made it all clear. "But she knew that he would. And she did it anyway. She loved you anyway."

"But WHY?" Harley wailed.

Joan pulled back just a little so Harley could see her face. "Because we made that formula together, Harley. And maybe I had more than just you in mind, but she did it solely for you. Whatever came from it, whatever came because of it, she chose to begin it for you. She loved you more than she feared the repercussions of working on it." She glanced down at Crane, who lay over Ivy's body, his face peaceful in death. "Just like she loved Jonathan enough to die for him."

Something occurred to Harley. "Together? Wait, you and Ivy . . . so all this time . . . it was your formula?"

"It was for people in abusive relationships," Joan admitted quietly. "The applications in your case were obvious. We both hoped that if we could just give it to you, walk you through the sessions afterwards, that you might someday choose to leave the Joker."

Harley broke down entirely. She wept like a child in Joan's arms, barely protesting when Bill and Louie pulled her gently away. She clutched blindly at Bill, who looked more than a little uncomfortable with the proceedings, but was a good enough man to sit down on the floor with her and let her sob herself out. He had several daughters, if Joan remembered correctly. The eldest might actually be about Harley's age.

Louie gave her a hug of his own, and Eddie attached himself firmly to her side. Joan roused herself to give them both a firm hug, and Eddie a big kiss on the cheek.

"My hero," she told him, her own eyes wet. "Thank you so much for rescuing me."

He blushed, which was adorable. "Aw, it was nothing. I was just the closest to that vine."

Just then, there was a crackle from a walkie-talkie, directly behind them. She turned to see Aaron Cash staring at her like he could set the world on fire with his gaze alone, but Gretchen Whistler's voice came through loud and clear.

"Medical to Security. Medical to Security. Are you there?"

Aaron answered without taking his eyes off of her. "Here, Dr. Whistler. Mansion is secured. Jackson—one guard down, and on Joker's side uh, everybody but Harley Quinn down. Joker is dead. I repeat, Joker is dead, and the island is being secured. If you see Harvey Dent, he's working with us."

A crackle of static, and then Gretchen said, "Harvey Dent and his men just freed us. They rendezvoused with Selina Kyle, whose ankle was re-broken in the melee. Adrien and Sarah are re-setting it, and we are told Stephen is alive also?"

"Yes, we'll send him and three other guards your way." He motioned to Raoul, Taylor, and Zach, who set off accordingly. Ostensibly Stephen was somewhere, maybe even here, but Joan could not attend. Cash was still staring at her and ok, she was staring back at him, but this was getting a bit ridiculous. She might start blushing soon.

"Have you managed to make contact with the mainland?" Gretchen asked, her accent thick.

"Not yet. We're gonna need someone good with computers for that, I think."

"Selina says the Riddler was able to open her cell in E.I. Give him another week or two, and he might be able to undo whatever blocks he has on the communications mainframe. We should have enough supplies to last that long."

"At this point we might need it. Or we'll build a raft. Doctor, I need ten minutes to clear the hall. I'll hail when I can."

"Of course, Mr. Cash. Thank you again," thanked Gretchen, polite even now. "We hope to see you all shortly."

Aaron lowered the walkie-talkie. The next moment he was in her airspace, and the intensity and purpose in his expression, in his body, in the very air around them robbed her of all thought. The next she was in his arms and for the life of her she didn't know who had moved first—him, or her. It hardly mattered because his mouth was on hers, kissing her firmly. And she may be a horrible woman, but she definitely did not stop him—in point of fact she deepened the kiss. After all she had been through she needed this. Needed this man, needed his strength, and needed him to keep kissing her until everything made sense and no one else was dying and the world was livable again.

"Wow, boss. Way to stake your claim right in front of us." Louie muttered, but he didn't sound angry. If anything, he was amused.

"Shhh!" Eddie said. "It's romantic! And I've been waiting for this moment for years, Louie. I need a happy ending."

Somehow, Eddie's enthusiasm brought her back to herself. She pulled away and closed her eyes. She couldn't cry, not when Harley's sobs were still echoing in the hall. "We can't," she whispered. "Letitia. Oh Jesus help me, we can't. I'm so sorry."

His hands were warm and gentle against her cheek. "I knew she hadn't told you," he breathed. "She could be so hateful sometimes. Joan, I finally got her to sign the divorce papers two months ago. We held off telling everybody because we didn't wanna overshadow Daniel's graduation news, but I moved out a week before the takeover."

"What?" Joan breathed, feeling like the dumbest person in the room. Aaron was . . . they had divorced? And Lettie hadn't told her? No one had told her? "What? Why?"

As Aaron could not read her mind, he answered only the verbal question. "Because she can't take all the hours I'm here, losing body parts and not paying attention to her." He leaned in and pressed their foreheads together. He continued in a quieter voice. "And I can't take being married to her when I am in love with you."

"What." She breathed again, but it was not a question, not really. And from the dawning smile on her face, even he could tell it was a not unwelcome invitation to elaborate.

He kissed the corner of her mouth. "Ten years, Joan. Pretty much since the moment you arrived at Arkham. Lord knows I tried to get over it, but there is no getting over you."

This had to be an exaggeration, as she vaguely remembered their first meeting as not all that momentous. She remembered thinking he had a very strident voice and wondered how he dealt with Letitia's histrionics, and if he watched her shows with her, because he didn't seem like a man who watched anything other than sports. But she would take it, because she was the most in love she'd ever been with this man, and the fruition of her romantic hopes had finally come true, after—

"Eight years, Aaron," she murmured, before she gave him a quick kiss on the side of his mouth, because solidarity. "And I'm going to kill Lettie when all this is over."

"Kiss me instead, woman," he whispered. And so she did.

July 7th, 20xx

Medical Center, 8:37 PM

Day 17

Dr. Gretchen Whistler put down the walkie-talkie and felt a good deal like crying. Not since her childhood in Bremen had she felt such soulful joy as this. She gloried in the strength and togetherness of her fellow doctors. The exhaustion and the fear of the last 17 days had chipped away at their fortitude, but they had not given in. Not when Richard had been gunned down in front of them, not when Penelope had been murdered by Zsasz, not when Sarah's finger had been amputated for her engagement ring. And now they were free—the Joker was dead, inmates were working with guards for control over the island, and perhaps in only a matter of days, they would be free to go home.

And at this moment, she felt a great connection to the institution at large. Arkham had been beaten down, but it had survived, just as they had. It was a different Arkham, but Arkham nonetheless. Inmates now had new roles, if Harvey Dent and Aaron Cash's partnership meant anything, and Selina Kyle was talking a mile a minute about how they had to get to the mainland to inform Gotham and the Batfamily about what had happened here (for according to her, Batman was dead) but all that could wait for the morrow. The infection had been purged, the evil tumor lanced, the Joker dead.

It was a good night to be alive. And Gretchen thought that the spirit of Arkham, such as it was, would agree with her.

I finished this almost a year ago, which does not say good things about my posting abilities, but also I am trying to space things out for Arc 4, of which I'm still only on chapter 1. But here it is! My favorite arc of the 4 (so far) and probably the most depressing. But I loved writing it, in part because it focused on a smaller cast of characters, and the main three were female. Maybe this was obvious, but each chapter had a major Ivy/Leland/Selina section, and then everything else was as needed. They were the main three, the vehicles for this story. And having finished it at last, I am really grateful to have told it.

:) Thanks for sticking with me for another arc. We'll meet again in Atlantis. :)

(Atlantis may only be posted on my AO3. Just look up the_mythologist on a03 and you're there, friends.)