Hello, hello, once again! This update is woefully overdue; aside from global craziness I needed to step back and create a clearer outline and clarify some details before barreling forward and I'm very happy I did. Thank you for joining me for this process and taking the time to comment and follow.

A small metal sign was rooted in the soil, polished and tidy and printed with a mild reminder.

Please do not throw coins in the pond

And she wasn't throwing coins; she was, however, draping an arm over the back of the bench and skimming her fingers across the cool water. This was not explicitly prohibited and, though she imagined it was also not explicitly allowed, Mel did it anyway. She was sitting in the middle of photosynthesis, the air heavy and warm and the richness of the moist oxygen heady. Her mind was sharp and she felt reckless. It was powerful in here and she soaked it in.

On the northernmost tip of Robinson Park stood the enormous glass and metal structure that was the Wayne Botanical Gardens. She liked to work there beneath the canopy in the manufactured jungle. Occasionally she'd stroll through the desert wing to feel the arid heat prickle on her arms, or weave through the misty green light in the palm room, but in the end she always ended up back in the rainforest. This bench- her bench as she thought of it now -was tucked in a rocky nook by a waterfall that rippled and splashed across the surface of the pond. Giant flowering water lilies nearly eight feet wide, victoria amazonica, floated contentedly as they rode the gentle movement. Mel's fingers trailed a lazy shape across the surface; the nearest lily shifted languidly closer and it was as if the pair of them were reaching out to one another. She smiled softly and considered its massive proportions as she packed her bag and rose from her seat. Nothing bothered these giants. The pond was not large so they nestled in beside one another, shifting, gliding, adjusting. They took up space. She could learn to be like a water lily.

The cosmetic pharmaceutical project had concluded shortly after the shareholders meeting in the middle of June. Afterwards she'd been shifted into research on the back end of an existing drug project. There was a time when this would've rankled her to no end, but now all she could see was the silver lining: a boring, minimal effort job meant she was able to invest nearly all of her free time and focus on the project. The new clean energy project that Miranda Tate had entrusted to her to cultivate. And Mel had thrown herself in the work: going back through years of papers and schematics, spending hours researching the physics she did not fully understand, scouring every outlet in the scientific community for developments in fusion technology. The conservationist in her had even decided to buy a fancy tablet to work on and keep her paper usage low. Sometimes she threw open the windows in her apartment and played her keyboard. She'd even gone on another date with Ed, if only because he promised to get a reservation at a restaurant where she had no hope of getting her own table. She'd hemmed and hawed and made an ordeal about their last date and it only seemed to spur him on to impress her. She let him. Every so often she'd email Miranda with updates or Miranda would email her with questions. Two weeks ago Mel's phone had buzzed with a notification: another meeting invitation.

July 16, 5:03pm - Meeting Invitation: July check-in

Meeting invitation to: m-isley

July check-in

(view on WE calendar)

Date: Sat, July 30th

Time: 2:00pm

Location: 113 Chambers Ave - Miranda's apartment

Event creator: Miranda Tate (m-tate)

Mel felt an odd little thrill to be meeting someone in their West Parkside home. That area was all brownstones and, while centrally located, was quiet and oozed old money and influence. When Miranda opened the door it was immediately clear that her home was no exception to the theme.

"Come in! I thought we'd set up back in the sun room."

Miranda was swathed in neck to toe crisp silk and linen, dark hair twisted into an effortless low chignon and her only ornament a slim gold watch resting daintily about her wrist. Mel glanced around as they walked down the hall. Everything was soft and elegant and expensive but it was absolutely the opposite of John Daggett's penthouse. Even the obligatory rich person Asian antiques were different. They walked past a delicately carved set of drawers and Mel noticed that there was some kind of writing twisted into the floral motifs. It wasn't Japanese, that much she knew; Sanskrit? Arabic, maybe?

A pair of glass doors stood ajar and a warm summer breeze wafted in the sweet smell of leaves and water and sunshine. The sun room, as Miranda had called it, was something like a combination of a large covered porch and the goddamn Wayne Botanical Gardens. Giant ravenea palms brushed the windows, chinese evergreens and ficuses and daphnes- some nestled in pots, some growing straight out of floor planters- lined the walls. A fountain tinkled softly in the far corner and a teak sectional with plush cushions and matching table was in the other. A man was lounging in one of the seats and he glanced over when they entered.

Oof.

The top button of his shirt was undone and his sleeves had been neatly rolled to reveal toned forearms; probably due to the summer heat but Mel didn't care tremendously why he had done it. He had one of the most perfect sets of cheekbones she'd ever seen on a human, a shadowy beard and an attitude of lazy confidence that seeped out of his pale blue eyes. She felt a mix of confusion at discovering this unexpected person and a need to fetch some smelling salts because he was hot as hell.

"Ander Mendoza, this is Dr. Mel Isley."

He rose when Miranda introduced them. Mel was suddenly very glad she'd thrown on a decent outfit and had taken a moment with mascara before leaving the house. She flicked her hair over her shoulder and held out a hand.

"Good to meet you, Mr. Mendoza."

He nodded and took her hand in his. The shake was firm and warm.

"Doctor."

Holy hell, he had an accent too. He hadn't said enough for her to place it but it had made the word deliciously soft. The three of them sat around the table and Miranda patted Ander Mendoza's arm.

"Dr. Isley worked on the initial run of the machine." Miranda gestured between them as she spoke. "She's the real brain behind this project. Ander has a history with this sort of thing, and since he was in town I invited him to sit in on our meeting."

She gave Mel an apologetic little wink.

"I hope you don't mind."

Admittedly it was a little stressful to be put on the spot like this, but Mel shrugged casually and chalked it up as another facet of Miranda's eccentricity. Mendoza leaned back in his seat and regarded her with curiosity.

"You're a physicist?"

How many times had she answered that question? A dozen? Fifty? Five million? Even delivered on the gentle slopes of his unidentifiable accent it still landed in her stomach with a thud. As the practiced, dumbed down, and slightly apologetic response rolled onto her tongue Mel thought of victoria amazonica: huge, calm, unbothered and confident. She met Mendoza's glacial eyes.

"A botanist. My background is primarily in biochemistry so, initially, I was brought on to field the conservation element. Keeping a clean energy project clean you could say."

She was fucking smart as hell, was a true beacon, and didn't owe anyone anything.

She shrugged and wrinkled her nose sweetly.

"It all sounds quite complicated but it ends up being lots of equations, a little chemistry, and making counter arguments for sustainability's sake."

Mendoza's face melted into a warm smile. Was it her imagination or had Miranda shifted ever so slightly? Had she noticed? Was she, perhaps, impressed as Mel had once been impressed? Before she had a chance to look more closely, all clues were erased when Miranda leaned forward and rested her chin on her palm.

"What have you got for me today, doctor?"

Mel pulled her fancy tablet and a well worn folder out of her bag, spreading out the papers and tapping in the passcode as she began to speak.

"I've been looking over the reports from spring of 2010, which was the main phase for initial building, sourcing materials, those sorts of things."

Her eyes flickered from the screen in front of her to her audience. What did she have to lose?

"There have been some interesting developments in fuel research since then, of course, although I recognize my own bias."

It wasn't precisely the point of the meeting but she dangled the carrot nonetheless. Perhaps some of her earlier recklessness still sparked in her synapses; perhaps she was simply owning the space. Miranda raised an eyebrow, thoughtfully.

"Such as?"

Mel's stomach flipped with glee. She distinctly remembered bringing up this same point in 2010; it had been waved off. Now, six years later, she was no longer the bright eyed new doctor and her high hopes had blossomed into something more. Her optimism had become her agenda. She was a beacon, a true beacon. She tapped a finger on a printed table.

"If you look at this summary here, Dr. Woodrue opted to fuel the reactor with 100% lab produced heavy water, sourced from LexCorp."

"Would the fuel matter very much if the reactor produces clean energy?"

Mel knew this question would surface. It always did. She was prepared but took a second to straighten the angle of the folder to occupy her hands. It was the moment of truth, after all; no need to rush.

"Fusion is an extremely effective means of producing clean energy as an output," she began, carefully, "but would it truly be clean energy if the process and fuel resources themselves were finite or inherently wasteful?"

Silence hung in the air for one lingering awful moment. Miranda frowned but then nodded her head as she thought, inviting her to continue. Mel pressed onwards.

"Fusion processes require fuel, a confined environment with sufficient temperature, pressure, and confinement time to create a plasma in which fusion can occur. Hydrogen is the most common fuel in naturally occurring fusion, though in the case of most fusion reactors we'd be looking at a hydrogen isotope -something like deuterium or tritium or both- because they require less extreme conditions to react. But that still doesn't change the fact that they would need temperatures in the tens of millions of degrees to both heat their fuel and remain stable."

She was rambling but holy shit it felt good to just let this, whatever it was burning inside her, just flow free into the sunny world.

"If we are sourcing them from artificial processes," her fingers ticked off each transgression, "transporting them from Metropolis, and paying exorbitantly for a product that is produced solely for this one purpose and cannot contribute to a sustainable system, I believe we need to reexamine our definition of conservation."

"So the fuel in the first machine was hydrogen?"

Mendoza asked the question, watching her face over steepled fingers. Mel nodded.

"A mixture of hydrogen isotopes. All of which would've needed replacing at some point and also careful disposal."

"How frequently?" Miranda asked.

Mel was glad she had looked into the process with some detail. They were past the point of her intellectual interest now; this was where her heart lay, where passion outweighed science and teetered on the edge of obsession. It was all so desperately clear in her mind; so simple, so necessary. It was intoxicating to feel that these two people sitting with her were listening.

"Not too often, not enough that sourcing would be a massive concern. But once it's out of the reactor the process involves proper transport, immobilization, and storage...and all of that needs to happen efficiently because the materials decay quickly and that could prove, well, catastrophic."

"How long?"

She paused for a moment, calculating.

"It depends. Five months, maybe six but that would be generous."

"Jeez, I hope Wayne Energy knew what they were doing when they pulled the plug."

Mendoza shook his head and leaned back in his seat once more.

"But you were saying there is a better fuel source."

"Yes."

Mel toes wiggled with excited agitation in her shoes. She leaned forward and Mendoza matched her posture.

"Plant leaves with short lifespans."

He furrowed his brow but she did not move back. The water could shift beneath her and she would adjust.

"Vegetable leaves. Beets, peppers, carrots, anything that can be produced in a greenhouse or a closed water system has a massive uptick in deuterium leaf water content. MIT began a study early last year."

Mel turned her gaze to Miranda who was sitting in perfect stillness with that smooth and impressive intelligence dancing on her face. Mel pushed the tablet across the table to her and Miranda took it without looking away.

"Think about it: a fuel produced for clean energy," once again Mel ticked the items off on her fingers, "during healthy food production, produced locally, and with a byproduct that is compostable. It's a textbook perfect system."

"Why has no one tried it before?"

The trill of his R's was heavenly. Spanish? Portuguese? Something Mediterranean? Mel raised and lowered a shoulder.

"The extraction of deuterium would be a complicated process to master."

"But you could do it?"

She leaned back and met his icy eyes. Her confidence crackled along her nerve endings.

"But I could do it."

To her surprise and delight, Mendoza cracked a lopsided grin that could only be described as dashing. He looked over the papers and, as his gaze moved lazily from the diagrams to her face, Mel had the strong impression she was being sussed out. Miranda had her fingers laced on the table and she watched Mendoza out of the corner of her eye. There was a glimmer behind her neutral expression, something thoughtful. The meeting went on: they asked more questions, Mel detailed more about her research. When she finished Miranda nodded slowly and gestured to the materials on the table.

"This is excellent work."

It never stopped feeling marvelous, hearing those words. She knew her work was solid; it just felt good to know that someone like Miranda agreed.

"Thank you."

Mendoza's pocket buzzed, sending a little fissure through the atmosphere. He fished a phone out and glanced at it.

"Looks like I must duck out a bit earlier than planned," he said, standing and nodding to Miranda, "Let's look at that MIT study soon. It was a pleasure, Dr. Isley."

With a final lazy smile he turned and walked briskly out the glass doors. As soon as the sound of his shoes faded away Miranda turned to Mel with that Gotham Magazine smile.

"Sorry to spring that on you, Mel," she went to a matching teak sideboard and poured two glasses of iced tea from a sweating glass pitcher, "we've had some very interesting developments on my end and this seemed too good to pass up."

She handed Mel one of the glasses and it felt deliciously cool against her hands. Her whole body felt warm, as if she'd just run a marathon. The tea was lovely and floral and just slightly sweet.

"And Mr. Mendoza is one of these developments?"

"One of them. There is another, however. A rather compelling investing opportunity that is presenting itself."

Miranda settled gracefully in her seat and leaned forward.

"Bruce Wayne."

For one feeble moment Mel thought she was being told a bad joke. The tea suddenly left a bitter taste on her tongue. She set the glass down and put her hands in her lap.

"Bruce Wayne, Bruce Wayne?"

"Yes."

All of the glorious marathon heat began to dwindle from her limbs, leaving an uncomfortable clamminess behind.

Bruce Wayne.

Bruce fucking Wayne.

Bruce Wayne was the reason the first project ended, didn't Miranda remember that? Mel sure as hell did. Mel sure as hell remembered being sideswiped at the 9am meeting where their project was unceremoniously terminated; remembered the shock and pain and anger all tangled in her guts as Bruce Wayne himself stood off to the side with his hands shoved into the pockets of his perfect suit. She remembered the rueful look on his handsome face, like a rich little boy who was apologizing from something he didn't understand. Mel felt Miranda watching her so she scraped together a response.

"He's...interested?"

"No, not yet," She fiddled with a small piece of paper between her slender fingers, spinning it back and forth, "But I just watched a person- who, rather like Bruce Wayne, is not easily persuaded- become a convert in the glow of your brilliance."

Some day, Mel told herself, she would learn to understand Miranda Tate. Or if not understand at least anticipate, even a little. In the meantime she would just have to keep sitting here trying to look cool and collected and ignore the lump that formed in her throat.

She was smart as hell, a true beacon, and her brilliance glowed.

Miranda held the small square of paper across the table. It was a thick piece of card with elegant gold foil letters twisting across the front like vines.

"Can I convince you to attend a charity ball?"

The medicine chest was from an apothecary in Shanghai though the lacquered text was in a Bhutanese dialect. The front was covered in four rows of small square drawers; inside the second from the left on the third row was a burner phone, one of many dotted throughout the apartment. She dialed and walked through the silent hall to stand before the wide bay window as it rang.

Once. Twice.

The connection clicked and though there were no words she knew by the warbled hiss that he was listening.

"It's done. And yours?"

A clicking, whispering hum.

"The cat has her instructions."

"Good."

She pushed the curtain aside. The doctor was walking away down the street, the afternoon sun casting coppery warmth onto her hair.

"She's very bright, your lost little blossom."

There was something sly in her tone that she did not bother to conceal. Something vulpine and deadly wrapped in mischief.

"We shall benefit from it." Was all that he said in response.

"Hmm." she let the curtain drop away, "Perhaps. I'll let your puppet extend a full report."

Without another word she ended the call and carried the phone to the kitchen. There she smashed it to dust with a hammer and threw the scraps into the fireplace.