"Everything all right with it then? Leg's not bugging you anymore?"

"No," Cassandra said.

"That's good. I get my ACL cut, you get your leg broken, we're practically starting a new tradition. Given another year, Tim will have a smashed foot or something."

Cassandra, a pair of binoculars in hand, said nothing as she and Stephanie waited atop a multi-tenant business building. The condemned bookstore and Asian tea shop Bruce had mentioned waited on the opposite side of the street. Each seemed infected by the feeling of decay that hung over much of Park Rowe, the sign over the book shop looked as if it could come unhinged and fall from its place at the slightest breeze.

"You've been awfully quiet tonight," Stephanie said. "You got the jitters or something?"

Cassandra turned from the binoculars and frowned at her. "What?"

"You know, nervousness because you haven't been out in a while—"

"Never nervous. Not to fight" Cassandra spoke sternly. "You know that."

Stephanie raised her hands. "I didn't mean to offend. I'm sorry."

Cassandra took a deep breath and looked through the binoculars again. Stephanie leaned back against the wall of the building and eyed her friend carefully.

Stephanie asked, "You want me to keep watch for a bit?"

"Keeps me busy."

Stephanie resigned herself to occasionally checking the motion censors on the board game shop a few blocks away. Bruce had warned it could potentially be a boring night, but she wasn't in any position to argue with him at that point. After the bunker was lost, a lot of his regulations tightened considerably. Stephanie couldn't even store any of her digital textbooks in the uniform's internal mainframe to pass the time or keep up on lost chances to study. So she was stuck on the rooftop with Cassandra, maybe until the sun came up, waiting on someone who might not even show.

She had long since gotten used to Cassandra's silence on most matters. Stephanie used to not even expect answers out of her. It was the irritation Cassandra responded with that put her off. Stephanie could respect just needing space, but Cassandra had been alone most of the day most every day for the last three months.

"Someone's there."

Stephanie snapped back to reality when Cassandra spoke and approached the edge of the roof. On street level was a car with its headlights off, despite the dark of night. Out from it came a gaggle of colorful dots.

"Mind if I take a look?"

Cassandra passed Stephanie the binoculars. The dots took the shape of a pair of tall men, one short haired and white, the other bald and Latino, in black leather jackets, two bulbous figures and a slimmer one in the center. The torn, beaten nature of his suit coat and moth-chewed hat suggested he had hastily bought them at a thrift shop because he felt naked without them.

"That's our Hatter guy." Stephanie handed the binoculars back to Cassandra. "Those look like his tweedle beetles or whatever they call themselves with him. The big ones—round ones, I mean. I don't recognize the normal-sized guys."

"Go," Cassandra said. "Before they reach their cache." She took a step before Stephanie put out her arm.

"Hang on," she said. "Bruce said he was sure they had a weapon cache in there, but that he could never find it. If we let them get a little closer, we can rip their inventory apart when we're finished."

Cassandra looked back and forth between Stephanie and the four that approached the store and nodded slowly. The Mad Hatter fumbled around in his pocket for a key, slid it into the door and stepped into the bookshop, followed by his employees.

Angel and Batgirl descended the rooftop on opposite sides of the bookstore just out of sight of the windows. Dust and cracks make it difficult to see into the shop. The two the heroines didn't recognize crawled on all fours, eyes close to the ground. Tweedledee walked to the opposite side of the shop where he pushed an old, empty bookshelf aside. Tweedledum pulled a few objects out, though the dirty window made it impossible to tell what.

"What the heck?" Batgirl was barely audible. "What are those two on the floor doing?"

When a minute passed, the Hatter looked toward the window in a jerk but then looked back down, as if he hadn't seen anything. Another minute passed, he checked the window and looked at his goons again.

Batgirl risked words. "Do you think he knows we're here?"

Despite the whisper, the Mad Hatter's head jolted up again and stared out the window. His lips moved, one of the Tweedle cousins stood up straight, dug behind the bookcase and drew a long-barreled gun. The Mad Hatter said something more, the weighty man reached back again for a nightstick and slowly approached the door.

Batgirl drew her staff, Angel remained motionless.

"Angel? Hey, Angel?" Batgirl said. "Guy's got a gun, are you gonna be ready?"

Angel's only reaction was a small nod. The door to the shop eeked open as Tweedledee stuck his head out and looked to his left. For a split second, he and Angel locked eyes.

Angel stepped forward and kicked the frame of the door. Tweedledee shouted as his bulbous head was caught between the slam of the door and the building's frame. Angel perused him as he retreated into the building, ripped the nightstick from his hand, delivered on thrust to his chest and three to his face when he bent forward. Tweedledee's doughy body hit the floor before he understood what happened. Batgirl followed Angel in, thrown by how fast she'd knocked him down.

The Mad Hatter grit his teeth. "The Batman is sending children after me? I'll teach him not to—"

Angel drew her grappling hook and fired. The four claws on the mechanism squeezed and dug at the Mad Hatter's throat and silenced him save for a gag. Angel yanked him forward and smashed the Hatter's face with a hook punch. The madman stumbled for his balance a moment before he collapsed backwards. Tweedledum pulled a gun out from behind the bookcase, but Batgirl leapt in front of him and locked her staff against the gun to keep him from aiming. The men in black jackets continued to feel around the floor as if nothing had happened.

Hand on his clip-on bowtie, Angel pulled the Hatter upward so she could look him in the eyes and said nothing.

"Angry as a queenie, aren't you?" The Hatter said. "Going to shout out with my head then—"

With her free hand, Angel punched him in the face again. And again. And again. By the burst of blood her third strike must have broken his nose. The force was enough to rip the bowtie from his neck and the Hatter again sank against the concrete floor of the bookshop.

"Enough!" His voice was shrill. "Through and through, the vorpal blade went snicker-snack!"

The exclamation was strange enough for Angel to pause a moment to process before four hands grabbed her from behind and flung her to the floor. The white man and the Latino stood over her, and for the first time she could see their eyes were wide, bloodshot and seemed to be blank. Both men rested their knees on top of Angel's outstretched arms, the weight enough to pin her to the ground.

"I'll gimble a hold in your head!" The Hatter crossed his servants and knelt down at a small hole in the floor. "It will be frabjous, you little jubjub!"

There came a slam across the room. Just as the Mad Hatter stepped back into Angel's view with a new hat with a clock in the center, Batgirl rushed over and tackled him. Angel twisted her arms and, after a brief struggle, forced one of her arms out from under her attackers. The attacker on her left took two punches before he let up on her other arm.

Batgirl forced the Mad Hatter into a chokehold as he struggled and squirmed. "I know how this hypnosis stuff works!" Batgirl said. "There's a kill switch phrase or something. You brought those guys here under a trance, let them out!"

"Never!" The Mad Hatter tried to bite Batgirl's clasped arm, but couldn't get through her armor. "They're all mad here!"

Angel grabbed ahold of her two attackers and smashed their heads together. For the first time, the two grunted. She turned her attention to the one with short hair, blocked a hook punch and threw two of her own, one to his gut and then another to his head. The Latino rusher her and Angel slid one foot behind the other to careen a kick into his face. Both fell to the ground, dazed if not unconscious.

"… Jesus."

Angel frowned, turned and glared at Batgirl. "What?"

"I'm sorry, that's not me, but… damn." As the Mad Hatter continued to struggle, Batgirl thrust him onto the ground and pulled a pair of handcuffs from her belt. "You didn't have to do that—I mean, you shouldn't have. They were clearly under mind control."

Her companion looked back toward the two. Neither appeared to move voluntarily, but they were still breathing. "They will recover."

"That's just usually not you. Not if you can help it." When Angel said nothing, Batgirl stepped closer to the latest piece of the Hatter's headware and the small opening in the floor. "Don't know what he must have done to keep Batman from knowing about that, but I guess it's taken care of now."

Angel stepped over to the overturned bookcase next to the unconscious Tweedledum. "Another opening here."

"Don't go interfering with all that!" The Mad Hatter shouted. "Cost me more than ten by six, it all did!"

As the Hatter rambled, Angel closed the distance between them and kicked him in the face. The strike silenced him as he rolled onto his side and blood spilt from his mouth and nostrils.

Batgirl flinched. "Geeze, I know he was annoying, but we were about to leave anyway."

"Talked too much," Angel said.

Batgirl stared a moment, though Angel didn't look directly at her. "I know it's your first night back on patrol… are you feeling all right?"

"Yes."

"You're sure?"

The tiniest drop seeped into Angel's voice. "Yes."

"Okay." Batgirl slowly looked over the damage before she looked to the two unconscious men without costumes. "I'd better get an ambulance out here."

"Do." Angel slid open the door. "Then we go. Lots of time before sunrise."

Stephanie slowly punched the number into her cowl and stared at her friend outside. She wouldn't press the matter, all the wounds were probably still too fresh. But something was very, very wrong.