Less than twenty-four hours after Cassandra's return to Gotham, a seemingly innocuous letter arrived at Wayne Manor. The envelop was standard and store bought, the weight was appropriate and it bore only one stamp. But there was no return address given, only a name tiny, well-written cursive. Lipov.
Bruce tore it open as soon as Alfred offered it and scowled. Within the envelop was a greeting card that depicted an infant asleep in a crib as the moon shown brightly outside and a cross hung just above. In playful, printed writing, the card said, "For your little angel."
It took Bruce a moment to shake the tastelessness of the joke from his head before he opened the card. Its inner-contents were straightforward.
Tuesday, the future sight of the Wellspring of Hope Christian Church. Send her alone.
The five children under my employ have outlived their usefulness. They will be scattered across the city and if there is any attempt to interfere, I'll detonate their suits. Maybe take out a few nearby buildings in the process.
You don't like to see people die, Mr. Wayne. Do your part. I only want the girl.
Tuesday was a mere three days away. If Lipov was as deranged as everything implied, there would be no point in trying to confront him in the skeleton-church before his given time. And if he did set off the detonators in the Reapers' suits, they and anyone nearby, maybe buildings full of people, were subject to be killed in the process.
But Stephanie and Tim had been hard at work decoding the information within the flash drive Figment had given them. That could prove to be the one factor Lipov didn't know about.
Time was short. There were preparations to be made.
-000-
"In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. One month since my last confession."
In spite of her past experiences within Saint Michael's confessionary booth, the tiny room seemed so foreign to Cassandra from the opposite side of the screen. With every past admission of sin, she had been willing to go to the monsignor with at least enough confidence to face him personally. After the madness that had taken place over the recent weeks, she was too fragile. She wanted to know his reaction, but wasn't positive she could handle seeing the expressions that may cross his aging face when they came. Father Ryan was a friend, she didn't want to see him hurt. Even if he did end up hurting her back.
Cassandra knelt on the tiny pew before the screen that separated the two of them in the tiny red confessionary. It felt so much less confining when she could see the monsignor, but that was a discomfort she would have to live with. For his part, Father Ryan recognized her voice from the first words. It troubled him just slightly to know she had chosen to sit on the opposite side of the screen for the first time, but he said nothing of it.
"Heavenly Father, whomever you forgive anything, so do I. For indeed what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for you in the presence of Christ, Amen." Silence took them briefly before he added, "Whatever your petitions to the Lord, please state them."
Cassandra bowed her head low. "I have sinned. Went against God's plan. Am so, so sorry."
"… I am almost certain of who I am speaking to," Father Ryan said. "You may tell me no, if you wish, it would defeat much of the purpose of the screen, but may I address you directly? I just want to better understand what you're saying or what you're about to say."
Cassandra dipped her head down further and contemplated. She was unsure of the answer for herself and hesitated long enough she appeared to supply nothing.
"Well, if this is who I think it is, you came to me with a rather substantial confession last time. I can only wonder at this point what you have to say after that."
"Hurt them. People I love. Didn't pray for people I fought." A shudder ran through Cassandra's body as she remembered the worst of the moments from those weeks. "… Anger took me. Fought someone, could have stopped. Didn't."
Father Ryan nodded slowly to himself through a furrowed brow as Cassandra kept talking. He'd never heard her overwhelmed with such hesitation and struggle before. The thought passed his mind to walk into her side of the confessional and try to say something comforting, but he remained in place. She had chosen to face him privately, he had to respect that wish. "So you've hurt people. Worse even then your work entails… again, if I'm speaking to the person I think I am."
"Only wanted to help people. Lost myself on the way." For a moment, Cassandra considered speaking of the horrific night against Zsasz. But she decided she wasn't ready. Not yet, maybe not ever. Perhaps she would one day have to confess that sin. But maybe remembering that she'd committed it for the rest of her life was penance enough. "Too driven by hate, not enough by love."
"Hatred is a powerful tool of the devil's," Father Ryan said. "God is love, as it is said."
Cassandra held her hands together tight and braced for what would come next. "Father… I love someone. Tried hardest to stop, believed it was sinful, but couldn't." The first tear ran down her cheek. "Even if I can't fix it, I live with it. Still love her."
In spite of all of his hopes and prayers, Father Ryan was fairly confident that was what he was going to hear. "Are you confessing to absolve those feelings?"
"No." Cassandra wiped her eyes with her sleeve. "Confessing I hated her and myself. Want to be forgiven for that."
The monsignor held his hands together and bowed his head in contemplation as she steeled herself for his response. In his gentlest voice, he said, "Cassandra?"
She replied with a tiny sniffle.
Father Ryan took in a deep breath. "It's not easy being a member of the clergy, you know." He rubbed at his temple and shook his head. "Though maybe it's easier than it probably should be."
"What do you mean?"
"For some, it's easy to just say you already have all the answers. God already told us what constitutes sin, far be it from us to ask any questions of our maker… but a good priest should be more than a means of pointing to Biblical passages. We're supposed to understand our parishioners and their struggles. Sometimes that's the hardest thing in the world."
"Father—"
"I've never been in a marriage where regret has taken the place of happiness. I've never had to work anything out with a spouse at all. But divorce is sinful, so I'm to do everything in my power to keep it from happening. That's a very difficult thing to do."
Cassandra was about the respond, but it seemed the monsignor wasn't finished yet, so she waited.
"Life begins at conception, I believe that in my heart and with my soul. But no woman who's ever come to me faced with a pregnancy they didn't ask for or a terrible choice they made has been a monster to me. I know what I am to say and what I believe, but I have never been in that agonizing position. The Lord gave us empathy, Cassandra, and it never makes the life of the empathizer any easier. But it does make life better."
It all felt as if Father Ryan was avoiding the issue at hand. Cassandra needed whatever response she could get out of him. "Tried to love a boy. A good friend. Maybe I can. But couldn't then. Heart was somewhere else." She opened her eyes and looked at the screen intently enough it was as if she was trying to look through to the other side. "Could God call that a sin?"
"I think you and I already know what my answer to that question is going to be."
Cassandra shut her eyes and bowed her head again. She was ready for that response, she wouldn't let herself cry over it.
"Per canon law, one cannot accept Holy Communion while in a state of sin. If you act on these feelings, I am not to allow you to accept the Body and Blood."
Cassandra bit her lip and held her grip tight. She refused to let those circumstances get the better of her.
But then Father Ryan quietly scoffed to himself. "Living in a state of sin… aren't we all doing that? Are we to confess all of our sins every Sunday before we accept Holy Eucharist? If so, even I'm not doing it right."
She perked up a little and looked toward the screen. Again, but with a new inflection she asked, "Father?"
"Canon says those who miss a week of mass shouldn't receive communion, am I to keep a record book? The Lord said not to mix types of fabric, should I be checking everyone's garments? Maybe it is a sin of my own, but will not refuse my parishioners for these matters. No one is worthy of the Body and Blood of Christ, that is why it isn't a reward. It is a gift."
Cassandra drank in those words for a long minute. Father Ryan hadn't given her his blessing or given his permission to disregard the traditions and ideas she was defying. On some level, it did still hurt that he still viewed her as a sinful for her feelings. But he wasn't going to punish her for them and it seemed clear enough he still cared about her very much. He still had a duty to perform, but it seemed as if he'd be perfectly content if he no longer had to enforce that aspect. It wasn't a great response, but it was probably better than Cassandra hoped for.
She raised her hand to the little slot at about eye-level that was between them, pulled it aside and faced the old priest. His look was much the same as hers: at once tainted by sadness and compromise, but doing everything in his power to remain hopeful.
"Thank you."
-000-
With the threat of her confrontation with Lipov and the Odmience on the horizon, Cassandra struggled with when the time would be right to make her final amends. If the battle didn't go right, if her opponent proved his superiority, if the plans that percolated in the back of her mind didn't work, the girl she was about to heap so much on would have to deal with her death. That wasn't something she wanted to put on anyone, even with the many who would already be thinking about it.
But, as she sat in faux-leather on one of the swings across from the big metal playground designed to look like a rocket ship, this would be one more motivator. One more reason to get out alive, no matter what.
Cassandra didn't move from the seat as the beat-up, French fry-smelling car parked. It was cool and dreary outside again, but at least that was more typical of the season. The playground sat empty, it was nice to know no one would be interrupting them this time. The second party was wearing an almost identical brown leather jacket and her hair was as short as Cassandra had ever seen it.
She stopped for a moment at the swings and looked down. "Is that one of my coats?"
"Cassandra managed a small smile. "You left it."
"I'd been meaning to ask about that, but that seemed like a really crappy place to try talking to you again." Sadie sat down in the next swing over and kicked the ground just enough for a few inches of movement. "So anyway, hey."
"Hey," Cassandra said. "Not sure you'd come."
"Had to think about it for a while after I got the instructions from Steph. Wasn't the easiest thing to do." Sadie shrugged. "Not the hardest either."
"She said you wanted to talk to me," Cassandra said.
"I did. But it seemed really obvious you didn't want to hear anything I had to say."
Cassandra looked toward the ground and bit her lip. "Things were… strange after you left."
The two shared a silence for a minute save for the creak of the swings as each moved back and forth. Sadie took a deep breath and a long exhale. "Are they still strange now?"
"Yes," Cassandra said. "But not the same."
Sadie mustered half of a smile that spoke to an internal struggle more than anything else. "We're not going to get anywhere if we don't talk about what happened."
Cassandra's response was delayed behind continued hesitation, but at last she asked the first question. "Did you really leave… because…"
Sadie stepped in when she hesitated. "Because of the sex? Or lack thereof?"
Cassandra nodded.
"Yes and no." Sadie kicked a little harder at the ground to build up some momentum. "Being rejected hurt, but I've never gone into a relationship thinking it wasn't going to hurt sometimes. The sex was the domino that made me think we just really weren't on the same wavelengths."
Cassandra nodded again and looked away. "You said we were too different."
"We are different," Sadie said. "Doesn't make you bad, doesn't make me bad, we're just different."
"I loved you. You loved me."
Sadie pinched the bridge of her nose. "How is this you and me thing supposed to work if that gut feeling is all we have to go off of? I'm getting ready to graduate and you've never been to public school a day in your life, I picked everything we ever did and it seemed like you just smiled and went along with it. Cassie, you go to church every Sunday when absolutely no one's telling you to. I quit trying to be religious before I even came out of the closet. I know you've told me that doesn't bother you, but how doesn't it?"
Cassandra gripped the swing's chain a little tighter. "I tried believing like that. Like the angry believers do. I didn't feel any better."
"Steph kind of alluded to that," Sadie said. "That you apparently went off the deep end for a while."
"Was afraid. Very confused."
"I'm not going to ask for details, but it sounds like everything I was always afraid of."
Cassandra pressed her feet against the ground and stopped swinging. "Afraid of?"
Sadie sighed. "Yeah. I felt scared the whole time we were dating that sooner or later, it wouldn't be okay with you anymore. Whether it was your idea or not, you'd have to choose between me or your religion, and I really didn't like my odds."
"I told you—"
"I heard you. I heard you every time you said you'd find a way so you didn't have to choose. And I really wanted to believe you. But I never quit being afraid I was just going to be a story about how you beat your baser instincts and gosh darn it, all you had to do was stay determined and you could pray the gay away. Something you'd tell your twelve kids someday."
In spite of everything, Cassandra let out a single, stifled laugh.
"You like that one?"
"Twelve kids?"
"Or you'd be a nun. I can believe either scenario." For a moment the two were quiet again, though the atmosphere was far less tense than before. Within a minute, Sadie asked, "Cassie, do you like boys?"
"You mean—"
"Like me. Yeah."
For a moment, her mind drifted back to Connor. "Yes."
"Than what are you wasting your time with me for?" Sadie asked. "You can keep following all your rules and still go off with somebody you can feel something for. Why are you trying to fix this thing with me when you've clearly got a better option?"
"Tried to change," Cassandra said. "Tried to bury everything we had. Was with someone a while, liked him. But I never forgot you. Never stopped missing you. Always wanted to make it right with you again."
The two of them sat quietly as they swung back and forth. The breeze was gentle, their movements were tiny. After what seemed like a long time, Sadie set her foot on the ground and slowed her rocking to a halt. Cassandra did the same.
"Listen Cassie, I'm going away next year. I can't just not go to my dream school over something I don't even know is going to work."
Cassandra breathed a heavy sigh and dropped her head. "I understand."
The moment passed as if there was nothing left to be said, before Sadie exhaled too. "But we're not living in the sixteenth century. You know how to work a cell phone, you know how to email… I don't have to look for anybody new while I'm gone."
Sadie slid her hand from one of the swing chains and gently wrapped it around Cassandra's. When she looked up, her smile was messy, but it was there.
"I don't know if we can want the same things. I don't know if this is gonna be a forever thing. But I've missed you too."
"Maybe I don't need forever right now," Cassandra said.
Hand still tight with Cassandra's, Sadie rose from the swing and looked down at her. "Let's make sure we are on the same wavelength this this time. I've got a couple thoughts I think are fair, I wanna run them by you."
Cassandra nodded. "Okay."
"The first thing is, I won't try having sex with you again. You weren't into it, you have your own reasons, I need to respect them—"
Cassandra nodded again.
"I wasn't done." Sadie paused until she stopped. "Part two is that if you change your mind, your outlook, whatever, you'll tell me."
Cassandra gave her a small frown. "You think I will?"
"People change their minds about things. I'd just like you to be open to the possibility."
It took a few seconds of thought, but Cassandra decided nothing would come of it as long as she didn't let it. "All right."
Sadie pushed Cassandra's hands back a little and got the swing gently moving again. "And you also have to agree not to pressure me with the marriage thing until I'm out of college. We're both still young, life still has a lot of other plans for us and we still have a lot of other plans for it."
Cassandra couldn't keep quiet. "But—"
"And part two of that one is I reserve the right to amend it if I want to," Sadie said. "If I decide I do want to be in something more permanent, I promise I'll tell you."
As she swung back and forth, Cassandra struggled with the mixed feelings she was being asked to accept. She knew she had said she would distance herself from making things too serious too quickly, but it was hard to let go of the thought. Then again, Sadie was making a sacrifice of her own.
"And lastly." Sadie pushed as Cassandra moved forward and pulled as she moved back. The swing was brought to a stop again. "We make our time together special. We listen, we support, we show one another how we really feel."
The words brought the smile back to Cassandra's face as she stood up. She clasped her hands behind Sadie's head as she wrapped her own around Cassandra's waist.
"Deal."
"Let's seal it then."
For the first time since the night at Sadie's house, Cassandra shared a kiss without any sadness to it. Not everything was resolved, they would surely find new challenges they would have to overcome. But they had one another. In that moment, it was enough.
