Chapter Nine

Why Madeline was at Monarch Theatre, Waylon had no freaking idea. Why she had been at any of the locations was totally beyond him. A library, and before that an Avery? The only one that had made any sense was the jewellery store, but even then she hadn't taken anything. What were the purposes of her appearances. Were they just random places she chose to visit every night and throughout the day she was hidden away somewhere else. Or perhaps she was being instructed by someone to go to these places, controlled in some way. Still, why these random locations? Riddler hadn't seemed to figure it out yet either, and if he couldn't do it then Waylon didn't have a chance.

As he neared the theatre he slowed down and scanned the area for danger. The place had been renovated in recent months. It was once one of Joker's hideouts back when the area was part of Arkham City. According to the rumours, Joker, who had been dying at the time, had hidden here while Clayface pretended to be him somewhere else. This was also the place Joker had died. It was a wonder the place wasn't haunted. After he was sure the place was clear, Waylon stalked up to the door to find the lock was broken. Madeline had come in through the front door, not very inconspicuous of her. Once again Waylon checked the coast was clear before opening the door and slipping inside.

The foyer was undisturbed, the box office all shut up and the whole room in silence. Waylon listened closely, but he couldn't hear anything moving about in the vicinity. Either Madeline was being quiet, or she wasn't here anymore. Waylon walked past the box office, past the food stand and past all the posters advertising the upcoming performances, and opened the double doors to the gallery. It was very fancy in its refurbishment, plush red seats and golden adornment on the wall of the upper seatings. Whoever had funded the refurbishment was certainly a big fan of the theatre, that or a guilty Wayne trying to atone for breaking his no kill rule. It would be totally up Batman's street to refurbish the location where he killed his arch nemesis. There was probably a plaque somewhere that read 'In loving memory of Joker'. Joker would have certainly done the same for Batman. Waylon never had understood their relationship.

He tentatively walked down the steps towards the stage, the whole room swamped in darkness. Because of his superior eyesight he was able to see every detail, and he used his other superior senses to try and scan for Madeline. He couldn't see, smell or hear her as he walked up the small side steps onto the stage. He scanned the whole room once more but came up empty.

"I think I missed her?" Waylon admitted dismally through the earpiece.

"Really? None of my camera's have picked up anything leaving the theatre. Are you sure you can't sense her or anything?" Riddler suggested, unintentionally annoying Waylon some more, as if he wasn't already frustrated enough.

"No I can't 'sense' her, I'm not clairvoyant." Waylon grumbled, looking around to see if Madeline would make an appearance upon hearing his voice.

"Keep an ear out. Looking at her anatomy I'd say she's built for stealth."

"Could you not look at her anatomy, thanks." Waylon suggested, feeling a little jealous. Riddler made somewhat of a laughing noise on the other end of the line, that or he was coughing his lungs out.

"Don't worry. I'm not into 10ft tall lizard women." Riddler reassured, still chuckling.

Waylon did grin at the prospect, but then it also got him thinking. Was he into 10ft tall lizard women? When he'd seen Madeline's new body, all be it for a couple of seconds, he'd certainly found her to be stunningly gorgeous, even though she didn't look anything like she used to. He'd always hated his own appearance, so why did he find Madeline's lizardish appearance so attractive. Was his devolution causing him to become attracted to creatures of the same species in a weird kind of way? If it was, that would certainly explain why he struggled to find human women attractive.

"Waylon I got movement!" Riddler blurted, and Waylon quickly glanced around for a positional attack, but everything was still quiet.

"Where is she?" Waylon asked angrily, scanning around. He still couldn't see, smell or hear her, but he knew she was out there. He could sense it. Okay, maybe Riddler had a point about that.

"I don't know, but she's in the room. She's stalking you." Riddler warned, and the prospect seemed very foreboding. Waylon wasn't used to being the prey, and now that he was, he felt a chill down the back of his neck and an itchy nervousness that made ever sound so much louder. The wind outside sounded like a gale. Every mouse scampering about sounded like an elephant. And every voice of passersby sounded like they all had a megaphone. But still no Madeline. Where was she?

Waylon was given no time to react when he suddenly felt Madeline's teeth sinking into his neck, her claws on his shoulders and her feet on his back. She pulled with all her might and tore a lump of flesh from his body before springing back to a safe distance as Waylon felt onto one knee. He grunted and growled as the pain burnt into his body like a branding iron, blood oozing from his neck and spurting through his fingers as he tried in vain to stop the bleeding. He could probably regrow the important parts of his neck before he passed out from blood loss, but only if he stayed still. By the look of Madeline's body language as she circled around him, searching for another place to attack, he figured she had other plans in mind.

"Waylon, are you alright?" Riddler asked frantically through the earpiece.

"No I'm not fucking fine." Waylon grunted as he arched his back and held one arm up over his head to try and protect himself. He couldn't engage her just yet, he needed his neck to heal otherwise she would certainly kill him. Lucky for him, the skin on his back was far too tough for Madeline to get through, but damn did she try her hardest with those sharp claws of hers.

"I'm analysing her attacks and it looks like you'll have to be sneaky if you're going to capture her?" Ridder suggested, and Waylon could hear him furiously typing away on his computer through the earpiece.

"I don't do sneaky." Waylon grumbled, bracing as Madeline's claws came dangerously close to snagging the side of his face. He curled up tighter and felt like a feeble weakling, cowering as he endured attack after attack. Madeline certainly wasn't slowing down, and this time she wasn't trying to avoid a fight, her purpose for being at the theatre was specifically to fight him. But why?

"She's got incredible endurance and agility, she can go for hours."

"Well that sounds wonderful." Waylon muttered, half joking half irritated that Riddler was spending more time glorifying Madeline's new abilities rather than giving Waylon a way to beat her.

"Looking at her psychological state however, she would most likely fall for the simplest of deceptions. All you need to do is look like you're going to attack her from one direction, but then attack from another instead. Like a striker in a game of soccer. Misdirection and all that."

"'All I need to do' huh? Have you ever been in a fight?" Waylon complained. He grimaced when he felt Madeline's claws start to cut through the skin at the base of his spine where it was slightly weaker. Shit.

He didn't have any more time to wait for his neck to heal up, and the bleeding had at least reduced to a mere dribble. But he felt kind of dizzy from the blood lose, and he wasn't sure if it was unconsciousness that wanted to take him, or Killer Croc. He couldn't lose it in this fight. If Killer Croc came out who knows what would happen in that fight. Sure, the brutality alone from Croc would be enough to bring Madeline down, but that monster didn't have any feelings and would just see Madeline as another creature to kill. Waylon didn't want to be responsible for killing Madeline all over again. He had to capture her without doing too much damage.

Madeline, obviously getting irritated with the lack of contribution from Waylon in the fight, decided to play dirty and went for Waylon's tail. It was an unexpected move but it was certainly effective. The moment her teeth sunk into flesh Waylon felt his body convulse of its own accord and force him to straighten up as if someone had just jabbed him in the ribs. Before he knew it, Madeline slid under his legs and pushed off the ground with her arms, her clawed feet colliding with Waylon's jaw and knocking him backwards. Waylon landed with a thud but managed to get his arms up in time to stop Madeline from getting a killing blow, holding her back with his forearm against her neck as she snapped in his face. Waylon certainly had no qualms with Madeline being on top of him, her breasts mashed against his chest and her ass in the air, but the saliva and blood dripping into Waylon's face as Madeline's vicious jaws etched closer kind of killed the mood. Oddly enough however, Madeline did that tail thing again, wrapping it around his and somewhat wrestling it in a playful way. She also seemed to move her body against his in a way that could be interpreted as just trying to get closer to kill him, or as just trying to get closer. To make things even more confusing, Madeline almost looked to have a menacing smile on her face as she tried to rip his off. Was she enjoying this? What the hell was going on?

"Madeline!" Waylon yelled, attempting to get through to her humanity. "It's me, Waylon. Do you recognise me or..." Madeline obviously didn't like it when he spoke during their fight because she suddenly gained a lot more strength and came dangerously close to ripping Waylon's head off.

"She doesn't appear to be anything more than an animal, Waylon. Words won't work." Riddler reminded, and Waylon felt a wave of uncontrollable rage come over him for a few seconds.

"SHE IS NOT JUST AN ANIMAL!" Waylon roared, possibly deafening Ridder down the end of the line. Contrary to what he was protesting against, upon hearing his roar Madeline responded according, roaring so loudly Waylon felt sorry for all the people he'd ever roared at. Wow, it was loud.

"Shit!" Waylon grumbled as his ears started to ring. Nice to see she had a good set of lungs though. Then an idea hit him, a rare occurrence to say the least. He really wanted to toss the earpiece because he didn't want Riddler hearing what he was about to do, but he couldn't get to it without risking his life so he was forced to endure the embarrassment.

"Hush little baby don't say a word." Waylon begin, his horrible, gravely and out of tune voice attempting to be soothing. "Papa's gonna buy you a..."

Madeline's face twisted with rage in a way that terrified Waylon to his core. Whether or not she'd found his singing awful or didn't want to be calmed down, he had no idea, but when she lunged for his throat again, this time he was unable to hold her back. He managed to tilt the arm holding her back so that it guided her head and jaws to the side while simultaneously shielding his injured neck. As he did so, he quickly got his free hand around Madeline's back and pulled her close to him. This wasn't because he wanted her body pressed up against his, however, that wasn't exactly the furthest thing from his mind, but so he could get a firm grip of her as he rolled them over, pushing her face down into the ground and pinning her there in one fell swoop. He pressed his arm against the back of her neck to keep her from getting up, the only downside was he had to be closer to her to do that which meant Madeline's writhing body was beneath him and her ass was pressing into his crotch.

"You did it!" Riddler cheered. "Now you need to get her out of there and back to the Orphanage so we can find out what is going on."

"And how am I supposed to do that?" Waylon grumbled, sounding irritated but it wasn't because the task at hand was an impossible one, but because he had to fight every manly urge in his body to keep Madeline down.

"You could knock her out?" Riddler suggested, and Waylon growled down the line at the idea.

"I'm not hurting her." He snarled, but again it was hard to be scary and vicious when he was turned on against his will.

"Then how else are we going to do this. I have some chemicals that might work but it will take at least an hour to get them to you."

"I can't last an hour!" Waylon blurted, accidentally sounding kind of whiny. Riddler certainly noticed it and Waylon hissed a breath in, cursing himself, but even that sounded like a pathetic submissive gasp for air.

"Are you alright?" Riddler asked nervously, not sounding like he wanted to know the answer.

"No I'm not, this is fucking hard... Just hurry up and bring some chemicals or something before I lose her." Waylon groaned, struggling to keep Madeline down as she was now serious about trying to get free.

"I'm on my way... Oh shit!" Riddler cursed, and Waylon dreaded the worst.

"What?"

"There are armoured vehicles on rout to your location. You need to get out of there!" Riddler warned, and Waylon felt a pang of dread in his chest.

"GCPD?" He asked. If it was the GCPD come to drag him and Madeline to Arkham then he was seriously going to lose it. He had been out of there for quite a while now and he did not want to go back anytime soon. But more importantly, he didn't want Madeline getting tossed in there with the rest of the crazies, especially with her like this. They'd fry her brain until there was nothing left of her.

"No, it's not the GCPD." Riddler answered, but his curious tone suggested that it wasn't a better alternative. "They look to be a private force. They have heavy weaponry by the looks of it, and my scanners indicate that they have quite a high voltage electroshock weapon."

"Shit! That's for us. We gotta go!" Waylon snapped, hooking his arm under Madeline's neck and lifting her to her feet. He held her tight by the neck as she clawed at his arms to get free. He did have an idea to maybe suffocate her just enough to knock her out, but he had never done that before and didn't want to accidently kill her.

"They're outside the theatre you need to..."

Riddler was suddenly cut off as the earpiece frazzled in Waylon's ear. It hurt like a bitch and Waylon instinctively yanked it out. Unfortunately, that meant he lost his hold on Madeline and she slithered out of his grip.

"Damn it!" Waylon cursed to himself, but he was kind of glad Madeline's body wasn't pressed against his anymore. He had been about to go crazy with all the struggling and writhing Madeline had been doing. Madeline scurried a few meters away from Waylon and crouched low on the ground, hissing and snarling at him but not attacking. She no doubt didn't want to end up trapped again. Waylon decided not to try and grab her again, not until she made the first move at least. If she thought she was losing then she'd possibly try and make a break for it.

"Madeline. There are people coming to capture us. We need to get out of here. Come with me." Waylon pleaded, praying to god that she somehow understood him. Strangely enough, it seemed like God was listening because Madeline's posture relaxed a little, and she stopped snarling. Waylon very slowly offered his hand out, careful not to move too quickly and scare her off.

"Come on babe, come with me." He coaxed with a sad smile. Madeline looked at Waylon's hand nervously, as if it were something she had never seen before. Her whole body language changed, becoming far more reserved and protective than the vicious attacker from before. She looked frightened and nervous, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. She seemed to be assessing the situation before her in a more human way than that of an animal, like a child that had been living in the woods for so long and was only seeing another person for the first time. Cautious but wanting to trust him. Seeing her like this made Waylon very angry. What had they done to her? They'd turned her into this creature that was so afraid and confused. Had they stripped her of everything that she was? Was Madeline even still inside her? She had to be. She needed to be.

The doors to the theatre bust open and the room was flooded with heavily armoured militia. They all had their sights on Waylon and Madeline, the lasers from the guns aimed at all the weak spots. They were certainly prepared. The sudden intrusion freaked Madeline out because she made a move to escape. Waylon was going to let her go so she would at least get to safety, but the militia had other ideas.

"Tranquilizer dart on Subject 3871, now!" One of the militia ordered, and before Waylon had time to react a dart was shot through the air and hit Madeline in the neck. The instant it made contact Madeline fell to the ground with a thud. Waylon rushed over to her and scooped her up so he could make a break for it and finally get her out of there, however, the militia quickly surrounded him, weapons primed with electroshock as well as armour piercing bullets. If it was just him he would have risked it, but he didn't know how bulletproof Madeline was and wasn't about to risk it.

"Subject 2493 has the target, how do you want us to proceed ma'am?" The militia commander asked into his headset. He was tall and lean, and like the rest of the militia, wearing riot gear so Waylon couldn't see his face. Whoever he was, Waylon had decided he hated him more than anything. There was silence as he received his answer and then he nodded.

"Understood ma'am." He said plainly. "All electroshock guns on Subject 3871." All the guns shifted and their lasers pointed on Madeline.

"Waylon Jones, place Subject 3871 on the ground and step back." The militia commander ordered, but Waylon did not make any attempt to obey the command. He couldn't just let them have her, not after all this time. He was so close damn it.

"Waylon Jones, this is your last warning. Place Subject 3871 on the ground and step back or we will shock her." The militia commander threatened, this time with more venom in his words. It was almost like he wanted Waylon to disobey. Damn it though, how did they know Waylon wouldn't let them shock Madeline. That was a personal detail only a few people knew about, how did they, or rather, their employer, know about it. Begrudgingly, Waylon let Madeline down gently, lying her down on the wooden stage floor.

"And step back." The militia commander coaxed after Waylon made no attempt to move. Waylon growled as he took a step back, and then another, and another until he was too far away from Madeline for comfort.

"Ma'am, Subjects are separated. Permission to proceed with Subject 3871 deactivation?" A pause. "Thank you ma'am. Administer gene deactivation dosage!" One of the militia, this one with a little red cross on his uniform to identify him as a medic, went over to Madeline, a small white box in hand. He placed it on the ground beside Madeline and opened it, producing a long needle. Waylon flinched just the slightest bit at the sight of a needle, containing god knows what, so close to Madeline. The guns were on him in an instant and he dared not make a move to do a daring rescue at the last minute. There was no escaping this time. The medic injected whatever was in the needle into Madeline's wrist. It was a good thing Waylon hadn't chosen to make a break for it when he'd had the chance, Madeline was certainly not bulletproof.

Once the injection was finished and the 'gene deactivation dosage', whatever that was, was administered, the medic took a step back and the militia ordered for them all to hold their position. Then, after a few seconds, Madeline's began to convulse. Waylon instinctively went to help her but one of the militia fired a very powerful bullet that shot straight through Waylon's leg, dropping him onto his knee. He snarled at the militia in charge who was paying more attention to Madeline's convulsing body. Then Waylon realised Madeline's body wasn't just convulsing, it was changing. Her arms and legs seemed to shrink, and the blood chilling sound of bones snapping could be heard by everyone in the room. Waylon didn't understand what was going on. He could only stare with disbelief as Madeline's reptilian form slowly morphed and convulsed until in its place was an unconscious and naked human Madeline.

"Subject 3871 has returned to base form, returning home." The militia confirmed, and he walked towards Madeline. He scooped her up and tossed her over his shoulder. Waylon felt a pang of irritation at the fact Madeline's naked body was in the arms of another man.

"Ma'am, what do you want us to do with Subject 2493?" The militia commander asked the person on the other end of the headset. Whoever this 'ma'am' was, Waylon wanted her dead. She was the one responsible for everything that was happening to Madeline. She had to pay for it.

"Understood. Heavy tranquilizer on Subject 2493 and then we are good to go." The militia commander ordered, and one of the militia, most likely the one who shot Madeline with the tranquilizer dart, aimed his dart gun at Waylon's neck. Now that Madeline was away from him he didn't need to worry about her safety, he could make a move.

Waylon made a charge for the militia commander but he wasn't fast enough, or perhaps the militia with the dart gun was faster. In any case, the dart hit its mark and Waylon tumbled to the ground, falling off the stage and landing on the seats. He couldn't move, it took instant affect, and as everything stated to fade to black, the last thing he saw was Madeline being taken away from him once again.

I did not intend to make the fight with Waylon and Madeline sexual, it just happened of its own accord but I hope you liked it. Oh so close Waylon, but you just missed her again. Maybe next time you'll have better luck.