Helena ran her fingers along the books on the shelf. Mostly what you'd expect: a dog-eared copy of Atlas Shrugged, no surprise there; a yellowed translation of the Nicomachean Ethics; a handsome hardbound two-volume series, the collected works of Nietzsche; and some economic classics like The Wealth of Nations and Hayek's The Road to Serfdom. There were a couple of computer reference texts with heavily broken spines, and -- heh -- Zoe: A Life in Music, one of those fawning and glossy pop-star picturebooks he must have rescued from some remainder table. She was a little startled by the last book: she recognized the intricate yellow papal seal on the cover.
"I didn't know you were a Zoe fan."
"I dance to Kewl when I get up in the morning," he said, not turning from the screen.
She stared at him. "Are you serious?"
"No. Now be quiet and let me work."
They'd met at his Gotham apartment. It wasn't much to look at -- one of those three-room numbers they advertised as one-and-half-bedroom in the classifieds which looked like a large bachelor when you got there -- but it would do as a place to crash. He didn't need anything more permanent, not when he could use League tech to beam him to his quarters on the station or his home in Hub City in a second. She missed that privilege of membership more than she thought she would.. that and the chance to look down on the gorgeously terrifying greys of stormclouds on the impossibly deep ocean blues.
Q finished editing the computer-generated transcription of Huntress' interrogation, attached that to the file along with the raw audio and his photographs of the lab, and assembled the set for upload to the Watchtower. He'd already had the physical evidence he'd collected transported for analysis, and he glanced over the preliminary results.
"The assignment's done. Time to give it to the teacher."
"I thought we were saving that for later," she said.
She could never be sure, not when he was wearing the mask, but she suspected that got a smile out of him.
He punched a few more keys, redirecting the comm signals through the microphone and speakers so that she could participate. After she'd been expelled from the League, her signal codes had been deactivated, so her comlink became a fancy earplug.
Since that would require him to pay extortionate cellphone fees, he'd had to come up with something after she started rejecting his collect calls. Eventually he'd adjusted her comlink's frequency out of the standard range. She was still using the cell relay sometimes, but even she couldn't fight with one hand busy, and this way they could chat while working. "Discretionary freedom," he'd called it.
He pressed enter. "Question to Batman."
"Batman," said the unmistakable gravel voice after a few seconds. "Report."
"Gotta love that charm," she whispered, and stuck out her tongue at the speaker.
"Huntress found Knauss and learned the protocol," Q began, and waited some time to let her name sink in. There was no response. He nodded to himself, satisfied, and continued. "The addresses should be valid for.." He looked at Helena.
She thought. "Three hours, tops. I timed it so that no one else should notice they're gone until morning, but Knauss will probably wake up in hospital in an hour or two. The boys in blue will lose the paperwork for an hour or so.." As an unofficial courtesy, when you served them up wrapped, the police moved a little slower so you could stay in front of your wake. Made life much easier all around. "Say another half an hour for him to figure out what story to tell that'll save his neck.. yeah. Three if we're lucky, one and a half if we're not. I'd move quick if I were you."
"Understood. And the lab?"
Well, that figured, she thought. Three evenings she'd spent searching before she caught the first exchange. Then another day lurking in the shadows –- exhausting stillness interrupted by sudden sprinting -- to follow the complex pattern of live handcarry and dead drops which led her to the people in charge. And the Bat's response? "Understood."
"That," said the Question, "was another story. Someone swept it, and it obviously wasn't their first time working cleanup. Unless they've got a natural forensic genius on staff, they've either been involved in this project longer than you think they have, or they've called in more experienced help. Neither of those are encouraging."
"Interesting," said Batman.
Not that you could tell from his voice. He'd use the same tone whether you told him that they were serving meatloaf in the Watchtower mess today or that Superman and Luthor were singing Sinatra covers off-Broadway next Thursday and you had an extra ticket.
"/He needs a girlfriend bad," she mouthed to Q during the pause, shaking her head.
"/I think someone's working on it," he replied.
"/Tell her to work harder./"
Finally Batman spoke. "The data on the project start is solid, and this group hasn't done anything on this scale before. They've brought in outsiders."
"There was a reagent trace they overlooked," Vic said. "Analysis isn't done yet, but it looks like mostly carboxyl group-to-terminal amine converters: the source material was probably biological, not chemical. My take is that the discovery was accidental, but then the scientists realized what they'd tripped over and decided to cash in quickly. The first people they contacted saw the potential, and it was the syndicate which brought in some external expertise to handle the shift to mass production."
"I've located three of the original researchers in Costa Rica, and J'onn is arranging recovery as we speak. I'd be surprised if they weren't in custody by morning. That'll give us more details on the chemistry, but since the drug's already in the wild unless it turns out the process has very particular requirements it's likely to be a dead end. I recommend following up on this James Dennison that Knauss mentioned: he seems to be at the head of the mobile lab group."
"Agreed."
"Okay, bored now," said Helena. She'd been leaning against the wall and had grown increasingly restless. "Look, we know where the bad guys are. Do you want me to make them ex-bad guys or not?"
Silence.
"I'll take it from here," said the voice.
"Fine. We'll stay at home, play with our Batman action figures, and cheer you on. So go sulk moodily at them, or impress them with your dancing, or whatever it is you do. Say hi to you-know-who for me while you're at it. Are we done?"
"Out." There was an abrupt click.
She smiled at the speaker. "Love you too, Bats!" she said sweetly.
Q closed the comm channel, cleared the screen, and swivelled in his chair to face Helena. "I see he's not the only one with a winning charm. Remind me again why you're not in the League?"
"Oh, that?" She dismissed it with a wave. "He can take it. And it's not like he doesn't deserve it, anyhow. Did you hear him when you first mentioned my name?"
"He didn't say anything."
"Exactly. Would some small talk kill the guy? 'Hey, how've you been, Huntress? League's not the same without you.'"
She warmed to her subject. "'And while I'm at it, thanks for helping save Gotham from a drug that makes crack look like oregano! Drop by the cave sometime, we'll shoot some pool! And get down with the mad funky beat! Uh! Uh!'"
Vic managed to keep from laughing until she started her very unkind but also very accurate imitation of a certain caped crusader's Egyptian-robot dance moves. The underground cellphone video had spread like wildfire through the League rank and file a few months ago, with Flash the obvious suspect.. but a little too obvious, Vic thought, and he had his eye on Zatanna. The general sense was that Batman didn't know it had been released, but so far no one had the courage to ask..
"Whatever," she said, after she finished the closing routine with the bizarre dog paddle/air punch combination, and made the shape of an L on her forehead. "He's just being himself, and he doesn't know any better. His loss. I still can't figure out if you like him or not, though."
He considered. "Does it really matter?" he asked. "I respect his skills, and you can't fault his determination."
"But?"
He sighed.
But? He's one of the most important people in the League, maybe the world, despite the fact that his mental health and a quarter will get you a phone call. Of course no one's willing to admit this; the implications are too frightening. J'onn must know but hasn't done anything.
And although you desperately want his approval, he'll never let you in, Helena. Because the real reason he won't ask you to join the club is that he doesn't like being reminded that not everyone who has a difficult childhood turns out like him. He needs to believe the myth he's made, that his choices were the only ones, that his empty shadow of a life is a necessary and inevitable response to tragedy.
So he surrounds himself with fellow angsty basketcases in his codependent Bat-cult, the one you so badly want to join, spreading his misery to help him think it's normal. Look at what he did to that poor kid Grayson, who loved him like a father.
Let's just hope he holds it together. For if Wayne ever snaps, God help us all. The cost of bringing him down will be terrible.
"But he has issues," he said at last.
"It takes lots of gall for you to say that, Q."
"I'm merely eccentric. Possibly," he allowed, "possibly even quirky."
"That's okay. I admire gall."
"What about quirk?"
"It's growing on me," she said, and resisted ruffling his hair for a moment before she gave in. "Anyway, if that's how you really feel, why'd you agree to help him in the first place?"
"He's Batman," he said simply. "He may like to pretend he's only an auxiliary, and that his membership in the Seven is purely honourary, but he's in it up to his pointy ears. And everyone knows it."
Though perhaps they didn't know just how deeply. By his last estimate, the Question was one of fewer than thirty-four people alive that knew who paid the bills.
"He's more than earned the right to have his requests heard, and this one seemed reasonable enough."
His requests heard. Not his commands obeyed, whatever he thinks; deference is not servitude.
"Well, maybe," she said. She toyed with her bow. Drugs that filled you with exuberant energy for four months before they turned your insides to sand in minutes sounded like a quick way to help control the student population, but not good for much else.
"But what I wanna know is why you got off so easy."
"Hmm?"
"I try to fill Mandragora full of sharp sticks and get read the riot act. You try to bring down Lex! freaking! Luthor! and everyone just laughs it off and moves on. 'Oh, that crazy Q! Murder one, ha ha ha. What'll he do next?'"
"There are distinct advantages to madness."
"Come off it."
"It's true. And under the circumstances, the Powers that Be weren't feeling their usual moral certainty."
After a few seconds, he added, somewhat reluctantly: "However.."
"Aha! Knew it."
"You're right. There is a conversation I've been putting off."
"Huh? That's not like you, Q. You stood face-to-face with the Last Son of Krypton, Defender of All That is Right and True, and told him he was full of it." She raised her eyebrows. "What d'you do for an encore?"
"I've been putting it off," he said, not quite answering the question, "because depending on how it goes I might choose to join you back in the freelance world."
"Oh." She thought about it. "Oh."
He tilted his head at the angle she'd learned meant a wry frown underneath the mask. "I'm not sure either. I think I know what's going on, but some people are very hard to read. Could go either way."
"And let me guess. You'd miss the League tech, right? And all that data?"
"I'll have you know I was finding the truth behind the lies back when I had nothing more than a secondhand laptop and a pencil," he said, affronted.
Unrepentant, she bowed her head and spread her arms like an actress at a theatre acknowledging applause. "Wait for it.."
He lasted seven seconds before he conceded. "But yes, I'd miss the tech."
"And there it is," she said. "Thanks, you're a wonderful audience, I couldn't do it without you." She blew air kisses at him and the crowd.
"Enjoying ourselves, are we?"
"Always. You think you're all mystery-man, but I've got you pegged."
She looked at him. "You're not seriously thinking of leaving, are you?"
"It's a possibility. One I'd like to avoid if I can, but there may not be a choice. It's long past time, though. I'll deal with it tomorrow."
She shrugged. "Either way, you've still got me, you lucky fool. So what's your problem?"
"I suppose," he said, "I don't have one."
She nodded and took his hand as he stood. "Tomorrow."