Chapter 3: Operation

"Do you think this was wise?"

"What I think is that there was much choice. This is beyond anything I can fix."

"But to kidnap a doctor…"

It was instinct more than anything that made Andi stay absolutely still. She was lying on what felt like bare ground, several large rocks digging into her back. The protesting voice was throaty and soothing, the sort that you instinctively wanted to trust, even now that she was blurrily recalling what had happened. An African American accent she thought. The other was that of the British man who had captured her.

What's going on? Andi ruthlessly quashed the thought. Escape first. Then she could worry about figuring out who these people were.

Carefully she began to assess her situation. Her senses were still dulled and her head felt like it had been stuffed with cotton. But she didn't seem hurt. Wasn't even tied up. Adrenaline was pulsing in her system, burning off the aftereffects of the drug. The dirt underneath made her suspect she was outside, but the air was very moist and cool for a summer night. And it smelled cleaner than most of the places in Gotham. There was the sound of roaring water somewhere close by.

"How long until she wakes up?" Soothing Voiced asked.

"Not long. You can probably get her up now if you like."

There was a pause and then footsteps approached. Andi readied herself. She was glad it was him and not British coming towards her; no matter what he had done, she didn't think she could bring herself to attack an old man.

"Miss? Miss are you awake?" She heard him kneel on the ground, felt a hand placed gently on her shoulder. Now.

Her eyes burst open and she sprang, fingers hooked into claws, striking at the face, the hand on her shoulder. His face was shielded with a black ski mask, but her nails pulled bloody ribbons across into his forearm. He flinched back, instinctively covering his eyes, and that was all the chance she needed.

Rock walls on either side and the British man behind her only allowed Andi to go one direction—towards the sound of the water—and it was a second before she realized that she was heading straight for a shallow stream, leading out to a huge waterfall with who-knew-what behind it. No escape that way. She skidded around to face them, eyes scanning desperately for another way out. Rough cave, illuminated by strings of light bulbs, with ceilings as high as a cathedral's. Old brick structures and foundations shored up the place, but she couldn't see any exit except for a shadowed brick tunnel that was behind both of her captors. Not very promising.

British wasn't wearing a mask—Andi had already seen his face after all—and he watched her warily. He stood protectively over a steel work table that held the body of a man lying face down, as if worried that Andi would attack it. Wonder about that later; active threats came first. The man she had attacked picked himself up from the ground and walked slowly towards her. By the way he moved, she guessed that he was pretty old too, but Andi refused to let herself feel guilt for hurting him. They had kidnapped her. Their fault if they got hurt. She cast around for a weapon but saw nothing. Even the rocks underfoot were too small or wedged firmly in the ground. Her fingers curled into fists, raised the way she'd been taught in self defense classes, nails biting her palms. Andi could only hope they didn't have weapons.

"It's alright Miss." The one approaching her said. He stopped several feet away from her, as if she was a wild animal that might spook at a moment's notice, and his dark eyes watched her warily through his mask. "We don't want to hurt you. We need your help."

"Help?" Andi asked, stalling for time more than anything else. "What sort of help?"

"Our friend over there," he pointed to the body she had taken for a corpse. "He's been shot."

Andi bit her lip as she slightly relaxed her stance, ready to raise her fists again at the slightest sign of danger. The masked man remained still, so she gave the man on the table a guarded second look. Not dead, perhaps, but she could see mounds of gauze pressed heavily onto his shoulder and neck.

"I'm not a doctor," she said, "I've never done surgery on my own."

"You haven't? I thought you told—"

"I spent a few years in medical school. Dropped out a couple of months into my fourth year," Andi said, "If it had really just been a sick wife like your other friend had said, I probably could have helped. Removing a bullet though…"

The masked man seemed to consider it. "But you're also all we have. And it's bad. Please, can you at least look at him?"

Andi hesitated, her curiosity unrelenting now that it seemed she wouldn't die immediately. Who were these people? Her initial guess—gang members looking for ransom—was laughable. Not with their age, the courtesy they were giving her, or this bizarre set up. But for whatever reason, these men felt that they couldn't just take their friend to a hospital. That had to mean that the man was recognizable and wanted by someone, whether law enforcement or people with good connections…

And suddenly it clicked in her head just who needed fixing. Bailey had hit the Batman after all. The man whose blood the entire police force was baying for, and they had picked her, of all the people in Gotham, to save his life.

Her mind went blank, felt almost as if it was floating. Blood still pounded in her ears, but somehow she felt an echoing, quiet calm take hold of her. She dropped her guard completely and simply stared across the room at the vigilante. There he was, stripped of all glamor, his only guardians an old man and what seemed to be a soft spoken pacifist. And it was up to her whether he lived or died.

"What would you do if I said no?" she asked quietly. The two men traded worried glances.

"Let you go," the masked one finally admitted, "He wouldn't want us to hurt you."

Andi barked a laugh. Right. Like Batman had stopped short of letting others die for him before, even killing them himself if they got in his way like Dent or Wuertz had.

But… he was also a human being. And, although she had blamed Leena for the same thought earlier, Andi knew that she could never intentionally turn her back on someone who needed her help. Besides, she still had a card or two up her sleeve. None of them knew she was a trace analyst after all, and if she was allowed to operate on the Batman…

Feeling almost numb, she moved to the side of the British man and looked down at the patient. His legs were still armored but his back was bare except for swaths of bandages and gauze. The helmet was gone, but where the bandages ended midway up his neck there was a large white towel draped over his head, not allowing so much as a hair to show. He was still as faceless as ever.

"Where was he hit?" she asked. Moving the gauze before she was ready might allow the bleeding to start again. And, somehow, touching him would make it all seem… real. This couldn't actually be happening could it?

"Superior region of the left trapezius muscle. It's lodged near the spine or I would get it out myself." The British man just grinned at Andi's astonished look. "I've patched him back together more often than I can count."

Andi nodded slowly. At least she would have someone to assist. Assist. Did that mean she planned on doing it? She swallowed and stiffened her spine.

"How did it get past his armor?"

"That blocked the worst of it." The masked man said, coming over to join them. He sounded grudging, as if he had something personal against the flaw. "But there are a couple of joinings in his armor between the suit and cowl that allow for him to turn his head. The shooter basically hit the sweet spot."

Carefully, reluctantly, Andi began to remove the bandages. She grimaced at the bloody hole. The British man was right, it was only a hair from damaging the spine. She let her eyes travel down the rest of the Batman and the grimace became a frown. Old bullet holes, knife wounds, even a few scars that looked suspiciously like dog bites covered this man's back. But no tattoos or other identifying marks.

"You realize I might do more damage with my lack of experience?" she asked evenly.

"Without you getting that bullet out, Miss, he'll die eventually," the Englishman said, "The worst that can happen is that he goes a little bit sooner. I stopped the worst of the bleeding but…"

Andi teetered on the edge, then made her decision. "Do you have anything I can use to scrub up?"

Andi pulled the last suture tight, clipped the thread, and leaned back with a loud sigh. It felt as if she'd surfaced from deep water, drawing her first breath since she had begun operating. In that whole time, her world had narrowed, focused almost, into the man under her fingers until it seemed that even she and the two men assisting no longer existed. Only the near perfect machine of his body, the repairs it needed, were of any importance. By the end, it was as if her own fingers piecing him back together were no more than extensions of her thoughts, clumsily assisting his body to match the pristine image she held of it in her mind. She had no idea how long this had taken—her aching muscles suggested hours, but it seemed only minutes. Or generations maybe.

Perhaps she should have stuck with med school after all.

Her utter involvement hadn't stopped her, though, from carefully separating a tiny sliver of muscle as she worked, and slipping the bloody piece into her glove when the men assisting weren't looking. Not a sterile environment by any stretch of the imagination—her DNA would have to be separated from his when she analyzed this later—but it would be a good start.

"Can you two clean him up?" she asked, "Wash off the blood, dry the skin carefully, and tape fresh gauze over the top." Both of them nodded and Andi used the distraction to peel off her gloves, carefully putting her tissue sample in the pocket of her jeans. Lucky that she had worn dark pants; the slight blood smears her hands left along the pocket blended almost unnoticeably with the denim. It was the best she could do.

With nothing else to do, she found herself staring, again, at the covered head. Who was this man? His aura of darkness was gone for her—Andi supposed that it was hard to keep when you were knocked out and laid on a table like the corpse at an Irish wake—but he still seemed something… more. And less. The mystery surrounding him thickened, but what little she had found disturbed Andi. To know that the Batman was protected from the hatred of all of Gotham by little more than his projection of strength and these two frail people. How had he accomplished so much with so little? Why would he keep doing what he did when everyone so clearly wanted him to stop?

"Would you like me to take you home now Miss?"

Andi shook herself. Yes, she did want to go home. She wanted to get away from these thoughts that were coming disturbingly close to sympathy. Batman was a murderer, she reminded herself. He deserved what was coming to him.

"Actually could you take me back to the hospital?" Andi grimaced wearily. "My car's still parked there." Plus, there was no need to make it easier for the Batman to find her if he wanted to. Not that missing her home address would do much, but it would be something to stall him.

"That's right. I drove you here too." The old man just smiled blandly as Andi glared at him, then relented. "Of course I can take you there. I'm afraid I'll have to blindfold you on the way though."

Andi had expected as much and, rather than making a fuss, she just turned to the masked man who was still in front of the Batman's unconscious form, apparently planning to stand guard while they were gone. "He'll need good pain medications when he wakes up, and antibiotics to prevent infection," she said, "And no strenuous work for at least a month and a half." That ought to be enough for Andi to track him down.

The Englishman's lips twitched. "Oh I'm sure he'll be glad to hear that. If you could stay still while I wrap this cloth over your eyes?"

Andi obeyed, forcing herself not to panic at her sudden blindness. The realization that this would be the perfect time to kill her, now that Batman was out of danger and she was helpless, didn't make it any easier.

Instead of shooting her, though, the old man just placed a hand on her shoulder and carefully steered her forward. They weren't going towards either the brick tunnel or the waterfall, and Andi realized that there must be another door hidden in the back of the caverns. So much for her hopes of collecting water from the fall. But there was still something else she could try…

"Can you wait just a moment? I have a rock in my shoe." Her guide paused courteously and, still blind, Andi knelt on the bare earth, pulled off her sneaker, and shook it as carefully as if she thought there really was something inside. As she retied it, though, she casually scraped her cupped fingers against the dirt and pushed several small pebbles and a fair bit of soil into her sneaker unnoticed. Perfect.

"Alright. Let's go." Andi said.

Andi spun around as soon as her blindfold was undone, but the old man was already hurrying away. The car—the same Cadillac that she had been kidnapped in—was parked in the darkest corner of the parking lot. Even when he started it, her former captor kept his lights off until pulling out of the lot. He must have guessed that Andi might try to get the plate number. As soon as he was gone, Andi checked his parking space for tire marks, but she was out of luck. If they had kidnapped anyone else, their precautions would probably have kept Batman as ghostly and unknown as ever. He'd find out his mistake soon enough. Reluctantly, Andi turned away from staring at the empty parking space and started her own car.

The clock on her dashboard told her that it was 3:30 AM, but Andi felt wide awake. A good thing too; even in these dead early morning hours, driving in Gotham required alert wits and she needed to get home soon.

Once back in her apartment she began to move quickly, efficiently. The slip of the Batman's flesh went into a small, sterile sample jar in her refrigerator. After a minute of scraping and clipping, the ends of her nails was given similar treatment; she had drawn blood scratching that masked man but it would take a great deal of luck for her to pull his DNA from there after scrubbing up for the operation. The makeshift soil sample she had smuggled into her shoe went in a slightly larger jar, and every stitch she had been wearing, even her jewelry and the hair tie she had had on her wrist, were folded into a neat pile to be tested for fingerprints.

Andi stepped back and surveyed her evidence. Four items and her own memories. It didn't seem like much, but then again, forensics' whole point was to make a very little turn into case-closing evidence. She would have to get up and go to work in a few hours too, act as if nothing had happened. The sooner she could analyze her DNA samples the better. Not bothering to turn off the lights—she knew she wouldn't be sleeping anyways—she set the alarm on her phone and curled up on her couch, trying desperately not to think.

Author's Note: GO IRISH! 23-12 AGAINST PURDUE!

Ahem. Anyways.

I actually started this story because this chapter popped into my head one day and got stuck there. Andi was originally supposed to be a fully qualified doctor, but the appeal of a forensic scientist was too much for me. I've tried to research some of the basics in both fields, but I'm far from an expert, so if any of you readers are, it'd be awesome to hear your thoughts and ideas about what's possible, likely, etc.

Once again, a ginormous shout-out to Delia Ra'Nar, Secret Identity Girl, and melbgirl for putting me on author alert, and most especially to NeverTooLate03, Were-girl13, and Secret Identity Girl for reviewing. Y'all are as unbelievably awesome as four-leaf clovers.