Chapter 13

Move on

The Penguin was not pleased.

'What the bloody hell?!' he was shouting at them. 'We're about control aren't we? We maintain control! So what the heck happened back there, Jim?!'

No one would normally have dared reply, but with his name called directly there was no way for the unfortunate inmate named Jim to avoid the question - though he looked around frantically for a method of escape.

'We got rid of Croc, sir,' he replied unhappily.

The Penguin laughed nastily.

'Ooh, did we now? Well I guess that explains the massive hole in the door!' he shouted sarcastically. 'I knew I should have locked him up, an asset isn't much use when you can't remove it from a cling-film of chains but then at least he would have been a collector's item!'

'He was beyond control-'

'Can anyone here tell me why I lock up Grundy?' the Penguin asked the crowd. 'Anyone?'

'Coz he's dangerous, sir?' one thug suggested, his partially healed scars and many bruises indicating that he was a newer recruit, a few days fresh from the fighting pit and not all that familiar yet with how the gang was run.

'Wrong!' without skipping a beat, the Penguin promptly turned shot the man, he thudded heavily upon the ground. 'Anyone else? No? Hah, how about you, One-eye Junior? Why do you think?'

Shit…just when she thought he had forgotten about her.

'Because he's hard to control,' Clara said holding her chin high but looking straight ahead; trying to disguise the fact that she was bracing herself to leap out of the way in case the Penguin decided to take potshots at her next.

'Bingo!' he shouted. 'Five points to club One-eye, we have a winner! Grundy is hard to CONTROL! But he's still useful. Now that stupid hulking pile of scales would also have been useful, if he could have been contained! Now who set the big bastard off?! Come on, speak up, you've won an all expenses paid vacation to an icy shark-filled lake, with complementary cement shoes!'

No one dared point out that nothing could have been done once Croc had been set off, or that it was the Penguin himself who had set Grundy on Croc to stop him from tearing the place apart. Even Sickle, though there was no way he could have been to blame, seemed to be cowering at the Penguin's wrath.

'I don't know what you idiots were thinking,' he continued, as one thug lit him a new cigar at his signal. 'But I know it wasn't much. Was there any plan at all? I didn't think so. So why don't you lot be good boys, find him and bring him back here! Dead or alive I don't bloody care! Before the bloody Joker or someone else hires him!'

Fortunately this time, Clara found that she was not the main focus of attention, and she waited the rest of the speech out, hiding in the shadows of others, her thoughts dark.

Killer Croc fell back heavily against the side of the tunnel, his weight disturbing the crumbling concrete and brick that made up the wall so that a fine hail of dust and debris fell down upon him, but he paid it no attention.

Everything stung, bullets had chipped away at his body all over, splintering scales and some of them digging deep into his flesh. He already knew more than a few of them had gotten under his skin, he could feel the sharp stab of their presence every time he moved - he would have to dig them out himself.

And that stupid great white thing! What the hell even was that? Some sort of nightmare creature that was impossibly strong, glowing with electricity, like his old collar from Arkham Asylum. Croc knew that if his skin had been any thinner he would have been seriously burnt from his fight, but as things were he just felt bruised all over. One of his shoulders smarted from where that thing had tried to wrench his arm off, he suspected it was fractured or something had torn.

He hissed as his mind drew up a parallel of this occasion to one in his youth. Back on the schoolyard he had once been pelted with stones by the other children, actually this had happened to him several times but this particular time was the one time he tried to do something about it, he had told a teacher, as he had seen the others sometimes did when they were picked on. Only none of the teachers had cared, they had told him it had been his fault, they said he had been provoking them.

But like now, and back then, he hadn't been doing anything. Just sitting by himself, minding his own business.

Of course, this was just the ways things were, it couldn't be any other way. If he wasn't suffering the world simply wasn't happy.

Now he had gone back to the subway and the sewers, the places below ground where few rarely ventured. Familiar territory, back again with no food, no pay and all alone once more.

His thoughts briefly strayed back to Tony and he wondered if she would be alright without him around anymore, old habit told him she would be fine and he shouldn't care, but part of him pined for her company. What did she think of him now? What story had the others told her of his departure, and would she believe them?

What if he had killed her in his rampage without even noticing?

He stopped to think about this, it was not something he had considered before, and suddenly he was filled with dread.

It was possible that she hadn't even been there but he couldn't be certain, he had been so filled with rage and underlying fear at being surrounded that his only focus had been on smashing everything and everyone out of his way. Croc had learned from a young age, from when his aunt had died, that the safest people were dead people, because they couldn't hurt you, they couldn't lie to you and above all they couldn't kill you. Dead enemies were good enemies, but whereas it normally would not have mattered to him to distinguish exactly who he was throwing around, on this occasion for all he knew Tony could have been a casualty.

There was no way for him to go back and check if she was alright, there was no way for her to communicate with him - and there was no guarantee she would have even wanted to communicate with him if she could have.

Maybe, he thought grimly as he painfully began to dig out a bullet that had become wedged between his ribs, she had already moved on. She had told him she knew how to survive, perhaps that was all he had been to her, a way to survive.

No one ever wanted him around once his use expired. That was just the way things were.

It had been a week since Croc had vanished from sight, and people were still talking quite avidly amongst themselves about what had happened, all with slight variations on the event. Some variations stating that Croc had been caught eating one of the guards, others said that he had simply snapped and started killing everyone in sight like some sort of rabid animal.

Clara wasn't sure what to believe. She knew of the damage Croc was easily capable of inflicting, but she didn't want to believe that just after she had begun trusting him that his true nature had revealed itself - that he really was insane.

'Apparently he just freaked out, went ballistic,' said Elvis, when Clara had asked him what had happened. 'One minute he was minding his own business, then BOOM! Tearing apart bodies left and right. The Penguin saw that there was no way to calm him down and decided that releasing Grundy was his only option, and even that barely worked!'

'It's for the best,' Enrique had added, crossing his arms. 'He was nothing but an animal, he couldn't be tamed and probably would have ended up killing all of us if he had been allowed to stick around.'

'…' Clara hadn't responded immediately, crossing her own arms and looking away.

'Tony, I don't know what sort of deal you had going on with him, but you can't be unhappy that he's gone now,' Enrique told her. 'Don't think that I didn't notice, or anyone else didn't notice for that matter, that you were always hanging around him.'

'It was nothing,' she said after being pressured, shaking her head and shrugging. 'I wasn't stealing goods and giving them to him if that's what you're thinking. I was just passing information I had overheard from others to him. In return he was supposed to back me up when I got in trouble. I dunno, it seemed to work...'

'He would have killed you once your use ran out.'

'Perhaps,' she tried to act indifferent. 'I don't care, it doesn't matter now.'

…

With her luck cartwheeling all over the place, Clara of course found herself placed on one of the most dangerous of the missions that month had to offer. They were attacking one of Two-Face's armories following a tip off that he was beginning to gather a large collection of guns and other weaponry that normally would not be found within the compound.

Clara had barely slept for the past few nights, it was hard to when she needed to be on the constant alert. And now, waiting once more to head out for another mission, she found herself nodding off against the wall.

Fortunately it was One-eye who noticed before anyone else.

'Come on, my boy, rise and shine now,' he muttered to her, shunting her shoulder only lightly. Clara started and nodded at him in acknowledgement. Unusually One-eye was also on the mission, she hoped he didn't have another of his 'freak-out' episodes. In fact the entire group this time was mainly composed of senior, more experienced individuals, and Clara was acutely aware of how much she stood out; she was only there as a method of flushing out opposition.

…

Everything went so well at first, they were gaining ground and were close to sending Two-Face's gang packing, but then the tides turned and back-up arrived. Two-Face was obviously playing high stakes this night, practically everyone in the gang had to be there; Two-Face himself was actually present. Clara was frankly terrified, this time simply keeping to the back of the pack wouldn't protect her from projectiles like bullets the way it did crowbars.

Guns were hard to come by in Arkham City, and Two-Face was pulling a bold move by letting so many of his men out armed – the possibility that the weapons would be stolen should the gang fall was 100%. It was a high bet, and Clara wanted nothing to do with it.

Clara threw herself behind a crate, already planning her exit strategy; there was no way she was going to be any use in this fight, and she wasn't going to try either.

It was death to stick around, she would have to get out of here and get out of the way until the fight was over. So she tried to bolt, thinking that in the chaos she might escape unnoticed. Only she was misled, she did not notice the others in her way until she had practically run into them.

Then it happened.

One of Two-Face's men were right beside her, for a split second the barrel was level with her head. But then One-Eye was upon him and doing something unspeakably violent with a knife to the man's face.

'It's alright, son, I've got your back,' he told her grinning proudly, dark red stains all over his front but he had eyes only the person he thought was his son. 'I'll always have you back. I was fast enough this time wasn't I? You're not hurt?'

'I'm fine,' Clara stepped out of his reach. 'Really, I'm okay. Let's just focus on the fight now.'

'You'll always be my boy, you know?' One-eye continued, staring off rather dazedly in her direction – his mind no longer in the present. 'I will always be ther-'

A loud gunshot rang out right by her head.

Clara ducked to the ground and looked around hurriedly for the source of the shot, she spotted Two-Face himself standing just a dozen meters or so away, reloading his gun. He was already aiming to take another shot, thankfully at someone else.

'We're fighting a losing battle, we need to fall back and regroup or something!' she shouted, turning to face One-eye. 'We need to -...One-Eye?'

One-eye was no longer standing beside her but lying sprawled upon the ground, motionless. And to her great horror she saw that in death he was still smiling, he hadn't even been aware that his life had been in danger.

It was too much for Clara, and without saying anything to anyone, she turned on her heel and fled out into the cold night.

Death right in front of her, she was no stranger to it here, but for something to have happened quite so suddenly in front of her, she couldn't believe it. It hadn't happened, part of her mind kept telling her, she kept remembering moments before when he had been talking to her.

She fled back to the museum without even thinking. It was only when she caught sight of the current guard at the door that she realised she had just deserted – she was a traitor, and without One-eye to back her up any longer they would surely kill her. She began to backtrack upon the spot.

But Elvis, one of Enrique's friends, who happened to be the guard tonight, had already spotted her and was waving her over.

'So how did the mission go? You kick some ass out there tonight?' he asked, grinning. 'Come, tell me everything. I've been stuck here for hours now and I'm so bored now that I think I'm going to fall asleep.'

'It...I – disaster,' she managed to get out, then clamped her jaw shut and looked around hurriedly for an excuse to leave.

'Is everything okay?' asked Elvis, and Clara could have sworn she saw real concern on his face – but knew at the same time she couldn't afford to risk believing this.

Clara thought of saying something, but her tongue was stuck to the roof of her mouth, she ended up shaking her head. 'One-eye is dead,' she eventually ground out.

A look of surprise went over Elvis' face, which then seemed to morph into what looked like pity. 'Oh, I'm so sorry Tony. The others said that he wasn't really, well that he wasn't your dad, I-I don't know what to say. You okay?'

'I'm fine,' replied Clara quickly, now looking upon Elvis with suspicion – expecting any moment for him to start laughing at her misfortune; these people were bad guys and she hadn't forgotten it. But she had nowhere else to go, ironically though she no longer had the option to stay either.

'You don't sound it,' Elvis said. 'When my shift is over, you can come have a drink with me and the boys in the lounge. Life's tough here.'

'Yeah, sure,' Clara replied, beginning to turn away. 'Listen, I'll be back in a bit. I just remembered I've got to head back and help the others get back here, you know? The wounded and all.'

'Oh, okay,' replied Elvis seeming to have bought the excuse, with what had to be false pity. 'I'll be right here, but if I'm not I'll be up in the lounge. You know where to find me.'

'Yeah, yeah,' she replied, and began to backtrack slowly towards where the raid had been that night. As soon as she was out of Elvis' sight, she turned away from her path and made for the entrance to the subway she had only used one time before many weeks previously when she had last been on her own and had been chasing a stranger over the bag on his back. Just trying to survive, just as she was now.

She found the terraced platform she had hid on all that time ago.

Silently, Clara looked down the tunnel for any sign of anything living, seeing no one she climbed down. But she had only gone a few steps when Dereck appeared in front of her, causing her to stumble back.

'What are you doing?' he asked exasperatedly, his image kept flickering in and out of sight, but she could hear his voice in her head. 'You just abandoned your lifeline!'

'I did nothing of the sort,' she hissed at him. 'They would have killed me! I bailed on the mission, and One-eye is gone! Do you really think they would have kept me around much longer? They'd kill me!'

'And you think Croc won't?'

'I don't know...but I hope he doesn't. There must have been some sort of reason that he lashed out last week, I don't believe that he simply went insane.'

'Well he was in Arkham asylum, you know? An asylum dedicated in particular to the criminally insane. What even was the purpose of coming down there, you don't get anything out of going after him. You've escaped from the Penguin's gang now. Why bother?'

'Because I don't want to be alone!' she blurted. 'I trust him! He's dangerous, but so is everyone in this facility. He won't turn me away.'

'You sure about that?'

'Yes, yes I am. Even if he doesn't want me alive, then at least I won't be alone and I won't have to suffer any further time in this hell!' she cried. 'I don't need you anymore Dereck! Little what-ifs aren't enough anymore, I will always wonder if perhaps there was something I could have done to prevent your death but I know that never once did I intentionally do anything to hurt you. I wasn't my fault you died, it was a doctor called Jonathan Crane, the Scarecrow! I was the last person who would have wanted you dead, but you are, and it was NOT my fault!'

Dereck slowly faded away before her eyes and was gone.

Breathing in deeply, Clara followed the old train tracks deeper under ground, ignoring the old bones that lay scattered about the floor.

It was time to move on.

A/N: Here's a small chapter, next one should be posted within the next day or so hopefully. I've written up to chapter 17 in draft form now (in my long break with no internet, I had some free time), I hope to now rapidly post up the rest of these chapters - warning, I tend to take forever to do anything, so I can't make any promises, but I will try my hardest.

Response to reviews:

Thank you darkwolf1121, Sunnycroc and LurkingLady for you reviews! :D

But LurkingLady, you saw into the future O_O, how did you know I was going to get rid of One-eye? I feel kinda bad for killing him off :( The best way to think of it though is that at least he died happy, thinking he had just saved his son from death.

I'll give him a little background because I never really went into it, but basically One-Eye has always been stuck in the criminal world, but for the good part of his later years he worked for the Penguin. Then one day he tried to take his son into work with him, but his son was killed on his first day by a hit-and-run case during a heist. Slowly over the years One-eye went insane with grief, always questioning what if there was one tiny little thing that he could have done differently. He blames himself for the accident, but since he can't live with this grief, the way his mind adapted to deal with it is by denying it ever happened. Thus the series of Tonys over the years, who all in turn died or fled.

Quick summary of this chapter:

Croc has left, but Clara must continue on her own if she wants to survive.

There is a mission to raid one of Two-Face's armories. The Penguin's gang quickly begin to lose this particular battle, One-eye is shot in the process. Clara, with no firm allies within the group, realises that she has to leave. She set off in search of Croc, hoping that he will not turn her away.