Poison Ivy Saves the World

by Clayton Overstreet 2

Ivy is feeling down and useless so Harley arranges for her to do something to perk herself up... much to Darkseid's regret.

- xI don't own these characters or profit from them.

Poison Ivy Saves the World

By, Clayton Overstreet

Sometimes a person just wants to do something to change the way things are.

It was late at night. Pamela Isley AKA Poison Ivy lay in bed with Harley Quinn spooned against her back. She had been in the area and decided to swing by to see her best friend and Harley had insisted a bit on the benefits, as usual. Both of them had complicated lives and while Ivy was part plant, it was nice to indulge the animal side occasionally.

Still in the dead of the night she was thinking. Absently she touched the sheets, feeling the cotton. The dyes. Raised and harvested.

Sliding free she put her feet on the wooden floor and walked to the window. It was late and the streetlight outside was burnt out. The moon was full though and her eyes focused on a tree. Just a skinny little thing planted in a little square of dirt cut out of the sidewalk. A dandelion grew among the roots. A little further down a crack in the concrete had a shoot peeking out of it. Aside from that was nothing but sidewalk, walls, and trash.

Strong arms wrapped around her waist and Harley whispered in her ear. "Somethin' wrong Pammy?"

"No. Yes." She paused. "Did you know it's my birthday next week?"

"Congratulations. How old are you goin ta be?" She didn't answer. "Not that it matters. I mean you age like a tree or somethin' right? I'm agin' pretty good myself. Between the acid bath, those chemicals you've pumped into me that make me immune to poison and heal up, plus everything else I've been exposed to countin' the years seems kind of pointless." She rubbed against Ivy's back. "See? Baby smooth." Ivy just kept staring out the window. "Wassa matter babe?"

"When I started out I… I was so worried about the environment. I was sure that if I didn't act the world was doomed. People. Things. Nothing else mattered. I was going to save the world, even if it meant killing every human on the planet. I figured if I didn't the world would end in ten… fifteen years." She sighed. "How many plans have I had? How many mutants, clones, experiments…. And the world is still screwed and in some ways worse, it's still here. Have I made even the slightest bit of difference?" Harley didn't answer. "Well?"

"Oh, that wasn't rhetorical?" She sighed. "Red, hate to break it to you, but none of us make a difference. Not in the little ways that matter. I've done the good guy thing, the bad guy thing. Saved the world. Almost blown it up. A week later everyone's back at work, walking the streets, and doing their own thing. Batman and the guys he fights like you and me used to be urban legends. Now we can go down the sidewalk and it's a fifty-fifty chance someone will even bother taking a picture with their phone." She licked her lips. They still tasted like some kind of fruit juice. She had made hundreds of smoothies trying to mimic that flavor. "Also I've been to the future a few times. Batman's been there. Superman. Green Lantern. Joker. Bane. Ras Al Ghul. Pretty much every villain and hero goes there eventually. Alternate universes. I think Booster Gold came from there…"

"Your point being?"

"Future's still there Pammy. And um, hate to break it to you, but mostly it's not run by plants. I mean out of infinity I'm sure a few of them alternate universes are, but usually when we go there you get some post apocalyptic stuff if you go far enough or if you get blown there by some evil scheme that causes massive damage that means you have to travel back to now and stop yourself. You can check with Booster Gold or Red Tool… I think like half the Justice League has been to a dozen different futures. Oh and those Legion guys. But mostly the near future is some gritty quasi techno thing and a few hundred years it's all space ships, aliens, and robots or a post apocalyptic wasteland depending on the week."

"How do you know that?"

"Went drinking with Wonder Woman a while back. Lady can hold her booze but seven or eight mugs of Guinness in and okay maybe I slipped that lasso of hers on her wrist and she can tell you stories."

"So it's all pointless."

"Pammy…"

"No. Never mind. It's okay." She sighed. "Maybe I'll move down to Florida and grow oranges or something." She broke away and went back to the bed. Snuggling in, she buried her head under a pillow.

Harley watched her. She was a trained psychiatrist and knew a midlife crisis when she saw one. Pam was either going to be very depressed for a while or she was going to kill a lot of people. Could go either way.

Tiptoeing to the kitchen Harley got a foot long meatball sub out of the fridge and then found her phone charging on the counter. "Hope she's up." It rang three times.

The screen lit up and a woman's voice said, "Harley? Gah! Girl, you're supposed to at least wear a top when you video call someone."

"I'm comfortable with my body," she said, sauce dripping onto her chest as she talked with her mouth full. "I can put on a filter."

"You can filter yourself? I know people who would pay for that." Harley hit a button on the phone. It made it look like she was wearing Batman's cowl. "Very funny."

"Look, actually I called because I need a favor. Pammy's really down in the dumps. Her birthday's next week and I want to get her somethin' nice."

"Like what?"

"An evil plan to save the world." She grinned. "I was wonderin'. Think your boyfriend would like to do the supervillain thing?"

000

Pam woke up in Harley's bed, turning her head toward the sun coming through the skylight. Natural as a sunflower. Then a familiar shadow darted between her and the light. She sat up but before she could do anything there was a bang and a cable tied to a baterang wrapped around her pinning her to the bed. Batman came forward, frowning down at her.

"You! What do you think you're…?"

Harley suddenly popped in. "Hey Pammy sweetie! I know it's not as good as me poppin' out of a cake, but I've got a surprise for you!"

"Harley? What are you doing?"

"Givin' you what you've always wanted. The chance to save the whole wide world! Bats here agreed to help."

"He… he did?"

"When I saw how down ya were last night I had Selina call him and came up with a plan."

Batman growled at both of them. "Don't make me regret it."

Ivy looked at him and then Harley. "What are you going to do?"

"Get dressed Pammy. Step one in Harley's plan to help Ivy save the woild! I'm kickin' you off the planet."

"Huh?"

000

Ivy sat in the back of one of the Justice League's spaceships. She was clutching a jar of water with a sprouting avocado seed in her lap. "I don't like this! Space really isn't my thing Harley!"

"I kind of figured," Harley said from the seat next to her. "But we just have two short stops to make and then we'll head back for home. Trust me you're gonna love our first stop. When I hoid of this place I immediately knew you'd love it. Hey Bats, we there yet?"

"Almost," he said from the pilot's chair. "I had to take the long way so Lantern would have time to get permission for us to go. I've got clearance. We should be there in another twenty minutes."

"See? Fourteen trillion light years in a little under an hour. Not bad, eh?" She looked out the window. "Ooo, look! There it is!" Pam kept staring at the seed in her lap. It was serving the same purpose as a therapeutic pet did for airplane flights. "Pammy you're missing it!"

Ivy peeked and then full on stared. They were heading towards a large green globe. "What is that?"

"Like I said, I know hotties jumpin' out of cakes isn't really your thing. I mean you had that fling with Jason Woodru, you have a love affair with the whole plant system on Earth, and I just know you lust after Swampthing like nobody's business. So I know your type with guys. They say size doesn't matter, but Pammy trust me on this, we're here to introduce you to your ultimate man. Poison Ivy, meet Mogo."

"Mogo?" As the spaceship swung around the planet she saw the Green Lantern symbol on the side.

"A living planet," Batman said. "Mogo is a sentient planet and a member of the Lantern Corps. Possibly their most powerful member." He flicked a few buttons. "Hold on, we're making a landing."

Pam tried not to scream as the planet quickly went from a distant green ball to the ground seemly coming up to them at incredible speed. She failed. Ivy was a huge fan of dirt in general, but not when gravity took hold and she was headed towards it at mach 3. 'Aaaaaah!"

"Weeeeee!" Harley squealed next to her.

Batman just rolled his eyes and engaged the vertical landing jets. The ship slowed and came to a perfect landing. "Mogo's friendly enough, but very private. We're not supposed to be here long. Just fast enough to pick up some cargo. Harley, no carving anything on the trees. Ivy, don't use your plant manipulating powers."

Swallowing Ivy said, "I wouldn't dream of it. I… I can feel the pressure of something vast. This planet isn't just alive. It's… watching us." She set her jar aside and undid the seat restraints. "I have to see this."

Harley was having trouble with the release button. "Wait for me Red!" It finally came loose and Batman opened the exit. A ramp lowered and contacted the ground.

The scent of a swamp filled the air. Plants and humidity. Animals too. Ivy felt it. Each living thing like a cell in a body. Connected. Not controlled, but working together. She walked down the ramp, eyes wide as she looked up at an unfamiliar sky.

Behind her Harley whispered, "Hey Bats, we aren't gonna get sick or nothing walkin' around without space suits are we? Like in War of the Worlds where the aliens land and think they're all hot stuff until Earths bacteria does a number on 'em?"

"We're fine. As long as you don't make Mogo angry." They reached the ground behind Ivy.

"Yipe. So you're saying I shouldn't make any fat jokes?"

Ivy meanwhile walked forward, closing her eyes and just feeling things. "This… this is amazing." She looked at a nearby tree and placed a hand on it. To her delight without even using her powers a branch reached down and stroked her arm with leaves. "A whole world, working together. Untouched by construction and deforestation." She beamed looking over at Harley. "You're right Harl. I think I'm in love." She leaned against the tree sensually. Harley openly leered and Batman blushed, looking away. "I could stay here forever." Then she paused and frowned. Standing up she said, "Except I couldn't. Mogo's wonderful. The Garden of Eden come to life. But I wouldn't be part of the garden. I'd be more like a worm in an apple. The way I mutate plants… I don't belong here any more than Jackrabbits belong in Australia."

Harley walked over and put her red and black gloved hands on Ivy's shoulders. "I kind of figured that Red. You're human, mostly. Not exactly great for the environment. I just thought you'd like to see that next time ya look out the window at night and see that maybe the world ain't exactly how you'd like it, you can still look up at the sky and know there's places like this."

Ivy smiled. "That was surprisingly poignant Harley."

"Yeah well last night you were totally bummin' me out. Had to turn that frown upside down somehow." She slapped Ivy on the butt making her jump with a brief cry. "Anyway we aren't stayin'. Like I told you we're here to pick up a few things. Incase you didn't notice, this planet doesn't exactly need saving."

Before Ivy could ask what they were picking up a buzzing filled the air. They looked around and saw something flying towards the, When it got closet they saw some sort of huge flying alien things carrying a huge leaf. No a pod. They landed in front of the humans and left it. The thing was about the size of a sleeping bag and when Ivy leaned down she found it was stuffed with… "Seeds? What are these for?"

"The next stop," Harley said. She bent down and Batman took the other end. They began hefting it back into the ship.

As they did a nearby tree twisted and changed until it became a living tree in the shape of Ivy. The leaves all became heart shaped. She smiled and bent down to pat the ground. She felt it rumble in response. "It would never work between us. Besides I'm sort of attached to the crazy clown chick." She kissed her fingers and pressed it to the planet. "If you ever need me though, I'll be there. Call me!"

Back on the ship she strapped in and said, "Thank you two. I'll always remember this place fondly. You know, unless someone erases my memory again or I turn out to just be yet another clone of myself."

"Been there," Batman and Harley said in unison.

As the ship took off Ivy watched the scenery fade until they were surrounded by stars again. It was like leaving Disneyland. She just wanted to rush right back in. Instead she picked up the jar with Andrew the avocado. "So we have what look like a wide variety of seeds. I assume we're going to plant them somewhere. As much as I like it I'm not sure they would do so good back home. For us or for what seem to be fairly invasive species of potentially intelligent plant life."

"I told you Red, we're taking you to save the world. A world anyway."

"Which one?"

"War World is pretty much just a machine. There are plenty of worlds ruled by supervillains. But I wanted to give you the chance to fix one that was really messed up." They came out of hyperdrive and there was another planet in view.

Ivy did not need much to guess where they were. The gigantic fire pits clearly visible even from a distance were a dead give away. "Apokolips."

"Yup," Harley said. "Been here. Done that. Brought home a giant purple girl. Had to figure all those times they've sent in spies and parademons to build flame pits on Earth ya gotta have a problem with them, right Red?" Ivy's eyes narrowed. She looked down at the cracked barren wasteland between the pits and cities. "And I had to figure Batman here being a goody-goody and all may have come up with tons of ways to overthrow the rightful leader of a country or somethin' he never gets to do and who deserves it more?"

"I have some connections on the planet who are willing to help us against Darkseid," Batman said. "The only problem is that this will be insanely dangerous."

"Bats has a point. On this planet ya got three kinds of people. Those toiling away for Darkseid. Those being tortured. Or those on the run being hunted down like dogs so they can be tortured or forced to toil away for Darkseid."

Ivy looked at Batman. "Why are you doing this? Seriously I'd like to know before we go down there. This feels like when I was a kid and my friend Vivian's older brother used to offer us a ride and then pull the car away and leave us behind."

"Gah, I hate when people do that," Harley said. "The Joker did that to me when we were supposed to be escaping from the cops. I spent seven months in Arkham when they caught me." She paused. "Seriously Bats, you ain't plannin' on leaving us here, are ya?"

"And if not, why not?"

"I understand you might question my motives in light of your own twisted morals and the way you two have on multiple occasions betrayed people and even each other, but seriously I thought this was a good idea. Even if it did come from Harley. Darkseid has destroyed countless civilizations. Not to mention tortured and/or killed me. I don't like to think of it much, but we live in a world where it's hard to make a difference.

"Look at Gotham. I live in a city that gets gassed, threatened with bombs, attacked by aliens and monsters, and has a huge crime rate. Half the cops are still at least mildly corrupt. I've been working for decades to fix it and it seems like not only does it seem like a futile attempt in light of the sheer number of costumes and mutants and the like running around, but the citizens themselves still choose to live there. Even Harley moved out to Brooklyn."

Ivy shrugged. "Where would they go? At least it's not Metropolis. The place seems a bit cleaner, but they have Superman issues to deal with. I'll take crazy bastards with acid bleached skin trying to blow up the planet or regular citizens who snap and put on masks every other day."

"Hey!"

"No offense Harl."

"I've fought Dracula and Godzilla and actual demons from several different versions of Hell," Batman said. "I've been mutated, turned into a vampire, time traveled… I'm not even sure how old I am. The first Robin is like thirty and my but… uh, a guy who helped raise me was old when I was a kid and may have been made immortal while working for MI6 or something. Sometimes it feels like I've been doing this for a hundred years. Hell they rebooted the entire universe a few years ago and despite massive changes to the time line, we're all still here doing this."

"Ya aren't thinkin' of quittin' are ya?"

"No. I talked it out with my therapist. Besides I've been to parallel worlds where I quit or turn evil and it never seems to end well for anyone."

"I went to a world where a version of me fights Hitler," Harley said brightly. "I made out with her but she thought I was a Nazi spy or somethin' so it didn't work out."

Batman looked at Ivy. "What do you see in her?"

"She tries. Plus she's amazing in bed. You know how it is with crazy chicks."

"True." He looked at Harley. "When you came to me with this I just thought, Darkseid's been doing the same thing for a long time. I know supervillains who have learned the secrets of the universe and even destroyed it a few times in careers measured in years or even months. A lot of them with more reasonable ideals and better morals. So just this once I thought, why not give him a taste of his own medicine? He deserves it and incase you missed it part of my mantra includes the phrase 'I am vengeance'."

"So there's no way this could backfire on us?"

"Ive, come on. This guy routinely tries to destroy the Earth by digging into the mantle to make giant fire pits and sending monsters and aliens and sorcerers to try to kill or enslave us all in his bid to wipe out all life and rebuild it in his image. It's not like he can up his game at this point. I've met him and the devil and even Trigon thinks Darkseid's a jerk. His people have been raised to believe he's god since before humans started living in caves and some of them still rebel. Even I can't make Apokalypse worse. But maybe we can make it better."

Ivy looked down on the flame pits she could see from space and nodded. "Okay, let's do this."

000

Dakrseid was standing over a pit of flames, hands clasped behind his back, staring at nothing in particular. Suddenly Steppenwolf ran up, something clutched in his hands. "My lord, something strange is happening. I think we may be under attack." He held up a strange yellow flower as Darseid turned to look. Like nothing that had ever been seen on Apokolips.

Suddenly the flower jumped out of his hands and wrapped around Darksei'd face, hissing and sprouting fangs. Red beams shot out of his eyes cutting it into two pieces which fell, but when they landed at his feet both took root and began to spread and reproduce until the ground at their feet was covered I a carpet of green, new flowers growing and biting at their feet. Darkseid watched impassively as Steppenwolf yelped and jumped, trying and failing to keep them from biting him.

Darkseid waved his hand and an image of the planet, still shooting flamed from massive flame pits, appeared before them. However where there had once been barren wasteland it was easy to see green spreading, covering the land. Actually as a wave of oxygen filled the atmosphere the flames seemed to ride higher.

000

Ivy smiled as they watched from distant orbit. "I combined the seeds from Mogo with Earth dandelions, so it'll be nearly impossible to destroy them completely whatever they do and they will just spread again. I also added some parts of plants that thrive in fire rather than burn easily. It's amazing what a bioengineer like myself can do when you do not have to worry about the mutants I make destroying the environment. Some of them have my brain and DNA copied into them so they can fight back…" Batman zoomed in and saw a giant version of Ivy stomping across the landscape, one of several. "…and others are vicious monsters, as I do and a few are edible plants that will bare vegetables and fruit. So people will like some of them. But wait until pollen season."

"Man Darkseid's going to be pissed," Harley said with a grin.

Batman aid, "To be fair, he usually is anyway." Aside from the green flowers were spreading, making Apokolips almost pretty. "I have to warn you Darkseid is all about killing things and he may manage it."

Ivy smiled. "Oh there are some burrowing deep. They'll hibernate a while and then respawn. It could take literally forever." She looked at Harley. "Thanks for this babe. I feel like I've actually accomplished something even if it's only annoying Darkseid…"

"Always worthwhile,' Harley said. She turned to Batman. "Uh, he's not likely to come after us for this is he?"

"Darkseid tries to destroy our whole planet on a regular basis. And he has a lot of enemies. Even if he can specifically tie us to this, he mostly sees Earth as a whole so it's not as if he can do anything worse than he's already got planned."

Harley nodded. "I get ya. I mean Darkseid already knows my name and face from last time I was here. So it's not like this'll cheese him off more than I already have."

"You have that effect," Batman said.

Harley snorted and looked at Ivy "So ya feelin' better Daffodoll?"

Ivy hugged her. "I really am. I think when I get home I'll develop a seaweed that filters pollutants out of the ocean and maybe trees that do the same to the air." She looked at Batman. "I'm not giving up being an eco-terrorist or killing polluting CEOs, but that should keep me busy for… six months?"

Batman nodded. "You know if you do anything against the law I'll have to step in."

"Yeah, yeah. But for now… we did good, didn't we?" They looked down at the planet where fleeing Apoocaliptian people were fleeing from the dangerous mutant plants.

Batman smiled. He knew this was not exactly in lien with superheroics, but he had been tortured and killed and otherwise harassed by these people. A few times they had come here and beaten Darkseid and his people had raised him up again. Here he was essentially god and he had been very, very smug about that.

It was nice to do something that would make the nigh immortal evil overlord at least mildly uncomfortable in his own home.

They caught a glimpse of Granny Goodness, wide eyed, being cocooned in roots like that lady in the Addams Family movie and then he turned the ship around and headed back to Earth. It had been a good day indeed. And admittedly thought he might not say it out loud, flying through hyperspace with Harley and Ivy I the back groping each other was not the worst trip through space he'd had. Only a month before he'd been trapped with Booster Gold and Plasticman when they had to get a ride back to Earth with Space Cabby and the other three decided to have an impromptu sing along. He had been one more bottle of beer from opening the airlock of the cab and embracing sweet death.

Behind the something exploded n Apokolips, wiping out a chunk o green the size of Australia. A moment later it had grown back. Batman smirked and headed for home.

000

Granny Goodness stared at her Furies and snarled, "Lord Darkseid has finally figured out who brought this plague of plant pestilence to our beloved Apokolips. Go my Furies and bring us the heads of Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy."

Kneeling they bowed their heads. "Yes Granny Goodness.' She stormed away, cape flying in the wind.

Lash stood up and said, "Okay, so Granny and Darkseid still don't know we're friends with them, so we'll do what we usually do."

"Bring booze, have a kegger, let Power Girl pretend she 'blacked out' from to much booze, and have an orgy with Harley, Ivy, and all their friends," they chorused.

"Can we invite Barda? I miss her and those abs of hers… yummy."

"We also owe tiny Tina a birthday present."

"Dibs on the whiskey."

"We so need to hit the Metropolis Mall…"

"Isn't there a chance Lord Darkseid's going to figure this out and kill us all?"

Lash shrugged. "Meh. It's Darkseid. To be fair there's a chance he'll kill us on a whim at any moment. When your go to move when you're bored is a hideous painful death and torture, it's hard to escalate when someone actually fails you. Besides we'll just do the usual, say that Superman and the Justice League stopped us and he'll swear vengeance against Earth and we'll spend the next week on some complicated plan that might work for the five minutes it takes a time traveler to show up and undo it. If that doesn't work, a woman named Amanda Waller gave me this specially designed gas that erases his memory for up to three days."

"I don't remember that."

"That's because you keep trying to rat us out about it." Lash pulled small spray canister from her breasts and spritsed her with it.

"Huh? Wait… what're we doing?"

(One Boom Tube and a shopping trip later outside Harley's Place)

"Surprise."

Harley grinned at the girls loaded down with party supplies. "Darkseid figure out we punked your planet?"

Lash nodded. "Yeah. Who knew our god-emperor had hay fever? Turns out that's the main reason he turned our world into a fiery hellscape. He's sniffly and pissed."

"He's always pissed," Ivy said with a grin. "Sniffly sounds cute though."

"Anyway we've been expecting you," Harley said. "Come on, we've got lots of our buds on speed dial and I got a special piñata shaped like Granny Goodness. When he heard what we did Swamp Thing got his buddy John Constantine to enchant it so it works like a voodoo doll!"

"Sweet," the Furies chorused with malicious grins.

Author's Note

The Justice League often heads to the future and if Batman Beyond, let alone the legion, show us anything, it's that Ivy does not wipe out humanity and make everything on Earth green. We know she can't anyway. Plants need animals. That's why Ivy had to share a cell with Harley, because otherwise Ivy would suffocate to death.

All the same I felt Ivy could use a win and terraforming Apokolips instead seemed like a fun weekend for her and Harley, who has indeed been to Apokolips. Given Darkseid's stated goal of ending all life in all existence, I seriously doubt anyone would have a problem with this. You know aside from him and his people. And even some of them might like it.

I know this was a bit short, but to be fair I was working on a collection of lesbian horror stories called "Queer Creatures" (Available now from Amazon and its affiliates) and as for super heroes you might enjoy my book "Super Naked" in which a very good superhero team gets a little less respect from the other heroes because their powers prevent them from wearing clothes.

Quick question for when you review this fan fic: who are your favorite heroes and given their super powers, how many of them should not be able to wear clothes unless they went to extreme measures, like inventing unstable atoms or using multimillion dollar equipment stolen from a lab or similar, to make ridiculously complex costume materials? I mean Superman has to run around in a soiled baby blanket (hence the yellow S). Flash pretty much has to be stealing from Star Labs. The Fantastic Four…