“Now to truly experience the wonder of caviar,” Talia
instructed, “you want to spoon a good-size portion onto your toast point,
there, just like this, and then place it in your mouth without biting…”
Greg’s eyes grew wide, but he let his pretty date feed him
the little triangle of bread she had prepared, heaped with gooey black fish eggs
and a sliver of onion.
“…now use that silver tongue of yours to pop them
against the roof of your mouth, to release the full flavor of the rich
delicacy.”
Greg managed a smile as he did so and then swallowed.
His palette wasn’t accustomed to the “full flavor of the rich
delicacy,” to him it tasted a lot like “too much salt.”
But he liked trying new things, and he appreciated the effort Talia was
making on his behalf—not to mention the cost of this extravagance (as well as
that of the champagne, a luxury he liked much better).
He wasn’t at all sure why she was doing it.
Well, he understood why in the strict sense; he wasn’t an idiot. Woman invites you out to dinner, then up to her room
afterwards, and there’s a candlelit table waiting with a bottle of champagne…
He just wasn’t clear on why him.
He didn’t get it. He
didn’t get it back in Chinatown when she transitioned so eerily from having
Nigma killed to dropping those hints about a charming little bistro near her
hotel… then once he’d let the hint pass came the flat out invitation.
Greg was far from sheltered but he had never been on a date
like this. It was like you
see in the movies, the posh restaurant on the Upper East Side, so loud and busy,
crowded with beautiful people in fashionable clothes.
There were older ones too that seemed to breathe money and power,
especially the men in the gray suits that kept eying them while they waited for
their table. At first, Greg assumed
they were just admiring Talia. She
was a pretty little thing, petite and brunette, which was certainly his favorite
combination, and with such a reserved, exotic air about her.
Certainly that warranted a look or two from men that have working eyes,
who could blame them.
But then, as Talia and Greg walked to their table, he
couldn’t help but notice the eyes that followed her were more hostile than
admiring. Phrases like
“Yeah, it’s her” and “some nerve” wafted through the air.
They could have meant anybody, but Greg didn’t think so.
Then while they looked at the menus, he could hear two men distinctly
from the table behind him:
“What’s she calling herself now?
Arugula or something. Like her face wasn’t plastered on enough
magazines that she’d go unnoticed.”
Greg winced, suspecting Talia could hear as well as he
could. ‘Arugula’ was the way
the reservation desk had butchered her name and most of the patrons had heard it
called out several times in the lobby and lounge before they were seated.
There could be no question now who these hostile pockets of dialogue were
discussing. Talia ignored it all
the same, studying her menu with icy dignity.
“…Head, huh, ‘bout all she’s good for, if you ask
me…” “Oh but pronounced
‘Heed,’ David, don’t forget, it’s pronounced ‘Heed.’
Affected little bitch.”
Both men seated behind him laughed bitterly, and Greg threw
down his napkin angrily.
“Many people lost money in the reversal of LexCorp’s
fortunes,” Talia said calmly to her companion, seeing that he was ready to
cause a scene on her behalf. “It
is most understandable that they wish to blame someone for their
disappointments.”
“Still, Miss al Ghul, people should have more
consideration.”
“Not in this city,” she muttered bitterly, “but
please, call me Talia. Now then,
the goose livers look tasty, how about that to begin?”
Greg said nothing but his eyes raced over the appetizers in
search of something-anything that sounded better than goose livers.
“I’m actually more of a Joe’s Crab Shack kind
of guy, Miss al… Talia. You know, All You
Can Eat Fridays, jalapeno poppers, heh hehe.”
Talia affixed him with an icy stare.
“How about the stuffed mushrooms,” he suggested,
grasping at the first words that looked familiar.
“Stuffed with crab, capers and—uh oh, Arugula.”
He gave a happy laugh—which startled Talia very much.
“You… can laugh at this?”
“What else is there to do?”
Talia stared.
“Hey, Miss Talia Head al Ghul, you’re talking to Greg
Brady here. ‘I’ll take
Names People Make Fun Of for 500, Jack!’”
He laughed again. Talia
didn’t seem to get the joke at all, but Greg recognized her polite smile for
what it was and encouraged it until it became a tentative laugh.
He had been in DEMON long enough to hear stories enough
about “the Great One’s daughter,” but he was beginning to think that, under
it all, she was a regular girl that just needed some loosening up like all the
rest of them. Get her away from
this place with the goose livers and nasty patrons that hated her, and find a
nice roadhouse where you tossed the peanut shells onto the floor, and who
knows…
Hiding over a head shop, how was that for irony?
Riddler, the greatest brain among all Batman’s foes, taking refuge over
a head shop.
This is how Edward Nigma consoled himself about his present
circumstances. He was in
hiding. He was on the run for his
life—and he wasn’t even sure how it all came about.
He had just got settled into the hotel where Talia was staying, conveniently
positioned right across the hall from her, he made contact and turned on the old
Nigma charm.
But the silly woman had refused to be charmed.
Talia al Ghul turned out to be not quite as stupid as he supposed
going in—which was terribly inconsiderate of her.
She saw through his pretense and she refused to be gulled.
That was unusual. Too many
women, in his experience, would latch onto the slightest hint of non-hostility and
decide romance was in the air. Stand
next to them in a group photo and they start picking out china patterns.
He had Talia pegged as exactly that kind of needy headcase, but she had
truly surprised him.
But then! Having
had brains enough to see through his charade, she reverted to form and foolishly let
him know she smelled the rat.
Why?
Why? Why? Why
do women do such things??? If
you’re going to be stupid, then BE STUPID and step into the trap.
If you’re to be savvy enough to see what’s what and set a trap of
your own, you should at least have the brains to cover your tracks!
Nigma doubted that a creature like Talia could present him
with any kind of actual challenge, but he would have been happy to engage
her in a test of wits (such as they were) simply as something to do.
It would have kept his mind occupied as they both went through the
pretense of courtship while trying to destroy each other.
But to simply TELL him to his face that he was an
unappealing little worm and she was going to have him stepped on!
What kind of game was that???
Women. Women
were a riddle. Women
were A RIDDLE.
So now he was in hiding in this cramped little room above a
head shop, and the irony that appealed to him so much when he rented it was
fading fast in the cloud of odors emanating from below.
Cheap incense was bad enough on its own, but cheap incense covering
marijuana was downright nauseating.
He had to THINK. Quite
apart from the whole ‘hired killers hunting him’ situation, there was the
Batman question to consider. He
NEEDED TO THINK—HE NEEDED TO THINKTHINKTHINKTHINKTHINK.
There had to be a way to clear his mind a bit so he could
process all this. There had to be.
There just had to.
Nightwing was positioned on a rooftop across from Gotham
Memorial Hospital. With the
Scarecrow and a DEMON assassin both inside as patients, it was understood among
the Bat-family that the place needed to be kept under 24-hour watch.
The midday shift was the most demanding at this time of year. And that,
Nightwing knew, is why he had been assigned it. Barbara’s little punishment
for his giving Jean Paul a hard time.
It was hot and unpleasant to be in a dark Kevlar costume on
a rooftop in the heat of summer. The
sunlight glared off the tiny viewscreen where Oracle piped the feeds from the
hospital’s surveillance cameras. He
had to squint. He was sweating like
a farm animal as the sun beat down on his dark hair and he had to squint, all
because he had acted like a husband and Babs didn’t like it.
…
Dick knew he was being petty. It was the kind of grievance you nursed on a stakeout simply
for something to do. Otherwise,
out of sheer boredom, you might start to imagine crazy things like Selina’s
Jaguar pulling into the parking garage below.
Dick stared at the car as a woman’s slim, white hand
reached out of the window to take the timestamp from the machine.
He saw the car disappear into the garage and then turned his attention to
the viewscreen. He punched up
the lobby cameras and waited to see if a shapely dark-haired woman got off the
elevator from the garage… none did.
He checked the ICU floor, and then the hallway outside the Scarecrow’s
room… Nothing.
He started to check the lobby again when he felt a delicate tap on his
shoulder and a thermos bobbed into his peripheral vision.
“Heya, handsome, something cold to drink?”
His head jerked up from the screen… Either Bruce was
finally providing rooftop cocktail waitresses for their convenience, or else…
“Hi, Selina.”
“Hi,” she smiled.
“I saw your car. Didn’t
think you’d be visiting Crane,” he said, taking the thermos gratefully. “Is this iced tea?”
She nodded. “Bruce
wanted me to look in on Jean Paul at his apartment. So I figured as long as I was coming into town, I’d come
see you before heading over to JP’s. We’re supposed to be working together
on this Talia idiocy. Although now
that he’s gone and broken his leg, I might be off the hook there.
Do I have you to thank for that, by the way?”
“Boy, you really don’t like him,” Dick couldn’t help
but chuckle. “I knew there was a
reason we got on so well.”
“No, I don’t,” she admitted frankly.
“Tied up with a lot of bad memories, I guess.”
Dick sipped his tea and ran his fingers through his
sweat-soaked hair.
“That’s true for most of us,” he mentioned.
She shrugged, not caring, and again Dick had to chuckle.
For Selina, other people’s views on any subject, from the laws against
burglary to the care and feeding of bat-wannabes, was entirely their own
business. Her view was dictated by
her own feline fiat and it always would be.
“It was Croc that broke Azrael’s leg,” Dick
explained, changing the subject. “The
two of us went down to the Iceberg just as soon as Oracle said there was
trouble. Croc was holding the DEMON
guy and fighting off Batman at the same time.”
Selina raised an eyebrow.
“Yeah,” Dick understood her skepticism.
“Even for Croc, that’s not possible.
He couldn’t do both, so he threw DEMON-guy down and sat on him—cracked up his ribcage, damn near collapsed a lung, I think. We knew we had to
get him to move before the guy was crushed.
Even Batman’s way can take a while with a monster like Crockers,
so—”
“Flaming sword?”
“Flaming sword. Azrael
got him to stand up all right, but then it’s not just Killer Croc, it’s
‘angry and scorched’ Croc. Picked
Az up like a basketball and made a free throw straight into the bar.”
“Ah.”
“Yeah…
So… Bruce has you going
to see him?”
She nodded. “Yep.
I’m not sure why. If it’s just to ‘be nice’ and make a gesture—or to get me out of the way for a while.”
“Selina! I can’t believe you’d even think that last
one. I mean, ok, Bruce’ll do
that, I know—to me. To me, sure.
To Babs, certainly. To Tim, weekly.
But c’mon, getting you out of the way?”
“It’s a little weird at home right now, Dick.
Something’s happening with us. There’s
something going on that neither of us seems able to talk about or even admit
to—”
“You’re just getting this now?” Dick asked in a flat
deadpan.
Selina’s eyes flared angrily, but she said nothing.
Dick gulped the remaining tea from the thermos and handed it back.
“Selina, I really think it’s nothing more than he
didn’t like that riddle coming in with the Catwoman goggle picture.”
The angry stare morphed into one of shocked confusion.
“Riddle?”
“Y-yeah. …Oops. Way
to go, Grayson. Guess he
hadn’t mentioned that to you?”
Selina slumped wearily.
“No. Not like he
tells me all about ‘work’ in the normal course of things—and I don’t
expect him to tell me everything but… damn.
Riddles now. And
demonspawn. This whole thing is
such a mess.”
“Talia? I
haven’t heard this one. You said
you’re working with Az on it? What’s
Miss Nepal up to now?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Selina sighed. “Trying to get under my skin probably. Running around town as a second-rate Catwoman.
I mean, really, at this point, what’s another one, give or take?
I’ve already got this idiotic goggle-bitch in the Post with cat-powers
and bad hair. At least the spawn’s
got decent hair.”
Dick stared.
“Well she does,” Selina insisted.
“Maybe she wants to bait you—get you to try and kill
her.”
“I don’t kill people,” Selina reminded him sweetly.
“I make them wish they’d never been born.
Speaking of which…” She stood, taking the thermos, and moved to
leave, “I’m off to the Imposter’s to take my medicine.
Checking in on the miserable…” She
trailed off, then turned back to Nightwing thoughtfully.
He waited… the mention of Azrael had obviously set her
off in some way and he was curious what might follow.
“Dick, when it happened… with… Bane.
If I’d come to you in Bludhaven, I mean, when I saw he was gone and that
it was an imposter in the batsuit, if I’d come to you and asked, would you
have told me… something? anything? that
he wasn’t dead at least?”
Dick gave a sad smile and a sadder nod.
It was one of those questions that couldn’t be answered fairly… It
was impossible to know what he would have done at that time—but it was easy
to see the answer she needed to hear. “Of
course.”
Nigma only took three steps into the head shop before he
reconsidered. Much as he felt the
need to calm his agitated mind, he simply wasn’t prepared to get high.
He got such a tremendous kick out of THINKING, he couldn’t risk gumming
up the works of the priceless mechanism of his mind.
One need look no further than that sorry chap behind the counter to
assess the risks involved using these substances.
“Dude,” the clerk began (because it was the
beginning of a sentence, Nigma figured), “Can I, like, help ya?”
“That’s okay, Dude,” Nigma answered back
(because it sometimes amused him to communicate with inferior minds on their own
level), “I only wanted to read these notices on your bulletin board.”
“OR DO A MUDDLE YON,” he muttered under his breath, improvising an
anagram for “you addled moron.” He
made a pretense of looking at the posted ads:
a band called Shards was playing at a club called Redlight—although how
that related to the picture of a candle dripping wax onto a human skull, even the Riddler’s great brain couldn’t fathom.
There were rooms for rent and futons for sale.
The cheap mimeographed sheets were all pink, yellow or blue—except
for a single one in white, with two simple words in plain black type:
???
GOT QUESTIONS?
A man of Edward Nigma’s mentality couldn’t help but be
intrigued.
“I say, Dude!” he called to the store clerk, “Would
you know who posted this enigmatic sign with the question marks?”
“Oh, that’s Madame Keila, Dude. She’s got that little place in the back, just go round to
the alley, green door by the dumpster, can’t miss it.”
Eddie’s face lit up and he
waved a cheery wave of thanks to
the helpful clerk. A green door,
what clearer sign could he hope for?
Azrael had been quiet.
At first, it might have been the painkiller administered before setting
the broken leg. But now, Jean Paul
was convinced it had more to do with the DVD he was watching to pass the time.
Mortal?
Azrael spoke at last, This program we are watching…
Sex and the City.
Er, yes. It
is not appropriate for one like myself.
You didn’t mind the SIMS bikini babes in the hot tub.
I merely drew your attention to elements of the game
your tiny avatar did not seem aware of. I
in no way—
Oh, whatever, you Dumasian stuffed shirt.
This show is educational, remember that.
That’s what Green Arrow taught us.
I do not know that he was completely serious when he
said that.
Sigh. Look, Az, the Order didn’t prepare you to deal with aggressive women.
And lord knows the girls at New England Polytech never gave me a clue.
This show helps. That guy is called Mr. Big.
You watch him, and next time Catwoman throws us a curve, that’s the
stuff to give her. Forget adding
gold epaulettes to the armor, just stand back like Mr.Big and say…
Nice dress.
Nice dress?!? We watch six seasons of this stuff and
THAT’S what you come up?
This is not suitable for one such as I, Mortal.
Give me the remote.
No.
Although this Charlotte does display a seemly virtue.
Really?
She is modest. She
does not discuss her orgasms as much as the others do.
Eh, yeah, I guess.
Her heart must be pure indeed to resist the wanton
influence of her comrades.
I like Miranda.
You would. Beware
the temptations of the flesh, Mortal.
It’s a TV show!
It is this lack of discipline that allowed our adversary
to gain the advantage and lay us low.
It was the fact that he’s a six-foot-five, 270-pound
reptile-man that could pick us up and throw us like a lawn dart.
Answer the door, Mortal.
The doorbell rang before Jean Paul could sputter his
surprise. He juggled his bowl of
popcorn and crutches, muttering all the while about insufferable angels that
were more literal than the Deep Blue chess program—when the door swung open
and he found himself staring into the icy green eyes of Selina Kyle.
“Nice dress,” he remarked meekly.
Riddler was less than thrilled on reaching Madame Keila’s
green door to see the sign above advertising “Horoscope, Palm Reading, and
Tarot.”
“What is a lot of hooey?” he queried at the sign.
But he went in anyway, remembering the original Got Questions? ad that
brought him here and the green door he had considered a happy omen.
Opening the door, he was again hit with a wave of aromas.
It was similar to the smell in his room—for this place too shared a
wall with the headshop and the same combination of patchouli and weed
seamed to permeate. But there was something else, something he couldn’t
identify… Bizarre smells seemed to be his special curse this week.
He began to wonder if he would be in this position at all if he’d just
made the best of the dead rat in the air conditioner and stayed in his hideout
in the first place.
“You crinkle nose,” a woman’s voice observed.
“You no like the smell of my sauerkraut?”
“Is that what it is?” Eddie wheezed, looking around.
The woman, presumably Madame Keila, had entered from a dark backroom not
unlike Kittlemeier’s. She had
dark, greasy hair pulled into a tight bun, an unflattering style that made her
look older than she probably was. “I’m
sure your sauerkraut is very good on its own,” Eddie offered.
“It’s just combined with those other smells from next door, it
presented something of a puzzle.” Madame
Keila smiled, revealing wildly crooked teeth.
“You want fortune?” she asked peremptorily.
“Yes!” he answered instantly. A question and a play on words, how could he resist?
“Sit,” she ordered, pointing to a side table.
Nigma did as instructed and Madame Keila disappeared into the back.
When she returned, she wore a heavy-looking paisley shawl over her
sleeveless cotton shirt.
“That looks warm,” he noted. “You don’t have to bother with it on my account.”
She shrugged it off her shoulders but looked at him
critically.
“You don’t believe, do you?”
“No,” he admitted, “But I like the amount of your
conversation that you phrase as a question.”
“Okay, fine,” she said decisively, as if suddenly
understanding everything. Then she
laid out several cards, placed her hands over a specific one and pointed down at
it with her middle finger. “Turn.”
Eddie obeyed, flipping the card over, and looking at it
with alarm.
“That man has bat-wings,” he noted, pointing to the
card.
“Is Devil,” Madame Keila explained.
“Could be,” Eddie admitted.
Or he could be an obnoxiously rich billionaire dating my best friend, came
the ancillary thought.
“You have strong feelings against this man,” Madame
Keila noted, observing her subject’s reaction rather than interpreting the card.
“That is a misconception,” Riddler replied, puffing
himself up with great dignity. “Others
may hate him. I merely enjoy the game. I rejoice in his existence, for at
last, I have an opponent smart enough to play with. When I can fool him, it is a success, intellectually and
artistically.”
Madame Keila nodded. If
the customer wanted to do all the talking, that was fine with her.
They were sure to be happy with their reading that way.
She pointed to the next card and Nigma flipped it over.
“Ace of Swords… is Air sign, has to do with brain.
Great mental powers at work.”
Nigma puffed up importantly. “That is very true.”
“Upside down means mental illness. Compulsion.”
“No, no, no, no, no,” he shook his head.
“That is another misconception. Look,
any game, there are rules. Giving a
fair clue, that’s just one of the rules of the game.
The way people carry on like it’s some kind of a disease, it’s quite
ridiculous. To be sure, there are
those who are downright crazy, but I am not one of them!
It’s only inferior intellects that can’t understand that, so they call me
crazy.” He pointed back to the
Ace, “It’s the curse of genius. The
mediocrities have always had to rework it so you’re not better than them, you
must be ill.” He turned
the card around so it was right side up, indicating genius rather than
compulsion.
Madame Keila gave an uncertain nod and pointed to a third
card, but Nigma wasn’t finished.
“And another thing, I don’t go around saying all those
stupid people should die, not like some, not like Miss Demonspawn and her old
man, you want to talk about who’s crazy.
I have absolutely no problem if all the dimwits want to go on living.
I’d like them to KNOW how fucking stupid they really are, but that’s
as far as it goes. Because there are smart people in this world and there
are stupid ones—which brings us right back to bat-wings over here…”
He pointed back to the Devil card and began punching his pointing finger
into the table to accentuate each word. “And
I really need to know which one he is.”
Madame Keila was now sitting back on her chair, one hand on
her hip, the other leaning on the table.
“You finished?” she asked dryly.
“No,” Nigma said petulantly. They sat in silence for a minute, his rant having spent
itself. Then he began wagging his
finger while he thought. “I need
some kind of a test. That’s what I
need to do… Well, let’s see,
there is that outstanding cat-clue that I was due to send out and never did.
What if I sent it in some sly way that he’ll never know about,”
Riddler pointed to the Devil card yet again, “unless he’s y’know, and then
he’ll figure it out and kick my ass… and then I’ll know!
Ha! That’s pretty good.
And I’ve already got the cat.
Cute enough little thing, but what do I want with a pet cat?
I only got it for that bit with Talia.
Yeah, that’s not bad. Send
the clue on the cat. It’s good,
it’s really, really good. Hot damn,
it’s the perfect plan!”
He stood happily and held out his arms. “Thank you,
Madame Keila!” he exclaimed, bending down to kiss the good lady, when he
suddenly bolted upright and slammed his hand back on the table.
“No, damnit all, there’s a snag. I’m still in hiding, because that miserable little bitch
has sent some kind of super assassins to kill me.
DAMN THAT SILLY WOMAN ANYWAY! AM
I NEVER to get this operation off the ground because of her interference.
Demons, Demons everywhere I turn. This
is all that Ra’s al Ghul’s fault, you know.
That miserable hairdo. And
whipped! The guy is whipped by his own girlie-spawn.
Not just this one, oh no, he’s got a whole litter of the psychobabes. Spare the rod and all that; they up and killed him, that’s what they did.
Someone replaced that Lazarus shower gel he uses with something a little
more potent, you hear what I’m sayin’. Took over his whole operation.
Girlified it, too. I hear they’re putting in a Pier One. And the henchmen used to think it was rough!
Ha! Just wait.
At least Ra’s never sent you on a feminine products/Haagen Daaz run or
had you exiled ‘because you look like that two-timing bastard Achmed.’”
“Your reading is concluded,” Madame Keila cut in.
“Twenty dollars.”
“You don’t even want to know what it takes to be an Ubu
these days,” Nigma replied.
“Twenty dollars, please,” Madame Keila repeated.
“Yeah, whatever,” Nigma reached into his wallet and
pulled out a bill, tossed it onto the table and left in disgust.
Madame Keila went straight to the telephone and called her
contact at the Gotham Post. “Gregory,
I have had such visions, great events unfolding in the Far East.
I have such predictions for you… it is about Death, grim and
inevitable, like that song, the Schubert, Death and the Maiden.”
To be continued…
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