Bruce scowled at the Batcave monitor.  Every time he turned his focus on one of them, the other tried something.  It was painfully predictable.

     He didn’t turn at the telltale sound of Selina coming down the stairs.  He barely even noticed.  It had been Selina’s plan, and it had been a good plan, but it had relied on the dubious premise that Ivy could be kept in line.  And well, clearly that was no more possible than it had ever been.

     “Ouch,” Selina said, looking at the monitor showing the evening news, then at the look on his face.  “Either the Knights lost again, or you saw the lead story and it was - ”

     “I saw the lead story,” Bruce growled unnecessarily.

     Selina winced.  “How bad was it?”

     “You knew?”

     “Well, it’s not like I have access to a television when I’m on the prowl, but I saw it on the headline crawl in Times Square so I popped into the Lounge to get the unofficial version.  There was a reporter?”

     Bruce pushed a button on the console and the recording started anew.  The news had set off about nine different red flags on the Batcomputer when it hit the airwaves.

     “Ivy, do you have a statement about Ms. Leibowitz’s accusations?”

     Once again he watched as the television reporter shoved a microphone in Poison Ivy’s face.  The harsh glare from the TV camera spotlight showed, once again, how insane Ivy really was if she insisted her skin wasn’t green.

     “She doesn’t seem too upset about having a pushy reporter and a camera crew in the Lounge entrance,” Selina observed.

     “Of course not,” Bruce graveled.  “She’s enjoying this.”

     “What accusations?” Ivy asked.  She was trying to hide it, but Bruce recognized the smug look in her eyes.  “Jenna Leibowitz is beneath my notice, really.”

     “So you’re unaware that Ms. Leibowitz invaded the headquarters of a local greeting card company wearing green tights, and tried to set fire to their main offices for ‘crimes against the plant kingdom’?”

     “Crimes against the plant kingdom?” Selina winced.  “That’s zero points for originality, and minus-ten for really wooden dialogue.  No pun intended.”

     “Oh, that,” Ivy was saying airily.  “I had nothing to do with it.  She’s been copying me – poorly - for months with that club of hers.  I’m not surprised she did it again.  I mean, yes, the greeting card industry is responsible for many deaths, but the overall numbers—”

     “Yes, yes, Ivy, but she says you used some sort of chemical attack to make her totally loyal to you, and then sent her to set fire to the building.”

     “Really?” Ivy asked, unconcerned.  “Well, I won’t dignify that with a response, except to say that you can ask every woman who ever crossed paths with me in my – former life.  Ask them if I ever used chemicals or drugs to make them do something they wouldn’t normally do.  None of them will say yes.  Men, yes.  Women, no.  It’s like she doesn’t know me at all.”

     “So you’re saying the accusations are false?”

     Bruce could read the look on Ivy’s face perfectly.  It said “Wasn’t that obvious from my last answer, you dimwit?”

     “Wasn’t that perfectly obvious from her answer?” Selina asked. 

     Bruce decided not to mention what he’d been thinking.

     “Green tights, you say?” Ivy asked instead.  “Do you have a picture?”

     The reporter leaned partially off-camera and then handed Ivy what was evidently a folded copy of the late edition.

     Ivy looked at it and then chuckled unpleasantly.

     “Don’t say anything, Pammy,” Selina muttered.  “Don’t say it.”

     “Well,” Ivy purred, “if she was attempting to look like me, perhaps she could have sacrificed just 1/10,000^th of one tree and made use of a little Kleenex.”

     Selina sighed as Bruce turned it off.  “Well, I guess she deserved a little cattiness.”

     “And what about Jenna?  What did she deserve?”  Bruce grunted.  “You and I both know, unlike virtually everyone else, that women are no longer immune to greening.”

     “Unfortunately,” Selina muttered.

     “Clearly Ivy decided to eliminate her competition the quick and easy way.  Because that’s how she likes life, easy,” Bruce said angrily.  “She set Jenna up, when all she had to do was what you told her: wait and let Jenna destroy herself.”

     Selina didn’t respond the way he’d been expecting, though.  “Actually,” she said, “from what I heard at the Lounge, Jenna was trying to destroy more than that.”

     “What do you mean?”

     “The cameras were gone when I swung by the Lounge, and so was Ivy.  But Hagen was there.”

     “Clayface?”

     “No, Joe Hagen the electrical contractor—Of course, Clayface!  He told me that Jenna started it last night.  He and Ivy caught her behind the Rydbergii with a satchel full of Molotov cocktails.  She was trying to burn the building down.”

     Bruce digested that for a moment.  “He could be lying,” he said finally.  “He and Ivy have been working together for weeks.”

     “No they haven’t,” Selina said instantly.  “Bruce, look, I know you’re inclined to see any two rogues in the same place at the same time as a team-up, but believe me, where those two are concerned, more divides them than unites them.  There’s a lot of history there that has nothing to do with Batman, and it would take a lot more than having once plopped you in a death trap to bring them together.”

Bruce grunted.

“Besides, Matt says Victor was there too.  And considering Victor was the one who had to give Ivy a ride home the night Matt bought her potpourri, I don’t think he has much incentive to lie for her either.  If those two say Ivy was acting in self-defense, she was.”

     He couldn’t argue with that.  If Victor could back up their story… “Rogue justice,” he sneered.  “Oswald never called the police if there was a problem at the Iceberg, and clearly Ivy kept that policy.  Instead of having Jenna arrested for arson—”

     “She framed her for attempted arson.  Ironically, she framed Jenna for a lesser offense.  As far as ‘The System’ goes—the official, legal, institutional punishments—she’s getting off easy.”

     “That’s not much of a defense.  Ivy is capable of anything,” Bruce growled.  It was halfhearted, though.  Ivy was guilty of obstruction of justice and a handful of other crimes, but she had been guilty of worse.  Much worse.  She had practiced restraint, for a rogue, and while that normally wouldn’t sway him, the fact remained that Harley Quinn was in a very dangerous mental state, and Ivy was, in all probability, the best chance of bringing her out of it.

     “Yes, she’s capable of it, but she didn’t do it. It’s a start.  If we drop it, she might just settle back to the path she was on before Jenna came along to firebomb her.”

     “I should make sure she knows I’m onto her,” he muttered.

     “I’m sure she already does, World’s Greatest Detective.”

     Grunt.

     We felt like this was the second time we’d done this.  Granted, normally we never do something only once if we can do it a second time.  But “having a private meeting in a nightclub with a beautiful redhead in green” was not normal for us.

     “Two-Face,” Ivy said as we came in.

     Ouch.  “No Harvey?” we asked.

     “You reap what you sow,” she quoted.

     Double ouch – just the way we liked it.  “If this is a seduction attempt, maybe you should stick to the pheromones,” we said.

     If it was a seduction attempt, and at that point it was looking like a two percent chance, she wasn’t putting much effort into it.  Ivy wasn’t behind the bar, and she didn’t appear to have a drink ready for us.  Clearly she was paying attention the last time we met, if this was her way of telling us that actions have consequences. 

     Now if only she could apply that lesson to herself.

     “This is not me trying to seduce you,” Ivy said frostily.  “I said I wanted to talk to you, not fuck you.”

     “Jenna said she wanted to talk.  Next thing we knew, she was straddling our lap, trying to polish our coin.” 

     Ivy looked revolted.  “I suppose you didn’t need to flip for that.  Two-Face gets his ‘coin polished’ and your better half gets a little payback, screwing my biggest rival.”

     “No, we did not have to flip for it,” we conceded.  “We had no difference of opinion, and therefore no need to let Fate decide.  But we agreed in the other direction, Ivy, not the one you seem to think: neither of us have any interest in a psychotic social climber spreading her legs.”

     She looked shocked by that.  Well, Pammy always did think she knew everything.  We sneered at her. 

      “You’re a bright girl, Pammy.  You can figure it out as quickly as we did: We weren’t the ones she was trying to screw.”

     Recovering from the surprise, Ivy returned our sneer.  “So?  You would both get something out of it.  Wouldn’t that be a win-win?  Isn’t that how your nasty side likes it?”

     “No,” we repeated.  “We can appreciate your logic, Pammy, but you miss the salient point.  We are a man. If we wanted to screw the little tramp, that would be a handy rationale, but since we didn’t, it’s not.  We weren’t interested.  She didn’t appeal.  Get it?  And we’re not so hard up for the horizontal mambo that we’ll let some demented nutjob use us to get back at you.”        

     She just stood there.  “Well,” she finally said.  “This might go a little easier than I hoped.”

     “What will?”

     “Even though neither of us find her all that appealing, evidently, we do need to talk about Jenna.  You heard the news?”

     We nodded.  “We saw the television.  Kleenex, Ivy?  We thought that was a little petty.”

     She just smiled back at us.  “I thought I deserved to be a bit catty.”

     “Speaking of which, we hear Selina has been by.  Business picking up?”

     Ivy’s smile vanished.  She got up from her barstool in a huff and went back behind the bar.  “I don’t want to talk about her,” she said.

     “Then give us the drink you should have offered us when we came in, and we will not speak her name.”  We glared at her.  “You’re going to have to get used to it, if you ever want our business one day.”

     Muttering something we didn’t catch, Ivy poured us a double-malt Scotch.  She was quick and efficient, something we wouldn’t associate with Ivy and day-wage labor.  We guessed the rumors were true.  “Here,” she said, shoving the glass in our direction.  “You’ll pardon the lack of niceties.  I’m still getting used to it.” 

     Ignoring her, we took the glass.  We remembered times when she was nicer about it.  Usually sex followed.  On second thought, it was probably best if we didn’t remember that. 

     “Jenna, then?”

     “From your ‘psychotic social climber’ remark, I assume you know the truth about her background.”

     “Groupie, wannabe sidekick, we heard.”  We didn’t say it was from Selina.  We did get our drink, after all.

     “And do you know what she did the other night?”

     “We heard a rumor.  Tried to burn this place down with you in it.  Slam-dunk for the prosecution.  She certainly had motive.” 

     Ivy frowned.  “We were still open, Harvey.  She tried to burn it down with me, Victor, and Hagen in it.  Not to mention my entire staff.”

     Once again, we were surprised to find our opinion of Jenna could sink lower than it already had.  The Rogues might not be frequenting the Lounge any longer, but people like Raven and Dove have a lot of goodwill with us.

     “You misunderstand us, Pammy.  We did not say ‘she had a motive’ meaning ‘she was justified.’ We… I was speaking as a prosecutor.  Jenna has such a public history of animosity towards you.  Escalating animosity.  When something like that finally erupts into a scarred side up action, her credibility is shot.  Even in a she said/she said stand off with an established villain.”

     “Oh.”

     We could tell she was thrown off balance by the unexpected support.  An unexpected bonus.

    “Interesting that you thought we were critical of you,” we chuckled, sipping our drink with a contented smile.  “For nearly getting yourself burned up, that’s an odd thing to be criticized for.  But then, we suppose you’re used to it.  People do tend to harbor strong grievances against you, Pammy.”

     “Yes, well, I harbor a very strong grievance against Jenna.  She tried something that can never be forgiven.”  She held up a hand before we could ask what – sarcastically.  Pammy doesn’t forgive much.  See “ceramic pot shards in the ass” incident.  “I don’t like to speak of it.  Just thinking about it makes me want to kill everyone in a five-mile-radius.”

     “Well, then we’d appreciate it if you stop thinking about it – or at very least, stretch it to six miles or cut it down to four.  We hate to think we’re about to die in a killing spree based on an odd number.”

     That seemed to calm her down a bit, judging by her smile.  She never was impervious to the ol’ Dentmeister charm.  Then her smile faded, and her eyes betrayed a quiet, seething rage.  The ol’ Dentmeister charm never worked for very long, either.

     “I’m going to make her suffer, Harvey,” Ivy told us.  “She’ll suffer every day for the rest of her life.  But I—” She sighed bitterly.  “For reasons that will become clear, I can’t do this alone.  I need your help and Eddie’s and Crane’s, and every other criminal in Gotham.”

     We sighed ourselves.  She needs our help.  She wants our help, more like it.  Typical Ivy assuming that just because she wants it, everyone will give it to her.

     “Christmas morning for you, Harvey,” she added when we didn’t respond at once.  “I am asking for your help.”  She folded her arms and looked away.  “Please,” she grumbled.

    …

     “I’m not the only one she’s offended.  She thought she could become one of us by replacing me, screwing you, and hosting everyone else in her little club.  A pathetic, sniveling groupie, Harvey.”

    …

     “She’s starved for our attention, Harvey.  She’s such an empty, soul-sucking vacuum that she needs us to notice her to feel alive.  She’s like a groupie on steroids.  Frankly,” she admitted reluctantly, “she needs to be made an example of.  You can all tell yourselves that’s what you’re doing, making an example of her.  It has nothing to do with helping me.”

     … “Did you put something in our drink?”

     “Ice?”

     “We must be hallucinating.  We thought you said ‘please’.”

     She looked pissed by that.  “Did you hear anything else I said?  And anyway, I’m not that bad!”

     “Uh, no, Ivy, you really are that bad.  In fact, you’re often a lot worse.  Why do you think I kicked you out of my lair last week?  You never ask for things, you demand them.”

     “Harvey—”

     We fished our coin out of our pocket.  “Heads, we help you, as a reward for you learning how to act like a human being.  Tails, we help you, so we can tell every man in Gotham about how you asked for their help.  Pleaded for it.  Hell, practically begged—”

     “All right, just flip the damn thing!”

     We smiled and flipped it – not because she told us, but because we wanted to.  We raised our hand and looked at it.  “Tails,” we said happily.

     “Fine.  Will you listen now?”

     “Gladly, once we’ve had our second Scotch.”

     Ivy rolled her eyes. 

     Jenna held her chin up high when the orderly came for her.  “Doc said it’s been twenty-four hours,” he told her.  “You can get your meds and sit in the rec room for a while before your first therapy session.”

     “Yes, that will be fine,” she told him.

     He looked at the ceiling briefly before taking her out of her cell.

     She was still extraordinarily pissed at Ivy for what she’d done.  The realization of what had happened when she found herself in those offices with the lit cocktail in her hand was bad.  The memory of all the things that lemony bitch had forced her to say was ten times worse.

     That being said, in one important respect she had made it.  She was one of Them.  She was a costumed criminal, a Rogue.  None of that sidekick shit for her, she was a woman in charge of herself.  And now she had the street cred of being confined to Arkham after everyone saw her being taken away on television.

     Ivy wouldn’t be able to get away from her now.  Sooner or later, she’d end up back in here with Jenna and all the others.  And until that happened, she’d have to take Jenna’s business.  She wouldn’t be able to deny someone of her stature, the others would demand Ivy let her in.  Ivy would have to pretend to smile as she served Jenna drinks like everyone else.

     Meanwhile, she’d have to come up with a fitting punishment for Harvey too.

     She was so lost in contemplating her new future that she didn’t even notice the trip to the rec room.  “Thirty minutes,” he told her as they passed through a set of double doors.  He handed her off to a second orderly.  “Take your meds like a good girl, okay?”

     Jenna didn’t answer.  She just looked around uncomprehendingly.  “Who are these people?” she asked after a minute, bewildered.

     “Your fellow patients,” the second orderly told her.

     “Uh, no,” she corrected him.  “That man who was just checkmated by an empty chair is not my fellow patient.  That woman who appears to believe she’s Judy Garland is not my fellow patient.  And the Mongoloid in the back?  The one who is pasting jigsaw pieces to his face?  That man is not my fellow patient.”

     “Damn, is he doing that again?” the orderly asked.  “Wait right here.”

     “But—” And he was gone.  Jenna had never been in Arkham before, so she didn't know how things were done here.  But this didn’t seem right at all.

     “You’ll get used to it.”

     Jenna looked to her right.  Where had this jumpy, shifty teenager come from?  “Used to what?”

     “To being a cartoon character.  I was shocked too when I discovered we’re all characters in a cartoon, but I adjusted.  These poor souls,” he said, gesturing around the room, “they haven’t adapted yet.”

     Wow.  They were just like the Rogues, except they lacked creativity.  “Where are all the criminals?” she asked.  “The Riddler?  The Mad Hatter?  Scarecrow?”

     “Oh, they have their own set,” the lunatic explained to her.  “They’re the stars of the show, you know.  They’re in the other wing.”

     The other wing.

     Jenna stormed over to the window where the nurse was sitting.  “Excuse me, but I appear to be in the wrong part of the hospital,” she said, agitated.

     “You need to take your sedative,” the nurse told her.

     “No, no, I do not belong in here with these garden-variety loons!” Jenna burst out.  “I belong in the other wing!”

     The nurse looked at her cynically.  “You’re the new girl, right?  The one on the TV?”

     Jenna stood up straighter.  “Yes, that was me.”

     “Yes, well,” the nurse replied, fishing out a file, “it says here your doctor feels that as you’re not a threat to society, you don’t need to be confined in our maximum-security wing.”

     “Not a threat to society?!  I tried to burn down Corporate America!”  It was no longer prudent to deny it or blame it on Ivy.  She needed to make this crime her own or they wouldn’t respect her!

     “Look, Ivy Junior,” the nurse replied, “I’m going to bend the rules a little bit and tell it to you straight.”  She leaned forward and beckoned Jenna with a finger.  She bent over.

     “You’re not the first copycat we’ve ever had,” the nurse said.  “The doctors have learned from experience that everyone is safer and happier when we keep the copycats away from the real criminals.”

     “Real criminals?”

     The nurse just put a little paper cup of pills in front of her, and then closed the shutter.

     Jenna stared at the pills.  The doctors were keeping her away from her brethren because she wasn’t dangerous enough?!

     Well, screw that!

     She tried to choke the chess player to death by stuffing pawns down his throat, but as she would learn, all that would get her was four days in a padded room.

     Like the nurse said, they’d gotten copycats before.

     “Harleen is recovering remarkably, Pamela,” Dr. Bartholomew assured her, looking almost insufferably pleased with himself.  “We have her on fast-track rehabilitation now.  She could be out in a week or two.”

     “Mm-hm, and what happens then?” Ivy asked, waiting for the perfect opportunity to tell him.

     “Well, we can’t just release her out onto the street.  Nobody wants her to regress into a life of crime.  This is a huge opportunity for her.  I think instead of releasing her right away, we’ll have the courts terminate the involuntary commitment order and issue a court order for outpatient commitment.”

     “So you think she could get better outside these walls with the right monitoring?” Ivy asked.

     Dr. Bartholomew looked at her for a few moments before answering.  “Pamela, I’m pleased to see you’ve given up your criminal ways, and I know how fond of Harleen you are, but I hope you weren’t thinking we’d just let her out the front door and into your waiting arms.  There are procedures to be followed, and the court has to approve everything.”

     If that wasn’t a perfect opportunity, then Ivy didn’t know what was.  “I completely understand that,” she told him, “which is why I’ve filed a motion with the courts to have Harley released into my care under one of your ‘outpatient commitment’ orders.”

     The doctor gaped at her.  “Excuse me?”

     “I’ve consulted with attorneys, Doctor,” Ivy told him.  She trusted that she was now the one who looked insufferably pleased with herself.  “They tell me that under the law, Harley has the right to counsel on her behalf.  They also tell me that under the law, Harley’s status needs to be reviewed by the courts every six months.  She hasn’t been here six months yet, but why not get a jump on things?”

     “Pamela,” Dr. Bartholomew told her, “I appreciate your concern for her, but—”

     “Doctor, Harley has not been charged with any crime,” Ivy reminded him.  “She was brought in the night the Joker died and, because she was considered a danger to herself, she was committed under a civil order.  And you yourself have just admitted that she’s recovering remarkably.  There is absolutely no legal reason why a court shouldn’t allow a successful woman of business such as myself to have temporary custody of her.  I can devote both time and resources to her that you cannot, and again, you yourself have admitted how ‘fond’ and ‘concerned’ I am when it comes to Harley.”

     “Pamela—”

     “Look, I… appreciate all that you’ve tried to do for her,” Ivy allowed, “but my attorneys have already filed the motion.  The asylum should be notified any minute now.  I assume that, as a trained and dedicated doctor, you will be completely honest when the court asks you to testify?”

     The doctor leaned back in his chair and stared at her.  “Fine,” he eventually said, suddenly seeming all too casual.  “I won’t oppose her release.”

     Her heart leapt a little, but it was held back by her suspicion.  “What’s the catch?”

     “No catch.  Since you seem to enjoy quoting me, let me remind you that I also said earlier how pleased I was that you had given up your criminal ways,” Dr. Bartholomew pointed out.  “I’ve had my eye on you ever since you began visiting her, Pamela.  Frankly, I think she’s had a more profound effect on your mental health than you’ve had on hers.”

     “What’s that supposed to mean?” Ivy asked.  She disagreed with him, of course, since she was the reason Harley had been committed in the first place.

     “She’s taught you how to care for another human being, Pamela.  I think trying to keep Harleen sane has kept you sane.  Which means the sooner she’s living under your roof, the better off you – and perhaps the city of Gotham – will be.”

     Ivy tried not to laugh.  A trained doctor, and here he was using armchair psychology on her.  Like she needed Harley to save her. 

     Harley Quinn sat up in bed, stretched, and yawned.  “Yessirree, today’s going to be another great day!” she said brightly.

     I keep telling you, don’t overdo it, Harl.

     “Right, Mistah J,” she whispered.  “I mean,” she said more loudly, “if today’s therapy goes well!”

     With some fahva beans… and a nice Chianti!  A-HAHAHAHA!

     Harley giggled.  She hadn’t meant to overdo the whole “Joker is dead and I wanna be dead too” routine, but at least that was over and done with, and soon she could look forward to being outside again.  And then Puddin’ could unveil his new plan.

     Dead/Not Dead – Take Five!

     And then maybe, after it was all over, she could drop by Red’s place.  She’d be awful sore when Harley got out of Arkham before she could do anything about it, but she’d been the “concerned galpal” for months now, and Harley owed her a little something.

     That might not be the smartest idea, Harl.  She won’t have to be “concerned galpal” once you’re out.  Then she’ll just be “raging PMS queen” and “bossy plant bitch”.  Perhaps a “Sorry I Missed You” card?  Ha!

     Puddin’ wasn’t too fond of Red these days.  Okay, he had never been fond of her.  But normally he saw her as a source of amusement.  Recently, however, in the middle of all the gloating, there was the occasional cutting remark that was low on humor and high on venom.  Like beating her had become personal or something. 

     Weird.

     Harley stepped out of her cell a few minutes later as the door slid open, and she was surprised to find Dr. Bartholomew waiting for her.  “Hey, Doc,” she said.

     “Harleen,” he replied.  “Come with me.  You remember our past discussion of outpatient treatment?”

     “Sure do,” Harley said.  They were letting her out already?  All-righty!

     “Well, there’s been a slight change of plans.”

     All-wrongy.

     “You see,” Dr, Bartholomew continued, “normally we arrange for patients to stay with responsible people who will monitor their compliance with the terms of the commitment order, as well as help them transition back into normal society.”

     “You mean like a – foster parent?” Harley asked hesitantly.

     “Sort of,” he said.  “We make arrangements with one of a network of people we rely on.  That, however, won’t be necessary in your case.”

     “Because I got a clean bill of health, and I don’t need monitoring?”

     “No, it seems someone applied for the position without warning.”

     It was then that Harley realized they were very close to the asylum lobby.  And that Ivy was standing there, waiting for her.

     Responsible person?  Responsible for mass mayhem, maybe!  A-haha… wait a second.

     “Yesterday a court granted Ms. Isley’s motion that she be granted custody of you for the duration of your outpatient treatment,” Leland explained.  “You’re all checked out, Harleen, and you can leave whenever you wish.”

     Harley barely heard his following remarks, something along the lines of “if you have any problems, blah blah blah”.  She was too busy listening to Mistah J freak out.

     That manipulative little crabapple!  Fake a nervous breakdown, Harl – they’ll have to keep you here.  Wait – attack her!  They’ll keep you here, AND Pammy will need a hospital stay of her own – hahaha – no, wait!  Pretend you’re happy to see her.  They’ll let you out – and then you can knock her out and take her car.  Be sure to drive slowly when backing up over her, humans are speed bumps too!

     If it wasn’t for the fact that his voice was moving through her mind at practically one hundred miles per second, Harley would have made so many jerks and starts towards and away from Ivy that they would have hospitalized her for epilepsy.  As it was, though, Harley needed only a second.  “Hey, Red,” she said, smiling and making a little wave.  It was easy “pretending you’re happy to see her,” because Harley was.  Until Puddin’ said she couldn’t be any more, that is.

     “Harley,” Ivy said sweetly, giving Dr. Bartholomew a triumphant look when he made a face at her failure to use the name ‘Harleen’.  “Are you ready to come back to the Lounge with me?”

     “Absafreakinlutely,” Harley said honestly.  “No offense, doc.”

     Nice place to visit, but you wouldn’t want to work here! 

     It took five minutes of paperwork and twenty yards of walking to Ivy’s car for Harley to accept that Ivy was very intentionally staying behind her.  She’d have to try something in the car to get away from Red.  Then she could have some real alone time with Mistah J.

     “What are you smiling at?” Ivy asked.

     “Me?  Nothing.  Just picturing the rest of my day.”

     “Mm,” Ivy said as she opened the passenger-side door for Harley to get in.  Once Harley was in her seat, Ivy came back around to the driver’s side.  She got in and closed the door.

     “So, Pammy,” Mistah J said as Red stiffened immediately in her seat.  “Now that you have Harl, what are you going to do with her?  You can lead a clown to the seltzer water, but you can’t make her spray it in the wrong direction.”

     “I’m going to make her better,” Ivy told him coldly.

     “Is that how you’re going to explain it to the police when Harley and I set my plans in motion?”

     Ivy didn’t respond.  She just turned very deliberately so that she was facing Harley.

     Harley was suddenly assaulted by a wave of jungle scent so dense that it was clogging up her nose.  Another wave followed that, and another after that.  She could barely breathe.  “Red, what’re you—” she asked, utterly dazed.

     “Took an extra dose of my special herbs this morning,” Ivy explained as she hit Harley with yet another layer of pheromones.  “And I just picked up a year’s supply.  You never know, I might need to up my dosage.”

     Doesn’t work on me, Pammy!  Just for that… might have to tell… octopus joke before… throttle her… know she loves it!

     “Die,” Ivy hissed before a fresh blast of pheromones hit Harley like being sprayed in the face by a hot shower two inches away.  “Die, you fucking bastard!”

     “Red, no, you can’t—”

     “I can, Harley!  You may have brought him back to life, but I can bury him in so much fetid soil, decaying leaves and rotting logs that he can never crawl out of his unmarked grave ever again!”

     “Red, please.”  It was supposed to be a scream, but Harley could barely even whisper.  The air seemed to shimmer before her eyes.  When did Gotham get this hot?

     Maybe global warming… not just a bad joke.

     “Drown!” Ivy snarled.  “Suffocate!  I’ll squeeze the life from you until there isn’t even a ghost of you to control her ever again, Joker.”

     It seemed to Harley just before she mercifully passed out that perhaps Mistah J wasn’t the only person to make their rivalry a bit more personal.

     “Try to be a little less self-conscious, Echo, okay?” Eddie asked irritably.  “Don’t look so easily impressed, either.  You’re my sole sidekick.  Act like it.”

     “Yes, Edward,” Talia said quietly.  It wasn’t easy.  She was a beautiful woman.  She knew she was a beautiful woman.  She had drawn the eyes of men many times in the past.  But she had never done so by displaying her body in such a public manner.  It had been easy to look at herself in a full-length mirror and admire how her hips looked in spandex, or how the cut of her top and the curve of the question mark emblazoned on the front met perfectly along the swell of her breasts.  After years of rejections from Bel- Bruce, it was very nice to feel desirable.

     In public, however, it was different.  She felt like a tramp, knowing that strange men were looking at her when her outfit was leaving nothing to the imagination.

     But Edward had told her to act like none of this was unusual, and so she would.  It would be hard, like most everything he asked of her, but unlike the tasks her father had set before her, Edward’s intentions for her didn’t feel so unattainable.

     Still, she unnecessarily adjusted the green diamond mask around her eyes.  It was bad enough when someone recognized her as Talia Head.  It would be even worse if someone recognized her tonight - the former head of Lexcorp reduced to being “Echo,” a criminal’s sidekick in tights.

     “Nygma,” a voice said sweetly.

     Talia and Edward both turned at the sound of his name being spoken. 

     “I trust,” Poison Ivy went on, “that your new friend isn’t trying to steal my old look?” 

     “Really, Ivy,” Edward drawled.  “When did your old look ever incorporate yellow gloves and a belt?”

     Talia tried not to tremble as Poison Ivy continued to look at her coldly.  “I’m so glad you were finally able to make it, Nygma.  Would you be willing to send the girl away for a few minutes?  I thought we could speak privately.”

     Edward shrugged.  “Echo, why don’t you head over to the bar after Raven seats you?  You know what I like.”

     She didn’t move, and Ivy opened her mouth to speak, but Edward held up a hand.  “Hold on, Ivy, give her a second.”

     Talia tried to think quickly.  Edward would want a Glenundromm, so…

     “Is this going to take all evening?” Ivy grumbled.

     “LONG - MEN DRUM?” Talia finally asked, just as she was starting to sweat.

     “Hm, not too bad,” Edward said.  “You’ll need to be a lot faster than that, though.  I’ll be back shortly.  Assuming,” he added, glaring at Ivy, “I don’t wake up tomorrow with a sprig of parsley in my hatband.”

     “That was one time,” Ivy shot back.  “Trust me, it wouldn’t be worth it now.”

     “I’ll just, um, go to the table now,” Talia said uncertainly.  Figuring out Edward’s anagrams was confusing, but she had absolutely no idea what they were talking about.  She didn’t think she wanted to, either.

     “So,” the hostess said after Ivy had pulled Edward aside.  “Is Query coming later?”

     Talia almost ignored the question, as her instinctive response was to treat this woman like the servant she was.  But Edward had hammered into her the “social ladder” of this world, and this “Raven” had her outranked.  “Query?”

     “Um, yeah.  I mean, the Riddler usually calls his sidekicks Query and Echo,” Raven told her.

     She was just the latest in a line of Echoes?  Edward had said that most sidekicks were “a dime, a dozen”.  Talia suddenly felt very anonymous behind the mask, the big question mark, and the name everybody had heard before.

     Then again, considering how hard she was trying to escape – from her father, from Metropolis, from strangers who turned their backs on her – losing her identity wasn’t so awful.

     “Although it’s been a long time since he showed up with one of you,” Raven added.

     “I am sorry, but there will be no Query later tonight,” Talia told her.  “Or later than that.  It’s just me.”

     “Huh!” Raven said.  “Well, enjoy your evening.”

     Talia watched her leave.  Huh?!  Hopefully this night would become less strange as it went on.

     One thing that was definitely strange to Talia as she headed towards the bar was the reaction of the people around her.  Or rather, the lack thereof.  She’d avoided large gatherings whenever possible since even before leaving Metropolis.  It was impossible to walk in public without being recognized, and suddenly it felt like everyone was whispering about her.

     Here, though, few gave her a second glance.  And of those, no one seemed to scorn her.  They were slightly interested, maybe a little admiring of her figure, nothing more.  Perhaps because, as the servant said, it had been a long time since Edward had brought someone like her into the Lounge. 

     Talia was not the Daughter of the Demon’s Head any longer.  She was just a personal assistant to one of Bel-Bruce’s enemies.  Actually, you could almost look at her situation as being exactly the same as before.  The only difference was that the enemy she served now was much weaker than the one she served before. 

     But she didn’t want to be her father’s Daughter any more.  She certainly didn’t want to be the head of Lioncorp.  And she was not a personal assistant.  She was THE personal assistant to a man who always had two in the past.  A man who was still a big fish in this smaller pond where her father would never dare to look for her.

     Also, Talia could not overlook the fact that for the first time in her long life, sex had become something to be enjoyed.

     Maybe she’d never really believed it before, but maybe… this life could work for her.

     Adjusting the neckline of her costume so that it showed off just a tiny bit more, Echo waited for the man to come so she could order a LONG MEN DRUM.  

     “What was that about?” Ivy asked once they were alone in her private office.  “Don’t tell me the sidekicks are speaking in anagrams now.”

     “She’s not supposed to speak in anagrams,” Eddie said testily.  “She’s supposed to think in them.  She can’t be of any use to me if she can’t keep up with the conversation.”  That was why, since moving in with him and accepting his “protection,” Talia had spent the first two hours of every day doing those word games where you had to take a long word and make as many 4-letter words out of them as possible. 

     She couldn’t pick a lock to save her life, and she wouldn’t exactly be confused with an Ethiopian marathoner when it came to physical endurance, but he had her doing word problems first.

     Well, it wasn’t good sidekick training, but it was necessary girlfriend training.

     “Where did you find her?” Ivy asked suspiciously.  “She’s not—”

     “She’s not a groupie,” Eddie said. 

     “She didn’t seem all that bright.”

     Neither did Harley, and her sexual relationship with the Joker was common knowledge, but nobody would confuse her with one of those dimwits.  “Echo may be a C student, C+ tops, but at least she’s in the classroom while the groupies are still trying to figure out that you pull to get in the building, not push.”

     “I think you made more sense when you spoke in anagrams.”  Ivy shrugged.  “Fine, then.  It’s so nice you were finally able to come to the Rydbergii, Nygma.”

     Eddie chuckled.  “You know, that’s the kind of customer service I expected from you, Ivy.”

     “This is personal business, not the Lounge,” Ivy replied.  “I trust you got word about – that woman?”

     “That woman?” Eddie parroted.  “What is this, the court at Versailles?  Yes, I heard about Jenna.  Harvey told me.”

     Ivy bared her teeth in an expression he supposed was a smile, but which looked a lot more like a snarl.  “All right, Jenna.  The question is, can I trust the other Rogues to be able to keep their tempers in check if she does something they find – personally offensive?”

     “You mean, like not flaying her alive if she throws a basket of kittens off a bridge?” Eddie asked.

     “Yes, like that,” Ivy muttered, looking down and to the left.

     Harvey had also mentioned that Selina was an even sorer spot than usual with Ivy.  Apparently he hadn’t been exaggerating.  “There’s always a certain appeal to physical violence for people like you and I, but yes, I think everyone is in agreement.”

     “Then, no matter what Jenna does in the future, no matter where she goes, no matter who she harasses—”

     “A MANIC FORK.”  Ivy just glared at him, and Eddie sighed.  Selina would have gotten it.  Talia would have at least tried.  But Pammy never had the patience.  “Mark of Cain.  She’ll be ignored by anybody who’s anybody.”

     Jervis would have been the logical choice to spread the word, but from what Harvey had described, the plan was a little too complicated to entrust to the Hatter.  Jenna Leibowitz had turned out to be the worst kind of groupie, the kind who thought she was a lot smarter than she was, who thought she could be one of them by taking their business and letting Harvey nail her.  Nimrod.

     If she was that desperate for their approval, or even their attention, Ivy had reasoned, then the worst kind of punishment would be to deny her existence.  She wasn’t at the bottom of their social hierarchy.  That would imply that she was a part of their society.  She wasn’t even on the chart.  Hugo had no idea how lucky he was until this happened. 

     The only concern was that Jenna would become so starved for attention, any kind of attention, that even suffering a beating from a Rogue was preferable to nothing at all.

     “I’m not worried about people like you, to be honest, Nygma,” Ivy said.

     Oh, that sounded like a compliment.

     “But I don’t know that people like Croc can hold their temper if she does something criminally stupid.”

     “I don’t know that he can either,” Eddie said, “but that’s your problem, Ivy.  Not mine.”

     Ivy glared at him.

     “If she does something particularly obnoxious,” he added, “would you be opposed to some kind of indirect retribution?  Something that can’t be linked to one of us?”

     “Well, she’s paranoid, delusional, and obsessed with us,” Ivy replied, “so she’d probably assume we’re responsible for anything bad that happens to her.”  She paused and then smiled.  “Actually, it might make her loonier than ever.  That would be fun.”

     “Mm-hm,” Eddie said.  “Mind if I get back to my table?  Echo really isn’t housebroken yet.”

     “Just a moment,” Ivy said quickly.  She got up from her chair, came around the desk, and perched on the edge.  Her crossed legs were just an inch or two from his.  Instinctively he shifted back in his seat.  “I wouldn’t trust this message with Harvey or Jervis or anyone.  Everyone will hear it direct from me.  You’re heard about Harley.” 

     “She’s here, I assume,” Eddie answered.  “Breaking her out of Arkham with a RECORD TOUR, a court order?  I hope you at least bribed the judge.  Ozzie would have.  Please tell me you didn’t win your case on the merits.”

     “Are you under the impression that I have anything in common with the Penguin?” Ivy snapped.

     Eddie adjusted the brim of his hat with one finger that, not coincidentally, pointed straight up.  “I’ve heard Oswald ‘haunts’ the living quarters above the Lounge.  Whatever it is you’ve done to him, Ivy, I’ll wager you two have a lot in common now.”

     Ivy’s glare had turned outright glacial, but Eddie didn’t really notice.  “And what did the man from Brooklyn say when he took a cruise to Egypt but got off in Greece instead?  ‘That wasn’t da Nile.’  You went back into the judicial system and played by the rules?  Ivy, people will think you’re going white hat on us.”  He rubbed his chin and chortled.  “That might not be such a bad idea, actually.  The Bat might have a stroke if he had to work together with Gotham’s newest protector, QUENCH HELL POORLY – Queen Chlorophyll!” 

     Before he quite knew what had happened, Ivy’s hand was wrapped around his necktie.

     “I’ll ignore that remark,” Ivy hissed, leaning forward.

     “This is ignoring?” Eddie asked, and she yanked his tie down a little. 

     “Harley is upstairs right now,” Ivy went on.  “I’m purging her system of all the medications they pumped into her at Arkham with a healthy, organic herbal cocktail.  I’m also using some – special herbs to fix her other issues.”

     “Ivy, it’s getting a little tight.”

     Ivy’s eyes bored into his.  “Soon she’s going to be all better, and then she’ll be back among us.  When that happens, you are NOT to bring up the night Joker died, or the months Harley has spent in Arkham.  EVER.  Her mental state is still fragile, and I won’t have you or anyone else setting her off.  Are we clear?”

     “Is this how you win repeat customers?”

     “Edward.  This is Harley’s future I’m talking about.  I won’t let anything interfere, not even the prospect of losing the club.  If you can’t be circumspect around Harley, then drink somewhere else.” 

     Nygma didn’t answer at first.  He probably shouldn’t have poked the tiger lily, but he wasn’t happy to be here.  Just because the Rydbergii appeared safe to drink in, just because Ivy was working for tips, it didn’t mean that he enjoyed giving her his business. 

     Having pissed her off royally, however, Eddie could also see that she was being unusually rational.  This wasn’t Ivy’s typical hysterical shrieking.  This was Ivy being intense and serious.  His eardrums should have been bleeding by now.

     Hm.  Clayface bought her potpourri, and she was still screaming about it three days later.  Harvey had a plastic table brought to the Iceberg, and she absolutely lost it.  But any threat to Ivy’s legal custody of Harley?  Suddenly she learns how to turn the tap from hot to cold?

     The Joker was out of the picture and Ivy finally had Harley all to herself… and neither her fellow Rogues nor the legal system were going to jeopardize that.  It was almost cute, if she wasn’t trying to make his blood run cold.

     Or if she wasn’t still tugging on the tie.

     “Will you let go of my clothes and calm down, Ivy?” Eddie asked, being equally serious now.

     Ivy waited a moment before she let go of his tie in a huff and leaned back.

     “If it’s for Harley’s welfare,” he continued as he adjusted the neckwear, “then of course I’ll hold my tongue around her.”

     “Good,” Ivy said, looking slightly mollified.  “Fine, then go back to the new toy.  First drink is on the house.”

     Giving him something for free?  Maybe this was the new Poison Ivy.

     Maybe Harley had a chance – unless she decided she wanted to leave.  Then she was probably screwed. 

     It had been some time since Ivy updated her wardrobe.  Before, she just didn’t have the time for shopping.  And since her discovery that she was no longer within shouting distance of her ideal weight, it had become much more difficult.  She couldn’t exactly blend in with a crowd.  If someone saw her at Bloomingdale’s and took a picture…

     She dreaded the Gotham Post headlines.  POISON IVY BUYS NEW WARDROBE TO ACCOMMODATE NEW FAT ASS.

     Ivy tried not to look at herself in the mirror, but that was why she was standing in front of it, wasn’t she?  She couldn’t go shopping, and she couldn’t just go on wearing the same things.  She still fit into her old clothes, but that didn’t mean she looked like she fit into them.

     Desperate, she’d gone to an unlikely source.  She paid Kittlemeier an exorbitant sum to “let out” some of her outfits.  He had thought it strange, but again, “exorbitant sum”.

     She was modeling one of her skirts in the mirror now.  Her rear end didn’t look like it was going to split the fabric any longer.

     It still looked fat.

     Ivy sighed in resignation.  She’d gone through her entire wardrobe and come across a couple old outfits that she hadn’t worn on a caper in years.  Trying them on had led to the gruesome discovery that she had not gained ten or fifteen pounds over the past year.  She had gained twenty or twenty-five over the past several.  Evidently over time her body had picked up a pound here and a pound there.

     She had an exercise bike, of all things, dragged up to her rooms, and she’d begun taking better care of her complexion and hair.  But Ivy still felt unattractive and overweight, and she was always tired.

     Especially since she moved Harley in three weeks ago.

     Harley’s situation had been a little more problematic than Oswald’s.  She hadn’t actually been trying to alter his memories.  It had just happened.  She couldn’t be so laissez-faire with Harley, though.

     Ivy had kept Harley’s system constantly drenched with pheromones from the moment she arrived.  The theory was that Harley would be so eager to please her, for such an extended length of time, that her hopelessly hypnotized mind would do anything Ivy asked.  Including forgetting the past and filling in whatever details she was given.  So Ivy had sat next to Harley’s bed for hours each day, whispering a new version of the last year into her ear. 

     Plus, Ivy hoped that Harley’s brain would want to forget the Joker’s death.  That when given the opening, it would run right through.

     The problem was that Ivy had no idea if and when to stop the treatment.  Maybe Harley was cured even now.  Or maybe the Joker was still lurking in a corner of her mind.  She had no way of knowing, without simply cutting the flow of pheromones.

     That was another problem, meanwhile.  Ivy had been taking the special herbs that boosted her powers daily.  She was wringing the pheromones out of her body like she was a sponge, then using the herbs to replenish the supply.  But the scary witch lady proprietor of the magic store had warned her months ago that abusing the herbs could burn her powers out permanently.  What if Ivy lost the ability before Harley was all better?

     And there was a third problem.  Oswald was now permanently in love with Ivy.  She didn’t know how to undo that if she had even wanted to.   

     What if Harley came out of her chemically-induced hypnosis the same way?

     That possibility terrified Ivy as much as not being able to cure her in the first place.  If Harley “woke up” madly in love with her, then Ivy would have unintentionally destroyed the one real friendship she still had, replacing it with something fake and forced.

     Then she’d really be alone.  She’d keep Harley with her, of course, but every loving look would be like a hot poker.  The Joker would have won after all.

     Why hadn’t she just stopped Harley from killing him?!

     Ivy froze.  Whoa.  Where the fuck had that come from? 

     At any rate, Ivy hadn’t touched Harley once since she came.  Hopefully a lack of affectionate physical contact would prevent emotional attachment.  And she’d firmly emphasized throughout the rewrite of Harley’s memories that their relationship was as it always had been.  Maybe even that Ivy hadn’t been supportive enough after Joker died.

     Maybe it would work out right.

     Sure, like everything else had?   

     Ivy flinched, then looked at the clock.  It was time for another treatment.  She quickly removed the skirt in favor of baggy pants (ulgh), then went to Harley’s room.

     With Harley’s unmade, empty bed in it.

     Ivy’s stomach dropped.  Where was she?

     First she checked the front door, half-expecting to find it wide open.  But Harley had not apparently fled the building in a headlong rush.

     After that it took Ivy two minutes of frantic searching to find Harley in the solarium.  Eventually the entire roof would be a living carpet of flora, but for now the plants were concentrated in one large room with plenty of sunlight.  Oswald was there, like he always was at this hour, watering the babies.

     Harley just stood there, watching him.

     “Harley?” Ivy asked quietly.

     She was still too thin, Ivy thought, as she turned around.  Then Harley beamed at her.

     “Heya, Red,” she said cheerfully, skipping over.  She leaned close to Ivy.  “Geez, Red, why didn’t you paint him green while you were at it?” 

     “You’re awake,” Ivy said, breathless.  She didn’t seem like she was in love.  She seemed – normal.  Something Ivy had once lost hope of.

     “Well, duh, Red.”

     “And we’re still friends?”

     Harley looked at her strangely.  “Gee, I don’t know if I can ever forgive you for getting me out of Dr. Jerry’s House of Fun and letting me move in, Red.  But just this once, okay?”

     Ivy stared at her.  “Could you give me a moment, Harl?”

     “Sure, I’ll just keep the bird-shaped vegetable company.”

     Leaving the solarium, Ivy went into a nearby bathroom and closed the door.  Then she burst into tears. 

     Gaia, it had worked.  Harley was herself again.  It had gone right.  After years of losses, Ivy had finally won at something. 

     Fuck, that felt good!

     There was a hesitant tap at the door.  “Red?” Harley asked.  “Is everything all right?”

     Ivy snatched a towel and wiped hurriedly at her eyes.  “Just a second, Harl,” she said.

     When she came back out, Harley clearly was at a loss.  “Were you just – crying?”

     “No, no, I just… got a little pollen in my eyes,” Ivy lied poorly.

     “I never see you cry.”

     “I’m sure you’ve seen me cry before.”

     “You once said that you never cry any more.”  Harley looked down.  “You said that I taught you how to deal with disappointment.”

     Ivy swallowed.  She vaguely remembered saying something like that – the eleventh or twelfth time Harley ran back to Joker as if he’d banged on a triangle and screamed “Dinner!”

     “I’m just glad you’re feeling better, that’s all,” Ivy said.  “You haven’t been yourself lately.”

     “Well, I couldn’t stay in that bed forever,” Harley replied.  “You had a lot to do with that, you know, after Puddin’ – well, you know.”

     She fought down the urge to throw up.  Harley had no idea how true that statement was, and Ivy would do whatever it took to keep it that way.

     “And to be honest, I’m kinda bored,” Harley added.  “I miss my sugar rush too.”

     Ivy bit her lip.  She had forgotten to buy the groceries that Harley liked.  She’d send someone – no, she had a better idea.  “I haven’t really shopped lately, Harl,” she said, as if she ever bought food herself any more. 

     “I noticed.  I couldn’t find Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs anywhere.  What the heck is Kashi anyway, Red?”

     It was always a mystery to Ivy how Harley’s teeth had survived both the Joker and a ten-year-old’s diet.  “If you feel up to it, we could go to the store together?”

     “Outside?  Oh, boy, Red!  I swear, your plants might get all the sunlight they need, but I’ve been feelin’ like a mushroom!”  Harley bounced off.  “Let’s see, I’m gonna need popcorn and graham crackers and chocolate and…”

     Ivy watched her disappear.  That was her best friend in the world.

     To be concluded…