Re: Main Street
Eddie knew that look and was fully aware of how it reflected from his own expression. What a simple puzzle this was. All the hints they dropped when they chatted about bats and clowns from the comfort of their own sides of Gotham. The flawless teamwork when they felt like investigating and pulling strings before anyone else knew what was going on. The concern from her family, even the cat who couldn’t keep her whiskers to herself. The night they broke their own rules and shared intoxication and truth like trading cards. The Christmas gifts that contained a little part of who they were so the other could clutch it close their chests. Even how they both went to this party looking for each other. All these obvious clues leading up to them holding each other tightly in some darkened forest.
His eyes searched her face as he thought of all the reasons why this was so different from the little pitfall trysts he had found himself in before. With Ivy, for example, it was just to turn that genius off for a little while. A long time ago he even had some affection for Harley, but that was just a game they played when the clown wasn’t home. This wasn’t playtime or an easy fix to his own neurosis. This puzzle would lead to more mazes and questions he didn’t know the answer to. Is that what you want? The Riddler asked himself. How could he play a game he couldn’t cheat his way through?
“It’s not a game.” Riddler whispered after a couple seconds of his mind whirring and just as he pulled her close to kiss her the ground below them started to change and threw him off balance. He stumbled away from her and looked around him in a small panic, waiting for whatever Passages has in store for him next.
Steph was sure her heart was going to beat right out of her chest with him so close. She saw the rumble of thought bouncing through his mind, his eyes lost in whatever consuming debate that raged inside him. And, she knew what he was thinking because it was the same thing going through hers. What had brought them to this place, clung close to each other in this snow-laden forest, and what was different than anyone else before? She didn’t remember it being like this with Tim, or with anyone else, but then again, those relationships had their own complications. Her mind, however, was completely wiped of any thought at all when he leaned in further. Oh god, oh god, keep it cool, Brown. Her eyes fluttered shut, and she pressed herself against him, and she waited.
And then, the ground rocked. Of course it did.
She lost her footing, some of the gracelessness she managed to shake off from her younger years coming back in her absolute focus on nothing but Eddie. “Goddammit,” she snapped as she tumbled to the floor, and eyes snapping open. But she didn’t see the forest again, and she hadn’t fallen into the snow, but on an unpolished hardwood floor. Looking around, she recognized the space instantly. Wayne Manor still wasn’t the same as hers, but it was the Wayne Manor from the new Gotham they all inhabited. Even still, it wasn’t right. It looked bare, almost as if it had been torn through by greedy hands or those looking for some semblance of revenge. Payback. There wasn’t a whisper of a person, though a television blared upstairs in one of the rooms.