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Gwen Dailey; Oracle (digitaldelphi) wrote in musingslogs, @ 2011-04-06 11:22:00

WHO: Thomas The Bat and Mockingbird Gwen that crazy redhead they picked up in the maze
WHAT: Trying to fix what's broken
WHERE: Outside the city limits and under the ground
WHEN: A little while after the maze
WARNINGS: None, I think.

She glanced at the clock with a scowl. If there was one thing more maddening than being restrained, it was not having anything else to do. Clearly they knew what she was capable of since she couldn’t find a single device to use to her advantage, not in the room and not out. She was either behind very thick walls or very far from the city, which was practically bursting at the seams with electric signals for her to find. Not for the first time she wondered where she was, how hard it would be to escape, and how long it would take her to reach the gardens again.

She heard the door open and she lifted her head, pretty much the only movement she was freely capable of since she was pinned down. The restraints keeping her to the bed weren’t too tight, allowing for the simplest of shifts but very little else. When she saw him enter she let her head fall back onto the pillow.

“Change of the guard?” The girl she had seen earlier was nowhere in sight. Judging by the time, she guessed she had somewhere else to sleep. Lucky her.

She was right, in the main, with her theories on location. The Bat’s preparations may to some verge on paranoia, but considering the number of times they had come in handy and even saved lives, it was harder to judge him as time went on. This location had initially been built in the second World War to ward off Japanese that had never come, and it was sunk deep in cool wet earth, so far under the ground that an apple orchard was regularly cared for on the surface. They were also far enough from Seattle that the lights weren’t visible even from the top of the hill nearest, and the Bat found it a comforting, solitary place, very like the hill he had grown up on, only without the empty manor decomposing behind it.

Fatherhood made him nostalgic.

The lights in the holding cell were kind, and besides the bed, round padded table and round padded stool, there was a doorless stall and a toilet in the corner. It was not a place to keep a victim. The Bat looked strange this close. You could see the seams in his armor and the rise of his chest, and it all seemed bizarrely human, though not in the least vulnerable. He moved forward in a rustle of cloak and released one of the belts that kept one wrist. While he was there, he could make sure she didn’t hurt herself or anyone else, and he could overcome her if she chose to fight. The knowledge was in the calm gray of his eyes as the folds fell over his shoulders and he stood back to wait for her to undo the rest of the bindings. “It’s temporary,” he warned, in his naturally gravel voice.

She supposed she should have been intimidated by the suit. He cut an impressive figure with the cape and cowl, and a man walking in with that much armor probably should have had her nervous. But it had almost the exact opposite affect. The sight of him was still a strange comfort, as it had been in the maze, and her frown was more to do with confusion over why that was than anything he was wearing.

She watched him quietly as he undid the strap on her arm, and once free she made little work of the rest, exhaling softly as she finally able to move her limbs properly. Though she wanted to flex and stretch and let all the blood rush where it should, her hand immediately went to her neck, searching for the collar that she knew wasn’t there. She couldn’t remember a time where she hadn’t worn it, and in this unknown place and meeting these unknown people, she frantically tried to find something she really knew. She continually came up short.

Swinging her legs over the side she stood up in one quick motion, stretching her legs and arms as she surveyed her surroundings from an upright position. It still was inescapable as it seemed from the bed, made worse now that she knew she couldn’t get past him. She knew she was stronger than she had been previously, Stephen had said as much and Bishop had praised her the last time she had seen him. Yet she knew she'd be no match for the man in black. He mentioned something so she pressed on. “How temporary?” She wasn’t sure if he meant the shift change between him and the girl or just her location, but if she could figure out his game plan then she could find an opening to exploit.

“An hour, perhaps,” he said. It was not like him to give such a vague time span. This was the man that announced his estimated time of arrival in minutes and in doing so, generally took the ‘estimated’ out of it entirely. He was watching her closely. The best she’d be able to do in this place would be to short out the lights, and that wouldn’t help her with the door, and he had learned that he was far more capable blind than any man should be in the same situation.

When she reached for her neck, he made the slightest movement with his head, the first sign of emotion yet. “Your daughter removed it.”

“An hour for...?” she asked, doubting she’d get a clearer answer but asking anyway. He didn’t seem the type to be vague and she pushed for more. Now free she took the opportunity to hop of the bed and take a walk around the room, not caring that she was still dressed for a party. She did notice the way he reacted to the missing piece of her ensemble, though. “You didn’t like it either.”

He didn’t answer the first question, thinking it obvious that an hour to move around and use the facilities would be clear enough eventually. He watched her move with a sharp eye, careful to keep the slightly widened wonder out of it. The mobility didn’t have the same effect that it might have on someone like Quinn, who lived with Gwen, but it still reached the Bat that still dreamed in blurs, when he had them at all. “It represents what was done to you. You don’t remember?”

She wasn’t sure what to think of that. Everyone kept talking about helping her. Fixing and restoring her in some way. She brushed them off but between the girl from before and this man, she was starting to feel there truly was something amiss. The familiarity she felt around them lent some credence to their words and their answers carried more weight. “Bishop tells me to wear it, always.” She still hadn’t quite believed he was dead.

The gray eyes became cold, edged with steel. “Did he tell you in your mind, or did he ask you with his voice?” The Bat knew he was dead. It didn’t matter. You could hate a dead man; the Bat had hated many dead men. Some before they were dead, some after, and some every moment of their existence, whether or not they were rotting.

She stiffened at the sudden chill, taken aback and halting her pacing. It hadn’t mattered before but now she paused to think back and frowned. “Mind. But that’s just how he is. He always speaks to me that way.” Always. It was as if she had known Bishop for a lifetime. Her eyes narrowed warily at him. “What I should be remembering?”

“You should be remembering when there were no thoughts in your head but your own.” The Bat didn’t pace, nor find the limits of the room with his presence, which he knew well enough. He just stood there, and he spoke when he chose, and otherwise he was a statue. “Can you not remember?”

He said it so easily that when she tried to think of a time, and seemingly found nothing, she scowled. She resumed pacing, a half a beat faster than before. She tried again and found very little outside of Bishop and what he wanted and what he told her and the place in the world he made for her, with a few exceptions. “The girl,” she said slowly. “She says she’s my daughter and she says things that just can’t...” She couldn’t bring herself to deny the fact, nor vocalize properly how it felt when she was called her mother.

“And you,” she added with a slight wave of her hand and a quick pivot on her heel to face him. “Something about you that I just can’t put my finger on.”

Quinn was getting through. He thought that the best thing, knowing how he felt for his children, but he didn’t say it, not to this woman with another man’s thoughts in her actions. He looked at her, not at her movement, not at her body, just at the way her eyes were set in her face. “I’m a man in a mask, Oracle. What are you?”

She held his stare for a long moment. Even him calling her that name sounded familiar but it didn’t quite fit, like something had changed, though she couldn’t even figure that out either. Her hand went back to her throat, looking for that reassurance from the symbol of the man who had become the center of her universe. Without it, without him, she was left with uncertainty and it reflected in her eyes and laced itself in her deliberately worded answer. “They call me Mockingbird.”

He took one step forward, just one. The cape didn't rustle, rippling in soundless movement. He didn't make enough sound to be human. "That is what he called you. We use the name you chose for yourself."

She didn’t flinch or falter when he moved closer, though her gaze didn’t follow and she stared at at his armor without focus. She thought about it more and then shook her head, laughing softly to herself, a shade of her old self. “And I chose Oracle? What kind of name is that.”

The Bat stopped moving, but there was something about his eyes that changed. A half-second more, his smile was perceptible. “I never asked.”

In the midst of all the familiarity, she knew that smile was rarity and took a moment to bask in it. She hoped it wouldn’t fade as she let her curiosity continue but each revelation spurred her on, opening up doors but showing her all the empty spots where memories should have lain. “How long have you never asked?” A quick pause as another question struck her and though she clearly considered not asking, she let it fly anyway. “Have I ever asked ‘why a bat’?”

The Bat appeared to reflect, growing sober again. “No. You didn’t. Almost nine years now.” He shifted ever so slightly, shoulders moving in the shadows at the edge of the room. “I presumed it was because you were the one with all the answers.” He said it very gravely, but the touch of humor was back to the edge of his mouth, encouraging.

Nine years. That felt right. She took a slow breath as it sparked a faint recognition, a wealth of half memories starting to open up with vague times and places where she had seen his silhouette or heard his voice or read his name. “Batman,” she said softly, testing to see if she was right. Nine long years. No wonder he seemed familiar. “So I’m a know-it-all. Somehow I’m not surprised. And it was only you and me? The others… they don’t...” She shrugged a little before gesturing helplessly to her temple.

The name, the name from Musings, brought him forward again another step. He watched her eyes, her face, looking for signs that she was not herself, that this was someone else’s game. He didn’t see any. “It was just me for a long time. You helped. You were my oracle.” A little smile again. He shook his head slightly. “I don’t know when you met the others. Many of them in the last year, in Humanity. Do you remember coming here? From Musings?”

She briefly wondered if the flood of memories was wrong and as he stepped forward she squared her shoulders back, ready for whatever he might say or do. But he smiled and so did she, albeit a little wider than his. That also felt familiar. The more he talked the more little fragments for her memory slid back into place, though there was still so much missing. “Here?” A slight furrow of her brow. “From…?” She looked around though quickly she realized he didn’t mean here in this space. She didn’t recall there was another world at all and she shook her head. “There’s only now, with Bishop,” she turned over one hand, “and… then, with you.” She turned over the other hand and stared thoughtfully at the empty space between both palms.

The Bat sat back on his heels, satisfied. Now she had it. The experience he had felt from her, the certainty that something was wrong, he knew she’d find it again. She was too smart not to notice the problems as soon as he could separate her from Bishop’s influence. “Ah,” he said, looking at the space between her hands as well. “So there’s some things missing.” It was a gentle conclusion, and one gloved hand touched her elbow, the directive to sit down on her bed again. Just in case.

She let him lead her away, hands wringing together as she thought more on the revelations. She stopped suddenly as her leg brushed against the side of the bed. She turned to look over her shoulder, back to where she had seen him enter. “I need to go,” she said slowly, much less of a demand than before. She didn’t want to make demands of him, not now that she had some idea of who he was to her. But that didn’t change the fact that she had something to do. There was still an obligation to meet and her feet were already leading her to make a break for it.

There was no trace of the humor anymore. Even the gentleness and the soft familiarity the gray eyes had offered a moment before was gone. “You aren’t in any condition to go anywhere,” he said, pulling the gloved hand back, open and empty, as she reached the bed that would catch her if she fell. The Bat didn’t smell like a man; he smelled like wet pavement and cold night air, more sharp than anything else. He paced away, intent. “You need to wait until you’re yourself again.”

She fell back on the bed but that didn't stop her. Moments later she was already scrambling to get back up, chasing after him, moving to pass him to the only way out. "I need to go," she corrected him. "I should be at the gardens! You don’t understand. Nothing else matters."

He was faster than she was. It was pure training, work, practice. The cloak didn’t even get in his way. Like silk through water, he was in her way, the door just a rectangle in the wall behind a solid barrier of armor and kevlar. “He wants you to go. He is gone, Oracle. Your thoughts are the only thing that matters.”

Her hands hit with the armor before she could collide into him, an impressed look at the quality lashing across her face before being overcome at frustration from being thwarted. Her fist pounded on his chest firmly but not hard, still testing the very limits of what she was allowed. "No, it doesn't," she said firmly, a slightly pained edge to her voice. "Regardless if he was there or not, if he commanded seconds before or days, I obey. It doesn't matter if he's gone or what you want me to do or what you say." Another pound thump against kevlar on his chest before she started to aim higher. "I have my orders to carry out and you won’t stop me."

He let her hit him until the thought she might do damage to her hand, and then he abruptly turned his shoulder, opened his guard, and caught the outside of her wrist in his palm. When he rotated back, he took her arm with him, drawing her wrist up past her ear in a trap that would only hurt if she continued to struggle forward. “We’ll figure out how to stop it,” he said, sounding sure even though he didn’t feel it at all. “Sit down.”

It was with supreme effort that she stopped struggling and it more for his sake that she did. A part of her still wanted to keep going, keep trying, no matter what the bodily cost in order to fulfill the directive. She knew that if he was a stranger, she could handle a horrified reaction to her single mindedness but not him and not now. “No.” She was equally unconvinced that they would find a way out of this, at least with her alive. “Out of my way.”

“Sit down,” he said, with more force, though his grip, with absolute control, didn’t change. His other arm separated from the cloak, touching her other arm and urging her back toward the bed as he’d done before. “It’s not real, that need he put in your mind. It’s not real. Sit down.”

She narrowed her eyes back at him and she had half a mind to tell him to make her. But his other arm was back and leading her toward the bed again and she could keep trying to get around or knock down this kevlar shrouded brickwall he called a body all she wanted. She wasn’t going to get anywhere today. She followed his lead and sat on the edge of the bed, not looking one bit happy about it. She moved the arm he held just a bit, silently asking for the full use of her limbs again.

He hesitated for a split second. It would be easier for him, and more secure, to just tie her down and make sure nothing happened to her. The Bat had learned, however, that such action didn’t really keep anyone safe, and all it did was temporarily make himself feel better. He wasn’t that selfish. He let his chin drop slightly and moved back, giving her space again. “Bishop is dead. He can’t speak in your mind anymore. Don’t let him.”

“You don’t know what it’s like.” It wasn’t just in her mind. She could feel Bishop's influence right down to the ends of her fingers and the tips of her toes. She rubbed her free arm gingerly, half wishing he would just put her back in the restraints. Trying to make herself sit and talk to him, trying not to make another reckless break for the door, was taking up nearly all her concentration. “It’s easier without my collar, but….” She trailed off, staring thoughtfully at the floor for a few longer moments before lifting her eyes to meet his. “You should go. Before I try again.”

The eerie, flat gray eyes watched her for a moment. “It is a good thing this man is already dead.” He didn’t sit on the statement or the cold anger it uncurled inside him. He moved forward, suddenly restless, rustling and solid. “I think you should lie back down,” he said, all control. He didn’t want her to start throwing herself at the walls.