[DC] The Truth Beneath the Rose
Title: The Truth Beneath the Rose
Fandom: DC
Rating: PG
Summary: The one where Ivy goes straight. Or tries to, the rules of the DCU being what they are.
Notes: takes place some time after NML and Murderer/Fugitive. Inspired by the eponymous song by Within Temptation, though there's no relation beyond the title. Fits the hc_bingo "mutation" square.
This time it's going to change.
They don't seem to expect all that much when they let her out, but she's done a lot of thinking, and she's been talking with the Riddler at least as much, and for the first time in a very long time she's watched the other inmates for what they are.
Riddler is right; they are crazy. It isn't just eternal optimism that makes Harley spring back to the Joker no matter what foul attempts he's made on her life. Eddie's suit and speech patterns, he's told her, aren't the affectations he'd honed a long time ago, not anymore - if they've ever been.
Pamela - Ivy - isn't sure where she fits in the middle of all this, but there's at least one point she's been picking up on. Her actions have not done any good for the plants. Forests are still decimated, genetic codes are still twisted beyond recognition, and Robinson Park has been burned down more times than she cares to count because of her actions. In fact, her actions are the very excuse the mayor gives when he's asked why he's not doing anything to make Gotham into a greener city.
Batman was right. She would do more good going the legal route.
Batman was right, and don't think that doesn't prickle her already battered pride, a lot, when he wordlessly confronts her after she's been released and she tells him so. He doesn't believe her any more than she'd believe him if he said he trusted her, but they've come to get on reasonably well. They're used to each other, and they've sometimes been allies, over the years. Maybe it's not saying much - she sometimes wonders if there's any rogue at all in Batman's gallery he hasn't ever made a truce with - but he's never made a secret of the fact that he respects her goal.
At least she had goals, which is more than what can be said about most of the crazies he's put in Arkham. According to Scarecrow, that's one of the reasons she was able to recover.
She could leave Gotham. Batman would probably prefer it if she did. (Probably. He hasn't actually told her so, and gossip has it that when he wants someone away he says it. Even some of his own, they say. Brings a whole new dimension to the turn-over of Robins and Batgirls over the years. For instance, Blüdhaven's Nightwing, or the Robin Joker said he killed, or the red-headed Batgirl.)
Lots of people would, as she learns when the Huntress breaks into her hothouse. But she's changed, so she's wildly annoyed but doesn't retaliate beyond brushing vines a little close to the woman when she retrieves the plant from its broken pot. She doesn't care about Huntress' threats; she's got the big guy's authorization, and - that's equally important - today she's home in Gotham. Like a cutting, she's grown used to her environment, and she knows how to extract what she needs from the soil and the air.
It's a long process. She wouldn't take lightly to being uprooted again.
And she's aware she's playing it close and it'd be loads safer to move, but she's become too closely invested in this place to leave it so simply.
She's cared for the orphans the streets threw up, that stumbled into her Eden during the No Man's Land. She's kept the city fed when they realized how their concrete had turned the earth barren. She's fought to return Gotham to Nature, to free it from the cancer they call civilization, trying to wrangle it, inch by inch, from Batman's grasp. Maybe that's part of her psychosis; she'd have had such an easier time if she'd chosen somewhere that wasn't either a city nor protected (and by that she really means owned) by Batman.
Well, she failed. Batman's town.
But she's come to love it, now. It's been hard and mistrustful and uncomprehending and treacherous to her; that's par for the course. Nature's never been a kind mother. Pamela can live for that. She loves plants and Gotham enough to make it work - enough to take her time, patient and resilient like her beloved plants, until one day Gotham looks like the true Eden she's dreamed.
She's healing Gotham with green, and Batman and his birds rarely ever come even to question her; she's never been quite in the loop with organized crime, and she suspects Eddie and Scarecrow managed to convince the rest of the Arkham folks to leave her alone.
She's grateful for it; she thinks that when Eddie is cured as well, she'd like to get back in touch with him. She's changed.
The only person she sees regularly, outside the visitors of the park, who don't really register on her radar, is the black, slight shape of Batgirl slipping between the trees, sometimes, at night. Pamela doesn't mind. Batgirl moves like she's in a museum or a temple. Pamela doesn't approach her, but she thinks that she wouldn't mind sharing one of her teas with the girl.
The only thing she wishes she could have on top of all is Harley's presence. Pamela's changed; maybe that means she's able to admit to herself that she's getting lonely. Lonely when she's surrounded with plants, now that's something she never expected to feel. She won't go visit her friend in Arkham, nevertheless. She's not that crazy. But that's not to say she's not missing Harley a little more with every week that goes by.
She never has the weakness to give in to the temptation, though, because the day Harley breaks out she and Joker visit Pamela's Robinson Park.
Joker burns it to the ground.
Fandom: DC
Rating: PG
Summary: The one where Ivy goes straight. Or tries to, the rules of the DCU being what they are.
Notes: takes place some time after NML and Murderer/Fugitive. Inspired by the eponymous song by Within Temptation, though there's no relation beyond the title. Fits the hc_bingo "mutation" square.
This time it's going to change.
They don't seem to expect all that much when they let her out, but she's done a lot of thinking, and she's been talking with the Riddler at least as much, and for the first time in a very long time she's watched the other inmates for what they are.
Riddler is right; they are crazy. It isn't just eternal optimism that makes Harley spring back to the Joker no matter what foul attempts he's made on her life. Eddie's suit and speech patterns, he's told her, aren't the affectations he'd honed a long time ago, not anymore - if they've ever been.
Pamela - Ivy - isn't sure where she fits in the middle of all this, but there's at least one point she's been picking up on. Her actions have not done any good for the plants. Forests are still decimated, genetic codes are still twisted beyond recognition, and Robinson Park has been burned down more times than she cares to count because of her actions. In fact, her actions are the very excuse the mayor gives when he's asked why he's not doing anything to make Gotham into a greener city.
Batman was right. She would do more good going the legal route.
Batman was right, and don't think that doesn't prickle her already battered pride, a lot, when he wordlessly confronts her after she's been released and she tells him so. He doesn't believe her any more than she'd believe him if he said he trusted her, but they've come to get on reasonably well. They're used to each other, and they've sometimes been allies, over the years. Maybe it's not saying much - she sometimes wonders if there's any rogue at all in Batman's gallery he hasn't ever made a truce with - but he's never made a secret of the fact that he respects her goal.
At least she had goals, which is more than what can be said about most of the crazies he's put in Arkham. According to Scarecrow, that's one of the reasons she was able to recover.
She could leave Gotham. Batman would probably prefer it if she did. (Probably. He hasn't actually told her so, and gossip has it that when he wants someone away he says it. Even some of his own, they say. Brings a whole new dimension to the turn-over of Robins and Batgirls over the years. For instance, Blüdhaven's Nightwing, or the Robin Joker said he killed, or the red-headed Batgirl.)
Lots of people would, as she learns when the Huntress breaks into her hothouse. But she's changed, so she's wildly annoyed but doesn't retaliate beyond brushing vines a little close to the woman when she retrieves the plant from its broken pot. She doesn't care about Huntress' threats; she's got the big guy's authorization, and - that's equally important - today she's home in Gotham. Like a cutting, she's grown used to her environment, and she knows how to extract what she needs from the soil and the air.
It's a long process. She wouldn't take lightly to being uprooted again.
And she's aware she's playing it close and it'd be loads safer to move, but she's become too closely invested in this place to leave it so simply.
She's cared for the orphans the streets threw up, that stumbled into her Eden during the No Man's Land. She's kept the city fed when they realized how their concrete had turned the earth barren. She's fought to return Gotham to Nature, to free it from the cancer they call civilization, trying to wrangle it, inch by inch, from Batman's grasp. Maybe that's part of her psychosis; she'd have had such an easier time if she'd chosen somewhere that wasn't either a city nor protected (and by that she really means owned) by Batman.
Well, she failed. Batman's town.
But she's come to love it, now. It's been hard and mistrustful and uncomprehending and treacherous to her; that's par for the course. Nature's never been a kind mother. Pamela can live for that. She loves plants and Gotham enough to make it work - enough to take her time, patient and resilient like her beloved plants, until one day Gotham looks like the true Eden she's dreamed.
She's healing Gotham with green, and Batman and his birds rarely ever come even to question her; she's never been quite in the loop with organized crime, and she suspects Eddie and Scarecrow managed to convince the rest of the Arkham folks to leave her alone.
She's grateful for it; she thinks that when Eddie is cured as well, she'd like to get back in touch with him. She's changed.
The only person she sees regularly, outside the visitors of the park, who don't really register on her radar, is the black, slight shape of Batgirl slipping between the trees, sometimes, at night. Pamela doesn't mind. Batgirl moves like she's in a museum or a temple. Pamela doesn't approach her, but she thinks that she wouldn't mind sharing one of her teas with the girl.
The only thing she wishes she could have on top of all is Harley's presence. Pamela's changed; maybe that means she's able to admit to herself that she's getting lonely. Lonely when she's surrounded with plants, now that's something she never expected to feel. She won't go visit her friend in Arkham, nevertheless. She's not that crazy. But that's not to say she's not missing Harley a little more with every week that goes by.
She never has the weakness to give in to the temptation, though, because the day Harley breaks out she and Joker visit Pamela's Robinson Park.
Joker burns it to the ground.