Epilogue: Consume

Ivy stopped dead and drew her gun.

The lab was trashed. Biohazard suits shredded, tables overturned, animal cages open, her glassware and chemicals smashed and spilled over the floor in a toxic sea.

Had the FBI raided? One of her lab subjects escaped? No—for all the chaos, her plants were vanished, not smashed. Like the person wanted to provoke her but knew which line not to cross.

Ivy put down her pistol.

"HARLEY!"

No answer. A couple of mice were scampering around, so nothing toxic had been released. Ivy strode through the mess to look at the damage. Most of her lab animals were dead, the electronics ruined. It looked like Harley had tried to use the centrifuge as a blender. The foot pedals to the sink had been weighted down with spare terra cotta pots, and the basin was so clogged with sludge that it overflowed. Ivy kicked the pots away, then turned at the sound of a crash coming from the greenhouse.

Harley was standing inside, kicking through the glass walls, one foot bare and bloody. She turned around as Ivy walked in and gave her an ear-to-ear grin. It did nothing to help Ivy's towering temper.

"Heya, Red!"

"Harley. What are you doing?"

"Celebrating."

"Celebrating what?"

"Oh. Uh…" Harley's manic grin faded just a little bit as she took in Ivy's expression. "Don't worry about your plants. I moved them. And all the experiments you're still working on. This was just the stuff you, uh, wouldn't take with you, you know? So I figured I'd have a good time with it."

She scuffed her feet on the floor like a guilty child, then caught sight of a mouse and pounced after it. Ivy expected the animal to get away, but instead Harley stamped hard with the foot that had a shoe on, and there were agonized squeaks.

"Harley. Put that thing out of its misery."

"Fine." Harley stamped again, then looked at the bottom of her shoe. "Ew."

Ivy rolled her eyes. "So. What are we celebrating?"

"Our move of course!"

Ivy felt her heart sink. "Move?"

"Come on, Red. You remember." Harley went back to kicking out the greenhouse's glass with her injured foot. "Now that Deadshot's done we're going back to Gotham. You promised."

There was silence.

Andi, why didn't you run? But Ivy knew why. Harley had her madness. Ivy had her obsessions. And Andi had her ideals. Changing any of them, stopping the collision course they were on, was more than Ivy could do. Maybe this—Harley against Oracle—was how things were always going to end. And right now, she wanted nothing more than to stand aside, to escape the choice that she knew was coming for her: Harley? Or Oracle?

But if she stayed here, Harley was going to leave without her. The only chance Ivy had to see her safe—to see both of her friends safe—was to agree. Maybe, just maybe, if she could play her cards right, she'd keep them from each other's throats. Wouldn't have to choose.

"You better have shipped my plants the right way. If I see so much as a broken stem, I'm holding you responsible."

The big, sloppy grin Harley gave her was almost enough to make it worth it.

"Thanks, Red! Oh, you're going to like the things I've got planned. I've got big ideas for the…"

There was more, but Ivy didn't hear it. She stared at the mess of fur and bones smeared on the floor, the shards of broken glass, the bloody cuts on the bottom of Harley's one bare foot.

Gotham.

Andi was getting better at steering; she managed to wheel herself through JP's door in one go instead of having to back up and try again three or four times. He was bent over a knapsack, but looked up when she came in.

"It was weird having you back in the Manor," she said. "And now you're leaving again, two weeks later, and that's weirder."

"Yeah, well, no offense, but I'm glad to be going," he said, zipping the set of fake IDs he'd been sorting into a pocket in his bag. "Wayne's taken all my guns, and I don't care how much you like Pennyworth, I still think he's a pompous, self-righteous—"

"You just don't like him because he's British."

"That's what I said."

He gave her that same roguish grin that had first made Andi date him, way back when he'd only been JP and she'd only been Barbara, and she couldn't help herself. She grinned right back.

"Are you sure you have to go?"

He shook his head. "What, are you getting sentimental? You know it's suicide for me to stay in the US."

"I could finagle… something. You saved Gordon's life, and he and I owe you for that."

"How is he, by the way?"

"Recovering. Slower than you did, but no permanent damage. And he remembers what you did for him, as does most of the SWAT team. They'd stand up for you. I could fake evidence, clear your name…"

JP's snort cut across her wild planning. "You're good, Andi, but with Deadshot, uh, dead and shot…" He paused, as if to check that she'd gotten the joke. Andi just raised her eyebrows, unimpressed. "There's no one else to take the blame. Unless you want your boyfriend to shoulder all of it."

Andi thought she showed commendable restraint to not comment on that.

"Besides," JP said, his grin slowly fading. "Let's be honest for once, Andi. You don't want me around. Not really."

The silence stretched for so long that JP eventually turned back to his packing. Andi searched his face for any sign of—she didn't know. Guilt? Satisfaction? There wasn't anything except the same old JP.

"You didn't have to kill him," she finally said. "I know that was what we agreed. But… I had already stopped him. It was over."

JP stopped midway through pulling on his socks and gave her a serious look. "He would have found a way out. I heard you trying to close loopholes right before I did it. Sooner or later, he would have found one you missed."

Andi was quiet.

"Don't pretend you didn't know it. What was your plan, Andi? Put him on the shelf and just hope he stayed there? Or…" He trailed off, studying her. "Was it more sinister than that?

"What was your plan after you got Deadshot alone? Order him to stay still while you shot him? Or keep your hands clean and tell him to kill himself?"

This silence was even longer, and JP didn't look away from her this time.

"I don't know," Andi whispered. "I thought about it. Both of those options. I don't know if I could have gone through with it."

"You should be thanking me." JP lifted the bag onto his back, and Andi realized that that meant he was done—ready to go. "If you'd done it, you would have hated yourself. I promise you, I'm not losing any sleep over it."

Andi couldn't think of anything to say to that, so instead she shoved the bleak mood aside and smiled at him. "Let me walk you out."

He followed her, but as they went down the hall, Andi noticed him give her a sidelong look. "Walk me out?"

She surprised herself by laughing.

Their companionable silence lasted until he reached the front door. The sun was shining, warm and pleasant, and a nice, anonymous Hyundai sat waiting in the drive. JP paused and turned to her.

"I know I joke about it a lot, but I mean it this time. You should talk to Wayne. I don't know what it is you see in him, but… I think he'd be good for you. And after everything, you deserve to be happy."

Andi managed to cover her shock and laughed, shook her head. "What, are you getting sentimental?"

"Maybe. You still should, though." He gave her an assessing look, then smirked. "And by 'talk to,' I mean 'sleep with.' Just in case you couldn't figure out what—"

"You made yourself perfectly clear, thanks."

JP grinned.

They stayed like that, staring at the car and the road away from Wayne Manor for a minute. Finally, JP sighed and turned to her.

"I guess this is goodbye, then."

Andi didn't know what to say, so she stuck out her hand instead. JP surprised her by taking it in both of his, and Andi felt her eyes go hot and itchy as she looked at him. Despite Deadshot, despite everything before that—she would miss him.

"Goodbye, Andi."

"Goodbye."

He made it halfway down the steps, and then the words Andi had been trying to hold back burst free.

"Maybe I should thank you. But I don't know if I can."

JP turned back so fast that Andi knew he'd been waiting for her to say something, but then he stood there, trying to think of a response.

"You got lucky," he finally said. "Someone needed to kill him and I took the choice out of your hands. But I'm leaving, Andi. I can't save your ass again. Next time…"

"It's on me."

"You need to decide where your line is. Because Harley and Ivy are coming for you. And when they do, you need to know exactly how far you'll go to stop them."

Andi couldn't think of anything to say, so she just nodded. JP nodded too and headed to the car.

"Stay in touch," he called over his shoulder.

"Stay in—you don't have a phone! Or an address!"

JP grinned up at her, slung his bag into the passenger seat. "You'll figure something out."

Andi found Bruce installing the computers on a new platform, right in the middle of the cave's pool.

"What do you think?" he asked as she joined him. "Smooth, wide track from the elevators down to here. And the desk is set at the right height for your chair."

Andi pulled her mind away from JP, from Harley and Ivy and having to kill, and smiled at him. "The ADA would be proud."

"I'm thinking about making it sink down into the water. That way I can still have the entire cave available when you're not down here."

"Won't that make the surface too slippery for my wheels?"

"Not with this material." He knelt down to rub his hand on the stone. "It's got the texture of sandpaper to give you maximum friction. A bit harder to push through, but it means you'll have a solid grip, even in the damp."

"You really thought of everything." Andi gave him a smile and they locked eyes. With Bruce kneeling, they were at the same height for once. And he was only a foot away—

She kissed him.

No hesitation. No warning. No looking back. She could smell the sweat and dirt on him, but his lips were soft under hers and the tension in his back melted when she put her hands around his neck.

It didn't last. Bruce was too wary, self-controlled, to just lose himself in the moment. He pulled away from her, like she'd known he would, and gave her a confused look. But he didn't stand and put himself completely out of reach. She took that as a positive sign.

"What are you doing, Andi?"

"Making a choice."

"What choice?"

"We're on borrowed time," Andi said. "Sure, we stopped Deadshot, but Harley and Ivy got what they wanted. Gotham softened up and me disabled. That means they're going to come back. Soon." And this time, the choice to kill or not would be entirely hers. "Things are about to change, and not for the better. I don't want… I don't want regrets."

Bruce's expression shifted, gentled. "I get it. Don't worry. We'll figure out some way to—"

"No we won't," Andi said. "Not right now. This isn't about defeating them. It's about me. And you. And choice."

He looked like he was about to stand up, so Andi gripped him by the shoulders. She leaned her face in, as close to him as she could get and still meet his eyes. Her words came out in a rasp. "Forget putting me first. Forget what I deserve. I'd rather have what I can, while I can, than nothing at all."

"Andi, are you—"

They were less than an inch apart. Desperate to shut him up, to keep him from pulling away, Andi closed the gap, and it was like a spark on frozen fingers. The pain broke through the numbness and despair, quickened her as it burned.

It took him a split second to ignite, and then his restraint broke and he pulled her straight out of her chair and held her to him, so desperate that he was almost rough, and then there was no hesitation, no questions or self-control for either of them. The fire spread over her whole body, flames trailing everywhere he touched, engulfing her face, her hair, her shoulders and wrists and back, delving deep inside as he kissed her, consuming the fear and loss and anguish.

It didn't matter. It didn't matter that she could taste her tears mixed in with their kiss, spattering the flames with oil. Didn't matter that he would never love her back. That he still wasn't hers, not really. That this meant nothing to him and everything to her.

Because she was going to lose him. She would kill Harley and Ivy or they would kill her, and either way, she would lose Bruce. Andi had fought like hell, struggled until she was broken and beaten, and it wasn't enough. There was one way out of this, and she could never tell him, but at long last she was willing to face it. She had let go, but damned if she was going to have regrets until then. Her past was gone, her future gone, and the here and now was all she had left.

And somehow, with the fire catching, making it impossible to breathe, think, regret, here and now was enough.