Welcome to the latest chapter of my DC stories. Thank you all for the votes and positive comments. This series will have more entries than the previous Robin vs the Gotham City Sirens series now that I've figured out my writing style and can stop stealing the ideas of much better authors.
Feel free to contact me if you have suggestions, want to help me edit, or have requests. You never know, your requests might be the next story! This story was in fact a blend of two reader requests.
All characters are 18+ and owned by DC and Warner Bros.
***
It'd been a fortnight since Batman left.
He said he'd only be gone the rest of the evening. Just enough time to get Catwoman's blood and a sample of the unrefined fear toxin to a lab owned by a Wayne Corp subsidiary. A few hours later, Robin got the call. This toxin was more potent than expected, far more than anything Scarecrow had cooked up before. Batman suspected Scarecrow had assistance, perhaps acquired the chemical ingredients from... unusual sources. He needed to utilise all the resources at his disposal.
After the call wrapped up, Robin didn't know whether to laugh or shiver. 'All the resources' meant one thing, but it was amazing how Batman couldn't refer to them by name. It was as if they were a secret shame. Or an odious chore.
So Robin was left with patrolling Gotham. First solo gig. No safety net. No backup. Batgirl was out of town and it was just him with Alfred on comms. And the comms only had bad news.
The criminals were getting bolder.
Dent, in a grotesque offering to his legal past and dual-personality, had kidnapped several prosecutors and defence attorneys. He forced them to participate in mock trials while he presided as judge and jury. Any guilty verdict was met with the death penalty, naturally carried out by Dent himself with a nine-millimetre Beretta full of hollow-point rounds. No matter how effectively the terrified lawyers argued their cases, Dent would always decide on the flip of his coin. To make things worse, it was being streamed online. Robin just saw an associate of Reeves, Beaumont and Twain get his head blown off on YouTube.
Killer Croc had thrown himself into a mob war between the Maroni mafia and the Triads. The Triads hired him to take out several Maroni capos partying on a yacht in Miller Harbour. Croc had free reign over the yacht for twenty minutes before Robin arrived and knocked the beast down with a combination of tranquilisers and shock batons. He'd only left once he was satisfied Gotham PD could transport the unconscious Croc to Arkham. Robin didn't envy the cops. Croc had been thorough, and a red yacht drifted back to shore towards the police. The yacht was white when it left its mooring a few hours ago.
Mercifully, the Joker was nowhere to be found. For whatever reason, Batman's absence seemed to have killed whatever motivation the Joker had for crime. It was like the Clown Prince was hibernating until his true nemesis returned. Robin was prepared to build an entire church himself to keep that particular miracle going.
Robin knew he couldn't stem this tide alone. The only thing that would be keeping Batman is that it was something important. Something that threatened more than just Gotham. Something that threatened the country, perhaps even the world.
Robin shuddered. He knew what types Batman mixed with when it came to global threats. That kind of thing was way out of his league. Metahumans, aliens and weirder still. And he'd had his share of weird lately.
Harley's girlish giggling in his ear as she pulled off his gauntlets
--
Robin shook the thoughts away.
Focus.
There'd been a string of break-ins at various biology labs across the city. Experimental specimens were going missing, and the specimens were all plants.
It fit Poison Ivy's MO perfectly.
Robin sucked air in through his teeth as he watched the next target. He managed to persuade the lab's research directors to publish an article about a project similar to the work done at the other labs. The article was a total sham, but hopefully it would be enough to draw Ivy out.
It was.
A car with tinted windows pulled up outside the lab's security gate. A single figure in a long coat and hat climbed out of the car. Robin pulled out a monocular to get a better look. The coat had its collar pulled up to the neck. He couldn't tell if the figure was male or female. The hat prevented him from seeing anything of the face or hair.
The figure raised a gloved hand. The concrete under the security gate cracked as thick brown roots forced their way up through the pavement, wrapping around the gate and violently pulling it down. The metal shrieked in protest as it bent and warped. Within seconds, the gate had been forced open and the figure walked past.
Ivy
.
Definitely Ivy.
Robin switched to a vantage points on the lab's roof. He got a glimpse of red hair tucked beneath the collar of Ivy's coat.
Red hair that smelled like wildflowers as she slid her tongue into
--
Robin shook the thoughts away again.
Ivy swiped a stolen keycard and moved into the building itself. She strode past the reception desk and towards the research stations.
Robin breathed and moved. He opened the roof exit and crept downstairs to the research level. White-tiled floors reached in every direction. Offices with dull grey furniture and pale blue carpet. Abstract corporate art.
There was the sound of movement. Robin slid forward. It was bright in here. Low ceilings. No dark corners or rafters to hide in. He'd have to be careful.
Robin pushed his way through a set of double doors into a long hallway. The hallway led deeper into the lab, and this section had research stations on either side. The research stations were collections of workbenches and cabinets, divided into individual rooms by glass walls. Ivy was searching one such station for a specimen that didn't exist.
Robin stood in the doorway behind Ivy. "There's nothing here, doctor."
Ivy whirled around. Robin could feel the floor shake and he imagined her plant allies racing through the ground to reach them. But then Ivy saw who it was. She smiled.
"Oh! Hello, handsome," Ivy said casually. The floor stopped shaking. "What's not here?"
"The specimen," Robin answered. "The lab's article was a fake to draw you out."
"Looks like it worked," Ivy purred as she took off her hat and the crimson waterfall of hair fell free. She slid the coat from her shoulders and it fell to the floor.
Ivy was radiant in the lab's bright light. She was wearing a unitard of tightly woven leaves, with lime-green boots that reached just short of her curvaceous thighs. Leafy bracelets climbed up her forearms. Her breasts were just as full and sumptuous as Robin remembered. Then there was the perfect hourglass figure with the wide hips and slim waist. Long legs. Plump crimson lips. Her skin was the same emerald as it was in the clearing.
In the clearing. With Harley.
Ivy idly played with her red curls, rolling a strand of hair around her finger. She smirked as Robin's eyes dropped to ogle her. "What are we going to do now?"
Robin brought his gaze back up. Already he could feel control slipping away. "I'm take -- taking you in!"
The buxom redhead laughed. "Oh, come now. Are you
sure
that's what you want to do? Wouldn't you rather do... something else?"
Robin shook his head. "Lose the tricks, Ivy. It won't work this time."
"Cheap Vegas magicians do tricks," Ivy said sharply. "I don't. Although I did make you see God. My own kind of magic."
"Cute."
"I thought so," Ivy ran her hands down her sides and bit her lip seductively. "Are you up for a little more? You won't have to chase me this time."
Robin didn't answer.
