Wrong.

I’d said everything that needed to be said to Rapetoy and Asa and I didn’t communicate about the app over text, we weren’t that dumb (though Skin’s brief little security tutorial made me feel medium dumb, we’d switch texting apps going forward) and I needed to get her to update my computer security generally…maybe I could ‘meet’ her through Diamond? Especially since I could now just tell Diamond the truth…

Great.

Diamond’s life had been changed massively and she wasn’t nearly the freak Asa had always been and wouldn’t be coming at this from the same angle. Maybe I could…well, I’d think about it. But for now, I wanted to go home and clean my damn shirt, which still had my cum in it. After a moment, I dumped it in my bag, at least the cum was dry, even if it stank, but there was a sweatshirt in my car, which I could wear, especially as it was late enough not to be too hot. I tied the bag shut to contain the smell and drove home quickly.

Long day and tomorrow I might be able to fully tame Jenna, which would give me a lot of intel about the supervillains in the city.

But between Rapetoy’s surprises and fucking Arkham and the world as a whole and the stress of revealing myself to Asa and the nervousness about revealing myself to Diamond, all combined to make me fucking exhausted. And I’d need to be sharp to deal with Jenna. She dealt with supervillains all the damn time. She might seem sort of like a hapless competitive dork, but I had to assume there was a reason she wasn’t dead, or working for a specific supervillain, and it likely wasn’t her carpentry skills.

I walked into my apartment, fumbling with the keys, dropping the bag by the door as I headed for the kitchen to grab a drink before I went to sleep. I poured myself a glass of water, then heard something behind me in my living room/office. Fuck.

My gun was in its safe, in my bedroom. Which was through the living room. Fuck. I had knives in my kitchen, but I wasn’t going that route unless I had to, though I slipped a smaller one into my hand as I finished the water. Time to run. “Dammit, Eli, you’d forget your head if it wasn’t attached,” I muttered as I headed for the door.

“Zatanna,” the voice was deep and very definitely not that of Zatanna Zatara, famous performer and superhero.

“What, Batman? I told you I’m not exactly sneaky!”

Tripple fuck. Was I blown? Why would Zatanna be here? Was the app magical? Why was I even still standing, were they that confident that they could handle me? I mean, they were probably right, but…that did nothing good for my ego. I put the knife down and the glass. Fighting wasn’t going to get me out of this.

Zatanna was flicking the light on in the living room, so as I turned around, I saw her sitting in my one actually comfy chair (Asa had taken its mate when she left--note to self, fuck her in that chair sometime--second note to self, focus on this situation!), and standing next to her was Batman.

Two members of the Justice League, in my shitty apartment. How would an innocent person in my shoes react? “If you want info on the Penguin, I can’t help you, I never--”

“Worked for him. I know,” Batman said.

I blinked, nice to know people knew I was innocent, not nice to know it was fucking Batman. My mind raced, but I was smart enough not to guess. “Then why are you here? Breaking in to my apartment?”

“I was expecting you earlier.” Batman said. “Where were you?”

I blinked incredulously, this was surreal. “Sorry I went out Friday night, dad, next time I’ll be home by curfew. What the fuck is this?”

“This is Batman being a control freak and hating it whenever anything doesn’t go exactly as predicted,” Zatanna teased him, which was…interesting. “We’re not here about your personal life. This is about Jinx.”

I blinked for a moment, my body relaxing as I realized what this was about…which was probably a dead giveaway to the World’s Greatest Detective that I was glad, but that wasn’t actually a secret. Anyone who had two Justice Leaguers show up unannounced would be nervous and knowing what it’s about means at least it’s not mind control or mistaken identity.

“The psycho supervillain who robbed Jackson LTD?” I asked, confused. Batman nodded. “Never even saw her. And the Arkham docs checked me out, I’m clean.”

Batman sniffed. “Debatable.” Shit, could he smell the sex on my shirt, or on me? I hadn’t showered and I’d practically been bathing in sex…well, so what? I was handsome, unmarried and my personal life was none of his business.

“This is quite complicated, but Jinx isn’t just a supervillain, she’s a powerful magic user, working on a dangerous ritual.”

They looked at me, like I was supposed to say something. “Okay?”

“To complete that, she needed to begin the ritual, then be beaten, then capture the person who ruined her plan and sacrifice them, to complete the ritual.”

“Are you saying that was all planned?”

“No.” Batman said at the same time as Zatanna said “Yes.”

They looked at each other, then Zatanna extended a hand.

”She wasn’t planning to get caught so early, but she intended to eventually be defeated by me," Batman explained. "We found several clues already planted which would have led me to her hideout, which she has now abandoned.”

“Why? You guys fought, you won, shouldn’t it have been an ambush?”

“It was, but Jinx wasn’t there--”

“Because Batman didn’t spoil her plan, you did.”

“What? No I didn’t. I literally ran away and called the cops! I never even saw her.”

“I can explain how the ancient ritual selects who her rival is, if you like. It should only take the rest of the night.”

“No. Fine. It’s not like you’d lie about this,” or would they? No, that made no sense, if they knew about the app, they’d take me down, this was just…life in Gotham. For now. “So, what, she’s on her way to get me and this is an ambush?”

“No.” Zatanna spoke before Batman could, giving him a confusing look. “I’ve cast a veiling spell over you and Oracle has edited the police reports to lead nowhere.”

“Which won’t help if she actually finds someone on the GCPD who knows something and will talk.”

“She’s from India. So are her muscle. She clearly doesn’t have any local connections!”

This had the air of an argument which had already happened. Repeatedly.

“Well, great, thanks for the warning and the protection, don’t let me keep--”

“We want you to help us set an ambush for her,” Batman said bluntly.

I blinked at that. “Uh…are your protections failing?”

“No,” Zatanna said, glaring at Batman, her tone a warning.

“Jinx will not give up,” he countered. “And though she preferred to use me as the subject of the ritual--” Zatanna interrupted with an explanation about ‘souls’ that honestly sounded so much like technobabble that I tuned it out, before he continued. “the fact that she is hunting you means that she is willing to take another sacrifice rather than risk being caught before she can make another attempt.”

I considered that for a moment, trying to ignore the looming and glaring superhero in my living room. That ‘another attempt’ sparked something. “In books, something like this would be on a clock. Like, ‘by the next full moon’? She really can come after me anytime in the future?”

“Yes.” Batman said as Zatanna said “No.”

“She could come after you anytime,” Batman stated.

“But the timeline for the ritual…well, it does actually run out of time when we’re past the full moon.” I reached for my phone, but Zatanna kindly glossed, “8 days.”

“Okay…so, she doesn’t find me in the next week and we’re good?”

“No, you’re good, but Jinx will still want to complete her ritual, so she’ll begin again, endangering the innocent to draw me out,” Batman explained.

“And that’s sad and all, but in case you forgot, the GCPD canned my ass. I don’t protect and serve anymore,” I was starting to get angry, though I was all too aware of how stupid that was. Yes, Drop Dead, might let me kill him, but that would have terrible consequences, as well as being wildly immoral. But this was bullshit.

“Come on,” Zatanna gave me a bright smile and a slight flash of cleavage that would have been more effective if I hadn’t been fucking all night, “you saved two people. Help us save a few more.”

“Helping someone in front of me and letting you use me as bait for a psycho witch are not the same thing,” I shook my head.

“And you care more for your ‘friends’ than random strangers?” Batman asked.

I gave him a hard look. “Yeah, the Jacksons have been good to me. Gotham? Ain’t done shit for me.”

“So you’re refusing to help us?” Batman’s voice was low, deep, menacing. I only kept from retreating the same way I did when faced with Bane, showing fear makes a predator strike. So, puff up your fur like a goddamn cat and show no fear.

“Yep. Now, it’s Friday night, I’ve had a long day and a longer night and I’d like to go to bed. Do you mind?”

“Your ex-partner works for the Penguin. I could find her--.” I looked at him uncomprehendingly, how the fuck did he know that? How much prep work had he done for this little meeting? Anger, desire and fear were warring inside me. Though desire knew there was no way to get Bridgette if I took him up on his offer. Why would he offer any of this? He didn’t know what I wanted with the bitch. Right? “You could turn her in. Clear your name. Get your job back. Be a cop again.”

Well, that explained that. Anger won. “I gave the GCPD ten years of my life. It never gave me anything back but a paycheck. That buys groceries, not loyalty. I don’t want that job back.”

Batman’s eyes were two endless pits of darkness, that I was afraid I would fall into and drown, but I held out and held out and held out in the endless silence. I didn’t know how long it, or I, would last, then Zatanna spoke, breaking whatever spell he had cast.

“If you change your mind,” Zatanna extended a hand, containing an unmarked card, with a phone number on it, I took it, brushing her hand, wondering if she’d somehow wronged me, and whether I wanted her to have…but she had not, to the annoyance of some parts of me and the relief of others..

“Tropelet Ot Ronam,” she said and vanished in a cloud of smoke. I coughed, waving it away and hoping it wouldn’t set off the fire alarm, that would be the fucking capper on my day. Though, my idiot dick couldn’t help thinking, that might be enough to count as wronging me.

When I looked around, Batman was gone. Assuming I was still being watched I grabbed the bag and dumped the shirt in my laundry basket, then put the electronics on a shelf, making it look like they were for display, just collecting old electronics, nothing weird about that, right?

I did take the tape out of the tape recorder and destroyed it in the bathroom. Really didn’t want Batman seeing that, but he shouldn’t be able to hear it now, no matter what else he’d done. I found no bugs and finally decided I was being paranoid. Batman might suspect me, but surely he suspected everyone. That was detective disease. And, as far as he knew, I was a tiny fish and his giant ocean. I doubted he would focus on me, there was no reason for him to, after all.

I still ended up taking a sleeping pill to get to sleep as my brain just kept imagining Batman watching me…