( IC CONTACT )

[fille_fatale]

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[promisetokeep]

[[Continuation from here]]


Of course not.

One of them tried to get us into a club with his influence, but the bouncer turned him away. He was being a jerk, so I decided to buy the club myself and invite everyone in except for him.

[fille_fatale]

huh

didn't think you had it in you.

[promisetokeep]

neither did they.

i suppose you can say i've been surprising everyone around me lately.

[fille_fatale]

no shit

[Before she can think better of it, she adds:]

what's up with you? you're not acting like you

[promisetokeep]

[It was a question he hadn't been expecting. Not from her. Catching him just off guard enough that, ironically, he opts for her approach in response:]

maybe I am. maybe this is who Bruce Wayne really is

[Deflection.]

for bought_the_bank

[fille_fatale]

Things did not go well with Constantine, and that was only the beginning. Going home was her number one priority, but the price was too high. When it came down to it, Selina has always lived by one rule: look out for herself. And the prospect of some apparently all powerful stranger fucking around in her head, taking her memories, was not looking out for number one. The whole thing came to a close when she tried to punch Constantine, and with the attempt her chance to go home evaporated.

She didn't trust it, at first. Why believe some creep who had just wanted to mess with her memory? Selina told herself that she left to find other possibilities, other roads home, but the real reason was Bruce. She may be trapped in his world, but she didn't have to be trapped in his home, staring every day at a gutted manor that would always make her think of the one she remembered scaling, dealing with his quiet moodiness.

No thank you. She had to know she could fall on her feet, even here.

It made the prospect of leaving Gotham easier - especially since she took the Aston Martin with her, pawned it for too little because of the scratch and the dent she'd left in it. It still funded her through a few cities - Metropolis first, where she had to learn what the hell a Kryptonian was, and then New York City, which wasn't bad, but it wasn't home. She even headed to Chicago, and would have headed for Miami if the money from the car hadn't run out.

The important thing was that there wasn't another option. No other way home. Nothing. She'd had that feeling all along, but the really important thing was that none of them were Gotham. None of them felt like they could even become home. Stubbornness keeps her away longer than she wants to, and it becomes a rhythm that carries her through five years. When her twenty-first birthday comes around, she realizes that she wouldn't need a fake ID anymore, except for the fact that the Selina Kyle of this world has been dead for almost a decade. Her license (a fake she picked up in New York) says Cat Pepper on it, in memory of Ivy. It's about as much sentiment as she allows herself; thinking about the few people she left behind doesn't even bother her anymore.

She tells herself that until she believes it.

When she gets off the bus in Gotham, she breathes deep and shakes her head at the smell: at least that is still the same. But there are differences, of course; she's different. She's not a street kid anymore, and any leeway she had out here thanks to her age is gone. It's okay, though: Barbara Kean told her once that she was pretty, and that it should be her first weapon. She still carries a switch blade, but she understands the lesson better, now.

She carries something else, too, but that only gets retrieved at night, when she goes to work. Not many people talk, but the ones who mutter to nurses in emergency rooms mention some crazy bitch with a whip.

It's not just robbing bookies anymore: she's done with just surviving. The problem with moving up in the underworld in this Gotham is that she doesn't know all the players, yet. It takes time, a couple months, before she's satisfied that the jeweler she robs isn't protected by anyone that can get to her easy. Finding a fence is a little easier: no matter the universe, that's a world she knows how to navigate. Finding a good price takes some aggressive negotiating, but she's not a kid with no hope of taking on a little muscle, anymore. She gets by.

So she's doing some actual legal shopping - with less than legal cash - when she spots him for the first time. It turns something in her, and before Selina can decide if it's anger or satisfaction or nostalgia, she heads for him and puts a pair of very expensive shoes in front of the cashier he's at.

"He'll get these for me."

The idea of him paying for things doesn't bother her so much, now. Maybe it's because she could absolutely pay for them herself, but she doesn't spend too much time considering it.

[bought_the_bank]

There's no double take this time. Which can only mean he's been keeping tabs on her throughout the years on some level. He might have even orchestrated being in the same place at the same time now that she's back in Gotham.

The woman behind the counter, who's been trying to attract his interest from the moment he walked in, seems perturbed. She casts her gaze from the shoes, to Selina, and then back to Bruce, silently asking if she should ring them up. He offers her that well crafted playboy smile, designed to pacify and charm. "You heard the lady."

Once the shoes are wrapped up, he offers Selina his arm. The bag hangs in his other hand. No greeting. No explanation required. No apologies.

[fille_fatale]

Selina flashes the cashier a brief smirk, though she almost feels sorry for the other woman. Almost: Selina isn't a very sympathetic person. But she's satisfied that she still has Bruce wrapped around her little finger (wrong Bruce, she thinks, and quickly moves past the thought). It's easy enough - that smile is distracting. It suits him the way a well tailored suit fits a hobo: it works, but it still feels wrong. She hides any surprise she might feel, though, by taking his arm.

A few years is enough to stop being angry. A few months was enough, really, but the time away was about her, not him. Besides, she's hardly about to apologize for stealing his car.

"This is the part where you ask how long I've been in town."

[bought_the_bank]

He doesn't expect her to. In fact, there's really no need. What was his became hers. And now belongs to him again. Maybe someday she'll come across it in his garage. The dent and the paint were fixed long ago.

"How long have you been in town?"

[fille_fatale]

Of course he'd buy it back: if she ever spots it, she'll probably wind up questioning her own surprise.

The smirk comes back when he asks.

"A month, give or take." Give or take a couple extra months. "City still stinks." But there's a fondness in her voice: she doesn't like this town, but she does love it, a little.

[callmefives]

The Admiral has paired us for this month, would you like to meet in the mess hall, on deck, or in the Enclosure to talk?

[fille_fatale]

I'm good talking like this.

[callmefives]

Is there some reason you're not willing to meet? It's a small ship, it's not like we won't likely run across each other.

[fille_fatale]

[She's silent for a long breath, talking herself through not caring about what she's seen. It lets her sound a little more nonchalant.]

Saw some of your videos.

[callmefives]

[He's quiet for a moment, frowning.] Okay. Is there some reason that made you unwilling to meet me?

TLV

[a_different_future]

Your warden is in the infirmary. He was killed some minutes ago. He'll wake up in a few hours.

I'll be here until then.

[fille_fatale]

[That is not the kind of text she expected to get, what the fuck.]

who did it

?

[a_different_future]

I don't know yet.

I expect they'll be apprehended soon.

If not, I'll handle it.

[fille_fatale]

how

[Feel the skepticism rolling off her in waves.]

[a_different_future]

My priority was Fives. But there's nowhere on this boat they can hide from me.

private text a few days after port

[ninefox]

do you like jewels you seem like you would like jewels

[fille_fatale]

yeah they're okay

[She typed something much more excited and upfront first and deleted it. Gotta tread lightly, right?]

[ninefox]

well I grabbed you some while I was out

[Which sounds a lot better than torching and pillaging. Or trophies.]

come by whenever

[He doesn't bother telling her the cabin number; of course she knows.]

[fille_fatale]

guess i can find some time

[By far the hardest thing she has ever, ever had to do, is not run directly to his room, the location of which she definitely knows.

But oh my god, does she want to go check it out.

She manages to make it fifteen, almost twenty minutes for knocking at his door.]

[ninefox]

[The black and gold door slides soundlessly open. Jedao sits with his back to one of the walls, slumping a little listlessly, but he scrounges up a grin and nudges a coarse sack at her. Inside are a strange assortment of - not rescues, not trophies. Relics, scraps of places lost to nothing. Golden bracelets like winding vines, dripping with clusters of tiny jade and garnet grapes. A necklace on an almost imperceptibly slender chain, diamonds and sapphires that look like vivid blue eyes at first glance, light glinting in a way that seems to gaze around. There are combs that are also feathers that are also single iridescent pieces of carved, gleaming pearl. A loose handful of bayberries, each composed of hundreds of tiny rubies. An opal ring that seems to contain eerie, beautiful worlds of water and fire all its own. He just - grabbed things, magpie like, with no idea what he would do with them, but the vague sense they shouldn't be trampled into ash. And now they're hers.]