Chapter Text
I
“Just making sure you’re real,” the Riddler mutters, eyes narrowed in calculation.
Oswald stares at him, face affronted, nose wrinkled. It’s a familiar expression, comically out of place after so much has passed between them. Murders and … resurrections.
It’s anger that he’s feeling, right? Anger making his heart race and his blood boil. “You are difficult to kill. More cockroach than penguin.” He can feel his pulse in his throat. “But don’t you dare call me ‘Ed’. I’m…” he savors the moment of reveal, tasting the appellation on his tongue, “...the Riddler. And I became him when I killed you.” His heart leaps violently at the thought; at the memory of his moment of ascension, of understanding.
But Oswald doesn’t seem to realize it; doesn’t understand that the Riddler is more than just a man. He sneers at the Riddler, and says in his most condescending, humorously biting voice: “Newsflash, Ed, I’m! Not! Dead!”
The Riddler chuckles,choosing to see the humor of the situation. Of course Oswald doesn’t believe him. Not yet. He hasn’t seen the Riddler in action. “It’s true,” he agrees easily. Oswald is indeed alive. Oswald is real and he’s here, and the Riddler is feeling more than he’s felt in months. “For now.”
II
There's a sense of familiarity, completeness, as Edward - ah, how silly of him, he's forgotten his own new name, must be the stress of the situation - the Riddler holds his hand out for Oswald to shake.
Oswald’s hand in his is bony, sinewy in a way that it wasn’t before. He’s always had thin wrists and hands with protruding metacarpals, but when he’d been coiffed and well-appointed they’d seemed aristocratic. Now they feel fragile, breakable, like they had when they’d first met. The Riddler sneers - it seems his near-death has taken some toll after all.
“Deal,” Oswald says, drawing the Riddler’s attention back to his face.
And that expression, that look of gleeful threat and delight in Oswald’s eyes, is one he knows very well. Excitement stirs in his veins, an automatic sort of response. It can't be helped, the Riddler supposes, not when he's so used to working with Oswald. His body knows what it means when Oswald wears that look.
“I think we both know how this needs to go,” the Riddler says, and Oswald scowls, but doesn’t argue.
III
Uh oh - that certainly shouldn't be happening. Well, the Riddler supposes, it's the thought of killing Oswald once and for all that has him so aroused. They're basically play-acting Oswald’s inevitable defeat at his hands, so it goes to figure that the Riddler should be hard.
His left hand grasps at the loose-fitting front of Oswald’s jumpsuit, feeling the firm musculature underneath. He shouldn’t be surprised - Oswald has always been stronger than he seems, faster, far more physically dangerous than most assume. He can feel Oswald’s heart racing in his chest and wonders if he, too, is realizing that this is how it will all end. Oswald’s ribcage expands and contracts under the Riddler’s hand.
The Riddler’s other hand holds the knife aloft, and he huffs in irritation as Oswald struggles with the jello in his hand. The Riddler supposes he’s grateful that Oswald is too distracted to realize his arousal - that could lead to some awkward lines of questioning that really aren’t fit for this damp little prison.
Or ever, really. Oswald has already made it quite clear that he no longer cares about the Riddler’s rejection - well, to be perfectly accurate, the Riddler had never rejected him at all, but made his feelings quite clear all the same - so there really is no need to imagine they’ll ever have a discussion at any point about the Riddler’s arousal (or lack thereof, though there’s no need to consider that since, to be frank, the arousal is there) at life-threatening situations or the occasional bout of serenading….
“Ed!” Oswald hisses, voice scathing, “Am I interrupting your nap?!”
The Riddler bares his teeth but doesn’t bother to complain about the name; he’s realized now that Oswald is determined to ignore his new title. “Are you sure you’re ready, or do you want to practice your juggling a little more?”
“Ready,” Oswald growls, voice dangerously low.
The Riddler smirks, moving the knife into place. With his wrist so close to Oswald’s neck, he can feel stress sweat on Oswald’s pallid throat and the thrumming of his heart beneath the delicate surface of his skin. His neck is surprisingly smooth for a man’s, the Riddler considers.
“Help!” Oswald bays, voice convincingly frantic, and Ed’s hand trembles against the man with desire. Or--
The Riddler’s hand, that is. With bloodlust.
IV
The Riddler can aim a gun at point-blank range, and when he shoots the dart, it hits the guard, steady and true. His eyes shoot over to Oswald; the Riddler can’t help him from here, so he’d better have it handled on his own--
Oh, he does.
He standing behind the other guard, gripping him like the Riddler held Oswald earlier, but when Oswald yanks the knife across the throat, it strikes true.
Oswald’s teeth are bared in a feral grimace, any noise he makes covered by the guard’s guttural scream. Blood gushes out of the man’s neck - Oswald hit the carotid artery, killing the man nearly instantly. The Riddler’s eyes follow the man as he collapses to the floor, an appreciative grin of his own on his face.
He is pleased and impressed despite himself, and a helpless chuckle escapes him as Oswald approaches with the key. The fingernails of his hand are stained a little with blood, and the Riddler thinks, gleefully, that this is how the Penguin should look.
The Riddler can’t remember the last time he saw Oswald like this - wild, like an animal, like a predator intent on its kill.
V
The Riddler laughs down at Oswald; Oswald, covered in streaks of blood and eyes flat and colorless like marbles, Oswald, who’s beginning to smile, and the Riddler is never sure if that is a good sign or a bad one.
“Actually,” Oswald says, in that familiar husky tone, and the Riddler quietens, waiting to hear his response with anticipation curling in his gut. “I have an army of Hugo Strange’s monsters at my command,” Oswald tells him, nodding along with the words. He’s looking too smug, too self-assured, the Riddler thinks, smile fading to an echo. Oswald is telling the truth.
“But,” Oswald says, the smile gone from his face, eyes focused unerringly as the Riddler stares uncertainly at him, “even if I were alone, you wouldn’t stand a chance.”
There is the fire, the competition he’s been missing. There is the bloodlust that neither Jim Gordon nor Lucius Fox could hope to match. There is that burning hunger, that focused attention.
Oh yes, he had known it back then. The Riddler needs an enemy.
“I suppose we’ll see,” he tells his foil, voice deep and pleased.
“I suppose so,” the Penguin agrees, voice soft with wrath.
The Riddler takes a step back, and so does the Penguin, and they turn their backs and they’re walking away, footsteps loud in the potholed alleyway.
And if the Riddler glances back --
--the Penguin looks right back at him, anyway.
FIN