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Poison Ivy might not be Catwoman, but that didn’t mean she didn’t know how to get into a building she wasn’t supposed to. Though, Selina would undoubtedly consider blasting every single guard with pheromones and asking them to open the locked doors for her cheating. But climbing through air vents and slipping past laser grids was for people who’s costumes weren’t mostly leaves.
Ivy smiled politely as her most recent victim, that is, "helper", opened the locked door to C suite with a dopey smile. Ivy smiled back and looked around for a cupboard to shove the idiot into. Normally, Ivy found it a blessing that her pheromones were so effective. A little dose would leave everyone light headed and compliant, and a power blast would have anyone handing over their free will on a platter. However, it wasn’t the most useful thing when her helpers also abandoned their higher brain functions for the sake of making heart eyes.
Ivy smirked as she gave the guard a kiss on the cheek before dropping his now sleeping form in a broom closet. Sometimes it was a pain being so easy to love.
She wasn’t just here for a walk in the park, though her break-in had been just that so far. She was here because Meridiana Industries had made the mistake of performing improper waste disposal while within a hundred miles of Gotham City. The only thing stopping Ivy from turning Meridiana Industries into mulch for her garden was the slightly annoying fact that it didn’t seem to exist. Oh, the factory exists (or it did before Ivy reduced it to rubble and foliage) but tracking down who owned it, and making them pay in turn, had proven infuriatingly difficult.
Eventually Ivy had been forced to give up, and she instead looked towards finding who used the parts the company manufactured.
Which is how Ivy found herself standing outside the door of Dr. Von Richter, CEO of Fixed Ideas Inc., at quarter past midnight, over two and a half thousand miles away from her home of Gotham.
And, as expected, there was someone in the office. She could see the light on, and a silhouette was moving behind the frosted glass window. The company publicized their CEO’s reputation as a workaholic, him working into the night, and even sleeping in the office, to polish their image as a company that worked hard and cared. All in Ivy’s favor, of course. One blast of her pheromones and he would be singing like a canary.
She stepped forward, summoning a cloud of pheromones, and opened the door.
One minor quirk of Ivy’s pheromones is that while they were cultivated to be effective against humans, extremely effective against human, they were effective on humans alone. Which is why, when she heard the growling and saw the hounds leap at her, she panicked. She took three steps backwards until her back collided with the opposite wall. She reached out with her powers, trying desperately to find a plant she could call to her aid. Anything, even a potted cactus on a desk somewhere. Yet, the only green she felt in time was… coming straight for her?
The first dog reared up on its hind legs and started licking her face. Meanwhile, the other circled her and whined.
“Down girl,” Ivy said, and pushed the leafy dog off of her. “You didn’t have to do that.” She wiped the slightly sticky slobber off herself, then wiping her hand off on the leafy dog’s coat. For a moment, Ivy just admired the two dogs. They looked almost exactly like German Shepherds: the proportions, the way they sounded, even the way their coats were patterned. Very impressive for two creatures made entirely out of plants.
“What’s happening out-” a figure stepped out of the door and doubled over coughing. The dogs retreated to their master’s side and whined in worry as she tried to catch her breath. They looked at each other, and Ivy saw eyes she hadn’t seen since she was fully human. “Damn, Pamela,” Bella wheezed, “are you trying to charm an elephant with all these pheromones?”
“I’m sorry.” Ivy waved her hands through the air, dispersing the cloud around Bella. “Are you okay? What are you doing here?”
“Investigating. What are you doing on the other side of the country ?”
“Investigating. And if Batman is allowed to leave that cesspit of a city from time to time, I don't see why I can't.”
“Fair.” Bella pushed the door to the office open further and stepped back inside, allowing Ivy to see the pile of files open on the desk. “What are you investigating? It might be in one of those files.”
“Meridiana Industries. Their factory made circuit boards, and their waste disposal poisoned the nearby marsh.”
Bella smiled. “I imagine they don't do that anymore. Also, try the bottom of that pile.” She pointed at one of the many stacks of documents. Ivy nodded and removed the top two thirds of the pile. She started flipping through the papers while next to her Bella alternated between looking at a laptop she had plugged into the CEO’s computer and skimming through her own pile of files.
The comfortable silence of research slipped over the pair of them like a blanket. It was almost like their days in the program- almost .
“I’ve always wondered,” Bella broke the silence, leaning back in the CEO’s chair. “Why the leafy swimsuit? I understand that dressing up for the job comes with fighting costumed heroes, but-”
“But what? I look good, don’t I?” A bit of hesitation slipped into her voice.
“Oh, definitely. They show off your legs wonderfully. And everything else as well.” Bella said appreciatively. Ivy hoped her dangling hair hid her blush. “But it didn’t really seem your style. Back… before , you just wore lab clothes or comfy stuff… dresses and sweats and so on.”
“I find I need less pheromones when everyone already finds me attractive,” she explained. “What about you? You used to only wear lab appropriate clothing and now...” She gestured up and down Bella’s body.
“Do you like it?”
“Normally I’m not a fan of people who wear themed three piece suits, but you make it work.”
“One of the benefits of living on a ‘villain’s’-” Bella mimed air quotes around the word, “budget as opposed to a researcher’s, is that custom tailoring and dry cleaning is available as an option.” Bella smiled at Ivy, and she smiled back. It was familiar, the back and forth, if only…
“So how many of those suits do you have?” Ivy asked, distracting herself. “And how fast do you go through them?”
“Five.” Bella said. “And I just get them cleaned and fixed. Keeps them out of landfills.”
“Reduce, reuse, and recycle.” Ivy chimed, like she had a dozen times before. It was an old joke between the two of them: what to do when a company destroys the world in the name of profit? Reduce, reuse, recycle. It really shouldn’t have been a surprise that they both turned out the way they did. Still, Bella laughed at the old inside-joke, and Ivy’s heart fluttered at the sound.
“And repair,” Bella added. “Look after a suit, and it’ll look after you.”
“Tempting, but I'll stick with a costume I can grow out of a bush.” Ivy smiled and then paused. She flipped back a document and scanned more intently. Her smile turned from warm to cruel. “Found you.”
“Found what?” Bella asked.
“The problem with Meridiana industries was that after I turned their factory to rubble, I couldn’t find its owners and make them pay as well. So, I came looking for the company that used the circuit boards they made.”
“Which was Fixed ideas?”
“Yes, and now,” Ivy hit the file with satisfaction, “I have proof that Fixed Ideas owns them through a shell company.”
“Well done.” Bella said. “Did it say anything about Techno Mining in there? They were the owners of an off-the-book copper mine. They were why I came here in the first place. If I found any evidence, I was going to leave a seed in one of the plant pots in the boardroom. They’re scheduled to meet next week when Von Richter gets back from his trip to the Caymans.”
“Wait, he isn’t even in the country right now?” Ivy groaned. “Typical. The one time I wanted to see a man…”
“You didn’t know?” Bella’s eyes narrowed. “Did you do any research before coming here?”
“I did… just… missed that bit of info.”
“What did you just walk through the front door too?”
“It’s the easiest way when the guards will just let you in with a smile and a blast of pheromones.”
“Pam just…” Bella froze, then continued in a slightly panicked voice, “you did at least handle the silent alarm right?”
“What silent-”
At that moment, the door to the office was flung open, and a half dozen cops poured in.
“NOBODY MOVE!”
“Look,” Ivy said at Bella’s pointed look as the two women raised their hands up. “I’m not Catwoman okay?”
“A shame really, I think you’d look good in skintight leather. Now,” Bella continued, “could you ask these people to let us go?”
“With you in the room?” Ivy asked.
“DON’T MOVE! DON’T DO ANYTHING!” one of the cops shouted.
“Yes, just do it!” Bella snapped as two of the cops grabbed her and another pair turned their guns on her dogs.
Ivy exhaled.
Another cop grabbed her and pulled out his cuffs.
“You don’t want to arrest me,” Ivy said, as the slightly hazy cloud of pheromones spread across the room.
“I don’t?” the man asked, confused. He must have been pretty resilient to not immediately succumb while standing right next to her.
“No, you don’t. None of you do. You all want to help me and my friend, don’t you?”
“Yes,” the chorus was stilted as the pheromones overpowered each of them.
Ivy smiled, “Bella-” she gestured at her new thralls, “how can they help us?”
“The Gardener, while we’re in public.” Bella was unphased even as the pheromone cloud in the room got thicker and thicker. “And if they know we’re here, we need to leave.” She shook off the two dazed cops holding her and walked over to check her laptop. “The hard drive has finished cloning. We can just grab the most important documents and leave.”
“Boys and girls,” the cops perked up at Ivy’s address. “We need you to carry this pile of documents on the table down to one of your cars. Got that?” There was a disjointed chorus of “yes ma’ams” and “yes misses” and one “yes Ivy” as the cops started folding up and stacking the files spread across the table. Bella folded up her laptop and tucked it and the hard drive into a bag. Then, she pulled a little seed out of the bag and tucked it into the pot of a small cactus on the window sill.
“A little parting present?” Ivy asked.
“I figured I wouldn’t get a chance to come back after this.” She dusted off her hands.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay, you couldn't have known,” Bella sighed with a small smile, “it’s not like we keep in touch.”
“Right…”
Ivy’s train of thought was cut off by one of the cops, their leader most likely, coming to attention and announcing: “Everything ready for departure.”
“Very good. Now… escort us to your car.”
To the cameras, it might have looked like an arrest, with the six cops flanking them as they were brought to the elevator, and Ivy’s hands clasped behind her to help sell the illusion. It was likely a pointless effort. With the two plant dogs leading the way, it was clear to the cops around them that they were more of a guard of honor.
It was during the elevator ride down that Bella thought to ask: “Are there more police in the lobby or waiting outside?”
“By now, yes.”
“Ivy, would you be a dear and-”
“-pheromone them?”
“I’d rather not get blood on my suit. Finding a dry cleaner when you’re a wanted woman is a hassle.” Ivy smiled at Bella and started flooding the cramped compartment of the elevator with pheromones.
There were in fact cops in the lobby - two swat teams worth of them. They even had gas masks on. However, they hesitated when they saw their colleagues standing in front of the two supervillains. A hesitation that proved their undoing. As the wave of Pheromones rolled out of the elevator, Ivy raised her two hands. Out of one, the pollen of a flower found only in the amazon basin. Out of the other, the spores of a mushroom found deep underground. The spores and pollens flew out towards the gasmask of the cops and combined in the filtration layers.
A small corrosive chemical reaction happened a dozen times over in each gasmask, enough to make a small, unprotected hole through the filters. From there, all Ivy had to do was count to ten.
At the end of that count, Poison Ivy stepped forward and said: “Open the doors for me.”
Almost two dozen swat members scrambled over each other in a mad rush to be the one to open the doors.
Ivy and Bella picked their way over the heap of bodies around the door, followed by the plant dogs and the lap dogs.
Her thralls were directed to load up the one plainclothes car. With a smile, Ivy opened up the side door for Bella. She turned to her thralls. “I need you to destroy all of the video records of us in that building Then, tell your headquarters that it was a false alarm. After that, go about the rest of your night as normal.”
“Yes ma’am.”
With a smile, Ivy slipped into the passenger seat. “So, shall I drop you off at your hotel, wherever that is?”
“There’s no need,” Bella said. “We can go to wherever you’re staying, I’d like to catch up.”
“I’d like that too.” Ivy turned the key and started driving away. “Oh, by the way, how did you make an antidote to my pheromones? Not that I want to control you-” she said quickly, “- I just want to stop Batman from doing it.”
“I didn’t make one.”
“Then how are you resisting my pheromones?”
“Who said I was?”
“But you’re not brain dead and head-over-heels for me.”
“That’s the secret.” Bella smiled coyly. “It doesn’t affect me because I’m always head-over-heels for you.”
Ivy almost crashed the car.