Chapter Text
The thing they don’t tell you about intense fear is that it hurts. It’s a burning sensation racing through his entire nervous system, scraping under his skin, pounding at the back of his skull. And it never gets any easier.
Or maybe they do say that. At the moment, he can’t remember. Everything is sluggish and foggy despite his thoughts racing so much he can barely breathe.
A sharp pain shoots out from somewhere just above his stomach and he staggers, his vision swimming as his hands flail, scrambling for purchase on anything he can grab. If he falls, his legs won’t let him get back up. The weights…
No…no wait. No, there aren’t any weights attached. Those aren’t real.
Where…? He needs to figure out where he is. Where to go from there.
There’s a kind of ghostly sheen over everything, glowing blurry afterimages making the buildings sway and warp. This is bad. Very bad.
Needs to get off the ground level. Too many police. They’ll be out soon. Strange must have called them by now.
His shoulders stiffen as his mind screams at him to hide. Get out of sight. Father will be home soon, and…
No. That’s not right. He’s not a child anymore. Hasn’t lived with Father for years.
But the door slams and he squeezes his eyes shut, chest tight, and crams his knuckles into the sides of his head, hoping in vain that the pain will push the image out.
It won’t. It never does. Instead, he feels himself yanked backwards by the hair as he lashes out, swiping at nothing with nails he’d been forced to cut.
Nothing. Not home yet. No, wait…
His nails were cut, but if he runs his thumb over them, he can feel the remnants of the black polish he’d used to paint them. That’s something he was never allowed to have before. He did that himself after he'd moved out.
Not a child. There is no Father.
But the police will still be crawling the streets soon. Can he climb in this state? A fire escape? If he can find one, can he use the ladder? Maybe. He can probably lean on it and hook his arms through. Hang for a minute until he’s ready to keep climbing.
Won’t help you if they catch you hanging there, Champ.
Muscles lock, and he’s suddenly, painfully aware of the bones in his arms and legs. And then, stronger than that, the pinch and the burn in the crook of his elbow.
Oh, God no…He never escaped after all. It’s another dose already and…
His rib cage feels like it’s made of metal, like no matter how hard he tries, he can’t get enough air. He tries to breathe and sucks in water. The storage crate again. Of course they’d put him back here. But this time, there’s no Batman to free him.
Batman…wait. No. He knows where he is. He knows this street. Turn left. Gotham PD. Get to the roof. Batman won’t believe you anyway. No. No. But it’s still his only shot.
He slumps against the brick just below the fire escape, biting hard into his cheek to hold back a scream that would rip his throat open if he let it out. The wall is the only thing keeping him upright and he digs the heels of his hands into his cheekbones, trying to block out the images. They’re not there. He knows that. But they still won’t go away. So he’s stuck riding this wave out until he can trust his eyes and hands enough to see and grip.
He stands, sways, coughs, and tries not to feel phantom bile rising in his throat. His hair feels too heavy for some reason, but somehow, he manages to get his legs under him.
The next round doesn’t start until he’s managed to pull himself up to the roof, and maybe he should be surprised about that, but the ringing in his ears grows louder and louder and he can’t tell if it’s in his head or if it’s police sirens. His clothes are wrong. Too loose against his body, and he needs the pressure of his mask against his face, but he doesn’t have it and so he’s stuck floating in empty space.
His skin feels hot, but he’s shivering, he realizes. Is he running cold or hot right now? His heart is pounding and it’s getting hard to see anything specific.
Father is saying something. The words all blur together, but it stings either way.
He doesn’t have much time now. Lying here on the…the concrete? Is it concrete? Lying here on the roof, he can still figure that much out. His legs are all pins and needles, and his head is spinning without even being upright.
Something pricks behind his eyes as he tries to pull his legs under him, tries to push himself up, stumbles and crashes back to his knees.
No. No, no, no, no no…Too late.
Anyone could have made it, Champ. Anyone, except you.
With a strangled whine, he slams a fist down and flinches at the sharp scratch against his wrist. Pushing himself on his forearms, he drags himself towards the searchlight, tries to keep it from blurring out, tries to remember where it is when it splits and sways.
When his fingers touch the cold metal, he’s dimly aware of the sounds coming from his throat. They don’t sound like him. But he knows they are. He’s got to find the switch, push down the can’t you even figure out a simple switch? So much for your brains, huh? And he tries to insist it’s not his fault, it’s not his fault, it’s just his arms are shaking and he can’t breathe and please, please, please, why won’t you believe me?
Finally, finally, he manages to claw himself upright enough to get his weight on top of the switch and he feels it lurch and he crashes down hard, and his mind supplies some vague, mocking call too far away to hear as he waits to be hauled to his feet and hit. But the electric humming roars in his ears louder than that, and the heat from the lamp makes him dig his chopped up nails into his arm.
He doesn’t dare open his eyes. Doesn’t want to see what he knows he’ll see. Doesn’t want to see the Bat’s blank, disbelieving glare or worse, doesn’t want to see him never showing up at all. But he hooks an arm around the base of the searchlight and pulls himself to a seated position.
His skin feels like he’s been scrubbed with sandpaper. His bones are full of pins, and he can’t tell if his breathing is shuddery because of the drug or because he’s shaking, and he’s not sure why he’s shaking when his skin is burning, and he can’t shake the screaming in his head of not enough, not enough, won’t work, didn’t work.
The only thing he can do is wait. Hope that someone (he knows who, he knows) will get here before his body gives out. That’s always the final stage. The body can’t function forever while on fear toxin. He knows. Even like this, he knows. Is the darkness pricking the edges of his vision real, or just because he knows to expect it?
His head sways, heavy, and he sluggishly reaches a hand up, numbly cards fingers through his hair.
Stay awake. Please. Please.
There’s got to be something. It’s too late, but there’s got to be something. His mouth works, tongue trying in vain to wet cracked lips. He can’t quite hear himself above the thundering in his ears, and he can only vaguely feel his voice in his chest.
“What three keys will never open any door?”
In spite of himself, he knows he’s cracked a smile. His head leans back against the light, one hand still working through his hair while the other runs over each nail.
Donkey, monkey, and…turkey, he thinks. Yes, that sounds right.
That’s…that’s better. A little better. Though his chest is still heaving with the effort of keeping his heart inside it.
“What…no…I have a mouth, but never speak, have a bed, but never sleep. I can run, but never walk…”
He grimaces. It’s muddled up. There’s something he’s forgetting. But he knows the answer. Knows it’s a river.
“No sooner spoken than broken…”
A secret. Though it could be silence, too.
Oh, now that he thinks about it, there’s another one that could be a secret, too.
“If you have me, you’ll want to share me. But if you share me, you won’t have me.”
The searchlight digs uncomfortably into his back, but his bones feel too heavy to try and move.
“What’s a question you can never answer ‘yes’ to?”
Are you asleep…or are you dead.
Oh, that was a bad one. A harsh wave of terror slams through him and he flicks his wrist several times to shake it out. He needs a different one. Better one. Anything but that.
“What…weighs six ounces…sits…in…a tree. And is very…is very dangerous.”
A sparrow with… Robin.
No. Not Robin. Batman.
No, wait. That’s not the answer, that’s just…
He blinks hard. Tries and fails to reach a hand up to rub his eyes. That can’t be real. It’s just the toxin playing tricks, because he’s about to…
“Riddler—Edward?” Ha. That’s funny. The Batman almost sounds worried. Must be because he didn’t think one of his foes would go after the light.
But before he can comment, his body decides that’s enough. Even if he knows it isn’t real, he feels oblivion creeping over him. “I didn’t…didn’t know…where else to…”
He hears too-light footsteps rushing towards him. Whether his head thumps back against the light, or a gauntlet, he’s out before he can tell.