Chapter Text
Melody-Rose Cortese was sitting on a bench by a restaurant, looking at her phone, waiting silently for Marcus to show up. They had been planning this date for three weeks and yet he was ten minutes late with no notification or anything to let her know why. “This is why I hate tinder dates…” She grumbled under her breath, grabbing the black clutch she had brought with her, it was as hard as a brick so it was very functional for self defence when she walks the streets in Gotham alone.
“Rose?” A man with soft, fluffy brown hair, pale skin which matched every other Gothamite and emerald green eyes that seemed to hide some kind of dark personality which was itching to claw out of his skin. This was Marcus, her date, however… he is taller than expected. About six foot three in height which made her eye twitch. His profile had said he was five foot six, meaning he had lied about his height which meant there would be a high chance of him lying about other things.
“Melody-Rose.” She corrected without thinking, it was normal for her to correct students, mainly the Wayne boy who had a habit of choosing between ‘Melody’ and ‘Rose’ everyday. I should start handing out detentions for it actually. “However most people call me Rose or Melody.”
“Well, Rose, It’s an honour to meet you in person.” Marcus’s voice seemed to be sweet, soothing even however the slight tremor in his eye told her all she needed to know. “What do you happen to be in the mood for?”
My bed. I want to sleep.
“I was thinking Italian?” She suggested. At least then she would get something to actually eat instead of just lounging in bed doing nothing all night. Melody-Rose was wearing a simple, black, long sleeved off the shoulder dress which went to just above her kneecaps, black fabric, heeled boots which covered the rest of her leg’s, hiding any unnecessary skin. Her pastel purple-fade-blue hair seemed to have disappeared over five minutes, mainly due to her black wig which she had slipped on due to last date. It was a horrible experience where the guy had left after seeing her hair for the first time.
Maybe I can scare this one off with the pastels as well.
“Rose, what do you do for work?” Marcus asked, his tone cheery and seemingly friendly, the slight undertones of thick honey made her stomach twist.
“I’m a secretary.” She explained, walking next to the man, hand tightly holding her brick known as a clutch. “What about you?”
“I’m a Forensic Pathologist, I do autopsies." He explained, shrugging. “It’s actually quite interesting. You see when you cut open–”
“I would rather not hear about cutting dead bodies open when we’re going to be eating dinner.” Melody-Rose explained, keeping a polite smile on her face, despite the fact she wanted to push him into oncoming traffic. “That will put me off food.” She didn’t want to hear about it even if she did have a strong stomach, her younger sister had passed away a month ago and it was still fresh on her mind so hearing what her sister, Lillian would have had to go through just to find out the cause of her death was being beaten would make her break down. And she was not doing that on a first date with some guy she found off tinder.
“I see, is there anything you would like to talk about in particular?” He asked, hands in his pockets, body language now more closed off that she had stopped him from what was going to be a ramble about the dead or something. “You’re wearing all black, I’m guessing you're in mourning.”
Her left eye twitched. “This is Gotham, everyone's wearing black.” Melody-Rose resorted, trying to keep a straight face as she held back her ever steadily growing anger. She had to behave, if she didn’t she would have to admit to her brother, James Howard, that she had lost their game and needed to ask the Red Hood on a date as punishment– though she knew he would decline but the idea of asking a well known vigilante out on a date was stupidly nerve racking.
“Yes, everyone in Gotham wears some black but not all black including black eyeshadow and lipstick. You only do that if you're trying to suck the colour out of your life when you lose someone important.” The way this man was talking as if he had known her for years instead of ten minutes was starting to make her want to throw hands. However, she couldn’t ruin her nails yet, she had just gotten them done.
Actually they were done a month ago, when her sister was still alive and smiling at her. She added a clear coat over the nail polish before it could be chipped away. She didn’t want the last piece of Lillian to wash away as if she had never existed. “It's a fashion statement.” Melody-Rose grunted, taking a breath so she could control herself. She wasn't going to fight this man. She didn’t want the embarrassment of asking Red Hood out.
“I would have guessed you preferred more colourful clothing from your profile.” Marcus said, side eyeing her.
Well maybe I’m wearing black because it helps hide blood better!
“Those were old photos.” She had to keep her calm, she couldn’t start insulting him, especially since they had just entered a restaurant. It was not an Italian place, it was a random restaurant that seemed to serve everything. Great. He couldn’t even do something as simple as listen to what she was hungry for. Next think you know he’ll be making her pay for everything.
“Where would you like to sit, beautiful?” The grin on his face could have made a baby cry from fear, in fact it did, a baby two tables across started to wail as he grinned at her. “Outside, maybe?” He suggested, eye twitching as the baby’s cries slit his ears. Some may think he could feel blood coming out of them.
“I would have liked to sit inside.” She said simply, yes the baby was annoying but it would also drown out his voice a respectable amount. “However, outside would have to suffice."
Why didn’t I leave when I had the chance?
The menus were handed to them by a sweet girl in her early teens who seemed uncomfortable with the attention Marcus seemed to be giving her. Melody’s eye twitched. This man was on a date with her and was checking out children? Disgusting. “Will you two be dining together?”
God no.
“Yes.” Marcus said simply, shortly. “We’ll have a table outside.”
“I’ll come out to get your orders in a few minutes then.” The teen said with what had to be the most awkward expression Melody-Rose had seen and she works with kids.
“Actually I would prefer someone older to be waiting on our table. I know you’re going to do your best but I would rather not have someone who will mix up my meal or get my order wrong.” Her tone was harsh, her words were cruel, yes. But it was also a way to protect this young girl from whatever her date was planning in his head. She just hoped the girl got the message; of course she would come back with Malissa and they would splurge on this place as an apology but that would have to wait.
Following Marcus around like a trained dog was not what she wanted to be doing, she wanted to smash his head into the wall and rip his eyes out for that suggestive look that had been on his face when looking at that young girl. But she couldn’t, not until this date was finished. Not until she had a full stomach. “Were you born in Gotham?” She asked, trying to make this date as normal as possible before she decked him.
“Yes, however my fathers German so I grew up there during the summers.” He explained. Ah, the being excessively tall German stereotype as a person. “However after my father passed I have mainly decided to stay here in Gotham.” He paused, pulling out a chair for her to sit down. “What about you?”
So you have some manners. Considering how your eyes kept wondering I was starting to worry you didn't and I would have to educate you properly before beating the shit out of you.
Melody-Rose sat down and smiled at the man, oh how she wished she could remove him from the earth. “I was born in Metropolis and lived with my mother until she passed away. Afterwards, my older brother and I moved in with my father who lives here in Gotham.” She wasn't going to give him the whole story, just a taste. It's not like he would be seeing her again after this.
“How did your mother die?”
Right, he worked with dead people. This was probably something he commonly spoke about over tea or something. “That’s a bit personal.”
“I know you don’t have a full sibling and your younger half sister was beaten to death. However the death records of your mother aren’t accessible." His words turned her blood to ice, the menu in her hands shifting under the deadly grip.
“And how would you have gotten all that information about me, Marcus?”
“I did a background check, my brother's a police officer.” He shrugged, like it was the most normal thing in the world.
“You don’t just do that.” She placed the menu down. She had to calm down before she broke his nose. “You had no right to–”
“I was looking out for my safety and seeing the amount of times you have been arrested for assault against members of a more masculine presenting sex I would say I’m lucky that I did a background check.” He threaded his fingers together, elbows resting on the table as he smirked like he had just beaten the system. “I also know you had a murder charge put on you but it was dropped due to it being and I quote ‘defense of another person’.”
Melody's fingers twitched on her lap, her eyes closing so she didn’t attack him. “Yes, I killed a man named Jay Weber, I beat him to death with a metal pole as he was stomping on a child's head. I did it to save her life, however I was too late to call the ambulance and she died in my arms.” She explained calmly, nails digging into her palms. “My family history isn’t as interesting as you think it is.”
“Your mother was a prostitute who had two children from two men, then your father took you and your brother in after her death where he had a young daughter.” Marcus grinned, that sick expression sticking to his face. It made him look more deranged than the Joker. “How did it feel having your younger sister die in your arms?”
Ah, this was why he wanted to go out with me. To get an interview. I should have known.
“I apologise however I have to go, my brother needs me to help him with something important.” Her voice was steady as she stood from her seat despite the rage, the pain, the need to scream building inside her like a raging fire about to hit ten feet high. “I will be leaving now.”
“Did she cry?”
Melody-Rose paused. She remembered that day all too well, the blood, the bruises, the blood coating her hair and face as she held her sister and cried, while Lillian cried about wanting to go home and have a movie night with her older siblings. She vividly remembers the weakening voice, the light and life fading from the preteens' beautiful ocean blue eyes, the last breath she took. She remembered it all and this man before her… she was going to kill him if he didn’t let her leave.
“Did Weber tell you why he was so angry at her?”
She thought back, trying to remember what the man had been yelling about when she had broken down the door to the room and smashed him over the head with a metal pole, tried to make out the faint words echoing from his lips as the metal slammed into his face again and again, when the mental broke his jaw and ribs. She couldn’t remember. She had been in such a haze of protective rage she didn’t even stop to hear, to let the man explain himself.
“Your sister was a whore, like your mother.”
She had always known her mother sold her body to make money, it was the only way someone like her could survive in that city, especially with the hidden life on the streets. She remembered it, the back alleys they would have to sleep curled up together if her mother didn’t make the quarterweek budget she had been set. However to imply that her innocent, sweetheart of a younger sister, her angel was living that kind of life under her nose? How dare he.
“What did you just call my sister?”
“A whore, a slut. A paid hole to use.”
Melody-Rose forgot about the punishment for beating this man up, if the punishment for ripping this guy's spine out would be going on a date with a gun-slinging vigilante; so be it. She would grab Red Hood by the balls and make him go on that date if she had to. But right now in this moment as her brown eyes seemed to darken to a jet black under rage and the moon's light disappearing behind clouds her rage took over. “Say it again, I dare you.”
“She was a whore, a slut, a paid hole to use as men pleased.”
Red clouded her vision as her body reacted on instinct. The same kind as that day, just more murderous. Her body launched across the small table a fist grabbing his shirt as her other one collided with his nose. Blood. Blood didn’t matter if it came from this man. She punched him again and again, the cold rage in her veins showing in her eyes as a sickening snap echoed in her ears. A grin twisted its way onto her face. His nose was broken. She was only getting started.
The chair Marcus was sitting on fell backwards as she shoved him, the man's head smashed against the concrete. Melody-Rose Cortese climbed off the table and picked up the seat she had been in four minutes about, walked around to her date who was struggling to get up before raising the chair above her head and bringing it crashing down onto him. Marcus let out a surprisingly girlish scream as the chair leg which had broken off almost landed through his eye, he had turned his head to the side just to avoid it.
She raised the chair again and threw it at him with all her might, the fragile wood shattered when it made contact with the concrete and the man's head. A howl of pain filled her ears as backed away on his hands, scooting his butt towards the road as if that would save him from her wrath. “Y-you’re insane!” The man's voice shook, making the words drawn out and trembling as his face paled more, he had messed up. He shouldn’t have angered someone with her history. “Look, I’m sorry, we can work through this–”
Her heeled boot connected with his face, snapping his jaw to the left. “Shut your mouth.” His rambling had annoyed her more. Melody-Rose wasn’t just any schools headmistresses secretary, she worked at Gotham academy. She had to deal with the Wayne children, she had to carry children to safe rooms during lock down drills and actual lock downs. She had hit the Joker in the face with her clutch more times than failed dates she had been on. “You should have shut up ages ago.”
The clutch in her hand connected with his head, the brick covered in gemmed fabric which seemed to be able to hold everything a girl could need for a fight, including money and lip gloss made his vision blur. Either it was the hardness of the bag or the strength behind the blow, maybe both.
A heeled boot made contact with his stomach, making him cough, Melody-Rose slowly turned her foot, digging her heel into the skin below it. “First, you’re ten minutes late.” She applied more pressure, her left eye twitching with the anger she had been keeping in for the past fifteen minutes. “Then you don’t bother to take into account that I don’t want someone I just met calling me anything but Melody-Rose.” The pain kept coming with each thing she started to list off, she kept twisting her foot, adding more of her body weight. “You then bring up cutting open dead people even after noticing I’m grieving. Then you start talking about why I’m wearing black when you already know why because you had your brother do a background check on me."
Her foot raised then came back down twice as hard, then it started to twist again, his hand going to grab her ankle through the fabric of her boot. “Then you prove you're incapable of listening when I mention what I would like to eat.” Her heel dug deeper into his skin, feeling like it was almost cutting into him. Warm liquid started to stain his shirt; it was, her heel was as sharp as a knife. “Then you check out a girl who's at most thirteen years old in front of me like it's normal.” Her voice was rising with each word, drawing the attention of the people on the street and the people inside the restaurant. “You ask me how my mother died and it spiraled from there to you calling my twelve year old sister who was beaten to death a whore.” She paused, the dagger-like heel digging in deeper.
“Did you say she was a ‘whore, slut’ and a ‘hole to be used’?” Melody-Rose asked with an almost purr to her voice. She had to make sure she had gotten it right, otherwise she wouldn’t be able to punish him properly. Marcus hesitated, his answer could mean life or death with a woman like this, especially while she was this enraged. Lying could make it far worse so admitting it would likely get him out of here alive.
“Yes–”
Her heel moved from his stomach, ripping open a hole which started to leak enough warm, red fluid to make someone who isn’t scared of blood queasy, then a kick to his face had the dagger-like heel stabbed through his cheek, then it was ripped out. Blood sprayed across the ground as he fell to the side. The twisted grin on her face never once left, even as a man with what seemed to be a red helmet grabbed her shoulder with a black gloved hand.
“That’s enough, you’ve got him now.” The voice was male, clearly. But it didn’t seem to reach Melody-Rose through her rage induced haze, she kicked the man laying on the concrete in the head, her heel going through his left eye like the chair leg had meant to earlier. “Okay, that's enough.” Red Hood tried again, grabbing her shoulder and pulling her away from the body. Her heel came out of Marcus’ head with his eyeball still impaled on it.
The woman stared at the blood draining from Marcus’s body, her hands slowly unclenching from fists. She had failed in keeping calm, now she had to somehow get Red Hood to go on a date with her but the feeling of teaching the man laying on the ground the lesson he deserved made her chest warm with pride. Next time he wouldn’t be such an asshole to a girl. “He's dead, calm down.” Red Hood's voice sounded in her ear again.
Ah, there won't be a next time. I saved humanity from a creep.
Her shoulders relaxed and her haze cleared, however the disgust and hate on her face didn’t fade immediately. “How long have you been here?” She had known a bat would be paroling the area, she just didn't know which one it was. Turned out, it was her punishment– well her ‘reward’ some people might say.
Red Hood is seen among students and teachers at Gotham academy as this hunk of a man who was incredibly sexy and powerful. Personally, she would have preferred Jason Todd over someone who dresses in a black spandex body suit which looks like it has no practical use aside from showing off everything to the naked eye, pairing that with a belt, brown leather jacket and a red full head covering mask? Yes, he has a fantastic body but that fashion sense with those what seem to be glitter monstrosity of combat boots? She’d take the son of Bruce Wayne any day.
“Well, I got here when you climbed across a table to punch him.” He explained, shrugging. “I was going to step in if you went too far, then I got invested in the drama and decided to let it play out longer.” Red Hood sighed as if this was inconveniencing him. “Now I have to clean this but before B gets mad I didn’t stop you.”
“So you sat somewhere and watched me beat the life out of this man while you ate popcorn?” Melody-Rose raised a brow, turning her head slightly so she could look at the man who was still holding her shoulders as if she was some kind of dangerous animal who would lash out again if given a chance. “Are you Nightwing in cosplay?”
“Nightwing would have stopped you when you started to throw punches, okay. I let you get your anger out and lost track of time which ended with a dead body hanging over our heads.” Red Hood pointed out, crossing his arms over his chest. “Now I have to go hide it alone.”
“Who said anything about you hiding the body?” Melody asked with a roll of her eyes. She was strong enough to carry a grown man to a river and dump it in without issue, yes it would ruin her dress but she could just wash it. “I don’t need help.”
“Never said you did.” He raised his hands defensively. “But this is going to be on my hands with Batman if we don’t hide it correctly.”
“Scared of getting grounded?” She cooed, lifting her foot and removing the eyeball from her heel without thinking twice. “Ew.” Melody-Rose then proceeded to toss the sensory organ down the closest gutter, letting it fall into the sewers. Then she lowered her foot back to the ground. “Where do you recommend we put him?”
“I recommend heading to the junkyard and burning it.”
“That’s going to smell like shit.” The woman pointed out. “We could bury him six feet deep, put a layer of dirt over him and then put a dead animal over that.”
“Now that’s the stupidest thing I have ever heard. And it would have to be nine feet deep.” Red Hood crouched down, picking up the body in a fireman's carry. “And you’re not coming with me.”
“Yes, I am.”
“Christ, woman. I’m going to hide a body.”
“We can turn it into a date if you're going to cry about me tagging along.” Melody-Rose snapped back, two birds with one stone. Marcus’s body is gone and she gets the punishment over and done with.