Insanity // J.Valeska

Part Nine: The Compromise

"Wait."

Jerome thought that he'd misheard. He shrugged it off and continued his prowl to Daddy Galavan's chambers, where hopefully Kitty Cat was ready to play with his newest... Companion.

But then he heard the voice again, much louder and clearer this time. It caused for him to pause, and slowly, carefully spin around.

And there was Steph.

She had amazingly caught up to him, her chest no longer heaving for breath, nor were her pupils dilated. No, instead, her sapphire eyes glinted dangerously, almost like a predator stalking her prey. She was not hunched over or in a defensive state - no, she looked prepared for battle. And battle, she would. She looked deadly, like a killer. She looked positively insane. And Jerome loved it.

He let out a low chuckle, gallantly turning on his heel to face the girl. "Yes?"

She tipped her chin up, her noise pointed upwards as she clenched her jaw.

"They'll kill me."

Jerome cocked his head to the side, "huh? Wanna try speaking up a tad?"

She grit her teeth so hard she could hear the bone grinding against bone. "The crazy siblings, they'll kill me. They brought me hear to rile you cavemen up. And now I've overstayed me welcome. I'm good as dead."

Jerome growled under his breath, stalking up to the girl's form. He hissed when she refused to tremble beneath his touch as he pushed her up against a wall.

"Listen here, uh, doll, you belong to me. And if Daddy Galavan wants to change that, then he'll have to go through me." His eyes visibly darkened as all sense of space disappeared between the two. His goal to intimidate her into submission failed miserably.

Steph, having seemingly abandoned all traits of the whining little girl her parents had trained her into, now pressed herself forward opposed to back, so that their chests were pressing together. Her head was tilted upwards, nose upturned, chin lifted and most of all, eyes hard.

Despite her obvious petite size, especially compared to the maniac, Steph sized him up, doing her best to impersonate his menacing leer. She was the first to break their intense staring contest, flashing the killer a sadistic smile before she physically pushed him away.

Regaining the spring in her step, Steph prowled away, pausing to turn back at the momentarily dazed Jerome - "ya coming, Ginger?"

[Jim Gordon]

Two weeks.

It had been fourteen tense days since Stephanie Harlem was kidnapped from her Grandparent's estate on the outskirts of Blüdhaven. Fourteen days since she disappeared without a trace.

And only two days prior to her kidnapping - a mere forty-eight hours - Arkham Asylum was broken into, several of their clinically insane patients gone.

Or, as Jim and Lee speculated, kidnapped. Probably by the same people who stole his niece.

Jim had spent hours upon hours pouring over every little detail from the case of his missing niece. An Amber Alert had been set out: essentially the whole GCPD was searching for the girl, and yet, as the days ticked by, Jim grew hopeless.

It was uncommon for a missing youth to be found alive after the twenty-four hour mark; and nearly unheard of for them to appear after a week. By two weeks, the culprit could have crossed several state borders where the alert was no longer held and successfully left town without a trace. Assuming of course, Stephanie was still alive.

Her paternal Grandparent's had been out of harms way during the incident; strangely enough they had already settled in for the night. Both had their hearing aids turned off for the night, bedroom door closed to the rest of the world, enabling for them to remain completely ignorant to the theft going on in the midst of their home.