The Aster {Book 1 & 2} (Batman/Joker/Robin/Batgirl story)

1.14. Investigation

I spend the next eight hours doing every possible thing I can researching Dick Grayson and Barbara Gordon. The only thing I can't infiltrate is Facebook, at least her's. He has a typical eighteen year old fuckboy's friends of friends profile, with plenty of pictures of him with his arms around round various girls, most often two or three at a time. There's only one of him and Gordon together, taken a few months ago at some black tie event. The way he's looking at her is the most convincing show of caring out of all the pictures.

Her profile is private, only showing a modest profile picture and stating the fact she works in Gotham Central Library. I'd give anything to hit that friend request button but it's too risky. I have no idea if they know my true identity or not, there's a distinct chance they do. But just case, they've both seen me without my mask on; leading them to my Facebook would be suicide. Plus, I don't want them to know I know who they are. At least not yet.

I print out both their profiles, along with numerous news articles concerning Batgirl and Robin, their links to Batman and Grayson and Gordon's various activities and glue them all into a flowery pink scrapbook I think I was given when I was about four.

I wonder if their parents know their secret - her being the Commissioner's daughter is too much of a coincidence, he must be in on it. And as for Grayson, it kind of makes sense as well. Bruce Wayne is a billionaire, who better to fund an outfit like this? Maybe Batman is linked to the cops as well? Maybe he isn't as independent as the police department would like to make out.

I slam the scrapbook shut and put it back on my bookshelf where it's least likely to be noticed.

I can't help aching to scream my discovery from the rooftops but I know I can't. I'm in this for Batman, not for his sidekicks. Down them and I lose my fucked up sense of moral high ground.

I reward my day's work with a packet of cookies. Eating hasn't really been on my priority list these past weeks, and I know one day soon it'll catch up to me. I haven't been sleeping either... every night, as soon as the lights go off, the panic attacks begin. I don't even know what they're about, I can't pin it down. I've had them ever since the attacks but never like this, all night every night. The only thing that gets me through them is detaching myself, repeating that I have nothing to lose over and over again.

Okay, I've got to stop thinking about this. The daytime is my break from the anxiety. I can't jinx it.

I slump down to see what old 90s Lifetime movies are playing on TV when something buzzes in my pocket.

Oh crap. It's the device the Joker gave me.

It's a small box a with a screen, kind of like an iWatch without the watch part. I press my pinkie on the fingerprint scanner and a pinpoint on a map flashes on the screen, along with a message.

9 p.m. Dress up for the occasion.

I guess I should google it just to make sure but I'm already certain what that pinpoint is.

The Iceberg Lounge.

This promises to be an interesting evening.

****

Sorry, I know this chapter is a short one but I promise to have another one up as soon as possible! X