Chapter 2: A New Pet for the Garden
The moss cradled Nightwing like a lover's embrace, soft and forgiving beneath his spent body. The glow of a thousand bioluminescent spores painted his skin in shifting shades of green and gold, and he watched them drift upward in lazy spirals, his eyes tracking their dance with the detached fascination of someone who had stopped caring about the world beyond these walls. His chest rose and fell with steady breaths, each one drawing in more of her scent, more of her poison, more of her.
The memories of the past hour were already blurring at the edges, dissolving like morning mist. He knew he should be feeling something—horror, shame, guilt—but the feelings were distant things, muffled behind a wall of fragrant foliage and the lingering pulse of pleasure that still thrummed through his veins. She had taken him apart so completely, and in the aftermath, she had simply lain beside him, tracing patterns on his chest with her fingertips while the plants whispered their secret songs around them.
"You did so well, little bird." Ivy's voice was a warm purr against his collarbone. "I knew you had it in you."
Nightwing turned his head to look at her. The red hair spread like a flame across the moss, and her green skin seemed to glow from within. She was beautiful in a way that hurt to look at, beautiful in a way that made everything else seem dull and gray and worthless.
"What happens now?" His voice sounded strange to his own ears—flat, accepting, completely unlike the man he had been.
Ivy's smile was slow, satisfied, the smile of someone who had won a game she had been playing for a very long time. "Now? Now we begin the real work."
She rose naked from the moss, her body moving with the fluid grace of a predatory cat, and began to dress herself in the living garment that grew from the greenhouse floor. Leaves and petals curled around her hips, her breasts, her shoulders, forming a shifting cover that revealed as much as it concealed. She looked at him from across the chamber, and her eyes were bright with anticipation.
"Batman is looking for you," she said matter-of-factly. "He's been combing the city for hours, growing more frantic with each passing minute. I can feel his presence in every vine that curls through the streets, every root that burrows beneath the pavement." She laughed softly. "He's worried about his little bird."
Nightwing felt a flicker of something at the mention of Batman's name—a distant echo of loyalty, a ghost of a bond that had once defined his entire existence. But the feeling was weak, pathetic, easily crushed beneath the weight of the craving that had taken its place. He closed his eyes, and all he could see was her.
"You want me to bring him here," he said, the words emerging from somewhere he didn't recognize.
"Such a clever boy." Ivy approached him, crouching down to cup his face in her hands. Her palms were cool against his heated skin, and he leaned into her touch like a starving man given bread. "I want you to bring him here, yes. I want him to see what I've made of you. I want him to watch as you serve me, as you worship me, as you do things that would make his noble heart break." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "I want him to know that he failed you. That he couldn't save you. That you're mine now, body and soul."
"Will you... hurt him?"
Ivy's laugh was gentle, almost kind. "Oh, darling. I won't hurt him. I'll simply show him the truth." She pressed a kiss to his forehead. "Now get dressed. Your old life is waiting just beyond those doors, and I have a feeling your former partner is going to be quite eager to see the new you."
The vines moved, retrieving his suit from where it had fallen, and Nightwing dressed in silence. The fabric felt foreign against his skin now, like a costume that no longer fit. He was aware of the changes in his body—the lingering sensitivity of his nipples, the raw tenderness of his lips, the ghost of her touch still burning on his skin. He was aware of the emptiness inside him, the hollow space where his willpower had once lived.
He was aware, most of all, of the aching need that had taken up residence in his gut. The need for her. The need to feel her again, to sink inside her, to hear her purr his name as she came undone around him.
"When you find him," Ivy said, adjusting a leaf that had slipped from her shoulder, "tell him you've escaped. Tell him you broke free and you need his help." She smiled. "Tell him anything you want. He'll believe you, because he loves you. That's what makes this so delicious."
"And when he comes here?"
"Then you bring him to me. Gently, so he doesn't suspect. And let me handle the rest." She reached out, trailing a finger along his jaw. "You understand what I'm asking, don't you? What I'm truly asking?"
Nightwing nodded. He understood. And the understanding should have filled him with horror, should have made him sick to his stomach. Instead, it filled him with a strange, breathless anticipation. He would deliver Batman into her hands. And then she would reward him.
"What do I get?" he asked, and the words felt natural, easy, as if he had always spoken this way.
Ivy's smile widened. "Whatever you want, little bird. Whatever your heart desires. As long as you serve me faithfully, I will give you everything." She pressed her body against his, and he felt her heat seep through the thin barrier of leaves. "But first, I want you to bring me your greatest treasure. I want you to prove that you belong to me completely."
He reached out, pulling her into a kiss that was all hunger and submission. Her lips parted beneath his, and he tasted the sweet poison of her tongue, felt the way she curled against him like a vine seeking purchase. When he finally pulled back, he was breathless and aching and utterly, completely hers.
"Wait," she said as he turned to leave. "There's one more thing."
She snapped her fingers, and a vine slithered down from the canopy, offering up a single crimson flower. It was large, almost obscenely so, its petals velvety and dark, and it pulsed with a faint internal light.
"Give this to Batman. Tell him it's a peace offering, a sign that you've bloodied my nose." She placed the flower in his hands. "He won't be able to resist it. It'll draw him here like a moth to a flame."
Nightwing turned the flower over in his hands, feeling the weight of it, the pulsing life that thrummed through its stem. He could already picture Batman's reaction—the narrowed eyes, the skeptical frown, the cautious approach. Batman would never accept a gift from Poison Ivy without a dozen precautions.
"But he'll sense the trap," Nightwing said, the thought surfacing from somewhere deep in his captured mind.
"Of course he will," Ivy agreed. "But he won't be able to resist the chance to study it. The chance to find a way to break its power. That's Batman's weakness, you see. He always thinks he can find a way to win." Her smile was a slash of red. "And while he's studying the flower, its spores will be working on him. Weakening his defenses. Making him vulnerable." She shrugged one bare shoulder. "By the time he realizes what's happening, it'll be too late."
Nightwing looked at the flower, then at Ivy, then back at the flower. Some distant part of him recognized the cruelty of the plan, recognized the fact that he was being used as a weapon against the man who had raised him, trained him, loved him. But that part was small and quiet and growing smaller by the moment.
"I'll bring him to you," Nightwing said, and the promise tasted like surrender.
"Good boy." Ivy kissed him once more, quick and possessive. "Now go. I'll be waiting."
The greenhouse came alive as Nightwing made his way through it, vines and tendrils curling out of his path, creating a corridor that led him back to the shattered roof he had crashed through hours ago—had it been hours? It felt like a lifetime. He climbed the remains of the iron framework, scaling the twisted metal with a grace that was almost mechanical, his body remembering the motions of the acrobat he had once been even as his mind wandered far away.
The night air hit him like a slap, cold and welcome after the suffocating humidity of the greenhouse. The city spread out below him, a carpet of lights and shadow, and he stood on the rooftop for a long moment, letting the wind whip around him.
He knew Batman would come to him. He knew exactly where to find him, exactly how to draw him out.
He was already running when his feet touched the rooftop of the clocktower, the flower cradled carefully against his chest, when he saw the silhouette against the moon.
Batman stood at the edge of the tower, his cape whipping in the wind like a tattered wing. He turned as Nightwing landed, and through the white lenses of his cowl, Dick saw something that might have been relief.
"Dick." Batman's voice was rough, strained. "Where have you been? I've been searching for hours."
Fifteen minutes, Nightwing thought. She said fifteen minutes, and then you'll be—
No. He pushed the thought aside, let it dissolve into the mist of her memories that clouded his mind. He smiled, easy and natural, the smile that had always disarmed difficult witnesses and terrified thugs.
"I got my wires crossed," he said, stepping forward. "Ivy got the drop on me in the greenhouse. I had to fight my way out."
Batman moved toward him, and Dick forced himself not to react as the Detective loomed over him, checking him, scanning him, looking for injuries. Batman's hands were firm but gentle, and the familiarity of the touch sent a jolt through Dick's system.
He remembered lying in this man's arms, bleeding from a bullet wound, Batman's gravelly voice promising him everything would be okay. He remembered talking in the Batcave, sharing strategies over the glow of a computer screen. He remembered being Robin, flipping through the air, laughing as the wind caught his cape and Batman's gruff pride when he executed the maneuver perfectly.
All of that belonged to another life. A life that felt increasingly far away.
"Ivy never lets her prey go easy," Batman said, his eyes narrowing. "How did you get out?"
This was the moment. The moment his story had to hold.
"I've been training for her poison for years, ever since the first time," Nightwing said smoothly. "I've been taking a counter-agent, low dose, building up a tolerance. She got me tied up, but she underestimated how much I'd metabolized. It burned out faster than she expected, and I got the drop on her."
It was a good lie. Simple, believable, rooted in the training Batman himself had given him.
Batman studied him for a long moment, and Dick could feel the weight of that examination, the penetrating force of a mind that had cracked the greatest mysteries in the world. For a heartbeat, he was certain the lie would fail, certain Batman would see the truth in his eyes.
Then Batman nodded, and Dick let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding.
"You're lucky you're alive," Batman said. "Ivy doesn't leave loose ends."
"I know." Nightwing reached into his jacket and produced the flower. "That's why I brought you this."
Batman's gaze dropped to the crimson bloom, and his body went still. It was such a subtle reaction—almost imperceptible—but Dick recognized it. Batman's mind had clicked into search mode, analyzing the threat, calculating the odds.
"It's a gift." Nightwing offered the flower, stem first. "After I got free, I found it in her main chamber. I don't know what it is, but I figured you'd want to study it. Figure out what she's working on."
Batman reached out, his gloved fingers hovering over the petals. "Careful," he murmured, his voice barely audible above the wind. "She grows these things for a reason."
"I made sure not to touch the inner part," Nightwing lied. "It's probably covered in something nasty."
Batman took the flower, handling it as if it were made of live explosives. His fingers found the stem, and he turned it over, studying the pulsing veins that ran through its flesh. "It's a hybrid," he muttered. "Some kind of night-blooming orchid, crossbred with something... I don't recognize the second strain."
"That's why I brought it to you." Nightwing moved closer, positioning himself at Batman's side, just out of arm's reach. "You're the only one who can figure out what she's doing."
Batman grunted, already lost in the study of the flower. Dick watched him, watched the way the moonlight caught the planes of his face, watched the way his brilliant mind raced to understand the secrets contained in a single bloom.
And he felt nothing.
"Is this really enough to bring him in?" Nightwing said carefully, watching Batman trace the line of a vein with his thumb. "Or will he need to dig deeper?"
Batman glanced up at the sound of his voice. "What?"
"The flower," Nightwing clarified, forcing a lightness he didn't feel. "Do you think it'll give you enough data to start working on a countermeasure?"
"Maybe." Batman turned the flower over in his hands, his eyes tracking every curve, every petal, every vein. "I'll need to run some tests. The greenhouse must have more samples. If I can see how she's breeding them, I might be able to predict her next move."
Excitement flickered in Dick's chest—not his excitement, but hers, the satisfaction she had promised him when he brought Batman to her door. "I can give you the location. I remember the path."
It was working. Batman was taking the bait.
Batman's laptop materialized from his belt, and he laid the flower on the metal surface, pulling up a spectral analyzer. "Show me exactly where you found this."
The flower thrummed with a subtle, internal vibration, pulsing faster and faster as Batman approached it, his gloved fingers curling around the stem in a grip that he would never release easily.
Nightwing pointed out a location on the map Batman had opened—the greenhouse, surrounded by the sprawling industrial park. "It's here," he said. "She's got a secondary lab on the north side, but the main garden is this section."
Batman's jaw tightened. He studied the map for a long moment, his eyes tracing the layout with an almost predatory focus. "The entire building is packed with her poison. If we go in without the right equipment, we're dead in the water."
Nightwing waited. He let the silence stretch, let Batman come to his own conclusions. To push now would reveal the trap. He'd learned the rhythm of Batman's thought patterns in his years as Robin. He'd learned exactly how the man worked.
"So you're going to find another way in?" Nightwing asked, the question casual, offhand.
Batman studied him from behind the cowl, and Nightwing felt a cold prickle run down his spine. For a moment, he was convinced his former mentor knew. That the whole performance hadn't worked. That Batman could see through the drug-fueled haze to the servant beneath.
Then Batman exhaled, a sound that was almost a sigh. "I've spent years mapping her safehouses, her labs, her routes. She's not unbeatable, just slippery." He glanced at the flower, then at the map, then at Nightwing. "I'll go in under the city. There's a sewer line that runs beneath the greenhouse complex. I can lead a team in through the service tunnels and take her by surprise."
Nightwing's mind raced. Ivy hadn't anticipated this. She'd expected Batman to come charging in through the front door, not to infiltrate from below.
She'd expected him to see the flower as a trap—for her, she'd told him, the trap she'd laid in the main garden was for Batman to find on his approach. But Batman wasn't falling into it.
The realization should have worried him. Instead, he felt a spark of something like approval. Batman was doing exactly what he always did, finding a way through, around, or over his obstacles.
It would make him easier to catch.
"The sewer line," Nightwing repeated slowly. "Which entrance would you use?"
Batman pointed to a spot on the map. "There's a maintenance hatch about half a mile east of the greenhouse. It's overgrown, but it's still functional." He frowned. "I'll need to sync up with Oracle to make sure the path is clear."
"Let me come with you."
Batman's gaze snapped to him. "No."
"Bruce." The name slipped out, easy and familiar. "I've been inside. I know the layout. I can guide you through the dangerous parts, lead you straight to her."
"You're compromised," Batman said flatly. "You were exposed to her pheromones. I don't know how much of her poison is still in your system, and I'm not going to risk bringing you into the den."
"I'm not compromised." Nightwing heard his own voice through a haze, felt the drug working at the edges of his mind. "I'm clean. The counteragent flushed it out." He stepped forward, pressing the point. "Bruce, I've been fighting her for years. I know how she thinks. I know what she wants. You need me."
Batman held his gaze, and Dick could feel the resistance, the stubborn refusal forming. But he also felt something else: doubt. Batman wasn't certain. And that doubt was a crack he could drive a knife into.
"Let me come with you," Dick repeated, softer now, the voice of the son he had once been. "Let me help you end this. She hurt a lot of people tonight, and I want to make sure she can't do that again."
The flower's pulse quickened, and Batman looked down at it, a faint frown forming on his lips. The plant didn't seem to have glowed in Nightwing's earlier examination, but Batman was on a hair trigger, interpreting every new detail as evidence.
He wanted the truth. He wanted to catch Ivy.
And he was missing the trap.
"All right," Batman said at last. "You can come with me. But you follow my lead, and you don't go near her unless I tell you to."
Relief flooded through Dick's system—not his own, but a surge of satisfaction from somewhere deeper, the primal thrill of closing a trap around vulnerable prey. "Understood."
Batman packed up the flower, careful, meticulous. "Meet me at the main Batcave entrance in an hour. I'm going to run some preliminary tests on this hybrid and sync ground routes with Oracle."
"An hour," Dick repeated, tasting the time on his tongue.
Batman moved toward the edge of the roof, cape flaring. He paused, glancing back. "I'm glad you made it out, Dick. I don't know what I'd do if I lost you."
The words hit somewhere below Nightwing's conscious mind, somewhere that should have mattered. He opened his mouth to respond, but Batman was already gone, swallowed by the night.
Now is the moment. She said to lead him to the greenhouse, but he's going in from below. I must warn her.
Nightwing stood on the roof, the wind whipping around him, the map of the greenhouse burning in his memory. He thought of Ivy waiting in the glowing cathedral, of her voice, of her touch, of the way she'd made him feel alive in ways he'd never known he was dead.
"One hour," he murmured to himself, and then he was running again, heading for the greenhouse, his steps light and sure, his vacant eyes fixed on the horizon.
The maintenance hatch was easy to find—a rusted metal cover half-hidden beneath a tangle of weeds. Nightwing crouched beside it, listening, but there was nothing but the distant hum of the city and the skittering of small animals.
His hand closed around the handle, and he was about to haul it open when his comm unit crackled.
"Ivy." The word was a sharp whisper, urgent and desperate. "He's coming through the sewer line. He'll reach the greenhouse in forty minutes."
She'd been expecting him to wait until Batman was inside.
"I'm coming," he said, already moving toward the greenhouse, the phone still clutched against his ear. "I'll warn you."
"No, you won't." Her voice was silk and steel. "You'll meet him in the sewer. And you'll stay with him until the moment he's in the main chamber. Then you'll bring him to me."
"But he'll see—"
"He'll see exactly what I want him to see." Ivy's purr was a velvet glove over steel. "You'll be his guide, his faithful partner, drawing him deeper into the garden."
A knot tightened in Nightwing's gut—a ghost of resistance, an echo of the hero he'd been. But he felt it evaporate as quickly as it had appeared, replaced by the warmth of her presence.
"Yes," he said, the word tasting like surrender.
"Good boy." A pause. "When you bring him to me, when you prove your loyalty, I'll have a reward waiting. Something better than anything you've ever felt before."
He could hear the smile in her voice, could picture the way her lips curved around the words. His body stirred in response, demanding more, demanding all that she promised.
The sewer line stretched ahead of him, dark and foul, and Nightwing slipped through the open grate like a shadow, moving toward the rendezvous point.
An hour later, Batman rose from the musty darkness of the service tunnel, the map glowing on his wrist. Nightwing stood beside him, eyes clear save for that faint, unfocused quality, the distant look that Ivy had given him.
"The main chamber's ahead." Dick pointed deeper into the gutted earth. "Through that door, then up a spiral staircase. She usually controls the plants from there."
Batman studied him intently. "What's your state?" This was an old question he usually asked Dick after a mission, a way he checked up on him.
"Clean. Focused." The words came out flat, empty, but Batman didn't seem to register it. In the dim light, Nightwing imagined he could see the fine sheen of sweat on Batman's brow, the slight tremor in his hands. The flower had done its work.
Ivy had made him strong, had filled him with her power, and Batman was no match for the hidden threads she'd woven into his mind.
"Let's move," Batman whispered, his voice unsteady.
Nightwing placed his hand on the door, hesitated. The final step.
He felt no hesitation. No doubt.
He was hers.
"I'll take us through," he said, and he pushed open the door.
The main chamber was a cathedral of green, glowing with soft phosphorescent light. Pitcher plants the size of coffins lined the walls, their maws open and dripping with glistening fluid. The air was thick with the scent of pollen and decay, and the ground was a carpet of soft moss that spread in every direction.
Batman stepped forward, his eyes scanning the room with professional wariness. "It's too quiet."
"She's waiting for us," Nightwing said, his voice echoing in the space.
The sound of laughter came from everywhere and nowhere, and suddenly Ivy was there, emerging from the canopy of leaves above. She dropped to the ground with impossible grace, landing on the balls of her feet.
Batman tensed. Reached for his belt. But the laugh grew louder, more triumphant as the vines shifted behind him, cutting off his retreat.
"Welcome, Bruce," Ivy purred, her lips curving into a smile of pure delight. "I've been expecting you."
Batman's hand closed around his baton, but his movement was sluggish, almost dreamlike. "You're under arrest, Ivy."
"I don't think so." She snapped her fingers, and the ground beneath Batman's feet gave way.
He fell through the moss, through the soil, into a darkness filled with the sound of hungry, grinding foliage. Nightwing watched him fall, watched the pitcher plant's massive mouth yawn open to receive him, watched him disappear into its red, pulsing interior.
For a moment, the chamber fell silent.
Then the plant began to move, its walls contracting and expanding as Batman struggled inside. Muffled shouts echoed through the thick vegetation, accompanied by the slow, sizzling sound of his suit beginning to dissolve.
"Oh, my new pet," Ivy purred. She walked toward the pitcher plant, her hips swaying. "You brought him exactly where I wanted him."
Nightwing stood frozen, his eyes fixed on the giant plant as it writhed and churned, Batman's cries growing fainter. He heard the words, understood them, but they felt like they belonged to someone else.
"He took the bait," Nightwing said, his voice a monotone.
"He always does." Ivy turned to face him, her smile widening. "Now, my loyal little bird, come here and let me give you your reward."
She pulled off the leaf garment, letting it fall away to reveal her naked body. Her skin gleamed like polished jade, her breasts heavy and full, her hips flaring into curves that seemed designed to drive a man insane.
Nightwing crossed the chamber, his body moving of its own accord. He stopped before her, and she reached out, stroking his face with a tenderness that made no sense.
"Undress for me," she commanded.
His fingers worked the fastenings of his suit, and the armored fabric peeled away, revealing the lean muscle beneath. When he was naked, she circled him, running her hands across his shoulders, his chest, his stomach, the muscles tensing at her touch.
"Beautiful," she breathed. "So beautiful."
She moved to the garden seat carved from a fallen log, and sat, spreading her legs. Her cunt glistened with moisture, and Nightwing felt his own blood surge toward her like a moth to flame.
"Come here," she said. "Come mount me. I want to watch you claim me as I watch him struggle and fail."
Nightwing lowered himself onto his knees, positioning between her open thighs, and in one movement, he pushed himself into her.
The heat was immediate, overwhelming, strangling. Her cunt closed around him like a fist, wet and velvet, pulling him deeper. Nightwing cried out, his body trembling as he sank to the hilt, and Ivy gasped, tilting her head back.
"Yes," she moaned, "yes, just like that, my beautiful, perfect pet."
She leaned back, and he followed, his hands finding her hips as she wrapped her legs around his waist, locking him in place. Her heels worked against his ass, guiding his pace, and he began to move, thrusting into her with a rhythm that built between them like a symphony approaching crescendo.
"Faster," she demanded, her nails raking down his back. "Harder. Let me feel it."
He slammed into her, driving deep, and she let out a cry that was almost a scream. Her body arched beneath him, her hands gripping his shoulders, her legs tightening as he fucked her with desperate, devoted urgency.
Behind them, the pitcher plant pulsed and churned, Batman's muffled screams now a steady, rhythmless backdrop. His fists pounded against the fleshy walls, but each impact grew weaker, the sound of his struggle fading into something like surrender.
Ivy laughed, a sound full of triumph and filthy pleasure, her body rocking against his as he drove her higher.
"You're mine," she whispered. "You're mine, and he's finished."
Nightwing felt the world dissolve into sensation, into heat and need and the exquisite torture of her body around his. He was losing himself inside her, and he didn't care. He never wanted it to end.
"Come inside me," she commanded, her voice low and rough. "Come inside me, fill me up, show me how much you love being my pet."
Her words were all he needed. With a cry that was part agony, part release, Nightwing buried himself to the hilt and let go. His orgasm ripped through him, and she tightened around him, pulling every drop from his body, milking him until he was empty and shaking and utterly hers.
She came with him, her body shuddering against his, her fingers tangled in his hair, holding him close.
"Oh, my darling boy," she breathed as the last shudders faded. "I've waited so long for this."
Nightwing slumped against her, spent and trembling. The pitcher plant had gone still, and no sound came from within.
"What about...?" he whispered, unable to finish the sentence.
Ivy's smile was serene, possessive. "Batman is still alive. For now. But he's trapped in that plant, his suit dissolving, his system filled with my toxins." She pressed a kiss to his forehead. "He'll be there for hours, maybe days, listening to us. And when I'm ready to let you prove your loyalty completely..." She paused. "You'll be the one to decide what happens to him."
"Decide?"
"You'll choose whether he lives or dies." She traced a finger down his chest, painted with sweat. "And I know exactly which choice you'll make, my loyal little bird, because you're mine. Utterly, completely, irrevocably mine."
Somewhere in the depths of the pitcher plant, a muffled scream began anew, and Ivy pulled him close, surrounding him with her scent and her warmth and her indomitable will.
And Nightwing felt nothing but peace.