Harley Quinn's Memories (Please Bookmark)

Harley had already lost count of which night of revelry this was.

A few days ago, her dearest Little Pudding had sent her a letter from Arkham through someone. The envelope was covered in a mess of language and symbols no ordinary person could understand, along with many lip prints in red marks that looked like blood.

But she knew it was real. This was a method of communication only the two of them could use, like a code or secret signal, a little secret belonging only to them. Every time she thought of it, her heart overflowed with sweetness.

When the timid prison guard handed the letter to Harley, then screamed and fled the Circus grounds, Harley joyfully pressed the thin sheet of paper to her chest and spun around the room in delight.

Jester had been locked in Arkham by Batwoman for over half a year. Harley missed her terribly.

When she received the letter, she remembered the joy of getting Christmas presents as a child, the sweetness of eating chocolate for the first time, and the secret delight of wearing high heels for the first time.

That happiness even made her forget to bash the messenger to death with her hammer. Before this, she had planned to disguise herself as a prison guard and sneak into Arkham to rescue Jester.

With one hand, she gently twisted the ends of her hair, blushing shyly like a maiden in love. With the other, she somehow produced a kitchen knife and eagerly tore open the envelope.

Unfortunately, that joy came to an abrupt halt the moment she opened the letter. The words on the page made her involuntarily roar things like, "Aah! No! This can't be real!"

Jester had written this in the letter:

"Dear Little Pumpkin, how have you been lately? I have good news to tell you: the world is ending, and we're all going to die! Aren't you happy?"

"Oh, death, what a wonderful word. I've already changed clothes and am ready for our date!"

"Today I ate a shriveled roast goose. How about you?"

"Mr. Spoon barely talks to me these days."

"Before you die, can you bring Batwoman to see me? I'd rather die with her. You can take a taxi home yourself."

"Mm, that's all. Hurry up, mwah mwah."

Although Jester's trademark manic laughter could not be seen on the paper, the sloppy handwriting and disjointed content made it clear that she was still herself.

Strange doodles she had casually drawn were scattered among the crooked words, looking like her smiling face over and over again. The paper also bore dried marks resembling snot or saliva. Jester had apparently been very happy while writing the letter.

But Harley was not happy to receive it.

The letter she had been looking forward to for so long contained this sort of thing. It made her very sad.

Though knowing everyone was going to die and that she would get to enjoy the ultimate chaos people showed in the face of death made her a little happy too.

In short, her feelings were complicated.

Jester's head was still full of that damn Batwoman. Harley herself seemed to be nothing more than a driver or errand runner. They had clearly promised to be each other's little treats. Hadn't Little Pumpkin and Little Pudding promised to be together forever?

Laughing wildly, Harley set fires and smashed things around the house, venting her dissatisfaction. But in the end, she still did as Jester had asked. After all, they were good sisters, weren't they?

Harley had never doubted her. The world ending was just a little thing, wasn't it? It had to be true.

Not only herself, but the entire Circus had been dispatched to search Gotham for traces of Batwoman.

Yet the methods that had always worked before failed this time. No matter how much chaos they caused in the city, only those boring police officers arrived. Batwoman never appeared from beginning to end.

For three nights straight, Harley went out to make trouble as soon as it got dark, like she was going to work, and only dragged her exhausted body home at dawn. But Batwoman seemed to have vanished. Not even her shadow had appeared.

"Maybe she went abroad on vacation. I sometimes want to go to Paris or somewhere else too."

Harley left huge signs in places Batwoman often appeared, such as rooftops. Each sign had a cartoon finger pointing toward Harley's home. She knew that bat would definitely catch her scent.

Then she returned here and waited every night for Batwoman to arrive.

At first, she simply waited while reading. But it was too easy to fall asleep that way, and Harley thought that would not do. Batwoman might come and go without her even knowing.

So on the second day, she read while drinking.

On the third day, she danced while drinking.

Gradually, she seemed to forget her original purpose. Instead, she made every night's revelry into a new habit, celebrating Earth's impending destruction.

But none of the people from the Circus dared to play with Harley, nor did they enjoy having their heads smashed by a giant hammer.

That made Harley feel lonely, so she invited her good friend over to live here and party twenty-four hours a day.

Meanwhile, Jester in the asylum went mad from waiting. She did not know what was happening outside or why Harley still had not brought Batwoman. She could only laugh even more hysterically in her room.

A few days later, a mysterious recording tape was carried out of her room by a prison guard. After changing hands several times, it reached Deathstroke. Cindy also accepted the task of finding Batwoman. That was what had happened before Su Ming and Cindy met.

Harley clutched a steel pole, panting as she stared at the person on the sofa. Then they both burst into laughter. Harley laughed so hard her legs gave out, and she staggered toward the sofa as if she wanted to roughhouse with her friend.

Then she noticed there was someone else in the room. Even under the psychedelic lighting, she could clearly see the figure's armor—black and yellow, nature's most famous warning colors.

The person had been watching them from the darkness all along. The red single eye on the helmet reflected an ominous gleam. Even Harley could not help blurting out:

"Uh-oh."

That was right. As a world-famous assassin, Deathstroke showing up in anyone's home was never a good thing.

"Deathstroke? Why are you in my house?"

Harley shook her head. Her flushed face made it clear she had drunk quite a lot.

"I need an answer to a question. Maybe you know it." Cindy did not stand on ceremony and stated her demand outright. "I'm looking for Batwoman. Where is she?"

"Everyone's looking for Batwoman. What's so great about that damn bat?" Harley did not answer. Instead, she ran to the sofa and hugged the other person, as if seeking comfort.

Su Ming stepped out from behind Cindy and said quietly, "Looks like Jester sent her to search too. It's probably the same situation as ours."

"Can't we just storm Arkham and ask her directly?" Cindy frowned beneath her mask. Since they thought Jester knew, they might as well go get a clear answer.

"No need. Jester doesn't know. My previous judgment was wrong." Su Ming calmly overturned his earlier conclusion, watching Harley roll around on the sofa from a distance. "If only your assignment had been vague, or if you simply couldn't understand it, then perhaps Jester did it deliberately. But Harley is someone she trusts. Even Harley doesn't know now, which means Jester gave her the same task as us: searching for a needle in a haystack."

Cindy nodded slightly. "So that was why you came to Harley first—to determine whether Jester knew Batwoman's whereabouts? Makes sense. Harley is much easier to understand than Jester."

Such praise did not make Su Ming proud, because the situation had reached a dead end.

In the comics Su Ming had once read, there had never been an incident where Bliss Wayne disappeared. The panels only showed her hiding in a secret base, watching Aquawoman come ashore for peace talks through a massive screen. She then concluded that the so-called negotiations were merely a cover and went to ambush Queen Arthur, setting off a series of chain reactions.

But Cindy had already been to the Batcave. It was not there. So where could this secret base be?

There were no clues at all. They said a cunning rabbit had three burrows, but Batwoman was far more cunning than any rabbit.

If they waited for Bliss to emerge on her own, it would definitely be too late. Su Ming did not know how Bliss had managed to blend in among an army of millions, get close to Arthur, and kill her successfully.

That meant that although he knew Atlantis would attack Paradise Island, he did not know when it would happen or what form it would take. Their best chance was to intercept Batwoman in Gotham.

Even his foreknowledge had limits. The scenes in the comics were too vague to serve as clues at all.

Only then did Harley remember that she had Deathstroke to deal with. She climbed to her feet, her hair a mess, and shouted:

"I don't know where Batwoman is. You came to the wrong place! Uh, wait, why are there two Deathstrokes?" Harley lowered her head and rubbed her eyes, then looked up again. There were still two of them, making her little mouth fall open. "Either I drank too little, or I drank too much. Oh no, I forgot Ms. J told me to find Batwoman! She's going to hate me!"

As if she had suddenly sobered up, Harley recalled what she had really been waiting for these past few days. It was not to eat, drink, and have fun while waiting for the end of the world, nor was it to wait for that chaotic human drama. She had been waiting for Batwoman to come find her.

"Ummm... did Batwoman come by or not?"

She propped up her chin, tilted her little head, and tried hard to remember. But she had been having far too much fun lately. When she was spinning around the dance floor like a little top, how could she possibly notice whether Batwoman had come?

"Hey, why didn't you remind me?" After thinking for ages without getting anywhere, Harley raised her hand and smacked the person on the sofa, as though she were angry.

"You never told me about it. How was I supposed to remind you?"

The person on the sofa sounded both amused and helpless. But judging by her voice and tone, she was probably a stunning beauty, with even her ordinary speech carrying an alluring sweetness.

Cindy leaned close to Su Ming's ear and whispered, "If things go bad, get ready to withdraw. I didn't bring any herbicide this time."

But the person on the sofa sprang up as though struck by lightning, wrapped an arm around Harley, and turned around. With a blank expression, she stared intently at the two of them by the door.

Now Su Ming could clearly see what she was wearing. More accurately, she was wearing nothing but leaves. Green leaves and vines covered her private areas, creating the half-covered look of nature having dressed her in nothing but underwear.

Her slender arms, shapely thighs, flat stomach, and smooth back were all exposed to the air. Her moist purple eyeshadow and lip gloss, along with her naturally flowing red wavy hair adorned with flowers, made her radiate temptation at every moment.

It was Poison Ivy, Harley's good friend, a renowned botanist, a fanatical environmentalist, and one of Gotham's greatest headaches.

Calling her an environmentalist was less accurate than calling her a plant protectionist. She did not care how polluted the air was as long as it did not affect plant photosynthesis. Nor did she care how filthy the water was as long as it did not affect her watering flowers. Even if a nuclear bomb went off in Gotham, it did not matter as long as it did not harm her precious plants.

Unlike other mental patients, Poison Ivy was a genuine Superhuman. She could create, stimulate, and command any plant to serve her—for instance, summoning enormous vines to grind buildings to pieces, making flowers across the city spread deadly poison gas, or planting tiny lethal spores inside other people's bodies.

Beyond that, she was extremely intelligent, held multiple doctoral degrees, and all of her bodily fluids were poisonous, each with different effects. They could control people's minds, drive them mad, or even let them die in sweet dreams.

Modified by plants and toxins, she possessed rapid regeneration. Even after suffering a fatal wound, she could sprout and grow again if buried in soil and watered.

In the comic-book world, even Supermen from Parallel Worlds could be controlled by her. Among the many worlds currently known, only the Batman of the New 52 was immune to this Mind Control toxin.

Batman's unshakable will kept him from being controlled, but his mortal body was not immune to other toxins. In many comic stories, Batman was poisoned by Poison Ivy's various deadly toxins and left at death's door, only to be saved by antidotes made by Butler and Robin.

Coming up against a genuine Superhuman like Poison Ivy without preparation, Cindy naturally felt that things were going badly. They would be better off leaving quickly.

And the herbicide Cindy had just mentioned was like pointing at a monk and calling him bald—a slap right in the face.

"How did she hear us?" Cindy was somewhat stunned, her hand slowly moving toward her weapon.

"All the lighting effects here, the lamps above and around us, are being turned by vines. Poison Ivy can use them to transmit subtle vibrations and hear anything we say."

Su Ming did not reach for his weapon. Instead, he stood in front of Cindy, holding out his palms toward Poison Ivy and Harley to show he meant no harm while explaining to Cindy.

"The other Deathstroke is right. Sound is a form of vibration too."

Poison Ivy relaxed slightly. Several snake-like vines withdrew back into her body. If possible, she did not want to fight Deathstroke either, much less two of them.

"Our employer is Ms. J too, so we all have the same goal in finding Batwoman. Why don't we sit down and have something to eat?"

In truth, Su Ming and Cindy's search for Batwoman no longer had anything to do with Jester's mission. They were doing it to save Earth -11, but there was no need to tell Harley and the others that.

His mind raced, and then he took off his helmet.

Harley was no match for him in a direct fight. The true threat came from Poison Ivy, and her methods of attack were precisely the kind a helmet could not defend against. It would be better to show his true face, distract them, and ease the tense atmosphere.

Because on Earth -11, he was probably the only male Super Villain.

"A man?!"

"A man?"

Just as he expected, Harley and Poison Ivy both cried out when he revealed his face.

"Hmph." Cindy snorted, took off her helmet as well, and walked to Su Ming's side. Aside from their genders and faces, the two looked as though they had been cast from the same mold.

The same blind eye, the same armor and weapons, the same sense of style.

Only their ways of doing things were somewhat different.

Harley plopped down onto the sofa, looked at Cindy, then at Su Ming, her big eyes filled with curiosity.

"Fine, now we're more interested in your story. As for finding Batwoman, if we can't find her, we can't find her. It's not like I can mold one out of clay and send her to Ms. J, right?"