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[bodilesswarrior]

Canon Timeline

Last Voyages Timeline

Mask or Menace Timeline

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Canon Timeline

[bodilesswarrior]

You've reached Barbara Gordon. I'm too busy to talk, but if you leave a message I'll get back to you eventually.

MoM CRAU, one week after their return

[criminallysane]

[ Waking up back in the Slab again should be a comfort. Here, all is familiar: the smells of prison, the sounds of prison, the horrifically bad Taco Tuesdays of prison. Here, Joker knows the game he's playing, and he knows the person he needs to be. There are no dead wives or lost children to haunt him, no puffy-eyed Harleys to throw plates at his head or hoard elephants in his home, no alternate versions of Batman trying to murder him in hotels. It's just routine, and pain, and an electrical grid that's practically begging to have somebody flip a switch or two. It should be easy as pie.

But it's not.

The time he spent in that other world -- other worlds, plural, really -- appears not to have passed here at all. His knee is still healing from Gordy's bullet. The paper peel-one-off-each-day calendar atop the desk of his new Slab psychiatrist stands testament to this reality's insistence that none of those realities happened. And yet Joker himself is different, changed in ways he can't quite articulate and doesn't think he wants to. The dance he's in is the same, but his steps are slightly off now, and it's not just the bum knee. It's like the music he's listening to is just half a beat early, or maybe half a beat too late.

And there's so much time to fill now. It never bothered him that much before, all the endless silence and solitude that came with his standard prison treatments. It wasn't pleasant, of course, but he'd long since learned how to make the hours fly. But now, the emptiness offers too much space for other thoughts to break through the barriers in his mind. Ronnie and Lucy, walking hand-in-hand on the beach. Jeannie and Sarah, studying one another on a train bound to nowhere.

And always, always, there is Barbara.

Is she out there, Joker wonders? Is she watching, even now? She's the one who put him here, after all, and he remembers the look on her face when he asked her about it. Could she be watching? The more he thinks about it, the more certain he becomes that she could.

The idea really shouldn't bring him as much comfort as it does. For one thing, she's Barbara. And for another, she's almost certainly not the same Barbara he knew in his... what, extended hallucination? Interdimensional holiday? And what could he possibly say to a Barbara who hadn't been through all of that with him, who would just look at him and see the same monster she used to?

Of course... she might have been there. Hell, anything is possible. And if she wasn't, well. She'll still be Barbara. Smart. Real. And, if he plays his cards right, maybe even willing to keep a clown company for a little while, and keep the ghosts at bay.

And so, one week after his return, Joker gets out one of the cheap burner phones a guy can get in any prison for a price, and he sends a text. ]

Would you think I was crazy, Barbie, if I said I could feel you watching me?

How many little birds have you got hidden in my rafters, I wonder?

Last Voyages Timeline

[bodilesswarrior]

You've reached Barbara Gordon and Dinah Lance. We're too busy to talk, but if you leave a message we'll get back to you eventually.

[From the background - ] Soon! We'll get back to you soon.

[Barbara huffs, something between a laugh and a sigh.] Dinah will make sure we get back to you soon.

[Hey, her other girlfriend has a time machine.]

[crossdimensional IM]

[routemistress]

jaguar, my jaguar, guess who turned up

only the sodding master again

except she goes by Missy now

just look at her

[attached is a snap of Missy in the barge pub, wearing a hat covered in berries and a rather shellshocked expression.]


i have a lot of feelings about this

love to D

also your horrible moggy says hi

[attached: a snap of Jonesy up on deck, disdainfully riding the Imperial mouse droid that Han and Iris stole to poop-scoop the deck and greenhouse.]

[spam]

[routemistress]

It's not like they haven't spent time together since Barbara's return - Iris was especially limpetlike after the Mirror thing - but it hasn't been particularly conversational.

Today Iris comes in and folds herself onto the floor, resting her head in Barbara's lap.

"What's this about you and Dracula?"

audio

[tucky]

If I ask you a question, do you promise you'll answer honestly?

audio

[tucky]

Hey. Can we hang out? I've been feeling even more feelings than usual lately.

[Which is a mean feat for Tiffany.]

Pre- House Record Port

[fuckaround_findout]

Cal and Nico are not the worst that Weathering has to offer by far, but they're not good either. Never really had a chance, most would say. Not surprising at all they'd turn out the way they did. If only their family hadn't died out on the trail. If only they'd stayed at the orphanage. If only -

Cal is perfectly fine with where she's at because she's always known she could have been much worse off if not for Nico. It means she's been aware of Barbara most of both of their lives, but she's never really tried to be friends because that would get super awkward when Sheriff Gordon would have to try to arrest Cal.

But Sheriff Gordon will never try to arrest anyone again, and Cal knows exactly what that feels like. It's why she turns up in the street outside, throwing pebbles at a window with one hand, a bottle of liquor in the other.

Mask or Menace Timeline

[bodilesswarrior]

You've reached Barbara Gordon. I'm too busy to talk, but if you leave a message I'll get back to you eventually.

encrypted text;

[cassassin]

[shiva has other shit going on. she isn't even sure she wants barbara to see her under these circumstances, and barbaras who weren't hers have been here before. but when the name comes up in the network directory, she takes pause. after a long, long moment, she finally sends a text, a code she hasn't had reason to use in months and months. a careful measure--if it's the barbara she knows, it will mean something to her.]

12 9 12 19 9 19

encrypted video;

[cassassin]

Penguin's here. Young one. Can't get a read on him, he seems... uh, erratic.

look if cass messages her let's just assume it's encrypted, voicemail; 10/7

[cassassin]

Barbara, I-- [fuck. fuck. yeah, she knows she doesn't sound great, but she's been crying, so whatever. downside: it's probably not hard to tell she's been crying. she's off video for a reason, not that it particularly helps. she managed to mostly keep it together while she was talking to the other Cassandra, but--]

Laura's gone. I'm... I don't... [she draws in a shaky breath, letting out a humorless laugh that borders on a sob.]

Come over? Please.

[Voice] Halloween Late Night (Like Super Late)

[batburgers]

Wow you do sound just like the Babs I know.

video; like...... the evening. after the batgirls thread

[cassassin]

[ well. once cass has gone home... ]

I had a... panic attack, yesterday. When I went to see her.

encrypted video; after dream shit

[cassassin]

Hey. I, uh...

[ she scrubs a hand through her hair. she's not sure it's her place to really get barbara to examine this or to call her on it. but she's kind of been meaning to for a while, so... ]

About the... Dinah stuff? In our dream. Before.

audio; sometime in july

[cassassin]

So, uh--

Steph and I are together.

Text;

[crypdick]

He underestimates you.

Encrypted text for Oracle

[kid_flash_found]

Can you arrange eyes on Mysterio? Am concerned re: Parker.

untraceable text

[maskormods]

\\

h-s•-n-i
o-n-’
t-o-t-s
t-s•-h
s•-s•-r-:-n-t•
d•-v-i-e-o-l
i-t-t-g-a
e-h-s•

text

[adultwonder]

So, have you cracked the weird code going around yet?

[He feels safe assuming she'll be among the first to get it.]

text

[notafraidofyou]

So, I got a weird cryptic text thing, and since you're the smartest person in most rooms... wanna have a look?

text

[callmesuperboy]

Hey magnificent Bird of the wires. How goes it?

text

[callmesuperboy]

So, the world is in danger, the odds are slim, and we may just be facing annihilation from a god being.

Sounds familiar, huh?

Re: text

[bodilesswarrior]

Painfully.

Have the Titans made any plans?

encrypted audio; id: cain

[cassassin]

[ after the other thing--

the sound of her voice is just ever-so-slightly wrong, not to mention the cadence and syntax. she sounds almost bored as she says this, like it's casual information being passed on. ]

Mother, get eyes on the cities, won't you? Oracle is running wild.

Re: encrypted audio

[bodilesswarrior]

[ Mother.

It ought to make her heart soar, but the way Cass says it - ]

What's happened to you? [She doesn't ask for details, though she does expand her mind as she speaks; maybe she'll see for herself.]

merry christmas

[the_caped_crusader]

[ $5,000 is automatically deposited into her bank account, because he knows she'll never accept the check. ]