Calling Cardinal

The Longest Night

"Choose heads, and Penguin dies. Pick tails, and Jim gets the bullet. It's simple, really."

Harvey flips the coin in the air. I lunge from my position. My body collides with his. I send both of us flying to the opposite side of the courthouse. I land hard against the wall.

My collision gives Two-Face just enough time to pick his gun and shoot. A burning sensation sears my leg.

"No!"

Jim shouts, too. "Leave her alone, damnit!"

I force myself up before I can get shot again. I duck behind a pillar.

"Give it up, Sera," Two-Face taunts. "We gave you an option. We hadn't planned on killing you tonight, Cardinal, but you forced our hand. Now all three of you will die."

I sneak to the next stone pillar as he nears. Each step is silent and calculated, just like Jim taught me.

He aims the gun to find an empty space and snickers. "Very clever, Cardinal. I never doubted your intelligence, but you're caught. There's no more running. Not unless you would like me to slaughter the only two men you've ever cared for."

Quietly, I position myself behind him. With one leap, I grab his neck in a chokehold. He drops the gun. My arms tighten around his throat. He struggles and gasps for air.

"Goodbye, Harvey."

"Kill him!"

Two-Face goes limp in my arms. I should kill him. I want to kill him for what he did to me. But I can't let him die.

I drop his unconscious body onto the floor.

I release Penguin and Jim from their restraints and face Harvey's almost dead body. Both of them try to comfort me, but I refuse it.

"Sera—"

I viciously raise my hand for them to stop. It shuts them up immediately.

"Get him to Arkham," I growl. "He needs help."

He calls Bullock to get a medic team to the courthouse while handcuffing the criminal district attorney. I grab his thumb and release the choker from my throat.

With a single stomp of my foot, the choker crackles and shatters. Once it's destroyed, I leave the courthouse to sit under a tree until the medics can treat the wound to my leg.

The stars are especially bright tonight. Under the light of the city, I can hardly see their gorgeous outline. But here in the slums where the electricity is scarce, they're as clear as day. Harvey grew up around here. I wonder if he thought the same of my stars.

The two men I love keep their distance. I hear them whispering to each other about my condition, and about Harvey's. Oswald demands to kill him. Jim threatens him with jail time if Oswald even looks at Two-Face the wrong way.

Giving up on convincing my brother, Os cautiously waddles over to my tree.

"Are you okay?"

"Well, I've been shot."

"So I've come to understand," he says, leaning against the bark. His hand rests on my shoulder. "That's not what I meant."

"No, I'm not okay." I pull my undamaged knee to my chest. "He was about to kill both of you. I don't know what I would've done."

"You stopped him." Os sits beside me and laces our hands together. He always had a way of forcing the emotion out of me, even when I didn't want it. "The day is saved, Sera."

"But will the day come that I can't save it?" I ask. The day came when Oswald couldn't save me. The only reason I'm back is because of the conquest by a mad scientist. My resurrection was pure luck. There are billions and billions of people who didn't get the chance I did. His mother is one of them, my parents, too.