2012-11-03 The Chaff From The Wheat

Believe it or not, these are the lucky ones.

Following the actions of Batman, Psylocke, Jynn, Jubilee and Domino, the majority of the gang responsible for the attack on D&G Chemicals has been apprehended. An exact headcount of the numbers involved had been difficult to ascertain; around thirteen, of which eight men - and they are all men - are in custody.

That is all that they have in common, though. These men are seedy figures of the Gotham underground, but they have no unifying criminal record. Two independent muggers, two con artists, a safecracker, and three members of organized crime families - but all different families! The mobsters have had slick lawyers turn up, of course, and pressure is being exerted to get them out... but the others?

Well, they were all caught trying to steal a large amount of Agent Orange - a chemical which is so illegal even the mob lawyers are having trouble getting an appeal in progress. It isn't even supposed to be manufactured any more, and D&G have loudly proclaimed that they have no idea how it got in THEIR warehouse.

At the moment, they are being held on questioning in relation to terrorism charges... but these guys aren't terrorists, surely? Criminals, liars, and scum, yes... but terrorism implies a level of commitment these men wouldn't recognize if it slapped them in the face.

For the past four hours, Jim Gordon has been neck deep in files and paperwork. Folders with criminal records and investigative dossiers have been spread across his desk, paired with empty cups of coffee, the left over wrappers of a sandwich, and an ash tray filled with cigarette butts. The lines of his face are etched with confusion and frustration, not to mention fatigue.

He's not the only one who's worked late, either. The team of investigators assigned to the D&G Chemicals case this morning have put in extra hours too, and one of them, Detective Benson, raps on the door to Jim's office around 8:45pm.

"Come in!" calls Gordon.

Benson throws open the door and walks in, similarly armed with a mug of coffee and a half-eaten banana.

"You find anything yet, Benson?" "Nothing. Not a damn thing." "I know, it doesn't make any sense." "You'd better get down there, Gordon," warns Benson. "Those mob lawyers are making this one hell of a fight. We'd better get to questioning them before they manage to sleaze these bastards out from under our noses."

Gordon sits there for a moment, poring over the file centermost on his desk, before pushing them away out of frustration. "I'm not ready yet! I've got nothing concrete to /work/ with, here."

"Yeah, well, maybe you'll dig something up." Benson smirks. "You're good at that." "Fine." Gordon stands up, taking the mug of coffee with him as he makes to leave his office. "Oh, and Benson, don't mention the smoking. If the Mayor knew I was-" "Yeah, don't worry about it, Jim." "Pick me one to start with, would you?" Gordon leaves his office behind, having committed almost every piece of information on the eight men they've arrested to memory, and makes to follow Benson to the holding facilities.

"Actually, there is one guy, said he wants to help..."

And that's really the tiebreaker. James Malhoney ain't never been a snitch a day in his life, but he, like the rest of the gang, has been getting progressively more confused and frightened as time wore on. Not because they are in jail; these are men who have been in and out of jail for years. But it is almost like they are just waking up.

James is a scrawny man, with ratlike features. He's in his early thirties, unkempt, and more than a little dirty. The mobsters wouldn't say a damn thing on principle, and the muggers are violent, angry men. The safecracker also has a reputation to maintain. But James Malhoney, used to swindling doctors out of meds and charities out of collections, well, he's just desperate enough to spill his guts now that he's starting to realize what, exactly, it was he had been doing that night.

When Gordon himself enters the interview room, the unpleasant man gives a greasy smile, all yellow teeth and gaps where there used to be more.

"Y-you gotta b-believe me, man, boss, Sir." He starts off, "I weren't, like, responsible. It weren't me what was robbin' the place, I ain't never even picked up a gun before! I was like, uh, it was... it was all her fault, you see?"

Incoherent. Rambling. Weak. But entirely, completely, sincere.

"James Malhoney," murmurs Gordon under his breath, while staring at the scrawny man behind the concealment of a two-way window attached to Malhoney's holding cell. "The con artist?" He looks over at Benson with a perked eyebrow from beneath his spectacles, only to have Benson smirk back at him. They share a silent look for a moment, before Gordon abruptly turns and leaves the surveillance room to enter the holding cell.

He seems momentarily taken aback by Malhoney's sputtering, but he exercises patience, letting the dirty man sputter along for a few moments. He looks over toward the officer standing guard at the door and slowly nods his head, cueing the officer to go ahead and lock up, leaving him alone in the room with Malhoney. "Hey, easy, son," says Gordon, with a hand held up to try and ease his rambling. "The fact that you're willing to speak with me is going to make things /much/ easier for you, alright? I'm your man. I'm on your side."

Even while trying to simmer Malhoney down, Gordon is studying him, trying to pick through the ramblings to determine not only his sincerity, but where it comes from. He slowly pulls out a chair on the other side of the table, where Malhoney sits with his hands cuffed, and sits down. "Listen, let's start from the beginning, okay?" He sets his coffee down and pulls a blank pad of paper over to rest between them. "I'll get you a glass of water. In the mean while, James, tell me... who first contacted you about this job? Name, description, everything. Lay it on me."

The calm manner helps a lot. This guy has been told he's being held in connection with terrorism! That he'd been found at the scene of the crime unconscious, with an automatic weapon, and there were even rumors that freakin' Batman was involved somehow! To say that James Malhoney feels out of his league would be like saying that a candle might feel overwhelmed in an inferno. His defences are melting away all around him.

"It, weren't like that." He says, slowly. A deep breath follows as he tries to calm himself down. "I was... well, I was, y'know. Just coming back from, uh, work." His discomfort is obvious, but really? That isn't anything compared to what he's being accused of here. "And then I heard this voice from an alley. Woman. I was going to tell her to buzz off, but when I got a look at her..." The man's brow furrows, and his teeth bite deep into his bottom lip.

"She never gave me her name, an', I swear this sounds crazy, but, I can't, remember much. I really can't! She asked me to help her, and, well, she seemed like such a, beautiful lady. I wanted to help. And, it was like I was in a dream, you know? It all seemed, reasonable, at the time, and, geez, Commissioner, I ain't never hurt nobody before, not, not /really/."

Detective Benson, who is watching the whole thing from the other room, orders one of the cops to get a glass of water. A few moments later, a police officer brings the glass of water in and sets it down in front of James Malhoney, before walking back out and leaving the two alone.

All the while, Gordon listens with careful intent, maintaining the polite features of his face in a continuing effort to keep the con man calm. However, deep inside, his curiosity is spinning. He's seen a lot of things in Gotham City, and he wouldn't be the first person to just trust a con man's words blindly. This could all be a ruse. However, even inside lies there are truths that can be picked out, and so he leaves the notepad alone, not wanting to further destabilize the prisoner with the scratching of a pen, and instead folds his hands and just listens.

"A beautiful woman can cause a world of hurt," sympathizes Jim. He would know, after all. "Tell me about that, James. She was beautiful, you say? What kind of clothes was she wearing, and do you remember what it was about /her/, exactly, not just the clothes, but /her/, that made her seem so pretty to you?"

James drinks the water. Not just a little bit of it, either, but all of it. He's been kept well fed and watered of course; the GCPD aren't barbarians... but he's nervous. He feels violated in some, nebulous way that he can't quite place. There's a lot he doesn't remember, a lot which really does feel like a dream, and then there's the now. Which is all too real.

"Her clothes were, green." He says, slowly. He is a man who makes his living on lies, but right now, the truth seems so much more difficult to grasp. There's important things he's missing, he knows it, and, the more he worries at it, the more painful it seems to become.

"She, smelt good." He continues, and his voice sounds a bit tighter as he realizes that. Fingers wrap tighter around the glass, "Yeah, that was it. It was her smell. She smelt like, wet earth, and honey, and, love, warmth, you know that smell your mom had when you was little? Like, a safe, smell, and, I wanted to keep ... being near her, for that, smell..." He's questioning himself by the end of it. Is that right? Is that what she smelt like? And why was it so important?

At this point, Gordon can't help but show the perplexed nature of his mind. Okay, so her clothes were green... that's not entirely helpful. Green dress? Green pantsuit? Green what? It's no longer important, for he's beginning to suspect that this nameless woman had something far more dangerous in her possession.

"Okay, James. Listen." A pause. "I think this woman has done something to you, which in this case, makes you as much a victim as it does a suspect. Now, we aren't going to drop the charges against you, and we're going to have to hold you for a little while longer. However, I'd like to take you over to Gotham General, and run some tests, to see if there's any evidence that she slipped you some mind altering substances."

He reaches out tentatively, to put a gentle hand on the man's wrist, the same hand that grasps the empty glass so ferociously, should he let him. "Would that be alright, James? If we can prove that she drugged you, then... well, that would change things significantly." There's such a tone of empathy in Gordon's voice that he hopes it will pierce through the man's confused state, wrapping him in comfort. At the same time, Gordon's left eyebrow cocks up into the air, as if trying to tempt the prisoner with the idea that he /might/ just get off scot free.

It is the physical contact which seems almost to unleash a dam for the man. Until that moment, he'd been nodding. Drugs... sound right, the dreamy state he'd been in had been like his own experiences with sedatives, but, when he's touched, his pupils suddenly contract. Thick beads of sweat stand out on his skin, and he gasps.

"M-my god." He whispers, "She, fed them to the plant!" His heart is beating much faster, but, perhaps luckily considering how unstable he is, his muscles are tense and tight; he doesn't lash out, he looks more like a deer caught in the headlights of his own memories.

"I, I remember, Commissioner! I remember! She fed them to the plant! It ate them up, bones and all, and God help me, we HELPED her do it! Her CLOTHES weren't green... SHE WAS!"

The pieces had likely been starting to come together already, but now the frantic horror in his voice, the fear, and the lurid description... there can be no doubt.

Poison Ivy is making a move again.

"Poison Ivy," mutters Benson, from the safety of the room next door.

The name is echoed in Commissioner Gordon's mind as well, but he has the tact not to say anything of it. Instead, he gently holds the man's wrist, and nods his head slowly. "Everything is going to be alright, James."

Slowly withdrawing his hand, Gordon stands up and makes a gesture toward the door. Immediately, two police officers walk in. To one officer, Gordon says, "Get him anything he needs. Food, water, what ever. Keep a close eye on him now, okay?"

Then, he's out the door, away from the prisoner, and coming face to face with Detective Benson again.

"Poison Ivy," says Benson.

Gordon nods slowly. "I want Mister Malhoney taken to Gotham General. Have Doctor Dyson conduct a full blood work on him, and then, have him admitted for overnight psychiatric evaluation."

Benson nods swiftly, and reaches for his cell phone.

"Wait." Gordon grabs Benson's wrist, stopping him. "Not yet." He looks around slowly, paranoia in his eyes. He can see it playing out right now... five cop cars, surrounding the SUV carrying James Malhoney to Gotham General. The perfect target. He's going to need the help of Batman. Looking back at Benson, he says, "Just... make the arrangements, and wait for my word to proceed."