theansweris | DUPLICITY: IC INBOX

Riddler shakes her foot carefully, giving her a slightly warmer smile than Adam got. "Her primary way of exploring the world involves a sharp beak and long claws, the occasional mishap will happen." No judgement. "She took shoelaces. Have you tried her with knotted strings with things threaded through them?"

"Oh, I'm not upset it happened. Not really. I just want to try and avoid a repeat," he says his voice slightly accented, all Appalachian vowels and softness. "She's family so I want things as good for her here as they can be."

She's their only child here, proof of Ronan's brilliance and abilities.

"Would you thread them loose so she can move them about? I figure she's gotten down some speech, and she understands a lot of what we say so she should be able to?"

"A variety would be best. Ribbons, ropes, washers, nuts and bolts, things to keep her engaged and able to try something new as she loses interest. She might enjoy a speech board." He hasn't moved his hand away from her, letting her hold his finger as long as she wants.

She doesn't let go, watching Ed as her head cocks from one side to the other, curious as she leans in closer to him. Peering at him as she toys with his finger, testing and experimenting with touch.

"Okay. I can do that. Lots of spare parts laying around our place. I work at a mechanics." His head cocks kind of like hers. "Speech board?"

"If you give me your address, or a mailing place, I can send things as I think of them." He suspects that a variety of knots might be fun for her, picking them apart.

"It's a board used for those with a disability that prevents clear speech. It has a variety of basic words, mostly nouns and verbs, so that they can make their thoughts and needs apparent. Some sounds may be difficult for her, but this would let her articulate a bit easier."

"Oh certainly, not a problem." It's not that hard since he's still in the Dominant tower. He hates it there but he's still working on finding a way to save the money to move them out.

He perks at that. "Do you think they have one here? I don't figure this place for being progressive," he says, considering it. "But she does have some issues. Like when she says Adam."

And she then, obliging, giving him what he needs to show it.

"A-tom!"

He grins, leaning in to nuzzles her shoulder. "Such a good girl."

"Have one? Probably not. But it would be easy enough to make. Either one with just words or maybe a series of buttons with a recorded voice. Basic electrical engineering."

He offers her his other hand to investigate, angling to see if she'll let him stroke the feathers of her breast. "You could just get a piece of wood, paint or carve words in and you have a speech board."

He nods at that, taking mental notes. "I can definitely work with that. I'm not bad with crafts and working with my hands." It's the one thing he knows he does well and he wants to what he can for Chainsaw. Like he should have for Opal back home too."

She does let him touch her, "mouthing" at his other hand, just testing.

"Well, I'll give you my details if you decide you need more for her. You can send mail for me to the Arena, care of Edward Nygma." Care of, because it was how they were starting to sort things.

He strokes softly, very gentle for what those hands were capable of. "She's a beautiful bird. The Narrows only really have pigeons and sparrows."

He makes mental note of that, nodding. "Edward Nygma at the Arena. That's the place with the fights, right?" No judgement in that question, just hoping he's got the right idea and the right place.

"She's amazing," he says, knowing what she is made of, and all that he went through to bring her into the world. Sometimes he forgets the worst parts, remembering things like their kids. Chainsaw and Opal. Sometimes he forgets the monsters and the death. Sometimes.

"Where's that? The Narrows? We're from the mountains of Virginia. Lots of animals out there." And some of them natural to the world.

"The place with the fights. I inherited it from a friend when he vanished." He moves his hands to his pockets, gaze shifting around them.

"It's the slums of Gotham, my home city. Your world might not have a city of Gotham, I've found it's fairly random if it's familiar or not."

He nods at that, head canting as he gets caught up in thoughts, trying to think of he had heard of that place.

"Not that I remember, but then who knows what cities might line up and be the same but each world calls them something different." He pauses before adding. "I grew up in a small town on the edge of the Appalachian mountains and..." He takes a breath, remembering that he's trying to change, to grow and accept himself. "If we'd had a slum, that's where I would have grown up to."

The wrong side of town, definitely. At least to most.

"Certain places tend to be the same. Most Earths have a New York City, for example. But Metropolis, Central City, Gotham, those tend to be pretty hit or miss despite all being major cities in my world." He gives a half hearted shrug.

"I didn't grow up in Gotham. I grew up in a... um, podunk town with a main industry of going somewhere else to work."

"I haven't found anyone that's ever heard of Henrietta Virginia, and I just assumed it's because it's that small of a town but never thought that it might be there just isn't one either."

Which is as odd to think about as just about anything else here.

He snorts at that, kind of smiling. "That could be Henrietta."

"Except I'm from New Jersey." He didn't often talk about it, in case people got it in their heads to look him up. "Ugh. Enough about that. Both are possible. It might not exist, it might not be worth mentioning. I just know about that possibility because in my world, Gotham is a major city. Highest crime rate in America."

He chuckles at that. "Yeah, that's a million light years from the mountains of Virginia."

It really feels a whole other world in his mind.

"Highest? Wow. I guess that pretty much sucks then. I mean, the image in my head is crime all the time, no way around it. Like always around you."

"The primary economic activity of Gotham is organised crime," Ed agrees. "On any street, any time of day, you will see at least four offences being committed."

Yes, he sounds ridiculously fond of the place.

He winces because that is not something you want said about your town. "So this place? Better or worse? Or just different?"

Because he thinks of his place as pretty dangerous and bad, but that is another story with the idea of organized crime running a town.

"Worse. There, even if the odds were against you, even if the system was against you, you weren't subjected to public rapes at the hands of the government because you have a line they drew on you."

Gotham is a hard knock city, but it recognises and rewards persistence.

"What I figured," he says, tensing at that. Thinking about Ronan and Noah and all they face and how much he wants to do all he can to protect them.

Chainsaw reacts to his emotions, screeching loudly next to his left ear. He doesn't so much as flinch at the sound, muffled as it was against that ear. Instead he reaches up, rubbing the back of her neck.

"I think about things like that every day," he admits, despite not bearing those marks. "My boyfriend and our good friend are both here. Both of them have that mark."

Riddler shies from the noise, like it actually hurts rather than being scared of it.

"You're not safe either," Riddler says quietly. "Write into any contract that you reserve sole right to punish your submissive," his lip twists on the word, "for any indiscretion or breach of rules and laws. It won't always work, but it should help."

"Sorry. She gets loud sometimes." It's why he carries her on the left, so he forgets how loud it is to others.

"I know. I've never been safe," he admits. "So I'm used to it." Ronan had thought he was. At least until he was a teenager. Noah had until he'd been murdered. "I'm not taking a lot of chances, just a few." Like a close friend and lover who was another Dominant.

He nods at that. "I put a clause in the contract like that. Someone said they wouldn't always but it's worth trying, right?

"It will stop things some of the time," he agreed. "I'll contact you if I come up with anything suitable for her. I have work in half an hour and I need to start off now to get to Insincerity before then."

"All we can do, I guess," he says with a nod, smiling as he takes a step back, giving Chainsaw a moment to resettle.

"Thank you. I appreciate you meeting with me and giving me ideas. She got snatched here too and I just want to make sure she's doing okay."

Of course she was manifested out of nothing but that's neither here nor there.

"I'll let you know." Riddler waves a hand. "When I have something. If I get something. In the mean time, ropes, knots, nuts and bolts." He stretches and starts off back towards the elevators.

DUPLICITY: IC INBOX

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