valerie d. @val-made-a-mistake - Tumblr Blog

❝DAY 7: KIDNAPPING.❞

(not my gif)

DAY SEVEN OF @breedvember

summary: kidnapped, trapped in riddles, and watched. edward nygma’s games are more than puzzles — and he’s far more interested in you than the solution.

warnings: THE LAST OF THE DEAD DOVE STUFF FOR A WHILE I PROMISE. this one definitely isn't as bad as the others. brief somnophilia, unhealthy obsessions, convoluted riddler traps that almost broke my brain to write, extremely dubious consent (because of the whole kidnapping/somnophilia thing - i mean, she does wake up and it gets more consensual from there, but like...who knows if it's some sort of stockholm syndrome or eddie being an unreliable narrator or the reader just genuinely wants to boink. it's open ended like that)

word count: 7.2k

a/n: i have the pleasure to tag @caesariawritesstuff in this fic. i hope you enjoy caesaria (i'm so chill about being in the presence of riddler-related royalty i swear), and to the others who are reading, check out her longfic about this riddler, "cat and mouse," on ao3 if you haven't already! enjoy!

(this could 100% be even more freaky/more explicit boinking but i'm way too hungover to write more than i already have - i might write a few more chapters tho)

Without much warning, you came to with a dull ache in your wrists and a throbbing headache in your skull. Startled, you looked around, and the first thing you noticed was that your body was restrained by cold metal cuffs that bit into your skin, fastened to a cold metal chair that felt less like furniture and more like an instrument of torture.

Second, you noticed that the room around you was a chaotic jumble — a mechanical nightmare undoubtedly crafted by a mind obsessed with puzzles and riddles. The walls were lined with blinking panels of code that made no sense to you, and all around you was a labyrinth of gears and levers that seemed designed more to confuse than help, not to mention the ostensibly random streaks of neon green spraypaint around the whole place that hurt your eyes the longer you stared at it. Unfortunately, it was hard not to, considering the place’s commitment to this gaudy green. The stale air tasted of rust, dust, and something acrid — like burnt rubber or old machinery pushed too far, making you think you were the first person to be in this room for a while.

Where the hell were you?

Before you could figure that out, a crackling buzz suddenly cut through the silence, and Edward Nygma’s annoyingly theatrical voice filled the room from hidden speakers. Who else could your captor be, after all?

“Welcome, my dear participant,” the unmistakable voice announced over the crackling loudspeaker, loud enough to make you flinch. “You should consider yourself quite fortunate to be selected for my latest intellectual experiment. A rare opportunity, really, to prove your mental faculties.”

A sickly sweet tone — polite enough to sound civil, but dripping with a kind of smug arrogance that made you instinctively want to roll your eyes. Ugh.

You suppressed a groan, staring at the complex puzzle panels arrayed before you. Kidnapped by Edward Nygma — the Riddler — the most insufferable, self-important, and frankly pathetic of Batman’s rogue gallery? Just great.

You stared straight ahead, your mind already in overdrive. This room had to be a kind of cipher, considering the whole theme of intimidating jumble of symbols and overlapping lines, so intense all of it was practically screaming at you. If it wasn’t, you figured you were kind of fucked since you couldn’t think of anything else — and you didn’t want to learn what that meant for you.

Before you could puzzle it out for yourself, Nygma’s voice crackled through the speakers again, his voice smooth as silk but dripping with derision.

“Ah, I see you’re eyeing my little enigma,” he began, his voice thick with self-satisfaction. “A classic polyalphabetic cipher — far more sophisticated than your average code. Most minds falter here, but I have faith you’re… special enough to persevere.”

You bit back a sigh. He wasn’t here to help, he was here to remind you just how clever he thought he was, and how little you measured up. What were the chances this was a colossal waste of your time?

“Observe closely,” he continued, undeterred, “the key lies not in brute force, but in elegant subtlety. Each symbol corresponds to a letter, but the pattern changes cyclically — a veritable dance of letters designed to confound the unwary.”

Your fingers twitched, itching to push past his words and dive into the cipher yourself. His overcomplicated, pompous explanation was just another distraction for something you could surely figure out yourself with enough time.

“But do hurry,” he added, the sharp edge of impatience creeping into his tone. Perhaps he could tell you weren’t paying attention now. “Time, after all, waits for no one — even those fortunate enough to be invited into my little game.”

Wishing for him to shut up, you stared at the cipher’s swirling symbols, the jumble of shapes and lines taunting your patience. Nygma’s verbose explanation played like background noise, but you tuned it out, focusing on the task at hand.

First, you scanned the symbols for repetition. Sure enough, certain shapes reappeared in seemingly random places — a clue that the cipher wasn’t purely random but followed a pattern. Taking note of this, you remembered that polyalphabetic ciphers use a key word or phrase to cycle through different alphabets.

Did he know that you knew that? Is that why you were here?

Your eyes darted around the room, searching for hints. On a dusty shelf nearby, you spotted a faded inscription: “RIDDLE”.

Could that be the key?

You jotted it down mentally, then turned your head back to the cipher at large. Using “RIDDLE” as the key, you began to match symbols to letters, shifting alphabets as you went. The pattern started to clarify, and slowly, words emerged from the chaos.

“TRUTH HIDES BENEATH THE SURFACE.”

You frowned, pondering the message.

Maybe he could tell that you wanted to be released from the stupid chair at this point, considering from the shadows, two Riddlerbots clanked forward — tall, wiry automatons with glowing neon green torsos, their sudden appearance making you jump. Their green eyes flickered as they approached, unnerving hydraulic arms extending to the cuffs binding your wrists.

With a precise hiss, they unlocked the restraints, the cold metal finally sliding free from your skin. As soon as they were free, you rubbed your sore wrists, grateful for the sudden freedom but immediately wary of what came next.

“Ah, now we can truly begin,” Nygma’s voice purred through the intercom, still dripping with smug satisfaction. No telling if he knew that you were already a step ahead. “You’ve been unshackled, my dear. Now the true test of your intellectual prowess awaits.”

The Riddlerbots stepped aside, leaving you to stand up.

“Do try to remember,” Nygma added, his tone mockingly gentle, “this is no mere pastime. Failure to solve these puzzles will have... consequences.”

You could’ve told him to go fuck himself, but you didn’t. Choosing to ignore him entirely, you took a shaky breath and stood up with shaky, aching legs.

As soon as you did, the room felt smaller, the weight of Nygma’s gaze pressing down like a physical force even though he wasn’t even there, and every beep and whirl of the machinery felt like a countdown. This room was designed to make you uncomfortable, but you had to push past it.

Forcing yourself to focus, you looked down at the console in front of you.

Beneath the surface, you repeated to yourself, sliding your hands over it. Beneath the surface.

There was a faint outline beneath the panel’s dusty top — almost invisible, but you could feel it with your fingertip. Pressing lightly, the panel clicked open, revealing a hidden compartment with the next piece of the puzzle.

Nygma’s voice buzzed in triumph through the speakers.

“Ah, I see you’ve found the key. Impressive…for a mere imbecile.”

You rolled your eyes but let yourself feel a small spark of satisfaction. First puzzle cracked, God only knew how many more to go.

Also, where the hell were you?

Later, you told yourself. Try not to die first.

Inside the hidden compartment sat what looked like a flat, circular plate made of brass, its surface carved with concentric rings of letters. A metal arm extended from the centre like the hand of a clock, and along the outer rim, jagged teeth suggested it could be rotated. The letters on each ring were scrambled, unevenly spaced, as though meant to form words when properly aligned.

Before you could figure it out, Nygma’s voice slithered back into your ears.

“Ah, the cryptogram wheel,” he said, savouring the words as though unveiling a masterpiece. “A delightfully simple mechanism to the enlightened, yet an insurmountable obstacle for the pedestrian mind. You’ll need to align the rings to form a coherent phrase — my phrase, naturally. Every correct alignment will unlock a portion of the mechanism. Every incorrect attempt…”

He paused to chuckle darkly.

“Well, let’s say the penalty will not encourage further mistakes.”

You stared at the rings, resisting the urge to smack the smugness out of his disembodied voice. You figured if you could summon enough willpower, you might actually manage it, but you had to solve this bullshit first.

The brass plate looked harmless enough, but you could see small wires disappearing beneath it — the kind of thing that might trigger if you guessed wrong too many times.

“Of course,” he continued, his tone dropping into that faux-polite lilt that grated at your patience, “you could try to brute-force it… but wouldn’t that be rather gauche? Let’s see if you can find the elegance in the solution.”

You ignored him, instead focusing on the outermost ring. The letters didn’t make sense at first glance, but you noticed faint scratches near certain ones, as if they’d been turned to the same position repeatedly. Testing your theory, you lined them up with the letters on the second ring — and a short word formed.

He really is a fucking idiot.

Despite your small victory, it was slow going. Each alignment gave you another fragment of a sentence, and each time you got one right, a quiet click sounded from inside the device. When you finally aligned the last ring, the full phrase emerged:

“ONLY THE CORRECT PATH LEADS OUT.”

As soon as the last letter clicked into place, the brass plate popped up with a hiss of released air, revealing a small metal keycard with a neon green question mark stamped into it. Somewhere behind you, you heard the nails-on-a-chalkboard grind of gears as a heavy door unlocked.

CREEEEEEAK!

“Not entirely incompetent,” Nygma mused, his voice now thick with amusement. “But don’t get ahead of yourself — that was the prelude, my dear. Now we’ll see if you can handle the real performance.”

Fantasizing about strangling him, you turned and inserted the keycard, just wanting to get this over with.

The door groaned open, and you stepped through into a narrow, dimly lit corridor. The air here was heavier, laced with that same acrid tang, and the floor was covered in a winding trail of glowing green arrows that pulsed faintly, drawing you forward. You didn’t have much choice but to follow them until you reached another chamber — this one far less cluttered, but far more ominous.

The centerpiece was a floor grid of metal tiles, each marked with a letter or symbol. Suspended overhead, a set of jagged, mechanized spikes hung just a little too low for comfort, their slow, deliberate rise and fall punctuated by the hiss of what had to be pneumatic pistons.

Before you could piece together the rules, Nygma’s voice slithered out from the speakers again.

“Ah, we’ve reached my favorite part — the gauntlet,” he announced, the smugness practically dripping from every syllable. “To proceed, you must cross the grid without stepping on the incorrect tiles. Naturally, each wrong step will have… painful consequences.”

Yeah, yeah, I’ve gotten the gist of that the other two times, you wanted to say, but you didn’t give him the satisfaction.

You just started to scan the letters, already searching for patterns — when his tone shifted into something more pointed, more personal.

“Of course,” he drawled, “given your mysterious little background, I can’t help but wonder… do you already know the rules? Or perhaps your dear friend in the cape has whispered them to you before?”

You froze. He couldn’t know — could he?

“No need to deny it,” he went on, voice taking on a mocking singsong. “You reek of that sanctimonious vigilante’s influence, my dear. I can smell the moral superiority from here. But let’s see if you can think for yourself, hmm? No Batcomputer. No gravelly-voiced hints in your ear. Just you… and me… and the spikes.”

Your jaw tightened, but you didn’t give him the satisfaction of a reply. Instead, you studied the grid. The phrase from before — ONLY THE CORRECT PATH LEADS OUT — had to be the clue. The correct tiles probably spelled it out.

You were hoping wildly that that was the case, anyway. You couldn’t think of anything else.

Testing your theory, you stepped onto the “O.” The floor panel lit up neon green.

Good.

As you moved forward, tile by tile, Nygma kept needling you.

“Careful, now. One misstep and splat! Oh, but surely Batman trained you better than that. Or… perhaps you’re just a civilian playing hero? Pretending you’re more than you are?”

You ignored him, your heart hammering as you reached the final “T.” The last tile glowed green, and with a hiss, the spikes retracted fully into the ceiling. Slowly, like they didn’t actually want to.

Well. That was stupidly easy, actually.

“Well done,” Nygma said, as what had to be a several years old recording of game show applause echoed throughout the still-locked chamber. Were you imagining it, or did he sound… annoyed? “Perhaps you’re more interesting than I assumed. Which means… you get to play a little longer.”

//////

Beyond the glass where you couldn’t see, Nygma prowled like a caged cat in a filthy, neon green shirt. Every time you moved toward an answer, his eyes tracked you — sharp, calculating, beady, unforgiving. He was the cat, the cat with gleaming, sharpened fangs, as his conscience so frequently reminded him, and you were the snivelling, pathetic mouse.

He had to remember that. He was completely, undoubtedly, one hundred percent in control.

When you solved a step too quickly, his smile twitched, just enough to betray irritation.

“Oh, marvelous,” he said even though he knew you weren’t going to hear him, his voice tight. “A correct answer by sheer accident — how… quaint.”

He was still in control, of course.

“Not completely useless, it seems,” he muttered to himself as you progressed further. “Perhaps there is a synapse or two firing in there.”

Still in control, his thoughts repeated. Still in control. The World’s Greatest Everything — Edward Nygma!

The walls behind him told a different story — one no one was ever meant to read. Yellowing newspapers pinned in untidy grids, captions scrawled in green ink, equations left half-solved on scraps of paper. When his brilliant brain was firing a million miles a second, it was hard to focus on one thing, you see.

Photographs — some blurred, some taken from rooftops — peppered the display, their riddled annotations circling certain faces. Your own image appeared among them more than once, a smaller printout shoved in the corner, the words BAT CONNECTION? written beneath.

If you had a brain, and he wasn’t totally sure that you did, you’d realize this wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment stunt. This room, this game, you — they’d been on his mind long before you walked in.

//////

“You get to play a little longer.”

After that menacing warning, the Riddlerbots wasted no time in herding you forward, metal hands nudging at your arms until you stumbled through a narrow doorway.

Ahead stretched a claustrophobic maze of mirrors — some pristine, some spiderwebbed with cracks — all throwing your image back at you from impossible angles.

“Step right up, mystery guest,” Nygma’s voice purred through the speakers, dripping with mock hospitality. His silhouette was a vague blur beyond the reinforced glass on the far wall. “A puzzle of identity for a contestant who, curiously, has yet to reveal theirs.”

As you moved, the mirrors flickered. In one, you stood in your normal clothes; in the next, you wore a black cowl. Another showed you in the armoured bulk of the Batsuit, Batman’s shadow looming at your shoulder. The reflections shifted with every step, green light strobing across them from hidden projectors.

“An accurate reflection is a rare thing in Gotham,” Nygma continued. “So many of you hide behind masks, literal or otherwise. But tell me, stranger, when you see yourself… do you even recognize the image looking back?”

This was totally going to help the throbbing headache at the back of your skull. It was weirdly impressive how annoying he was, honestly.

“Only one of these delightful little visions is the truth. Line it up with the laser on the pedestal, and you live to guess again. Choose poorly…” He paused, because apparently dramatically explaining the rules was a formula he couldn’t stray from, “…and the obituary will read: Crushed to death by their own vanity.”

Ha ha, very funny. How long did it take for him to come up with that one?

The beam on the remote was already live, casting a tight green dot across the constantly shifting maze. You started forward to grab it from the pedestal, and it was then the mirrors started sliding open and shutting with a loud mechanical grind, the angles distorting until you weren’t sure which way was forward.

Taking a deep breath, you looked around.

Some reflections blinked when you didn’t. Others smiled when your own lips stayed still. One wore a mask patterned in emerald green question marks.

“Tick-tock, little conundrum,” Nygma sang from the speaker. “Batman won’t save you. Not this time. In fact, I’d bet my genius he hasn’t even told you the rules of our game.”

The grinding of gears was louder now, the walls growing closer. Your heartbeat picked up. Somewhere in the flickering mess of false images, the real you was waiting — if you could recognize yourself before the maze swallowed you whole.

Feeling yourself start to panic, you slowed your breathing, forcing yourself to focus — because if you couldn’t focus, then you couldn’t think sensibly, and then you were screwed.

Think think think think think, you told yourself repeatedly. It’s Nygma. This is probably dumbly easy. Think think think think think —

If the puzzle was about “identity,” then the trick probably wasn’t to find something unflattering — it was to find something uncompromised. Duh.

So one by one, you scanned the mirrors.

The cowl? Too obvious.

The armoured suit? An intimidation fantasy, probably for his own amusement.

The version with the green mask? Please.

Then you noticed it — tucked behind two fractured panes, half-obscured by glare. This reflection didn’t blink out of sync or smirk when you didn’t. There was no clever lighting, no extra props. Your hair was a little mussed from whenever you’d been yanked into the riddle chamber, and there was a smudge of dirt on your cheek, probably from when you’d been rudely forced onto the Miagani pavement. It was… just you.

Without hesitating, you maneuvered the laser’s green dot toward that image.

The beam must’ve hit a sensor, considering the reflection shimmered, and the surrounding, dizzying panels suddenly snapped into place with a heavy CLUNK.

Somewhere inside the walls, you heard a lock disengage.

Through the glass, Nygma froze mid-step. His mouth opened, then shut again.

“Well,” he said finally. “Congratulations. You can tell a mirror from a mirage. Such keen instincts… for a civilian.”

You couldn’t help yourself this time. “Better luck next time, Eddie.”

You stared at the speaker high above your head and found there was silence. Had you finally shut him up?

No. Of course you hadn’t.

“Enjoy the victory lap while you can,” was the Riddler’s response, after a tense beat. “You’ve bought yourself… oh, perhaps another fifteen minutes of existence. And I do so enjoy watching you squirm. So don’t die too quickly.”

The door behind you clanged open, revealing the next chamber. You stepped through, the weight of his eyes following you even after the door slammed shut.

Ugh.

//////

Some time later

The hours bled together. The lights outside of your cell hummed like they were conspiring against you — dimming, brightening, buzzing in an endless cycle. There were no clocks, no windows, nothing to measure time by except your own rough estimates. With nothing better to do, nothing to satiate your rumbling stomach and nothing to soothe the continuous throbbing pain at the back of your skull, you just paced around and around the tiny square room until your legs burned, laid on the cot until the frame bruised your spine, then paced again. You were even beginning to get used to the stench of mildew and sweat.

You knew this whole setup was designed to make you stew, to make you unravel in silence. And every time you thought to yourself that this was torture, you automatically reminded yourself that this was fine. This was supposed to happen. You were exactly where you and Bruce had intended you to be.

…

Still, as the minutes dragged on, you caught yourself wondering how long Eddie would take to come back.

You hated the little jolt of anticipation in your stomach every time you looked up, and sure enough, there was no one beyond the bars.

//////

Even more time later

When the cell door finally — finally finally finally, after at least five hours of pacing — hissed open, the metal grinding and screeching like it resented being useful, you almost smiled at his reappearance, but you smothered it fast.

Nygma stepped inside like he’d been practicing his entrance, smug as always.

Notably carrying a tray in one hand. Your gaze couldn’t help but immediately fall to that.

“Still alive,” Eddie said as a greeting, as though he’d just confirmed a hypothesis.

He set the tray down in front of you with a flourish: to your surprise, it was actual food, not the sludge you knew from experience they served in Arkham, and a paper cup sending up thin curls of steam. The dark brown liquid told you it was probably coffee.

Despite this, you stretched out on the cot, feigning nonchalance. It made the most sense to ignore the tray, even though your stomach had been growling for hours now. “Disappointed?”

“Amused. Though I admit, your little performance earlier did surprise me. Solving it that quickly… Did you spend the interim rehearsing how smug you’d sound when I returned?”

You let yourself grin, slow and deliberate. “Maybe. Or maybe it was just too easy. Leaving RIDDLE right there? Like a cheat sheet for a bored schoolgirl. Come on, Eddie. You know you can do better.”

For a second, something in his face cracked. Just barely — the twitch of his jaw, the flare in his eyes.

And god help you, the rush that gave you was real. You’d poked the beast and he’d felt it.

He smoothed it over fast, voice dipping low. Almost intimate.

“Careful. Keep talking like that and I might decide puzzles aren’t nearly enough to keep you entertained.”

You laughed. “That supposed to scare me?”

But even as you said it, you could tell that your pulse was betraying you, and from the look he gave you, you weren’t the only one who noticed.

Deflecting, you glanced down at the tray in front of you, which was…surprisingly normal, actually.

A small sandwich cut into triangles, a shiny green apple, and the paper cup of coffee still steaming faintly beside a pair of aspirin tablets. Not a feast, but not the watery gruel you’d expected either.

You eyed it the way you’d eye a snake in the grass. “You brought me lunch?”

“Dinner, technically. Hours have passed, if you hadn’t noticed,” he said, that smugness apparent in his voice. He loved correcting you, you could tell. “Time flies in captivity.”

“Or crawls.” You stayed sprawled across the cot, making no move toward the tray. “What’s the catch? Poisoned apple? Sleeping Beauty routine?”

His mouth curved in a grin. “If I wanted you unconscious, there are far easier methods.”

“Not exactly reassuring.”

“You wound me. Think of it as… hospitality, my dear. Aspirin for the pacing-induced headache, caffeine to restore that sharp tongue of yours.” He tapped the cup with one long finger. “I wouldn’t want you dull.”

Huh.

That was the problem, wasn’t it? He knew you’d want the coffee, the aspirin, the food — he knew it because he’d been watching, tallying every restless step and every flicker of discomfort like the deranged creep he was. And yet, your stomach tightened at the thought of taking anything from him.

Your stomach betrayed you first, a low twist that you hoped desperately wasn’t audible. Truth be told, the aspirin looked like salvation, and the coffee smelled like it had crawled right inside your skull and was dragging you toward it.

For a long, stubborn beat, you stared at him instead of the tray. His smirk said he was counting the seconds.

Then, with a sharp exhale, knowing you were about to made fun of until Bruce and Tim rescued you, you reached for the cup of coffee.

The paper cup was warm in your palm, and the aspirin was bitter against your tongue, though it went down greedily. You bit into the apple next — crisp, sweet, and humiliatingly good.

His eyes lit like he’d just solved something.

“There it is,” he murmured, almost tender. “Proof even the cleverest creatures can be tamed by the simplest hungers.”

You shot him a glare over the rim of the cup. “Don’t flatter yourself. I’m not tamed, I’m starving.”

“Semantics,” he said, and sat back as though the whole game had shifted in his favour.

//////

Several hours later

The lights outside the cell had gone dark hours ago. Riddlerbots rotated shifts, half-built contraptions hummed, and Gotham itself pressed on outside, not that anyone inside the orphanage would notice that.

But here, in her cell, there was only the sound of her breathing.

Edward had been standing on the other side of the bars for nearly twenty minutes, perfectly still, perfectly silent. Watching the slow rise and fall of her chest, the way her hand twitched now and then against the blanket. Studying her. Naturally.

Only when he was sure that she wouldn’t stir did he move.

Edward slid the card through the reader, slipping inside like a shadow. He didn’t switch on the lights: he didn’t need to. He’d memorized the room in daylight, every angle, every flaw in the walls.

On the cot, she was asleep at last, deep enough that even the miserable groan of the cell door hadn’t stirred her. She lay on her side, her knees drawn up, the thin blanket twisted half around her legs. Her hair had fallen across her face, one strand stuck to the corner of her mouth. She no longer had that sharpness to her she had in lucidity.

He crouched, close enough to catch the warmth of her breath. Close enough to see the small pulse at her throat, the tiny twitch of her eyelids as if she were dreaming.

He could feel his trousers growing tighter by the second.

Part of him wanted to touch. To test how easily that peace would shatter under his hand. A curl of hair tucked behind her ear, his fingers brushing her cheek — she’d wake, startled, angry, maybe even afraid. It would be delicious.

But he held back, because restraint was its own kind of power.

Instead, he whispered into the dark, so low it might’ve been mistaken for the hum of the lights:

“You have no idea how thoroughly I’ve already undone you.”

He stood, circling the cot in slow, deliberate steps. He drank her in: the way her fingers curled near her chest, the faint lines of tension still written across her brow even in sleep. A fighter’s body trying to rest, a mind too sharp to stay quiet for long.

Every detail was data. Every breath a clue. He collected them all, tucking them away like puzzle pieces only he had the picture for.

He wanted more.

Tentatively, he leaned closer to the cot, inhaling the faint scent of her — warm, tired, foreign. Every subtle movement she made in sleep, a twitch of her fingers, a slight shift of her hips, set his mind alight.

He let one hand hover just above her arm, tracing an almost imperceptible arc in the air. Not touching — not yet — but enough for the heat of proximity to press against him. His gaze lingered on the curve of her shoulder, the way her chest rose and fell beneath the blanket.

“Fascinating,” he murmured, barely audible, more to himself than her.

His fingers drifted lower, brushing the edge of the blanket, testing how it moved against her skin. She whimpered softly in her sleep, a noise caught between a sigh and a shiver, and Edward’s breath caught. Not from hunger, not entirely, but from the thrill of control, of being the hidden observer of something so intimate and unguarded.

He leaned closer still, the warmth of his body just at the edge of hers, the faint press of fabric, the subtle heat radiating off her like a beacon. Every instinct screamed caution, but the pull of fascination — of desire wrapped in obsession — was stronger.

His hand finally brushed against her arm, light, experimental, enough to make her shift in her sleep.

Her skin was so soft.

Edward’s fingers trailed lower, skimming the curve of her hip, careful to avoid sudden pressure that might wake her. Every subtle shiver, every tiny gasp she made unconsciously, sent a jolt through him — proof that even in sleep, she responded to him.

He pressed a little closer, leaning over her, the warmth of his body brushing hers just enough that the edge of her back arched instinctively.

A small sigh slipped past her lips, soft, unguarded, and Edward’s pulse quickened.

"Eddie," she mumbled, still obviously asleep.

His eyes remained fixed on her face, taking in every minute detail of her expression as he caressed her body. The way her lips parted slightly, the flicker of her eyelids, even the smallest movements of her hands. Each reaction was a piece of the puzzle, a clue to how her mind worked, how she processed the world around her.

He marvelled at the way her body responded, even in sleep, to his touch. It was as if some part of her was attuned to his presence, even in her subconscious state. He could feel the heat of her skin under his fingertips, the softness of her curves, and it ignited a hunger within him that he had never experienced before.

Edward's hand continued its exploration, skimming over her hip, her thigh, tracing the lines of her body with a feather-light touch. He could feel the tension in her muscles, the way she shifted slightly under his ministrations, and it only fuelled his desire.

He leaned down, his lips brushing against her ear as he whispered, "Do you know how long I've waited for this moment? How much I've studied you, watched you, learned everything about you?"

His hand slid under the blanket, slipping between her legs, and he could feel the heat emanating from her core. Even in sleep, her body betrayed its need, its hunger for him. He could feel the wetness gathering there, and it made him throb with desire.

"You're mine," he murmured. "Mine to study, mine to possess. And soon, you'll carry my child, and then everyone will know that you belong to me."

He ran a knuckle lightly down her arm, deliberate.

At that, her eyelids finally twitched, then rose — slow, reluctant — like surfacing from deep water.

Their eyes met.

"Huh?" she mumbled.

She stirred — a slow, reluctant shift against the cot’s miserable surface — and he felt anticipation crawl up his ribs like a warm, embarrassing itch. Her eyelashes fluttered, unfocused. She inhaled, and he watched recognition flicker behind her eyes as she woke.

Her pulse jumped, and he saw it; he catalogued it.

She blinked into the dimness and finally saw him sitting at the edge of her cot — elbows on his knees, posture casual but every nerve in him painfully alert.

She startled. Only slightly, but enough that he lifted a hand — a small, gentle gesture to keep the fragile moment from shattering.

“Relax,” he murmured. He kept his voice even, mild, though of course he still sounded smug. “If I wanted to harm you, I wouldn’t have waited for you to wake.”

He meant it as reassurance, but he realized, a second too late, that it sounded like a threat.

She pushed herself upright, knees drawing in. He tracked the movement like a hawk — not because he expected attack, but because he couldn’t not.

“How long?” she asked.

He pretended to consider the answer, though he’d been rehearsing it in his head.

“Twenty-three minutes,” he said. “Roughly.”

Twenty-three minutes, nine seconds since he’d first slipped inside, but she didn’t need to know that.

There was a beat where she didn't say anything.

“I checked.”

She huffed. Almost a laugh. “Of course you did.”

His eyes swept over her face, reacquainting himself with the subtleties of it — the slight tension at her brow, the faint crease near the corner of her mouth. She looked softer than when conscious, but not harmless. Never harmless.

“Headache?” he asked.

She nodded once. He’d expected that. The puzzles, the adrenaline crash, the stress — he reached into his pocket and removed the tablets he’d set aside. Held them between two careful fingers; an offering, not a command.

She took them and swallowed dry — he watched the line of her throat move.

Unnecessarily.

“Why watch me sleep?” she asked.

He didn’t look away. Why lie?

“I wanted to see what you were like without your guard up,” he answered, smug as ever.

To his surprise, she held his gaze. Testing.

“And?”

A corner of his mouth twitched — not quite a smile. Anyone else might’ve missed it.

“You dream actively,” he said. “Your eyes move. You tense when you shift. You talk, sometimes.”

His voice dipped, near-intimate.

“I heard my name.”

Her stillness was immediate. Beautiful.

“That doesn’t mean anything,” she murmured.

“No,” he conceded. “But it meant something to me.”

Silence pooled — thick, charged, dangerous.

He felt her awareness of him like heat under the skin. Their knees were close — barely a whisper apart. He could feel her warmth radiating toward him. He hadn't forgotten about the heat between her legs. She didn’t retreat.

Good.

“What did I say?” she asked.

“Just my name.”

A slow blink.

“But… like a question.”

Her expression flickered — a defense warring with curiosity.

“And how did you answer?”

The question hit him harder than expected.

He paused — just a breath — then:

“I didn’t.”

His voice softened, dropping low. “I thought you were asking me something only you knew how to finish.”

She swallowed — the tiny movement striking him with disproportionate force.

He waited, and the second stretched, poised, balanced. She didn’t pull back.

He touched a strand of hair near her temple, tucking it gently behind her ear, and her breath hitched — audible, involuntary. His chest tightened in response, ridiculous and obvious.

“You should be terrified of me,” he said quietly.

It wasn’t bravado, it was fact. Statement of the natural order. He was the Riddler, after all, the world's greatest everything.

“Maybe I am,” she replied.

His head tilted, studying her. “Yet you’re still here.”

She reminded him — dryly — “You came into my cell.”

“Yes,” he allowed. “But you’re leaning toward me.”

She hadn’t realized she was. He had. He noticed everything.

Something inside her tipped forward, emotion without logic, and he watched the decision form on her face before she moved.

Her hand rose, fingers brushing his jaw — tentative, exploratory.

He inhaled sharply — more reaction than intention — like she’d pressed a thumb to a pressure point he didn’t know he had.

“Is this why you woke me?” she whispered.

“No.”

A beat.

“But I hoped."

The admission surprised even him. He didn’t move first, she did.

Her mouth met his — light at first, then deliberate, accepting. His breath caught against her lips. She tasted like sleep and resignation and something dangerously open.

His hand found the back of her neck, his thumb tracing slow circles, memorizing texture and warmth and the way she leaned — not out of fear, but invitation.

Each movement felt like a question posed and answered in turn:

Why are you doing this? I don’t know. Are you sure? Yes.

When they parted, their breathing was uneven.

His forehead hovered near hers, drawn like metal to a magnet he hadn’t yet defined.

“For the record,” he murmured, “I’ve imagined this a hundred different ways.”

She let out a small, breathy laugh. “And?”

He smiled — small, surprised, unguarded enough to make his chest ache. “The reality,” he admitted, “is much harder to predict.”

She smiled back — reckless, conspiratorial, that bright, dangerous spark blooming between them like a match catching.

Outside, bots whirred their rounds. The city churned. Time moved. Inside the cell, neither pulled away.

And that — Edward knew — was the variable that would ruin everything.

He’d let it ruin him.

Their mouths met again, faster this time, and this time there was nothing gentle in it. The sweetness of before evaporated; he kissed her like he was prying a secret out from behind her teeth, like each breath she allowed him was confirmation of something only he understood.

“That’s it,” he murmured against her lips. “You always tell the truth when you’re half-awake.”

A tremor traveled through her — whether from heat or fear, he couldn’t tell. He drew back just enough to look at her properly, his face haloed in green glow from the monitors. The lenses of his glasses caught the light like a blade, sharp and shimmering.

“You have no idea how long I waited for this,” he whispered. “How many times I solved you in my head.” His thumb brushed her lower lip, slow and thoughtful, the touch intimate and clinical all at once. “You make patterns I can’t stop seeing. Because you make me wonder what I’ll find when you finally break open.”

Her pulse stuttered. He heard it — of course he did — and his smile sharpened. His hand slid to the back of her neck, guiding, claiming, and he kissed her again. This time it was deeper, filled with something feverish and hungry, as though he meant to leave the shape of himself pressed into her for hours after.

“Tell me you’re afraid,” he whispered.

She didn’t answer. She couldn’t. He was satisfied anyway.

His hand paused at her waist, his fingers flexing like he was measuring the distance between curiosity and hunger, between safety and surrender.

“Good,” he murmured. “You’re staying. Even when you shouldn’t.”

He rested his forehead against her shoulder, breath shuddering like the proximity itself was a victory. “You’re mine,” he said — not a threat, not a plea, but a deduction.

The overhead lights flickered. Her breath hitched. His mouth drifted lower, ghosting over the edge of her collarbone, a question only one of them knew how to answer. She felt her fingers lift, curling into the fabric of his shirt to pull him closer rather than push him away. Something in him reacted instantly — a soft, triumphant laugh, like he’d just solved the final line of a puzzle he’d been working on for years.

“Perfect,” he murmured. “Just perfect.”

The hum of machinery rose around them, swallowing sound, swallowing reason. Shadows lengthened; heat gathered; his body moved over hers. Thought dissolved into breath and proximity, into the press of his weight, into the sensation of being surrounded, claimed.

The green glow dimmed.

The world narrowed to heat and breath, the sharp press of his frame caging her in. His fingers slid beneath the thin fabric at her hip, not groping — no, mapping, as though he needed to memorize the curve, to confirm she was real beneath his obsession. He inhaled at her throat, a shaky, reverent sound, and she felt his smile ghost against her skin.

“You fit exactly where I knew you would,” he whispered. “Every variable checks out.”

Suddenly, she hissed through her teeth. “Shut up.”

He froze, eyebrows rising, a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I… what?”

“I said,” she repeated, her voice low but firm, “shut up. Just… be quiet for two seconds. I’m trying to… focus.”

His grin widened, amused and oddly impressed. “Focus, hmm?” His hand paused, hovering at her ribs, fingers light, teasing. “I see. A little test, then.”

She smirked, tugging him closer with a sudden movement, her lips brushing his in a daring, sharp kiss. “Exactly. Pass it.”

His laugh was low, dangerous, and strangely pleased.

“Very well,” he murmured, lips pressing to hers again, finally quiet — if only for a heartbeat — letting the tension, the heat, and the small, wicked spark of challenge between them take over.

Her hands found his shoulders — hesitant at first, then firmer as she pulled him closer. He shuddered. Actually shuddered. He could tell the realization sent a surge of heat through her that had nothing to do with fear.

His palm slid higher, resting at the edge of her ribs. Not pushing. Not asking. Waiting. As though he wanted her permission just to want her. She nodded — tiny, instinctive — and he exhaled like she’d solved something impossible. His thumb brushed the underside of her breast, a whisper of contact that made her arch before she could think.

He stilled again, reading her response like a code. His other hand cupped her cheek, guiding her into another kiss — deeper this time, hungry and searching. He tasted like adrenaline and mint and triumph. Her fingers tangled in his hair; he groaned into her mouth, the sound low and almost startled.

“You have no idea,” he said, lips brushing hers, “how hard it is not to ruin you all at once.”

He shifted, covering her body with his. The cot creaked. Her breath hitched as his thigh slid between hers, anchoring her, guiding her hips into a slow, unthinking grind. His breath stuttered — his self-control thinning, fraying at the edges.

“Good girl,” he whispered before he could stop himself, reverent and wicked at once.

He could tell the praise nearly undid her. She grabbed at him, pulling, and he lowered his mouth to her collarbone again, teeth scraping lightly before soothing the bite with a slow, hot drag of his tongue. His hand slipped beneath her shirt — palm warm, fingers greedy but precise.

She gasped; he caught the sound with his mouth, kissing her like he needed it to live. His hips pressed harder into hers, breath turning ragged.

Her fingers ran down his back, feeling the tension there, the restraint wound tight. He made a sound — half growl, half prayer — and buried his face at her throat.

His hand slipped lower, gripping her thigh, guiding her. She moved with him without thinking — drawn, reckless. Their bodies aligned; heat built; thought frayed. The room around them faded into nothing but breath and friction and a thousand unsaid things.

The lights flickered again, dimming as if they, too, were holding their breath.

His lips found hers once more — slow, consuming, inevitable.

The world dissolved into heat and shadow and the press of him everywhere.