Chapter Text
On more nights than not, Barbara Gordon dreamt of running. In the park, on a beach, through a wheat-filled field. The details changed dream-to-dream, but they all had the same feeling to her. Liberating. Freeing. Then, when she woke up, she’d drag herself into her wheelchair and start her day.
They had started a couple weeks after the diagnosis. And for the first few months, those mornings were some of the worst she’d felt since. Even after she had come to terms with the fact she’d never run like that again, those dreams still haunted her. One day, though, she simply decided there were better usages of her time than to sit sulking, and just… moved on. People she trusted needed her to be at the top of her game. Her friends needed her. Her city needed her.
Today was no different, and a quick sigh was all Barbara gave herself when it came to grief. In her half-awake state, all she wanted was to just shrink back into her bed that felt infinitely softer than usual. But every second she stayed in bed was another second away from her very-limited free time (commanding a double life as Gotham City’s primary information broker didn’t leave a lot to go around), and decided to press on, like she always had.
She stretched out her right arm to fumble around for her wheelchair, and her hand banged into solid metal. She gave a small wince as the pain woke her up a little more, and realized that she had reached straight into a stack of metal carry cases, positioned right behind her wall. Barbara didn’t exactly have that much space in between her bed and her wall, but didn’t think much of it. She rolled over and stretched her left arm out instead, but no matter how much she reached around, she grabbed only air.
It was about now Barbara had realized something wasn’t right. She felt her glasses resting by her midsection, and scrambled to put them on. Blinking to wake her eyes up, she found the room she was in was nothing like her own. It felt more cramped, with a lot of metal shelving and posters on the walls filled with characters she didn’t recognize. On the opposite end of the room, she also noticed a surprisingly-sophisticated computer setup—with what appeared to be an entire mainframe off to the side.
Ok, Barbara immediately thought. I’ve been kidnapped. Most people probably wouldn’t have formed a thought like that so calmly, but as the only daughter of the police commissioner in the most crime-ridden city in the world, Barbara was assuredly not most people. The last time it happened, she woke up to Damian lecturing her about safety with about 8 of Scarecrow’s henchmen on the ground unconscious. So why haven’t they found me yet…?
There may not have been a wheelchair in the room, but there was a gaming chair nearby. She scooted herself to the edge of the bed, barely managing to grip the arm of the chair and pull it to the foot of her bed. There, she slid herself on the seat and swung her legs down. It wasn’t exactly her wheelchair, but it was something. Barbara also took the opportunity to pat her pants pockets for anything that could be of use. Her phone and wallet were still there, which she attributed from the lateness she got home last night. She almost fell asleep in her chair several times just trying to make it to her room. Still, the fact that she still had both on her meant that these kidnappers were either so oblivious as to not even check for them, or so stupid they thought it was a non-issue.
Now that she was mobile, the first order of business was finding out where she was. Barbara guessed either a house or apartment; maybe the occupants were just out of town. She pulled herself along the walls to the door, noticing it was locked from the inside. Strange place to hold your hostage, huh? Cracking the door, her suspicions were confirmed. It wasn’t like any house she had visited in Gotham, or anywhere else for that matter, but it was unmistakably a house. It was also suspiciously empty, for that matter. Not a guard in sight. The coast was clear.
First, Barbara fumbled through her pocket and opened her phone, going to her map app to find out where in Gotham she was. Safe to say, her guess was way off.
“I’m in Tokyo?” Barbara thought aloud. Why would anyone bring the commissioner's daughter to Japan? Of course, the thought crossed that she wasn’t brought to Tokyo just for being the commissioner’s daughter, but rather on account of her double life. Like Jason. Time to get serious.
Bruce had insisted the Gotham City Vigilantes—the “Bat-Family,” as they liked to call themselves—put an emergency panic button in each of their phones, just in case something like this were to happen. She opened the nondescript app the button was disguised as, and entered the proper code to activate.
An error message flashed across the screen. That was her first warning, because that simply shouldn’t have been possible. Barbara partially coded it herself. It had a range bigger than the earth itself. She supposed, with a big enough EMP, it might have disrupted the signal, but she still had bars in her phone. And no way they could even get an EMP that sophisticated. For god’s sake, they didn't take my phone, didn’t leave guards, and left me in a room with a fully-functioning—
Computer! Barbara remembered they had planned for this, as well. Even if they didn’t have their phones, all any of them would have to do was find a working computer and use a secure route through the Wayne Enterprises Website to activate a tracker, in case nothing else worked. Once again, Barbara pushed herself to the opposite wall and spun herself to the computer set up, breathing a well-needed sigh of relief realizing it was already on. She quickly typed up the URL for Wayne Enterprise’s website and…
Another error message. Odd. She double checked. Everything was spelled correctly, as far as she knew. Barbara typed it into a search engine. Other than a bunch of small-town companies bearing the last name, there wasn’t a single hit. Not a single result for a multi-trillion dollar company? She checked around further, still not finding anything of note. Unless…
A chill going down her spine, Barbara reopened up her map app on her phone.
Gotham City was nowhere to be found.
“N-No,” she stammered. “No, what… How…?”
And it wasn’t just Gotham. Metropolis, Coast City, Central City, Star City, all gone. So was Atlantis and Themyscira and a number of other, smaller nations. Whatever this world was, it wasn’t hers. With a shaky hand, she typed “JUSTICE LEAGUE” into the search engine.
No results.
It was at this point Barbara shifted back into her chair, her usually-cool head abuzz with questions. No Gotham? No Bruce Wayne? No SUPERHEROES? It was like when she woke up, she was in an entirely new world.
Wait. An entirely new world?
Barbara knew they existed, alternate universes. Bruce and the rest of the Justice League had gone to quite a few over their careers, some apparently being barely different from her own. She had even heard of worlds where there were no superheroes, only existing as stories. But she never expected to actually go into one. And certainly not like this.
“…I’m in an alternate universe,” she concluded aloud, closing her eyes and taking a breath to calm her nerves. “Alright. If I came here, there’s got to be a way I can get—”
The door slammed open, jolting Barbara up.
“You!” a gruff, older voice shouted from behind. “Who are you, and how did you get in here!?” The man paused, as if to look around. “And where’s Futaba!?”
The man spoke Japanese, expected for someone apparently living in Tokyo. Thankfully, Japanese was one of the many languages Bruce had insisted Barbara learned as part of her training. At least when explaining how she got sent to another universe, she didn’t have to worry about a language barrier.
“Sir, just let me…” she spoke, spinning herself to face the man and shooting her hands up. The man was middle-aged, sporting receding hair and wearing wrinkled clothes and an apron. Whoever this man was, he probably didn’t have anything to do with her appearance here.
“Well!?” the man demanded again, holding up his phone in clear view. “Answer, or I’m calling the cops!”
“No!” blurted out Barbara. “I’ll tell you, OK?” She took a deep breath. “My name is Barbara Gordon. I’m a… librarian. From America. I woke up in this room. And I don’t know anyone named Futaba.” She saw no reason to lie, as she was defenseless regardless.
The man’s expression faltered, that clearly not being the answer he was expecting. “…Huh?” he muttered, before his confused look was quickly replaced by the same defensive fury as before. “Don’t play dumb with me, lady! You expect me to believe that? What do you want with her!?”
“I already told you, I don’t know who Futaba is!” she responded. “And no. I don’t really expect you to believe me, but you can’t call the police.” Here, she had nowhere to go, no alibi, and knew enough about Japan’s legal system to know navigating it would be a nightmare. “Please, let me try to explain.”
The man lowered his phone cautiously. “Make it quick.”
Barbara looked down at her feet. “I know you probably won’t believe this either, but…” She now looked up to face the man. “I don’t think I’m from this world. This universe, even”
He scoffed. “Really, now?”
“There are cities I’ve been to that don’t exist here,” she continued. “People I know that never came to be.”
“Uh-huh,” he dismissively said, before taking out his phone again to dial the police. “Trust me, I’m doing you a favor—”
“Wait!” she urged, more desperate than ever. “I-I’m not crazy! I can prove it.”
The man once again stared sternly, prompting her to gulp and look away. She just said that to buy time, and now she actually had to think of a way to logic her way out of this. Nervously feeling her pockets again, an idea came to her.
“My I.D,” she stated, taking it out from her wallet and handing it to the man. “Under residence, it says I’m from a place called Gotham City.”
“I don’t—”
“As far as I know, Gotham City doesn’t exist. At least not in New Jersey. Look it up, I swear.”
He scanned the I.D, hard flipped it over, inspected every last detail. Barbara noticed his face start to mellow.
“What’s more likely?” Barbara added. “Either I broke into your house, kidnapped… your…”
“Daughter.”
“Kidnapped your daughter, and stuck around using a crazy story and a fake I.D…” She leaned in as best she could. “Or that everything I told you is, somehow, true?”
The man glanced at the I.D, then at her, then back at the I.D. Then, he let his arm fall to his side. “You’re sure you don’t know where Futaba is?”
“I swear,” Barbara stated, mustering up every bit of sincerity in her body.
He sighed. “All right. I believe you.” A wave of relief crashed over here. “For now. I have to call some people who might help. Trust me, they’re not cops. But you’ll definitely want to talk to them. They’d know more about this than me.”
Barbara let out a nervous chuckle. “…Thanks,” she told the man.
He gave a cold, yet approving nod. “Stay there,” he demanded. “I’ll be back with them in a bit.”
With that, he closed the door. And as soon as he did, Barbara realized she forgot to ask him the most important question.
“Hey, do you know where I can get a wheelchair?”