Archive of Our Own

"Oh, Ive, have I mentioned lately how much I love you?"

"Once or twice, maybe. And, and I love you, babe. But, uh, we haven't actually cleared the blast radius yet, so..."

"Right, right, I'm just gonna shut up and keep running."

Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy reached the gap in rusted chain link fence they'd used to enter the factory grounds. Neither of them had actually made the gap, it'd been there already, ready for the two of them to slip through and get started on tonight's work.

Behind them, a huge, squat block of concrete, glass, and steel loomed in the night. Like the rusted fence, the great, decaying hulk had not been maintained properly. Unlike the fence, it hadn't even been built properly in the first place. And the factory was still open for business. So Poison Ivy had decided the time had come for it to go out of business.

After slipping through the fence, Harley and Ivy booked it for the nearby treeline. Well, Harley thought of it as a treeline. Ivy thought it an abomination. A dead, diseased mockery of nature that deserved healing. And revenge. Bare, twisted trees, and a handful of stubborn shrubs clung obstinately to their miserable lives, forced to drink the poisoned groundwater and breathe the toxic air the factory left for them.

Harley flung her arms around Ivy and bore her to the ground, kissing her with an exuberant passion. Ivy accepted Harley's enthusiastic lips for a while, but soon pushed her girlfriend off of her as gently as possible.

"Not now," Ivy said reluctantly. "Later, I promise."

"Promise?" Harley said.

"I mean, I just said so, so, uh, yeah," Ivy replied.

Ivy sat up and turned to look at the ominous bulk of the doomed factory. Harley couldn't help but notice the worry in her eyes.

"Something wrong?" Harley asked.

"What? No, no, it's fine," Ivy said, distracted. "It's all fine."

"OK, now say that to me again and try to sound even less convincing."

Ivy sighed. "Sorry. I'm sorry. I just... I want this one to go right."

Harley frowned. "Why? We're just blowing up a factory. We've blown up dozens like 'em before. We know how to do this, it'll be fine."

"You're right," said Ivy. "Of course you're right. It'll be fine."

Harley put a hand on Ivy's shoulder. "OK, you're seriously starting to worry me. Please tell me what's really bothering you."

"Harls-" Ivy stopped, closed her eyes, took a deep breath. She looked like she calmed down and got a grip on herself, but Harley knew her too well to be fooled. "Alright. OK. I'll tell you everything. Afterwards. If you still want me to. But let's just watch this factory explode first, alright? Please?"

"Alright," said Harley.

Harley inched up next to Ivy. They sat, side by side, watching the dark shape of the factory. Ivy's hand reached out for Harley's. Even though something was definitely wrong, Harley allowed Ivy to take her hand and let their fingers intertwine. The near unconscious closeness was comforting, but it would've been a lot more comforting if Ivy had just opened up to her.

But that was just Ivy. Sometimes she got into one of her moods and there was just no talking to her. And yeah, sure, Harley could try to drag whatever it was that was bothering her out of her, but that wasn't the way to go. Ivy sometimes just needed time to process things by herself and, well, Harley would just get in the way. Ivy would tell her when she was good and ready, and then the two of them would deal with it. Whatever 'it' was.

The ground rumbled, the rotting factory trembled. Harley should've felt some anticipatory glee, but she was too worried about Ivy to get all excited over watching some structure getting torn apart.

Still, it was quietly satisfying to see the concrete walls split apart like so much wet paper. To watch great and powerful vines tear out of the ground and tear through the roof and demolish the factory. It was a gorgeous spectacle of nature taking well-deserved revenge against one of its many would-be murderers. The vines swept the concrete aside like sand, cut through steel bars as though they were little more than fragile blades of grass. And the best part was, Ivy's vines only got that powerful because they fed on the very toxic waste the factory owner had been too cheap to treat and dispose of properly.

Harley sighed with contentment, watching the triumphant vines stand boldly within the ruins of the factory.

And then the flowers bloomed.

Harley blinked. That was new. Usually, Ivy's vines just tore the factory apart, then decayed rapidly to renew the soil. They didn't grow flowers. She was pretty sure of that. She would've noticed them at least once before. But these vines grew flowers. And not just one or two, but dozens of them. Maybe hundreds. Thousands. It would've been a real riot of colours, too, if they hadn't only been lit by the silver light of the moon.

Ivy inhaled sharply. Her body tensed up and she squeezed Harley's hand hard.

The flowers bloomed and bloomed, petals unfolding one after another. And then, finally, the pattern clicked in Harley's mind. Her eyes widened, her mouth fell open, and something rose within her chest. It might have been joy. It was probably joy. But never had joy felt as... as... joyful as this. The world - or at least this part of it - might have been stuck in the dark of night, but to Harley everything was bright.

"Oh, Ive," she gasped, unable to say anything else.

"So, uh..." Ivy began.

Harley bore Ivy to the ground again, kissed her all over again. She'd thought she'd been exuberant before, but that was nothing compared to this. Her feelings were a chaotic mess of superlatives that would need a poet to sort out, but they all revolved around how much she loved Ivy. Which was just... the absolute most. She loved Ivy the absolute most.

"OK," Ivy said in the brief window between Harley running out of breath and getting enough of her breath back to start kissing her again. "So, what do you say?"

Harley stared at her. "What, you have to ask?"

"I mean, I just kinda did, didn't I?" Ivy said.

"Yes! Obviously. A gazillion times yes!"

Harley and Ivy lay entangled in an embrace of kisses, caresses, and giggles. They didn't care that they were getting covered in dirt or that twigs got tangled up in their hair. They only cared about holding each other, feeling each other, loving each other.

Some way away from them, towering above the wreck of the factory, the flowers were in full bloom. They would rot and decay and feed the soil with the rising of the sun, but for now they still flowered in Ivy's carefully crafted pattern: