A cacophony unravelled, as Harleen slowly awoke, and pierced through the murky spaces of her mind. The first thing she was able to hear was the noises of the outside – vehicles moving from point A to point B, pedestrians running in a hurry. Then, there were the sounds of commotion inside the building – tenants walking around, someone arguing, a dog barking. In the end, there was a child crying. It signalled fear, anxiety, pain. Quinzel knew this sound very well – her house had resonated with it.

As if on autopilot, the woman got up to her feet, ignoring the ringing in her head, and walked uncertainly towards the source of the noise. It was coming from the bedroom where she'd found the picture and dealt with the thugs. Her steps are unnaturally noiseless as the fluffy carpet softens the clicking of her boots' heels. Quinzel stalks in the direction of the crib where a baby is lying, wondering if it was even there. Although the child's screaming was loud and clear, she didn't believe it until she saw it, flailing its tiny arms and legs.

Harleen's eye twitched and for a second, just a second, she thought about squeezing the little thing's windpipe just to make it all stop. Then she looked down on the baby once again and shuddered. Her hands stopped shaking so she was able to lift the pink blanket covering the infant. Its body moulded itself with the woman's neck and chest when she brought in to her arms. It felt natural – she'd done it a million times before, with her siblings when she was younger or Nicky and Jenny – so she began to coo, trying to calm the baby down.

"Get away from her!" Morgan hissed almost right to Quinzel's ear. Her bony hands snatched the infant and embraced it protectively.

The teenager looked exhausted – her curly hair was messier than usual, her eyes had dark circles. She was also wearing the same clothes from the day before. The shirt was creased and had a strange stain on it. The girl left the room hastily, not even hiding the disdain in her gaze, and almost tripped over one of the thugs' body. The older woman chose to follow her.

"You need to leave," Morgan mumbled, searching for something.

Harleen ignored her demand. The young girl had left last evening, presumably for her shift at the club, but hadn't stayed at her workplace for long. Then the thugs had come by looking for 'Kitty' to drag her ass back to the club, probably, and stumbled upon Harleen. Now, Morgan was back from wherever she'd gone, with a wailing infant in her arms and packed bags lying by the couch.

"I bet they missed you at work."

"Shut up!" Morgan snapped and jabbed a finger at the doctor's chest. "Look what you've done! You've ruined everything!"

And suddenly, it all made sense. Scott had had a plan, of course, and it all had depended on the whimsical mind of Morgan, a very young girl with a lot of emotional baggage and even more trust issues, and a mother on top of that – the ultimate example of a perfect victim of manipulation. Just dangle a promise, a prospect of the desired event in front of her and, gulp, she'll swallow the bait instantly. Oh, it made sense alright.

The thugs hadn't come here for the teenager, but for the clueless doctor Quinzel, without the knowledge that the older woman would've been in the apartment. Scott had disappeared into thin air, no doubt in a ditch somewhere in the docks. The poor little Morgan had got scared, she'd been hiding Harleen after all, so she'd decided to pick the solution that'd seemed the best to her.

Harlen wasn't angry, honestly speaking, but a tad bit annoyed. The circumstances of this situation were unnecessarily convoluted, to say the least, changing Quinzel's plans in an instant. She pursed her lips and cocked her head to the side. Perhaps there would be a silver lining to it all.

The woman still had to find Tommy, that much hasn't changed. She didn't know exactly how he would be able to help her, but Scott had given her the clue, so she would have to trust him.

If she was supposed to do it alone, then it meant she couldn't leave any traces behind; anything that could indicate her presence in Gotham City. That included Morgan.

Letting a weary sigh out, Harleen turns towards dead Ray's friend still tied to the chair. He was awake by now, breathing heavily and glaring at her. She removed the rag from his mouth and shook her head disapprovingly when it looked as if he was about to start screaming.

"How are you feeling?" the woman asked as she reached for a glass standing on the coffee table. "No nausea? Headache? Feeling dizzy?"

He only shook his head stiffly, but she figured it wasn't because he was answering her inquiries, due to him still being in shock. Harleen clasped his chin in her glove-clad fingers to look deeply into the man's bloodshot eyes - they were staring at her with the utmost contempt. She'd thought she'd beaten him too hard. Now she knew he'd be alright save for the nasty purple bruise on his temple.

Ray's friend greedily drunk from the cup Harleen brought to his parched lips as his hands were still bound behind his back. Some of that water dribbled down the man's chin onto his navy blue sweatshirt. He was a mess - it would take some effort to get him back on his feet. Everything had already been set up. She had to hurry, there was no time.

"I'm going to ask you a few questions now," the woman said softly, smacking him on the cheek. "You have to promise you'll be honest with me, okay? Otherwise, it won't work."

He swayed his head side to side in a poor imitation of an answer and that seemed to be enough for Quinzel. First, she repeated her question from last night – had he and his buddy come here for Morgan? - to which he said yes, although it hadn't been the plan initially. She didn't dig any further and moved on to ask whether anybody else knew where he was. No, the trip had been supposed to be kept a secret between him, Ray and Morgan and they would tell everyone afterwards. Whose idea had it been? He didn't know, maybe Morgan's or someone's from higher up. Why? The boss had wanted it done.

Harleen stepped back and flexed her fingers, trying to fight the urge to smack the thug. She'd have to wait a little longer.

"Don't make any sudden movements. You might still feel disoriented so take it easy," the woman whispered as she shot her prisoner a sharp glare.

With some difficulty, Quinzel cut through his tape-bound hands with a knife she'd found in the kitchen. A brief thought that perhaps she'd taped his limbs too tightly crossed her mind, but it disappeared when the man moved his fingers with ease. After he'd been freed of the restraints, his body slid onto the floor as if it had been a puppet whose strings had been cut.

Dead Ray's friend was behaving tamer than last night, although it was undeniably caused by his head injury, and Harleen was pleased about it. There would be less mess to deal with.

Everything had been quite meticulously set up. The woman had already taken care of cleaning up everything as well as she could. She also meticulously washed the glass which the thug had drunk from and put in the upper cupboard as if it had never been used in the first place. Morgan wouldn't have had time to do the dishes in her state of mind, after all. Remains of tape used for bounding the man were pushed into the pocket of her sweatshirt. It'd have to be enough.

Still, she quickly glanced around the make sure that the pillows were positioned on the ugly couch naturally, a few articles of clothing were carelessly thrown on the floor in the bedroom, the blankets were bunched up on the bed. A perfectly normal apartment, very cosy, even with the mismatched furniture and stench of death.

It had been especially tedious to move the bodies. Ray was a heavily built man, with wide shoulders and long limbs, but it wasn't only because of that. The question was – how to make this scene look as legitimate as possible? Or, more accurately, legitimate enough to keep the cops busy. The timeline wouldn't line up flawlessly, but it would give the woman some freedom to act while everybody else was running around like headless chickens, trying to piece the puzzle together.

Now, Quinzel had to use all of her resources. Dead Ray's friend was still sitting on the floor, where he'd slid down after she'd released him from the bounds, and looked quite confused. His hands were clasped tightly on his chest as the woman had ordered him to. All she had to do was steer him in the right direction.

"You plan on staying?" Harleen asked casually, twirling the car keys she'd found on Ray around her finger. The man scrambled to his feet clumsily. "Alright, see ya around."

He frowned. "Why are you whispering?"

The baby was sleeping soundly in its infant car seat. Harleen had made sure it was comfortable, that it wouldn't be disturbed. She even wrapped the tiny thing in the pink blanket from the bedroom. The serene expression on the baby's face made the woman jealous - she wished her mind was at peace, innocently silent.

Step by step, the thug got closer to the living room, his eyes widening with shock. He finally saw the scene Quinzel had set up while he'd been unconscious. First, his eyes fell upon Ray's stiff, discoloured corpse. The woman had had some trouble putting him in a semi-natural position, his joints unwilling to bend. Nothing would erase the grotesque grimace plastered on his sickly white face. However, the sight of Ray did not surprise his buddy as much as the state of the sweet little ex-conspirator of his.

Morgan lay on the light wood floor, her curly hair framing her head, some strands glued together with blood, like a halo. Unlike Ray, she looked calm, her expression devoid of distress - she hadn't expected a thing. Perhaps the quiet click of the silencer had given her a small clue of what had awaited her.

Harleen felt a little bad. The surface of the wall to her right had been sprayed with remains of Morgan's frontal lobe, the frames with pictures of the baby were now tainted pink. The woman had crouched next to the sprawled, spasming young girl. She'd been conscious for a moment, her eyes wide open, chest heaving, gasping for air. Poor girl, she couldn't even off herself without botching the job.

Quinzel found wondering about Morgan's final thoughts pleasing. Had she regretted agreeing to the deal? Had she lamented silently about the possible gruesome end the child's short life? Or maybe nothing but panic and horror had passed through what was left of her brain, trying to save the last remnants of her sense of being.

Well, the deed was done. Harleen supposed Morgan's last moments would serve as a sort of atonement. What had to be done was make sure Javier felt sorry for ever setting his eyes on doctor Quinzel.