I'd like to dedicate this to my infinitely patient beta princessbee. She was an enormous help and an incredible source of information, not to mention very much tolerant of my horible procrastination.
It wasn't supposed to be like this.
After everything that had happened, after getting away, I should have been able to go on with my life.
Instead it seemed everything had come crashing down around my ears, and he had set it all in motion. I never went back to work after that, and I wasn't sure how much further my last paycheck could stretch. I was still having nightmares, seeing that grinning face, smelling again the scents of fear and blood, hearing his chilling laughter all the while.
I took another swig of Jack Daniels, staring down at the sketchbook in my lap. Every page was festooned with that grin.
I couldn't get the Joker out of my head.
Every time I tried to put pencil or charcoal to paper his face was the one that took shape. I didn't understand it. A thump above me made me jump; sloshing my drink a little. It sounded like my neighbors were dropping babies and I heard it all the time. You'd think I'd get used to it, but no. It made me cringe every time. With a sigh I closed my worn old sketchbook and replaced it in the drawer of my nightstand. I couldn't bring it to class anymore. It scared my professors. I had gotten a new one and made a point to draw nice things in it in front of them so as not to cause further alarm. It was harder than I thought it would be, my pencil still wanting to smear grotesque smiles on our subjects in life drawing.
I rose to my feet and crossed my tiny apartment to the window, staring past the iron bars out onto the street. My apartment was a small place; one room with generic carpet and plaster walls painted a dirty white. The kitchenette wasn't separated from the rest of the room by anything more substantial than the difference between tile and carpet. My bathroom was just as small as the rest of my place hinted it would be, containing a shower, but no tub. No matter how hard or often I scrubbed, everything in it was still more yellow than white. Still, it was the only place I could afford and it had the bonus of cast iron bars on the window.
I didn't have to look to know there was a fine layer of dust gathering on my phone. It hadn't rung in weeks. I supposed I wasn't much fun anymore. The slightest thing made me jump and I was always looking over my shoulder. I couldn't help it. My friends tried to help at first, but I don't think they really understood how terrifying it had been, being a hostage, and how much worse it had been in Arkham, how it had been being held captive by the Joker, what it had been like to have those white hands clamped down on me.
They didn't know because they'd never been there and they'd never been as close to the Joker as I have. They'd never felt the heat of him, the threat of him. It didn't seem possible, the kind of manic energy he had locked up behind that manic smile, like storm clouds ready to burst. They hadn't watched him kill a guard with his own handcuffs, they hadn't heard his laughter or seen him smile. They didn't know the way the bottom seemed to drop out of your stomach when he looked at you that way, promising death. All they knew was what they saw in the newspapers or on TV.
I'd seen the real thing, and I'd somehow gotten away with nothing more than a broken finger.
It couldn't be that simple. The Joker didn't just let people go. No. I scolded myself. Stop right now. These thoughts lead down a bad road. You know this already, don't go back there. You're having enough trouble as it is. He let you go because the game was over and that's it. He can't get you. He's locked up in Arkham. He can't get you.
Except the Joker always escaped, he always got out again to kill more people before Batman put him back.
I stared at my drink for a moment, my forehead pressed against the cool glass of my window. I watched the ice in my glass melt, swimming in the amber liquid, aimless and shrinking.
Like me. I'm wasting away.
Movement out of the corner of my eye made me jump again. A flash of purple outside, disappearing so quickly I was sure I'd imagined it. It could have been anyone, maybe that nice old lady down the hall doing her laundry. She liked bright colors.
But purple? Face it Pearl, purple isn't a popular color in Gotham, and you know why.
I shook my head, as if the force of the movement alone could scatter those thoughts. I had to get out. I had to do something. I had to work out the kinks in my brain with motion, with action. He was in Arkham, locked up in a high security cell. That's what they'd told me when they begged me to come back. It was hard to find people to work there, and now I really understood why. I knew. I knew better than most.
Well, except all of those dead guards.
But they couldn't really benefit from the experience now, could they?
OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO
Wannabee's was the hot spot of the week. It was everything a trendy club should be without the prices or the class of joints like the Iceberg. It was dark except for the scintillating colored lights that were more for mood than illumination, and the occasional strobe if the D.J called for it. Bodies writhed together to throbbing oonce oonce music. It was too crowded for anyone to do much more than bounce in place or nod in time with the music. It was the perfect place to get lost. There was no need for thought or words with the bass pounding rhythmically in your skull.
I smiled for the first time in a long time, feeling a curious sense of relief. It was comforting being amongst all these strangers. None of them knew. No one would stare or whisper behind their hands. I could let go and pretend there was nothing amiss. I could be numb, let the sound and sensation close over my head like water and stay like that all night, cool, tranquil and solitary.
I squeezed through the crush of bodies to get to the bar. A few drinks and everything would be perfect. I could revel in the feeling of airy disorientation. Since the asylum, I'd discovered the soothing effects of alcohol. It was crowded at the bar too, people standing almost elbow-to-elbow, smoking, drinking, groping. There was no rational thought here; everything was some sort of primal ritual, everyone trying to get the same thing. It almost made me laugh. I squeezed against the bar beside a girl with a fluorescent orange Mohawk and several gleaming facial piercings. She had one ankle crossed over the other and a cigarette bounced on her lip as she spoke to the scene kid beside her.
"The way I see it, you can either live forever, or die trying." She said a moment before scooping up a bottle of some German beer and gliding away. I stared after her long after she'd disappeared, her words echoing dully in my head, like stones dropped into an empty well.
Live forever or die trying. I'm doing great with the die trying part.
I gave a weak chuckle, shaking my head slightly. I opened my mouth to order a drink, needing one more than ever, but the bartender was already placing a long stemmed glass of red wine in front of me, a pink rose beside it. A note was tied to its stem.
"From the gentleman at the end of the bar." The bartender explained to my questioning gaze. He flashed a slightly nervous smile and hurried away, making a show of wiping down glasses, his back turned to me. My head shot up and I looked wildly in the direction the bartender had indicated, but all I saw was a gaggle of girls in halter-tops, short skirts and too much makeup. Brow furrowed in puzzlement, I picked up the rose and unfolded the note, scanning the single phrase with a growing sense of dread.
See you soon, Cupcake. – J
I licked my lips, swallowing against the sudden dryness in my throat.
I almost took a drink of the wine I'd been given, but thought better of it. I still needed a drink, now more than ever. Liquid courage, but this was from the Joker. It could be filled with corrosive acid or his damn Joker Venom. Or it could just be a glass of wine. A joke.
I darted a glance around me, but still there was no sign of him, even though I knew he was lurking somewhere in the club, watching. I felt suddenly nauseous, dizzy. Ducking my head I elbowed my way through the human tide as everyone writhed like a mass of maggots. The floor tipped and undulated beneath me as I lurched into the ladies' room, shoving the door open with a bang.
Immediately I regretted it. The first thing I noticed was the smell.
At once sweet and salty, it left a metallic tang in the back of my mouth. It hung heavy and wet in the air and was far too familiar.
Blood.
It was everywhere, pooled in sticky puddles on the tiled floor, spattered in abstract patterns on the wall, dripping, pointing like tattling red fingers at the form slumped beneath the white porcelain sinks.
A young woman in a turquoise top was crumpled awkwardly, blood still dribbling down her front from the red smile in her throat. Her legs were bent at unnatural angles, possibly broken. Her eyes were wide and staring, almost accusing even though her teeth were bared in a rictus grin.
And there, smeared on the long mirror above her in bright crimson, were three words: Ha Ha Ha.
I wanted to scream, could feel it clawing at my throat, but no sound came out.
The game's not over. He's come to finish what he started, I thought dully, staring at the corpse of this girl. The Joker was out of Arkham and he was after me. I backed towards the door, slipping in a puddle of blood before I bolted, The sound of the strange slick shriek my shoe made on the tile snapped me out of my stupor. Shock was replaced by fear and revulsion, two emotions I was becoming very familiar with. not caring who I knocked over in my desperation to get out, away from the ebb and flow of the human tide and the blood and the accusing stare of the dead girl on the bathroom floor.
Outside was cool, a wind kicked up off the bay. I felt strangely exposed, the distance between the club and my beat up old Honda impossibly vast. Still, I had to get away, quickly. It wasn't until that moment that I realized I was still clutching the pink rose he'd left me. It was a perfect bud, partially bloomed, the silky pink of a sky at sunrise. I flung it away from me as if it were a dead rat and darted towards my car, not caring that I was sprinting, that a couple was staring after me with amused expressions on their faces. I had to pause and fumble in my purse for my keys, my hands shaking so much the task was all but impossible. They kept slipping from my fingers, burrowing under all of the junk I had stashed in my purse. It was while I was rifling through my purse, my legs threatening to give out beneath me, that I saw it. Stuck behind my windshield wiper like a parking ticket was a single playing card. A Joker.
I lost it, simply upending my purse and snatching up my keys and wallet. Everything else I left. It didn't matter.
I felt a little more in control as I slid into the driver's seat and locked all the doors. I turned the key in the ignition, darting glances all the while, out the window, in the rearview mirror. The night still appeared empty. I didn't see anything at all in the amber pools of streetlights, but that didn't lessen my desperation to be gone.
Go go go go go go go go. I thought, swallowing hard as the streets of Gotham fell away beneath me. It was so hard to keep under the speed limit. I could feel my foot itching to push down harder on the gas pedal, my fear making me desperate, the car seeming far too sluggish, but the last thing I needed was to get the cops involved. That would just make him mad. Part of me almost wanted to get caught, to be kept safe at the Gotham City Police department, but I doubted the merit of that idea. What would stop him from simply killing everyone there, anyone who got in his way?
OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO
Batman scowled, brows drawn down in a deep frown, as he studied the corpse in the Ladies' room of Wannabee's. Beside him Commissioner Gordan was shaking his head, half in disgust, half in remorse. The Joker had been out of Arkham for less than a day and already people were dying.
"What do you suppose He's after this time?" Gordan asked, regarding not Batman, but the corpse.
"I don't know." Batman admitted, crossing his arms over his chest so that his inky cape obscured his tall, muscular frame. "Maybe nothing at all. It's too soon to tell."
"How many people have to die before you can tell?" Gordan asked. His tone wasn't accusatory, merely defeated. He seemed to deflate a little, shoulders slumped and head bowed.
OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO
I'd never been more grateful to see my dingy little apartment. The faint musk of mould and beer was as comforting to me as my mother's perfume as I sprinted up the rickety wooden stairs towards my door. Even the sounds of my neighbors screaming, or blaring their music was comforting, if only for its normalcy. It all came crashing down when I noticed the object hung carelessly on my doorknob.
A violet fedora.
I wanted to scream again, to flee. I shouldn't go in there. He was in my apartment, touching my things, possibly learning even more about me, preparing more torture. Still, I moved forward as if sleepwalking, stretching out my hand and plucking the hat off my doorknob. It was a nice hat, made of some soft material I couldn't name with my fear-numbed mind and probably custom dyed to be the perfect shade of purple. It made me shudder to think that a monster like him could hide so easily behind fine things. I couldn't resist running my fingers along the brim of the hat once more. I don't know how long I stood there; but a part of me knew I had to decide what to do. I could run again, go out to my car and drive. It didn't matter where.
Or, I could go into my apartment. Maybe he wasn't there, maybe he wanted me to run. Maybe he was waiting somewhere else, lurking beneath the stairwell as I stood and deliberated, running my fingers along the brim of his hat.
You're an idiot, I berated myself, reaching for the doorknob, turning it slowly and pushing open my door. I watched the fake gold nine swing crazily before I stepped over the threshold and closed the door behind me. You're a dead idiot.
He was there.
He was sitting, no, lounging on my ratty old couch; the very picture of nonchalance. Clad in his trademark purple suit, a tumbler of my Jack Daniels in one hand, his head propped in his other, he was leafing slowly through my worn sketchbook. A satisfied smile was plastered on his bone white face and his eye-pricking green hair glinted in the sickly light from my ceiling fan. I watched as he turned another page, running one finger absently along the edge of the book. He seemed oblivious to my presence, but I was all too aware of him. Even as seemingly relaxed as he was he gave off an impression of manic energy, the tilt of his angular chin possessing an air of malevolent cunning. My chest tightened at the thought. He was in my apartment, looking through my sketchbook. No one had looked through that thing. Ever. It was private, it was where I locked away everything that scared me. It was where I'd kept him so he would leave me alone during the day.
"Oh, Pearlykins!" He exclaimed, abruptly looking up from my sketches. "I've been waiting positively ages! Did you get my little message?"
I nodded mutely, watching him toss aside my sketchbook and rise from my tatty old couch in one fluid motion.
"And you found my hat!" He said, crossing the tiny room to stand in front of me. "You're such a thoughtful girl." He added, pinching my cheek a bit too hard. I rubbed the spot where he had pinched me, feeling a blush steal across my face as he took his hat from my numb hand.
"Whu-why are you here?" I managed to ask, running a hand nervously through my hair. He was absently spinning his hat around one long fingered hand, turning away from me to survey my little apartment.
"Why, I came to visit you, of course." He said, turning to smile slyly over his shoulder at me. "I missed you. We had so much fun together last time." He cast a wink over his shoulder, then promptly went back to looking over my apartment, hands fisted on his hips, expression turning from sly to disapproving.
"I had said to myself, Mr. J , Arkham is positively dreary without little Pearl to spoil you in the lunch line. Of course, this is looking just as bad." I took the opportunity to cross into my living room, scooping up my worn old sketchbook. The spine was even more flimsy from being manhandled by the Joker and a few pages fluttered to the floor like dying butterflies.
"It is?" I asked, feeling a pang of shame. Of course, even the most derelict of his hideouts would have been a far cry more appealing than my dingy little hole.
"Absolutely. There are no words to describe just how disappointed in you I am. I thought for certain my darling Pearl would have better taste than this." He tsked and shook his head, placing his hat on his head and strolling towards me again, and I tensed so suddenly my entire body hurt, and then passed me and I was able to breathe again.
I held my sketchbook to my chest as if it could shield me from his words. It shouldn't bother me this much, what he was saying, except that it was true. My apartment was a piece of shit, and he thought it reflected me. I wanted to insist that that wasn't the case; I was only here because I couldn't afford anything else, but I stopped myself, fighting back tears. I was terrified of this man, why should I want his approval?
"Look at this? Garbage! Excrement!" He proclaimed, pinching his nose and pointing to the lamp on the end table by my couch. "The shade doesn't even match." He informed me despairingly a moment before he snatched it up and threw it savagely against the wall. The bulb shattered with a hiss and a pop, showering glass onto the couch. The rest of it, snapped into several pieces, clattered noisily to the floor.
I flinched at the sound, at the sudden savagery of his movements as he proceeded to overturn furniture or smash nick knacks, tossing things through my windows, kicking over my tiny television, slashing my couch. I could feel tears not far off and shrank into the corner. It was like watching him rip the skin from my own body. These were my things, this was my home and he was single handedly tearing it down as thougholy as he'd torn me apart with those snatched moments in Arkham. He was a blur of motion around me, cackling, the sound like ice shattering on concrete. The air was filled with dust and fluff; it clung to my hair and eyelashes and made me sneeze. I couldn't speak, couldn't move, watching in open-mouthed horror as he single-handedly destroyed everything in sight with disconcerting ease and even more fearsome enjoyment.
Eventually, he stopped, turning to regard me with a satiated grin. The pupils of his purple eyes were mere pinpricks, lending him an even more frenzied appearance, but he wasn't even breathing hard. He swept one had out in a grand gesture.
"There, isn't that better?" He asked as I stared in dismay at the wreckage that used to be my home. He strode towards me, lifting my chin with his fingertips, expression indulgent. I swallowed and opened my mouth to speak, but wound up gulping wordlessly. "My little Pearl shouldn't be trapped in such a dump. Why, look at all the pretty pictures you've drawn of me!" He continued, leaning close, his nose almost touching mine. "It's so nice to know you've been thinking of me." He purred, his breath warm on my face. He released my chin, trailing his fingers along the soft skin of my throat in a feather-light touch, taking my hand and pulling me flush against his chest, resting his other hand on my hip.
"I wish I knew how to repay you for being so very thoughtful." he cooed, his lips brushing against my ear as he spoke. I shivered, gripping his hand a bit in spite of myself. This couldn't seriously be happening again. What did I ever do to him? Hadn't I been nice enough? I though he'd liked getting all that extra dessert! Was he angry with me for something or was this his way of showing he actually did like someone? I barely noticed as he slid my sketchbook from my grip, setting it on the counter of my kitchenette without taking those frighteningly intense eyes off mine, holding me in place like a cobra would a mouse.
"I know just the thing." He said, snapping his fingers at the brilliance of his abrupt idea. "I'll take you away from all this, take you somewhere far more in keeping with your - artistic spirit." He announced, lowering his voice to a sensual whisper at his last comment.
"Of course, I'm sure the Big Bad Bat is already on his way here. We should leave him a little note, let him know where to find us." He informed me, a playing card materializing in his hand, too rapidly for me to discern how. There was something distinctly wrong about the card though; something sinister about the way it gleamed dully in the sickly light from the ceiling fan above us. I was numb with dread as he took my hand in his once more, lifting it and curling his fingers around mine only to slide them down to encircle my wrist, studying my hand minutely.
"Your finger has healed nicely." He remarked, reminding me of what he'd done last time we were alone together, how he'd brutally, easily, snapped the digit, laughing all the while. "Not even crooked at all."
Finally a sound escaped my constricted throat, a strangled sob. I stifled it quickly, not wanting him to be inspired to even greater cruelty. I'd heard stories of the things he'd done to people. I didn't want to be one of them.
Too late for that. I thought to myself. My fears were confirmed by the expression on his face, the menacing leer of his rictus grin, the low chuckle that bubbled past his lips, threatening to become full-fledged laughter. He was so close to me, lean and firm and warm. I could feel the fevered heat of his body through his fine purple suit His face brushed against mine. I felt something soft and wet and hot against my cheek and realized he was licking my tears from my skin. I hadn't even noticed until then, was shocked into awareness by the touch of his tongue.
A bright searing pain in my palm made me gasp and jerk in his grip, made him chuckle again. He'd slid the playing card along the inside of my hand, slicing it neatly open. My blood glimmered faintly along its razor edge, gathered wetly in my palm and ran down my arm in sickening rivulets.
"Laugh clown, laugh." He said, suddenly business-like, backing away to look me up and down, my hand half raised and cupping my own warm blood.
"What?" I asked stupidly, blinking up at him, the scent of my blood and the sticky warmth of it making my stomach churn.
"Laugh. Clown. Laugh." He said again enunciating each work carefully, his smile gone, and his voice glacial. I stared in dumbfounded silence a moment longer before realization dawned on me. Without further argument I stepped over the wreckage of my couch and close to the wall, smearing the words on the dirty white plaster. I felt sick with fear, shaking slightly. I could feel fresh tears running down my cheeks and wondered numbly what he'd do when he saw that. As I worked the Joker turned away, rummaging through my cabinets, emerging with a tumbler and a bottle of my Jack Daniels, pouring himself a generous amount and turning back to watch me work. His previous glass lay in a glimmering amber pool of shards on the floor.
"Beautiful." He murmured, taking an idle sip of whisky. "You really do have an artist's flair, Cupcake." I felt him come up behind me, pressing himself lightly against my back, one hand at my waist again as he bent to examine the sticky crimson mess I'd made. His chalk white cheek was a hair's breadth from mine, not quite brushing my skin, but close enough to send heat racing through my face. I was so acutely aware of his proximity, the smell of his cologne and his pomade, the soft his of his breath and the reek of whisky in the tumbler.
I wasn't prepared for this, for the closeness of him. The threat of him. I had expected terror and pain, and gotten them both, but not to the extent I'd thought I would. I hadn't expected him to be so sensual.
I didn't expect to be thrilled by it, and I didn't want to like it. I watched with slightly parted lips as he took my hand in his once more, lifting it slowly to his lips, his tongue darting out to teasingly lick the blood from my fingers, caressing each one with singular care. He should hold her eyes while he does that.
"Mmmm. You're tasty." He purred once he'd finished . A tiny whimper escaped my lips as I stared at him. He produced a silken handkerchief, lavender with mint polka dots, from his breast pocket and wrapped it gently around my hand, taking care with the knot, then patted my knuckles comfortingly.
"Come along now. Time to be off." He announced, his fingers tight around my wrist. Whistling a jaunty tune, he tossed back the rest of the whisky and dragged me towards the door. I cringed but didn't have the energy to fight him. My legs were strawberry jam and I was dizzy from all the blood I'd lost, smeared on the wall and already drying a sickly black. The door looked like a hungry mouth as I was pulled through it. Oh god, what next? I was being swallowed whole and there was no way back. Scream. Run! You can still get away! Slam the door on his arm! A small part of my brain shouted at me, but it wasn't really trying that hard. I was a bit of driftwood being dragged downstream. I didn't know how to get to shore.
OoOoOoOoOoOoO
Batman met Gordon and the coroner at the Gotham City Morgue, expression stony as his gaze met that of the other men. Laying on that cold metal slab was another person he hadn't been able to protect, a young woman who had a life, a family and friends. All of that had been taken from her, taken from them, by the Joker.
Why? For another sick joke. But what this time? Where was he going? What did he have planned now that he was out of Arkham?
It was eerily silent in the morgue, the room spotlessly clean and gleaming chrome. Batman found his gaze straying to the wall where dozens of little doors housed nooks where bodies could be hidden away. He hated the smell, the embalming fluid and disinfectants. He smelled it every time he failed, every time he came here for more clues because he wasn't smart enough, wasn't quick enough to stop a killer like the Joker in time.
"Batman, I think you should take a look at this." The coroner, a squat man with a neatly trimmed white beard, said suddenly, straightening. He pushed his glasses up further on the bridge of his nose and stepped back, allowing Batman to step closer, to peer down at the girl from the club.
She'd been cleaned up, her legs straightened to a more natural pose, the gash in her throat rinsed out, now raw and pink and surreal.
It was her pert, dead little mouth however that everyone, the coroner, Batman and Gordon, were all focused on.
Tentatively, Batman reached a gloved hand towards her face, parting her lips further. Her head tipped slightly to the side. Small white round objects poured from between her teeth like wine from a decanter.
Pearls.
They spilled over the side of the metal slab and bounced on the floor, rolling to a stop at Batman's feet.
It was a shame the only thing it made him think of was his mother. Of the night she was killed, of how hard it was for him. It was a shame that in that moment he could only think of himself when somewhere a young woman was in danger, a prop in one of the Joker's games.
OoOoOoOoOoOoO
The Laffco Warehouse was a broken cadaverous parody of a building, having closed down nearly twenty years ago. I'd never had the occasion or the inclination to visit the docks. Now that I was here all I could smell was piss and brine, even the Joker's cologne overpowered by the rank smell of rotting trash and dead fish.
Still, he seemed perfectly at ease, whistling a jaunty tune as he led me deeper and deeper into the remains of the Laffco building. It was like traversing the rotted corpse of a giant, everything around us dark and empty and brittle. He made a subtle gesture with one long-fingered, elegant hand, and strains of calliope music began to drift between the exposed timbers of the roof . It made me shudder. The lights came next, clicking on one by one. I caught a glimpse of some nondescript man in jeans and a beanie slip out a door at the far end of the warehouse. Hired goons, of course. Someone had to carry out the little things while the Joker amused himself.
We'd stopped walking, having reached our destination: an easel set up in the middle of the warehouse, a cart of paints and brushes beside it, a canvas already waiting.
"I kept that picture you drew of me back in Arkham." He informed me airily, as though by doing so he was conferring a favor. "But I'm afraid it got a bit damaged in the tussle between Bat-sap and myself after you'd scurried on home."
I turned a questioning glance towards him as he placed his hands on my shoulders, kneading gently, guiding me closer to the canvas and easel.
"I'd like you to paint me a new portrait." He said in reply to my look. I wanted to ask why he had to take me all the way here for that, why I couldn't have just painted him something at my apartment. But, I knew better than to risk saying anything that might make him angry. I was certain part of the reason I was still alive was because I hardly spoke at all.
I acquiesced with a small nod, taking up a brush and palette, my fingers scraping the tops of paint tubes, looking for the right colors. It was comforting, so natural. This was part of who I was, and I was good at it, not to put to fine a point on things. Maybe it could end here tonight. I would paint the Joker's portrait and get on with the shambles he'd made of my life.
"There's no red." I murmured, half turning back to look at him again.
"No? Oh my. We'll have to fix that, wont we?" He asked, his voice suddenly dark, heady with a vicious glee.
I didn't even have time to scream as he drew his Joker card across my throat coloring the canvas with a hot spray of red.