Author's Note: Hey, everyone. I just wanted to let you know that this is my first fic ever (!) and I'm really glad it was a Harley/Joker fic. I'm an avid reader of H/J fics and I've been wanting to write my own story for ages. So please leave me some reviews and try not to flame me too bad. Thanks! :)
Harley stepped tentatively into the cold, gray lobby of the asylum. This was to be her first day as a resident at Arkham Asylum, a first in the field given her young age. At twenty-two she had already earned her degree in psychiatry and been accepted at Arkham after a very brief internship at the Metropolis Mental Health Institute.
MMHI had offered her a position at the end of her internship but Harley wanted more than the textbook schizophrenic. She wanted a challenge. She wanted danger. All of that awaited her at Arkham. She had already put a security deposit down on a cheap one-bedroom apartment located dangerously close to but not actually in the Narrows. She spent the majority of her internship moving her belongings out of her parents house in Metropolis and into her new, humble dwelling. She was on her own for the first time in her life. It was exciting. Of course, that was the whole reason she had come to Gotham.
Harley nervously approached the front desk and cleared her throat, causing the receptionist to look up.
"Can I help you with something?" She asked with a hint of annoyance.
"Yes," Harley responded in a high voice, her accent slipping through in her nervousness. "I'm Harlee-- sorry, Dr. Harleen Quinzel. I have an appointment with Dr. Leland."
The woman quickly scanned her computer.
" Ah yes, here you are. Take those elevators to the third floor. Take a left and her office is the second on the right. Have you got that?"
Harley nodded.
"I'll let her know you're here."
"Thank you." Harley said, her voice now steady and her false non-regional accent now back in place.
She headed to the elevator and pressed the UP button. An orderly joined her, carrying a folded up biohazard suit under one arm. Harley stole a sideways glance at the suit. The orderly noticed.
"Biological warfare." He said simply.
"Ah." She replied, though she had no clue what that meant. Apparently it read on her face because the orderly elaborated.
"When an inmate uses bodily fluids as a weapon. That's what they call it in prisons at least."
The elevator doors slid open shakily. Harley and the orderly stepped in simultaneously and the doors closed behind them.
"So you worked at Blackgate, then?"
"Six years, yeah. I started working here about two years ago." He replied, shifting the suit to the other arm.
"How do you like it?"
"Well the inmates are definitely more dangerous because, pardon my French, they just don't give a fuck. Half the time they're so far gone they don't even know what they're doing. But the pay is good and it's pretty enjoyable as long as you don't mind a little excitement." He smiled charmingly at her.
She knew that smile. She had seen it enough times in her life to know what it meant. Before she could give any kind of response the elevator door dinged open. Harley stepped out and continued down the left corridor.
"See you around!" The orderly called as the doors closed on him.
"Yeah." She answered halfheartedly.
She stopped in front of the door marked "Dr. Joan Leland: Head of Psychiatry" and knocked softly two times. A voice from within called, "Come in!" and Harley entered tentatively.
Dr. Joan Leland sat behind her old Mahogany desk, looking seriously at a file, her small rectangular glasses perched on the edge of her nose. She glanced over her frames at Harley and set down her papers.
"Harleen Quinzel?"
"Please, call me Harley. Everyone does."
"Please, have a seat, Harley." Dr. Leland gestured to the seat across from her. Harley stepped forward and sat down. She looked at the older woman in front of her.
Dr. Leland's eyes were stern but fair. Although her hair was black it had faded to gray in some places, revealing her age. She was the antithesis of Harley.
Joan was dark, hard, wise and mature where Harley was young, fair, and incredibly naïve.
"Tell me, Harley. What compelled you to want to work in a place like Arkham?"
"Well the human mind has always fascinated me." Harley answered, immediately regretting it. Of course that's why she was here.
"Well certainly everyone here would agree with you on that. I guess more specifically I'd like to know why you've chosen to apply for the criminal unit." Joan removed her glasses and stared directly at the pretty young girl before her. This was the question she so desperately wanted answered. Pretty young girls weren't interesting in the criminally insane, even in the field of psychology.
"Well what kind of mind is more fascinating than that of the criminally insane? There's so much we can learn by just listening to the way they think and rationalize."
Harley felt confident that her answer was the right one, not to mention it was how she truly felt.
"Please, don't be nervous, Harley. As you know, you've already been given the position. I just wanted to satisfy my own curiosity. Please excuse me."
"No problem. I don't mind answering a few questions about myself." Harley said happily.
Dr. Leland shuffled through the papers scattered across her desk. She heaved a sigh and pinched the bridge of her nose.
"Is something the matter, Dr. Leland?" Harley tried to sound concerned but really she was just curious.
"You can just call me Joan, if you please." Harley nodded her agreement. "We've just got an extremely difficult patient on our hands. In your own unit as it happens. Though I doubt you'll be dealing with him. He's maximum security and you're on probation, being a new employee."
Harley's ears perked up. That was the kind of patient she wanted to work with. The probation period was a minor setback. Though she could just wait it out, Harley wasn't really known for her patience. However she did have a knack for getting past such formalities. That was her second mission for the week. Her first would be to find out who this extremely difficult, maximum security patient was.
"Why don't we take a tour of the criminal unit and get you oriented?" Joan asked, pulling Harley from her musings.
"Sounds good to me." Harley said.
Both women stood up and Joan led the way out the door.
They had taken the elevator up to the tenth floor; the minimum security unit for the criminally insane. The walls were line with generously sized 9x9 cells. The doors to each cell were made of 9x9 electronically sealed double-paned bulletproof glass. Harley glanced into the cells as they walked past. Joan was going on about safety precautions but Harley wasn't really paying attention anymore. Something green had caught her eye. She stepped closer to one of the cells on her right while Joan kept walking, oblivious.
There seemed to be a warmth emanating from the cell, unlike the others. Inside, a woman sat on the cot bolted to the wall. When she noticed Harley staring, she set down the potted plant she had been holding and stood up. She was Amazonian in stature, standing a head taller than Harley. Her legs made up nearly half her body and, given the strange, pale green hue of her skin, it gave a whole new meaning to the phrase "Nice stems". Her hair flowed long and unbelievably red down her back. She stared intensely and curiously at Harley with eyes that could be only truly described as violet.
"Ah yes," Joan said from behind Harley, startling them both. "This one is being released tomorrow on good behavior and sound mental state. I myself am rather suspicious of the latter, but I am not the only member on the board. If my suspicions are correct, you'll be seeing her back here before long."
Joan continued down the hallway and Harley saw the entrancing green woman shoot a vicious glare at her before she followed after. That look led Harley to believe Joan's suspicions were correct. She was sure the green woman wouldn't agree but this notion rather pleased Harley. She hoped she would get a chance to talk to her. Certainly she must have quite a story to tell.
They had reached the end of the corridor and Joan was now facing Harley, a heavy metal door labeled STAIRS directly behind her.
"Now I'm going to take you upstairs," she told the girl. "Because it's important you know where everything is, and in case of emergency, all residents on the unit must respond. This includes you. But under no other circumstances should you be on the maximum security floor. Do you understand?"
Harley gave a hard nod, barely containing her excitement about entering the maximum security floor. With that, Joan pushed open the metal door and they began their ascension.
The maximum security floor had far fewer cells, making it appear that the classification was a special privilege of sorts. There were five cells on each wall before the hall stopped short. At the far end was a large set of thick, metal double doors. There were a handful of guards mulling about the floor, occasionally looking into the cells to check on the inhabitants. Something about it made Harley feel rather sick, as if they were checking on dying animals.
"Make sure you stay in the center of the hall. You don't want to excite them." Joan said, beginning to walk forward.
Harley quickly followed, a million questions forming in her head. What patients were housed here? How did they earn max. sec. status? Which one was the 'extremely difficult' patient Joan spoke of before? And what was behind those big double doors?
Joan was talking about preliminary probation and the many dangers of working with someone in max. sec.
"They'd eat a novice like you for breakfast." Harley heard her say.
It had seemed that there was a whistling that had been in the back of her mind ever since arriving on the eleventh floor. Now she could tell it was coming from the fourth cell on the left. When they reached it though, the lights inside were switched off, making it appear unoccupied. Disobeying Joan's order, Harley walked right up to the glass, attempting to peer in. When she put her hand up to the glass to try to shield the light from the hall, the whistling stopped. Harley peered inside. She could hardly make out the figure of a man. He shifted and Harley could make out the vague outlines of his dace. The dark space where his eyes would be, the straight line of his nose. Then the light glinted off something in the area that would be his mouth. Was he smiling at her?
Harley snapped out of her daze and caught up with Joan before the good doctor noticed she was gone. Just as Harley had fallen into stride with Joan, the older doctor stopped in front of the big double doors and turned to the girl.
"… but you won't be needing this facility." She continued. It seemed Harley had missed the explanation of the room behind those heavy looking doors. "Well, that's just about everything. Why don't we head down to level nine and get you settled in?"
"What's on level nine?" Harley asked, confused.
"The criminal unit offices. Didn't I say that?" She probably had but Harley hadn't really been listening.
"Oh, that's right, you did." Harley said, covering her ass. "I guess I blanked there for a second. All that information, you know?"
Joan didn't respond. Instead, she walked directly past Harley to the elevators on the wall opposite the whistling inmate. Harley of course followed.
"Who was that inmate who was whistling?" Harley inquired.
"The Joker." Joan stated simply.
"The one who-"
"Yes. I really can't say any more about it. I'm sorry." Joan said, keeping her eyes trained on the elevator door.
Harley watched the floor numbers light up, changing from ten to nine. The door slid open and they exited.
"All of these rooms are the offices of your colleagues on the unit. All other rooms are clearly marked. You'll have enough time today to sort them all out." Joan said.
She stepped in front of a wooden door marked "Dr. Jonathan Crane: Head of Internal Medicine, Criminal Unit".
"Normally I would show you the other rooms but I'm actually running late for an appointment. I'm terribly sorry."
"Oh don't be. I'm sure I can find my way around." Harley said, though she wasn't sure where her office was supposed to be.
"Okay, well before I go, this is your office." She pointed to the office behind her. "Maintenance hasn't gotten around to changing the names yet. Cafeteria is on the fifth floor. You can't miss it. It's the only thing there. I've really got to run now but stop by my office before you leave." Joan was halfway down the hall before she even finished talking.
Harley entered her new office and was surprised to see it was already furnished. It looked like something out of a magazine. Everything in its place yet eerily unlived in. The room held no identity of the person who used to work here. It was as if this Dr. Crane had gone through Ikea and randomly picked out one of everything needed to fill an office and then never returned to the room again. Surely the patients couldn't have enjoyed their sessions in here. Harley added another item to her list of goals for the week. She would have to buy something to make her office a little more homey, perhaps some flowers.
She crossed the room and sat down in the large brown leather chair behind her new desk. It was hard and uncomfortable and desperately needed to be broken in. She began rummaging through the desk drawers, coming up with very little other than stray notes written in the classic illegible chicken scratch only doctors seemed to possess. The bottom drawer was locked. Curious to know the contents of the drawer, Harley got down on the floor, removing a bobby pin from her neat bun and proceeded to stick it in the lock. Harley knew nothing about lock picking, especially with such rudimentary tools, but it really couldn't be that hard, could it?
She twisted and turned the pin. She tweaked it this way, bent it that way. When the lock still wouldn't give, she grew frustrated and began to take it out on the lock. Suddenly her stomach gave a loud, hungry growl, causing Harley to jump and break the pin off in the lock.
"Well there goes that plan." She said aloud.
She looked at her watch. 2:45. No wonder she was hungry, she had missed lunch. Giving up on the drawer, Harley decided to obey her stomach and find the cafeteria.
Joan didn't lie. When you stepped off the elevator onto the fifth floor, you were already in the cafeteria. It was understandable that it would take up an entire floor. It did have to accommodate every single patient in the asylum. At this time though, the cafeteria was nearly deserted. There were a few stragglers, with accompanying orderlies, but that was all. On each side of the large room there were buffet lines--one hot, one cold--manned by cafeteria staff. On the wall furthest from Harley, though, there was a nurses' station. It reminded her of the one seen in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and she had to suppress a giggle, lest she be mistaken for a patient. The nurses' station was undoubtedly for those patients who needed to take their meds with a meal. It was closed up now of course.
Harley made her way over to the hot food line and filled her tray. She paid the portly woman at the end of the buffet and turned towards the tables. She had just spotted one that wasn't too filthy and was heading to it when someone called "Hey!" Harley turned around and saw the orderly from earlier jogging up to her. She let him catch up before returning the greeting.
"I'm glad I ran into you," He said. "I never got your name. I'm Charlie, by the way."
"Harleen." She said, walking backwards toward the clean table.
"That's a strange name. Is it German?"
Harley had heard these words a million times by nearly everyone she met. Her stomach growled again.
"Uh, I don't know. My mom made it up." She replied, still backing up. "I'm actually about to eat my lunch so-"
"Oh I'm sorry. Let's sit down."
He took a towel from his pocket and wiped down the table on his right and gestured for Harley to sit down. She looked back at the other table and reluctantly sat down across from Charlie.
"So what brings you to Arkham Asylum? You haven't admitted yourself, I hope."
"No, I just started as a resident on the criminal unit."
"Impressive. How old are you, if you don't mind my asking?"
"Twenty-two." Harley answered.
Charlie whistled low. She hoped that if she kept her answers short and factual, he would get the hint and leave her alone.
"I'm twenty-eight." He said.
Harley tipped her head in acknowledgement and continued eating her chicken sandwich that had already grown cold. She could feel him watching her, as if expecting something. She looked up at him, mid-chew.
"So what do you do for fun, Harleen?" There was that charming smile again.
"Don't know, haven't had the time." It was true.
Between work/interning and moving, she had had time for little else. She didn't feel the need to explain this, though. She really just wanted to finish her meal in peace and get back to her office.
"Aw, that sucks. Everyone should make time for fun."
Harley wrapped her leftover brownie in a napkin and shoved it in her coat pocket and stood.
"I really have to be getting back to work." She said.
"Oh, okay. Well, nice talking to you!" He called, as she was already halfway across the cafeteria.
Harley rummaged through her purse for the keys that she had just received to be able to unlock her office. She felt around blindly, her hands trying to follow the sound of her jangling keys. Just as she was about to give up and dump out the contents of her purse, they found their way into her grasp and she pulled them out triumphantly.
Door now unlocked, she stepped inside and switched on the light. It was only four pm but winter nights in Gotham got dark quickly. She shut the door and hung her white lab coat on the back. When she turned back toward her desk, she saw something strange.
Sitting in the middle of her desk was a slender, blue vase with a tag tied around its neck. In the vase was a single rose. Harley looked around, confused. Who could've gotten in here? The door had been locked. She approached the vase warily and held up the card.
It read: Come up and see me sometime. -J
Harley took the note and made her way quickly up to max. sec.
So I know, not really much Joker in this chapter, just a little cameo. Though I promise the next chapter will be loaded. The task of writing the Joker is a little daunting so I'm trying my best. I felt this chapter went by a little quickly and I'm trying to slow down what happens a bit. What do you think, was it too fast? By the way, I don't really have a plot laid out for this story. I write best by just putting pen to paper and seeing what happens so whatever happens, I'll be just as surprised as you!
Please, lots of reviews! :D
-Chelsea