SHATTERED MIRRORS
Disclaimer:
If it's fictional, a work of art, and wears a ridiculous costume, I probably didn't create it. The characters used in this story belong to the geniuses who were crazy enough to think that a man in a bat costume fighting a clown would be cool. Of course, those jackasses were right.
The Batmobile streaked past the unusually quiet streets of Gotham. Everybody had locked themselves inside of their homes, waiting for the Joker to be apprehended and locked away before they could fill the streets and live their lives again. This was one of those nights where they were genuinely afraid of the city.
The Joker's car moved faster still, somehow always meters away from the Batmobile. He laughed the same familiar cackle that sent shivers down the city's spine.
"My, my, dear Batsy," he said, more to himself than Batman, "Thou art persistent, aren't you?"
From inside the Batmobile, the Dark Knight gritted his teeth. A dozen dead. Three dozen maimed. He was still being haunted by the reason he tried to keep Gotham clean from scum like the Joker. Tonight was another night for children to lose their parents. Parents to lose their children. Entire families to die in the hands of whichever madman had escaped from Arkham or Blackgate. It was an old cycle he wished he could break.
Gotham was filled with honest and brave people made to look bad by a few sick freaks. But it wasn't just a few anymore. It was morphing into a number he feared he could no longer contain. And amongst them all, the Joker stood out, laughing at his face, mocking him.
Batman could not help but wonder if the Joker was less culpable for the things he did. After all, the clown was insane. At least, when it was convenient: he had observed him acting in full consciousness more than once.
The Joker stopped his car in front of an alley and hurriedly got out, swallowed by the darkness as he sprinted deep into the shadows. Batman was right behind him.
The Joker's ragged breaths sounded more like exhilaration than exhaustion. He ran as fast as his legs could manage, looking back every once in a while to be assured that Batman was doing the same.
The old jog trot never grew stale. He never knew if he would be able to escape or land in Arkham. He wondered how many kisses he'd get this time around. Maybe he'll spend months in a body cast, eating through a straw. He never was sure with Batman. It was the same chase but the finish was always different. All he knew was that the vigilante would do anything and everything necessary to stop him. It was good to know that some things never changed.
After mere meters of running, Batman hurled a batarang, aiming for the Joker's leg. The clown heard the object soaring through the air and dodged it by crashing into a few garbage cans. Quickly, he got back up. Looking behind him, he saw the vigilante having already cut the distance between them in half.
He grinned and continued running.
"Stop," Batman yelled, "We could end this with neither one of us getting hurt."
The Joker laughed.
"Now, now, Batsy," He said, looking behind him, "I'm all about exploring new things, but this time it just won't do. Tradition is tradition. Plus, you need the exercise. You're looking a little flabby. Hahaha!"
He turned his attention back to the path in front of him, and almost crashed into a fence. But he was agile—more so than you would expect—leaping up and beginning to scale it. He was not fast enough. Batman grabbed him by the leg and yanked him back down.
The Joker crashed to the ground. He half-ran and half-crawled to avoid Batman, but another batarang found him. He was hit in the leg and stumbled over a pile of scrap wood. Undeterred, he took a nail-infested piece of wood out the pile and, holding it like a baseball bat, he prepared to swing.
"Batter up!" he shouted.
The Dark Knight ducked left and right, avoiding the Joker's swings, and kicked the clown in the wrist, making him lose his grip. The clown sighed.
"Hmph! Didn't even make it to third base!"
Further down the alley were a few empty beer bottles. Finding another weapon, the Joker grabbed one and expertly broke off the end against the wall. A grin stretched his face.
Batman dodged every one of the Joker's jabs except for the last and got stabbed in the leg. He grimaced in pain but cocked his fist back. He punched the Joker square in the jaw, then threw another haymaker that sent the Joker crashing into a wall.
"Eh," the Joker said. "Guess I should have just stuck with the classics. What do you think, Bats? Should we stick with the old antics or turn a new page in the Kama-Sutra. Hee hee."
He laughed as he squeezed the flower on his coat, squirting out acid. Batman barely avoided it in time, a crater-like hole in his cape a testament to that. Then the acid stopped.
"What the?" The Joker frantically squeezed the flower. "The little minx forgot to refill it again. Women. You can't trust them, you can't leave them to rot in prison. Oh, wait—you can! Haha! You see, this is the reason I left Harley at Arkham. Sometimes you just need some time alone with your guy friends. What say we shut the curtains and turn the music up? Heck, let's talk about our feelings!"
"Shut up," Batman said soberly. His fists tightened. "You just love hearing yourself talk, don't you?"
"Well, if you're gonna use that tone on me, then I guess we're not friends at all." The Joker suddenly threw razor-sharp playing cards. "We could still play poker though!"
One of the cards hit Batman on the arm, ripping through cloth and skin. He tore it out and avoided looking at the blood. He wasn't disgusted or scared by it—blood was the most normal part of his day—but he was just so sick of the color. It was the same shade of red in the Joker's grin. The same one he had seen more times than anyone should.
The Joker ran fast while his foe was distracted by injury.
"Aww come on," the Joker said. "Don't tell me you can't handle a little blood. You've gone soft. Crooks these days, huh? But I can bring the thrill back to that dull life of yours. I'm always prepared to play hard to get." Once again, he mounted over the fence and this time dropping down on the other side. "Do you realize we've been doing this for a decade now?" he asked, not bothering to look behind him. "Heh. This must have been the longest I've been locked up. I'm beginning to get sentimental. Haha."
In front of him was a wealth of fly-tipped furniture. He hopped over a few garbage cans and found a large antique mirror. After smashing it into a thousand pieces, he took the sharpest shard he could see.
Batman drew level. The Joker stabbed him in the stomach twice.
"Ten more years of this can drive you crazy, bats," the Joker said. "But I always keep my cell warm, just in case. Haha."
The Dark Knight managed to dodge the third lunge and counterpunch the Joker, watching him bang into the wall and crash on the other shards that lined the alleyway like surreal confetti.
They could barely breathe now. The Joker let out a wheezy laugh, gasping for air in between 'ha's'. Batman's fist tightened with enough tension to strangle a man to death.
"Wait a second," said the Joker, still laughing. "Let me... haha… let me catch my breath." He took a large gulp of air. "You know, Batsy, no one can work me out the way you do... Not even Harley, hehe... Guess I'm a tad out of shape, myself. Arkham isn't exactly gym central. Haha!"
Batman gritted his teeth.
"There's nothing you don't laugh at, is there?" Batman said. "You make me sick. The people you've murdered, the lives you've ruined. And for what? A joke?"
"Your attention," the Joker said, getting to his feet like some demented Lazarus.
"You just don't get tired of this, do you? This endless routine. You don't even stop to think about the people you've murdered in cold blood, you just keep on going."
He looked into the Joker's eyes. Every time he looked into those eyes he saw rage and excitement. Anger and madness. Chaos and mischief. But that's just because that's what he wanted to see. He did not like looking into those eyes because he did not understand what they meant. He couldn't understand how—even after all that madman had done, all the people he had killed, all the chaos he had inspired—every time he looked into those eyes, he saw love. The kind that boggled the mind. The kind he wasn't sure existed. Love as depraved and demented as the Joker.
Batman sighed.
"It's revenge, isn't it?" he said. "For what I did."
The Joker's smile disappeared. The clown looked down at the shattered pieces of glass on the ground.
"That night in Ace Chemicals," Batman said, "I could have done something to save you, but I let you fall into that vat of acid. And now you're trying to make my life a living hell because of it. But I don't blame you. I could have prevented this. All of it."
"Did you?" said the Joker, staring at his reflection. "Well? Did you?"
"No. I didn't." Batman looked away. "I'm sorry."
"Sorry?" The Joker shifted his gaze up to Batman. "Did you just say what I think you did?" A smile crept up his face. "Apologies... Ha! Pathetic. Take a mirror and throw it to the ground..." He motioned to the shards of glass, "What happens? It breaks. Now, say sorry to it, then what happens? Nothing. See? It can't undo the damage. You keep staring at the broken pieces of the glass, unable to take your eyes off of it. Then everything becomes clear. The damage has already been done.
"'Sorry', it's a selfish word, isn't it? It makes you feel better for the sins you've done in the past, but it doesn't fix anything. Oh, they tell you that it does; but, alas, it's really doesn't. Candy floss, sugarcoat, and all that malarkey, blah! Yesterday's news! But you know all about that, don't you? All the lives you've ruined. You've scarred this city, with us you've scarred this city. And you say you're not like us." The Joker erupted in maniacal laughter for almost a minute before collecting himself.
"I don't hate you, so don't apologize, Batman. You can't apologize for what fate had intended to happen. We all have that one bad day! Who knows, I might have even caused yours! So don't go brooding over the haunting memories of the past! What's important is where we are right now. You're Batman, I'm Joker, and we're sitting on the powder keg we call home. Let's shake on it." The Joker offered a gloved hand. "To a long and bloody friendship."
He did not expect the Dark Knight to shake his hand. That would not be his Batman. He knew the vigilante better than anyone. He knew all the right buttons to push. He knew how to challenge him. He smirked.
"I won't stop," Batman said. "I'll never stop. I'm responsible for this. And I will find a way to help you. Then, I can forgive myself for all the deaths I've caused."
"I know you won't stop," the Joker said, his grin turning from playful to mischievous. "And I love you for it. You're a man after my own heart."
He laughed hysterically. He laughed then laughed harder, then even harder than that, taking no pauses for breath. His laughter was like a barrage of explosives drowning out the silence. Afterwards, he coughed so hard that he expected blood to come out. Then he continued to laugh again.
Batman turned his back at the Joker, and walked away. He loathed when the clown laughed like that. It was a laugh that chilled his bones. Every soul he failed to save was part of it. Every. Last. One.
Love. He did not believe the Joker knew the meaning of the word. A cold hearted madman, the Joker was devoid of any genuine human emotion. He knew them only as words used to manipulate and torture. And yet, it was a thought that kept Batman up at night.
The Joker stopped laughing.
"You know, Batsy," he called after Batman. "I think we're destined to do this forever..."
He slowly took out a revolver from inside his coat and removed the safety.
"And ever…"
He pointed the gun at Batman and cocked the hammer.
"And..."
His finger squeezed the trigger gently.
"Ever."
He fired dead centre of his adversary's head.
Batman jerked his head out of the bullet's path and replied in kind with a batarang, hitting the madman's hand. The Joker dropped the gun, blood trickling down his fingers.
Their gazes met. Batman looked away and the Joker let out a dark laugh.
"Don't tell me you don't think so too, Mister holier-than-thou," the clown said. "You'll never kill me. Not in a million years would you cross that line. You're stuck in your own twisted little world, where your morality and sense of self-righteousness make it seem like killing me is such a bad thing. And I thought I was irrational. Haha. Do you think about killing me, Batman? Subjecting me to every kind of horrendous torture under the sun while you wonder what the worst way for me to die is? I think the same way about you. But you just don't have the guts to do it, do you? And I have nothing better to do than make you miserable for not killing me in the first place. And thus, our game never ends."
He looked at the ground, staring at the shards of glass as Batman approached him. His smile disappeared.
"But we aren't that lucky, are we?" he said. "Heh. We'll die, we'll be forgotten, like everybody else. I guess that's the sad truth, isn't it? Buried six feet underground, no better than worm food. C'est la vie, I guess."
Batman followed his gaze and looked down at the shards of glass.
"But I'll be damned if it's not me who kills you," the Joker said. "Or you who kills me."
His smile reappeared.
"That's just as good as living forever, don't you think?"
He went silent. Batman said nothing. The air grew colder as they both stared at their reflections, covered in blood.
A/N
Special thanks to JackOwens1860 for beta-ing this and for giving me a more twisted and Jokerish term for bruises: kisses! Just brilliant! Check out his stories. He is a much better writer than I am.
Also, hurray for my first story featuring our favorite hero! If you liked it, feel free to leave a review. If you think it is the worst piece of garbage ever to be laid eyes on, then by all means, I would like to hear your opinion. Just no flaming please.
Another also, just so we are clear, I did not write the Joker to be a homosexual, being that I do not know what he is. It is hard to label a character who reinvents himself everyday (except if that label is psychopath, lunatic, madman, or something similar). If you think of him as a homosexual, that is perfectly fine; I am not at all homophobic. I simply love Harley too much to portray her beloved as a homosexual.
And by the by, just a trivial piece of information: every time I read this, I imagine three different Joker voices. It starts out with Hammil, then Ledger, then Emerson near the end. Which voice did you hear?