Q and A

by IrvingDiedriech

Oneshot : Scarecrow and Joker have nothing better to do but wait to be found and try not to kill one another.

** A/N my first story in a long time, and my second writing Joker and Scarecrow together. Well not together together.. you know what I mean. Mainly early DC comics Crane with overtones of B:TAS, and a Joker who started out Nolan and veered towards Mark Hamill more with every hour I spent playing Arkham City. None of it's mine, yadda yadda. Thanks to NightMonkey for 'Mop Man' - I know that's not how you meant it but it tickled me, hope you're not offended **

"So, you wanna play a game?"

Jonathan Crane sighed heavily and closed his eyes, willing away a headache. This was exactly why he operated alone, especially when the operation in question was 'Break out of Arkham without being caught.' Unfortunately, at the last minute the Joker had stuck his nose into his plans - and despite his hatred of company, Crane figured it was always best to go along with Joker. Especially when he had a penknife in his hand.

"No"

"Are.. are you sure? 'Cause it's going to get dull down here"

"I think we're up here, actually. Of course since you dropped that schematic, we could be anywhere"

"Still dull. Come on Doc, I wanna play a game!"

"So did Saw, it didn't end well"

"K..." Joker stopped bouncing on his heels and sat down on the other side of the dank space they occupied "Soooo... you want to try and get out of here?"

"No, I want to do the most sensible thing under the circumstances, which galling though it is, is wait for people to notice we're gone"

"And then?"

"To figure out that we probably haven't left the Asylum grounds"

"And then?"

"They'll alert the Bat, he'll come and find us"

"And then?"

"We ask Batman very nicely to put us back in our cells and go with him quietly, or he'll probably break every bone in our bodies"

"Aaaaaaand theeeeen!"

"And then you shut your mouth so that I can concentrate on not dying of thirst before we get rescued by the man I spend my life trying to thwart, and not have him walk in here and find a dead clown and guilty-looking Scarecrow"

The Joker paused, looking thoughtful,

"And then?"

"Will you stop saying 'and then' for goodness sakes! Why do you keep doing that anyway, apart from the fact that it's deeply annoying?"

"Oh so he tunes in for the torture porn, but a little road movie like 'Dude Where's My Car' is far too lowbrow for the great and terrible Dr Crane""

"The last time I watched anything of the sort was whilst strapped down to a bed in the infirmary, after Batman had broken my jaw. On balance the jaw-breaking punch was more enjoyable than the entertainment"

Much to Crane's relief, Joker seemed to find the idea of somebody not enjoying movies that centered around exactly the sort of college student that Crane had taken enormous pleasure in failing so baffling that he had actually shut up. In the few precious minutes of peace, he fell into his standard track of self-pitying disgust at the idea that this could actually come off.

He'd been piecing the idea together for weeks, ever since Junkyard Dog had asked if he might be interested in a grimy scrap of paper he'd found in whatever section of the Asylum they had foolishly let him loose in this week. Quickly realising that the scrap was part of a schematic of Arkham's long-abandonned northwest section, he had promised Dog half his food rations if he kept looking for more pieces. It had taken eight weeks, 56 missed meals, and a lot of planning, but finally Crane had been able to put together enough to constitute a map. Some of the passages looked precarious to say the least, and he'd have to switch to the ventilation systems for some of the way, but he was relatively certain he could make it out.

It would have possibly worked, too. Then there had been the head thrust over the shoulder in the TV room, where for some probably accidental good behaviour Joker was currently allowed to spend an hour each day. After that, there had been no question of going without Joker in tow. Crane had no problems making it through the awkward bends of partially collapsed corridors, into ventilation shifts, and through small spaces, for once his lanky physique worked to his advantage. Though by no means burly, Joker still couldn't quite fit himself through one particularly tricky gap - and of course, since he had claimed he was clearly better at map-reading because he didn't wear glasses, he had been holding the schematic. The one that he had dropped in a puddle of stagnant water in the process of trying to force himself through a gap too small for him, and which had disintegrated the moment they tried to pick it up.

After insisting he remembered the way for what seemed like hours, Joker had led them into one blind alley after another, until Crane had finally lost patience and sat down on the floor of one of the fallen-in rooms they came to, refusing to move. Just at the moment, he quite fancied the idea of sitting in this cold room slowly starving to death, as long as he could do it without Joker yapping in his ear. Sadly though, Joker had said he couldn't possibly abandon him to that fate, and insisted on staying.

"How about that game then?" came a quiet murmur from across the room, "You can choose"

"I don't know any games" the Professor intoned hollowly, "If we must, you choose"

"K, right - this is really simple, you'll get it easy. See that hole in the floorboards?"

"Which particular one?"

"The one right over there, almost out of sight"

"Yes," Crane sighed again, "What about it?"

"There's a bunch of loose gravel over here. You get one in, you get to ask me a question. I get one in, I get to ask you a question"

"That is probably the most idiotic, childish, unevolved 'game' I have ever heard of, is that really the best you could come up with?"

"We could play spin the penknife. I don't have a bottle. But there's only the two of us so it would get a little predictable. Ah c'mon, Ed would play if he was here"

"Edward would get us out of here, if he was here"

"How, by outsmarting the rocks into moving? No you called it - we should just wait for Batsy to come find us. Meantime I really don't think you want me to get bored. I get all.. y'know, antsy and I'd hate to have to cut bits off you to amuse myself"

"Can't we play 'Joker sits quietly whilst Dr Crane gets a little rest'?"

"After. First you gotta play this game with me, honest it'll be fun"

Heaving the next long-suffering sigh up from somewhere near his boots, Crane reluctantly reached out and took the handful of gravel Joker held out to him, reminding himself that it was this or get turned into Fillet-o-Scarecrow, and aimed one somewhere in the direction of the out-of reach hole. To his great surprise it went neatly through.

Joker whooped with what seemed very uneccessary enthusiasm, and began to bounce in place again

"You've got to ask me a question now!"

"What question?"

"One about me - something you've always wanted to know about me"

"Do I really? Because honestly, there's nothing I need or want to know about you. As a research subject you're useless, as a case study you're frankly dull since you're fundamentally undiagnosable, you're not even treatable, why should I care?"

"Because I'm sitting over here with a rusty knife, and you're not playing my game right."

"Oh for God's sakes. Fine, what's your favourite colour?"

Joker gave him a pitying look, and blinked slowly at him

"Doc, when did you last get your eye prescription renewed?"

"Oh alright, I suppose your favourite colour is clearly purple"

"It's green"

"I asked a bloody question, now it's your turn"

Joker tossed a piece of gravel, which skimmed the hole and scooted over to another dip in the floor

"Damn. Your turn"

Another throw, another rattling that indicated Crane had got another one down.

"Will you really answer anything I ask?"

"You have my solemn vow"

"OK," he thought for a moment, determined to use this stupid game to some useful purpose "Have you always been afraid of nothing?"

"Nope. One afternoon my dad found the stray dog I'd hidden in my room, and left it in my bed Mafia-style. Wasn't scared of anything after that"

"Why not?"

"Ah-ah-ah Dr Nosey, one win, one question, and it's my turn"

This time, the pebble that Joker tossed fell straight through the floorboards, and he grinned at Crane before licking his lips and asking

"What did you get called at school apart from Scarecrow?"

"How did you know they -"

"Because it's obvious. Answer the question"

"All sorts... bookworm, nerd, twig-boy, stickman, beakface, mop-man -"

"Mop-Man? Damn that's a good one, I never thought of that one!"

Riled, Crane tossed his piece angrily and scored

"You thought of all the others though?"

"Oh yeah, it's a pretty popular sport on Maximum: better names for unpopular supercriminals. Apparently there's already a Bookworm though so that got disqualified, but I really like Mop-Man, it's bang on"

"Wonderful. Even in Arkham Asylum I'm the one who gets picked on, isn't that just perfect. Just throw."

"In - what's your favourite ice-cream flavour?"

"I don't have one." Throw. Score.

"Did you ever -"

"Hey hold on! You didn't answer my question! You lose a turn AND you have to answer"

"What? I answered your question!"

"You didn't give me a valid answer to 'what's your favourite ice-cream flavour?' - you've got to pick one"

"You're making these rules up as you go along"

"It's my game. Now What Is -"

"I don't have one!" Crane yelled, loud enough to make a tiny trickle of plaster fall from the sagging roof "I loathe ice-cream, cream, milk, and anything even slightly reminiscent of dairy produce, as would you if you had been forced to drink three tall glasses of buttermilk every damned day!"

"Even mayonnaise?"

"Mayonnaise is made from eggs, you dolt. And you just used up your free question, so it's MY turn"

Crane pitched his piece with such violence that instead of dropping into the hole as intended, it riccoched off the opposite wall and pinged Joker in the lapel, making the clown chuckle to himself and mutter "Good shot." His own, calmly-thrown piece rattled snugly through the opening.

"When you say forced..."

"I mean told to do or spend the night out in the atrium, where the deliberately-maddened crows could get a good sniff of the avian-infuriating toxin all over me. My interest in the properties of hallucinogenic terror-inducing chemicals is the single good thing that runs in my family"

Throw. In. "Why are you asking me these horrible questions?"

"I'm asking pretty reasonable questions, as it happens. How was I supposed to know you had a traumatic childhood memory linked to ice-cream somehow? I mean aside from the fact you've got a childhood trauma for every occassion"

"That's unfair! You have no IDEA what it was like!"

"That's kind of why I'm asking"

Crane clenched his fists and tried to form some sort of furious retort, but found himself ensnared in Joker's illogical logic, and simply dropped his hands limply, resigning himself to whatever came next. There really was little point fighting the inevitable.

Toss. In. "Who was it locked you in with a bunch of Angry Birds? And was it anything like the game?"

"One question, Joker. To answer the first, it was my grandmother. She brought me up on her farm and she neither spared the rod nor spoiled the child. She also had an unsatisfied streak of creativity."

A wobbly throw left Crane's piece teetering on the edge before it rattled down

"How did you get the scars on your face?"

"I got cut with a sharp knife once"

"Wait! That's not -"

"Can you deny that it's the truth, or say I didn't answer your question?"

"No, but..."

"Then it's my turn, my friend"

"No, bugger this game. You're changing the rules as you go and making me spill my guts, and not telling me a bloody thing about yourself! It's not fair, and I'm not going to play any more!"

"You know you sound like, five, right Doc?"

"I do not care a fig whether I sound like a child, I am NOT playing this ridiculous so called game with you!"

Crane bellowed, causing more plaster to sprinkle down, and a portion of the partially-collapsed doorway they had come through suddenly become fully collapsed. When the dust had settled enough for him to be able to see, Crane looked over to find Joker brushing a little plaster off his cuff, still sitting perfectly calmly where he had been, looking over at him expectantly.

"Can I have my turn now?"

"No. You asked your question when you asked if I knew if I sounded like a five-year old child."

"So you are still playing!"

"What? No! I..." Crane let his head fall forward limply onto his knees, and almost gave himself a black eye in the process, "I will play. But I want you to know, I'm only playing in the hope that you will irritate me into a stroke and I can finally get some peace and quiet whilst unconscious"

Crane half-heartedly tossed a pebble toward the opening, scoring an easy in

"What was your mother like? And I mean it, tell me about her properly"

Joker licked his lips a couple of times, seemingly deep in thought, before beginning quietly

"She was the prettiest lady I ever saw. She had this long, long blonde hair - natural, I think, and she just had the nicest smile." he paused, twitching the smile he had so clearly not inherited, "she loved to wear yellow, and it looked great on her. She was always happy, except when my father came home drunk and kicked her around, and she wasn't so pretty after a while"

"That's... nice. I didn't expect that"

"Yeah well even supercriminals have a little love somewhere in their heart," he heaved a sigh, and almost casually threw his piece straight in, "same question - what was Mommy Crane like?"

"Well for a start she wasn't 'Mommy Crane,' - apart from that... well I don't know what she was like. She gave me to my grandmother. I only really saw her once that I remember. She had red hair, I- I forget the rest" Crane turned his face a little more to hide the blush, hide that he knew far more, "I don't look like her"

"Geez Doc, if you *did* look like your Mom I'd kinda wonder how you ever got here unless someone put a feedbag on her head. Hey... wait a second! Is that where you got the idea?"

At the stinging look of hatred Crane flung his way, Joker put his hands up to signal innocence and said

"I'm sorry - I'm sorry... I'm just kiddin' around, K? I mean *helloooo* Joker here! Always with the joking around! Tell you what let's just drop the pebble part, we're low anyhow. Just have a question. Go on, anything"

Crane stared at him for a while, until a nasty, malicious light began to grow in his eyes and the corners of his lips twitched in an unpleasant smirk

"What did you do to make Harley walk out on you in the end?"

"Oh now that, that is *not* a fair question"

"Why not? You said anything. You've been probing some deep wounds of mine, what say we even the balance a little?"

"No nonono, you don't get it. It's not fair because you can't ask a question you already know the answer to"

"But I -"

"Like if you asked 'what's the word for the fear of long words?' then it wouldn't be a fair question, because you already know the answer is '' so it's not fair"

"How do you know that word?"

"The fear of long words is a really long word, of course I know something that funny. Have you ever diagnosed one of those? Seriously, I would LOVE to do that!"

"You're avoiding my question!"

"Jeese-Louise! Like everybody doesn't know I treated Harley like crap! The only secret here is how the crazy shmuck put up with me and stayed alive for eight years! C'mon Doc, you wanna strike at me you're going to have to do better than that!"

"That's it. I've had enough" Crane hauled himself to his feet and started over to the collapsed doorway, intending to try to clear away the fallen masonry by hand, "I told you this was an impossible game to play with you!"

"I've told you a ton of stuff, what's the matter?"

"Just shut up. Be quiet. Stop talking. It's hard to choose my least favourite thing about you, Joker, but I think if I was pushed it would have to be your incessant, inane, pointless, thought-disrupting, thoroughly senseless, moronic-"

Before he could run out of expletives, and unfortunately before Joker could move away to avoid getting landed on, the fallen doorway exploded inwards. Through the hanging dust, a dark figure stepped, armoured boots kicking away chunks of rubble before them. Batman strode toward the two of them purposefully, and lifted the uppermost body off the lower by the scruff of its neck.

"You're going back to your cell for good this time, Crane"

He growled, shaking the dusty, limp body a little for emphasis. From his sprawled position, Joker made a noise halfway between a cough and a giggle, and replied

"I wouldn't bother, Bats. He's already unconscious. Hey! Why don't we put him up a pole before he comes round and see if he really does scare the birds away! Can we, please!"

Batman regarded the villain lying at his feet with the merest flicker of contempt passing across his otherwise inscrutable face

"On your feet, Joker" he ordered, "and stay still"

A pair of bat-shaped cuffs appeared in the hand that wasn't holding an unconscious psychologist, and a steely glare repeated his order silently

"Honestly, do you have everything in that shape? Don't you ever get bored and say hey y'know today I'm gonna use uh... apple-shaped gizmos instead. Maybe you shouldn't use apples though, you might get in trouble for infringment of - owowowow! quit that!"

Throughout the process of Batman reaching down to grab a handful of dusty green shirt-front, haul Joker up to his feet, and yank his arms around to get the cuffs on him, the clown had continued to prattle half to himself. It was only when the Dark Knight had forced his right arm behind him that he had noticed how badly it hurt

"Say you must be used to that sorta thing, be a pal and see if that arm seems to have a couple of extra moving pieces to you"

Obligingly, Batman grasped the arm again, feeling two edges of bone grind together with a certain amount of satisfaction.

"It's broken, and I think Scarecrow has a concussion. I'll take you both to the infirmary. Move"

Joker threw back his head and whooped with laughter as if nothing was funnier than a broken arm, punctuating the laughter with a scream of pain as Batman pushed him toward the freshly re-opened doorway. He was still laughing when Batman decided he'd rather carry two unconscious bodies than listen to it, and pressed a pad of chloroform over Joker's face.

For a few minutes, hovering in the red gloom that immediately preceeded his waking, Crane allowed himself the luxury of believing he was dead. No - scratch that - very very close to death, suspended in a blissfully painless oblivion, vaguely aware of the harmless hum of voices around him. They had taken him to the Arkham Infirmary after Batman had blown the wall in and sent him hurtling with surprising force straight at Joker. He had suffered some sort of dreadful head-wound, surely, and was not going to recover. Poor, doomed Gotham City would have to manage without the Master of Fear. How sad for them all to have to face life without his instructive scientific demonstrations.

His delusions of the safety of a slowly-deepening coma were soon shattered as he realised with great irritation that he recognised one of the voices. Surely there was only one reason why Dr Leman would be personally attending his sickbed, and that was if she was accompanying another patient. But whom of her assortment of rogues could possibly wish to visit a sick and injured Scarecrow? Had Harley Quinn returned to Gotham simply to see him, and had been allowed in under those provisions? It caused a pang of fondness for the dear, hopeless child to think that she may do such a thing, but it quickly disappeared when he chanced cracking one eye partly open, and saw Joker sitting by the side of the bed.

"Hey! You're awake at last! It's been days, Doc - say I don't suppose you want to carry on with our game, do you? I was getting into it"

"You," Crane croaked at him, "Here?"

"Oh yeah, you broke my arm when you landed on me. Funny, y'know, I wouldn't have thought you'd be that heavy. Been in here 'til they process the paperwork. But really I'd have come back anyway to see my favourite ol' pal"

Joker tried to lean a little further toward him, at which point Crane noticed that even the arm that was in a cast was strapped firmly down to the wheelchair he sat in. He imagined he was similarly restrained - a place with medication in it was not a place they took any chances with the likes of Jonathan Crane. Eventually Joker stopped trying to lean, and made a head-jerking gesture to Dr Leman, who sighed impatiently and fetched a piece of paper from her pocket.

"You're lucky I'm left-handed, or I couldn't have made you this nice Get Well Soon card"

Leman shrugged and held the tatty piece of paper up. On it was a crude, crayon sketch of something shabby-looking and sticklike hanging from the hand of a huge black shape with enormous pointy ears. Judging a card to be no threat and happy to pacify the Joker in this way, Leman placed it on the steel shelf bolted to the bed.

"I think I got a good likeness of you, whatdya think? You were unconscious for this part by the way, but now you have the card to remember it by"

"Thanks"

Crane grunted quietly, as much through gritted teeth as his throbbing head allowed him. Just when he thought he could physically take no more inanity, a small nurse with a sleek black bob wandered into his field of vision.

"Um, Dr Leman I'm afraid your patient will have to go back to his room now. The Sister doesn't want him here more than a half-hour a - "

"It's alright, Lizzie, I understand" Dr Leman sounded relieved, "He's going"

"Well that's my cue! Don't worry though, I'll be back, and this nice lady here is takin' really good care of you" he leaned forward conspiratorially, and stage-whispered, "I like Nurse Lizzie. She looks like my Mom"

With a wink, and a menacing chuckle that hung in the air like a bad smell, an armed guard stepped forward and tentatively took hold of the wheelchair, beginning to manouver Joker away from the bed. Before he was more than five feet away, he tried to look back and hollered

"It's OK, Jonny-Boy! I remembered to tell them to get you your buttermilk everyday!"

Crane closed his eyes, and hoped against hope that the needle Nurse Lizzie was readying would contain far more morphine than he could take.