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Author's Notes: This is a quick oneshot that I wrote around 3 am on a Saturday night, because I had nothing else to do. After a bit of editing, I let a very persistent friend (an fellow fanfic author) read it, and she said I should post it. I did, and here it is, my take on Harleen Quinzel's first ever meeting with the man only known as The Joker. I hope you enjoy. Reviews appreciated, as always. Based on Heath Ledger's Joker.
To describe the internship program at the Psychology unit of Arkham Asylum for the Criminally Insane as popular, would be a stretch. 'Notorious' was probably a better word, but never the less, in the last couple of years there had always been more applicants than available internships. The regular staff were never sure what to make of this phenomenon, but since the Asylum was always understaffed, they took all the help the budget would allow.
These thoughts went through the current Director of Psychology at Arkham, Doctor Patrick Stevens as he surveyed the young woman now sitting in front of his desk. She had short cropped, bleached blond hair, blue eyes and straight, white teeth. She was slight in build, but athletic, and reminded him somewhat of a pixie.
He looked down, leafing through some of the contents of a manila folder. It contained a number of recommendations, diplomas and attestations, and the name on all of them was Harleen Quinzel. This was the woman who now, at age 25, and with a degree from the prestigious Department of Psychology at Gotham University under her belt, was about to start working as an intern at Arkham Asylum. He thought that maybe this young Miss Quinzel had thrown herself into the water at the deep end a little too soon, but he didn't say anything. Most students fresh out of University elected to start with something a little easier and less straining to the sanity of their own minds, but this young woman seemed very determined, and who was he really to try and dissuade her. Besides, it was a well known fact that Arkham was notoriously understaffed. He needed another intern, and this young woman it seemed wanted nothing more than to be one. Never the less he thought it best to start her out a little easy, with a tour of the facilities, which he admitted sounded much more glamorous than it actually was.
Arkham Asylum was, to say the least, run down and in certain places it had gone from 'run down' to 'falling apart'. The conditions were less than ideal to run an asylum for the criminally insane, but they really had no choice in the matter. In an effort to help, and alleviate the burden on the staff, the Asylum grounds had been thoroughly extended after the Narrows incident, and a special branch of the Gotham City Police Department had been formed to provide additional security around the perimeter. All that did was make things even worse. Now, instead of having all the prisoners locked up, they had two thirds roaming free all over the Narrows and only the one third that was deemed most dangerous incarcerated. The only bright spot was that no civilians ever went near the Narrows anymore.
The main building of the Arkham Asylum was a concrete block filled mostly with steel. There was nothing even remotely friendly about it, the lights were a glaring yellow, the sound of water dripping from somewhere was frequent when the weather was dry, constant when the weather was wet. Because of this, rust was everywhere, and the atmosphere was heavy and damp. In everything to do with appearances it resembled a conventional prison much more than it did a mental hospital.
As he led Harleen Quinzel through the different wards, Dr. Stevens thought of how misplaced the bright young woman seemed inside the Asylum walls. The white blonde hair, the flashing smile, the clear blue eyes and the flushed cheeks…none of it fit in at all. She appeared an outsider, not to say outlandish in her beauty, and it saddened him to think that if she stayed she would lose everything that now made her beautiful. Nobody knew why, it was just one of the things that happened, just as surely as the sun set. He assumed that it was a way for the staff to blend in. A beauty like Harleen Quinzel was out of the ordinary, and as such was sure to attract attention. And attracting attention from an asylum full of mentally ill criminals could be very dangerous indeed.
They had walked for a while, talking mostly about what her work as an intern would mean, and what she ought to be aware of when dealing with the inmates when he suddenly stopped. She stood beside him, cocked her head slightly to one side, flashing him another one of those impossibly bright smiles, and asked in a sweet southern drawl that seemed to almost disappear between the walls.
"Why are we stopping?"
He shook his head slightly and said with caution in his voice;
"I think it's better to go back the way we came. That's the maximum security ward. Better if you don't go in there just yet…"
"Oh, don't worry about me," she replied brightly, "I'm not afraid."
He looked at her for a long moment, but saw a sudden determination in her eyes that caused him to relent, despite how unwise he thought it to be. Hesitatingly, he opened the door for her to pass through, before following. He watched her from behind as she walked confidently down the middle of the walkway between the cells. He was about to tell her to stop and wait for him, when something happened that made them both freeze.
A desperate, yet almost giggly man's laughter came out of the darkness, and it was so chilling in its apparent happiness to see them, and so unlike anything else in its tone, that she couldn't help but stop and listen. The sound sent shivers down her spine, and she had to focus on her breathing to calm herself enough to not simply turn around and run. She kept walking, her eyes nailed to the door on the opposite end of the corridor, her heart hammering furiously in her chest and that freakish laughter ringing in her ears. Then, suddenly, it was as if her feet became nailed to the floor. She stood in front of one of the cells, the only one that was already darkened for the night. And she felt his eyes on her. It was a sensation that made her want to scream. She turned slowly, terrified, but still wanting to get a glimpse of the man who had such an effect on her.
She saw nothing. Nothing but a faint outline of a man sitting broad legged on the bed of his cell, one hand placed on each knee, his back straight. But she felt his eyes. It was as if they were knives, piercing her to the core. She had never felt such terror before in her life.
The laughter stopped, and the quiet it left was deafening. Then the same hoarse voice gently crooned;
"Well…hello there, beautiful."
In that moment, Harleen Quinzel knew that the eyes which had caught her were the eyes of evil. And she knew that they would never let her go.