PROGENY AROUSED
Jared sat the newspaper his fat friend kept proffering on a battered cafeteria table (battered at least once because Jared had thrown it during a previous incarceration in a fit of pique over the quality of rice pudding.) of the Fenton Prospers YouthVillage.
Twenty minutes out of the hole, and Jared still had the pale skin of sixty days of solitary confinement—but Otto gave him no peace. "Otto, why is this so interesting that I can't relax" Jared shrugged his shoulders at this battered copy of the Gotham City Gazette from 1999.
Otto had been holding on to this paper for Jared for several weeks, he'd found it in the library, and wanted to show it to his buddy, but of course Jared had been in "the box" for giving an involuntary hare-lip to the Fenton Prospers speech therapist so she'd have more empathy. The therapist, a former Rose Bowl Queen had since committed suicide.
Otto was aware that Jared might be hauled into court and tried as an adult for this latest outrage…and so he had to read this article really fast, and make a decision.
And Jared wasn't happy about it. For eight weeks he'd been reading old Scientific Americans and setting fire to cockroaches…he'd not even had the energy to spit at the guards when they came to feed him…perhaps he'd been off his feed in the hole.
Perhaps he would put a little ammonia in his psychologist's lemonade later…they had to give him an "out of the box" exit interview…
Otto Blevins clapped his pudgy hands eagerly as he noticed that Jared was catching on to the article. He clapped his hands again, hands that had once set fire to a daycare center because while delivering laundry for a local diaper service, Otto had thought the little tykes were sneering at him.
But Jared was nodding his head now. Otto encouraged immediately. "Jared it's inner-estin'. 'Member how you told me about your tes'tube birth? An' Wesley on Five Block says you look jus' like that evil dude, the Joker. Sez here that th' Joker once hid out from Batman at this-shere sperm bank, and the dy-rector suspected mischief on th' Joker's part, dy-reck quote there."
Jared reviewed the article quickly. He and Otto were two of maybe seven literate inmates at Fenton Prospers. And despite his extreme youth, Jared had scored an almost perfect PSAT, and was able to successfully ridicule those on the psychiatric team here at the juvenile prison.
Jared had read Freud, Maslow, Piaget, Skinner, Durkheim and the rest, and been bored with their antiquated theories long before he'd been expelled from the Laredo, Texasschool system back in fifth grade. Jared also had gotten a number of Op-Eds and articles published in the New York Times, Business Week, and Popular Mechanics while the Fenton Prospers headmaster couldn't even get into the Laredo Morning News.
Yes, this was very interesting. And Otto was grinning, his chubby face shiny with enthusiasm. He'd been trying to spark a desire in Jared to quit this place and to, more importantly, take Otto with him before Otto aged out of here and had to go to a real prison where a lot of corn holing was in his future. Would Jared take the bait?
Jared looked up, he easily read Otto's mind. "Yes, I guess I have to get out of here, meet the guy at least see if he is the pater."
Otto didn't understand Latin, but he did understand…
"Wait, I want to go with you, Jared…Cain't I go?"
Jared grinned. "Why should I take a fat pustule with me…you'd stick out like a sore thumb. You've been bothering me since we were locked up in the Corsicana ResidentialTreatment Center…since Boy's Ranch. I'm so sick of you, Otto…Besides you'll be sexy hot meat up there in the Fort Bendjoint when you turn seventeen, how can I spare the boys that…?"
But Jared, after a few minutes of amusement watching Otto sob, relented.
"I guess I'll have to take you along, Otto, for comic relief if nothing else…we leave for Gotham tonight."
A BORING ARKHAM AFTERNOON
Maurice Hilliard grabbed his head and screamed…and then screamed again. The voices, right by his ear…they were getting to him. Two aides came up to this patient, who had been committed as the notorious "Black Widower" some months previous.
"It's weird, Dennis" the tall African-American orderly said to the short bald attendant, as they tried to hold Hilliard down. "There's no schizophrenia on his record, until a few days ago… now he's kicking in the teevee, swallerin' Ping Pong balls in the rec room…it's real weird!"
Apparently next, one of the voices told Hilliard to kick the black aide in the nuts, and now there was a terrific scuffle, before Hilliard was taken off to the Seclusion area.
The Joker, his red lips gleeful, watched all this with great amusement, behind his copy of "People" magazine.
Ever since Arnold Wesker taught me ventriloquism, the Joker thought, as he pretended to peruse an article about Britney's pregnancy, life has been quite a fun-fest here at the Home. Yes, it certainly has.
Benny Price, the Joker's favorite orderly came up to him and waved something. Oooh! A letter. The Joker kept Benny smuggling mail before it made it to Jeremiah Arkham's inquisitive eyes.
In turn, the Joker gave his many Dilaudid, Fioranol and Percodan meds to Benny…the nurse's station was always hopeful that opiates would calm the Joker down, but calmness wasn't all that interesting, really.
Opening the letter, the Joker read:
"I believe I am your son. Enclosed is a newspaper article about your activities in the late 90's. Before my mother turned me over to the Texasfoster care system after some behavioral misunderstandings about ten years ago—"
Behavioral misunderstandings! The Joker laughed loudly at this, but shut up fast, as he didn't want to have this peculiar little missive catching the staff's attention.
"—Mom told me that I was the "wretched product" of a sperm bank, which didn't surprise me much since Dad's kind of a douche, my late dad, there was an accident—"
The Joker at this point became almost apoplectic in hilarity, and had to accept a cheerful blue neckerchief from the hophead Benny Price, and he coughed into it. Oh, the pleasure…an accident! The douche had an accident!
The Joker remembered how he'd self-abused, filling a few of those little tubes, emptying out the contents that apparently had been doctors or writers or scientists…he'd forgotten all about it after he'd left the Greater Gotham Woman-Owned Fertility Center…but here it was! An heir, by George!
Finally the Joker saw, through bleary eyes, that the child had an e-mail address and was coming to Gotham soon.
Well, Goodness Gracious!
STRANGER DANGER (REMEMBER, OFFICER FRIENDLY WARNED US)
"Must you drive so slowly, Raymond?" Norine Celeste Rambert asked peevishly. But Raymond just drove in silence. How boring. How did Norine Celeste get such a boring fiancée, dammit?
Who the hell would rather go to the Republic of the Rio Grande Building Museumin a shit-hole like Laredo, rather than Sea World in San Antonio? Or Six Flags in Dallas?
Norine Celeste's last fiancée was a dirt bag, but at least he liked a damn roller coaster. And he didn't make Norine Celeste put him through tree surgery school. Nope, Walker Lee didn't do much of anything but he was fun.
"Ray are you listening to me? I don't want to go to a damn building museum?"
Norine Celeste wondered if she should take her curlers out. That might get Ray hot. But if he didn't like the way she looked, why did he sign up on the Christian Chubbies & Big Beautiful Women dating site anyways?
Norine Celeste turned the radio on, her press-on nails manipulating the dial in the hopes of finding some Springsteen or at least Charlie Daniels. But it was all fuzz and static except one boring news station.
"The Laredo Sheriff's Department has updated us, Carolyn!"
"That's great, Bob. Is there better news about the survivors?"
"There is, Carolyn. After the explosion and fire at Fenton Prospers Youth Center—bomb squad says there's never been a more diabolical—that's the word, Carolyn—diabolical use of household ammonia and sulphuric acid—"
"Ugh, Bob, how awful!"
"Yes, that's right, dear. It was quite an explosion but there are actually seven survivors, not five as we said before. Out of the 6,49 staff and residents of the Fenton ProspersYouth Center, seven still live, not counting the two escapees, not five as was reported before. Apparently the creator of the bomb somehow was able to sprinkle gunpowder to a nearby Sunoco station, and that made the explosion bigger and unnecessary. These are some bad kids, Carolyn."
"Oh, Bob!"
"One of the survivors is Dr. Beverly Wilkison, a psychopharmacologist and former Daughter of the Confederacy, who has five children, Carolyn. Although Dr. Wilkison no longer has her limbs she says she is grateful to the Lord—"
Well, for Heaven's sake. "You see, Raymond? What the hell kind of place are you takin' us? They're ess-caped conn-vicks out there." But Ray just laughed.
"They ain't no criminals who can mess with me and Big Bertha, my forty-five under th' seat, Norine Celeste. Now shut your haid an'let's listen some mores."
"—must be on the lookout for two juvenile boys, teenagers, Carolyn."
"Just young boys, Bob…how horrible."
"But very dangerous. One is an overweight red haired sixteen year old, about five foot six, he was detained at Prospers for arson, or pyromania or whatever they call it, but the other a male of just thirteen has a record of, my goodness, Carolyn, throwing cherry bombs at the Houston Rodeo, to make the horses dance, murders, rapes, grand and petty larceny, repeated, REPEATED, Carolyn, weapons possessions charges, and representing rat poison as crack cocaine at the Sam Houston Middle School where the boy, whose name we cannot reveal as he is a juvenile, said he was annoyed by his fellow students and wanted to, and I quote, "thin the herd"
"Oh my God, Bob—"
"What the hell's this?" Ray interrupted, turning off the radio. Standing by the side of the highway was what appeared to be a bearded dwarf and an old woman in a wheelchair Ray would've flipped them the bird and driven on—"Charity begins at home" as the Bible says, or whatever—but the little bearded guy with an ugly Amish hat was waving a sign "STRANDED…WILL PAY FIFTY DOLLARS FOR RIDE INTO LAREDO"
What dumb-asses! Ray would've done it for twenty-five. But after they got the two of them in the car, putting the lady's wheel chair in the trunk—the old lady was a frisky thing…how the hell'd she find Ray's forty-five under the seat so damn fast?
TWO
YOU'VE GOT MAIL!
The two patients walked down the hall, fortunately unescorted. But most Arkham Asylum aides let them severely alone, anyway.
"Unbelievable, Victor! You actually got us some unsupervised computer time!" The Joker smiled at Victor Szazs, although even to the Clown Prince of Crime's hardened senses, Szazs was not particularly easy on the eyes.
Covered as he was in hash marks he'd cut into his own body, one for every person he'd killed, there were perhaps a thousand renditions of six lines down and one across. Scratched from forehead to ankles, rendered this tall scowling blond man as a prison cell wall…
Szazs grinned. "Well you know, Jokes old man, I think the institution would prohibit my openin' an account on the personals site, and you was so nice about helping me um…"
"Compose your initial profile and love missives for the ladies…Cyrano I am." The Joker smiled. "And why not, and you've found a computer to set up the account on, and you'll share it with me!"
Szazs grinned at the joker and stopped to open a door with a small sign "Suzy Rellis, Institute Public Relations Officer"
"How curious, I wouldn't think Arkham would use a publicist, they're quite better off staying out of the news, I'd think." The Joker smiled, scratching his dead white chin. "After all, I give them plenty of press, right? And so do you…why do they need an attention-getter."
"Well, they don't have one no more, they can save on th'budget." Szazs grinned. "I put Miz Rellis's corpse in a laundry bag and gave her to Killer Croc as sort of a pre-dinner snack, if you know what I mean?"
The Joker laughed loudly, and they entered the late publicist's office.
Szazs handed Joker a small computer. "Here you can use Suzy's Ipad, and I'll just go on the Dell office computer here at her desk."
The Joker handled the pink Ipad gingerly, and hit a few keys. He had not told Szazs the news about his possible offspring, just that he needed a little unsupervised online time…
And what fun this was! The Joker had sent Jared a brief e-mail, and here the boy had written him!
"Dear Mr. Joker:
We don't know for sure that I'm your son, so I'm not up to calling you Poppa yet, but I wanted to let you know that my partner and I are making serious progress coming up the East Coast towards Gotham. We traded some kiddie porn to this old geologist dude for a little bit of kryptonite that he'd been keeping for "historical" purposes, and Otto and I dissolved the Kryptonite into a solution that we put in a can of Raid bug spray, and when we hit Metropolis we took it around with us while we broke into stores and stuff, just in case we had to ward off the Big Red Cape, you know what I mean?
But we didn't run into him, though we did meet this old dude called the Prankster, who used to fight Supes back in the day. He bought the Kryptonite from us, and we had enough to get plane tickets to Gotham, but we blew part of the cash on some dynamite, as we were going to see if we could make a herd of cattle from Metropolis County Beef Farms trample into the city proper and break up traffic. That was hilarious!
And then we still had enough to take a train, but I got this cute idea that we buy some of those expensive Love Dolls, you know the full-size types the pervs use? And we kept dropping them off overpasses…one of the blow up figures was a red-head, and we got a school bus to swerve into an ambulance, what a riot! I kinda got excited watching all the bodies frying up and stuff….
The absolute best part was, one of the dolls fell by the side of the road, and a respectable looking guy in a Mazda got out to look at it, see if it was a suicidal woman, and when he found out it was just a doll, he put it in his back seat! Otto claimed he saw the dude kiss the doll, but I don't know.
Can't wait to see you, Joker!
Jared"
The Joker was thrilled. He was a two fingered typist, but he poked out "It was well worth it, what you did with the money…that's what life is about! When I was your age, I dropped a purloined hundred dollar bill off the Empire StateBuilding and caused much mayhem and rioting. Youth, yes! I wish I could help you in your journey, but as you are aware, I am a guest of the state just now. If I am not your dad, certainly I am your Uncle Joker!"
Later on that evening, there was something on the news about Superman having been admitted to the Emergency Room (for the first time in his life) of the Metropolis MemorialHospital with a flu-like symptom after tangling with the usually harmless Prankster.
Everyone watching the TV in the Arkham South Lounge noted that patient John Doe A.K.A. "Joker" seemed in unusually good cheer.
THAT WHOLE SELF-ESTEEM THING
Speedy dropped gracefully onto the roof of the Star City Presbyterian Tabernacle. The cops were all in full force outside, and there was a hostage negotiator, but Green Arrow had radioed Speedy that the girl who had taken the entire choir and youth group hostage had been unusually hard to break…and she might kill everyone!
Speedy bent over the church roof to talk to the Star City Police Chief.
"It's bad stuff, kid." The Chief said somberly. "Two of yer people, Green Arrow and Arsenal have gone in, and there's been nothing heard from either of them. And the girl is threatening to shoot everyone."
Both Green Arrow AND Arsenal couldn't quell an adolescent hostage taker? Speedy shook her blonde head. Opening a stained glass window, she consulted her notes on the case, and called in. "What's going on in there? Angela I heard you are angry because the pastor may have behaved um, inappropriately?"
A girl's voice came up. "Th-that's right. My new boyfriend hypnotized me, and I had a recovered memory. Yes, the Reverend Kearns sexually abused me." There was a pause. Then came the girl's voice again, a bit lower."Yes, Jared, I'll tell her. Uh, Miss Arrow?"
Who was Jared? "Speedy, Angela, just call me Speedy." Speedy said soothingly. "It's okay, I'm your friend, Angela. We can't let anyone get hurt. Are Green Arrow and Arsenal down there? Are they um, alive?"
"Forget about them. Jared says Green Arrow is an overblown populist windbag." The girl's timorous voice hardened. "I will kill every one of the choir members and the snotty bitches in the youth group unless you give me one million dollars and a plane to—where, Jared?"
Speedy heard the girl talking quietly with someone, and then a male maniacal laugh.
"Yes, to Gotham City. And, and we want a helicopter, not a plane just for three people. Why does Otto have to go, Jared , why can't it be just us—"
Speedy had had enough of this. "Angela, who is Jared? Is he in the youth group?"
This made the male laugher downstairs go into true hysterics.
Again Angela spoke."Jared is my brilliant boyfriend. He has saved my life. If he hadn't hypnotized me, I wouldn't have known that Reverend Kearns had raped me. Jared strangled the Reverend right in front of me, with piano wire like the Al Capone guys used, and we burned him up with acid, and put him in one of the holy water fonts yesterday just to get even, and then he said I should get reparations, and you all better damn well give them to me!"
She paused again "And Jared was the one who let me know that my parents were taking advantage of me big time—you'll never find their bodies—and my so-called friends in the youth group were plotting against me. Jared's great…" There was a giggle. "He let me kill Marion Hyslop, just to see what it would be like. But the rest of the hostages are fine unless you—"
Speedy held her forehead in one hand. "Um, Angela? Let me talk to Jared. He sounds like a real winner, and I feel I should be talking directly to him."
There was another pause. "Speedy, I'm afraid if you talk to him, you might fall in love with him and try and take Jared away from me. He has real serious charisma."
Again there was the male's maniacal laugh.
Oh Jesus. "I can—yes, I can completely assure you that those are not my intentions towards Jared." Speedy said this between her teeth."Please, Angela, let me talk with him."
There was another annoying pause, and Speedy began balling her small fists as she shuffled on the roof.
"Jared's shy." Angela said loudly. "He doesn't want to talk to you. He says he saw you in the newspaper, and you're not his type."
Speedy heard the laughter again in the background. She'd had enough. Speedy kicked in the stained glass window and swung down into the rectory, alighting on one of the ceiling rafters just above the altar. What she saw kind of opened her eyes.
Nine teenagers, five girls, four boys alive, one dead, presumably this bitchy Marion Hyslop lying with a black smoking hole where her nose once was. On the other side of the room Speedy spied thirty weeping middle aged choir members, mostly female.
On the north end of the rectory was an obese fifteen year old girl with thick black glasses who closely resembled Amy Farrah Fowler from"The Big Bang Theory" This must be Angela, Speedy thought.
The fat girl was holding a Glock model 22c semiautomatic pistol, and she was waving it around enthusiastically with the vacant smile of one who did not usually get this much attention. Although Angela seemed fond of the Glock, Speedy could tell it was a little heavy for her.
Next to Angela, the fat gun bearer was a skinny kid, the sort who would look like he was twelve when he was eighteen, though he couldn't be more than a high school freshman right now. Speedy could tell this boy was self-assured and extremely pleased with himself.
He was unarmed, but next to the slim lad was another overweight teenager, this time a boy in late adolescence with a shock of red hair that was already receding. This fat red head was fiddling with what appeared to be a nasty looking machine gun, complete with tripod and lots of bullets. Speedy was feeling a little sick to her stomach.
"I cain't git it, Jared, Ah think th' trigger's stuck." The fat boy was sweating heavily and biting his tongue, and as the machine gun swung on the tripod, Speedy saw one of the elderly choir members wet her robe.
"Take patience and enjoy it, Otto," the slender boy said in voice that was still changing. "This gun, the Schwarz lose MG M.07 was of marvelous use in our history. With the Austro-Hungarian empire, it served as just a great anti-aircraft shooter—"
"Do the Palestine Liberation Army use it?" asked Otto suspiciously.
"No, but it will serve us well with the piggies outside methinks" said the smaller boy, and with that statement, Jared emitted a frightening bark of laughter that shattered a crystal goblet that was sitting on the altar.
Speedy goggled at Jared, the slender boy. Although the fat redheaded gun wielder was wearing a Black Sabbath T-shirt much too small for him, the slender boy had a yellow button down shirt with a light pullover sweater. He looked quite respectable, like Tintin.
Suddenly the Schwarzlose MG went off, drilling several loud holes in nearby pews, and the tubby shooter clapped his hands in satisfaction, and Jared giggled as he watched three choir members faint dead away.
Speedy tentatively took her bow off her back and began fiddling with the quiver. She'd assumed she'd not been noticed. Ritalin, do not fail me now!
"Miss? Uh, Speedy?" The slender lad looked up at Speedy."Drop your bow and quiver, please, or I'll have Otto here clear out the choir. He's eager to do it, you know."
"Why don't I knock off the old bitch that smells of Ben-Gay on th' end, Jared?" pleaded the red-headed chubbo. "That'll let Speedy know we mean business."
But, as Otto mouthed "Business" Speedy dropped all her equipment immediately from the rafter she was standing on.
"Yes, as Mao said, "Political power grows out of the barrel of the gun" Jared smiled, and then emitted a loud laugh
"Mary who?" asked Otto, puzzled.
"Are you dating someone called Mary?" screamed Angela. "I'll shoot her!"
"Uh, where are Green Arrow and Arsenal, may I ask" inquired Speedy shakily. She was feeling a little under the weather now.
"Oh, Green Arrow kind of barreled in here and I had to spray him down" Jared said sunnily. "And then Otto cuffed him, and G.A.'s cooling his heels in the pastor's office."
"The pastor molested me" said Angela, as if afraid that she was losing her role in this drama.
"What, you spray him with that kryptonite stuff?" Otto asked curiously "He sure went down fast, but Green Arrow ain't Superman."
"No, we sold the Kryp, remember?" Jared giggled. "I just used a little old fashioned Mace. Works well with a boor like The Green Arrow. It stuck to the Emerald Archer's cute little blond beard, you know?"
And then Jared laughed again, a screeching sound that caused Speedy to almost fall off her rafter.
"And Arsenal is over on that pew, having a siesta." Jared smiled slightly and motioned to a nearby pew."
"What's a siesta, like a Margarita?" asked Angela, puzzled."He's just takin' a nap, Arsenal is."
Speedy looked over and indeed Arsenal was very, very much asleep on a nearby pew.
"Not so good, right Speedy?" Jared asked, looking up at the masked girl. "Hell of a time for your predecessor to sleep, right?"
Jared paused, and walked over to the pew where Arsenal reclined, and leaning down, he picked up a syringe from the floor.
"Yes, I knew of course that Arsenal was Speedy before you"Jared said with a barely contained chuckle. "Not as cute a Speedy of course—"
"Hey!" shouted Angela, pointing her Glock at Jared. "What's that supposed to—"
Jared held a palm up. "None so cute as you, babe…Just talkin'. Yeah, I learned about Speedy becoming Arsenal, and also that this old Speedy used to like drugs…the needle, you know. When he burst in, following Green Arrow to rescue the hostages, I just waved it at him, not even using Mace or anything."
"You just waved a syringe at Arsenal, who is an anti-drug warrior—" Speedy asked, disbelieving.
"Junkies are always junkies, honey." Jared said, laughing again. "I have spent most of my brief period on the planet locked in various hospitals and institutions, reform schools and nut wards, and I learned about the monkey on the back, that just doesn't leave…ever. Speedy was under some pressure about other things…who knows what? And he took the syringe greedily."Jared paused. "They say in Alcoholics Anonymous that there will be a day where there is nothing between you and a drink but God, and apparently God must not be impressed with this church, because Speedy took to his drink-substitute readily."
Otto laughed. "But it warn't skag in that there needle."
"No, liquid Valium and just a touch of Thorazine, which I was able to procure at a reasonable price. I am aware of Thorazine's power, as I have unwillingly experienced it myself." Jared snorted. "Arsenal shot up and will be out for about eighteen hours. He—"
But Jared had looked away from Speedy just a little too long, and she'd swung down from the rafter, sweeping up her bow and quiver…in the blink of an eye Otto's Schwarzlose was gummed up with an Elmer's Glue arrow, and a boxing glove arrow had knocked poor Angela out.
And now Speedy was striding up to Jared…but he was still just grinning at her! And then, before she could react, Jared reached out and plucked the mask off her face.
"Well, whaddya know? It's Mia the Mouth Dearden, an old employee of mine. You don't remember me without the sack, do you honey?" Jared smiled. "My mask? Do you recall now, dear?"
Speedy breathed in quickly. As Mia Dearden, Speedy had been a child prostitute, and now was HIV positive because of it, though thankfully she'd been rescued by Green Arrow.
But during a period about twenty months before, Mia had been whoring on the streets of Houston, Texas, working for a short but virulent masked fellow called "The Pillowcase Pimp" who Mia had always thought of as some kind of dwarf.
Jared laughed, nodding his head as he saw the slow comprehension on the girl's face. "Yup. I was eleven years old, Mia! Eleven to your sixteen, right? And I kept you and the other sluts in line, didn't I?"
"Those days are over now" Mia said firmly. "You don't rule me anymore, and you are going to jail, or juvie or—"
But then Jared carelessly swung his fist into Mia's stomach, and she fell down, howling. How could this have happened? She was a trained superhero. She'd defeated Robin in combats for practice.
But of course as the Pillowcase Pimp, Jared had known how to push Mia's buttons…she was programmed for abuse, during the eight months he'd been in charge. Now Otto was kicking Mia in the head, and then all went dark.
About half an hour later Mia came to, and looked around. My God, the cops were streaming in the church, shepherding out the choir members and stunned youth group kids.
The Police Chief came up to Speedy. "Thanks for holding them off. Angela came outside and surrendered. It seemed like she was in some kinda trance, and said you'd disarmed everybody, Speedy. You're a hero, and Green Arrow and Arsenal are in an ambulance."
But later, Speedy found a note in her pocket.
"Mia babe—I replaced your mask and put everyone else in yet another hypnotic stupor, and Otto and I sneaked out of the church disguised as choir members…the cops herded us out, though we must've looked quite peculiar in the costumes…But you have some kind of guts. So now you can be a hero, and I doubt they'll do anything to Angela but put her in a nuthouse where frankly, she belongs. I don't need the helicopter and the cash I guess. We'll find some other way to get to Gotham.
Hilarious time, right
Best, Jared (The Pillowcase Pimp) and of course Otto."
Speedy balled up the note. He didn't even try to get the money and the helicopter. Was this some kind of joke?
ENTOMOLOGY AMONG THE INMATES
Harvey Dent checked his half combed, half scraggled nape in the cracked mirror just outside the Arkham South Lounge. There had once been a time when the ladies of the courthouse from old Judge Hilda Hoskie to the nineteen year old typist Kendra Burke…they'd all voted him the handsomest of the prosecutorial staff, and that was just when he was an assistant DA.
Of course now, Harvey's face was half monster…the gangster's little acid shot had changed Dent's fortunes forever. At one time, Batman had tried to help Harvey Dent from being the murderous lunatic Two-Face…there'd been plastic surgery…but eventually Harvey had taken a switchblade to the new skin, knowing Bats was just trying to ruin his good time.
Harvey walked into the South Arkham Lounge. He spied a green haired figure bending over the coffee table, and then turned to Jervis Tetch, who was placidly turning that day's "Gotham Gazette" into a paper hat.
The Mad Hatter winked at Harvey."Someone sent our cheerful friend a present. If you can believe it, an ant farm. I had no idea the Joker was a budding entomologist."
Two-Face cocked his head and strode across the lounge to where the Joker was fiddling with the thin plastic container, containing sand and little insect figures.
"Oh, hello, Harvey. I had one of these when I was a lad, you know. Used to drop red and black ants in together, and watch them fight things out."
Harvey sat down next to the Joker on the Lounge's battered couch. He squinted his bulbous eye into the ant farm. "What's that little blue thing? That's not an ant, is it, Joker?"
The Joker grinned at Two-Face. "No, Harvey. That's an Atom. THE Atom. My little boy, the one I told you about who is planning to come and see me—he was passing through Ivy Town and somehow ambushed the Atom, and took the little piece of Dwarf Star or whatever it is that adjusts the Atom's height. At the time that Jared removed the belt, the Atom was about two inches high."
The Joker thought about this for a minute and laughed raucously, and Two-Face admitted it was rather humorous.
"Jared put the Atom into this little ant farm to me as a little souvenir of his travels. He FedExed it to me, if you can believe it!"
The Joker shook the plastic ant farm a bit. "They're called formicariums, these ant farms. It's quite distracting watching them. Almost calming. That's why the staff didn't mind my receiving this little gift." The Joker laughed madly.
"I once had diseased black rats in a Habitrail as a child. This really brings back old times."
Two-Face leaned closely into the ant farm. Sweet Jesus. He'd heard something from the Joker about this possible paternity business and wondered if there was any truth to it. The boy must have some ingeniously psychopathic qualities…
Two-Face had skirmished with the Atom once or twice, and enjoyed watching the little blue costumed figure running up and down the sand, cursing the Joker's name faintly, and frantically trying to avoid the ants and—
"Is that a tarantula Joker?" Harvey Dent asked incredulously."How the hell did that get in there?"
The Joker smiled at Harvey."Well you know, I didn't want the poor little blue guy to get too lonely."
REUNIONS, ANYONE?
The skinny kid attempted to bum a cigarette off a Jehovah's Witness standing in front of the Lonigan Eatery on Highway 51. The Witness gave the boy, barely in puberty a lecture "Sure I smoke, but I'll be damned if a boy like you—" The Witness hustled the boy behind the diner, and about five minutes later, Jared came out alone, Viceroy in his mouth, wiping off a bloody letter opener and mumbling, "Hypocrite."
Thinking about the born-again throat he'd just carved, Jared laughed loudly, perhaps a little too loudly, startling a couple of truckers standing in the parking lot…
After his smoke was finished, Jared went back inside to join the others in the booth. Still talking. Jared studied Ulysses Hadrian Armstrong from across the scuffed diner table. Fifteen if he's a day, and he acts like he owns this part of North America!
Otto's old military school buddy was certainly the martinet, Jared thought. Armstrong had abused the shit out of the poor waitress, snapping orders…great way to get your food spat in—and that crew cut of his was something out of "Leave It To Beaver."Too bad he didn't have a coonskin cap, too. Just loved authority, this kid did.
Jared supposed he should be impressed. The so-called"General" was, despite his juvenile status, Public Enemy Number Four in the state. He had a lot to be authoritative about.
But what was authority, or violence without a little fun? Jared and Otto had captured a nest of baby copperheads along the highway, and sneaked into the women's lavatory in this shithole, dropping the whole litter of glorious little wrigglers into the first commode they could find, weighing them down a bit with a fishing sinker.
See, that was fun, AND violent and a way to make yourself known…Jared sincerely hoped that the fat chick nearest to the door would be needing to pee at some point. The little buggers in the toilet would be hungry for some soft pink meat, right?
Jared was a firm believer that a restroom shouldn't encourage actual resting unless it involved someone being murdered and sent to their eternal rest, hee hee.
Jared grinned with amusement as he watched a grizzled salesman type searching in vain for his wallet at a window table. You're not paying your bill today, old timer.
Otto, for all of his apparent clumsiness, had relieved the fellow of two rings, a good watch, an Iphone and a wallet laden with cash and credit cards, just passing him in the hallway from their snake planting fun in the Ladies W.C.
Yes, Otto was a skilled pickpocket, but sadly, not much of a conversationalist.
"Warn't that sum'thin th' way we blew that sombitch up? An'Cap'n Danvers, I watched that push-up lovin' bastard fry, I did." Otto was telling Ulysses Armstrong gleefully. "Military school sucks grits, lemme tell ya."
Armstrong slowly sipped his milkshake, and then grinned."Yes, Otto, I wish you'd stayed with me and the fellows when we left the burnt down academy and gone into Gotham, to take over Black Masks's gang. We might have succeeded with your assistance, but you had to hitch back to Laredo, to drink your Texas Driver, and travel around with your old girlfriend…."
"Yup, and I left a piece of her, my Cherlynne, wherever we traveled. Otto reminisced fondly. "A foot in Austin, arm in Fort Worth, head in…"
"So what's the deal with you now, Armstrong?" Jared rudely interrupted Otto's nostalgia. "I've read a bit about your exploits, and you've got cash and money, right? Big gang?"
Armstrong fondly tapped a large gray tote bag next to the booth. "Yes, sirree. My Mauser is always by me, and it has a silencer!"Armstrong flushed with pride, as he went on. "The General is always prepared. And this bag also has quite a bit of cash in it, we opened an ATM in Bludhaven just before coming to meet you, and my squad of ex-Hell's Angels is smoking meth and waiting for me down at Motel 6 on Ravenswood Road."
Jared nodded meditatively. Sometimes he was full of giggles, and sometimes he was quiet. His mother, before she'd dropped him off at the orphanage and fled for her life, had been a bit of a quiet woman…he really should look her up.
"We got big plans, Ussy." Otto said excitedly. "We need to get into Gotham, but Jared thinks that the Green Arrow group might have warned—"
Jared tapped Otto's arm. His friend had his uses, but he often hemorrhaged information.
"Uh, yeah, Ulysses, we are interested in kind of moving in and taking over, and possibly freeing a contact of mine from an institution there, and possibly we could work together."
"That's good. I wish you luck. Gothamcan be a tough nut to crack. I think, though, that my people have other plans."Armstrong patted his large tote bag, dreamily. "Remember, Otto, you had to go dismember whats-her-name instead of helping us? I, your General, had to deal with a deserter."
Otto began to protest, looking uneasily at Jared. "C'mon, Ussy, baby. That was, like two or three years ago, an' Jared has a lot of big plans that could make us all real rich. He's been raisin' hell, man."
Armstrong snickered. "Sure, but what would you do for me, Otto? And remember I don't do owesies. Sure you blew up the school for me, but you deserted my tribe afterwards. If you want to make it big, you should desert this wimp here—"Armstrong reached over his muscled arm and rudely tapped Jared's cheek (And Jared did look rather inoffensive in his cardigan) "—and join my army!"
Jared viewed "The General" curiously. And then he looked at Otto's vacant enthusiasm. Why were they meeting with this shmuck? "The General"had had his rear kicked by Batman, Red Robin and the regular Robin a number of times, as well as the purple covered girl, called the Spoiler.
Ulysses Armstrong had spent quite a bit of time locked up in reformatories and juvenile prisons, even more than Otto and Jared combined. What made him such a winner?
Still, they needed something. Money, weapons, a crew…Jared knew that the Green Arrow family had been able to notify Batman and the Gothamcops that there was a dangerous little twerp headed their way.
Why had Jared left them alive? That Speedy, she was full of beans, you know? Jared wasn't sure where his sexual preferences lay, other than the excitement he got when he took lives…but he just couldn't knock her or those other idiots off…now he had to work around that foolhardiness, he guessed.
Also, Jared had been hoping to be able to steal up a nest egg for his putative father, the Joker. But Jared and Otto liked to party hard, and when they did get a hold of some money…it was time to gamble, to drink, to fuck up some hookers, right?
And the capers had gone a little dry lately, in their travels. Jared had few resources. In most of these hick towns the gas stations you could normally hold up had gun wielding pump jockeys…and none of the houses had brought up much booty in their second-story efforts, either.
He and Otto had been reduced to selling autographed pictures of Jesus at a nursing home.
Jared considered what he'd taken off the dead Jehovah's Witness. Two copies of "The Watchtower" magazine, a wallet with twelve dollars, and of course the cigarettes.
As Otto babbled on to Ulysses Armstrong, Jared arose casually and went to the counter and ordered a hot chocolate, dropping a few crumbs of Ex-Lax in it. He went over to the fat girl who he'd hoped to introduce the copperheads to.
Smiling sincerely to her, Jared said. "You remind me of my VacationBible Schoolteacher…you have such beautiful, pensive eyes, ma'am." They were the only parts of her that didn't weigh about 400 pounds, Jared considered.
And it was true, Fattie resembled Mrs. Dinsmore, who criticized the toddler Jared for going outside the lines in his "Rug Rats"coloring book. Little Jared had shouted "Get off the rag, bitch" at Mrs. Dinsmore. After she'd slapped him, Jarrie had responded. "Usually I charge for that, beat me beat me, baby!"
Too bad Mom was such a fag hag!
But this diner behemoth could have crushed ten Mrs. Dinsmores and her ugly aide Mrs. Iglehart too. What a cow! We have to get her on that commode.
Jared shook his Watchtower magazine next to the fat girl's"What Would Jesus Do" bracelet, and put the cup of "hot chocolate" down. He smiled. "I thought you might like this."
"Honey, you're sweet, but Swiss Miss gives me gas" the chubette said, smiling. "Thanks anyway." She pronounced it "innyways".
At the thought of "gas" Jared felt a little nauseous. He patted the woman's hand and returned to his table. It's no victory to get her fat ass on the throne if she's going to be vulgar, really.
The General looked at Jared as he slid back into the booth."Otto is trying to convince me to join up with you, and it's a joke, dude. To take my army and go into Gothamand free your so-called father, the loser…the Joker is a psychopathic loose cannon!"
Jared smiled. "Well, any cannon's better than none." Jared looked over to Otto as he picked up the General's tote bag . "Let's go, Otto. This loose cash of Armstrong's will get us into Gotham I think. Even if we have to go in by Amtrak."
Otto looked over to Armstrong. But instead of objecting, the General seemed to have fallen, face first into his omelet. "What happened to Ussy, Jared?"
"Well, perhaps he should've kept silent about his silencer."Jared responded, and gave a maniacal laugh that really woke up the diner. Jared pushed the Mauser back into the cash filled tote sack.
As the two left, Otto casually dropped a spare baby copperhead into a toddler's milk.