La Llorona

(I Don't own any of these characters - except Cybil Rodriguez - but - I highly doubt you're gonna want to use her when you're doine reading this fic xD)

"Dr. Rodriguez…"

I hear my name being called.

"Dr. Rodriguez."

All I see is darkness. A thick and overwhelming dollop of darkness. I don't even know if my eyes are opened.

"Dr. Rodriguez, I think I've given you plenty of time to rejuvenate yourself."

I feel myself blink – the lights aren't on.

Something far off into the abyss rumbles and the sound bubbles into Dr. Rodriguez's ears. Her heart stops for a fraction of a second, and if she were sound of mind, she would start panicking. The grumbling of the beast within the black shroud soon ebbs and florescent lights flicker above her. That sound, she begins to regain her senses as she recalls what it is that makes such a sound; it was a power generator.

"I believe you'll find your surroundings to be more than hospitable – "

She's in her kitchen.

"– I didn't want to jump in head first and," he pauses, as if savoring and tasting the next word he's about to say, "SCARE - you." She hears a low murmur – she assumes he's laughing – but it sounds more like the beating heart of a dying bird.

Rodriguez groans loudly; she suddenly feels sharp pains throughout her body. Again, she feels her heart pause. Had he broken her legs? Her arms? Her spine?

She tries to remember things, anything, to keep her from panicking.

The Calgary Health Region is incorporating a relaxation technique that increases the mind-body connection in three steps in order for terminal patients to overcome their chronic pains: 1) relaxing; 2) focusing on pain; 3) replacing painful feelings with healthy images.

She remembers she learns that from her college Psychology course in Gotham University. She does what she remembers her $100 dollar text book telling her to do. And slowly, but surely, she lifts herself off from the cold linoleum kitchen floor. She feels her head rush with blood and she wonders how long has she been lying on the floor of her kitchen. However, she wastes no time getting straight down to business and starts clumsily going around toward the cool metallic kitchen sink, opening up drawer after drawer of forks and spoons and finally reaching the one with her various assortments of knives.

"- it's a fight or flight response, Cybil." The voice had been talking. He had used her first name. There were so few, a handful really, who ever called her by her first name – or even knew her first name. "Those sedatives I've given you are wearing off because of the surge in your adrenaline. You're SCARED." He says this last part mockingly, she can already hear the glee in his voice as he watched her, from wherever he was, arm herself with everything from plastic knives to butcher knives.

"Wh-Who are you?" Her voice faltered and it sounded rusty with age and long silence. She defensively slouched with the butcher knife in her hand, her grip tensing up around the handle, and then loosening it, and then tightening up again. Her hazel eyes darted from each of the four walls of her kitchen, ready to battle her invisible enemy at any given moment. And her usual bronze colored skin that sparkled and greeted the welcoming sunlight now dulled a dirty filemot color under the flickering gaze of dying false lights.

"Now Doctor, I'm hurt. You honestly don't recognize one of Gotham's most abominable and vile children? One, whom I might add, has been a faithful patron of your cerebral analytical services for the past two years - "

Cybil already had known whom she was talking to. She didn't need to ask, and to be honest, she had no idea why she did. Perhaps she simply just couldn't believe that HE was here, and that all of THIS was really happening. She needed to HEAR him tell her who he was, she needed the verification.

"- THE SCARECROW!" He bellowed loudly, "THE ALL POWERFUL AND OMNIPOTENT BEING OF FEAR AND FRIGHT!"

Jonathan Crane – her patient for the past two years at Arkham. He had periodically broken out of the asylum during the time she was his therapist – and never – had he terrorized her as he now did. Never.

"You know Doctor, for all the hours you've spent pouring over your Freudian books and practicing in the mirror all those Nietzsche quotes, you really know nothing about the mentally "ILL", as you like to call it."

Cybil knows better than to titillate inmates at Arkham with a response, so she keeps quiet, and feels beads of cold sweat slide down her back. Her cascading raven hair feels heavy over her shoulders and bothersome, but she doesn't move an inch of muscle to slide it back.

Name: Jonathan Crane

Arkham Inmate #65118

Height: 6' 3"

Weight: 140lbs

"Though technically I can't really blame you, you can't ever really understand something you've haven't had – first HAND – experience with. Much like FEAR, its feeling and pure ESSENCE is simply – indescribable - unless you FEEL it for yourself. The prickling on the back of your neck, the feverish beads of sweat on a furrowed brow, the trembling hands and clattering teeth, the black dark pit in the base of your stomach – that seems to suck out the very LIFE from you! Ooo! Talking about it makes me simply giddy with gooseflesh!" He gives off one of his most genuine chuckles – one that savors his mocking and ridicule of others.

Cybil knows she's been standing in the kitchen far too long; she needs to get out, to find this madman or at least make a call to the police. But the dark corridor that leads into her living room stares at her with its gaping mouth. It's hungry for flesh and blood, tears and sweat, her very being. She consciously knows she has to make that move, but unconsciously can't force herself to do so. She swallows hard as she meekly takes a step toward the black hole that's her hallway. She closes her own eyes as she takes another step, hoping to ease the tension, that when she marches towards her own possible death, she may at least be in the comfort of her own darkness instead of his.

Dr. Rodriguez's Notes: Crane is described in his younger years to be a quiet and meek boy who excelled in all his classes – all except, gym, and has been seen to have been mocked by his peers. He was lacked in a strong male role model and in order to combat his childhood's excessive bullying by neighborhood children he acquired a preference for experiencing other people's fears rather than come to terms with his own. Freud calls it "identification with the aggressor."


"Any day now - good doctor."

She had barely reached the outskirts of the safety net of light from the kitchen. She defensively held her kitchen knife into the air – all too ready to swipe anything that moved in front of her. The other knives she carried in her sterile white doctor's over coat. Apparently he had knocked her out and kidnapped her right after her working hours.

Her hand brushed up against the hallway walls, making sure she hadn't lost her way, but when the walls gave way and there was nothing tangible to grab onto she clutched the knife in her hand close to her breast and began to breathe heavily in the dark center of her living room. There was a loud beating sound echoing in the room, and she shook like a dead leaf in the autumn wind. She heard the power generator's hum again – she kept it in her basement. She had grown somewhat paranoid during Gotham's No Man's Land incident that she carried gallons of water, preserved foods and two power generator's in her cellar. Most likely he had cut her off from electrical power so she wouldn't run around turning on all the lights herself and keep her from using the telephone – the power generators didn't account for telecommunications.

However, slowly piecing together where she was, and how Jonathan was going about harassing her made her feel more at ease and in control. She had now a definitive point to reach: Going down into her basement and beating the living day lights out of him and then afterwards going to her nearest neighbor (she regretted now living out in the outskirts of the city in the country) and call the police. She had a plan, and as long as she had a plan – everything would be fine.

"I know where you are!" She said confidently out into the darkness, the flicker of lights in her living room went on, and she could've sworn she saw something scuttle across the carpet.

He laughed, "Where? In the basement? Like the good old boogeyman from childhood's past! Oh dear, I do love the classics, but where I lurk is FAR from your reach." She can almost imagine him smiling under his petrified rags of cloth and straw. "FAR."

The lights came on in a sudden bright flash of brilliance. She had to shield her eyes from the sudden exposure after getting so adjusted to the dark. But what she saw – made her plead for the shielding darkness to come and envelope her from the horror she found to be her living room. Repulsion flooded through her body and exited out from her mouth in vomit. Her nose was assaulted with the rank smell of rotting flesh and dried blood. She threw up a generous heap of bile onto her mocha color rug (which she took much pride in taking good care of) before she was done retching.

She had heard the horror stories from Arkham's under belly. Read the Gotham newspapers, and even on occasion had to visit the Gotham City morgue, but never could she ever fully comprehend what she was seeing before her eyes. Crane was right about her to some extent; she simply couldn't comprehend what her patients felt or saw or did until she had witnessed it herself.

"Oh! There is probably something I should've told you sooner before you started wandering off into your 'Little House of Horrors'. While you were lying dormant on the floor for a generous couple of hours – I took the liberty to filter my infamous Scarecrow toxins through your entire house! Minute by minute – a slow but steady seepage of my toxins crept along your corridors, by now, you should already have a heavy dosage of it, and should be feeling a little over the edge – maybe seeing things that may or may not be all entirely there."

Her walls – her walls her pulsating. She felt like she was in the stomach lining of a huge beast. Her white pristine walls were now tendons and muscle and were bleeding – throbbing every minute. She could trace the blue bruised veins and the small capillaries from the ceiling to the floor, and when she went to touch it, she felt the slime and shiver of her house's interior. Her hand picked IKEA furniture looked as if it were part of a murder scene – the throw pillows, foot rest were thrown in disarray, drenched in more blood than one body can produce. She could hear crisply, sounds coming from various parts of her house, making numerous demonic melodies – and she wished that she would go deaf. Scraping, clawing, creaking, chewing, grunting, moaning – and all in such synchronized form that it made her shiver and feel the cold touch of FEAR beckon her to move – and move fast – from where she stood. But also making her weary enough to stand perfectly still in her position, should – something – be waiting for her right around the bend.

She had never been a devout Catholic as her mother and her grand-mother had hoped and pushed for her to be. But at the moment, she wished she were. But it did not seem hymns or prayers could penetrate through those ghastly walls of flesh. She relied on what she knew - her common sense. All it really was was just Scarecrow's hallucinogens – they can't hurt her – and they weren't real. But as much as she tried to convince herself – her irrational unconsciousness poked out and made her turn the other way in fright. Perhaps they couldn't hurt her physically but – mentally – was another story.

Crane should be considered to be seen under a quasi-Freudian style of analysis—a frightened child grows up to be a frightening adult—he's also a terrific argument for long-term, deeply explorative psychotherapy. There's more to every human being than what we see on the surface, or even what they know about themselves. This kind of therapy, as maudlin and saintly as it may sound for one of Gotham's own hardened criminals, could help Crane conquer his underlying fear of his own empty spaces. Who knows what cheerful goodness lurks in the heart of this shadowy man?

"Haven't you forgotten something Doctor?" A slip of the sinister smirk is heard through the walls and the flesh vibrates with his voice.

She looks to her hand, and is surprised to see she wasn't holding her knife anymore; most likely she misplaced it when she was vomiting in the corner. And that wouldn't have been a problem if she hadn't also realized that she misplaced all her other knives. She frantically patted her doctor's coat but heard no reassuring jingling or even felt a comforting sharp ended point. She looked over her shoulder toward the kitchen – but the dark corridor seemed so much farther now – and the shadows bumped and heaved and moaned in anticipation for live bait to enter into their premises. She couldn't go back. But she couldn't bear to go forward.

Cybil closed her eyes again. Knees weak and legs shaking –

There was nothing to fear – there was nothing there – nothing that could hurt her – and Crane was just a man with a microphone. Just a man with a microphone.

Take away the need to be fearsome, and what's left? Who is Jonathan Crane after all? These are the disquieting existential questions that Dr. Jonathan Crane has been avoiding since his dismissal from Gotham University. What else has he done with his time? Seen in this light, the fear-gas fixation looks more like a defense against the yawning vacancy of Crane's jobless, spouseless, joyless adult life than overcompensation for an anxious childhood. And perhaps he knows not how – or maybe doesn't remember – how to interact with people in a socially acceptable way.

"You know – you trying so hard is really very cute. Very futile and STUPID – but very cute." Cybil opened her eyes, nothing changed, and every little disgusting nightmare that slithered in her house – continued to do so. "You've already inhaled enough of this toxin to eat your own flesh without a whimper."

She feels something cold and sharp twist between her legs. He sees her tense and squirm, "Or perhaps solidify and create monsters that only you can see."

Immediately she runs into a sprint and heads aimlessly down into a hall of bedrooms. Hoping to find a window, to call for help, to escape. But each and every window she passes is barred with twisted pieces of flesh from the walls. And though she knows this is all the work of her drug addled brain – she still can't force herself past the hallucinations that her mind finds to be so real.

"Running? And where do you think you're running to Cybil? You've been running all your life!" The darkened bedrooms she runs past seem to light up with life, and like old films projected directly from her brain, they begin to play flash backs of her childhood. "A typical Hispanic family living out their life in poverty in one of the worst cities in the world." She dares not turn her head to the side to catch glimpses of reels that are playing parts of her past she thought she had buried a long time ago. "Your mother stayed at home and your father was a factory worker – who was a mean drunk." Loud yelling, bottle breaking, fists hitting and the smell of alcohol sifted into the air. "And, well, let's just say he often had very SERIOUS lapses in judgment."

Her heart was beating as fast as a humming bird – she simply couldn't run anymore. She wanted to run, run faster than the Flash, endure longer than Superman, have a will stronger than Wonder Woman's, or even just simply – disappear – like the Batman. But - she wasn't blessed with any of those godly attributes. And she fell hard onto her knees despite herself and huddled her back up against the cool white wall, and watched with frightened eyes as the bedroom door in front of her creaked open with painful slowness.

"Do you remember that day Cybil? I bet you do. That fateful day that would come to haunt you and shape you into the fine upstanding and emotionally traumatized woman you are today."

"Daddy that hurts!" Amber light oozed slowly out from crack of the opening as she heard her ten year old self cry out. "Daddy please!" A loud smack was heard followed by a low guttural warning. Her jaw clenched and fists balled as she heard a loud scream of agony and betrayal emanate from the room. She imagined grubby dirty calloused hands roaming around her private areas, sweaty skin slapping against hers, and constant cries for help and mercy falling on deaf ears.

"You started running that day. Ran right into all your Advanced Placement classes, ran right into the top percentile of your graduating class in Gotham University, and ran right into Arkham Asylum. But you never could ever run fast enough, far enough, from your father, hmm?" The sounds from the room grew louder, the musky smell of dirty thoughts and sullied innocence wavered into the hallway where Cybil clutched her knees to her chest and wept silently, chewing on her bottom lip nervously – biting so hard that she bled. "So you decided to hide yourself away into psyches more extreme than yours so you wouldn't have to face up to your own damaged thoughts. THE THING THAT FRIGHTENS YOU THE MOST! And you sit in your Doctorial seat, telling ME that I should overcome my own "underlying fear of - empty spaces"?! And you don't even have the gall to admit you have your own skeletons?!"

Cybil rocks back and forth on the floor, her hands covering her ears. She didn't want to hear it – hear any of it. But everything seemed to seep right through her fingers – from the building rage in Scarecrow's voice to the creaking sound the floor made every time she moved forward. Everything was crystal clear.

"I have faced MY devils – and now they work FOR ME! I may be damned – but I am more saved than you'll EVER be!" He laughs hysterically, "Hiding yourself amongst the sinners when you're more damned than any of us! Using reason to control the unreasonable! Is it science that starts a nuclear holocaust? Is it God that RAPES LITTLE GIRLS?!"

"Stop it – stop it – stop it – stop it-" She mutters to herself– chanting it as if it could ward off all the evil spirits that haunt her very soul.

"IT'S NOT! IT IS ONLY US! WE DO THIS TO OURSELVES! WE ARE THE CREATORS OF OUR OWN FEAR AND FEAR OUR OWN DEVICES! WE ARE AN UNREASONABLE LOT – A DISPICABLE AND UNREASONABLE LOT! WE DON'T LEARN THROUGH REASON AND RIGHTEOUSNESS – WE LEARN THROUGH FEAR - "

"STOP IT!"

" - THROUGH PAIN, AND AGONY!"

"OH GOD! PLEASE!" She shakes violently on her carpeted floor. Her sobs rack her body and tears moisten her face and hair. She holds her arms up over her face, and her hands curl up in limp defensiveness. Her knees still tightly pushed up against her chest and her loud cries nearly mask the sound of footsteps coming towards her. "Stop – please – "

A ruffle of straw and a pungent odor of old clothes stands before Cybil's cowering figure. Through teary eyes she looks up at him in disbelief, and as he gingerly nestles himself down, slowly creaking his limber legs down to her petrified and cowed state; he lifts a bony hand and strokes her raven hair. She trembles and shakes with his touch – another uncontrollable set of sobs follows. "Please – "

"I do not do this because there is a "yawning vacancy – in my adult life" but because this is MY life. This is ALL there is – and all there ever will be. I am here to TEACH and to EDUCATE – since it is through FEAR that we learn, it is through HORROR that we find our true selves, and it is through PAIN where we find retribution and peace."

"My sweet child." He coddles her, his cold hand stroking her back tenderly and softly, and despite herself – she is comforted. "Misguided child." His long fingers entangle themselves in her hair like spiders and his cool voice soothes her feverish mind – it's as if the world around them falls apart into nothingness. "I can help you dear." It's as if none of it had ever happened.

She turns her red rimmed eyes towards him, though the mask obscures most of his face - she can still see his eyes looking piercingly down at her, genuine in feeling and veined with lack of sleep. She catches a flash of something glistening off in the dark; right in the palm of his free hand. She looks quizzically out into his hand, to see what it is that he had. When suddenly, without warning, he forcefully pulls at her hair and holds her head steadily within his large hand. She yelped in pain and disbelief, and held her breath at the sight and feel of the smooth metallic knife edge run across the length of her arm, that knife that had winked at her so deviously from the darkness not so long ago. Her heart paused.

"I can help you…"

* * *

GOTHAM GAZETTE

OBITUARIES

Dearly Departed

Dr. Cybil Rodriguez

A vibrant and intelligent woman cut down in her prime.

Brutally murdered in her own home; with parts of her hippocampus and prefrontal cortex either missing or pulled out from her skull.

If anyone knows anything concerning her death please call your local precinct.

Thank You and God Bless.

Some interesting stuff you might not have caught on to...

1) La Llorona - (totally wikied this - even though I'm spanish myself but wiki just explains things so much better xD) is Spanish for "the weeping woman," and is a popular legend in Spanish-speaking cultures in the Americas, with many versions. The basic version is that La Llorona was a beautiful woman who killed her children to be with the man that she loved and was subsequently rejected by him. He might have been the children's father, and left their mother for another woman, or he might have been a man she loved, but who was uninterested in a relationship with a woman with children, and whom she thought she could win if the children were out of the way. She drowned the children then killed herself, and is doomed to wander, searching for her children, always weeping. In some cases, according to the tale, she will kidnap wandering children. (It's also a very good song - whichc I can totally picture for this fic - watched the movie Frida? Its one of hte songs on the soundtrack xD)

2) Arkham Inamte #65118 - spells out FEAR. 6 = F, 5 = E, 1 = A, 18 = R - cool huh? xD

3) This was initally inspired by Silent Hill - love that video game - and as to homage to one of my games - Cybil is the name of police officer in Silent Hill 1

4)Hippocampus and Prefrontal Cortex - is the main operatative base for memories

So um - ya! I love Scarecrow - I love Batman - and I think he can be a little under appreciated a long with a lot of the other rogue's because of the new JOKER craze goin' around. I LOVE the Joker - he's my numero uno - but - I think we need to start spreadin' the love around! xD Probably start my own little short stories or one shots on various under dog rogues or something. LOL! We'll see!