Commissioner Gordon braced himself as he drove up to the foreboding grey building. Arkham Asylum was a miserable place, and the Commissioner couldn't help but wonder if the depressing architecture was meant to be a deterrent to people trying to escape regular prison on grounds of insanity; no one in their right mind would ever want to come here. It was said the staff were as mad as the patients, and the only reason they weren't patents themselves were that they weren't crimininally insane. Usually. After Dr. Crane, a team of psychologists had been assigned to evaluate the Arkham staff regularly, as well as monitor the treatment of their patients. Commissioner Gordon oversaw this oversight committee personally, and visited Arkham as frequently as he could bear in order to check up on its most famous patient.
"Any news?" Commissioner Gordon asked while checking in.
"Plenty; head over to Block F and they'll tell you all about it." His curiosity piqued, Gordon made his way through the numerous gates, double-reinforced doorways and guard stations that led to the asylum's maximum security section of the maximum security core. Dr. Crane, A.K.A. Scarecrow resided here, as did one other patient-prisoner.
"Commissoner, welcome!" John Dibaba, a gigantic Ethiopian nurse, greeted him as he arrived in Block F. John was a pious catholic, and he truly believed it was his calling to be a nurse to the criminally insane. Most of the staff in Block F were very religious; it gave them an extra layer of protection against their patients' verbal salvos. Block F of the maximum security section was reserved for those whose violent madness was "contagious," for lack of a better term.
"John, reception told me there's news?"
"Big news, Commissioner; very big. The new intern is a miracle-worker! She has a gift; we have been so blessed by her. He's made so much progress in the last month alone!"
"Really?"
"Oh yes, amazing; nowhere near as violent now. Of course, nobody minds having a lovely intern in this grim old place, least of all him;" John leaned over and whispered, "I think he fancies her. Crane is always trying to chat her up, too."
Gordon looked over into Dr. Jonathan Crane's cell. Crane was clean and well-groomed. He wasn't wearing a strait jacket, just the white clothing assigned to all Arkham patients. He was watching them and nodded in greeting. His cell was on the complete opposite end of the block from the other patient's. Crane had demanded this arrangement, saying the other patient scared him. Nobody had argued. He looked…broken.
A pretty young redhead with stunning blue eyes and a stern expression appeared. "Dr. Quinzel," John called to her, "he's refusing to take his medication again." He offered a small paper cup to the young woman.
She sighed and took it. "You're enabling and empowering him, John. You can't let him intimidate you." She scolded him in a way that told the Commissioner she'd done it countless times before. She spoke in a New York accent that had been greatly polished by her considerable education. She headed towards her patient's cell.
"I still remember her first day here; pretty little thing like that; I was worried sick. But she goes up to that freak's cell, and he looks at her, and grins, and says what a pleasure it is to see her, then asks if she'd like to know how he got his scars. You know, his usual gig."
"His stories get more disturbing every time."
"Yeah, well, she says 'you did it to yourself. You had no reason.' Never even looks up from her clipboard. I tell you he was so taken aback she got him to take his first dose of antidepressants as easily as you'd take your aspirin."
Dr. Quinzel nodded to one of the four guards standing outside of a cell. They all looked even more humourless than she did. Gordon watched as she grabbed the Joker, held by two nurses, now devoid of makeup, his purple suit replaced with a white strait jacket, by his still-greasy-but-now-dirty-blonde hair, wrenching his head back and forcing his mouth open. The scars of the Glasgow smile on his face were the only trace remaining of the grinning fiend who had terrorized Gotham. She then shoved a pill down his throat with her finger. She then nodded for the nurses to release him. He scrambled to the back corner of the padded cell to sulk.
"Do you want some water?" Dr. Quinzel asked him in a cool, professional tone. He never raised his eyes to her, but, after a moment, nodded once. She brought some over in a wax paper cup. He drank like a man defeated, having her lift the cup, as his arms were secured to his sides. "Why do you persist in this, Mr. J? You know perfectly well you wouldn't be restrained at all if you took it yourself, on time."
"You like it better this way," the Joker answered, and for an instant, he looked at Dr. Quinzel with all the wicked intelligence the Commissioner knew he possessed.
"I like it when my patients do what is best for their well-being," Dr. Quinzel countered, completely unrattled.
"Ha hah haha…" the Joker chuckled, "HAHAHAHAHA!" his manic laughter echoed through the hallway. Dr. Quinzel exited the cell and closed the door, returning silence to the dreary halls. She hurried down to Dr. Crane's cell.
The four guards followed her, but didn't seem to be anywhere near as careful with Crane. One opened the door for her before the others had caught up. Crane was now hysterical. He was curled up in a foetal position, rocking back and forth with his hands over his ears, saying "I'm being good!" over and over again.
"Jonathan," Dr. Quinzel called, taking him by the shoulder.
"I'm being good!" he insisted to her.
"Yes, Jonathan, you've been extremely cooperative," Dr. Quinzel assured him. "You'll be transferred to the other side of the facility as soon as we can be certain you don't pose a threat to the other patients, nor they to you. Many of the patients in the regular treatment program were subject to your experiments and they do not remember you fondly. We have to make certain you'll be safe; you know that."
Crane turned to Gordon with a pleading expression. He was sweating profusely and obviously terrified. "Nothing scares him. There's a great big hole where his feelings should be. He gives my nightmares nightmares." He looked back at Dr. Quinzel, "she's got a hole, too."
"Jonathan, what have I said about derogatory remarks? Besides, Mr. J is making progress, just not as quickly as you. We have to be patient with him. Now; do you want something to help you relax?" Dr. Quinzel asked him.
Dr. Crane smiled like a man being offered salvation. "Yes, please."
Dr. Quinzel called to John, "Sedate him."
John nodded, went away and came back with a hypodermic needle. Crane eagerly offered his wrist, and sighed happily as he was injected. John helped Dr. Crane onto the bed, and he drifted off into a drug-induced sleep.
"You must be Commissioner Gordon," Dr. Quinzel said, finally turning her attention to him and offering her hand, "Doctor Harleen Quinzel. I'm interning here, and will most likely join the staff on completion of my internship. Might I say I think it's very responsible of you to personally oversee the patients in this facility?"
"The safety of Gotham depends a great deal on the effective operation of Arkham Asylum. I consider it my duty to come." Actually, Batman assigned him that duty, since he could hardly come himself, but Gordon wasn't going to tell them that. "Doctor, is it true you specifically requested to work with the Joker?"
"It is. And we don't use that name here; we address him as Mr. J, as he persists in refusing to provide us with his real identity."
"Has there been any development at all in finding out who he is?"
"Very little, I'm afraid, and what little we have is mostly conjecture. He is a pathological liar and the information he does give us is so contradictive we have to assume it's all false. I have been able to make a few strong observations from his behaviour, however. He was almost certainly abused as a child, probably battered by both parents, and possibly by subsequent foster parents. We're running him through Children's Aid, but so far we don't have any matches. While he was physically abused, he was intensely educated."
"How do you know that?"
"While genius is born, it must be nurtured to survive. That is why the women born in those polygamist colonies have such low IQ's, they are exposed to nothing but physical labour, and their education is neglected. So of course they are content to be cattle, since they have no chance to grow mentally. Mr. J, on the other hand, had someone instructing him in critical thought, weaponry, combat and terrorism. Other than that, his range of knowledge is very limited.
"He doesn't even make cultural references, or show signs of knowing popular songs or television or movies from any era. Judging from all that, I'd say he was home-schooled in extreme social isolation. He has a natural aptitude for the physical sciences, and it stands in very odd contrast to his newfound affinity for cartoons. He was fascinated when I told him about Darwin and the Theory of Evolution. He is also very interested in biochemistry, and insists on knowing the minute details of how all of his medication works at a molecular level. I frequently make him ask Dr. Crane to explain it to him, as it allows Dr. Crane to maintain his skills and fosters interdependency.
"Forensics said he is probably in his early twenties. IQ of at least 180, though he won't cooperate long enough to complete a Standford-Binet test, and it's impossible to get an accurate score without knowing his age for certain. It sounds like a lot, but really, it isn't."
"Well, I can say you seem to be the right person for the job; the Joker was committed eight months ago, went through every sort of drug therapy and psychotherapy program available. Nothing changed him at all. Looking at him now, it's only been six weeks and the difference is amazing! I've never seen him so calm or so cooperative. I have to ask how you've done it?"
"His progress has to be gauged against his obvious transference, remember, but it is still significant. A lot of it was back to basics; a regular schedule, good, nutritious meals, a fitness program. But to be honest, none of it would be possible without the antidepressants. It was obvious to me from the start he needed them; I have no idea why it never occurred to anyone else. I make sure he takes them every day at the same time. It's done him a world of good; he seems to be genuinely happy a lot of the time, now. He even has a sense of humour. He's very fond of gag props and joke paraphernalia, and keeps smuggling it in somehow."
"I still don't know how he got that rubber chicken," John interjected, rubbing his head, perplexed, "though I'm not sure I want to. I think he's downright jolly most days."
"Johnathan almost had a nervous fit when Mr. J got him with a joy buzzer." Dr. Quinzel allowed herself the barest of smiles. "I also insist that all my patients have regular social interaction. Jonathan has more or less normal social skills, and is allowed to interact with Arkham's mildest cases -under strict supervision, of course. Being a psychologist himself, he knows how to behave around the mentally ill and the social time seems to benefit both parties. As you know, Mr. J of has an avid following among our most extreme anti-socials. They do what he says and so he tolerates them. All in all they follow the schedule and have of course made significant improvements."
"Well, Block F is clearly in very capable hands," Commissioner Gordon told Dr. Quinzel as he shook her hand, "I'm looking forward to your patients' progress."
"As am I, Commissioner." Gordon tried to ignore the chill he got when she said it.
He returned through the various security checkpoints, eager to be out but trying not to look it. As he approached the surveillance station, he heard the Joker's voice.
"Would you like my…professional opinion of the good doctor, com-mishoner?" The Joker asked, grinning into the camera. Gordon was alarmed for a second, then realized the Joker must know exactly how long it took him to reach the surveillance station. It was still a concern. He stopped and looked at the screen. "Dr. Quinzel likes to bully people. And she's very good at it. She's got old Scarecrow good and whipped, and she loves roughing me up," the Joker shivered with enjoyment, "though we don't get it half as bad as the staff do, ho-hoo! I wouldn't take their jobs for anything! Frankly I think it's going to be a race to see whether she or the Bat gets locked up first. I do hope that hot little piece of ass will be my cell mate! Oh, but don't tell her I said so."
The commissioner turned to the guard in the station, "This surveillance footage is saved somewhere, isn't it?"
"Yup," said the guard.
"And Dr. Quinzel sees it, doesn't she?"
"Every word," the guard assured him. "Don't let it bug ya, commish, that nut's always going on about the doc. Goin' on about how he wants to wrestle her in peanut butter or have her tie him up with barbed wire and 'riding him like she's trying to break a rocking horse.' You know how he likes to be hurt, he tries to make her get rough with him every chance he gets. She's always by the book, though. You could never write her up for nothin'."
"I'll bet," the Commissioner answered. He wanted to sound like he had every confidence in the good Doctor, and ignore that deep down, he thought the Joker was dead right. You had to have faith; in these dark times, it was all that stood between humanity and the Joker's vision of what it should be.
Dr Quinzel reached for her radio and called the guard in the monitoring room. "Come here, I want to check up on Dr. Crane."
She joined the guard outside Crane's cell. He looked agitated. "Are you all right, Jonathan?"
"Why did you go over there alone?! You're never supposed to interact with maximum security patients unsupervised!"
"And you should know; you wrote the protocol. Then violated it repeatedly to experiment on your patients."
"Look where it got me," Crane answered sardonically.
"Your concerns are noted, Jonathan, thank you."
Crane shook his head. "The hole is getting bigger…the hole in your head…" Crane
Commissioner Gordon walked into the dark alleyway, trying to ignore how completely insane it was for a person as loathed as he was by Gotham's underworld to do such a thing at four-thirty in the morning. "Are you there?" he asked quietly, feeling rather silly for talking to the dark.
But the barest hint of movement could be seen in the shadows, and the Batman emerged. "I know you wouldn't risk contacting me if it wasn't important, but we should still make this quick."
"The Joker has escaped from Arkham."
Gordon thought he saw Batman wince. "How?"
"It seems he had a cell in solitary prepared for him. He was sent there this morning, or yesterday morning now. He broke out of solitary about an hour and a half ago, and was out of Arkham in about half an hour. He passed Dr. Quinzel on his way out, and she says he hid in the woods until a white van came to pick him up. She said it looked like it was industrial in nature, no markings, and it was too dark to read the plates. Tech is trying to get a number off surveillance, but odds are it's a stolen vehicle they'll have ditched by the time we get something useful."
"Do you have a copy of the footage?"
"Here," he handed Batman a DVD.
"How did the van get past the perimeter?"
"Rocket launcher."
"Sounds like a good argument for having all Gotham detention centers' physical defences upgraded."
"You're right. I'll suggest it to the mayor when I break this to him…after the sun is up."
"I'll be in touch. Good luck."
"God help us if that lunatic is set loose on Gotham again."
"Gotham is once again in the grip of fear: the Joker has escaped!" the news reporter announced in her usual impartial tone, a grinning portrait of the Joker above and to the right of her, "Police officials have confirmed members of the Joker's gang broke into Arkham Asylum early this morning and freed him."
The tv cut to Commissioner Gordon having a press conference. "I must regretfully confirm that yes, the Joker is currently at large, and all of Gotham P.D. is on high alert. Furthermore, the mayor has authorised me to offer a reward of 5,000 for any confirmed Joker sightings promptly reported to the police, which will become 5,000,000 if the Joker is apprehended. We will not, I repeat NOT allow this menace to terrorize the city once again."
Bruce Wayne watched it all pensively.
Commissioner Gordon sorted out which reporter he would answer first. "Commissioner, is it true the Joker has already claimed his first victim?"
"I'm afraid that is correct: a pimp known as Pete Martin was found dead early this morning at the corner of Howe and 17th street. The Joker also…assaulted a prostitute that was with the man."
Bruce rubbed his temples "How can I stop this from happening again?" he asked, searching desperately for an answer.
"Dr. Quinzel," Commissioner Gordon greeted her when she arrived at the station, "We were going to call you."
"I thought I'd save you the trouble. Here's Mr. J's file," she handed it over. "I want to assure you I will help in any way I can."
"Five bodies, five Joker sightings: Pete Martin found at Howe and 17th, Frankie Ingles at Atwood and 21st, Nancy Derek at Lars and 9th, Marty Evans at Elm and 14th. All at exactly 2:23 in the morning. Streetwalkers, pimps and street-level dealers; small-time low-lifes: not the Joker's usual fare. If we assume, as the eyewitness account suggested, that the first killing was done hastily and not planned, but the location where the body was found was "
"I know, a child could figure it out; he's spelling out my name, and the victims' names spell 'find me.'"
"Yes. Which means he's going to strike on 26th street next, but we don't know whether he'll choose Escher, Eckhart or Elm again. And there's more: Marty Evans wasn't stabbed to death; he was poisoned." The commissioner passed a crime scene photo to Dr. Quinzel.
"Died with a smile on his face," she said, shaking her head. The unfortunate man bore a manic grin.
"This is no time to be droll, Doctor. Pathology found an unknown toxin in his system. The closest thing we found to it was Felinax."
"His antidepressant?"
"Anything you can tell us will help."
"Felinax actually contains two drugs: the first counteracts chemical changes in the brain linked to depression. The second is activated by violent impulses. When the patient gets an urge behave aggressively, it stimulates parts of the brain known to cause bliss and complacency. Simply put; the subject loses all interest in violent behaviour in a rush of pleasant feelings. Unfortunately, there is a risk of side effects, such as uncontrollable laughter, which is why it is only used of very serious cases, and is not available to the general public."
"And the Joker insisted on knowing how it worked inside and out."
"Oh god! What have I done?"
"Please, Doctor; we need to know where he'll appear next. Which street will he choose?"
Dr. Quinzel shook her head. "I'm sorry, he's incredibly complicated and I was barely able to scratch the surface of his mind. He was just too dangerous to do full sessions with; you have to understand! And…I'm not a forensic psychologist, Commissioner; this sort of reconstruction is not my expertise. I can try to work it out, but, I'm afraid I can't make any promises."
"Our people are completely stumped; you know him better than anyone. Please try."
Dr. Quinzel looked over everything the Commissioner had gathered, thinking hard. "Eckhart."
"You think he'll choose there?"
Dr. Quinzel shrugged. "It sounds funny."
"It's all we've got." Gordon turned to the police behind him. "I want eyes all over Eckhart and 26th. I want patrols up and down 26th, Eckhart, Elm and Escher, in that order."
"If that is all, Commissioner, I'd like to go home; I think I need to lie down."
"I want you escorted at all times, Dr. Quinzel; this could well be a sick joke, and your murder the punchline."
"Of course."
"Commissioner, we found something, and you're not going to like it," came the grim voice over the radio.
"Another body?" Gordon looked at his watch; it was 2:23 am exactly.
"No; no body and no Joker."
"Then what did you find?"
"A doll, Commisioner, a Suzie Doll with red hair and blue eyes dressed in a harlequin costume."
"Anything else?"
"It was holding a little toy suitcase with a note in it saying 'goodbye.'"
"Detective Reeve, report, is Dr. Quinzel all right?"
"She's…she's gone sir."
"What happened?"
"We were getting ready to relocate Dr. Quinzel to a more secure location. Perkins went to check on some suspicious activity outside the building, and got tasered. Somebody knocked me out. I just woke up, I've been out for almost half an hour, and she's long gone. No sign of a struggle."
"Damnit!" Gordon hissed as he slammed the receiver down on the desk. He leaned out the window to get some air. There was a dark shadow not far below. "Please tell me you have a back-up plan."
"I do."
Godon's cell phone rang, it was a blocked number. Gotham P.D. wasn't supposed to get blocked numbers, so there was only one person it could be. It had been over an hour since he'd seen Batman on the window sill, and for it to have taken so long was a bad sign. "An old abandoned warehouse on J and 17th. I'm sorry; I was too late."
Gordon sat dejectedly in his car, letting CSI finish up. The inside of the warehouse was a gruesome scene: there was a back room with blood all over it. Someone had been tied up with rope and cut repeatedly. There were also several discarded packages for keeping surgical equipment sterilised; meaning the victim had likely been stitched back together without anaesthesia, no doubt to be kept alive and tortured again. Even for the Joker, it was ghoulish.
"I put a tracer on Dr. Quinzel, but I lost the signal. When I was able to find it again, this was what I found." Batman told Gordon as he appeared from the shadows.
"We might still find something," Gordon offered, to comfort himself as much as the Batman, "Dr. Quinzel is still alive; we might still be able to recover her, and she might have important information when we do." Gordon's cell phone rang. "It's forensics; they must have matched the DNA and finger prints. Excuse me –Gordon here."
"Commissioner, I'm sorry about the delay but…the matches I got didn't make any sense; I ran them through four times…they still don't make any sense."
"Just…tell me what you found."
"The fingerprints don't belong to the Joker or any of his gang, and the blood isn't Dr. Quinzel's. It's not even a woman's; the testosterone levels are too high"
"You said you found a match?"
"That's what doesn't make any sense: the fingerprints are Dr. Quinzel's, and the blood belongs to the Joker."
"What about the scalpel we found?"
"Same thing again; Dr. Quinzel's finger prints on the handle, and the Joker's DNA in the blood. It's her fingerprints on the packaging as well as the rope and his DNA in the tissue on the rope fibres."
"Why the hell would the Joker create a fake crime scene with him as the victim?"
"Damned if I know, but we'll keep working on it."
"There must be explanation," Batman said, shaking his head in disbelief.
"I'm happy to hear about any theories you have. I'll call CSI out so you can look at the room." Gordon went to call CSI out and tell them what he'd heard.
It had been three weeks since Dr. Quinzel's disappearance. In that time, the Joker had stolen an entire shipment of fine European chocolates, painted several blocks of the east side in bright primary colours, stolen a couple of hyenas, puffed up all of the rice in a warehouse, making the building explode, and produced several victims of his new toxin. He appeared to be experimenting with dosage as well as variations on lethality: some people laughed for a couple of days then recovered with no further symptoms, some people were found to have died laughing. Others still would just start all of a sudden, and laugh themselves into asphyxiation.
"It doesn't make sense, Alfred, why would he pull college pranks?"
"Only the Joker knows for certain, sir."
"He's made no threats, no ransom demands, shown sign of Dr. Quinzel or given any indication of what his intentions for her are."
"Perhaps she had discovered something he didn't want known," Alfred offered.
"Then why not just kill her outright? He must have had several opportunities, including when he first broke out of Arkham. No, she must be of some value to him alive. I just can't figure out why." He shook his head. "I'm going on patrol; maybe tonight I'll find something."
While a new batmobile was being carefully and quietly made, Batman was making due with a batcycle. He was using it and a new sensing system to root out caches of the most dangerous weapons in Gotham's underworld, to great effect. These caches were generally in areas so violent the Gotham PD avoided them, and so it was unlikely he would have a bad run-in with the police while he patrolled. Unfortunately, the criminals who held the weapons had realized what he was up to, and were throwing everything they had at him. Batman was prepared; better him than the police, or innocent bystanders.
Worse still, most of the caches he'd uncovered so far belonged to Maroni's men, and that meant the Joker's weapons were now probably well-defended and the clowns guarding them well-prepared, and getting more so every time he found one of Maroni's outfits and not the Joker's. Tonight he was in one of many of Gotham's old warehouse districts; the abandoned buildings were crawling with scum of all sorts, and his sensor was going haywire. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a flash of white. He hit the brakes, but that only gave the clown with the harpoon a slower-moving target. The weapon's explosive tip, designed to kill a whale on contact, ripped through the batcycle's armour-plating like paper. The anchor-like part left after the explosion latched onto the batcycle, rendering it useless. Batman set the batcycle's auto-destruct for twenty seconds and hurried towards the warehouse the sensor last targeted.
The body armour Batman had put on for this patrol was second in protection only to an armoured vehicle; the suit had an underlying layer of Kevlar, followed by custom-fit titanium plates. His face was completely covered and triple-redundant sonar systems fed him audio and visual input. The ears of his suit contained an advanced filtering system that allowed him to breathe quickly while being unaffected by smoke, tear gas and other airborne threats. Bionics gave him a stronger punch and greater speed even under the weight of his virtually-impenetrable armour. He also carried a ceramic shield almost as tall as he was, though this was mainly intended to draw fire and attacks away from him as his opponents attempted to deprive him of it. The sub-machine guns that made up the first line of defence didn't even slow him down.
Next they used grenade launchers. Batman clambered out of the craters the grenades made and carried on. The clowns persisted with the grenades dangerously close to the warehouse, blowing a couple of holes into the wall of the building. Batman obligingly entered using one of the holes. On the other side was a manned turret-mounted Gatling gun, no doubt loaded with armour-piercing shells. Batman dove behind his shield and threw a charged batarang at the gunman. He hit and stunned the man, but not before getting grazed by a bullet. He attached an explosive charge to a key point on the Gatling and dragged the gunman to a (reasonably) safe distance away from the impending blast. He scanned and found a second, unmanned Gatling. He fired a few self-attaching charges at the second Gatling. Nearby goons wisely scattered. Batman scanned the area for ammunition and guns not currently in use. He pressed further into the warehouse, shielding the opening the bullet graze had made in his armour and taking out nearby goons as he went. He fired off more self-attaching explosives at the weapons of men who stayed farther off, taking out a lot of the higher-calibre weaponry, but there seemed to be no end to the guns and no place in particular they were being kept. He pushed the gangsters back away from one of the more obvious stockpiles, creating a perimeter, and blew a hole in the ceiling. He hunkered down and punched some commands into a device on his left wrist. The device directed a nearby drone helicopter to drop its load through the hole in the roof onto the gun stockpile. It dropped a substance that burned so hot and fast it made Napalm look like a sunny day and the weaponry was reduced to molten slag in a manner of minutes. The fire burned itself out in a very concentrated area in the process. Batman blew a second hole in the roof. Firefight intensified but the gunmen fell back. Another stockpile was promptly reduced to slag. Many of the fighters had now fled the building, while those that remained were turning from defending the weaponry to throwing everything they had at him. Batman used one of the slag piles for cover while he attempted to push the remaining gunmen out of the building, destroying any unattended weapons with more firebombs. The gangsters threw caution to the wind and resorted to grenade and rocket launchers, clearly determined to take Batman out with the building. Something hot ripped through Batman's leg, hamstringing him. A huge piece of flying concrete hit him in the head. As the world went dark, he thought he heard the Joker laughing.
Batman awoke with a strange sort of haze clouding his mind. It took him a moment to realize he was under the effects of a very strong painkiller, probably narcotic, judging by how little he was worried about it. He was also flat on his back. He couldn't understand what he was seeing and hearing at first. He had to think really hard before he remembered how to interpret the data from the sonar equipment. It was just too confusing, so he gave a voice command that deactivated it and removed the parts of his face shield that blocked his mouth and eyes.
"Whoop; he's waking up!" it was the Joker's voice, and he was way too close. Batman tried to get up and into a more defendable position. He found that he was strapped down.
"Hold still! You'll pull your stitches an' I ain't even finished yet!" came a shrill woman's voice nearby. A red-headed blur was moving down near his injured leg. The blur focused itself into a young redheaded woman focusing intently on making neat little sutures. The armour plating around the injury had been bent back just far enough to allow her slender fingers access.
"Dr. Quinzel, are you all right?"
"Hah; I ain't the one with my insides hangin' out."
"Why are you doing this?" Batman asked the Joker, hoping he could get the clown to chatter on while he figured out a plan of escape.
"That little bust of yours lit up the skies for miles; the police would have been there by the time the building collapsed if I hadn't blocked their route. In which case they would have found you quite incapacitated, and while they would certainly have taken you for medical attention, they would also have arrested you and unmasked you. And where's the fun in that?"
"I could have tried to hold them off until you woke up, but with your gizmos out of commission as well as your leg, on the off chance you did wake up before you bled to death, odds were long on you getting anywhere useful, and especially anywhere that wouldn't make you surrender your identity in exchange for patching you up.
"Whereas I don't care who you are under that mask, and want you to stick around to play the game. So I brought you here to have Harley put you back together again. Just sit back and relax, Bats, she does good work."
"Lucky for you all doctors at Arkham are required to have training in trauma surgery."
"Wait, what did he just call you?"
"Harley," Dr. Quinzel answered, "Harley Quinn." She grinned at the Joker.
"You like giving your therapists pet names, Joker?"
"No, I usually like killing them, but Harley was just so very...talented. I couldn't let it go to waste." Dr. Quinzel giggled.
"What has he done to you?"
"Not nearly as much as she's done to me," the Joker countered. He unbuttoned his vest and shirt, revealing a deep cut running up his side that had been sewn up with neat little sutures.
"Do you actually want me to believe she tied you up in that warehouse three weeks ago and tortured you?"
"I wouldn't use the word torture; that makes it sound like I didn't enjoy it. I'd gotten so used to playing with the boys that when I took a turn with kitten here, I got her a little over-excited."
"Hmpf," Dr. Quinzel said as she finished, "I shoulda let you bleed longer, take the fight out of you."
"Oh, come one now, Harley, you can't say I haven't made up for it, hmm?" the Joker snaked his arm around her. Dr Quinzel crossed her arms and rolled her eyes in such a way that made it clear she'd relent if given enough attention. The Joker fussed over her a bit more until she turned and let him kiss her.
"Please stop," Batman said as he fought down the contents of his stomach.
"Everyone's a critic," Harley sighed. The Joker laughed.
Batman looked at the Joker. "I am going to find out what you've done to her, and then I am going to make you regret it."
The Joker sighed and kneeled down next to Batman, putting on a fatherly expression. "Someday, if you're lucky, you'll meet someone who's as delightfully dysfunctional as you are, who takes interest in your hobbies and who likes you for who you are, not whoever you pretend to be when you're not wearing that mask. And if you do, then you'll understand." Batman strained at his bonds. The Joker got up and went over to Harley. "We'd best be off: his ride will be here shortly."
"Stay off that leg for a week at least," Harley instructed him, "preferably three! I MEAN IT!"
"Best do as she says, trust me on that." The Joker shook his head. "By the way, the Chechen liked to keep all his eggs in one basket, as they say, and the men I… inherited from him never learned different. That was his stock you incinerated, and he had all the best goodies. It's gonna take me forever to replace that stuff, but you sure put on one helluva show!" the Joker's laughter echoed through the empty building as he left.
The
drug-induced fog that still hovered in Batman's brain altered his
perception of time. He was still puzzling over what to do next when
Commissioner
Gordon arrived. He sighed and looked down at the
vigilante. "The Joker called me at home asking for some "pest
control." Please tell me you weren't involved in that...war zone
down on 32nd."
"All right, then, I won't tell you."
Gordon shook his head. Then he looked over at an IV line Batman hadn't noticed. It was empty, Harley must have had him hooked up to something before he'd woken up. Gordon sniffed the bag. "Heroine." He pulled a small re-sealable bag out of his pocket and squeezed a drop from the IV bag into it, then burst a bubble of some chemical inside. The chemical mixed with the IV substance and turned bright orange. "Potent and not cut with anything nasty; hospital grade but likely illicit in origin. Feeling no pain?"
"And too doped up to fight back."
"To top it off, the gang members we arrested at the warehouse are claiming they were involved in a turf war with Maroni's men, and said you came and left. No one mentioned you were in the building or that you were injured: the Joker's covering for you. Finding you so well taken care of worries the hell out of me."
"You heard what the Joker said when I interrogated him: he enjoys having me around to play with. In a strange way, I think I can trust him, at least when my life is at stake. Dr. Quinzel may have effected his choice, though."
"You saw her?"
"That's her handywork," Batman indicated the stitches, "the Joker claims she's come to him willingly, even indicated they were involved in consensual rough play three weeks ago. He's certainly cut deep enough to account for the amount of blood we found, and the stitches he had looked just like these, but I'm still not convinced."
"We can puzzle over it after I've gotten you somewhere safe. I brought a van, as per the Joker's cryptic instructions, and he seems to have left you a wheelchair."
"I'm going to have a few weeks to puzzle over this while I recover."
"And I have a feeling they are going to be very quiet weeks."