So thank you to everyone who read last chapter and is back for more. I was pleasantly surprised by the attentions bestowed on me by eager readers— your support means more than you realize! :-)
Speaking of support, I'm not so sure about this chapter, as is the case with most chapters. Any constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated. I hope I can live up to all your expectations!
DC readers will probably notice more nods to the comics in this chapter. Again, Kudos if you spot them. And once again, all of their scenarios and characters belong to them, not me.
Please, please, please review. I don't mind so much about the whole reading bit, it's not that important.
... Kidding.
Enjoy!
.
.
When Dear arrived at work at ten o'clock the next day, she was surprised to see someone already waiting at the visitor's entrance. She quickly realized it was Heidi Johnston's sister, Ingrid Johnston. A regular.
But not the regular time. Or day.
Ingrid turned at the sound of Dear's shoes on the pavement. A smile crossed her face.
"Morning, Dear."
"It's not the right day, Miss Johnston." Dear motioned for Ingrid to follow her to the back entrance she used. "Something wrong?"
"No, not at all."
They walked down a sloping path to the side door. Dear, for the most part, ignored Ingrid. She wasn't visiting today, that was for certain. Once Dear entered in the code to open the door, she marched inside.
"Is Dr. Arkham in?"
Dear stopped. "Doc Ark? Sure." She shrugged. "If he's not, well, he should be."
Ingrid smiled shyly. "His office is this way?"
"Yes. Just go straight, you can't miss it."
Dear nodded at Ingrid before going down a side corridor. Ingrid raised a hand in farewell. "Till Tuesday." Dear tossed up a hand casually, then took another turn and disappeared from Ingrid's view.
Ingrid let out a breath she didn't know she'd been holding. She liked Dear, but the five years between them went a long way. Thank God she liked Heidi.
She started down the hallway to Dr. Arkham's office. He had a hectic schedule, but she had the whole morning to wait. And she had to come in on Tuesday, anyway. She could wait if she had to.
She smiled when she finally got to Arkham's office. She knocked, waited, then knocked again. After a minute, she sighed and turned, looking down an intersecting hallway for anyone.
Barely a minute had passed when she spotted a pretty young blond headed her way. She waved. "Hello," she called.
"Hi." The woman stopped a few yards away. "Can I help you?"
"Yes! I'm looking for Dr. Arkham. I need to talk to him about my sister." At the confused look on the other's face, Ingrid added, "Heidi Johnston." She pushed her glasses up her nose.
"Heidi's your sister? I'm working with her psychiatrist. Dr. Harleen Quinzel," she said. Dr. Quinzel stuck out a manicured hand. Ingrid took it.
"Ingrid Johnston. Nice to meet you."
"Dr. Arkham's with a patient right now, but he should be done in a few minutes."
"Anyone I know?" Ingrid grinned.
"Doubt it."
Dr. Arkham pursed his lips, reading over his notes. He was waiting for the elevator.
When it came, he stepped in, pressed for the ground floor, and looked back at his notes on Peyton Riley. She was a twenty-seven year old criminal genius who suffered from dissociative identity disorder.
She was also a ventriloquist with a crazy dummy, name of Scarface. Scarface referred to Riley as 'sugar'. Dr. Arkham was wondering if the dummy didn't have a mind of its own. It sure looked that way— if you ignored Riley's disorder.
He shook his head and closed her file. The elevator door opened and he headed to his office. He was surprised to see someone waiting for him— did he have an appointment?
"Good morning," he said.
Ingrid Johnston turned around and smiled. "Morning, doctor."
"Miss Johnston. It's not Tuesday."
"I know. I have a few questions for you."
Dr. Arkham unlocked his office. "Of course. Come in." Ingrid followed him in, glancing around. She'd only been in his office once before, and that was months ago. Dr. Arkham sat down. "Now, how can I help you?"
She sat down in a hard chair. "Well," she started. She licked her lips. "I need to know if there happen to be any patterns in Heidi's hallucinations, and if so, I need to know them."
"Well, that's best answered by her personal doctor. Unfortunately, Dr. Carver's out for the day. Her intern's filling in."
"Dr. Quinzel?"
"Yes," Arkham said. He raised his eyebrows, surprised Ingrid Johnston knew Harleen.
"I just met her; she seems lovely." Ingrid looked down, smiling. "Well, I guess I'll talk to Dr. Carver on Tuesday, then."
"She should be in early tomorrow—"
"No, no, don't bother." Ingrid stood up and adjusted her gray slacks. "I'm out of town till Monday night, anyway. Family reunion," she said, and rolled her eyes.
"Would you like to see your sister?" Ingrid looked surprised, but Dr. Arkham had expected that. Ingrid, better than most, understood the notion of normalcy for the patients.
"It's not Tuesday," Ingrid said, quoting him from before. "But thank you for asking." Arkham quickly stood to let her out as she turned to the door. "Please, don't bother. I know my way to the visitor's entrance." She smiled. "Thank you very much, doctor."
With a turn, she left.
Dr. Arkham sat gingerly back down as the door closed behind her. Ingrid Johnston was one of the most tolerable regulars, but it took more than his usual share of understanding to let her leave without supervision. She was, after all, a very private person. And she didn't like being treated like a woman, either.
It wasn't as though it mattered, he reminded himself. Ingrid Johnston needed to be kept happy, lest she pull her sister out and move her somewhere else. As much as he had respected the whole Johnston family, it was Ingrid who was now fronting the bills for her sister's admittance.
And whether Heidi was sweet or not, six or fourteen, she brought in quite a bit of money. Dr. Arkham didn't want to disappoint the Johnston sisters, but he also didn't want to have to close his hospital down.
So he let Ingrid walk out alone, no matter how serious the consequences ended up to be.
.
.
Ingrid walked back to the visitor's entrance, looking the other way while she passed her sister's door. When she reached the front desk, she found Dear typing on her PC. Without looking up, she said, "Found the doctor?"
"Oh, yes, yes I did." Ingrid paused and adjusted her pants again. "I'm going out of town till Monday night. If anything happens, call either my cell or David's. You can also reach him at my home number."
"Okay."
"Well, bye, Dear. See you Tuesday." Ingrid started to the door when Dear's walkie-talkie crackled to life.
"Paramedics to J ASAP. ASAP."
Dear glanced up after another few seconds, surprised to see Ingrid still there. "What?"
"Is everything all right?"
Dear snorted. "I don't know. I just work here. See you Tuesday."
"Bye."
.
.
Not fifteen minutes later, after a call from Ingrid Johnston reminding her to tell Heidi she said hi, Dear looked up as Commissioner Gordon walked in with a very pretty young woman she'd never seen before. Dear stood up and looked the girl up and down. Gordon cleared his throat.
"Is Dr. Arkham in?"
"Yes. He was fifteen minutes ago." Dear scratched the back of her neck. "Are you here about the, uh. The Joker?"
"Yes. Can you take us to Dr. Arkham, please?" When Dear favored the young woman with a suspicious look, Gordon introduced her. "This is Katherine Johnson."
"Kitty, he means," Katherine, or Kitty, rather, said. She stuck out a hand. Dear didn't take it.
"Nice to meet you." Dear turned on her heel and marched towards Arkham's office. She knocked once she got there and crossed her arms while she waited for an answer. A young man, possibly an intern, opened the door.
"Go right on in," he said. He was looking at the commissioner, and then glanced at Dear, not sure what to do. His eyes slid over to Kitty Johnson and they lit up. "Hello," he smiled. Kitty Johnson hid a smile and nodded.
"Well, see you later," Dear said. She turned on her heel and went back to her desk.
.
.
"She's a bit odd."
"Who? Dear?" Arkham shrugged. Commissioner Gordon chuckled quietly.
"She is odd," he agreed, "but she's a wonderful candidate for the job. She's pretty fearless."
"She sure was hesitant to talk about the Joker."
Arkham and Gordon stared at Kitty Johnson. Gordon ended up smiling; Arkham, frowning.
"It's a touchy subject," the doctor said. "He may have killed someone she knew."
"No," Johnson said. "She hasn't many friends, and she couldn't care less about her family. They don't live in Gotham, at any rate. They probably still live in Texas." Gordon laughed out loud.
"You see, doctor? She'll get in his head in a minute."
Dr. Arkham forced a smile. He looked at Johnson. "How do you figure all that?"
"Well, she's not from Gotham— she has a Texan accent. It's still strong, so that must mean she's either been her a short time, which doesn't seem likely, or she doesn't talk to people around here much. And she doesn't have any rings, so she's not married or engaged. And if her parents lived around here, she'd probably live with them, and not have takeout from McDonald's."
"How do you know her parents don't live in Gotham somewhere else?"
Johnson laughed. "I have to tell you, Dr. Arkham, I looked everyone who works here up on the internet." She ran a hand through her dark blond hair, sweeping it away from her face. "And Gordon said she was fearless."
"What's that got to do with it?"
"Fearless people go on adventures. They either live with their parents or far away from them— if they're alive at all."
Arkham stared at her, trying to form a smile. She held his gaze and didn't bother hiding her smugness. Gordon cleared his throat again. "Dr. Arkham, I'll leave you to show her the ropes." He nodded and left.
As soon as the door closed behind him, Dr. Arkham got serious.
"Look, Miss Johnson, I know Commissioner Gordon gave you the highest recommendations. But I'm still not entirely convinced."
Kitty Johnson arranged herself in the chair in front of the psychologist. "Don't worry about me, doctor," she said. "I'm perfectly capable of dealing with him." Her brown eyes twinkled and she smiled, baring her canines. "I'm quite a bit tougher than I look, I assure you."
He folded his hands in his lap, and she sighed as he continued. "I have no doubts about your qualifications. I just don't think you realize exactly what you're dealing with."
"I've read the papers and seen the news. I read his case file, I read his profile that your colleagues wrote up. I've worked with people like him before."
"There's no one like him," Dr. Arkham said.
"Well, one would like to think that." Kitty Johnson glanced at her watch. "There's no one nearly as extreme as him, not that I know of, anyways. But there are people who just really don't care about anything."
The doctor shifted his position. "Well, I suppose." She nodded. He glanced at his own watch and bit back anything else he'd wanted to say. "I'm going to put a guard in the room with you, at least for the first session.
"I'd rather just let you introduce us. You can have video monitoring, I don't mind. A guard right outside. But I work best without variables."
"You consider your protection a variable?" Dr. Arkham was incredulous. "Miss Johnson, it's my job to make sure you're safe—"
"And I will be."
Kitty Johnson stood up. Her mouth was set in a fierce line, and her hands were tightly clasped together. Arkham was surprised at her intensity; she seemed a whole different person from the vain girl she'd been minutes ago.
"I'm not a child, and I don't like being treated like one. Take me seriously, doctor, or the joke will be on you." She leveled her chin. "I understand why you're hesitant here, but I can't give you the best results with people I don't know interfering."
Dr. Arkham didn't know what to say. He saw how it would be: the Joker would get to her, and she'd blame him. And he didn't have a real choice in the matter— Gordon clearly was confident in Johnson, and there wasn't a damn thing Arkham could do about it. He sighed, defeated.
"Well, I hope you end up being right." He stood up and motioned for her to lead the way out. She turned sharply and stepped into the hallway. She stopped, her frown deepening. Arkham saw an edgy Harleen Quinzel eying Johnson. "Dr. Quinzel, this is Kitty Johnson. She's taking up the Joker's case."
A spark of interest flared into Quinzel's blue eyes. "Nice to meet you." She looked at Kitty Johnson calculatingly, not quite sure what to say. Johnson looked five years younger than her, not to mention worlds less professional. She wasn't even wearing a suit. Just a pair of brown Gauchos and a cream-colored ruffled blouse with ballet flats.
Arkham wasn't expecting Johnson to reply. But she managed an almost natural smile with a cheerful wave. "My pleasure."
Dr. Quinzel smiled uncertainly and turned to Arkham. "Heidi Johnson's got a sore throat."
"Well, get her some medicine for it."
The blond left, her heels clicking cheerfully on the floor.
Dr. Arkham turned back to Kitty Johnson. "Shall we?"
A dark smile spread across her face.
"My pleasure."