I woke to the sun laying on my face. I smiled to find the blonde hair tousled over my belly and the weight of a head laying on my ribs. I stroked Harley's face softly and watched her smile in her sleep. I hoped that her dreams were not about the clown.

"Mornin' Red." I snapped out of my thoughts and saw her sweet face staring at me. I shuffled us both until I could kiss her on the nose. She giggled and my stomach jumped as I felt a smile creep over my face.

"You're pretty when you smile." She giggled again. "Can we stay here?" I pecked her on the lips and hummed affirmative.

And we did stay just like that for as long as I could allow it. It ran through my mind on and off what we had to do until it finally forced me to move from beneath Harley. I heard her whine like a toddler when I lifted her head from me and sat up beside her.

"I don't wanna get up, Red. I don't wanna do anything." I sighed. I felt badly for her; we both knew what I had been thinking about. And we both knew that the outcome would be unpleasant.

I knew that I wanted the Joker dead. If I were more cynical, I would take his head as a souvenir. It was the only way that I could be absolutely sure that Harley would not go back to him or feel sorry for him or be stolen away from me by him. It was also, quite frankly, the only fair punishment for what he had done to her. I couldn't care less what he had done to the rest of humanity. I was no angel in that sense myself, so it would be hypocritical to be upset. He had, however, hurt Harley over and over and worse each time. He had never loved her and he had never felt even an ounce of the affection that she smothered over him.

It was me that she had come to when he became violent. I was the one who found her all of the times that she couldn't walk after being beaten. It was my garden of rarities spawned in this metropolis hell that healed her body. And, she had told me often through sleepy words that it was me who healed her beyond her body. When she is thinking straight, its always me that makes her who she truly is.

When the clown is involved, she is no longer thinking straight. Her mind goes into some sort of short circuit that I cannot fully understand. And then, she is somehow able to ignore the things that he does. The things that he says to her have only joyful meanings in her mind.

The thing about him that perhaps bothers me most, is that he can do all of that, and I can do everything that I love doing for her, and she will still love him blindly and indefinitely. It is painful, in honesty, when I am caring for her or making her feel wonderful and all she can talk about or think of is him. I can never be good enough as long as he is alive for her mind to wonder to. Soon though, it will be my game, my affection, and forevermore, my Harley.

Harley's lips left my forehead and landed briefly on my lips. She backed away and smiled wide and happy.

"Stop thinking! You make me nervous!" She pecked my lips again. I cupped her chin as she pulled away.

"Harley-" I swept my fingers and her hair behind her ear. I rested my hands on her shoulders. "Harley, you do understand what I need to do, don't you?" She shook her head violently as she backed away.

"I don't wanna hear about it. I don't wanna know. Please?" She looked up with glassy, pleading eyes and I pulled her head into my shoulder and stroked her hair.

"However you want it, Harley."

The hours were uneventful until the sun set. I worked on my experiments, or at least I tried to. Harley read magazines, but got bored eventually and ended up cuddling in my lap as I worked around her. I hadn't been working that hard anyway. My mind was elsewhere.

When Harley fell asleep against my breast around sunset, I picked her up and cradled her until I could set her down on the bed. I decided to stop my work and ready myself for the night. It was a special night indeed so I took the time to make my hair and light makeup look just right. I watched myself grin in that maniacal way as I applied my poison red lipstick. My grin grew when I stepped into my suit. I struggled a bit with the zipper until I felt a set of hands lay over mine slowly.

"Let me zip you up." Harley said softly with an eerie lack of emotion or her personality in her voice. I tried not to move as a shiver run up my spine.

"Harley, are you going to be alright?" She slid the zipper up my back without answering.

"You don't have to come out with me tonight, Harley. It might be better if you stay here."

"I do need to come with you." She said with the same dead voice. I turned and kissed her lightly. When I pulled away, I saw her look down and her face was blank. I felt the same shiver run up my spine. I decided not to push her any further on the subject and allowed her time and space to ready herself.

I didn't know what exactly I was going to do yet. I assumed that the answer would change as the situation unfolded. I rifled through my vast outlook of potions and poison and looked over my many seeds until I had built what would be to most people, a terrifying assortment of solutions to the problem. I hid them away and waited.

Harley emerged from the washroom wearing her harlequin jumpsuit, but did not have her jester hood on. She had her hair pulled up into pigtails hastily and was pulling her black mask onto her face. She hadn't applied her white cream face paint. I think she might have been suffering with her identity as the Joker's Harley Quinn and what she was outside of that persona. Taking her out of the tragic harlequin would be a slow process, but she had started it by herself.

I walked to her when she stopped moving and took her into an embrace. She was motionless and unresponsive in my arms. I rubbed her back to soothe myself as much as her. As I released her, I took her hand and led us out the door.

The roads of the city seemed darker than usual. There was a light fog forming below us. We stayed in the shadows and moved swiftly through alleys. I rarely let go of Harley's hand. I knew my way to where the Joker was. I remembered it well from where I had found Harley the day before. I bet I could find the blood stains if I looked.

When the warehouse came into view, Harley lead the way to a remote entrance. She sped gracefully through the halls until we came to the center production area. At a control panel sat a green haired freak. We crept to stand below his overhang. I scattered my seeds on the ground and readied a vial between my fingers. I handed Harley a handkerchief and she took the hint to cover her mouth and nose.

I threw the vial up and heard it shatter above me. The orange fog quickly filled the area and my seeds sprung to life. I urged them upward with me and I moved out of the way as they entangled the Joker.

"You." He ground his teeth.

"Me." I ran my finger over my lips and took up some of my lipstick. I leaned in close and smothered his lips with my lipstick. I saw him begin to squirm and I knew that his face was starting to burn. I grinned, amused with the struggle.

"You should be fine. It would seem that you like pain." I placed a hand on his chest and leaned on it. "Or- is it other people's pain that gives you a thrill?" I slapped him across the face.

"You bitch." He snarled through clenched teeth.

"Ah ah, those aren't very kind words. You should learn to control your mouth." My voice turned from teasing to angry as I reached for a vial and broke it against his forehead. The liquid rolled down his face leaving steaming purple rivers in his snow pale skin. The chemical steam mixed with blood from the skin with shards of the broken vial. He seethed, but said nothing.

"What makes you think that you deserved her affection?" I asked, trying to look as tall and imposing as I could. He stared back confused. I slapped him twice.

"What makes you think that you deserve Harley? What makes you think that you are so big that you can treat her that way?" I screamed through a clenched jaw.

Suddenly, I felt my body stiffen and my mind stopped. When I could think again, I found myself falling to the floor. I twitched helplessly and smelled burnt flesh. From my spot paralyzed on the floor, I saw my plants slacken. The clown ran a sleeve over his face and clawed out most of the glass.

"I knew you were there." I tried to speak, but all I could hear was myself sputtering strange sounds as I continued to twitch.

"I set this device on a timer. I assumed you would be up here soon enough. Turns out three minutes was just right. Its actually a malfunction that caused that spark. How does it feel to be taken down by a malfunction? How does it feel?" He screamed the last question into the air.

"That girl was a malfunction; all too often a hitch in my plans. She is always ruining things for me and when she isn't destroying something, she is all over me. I can't even think!" He hit a button on the console and I was struck again by the spark.

"Every day, she ruins something or she breaks something or she does something wrong! You need to fix a malfunction or it will ruin everything." He hit the button once more, thankfully the shock was smaller. "I fixed her. I tried anyway. A device, I can fix. A problem, I can solve it. A malfunction, I can remedy it. But that girl, that girl was something that could not be fixed, no matter how many times that I tried to fix it. There is no remedy for her, no solution!" He reached for the console again and I braced myself.

A loud sound echoed through the factory suddenly. At first I could not recognize the sound, but it became apparent when the Joker fell to his knees and slapped his head onto the console before slumping over awkwardly. Blood seeped from his hair and began to run down his back. Behind him on the platform a few yards back stood Harley, stunned in place. She held a pistol between her hands and was in a ready stance to shoot. But she wasn't ready to shoot, she had already shot.

The few minutes that it took me to regain use of my muscles was torture. I saw her standing there, unable to move and I felt myself try over and over to move to her.

Finally, I felt weak motion returning to my hands and then my arms and then my torso. My legs were not responding yet. I pulled myself to her somehow and reached up as high as I could. I bent her until I could grab the gun and I tossed it across floor. I pulled her onto the floor with me and stared at her.

"Harley, stay with me." I put my hands limply on her shoulders.

"Harley, please help me back to my plants. Help us get away from here. I'll do anything if you'll just get us out of here." Luckily, I felt her help me up and link me onto her back.

As I sat on Harley like a backpack, I looked back and watched the body seem to shrink as we got further away. Harley had shot the Joker, her "Mista' J". I did not know if she did it to protect me or because she felt that she needed to or because he was bad talking her. I tried not to think about it. The Joker was dead.


I hope this is exciting, I'm trying to keep the girls in character.

Let me know if you like this! Reviews are exciting.

There should be one...maybe two full chapters after this and one epilogue. :)