Chapter Three-
Harleen sighed as she rubbed the bridge of her nose, she had a headache. She glared over the top of her laptop to the source of her headache. Her roommate and her roommate's friends. They had come pouring into the small dorm room just minutes ago laughing, squealing, and happily yelling over each other. She wasn't in the mood for this. She had to focus on writing her new theses paper while typing up Dr. Jefferson's notes on one of his patients. A patient that she had never even meet for that matter!
A loud squeal made Harleen itch to reach over, grab her heaviest book, and throw it at the person who squealed. Oh, Harleen knew she could just get up and leave, go some place quieter, possibly even go to the Asylum and work there. But she didn't want to leave. She had been here first! They should leave!
Another squeal was her only warning before a pillow hit her cup that was sitting right next to her, knocking it over. The liquid that had once been in the cup quickly drenched her research papers on it way towards her laptop. "What the hell!" Harleen cried quickly moving her laptop out of the way of the water and to the safety that was her bed. "Hand me that towel!" She demanded one of the still laughing hyenas that had taken human form as she pointed towards the used towel the woman was partially sitting on. When she didn't hand her the towel, Harleen growled under her breath, grabbed the pillow and launched it at her roommate before storming over and ripped the the towel out from under the woman.
"What the hell bitch?" The woman screeched as she fell on her side from the force Harleen had used to rip the towel out from under her.
"God Harleen, what's the matter with you?" Her roommate asked getting up from the floor to glare at her over the edge of her bed she had been knocked off of when the pillow had hit her square in the side of the head as Harleen quickly made her way back to her desk to try and save her research papers.
"What's the mattah with me? Oh I don't know, maybe mah dumb ass roommate and her gaggle of airheaded friends disrupted mah work!" Harleen hissed at her as she soaked up the water on her desk.
"Then why didn't you leave." One of the airheads asked.
"Why don't you leave. This ain't your dorm, so why don't ya get the fuck out!" Harleen growled.
"What the hell crawled up your ass today?" Her roommate asked.
"Aw, did Markus not want your used pussy?" Another airhead asked. Harleen threw the damp towel down and (with a loud, crazed, high pitched shriek) launched herself at the airhead who had no time to react before she suddenly found herself under Harleen who was pulling, scratching, punching, biting, and kicking anything she could. Harleen heard her roommate and the other airheads scream at her, yelling at her to stop. A few of them tried to pull her off of their friend, but she would attack them with scratches and bites.
Harleen shrieked as strong arms pulled her off the now unconscious airhead and tried to go after the person who had pulled her way from her victim. But the person seemed to know how to handle her, they pinned her arms at her side while holding her back to their front. She tried to wiggle her body to get out of the hold, but that only tightened the hold on her. She tried kicking her legs wildly, but that did nothing but tire her out. She tried slamming her head into the person's chest, but that only knocked her silly. She even tried to tilt her head to try and bite the person, but the arms that held her were out of reach.
Once Harleen realised the person wasn't going to let her go any time soon while she was still in her crazed frenzy, she calmed herself down. And as she calmed down, Harleen realised that the stress that had been building in her that whole week, was now gone. Harleen waited a few minutes to make sure she was actually calm before she relaxed in the person's hold. Seeming assured that she wasn't going to launch herself back at the airhead (a very tempting thought), the person dropped their hold on us.
"Thank you." Her roommate sighed in relief. Harleen glanced at her, huddled in the corner with the rest of the airheads as she stayed leaning back against the person.
"As payment for my help," The person that had been holding her started (his voice deep, kind of monotone but not really, and somewhat soothing) in a bored tone, "you will keep this a little secret. This never happened." Harleen turned to look at the man in shock, and found that it was the man who had been watching her the last few weeks.
"What! That crazy bitch nearly killed our friend and you want us to just pretend that it never happened?" Her roommate asked.
"You will, of course, be compensated for your silence." The man said reaching into his suit, pulling something from his inside pocket, a wad of bills. "The Boss made it very clear that nothing was to keep Miss Quinzel from eating at the grownup table." Harleen's eyes widened at his words, her mind instantly connecting the dots to who his boss was. "And this little⦠misunderstanding is sure to delay her on her way to the grownup table." The man said tossing the wad at her roommate before walking over to the unconscious airhead on the floor and tossed her over his shoulder as if she was nothing more that a sack of potatoes. On his way out of the dorm, he stopped in front of Harleen. "The Boss hopes you like the flowers." And then he was out the door.
"Flowers?" Harleen asked looking around the room, her eyes landed on a dark purple vase on her desk. In the vase sat a bundle of white roses with a single blood red rose in the middle of the bundle. A card sat beside the vase. Curious, Harleen made her way over to her desk and picked up the card, opening it allowing a Joker card to fall from it. She picked it up, looking at it only to note that it was just a regular playing card. Harleen sat the playing card on her desk before reading what was written inside the card.
'I've got a seat saved for you. Don't keep me waiting long.'
-J
-?-
Harleen nervously sat in front of Dr. Arkham's desk waiting for him to finish the report he was working on. Her last class for the day had gotten canceled and not wanting to go back to her dorm room (she had started spending less time there the past few weeks) she had drove here. Harleen hadn't known why she had come here (her scheduled time to shadow Dr. Jefferson wasn't for another two hours), just that she felt she needed too. She had sat in her car for a solid ten minute until a crazy idea popped into her mind. But she needed permission to for her idea, hence why she was now sitting in front of Dr. Arkham.
"Sorry about that." Dr. Arkham said as he slipped the now finished report into a file and closed it.
"Oh, no, don't worry, Dr. Arkham. I'm the one who should apologize for popping in unannounced and unexpected." Harleen said politely giving him an apologetic smile.
"What can I do for you, Miss Quinzel?" Dr. Arkham asked with a smile.
"Well, I'm being forced to write my final thesis paper on the Joker and I feel that the few sessions Dr. Jefferson and I have had with the Joker aren't giving me a lot of research material. So I was wondering if it would be alright if I observed him outside of the session room, like during his recreation time. You know, see how he reacts to the other inmates, it might help me get a feel for who the Joker really is." Harleen said happy she had been able to keep it sounding professional and not saying it all in one breath. Dr. Arkham shifted in his seat and sighed as he looked away from her in contemplation. As the minutes ticked on, Harleen began to worry her bottom lip, afraid that the answer would be no.
"You want to observe the Joker around the other inmates for research?" Dr. Arkham asked finally breaking the silence.
"Yes, sir. At least, just for today. I don't know if I'll be able to have time to observe him everyday." Harleen told him and begin to fidget with her hands, a nervous habit she had picked up from one of her many foster homes she had grown up in. Dr. Arkham sighed again and rubbed his chin narrowing his eyes in thought.
"Normally if someone who had yet to get their degree, medical or not, came to me asking to observe a patient here, Joker or not, the answer would be an immediate no." He told her and Harleen began to deflate. "But," he continued catching her attention, "seeing as it is you, I do not see the harm in letting you observe him for today." Harleen smiled happy that he was going to give her special treatment and let her observe the Joker. "Now, the only problem I can see here is that the Joker doesn't get recreation time. He's too dangerous, to unpredictable. But we do occasionally let he eat in the cafeteria if he's been good."
"Oh." Harleen said sadly.
"And you seem to have exceptional timing." Dr. Arkham told her with a smirk. "He's been suspiciously well behaved this week. Maybe he knew you would want to try to visit him." He joked.
"I don't see how, I never gave any indication that I would." Harleen told him.
"You'll soon learn that with the Joker, anything is possible. I honestly wouldn't put it past the Joker to have some how planned for this." Dr. Arkham sighed before looking at the clock on the wall and stood up. "Come, I'll escort you to the cafeteria, the guards should be bringing him down for lunch right about now." He walked around his desk and held his hand out gentlemanly to help her up. She took it with a polite smile and stood from her seat, the second she was up, Dr. Arkham let her hand go before politely motioning for her to exit his office, him following her.
"Thank you for letting me do this." Harleen said as he began to lead her through the maze of hallways. She had never been to the cafeteria, had never needed to before.
"You are welcome, Miss Quinzel. Now, I won't be able to stay with you as you observe him, I have few sessions of my own. But you won't be alone, I'll have one of the guards stay with you." Dr. Arkham informed her.
"Of course." Harleen said nodding.
-?-
The cafeteria wasn't what Harleen had been expecting. The room was noisy with chatter, and the occasional insane shriek, but it wasn't overly noisy like she had been expecting. The inmates were filling up almost every table that sat in the room, only one table in the middle of the room sat completely empty. And they way the inmates seemed to bundle themselves it reminded Harleen of a High School cafeteria.
The cafeteria seemed a little too calm. Not insane enough. It didn't match her idea of an insane asylum cafeteria. Harleen had been expecting more insane shrieks, more noise, more chaos. But that wasn't what she was getting. It unnerved her. Threw her off balance. And she didn't seem to be the only one.
The guard that Dr. Arkham had assigned to stay with her, a young man by the name of Robert, stood at alert, hand on the handle of his taser gun. His dark brown eyes raking over the inmates waiting for something to happen. "They're too calm." He had informed her. "Somethings 'bout to happen." They stood watching the inmates, him slightly in front of her, when they brought him in.
The room got deathly quiet. And her ears began to ring at the sudden lack of noise other than the soft jingle of the chains that connected the Joker to his eight guards. Harleen couldn't take her eyes off him, his head was slumped forward, his hair was slightly messed up. As he was forced to walk through the room by his guards, Harleen took note that his walk was slow and sluggish, as if he had been drugged.
The guards roughly pushed him into a seat at the empty table, and began to unchain him from them only to chain him to the chair and table. Once the guards backed away from him, an orderly came over and practically threw the tray onto the table in front of the Joker causing some of the mashed potatoes to splash onto his straight jacket.
"Eat up." The orderly hissed before stomping away. Harleen watched as the Joker just stared at the food and wondered if they expected him to eat off the tray like a dog seeing he couldn't use his hands. He lazily turned his head in her direction showing that they had once again placed a muzzle on his face, she gasped in realisation. They weren't expecting him to eat at all, they were basically torturing him by placing the food in front of him with no way for him to eat it.
Without realising what she was doing, Harleen shot forward towards the Joker, evading Robert's hand when he tried to grab her, and slipped past the Joker's guards. Her hands quickly found the clasp of his muzzle and had begun to undo it when a Robert pulled her away.
"What do you think you are doing?" Robert demanded.
"What am I doing? What are you doing? How is he suppose to eat with this thing strapped to him?" Harleen demanded as she pushed the guard off her and went back to undo the Joker's muzzle when Robert pulled her away again.
"Listen here, you little-" Robert started Harleen cut him off.
"No! You listen! It is unethical to torture an inmate, a patient! And that is what you are doing right now! You are torturing him! Do not think for one second that I won't report you to Dr. Arkham!" Harleen screeched somehow knowing that Dr. Arkham had no part in this. Robert paled and backed away his hand thrown up in the air.
"Fine! Don't come crawlin' to me when he tears your throat out with his bare teeth!" Robert growled. Harleen glared at him before turning to finally take the muzzle off the Joker who stretched his jaw open, popping it. Harleen sat next to the Joker and picked up the plastic spoon that was on the tray.
"Will you allow me to feed you, Mister Joker?" Harleen asked. The Joker's eyes slowly slid to hers as he opened his mouth waiting for her to feed him. Harleen couldn't keep the smile off her face as she began to spoon feed the Joker his lunch. She didn't really care to take notice when the noise level in the cafeteria rose to the level it had been before the Joker had been brought in, louder infact, her only focus was the Joker and his intense eyes.
