Full Summary: We all at one point or another have fallen for someone who did not love us back. For Jervis Tetch it was when he fell in love with Alice Pleasance, for the new girl at Arkham it's when she fell for The Mad Hatter. Mean while Dr. Leland must struggle to cope with her daughter's death, her failing marriage, and her patients' twisted problems. All this leads her to question reality it's self and the true nature of humanity. OC X Jervis, Jervis X Alice
AN: Oh Goody! I'm up to the 4th Chapter! Let's have some fun ^_^
Warning: I did a real rush job with the editing so there is probably a bunch of spelling mistakes.
July 16th, 1992
A week had passed and Carol was now out of solitary confinement, unfortunately for her she found herself in a cell across from Harley Quinn's. Carol had confessed her distain towards Harley about what Harley had forced Carol to witness. Harley tried to explain to Carol that she didn't want the children to die, especially not to be shot in the heads but 'Mista J' was the one in control and there would have been no way that Harley could have stopped him. Carol simply refused to listen.
Carol had been leaving her cell without anyone's knowledge. She was good and slipping past guards and other inmates. She was an expert at making herself invisible. Carol had even managed to leave the asylums grounds without being detected then she simply snuck back in. Carol left mainly for better food and to get some fresh air. While she had no money she found that by simply asking people for whatever, always got her what she wanted. Carol could only call it "her childish charm", as she her self could not explain why people were so willing to give her handouts. Harley and the others knew that she had escaped before and they couldn't understand why she'd return. Only Carol knew why…
'Dr.Leland, where would I go?I have no home and no intention of devoting my self to a life of crime.There simply is no purpose in leaving .Arkham is my home and my hell.Besides if I left then Iwouldn't get to talk to Jervis anymore.'
Ah! Yes Jervis Tetch. Indeed he had grown rather found of Carol as she had of him; though Carol's 'fondness' was border line stalking or so Dr. Leland put it. The only one in Arkham who was left completely blind to Carol's fixation of Tetch was Jervis himself. Jervis had begun to look at Carol as a confidant, to whom he would speak of Alice Pleasance to without feeling judged or threatened. Carol didn't mind this but she did become slightly perturbed when he'd stare off into space and start humming the Mock Turtle's song. She was not of 'his world', she would never be 'Alice' or any other character created by Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll). This troubled her in more ways then she could express and it led her to strike a closer bond between both Jonathan and Dr. Leland.
Today Carol would walk proudly into the Rec Room for the first time since her arrival in Arkham. She entered the room and scanned it over very quickly. She saw a giant top hat sticking out of the back of the couch. Carol with swift hands plucked the hat from its owner's head and ran off. Jervis turned around, panicked stricken "Who took my hat! I keep them to sell I have none of my own!"
Carol tapped Tetch on his back and Jervis flipped back around to find Carol sitting next to him with his had atop her head. The hat was far too big for Carol to wear and it slunk down, covering her face (except her mouth).
She smiled triumphantly
Jervis raised an eye brow and shook his head. He took his hat back. He was amused but he was having fun playing annoyed. This little imp was into games after all. Carol crawled over to him and lay her head down on his lap. By now Jervis was more then accustomed to having Carol follow him around and squeeze the life out of him.
Carol looked up at him "Watcha doing?"
"I'm watching television until Jonathan gets here. Then I shall beat him at chess." He stated this with confidence.
"How do you know your going to win?"
"Because I've never lost a game of chess to Jonathan. Still he tries. Have you ever played chess before?"
Carol smiled and nodded her head
"Good then you may play after I've won."
A short while later Jonathan entered the Rec room looking like absolute shit. He'd had a run in with one of the guards last night as he tried to escape. Jonathan had reached for what he thought was his fear toxin but when he went to spray the guards with it, rubber snakes fell out instead. Apparently before the Joker had escaped all those weeks ago, he had replaced the fear toxin with a gag trick. Due to this unforeseen incident Jonathan had been pummeled to the ground and heavily drugged. The only question on everyone's mind was "How in the hell is he still able to walk?"
"Hi Jonathan!" chirped Carol
Jonathan moved away from Carol's reach and motioned to Jervis to follow him. The two men walked over to the chess table. Carol walked behind Jervis.
Jervis sat on one side of the table and Jonathan on the other, the chess pieces had already been set up.
Jervis crossed his legs and delicately picked up one of the chess pieces, smiling with his Cheshire cat grin. The master was at his work.
Jonathan sat hunched over, rubbing his chin furiously as he carefully thought out his move. He looked up to find Carol standing there in between the two men.
Jonathan flapped his wrist at her "Shoo! Go away."
Carol just stood there.
"Carol, we shall play afterwards. Why don't you go read something?" Jervis pointed to three large bookshelves.
"Tetch don't be stupid. She probably doesn't even know how to read. It's not as if she went to school."
"Actually I can read, and write, and do math."
Jonathan scoffed "And where pray tell did you learn all that?"
"Molly taught me. She made friends with one of our neighbors and he taught her so she taught me."
"You see Jonathan; she is a very smart young girl. So stop picking on her and let's return to our game."
And just like that Carol went back to being ignored. She felt strange being away from Jervis. She remembered the first time that she saw him…
#Fashback#
"Lucy! Natalie! You're going to be late for school!" Carol called, lunch boxes in her hands
Two little girls came down the stairs, practically shoving one another as they both hurried to get down stairs first.
"Be careful or you'll hurt your selves." Carol warned the twins.
As Lucy grabbed her lunch box she noticed Carol's arm.
"Is that how you hurt yourself?"
"Huh? Oh that…that was nothing. A simple mishap in the kitchen." Carol gave her patented fake smile at the younger girl.
The girl's took their lunch boxes and grabbed their backpacks.
"Bye, Carol!" they said in unison as they opened the door and left to catch the bus.
Leaving, Carol alone.
Carol clutched her arm and re-observed her fresh cut. 'A simple mishap in the kitchen'
More like a kitchen knife…
Still work with The Grays had been Carol's first chance at near peace. Nothing Mr. Gray could do to her would ever top the others. She'd finally caught a break. Mr. and Mrs. Gray were gone most of the time at work and Carol's primary duty was to care for the Grays twin children, Lucy and Natalie. They reminded Carol of her life when she was still with Molly. They were even 7, the same age Carol and Molly were when….
Carol sighed, it was sometimes all too much to bare.
Carol made her way over to the large window in the living room. It had a beautiful view of downtown Gothem. A view that so many would die for.
Carol looked across the way into the next building. It was a business corporation known as WayneTech, a division of Wayne Enterprise.
Then something caught her attention. A man with blonde hair working in one of the offices. It was hard to tell exactly what he was doing so Carol took out Mr. Gray's telescope for a better view. He had a strange sort of headband on, made of metal and he was working with lab mice. The lab mice, as Carol noticed sat on tiny chairs and poured each other tiny cups of tea. The mice also had on their heads the same headband that the blond man wore. 'Amazing…' thought Carol 'Is he actually controlling those mice's minds with that headband?'
But then a loose wire fell out of the headband and the mice began to trample over the table. The man looked absolutely heart broken as though his entire life depended on those mice, or the headband. 'That poor man.I really hope he can get it to work.'
Then a woman entered the room. She had long blonde hair, blue eyes, and she wore a simple white shirt and a long blue skirt. Her face although plain did possess this strange sense of beauty and innocence. That was it, innocence in its simplicity. The man appeared to be very embarrassed but not by his failure, but just by being seen at all by her. The woman placed a hand on the man's shoulder, smiled and laughed. All this made the man blush. It made Carol blush too. She couldn't explain why but she felt happy and somehow comforted by this odd little exchange. She had to find the man's name. She searched around the room with the telescope. She saw a large paining of 'The Mad Tea Party' scene from Alice's Adventures In Wonderland.
'He's a fan of Charlie's too!'
Carol then scanned over the door and found the sign. 'Bingo!'
Carol murmured to her self "Jervis Tetch."
She smiled genuinely for the first time in a long time.
#Flash back Ends#
Carol had continued to observe Jervis and Alice through the telescope until one day when Mr. Gray had come home early and found her. Carol received two black eyes and a week without food for that, but the joke would be on him because the next day he and the rest of the Gray family would be murdered by The Joker.
Carol wondered over to the bookshelves and began to search through them, but she found nothing. She was about to ask the guard standing next to her but the guard broke in first "No we don't have any Alice books or anything by Carroll."
"That's a real shame. Oh and his name is Charlie."
"What?"
"Lewis Carroll's real name was Charlie. Don't you have anything good to read?'
The guard thought for a moment, and it was certainly a rare sight. "You're that girl who has a crush on the Hatter, right?"
"His name is Jervis."
The guard stepped in front of Carol and bent down on one knee. He pulled out a book and he handed it to her. "Trust me, you'll love it."
Carol looked down at the cover of the book. It had a close up picture of a young girl's smiling lips. In small script it read Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
"Thank You." And Carol walked off and sat down at a near by table and began to read. "Lolita light of my life, fire of my loins,my sin,my soul. Lo-lee-ta…"
Carol read with her mouth agape as she struggled to take in the intense, emotion filled text that lay before her. One page after the next. Each word filled with so much depth, to the point that Carol felt like she was about to drown in someone else's words.
"Carol? It's your turn."
"Huh?'
Carol looked up; it was Jonathan standing over her with that same annoyed look on his face.
"I said it's your turn to play against Tetch." Then Jonathan noticed the book and he grabbed it from Carol's hands.
"Lolita? It is without a doubt the best book for you. What page are you on?"
"62. Hey Jonathan? Why don't they have anything here by Charlie?"
"Because of Tetch. After all you don't want to aid in someone's obsessions. This is why I can't understand why you're still able to be around Tetch. I suppose that if it's an obsession that revolves around the libido then it's considered natural and sane."
Carol got out of her chair "You really need a vacation." Carol walked over to the chess table where Jervis was waiting for her and grinning devilishly as always.
A short while later Jonathan looked over to find that Carol and Jervis were gone. He looked over at the couch and he saw Carol curled up next to Jervis.
"What happened? I thought you two were going to play chess." Jonathan sat down on the other side of the couch.
"We did. Apparently I have found a worthy adversary." He smiled down at Carol. Jonathan rolled his eyes and pretended his hand was a gun as he brought it to his temple and "pulled the trigger".
July 19th, 1992
Carol sat in her cell bored out of her mind. Today was just one of those days. Boredom and silence rang through most of Arkham. You see once every week a doctor from Arkham is given the day off. Today just so happened to be Dr. Leland's day off. That meant that there would be no meals in the cafeteria, no therapy sessions, and no rec room time for any of Dr. Leland's patients.
That same morning two arms reached out of the covers and approached the suns morning rays. A yawn came out of the covers as the hands pulled off the blankets revealing a dazed Dr. Leland. Another nightmare like the night before last, and the nights before that as well. Another empty bottle of anti-depressants and sleeping pills sat on her night stand next to her daughter's photo. Just like the night before last. Dr. Leland wondered if her husband, Henry ever even came home last night. She made her way to the living room, the couch was empty. "I guess he stayed at a friend's…again"
Dr. Leland and Henry slept in different rooms and lived separate lives for the sake of their marriage. In order for them to be together they had to remain distant. Dr. Leland knew this was wrong and had tried to convince Henry to go with her to a councilor or simply just to talk to her, all this to no avail. Dr. Leland got dressed and drank her coffee only to remember that it was her day off and she had no where to go. Today she was not Dr. Leland she was just Joan. Joan, a woman who was born and raised in Gothem and received her PhD in criminal psychology at Gothem University. She had been so ambitious back then. She promised her self that she was going to save every patient that she was handed, that she would find the good in everyone and show it to the rest of society. Alas, the patients at Arkham were far from what she had expected when she had been so young and native. That's why when Harleen had first started working at Arkham she had warned her of the dangers and kept an eye on her. Yet right before her eyes Harleen had fallen for the Joker and become Harley Quinn, this was something that Joan had trouble forgiving herself over…one of many things. Now today was her day off and all she could think of was her patients and what sort of things might be happening at Arkham while she just sat there.
Admit fully it does sound rather strange when you can't help but wonder what's going on in an Asylum so think of it like this. Your friends are going to a party but your mom won't let you go so you spend the whole time thinking "what's happening now?" and you get that sense that something really exciting is going on but you can't tell so it makes you anxious.
Joan had been working at Arkham long enough to know who would stay and who would at least try to escape. She knew who was talking about what or who would be trying to stab who. Still she felt like she had to be there.
A normal person would have called up their friends at this point and started gossiping about celebrities and talk of fashion, but Joan was friendless, a true loner by all accounts. This was strange because her face and demeanor could be quite entrancing.
Her loneliness was a product of circumstances.
Joan found herself thinking back to her sessions with Carol. They'd been talking more of philosophy then anything else, no matter what questions Joan had for her Carol always found a way to tie it into some larger point of life's many fascinations. It had been frustrating and interesting just the same.
Joan looked down t her clothes and at the clothes in her closet. She adjusted her headband and left her apartment. She decided that she'd try and have some fun and do some shopping.
July 20, 1992
At 7:15 on the dot, Dr. Leland made her way up the drive way of Arkham Asylum. She was happy to be back. As she turned up the winding rode she noticed something peculiar in one of the trees. She continued up the winding path and parked in the back where the parking lot was. She walked back down the rode and starred up at the tree. Dr. Leland saw Carol lounging peacefully on a long branch, high up in the tree. "Hi, Dr. Leland? How was your day off?"
"Carol, what are you doing up the tree!"
Carol sat up on the branch and stretched her arms up to another branch and plucked out a fresh red apple. "Resting…" Carol took a bite out of the apple and sighed with satisfaction. The apples were coming in nice and juicy, despite it being the wrong season.
"Carol, come down from there."
"I will when you tell me about your day."
"I'll tell you all about it when you get down here!"
"Fine but first, say it." Carol grinned
"I'm not going to bargain with you. Ether come down now and I'll tell you or I'll force you down here myself and you'll be in solitary for the rest of the month."
Carol thought for a moment before standing up on the branch "Just say it! Say it and then I'll come down and we can talk."
Carol made a sad puppy eyed plea
"Fine! But just this once!" Dr. Leland sighed heavily "I don't want to go among mad people."
"Oh you can't help that. Were all made here. I'm mad, you're mad…"
"How do you know I'm mad?"
"You must be or you wouldn't have come here."
And just like that Carol jumped down from the tree. "Now was that so hard to do?" Carol took another large bite out of her apple.
"So, how was your day off?"
"It was fun." Dr. Leland lied "I went shopping."
"Really? So who'd you go with?"
"My friends."
"Dr. Leland, don't lie to me. I've been honest with you; you should give me the same courtesy."
Dr. Leland giggled "I'm not lying."
"There you go again. Let's be honest Dr. Leland, I'm the only friend you have."
"Carol, you're not my friend, you're my patient."
"Can't I be both?" Carol stopped walking and looked up at Dr. Leland for an answer. It was a clear "No."
"Well you're my friend, so we should be honest with each other."
"Just like you're honest with Jervis?"
"Touché. I will be honest with him, eventually about everything. Though it's not like I've lied about the unpleasantness of my past."
"You don't have to tell him if you don't want to."
"Yes I do, and I will. You keep telling me that if I really loved him then I'd tell him everything, and I do love him. One day I'll tell him everything."
The two of them remained silent for long time as they continued up the path to the asylum's entrance.
Then Dr. Leland broke in "Carol, please don't brake out again, even if it's just for a little bit. The more you keep getting out the more jeopardy you put my job in. Besides it's only a matter of time before someone other then me catches you leaving."
"So, what? If I get caught, which this is only the first time I have, then I shall be simply put into solitary. Even then I can still easily break out anytime I want to."
"Carol, if anyone but me caught you sneaking out, you would be put in the hydrotherapy tubs! Believe me when I say I've been more then lenient with you."
Carol had never really thought of it before but if Dr. Leland really wanted to she could have really punished Carol. The hydrotherapy tubs were bath tubs that were filled with ice cold water. Patients would be strapped down into the tubs with leather harnesses. Although it was never originally designed to be a form of punishment, the screams from the hydrotherapy room could be heard for miles. Due to its medieval torcher like appeal it did make nifty weapon against the patients.
Inside Arkham, Dr. Leland handed Carol over to an orderly who was to bring her to solitary confinement. Before parting ways Carol said "Thank you, Dr. Leland. Oh and by the way, Harley and Ivy broke out."
Carol sat there in her padded room. She was displeased that the orderly had made her straight jacket way too tight. She thought of what she and Dr. Leland had been talking about and she whispered "One day I'll tell you everything, Jervis. I'll tell you about what happened to me, I'll tell you things that I haven't even told Dr. Leland about, and one day…one day I'll even tell you that I love you."