A/N: Wow, it's been a while...I apologize.

As a side note—since I love making references to both the comics and the television shows, you might find a few in the following chapters. I'll point them out at the bottom of each chapter.

Title: In the Eye of the Hurricane – Chapter seven
Author: ladyofpride
Characters: Joker, Scarecrow/Crane and the Riddler. Batman will be mentioned (and make appearances) as the story progresses, though he isn't the focus of the story.
Rating: Pg-17 (if such a thing exists).
Timeframe: follows after the second movie
Warnings: violence, obvious insanity and the death of innocent (or not-so-innocent) bystanders...after all, this is about the Joker...
Disclaimer: I'm not making a profit off of this—nor do I have the desire to either. I'm just playing in someone else's sandbox.
Summary: It's true what they say. Sanity can only last so long...

The Riddler shivers every once in a while in the company of his fevered delusions, cold with sweat and shifting uncomfortably as his mind races between reality and dream. He's trapped somewhere on the border, twitching away from the lurid provinces of his mind as the Joker prods him solidly in the knee periodically. The Joker wakes him on the hour. And then every half hour.

Just for good measure.

"Blame the brain damage," the Joker says when the Riddler tosses him a glare.

After the drugs begin to wane and the Riddler's had a chance to pull the fractured pieces of his psyche back together again, he stretches awkwardly on the sheets and nudges his abused leg out of poking range.

"Leave me the hell alone..."

"Humor me."

"I'll need stronger drugs for that..." His eyes scan the bedside table where the bottle of painkillers once stood, his body stiff as he tries not to move his torso.

The Joker stole it when the Riddler drifted off.

"Where did you put them?"

The Joker jolts back in mock surprise and feigns an innocent smile. "Put what? I have knives—" he replies, lifting the left corner of his lapel to show the potato peeler tucked inside his breast pocket. "You could search me but you might find me a little prickly, I—"

"Forget I ever asked," the Riddler interjects, making the words sound short and clipped. He sighs a bit. Sounds as though he's a little on edge. "And leave, please. You obviously know I'm not going anywhere."

He's right...

The Joker smiles.

"Tell me a riddle first."

The Riddler sighs again, settling back into the pillow as best he can. He's doing remarkably well considering a fractured collarbone and a concussion. "How about I make a deal with you?"

"That all depends on the deal, sweetheart."

"It'll be a riddle, of course. I'll give you one and you'll leave the room until you can come up with an answer."

"And if I'm wrong?"

The Riddler smiles—a little curl of the lips that looks more menacing than it ought to be. "If you were polite, you'd let me beat you with my cane, but let's be honest...if you're wrong, you'll leave to my peace until the doctor returns."

"That's, uh...swell, kid, but the doc says I have to keep an eye on you." He licks his lips, breath coming out in short, excited pants as he leans in close to the Riddler's ear. "And if I'm right..." he murmurs, slipping the glove off his right hand to trace the faint scar that runs diagonally across the kid's good collarbone—one he only noticed an hour or so ago, "you'll tell me all about these beautiful scars. Deal?"

The Riddler hesitates. Doesn't say anything for a moment. The Joker ghosts his hand across his chest to the other collarbone and then down a little just below the damage. The man's body stiffens.

He hisses in pain between his teeth.

The Joker can feel his heart hammering against his ribcage. Loses himself in the rhythm...

Then: "...Only one colour, but not one size; stuck at the bottom, yet easily flies. Present in sun, but not in rain; doing no harm and feeling no pain...What am I?" (1)

He leans back, grinning again. When he leaves the room, he feels surprisingly satisfied.

Closing the door partway, he wanders into the kitchen and cranks up the radio.

-1-Joker-1-

"—She says 'stop' when it's time for me to go. She says 'go' when I say I love her so—Oh yeah, yeah, yeah...Oh yeah, yeah, the trouble with love—you've got me so mixed up, I don't know what I'm doin'—"

He hears a thump from the bedroom...and maybe a shout. The Joker isn't sure. He's too caught up in the music to care. Playing ignorant, he turns the dial a little farther to right despite his weary audience.

"—that's the trouble with love!" (2)

The second thump comes from the front door.

He takes one last glance into the kitchen shelf before he closes the drawer. The previous owner didn't have much in the way of volatile chemicals and he doesn't suppose Crane would be merry with the idea of him fooling around with his drugs—all the same, he needs something with which to entertain himself. The Riddler's a bit too fragile at the moment for anything he has in mind.

Somehow, he's not surprised when he doesn't find the doctor alone.

"Is it poker night already?" he asks, opening the front door a little farther as he eyes the two thugs behind Crane. One is stick thin and twitchy (he's wearing his orange Arkham jumpsuit under a ridiculously large overcoat) and the other could probably kill an elephant with his bare hand if he wanted to. The man towers over Crane like a totem pole, his face a mess of scars and stitches...

The Joker likes this one.

"Old chums," Crane says absently as he brushes past him into the apartment, a sack of goodies thrown over his shoulder. Strolling into the kitchen, he drops the bag on the table and reaches inside to pull out what the Joker supposes is a figure-of-eight brace.

"You any good with riddles, Dr. Goodfellow?"

Crane quirks an eyebrow at the peculiar name and glances briefly at the radio. "I imagine you forced our guest to entertain you while I was gone...?"

The Joker reaches into his pocket and pulls out the napkin he wrote the riddle on, the words sharp at some points and blotchy at others where he penned them on the thin material. Crane glances at it, does another eyebrow trick and wanders off into the living room.

Stickman and Lurch ebb into the apartment after the good doctor, eyeing the Joker warily as he rummages through the various bottles in Crane's santa sack. When Lurch lingers in the doorway, the Joker opens his mouth to ask him who stitched up the worst of his pockmarks.

He's interrupted by the return of Crane.

"You'll find your answer on the balcony," he says smartly, reaching for the radio dial—

"Uh-uh! Shhh..." the Joker whispers, slapping his hand away, "I'm playing a game with Riddles."

"And the radio...?"

"Here—" He grabs a couple of bottles and shoves them into Crane's hands. The man eyes him suspiciously, but doesn't make a move to stop him. "—play with these. Keep the goonies quiet until I get back."

With an oddly professional sounding sigh, Crane humours him and lines the bottles up on the table, reaching into the bag to pull out a new batch of needles as the Joker darts into the living room. Staring through the glass door that separates him from the balcony, he squints his eyes in the mid-afternoon light and finds...

"A barbeque?" he asks dryly. When he turns to face Crane, the man shakes his head and gives him a look that says, 'try again'.

And he so tries again...

...And then he gets it.

He skips across the living room to the bedroom with an extra spring in his step and opens the door quietly. It closes behind him with a gentle click—the Riddler's wary eyes shift immediately to him.

The lamp that once stood on the bedside table is now lying on the floor and the alarm clock is flashing its red numbers coyly at him from where it sits beside it. And the Joker could be wrong, but he'd swear the Riddler's moved an inch or so closer to the edge of the bed.

He supposes Crane's muscle relaxant is really the only thing keeping the kid in their good company.

It's a pity.

"Must have been one heck of a party in here..." he muses aloud. Walking over to the side of the bed, he leans down to pick up the lamp and the clock before placing them back on the table. He eventually abandons the lamp shade on the floor after it falls off twice. "Some house guest you are, Riddles. Oh, and before I forget...shadows."

"Took you long enough," he mutters sardonically. "Next time, I'll ask you what's black and white and red all over..."

"No one likes a smart ass."

"You know, I've never heard of a clown that couldn't take a joke."

The Joker waves his hand dismissively and stretches himself out across the bed beside the Riddler. The man's jaw stiffens when he starts tracing the old scar again. "So, tell me a story."

"...Once upon a time, there was an ugly duckling—"

The Joker slaps him gently on the cheek and rolls over onto his back. "Not that story."

"You should be more specific."

"You're alarming coherent for one of Crane's patients..." The Joker steeples his fingers over his chest and crosses his ankles. "So, about all those little nicks and scratches..."

A weary sigh.

Then silence.

"...Are those my gloves?"

The Joker glances down at his hands and wriggles his fingers. Shifting a little to get comfortable, he glances at the ceiling and notices that part of the stucco looks like a horse's head. "Uh-uh—my question first."

"My father beat me as a child—now, are those or are those not my gloves?"

"They're yours," he admits, and turns his head to give the kid a curious look. "...Your father beat you. Where are the waterworks?"

The Riddler rolls his eyes. He looks oddly rigid doing. "As much as I hate the man, his method of parenting is hardly something to cry over."

"What'd he do?" he asks, eyeing another faint scar below the Riddler's ear. "Whip you?"

"He preferred his fists."

"Big guy?"

"He had a thing for sports."

The Joker has to laugh at that—not the answer, of course, but the kid's wit. Most people tend to lose their tongues when they find themselves trapped in a colloquy with him. His relationship with Crane is silent for the most part and his banters with the Bat tend to be one-sided. The Riddler seems to be an entirely different breed of man.

"What's your excuse?"

"Huh?" The Joker blinks.

"The smile." The Riddler elaborates—and either the drugs have lowered his inhibitions or the guy doesn't know what happens to people that hear the Joker's story. That was just an invitation for disaster.

"You want to know how I got 'em?" he asks. His finger's itch for a blade. Any blade. He's never had an introduction to the tale like this before. It's enticing. "You see, I had an older brother once. Worked for the mob. He did the dirty wo—"

"No."

The Joker pauses.

It feels like a slap to the face.

"No..." he says again, and this time it has something of an edge to it. When the Joker turns to look at him, he finds the Riddler's eyes focused on the ceiling, the corner of his mouth curled up in a grimace. "That's a lie."

"I wasn't finished," he growls—but props to the kid for getting it right.

He turns his body onto his side and leans over the Riddler, and he's so damn close to putting a little pressure on his collarbone... He wants to, but that gleam is back in the kid's eye, the maniacal one—a little window to the chink in his sanity. It's what the Joker was looking for earlier.

It's a wonder a lie can do.

"Out."

Crane's voice cuts through the tension like a surgical knife. The command is soft, but cold, just like everything else about the doctor as he leads Lurch fluidly into the room. The Joker can see he's working on automatic again as he slips on a pair of rubber gloves. Lurch is carrying a bottle and a needle.

They crowd the Riddler like vultures circling for meat.

The Joker's willing to leave them alone to stew in their madness.

"I'm not an avid fan of dishonesty," the Riddler hisses as the Joker leans into him (purposefully) before slipping off the bed. The Joker pretends he isn't listening, but he takes his time walking to the door. "Would I be wrong in assuming that the worst of those scars were self-inflicted?"

The Joker spins so sharply on his heel, he almost loses balance. But Crane is a swift man and he's already standing in the way before the Joker can figure out what he wants to do now that the cat's out of the bag. It's not as though he's ashamed of his face, but he knows where the danger lies in a man that never misses a trick—and what exactly did the Riddler do to attract the Bat's attention? What diabolical plan had he concocted that Gotham's Police Department couldn't handle by themselves...?

He settles for flashing the Riddler a smile over Crane's shoulder before he strolls out of the room. He'd be angry if he hadn't just figured something out.

The kid obviously has no clue what he's gotten himself into.

The Bat would agree...

A/N: (1) The riddle comes from "meanriddles. com". They've got a couple of good ones there and they're rated according to difficulty.

(2) The song playing on the radio is called "That's the Trouble with Love", which was sung by Frank Gorshin, the Emmy nominated actor who played the Riddler in the 1960s television show (he's also the man that escalated the Riddler's popularity from a minor villain to a full-blown, maniacal, Gotham Rogue). I'm currently trying to find out who wrote the song and I believe it was Bering Strait...if I'm wrong, feel free to correct me. ;)

P.S. You can find the song on youtube

P.P.S. All comments, questions and concerns are welcome. Especially if they're related to grammar. I think I need a beta...