AN: So I found that "Scarecrow takes LSD inadvertently and hallucinates IN 3-D" comic online, and wow, was that horrible. Not even in a so bad it's good way, either. Literally the only good parts were the splash page of Scarecrow hallucinating teddy bears and unicorns and the like, and this wonderful little panel: i158. photobucket. com/ albums/ t92/ Lauralot/ stonedcrow-1. png

Thanks for the reviews!

"I had a dream my life would be so different from this hell I'm living.

So different now from what it seemed; now life has killed the dream I dreamed."

—"I Dreamed a Dream," Les Miserables

There wasn't much of a point to hitting someone who enjoyed it; a concept the orderlies couldn't seem to grasp.

It wasn't that the Joker didn't mind. There was a very short list of men he'd allow to hit him without suffering grievous injury as a result—be it immediately after or years later, depending on his mood—and as of this point in his life, there was only one name on that list: the Batman. No, his nightly visitors had both feet in the grave but kept right on digging. This was disrespectful, beneath him, and he wasn't about to let that slide.

But when he put aside his indignation, their persistence was amusing. Like a chicken with the head cut off, still going and going and going.

"Anybody ever tell ya—" A foot connected with his lower back, waves of pain radiating from the point of impact. He got the feeling he'd be pissing blood tomorrow morning. Again. "—that doing the same thing over and over expectin' a new result's a sign of insanity?"

The one that smoked a lot and took double shifts—Lotter—brought his nightstick down across the Joker's ribs. A loud "crack" resounded through the room, a sound of impact and not breaking bone. Probably. "You would know, freak."

There weren't enough vitriolic words in the English language—in any language—to express the Joker's hatred for that word. He managed not to grind his teeth, rolling his eyes instead. "Nice repartee. Very "playground scuffle" influence you've got going, there."

Someone kicked him. He didn't turn his head to see which. Odds were that at some point, one of them would get carried away and do serious damage, damage they couldn't cover up. The Joker wondered idly what would happen then. Going by Jonathan Crane's example, nothing whatsoever.

A blow to his chest—had to have been a kick. He didn't have to see it to know. Most of them hated getting close enough to punch. It winded him, forcing out the laugh he'd held in before that point. "Got…kids—" His eyes trailed up the nearest leg to the face "—Steven? Take Your Daughter to Work Day's coming up; I'm sure they'd love to see how their daddy spends his—"

The Joker's vision exploded into sparks of red and black—much better aesthetic than the padded walls—and if he finished that sentence, he didn't hear it, having gone temporarily deaf. Who's stupid enough to hit me across the back of the head? He rolled over. It stung about the same as the blows.

Oh. Hadley. The ringleader. The alpha-pig in a pack of boars. Some of his nightly callers had a pretense to justify their behavior; they'd been on the ferry, they'd lost a relative to one of the Joker's rampages. He'd never heard Hadley make such an excuse. There were two sorts of orderlies in Arkham, insofar as the Joker had witnessed: the ones whose skulls were as thick as their bodies, and the ones with some light in their heads, however dull. The sort who'd probably gone into this profession so that they could beat the crap out of people without anyone making a fuss. Hadley was a type two.

"Shut it, clown."

The Joker managed to prop himself up on his elbows. "That's mimes, honeybunch. Mimes are quiet. Clowns are laughing at you. I can draw some pictures to illustrate the difference, if that would make it easier—"

Hadley's foot collided with his sternum. The man was wearing steel-toed boots tonight. "You're not laughing at anything anymore."

"Apar…" He inhaled until his ribs burned, tried again. "Apart from the fact all this is turning me on?"

This time, the blow to the stomach was hard enough to make him vomit. That was new.

Joan took the syringe from the nurse, pushing the plunger just enough to remove the air mingling with the sedative. "This won't hurt."

Jonathan, lying bolstered to the MRI's examination table, didn't look at her. She didn't want to sedate him. He'd had enough morphine pumped into his system last month to risk an addiction, and besides, the last thing he needed was to have people invading his space and laying their hands on him, even if it was just to administer a shot. Of course this wasn't going to hurt. After what he'd been through, she doubted a needle stick would so much as register. As far as physical pain went. Who knew what emotional trauma it could spark, especially when he was pinned down?

But he was shaking. He was almost always shaking, however faintly, ever since the police had brought him back in. Exposure to his toxin, maybe, or a symptom of an underlying mental or neurological condition. Joan didn't know. Nobody did; until now, they'd had no way to check. But whatever the reason, he couldn't lay still without chemical assistance, even with the straps securing him, and he had to lie still for the scan to work. She'd chosen to inject him, hoping Jonathan would find it less invasive than a nurse he wasn't familiar with. Considering the luck she'd had in their sessions, he might find it worse.

She'd expected him to tense when she slipped the needle in. He didn't even blink.

"Jonathan?"

This time he met her eyes. There was that, at least.

"Do you want earplugs?"

A shake of the head, slow.

"I'm going to the other room with the technologist, all right?"

Jonathan didn't say anything.

He'd been here for two months, or a little over that. How much had they subjected him to, in that time? The blood tests, to determine which chemicals remained in his system. Examinations to rule out as many physical and neurological disorders as they could without the ability to scan his body. A lumbar puncture, to test his spinal sugar. He'd been invaded, time and time again, before the assault, and all the medical intervention that came with it.

Joan liked to think that the Joker hadn't been subjected to all of that because the administration had felt guilty for treating Jonathan like a lab specimen. She tried to ignore the voice in the back of her mind which argued that no one wanted to get close enough to the Joker to try any of it.

She couldn't tell if she wanted the MRI to find something or not. Brain damage…it could make him easier to prescribe for, easier to understand the damage. But the damage that he'd suffered while he should have been protected by the hospital; at least emotionally, there was no scan for that. No pill to counteract it, no procedure to cut it out. All this technology, and it couldn't anything to help him.

And each session that went by increased her fear that she couldn't do anything either.

"No."

"It's not a choice, Joker." Ruth was walking at his side, though a few steps ahead. The orderlies flanking him made it difficult for anyone to walk directly beside him without monopolizing the hall. Not that there was anyone else in the hallways. Social etiquette was that ingrained, he supposed. Pathetic. "We have to give you an MRI."

"I have the right to refuse—"

"This is part of the court order." Her shoes made a click-clack rhythm on the floor. The Joker had never given much thought to Ruth's shoes before. She hadn't struck him as the type to wear heels. They weren't stilettos—his favorite—or anything, about as practical and vanilla-boring as high heels could get. Even so, they didn't seem sensible enough for her.

She smelled more strongly of nicotine, as of late. The Joker had the feeling that was his influence.

"We have to make a full assessment of your health, Joker. For all we know, you could have brain damage that influences your actions. And we can't perform the scan if you're moving, so you have no choice—"

"I won't move."

She looked at him the way a mother looked at a child who promised that he'd only have one cookie before dinner. "You're never not moving." Click-clack. Click-clack. He wondered what noise heels would make if he stomped over an orderly's head in them.

"That doesn't mean I have to be." Drug him once, and get him to consent to more while his judgment was impaired. Even if Ruthie didn't try it, the Joker had no doubts that somebody would. Not something he was about to fall for. An insult to his intelligence, really. "I won't move."

"Joker—"

"Gimme a chance, at least." He leaned forward to better meet her eye. A hard enough task in a straitjacket; more difficult still when his body was battered. Would that show up on their scans, or were they only focused on the head? It would be interesting if they did record it, putting the abuse on paper. Impossible to conceal.

Yet he had the feeling nothing of consequence would change, even with the evidence.

"Look, you can sedate me if I'm twitchy. But give me the chance to screw up before I'm punished for it, Ruthie."

"This isn't a punishment—"

"Please?"

Ruth's hand went instinctively for the pocket that held her pack of Pall Mall's, withdrawing a second later as she sighed. "Joker, we don't have time to—"

He opened his mouth to protest, and didn't get further than that.

"Oh, all right. But if you so much as wiggle a finger—"

"I'll be immobile as an agalmatophiliac."

Honestly, she had no right to lecture him on excessive movement, considering that nervous tic in her eyelid.

There was a bench outside of the procedure room, made of thick plastic and bolted to the floor. There were identical benches in other halls of the asylum, such as the one by the door of the infirmary, presumably to hold patients when there was an overflow of activity to the nearest room. The bench in and of itself wasn't at all interesting, but the fact that there was a living, breathing human being lying on it was. Very much so.

Apart from Ruth and the orderlies—and Gilda—he hadn't seen a soul since he'd left the infirmary. And here was one right in front of him; a patient, judging by the jumpsuit. Jonathan Crane, judging by the face.

Ruth, judging by her face, hadn't expected to see him here either. "Joan must still be inside. Hello, Jonathan."

Jonathan Crane didn't say anything.

A nervous glance between the two patients before she turned to the orderlies. "Watch him. And Joker, leave him alone."

"I haven't done anything."

She didn't answer, walking through the door.

They must be cleaning off the examination table. Or resetting the machine. Something that prevented him from coming in. That, or Ruthie had started rolling hard drugs into her cigarettes and lost all reservations about procedure and patient safety. That was the only way this made something remotely approaching sense.

Not that he was going to question it. The Joker sat on the end of the bench the strawman didn't occupy, cheerfully ignoring the orderlies crowded around him. "Hey, Scarecrow."

Judging from the slow movement of Jonathan Crane's eyes and the distinctly glazed look to them, the good doctor was not exercising his legal right to refuse medication.

The expected "shut up" from the orderlies never came. It would seem that they didn't care about the conversation as long as the Joker wasn't outright tormenting him, and probably not even then. "What've they got you on? Valium? Ativan?"

Jonathan Crane's eyes fluttered. The lashes were nearly long enough to brush his cheekbones. "Dunno."

A month and a week of social deprivation, and this was the conversation he got. It figures. "It's, uh, not very fun around here, doc, no offense. Was it this bad when you were running the show, or is it new management?"

"It's…an asylum." He was struggling just to stay conscious. It seemed excessive, pumping that many drugs into a scarecrow. They couldn't be all that violent. It only took one good rip in the skin to spill the straw. Kind of sad, that this was his villainous predecessor.

"So what's your verdict, Crane?" He tried pointing at the man's forehead, remembered that he was in a straitjacket, and added, "With the scan, I mean. There, uh, field mice in the straw or what?"

Jonathan Crane's shoulders made a movement that could have been a shrug, were he not drugged and lying down.

A moment passed in silence.

"Is it incredibly boring in this place, or is that just me?"

The Scarecrow didn't answer.

The Joker wondered if it was the sedatives, or if his conversation skills were always this poor. "Hey, you're a shrink, right?"

He blinked so slowly that he looked as if he was falling asleep. "Yes?"

"So you're familiar with Jung and Freud? Know that they used to be friends, had a falling out, all that?"

Something that might have been irritation in more lucid circumstances flashed—dragged—in Crane's eyes. "Of course."

"Right. They agreed to interpret each other's dreams—you show me yours and I'll show you mine, and all that—and Jung went first, but Freud didn't offer back. Talk about, uh, being stuck in the phallic phase. And that was the end of a beautiful friendship."

Jonathan Crane's eyebrows furrowed at a glacial pace. "Your…point?"

"I'm bored. And I had a dream last night that I don't quite get. Wanna play? We don't have to analyze. I don't know how, actually. We just tell."

His eyes closed again, sluggishly, like a life-size porcelain doll with a bad haircut and outfit. Certainly he was pale and thin enough. The Joker was about to concede defeat when Jonathan nodded.

"You first, Harpo."

One eye opened, stared, closed again. "There's…a room."

"Is it white?"

A nod.

"Figures."

"In the room…alone. Outside, there's…breathing. Pounding. Trying to get in. The door…bleeds."

"Bleeds?"

"The walls bleed. And it…comes inside, and the room…is dark, and I can…feel its breath. Its tongue. And the door…won't open." Jonathan Crane opened his eyes, looked up at the Joker. Again, too drugged for the Joker to distinguish between an imploring look and a passive one.

"Like I said, I'm bad at this." He sucked on his scars, thinking. "But if I had to guess? Lay off the acid before bed, Jonny."

His mouth twitched. Amusement, maybe, or disgust. Or just a movement. "Yours?"

"'Kay. I'm walking through Gotham—it might be Gotham, I really can't tell. It's all gray and indistinct; more so than usual, I mean. Like a photo that's overexposed, with the form of the subject, but none of the detail, you know?"

With the faintest of nods, Jonathan Crane closed his eyes.

"So I'm walking down the sidewalk—again, I assume it's the sidewalk, 'cause I can't really make it out—and there are people, but they're as blurry as the buildings, all black and white and grey. Maybe a flash or two of sepia, but nothing else. So I keep on walking, and then I see it. There's a person, and I can't make out, uh, gender or age or anything. It's like looking at a silhouette. Black, but defined. There's another person, Crane. A person walking away.

"So I try and follow, but the sidewalk-ness is crowded. I shove someone out of the way, and he—she—whatever, falls on the ground, and breaks. Like an Easter egg. And color spills out, and form with it. It's not a shape anymore, it's a woman, and the sidewalk's still gray, but it's got detail. And I keep moving, and working my way through the crowd, and the whole world lights up where I've been, where I've pushed. It was beautiful. I think, I didn't stop to look. But the person keeps moving away, and, uh, the crowd doesn't get any thinner, no matter how much I break."

The door to the procedure room opened. Ruth stuck her head out. "Joker? They're ready for you."

He didn't stand. "So, uh, what's your diagnosis, doc?"

Jonathan Crane, having fallen asleep, didn't say anything.

AN: Here's "I Dreamed a Dream" from Les Miserables: www. youtube. com/ watch?v=Yt-IBJpEMzA I've had a special place in my heart for that musical ever since I won gold at my local state Solo and Ensemble competition singing "On My Own."

Hadley is named for the guard in The Shawshank Redemption. Watch it, if you haven't.

A lumbar puncture is a procedure where spinal fluid is drawn out with an enormous needle.

Agalmatophilia is an immobility/statue fetish.

I should take this time to point out that the Jonathan in this fic is a bit more psychologically off than the Jonathan in my other stories. Also, I believe "Jonathan didn't say anything" is the most written sentence in this story.

The sitting on a bench with Jonathan sedated bit was somewhat inspired by my sister waking me up after my wisdom tooth extraction. Only she did it with a Vulcan mind meld. Or so she said.