***This chapter brought to you by a Guest who wanted a 'jealous Ed'. Enjoy!***

Ed threw a dart.
It embedded itself in the plaster of the wall.
He tutted to himself, frustrated at his impaired aim.
He knew what was causing it but that didn't seem to help dampen his simmering anger.

This jealousy was ridiculous. It was beneath him!

But then why did it sting so much when Oswald asked Butch to do something and not him? The trust he had in the lummox was baffling.

Ed threw another dart.
He ignored the worried whimper that he heard.

How was the big oaf supposed to be Oswald's right hand when he didn't even have two hands of his own?!

Ed had laughed when Oswald had introduced them. He had been convinced it had been a joke: something to cheer Ed up after his incarceration. He had laughed harder when Butch had told him the story of how he had lost his hand. That hadn't gone down well with Butch. Ed was convinced Oswald had been about to burst into a fit of giggles though.
Then Ed had realised Oswald wasn't joking and his merriment had been replaced with trepidation and annoyance.
How could Oswald think it was okay to keep someone like that around? Who had already betrayed him once! It had brought back memories of the day Ed had seen Oswald tarred and feathered and that had only made him angrier.

First impressions were one thing but Ed had quickly realised that Butch was not only a dimwit but a liability to Oswald's budding mayoral campaign.
Ed threw another dart. This one had too much force behind it. It bounced off the plaster and embedded itself into the wooden floor. It shook for a moment then stood bolt upright.
Ed massaged his forehead with two fingers.
That whimpering was starting to grate on him.

But what really vexed him was that Butch wasn't even convinced Oswald could win this election.

It was obvious to a blind man that the public were desperate for a leader: for change. Oswald was filling that void without even realising it! Despite his unusual demeanour, people believed in him and responded to his words. What had begun as him spearheading a witch hunt had turned into a serious political movement. It said a lot that the public were so obviously favouring a hardened known criminal over a tried and tested politician. They were practically the same thing!

'Maybe they want an honest crook for a change?' Ed mused.

A questioning whimper responded to his musing.

'Shut up!' he snapped, 'I'm thinking'.

But Oswald was not making the gains he should have been: the whole thing should have been moving much faster. With Butch in charge, the campaign was driving with its hand brake on. Oswald was still very likely to win but by Ed's calculations, the current mayor should have been no challenge at this stage of the game.
Butch was playing it too safe.
He had called on all his old connections and even brought in a simpering little image consultant called Fabiano. There was more authentic Italian in the leather of Ed's shoes than in that preening little popinjay!

Butch and Fabiano had been the ones who suggested that awful fake tan! Ed could've killed him for that alone. Ed had suffered from acne when he was a teen so was always conscious of good skin care but Butch seemed intent on burying Oswald beneath orange clay!

Ed understood a bit of make up was necessary: you needed some to look presentable on camera or under stage lights. But Oswald had been slathered and glistening like a thanksgiving turkey and it had rubbed off and stained his collar! Ed had learnt a long time ago that not everybody noticed the minuscule things he did but they couldn't take that chance.
More eyes than usual were on Oswald and many were keen to see him, an upstart, knocked off his perch.

Ed twiddled a dart between the index fingers of either hand thoughtfully.
Was Butch deliberately setting Oswald up to fail?! He would no doubt try to bribe officials and other people in power to ensure Oswald would win the election: it was Gotham electoral tradition. But what was the guarantee that once Oswald was in office, Butch wouldn't call on some favours? Oswald had made friends with the public but enemies with other, more dangerous figures.

Speaking of friends…
Ed gritted his teeth as he felt the dart's sharp end prick his finger.

He hated the way Fabiano was always touching Oswald.

He hated how he fussed around him, straightening out every little crease like a mother hen! The suits he picked were awful too. A leopard print handkerchief: really?! Oswald had only been spared that public humiliation by Ed throwing it in the fire when nobody was looking.
The ignorant Italian fop had no understanding of personal space! How were people supposed to take Oswald seriously when he had a greasy little lickspittle fawning over him all the time?!
And the way he looked at him was infuriating: the doe eyed, little-
He tried to take a deep breath and count to ten.

One…two…three…

Whimper.

'For the last time: don't interrupt me WHILE I'M THINKING!' Ed shouted and threw his last dart, droplets of blood from his wounded finger flying with it through the air.

This one hit home as it buried itself slightly below the centre of the sack.
The man inside the sack made an odd choking noise.
Ed watched coldly as the man's leg spasmed. The ropes binding him to the chair wouldn't allow for any other movement.

'Jugular', he diagnosed internally as he watched the man's subdued death throes, 'Still pulling downwards when I release the dart. Have to fix that'.

He savoured every miniscule movement until his captive finally and literally gave up the ghost. He watched the dead man sag in the chair.
He walked over and pulled the sack off his head.
Fabiano's dead eyes stared at the ceiling.
Ed was tempted to fix the man's hair: give him some dignity in death. He decided against it when he noticed the amount of goo like product slicked through the black locks. Even the blood from the head wound Ed had inflicted to knock him out hadn't diluted it.
He sighed in satisfaction and began to collect the darts he had been throwing steadily closer to Fabiano's bound body over the last hour. He had hoped to drag it out a little longer: he had been preparing a speech outlining every little thing Fabiano had done to bring himself to this ignominious end. Oh well, you couldn't have everything. The man rubbed Ed the wrong way, unconscious or not. Dead however, Ed suddenly found him utterly agreeable.

He placed the darts back in their wooden box and closed the lid with a click.

One annoyance down.

The mansion had spacious grounds. Nobody would notice another uneven mound beneath the fallen leaves. The fop's resignation letter in fluent English not Italian (the Italian phrases Fabiano had often thrown into conversation had usually been incorrect and mispronounced) and matching his parlance had already been typed and sent to the mansion. Tomorrow Ed would stumble upon the sealed envelope in the hallway and bring it to Oswald. He would then offer his services to help the campaign instead which, due to a lack of other options and the hectic schedule Oswald was keeping, Butch couldn't very well turn down.
And why should he? Oswald had said he had wanted Ed to play a part in his campaign on the limo ride to the mansion and Ed couldn't help it if he was industrious and self-motivated. He couldn't wait for Oswald to see the filing system he had already prepared for his appointments!
Butch couldn't be removed from the board. Not yet. His hulking build was necessary as a background prop to ensure people remembered Oswald was also The Penguin, no matter how many promotional buttons he handed out or babies he kissed. Ed made a mental note to remind Oswald to stop doing that, no matter how much the press pushed him to. Children were absolutely infested with germs and he wasn't convinced Oswald's slight frame could endure that much exposure.
Butch had to stay but that didn't mean Ed was going to make it easy for him. He was happy for him to play a part in the campaign: as a chauffeur or muscle. He just lacked the cranial capacity to run it effectively. Ed supposed he should pity him but it seemed more enticing to tease him. Nothing brought a rush like taunting a chained attack dog. It would be an intriguing experiment to see how Butch would react to Ed's manipulation and subtlety.
Butch couldn't touch him and he couldn't touch Butch but Ed was not about to watch Butch get his dirty fingerprints all over Oswald's hopes.
Oswald had been through enough. Ed still didn't know everything but he caught the quiet introspective stares Oswald would sometimes make or the forced smile he would give when something reminded him of a memory that hurt him.
But when he had seen Ed, he had been beaming.

'Hello old friend', he had said cheerily.

Ed was willing to do anything to keep seeing that smile.

Ed smiled quietly to himself as he began to ascend the stairs back to the warmth of the mansion proper. His first stop was the kitchen to disinfect the darts of dirt and incriminating fingerprints. Then he'd grab some trash bags, a bonesaw, some industrial strength bleach and get to work taking out the trash.

One way or another, in terms of right hand men, Oswald was about to trade up.

Whether Butch liked it or not.
Ed gleefully hoped he wouldn't.