Hey Peeps and Peepettes. This chapter is the longest I've done in a while, and I hope you enjoy it~!

Also, I think I'm going to begin giving props to those who review my stories, so I'd like to thank Le Bijou, CorporealPresence, ra1nf1re, and Bookluvr888! I really appreciate it!


Chapter 12

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"Oh good. You're awake."

Bruce strolled through the entrance quietly and gracefully. So much so, that he did as if he had been born to perform that one move his entire life.

He was wearing casual loose-fitting dark blue jeans that somehow arranged itself to fit perfectly against his shapely legs, and he was currently in the process of straitening out his crisp, white-button down shirt, giving me the impression that he had recently just put it on. His hair looked a bit scruffy and messed-up, like I assumed it would if he'd just recently woken up, and there might've been the slightest hint of a five o' clock shadow on his face.

In short, he looked like sex on a stick; A very tall, dark, lean yet still muscular, handsome beyond belief, sexy, stick.

"I woke up almost an hour ago." I responded distractedly, taking in the way his clothing hung on his body.

Bruce's eyes swept around the room quickly, searching for something. He glanced at me for a moment, and then continued his search.

"Are you hungry?" He asked still spinning around looking, "I thought I'd asked Alfred to get you some food, but maybe I—oh." Bruce finally spotted the two trays of food on a small table right behind him, and I could've sworn that I saw a hint of color flash over his cheeks before it went away.

Bruce ran his fingers through his dark hair, which only served to mess it up further. I had to blink a few times because I became momentarily speechless from the sheer masculinity and sexual prowess that practically oozed from his body.

I looked up at his face only to see that his mouth was moving, and belatedly realized that he was currently in the process of trying to tell me something. I then took a second to get my mind out of the gutter and focus on what he was saying.

"—ink it might be best to get you into a shower. I'm sure you'd like one after your whole ordeal."

I almost moaned in happiness at the thought of finally getting a chance to take a real shower with warm water, and not one of those—those hoses that I was forced to use when I was with the Joker.

Bruce was looking at me a bit strangely, and in that moment, I prayed to God that I hadn't actually moaned at the thought of a shower. Bruce stood up a bit straighter and cleared his throat before speaking.

"Well, I'm sure you'd like some privacy to change. Shower's down the hall to your left," Bruce gestured vaguely in that direction, "and feel free to help yourself to anything you see in there. I'll just . . ." Bruce began to turn away to leave.

My mind finally lifted from a deep haze long enough to allow coherent though to process through it. I had questions for Bruce, and I had to ask them before I forgot.

"Bruce!" I called, perhaps a bit too urgently.

Bruce flipped around, his eyes wild and he searched my body for any injuries. I waved his eyes away and cleared my throat. I was still in great need for water. Bruce saw this, picked up a glass of water from the tray Alfred had set down, and in two long strides, crossed the large room to hand it to me.

I gulped down the contents greedily before thanking him. Bruce waited patiently for me to finish, probably sensing that I had more to say.

Once I finished the water, I took a deep breath, and stared him down summoning what I hoped to be my strongest I-will-not-accept-any-bullshit-from-you face, and steeled myself. Bruce began to look a bit weary, but I ignored his caution and gathered up the questions I had for him.

"How long have I been out?" I asked with dread.

"Almost twenty-four hours."

All the air in my lungs suddenly whooshed out. A day! I'd been completely unconscious for an entire day? Immediately, My mind began to spin in about a million different directions, trying to wrap itself around the implications of that. I couldn't even begin to think of all that I could have missed while I was out. The Joker could've been shot down for all I knew, and the police could've caught on to my involvement in his schemes. Hell there could be a warrant out for my arrest and-and-

Bruce was watching me freak the fuck out over this and he quickly came to put a hand on my shoulder comfortingly. Slowly, my heart rate stabilized.

"Alright . . ." I conceded, still getting used to the idea, "But, how exactly did I get here?"

Bruce thought for a moment about how to answer that, before sighing deeply and taking a seat on the edge of the large, circular bed and bending at the waist to put his elbows on his knees.

"How much do you remember from what happened at Wayne Enterprises?" Bruce asked quietly.

"Nothing."

Bruce blinked in surprise at the casual tone of my voice, before quickly recovering.

"Oh." Bruce chuckled lightly and ran his fingers through his hair, "Well then, um, wow, so much to say, where do I begin?"

"How about at the end?" Bruce looked at me, once again surprised. He then tilted his head and raised an eyebrow, asking me a silent question.

"Roxanne." I answered as way of explanation.

The confused look he wore melted from his face when he heard the name, and his lips formed the shape of a little 'o" of recognition. Bruce then shook his head good-naturedly and smiled at me.

"I take it you've met her. . ?" I ask tentatively.

"I have." Bruce confirmed, chuckling a bit. I raised my eyebrow questioningly at him and he continued to shake his head. He then looked away from me as if he were lost in a memory.

"That girl would not allow me in this room longer than ten minutes," Bruce mused, "She kept questioning me about my intentions towards you, and she fretted over your sleeping form like a mother protecting her child." Bruce chuckled deeper.

"Never in my life have I seen someone so fiercely loyal to another like that," Bruce turned a thousand-watt smile my way, "and I thought her glare alone would incinerate me on the spot."

I found myself smiling at that, because only Roxanne would act that way. Not that I wouldn't do the exact same thing for her . . .

"What I don't understand though," Bruce continued, snapping my attention back to our conversation, "Is why your friend didn't immediately tell you where you were?"

I smiled sheepishly and cleared my throat.

"Uh, well, I'm not sure if she actually acquired that information or not; she'd been a bit preoccupied by her anger with my irresponsibility and lack of communication while I was . . . away."

I gave him a meaningful look.

"Ah." Was all he said.

"Anyways, what I meant by 'start at the end', was that she had already filled me in on what happened in Wayne Enterprises after I passed out right up she herself had gone unconscious,"

Bruce looked taken back for a moment but quickly recovered himself. "Well," Bruce began, "since I wasn't really around when your friend . . ."

"Roxanne." I supplied.

"When your friend Roxanne passed out, I can't quite continue the story from that point, but," Bruce paused to stare directly into my eyes, "I can tell you what happened to Joker . . ."

The sound of his name alone sped up my heart. Not necessarily for the reason one might expect . . . Well, maybe that too, but it mostly stemmed from anxiety and fear.

I sat up a bit in the bed and tried to inch a bit closer to Bruce, ensuring that nothing he was about to say would be missed, and at the same time keeping my promise to take it easy. Bruce caught this and took it as confirmation to begin.

Bruce gave me a hard stare. "First, I wanna know just how much you've been told."

I took a moment to remember Roxanne's story. "All I know so far is that I was sent out with Roxanne and another goon to be taken to a van that was hidden somewhere outside the building after I destroyed the Detonator" I said, "She told me that they barely had enough time to get away before they heard what they thought to be the police bursting into the room and shooting off multiple rounds."

"Okay good. I'm sure I can provide you with a sufficient amount of information from that point, because here's where things got interesting."

Bruce glanced at me one more time before engaging in the story.

"Well, your friend was right, the police did enter the room. However, they certainly weren't the ones to initiate all that gunfire. That began via the Joker's panicked henchmen, which, in itself wouldn't be too strange under the circumstances, but the Joker apparently wasn't the one to send off that attack. The madman just stood there and observed the entire ordeal. One of the officers said that the Joker looked angry, but that was pretty much it. His mind wasn't attached to the situation at hand, and when the officers finally took him in, he just held out his hands and let them cuff him. Although," Bruce looked directly at me when he said this, "that furious expression never left his face—no hysterical laughing, no secretive smiles, just pure, unadulterated rage."

There was a pause.

"And you think I was the source of all his fury." It wasn't a question, and the look on Bruce's handsome face said it all.

Bruce put his head in his hands and then ran his fingers through his hair, sighing deeply. He looked pained when he finally spoke.

"Actually," Bruce said with a sigh, "I know that you were the source."

I raised an eyebrow. "How do you know?"

Bruce didn't respond. Instead, he climbed onto the bed, shocking the hell out of me, and reached over to the other side where there was a small table with a lamp and a remote controller that I hadn't noticed. His proximity allowed me an unobscured view of Bruce's chiseled torso, and I was helpless to do anything but admire his strong physique.

Bruce then pulled away and sat back in his previous spot. He pressed a button on the remote, which served to reveal a large television set that appeared when the wall to my left flipped around, only to reveal what was probably the largest flat screen TV I've seen outside of a movie theatre.

Bruce pressed a few buttons, and then we saw a pretty reporter standing outside of Arkham jail with a short, pudgy man dressed in white robes behind her; what caught me though, was the disturbingly haunted look in the man's eyes.

"…Patient 4055, currently known as the Joker is being held custody over at Arkham; a holding facility in Gotham City for the mentally unstable. Reports came in about the madman, saying that he hasn't uttered one word since the twenty-four hours he's been here. Police seem to say that 'He looks like he might be planning something', but the doctors over at the facility haven't been successful in communicating with him.

"I have here with me Dr. Van Goodman, a psychologist who has been assigned the Joker's case." The reporter turned around to face the man who fidgeted uncomfortably under her gaze.

"Now, Dr. Van Goodman, the public wants to know. Why do you think the Joker is acting this way? Do you think he's plotting something? Was he injured mentally? What's your take on the situation?"

The reporter flung the microphone into the poor man's face and looked to him eagerly. Dr. Van Goodman regarded the reporter nervously and pulled on the collar of his dress shirt.

"Well, patient 4055 is a rather . . . ," The doctor searched for the right word, "delicate . . . case. But, in all the years that we've seen the patient in this hospital, we've never quite encountered him . . . as such."

"Yes, well do you think caused this change in the Joker's demeanor?" The reporter asked impatiently.

"Well, keep in mind that the joker didn't REALLY change TOO much. For example, he still engages in, um, 'mind games' with the other doctors . . . he's just darker." Dr. Van Goodman looked as if he were gathering his wits about something important.

I looked over at Bruce questioningly, but I couldn't catch his eye—he was too focused on what was going on in the news.

"The major change with patient 4055," The man finally said, "is that apparently he . . . keeps calling out for, uh . . . his pet cat."

There was a pregnant pause as the realization began to dawn.

The reporter looked a bit angry. "The Joker, the madman, sociopath, serial killer is in Arkham calling out . . . for his pet cat?" The reporter looked to be in pure disbelief over the matter. She'd obviously been expecting something much more revealing—Like a confession, or perhaps even a name.

The look on the doctor's face though, told me that he knew just how insignificant it sounded, and had a hard time believing it himself.

The reporter frowned and faced back towards the camera. "Well," The reporter sighed, "There you have it folks, the Joker's missing his pet cat. Join us for more on this story right after a word from our sponsors."

The show went to commercials, and Bruce turned off the T.V. The wall flipped back around and a heavy silence coated us.

I was finding this situation I put myself in to be a bit difficult to swallow. I can't imagine how I could've possibly fucked up so bad to land myself here. I do recall smashing the little detonator back at Wayne Enterprises that night, but in Roxanne's story, she made it seem like the Joker wasn't all that affected by it.

But of course I did something. I always find a way to fuck up. In fact, I'm surprised I didn't get him to want to kill me sooner!

"Hey, Look at me." Bruce said. I turned towards him only to see him frowning at me as if he had heard my thoughts. "I can see that whatever you were just thinking, it's wrong, and you need to stop."

I only sighed and shook my head slightly.

"Yeah, well, this is unbelievably typical for me to get myself into these types of situations."

"Katherine," Bruce reached over and took my chin in his fingers forced me to look at him, "listen to me. You did nothing wrong. You hear me? Nothing. That—that . . . ," Bruce gestured vaguely to the space where the television was, "thing, isn't human, and is often highly irrational. It's obvious that you have no clue as to why he would have reason to be upset with you, so there's absolutely no reason to blame yourself blame yourself,"

"I obviously did something wrong." I protested stubbornly with my chin still tucked in his fingers.

Bruce gave me a dour look.

"You saw him!"

"Yes I did, but Katherine, he could be angry with you for a number of different reasons. They don't all have to be because you were at fault."

I chose not to respond to his words, because deep down I knew inexplicably that I was I who messed up. If only I could just remember what I did to—

"Regardless of the reasoning behind the Joker's hostile behavior," Bruce said suddenly, "I'm going to do everything in my power to ensure your safety. That is why I decided that you'll be residing in my mansion with me for a while."

My eyes widened to almost comical proportions. I blinked a few times. Clearly I had misunderstood him. Do I live here now?

Bruce flushed a bit upon seeing my reaction to his words, and was quick to correct himself.

"Well, not necessarily with me, in that way, just consider it as us . . . room mating in order to protect you,"

My expression didn't change.

"Okay, maybe not quite like that either," Bruce amended quickly, "Just consider it a kind deed from a friend. I'll make sure that living here will be a simple partnership between—By partnership I mean friendship. Don't get me wrong, it's not like I wouldn't mind a—not to say that my intention was for you and I to become partners—not that there would be anything wrong with that. You're a very beautiful woman and so of course I, um—"

At that point I couldn't hold back my smile. This was coming from the guy rumored to be the smoothest Casanova type Alpha male in the city.

Bruce's face reddened slightly and that's when I had to cover my mouth with my hand to hide my full-fledged grin. Who knew that such a sexy man could act like this?

'Roxanne would love to see this,' I thought, highly amused.

Bruce looked like he was getting prepared to say something to defend himself again, but before he could get the words out, the door burst open unexpectedly revealing a rather frazzled-looking Roxanne, eyes wild with fear, a phone clutched tightly to her chest.

She couldn't speak for a few moments, but finally she swallowed and told me the worst possible news I could hear at this time.

"The Joker . . . Katherine, the Joker, he—he escaped!"

My heart clenched deep within my chest.

"What?"

My eyes flipped wildly to the area where the television had been and I gestured at it frantically. "But! But! We just saw the news, and they acted like the Joker was still incarcerated in Arkham!"

"That was only a recording of a previous broadcast." Bruce muttered quietly from his place in the room.

"WHAT!"

Bruce didn't seem all that perturbed by my blatant panic attack. In fact, he handled that information quite well for someone who was currently harboring the target of the most notorious madman Gotham City has ever seen.

I, on the other hand, couldn't quite manage to breath correctly as of yet. I almost began hyperventilating when Roxanne spoke again.

"I was on the phone with Aleks and he had the news on, so he saw the broadcast and told me about it. I ran right up to tell you as soon as I heard." Roxanne was looking at me with that wow-this-is-sucks-for-you-how-do-I-make-you-feel-better sort of expression.

Roxanne looked back down at the phone still clutched tightly in her hands, and pressed a button almost apologetically. I think she might've realized that Aleks was still on the phone and hung up on him.

I didn't have much time to decipher any of the events occurring around me though; I was too busy planning my funeral in my mind.

"Hey now, none of that." Bruce scolded, once again reading my mind, "I've already told you that you're going to be placed in protective custody here at my manor right? I predicted something like this prior to you waking up, so I've already taken care of everything. And you do not have to worry. The Joker is not getting in here without me knowing it." Bruce seemed so confident in his words, I almost snorted.

"Now come on. A good shower will do you both some good. In fact feel free to make use of my newly installed bath houses and spa recreational center," Bruce turned around and gave me a charming smile, "Help yourself to any and all of the benefits provided by Alfred and the other staff while you're here, okay? I want you to be comfortable,"

'Well,' I thought cynically, 'At least I'll be refreshed and rejuvenated when the Joker comes to slaughter me.'

Roxanne took it upon herself to come to the bed and practically drag me out of the room towards the direction of the bathhouse. She tried to distract me from the situation by talking about how we've always wanted to take a spa day, and how this place is the better equivalent of a 5 star bed and breakfast hotel.

I couldn't quite get up the energy to share her enthusiasm though.

Maybe I'm being paranoid, but it's starting to seem like nobody understands the Joker. I was not convinced in the slightest bit by Bruce's words. When the Joker has targeted you, history has proven that he will go to any lengths, and that means ANY lengths to get you.

I sighed deeply. I just hope that he'll be merciful enough to spare everyone else's lives.

Speaking of which, I turned around to check to see where Bruce, and saw that he'd disappeared.

I halted abruptly and groaned, smacking my head in the process. Wow I'm an idiot.

"What? What is it?" Roxanne asked worriedly.

I looked at her and sighed. "I never got to ask Bruce how we both got here."


The Joker listened in on the scene with great disinterest. He had been hearing the bumbling so-called Doc-tors argue over him for the past few hours now. Those idiots had no clue that they were being overheard.

They'd tried to put him in one of those straitjackets when he had first arrived at Arkham, but he made quick work of that by 'convincing' one of the nearest doc-tors to relieve him of it. So far, no one's tried to put it back on, and that fact made the Joker smirk.

Currently, the Joker was in the interrogation room, sitting behind a large brown table, drumming his fingers impatiently while his hands were cuffed as he was plagued by thoughts of her.

The Joker fought the urge to snarl in fury, because the Joker was indeed furious-angrier than he could ever remember himself being. But more than that, he felt an emotion beyond his own comprehension. He felt betrayal.

Which of course, was ridiculous in itself, because in order for one to feel betrayed, there had to have been trust or some other frilly emotion somewhere in the picture. Which is impossible, because the Joker did not trust peo-ple. Trust, is for the suckers. You pull down your painstakingly built defenses for someone, trusting them to love you, to care about you, to protect you . . . the Joker inwardly smiled.

He'd definitely used 'trust' to his own advantage on people many times in the past, which, unfortunately for them, often ended with a bullet in their heads, or a knife in their backs.

And that is why the Joker couldn't for the life of him understand why he would even think that he might've trusted her. He knew better than to do something stupid like that.

The Joker did feel betrayed though. Deeply so. In fact, he felt his anger rising again as he thought of how that slimy cow had double-timed him with the playboy back there. But what did he expect? She was a woman. He knew on a personal level how susceptible they were to a little flirting here and there, and once that bachelor got his hands on her . . .

The Joker grew frustrated with the whole situation. Initially, he'd wondered if she'd made a mistake, and the whole fiasco was an accident, but he quickly expelled the idea, because he knew how he inspired fear in her, and he was sure that she would've made sure to be careful.

That is, unless she wanted to mess up.

He tried not to think about that right now though, because as the Joker looked as if he were not-so-calmly waiting for the doc-tors to stop their incessant bickering, he actually had something much more pressing to get to, which first involved him getting out of this hell.

There was a commotion outside of the room, and in moments, the door opened to reveal a tall, burly looking man dressed in all black, with his eyes covered by dark sunglasses, and a silver pistol hooked onto his belt strap.

The Joker was not impressed.

Dr. Van Goodman poked his head inside the room nervously to address the burly man. "Are you sure you can handle him, Jake? This patient is known to be quite," The doctor paused, searching for the appropriate terminology, "tricky, to deal with."

The Burly man only smirked and stood up a bit straighter, his hands clenched together behind his body in a military-like stance.

The Joker tilted his head curiously, and for the first time since he'd arrived, revealed a bit of interest in the situation. The doctor saw this, and grew considerably more nervous.

"Yes, well. I'm sure you'll have it all under control." The man squeaked, "I will return shortly. A patient just caused a lot of chaos in the dining hall, and they called in all the doctors just in case."

The Joker smiled at that and made a mental note to add a little bonus to Scarecrow's cut when the opportunity arose.

Dr. Van Goodman waited for some sign of acknowledgement from the guard, and when receiving none, gave up and fled out of the room so quickly, one would think the devil himself was snapping at his heels.

Once the doctor was gone, a heavy silence filled the room.

While it was obvious that both men were sizing each other up, the Joker was much less discreet about it, and took the time to shift his body around in his chair, and tilt his head to get a better look at him.

"So I hear yer that Joker character everyone's been talking about." The guard mused, his voice deep and gravelly.

The Joker, having expected to be the first one to break the silence, was surprised.

"It speaks!" The Joker exclaimed, bringing his hands up slowly on the table. When the guard didn't react, the Joker licked his lips, "Is uh, that what you heard? No, see you have it all wrong. I'm just a regular good ol' sim-ple-ton."

The guard unclasped his hands, and made his way over to the table where the Joker sat. He then extended his hands and placed them both flat on the surface of the table, leaning in closely. There was no doubt that this was an attempt to intimidate the Joker, and the Joker brought up a hand to his mouth, and yawned as if this were the most boring action in the world.

"You can't fool me." The man practically growled. "I know who you are, and I'm not going to let you go without a fight." Jake's indifferent disposition broke, and now all of his emotions were written across his face, clear as day. "I take this job. Very. Seriously."

"Yeah, that was a very cute speech," The Joker said rolling his eyes, "and I'd love nothing more than to come up with some witty retort to that, but, you see, I have an un-be-lie-vably important rendezvous with some 'friends', and I'm gonna be late if I don't leave soon. So uh, if ya don't mind . . ."

The Joker then made a move to standup, but was quickly thwarted by Jake, who stuck his hand out and pushed the Joker back down onto his chair. The Joker eyed the man incredulously. Clearly the guy was NOT familiar with the way things worked with the Joker.

The burly man moved in close to the Joker's face, and scowled. "I already told you clown. Yer not going anywhere."

The Joker paused for a moment, thinking of a good way to deal with this waste of oxygen, before smiling and bringing his hands together above the table.

"Well!" The Joker exclaimed, licking his lips. "In uh, that case, how about a good ol' card trick while we're here, eh?"

"They told me you didn't have anything on you."

"That's because I didn't. This," The Joker held up a new deck of cards, "I got a little souvenir from the oh-so gen-er-ous doctor that had released me from the jacket. So pick a card."

The Joker took out the deck of cards and messily spread them out facedown on the table. Confused, but willing to participate in something that would distract the Joker, the tan, dark haired guard pulled out a card in the pile.

The Joker then collected all the cards from the table, and put them in a stack in his right hand.

"Now, uh, take a reeeal good look at your card, and put it back in the deck whenever you're ready."

Jake took a second to glance at it, and then stuffed it back into the deck, somewhere around the middle. The Joker split the cards, and spent a good minute or so, doing some elaborate card shuffling.

Jake appeared to have calmed down somewhat and was perhaps even entertained after the Joker finished shuffling the cards.

"Now," The Joker said, picking through the deck of cards, "Is . . . this. Your card?"

The Joker held up the three of spades. The guard smirked. "No."

"You sure?"

"Yep."

"Well," The Joker twirled the card around in his hand once, and the face of the card changed to the Joker symbol. "What about now?"

Jake recoiled violent from shock and made a grab for the card in the Joker's hands.

"Ah-Ah!" The Joker scolded, "There'll be none of that. Here, take a close look and I'm sure you'll uh, be able to see how I did it."

Jake, who was now baffled beyond belief, wasted no time and moved in close to scrutinize the card in the Joker's hands. "No, no, no!" The Joker exclaimed, "You'll never be able to see it from that far away!"

Jake inched in even closer.

In one swift and powerful motion, the Joker grabbed the guard's neck, and flipped him over the table belly-up. The Joker used his handcuffs to choke Jake, and shoved the card into the inside of Jake's cheek with his right hand.

"Aw! Jakey-poo! I thought you'd put up a little more fight!"

The Joker laughed hysterically, and dug the card in deeper, making Jake wince in pain. Jake began to struggle in the Joker's grip, but with every movement he made, he chocked himself against the chains of the handcuffs, and the Joker dug the card in deeper.

The lack of oxygen to Jake's brain sent him into immediate panic mode, and the man became incapable of logical thought.

The Joker had of course anticipated this, and was quickly calculating a way to bring the poor man to his ultimate demise. Should he snap his neck? No, that would be MUCH too typical. Should he slice his face up? Maybe, but the way things were going now, the Joker might just end up choking him to death.

"Jake, Jake, Jake. You must've seen this coming." The Joker scolded in a calm voice, "After all, I am the uh, Joker. But I'll tell you what. Just to be a good sport, I'm gonna tell you a story. Wanna know how I got these scars?"

The Joker didn't give him a chance to respond. "When I was little, I had a Dad. And a Mom. And a simply darling older brother." The Joker licked his lips. "But all was not well in this cute lit-tle Brady bunch of a family. You see, remember that uh, brother I told you about? Yeah, well, we never quite . . . got. Along."

Jake tried to break free again, attempting to punch the Joker in the face, hoping that he would be distracted enough to loosen his grip somewhat. Unfortunately, the Joker had also anticipated this move, and grabbed the offending fist, twisted it, and pulled it down so that Jake was choking himself as well.

"Well that was rather rude!" The Joker admonished, "Here I am taking the time to tell you a bedtime story before you go to sleep, and you interrupt me!" The Joker pulled on the arm that was wrapped around Jake's neck violently, and he began to make painful choking sounds.

"Now, where was I? Oh yes. My big bro and I weren't very close." The Joker licked his lips. "See, My brother had . . . issues. Yeah. Men-tal issues; he got physical with me at times, but darling old Mom and Dad never punished him for it."

The Joker looked down at Jake's body casually, as if the man wasn't dying. "But I never let that get me down, no sir. I was the happy one in the family." The Joker paused and licked his lips again thoughtfully. "My brother never liked that."

Jake struggled even harder now, as he grew light headed from the little oxygen he was receiving. His breath came out in short wheezes and his eyes grew wild.

"Shh, shh! Hush now, you're ruining the moment." The Joker said, laughing. "So one day, I came home after a long of day of school, happy as a clam, and there I found my brother, leaning over the bloody carcasses of my mom and my dad with a bloody butcher's knife in his hands, and blood splattered all over his shirt." With every word, the Joker pulled down Jake's arm just a little bit further, choking him just that much more.

"As the little tyke I was, when my mind finally put together the pieces, I threw myself onto my brother, tried to fight him, and oh ho!" The Joker looked into Jake's eyes, "Was that a mistake."

"My brother wailed on me again, and again, and again, and again, until my face was so bloody and bruised you couldn't tell me apart from a bruised eggplant." The Joker laughed, "So as you can probably guess, I wasn't smiling quite as much after that."

"My brother then took his knife, placed it inside my cheek just like this," The Joker mimicked his words, and put the sharpened Joker card inside of Jake's cheek, digging it deep into his flesh, "and . . . !"

Jake shut his eyes tightly and froze, waiting for the pain. When none came after a few seconds, he opened one eye only to see the Joker looking down at him, highly amused.

"I wasn't finished." The Joker stated as if way of explanation. "The story does have a happy ending though, but I won't get into those details, let's just say that my brother now spends his days decomposing at the bottom of the ocean, and I became the most notorious villain in the world! See? Happy!"

"The point of this story though," The Joker continued, "is that you remind me of him. My brother that is; same intimidation tactics, same level of intelligence, ev-er-y-thing." The Joker pulled on Jake's arm some more.

"I think I'm gonna do the world a favor, and rid of my brother. Again. We can't have those kinds of crazy, homicidal maniacs running around here, can we?" The Joker laughed loudly, before releasing Jake and shoving him down hard onto the floor.

Jake sucked in huge gulps of air greedily, his face beet-red, couching on his hands an knees, but he didn't make a move to pick himself up from the floor. The Joker observed him pitilessly, and checked the dirt under his fingernails.

"I'll tell you what Jakey," The Joker said, "just because you've been such a good sport, I'm gonna let you choose how you want me to kill you, 'cause to tell you the truth, I've been a little torn about it myself."

Jake turned his head at the sound of the Joker's voice, but still he didn't dare look up at him.

'What a uh, macho man,' The Joker thought sarcastically.

"Now!" The Joker exclaimed, "What could possibly be behind door number one?" The Joker held up the playing card that had been held against the inside of Jake's mouth for the last ten minutes.

"I give you five seconds to get up and out of this door before I throw this card at you; the edges are bladed just in case you didn't already know that, and I may or may not hit a major artery, leaving you to bleed to death on this pretty little cement floor." The Joker smiled brightly, already favoring this outcome.

"Or?" Jake croaked.

"Or," The joker echoed, pausing dramatically. He then pulled out a silver pistol, and pointed it right at Jake's head. "I use this gun and blast your brains out of your skull. No chance of escape, no misses, quick. And. Pain-less."

Jake palmed himself for the gun that he'd carried with him into the room, and was surprised when he found that it was missing. "What's it gonna be?" The Joker asked, "The longer you wait to decide, the more uh, trigger happy my hands get."

Jake stared into the barrel of his own pistol and immediately came to a conclusion.

"The card."

"The card!" The Joker exclaimed happily. "I was, uh, hoping you'd say that."

Without any further preamble, the Joker put the pistol down on the table, picked up the card, pulled his arm back and threw it at Jake.

Jake's eyes widened exponentially. "You said I had five seconds!"

The Joker smirked. "Yes, and I gave it to you, I just uh, didn't specify when I'd start counting,"

Jake's hands flew up to his neck instinctively, but strangely enough, no skin on his neck was broken, and this realization brought a half-crazed, half-relieved smile to his face.

"You missed!"

The Joker guffawed loudly. "You think so, huh?"

Jake sat there dumbfounded until he felt something trickle down the side of his leg. He looked down, only to see that his thigh had been sliced open, in the exact spot where his femora artery is, with the card wedged into his body, and the wound bleeding profusely. Jake stared at the wound on his leg for a few moments, terrified into immobility.

"Well," The Joker finally said, stretching his arms over his head, "This has been fun." The Joker paused, grabbed both of Jake's wrists in one hand, and cuffed him to the table, making it now impossible to close the wound and stop the bleeding.

"What—How!" Jake snapped out of his trance and thrashed against the handcuffs, which only served to cut up his wrists.

"But uh, I've got places to go, a city to terrorize, and oh!" The Joker mimicked looking at a watch, "I am so late!"

The Joker then walked casually to the door, but before he exited, he turned back around to face the now terrified Jake. The Joker pointed to his bleeding wound. "You know, you really should do something about that, because from the looks of it, you're not going to be getting an-y help, any-time soon."

And with that, the Joker strolled on out of the interrogation room, down the halls of Arkham, and crossed through the front doors of the facility, without anyone trying to stop him.

This, of course, was mainly due to the fact there wasn't anyone around to stop him. They were all still otherwise preoccupied with other matters in the insane asylum.

The Joker paused outside of his van filled with his eternally loyal goons who were just waiting to take orders from him. The Joker gave them all a nasty smile.

"Now," He began, "If you were a scared little Kitty Kat, where would you hide?"

The police stood outside of the crime scene in the interrogation room in Arkham, and observed as the specialists searched the body for clues.

"How do ya figure he died?" One asked.

"Looks like something cut him." Another man answered morbidly, "And then he must've bled to death."

"Hey boss!" One man called from across the room, "You're gonna wanna check this out. I think we got us a clue."

Police chief Gordon approached the young man, his face hard set, and his back rigid. He laid his eyes on the object in young man's hands. When he saw it, he took a deep breath and feared the worst.

In the young man's hands, was a single, sharpened playing card. The Joker.


A/N: And there you have it folks! Next chapter, more things come together . . . time for a little reunion maybe? *Chuckles darkly*

-SongsThatSerenade7