(Hello Dear Readers! I'm back! And once again, I'm sorry for the delay. So what exactly can I say to make it up to you Readers for the amount of time that's passed since I've updated? Hmm. All I can tell you is the truth. Let's recap for those of you who are not followers of my other stories and have yet to read my excuse. REWIND! *sounds of tape being rewound*

Okay, first of all, my laptop decided to crash on me twice during the summer of 2014. I got it back sometime in November of 2014. Then my USB drive, THE USB drive that I keep ALL my stories and EVERYTHING on, decided that it wanted to be "cool" like my laptop and crash as well. So I got it looked at and the techie who worked on it saved as much as he could. Unfortunately, all the titles were erased and replaced with codes, so I had to go and look through every single item and figure out what was what! And there's also the fact that I have TWO jobs (three if you count the side acting I do when the time allows) now and I'm a full time college student. So there you go!

In this chapter, we're going to be saying good-bye to a certain character. But who will it be?

I decided that I'll start posting a story date along with the chapter since my updating consistency is unknown. It'll also help you guys keep track with how long Amber has been working at Arkham.)

[Song Suggestion for this chapter: 'Everything is Alright' by Motion City Soundtrack. Songs used in this chapter: 'That's Not My Name' by The Ting Tings.]

Chapter Twenty-One

Leaving the House

February 23, 2013

"How you feeling, chika?" Amber asked a pacing Chelsea.

"Nervous, excited …. Nauseous."

"That'll pass."

Chelsea turned her face to the nurse, her brown skin unusually pale. "No, seriously, Amber, I think I'm about to hurl."

"Oh geez!"

The young nurse hurried across the room and stuck her head out the door where two guards were keeping watch.

"Hey! Sick girl needs a bucket- pronto!"

One of the guards took off down the hall to retrieve the item. Amber closed the door and turned to look at Chelsea, who was currently slouching in her chair with her head between her knees.

"Just be sure to take slow, deep breaths; okay?"

Chelsea moaned in reply.

It had been a month since the gang had gotten Nurse Amber back from her unfair suspension and towards the beginning of February Amber had been told that the Board was seriously considering Chelsea's release and would be going over the girl's progress to determine if she was ready. Amber had insisted that on the day of the decision, Chelsea would not be kept waiting in her cell but in a different room that would calm her. Today was that day, and Chelsea had requested that Amber be with her as she waited to hear the Board's decision.

The room they were in was a visiting room where patients who were not a big safety risk could meet their visitors with no barriers between them. The room was decorated with two bolted down pictures on the wall, along with very minimal pieces of bolted down furniture, such as a cushioned chair. The decorations were more for the visitors' benefit so they wouldn't feel like they themselves were in a cell.

Chelsea still looked a little ill. "Think happy thoughts," Amber offered.

"Fluffy bunnies and crayons, fluffy bunnies and crayons, fluffy bunnies and crayons," Chelsea chanted.

A knock at the door and Chelsea sat bolt upright. Amber watched the girl's face wrinkled in discomfort. "Moved too fast?" Amber asked.

"Mh-hm." Chelsea put a hand over her mouth and sagged in the chair.

Amber went to the door and opened it to find the guard with a bucket. "Got it," he said and held it out to her with a smile. His smile faded when he caught sight of Chelsea. "She looks awful," he remarked.

Amber took the bucket with one hand and grabbed the doorknob with the other. "I bet the ladies love you," she said with heavy sarcasm and slammed the door shut in his face. She swiftly brought Chelsea the bucket and nudged the girl's foot with her red converse clad one. "Here."

Chelsea looked up and gratefully took the bucket. "Thanks."

They sure are taking a long time to come to a decision, Amber thought to herself.

"You know…if I don't get to leave, Gatsby's going to be glad."

Amber frowned. "What?"

Chelsea wrapped her arms around the bucket and sat it on her lap, at the ready. "Gatsby says I'm his favorite patient because I'm so good at art."

"I'm sure Gatsby will be even happier once you actually leave." Amber sat down in the opposite chair from Chelsea and focused her attention on the girl. She'd been in Arkham Asylum now for a year and nearly six months and had come to know each of her charges fairly well. Chelsea was nearing her twenties. "So once you get out-."

"If I get out," Chelsea interrupted.

"No. Think positive. There's power in words that are said."

It was something she firmly believed in. Back in high school she'd had two guy friends in two separate families. One boy's father spoke nothing but negative things, saying how much of a disappointment he was and how he'd never amount to anything. The other boy had a father who talked positively and told him how smart he was and successful he'd be in the future. As time passed on, the words both fathers had spoken over their boys became true. Since one boy had been told nothing but how worthless he was, he never tried to better himself and the one who'd been told great things became a very wealthy and happy business man who had a girlfriend that Amber suspected he was going to propose to any day now.

Amber leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees and picking at her short fingernails. "Once you get out of here, what will you do?"

Chelsea was quiet a moment as she thought about her answer. Her brown eyes were trained on the floor as if the words were printed there.

"I think...I'll go to college and major in art." She lifted her eyes to meet Amber's gaze. "I've always wanted to be an artist."

"What kind?"

"I don't really know. I guess I'll find that out when I get in college."

Amber noticed the change in Chelsea's use of words but didn't comment, merely smiled.

…...

"I'm bored," the Joker whined.

"You've said that already," Nigma reminded him.

"But I'm even more bored."

"Well too bad."

"Entertain me."

"No."

"Oh come on."

"No, clown!"

"But I'm booored!"

"Deal with it! We're all bored! But we all have to wait for Amber!"

"I still think they should have let us wait in the rec. room," Katherine insisted.

The patients had been left to their cells for the time being.

"But there's no telling how long Nurse Amber and Chelsea are going to have to wait and no guards or orderlies want to be in the rec room with us for too long," Two-Face grumbled while lying in his bed.

"Can you blame them?" Nigma added.

The Joker tilted back his head and let out a long suffering sigh loud enough for everyone to hear. "I'm boooooooooooored!" He sang.

"Can it, Joker!" Ivy shouted.

"Bored, bored, bored, bored, bored!"

"Oh how awful for you," came a smooth British accent.

All heads turned to the hall entryway. Those whose cells were too far down the hall strained to press their faces as close to the glass as possible but it did no good. The ones who didn't need to strain ended up wishing their cells were switched. Dr. Bernard Fitz was grinning smugly at the gang.

"What do you want, Brittney?" the Joker asked, glaring daggers at him.

Fitz sneered at the nickname and strolled leisurely down the hall. "Now, now now; don't be so snappy, Clown," he chided.

Katlyn 1 sighed dreamily. "Ooh his voice is so pretty."

"Katlyn, no!" Katherine scolded.

Katlyn 1 shook herself and changed her dreamy expression to annoyance and directed it at the doctor. But the doctor was just as equally pretty to look at. Darn it!

"Mean doctor," Caleb said.

Fitz placed a hand over his heart as if the words had wounded him. "Now, Caleb, that wasn't very nice."

"Caleb no like you; meh!" He stuck his tongue out at the man.

"Fine by me. I'm not particularly fond of any of you," Fitz responded with a lazy shrug of his shoulders.

"So why are ya here?" Harley asked.

"Because I've been told by my supervisors that I have to conduct an interview with each and everyone of you today."

"Interview us about what?" Crane asked suspiciously.

"Nurse Amber Johnson."

Chelsea eventually used the bucket. The same guard who brought the bucket also came in to bring Chelsea her lunch. Chelsea got a whiff of the meat loaf and Amber saw her get ready to heave.

Incoming, she thought.

The guard looked a bit queasy himself as he heard Chelsea empty her stomach in the bucket that he'd brought her. Amber turned her back to Chelsea and asked, "Could you please make a request with the cafeteria to bring us something simple, like PB and J's?" A rather moist slopping sound from behind made Amber purse her lips with the effort of repressing a shudder. "I don't think she can handle anything else at the moment."

The guard nodded quickly and hurried away.

The gang had been brought to the cafeteria for lunch and were all gathered together at one table, conversing in low tones.

"What could Dr. Ditz possibly want to interview us about Nurse Amber for?" Katherine asked with a sharp bite.

"Quite a little conundrum," Jervis Tetch remarked.

"You think she might be in trouble?" Tommy nervously asked his cousin. Jervis shrugged.

Katelynn 2 picked at her mashed potatoes and hummed her theme song under her breathe.

"Care to add your opinion?" Katherine sassed.

Katelynn 2 looked up with a start and noticed all eyes on her. "Sorry, I was just busy thinking what devious things I could do to Doctor Pretty Boy."

The Joker snickered at her comment but added nothing to it. He was being unusually quiet as he stared at his food and ate.

"Puddin'?" Harley cautiously nudged him with her shoulder. "You okay?"

"Yeah, pumpkin pie. Just thinking."

A sudden coughing fit came over Nigma, who had been in the middle of drinking water. "Good lord, you can do that?!"

The Joker's face was a perfect dead pan as he used his spoon to catapult a glop of mashed potatoes at Nigma's face. It gave a satisfying splat against Nigma's nose.

"Hey, guys. What if Fitz is still mad at Amber for dying his tongue purple?" Katherine asked, bringing the focus back on track.

"But that wasn't her, it was the Joker," Dent reminded her.

"Yeah, we know that, but Dr. Fitz still thinks it was Amber."

"I thought he let that go?" Ivy said, inspecting her peas and carrots with a critical eye.

"I wouldn't put it past him to still be miffed at her."

"Never trust a British accent," Katlyn 1 warned. "No matter how pretty is sounds."

"Eh-hem," a very British and cultured Edward Nigma sounded.

"Unless it's yours of course!" Katlyn 1 hurriedly added.

Nigma smiled and sipped at his drink. "Hm. Better."

Katherine suddenly slapped a hand on the table and stood up so quickly that if the stool hadn't been attached to the floor it would have toppled over. "What if he's going to take Amber away from us!" she spouted in horror.

The group froze for a moment then relaxed.

"That can't happen, she's too valued here," Crane said.

"Exactly!"

"Make sense, little creature," the Joker prodded.

"He could try to get Nurse Amber transferred to his division."

That gained a pause from everyone. A few glanced at each other uncertainly.

"Think about it. We've been singing Nurse Amber's praises in order to keep her as our nurse and, let's face it, guys, we behave better with her around. Since Amber became our unofficial supervisor, Chelsea's actually being considered for release and Amber's lasted longer than most other nurses and orderlies and she's only been here for a year and a half! What if we just made her look desirable to other asylums that could offer her better benefits?"

There was a couple of seconds of silence, then Harley summed up in one word what they all were thinking.

"Oops."

"This is a catastrophe!" Jervis cried, grabbing the top of his head and clutching fist fulls of blond hair.

"Nobody panic!" Dent ordered, though his voice had slipped an octave higher.

"Who's-panicking-why-would-you-tell-us-not-to-panic-because-nobody's-panicking-we're-not-panicking-NOBODY'S-PANICkING!" Katlyn 1 shrilled.

The Joker grabbed Katlyn 1 by the shoulders and shook her. "Keep it together, Munchkin!"

"Release my Munchkin friend, Clown!"

"Caleb doesn't want Nurse Amber to leave! Caleb like Nurse Amber!"

Crane calmly stood from his seat, put his fingers to his lips and let out a high pitched whistle that got the groups' attention.

"We're wasting valuable time panicking. What we need to do is gather what intelligence we have and formulate a plan."

"Another one of yours, Crane?" the Joker asked, lifting an eyebrow.

"But of course," Crane said with a smug smile.

"If I have to wait any longer, I'm going to slip back into insanity," Chelsea grumbled.

Amber chuckled.

"I'm serious."

The chuckles became muffled but still continued.

"Why are you laughing? My newly found sanity is slipping and you're laughing at me."

The chuckling became a giggle fit.

"Stop it!"

"I'm sorry, Chels! It's just," Amber smothered more giggles, "It's just that you look like an angry chipmunk when you make that face."

"I do not!" Chelsea wailed. She did her best to glare fiercely at Amber but the young nurse only shook with laughter. Chelsea huffed and slouched in her cushioned chair. "Am I at least a cute chipmunk?"

"You're freakin' adorable."

"That's friggin' right I am! If I'm going to look like a chipmunk then by the powers that be, I will be the most adorable chipmunk that ever munked! And I happen to be a very angry chipmunk at the moment, because the longer those people take to decide my fate, the nuttier I'm gonna get!"

Having finished her speech, Chelsea slouched even further into her chair, folded her arms over her chest and pouted.

"I feel like I should be applauding right now," Amber said.

Chelsea continued to sulk.

"Really moving speech... Very motivating...Blows away any presidential speech...Right up there with 'We the People.'"

"I'm a very emotional chipmunk."

"Well of course you are. Chipmunks are so tiny, how are they expected to contain all those big emotions?"

The clock ticked five seconds.

Chelsea and Amber looked at each other from their opposite chairs and smiled. "Thanks, Nurse Amber."

"No problem."

After lunch, the gang was reluctantly led back to their individual cells where they were to await their turn to be interviewed. Each would be taken, one at a time, to a consulting room where Dr. Fitz was waiting with a voice recorder and two armed guards at the ready. The first of the patients to be interviewed was Tommy Tetch.

Tommy, considered a low threat by Arkham's doctors, was allowed to be unrestrained while his interview took place. He sat in an uncomfortable chair opposite of Dr. Fitz with a small, rectangular, bolted table in between them.

Tommy shifted in his seat, trying to get comfortable and failing. Fitz waited quietly until Tommy's fidgeting ceased, then turned of the recorder. He slowly gave the patient a close-lipped smile. It kinda creeped Tommy out, and he was one of the Joker's (the master of creepy smiles)henchmen!

"Comfy?" Fitz asked with feigned concern.

"Uh, no. Not really."

"Good." Another smile.

Tommy gulped.

"Now, Tommy Tetch. Is Tommy short for Thomas?"

"N, no. It's just Tommy. Even says so on my birth certificate."

"Hm. How... informal."

Fitz jotted down something in that illegible scrawl that doctors all seem to acquire, so Tommy couldn't make it out. The doctor set aside his pen, fixed those blue eyes on Tommy and clasped his hands together on top of his notepad.

"So, Tommy. How do you like it here in Arkham?"

Tommy gave him a perfectly executed lift of his eyebrow that couldn't be mistaken as anything but, "B-, please."

The smile fell from Fitz's handsome face and the two men stared each other down.

"All right then. We'll cut to the chase."

"Sounds good to me," Tommy squeaked.

"Tell me how you feel about Nurse Amber Johnson."

"Um... can I go to the bathroom?"

Fitz blinked. "Excuse me?"

"Oh, sorry. May I go to the bathroom? I drank alo-o-ot of water at lunch and well..." Tommy gave a sheepish grin.

"Um, of course. Go on ahead. Guard, please escort him to the lavatory."

"It could take a while, Dr. Fitz," Tommy called while he was being led out. "I don't think lunch agreed with me today."

Fitz sighed and rubbed at the bridge of his nose. "Fabulous," he mummered.

"So, the donut says to the barista, 'what, you don't take my dough?'"

Chelsea groaned at Amber's punchline. "That was horrible."

"Yeah, I know. Your turn."

"Ugh, who's idea was it to play One Hundred and One Things?"

"Yours, oh Lady Chipmunk."

"Oh. Okay, hit me."

"Your word is 'apples'."

"Apples. Okay, um … One hundred and one apples walk into a coffee shop. One of the apples goes up to the barista to order a cup of coffee. The barista says, 'I'm sorry, we don't serve your kind here.' The apple says to the barista, 'Well, that's not very appealing.'"

Amber shook her head. "Eh."

"Oh, you think you can do better?"

"One hundred and one apples walk into a coffee shop. One of the apples goes up to the barista to order a cup of coffee. The barista says, 'I'm sorry, we don't serve your kind here.' The apple says to the barista, 'Well, you just cut me to the core!'"

Chelsea slow clapped with great sarcasm. "That was, I admit, better than the last one."

"Care for another round?"

"No!"

"Thank God."

Dr. Fitz watched Katherine. Katherine watched Dr. Fitz. The interview was at a standstill.

"You're siblings with Caleb, correct?" Fitz asked.

Katherine stroked her chin thoughtfully. "I'm not sure about this question. Are you asking or stating?"

"I...It's a question."

"Hmm. Yes. I think that's the correct answer. Is there an option A, B, or C?"

Dr. Fitz's brow wrinkled with confusion. "Um..."

"Or is it a True or False question? I hated those kinds of questions. The teachers always worded them funny and you couldn't even understand what they were asking was true or false."

"Yes, well, moving on-."

"And so you end up staring at the stupid question for a good five minutes, trying to decipher this supposedly easy question-."

"Can we move on, please, Miss Katherine."

Katherine blinked. He really did have a nice accent. Nice cheek bones too. She wondered how fragile those cheek bones were.

"How do you like Nurse Amber Johnson?"

Katherine once again displayed a ponderous expression, relishing the sight of the frustrated compression of Fitz's lips.

"Hm... Hmmm... Now that is a very good question. You know, I think that's going to take a while for me to come up with an answer for you. I mean- wow, just wow- that is such a deep question. I'll have to write some notes on the subject. Pros and cons. I think I may have some pink paint left over and plenty of wall space."

"It's a simple question!" Fitz snapped. "Do you like Nurse Johnson or not?"

"Is it? Is it a simple question?"

"Yes!"

"No, Dr. Fitz, it is not!"

Katherine stood from her chair, looked down her nose at him with narrowed aquamarine eyes, and said with all the authority of a psychiatrist, "Thank you, that will be all for today, Dr. Fitz." She turned and walked out with one of the guards.

Fitz blinked a few times, removed his reading glasses to rub at his eye lids, then put them back on to look at the remaining guard with utter bewilderment. "What the bloody bugger just happened?"

"Don't ask me, doc, I just work here."

Amber and Chelsea's voices reverberated off the walls as they sang unabashedly.

"They call me 'Bell'
They call me 'Stacey'
They call me 'her'
They call me 'Jane'
That's not my name
That's not my name
That's not my name
That's not my name
They call me 'quiet girl'
But I'm a riot
Mary, Jo, Lisa
Always the same
That's not my name
That's not my name
That's not my name
That's not my name!"

"What ever happened to that band?" Chelsea wondered aloud.

"I don't know. I guess they were a one hit wonder."

"Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaats!"

"Get him out of here! Who gave him that picture of a bat in the first place!"

"Baaaaaaaaaaaaaats!"

"And we'll never be royals-."

"Royaaals," Chelsea echoed.

"It don't run in our blood,
That kind of love just ain't for us.
We crave a different kind of buzz
Let me be you're ruler-."

"Ruuuleeer."

"You can call me queen bee
And, baby, I'll rule-."

"I'll rule."

"I'll rule."

"I'll rule

"Let me live that fantasy," Amber finished with a chuckle.

"Are you quite serious, Mr. Dent?" Fitz asked, bordering on disbelief and wariness.

"Very."

"You actually have to flip your coin to decide whether or not you're going to tell me how you feel about Nurse Johnson?"

"Yep."

"... Well...proceed then, I guess."

Dent flipped his coin, peered at the outcome then put it down on the table.

"Well?" Fitz asked.

Dent hardened his stare at the doctor and folded his arms in silence.

"Oh come on!"

"The coin has spoken."

"Bloody brilliant! This is bloody-! Bugger!"

And so it went with the other interviews. No one ever gave Dr. Fitz a straight answer. It was down to the last patient and this one required restraints.

The Joker cooperated with the guard as the leather straps were cinched around his wrists to the chair arms. The Joker smirked when he caught Dr. Fitz nervously fingering his collar and a bead of sweat trickle down the side of his face.

"So, u-u-um." Fitz cleared his throat. "What are your thoughts concerning Nurse Amber Johnson."

The Joker cracked a smile. Okay, Crane. Here we go.

"Oh she's a peach."

Fitz gave a start. "Wha- you answered me-? Um, o-okay. Could you be more clear on that?"

"Just what I said, doc. Amber is an absolute peach. Delicious, really. She's the cutest thing when she tries to act all mad and order me around."

Dr. Fitz checked that his recorder was still on and jotted furiously on his notepad. "Yes, yes- and?"

"And what?"

"Well, do you feel well treated under her care?"

"Oh yeah, sure."

"Does she treat the other patients well?"

"Doc, Amber-."

"Nurse Amber," Fitz corrected.

"Amber," the Joker emphasized with a malicious smile. Dr. Fitz didn't reprimand him for it. "Amber does all she can for us. God knows why."

Dr. Fitz was eating it all up. His pen flew along the paper as if he couldn't write past enough. Time to deliver the punchline.

"Which is why we're all prepared to kill whoever takes her away from us."

Fitz's pen nib tore through the paper and he looked up sharply. "What?"

"See, here's the thing, Fitzy. Amber is our nurse and we tend to get a little protective over things that belong to us."

Dr. Fitz slowly began to write again, but with less excitement now. "You think Nurse Johnson belongs to you and the others?"

The Joker chuckled. "Well, she belongs to me more than she does to any of the others."

"And why is that?"

The Joker smiled. "It's just meant to be," he intoned with an amused sigh.

"I – uh..."

"Look, doc, all I'm saying is, if you mess with our girl, you'll have to answer to all of us. But if you take my nurse away, you'll have me to answer to. Got it, Brittney?"

Dr. Fitz could only gape at the Joker while the clown gave him a big, toothy grin.

"Well, I'm glad we had this little chat, huh, doc? We'll have to do it again sometime. Let's do lunch!"

"Guards, this interview is over. Please escort the Joker back to his cell."

"Bye-bye, Fitzy!"

The door opened to find Amber and Chelsea lying on the floor, staring up at the ceiling. Amber pointed up at ceiling popcorn. "I swear that cluster there looks like a penguin."

"Those are clearly bunny ears, Nurse Amber," Chelsea argued with a laugh, pointing and tracing a shape.

"Eh-hem," a voice sounded.

Amber and Chelsea craned their necks to look at the door. Dr. Arkham and Dr. Joan Leland stood in the open doorway. Chelsea quickly rolled to her feet and Amber followed. Amber tried to detect any hints from the doctors' facial features. What she saw made her gasp. Joan nodded at her.

"What did they say?" Chelsea asked warily.

Dr. Arkham was the one to deliver the news.

"You'll be released from Arkham within two weeks. You'll go through a course that will teach you how to get yourself back into society again and we'll have someone to help you find a place to live and find a job."

Chelsea crumbled to her knees and wept with joy.

"Oh, Chelsea, don't cry," Amber said. "You'll get me crying too."

"I can't help it," Chelsea said, wiping her eyes. "I'm a happy chipmunk!"

(Well, that was a long chapter! I hope this wasn't a disappointment after such a long wait. Don't worry, I have no intention of dropping this fan fic any time soon. I still have a lot of ideas for this story. I will update when I can, but it may be awhile. Thanks for sticking with this for so long! Let me hear from you guys!)