AN: Thanks for the reviews!
Damn the Joker and his cell phone.
There was nothing in this world that would make him happier than to never look at that clown again, leave him to waste in the cell. It would hardly be cruelty on his part; being in the cave was what the Joker had wanted in the first place. He'd still have to go in to feed him, he supposed, but a person could last forty days without food before dying, and three without water. Three Joker-free days, longer if the clown realized he could drink out of the toilet tank.
I have a code. It felt like—and very well could be—the thousandth time that day he'd thought that. It had become something akin to a Hail Mary for him, the only thing that kept him from losing it completely and slamming the Joker's head into the wall again. Hard enough to break the skull, this time. The code covered more than just killing, though that was the main tenet. It also didn't sit right with his beliefs to starve or dehydrate a man, even someone like the Joker, no matter how stress-relieving it would be. Still, the thought of three days without having to look at or speak to that bastard was a blissful idea.
Unfortunately, the issue of the twice-daily phone call prevented that. He couldn't leave the cell phone alone with the Joker, both because it would die—he was not about to let the Joker lay hands on any sort of machinery, even something as simple as a phone charger—and because without microphones in the cell, there would be no way to monitor whom the Joker was calling, and what he was saying. Batman gritted his teeth, wondered why he hadn't had microphones installed. Surely having to listen to the clown all day couldn't be worse than being in the room with him.
He remembered, suddenly, the Joker masturbating in front of the cameras yesterday. Then again, maybe microphones weren't the best idea.
He wondered why the Joker had chosen to make the calls twice a day. There was no real way of knowing that without knowing what the Joker's plan was, why he'd been heading to the Palisades in the first place. If he had been going to the Palisades; knowing the Joker, that could easily be a lie. But the clown had an infuriating habit of mixing his lies with just enough of the truth that it was dangerous to disregard them.
Whatever his reasoning behind the number of calls, he must be absolutely giddy at being visited by the Batman twice a day. For Bruce, it was beyond irritating, heading back in the middle of his patrols—which, as of late, consisted mostly of searching for clues around the payphones the Joker's men used—to deliver the phone. He'd been staying at home without issue so far, but eventually he'd be needed at Wayne Enterprises, and then he'd have to head back in the middle of the day to give the Joker the phone at noon. As if his life weren't hectic enough, he'd have to battle Gotham's midday traffic as well.
That or put Alfred in the Batsuit and have him bring the phone down, but Bruce doubted that would be convincing.
The phones the Joker had called so far were, as far as Batman could ascertain, completely random. Their locations were scattered throughout Gotham in no recognizable order. He'd originally thought that they'd been chosen based on lack of surveillance, but two of the calls had been made in areas easily viewed on security cameras for nearby buildings. The footage, as he hadn't been surprised to find, was completely unhelpful.
The Joker's men—surely acting on his orders—were intelligent enough to keep their faces obscured by hats, and enter and exit from an area that took them off camera before they could reveal too much about where they were headed or coming from. He couldn't be sure, from the poor quality of the surveillance footage, but it seemed they were wearing gloves, and even if they weren't, the phones were covered in various fingerprints, and the prints were all smeared and broken beyond use. None of the areas had offered any telltale footprints or other clues.
His only comfort was in the knowledge that at some point, the Joker would run out of numbers. And when that happened, he'd have to start repeating, at which point his men would be easy to find, as would the bombs. That day could not come soon enough.
He could hear the Joker's voice as he punched in the access code. Not loudly, just a faint murmur that indicated the clown was speaking in a normal tone of voice. So he'd started talking to himself again. Lovely. Bracing himself for this latest idiocy, he pushed open the door.
"Obviously." The Joker was reclining on his mattress, leaning back on his hands for support as he stared up at the ceiling light. He was licking at his lips, still somehow covered in paint, despite the constant rubbing from his tongue. Batman wondered how long it took to wash off, if the Joker walked around with faint red and black stains on his skin even when the makeup was gone.
It was bizarre to think that it came off at all. He'd seen him without it briefly, while patrolling Arkham, but he'd never stopped for a good look. The makeup seemed as much a part of him as the violence or the madness, and the Joker had responded to the threat of losing the paint as violently as if someone had threatened to tear off his skin.
"Of course it would be harder," the Joker went on. "That's the point, my, uh, not-so-illuminated friend. Think about it. If it takes more effort, people aren't going to eat as much. I dunno if you've noticed, but this country's got a bit of an obesity issue."
He paused, tilted his head to the side as if considering another's words. It occurred to Batman that the Joker had yet to acknowledge him, which, for the clown, was unheard of. He never passed up a moment to get the Batman's attention. Perhaps this was some new scheme. That, or he'd been greatly angered over the loss of the apple.
Well, good. He'd certainly been unnerved by that encounter and he saw no reason why the Joker should get off with no ill effects.
"That's not what I'm saying." The last word came out sing-song, with a smack of the lips, in contrast to his previously serious tone. "They wouldn't starve anyway. I just so happen to think that if people slowed down and thought about what they were doing, it wouldn't be such an issue. 'Sides, so what if they starve? Isn't the Earth, uh, overpopulated?"
He had no idea what the clown was rambling about, and he was perfectly fine not knowing. "Joker."
"Uses as what?" His attention was still focused on the light, without so much as a glance in Batman's direction. "Ya really wanna argue that point against me? You're not as bright as you look, my friend."
"Joker."
"Yeah, it'd hurt. But the little tines are fragile. They break off faster and ya can't do as much, I know from experience. Whereas as spoon's much tougher and it's dull, so you could—"
"Joker."
He looked away from the ceiling for the first time, blinking for a moment. "Bats!" He lifted his arms, nearly losing his balance for a moment, and spread them out as if expected a hug that certainly wasn't coming. His eyes flicked from Batman's cowl to the tray in his hands. "With lunch, I see. And…" He sighed, sudden change in posture and expression suggesting unbearable sadness. "Ya didn't bring back my apple."
"It's gone." Sitting half-eaten on Crane's floor, from what he'd seen before heading into the cave, but he wasn't about to say that. The last thing he needed was the Joker breaking out to kill the Scarecrow for stealing his spotlight or something equally ridiculous. Looking back, giving Crane the apple probably hadn't been the wisest of ideas. The man had looked bewildered and more than a little terrified when he'd handed it over. He wasn't sure he wanted to know what Crane's overly-medicated mind had made of it.
"Jerk." The Joker remained dejected for five seconds or so, before brightening again. "Hey, Batsy, you can help settle this. Which is better, a fork or a spoon?"
Batman stared at him. And to think he'd been disturbed by the idea of Crane's thoughts.
"Oh, c'mon, Bats. You've gotta have some opinion. Judging from your hospitality, you don't use, uh, either—" He glanced at the tray, lacking utensils as always. "But you've gotta have a preference. See, Glowy here," he went on, with a tilt of his head towards the light, "is arguing that spoons aren't necessary 'cause anything too thin to pick up with a fork can be drunk, and forks make it easy to pick up little stuff. I, however, think the difficulty with spoons a good thing, 'cause eating slower burns more calories with effort and helps people to, uh, realize that they've had enough. And now he's trying to say that a fork makes a better weapon, as if he's got any experience in the matter—"
He put the tray down, held out the phone. "Call."
The Joker scowled. "Have ya got a chronic inability to communication, or a chronic inability to have fun? 'Cause I honestly can't tell."
"Call."
The Joker stared at the phone as if he'd never seen one before, while Batman fell what remained of his patience begin to crack. "You took my apple."
"You only said I had to bite it. I thought you said you were a man of your word."
"Aren't you the one who said that my word only means what I want it to mean?"
That had been Edward Nigma, actually, but that was one issue on which the Batman shared his opinion. "Either call or I'll take you back to Arkham."
"Excuse me for trying to start a conversation, Bats." He took the phone and flipped it open. The fingers of his other hand hovered over the buttons, though he didn't dial yet. "You don't treat Crane like that, do ya?" The Joker nodded towards the cell door, bloody, matted hair falling in his face. "'Cause that'll give him a heart attack after a while. That, or really piss Scarecrow off."
He wondered why the Joker was referring to Crane as if his criminal identity was another person, then recalled that the clown was psychotic. His actions needed no explanation, and besides, the chances of him giving a straight answer were so miniscule, they might as well not exist. "Call."
"I've got a theory about your, uh, vocabulary," the Joker said, beginning to dial. "You know those video games and such where you can only learn say, four moves at a time? I think the language part of your brain's like that, and that's why you repeat yourself so often."
"You—"
"Quiet, Mommy's on the phone." He held it up to his ear, listening. Batman took the opportunity to glance around the room. He'd searched for lock picks earlier in the morning, when the Joker had still be asleep, and found nothing. The mattress and sheets hadn't been concealing anything, and nor had the toilet. He'd seen enough of the Joker when the clown had changed out of the dress to know he wasn't burrowing anything into his skin, and he doubted the man could conceal one in his rectum. Lock picks may be thin, but they were long. Then again, he could be using makeshift ones using smaller materials.
He imagined just how uncomfortable conducting such a search would be and began to wish he'd let the Joker detonate the bombs.
Perhaps he wasn't using any sort of pick at all. It was possible to slide out of cuffs without breaking or dislocating anything, difficult though it was. Still, if that was the case it would almost certainly leave scrapes or bruises as evidence, and the Joker didn't seem too badly torn up around the wrists or ankles. No worse than the rest of his body, anyway, which was scarred or black and blue almost all over. He supposed that was a sign of abuse at Arkham and wished he could bring himself to care. Maybe if it had been someone else. But not the Joker. It was wrong, he knew, it was making things personal, but he couldn't care less what happened to the clown.
"Does it depress you?" the Joker asked, closing the phone with a loud clack that broke him out of his contemplation.
"What?" Startled, he answered without thinking about it, thankfully remembering to disguise his voice.
"The fact that you've got no idea where the bombs are. That you can't find any pattern in the phones I've chosen." He smirked, holding up a hand to silence Batman before he could so much as open his mouth.
"There isn't one, you know. You've got nothing, nothing at all."
He knew he shouldn't respond, but knowing meant little when the bastard was right there pushing him on. "I don't need a pattern. I only need you to run out of phones."
The Joker shook his head, clucked his tongue. "Do ya know how many payphones there are in Gotham City, Batsy?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Five thousand, seven hundred and twenty-one. Twice a day? That's two thousand, eight hundred and sixty, and a half. So what, seven years?"
"You haven't memorized five thousand phone numbers."
"Five thousand, seven hundred and twenty-one," he corrected, with a wag of his finger. "And I don't need to. Seven hundred and thirty would give me a whole year of your lovely company. Maybe you'd learn how to talk in that time."
"You haven't memorized seven hundred phone numbers." It was ridiculous. The mind was capable of retaining far larger amounts of information than that, he knew, but surely not phone numbers. Those were just random numbers with no meaning attached. Why would the mind hold on to them?
"See, that's what I mean about saying the same thing over and over. And I could if I wanted. Just 'cause I'm impulsive, it doesn't mean I'm stupid." He crossed his arms. "Why can't ya believe that?"
"That's not possible unless you're a prodigy or a savant."
The Joker glared, straightening up as he uncrossed his arms. He cleared his throat and began to speak. "'But sirs, sirs, I see that it's wrong. It's wrong because it's against like society, it's wrong because every vech on earth has the right to live and be happy without being beaten and tolchocked and knifed. I've learned a lot, oh really I ha—'"
"What are you doing?" In addition to making no sense at all, the Joker seemed to have developed a Russian accent out of nowhere.
"A Clockwork Orange. Anthony Burgess. Chapter six, the fifth page, I think." The accent was gone.
He stared at him, vaguely remembering a movie by that title. "What's your point?"
"That I can so memorize things. Like entire books. Want me to begin at the beginning? 'Cause I totally could, if ya wanted. I can even translate the Nadsat."
He felt more than a little unnerved at that. A madman was bad enough, an intelligent one worse, but one with the ability to commit entire novels to memory? That suggest a brilliance he didn't want to comprehend. Assuming, of course, that the Joker wasn't lying. It was fully possible he only knew a bit of the book, or was making it up completely. Either way, he wasn't about to show his unease. "A novel is different from a string of numbers. It has substance behind it, meaning."
"I can do the first two hundred digits of pi, if you want."
"You canno—"
"Three point one four one five nine two six five three five eight nine seven nine three two three eight four six two six four three three eight three two seven nine five zero two eight eight four one nine seven one six nine—"
He was still reciting when Batman left the cell.
AN: Anthony Burgess's novel A Clockwork Orange is set in a dystopian future made with Russian, English, and American influences. It's about criminal nature and free will. Nadsat is the slang spoken by the main character, and nearly every word that comes out of his mouth is in Nadsat. It's somewhat confusing at first, but I think it becomes easy to understand pretty fast.
The digits Joker gives for pi are correct, according to the Internet. The number of Gotham City payphones comes from a site's estimate on the phones in Chicago.