AN: Thanks for the reviews!
Bruce Wayne had always been a light sleeper. At least, since the age of ten. In childhood it had been involuntary and distressing, waking from each and every nightmare his brain concocted instead of being able to brush it aside and remain asleep. He'd thought the nightmares about the bats were bad, when they first began, but that was nothing compared to the dreams he'd had in the months following his parents' murders. Even now, those were painful and frightening to recall.
Once he'd left Gotham, his ability to waken easily had become an attribute. On the streets and in prison—as well as with the Leagues of Shadows—there was a very high probability of waking in a less than ideal situation. If he was lucky, less than ideal amounted to waking up to find rats crawling over his body, the hungry ones biting. In more unfortunate circumstances, it meant awakening to find himself surrounded by possibly dangerous, always armed men.
But fortunate or not, it was better than not waking up at all.
He'd remained a light sleeper upon returning to Gotham, despite the fact that his home had only been threatened twice—well, three times now—and never while he was asleep. It wasn't an ability he could control, he supposed, and he didn't want to. It was still useful. It had lessened somewhat—staying up fighting through most of the night, and sometimes days on end before crashing tended to keep him out for a while—but slight noises could still jolt him into consciousness, and often did.
Which made it all the more odd that an intruder walking through his bedroom didn't wake him until said intruder turned on the light to his closet.
He woke up the instant the light came on, despite the fact that the closet door was almost entirely shut, and the beam of light coming through the gap could only be a few inches wide. It took his mind a moment to catch up with the rest of his body, but the second the moment was up he was out of the bed, a Batarang in either hand. Despite Alfred's lectures about his safety, he didn't consider sleeping with a weapon or two under the mattress to be paranoid, just cautious. Certainly it would pay off here.
Careful not to make a sound, he crossed the carpet to the closet door, listening. Someone was moving around inside, slowly. There was a rustling that he assumed was the sound of clothing being pushed around. He ran over the possibilities in his head as he approached. Definitely not Alfred; at far as he knew the man made a habit of getting normal amounts of sleep, and he was certain the butler would have mentioned it if he'd started putting Bruce's laundry away in the middle of the night. Alfred had too much common sense for that.
It could have been an intruder unrelated to either of the criminals in his house, just a thief trying to get as much of the Wayne fortune as he could. But Bruce doubted that so much he barely considered it. Logic dictated that the simplest explanation for an occurrence was the best, and it was far easier to believe that one of the villains had escaped than it was to think this was a completely separate occurrence. Besides, he couldn't see why a thief would decide anything in his closet was of great value. He wore expensive clothing, yes, but most of things throughout the mansion were even more expensive. Unless he had a crazed stalker breaking in for a souvenir, which was extremely unlikely, it was one of the villains.
Fantastic.
He couldn't conceive of any reason for Crane to come up here. Certainly none of the clothes in his closet would fit the doctor any better than the ones he'd given him, and he doubted that would be the man's priority in an escape attempt anyway. Though knowing Crane, it wasn't that much of a stretch; the man seemed to become distraught over minor things, like his sheets being dirty or his DVDs getting out of alphabetical order. He doubted Crane would leave the Joker alone for any period of time, however.
The Joker was the more likely of the two, despite how out of it he'd seemed when last Bruce saw him, a bit after midnight when he'd gone in to bar the windows. He hadn't seen much of the man, due to Crane's continued efforts to block Bruce from the clown's line of sight, but from what he had seen, the Joker looked as broken and lifeless as before, lying on his back and staring the general direction of the ceiling, barely blinking. But that didn't mean he couldn't have been faking. Or have recovered since. And he didn't need a reason to sneak into Bruce's closet, beyond 'I was bored and it was there.'
Alternately, it might be neither of them, but one of the Joker's henchmen instead. Both numbers, from the call at noon and the call at midnight, went to a payphone, but he had no way of knowing exactly what Crane—or perhaps the Joker—could have said. If he lived through this, Bruce would have to bug that cell phone. The entire mansion could be under invasion, and this was just the first intruder he'd heard.
But he couldn't see why a henchman would be in his closet either.
He moved in a way that put him to the side of the door, in case of gunfire, and kicked it open, readying a Batarang to throw if needed.
Jonathan Crane backed into the far wall of the closet, eyes twice as big as their usual wideness and his expression one of pure terror. For a moment, anyway. Then he composed himself, features settling back into a calmer but still shaken form. "I think your closet is bigger than my entire apartment was."
Bruce wondered if the doctor's body hadn't adjusted to his medication in an odd way that swapped 'inability to stop talking' with 'speaking only in non sequiturs.' Certainly he'd been saying more of them as of late. "How did you get in here?"
"Through the door."
"You know what I mean."
He shrugged. "Spend enough time at Arkham and you learn how to open any kind of lock." Bruce noticed that he was back in his own clothes, which meant he must have visited the laundry room, along with God knows where else in the house. He could have made his way into the kitchen or the weapons room. Bruce kept his distance. He didn't see any weapons, but that didn't mean anything.
What Jonathan Crane was holding that was visible was one of Bruce's dress shirts, light blue in color, and obviously far too large for the man. It was draped over his arm, and over that lay one of Bruce's vests, an ugly color that he'd never worn as he could never figure out whether it was green or gray. "What are you—"
"I don't suppose you have any purple pants, do you?" Crane asked, with a glance around the closet. "Or indigo, or anything? You don't seem the type to dress that way. I mean, of all the stupid things Bruce Wayne does that the papers and news cover when there isn't anything of substance to report, you're always dressed well. You might ruin your clothes by going swimming in them or something idiotic, but you've never actually worn something as stupid as a purple suit that I've seen. I don't know what's wrong with the area of his mind that should cover fashion sense, but apparently it's rather a lot."
It would seem he hadn't adjusted to the medication after all. Bruce waited until it became clear that the doctor wasn't going to go on the second he opened his mouth to speak before saying anything. "Why do you need purple pants?"
"For the Joker, obviously. I'm certainly not going to wear them." His hand disappeared between a rack of dress pants, reemerged with a pair of navy pinstripes. "Close enough. You have his coat, don't you?"
"Yes. What are you doing?"
"Trying to bring him out of a dissociative state by giving him familiar things, what does it look like? You're not a very good detective, you know."
Bruce held back the urge to respond with a comment about all the times he'd successfully tracked down Crane. The doctor seemed, for reasons that made sense only to himself, content to raid Bruce's closet when he could have been escaping, and Bruce didn't want to anger him and risk reminding him of how easy it would be to get out of the mansion should the mood strike him. "This couldn't have waited until morning?"
"Technically, it is morning. And no, not unless you wanted both of your captives to be absolutely miserable. The bed sheets need to be washed, by the way."
"What?"
"The sheets. I found your linen closet, so I've got new ones down there already, but I couldn't wash the sheets, or the clothes he was wearing. The detergent appears to be missing. And if you were hiding it in case you thought I'd break out, let me assure you that I've never tried to make toxin out of laundry chemicals, and I doubt that I could, now that I think about it. So I just left the dirty things on the floor."
He wondered if Alfred had hidden the bleach and such. Probably. The butler always seemed one step ahead of him in safeguarding the house, among other things. "Where's the Joker?"
"Sitting on the bed. I left him there. Seeing as I locked the door and I doubt he's recovered in the meantime, I think it's safe to assume that he hasn't gone." Crane glanced down at the items of clothing in his arms. "Where do you keep your socks?"
Oh, it was too early for this. "You can't just come in here in the middle of the night and—"
"It's hardly my fault if your security is subpar, Batman." He brushed past him, a slight shudder betraying his fear, found Bruce's dresser, and began searching through the drawers. "If you want to lecture me about it, I'd rather you do so later in the day. Getting someone who won't move of his own volition to stand up in a shower isn't exactly a restful task."
He found the socks, settled on a pair that mixed black, green, and yellow in color. They were argyle, in contrast to the Joker's usual checkered pattern, but it was the closest Bruce had, to his knowledge. "Why didn't you just give him a bath?"
Crane scowled, looking at him for the first time since he'd begun searching for pants. "Because. Are you giving me the coat, or not? Surely you've already removed all the weapons?"
"Will you go back to the room after that?" He didn't know why he was giving into this. He blamed stress and sleep deprivation. Of course Crane would be going back, because Bruce would be escorting him. But if giving him the coat would make him go back faster, and without struggle, then there was no logic in withholding it.
"Yes."
The Joker was in the same position Jonathan had left him in, and once the Batman had left—locking the door behind him and, from the sounds outside, barricading it—Jonathan helped him out of his robe and into what he'd amassed from the Batman's closet. It was a slow-going and laborious process. He'd never understand what made little girls crave life-size dolls so badly. Then again, those dolls didn't have all the dead weight of a real human being.
The effect wasn't nearly as good as the Joker's actual suit, which, ridiculous though it may be, was still nice in its design. The clothes he had on now clearly weren't made to go with each other, though they didn't clash too horribly, and it didn't work as well without a tie, which the Batman had considered too dangerous for them to have. Jonathan had expected that, and tried smuggling one in, but the Bat had found it when he searched him. The pants were too long and too wide—a belt hadn't been allowed for the same reason—as was the shirt and vest. He saved the coat for last, running the Joker's hands over it and holding it up for him to see before sliding it on him.
It might as well have been one of the Batman's coats, based on his reaction. That lack of a response was the most frightening thing Jonathan had seen since becoming the Batman's captive. Fighting to hide his fear, he turned his attention to the little jars of makeup sitting beside the Joker on the sheets.
He'd searched the coat thoroughly before putting it on his friend. The Batman, had, to his dismay, found each and every hiding place and removed the weapons from them, but thankfully he'd left the makeup behind. Jonathan wasn't sure what difference it would make, if the coat had failed to bring him back, but he had to try.
He unscrewed the lid from the jar of white, held it up so the Joker could see it. There was no reaction, no spark of life as Jonathan had been hoping for. Holding in a sigh and forcing his face to remain impassive, he dipped his fingers in the paint, then spread it smoothly across the Joker's forehead.
No. That wasn't right. He doesn't make it even that way. He brought his fingers back over, gently smearing what he'd done to make it thicker in some places, and absent in others. If he was going to recreate a safe environment for the man, it had to be accurate. He almost expected, as he went on applying the white, for the Joker's hands to close around his wrists, shove him away so the clown could do it properly himself.
By the time he'd started on the black, however, he'd lost hope of that happening. He closed the Joker's eyes, softly, painted, opened them again. Nothing. Nor was there an effect when he began with the lipstick, taking no care to keep it in the lines of the Joker's lips. He could have slapped himself for letting his hopes get so high. He put the lid back on the tube, waited. Nothing, of course.
"Do you want to see?" he asked, stroking the Joker's hair. "Come on, do you think you can make it to the mirror?" He put the Joker's arm over his shoulders, holding it there with one hand as he wrapped his free arm around the Joker, standing. Getting him to the bathroom took as much effort as it had taken to get him changed.
They stood before the mirror, or rather, Jonathan stood and held the Joker up. The clown stared in the direction of his reflection, and Jonathan could tell that he wasn't seeing himself. He couldn't even feel disappointed this time. It wasn't right. The coat and the makeup, yes, but everything else was off, from the blond hair to the lack of a tie to the color of the pants. It wasn't the Joker's world he'd recreated, not really. Just an imitation that couldn't hold a candle to the real thing.
He turned the Joker away from the mirror, hugging him tightly. "I'm sorry it isn't right," he whispered, speaking not just about the suit but the entire situation. He stroked his friend's face, heedless of the paint there. "I'm sorry." If I were you, I wouldn't want to come back to this either.
The city was unusually quiet that night. It would figure that just when Bruce most needed a distraction from the chaos his home had become, there would be no crimes to stop. It wasn't the first time in his life when he'd questioned if the universe was out to get him, not by a long shot, and he doubted it would be the last.
He'd tapped the cell phone that morning, when he'd brought the pair breakfast. Crane hadn't interfered or even noticed, being too busy shielding the Joker from him. It was beyond unsettling, seeing his own clothing used to try and recreate the monster. He couldn't help but be happy that it hadn't worked.
The noon call had revealed no sinister plots or escape schemes. If the Joker or Crane had made some plan with the henchmen, it had been made before that call. It should have been reassuring, to know that his captives were held securely, and the city safe, but it wasn't.
How long could he keep them there? Not indefinitely, the Joker would have to run out of numbers at some point. The fact that he'd begun barricading the door wouldn't be worth much after a while, either. Crane was too conniving for such things to stop him for too long, as was the Joker, if he recovered. Or if he already had. Every minute they stayed in the mansion was another minute that they could escape, attack Alfred, reveal his secret.
Even if they did stay put, he didn't want them there. Having them around was miserable enough without the Joker's current condition serving as a constant reminder of yet another one of his failures. They were dangerous criminals, not house pets, and he wanted them gone. If only he had a way of ensuring the city wouldn't blow up and his secret wouldn't be exposed.
But he had no such way, and on top of that, with no criminals to apprehend, he had no outlet to relieve the tension. The night had been completely unproductive and he found himself so overwhelmed by all the stress as of late that he couldn't even be angry as he headed back for the mansion.
He found himself still in the Batsuit at a minute past midnight, as he removed the bookshelf that was barricading the door to the villains' room. He was too apathetic to change, wanting nothing more than to get in, assert that the call had been made, and get out, fall asleep, and for a few glorious hours, forget all about the situation.
He knocked, unlocked the door, and entered. Crane's eyes widened at the sight of the suit, though he didn't remark.
"Did you call?" He realized he'd spoken in the Bat-voice without thinking about it. Habit, he supposed, that went along with the suit.
"Yes, I—" He cut off, eyes widening again and no longer focused on Batman. Crane inhaled, sharply, and Bruce had just enough time to register that he was staring at the Joker, that the Joker had turned his head and was looking at Batman, before there was a sudden blur of purple and an impact against him, knocking him backwards. He collided with the wall, bounced back, and felt arms wind tightly around him as he collapsed on the floor.
"Bats!" The Joker's face was above his own, so animated it seemed impossible to think that he'd been nearly comatose for the past two days. He had never seen the Joker's face look so joyful, so truly, harmless happy, and it was every bit as unnerving as the dissociation had been. The Joker hugged him tighter, tears coming to his eyes as his grin widened as far as the scars would allow it to go. "Bats. You don't know how much I've missed you."