Ava was tired of seedy buildings. The Alibi, Joker's main lair, and now the armory—all of them looked the same. Cathedrals of threatening glass and brick, they always housed weapons and unsavories. This one was no different. As Parker whipped the getaway car around the Butcher District, Ava felt trapped by streets crowded with one crumbling structure after another. Her stomach tossed, but she wasn't sure whether it was her nerves or a side effect of the pills.
Probably both, she thought, cheek slamming into the glass as Parker swerved to the left.
"Give it a rest already, will you?" growled Ava.
"What, can't handle a little car ride?" he quipped, slowing down.
"A 'little car ride'? You've been tossing me all over this damn car for the last thirty minutes because you're pissy I didn't screw you, is that it, hm? Little Parker can't handle getting hurt?" she jeered, growing angrier by the minute.
"Well maybe if you kept your legs shut you wouldn't be so goddamn worried right now, you ever think of that?"
"That's enough kids," chimed Ryan, lighting a cigarette in the backseat. "I don't like it when Mommy and Daddy fight."
"Well Ava's daddy isn't here right now, so I don't think that much matters, does it Curly?"
Ava stared at Parker mouth hanging open. She grabbed the gun off her lap. "What did you just say to me?"
Parker was silent as he made another turn. He eyed the gun in her hand, likely gauging just how quick she'd be to use it. Ava stared stonily back, waiting for him to do something dumb. Chastising her once because she'd made the fear-toxin-addled decision to sleep with a murderous sociopath? Fine. Telling her she had to be smarter when bartering with Joker and attempting power plays? Fine. Calling him her fucking daddy because of a one-time mistake?
That was enough for her to shoot him. Parker pulled the car to a hard stop and cut the engine.
"I said that we're here, your highness."
"That's what I thought," she said, lowering the gun. "Now let's go—I don't wanna be down here any longer than we have to be."
As soon as she stepped out of the car, Ava could sense someone watching her. She turned around but could see only a dark street with intermittent lamps between alleys. It was an eerie feeling, the eyes on her back—familiar, urging, disbelieving. It's nothing, she thought, trying to calm herself. You're being paranoid.
Given the past month of her life, she had every reason to be. But even as Ryan, Parker and Bozo bickered among themselves—what supplies they needed to grab, whether they could lay remote charges to break Joker out—Ava couldn't shake the idea that she was being watched. So she stepped under a streetlight. And from the shadows of the Butcher District West docks came Harvey Dent. He was different—blonde hair traded for brown, slightly bearded—but she knew her boyfriend when she saw him.
"Harvey?" she whispered, too awed to truly believe it was him. Then, ignoring Joker's thugs, ignoring `that they'd likely kill him the instant he came toward her, she shouted it:
"Harvey!"
She saw his shoulders sag in relief, as if he'd expected her not to recognize him.
"What?" said Parker.
"It's Dent!" answered Ryan, aiming his gun in Harvey's direction. Shots came from the dark street behind, splitting the night air. Ava didn't have to wonder long as Pam emerged from the shadows with a blonde woman, gun in her hand.
"Oh my god, Pam!" she shrieked. "Ryan, Parker, put your guns down!"
Ryan glanced at her with the same disregard Joker did when he ignored her wishes. It wasn't hatred per se, just an overwhelming apathy for what she had to say.
"Can't do that, Curly," said Parker, shooting a bullet that veered dangerously close to Pam's blonde friend.
Ava cocked her own pistol and pointed it at them. "I said put them down, goddamn it! Put it down or I'll blow your brains out."
Instantly a gun was pressed to her own temple. Ava stilled, heart thumping as Bozo pressed the hot muzzle of the gun against her skin.
"You try that and we'll take you out first...then pick them off. I'm not risking my ass with Joker 'cause you wanna play hero, got it?"
Ava nodded, skin scorching underneath the hot metal. Bozo took the gun away from her head and raised his voice so Harvey and Pam could hear it.
"We've got nothin' against you, but Curly's coming with us," he said, gruff voice sailing across the space between them. "Get cute again, and you'll be nothin' but holes."
Of the four of them, Ava knew Bozo was the most serious. He didn't care nearly as much as Parker or Ryan about her life before. The man was a drinker and a former fiend—not someone who was shy about pulling triggers or making rash decisions. For a moment she imagined them splayed out on the filthy pavement, broken and bleeding because they'd decided to be bold on her behalf.
Do they not think I can handle him? she thought idly, wondering just why they'd begun shooting in the first place. They were outnumbered, outgunned and all around outmatched. Ava knew Harvey was acting on impulse, but desperate moves seldom panned out the way they were intended. A dark voice bubbled up from the pit of her stomach, an ugly little question: Desperate like the two of you had been?
"Fine, you win," said Pam, raising her arms. She motioned for the blonde and Harvey to do the same. Ava could hear the defeat in her voice, knew it was killing her to concede anything to a crew as deplorable as Joker's. "Just...don't hurt her, alright? Leave her alone."
"Don't you worry, Red—she'll be just fine. In fact, Curly's become somethin' of a fixture around here, hasn't she boys?"
Ava felt her heart drop out when Parker stepped forward, a cruel smirk on his face. "Oh yeah. Especially with the boss—he's taken a shine to her...hell, left her shining a few times himself, if you know what I mean."
Harvey let out a weird, strangled cry that wouldn't have been audible if it weren't for the silence that reigned over the street. Ava felt sick, limbs threatening to give out. Of all the ways to break the news, to speak the unspeakable, fucking Parker had to blurt it out. Oh God no, she thought, vision blurring as panic settled over her like a blanket.
"Ava?" It was Harvey's voice: questioning, pleading. She knew what he was asking.
She was silent. He asked again, this time angry.
"AVA!"
His voice cracked around her name. "Goddamn it, answer me!"
She tried and failed to find words. "Harvey, I—"
He didn't wait to hear the rest. Ava watched in horror as he threw down the gun, as his fists clenched, as he stood not 20 feet from her—an entire lifetime away. Parker was delighted, voice bordering on Joker's nasal lilt.
"Well I guess that settles things, hm? She doesn't want you and you don't want her. So why don't you and your friends just take your little pea shooters and run home before I call out the big guns."
Ava's gaze switched from Harvey's broken frame to Pam, who eyed her with an expression between disappointment and pity; the blonde clung to Pam, unsure of what else to do but sullenly trail behind as Harvey turned his back on Ava and the goons. Every bone in her body told her to run after them, Bozo's threat be damned. But she wasn't dumb, knew that even if the goons let her go (which was unlikely), neither Harvey nor Pam would want to be around her just then. She knew Harvey wouldn't even want to look at her.
So Ava did the only thing she could right then. Swallowing the very strong desire to cry, to shoot Joker's thugs and hijack the car, she chose to live another day in hopes she'd one day return to her life at University Row.
Without a look at Parker or Ryan or Dopey or any of the other fucks she'd been dumb enough to believe cared about her, Ava turned on her heel and walked towards Joker's armory, a single thought penetrating her haze of grief: Killing every last one of them.
-X-
Breaking out of prison wasn't difficult at all. Or at least, that's what Joker thought as he dug a mirror shard into the neck of a Major Crimes detective. Impossible, insane—all sentiments he saw on the faces of the Major Crimes unit when he strolled into the room, tough guy in tow. Joker took immense pride in the impossible, reveled at the opportunity to make it improbable but goddamn likely because he wouldn't be outmaneuvered by anyone with a GCPD badge on their belts.
Or anyone in a bat costume. So he held the hostage and demanded the one thing he knew would get him out of there alive.
"I just want my phone call." One of the cops tossed him a cellphone and he dialed a desk.
Honestly, he never thought he'd have to use the failsafe. But Maroni had given him free reign over his corrupt cops and he couldn't let it go to waste. A few weeks ago he'd come up with the idea for a bomb somewhere in MCU, largely because it had a high concentration of all his favorite people—Gordon, Wuertz, Ramirez, even an occasional visit from Rachel Dawes or Dent if they were prosecuting a case.
With that intel, he'd tinkered around and built a C4 explosive strong enough to cause quite a bang. Not fatal per se, but definitely more than any non-battle-tested cop could withstand. If he could trust his currently-concussed memory, that cop's desk was a good three rooms away.
Joker heard the faint ringtone (his own laugh) and waited.
Once. Twice. Threefourfive—then rapid beeping. 10 seconds. He dropped the dying cop and broke into a sprint.
Joker didn't hear the last beep, but he sure as hell felt the heat that engulfed the precinct. He was launched forward in a belch of smoke and flame; debris sliced clean through his clothes and his skull scraped the tile floor as he skidded across the ground.
For a moment, all he could see was grey haze. Then it came to him—blood, the coughing and groans of an entire GCPD unit brought to their knees. His face spread into an involuntary grin.
Anyone else would've likely stayed on that floor and died with them. Their cries gave him strength and the metallic stench of blood acted like smelling salts to his battered brain.
Willing his body to move, Joker found his way toward the emergency stairs and found his way to the parking garage. Though the prospect of hot wiring a police cruiser—particularly busting the window—wasn't a great one, he couldn't stop the mad laugh that bubbled in his throat.
Batman had trusted that if he left the interrogation room for the piers, the police would be able to keep him contained until he got back. He'd trusted that if put in a box, Joker would simply shrug his shoulders and wait for the other shoe to drop. He'd made the mistake of underestimation, thought Joker was kidding when he called himself an unstoppable force. Joker lifted his arms and threw his head back, let the wind of chaos whip around him as far-off sirens began to blare.
His war had finally begun.
-X-
Harvey wanted to break something—everything. He didn't bother trying to drive back to Lucky's hideout, simply tossed Pam the keys and stared numbly out the window. He felt Harley and Pam's eyes on him, wished he could muster some sort of smart response to shut them up.
But he could only seethe, feel the boiling in his veins as he thought about her. After weeks of sleepless searching, he'd found his girl—battered, thin, frightened. Alive. All his worries about finding her dead under some bridge, of losing the one person who'd kept him glued—gone.
Ava Madden was alive. And Harvey Dent did not know her.
It wasn't that he anticipated some big reunion (or a reunion at all). He just hoped he'd be able to look her in the eye and still see the woman he fell in love with. But Joker's lackeys had made it exceedingly clear. That person was gone, replaced by someone who'd done the unspeakable.
He didn't want to believe it, figured Joker's thugs were simply trying to get to him. So he asked her, and was swiftly greeted by the heinous admission. She's slept with Joker.
Pam's hand on his shoulder pulled him from his thoughts.
"...Harv!"
"What?" he snapped, teeth gritted before he realized where he was. He glanced at a shocked Pam. "Sorry, that wasn't meant for you."
"It's okay," she said, switching the car off. "We're here."
He looked out the window.
"I guess we are. Lucky's not gonna be psyched about me bringing two new people around, but if you can promise to keep a secret I'm sure he'll get over it. Besides, Selina likes you two."
Pam simply nodded while Harley gave him a long, chirpy affirmative that made her sound like a cartoon character. Harvey trailed after them, thoughts still clouded by what he could only term as grief. A yawning grey pit was opening in his chest, and he twirled the two gun bags in hand as he entered Lucky's home—it was all he could do to stop himself from collapsing.
"Harv, you're back!" said Selina, meeting him at the door. She looked past him to see Pam and Harley. "With friends in tow."
"They've seen some shit, and I'm too tired to take them back to Harley's apartment."
"Fair enough, though it seems your party's one short—where's your fair lady?"
He froze. "Your fair lady." The words shouldn't have tripped him up so badly, but he was plagued by the image of Ava wrapped around Joker like a cat—of her lips smeared with his paint and his hands all over her, in places that were sacred between the two of them, why did she let him how did he do it where did he take her—
"We weren't able to get her," said Pam, catching up to them. Harvey was grateful not to have to speak about it again.
"What do you mean you 'weren't able to get her?' Harv told me you guys had gotten a pretty good lead on her location."
It wad Harley's turn to be his voice. "She's alive and all, but Ava ain't comin' back anytime soon."
Harvey shuffled inside after that, unable to hear anymore. He dropped his bags on the floor and braced against a brick wall, head spinning. Lucky was the next to find him.
"You look like shit."
"Thanks," sighed Harvey, glaring.
"I take it your little rescue mission didn't go well? I mean she ain't...y'know—"
"She's alive. Saw her and everything."
Lucky raised a brow. "What do you mean you 'saw her?' Then why isn't she standing here right now?"
Despite his best attempts, Harvey couldn't shake the rage that was choking his voice. Louder than the sorrow, than the pain of not being able to hold her, was the sheer fury of what Joker had done to her—what she'd done with him.
"Because she's screwing the Joker and I don't really want to get in the way of a happy couple."
Lucky whistled, then braced on the wall next to Harvey. They were silent for a while, not saying anything when Selina brought Pam and Harley in, or when they put in an order for late night pizza. It was only as Harvey took a pack of cigarettes from his back pocket that Lucky ventured to speak.
"Remember the last time I sent you back to your dad's house?"
Harvey held the pack out to Lucky, who took one. "When I was nineteen? Yeah."
"You were so mad at me I didn't think you'd actually come back home. All that screaming and cursing because I said you couldn't spend a rich summer out in Gotham if your dad thought you were a broke college boy barely making it through law school."
"I remember," said Harvey, taking a drag. He hadn't smoked in years, but damned if this wasn't an occasion for nicotine. "Made me pass up that Egypt exhibit score when you knew I wanted that damn Anubis bust."
"Yup. Happy I did too—you were getting too comfy with the lifestyle, became a lush mid-way through the semester. You recall what I said to you before you left?"
"You told me that sometimes appearances can be more important than truth," said Harvey, not believing a single word of it just then.
He couldn't help but wonder how deep her damage went. Her hesitance and shame were etched into his skull, the falter in her voice when she answered him; Harvey's stomach lurched: Did she enjoy it?
Though he wanted to cast it from his thoughts — scold himself for believing she even could — he didn't have the faith or vehemence. Once she'd spoken the words, Harvey could almost see Joker's handprints all over her: purple marks wrapped around her waist, snaking down the front of her shirt to grasp at soft places only he'd seen. Harvey's head swarmed with sick thoughts, stung by them like a hand in a hive.
Did she moan the same way? Fuck it, did she moan at all? Did she ride or take him lying down? Did she did she did she...?
"Exactly. I don't know what your girl's got herself into, but she's survived this long in the hands of a psychopath who's blown up half the city. I'm sure that's required...sacrifices."
Harvey's teeth dug into the cigarette filter. "Sure—murder, lying, theft. I can take those. But you mean to tell me that she had to fuck him too?"
"I'm not telling you anything, Harvey. This girl's been your world for months and you're willing to throw it all away on a technicality?"
"Yes! She's slept with a mass murderer and didn't even have the balls to say it out loud."
At least that's what he wanted to say. She'd hurt him something horrible, opened a vein he hadn't cracked since he shot his father. Harvey felt sorrow, betrayal and anger festering in his stomach — a heady, nauseating cocktail. And though the logical part of him pointed to his many transgressions—hiding Ava behind Rachel for half a year while he promised to get his shit together, keeping much of his past from her—he couldn't scrub Joker's shit-eating grin from memory.
The goddamn news broadcast —that's why she was so skittish! Harvey threw his cigarette on the ground, stamped it out with his heel. He felt like lodging his fist in the sheetrock but didn't —Lucky was still watching him.
"Like it or not, that girl's gonna have scars when she comes back home, and it ain't fair for her to face it alone if you have even the slightest bit of love left for her."
"I didn't say I'd throw her away," Harvey hissed; his voice wavered, caught between hatred and grief. "But I don't have to put her back together."
A knock interrupted them. Harley bounded to the front door, saying something about the pizza being here. Harvey helped her bring the food inside, chuckled at Lucky's comment about being their being the luckiest men in Gotham tonight, and sat down on the couch.
He didn't tell Selina that he needed a big hug, or Pam that he'd need help sleeping tonight—they knew. Despite his feeble protests, he was happy when the botanist breathed lavender spores onto his face. It wasn't nearly as strong as bourbon, but he didn't trust himself on liquor tonight. He didn't complain when Harley ruffled his hair or when Lucky let him have the last slice of pizza.
Harvey was certain his dreams would be plagued by visions of Joker and Ava (how he hated the junction between their names); but for now he was just happy to be in the presence of people who demanded nothing of him. No press photos or speeches, no moral obligation to be pleasant. For now, he could simply exist.
In that mindless existence, as the five watched reality TV and poked fun, Harvey rounded on a sole truth: I still love her.
And he hated himself for it.
A/N: (Slurps tea)
Til next time,
~L.L.