Theme: Katie Gatley - 'Allay'
The Pantomime
13.
It was just before dawn when Harley and the Joker pulled up out front of Samantha Pierce's building, parking a few cars down from the dark blue BMW waiting there.
The Joker glanced sideways at Harley, taking note that while she'd managed to shake off some of that uncertain moodiness, she was still looking a little too pinched for his liking. She was wearing one of his shirts, which she'd chopped up to fit herself on their travels, the cherry-red polyester printed with pale blue and white hibiscus flowers stark against her pale face. Pale and pinched, but she also had that determined gleam in her eye, the one that meant there would be no stopping her.
That was bad news for Black Mask. Even the most vicious of killers found themselves sobbing at Harley Quinn's feet once they got on her bad side—a spoiled little daddy's boy like Sionis didn't stand a chance.
And the Joker was really… really looking forward to watching her go to work on him.
"You really need your bag this bad, huh?" he drawled, reaching into the backseat to grab a brown paper sack off the floor.
"I liked that red dress," Harley shot him a smirk. "Besides Samantha's got this green number for tonight."
"Women," the Joker rolled his eyes, pulling a pistol with a suppressor attached out of the bag. "All you care about is clothes."
Harley chuckled and hung back while the Joker strolled up the street to the BMW, the gun hidden rather indiscreetly behind his back. He pulled the MGGA hat down over his eyes and knocked twice on the window, waiting for the driver to roll it down halfway before he shoved the suppressed gun inside and fired four shots—zip-zip! zip-zip!—two for each of Harley's babysitters.
"There goes you being a nice little terrorist for hire," he observed when she joined him.
"I'm sick of pretending," Harley shrugged. "I'd rather have them try to hunt me down."
"Mm, me too," he flashed her a roguish smirk and Harley grinned back at him, ecstatic about playing offense for a change.
The crosses the street to Samantha's apartment and Harley disappeared into the bedroom to pack whatever she seemed to think she needed while the Joker loitered in the living room, squinting at the murder board over the couch. The names taped to the wall were all familiar enough, all of them boring, all of them schemers in the same mold as their leader, Black Mask.
The Joker ran his tongue over his teeth as his eyes landed on the card bearing Black Mask's real name—Roman Sionis. A little shiver of discontent rolled over his shoulders as he thought about the country club prick they'd met at the Tobacconist's Club. The idea that a guy like that thought he could put on a mask and tell Harley Quinn to submit... Ooh… J couldn't tell if it pissed him off or if it was the funniest thing he'd ever heard in his fucking life.
But the tension stringing his body tight like a bow seemed to indicate the former was winning out, forcing him to bottle a few violent impulses, a practice he personally found… unnatural. It took a lot to get the Joker up to genuine anger, tempting him to act when he wasn't yet ready to make his move, tempting him to be stupid. Getting his blood pressure up nice and high like a tea kettle ready to pop.
Sionis was Harley's to tear apart, but the Joker was hopeful she'd be generous enough to let him take a swing or two if he asked nicely, a thought that made a genuine grin slide onto his lips.
Harley emerged from the bedroom, that stubborn gleam shining bright in her cold blue eyes, a duffle bag slung over her shoulder, ready to abandon ship.
"Alright," she sighed, determined. "Let's go get Ed."
Ed's eyes were burning with exhaustion. He'd worked a full shift at the Iceberg Lounge—somehow, he was still short on money—and after the club closed around dawn he'd grabbed a bus straight to the East Pier, an area Uptown dominated by cranes and shipping containers.
The sun had risen by the time Ed found the dock Harley instructed him to meet them at, his heart pounding in his throat, unsure what to expect. She'd texted him the night before with an address and a time, and no other explanation. Believe it or not, Ed wasn't really a thrill-seeker, not unless there was a major pay off. But the promise of working with Harley Quinn definitely fell into the category of possible-big-pay-off.
Ed hovered behind a shipping container, examining the small group waiting for him. They stood against the backdrop of Gotham's East River, the sun high overhead, the promise of another unbearably hot day to come.
There was a tall, muscled man with a spray tan and a bleach blonde ponytail, who must have been some kind of henchman, leaning against the trunk of a dusty little red Nisson. The Joker was sprawled out on the hood, dressed exactly as he had been the day before, MGGA hat and all, a cigarette pinched between his lips as he spoke to Harley. She was wearing the same outfit too, those cute little cut off shorts that were just a fraction of a centimeter away from being slutty—Ed was a big fan of slutty, on men and women—and a Hawaiian-print shirt that had seen better days, but showed off a highly-enviable little body indeed.
Her hair was all bouncy and clean.
And her face was perfect.
Ed slipped out from behind the shipping container, cautiously approaching them with only his Smith and Wesson tucked in the back of his suit trousers to protect him. The Joker spotted him first, his face souring as he nodded in Ed's direction, prompting Harley to turn around and push her knock-off Ray Bans up on her head.
"Hey, Ed," she called, a little flirtatiously, a smirk sliding onto her lips as she strolled up to him. "Black Mask's real name is Roman Sionis," she announced, making Ed's eyes widen. "He's a business consultant for Hamilton Hill. He works with dictators, terrorists, and businessmen right here in Gotham, and he hates Bruce Wayne."
She came to a stop in front of Ed, cocking her head to the side as she held his gaze, reading him.
"He's going to be at Wayne's fundraiser tonight," she smirked, raising an eyebrow. "Want to help us steal him?"
Quite remarkably, Ed found himself speechless. She wasn't wearing her Harlequin paint—hell, she wasn't even wearing heels or makeup—but the fierceness was rolling off her in waves. Ed's heart leaped happily because since the night he'd met Harley at the Iceberg Lounge, he'd sensed they had a connection. Now here she was, inviting him to join her team to take down Black Mask, and even if she was dressed completely tragically, she was still managing to be hot and scary, and so much more, promising Ed all kinds of fun.
"Sure," he grinned, batting his eyelashes at her. "I love a party."
"Mmhmm," she smirked, turning to stroll back to the Joker.
"So, what's the plan?" Ed asked eagerly, following her.
"We'll get you on the guestlist," Harley explained. "You attack the party, throw out some riddles and scare the trust fund brigade, distract security. We'll grab Roman in the chaos. Frost is our getaway driver." She hitched a thumb at the bodybuilder.
"So it's just the four of us?" Ed frowned. You don't have any other men?"
"Alexandra Kosov controls all the muscle in town," the Joker drawled, stretching two lanky arms over his head, reminding Ed of a ventriloquist's dummy. "And your buddy Black Mask controls her."
"We don't need anyone else," Harley flashed Ed a sweet smile. "The Riddler attacked three galleries in three weeks without backup."
"Galleries are poorly guarded," Ed pointed out, seeing right through her attempt to flatter him—which he completely loved and appreciated, by the way. "Wayne Manor will be a different story."
"Maybe," Harley shrugged carelessly and leaned against the Nisson's hood so the Joker could wrap an arm around her from behind, like a couple of teenagers on the bleachers.
How old were they anyway?
"One more rule," Harley said. "You can't kill anyone."
"Um, why?" Ed made a face.
"Because our contact on the inside is… delicate," Harley explained, twisting around to exchange a look with the Joker, who rolled his eyes like he also thought it was a stupid rule. "And I want to keep her happy… for now," Harley added.
"Fine," Ed agreed, watching them closely. "No dead richies, no backup, no weapons aside from what I can sneak in through the front door." He huffed impatiently, pretending to be annoyed when really, he was thrilled. "Is there anything you can give me?"
"How about freedom," Harley suggested, shrugging off the Joker and swaying back up to Ed, being very sassy about all of it.
"Freedom?" Ed raised an amused eyebrow.
"You just spent all night bartending," Harley pointed out, her expression pitying, which Ed hated. "Black Mask is your boss, Lucy is your boss, Alexandra Kosov is your boss. Don't you want to tell all of them to fuck off?"
"Maybe," Ed admitted, shifting uncomfortably, knowing she was using that pretty face and that bouncy blonde hair and that, frankly, incredible body to trick him into thinking they were friends. "Do you do pilates?" he blurted out.
"No," Harley took it in stride like the professional she was. "So, what do you say?" she pressed. "Can you come up with a distraction while we grab Roman?"
"I think I can handle that," Ed agreed slyly.
It all felt very… thrown together, which Ed didn't mind too much. As far as plans went, he was a fan of leaving room for improvisation. And from what he knew about Harley and the Joker, and what he saw a couple of days earlier at City Hall, carrying off something big and last minute was where they excelled.
"Great," Harley said drily, dropping her little schtick about being nice to Ed for a brief moment, enough to make him pout.
"I have one condition," Ed announced haughtily, forcing Harley to turn around, her eyebrows raised. "You have to come shopping with me," he smirked. "If you're going to fit in at Wayne Manor you're gonna need a little help."
Harley laughed, a throaty chuckle that was a little bit dickish, a little bit sweet. Then she made a patronizing face like she thought Ed was adorable, which he couldn't decide how to feel about.
"I've already got something to wear," she promised him. "Next time," she added, winking before she ducked into the front seat of the Nisson.
Ed sighed as he watched their crappy little car putter away, feeling...
He wasn't sure what.
It was with a sense of dread that Lucy took the private elevator to Roman's penthouse. That dread wasn't new, but it had been growing exponentially since Jonathan Crane arrived at the Iceberg Lounge the night before, ready to make a deal.
Lucy hadn't heard the details of that deal since Roman kicked her out of the car before Crane started talking, but she'd been around when the Scarecrow was ripping people off with his bad drugs before, and she'd heard plenty back then. He was a terrible combination of arrogant and lecherous. That wasn't the sort of guy you got into business with.
Roman had promised stability, a profitable business, and respect. He wasn't supposed to be negotiating with terrorists. First Harley Quinn, and now the Scarecrow? What was next? Would he recruit Poison Ivy? Mind control was absolutely not something Lucy was prepared to deal with.
While her advice about Harley had been ignored—or rather, belittled—Lucy hoped Roman might be more open to her position on Crane. Whatever the Scarecrow had to offer, they should get it out of him and send him packing, either back to Arkham or to the bottom of the East River. He was dangerous in an entirely different way than Harley—easy to predict, and sure to fuck then over as soon as he was able to.
Instead of Circe, Lucy was welcomed into the penthouse by a maid, who took her jacket and offered her iced tea before showing Lucy out onto the sun deck.
"Lucy," Roman greeted her with a smile. He was wearing a white polo shirt and white shorts, a pair of dark sunglasses covering his eyes, a bright red drink with a slice of orange in a crystal cut glass in his hand. He looked, Lucy thought, like money and entitlement personified on his new sun deck, with its views of Gotham's Midtown.
The effect was only ruined by Crane, pale and bearded, and sitting beneath an umbrella on a deck chair. He had a new suit and looked less scruffy than he had the night before, though he still hadn't shaken off the lingering stench of desperation.
Lucy pressed her lips together; she hadn't expected him to be there. Roman bringing the Scarecrow up to the penthouse only meant one thing: he'd decided to bring Crane under his wing.
Like he could tell what she was thinking, Crane narrowed his pale blue eyes shrewdly.
Good, Lucy thought. She wanted him to know what a fuck up she thought he was.
"Hi, boss," Lucy forced a smile, her eyes lingering on Crane. "We need to talk."
"I'm always available to talk, Lucy," Roman smiled beatifically, gesturing to Crane. "Do you know Dr Crane?"
"We met a couple times," Lucy forced another pinched smile. "How ya doin' Dr Crane?"
Crane glowered at her in silence.
"Not well, as you can see," Roman sighed, moving closer to Lucy as he removed his sunglasses and tucked them neatly into the neck of his polo shirt. "Jonathan here just spent a month working with the Joker and Harley Quinn." He explained, pausing to look over his shoulder at Crane. "Haven't you, Jonathan?"
"Yes," Crane sneered.
"Because," Roman turned back to Lucy, his sunken eyes taking on a malevolent glint, sending a shiver of fear racing up her spine. "While Harley has been telling you stob stories about her relationship troubles, she and the Joker have been efficiently working out the intricacies of our operation."
Roman stopped in front of Lucy, running his tongue over his white teeth. Looking annoyed.
"Isn't that right, Jonathan?" he snapped, staring at Lucy intently.
But before Crane could confirm, Roman lashed out at Lucy, backhanding her so hard she yelped. Her head snapped to the side, pain exploding across the lower half of her face as the metallic taste of blood filled her mouth. She gasped, her hand flying up to hold her stinging cheek while she stared straight ahead at a deckchair, unsure what to do.
"Harley played you, Lucy," Roman sneered, strolling over to a drinks cart and adding a few more ice cubes to his glass. "I mean, you're a moron so I don't know what I was expecting," he added bitterly.
Lucy took two deep breaths before she straightened up, her teeth grinding together as she squared her shoulders and faced Roman bravely.
"Did ya really think they wouldn't fight back?" she demanded quietly.
"Why would they?" Roman scoffed, pitching forward to rest his elbows on his knees, taking a sip of his fancy drink. "No one else does. They never do. Why should these two be any different?"
Lucy pinched her lips together, unwilling to give Roman any further council. Not just because he would disregard it, but because she was no longer interested in saving him.
Then there was a hand on Lucy's arm, and she turned around to see Victor standing there, his eyebrows raised expectantly.
"Victor, take Lucy home," Roman instructed, flapping a hand at them. "Security is about to get much tighter and we wouldn't want anything to happen to her."
"You got it, boss," Victor replied obediently, his hand tightening around Lucy's arm, reminding her who he really worked for.
The tailor's shop felt like it stood still in time, never changing. The shriveled old man with his monocle always shuffled out of the back with a magnanimous smile, and his irritating wife always buzzed around Harley and the Joker as if they were normal people. They were the tailor's only customers though, so perhaps they just didn't have anyone else to compare them to.
Harley had changed into Samantha's evening gown, her costume for the evening. It was forest green and made of slinky satin, with a low v neck and capped, beaded sleeves, covering her better than Samantha's clothes usually did. She wound her platinum hair into a conservative bun at the nape of her neck, and applied some light make up she'd brought from Samantha's too, then clipped on glittery earrings to help dress it all up while she waited for the Joker to finish his disguise.
The tailor had pulled together a tuxedo at the last minute, tailoring something he had on hand to the Joker's measurements. Harley chuckled when he turned around on the raised platform in front of a three way mirror, spreading his arms in a lazy pose.
"Whaddya think?" he lifted an eyebrow at her then hopped off the box gracelessly.
"It'll do," Harley smirked, grabbing a pair of circular glasses and reaching up to pop them on his face. They transformed him into something closer to a professor than a terrorist with his hair clean and tucked behind his ears the way it currently was. "I'm not sure about this spray on beard thing, though," she wrinkled her nose.
"It'll work," he reassured her wryly, his hand skating up her side, following the curve of her gown over her hip to her waist before he yanked her close.
Harley laughed and grabbed the lapels of his tuxedo jacket, trying to focus on him instead of that uncertain feeling. The uncertainty had been held at bay for the past few days since they reconciled, but it was peaking through again, her lack of faith in Ed making her anxious.
The Joker seemed to pick up on her mood, and in an uncharacteristically generous show of patience, his arm tightened around her waist, pulling her up against him as he held her gaze thoughtfully.
"You wanna say fuck it and take off?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.
Harley licked her lips, trying to envision bailing like they'd done at Christmas.
"No," she said, with certainty. "I want to see Roman suffer."
"Mm, me too," the Joker agreed, widening his eyes, making Harley laugh a little easier this time.
Ed couldn't be trusted, that was much was certain, but his role in their plan was simply to create a distraction. All they needed to do was get Roman alone—with Vicki's promised help—knock him out, and drag him off through a back kitchen where Frost would be waiting.
Then, once they were at a safe house in the Meatpacking District, Harley could take out all her uncertainty and frustration on Roman, which was sure to be far more satisfying than dealing with Ed would be.
From there it was simple. Get Roman to spill on the other members of the False Face Society. Get it on tape to expose them in the media. Then take them out one by one, discrediting them, murdering them, and then...
Well, they hadn't actually gotten that far yet.
You didn't want to plan too far in advance, after all.
The tailor's wife came blustering in then, huffing and complaining in Italian, apparently annoyed at Harley like she always was. She gestured for the Joker to hold his hand out, which he did, looking amused as she deposited two rings in his palm, giving one last snappy reprimand to an exasperated Harley before she hurried off again.
"I'm gonna kill her," Harley muttered as the Joker popped one of the rings, a simple gold band, onto his left ring finger, then grabbed Harley's hand.
"Don't get any ideas," he joked drily, sliding the ring onto her left ring finger.
"Oh please," Harley smirked, looping her arms around his waist and tipping her head back to look up at him. "As if I'd have you."
"Uh huh," he chuckled, tugging the bun at the back of her head loose, letting her hair swing free down her back.
Then he backed her up into the dressing room, making Harley snicker as she stretched up to kiss him.
When Dinah moved into Wayne Manor with Bruce and Alfred, she was given a choice of fifteen bedrooms to call her own. She chose the smallest one, which was still obscenely large and lavishly decorated, but was also closest to the living room so she could get to the secret passage without winding through endless twisting corridors.
The caterers arrived at dawn, shortly after Bruce and Dinah returned from patrolling. Not long after that, the party planner and representatives from the Wayne Foundation arrived. Alfred seemed an old hand at fundraiser-party-planning-coordinating and took the lead while Bruce and Dinah caught up on sleep, though Dinah didn't find rest easily with the looming threat of socializing with the trust fund brigade.
When she emerged that afternoon, the manor was a flurry of activity in preparation for the party. She hung back awkwardly, not knowing what to do with herself as she tried to procure food, a nearly impossible task when the kitchens had been taken over by a catering team of eighty.
There were florists everywhere you looked, people setting up tables and hanging strings of lights outside, making themselves perfectly at home in a space that had only recently started to feel like home to Dinah.
Then a personal shopper from Saks arrived, bringing ten different dresses for Dinah to try on, all of them conservative and simple per Alfred's instructions, but with price tags that made Dinah's eyes bulge.
Refusing to be subjected to parading around in each gown for the personal shopper, Dinah picked out a cornflower blue one, announcing it would do the job without trying it on.
It was just a lot, and though Dinah had no problem fighting bad guys in back alleys, being confronted with personal shoppers and party planners was another challenge entirely.
As evening approached, she changed into her dress, feeling silly in the flouncy skirt, and tied her ashy blonde hair back in a low ponytail. She wasn't entirely sure why she was being subjected to this when she wasn't a member of the Wayne family—and she wasn't pretending to be either—and it was hardly an appropriate time to take nights off, though thus far they had no leads on either clown.
The party would wrap up by 1 AM, and though Bruce would need to stay home because of Vicki—Dinah tried not to roll her eyes thinking about it—Dinah would be changing out of her silk dress and into her Black Canary armor as soon as the last fundraiser guest was out the front door.
She sighed at the image she made in the mirror, obviously trying too hard to be something she wasn't, and somehow still managing to look like a street rat even in a dress that cost more than most people's rent.
There was a knock on her bedroom door, and Bruce poked his head in. He looked infinitely more suited to the role of trust fund brigade pretender, and when he saw Dinah in her dress, he laughed outright.
"Thanks," she said drily, shooting him a dirty look in the mirror.
"You just look so miserable," he protested, pushing the door closed behind him, and hastily adding, "But very pretty."
"Pretty?" Dinah raised a dubious eyebrow. "That's low on my list of priorities."
"I know," Bruce shrugged helplessly and reached into his tuxedo jacket. "Uh, listen, I wanted to give you something."
"What?" Dinah asked warily, watching him pull out a flat, rectangular box made of dark blue velvet.
She shot Bruce a warning look that made him chuckle as he handed it to her, making Dinah sigh, feeling unbearably embarrassed that Bruce was giving her jewelry.
"Open it," Bruce suggested awkwardly, stuffing his hands in his pockets and rocking back on his heels. Dinah opened the box, her eyes widening at the glossy string of pearls sitting inside. "They were my mother's," Bruce explained, subdued.
"Bruce," Dinah looked between the pearls and Bruce's face a few times, her throat feeling thick as she realized what this was. "I can't."
"If I had a sister, these would have gone to her," Bruce explained with a shrug.
Dinah looked into the corner of the room as an annoying, unfamiliar stinging suddenly hit her behind the eyes, and all she could think of to do was glare at Bruce to ward it off, making him laugh awkwardly.
"I'm sorry you're being subjected to all this," he waved a hand at the door behind him, indicating the party while Dinah tried and failed to maintain her glare.
"It's very inconvenient," she agreed, pulling Martha Wayne's pearls from the box before she looked up at Bruce. "Are you sure? You don't want to give them to Vicki?"
Bruce rolled his eyes and gestured for Dinah to hand him the pearls so he could help her put them on.
"Vicki hasn't saved my life more times than I can count," he pointed out, joining the clasp behind her neck.
"She hasn't kicked your ass more times than you can count either," Dinah smirked, making Bruce laugh again.
Ed spent the day preparing for the fundraiser, buying himself a gorgeous new suit—Armani, black, double-breasted, waistcoat, very luxe Murder on the Orient Express vibes—and treating himself to a manicure and a facial, all the while staying in touch with Harley via text. She was texting him a running list of updates—security numbers, timings, yawn—which made him think she might be more Type A than he'd originally given her credit for.
What a weirdo.
He hired a limousine to drive him out to the Palisades, and even though Ed loved a limo, he couldn't help the twinge of… mehhhhhh that was ruining the whole experience of planning a job with the Joker and Harley Quinn. She'd been wonderfully attentive to him that morning, making him feel special and playing coy and popping her hip like the sassy little terrorist he knew her to be. But now? Now they were just... coordinating.
And it took Ed almost all day to realize that he didn't just want to work with her.
He wanted her to like him.
Was that so much to ask?
He pouted the entirety of the drive to the Palisades, not feeling inspired in the slightest about taking a party hostage, even if there did promise to be plenty of jewelry to steal, which meant plenty of money to make. He'd even read the Waynes had a few Faberge eggs sitting out on display—who didn't want a Faberge egg in their collection? One or two would look fabulous in Ed's kitchen.
This was usually the part before a job where his toes would start curling with anticipation… but this time they were notably limp in his fantastic Alexander McQueen Oxfords.
Stupid Harley.
But then Ed got a text, one that opened a new door for that anticipation to come flooding through, one that would make things much more interesting, and possibly impress Harley too.
Vicki got to Wayne Manor twenty minutes early and immediately helped herself to some champagne. She'd spent the past twenty-four hours an anxious mess, trying to focus on work when the burner phone in the bottom of her handbag seemed liable to burn a radioactive hole through the leather.
Detective Montoya finally returned Vicki's call, but Vicki ignored her.
A very large, very reasonable part of Vicki felt incredibly stupid. Like she was once again being duped by Harley Quinn, which… she probably was. But then she reminded herself what was at stake, what Roman wanted, and what Harley was capable of doing that the police were not. Exposing him, just like Lois Lane tried and failed to do.
Good and bad were not black and white, Vicki reminded herself, chugging a flute of champagne.
At first, Vicki was left to her own devices, which meant loitering near the table of free booze and people watching until Alfred shepherded Bruce and Dinah out to greet their guests. Vicki took note that they both looked exceedingly uncomfortable, Bruce's capacity to project smug billionaire apparently diminished when Dinah was in the vicinity. Vicki wasn't entirely sure why Dinah was being subjected to it, considering she was supposedly Alfred's niece, and she could only pin it on a misguided attempt to make her feel included.
It was very much the same crowd as had been present at the Tobacconist's Club, Gotham's wealthiest and most elite citizens. They swanned in through the Manor's front entrance to be greeted first by a line of photographers, and then by a table of Wayne Foundation people handing out envelopes for donations, and then by well-heeled waiters with flutes of champagne before they finally made it to Bruce, who was flanked by Dinah and Vicki, all of them smiling tightly as they shook hands and welcomed guests.
There were members of the Kane family and the Dumas family and the Crowne family, and the cast members from Made in the Diamond District and Real Housewives of Gotham, including Hamilton Hill's daughter even though Hill himself hadn't been invited. But Vicki had her eyes peeled for one man: Roman Sionis.
Then, after an hour of shaking hands and smiling, she was confronted with a different face to contend with.
"Shit," Vicki hissed, seeing Harley and the Joker breeze through the front doors with the other guests, their disguises so unfathomably flimsy it had to be intentional.
Harley was wearing a slinky green dress, her platinum hair knotted at the back of her head, wearing very little makeup. If you only knew the pictures of her from Arkham and CCTV cameras, you might not recognize her, but it was still outrageously obvious. Meanwhile, the Joker was wearing a tux and a pair of glasses, his scars only just hidden behind a film of stubble. Again: outrageous.
Vicki tried not to stare as they turned down photos, then Harley graciously accepted a donation envelope from the Wayne Foundation people. They both grabbed glasses of champagne, and linked their arms to clink the crystal together before knocking the bubbles back like they were just there to enjoy themselves.
Harley spotted Vicki, a smirk sliding onto her lips as she waved and started toward her.
Vicki glanced over her shoulder, relieved to see Dinah had disappeared for the moment, and Bruce was absorbed in a conversation with Lulu Crowne that he looked desperate to get out of it.
"Vicki, dahling," Harley greeted her, putting on a British accent that made Vicki's teeth grind together. "You know my husband George," Harley continued, obviously enjoying herself.
The Joker giggled wickedly at Vicki's mortified expression.
"You couldn't wear a wig or something, Ann?" Vicki hissed.
"No one will notice," Harley reassured her in her normal voice, her eyes sweeping the room. "Is he here?"
"I haven't seen him yet," Vicki admitted, rolling her shoulders back as uneasiness spread through her. "This feels…"
"Forced," Harley filled in, her face darkening. "Don't worry. We've got a backup plan."
"A backup plan?" Vicki's eyes widened. "What does that mean?"
"It means relax and enjoy yourself," Harley offered Vicki a smile that was supposed to be reassuring but looked strained. Forced.
"Alright," Vicki agreed warily. "I'll text you if he comes in this way."
"Lovely," Harley said in the British accent again. "Cheerio, dahling," she beamed before they swept off.
The city of Gotham was built on rocky limestone, ideal for building skyscrapers on the main island. But the farther out you got, the more porous the land became, with deep caves full of ancient stalactites. The land around the Palisades was like this, riddled with caves stretching far underground, an ideal plot of land for mansions with deep foundations. They were also ideal for housing the dynastic crypts of Gotham's wealthiest families.
The Sionis family's crypt was in one such cave. The walls glistened with moisture, two matching tombs laying silent and still, only the steady drip, drip, drip of water cutting through the quiet of death. The crypt had recently been updated with an elevator, modern and silver, and outfitted with a cheerful bell that tinkled when the doors opened.
Crane didn't traditionally have strong feelings one way or another about cemeteries, but his new benefactor had an affinity for them. Specifically, his family crypt, where Roman's parents were buried, and where official business was carried out with the False Face Society, the group Roman had invited Crane to join.
It was all very… theatrical, reminding Crane exceedingly of the League of Shadows in the pomp and circumstance. He had yet to attend a meeting, but Roman explained about the use of masks and cloaks to keep identities secret. Powerful men and women were members of the False Face Society. They relied on Roman to discreetly give them what they wanted.
It sounded like a cult.
A cult that met in a cemetery.
A cult that would provide Crane access to the blue poppy.
So be it.
"Do you think she will fight back very hard?" Roman asked suddenly. He was wearing his mask, his voice a low electronic purr.
They were sitting across from each other in the crypt, waiting for a third to join them.
"Yes," Crane replied, his impatience thinly veiled. "She is very strong-willed."
"Strong-willed," Black Mask mused. "I don't mind a challenge."
If Harley never had to duplicitously socialize with the members of the trust fund brigade again, it would be too soon. For a solid hour, she and the Joker managed to have some fun playing George and Ann Smiley, a wealthy couple keen to donate to the Wayne Foundation. But it got old fast, the Joker especially getting bored of playacting. He was about five seconds away from pulling out the revolver tucked into his sock and causing a ruckus, by Harley's estimation.
Roman still hadn't shown up, as Vicki pointed out each time she spoke to Wayne then anxiously flitted over to them with another pointless update. She was being too obvious, and it was making Harley nervous.
Fuck.
The Joker sighed melodramatically as he considered a cocktail stick with a shrimp perched on the end, making it known that he was employing a significant amount of self-control while Harley leaned against his shoulder, her eyes searching the room.
"I'm gonna smoke," he muttered, shrugging her off and strolling away, his gate straight and steady instead of his usually rolling lope.
Harley watched him walk away, her mind wandering to his suggestion that they take off again, just hop on a plane and leave Gotham. Because this was terrible, and though she didn't tend to plan long term—a few days, maybe a few weeks in advance at most—anymore, Harley couldn't see a viable outcome for them in this city.
For a few hours, she had started to feel like she was about to get the upper hand on Black Mask. But now… with so much relying on Vicki Vale and the fucking Riddler… now she was wondering if this wasn't a death trap after all.
What did she want more?
To live? Or try to take down Roman?
It was hard to accept that she might not be able to have both.
Harley sighed and let her eyes sweep the room once more before she headed for the bathroom to touch up her hair and makeup for the sake of having something to do with herself. The thrill of hiding in plain sight with the Joker at her side had long since worn off, leaving her with this empty feeling of foreboding that made her want to rip her own intestines out.
She turned a corner to a large, empty hallway lined with marble pillars, and briefly wondered what it would have been like to grow up in a house like this, with all of its luxuries and its treasures on display. What would that have been like for Bruce Wayne as a child? To ride his big wheel across these Italian marble floors, or to scrawl on these old, expensive tapestries with crayons.
A blonde in a blue dress was heading up the hallway toward Harley, ostensibly coming from the restrooms, which were no doubt as luxurious as everything else in Wayne Manor. The blonde's head was down, and Harley hardly took any notice of her until she stopped to talk to an old man wearing a butler's uniform. Then Harley saw the blonde's face, and it took her a few seconds to accept who she was seeing.
Harley stopped short, her eyes widening.
Dinah.
It was Dinah Drake.
She was wearing a pretty blue dress and pearls around her neck, and her ashy blonde hair was still the same, shaved at the sides and tied back in a stubby ponytail. She looked healthier, well-fed.
What the hell was she doing there?
As Harley stood there staring, unsure what to do, the butler turned to leave and Dinah stared after him for a moment. Then she turned down another hallway, out of Harley's line of sight.
Harley prepared to bolt after her, but an arm suddenly snaked around her waist from behind, yanking her back behind a marble pillar. Harley snarled and stomped down on her attacker's instep, throwing her elbow back into their gut, knocking the wind out of them. But before she could fight them off completely, they threw a rag over her face.
Harley had used chloroform on enough people to be familiar with the smell. It filled her nose and mouth, making her head spin, and she felt herself start to slip… slip… slip away…
Frost didn't typically call the Joker—he called you if he needed something, and you'd damn sure better be available to answer when he did.
It had been a good three hours since Frost dropped Harley and the Joker off in front of Wayne Manor, and he'd been circling the property ever since. The plan was to wait for their call or for screaming over the Riddler's attack to kick off—whichever happened first— then meet them around the back of the manor once they'd subdued Roman. But Frost never got a call, and he'd yet to hear any screaming.
Frost had pretty good instincts, and it was hard to ignore his growing sense of dread that something bad had happened.
Eventually, guests started leaving the party, their limousines and town cars lining up out front to pick them up. Frost drove up to the entrance, hoping to get a sense of what was going on, but by all appearances, everything was normal for Bruce Wayne's cheerful guests.
Without anyone to pick up, Frost circled the property again, and with little else to direct him, he kept circling until the tank started to run low on gas.
Vicki wasn't an expert on kidnapping plots, but she had assumed there would be something… obvious about Roman Sionis being snatched. It'd been over three hours since she last saw Harley and the Joker, and she'd not once set eyes on Sionis. Trying not to be suspicious, she needled the guest list people to find out if he'd ever arrived. They said no, but that didn't mean he wasn't there, much to Vicki's frustration.
She could only guess the whole thing had been called off or Harley had actually succeeded and just been very quiet about it. Annoyingly, Vicki found herself feeling grateful if it was the latter, if Harley had given her some plausible deniability and practiced discretion for once. And if they'd just given up well, that was a relief too.
But Vicki's gut told her otherwise—it told her something had gone wrong, and after three hours of worrying, she gave in and called Harley to check.
She stepped out onto the back patio, leaning against an elaborately carved stone railing as the phone rang. It rang, and rang, and Vicki's nerves stood on end as she envisioned Harley being too wrapped up in torturing Roman to come to the phone. Was that a good outcome? Was that what Vicki wanted? Was that preferable to something bad happening to Harley?
Then finally, someone answered. But it wasn't Harley Quinn.
"Hello, V," a soft voice purred down the line. "I wonder what V stands for…"
Vicki's eyes widened. She cancelled the call, panic hitting her like a bolt of lightning as she stared down at the phone, trying to make sense of what was happening, of what it meant.
It meant someone had Harley's phone—It meant someone had Harley.
Panicking, Vicki pulled back her arm and pitched the phone into the garden, then turned on her heel and fled back into the house.
Harley woke up slowly, her eyelids impossibly heavy, her brain swimming like she was drunk. She inhaled sharply, trying to clear her head as she fought to open her eyes, but all she could see were shades of black and gray. She tried to speak, but her lips were fused together—there was tape covering her mouth, silencing her.
Her shoulders were aching, and it took her a few more seconds to realize it was because she was hanging from her wrists. A bolt of adrenaline surged through her as memories of that day in the basement with Victor rushed across her mind's eye. She blinked rapidly, her vision solidifying to the very unsettling image of her bare feet limp on a stone floor. There was an iron cuff around each of her ankles, rusted chains connecting the cuffs to the wall behind her.
Moving sluggishly, she turned her head to the side, accepting that her arms were stretched out in a T on either side of her, her wrists manacled and chained to the wall too. She took a deep breath and tried to plant her feet on the rocky ground beneath her. But her legs were like rubber, and she quickly slumped back down again, straining her shoulders further.
Harley hung there for about thirty seconds, breathing deeply to clear her head, trying to collect herself, trying to understand why she was chained to a wall in a basement. Eventually, she found the strength to lift her head again, and what she saw made a whimper catch in her throat.
Across from her, the Joker was unconscious, handcuffed, and hanging from a rusted iron loop sticking out of the stone ceiling. He was shirtless and barefoot, his feet tied with rope to a second iron loop sticking out of the ground.
Harley stared at him, horror creeping through her, as she slowly took in the details of the room they were in. It was like a cave, but there were two carved stone tombs, one against each wall.
It was a crypt.
Harley's heart started leaping wildly in her throat, and she tried to make a sound through the tape covering her mouth to get the Joker's attention, to wake him up. Her lips strained against the tape as she found the strength to plant her feet and stand on her own, her aching arms still stretched out wide. She made a sound close to something like a squeal, and the Joker's head finally bobbed against his chest as he began to wake up.
He lifted his head, blinking sleepily at her before he looked around, taking it all in like he wasn't sure how he felt about the fact that he was chained up in a cave or a crypt or wherever they were. Then he released a long, annoyed sigh as he found his footing on either side of the metal loop his feet were tied to.
There was a cheerful Beep! and a pair of silver elevator doors opened in the rock wall, revealing Roman, wearing a neat tuxedo and a crisp bowtie, his curly black hair raked back from his face, offering them a patient smile.
Harley made an enraged sound behind the tape, and she started to struggle against the manacles chaining her to the wall, huffing through her nose as she attempted to scream past her gag.
"Hello, Harley," Roman greeted her, his sunken eyes rolling over her quickly before he turned to the Joker. "J."
The Joker raised an unimpressed eyebrow, still looking sleepy.
"You know, Lucy was right about you, Harley," Roman sighed, shrugging out of his tuxedo jacket and tossing it over one of the tombs. "You're duplicitous." He loosened the collar of his shirt and set his bow tie aside before rolling up his sleeves. "I can't tell if it's an asset or… something that needs to be bred out."
Harley stopped struggling against her restraints, his words sending a wave of dread spreading through her, making the hairs at the back of her neck stand on end.
"I thought we could have something special," Roman continued, sounding put out as he drew closer to her. "I hoped this could all come together… naturally."
Harley looked at the Joker over Roman's shoulder—he was watching warily, listening closely.
"It comes down to loyalty," Roman mused, his eyes trailing over her arms to the manacles chaining her to the wall. "We'll see if we can't fix that."
He met her eye, holding her gaze for a long moment, then ripped the tape off her mouth. Harley didn't flinch, she didn't say anything, she just stared at him, her heart pounding in her ears as she tried to understand what was happening.
"You don't have anything to say?" Roman raised his eyebrows.
Harley licked her lips, tasting the acrid glue from the tape as she considered her words carefully.
"Why are we here?" she settled on, her voice weak.
"That's a long story, Harley," Roman admitted, crossing his arms. "But the short version is Ed told me what you were planning and I got ahead of you."
Harley took a deep, angry, breath, fighting back a scowl.
Of course he did.
"And, obviously," Roman continued, turing to the Joker. "And of course, Jonathan came to me looking for help since you were making his life miserable."
"So you're saying we brought this on ourselves," Harley sneered, jangling one of her manacles.
"Partially," Roman shrugged. "You just… accelerated things."
"What do you mean?" Harley narrowed her eyes. If she could get Roman to talk, maybe she could stall for time.
"You want the long version, huh?" Roman nodded. "I admit, I've wanted to share it with you." He took a step closer to her, his eyes softening as they drifted over her hair, which Harley only realised then was hanging loose around her shoulders instead of tied back. "I want to share so much with you, Harley."
Harley's eyes widened and she looked at the Joker over Roman's shoulder again. He was squinting at Roman like he didn't understand something.
"I suppose it started with Mayor Garcia," Roman continued, sliding his hands in his pockets. "It's actually remarkable what you two manage to achieve with the limited resources at your disposal. But I don't really have a use for that kind of chaos and violence, and it was always obvious to me the Joker can't be controlled."
He looked over his shoulder at the Joker, who had tipped his head back, watching through hooded eyes.
"So, when Alberto started clearing out some of the… let's call them, unnecessary members of the workforce," he offered Harley a smile. "He was supposed to take you two out too."
"You had Alberto Falcone take out the mob's top brass as Holiday," Harley surmised. "Leaving weak people in charge so you could control them."
"Do you consider Lucy to be weak?" Roman asked, genuinely curious. "Sometimes she has moments of strength, but overall." He sighed like he was under duress. "This is the kind of thing I wish you could advise me on," he admitted, catching her eye. "But I'm getting ahead of myself."
"Why take over the mob?" Harley demanded. "What's in it for you?"
"The mob is the lifeblood of Gotham," Roman's eyebrows rose. "I'm surprised you don't know that."
"The mob is greedy and boring," Harley countered drily.
"Maybe," Roman agreed. "Those things aren't mutually exclusive. In any case, Alberto was all too happy to remove the people who would have been problems, and that was supposed to include you two." Roman started toward Harley again, his eyes narrowing, sending an uneasy ripple over her shoulders. "But then… I had a change of heart..."
"What does that mean?" Harley snapped when he didn't say anything further.
"I mean I started to learn about you, Harley," Roman explained, his eyes settling on her throat. "I heard how close you two came to stopping Alberto on Christmas Day." He met her eye, his gaze intense. "And when I took the time to actually look at you… I was surprised."
"Surprised?" Harley spat, pressing her back flat against the wall as he edged closer to her.
"The Joker? He's a rabid dog. But you? Harley, you're different," Roman insisted, a smile growing on his full lips. "You're well-educated, you're beautiful, you're ambitious."
He stopped right in front of her, and Harley could only stare at him numbly as he lifted a hand between them. Like he wanted to touch her, just as he'd done in the Wayne crypt and in the basement of the Tobacconist's Club. But he'd been Black Mask then, a skull without a face, not a man. Now he was all too human, and he was making Harley's skin crawl.
"An orphan who grew up in foster care and ended up with a PhD," Roman laughed quietly, affectionately. "You're the American Dream."
Harley swallowed thickly, trying to find her voice.
"So you decided you'd rather have me work for you than kill me," she said at length.
"At first," Roman nodded. "You two had already disappeared, but I had a kind of… sixth sense it wasn't for good. That's when I started learning more about you." He raised his eyebrows. "A lot more."
He turned around abruptly and strolled up to the Joker, who was looking deeply unimpressed.
"Not just from your men," Roman continued, examining the Joker curiously. "You know, J, there are hundreds of psychology journals out there with her work in them, for anyone who wants to read it. Have you ever even bothered to learn about her?"
The Joker rolled his eyes stubbornly.
"I got to know how Harley Quinn's mind works. Analytical, observant, organized, strategic." He pushed on the Joker's shoulder experimentally, making him sway back in his restraints. "I spoke to your mentor Joan Leland, and I even listened to your tapes from Arkham."
"You spoke to Joan?" Harley demanded indignantly.
"I spoke to Sofia Falcone too," Roman admitted, turning back to Harley, smiling when her eyes widened with betrayal.
"Sofia knows about this?" Harley croaked.
"Not exactly," Roman shrugged. "But we had dinner when I was in Milan on business, and she had nothing but wonderful things to say about you when I asked." He chuckled. "Honestly, I think she's a little bored and misses the excitement."
The Joker groaned then, loud and exasperated. He started talking against the gag, his head flopping from side to side, not making any sense but easily conveying his irritation with the whole conversation.
Roman frowned like he wasn't sure what to make of the performance.
"He's not a big fan of the Falcones," Harley sneered.
"I've heard," Roman nodded, wagging a finger at the Joker. "You know, you really are a mystery. Your name, where you came from, how you got those hideous scars. I couldn't find answers to any of those questions." He squinted at the Joker. "Did you kill everyone who knows?"
The Joker didn't even bother to glare at Roman, he just stared back at him impassively, unfazed.
Roman cocked his head to the side, examining the Joker like he was a curiosity.
"Alberto told me about your work for his father," he continued. "And I even spoke to some guys who worked with you back then, including Victor, obviously." He looked up at the Joker's left arm where it was dangling overhead, a long rectangle of shiny scar tissue covering the inside of his forearm. "A skin grafter as a persuasive instrument—now that, I like." He cracked a small smile. "I'll have to add one to my repertoire… Pretty Boy."
Harley started struggling against her manacles again, hoping maybe she could rip one off the wall and use it as a weapon. It drew Roman's attention back to her.
"I love that you recruited Ed, by the way," he flashed her a smile as he pivoted away from the Joker to grab his tuxedo jacket off the tomb. "Ed's a funny one, isn't he."
Roman pulled a Gerber knife from the folds of his jacket and held it up to the light. Four inches, black handle, military-grade. Harley's pulse started to pound harder in her neck as she imagined all the places that knife could end up.
She caught the Joker's eye again, trying to find a solution to their captivity via eye contact alone. But he just stared back at her expectantly, and Harley realized he was doing that thing that drove her crazy and made her giddy in equal parts —he was waiting for an opening. For an opportunity to come along so he could snatch it. If he willed that opportunity into being, it would come, and they would survive.
That opportunity had always come before when they'd been in sticky situations.
But what if it didn't come this time?
"Ed's easy to control," Roman continued, examining the blade. "The old fashioned way, with money."
"Ed's a sociopath with ADHD," Harley corrected him. "His love of material wealth won't stop him from fucking you over."
"Oh, you mean like how he fucked you over and told me everything?" Roman pointed out, looking amused. "You know, he was in really bad shape that night after the fundraiser." He feigned a wince. "It wasn't very deep but still… you stabbed him twice."
"I remember," Harley said flatly, her throat growing thick when Roman sidled up to the Joker.
"I think Ed deserves a little something for his trouble," Roman mused, making Harley's eyes widen.
"Wait…" she started to say.
But before she could protest further, Roman stabbed the Joker in the side, just beneath his ribs, exactly where Harley had stabbed Ed, but with a much shorter blade.
The Joker made a low, strangled sound, more like he was annoyed than in pain. He twisted away from Roman, the knife handle sticking out of his side as blood streamed down his stomach, pooling in the waistband of his tuxedo trousers.
Harley pinched her lips shut, knowing he wouldn't want her to beg. But listening to him grunt and roll his head in a circle made something horrible, something painful twist in her chest. He wasn't in immediate danger of dying, he'd have to bleed for days to die from a wound like that, but Harley knew all too well what having a knife sticking out of your body felt like.
"So anyway," Roman continued breezily. "You two came back, and we started hearing about you within… I'd say days." He shot Harley a knowing look. "Subtlety isn't your strong suit."
"Gotham isn't usually a subtle place," Harley countered, pressing herself back against the wall when he started prowling closer to her again. "This would be about when you put Reeves in my path?"
"Arthur," Roman chuckled. "It's easy to dismiss him, I know. But… it's really impossible to quantify how much what he told me about you changed everything."
Harley narrowed her eyes. "What are you talking about?"
"Arthur likes what I like," Roman explained, waving his hand. "He wants what I want, he says what I say. His job was to get to know you a little bit, away from the Joker to see what inviting you to work with us might look like. And surprise surprise, Harley Quinn is more of a bored housewife in need of entertainment than a psychotic terrorist."
He laughed at the bewildered expression on Harley's face.
"So the first few times he meets you, he insists you're this feral psychopath, just like the Joker," Roman continued happily, like he was recounting a fond memory. "I knew that couldn't be the case, but he was adamant. But then you take him to that wine bar, and everything changes."
He met Harley's eye again, and there was a tenderness in his expression that made her feel sick.
"Arthur tells me you finally opened up to him," Roman explained, edging closer to her. "He tells me actually, she's not just beautiful, but when she's smiling and wearing a nice dress, she's stunning." His eyes drifted over her hair. "And not only is she dangerous and ruthless… but she's funny, and she's sexy, and she can even be sweet when she lets her guard down." He smiled softly, almost tenderly. "She's a fascinating dichotomy of so many things."
Harley's skin started crawling as she realized how Roman was looking at her.
Like a toy he'd been waiting to play with.
"So I had to meet you," he shrugged. "I needed Akins taken care of anyway, so why not? And I was not disappointed, Harley. I mean," he laughed softly, his large eyes rolling back in his head. "The way you asked for Circe's dress, it was just… it was too perfect. And that was when I knew."
"What are you talking about?" Harley demanded, tugging on her manacles to distract herself from the queasy feeling consuming her.
"I mean, it's not just about working together anymore," Roman looked genuinely emotional. "I want you to be my partner, Harley."
Bewildered and alarmed, Harley looked at the Joker, who was perfectly still despite having a knife embedded in his torso. He was glaring at the back of Roman's head like he was trying to see through him.
"Don't get me wrong. Circe was wonderful, but she was more like a placeholder," Roman continued thoughtfully. "She was gorgeous and obedient and she made great cookies." He met Harley's eye. "But she was hardly strategic. She wasn't someone who could advise me and work beside me. She wasn't you."
"What happened to her?" Harley pressed, dread unspooling inside her.
"Oh, you want to hear something really funny," Roman suddenly broke into a grin, his white teeth like chicklets in two perfect rows. He glanced over his shoulder at the Joker. "You'll like this," he promised him, turning back to Harley, widening his eyes at her. "Circe's real name was Samantha Pierce."
That dread that had been rapidly unraveling inside Harley suddenly overwhelmed her as she finally realized what Roman was saying.
In the same way he'd turned Victor Zsasz from sick predator to dopey bodyguard, he'd turned Samantha Pierce into Circe.
And not only that…
"That's right," Roman laughed. "You've spent the past month living in Circe's apartment! Wearing her clothes, sleeping in her bed… all because I put you there." He looked between Harley and the Joker again. "It's funny right?"
"What happened to her?" Harley demanded, her voice weak.
"She was a distraction," Roman shrugged helplessly.
"I meant, what did you do to her?" Harley spat.
"The same thing I did to Victor," Roman fought back a smile. "I tamed her… I liberated her."
Harley's eyes widened, horrified, making Roman chuckle.
"I thought you'd like that," he grinned. "Victor and I have gotten to know each other exceptionally well. He tells me everything."
"What did you do to them?" Harley snapped.
"Oh, come on," Roman lifted an eyebrow at her. "It's simple conditioning. I give them a choice between pain and relief, and the cycle continues until I have something to work with."
"Torture," Harley inferred, her lip curling.
"In layman's terms, yes," Roman shrugged one shoulder. "What's the longest you've tortured someone, Harley?" He narrowed his eyes at her. "Are you really going to pretend you have some kind of moral high ground?"
Harley ground her teeth together. "I have never taken away a person's free will."
"No, you just manipulate them into doing what you want and kill them when you lose interest or they're no longer immediately useful for you," Roman agreed blithely. "I prefer to invest more time in certain people, and then I keep them close." He frowned at her. "Are we really so different?"
Harley pressed her lips together, trying to think of a response to defend herself, to prove she was nothing like him.
"Victor was relatively easy," Roman continued, leaning against a tomb. "Circe was harder." He looked at Harley squarely. "She couldn't have any scars, for obvious reasons, but there were certain things she didn't need." He cocked his head to the side and smiled. "Like her tongue. She also had three sisters who were quite… reactive."
Harley stared at Roman, feeling genuinely speechless.
"You don't have sisters, and I need you to speak to advise me so," Roman waved his hands like he was weighing up the situation. "We're going to have to get creative."
"So," Harley's face darkened as a much more comfortable anger settled in. "You're saying you want to torture me inlto being your girlfriend?" She ground her teeth, her face twisting into an ugly scowl. "That is what this is all about? You're just a rapist under all this pretentious culty bullshit?"
"Rapist?" Roman looked bewildered. "I respect you, Harley. I wouldn't touch you unless you asked me to," he made a face. "And believe it or not, sex is very low on my list of priorities. I want a partner, not a sex toy."
Harley was shaking, outrage and anger making her vibrate as Roman sidled up to her.
"I think underneath it all, you know you want this too," he told her patiently, his eyes drifting over her hair. "I mean, god, look at your hair," he sighed and smoothed a platinum lock back from her face.
Harley lurched away from him, repelled, but he grabbed a handful of her hair more forcefully, holding her in place so she couldn't pull away, his face unnaturally calm.
"It's exactly what I would have wanted," he said softly, examining the silvery-blonde waves in his fist.
"Get away from me!" Harley spat, and Roman swayed back with a sigh, releasing her hair.
"Fine," he agreed mildly. "All I'm asking is you advise me, protect me. Be my partner and stand beside me. Gotham is just one city, there's a whole world out there waiting for us."
"You have got to be joking," Harley laughed incredulously. "You think you can make me want to be with you?"
"Sure," Roman offered her a small smile, his eyes soft again. "Just like Circe."
Harley could only stare at him, fighting with herself over how likely what he was suggesting was, and questioning the sanity behind it. Then her eyes drifted to the side, finding the Joker. He wasn't blank or impassive anymore. His jaw was twitching as he glowered at the back of Roman's head, looking more pissed off than Harley had ever seen him.
Harley looked at Roman, narrowing her eyes to a squint.
"I'm his partner," she said quietly, earning a dubious look.
"You are way too good for him, Harley," he shook his head. "I know you went through some personal changes a couple of years back, and he was there for you or, whatever," he rolled his eyes dismissively. "But you are not like him."
"Okay," Harley said slowly, changing tactics, trying to stall for time. "But I take it, I'm not the reason you're helping Daggett take over Wayne Enterprises?"
Roman laughed sharply, looking both surprised and pleased.
"What makes you think I want to take over Wayne Enterprises?" he asked, narrowing his eyes curiously, a smile on his full lips.
"I have sources," Harley sneered. "So, what's the plan? Are you going to torture Bruce Wayne into being one of your puppets too?"
"Now that's exactly the kind of thinking I'm after," Roman beamed. "That's why I need you."
"It wouldn't work," Harley added quickly. "I knew Victor was different the second I laid eyes on him. No one who knows Bruce would believe he was acting rationally or let him hand over his company."
"And again, you're right," Roman nodded, pleased. "Which is why we've decided to go down a more… technical route."
"Technical," Harley's brain jumped from one conclusion to the next, her eyes darting from the Joker back to Roman as she put the pieces together. "Anarky."
"Don't you mean…" Roman offered her the soft smile again, which was rapidly becoming more and more sinister to her. "Lonnie."
Harley knew she shouldn't have been surprised, but her teeth still ground together as disappointment made her stomach sink, the reality of being betrayed by both Ed and Crane cutting through her confidence.
A memory flashed before her mind's eye, her own voice predicting this moment, rocking her to her very core.
Narcissists over play their hands eventually—it's always how they get caught.
Harley released a shuddering breath, feeling confused, distracted, out of her depth. And scared.
Roman shifted closer to her, observing her frustration for a few moments before he reached up to touch her hair again, feeling entitled to it.
Harley's thoughts of her own failures evaporated, replaced with a visceral rage that made her tremble.
"You're psychotic," she sneered.
"Are you kidding?" Roman laughed. "Frame your behavior next to mine." He took a step back and pulled a small black case out of his trouser pocket. "You two blow up kindergartens and play mind games with the media. But Harley, that isn't you. That's the Joker. I need you to understand this."
He unzipped the case, revealing a shiny silver scalpel inside, and seeing it made Harley's blood run cold.
Because she knew that scalpel wasn't for her.
"Fine," she said quickly, licking her lips as she forced herself to look Roman in the eye. "Fine, I'll do it, I'll be your new Circe. I'll protect you and advise you and do whatever you want." She swallowed thickly. "Just let him go."
The Joker started making a gruff panting sound, shaking his head furiously, but Harley refused to look at him.
"Let him go?" Roman laughed, slipping the scalpel back in its case. "Are you serious?"
"Maybe then," Harley licked her lips again, trying to get creative. "I could hunt him for you," she met Roman's sunken eyes across the room. "We could take bets on how long it would take."
She tried to make her expression beguiling even though inside, she felt like she was dying. The Joker was grunting and huffing through his nose, trying to get her attention, but she refused to look at him. She held Roman's gaze instead, trying to cover the fear coursing through her.
"Don't you want to see me kill him slow," she asked softly. "Slow and messy."
Roman started toward her, his eyebrows raised, intrigued.
"Because I know how to hurt him better than anybody," Harley continued, her skin crawling as he got closer. "And I know exactly how you want to watch me do it."
Roman stared at her for a few long seconds, then he chuckled quietly, shaking his head.
"You're good," he wagged a finger at her, making Harley deflate until she was hanging from the manacles again. "You're really good. You have no idea how tempting that is. To watch you hunt him down and rip him apart." His eyes rolled back in his head. "You're right, I would love to see that. Maybe we go big game hunting in Africa instead? Treat ourselves to a nice vacation sometime?"
Harley met the Joker's eye across the room, and he shook his head slowly, his dark eyes glowing, making her chest ache.
"Whatever this thing between you two is, it's a little road bump between… just about everything I want," Roman explained. "So instead of leaving you lingering over him, I'm just going to take him out of the equation completely so we can get started on you."
"Roman," Harley tried to reason with him, her voice strained. "Please don't."
"Don't beg, Harley," Roman made a face as he retrieved the scalpel from its case. "It doesn't suit you."
Harley looked between the scalpel and the Joker, and she started to panic in earnest, yanking on the manacles, tentatively at first, and then harder, using her whole body to pull on the chains as they rattled against the stone wall.
"Now, J, it did occur to me that a bullet to the head would be easiest, but it's a little too sudden," Roman explained, gesturing to Harley. "I need her to accept that you're gone, and to do that she needs to see you die slowly…" He shot Harley a smirk. "So it really sinks in."
The Joker growled behind the duct tape covering his mouth.
"See, wild dog," Roman glanced at Harley again, and she scowled back at him, the manacles rubbing her wrists raw as she fought against them. "As I'm sure you know, there are a lot of factors to take into consideration in a situation like this. Do you take hours, do you take days… Are you forcing someone to accept they're nothing but a hunk of meat, or are you using them to traumatize someone else. Or are you just… taking something away."
Roman turned to Harley, his eyes cold.
"Blood and gore don't affect you," he predicted, looking at her arms, her biceps standing out as she yanked on her restraints harder. "And it might just make your will stronger if his death is too… messy." He stopped in front of her, forcing her to meet his eye, offering her a small smile. "This should be an emotional moment for you, Harley, where you accept he's gone. Then we can work on realizing how you're nothing like him, and didn't want him anyway."
He reached up to touch her face, but Harley flinched away.
"Roman," she said, her voice wavering, panic making her head spin. "If you kill him, I will never forgive you. I will never forget."
"You're feeling vulnerable, I understand," Roman laid a hand over his heart. "Let me tell you something about me, okay? I want us to be vulnerable in front of each other, and this is an personal moment for both of us."
Harley stopped struggling against her restraints, feeling completely lost, and more afraid than she could ever remember feeling before.
"You and I both grew up without families," Roman continued, more solemnly. "My father died when I was twelve, and my mother slit her wrists when I was fourteen."
He said it without emotion, like it had happened to someone else.
"My father was a mistake, but my mother… She wanted to die. Badly."
Roman looked down at the tomb he'd so casually thrown his jacket over, and Harley knew instinctively that his mother's body was rotting inside it.
"She cut her wrists so deeply the arteries severed, and she bled to death within… minutes." He looked at Harley, his eyes lifeless. "That's not what we're aiming for here."
He strolled back to the Joker, who glared at him resentfully, like there wasn't a knife sticking out of his side.
Harley couldn't think of a single thing to say, a single argument to make. She did feel vulnerable, and this did feel personal, and when combined with those moments with Black Mask, when she'd felt so compelled by him, she had to accept that Roman was right—that he could do this to her. That he was in control, and she was powerless.
That she had overplayed her hand, and lost.
"I don't know how long it will take, or how creative I'll have to be, but you will submit." Roman turned his eyes on Harley fully, dark and vacant. Nothing like the Joker, who was full of life. "They always do."
He pivoted back to the Joker and lifted the scalpel to his wrist, cutting a deep incision up his forearm in one sharp, deliberate motion.
"No!" Harley shrieked, shocked as she watched blood leap from the wound, the artery perfectly sliced open.
The Joker turned to stare at it like he was bewildered by what his body was doing, the blood streaming down his arm pouring impossibly fast the way only fatal injuries did.
Harley wailed something incoherent, her eyes stinging as panic flooded her brain like white noise.
"Unfortunately," Roman circled to the Joker's other side. "It's a yes from me, and that's all that matters here."
The Joker seemed to lurch to life suddenly, snarling and trying to wrench away. But it was no good. The way he was tied up made it impossible, and despite the snarling and scowling and twitching, Roman still slashed his other wrist neatly, another spurt of blood telling Harley he'd sliced that artery open too.
"Stop!" Harley shrieked, her voice pitching higher.
The Joker was blinking hard, his eyes darting around the crypt, searching for some means of escape. Willing that opportunity to arise at the last moment like it always did.
"It's done now," Roman shrugged, watching the blood stream down the Joker's arms, his chest, his stomach, soaking the top of his tuxedo trousers. "Does the blood bother you?" Roman frowned at Harley. "I would think you'd be used to it, but it's different when it's yours. It bothered Victor too."
Harley didn't respond, she felt incapable of speech, numb, helpless, the sheer amount of blood leaving the Joker's body too much proof of what was about to happen even if her brain wouldn't accept it.
Then she saw his eyelids droop, his head bob, getting weak.
He was going to die.
"No… no-no-no-no-no-no," Harley chanted, struggling against the manacles as adrenaline and fear surged through her fresh, making her brain fuzzy, making her vision blur and turn red, like blood released in the bath. "No, NO, NO! NO! NO!"
Her voice pitch higher into a scream as she flailed against her restraints, desperate to get free so she could get to him, the weak bobbing of his head stoking an awful, horrible pain deep in her heart.
"Tears, that's interesting," Roman observed mildly. "I wouldn't have expected that."
"YOU SONOFABITCH!" Harley screamed hoarsely, thrashing against the manacles, making Roman's eyes widen. "I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU!"
Her face grew hot and sticky as tears streamed down her cheeks, but through them, she could see the Joker shaking his head, his eyes narrowed, trying to communicate with her. Telling her, she realized, not to give in to this asshole. She could hear his voice as clear as day. He didn't want her to submit.
"NO!" Harley howled raggedly, bursting into gut-wrenching sobs as she tried to rip the manacles off the wall, nearly pulling her arms out of the socket.
"Really?" Roman lifted an incredulous eyebrow. "All this, for him?
Harley screamed brokenly, rage and grief throbbing through her veins as she thrashed against the wall, feeling utterly helpless. She saw the Joker's head fall forward against his chest and she released a sound so wild and unhinged Roman took a step back.
"I suppose this is good," he mused. "Getting it out of your system."
"I'LL TEAR YOU APART!" She wailed, her throat aching as her voice sank into a strangled register. "I'LL RIP YOUR HEAD OFF YOU PIECE OF SHIT! I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU I'LL—"
Roman was frowning at her thoughtfully, considering her distress.
Then suddenly, a stool crashed into the side of his head, sending him tumbling to the floor, cutting off Harley's screams.
She sucked in a shuddering breath, blinking past the tears as she realized that standing there, holding the stool with his eyes wide, was Ed.
A/N: DEEP BREATHS, PEOPLE! Deep breaths! It's all going to be okay! Ed is here...!
Full disclosure, next week is an emotional clusterfuck as they race to save the Joker's life, but it's less disturbing... just possibly more upsetting. It'll be okay!
And hey, we got a trope! Roman shares his evil plan like a Bond villain! That's pretty funny right?
And Dinah getting Martha Wayne's pearls — soooooo tropey.
And the fake wedding rings! It's fluffy trope city! It literally makes me cringe, but screw it.
And how about that reveal that Samantha was Circe... oooh, boy.
On a more serious note, I am hyper aware that going down a "Roman uses his mother's suicide as a footnote to kill the Joker in a deeply personal way as a first step toward brainwashing Harlry" is very very dark. We explore some dark spaces in this series, but they rarely fall into the category of "triggering" like this might. I hope anyone feeling vulnerable or sad will come talk to me/us on tumblr or in the comments below!
This is the end of the dark, angsty part 1. It's not 100% smooth sailing from here on out but there are plenty of buddy-adventure-bickering, J's POV, sex (sex from J's POV!), and lolz (and shopping!) to come. But yeah, things will have to get worse before they get better, especially Harley's shaken confidence—which she will get back tenfold, and become the most badass version of herself we've seen yet.
I get a LOT of asks about Harley and the Joker dying, and how they would each react to that. This and the next chapter should suitably answer at least some of your questions.
Next: Part 2 - Flame
Please review (wince) C'mon lurkers, I'm talking to you too—let it all out, my loves xo