Author's Notes: To anyone who's curious about the special item in this chapter, you can refer back to chapter fifteen of Clockwork.
Chapter Six
Taylor jolted awake to the sound of a gunshot, not sure if she'd imagined the noise. Her head was swimming.
She took a few slow, deep breaths—in and out, in and out—and tried not to let her panic sweep her into another panic attack. She'd passed out after they'd put the bag over her heard, oblivious to anything that'd happened after that.
She studied her surrounding as dread settled like a deadweight in her gut, carving itself a permanent home there. She'd thought it had been a dream, all of it. She'd half expected to wake up to find herself in her own bed, like none of this had happened.
Instead, she was sprawled on some dusty hardwood in a bare-boned room. It was stifling hot, and when she inclined her heads towards the boarded window behind her, she noticed the strands of sunlight poking through, a stark contrast to the bitter cold rain she'd experienced that morning.
She must've been out for hours. She wondered what time it was, where everyone was, if Austin had tried to reach her and if he was concerned that he hadn't heard from her yet.
She groaned as she slowly got to her feet, her vision turning, like she'd just stepped off one of those fast, spinning rides at the carnival, and the world had yet to right itself. She reached out to the window to regain her balance, steadying herself until her vision cleared. When it did, she immediately scanned the room for exits. There was a closet, a bathroom, and the main door. The rest of the room was completely bare.
I have to get out of here.
Her arm—still throbbing from the fall—was a dull ache compared to what she'd felt earlier. But there was no time to dwell on pain now. The clock was ticking. She tried all the doors. Closet, empty. Bathroom, dead end, no windows. The main door locked, as she had suspected.
She turned to the window, where it had been haphazardly boarded over with misshapen boards and rusted nails. Warm beams of sunlight filtered through the cracks, piercing through the burgeoning twilight that had begun to descend upon the room, illuminating the dust particles that hung suspended in the air. She thought maybe, had the situation been any different, the yellow sunbeams might actually have been very pretty.
She tugged on a few boards, prying at them with all of her strength, but none of them would budge. By the time she had given up, she was exhausted, sweating, and on the verge of tears.
She groaned as she sunk to the floor, covering her face with her hands in a feeble attempt to stop the tears she knew would come. She wondered what Austin was doing, if he was having a good time with his friends, if he was safe and okay. God, she'd do anything just to hear his voice. She could hardly bear to imagine the thoughts that'd tear through his mind when he returned from his trip. He'd see the shredded leftovers of the house, the disarray those men had left behind, he'd scream for her, search the whole house, looking for clues, panicked… and then what? He'd call the police, contact the hospital to see when the last time she'd checked in was, maybe start a search party... would they ever find her? Would they ever uncover the web she'd gotten so inexplicably tangled in? Was that even a possibility, or would she be lost forever, just another missing person tucked away in a filing cabinet? Closed case, dead end. It'd drive Austin mad not to know what had become of her, just like it made Taylor sick to her stomach not to know what had become of Terrence. There wasn't a day that went by that she did not think of him, that she did not ask for a sign, anything to indicate that at least he was alive, that he was out there somewhere in the world, living his life.
She put a hand over her mouth to hide her sob. She would never see Austin again. She'd never again get to tell him how much she loved him, how he was her best friend, her biggest supporter. Her great love. She did believe in soulmates—the two of them were proof they did exist.
And her father, devastated beyond repair. He'd lost his wife, his son, and now he would lose his only daughter, the last remaining piece of their family he had left. He would shut down completely without her, waste away into nothing. He might even kill himself. It was a wonder he hadn't overdosed already, and she knew the only reason he hadn't was because of her, because she was the only thing he had in his life that hadn't abandoned him. It suddenly dawned on her now why he watched TV so much, why he felt so drawn to the characters he watched, probably the closest things to friends, family, that he'd felt in a long time, the only thing that made him feel something other than the sharp sting of despair for once. They were always there for him, even when she and everyone else he loved couldn't be.
The tears were flowing full force now, and she hated herself for them. She wanted to scream at herself for being so weak, for letting hopelessness overrule every other rational thought, for giving up so easily. This was not the end. It did not have to finish this way. She had gotten herself this far—whoever this 'boss' was, maybe she could reason with him, could bargain for her life. She could still save herself. She had the missing link they needed, after all. That had to mean something.
She wiped away her tears with the back of her hand and reached for the crumpled piece of paper in her back pocket, unfolding it to reveal the cipher. Without any clues yet of how to decode it, or having any ideas of what it even meant, whatever this cipher was hiding, she knew it was important. Her key to freedom.
Her hands shook as she carefully spread it out along the floor, smoothing it down as her eyes raked over those unfamiliar symbols, memorizing every curve, every detail and shape of those strange markings. Seven symbols in total. She burned them into her memory, all the while listening for noises outside the door, for a sign that someone was coming—but it was quiet, and soon the sun was setting behind her, igniting the room in a warm, orange glow. She was accompanied by the constant, pleasant hum of cicadas in the woods, a sound she was unused to hearing in the suburbs.
But the serenity—however tense it was as she waited, waited, waited—could not last forever. When she heard footsteps approaching, she thought at first she had imagined then.
She held her breath to listen, every nerve in her body going rigid. She willed her heart to slow, to stop pounding in her ears so she could hear.
Someone was coming.
She licked her lips and drank in those symbols one last time. She'd had time to memorize them, down to every last detail, and she felt sure of her next decision, that it was the right thing to do.
She shredded it, scattering the remains as best she could, scooping up handfuls of the remains to squeeze them between the boards covering the windows, where they went fluttering to the ground below.
God, please.
The door burst open and she spun to face the intruder, her breath catching in her throat. The door hit the wall and ricocheted back, momentarily shielding the man until the door swung slowly open once more. She could hardly believe what she was seeing.
The purple suit was unmistakable.
The clown masks—suddenly it all made sense.
When he came into view, when the monster slowly, slowly took a step into the room—the door swinging wider with an eerie creak—Taylor felt as if the wind had been knocked out of her, like she'd been laid out, a hard punch to the stomach, flat on her back. Her mouth opened in a silent gasp. She unconsciously took a step backwards, fumbling, nearly tripping over her own feet.
All she could think was how tall he was. She never would have imagined him to be this way, towering, with broad, thick shoulders, long torso and legs. She'd only ever seen footage of him on the news and pictures in the paper—but those were grainy, at best, and never had he been captured in full view.
Her mind raced as she tried to process him; He was the boss they'd referred to earlier. What could he possibly want with the cipher? Was this all some kind of joke? What did he have to do with Bishop, with the Scarecrow? She couldn't see the connection.
She felt star struck as she stared at him—and she knew she was staring. She could not take her eyes off him. He'd always been somewhat of a celebrity to her—to all of Gotham—in that she'd never dreamed she would meet him. You read about the horrible things he did, saw the aftermath of his destruction on the nightly news, but still you somehow always thought, "Thank God I wasn't there" or, "Thank God that wasn't me"; that wasn't my family, my workplace, my part of town. There was always some sense of detachment, even as the sheer horror of what'd he done sunk its sharp hooks inside you, grabbing hold, tearing you up, leaving mountains of scar tissue in its wake until the next sharp hook came along.
Yet he was here standing before her, precious space—mere feet—the only thing that separated them now.
The sheer realness of him was overwhelming. He wasn't just some scary, made-up character the media had put together to boost their ratings, he wasn't just some caricature for the press to mock, some fear-mongering tool for the government to use at their disposal to keep the masses in check, no. He was more than just some media staple to swing political votes or to stir up controversy about Batman. He was a man—a man who terrorized Gotham and loved it, who'd killed thousands of innocent people and didn't bat an eye, who loved what he did and did it without purpose, without reason, because it was funny. Because he could, and no could stop him.
Her eyes widened when he stepped into the room, suddenly drawn to the long-stemmed ax in his hand. She could smell the sharp tang of copper even before he entered. The orange stripes of sunlight from behind her caught the gleaming of blood on the metal blade. It was fresh.
She let out a stuttering breath, palms sweating, chest heaving, her adrenaline kicking into gear. She'd never been more terrified in her life, and he stood there like he knew that, like he drew power from it. He was going to kill her. There was nowhere for her to run. She was going to die.
Taylor had to brace herself against the window to keep from collapsing.
It was all too surreal. He was too surreal.
His trademark suit was a brilliant flash of purple, faded around the knees, mud-caked and dirtied along the edges, along the hem, so long it nearly touched the floor. Her eyes started at ground level and slowly worked their way up—taking notice of the silver chain that hung from his hip and disappeared inside the pocket of his pants—the dark green vest, the patterned tie, the collared shirt, that pale throat, up, up, up.
She swallowed, finally looking at his face. The scars on either side of his mouth, large, jagged, pictures never having done them justice. In real life they bulged, all that swollen scar tissue, a stitch job gone wrong. Maybe that was the point. Maybe he did it himself. Maybe that was how he wanted them. Tight and strained, looking like it hurt simply to smile, the blood-red greasepaint only enhancing their deformity.
His face and ears were slathered in dirty white greasepaint, the paint cutting off under his jaw, leaving a sliver of pale neck exposed.
All that white though, and the red puckered scars, they were nothing compared to the fathomless black pits that were the Joker's eyes. They terrified her, seeing those dark eyes shifting back and forth, looking at her—studying her. She felt so laid bare beneath his gaze she was nearly breathless, and all he'd done was look at her. She felt as if he could see right through her. It was hard to remind herself that he was just a man, just a man beneath all that greasepaint, not a monster.
Perhaps he was both.
And then, suddenly, he moved, crossing the room in three simple strides. Taylor let go of the windowsill at the same time and sprung forward, suddenly torn over whether she wanted to run or remain where she was.
He was just an arms-length away from her. He could have reached out and touched her if he wanted. She let out a shuddering breath as he looked down at her. She stared at his chest, eye-level, terrified to meet his eyes, terrified they would swallow her whole, that he would eat her up, chew up her skin, spit out her bones all over the floor. She tried not to tremble but she couldn't help it, she shook like she was cold, even as the scorching heat of the room made sweat drip down her back, had dampened her hairline.
When he leaned in close, she stayed stock still, not moving, hardly daring to breathe. Her nose and throat were filled with the taste of gasoline and sweat and something else, like smoke from a bonfire. Her head spun. She felt his warm breath on her face, the heat emanating from his body, hot like a furnace, swore she could hear his pulse, slow, measured, calm, nothing like her own.
She whimpered when he shifted forward, moving so that his mouth hung near the shell of her ear. The inside lining his jacket brushed her arm—smooth, cool silk. She closed her eyes.
"Give me one reason why I shouldn't kill you," he whispered. "Try me."
Taylor swallowed, letting out another shallow breath in an attempt to calm her rapidly beating heart. She wanted to pass out. She wanted to crumble to the floor, to melt, disintegrate, seep into those floorboards until she was nothing. She could no longer hold herself up, especially now that her weight wasn't being supported by the window sill. She reached behind her with shaking hands, needing support for her weak limbs. She took a step back, and he followed her.
She gripped the windowsill desperately, felt those warm rays from the sun heating her up, setting her blood on fire, dancing along her back as the sunlight poked and prodded through the thick foliage of trees. Dust particles clung to the back of the air, suspended, almost looking like snowflakes. The humidity so thick you could have cut it. She finally dared to look up, to meet his heavy gaze.
"I'm wait-ing," he said.
She licked her lips, wetting her dry mouth, gathering all of her courage. "I have the cipher," she said, voice shaking. "I know it. That's what you want, isn't it?"
The Joker exhaled through his nose, a small, thin smile lifting the corners of his mouth. "What I want," he said, contemplating the phrase. "I want a lot of things."
She shook her head, swallowed back her fear, her doubt. "I'm the only one who knows it," she said, not even knowing if that were actually true.
He smacked his lips in response and cocked his head. "You don't know what's it for, do you? What it does. That doesn't exactly… put you in a position of power over me." He moved closer, backing her further into the window. He didn't touch her.
"I just want to go home," she whispered. She stared into his eyes, pleading. "Please, if I give you the cipher—"
"I'm afraid I can't let you do that." He shifted his weight to his other foot. She heard the ax hit the floor with a thump when he let the handle slip out of his hand some, and it startled her. She forgot he was holding. "You see, you know too much and you've become a bit of a liability," he said, his voice high and nasal as he feigned sympathy. His brows drew together as if he were sorry that he could not control the outcome of the situation.
"Please!" she cried, her voice cracking. "I don't want anything to do with this, this is all a mistake!" Her heart slammed so fast that it hurt.
"Oh, oh, sweetheart," he crooned, his mangled lips forming an exaggerated frown. He stepped closer, the front of his thighs pressing hers. She could feel all the muscles there. He lowered his face towards hers so they were eye level. "Don't cry. Crying never solved anything," he mock-soothed.
She wanted to scream. She wanted to push him away. To run. Instead, her eyes lowered to his waist, suddenly catching the gleam of handgun, a Beretta, maybe. Not that it mattered. She sucked in a nervous breath, squeezing her eyes shut briefly to fight back the tears. "Please, please don't shoot me."
The Joker tsked, leaning back, as if he were suddenly disappointed. "If there's one thing you should know about me," he began, then stopped when Taylor's eyes became so heavy with tears she could no longer look at him. "No, no," he warned, gripping her chin with a gloved hand. "Look at me." He jerked her towards him so she had no choice but to stare into his eyes. "If there's one thing you should know about me," he started again, "it's that when I kill you… it won't be with a gun."
Taylor's eyes widened at his words, and he smiled, like that was funny.
She bolted—or at least tried to.
The Joker anticipated her move, his hand snapping forward, those long gloved fingers wrapping around her neck, smiling as he did. He lifted her up and threw her throwing her into the boarded window with enough impact to leave her gasping for air, landing on the hard floor in a tangle of her own limbs.
She didn't have time to right herself before she felt the sharp blade of the ax on her back, forcing her down into the floor. She didn't move a muscle. The room was quiet save for her struggled breathing.
"Let me tell you how this is going to work," he said, standing directly over her as he admired her obedience, the power of wielding fear. "You're going to give me the cipher. And then I'm going to kill you, niiiice and quick, because I'm feeling generous today. How does that sound?"
Taylor whimpered, digging her nails into the floor. "Please," she begged, past the point of dignity long ago. "I won't tell anybody, I promise I won't," she choked. Tears stung the back of her eyes.
"I'm get-ting im-patient," he replied through gritted teeth.
She cried in earnest now, shaking her head. "I won't, I won't do it."
She kept thinking if she could just hold out, that he would change his mind, he would have to. He knew it was the only bargaining tool she had. She could not give that up so easily.
She waited with bated breath. The Joker was silent.
After a moment, he heaved a sigh.
"Then I'm going to kill you." She watched him twirl the ax once, twice, before he raised it over his head, and Taylor screamed, just barely rolling away before it came crashing down right beside her head, burying itself into the hardwood.
The Joker growled at having missed his target, and Taylor was sobbing as she scrambled to her feet, begging for him to stop.
"Don't, please just—wait!"
But there was no stopping him.
She knew had to get to the door, but he was purposefully blocking her exit.
"Come hereeee, sweetheart." The ax dangled from his hand, the other hung at his side, balled into a tight fist. "Daddy won't bite."
She shook her head, and when he poised the ax over his head and threw it at her, she screamed, managing to dodge it, but just barely.
The ax embedded itself into the wall behind her, and Taylor met the Joker's feral gaze just as he lunged at her, knocking them both to the ground.
She fought him with everything she had, breathing hard as they both struggled for dominance. She tried to shove him off, but the resistance she met was made of pure muscle and steel. She managed a kick to his jaw, and the Joker hissed, seizing her wrists and pinning them to the floor. He straddled her legs next, immobilizing them with his weight.
Pinned on her back with the Joker above her, she knew she had lost. She choked on a sob as she watched the Joker reach inside his suit to reveal a serrated switchblade. They were both breathless as she stared at him, wild-eyed, panting, thinking, this is it. She bravely met his gaze as he leaned over her, making himself comfortable. The intimacy of the situation was not lost on her, and she stiffened as the Joker offered her a mouthy grin.
"Mm," he shifted a bit until he was comfortable. "That's it."
His rancid breath wafted across her face as he leaned in close.
"You know," he said, sliding his tongue out over blood-red lips, quick, snake-like, "I am a gentleman." He dropped his face low over hers. Their noses touched. "I'll make it good for you," he breathed.
Taylor shouted, screaming at him for him to let her go. She arched off the floor to allow herself more leverage, to try one last time to throw him off, but he merely ground his hips down into hers, and she cried, because it'd hurt, and because he'd enjoyed that. And she hated how he was practically thrumming with all his excitement, wired up like an electrical box, ready to explode.
She'd once heard that, in your last moments, you saw your life flash before your eyes.
But that wasn't true. In your last moments, you saw the life you missed out on flash before your eyes. You saw the children you would never have, the anniversaries you and your husband would never share, all the lines and the wrinkles and the wisdom of old age you'd never get to receive.
She closed her eyes, breathing hard, waited for that cool sharpness to slice her neck, hoped it would be quick, hoped she wouldn't feel anything….
But it never came. The Joker had stilled above her.
When she cracked open her eyes, she realized he was staring at her neck.
She looked down at her chest, confused, and then looked up into his eyes just as he returned her gaze, staring down at her. She was almost startled to find that he looked confused and almost... hurt? Why would he... ?
He grabbed the chain around her neck and pulled it until it was taut.
His brows drew together as he met her gaze once more, his voice lower than she'd ever heard it before.
"Where did you get that?"
Taylor didn't know what to say. She openly trembled beneath his gaze, a fresh sheen of sweat breaking out across her forehead. She was still reeling from the fact that she was not dead, her blood was not spilling out all over the floor, that he had asked her a question. Why would he ask that?
"I sai-d," he repeated through gritted teeth, "where. Did. You. Get. That?"
Taylor swallowed. She shook her head. Despite the stifling heat of the room, the hairs on her arm were standing on end. "I—I don't know," she gasped between breaths. She swallowed again, fighting back tears. "I've had it since I was a child…."
She studied his face, looking for signs, for any sort of clue, hoping her answer would somehow appease him.
His expression, however, revealed nothing. His mouth was pulled into a thin, tight line, his eyes glazed over, dark, like he was looking through her somehow instead of at her. With her heart pounding wildly, her ears ringing in the pervading silence, he relinquished her necklace, where it fell back against her neck without a sound.
She watched as the Joker bowed his head, watched him shut his eyes. His palms were now splayed flat out on the floor on either side of her shoulders, freeing her hands. She kept as still as a board, didn't dare move.
"You don't… remember," he said. He didn't open his eyes until after he'd spoken, and the gaze he fixed her with when he did sent every nerve in Taylor's body on fire. She felt like she'd been electrocuted.
She realized she couldn't reply, couldn't even move. She was paralyzed by the depth of his stare. Didn't remember what? What the hell was he talking about?
When she managed to shake her head in response, just the slightest gesture, he breathed out hard through his nose, as if he couldn't believe it, as if that information had just throttled him to his core. He straightened and leaned back, his thighs still tight around her waist on either side of her, his eyes still fixed on her, so intent, burning holes like that was all he knew how to do with them, and for the first time Taylor realized he looked completely beside himself. His whole demeanor had changed in a matter of seconds. He looked broken all the sudden, like his chest had deflated and there was no breath in his lungs. The danger in his eyes was gone.
He looked human.
She watched him close his eyes, and she would have missed the way his lashes pressed tight against his cheeks had it not been for the sun that had cast the window aglow in a burst of orange and yellow beside him. The fiery light highlighted all the crevices and lines of his face, and the green in his hair shone with an almost metallic gleam. All those dust particles hanging in the air around them now, almost like snow, the lightest dusting of it, just suspended there around them in all that heady silence. She dared to breath, and for a bizarre moment wondered what he looked like with all the makeup stripped off, with normal-colored hair and street clothes—but she couldn't picture it.
She held her breath as she waited for him to do something, to say something. What did her necklace have to do with all this? She didn't understand. Was there something he knew about it that she didn't? Did it somehow look familiar to him?
When his lids opened, slowly, revealing a black set of eyes fixed directly on hers, she could do nothing but stare back, wondering what was going through his head, what was he thinking. She startled when he leaned over her, caved towards her until their chests were pressed together, until his abdomen was pressed solidly against hers. The heat emanating from his body was feverish. She gasped, twisting beneath him, but he held her fast, and she didn't dare move after that, keeping her hands above her head, immobile. She wasn't sure if the heart thudding between them belonged to him or her, or perhaps it was both of theirs combined. She heard his knife clatter to the floor somewhere near her head, making her jump, and suddenly he was lowering his face to her neck. His gloved hands in her hair, gripping her scalp not roughly but with desperation, like he needed to draw her in to himself, draw her closer. When she swallowed, he chased the movement of her throat, pressing his face against it, nudging her neck with his nose. Felt his eyelashes against her jaw, soft as the bristles of a paintbrush, felt his hot exhales of breath along the column of her throat, felt his hips shift against her.
Then, he laughed.
It started quietly at first, but it slowly built in tempo and pitch, rising until he was wheezing for breath against her neck and collarbones, laughing into her hair, gripping it between leather gloves until her scalp burned and her mouth opened in silent protest.
"You," he wheezed between fits of laughter, "you… you're scared of me." He drew back to smile at her, and Taylor could only stare back at him in confusion. Of course she was scared of him. Wasn't everyone? Was there not a soul in Gotham who didn't cower upon mention at his name, who wasn't scared shitless when his face appeared on TV, at the sound of an explosion in the distance, thinking, this could be it, he's back?
Of course what she couldn't understand then, what the Joker found so amusing was that she—the little girl who had once clung so desperately to him, who had once begged and screamed for him to save her—was now trapped beneath him, and was trembling like a leaf, terrified for her life—and rightly so.
Even funnier, even more hilarious than all that, though, was that she didn't remember him at all. Nothing. Not the greasepaint, not the suit, not his smile. The little fucks had brainwashed her with therapy and psychiatrists and repression and pills. They'd made her forget him. He could see it all now. They'd made her erase him from her memory, as if he had never been there. He was nothing but a mere shadow of a ghost now, a fragmented piece of a puzzle she once knew.
The Joker clenched his teeth with a low growl and suddenly removed himself, rising to his full height and towering above her.
She let out the bottled-up breath she hadn't known she was holding, staring up at him, heart thudding, wondering what he would do next. She knew something had changed, the air shifting, crackling, alive with something now, some unidentifiable spark.
She was surprised when he began to pace, his head bowed low, back and forth across the short span of room, muttering to himself, something unintelligible she couldn't hear. She watched his fists clench and unclench at his sides. A squeak of leather from his gloves.
She lowered her arms slowly, so as not to draw alarm, and eyed the open door, the hallway—empty. Did she dare? Could she really hope to outrun the Joker? And not just him, but the men in clown masks downstairs, she'd seen at least seven of them, if not more. Was it worth it test fate when the Joker had just spared her life? Would she only succeed in angering him further? Or would it be stupid not to try at all?
Her eyes drew back to him of their own volition when his pacing changed course, and suddenly he was standing in front of the wall where the ax had been embedded, when he'd thrown it at her. Her breath caught in her throat as she watched him stare at it, as if considering it, perhaps realizing he had made a mistake in not killing her.
He turned to look at her.
"Get up," he snapped.
She was still reeling from the turn of events, from whatever gotten in that head of his and shaken it up so much, but she didn't need to be told twice. It took her a moment, limbs like Jell-O, like they might give out without her consent, but she did rise, hands trembling at her sides, body tense and rigid, readying itself to fight, to run, whatever was necessary to survive.
"Come here."
He was staring at her, unblinking. She couldn't read his expression. She just wanted to know what he was thinking, but his face revealed nothing.
Around them, the room was beginning to fade, dusk starting to settle. Only a sliver of orange light remained, cutting a shaft of light through the boarded window, across the floor, where it tangled amongst a flurry of dust and cobwebs.
For a split second, she eyed the door again, but then she caught the Joker's gaze, warning her, don't you fucking dare, and she closed her eyes, knowing she couldn't, that he would overpower her, wrap his fingers around her throat and press and squeeze until the air was forced from her lungs and she lay lifeless on the floor.
"Come here or I'll make you," he growled. He just wanted to see if she would, if she'd listen to him like she used to. All those years ago, so obedient, so full of trust.
And she did, trembling the whole way, padding to him slowly, trying to mask her fear, her uncertainty, trying to put on semblance of bravery, and knowing she was failing miserably.
She saw that muscle twitch near his jaw, all tensed up, tight like a cord, ready to snap. It made her instinctively take a step back.
"Ah ah, don't," he warned. "Don't. Move."
He stalked her, moving around her in a tight circle, inspecting every inch of her, once, twice, until he stood in front of her, towering, and she looked up at him, at those eyes, like black liquor. There was something familiar about that darkness, something terrible and sick, like that itchy uneasiness you felt as a kid after watching a scary movie that you weren't supposed to—realizing afterwards that your parents had been right, that you should have heeded their warning. And all that intensity, like he could just burn you with it and you'd stand there and take it, because that was the thing to do. No going back.
And he looked at her in turn, his brows knit together, like she was a curious thing to behold, like she were some strange, foreign creature he'd seen in a dream once, one he hadn't thought about in a while. Looking at her like the way you looked at an old photograph you hadn't seen in a long time, that bittersweet nostalgia that wrapped itself around your insides, curling, twisting, sliding, slow and thick like molasses, making sure every bit of that feeling coated you in its sticky embrace.
She gasped when he reached out and touched her—almost gently, this time, gloves as soft as butter, touching her face, so tenderly, like a lover would. She wanted to pull away but she didn't dare, both enraptured and terrified of that look in his eye, trying to dissect what it meant, whether he was going to let her live or die.
When he took a step closer—so close now she could feel his breath on her face, could see the deep-set lines in all that greasepaint, could see where pale skin was beginning to bleed through—she took a shuddering breath. She thought, for one heart-jerking, bizarre moment, that he was going to kiss her. She watched the way his eyes drifted to her parted mouth and lingered there for too long, for too many loaded seconds, wondering what the hell that meant, what kind of game he was playing at.
And then he was snarling, and his hands were moving up, gripping her skull now in a vice, like he was trying to break it, like he hated her and everything she represented, and it all happened so fast, the way he pulled her head forward only to shove it back, slamming her head against the wall, the impact brutal, knocking her out cold.
She slumped to the floor, and the last thing she remembered was the Joker crouched down in front of her, reaching for the necklace around her throat.
Everything that followed seemed to pass in a strange blur, like she was shrouded in a fog she couldn't escape. She slipped in and out of consciousness, caught the tail-end of sentences from a myriad of different voices, felt herself cushioned against warm, ripped leather, felt her eyelids occasionally flutter open only to catch glimpses of shapes and colors, all whizzing past too quickly for her eyes to try and follow.
She heard the familiar squeak of the front door of her house opening—she'd recognize that sound anywhere. She felt strong arms beneath her thighs, heard banging and men shouting angrily. She felt her shirt pulled over her head and her shorts tugged down her legs. Felt an ice-cold washcloth against her skin. Lastly, she felt the softness of her sheets against her back, and a pillow beneath her head.
Then there was silence.
When she woke some time later, she felt as if she'd slept for days. It took her a long time to gather her bearings. The room was dark, and her body ached like nothing she'd felt before, like she'd been run over with a steamroller. Her sheets clung to her bare legs, slick with sweat. A window was open. A slight breeze was ruffling the floor-length curtains.
Her bedroom. She was in her bedroom. She licked her lips and pushed herself up onto her elbows—her vision swimming, head pounding—and surveyed her surroundings.
Her room was exactly as she had left it, not a thing out of place.
And suddenly her thoughts from the previous night came rushing back to her in a terrible onslaught, and she froze in terror.
Are they still here?
She knew immediately that it hadn't been a dream. As much as she would have liked to of made herself believe that it was, the pain that pulsed throughout her entire body, her pounding head, the ringing in her ears, the explicit stench of… him… it was all too real to have been a dream.
She was breathing hard as she pushed the covers off her legs. She was surprised to find herself half naked, wearing only her underwear and bra, and the realization caused a sliver of fear to shock through her. She paused for a moment, mind racing as she tried to think back to everything that had happened. She couldn't remember taking off her clothes.
She shook as she reached for the nearest set of clothes, not carrying whether or not they were clean.
Her bedroom door was closed, and slowly she crept towards it, pressing her ear against the wood, listening to the silence, waiting and dreading the sound of men's voices, of that sick, mocking laughter she'd grown to hate.
It was a full two minutes before she was satisfied enough to twist the knob, pull open the door.
She padded down the stairs slowly, shocked to find that the house was spotless. There were no traces of the earlier break-in, no traces of a house left overturned, a vain attempt to locate a paper that'd been in her back pocket the entire time. It was as if none of it had ever happened.
And, as Taylor rounded the kitchen counter, she realized that maybe that was the point. Had they somehow gotten the information they were looking for without the cipher? Had they decided to give up on the search all together? And if that were true, why return her in one piece? Why hadn't the Joker killed her? Why had he stopped?
She remembered the way he had touched her necklace, the way he'd looked at her then, for that split second right before the ax was supposed to come down… the way he'd spoken to her, as if… as if he knew her. What had changed all the sudden? He had wanted to kill her, and then he hadn't. She couldn't understand it, couldn't make the pieces fit together.
And further still, what did all this have to do with Bishop, with Crane?
Nothing made sense, and the more she tried to reason it, tried to make some modicum of sense of this tangled web she had gotten herself caught in the middle of, the more her head spun like a wheel, the edges of her vision starting to blur.
She stood in the threshold of the kitchen now, remembering what had occurred there, remembered everything, and she crumbled there, falling to her knees, burying her head in her hands as sobs wracked her body.
Sometime later—when she was slightly more composed—she called Austin.
Then she called the police.
A symphony of police sirens, ambulances, and the static of radio chatter rang in Taylor's ears.
When the SWAT team had arrived, busting through her front door with their guns and masks, Taylor was still kneeling on the floor of the kitchen, shaking as tears streamed down her face.
Two men wearing bullet-proof vests, helmets, and special goggles were kneeling before her. She could hardly see them through her stream of tears.
Moments later, after it was determined that the house was clear of any possible threats, that there were no explosives or other potentially lethal devices, police officers began flooding inside. Angry red and blue lights flashed through the front window. There was an ambulance waiting for her outside.
She was led to the couch in her living room, guided by the gentle hand of a female officer. She appeared to be in her early forties. Her dark, curly brown hair was tied in a neat bun at the nape of her neck, but there were a few stray spirals that had sprung free around her forehead. Behind her, another officer sat down on the couch, a male, younger, with a notepad in hand.
"Mrs. James," the woman began, "I know this is hard for you, but I need you to tell me everything that happened. If the Joker is still nearby we may be able to catch him."
She shook her head, crying. "You won't. You won't catch him." And she'd never believed anything more fervently in her life. He wouldn't be caught unless he wanted to be. Wasn't that obvious? Wasn't that always how it went?
But she told them her story, everything, from start to finish. She told them what little she knew of the paper they were after, the men who'd cut her, the strange location they'd taken her to. It could have been anywhere. It could have been in another state.
And all the while, as she rehashed her entire story back to them, she knew how bizarre it all sounded, how sensational it seemed. She couldn't believe she was alive.
"You're lucky," said the officer, shaking her head. "When the Joker kidnaps someone, they don't usually live to tell the tale."
Taylor swallowed. She knew that was true.
Officers hounded her with questions, wanting to know as much as they could. Other officers and members of the SWAT team searched the neighboring houses and the small woods out back, looking for left-behind traces and clues.
The forensics team arrived to dust the house for fingerprints, and the EMS inspected the purpling bruises around her neck, wanted to take her to the hospital to have a CT scan done of her head to rule out a concussion, but she didn't think she could handle the bright hospital fluorescents the people. She didn't even know if she could stand.
When Ryan's jeep pulled into the driveway, Austin was frantic as he tore open the door and got out. The officers in the driveway attempted to hold him back as he fought to get to the front door.
"Sir, sir," one of them said when he wouldn't stop struggling, "this is a crime scene, we can't let you through."
"That's my wife in there!" he yelled. "That's my wife, I have to see her!"
All those flashing red and blue lights sent Austin back to a time he wished he could forget but never could, would live with him until the day he died, that image of Taylor being carted off into the back of an ambulance, death clinging to her like a bad perfume, wondering, how could she do this? How could she do this to me? Doesn't she know that I love her?
He'd never felt like such a failure. It was the first time he realized that love was not enough. You couldn't love someone's demons away, couldn't wrap them up in a warm cocoon and tell them the world was going to be okay, that things would be fine. It didn't work like that. He knew that better than anyone now.
He managed to break free of the officer's grip, pushing through the front door, chest heaving in his panic. She'd been so vague on the phone, asking him to come home, telling him something had happened but she couldn't explain, that she was calling the police. Some of the worst hours of his life, not knowing what had happened, what was going to happen, if she was going to be alright.
When his eyes landed on her—crumpled on the couch, flanked by three officers—he felt his heart break into fragments so small he didn't know if his heart would ever be the same afterwards. It the second time he had to see Taylor like this—his Taylor, always so strong in his mind, now at the mercy of others to be cared for. It should have been the other way around.
Her eyes were bloodshot and red from crying, and her body—folded in on itself with her shoulders curled in like a protective shield—had never looked so frail, so tiny. Her hair hung tangled and disheveled over her shoulders, and her hands were shaking. Seeing her like this… it was like her suicide attempt all over again. It made his stomach roil, made him want to puke until there was nothing left, until he was empty of this feeling, all those putrid memories. It felt as if all their years of hard work, all those years of trying to rebuild her, of trying to help her fight off the nightmares and memories—it had all come rushing back and he felt so stupid, stupid because he knew you could only force the monsters down so far before they came clawing back up to the surface, fighting this time with a vengeance, with pitchforks and sharper teeth.
He rushed to her side, kneeling next to her in front of the coffee table as he pulled her to him. Fresh tears sprung to her eyes at the sight of him, and she wrapped her arms around his neck with a sob.
"Hey, hey, I'm here. I'm right here." She buried her face into his chest. He wrapped an arm around her waist and with his other hand smoothed down her hair, trying to calm her as she shook.
For a while, no one bothered them. The background was alive and buzzing with noise, the forensics team hard at work as the officers secured the perimeter from curious neighbors and spoke quietly amongst themselves. Outside, Ryan and Matt were speaking to a police officer, trying to garner as much information as they could.
"Taylor," Austin had to swallow to get his throat working again, "Taylor, look at me, who did this to you? What happened?"
She could not answer him. Tears wracked her body and she just shook her head, burying it into his chest. It was too much. He could see that, he could see she couldn't handle it.
He'd never felt so useless in his entire life.
"It's okay, I'm right here for you, I'm right here." He whispered the words to her over and over again, a fervent mantra as she sobbed into his chest. All the while, his mind was racing. He needed to know what had happened, who did this to her.
Behind him, someone cleared their throat, and Austin instinctively craned his neck—still holding Taylor in his arms—to acknowledge the person trying for his attention.
"I deeply apologize to have to interrupt. You're Austin James?" The man addressing him was tall and extremely well-dressed in a three-piece burgundy colored suit. His mere presence was enough to capture the attention of everyone in the room, his posture straight and commanding. He was of mid-age, early forties, if Austin had to guess, with high cheekbones and neatly-combed brown hair that partially fell over his forehead, but was swept aside. He smiled lightly in an attempt to lessen the tension, to put him at ease, but Austin could not return the gesture.
"Who are you?"
"My name is Christopher Shaw, I'm a psychologist and moonlight as a detective for the Gotham Police Department, when I can. It is a pleasure to meet you, though I'm sorry it has to be under such lugubrious circumstances." He paused to let out a small breath, clasping his hands behind his back. "We'd like to take your wife to the station to ask her a few questions, if that'd be alright."
"I don't even know what's happened," Austin confessed, at a loss for words. He didn't want to let Taylor go.
The doctor nodded once, his lips hardly moving when he spoke. "You will soon," he said.
He looked up at the doctor with rising doubt, suddenly feeling angry.
"The last time she spoke to a psychologist, she had to be admitted to a psychiatric ward for a month," he said to the man as he rose. Taylor remained crumpled on the couch, too weary to move.
"Mr. James, I promise you I will not let that happen again, but we must speak to her about what happened. It is of the utmost urgency."
Austin looked at him, and then down at Taylor, looking so crumpled and broken. What other option did they have?
They were separated at the station. He hugged her tight, telling her he'd be right outside when they were done, telling her not to be afraid even though his own fear had his blood on edge, like it'd moved to this impossibly slow crawl while he waited for the mallet to drop.
He tried not to feel hurt that that she kept her head down and would not meet his eyes, taking him right back to her suicide, making him feel all over again like he would never understand, never could understand. They led her away and closed the door.
"Sir?" There was a police officer behind him, the same woman who'd been at the house. "We'd like to ask you a few questions as well."
Austin sighed through his nostrils, knowing he didn't have much of a choice in the matter, but also hoping that they would finally tell him what the hell was going on. He followed her into a nearby room with a single table, three chairs, and a two-way mirror. He felt like a criminal.
"Can I offer you something to drink? Coffee? Water?"
He shook his head. He didn't think he'd be able to stomach water let alone coffee. It was several minutes before a detective entered, a large man with an even larger gut, hanging over his trousers like a full balloon about to burst. He had a sand-colored beard, where threads of silver where beginning to poke through. He entered wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, dusting crumbs from his tie, and holding a cup of Styrofoam coffee, multi-tasking at its finest. He pocketed the food he was chewing to his cheek and reached out a hand to shake Austin's.
"Detective Bullock," he greeted, taking a seat at the table and retrieving a memo he'd tucked in the back of his pants. "Sorry to keep you waiting." He took the pen out from behind his ear.
Austin stared at him. "Can you please tell me what is going on? What happened to my wife?"
"You should probably sit down," the officer said. He'd almost forgotten she was there. She herself was standing, arms bent in what he could only assume was a habitual stance, hands resting atop the many arsenals at her disposal hooked to her belt. She was looking at him with a worn expression, like she'd seen this same scenario more times than she dared count.
He was too electrified to sit. In fact, he could hardly keep still, his hands trembling when he tried to tuck them in the pocket of his pants. He clenched them in fists at his side instead as he turned to the officer and shook his head. "Just tell me what happened."
"Alright," Bullock said. "I won't cut corners. Your wife is claiming to have been kidnapped by the Joker." He paused to gauze Austin's reaction. "You wouldn't happen to be able to tell us anything about that, would you?"
"What?"
Bullock explained everything—very matter-of-fact, with surprisingly very little emotion—everything from the assault, the kidnapping, to her encounter with the Joker, not sparring any of the gory details.
When Bullock finished, he did need to sit down. He blindly reached for the chair in front of him, sinking into it like it was his last hope. For a moment, all he could do was stare off into space, at a loss for words and any other emotions aside from shock, his cognitive brain shutting down completely. To think all that had happened to his beautiful, sweet girl… it made him sick, a sour bile rising in his throat, leaving an acrid taste in his mouth that he forced himself to swallow back down.
"Why? Why… her? I don't understand."
"We're still trying to work out the details and corroborate her story."
He didn't say anything. The officer disappeared momentarily to bring him a cup of water, but he wasn't thirsty. Bullock hounded him with questions, all of which Austin answered truthfully and to the best of his knowledge. Mostly he was still in shock, dazed, like he'd just had the rug ripped out from under him and had landed flat on his back.
When Bullock left, instructing him to wait and promising he'd return soon, it was some time before he was able to put his glasses back on again, power his legs enough to stand. The officer—Gomez, he soon learned when he heard her name garbled over the static of her walkie—was still standing off to the side, but even she left shortly after Bullock, allotting him some privacy for his thoughts.
He couldn't decide if he wanted his glasses on or off. Either way they made his eyes hurt. In the end he removed them, laying them on the table. He rubbed at his eyes, suddenly feeling tired, angry, wanting to sleep, wanting to fight, wanting to hold Taylor, wanting to get away from here, wanting to punch himself for leaving her alone, for letting this happen. He could have prevented this if he had only been there.
But most frustrating of all was why? Why had the Joker done this? What could someone like him possibly want with her? And why… why return her? It did not escape his notice how lucky she was to be alive, to be in one piece—his mind was still reeling from the shock of that alone. But what could he want from her? The Joker hadn't been seen or heard from in years… was this all part of some elaborate scheme to strike terror into the heart of Gotham citizens? It didn't make sense.
It was almost two hours before Bullock returned—Austin almost thought they had forgotten about him—this time with Dr. Shaw in tow. Bullock closed the door behind them, and they both took seats across from him.
"Is she alright?" he asked. He felt like the entire day had been such a whirlwind. He'd barely gotten to see her, to comfort her, at all. It killed him to have to be separated from her when he knew that he needed her, now more than ever.
"She's suffered a lot of emotional and physical trauma," the doctor said, his voice heavy, careful. "That much is certain."
No shit, Austin wanted to say, but he bit his tongue. "Do we have a motive yet? Do we know what he was after? It doesn't make any sense that he'd take her and then just… return her."
"No, it doesn't," the doctor agreed. "In fact, it doesn't make sense at all." It did not escape Austin's notice the glance exchanged between Bullock and Shaw, like two parents wondering how they were going to break some bad news to their belligerent child.
"There are some colleagues of your wife's at Gotham Medical that we will need to speak to, and we're also waiting on forensics of your home." Shaw cleared his throat. "However, we'd like to keep her—both of you—here overnight until all of this is sorted out. We take threats of the Joker here very seriously at the MCU, especially considering the clown's… extended absence, if you will."
There was something Austin did not like about Shaw, the way the doctor spoke to him, maybe, just a touch of condescension, and how calm he was about all this, and perhaps his sympathy, which felt distant and artificial, like he said those things just to assess the reaction he'd get, like he was feeling you up, dissecting you.
Austin also didn't like the furtive glances he was sharing with Bullock, which were not as surreptitious as they both thought. It angered him that there was information they were pointedly withholding from him. It was obvious, and all three of them knew it. There was something about this story he had not yet been told. He still didn't know why the Joker had wanted Taylor, after all. Why her out of the millions of people who inhabited Gotham?
"We'll have an officer escort you to the house to pick up any items you may need, and then you will return here and an officer will escort you both to a hotel just down the street. We'll have officers posted outside for surveillance."
"Is all of this really necessary?" Austin asked.
"For her safety and yours… yes. At least until we have some more answers." Both men were standing. Austin remained seated.
"That's it?"
"Until tomorrow, I'm afraid so. I regret that I cannot tell you more at this time."
Both men waited for Austin to stand, which he did so reluctantly, even as a million other questions hung on the tip of his tongue. He knew they wouldn't answer them, but he'd never been very good at being patient. Waiting was not his style. He was a journalist, after all, he needed today's news yesterday.
He gathered his glasses and took his time putting them on.
"Officer Gomez will accompany you to your home to retrieve any items you may need," Shaw said, nodding to the door where she stood waiting just outside of it.
Austin paused, looking at them, wanting to say more, wanting to ask them to cut the bullshit and tell him exactly what was going on, but the longer he stayed, the longer he prolonged his time away from Taylor. He left without saying anything.
"You gonna wire the room?" Bullock asked.
Dr. Shaw felled him with a sidelong glance, what an idiotic question, he didn't have to say, and exited.
"Guess that's a 'yes' then…."