"Jinkies!" exclaimed the Joker suddenly, as the Arkham inmates crept along the deserted corridor, making everyone jump.
"Shut up, J!" snapped Ivy.
"Just trying to lighten the tension," said Joker, shrugging. "I'm the Joker – that's kinda what I do, as the comic relief character."
"No, what you do is annoy everyone constantly," retorted Ivy.
"But if you're annoyed, you're not scared," said Joker, smugly.
"Technically fear is a state that can co-exist with many other types of emotions," spoke up Crane. "In fact, many people go through their entire lives completely ruled by fear as a predominant driver for their actions…"
"Shut up, Johnny!" snapped Ivy. "Nobody wants to hear your PhD thesis right now, or ever!"
"Have you considered for one moment that the key to figuring out this mystery might be some basic understanding of human psychology?" demanded Crane. "If this stalker is the man who accidentally murdered his wife, and if we want to catch him, we have to think like him."
"So what, you want me to murder Harley accidentally?" asked Joker.
"Of course not!" snapped Crane. "You can think like people without imitating their actions – that's the whole point of psychiatry!"
"Yeah, I never understood that part," spoke up Harley. "If you really want to understand Mr. J, you gotta do your best to emulate him. Of course nobody will ever be as great as him, but a gal can try her best. And it's the only way I'll get any insight into his brilliant mind, by being around it constantly and trying to imitate it."
"Well, Harley was always more dedicated to everything than is healthy," muttered Crane. "Nobody could ever accuse her of under-doing things."
"Look, I know you and Harley still have faith in the ideals behind psychiatry – that people have reasons for the things they do," said Joker. "But you should have realized by now that reasons don't explain crazy actions. Random stuff just happens, like that guy accidentally murdering his wife. It wasn't a conscious decision, just an unfortunate accident. That's life, one unfortunate accident after another. It doesn't mean anything – it's just the way things are. On the other hand, if we are in a slasher movie, or an episode of Scooby-Doo, the guy in the mask has to have some backstory that explains his actions, and that backstory has to make sense. That's the difference between fiction and reality, you see."
"Yeah, you totally know the difference between fiction and reality," said Ivy, rolling her eyes.
"They're not so dissimilar sometimes," spoke up Tetch. "And it can be very difficult to tell one from the other. Are we real or fictional? Are we the dreamer, or the figure within the dream…"
"Shut up, Jervis!" snapped Ivy.
"Shut up, everyone!" demanded Two-Face. "We're meant to be trying to find a maniac, and he's not going to be dumb enough to just wait around to be found if he hears us coming!"
"So where are you thinking, Harv?" asked Joker, as they left the cell block. "Left is offices – right is maintenance corridor."
"Let's ask the coin," said Two-Face, taking it out.
"Or we could just go down the maintenance corridor, since it makes more sense," interrupted Ivy. "The doctors would presumably have noticed an intruder in their offices, but Johnny said he hid a supply of fear gas in the basement for a year. So that's a better hiding place for a maniac."
"You're assuming the stalker is reasonable and logical," argued Two-Face. "Which he might not be. Maybe he killed a doctor and he's hiding out in their office with the undiscovered body. Or maybe he's wearing their face under his hood, and he's posing as the dead doctor in order to move around the asylum unnoticed."
"You think he wanted to cut off our faces and wear them?" asked Harley, nervously. "You think that's what he wanted to do with that knife?"
"Why would that freak you out, Harl?" asked Ivy. "Cutting off faces and wearing them sounds like the kinda thing your boyfriend might do."
"Like hell," retorted Joker. "My face is too beautiful to cover it with anyone else's. And why the hell would I cut off my own face? That's just ridiculous. Anyway, you don't go from accidentally murdering your wife to cutting off faces and wearing them within a year," he added, rolling his eyes. "Honestly, Harvey, get real!"
"Well, this all seems a little surreal to me!" snapped Two-Face. "We're the most dangerous people in Gotham, and we've been spooked by some maniac in a hood who's threatening us! How dare anyone threaten us of all people?! The guy's gotta be totally cracked!"
"He doesn't scare me – I don't fear men," snapped Ivy. "But he will pay for threatening me."
"Ok, so why don't you lead the way, Pammie?" asked Joker with a smile. "If you're not scared of men."
"Fine," snapped Ivy, shoving Two-Face aside and heading down the maintenance corridor. "He'd better watch out, because I'm prepared for him this time. Let's see how he copes when he can't just sneak up on vulnerable women! I'll beat the crap outta him and have him cowering like a little girl!"
"Pammie, surely you need a different metaphor than that!" chuckled Joker. "It's not very feminist of you to use little girl as an insult!"
"Shut up, J!" she snapped. "I want to sneak up on this guy like he tried to sneak up on me, and I can't do that with you babbling!"
The maintenance corridor was a long, dark, gloomy hallway, full of shadows and strange sounds. The steady drip of water from a leaky pipe echoed in the vast, empty space, along with the footsteps of the inmates, their ears strained for any sound out of the ordinary.
"Jesus Christ!" shouted Harley, as a pipe suddenly began to hiss. She leaped onto the Joker's back, knocking the breath from his body, and hugged him around the neck in a death-grip.
"It's just…the boiler…you dizzy dame!" gasped Joker, trying to prise her off him. "Let go of me!"
"See? Harvey's right. This maniac has got us all terrified, which is insane," said Crane. "He should be afraid of us if anything."
"Don't say 'all' when you mean Harley!" gasped Joker, still struggling to free himself from Harley's grip. "I know you're trying to make her feel less alone, but she's the only one freaking out over this guy! I think the whole thing's a great gag, and I'm not afraid in the slightest!"
"Joker, don't move!" exclaimed Tetch suddenly.
"Oh my God, what is it?!" shrieked Harley, who was still clinging to Joker. "He's behind us, isn't he?!"
"God, I hope so - he could lend a hand at getting you off!" shouted Joker. As he struggled to push Harley off him, he suddenly slipped, causing both him and Harley to crash to the ground.
"That's why I didn't want you to move - there was a puddle of water beneath your feet," said Tetch, as Joker slowly got up, glaring at Harley. "It was a slipping hazard. Someone should really put up one of those wet floor signs to prevent such accidents in the future."
"That's not a puddle - they're footprints," said Ivy, kneeling down to examine them. "They've got to be the stalker's. They're wet from when the creep surprised me in the shower. These should lead us to him," she continued, following them as they led down the hall. They stopped at a grate mounted on the wall, just big enough for a person to crawl through.
Ivy tried to peer into the grate, but it was pitch black inside. "Guess we're going in after him," she said. She grabbed the bars and began to push against them, but they didn't budge.
"Women are weak – out of the way," announced Joker, shoving her aside and seizing the bars himself. He proved no more successful at removing them than Ivy.
"Go on, J, tear them off, since you're not a weak woman," said Ivy, mockingly.
"I'm going to tear them off, and then beat you with them," muttered Joker.
"Why don't you let me try?" asked Tetch, approaching them.
"You think you're stronger than me, runt?" demanded Joker, rounding on him.
"No," said Tetch, reaching out and grabbing the bars…and then pulling them off with one hand. "I just noticed that it was a pull door rather than a push door," Tetch finished.
"That's a fire hazard," commented Joker. "First the wet floor with no sign and now this - this asylum really is a death trap," he sighed. "Harley, after you," he said, gesturing to the dark tunnel looming before them.
"Nah uh, no way!" said Harley, backing away and shaking her head vehemently.
"Come on, pooh, the only way to overcome your fears is to face them," said Joker, seizing her and trying to shove her in.
"Joker, let go of her!" snapped Ivy. "I'll go in first! Does anyone have a light?"
"Right here," said Two-Face, flicking on his cigarette lighter. Ivy took it, took a deep breath, and then crawled her way into the dark tunnel before her, trying not to think about rats. Everyone followed slowly after her.
It was impossible to see much further than a few inches in front of her face, and Ivy could hear nothing but the slow drip of water surrounding her and the echo of her movements on the metal. She let out a scream as she suddenly dropped out of the vent into a large, dank, windowless room.
"You ok, Red?" called Harley nervously.
"I think so," said Ivy, picking herself up and looking around. The room was decorated in mildewed scraps of paper and photographs, slowly rotting in the damp. And Ivy was startled to see that the photos were of the Arkham inmates.
"This guy's really sick," she whispered, holding up the light to see the candid photos taken with a hidden camera of the inmates going about their daily lives. "And he's clearly been planning this attack for a long time, maybe since last year," she murmured, recognizing the changes in the asylum over the seasons. She was horrified to see writing scribbled over some of their faces, smeared in what she hoped was red ink: Degenerates, Criminals, Must Be Destroyed, Must Be Punished, Face Justice, Exterminate.
"I would say it's a Dalek, but his vocabulary is too good," commented Tetch, as the rest of the inmates joined her in the room.
"It's not whatever that is," murmured Crane. "It's something much worse. Someone who's not afraid of a bunch of criminal lunatics, whose fear is overridden by his hatred. And there's only one kind of person who lives without fear."
"Which is?" asked Tetch.
"A lunatic," replied Crane with a small smile. "Perhaps we created another a year ago on the bridge, by letting him get away with his crime. Perhaps the guilt drove him mad, and he holds us personally responsible for his madness."
"That's a nice theory, Professor, and we can ask him to confirm it when we find him," said Joker. "But while I see a lotta junk, I don't see him in here."
There was a sudden noise close to them. "That's…that's not the boiler, is it, Mr. J?" stammered Harley.
Nobody replied, but in the silence they heard the sound of breathing in the darkness next to them. Then they heard the clanging sound of someone entering the vent.
"After him!" shouted Crane, as Joker leapt back into the vent, seeing a dark shape up ahead of him. He was gaining on him when the tunnel suddenly ended and Joker tumbled back out onto the floor of the asylum. He heard guns cocked and pointed at him, and looked up to see the Arkham guards surrounding him.
"Well, this takes me back," he commented.
"Joker, what were you doing in there?" demanded Dr. Leland, motioning for the guards to stand down.
"We found the freak's hideout," said Joker, looking around. "Where did he go? He came out just ahead of me."
"Nobody came out of there except you," replied Dr. Leland. "The guards were searching this corridor when they heard a banging sound, and then you appeared."
"No, you must have just missed him," insisted Joker. "Or there must be another way out of those vents. He knows the layout of the asylum. Pammie's right – he must have been planning this since last year to be so familiar with Arkham…"
"Did you catch him, Joker?" asked Tetch, following him out of the vent with the rest of the inmates.
"No, he got away," said Joker. "Thanks to these loser guards. Couldn't catch a virus in a pandemic. Topical joke!" he added, brightening instantly.
"We need to catch him – he's obviously very unhinged," said Crane. "You should see what he's done in there."
"I'm sure I don't want to," retorted Dr. Leland. "Anyway, I thought I told you all to stay in the Rec Room while we searched the asylum."
"We didn't trust the guards to be able to find the maniac," said Two-Face. "I mean, they're so bad at finding us most of the time that they don't stand a chance with anyone new. And considering they probably wouldn't have searched these vents if we hadn't appeared out of 'em, I think our doubts were justified. Besides, the guy attacked Pammie in the shower so we figured we couldn't wait."
"Yes, Ivy would have been cross…" began Crane.
"What did you say?" interrupted Tetch suddenly.
"Um…Ivy would have been cross?" repeated Crane.
"Been cross," repeated Tetch, shutting his eyes. "Been cross. That's it!" he exclaimed, opening his eyes and snapping his fingers. "That was the name! The name of the man who accidentally murdered his wife this time last year! Ben Cross!"