Vox stared at me, not giving a cocky rebuttal to my statement. It seemed like he was thinking about what to do now that I managed to escape his little trap. Or waiting for me to move so he can catch me off-guard. I stood poised in a defensive stance just in case; the last thing I wanted was to catch one of those scalpels to my eye. So, for a moment, neither of us made a move on the other. Pentious continued to hang where the wires held him silently, too weak after the injuries he suffered earlier.

Not seeing Vox budge, I decided my knife needed an upgrade if I wanted to get this fight over with quickly. So I imagined my gun sitting in my pocket, and I felt it materialize. Now all I had to do was reach for it.

"Gotcha!" Vox exclaimed with a smile, then I heard something detach itself from the wall behind me and start zipping my way. Pulling my hand out of my coat, I reflexively jumped and saw a cable sail below, between my feet. It seems like I wasn't the only one trying to not play fair. The bastard is trying to tie me up again to get a free shot! Fortunately, I'm more nimble than I look. I guess the gun will have to wait.

As soon as I landed I bounded to the side and away from the wire so it couldn't reach me. Seeing me dodge his first attack, Vox's frown returned and he extended both his arms out. Seeing this gesture, I turned around to see more cables shooting out of the walls, more than I could possibly dodge. So, taking the knife, I bent down and slashed a wire that was heading for one of my legs, then I jumped up from that position into a front flip. This allowed me to avoid most of the tangled strands threatening to ensnare me, but there were still a couple coming towards my head, ready to twist around my throat. Before they could reach me, however, I grabbed hold of them with one fist and dragged them down with me to the floor. I then cut these with the knife as well and rendered them useless, as they sadly slunk back into the wall they came from.

That still left the wires I flipped over earlier, and I looked back in time to see them flying towards me, hoping to pin me to the wall. My brow knit in frustration. This wire game was getting ridiculous! I needed to deal with these in a way that'll make Vox quit this pointless endeavor of entrapment. So I looked back at the wall and an idea formed in my head. With a smile, I ran towards it, with the wires closely behind. As soon as I was against the wall I started running up it, using the wires to give myself purchase. Once I was higher than the retreating cords I pushed myself off and imagined a small, lit, Joker bomb as I put my hand inside my jacket. Pulling it out, I flipped and threw it as hard as I could at the wall of cables. As soon as it connected it detonated, destroying that entire portion of the wall-cables so nothing but the bare metal underneath was shown.

I couldn't help but smile at the results, I bet Vox is fuming behind me right now. But my small triumph over cable management was cut short when I landed hard on my behind. "Yow!" I exclaimed, arching my back as I felt a shock go up my spine. "God, Harley made this look effortless. I really should have asked how she did it before she left me. Heh, maybe I'll ask Bats if I ever see him again."

I rubbed my lower back and looked up in thought, "Actually, I was in the middle of something wasn't I? Oh right."

I rolled over to one side to see Vox embed a machete into the ground where I was laying not a moment ago. It looks like he finally decided to go on the offensive. He wasted no time pulling the machete out and started coming at me with it. Swiftly, I rolled backwards and onto my feet, holding my knife up just in time to deflect a wild slash from Vox's blade. He continued his assault, swinging the blade angrily trying to get a cut in. I was forced to remain defensive; he was giving me no breathing room to pull out another weapon or even counter with some attacks of my own. Each swing pushed me back more and more, until we were in the center of the room again. Vox then threw an overhead strike which I managed to block with my own knife, holding it perpendicular to his. Rather than retract, he continued to push against me, trying to force the blade down into my body.

I managed to keep my hold against him, however, although a pertinent question began to sear into my mind. "Hey… Vox?" I grunted out.

Vox let out a labored breath, "What?"

"Where… the hell… did you get a machete? I don't remember seeing it on your… tray of toys."

Vox huffed again, and it seemed to carry a laugh with it, saying, "Velvet gave it to me… birthday present. She's very fond of knives… insisted I carry it on me at all times. Good call on her part, Valentino's gift… wouldn't have been so helpful."

He placed another hand on the blade of the machete as he finished entertaining my questions, and pushed harder into me. The tip of his blade came closer to my head, as I admittedly began to struggle against him. For a scrawny little television set, he was tougher than he looked. Seeing that holding this position would only end one way, I stepped over to the side and let his advance go through. The sudden absence of resistance surprised Vox and he stumbled forward, allowing me to get a cut along his side as he passed me. He let out a cry of pain as the serrated edges carved into his body, which pleased me greatly.

I turned around to face Vox with a cocky smile. He had his hand placed on his injured side, which he retracted to see it covered in neon blue fluid. His hand curled slowly, angrily, then he turned to glare at me.

"So Voxy, how are we doing right now?" I asked, throwing the words he said to Pentious back in his face.

"Oh I'm doing fantastic," Vox growled, pointing his blade at me, "you think that knife of yours is going to kill me? Please, I know how Exterminator blades feel. And even if that was one, I have a factory of spare bodies to recall to. So really, all you're doing is pissing me off." He spun his machete around with a flourish, quipping, "And delaying the inevitable."

With a roar of anger, he leaped at me with the large knife, swinging it down hard. I jumped back to avoid the attack, only to feel something wrap around my ankle. I quickly stole a look down to see what had hooked me, to see many small wires slithering along the ground like snakes. Vox was still trying to tie me up! He just needed me distracted long enough so the wires could sneak their way over to me without me knowing. I poised my knife, ready to stab into the collection of strands holding me down, but seeing Vox move out of the corner of my eye I returned my attention to him.

"Heh, you seem a little tied up. Get it? Come on, you have to appreciate that one Jokester," Vox said facetiously.

The intentional mispronunciation of my name was starting to get to me. The last kind of person I liked to deal with was someone who was cocky. Just ask every Robin I've ever beaten. Before I could say something back to him, he started slashing at me more, forcing me further and further back into the wires surrounding my feet. With each step back, I could feel more of them wrap around my legs. At first they did nothing to stop my movements, due to their size, but as they piled on I could feel my legs move slower and slower. Vox knew what he was doing, and it seemed he had completely stopped trying to kill me, focusing on stringing me up once more. Eventually, I couldn't move my legs any more, and the strands of multi-colored wire started working their way up my body. In a couple seconds they completely encased my lower half, and were focusing on the upper half next.

Vox looked at me, tilting his head side to side annoyingly, like a confused puppy. "Well, I can't say that wasn't entertaining," Vox breathed out. "You actually had me going for a moment. I mean, no one has ever escaped my little fun dungeon until you. Then you manage to cut me, I am moderately impressed."

He walked up to me, seeing the wires had now held my arms against my body. Growing bold, he grabbed my chin with his hand and glared at me, his cocky demeanor disappeared in a flash. "But you also really pissed me off. Not because you escaped, no. But because now I can't have my fun with you. That knife must've been well-hidden if I couldn't find it before stringing you up; who knows what else you've got inside your coat right now?"

"Oh, I can think of a few things," I said. The double-meaning was lost on Vox.

Vox snorted, looking down and shaking his head at the comment. Facing me again he continued, "Well, regardless, I don't have the time to dress you down again to make sure you're unarmed. So, unfortunately, this is where our time together ends."

He let go of my face, pushing it away roughly, then he pushed the machete in its place. The tip of the sharp metal poked at my throat. Even from this simple touch I felt a burning sensation arise due to the Exterminator steel.

Before he moved to kill me, he made one last quip, "Honestly, I feel more for Pentious. Once you're dead, he'll be enduring your torture on top of the one I already have planned for him. As soon as I'm finished with-"

Vox turned his head towards where Pentious was hanging and stopped talking abruptly. I raised an eyebrow that he didn't catch, wondering what the hold up was. Then I felt the blade leave my throat and I breathed audibly. Curiously, I turned to look where Vox was looking, only to find Pentious, and the wires holding him, were gone.

"Oh you've got to be fucking kidding me," Vox said, looking around the room trying to place the snake. Due to my bindings I couldn't look around in a similar manner, but I equally began to wonder. Where the hell was Sir Pentious?

As the question circled in my mind, the room around us started to shake.

-5 minutes earlier-

Pentious stirred from his weakened state. He coughed a little and felt warm fluid exit his mouth. He awoke to the sound of metal clashing on metal, and different voices grunting with great effort. Not only that, but he also woke to the feeling of a cold floor rather than the bindings he was in earlier. His eyes snapped open and he looked around. He was indeed on the floor, free from his restraints. Not only that, but so was the weird clown, and he was currently fighting with Vox. He began to question how either of them escaped, and seeing Vox preoccupied he looked around the room for an answer. He found it upon seeing an exposed wall in the middle of the continuous series of wires; dark marks lined the edges of this space, showing signs of an explosion. He smiled deviously. He didn't know what had happened earlier, or if Joker had anything to do with it, but what mattered was he was free and he could finally put his plan B to action.

He tried to slither up to full length, then let out a soft cry of pain as he felt the lower half of his body start to burn. When he looked down he saw the destroyed eyes and remembered what Vox did. This served only to enrage him, however, and as he slunk back to the ground hatred filled his eyes. He began to crawl towards the bare wall, hearing Vox and Joker still brawling it out behind him. Once he reached it, he gingerly reached into his suit jacket and pulled out a small two-way radio; he knew Vox would search him before hanging him up so he made sure to place it in a pocket that blended in with the inside material of the piece of clothing.

Putting it to his mouth, he whispered, "Egg Leader, do you read me?"

The radio crackled for a second, before a boisterous voice said, "Boss?! You're alive! Oh my goodness, you've been gone for aaaaaages. Are you-"

"Cease your jabbering Egg Leader! I need you to take the ship and fire directly on my position. Once you accomplish that, prepare to move in," Pentious hissed.

"Ummm," a confused voice came through, "are you sure about that boss? With the upgrades you made, you could… well…"

Pentious knew what he was trying to say, and he rolled his eyes, "I could die, yes. But if you don't I'll die anyway, so just do it! Record my current position and fire, I'll have moved out of the way long before you get over here."

"Ok boss-man!" The voice exclaimed, then the radio crackled into silence. Confident this batch of minions were more competent than the last, Pentious trusted him to get the job done. He crawled away from the wall to get away from the blast.

-Now-

The room's shaking grew more intense, causing Vox to stumble around and fall on his knees. I similarly would have done so had my legs not been locked. As the room shook, a new sound started to drown out the current noise. The sounds of wrenching metal, like something was trying to push its way into the room from the outside. I looked around to find its source, I found it at the wall I threw a bomb into moments earlier. Something was definitely trying to come in, as the wall extended out like an overfilled water balloon. Then, much like that aforementioned metaphor, the wall burst open, sending bits of metal flying towards me and Vox. I ducked as best I could, although I could only move the top half of my body. Thankfully none of the jagged pieces of shrapnel managed to hit me. Unfortunately, they seemed to miss Vox as well, as I saw him get back up angrily and face the open space now that the shaking had ceased.

"Pent," he snarled, "you better not have done what I think you just did."

His angry comment was answered by a hoarse cough coming from across the room, and he turned to face it. I followed his gaze and we both finally found Pentious, leaning on a wall a little bit away from the new opening. Having gotten our attention, he smiled and raised his radio as if to mock Vox.

"Yeah, I did," he said weakly. "I blew a hole in your fucking tower."

As he finished his taunt, a shot rang out, and me and Vox returned our attention to the hole, seeing a hook pierce through the metal above it. I knew a grapple hook when I saw one, and smiled realising that Pentious called in the cavalry. This will give me more than enough time to free myself again. But then, the most bizarre thing happened. As we stood there waiting to see who would come through, the first thing to arrive was a giant egg dressed exactly like Pentious. Then another, and another. One by one they came through, until at least ten of them were in the room with us. Suddenly, the thoughts I had about escaping left my mind as I was left completely baffled by the display. My earlier elation towards Pentious was slowly being replaced by annoyance, and slight anger.

I turned to look at the snake, "Are you kidding me? You called for help and instead you sent breakfast?! If I wasn't restrained right now I'd kick your ass."

Vox laughed at my reaction, and he too looked back to the wounded snake, "Honestly, I gotta agree with Gacy over here. Seriously Pent? You sent your minions? I've made omelettes out of these abominations plenty of times, what makes you think-"

His taunts were cut short by the sound of a gunshot, and his shoulder breaking apart. My eyes widened as Vox cried out in, what seemed like, actual pain. He gripped his shoulder gingerly, blue fluid gushed out between his fingers, and he faced the egg army once more. Turning with him, I saw they were now all holding the same model of machine gun. They looked like the kind of guns that wouldn't have stood out in any of the gang wars that occurred on a daily basis in Gotham. Although they did seem to have glowing etchings running along their sides. The egg in front of the group was the one to fire the bullet, his barrel still smoking and the gun glowing a little brighter than the rest. For once, Vox actually looked worried, and he stepped back.

"No… how did you get your hands on those?"

"Like I said," Pentious answered him, "you always underestimated me."

As he finished his sentence, multiple clicks could be heard as the rest of the eggs readied their guns. Then the room exploded into a cacophony of gunfire. My face strained as I could feel the hail of bullets flying past me, and straight into Vox. In a matter of seconds I saw his body get shredded to pieces. His head was the first to go, as multiple bullets shattered it then destroyed it completely. Then large holes tore his body open, his limbs were easily severed and flew away due to the force of the projectiles. Blue liquid sprayed everywhere, on the floors, on the nearby walls, and even on my nice suit. Eventually the gunfire stopped, although ringing still persisted in my ears, and what was left of Vox dropped to the floor, dead. When his body connected with the ground, I felt the wires around me relax and drop dead as well. It seemed like they were just extensions of Vox, and with him gone there was nothing controlling them. At least that was one problem solved, that only left one more.

Now that I wasn't preoccupied, I pulled the revolver I summoned out of my coat and walked towards where Pentious lay. I stopped about halfway to him when I heard the sounds of reloaded guns, and remembered about the egg minions. I put my hands up in the air and turned to look at them, and as I guessed they had all their guns trained on me now. It seems like things just aren't going my way lately.

"Drop the gun buddy, now," the egg in front commanded. The fact they could talk surprised me more than the fact they could use weaponry, and I nearly burst out laughing at the absurdity of it.

Rather than do as they asked of me, I kept my hands where they were and said, "Look, you got it all wrong. Vox was trying to kill both of us. I was the one who saved your boss, and I was merely going over to help him."

"With a gun?" Another egg asked, his voice was slow, and his tone sounded confused. It was like he was genuinely believing the words that were coming out of my mouth.

My eyes flicked between the gun in my hand and them, and I responded, "It's a very helpful gun, if you let me over there, I could demonstrate for you."

"Enough!" An annoyed voice shouted out, and we all looked to see Sir Pentious had managed to get himself off the ground, albeit he looked very pained doing so.

Breathing heavily, he pinched his brow in frustration and addressed all of us, "Look, we don't have time to fight amongst each other. While normally I would easily dispatch of you, Joker," he paused, glaring at me, and I rolled my eyes at his remark, "I am reluctant to admit that I'll need your help."

I slowly placed a hand on my chest in surprise. "My help?"

"Don't test me!" Pentious exclaimed, grimacing and holding his wounds in pain. "Listen, Vox is far from dead, but those Exterminator rounds will delay him a little bit. As long as his network exists, he can keep coming back to different bodies over and over again. This is what I was trying to do earlier. He needs to be shut down, then he can truly be killed for good."

He paused his explanation, sighing, then reluctantly said, "As you can see I am far too weak to do that myself now, and as reliable as they just were, I don't trust my minions to finish this job. So… I need you to help me shut Vox down."

"And how do you suppose we do that?" I scoffed, not really taking his words seriously. I mean, Vox was lying pretty dead on the ground right now. I'd be surprised if anyone came back from that.

"The box, the one I used to infiltrate this place to begin with," Pentious replied simply.

"Um, are you suffering from memory loss? Vox destroyed that, remember? Smashed it in his hand like it was a piece of old candy?" My hand clenched into a fist demonstratively.

Pentious grimaced, whether it was due to my constant questioning or the pain he was going through I couldn't tell. "I have another one, a spare one, although it isn't complete. I was worried I was going to die in this place, but seeing that I haven't, I need to get back to my ship to retrieve it and finish it. Then you'll take it back here, plug it in, and kill Vox for both of us."

Pentious extends his hand towards me, "So, will this be a truce, or would you rather we both die here and let Vox win?"

I stared at his hand for a moment, considering his words. Normally I would think he was lying to try and kill me, it would be something I would do. But considering that he said the exact same thing Vox told me, and how willing he was to work with me after his earlier behavior, this couldn't be a lie. Somehow Vox managed to find a way to cheat his final death, and only Pentious knew how to even the playing field. And as fun as it sounds to continuously kill Vox again and again, there are other people I'd like to kill in this afterlife. So if I want Vox to die like I had originally planned, I would have to go along with him. As annoying as he was, I can allow Pentious to live just a little while longer while we both work on Vox. But as soon as he's dead, I won't be held accountable for what I do next.

Smiling, I replaced the gun inside my jacket, and I walked over to Pentious and took his hand, shaking it. "Consider it a deal, partner." Pentious smiled nervously at my touch, looking like he was already regretting his decision.

Then the room began shaking once more. We released our hands from each other and fell to the ground, having trouble maintaining our balance.

"Pentious?!" I asked, wobbling as I tried to get back on my feet, "This isn't you again is it?"

"Tell the ship to stop firing, Vox is taken care of!" Pentious wailed as he flopped on the ground.

One of the egg minions who weren't busy rolling around the ground managed to reply, "It's not us sir, the ship is in standby!"

"D-did you think I'd shut down so e-e-easily?" A glitching, booming, voice answered. Looks like Vox came back sooner than Pentious expected. "I am the controller of e-everything you see in this shithole, and I s-see everything. I am not going to be killed by some has-been inventor and a ghetto party clown. DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?! I AM VOX, THE DEMON OF TELEVISION, MASTER OF MANIPULATION! And you're on my set."