CHAPTER 16:
INTO THE MIND OF MADNESS
"Well, there's ya problem," drawled Luna Lovegood as she examined Harley. For some reason, she affected a New Jersey accent, as if she was a dodgy car mechanic instead of, in Hermione's words, one of the best mind-healers who never got proper accreditation. "Too many Wrackspurts in the carburettor. Clogs up the works somethin' fierce."
"…What the actual fuck is your major malfunction?" Psycho demanded. "Wrackspurts? What kind of Third Age, homeopathic mind-fuckery are you peddling?!"
"It's just Luna's way of talking, get used to it," Harry said. "And mind your language in front of Delphi!"
"Fuck. You," Psycho sneered, only to have Delphi skip up to him, and peer at him with her eyes. One thing Harry knew that she had going for her was her ability to give not a glare, though those were impressive, but a dead stare that looked like it belonged on a corpse. "The fuck you want, brat?" he asked waspishly, and rather unwisely.
Delphi recoiled, before proffering a candy in a very familiar wrapper, putting on a nervous look. Psycho, after a moment, cringed. "…Okay, sorry about that, kid," he said, taking the candy and eating it. "I just get so sick and tired of my professional integrity beinGMPH?!" This noise heralded his tongue suddenly swelling and protruding from his mouth.
Delphi looked at him coldly. "Your professional integrity being questioned? You can't question what doesn't exist. You called Wonder Woman the C-word, and your wife, even though you did nasty things to both of them. And you just dissed my co-mum. Have fun with Weasley Wheezes-brand Ton-Tongue Toffee."
As Psycho gagged around his newly growing tongue, Delphi rolled her eyes. "I'm sorry, what's that? Just remember this: my name, Delphini, is derived from Greek. And there's an old saying: Beware of Greeks bearing gifts. Oh, and beware of Trojans, because they're total morons who let a blatant trap inside. I learned that one from Red Dwarf(1)."
Luna sighed, before coming over and taking out a vial of some liquid, and dropping it onto his tongue, which promptly shrank. Psycho's face twisted into a snarl. "You'd better watch your back, brat."
"I'm sorry, did you just threaten her in front of us?" Harry asked, his tone deceptively calm-sounding. Everyone present was currently glaring at Psycho. Even the easy-going Nanaue and Clayface were glaring at him, and Clayface was the one who got along best with the psychic rapist.
Psycho, wisely, chose to shut up. The group had moved to the abandoned mall owned by Sy, the cyborg agreeing to let them use it temporarily until Harley had recovered, and she could make the final decision. Pamela also took the time to let him know that they might have to dive into Harley's mind to fix her, so if he saw their supine bodies, not to panic. Frank would be watching over things, just in case.
"Now, I have a solution that's similar to Dr Psycho's, only less brute force-y," Luna said. She took out a rather large scroll out of seemingly nowhere, before unrolling it on the floor. A complex magical ritual circle was inscribed on it, and Luna then levitated Harley onto its centre. "And unlike your powers, we aren't playing by Nightmare on Elm Street rules. In other words, if you suffer fatal damage within her mindscape, you don't die. Well, normally. There is a non-zero chance of cardiac arrest in that scenario, but there's more chance of Batman dancing the Macarena on top of the GCPD building without being mind-controlled into doing it."
"You're full of shit," Psycho retorted. "I'm going with you. You might think you know it all about diving into a mind, but I am a professional!"
Luna rolled her eyes. "Okay, if you must. Sit in a circle around Harley. It doesn't matter where, as long as you're on the circle. Oh, and you don't need to clench your bum."
Psycho grumbled imprecations, even as Delphi sat next to Luna. "Wait, is Delphi coming with us?" Harry asked.
"She's done this a few times," Luna said. "We'll just try to keep her away from the naughty stuff. Okay, everyone, hold onto your sphincters!" She slammed a hand onto the scroll, which began glowing. The gathered people's bodies were held in place, while they felt their minds being drawn into a vortex right out of Doctor Who…
…And suddenly, they were tumbling into a surprisingly utilitarian white room, lined with paintings that seemed to move, as well as items here and there that reminded Harry of exhibits at a museum. As they picked themselves off the floor, Delphi and Luna cheered. "That was fun!" they chorused.
"That's debatable," Pamela muttered. "Where's Psycho?"
Clayface's abdomen burst open, and Psycho's clay-covered face thrust forth with a livid expression. "That's DOCTOR Psycho!"
"More like Dr Chestburster," Harry snarked. "Clayface, you're fine going through what John Hurt did in Alien?"
"Well, it's a rather unpleasant experience," Clayface said as Psycho crawled out.
As he was helped out by Nanaue, Pamela looked around. "Honestly, it's cleaner than I thought, more organised."
"That's deceptive," Psycho said, wiping clay off his body. "We're in her Museum of Memories. It's not in any particular order, and besides, it's just our frame of reference for what's in her noggin." He shot a triumphant glare at Luna, thinking he had scored points against her.
Harry noticed one painting marked 'Happiest Moment', which showed a young Harley playing pretend with a pair of dolls, with the woman accusing the man of coming home smelling of drink and whore, and the man retorting that it was just a friend from work. It degenerated into Harley using a cleaver, pretending to be the woman, chopping off the male doll's neck with a cleaver. He stared, even as Delphi cackled. "What is this, I don't even…" he mumbled. "How old was she?"
"Too young to know those words, normally," Pamela said quietly. "Maybe six?"
"She's seen worse," Luna said with a shrug. "Delphi, I mean."
As the others commented on that, they moved to Harley giving her valedictorian speech, where she denounced the school, the principal, and especially the shop teacher staring at her ass. After that, they moved on to find Harley on a bench watching another memory portrait, of the Joker leaving her to be captured by Batman. "Oh, hey guys!" she said cheerfully, a complete contrast to her frozen snarl on her body.
As Nanaue looked bemused, and began to ask how Harley could be in here, Luna held up her hand. "It's merely a form of mental recursion. It's best if you don't think about it too hard, your own mind will twist itself into a Klein bottle trying to comprehend it." She then poked her tongue out at Psycho, who harrumphed and muttered imprecations.
As Nanaue reached for a display case, his hand was slapped away by Psycho. "Listen here. I'm going to be searching for the hard reboot switch, not this wannabe and her demon spawn," he snarled, indicating Luna and Delphi. "So while I'm gone, you follow hooker rules."
"Can you stop saying such things in front of her?" Harry snapped at the misogynistic midget.
"Can I? Yes. Will I? No. And I meant stripper rules, actually. Look, but don't touch."
"He is right," Luna said. "About no touching. The mindscape can have its own protectors, like antibodies. My ritual circle should protect us from being fatally affected by them, but it's better not to risk it in the first place…"
Dr Psycho, real name Edgar Cizko, strode towards the hard reboot switch, knowing with the unerring instinct of one who had been in scores of minds. He fumed as he did so. How dare these bastards judge him? He was a former Legion of Doom member, and only got kicked out because of Luthor's hypocrisy. The only difference between him and Luthor (aside from stature, money and prestige, not that Psycho would admit such a thing) was that Luthor hid his misogyny better. At least Psycho was more honest.
Still, the thought that this lunatic Lovegood woman had created a means of safer entry into the mind intrigued him. Oh, it galled him, and he would love nothing more than to eat popcorn while watching her and that hellspawn die in a fire slowly, but he could admit, albeit grudgingly, the achievement. And it gave him an idea.
He'd had enough of being shown little respect by the others. Clayface could talk with him, true, but Psycho hated the clay ham that was once Basil Karlo, an overrated hack who specialised in monster films before he got shafted. But the others? Ivy and that Potter fool hated him, Nanaue was a pussy instead of a shark…and Harley was struggling to get him back into the Legion of Doom, where he belonged! And they always went against him, Dr Psycho!
So, he decided to teach them a lesson. In fact, he intended to send them one hell of a message. If one of them didn't decide to touch something here, then he would. Of course, he didn't think he had long to wait: the collective IQ of these idiots was somewhere around room temperature. And in the distance, he saw Harley reach for a memory picture, apparently of her falling into the vat of chemicals as the Joker looked on.
The stupid blonde bimbo proved why stereotypes of blonde women (or indeed any woman) being stupid were correct by touching the memory picture. Red lights began to flash, the wail of a siren rang out, and the switch dissolved from the wall. Psycho feigned panic (not that it needed much feigning: he was still worried this wouldn't work), and charged out of sight, away from the others.
He then ran into the first of the 'antibodies' of this mental domain. Harley when she was a little brat. Sobbing crocodile tears, waiting for someone to get close.
Psycho approached, gambling that that Lovegood bitch was right about her ritual circle thing. Because if not, he was going to die doing something pretty fucking stupid. "Hey, bitch," he hissed. "The best part of you ran down your mommy's thigh."
The antibody looked up with a snarl, revealing glowing golden eyes and razor-sharp teeth. Yep, he'd pissed it off. With a screech that wouldn't have been out of place coming from a Fazbear animatronic, it leapt at him, and began tearing out his throat…
…And he sat bolt upright with a scream of pain and fear. As he gathered himself after that horrible experience, he heard hateful chuckling. "Oh man, you fucked up, didn't you?"
Frank. That damned overgrown houseplant of Ivy's. "Shut up! I didn't fuck up, Harley fucked up! I clearly said stripper rules! Look, but don't touch!" Psycho snapped.
"She touched herself, didn't she? That's stripper rules, ain't it?" Frank asked with a chortle.
The sad thing is, the overgrown weed had a point. Just not the one Psycho was trying to make. As he waddled away from the ritual circle, he looked around for anything to kill these fools with. He glanced towards a pizzeria at one point, and thought that, if the oven worked, that had possibilities. But if he broke the circle, it'd probably wake them up, and he wasn't quite confident enough in his telekinetic abilities to risk moving a flimsy sheet of paper plus seven people on it.
In any case, he needed Harley to survive. Like it or not, the bimbo was his ticket back into the Legion of Doom. And if he took her out of the circle, he would bet any money, even with his limited knowledge of magic, that the other fuckers would wake up.
He looked up at the ceiling. Again, that had possibilities: pull down the ceiling with telekinesis, but ensure Harley survived. In fact, he would do that. But first, he'd have to deal with that overgrown houseplant, and…
"Incarcerous Maxima."
Chains suddenly wrapped themselves around Dr Psycho. As he toppled down, he saw that Luna was watching with her pale eyes, her hand outstretched, a wide smirk on her lips. "Oh, I do hope you weren't thinking naughty thoughts, Psycho."
"How…how can you be talking to me while you're in her mind?! It's impossible!" Anger burned within him. "And that's DOCTOR Psycho, you stupid cunt!"
"Well, that was rude," Lovegood said, deceptively calmly. "You were disbarred from being a doctor. And in answer to your question…I'm Luna Lovegood. When I hear the world impossible, I have to reach for the nearest dictionary(2)."
Whatever retort Psycho had died when the crimson strobe of a Stunner smacked into him, sending him sprawling into unconsciousness. As darkness took him, he cursed everyone, especially crazy, stupid blonde bimbos who thought themselves better than him…
Within Harley's mind, the group of fantastic voyagers stared at a cackling Delphi as she was borne aloft by the small army of antibodies in the form of sharp-toothed, feral chibi-Harleys. "How did she…how did she win them over?" Harley asked. "I watched it happen, and I still can't believe it, let alone understand how."
"I have a bad feeling about this," Harry said flatly. "What if this is her first step onto the path of becoming a Dark Lord? I mean, Dark Lady? I mean…Dark Princess?"
"That's my girl," Luna beamed. "By the way, I've dealt with Psycho, for now. The little gremlin looked like he was thinking of bringing the roof down on us."
"…Why would he do that?" Harley asked, puzzled.
"Because he's a misogynistic, walking Napoleon Complex who gives little people a bad name, and he's tired of being shown up by women, or anyone else for that matter," Luna said, matter-of-factly. "Psycho was always the loose cannon on your team. You can ask Frank for corroboration. But that can wait for now. We'll need to find another way of getting out of here. Of course, with Delphi's new minions, this should be easier."
"Yes! Onwards, my minions!" Delphi cackled. "Let us delve further into the mind of Aunt Harley!"
"…I'm actually okay with that," Harley said. "You know why I touched that memory painting? That memory of me being pushed into the chemicals was glitching out. The part where Joker pushes me in is missing. And I want to find out why. The answer's got to be somewhere in here, along with another exit, right?"
"Right," Luna said, pumping her fist in the air. "To the subconscious we go! Allons-y!"
Harry groaned, wondering whose bright idea it was to let Luna watch Doctor Who. Still, he had to admit, despite everything happening so far, he too was intrigued. He just hoped that it wouldn't be the death of him…
CHAPTER 16 ANNOTATIONS:
Well, with Psycho out cold, Luna's ritual circle working, and Sy not looking to cover up what he thinks is a suicide cult, it won't be. Hopefully.
Now, with Psycho, you may be thinking I am bashing him. I am not. He is such a contemptible creature in the show, I am honestly surprised Harley even bothered to recruit him. He's a mind-rapist and a misogynist, and Harley just got away from a misogynistic abuser, and her main justification for bringing Psycho on-board is because she's recruiting people nobody else will touch? I am genuinely surprised it took him until the second season to turn on Harley, and I mean in a way that showed his true colours. And sadly, he's much worse in the comics. This is someone who got off on controlling people into committing cannibalism on each other, and then broadcasting his arousal to his victims.
I am kicking him out of Harley's crew, with Harry and 'Oracle' fulfilling any role he needs to play. But that won't mean he won't play a part in the story beyond that. If anything, he'll have a significant role to play later.
As for Delphi taking control of the chibi-Harley antibodies, well, I didn't write how she did it partly because I'm a lazy writer and couldn't think of an adequate reason, but also because it was funnier to have it just happen, and people stare in sheer disbelief afterwards. It's probably Delphi's 'Dark Lord' genes from her father, allowing her to minionise certain beings with ease.
Review-answering time! LoamyCoffee: I actually made up the backstory of why Ivy first used her pheromones. The only part of that that was canon to the show was that one of the creators claimed that Ivy had been interested in a girl in high school. The rest, to quote a certain DC-related meme, "It was me, Barry!" Sorry, for some reason, that episode of Death Battle pitting Reverse Flash against Goku Black really stuck in my head…
Gabriel Herrol: I think Harley just left it in the warehouse along with Robin. It's implied to be what she did in the show. She stole the Batmobile purely to get Batman's attention more than anything else.
1. Delphi is paraphrasing David Lister from the Red Dwarf episode The Inquisitor, though he says the saying should be "Beware of Trojans: they're complete smegheads" after reading a graphic novel version of the Iliad. Ironically, Lister uses the same Trojan Horse tactic at the end of the episode, fooling the Inquisitor into using his own sabotaged Time Gauntlet to wipe himself from history…
2. Luna (and her Witch persona) use this very turn of phrase in my twoshot Puella Magi Madoka Magica crossover Puella Magi Luna Magica, upon Kyubey's reaction to her rather unique Witch transformation.