Theme: Blondie & Philip Glass - 'Heart of Glass' (Crabtree Remix)
The Pantomime
22.
Harley.
With a frustrated growl, the Joker lifted his head, barely registering the broken glass cutting into his palms. He blinked hard, registering Harley sitting on Black Canary, looking at him over her shoulder. Her eyes were wide, shellshocked beneath the blood running down her face, impossible to differentiate from her red warpaint. Something had happened.
Then she leaped to her feet, and she started sprinting toward the open window.
The Joker caught her eye as she bolted past, and he realized she was about to take a gamble that might not pay off.
He could see she wasn't sure if it would pay off either.
Then she jumped, her red dress flaring out behind her as she disappeared over the ledge into the night sky.
Harley.
The Joker bellowed her name, his voice ragged and inhuman like death itself, his heart slamming against his ribs, trying to chase after her.
He glared up at the Batman, who hesitated, not throwing himself after her like he did for Rachel Dawes.
There was a long moment, a moment in which Harley got closer to crashing into the street below… and then finally, the Batman released the Joker and dove after her.
The Joker scrambled over to the window, slapping one gloved hand down on a jagged shard of plate glass as he peered over the edge. A streak of red followed by a streak of black, both of them rapidly growing smaller as they fell to the earth.
If she hit the pavement from that height, there would be little more than a squishy puddle left of her.
She would be gone.
Breathing hard through his nose to clear his head, the Joker shoved himself to his feet with a strangled grunt. He immediately collapsed again, catching himself on the sofa and taking half a second to gather his strength before throwing himself forward, determined to get to Harley regardless of if she was alive or dead.
There was only one way out besides the main elevator, an escape route good ol' Don Falcone installed in his office.
Harley. Harley. Harley Quinn.
Her name pounded through his veins in time with the beating of his heart. Loud, constant, relentless. Just like her.
He lurched through the dark penthouse, a bad concussion and what felt like inner-ear damage making him stagger into walls to keep himself upright as he limped into Carmine's old office. Roman had already high-tailed it out of there, the bookcase standing open, the industrial elevator already gone. A few violent fantasies flashed before the Joker's mind's eye as he slapped the call button repeatedly, growling to himself until finally, the gears started to turn, the cables rotating to pull the elevator back up.
Each creak of the gears sounded like her name.
The pigs could have already scraped Harley off the sidewalk by now.
Get her. Get her.
The elevator arrived with a screech, and the Joker leaped in, shaking his head like a dog to push past the head trauma, slapping his buzzing ear, which he realized then was bleeding. Blood was streaming down the side of his neck, pooling in the lapel of his suit jacket.
He muttered impatiently to himself, blinking hard and rocking from foot to foot, slapping his ear as the elevator began to lower.
The lift hit the ground floor with a jarring thud, and the Joker lurched out into a long, concrete hallway. He swayed for a moment, getting his bearings, then chose a direction and loped down the tunnel, picking up speed as he embraced the all-encompassing need to get to her.
Harley. Harley. Harley Quinn.
There was a fire exit at the end of the tunnel, just as Harley promised, and the Joker threw himself against it, bursting out into the humid summer night, and almost falling on his ass.
The air was thick with tear gas, and the street was empty aside from a handful of coughing stragglers. A few yards west, mounted officers were attempting to kettle a mob of rioters that had taken over a city block. Right about where Harley would have fallen.
The Joker swallowed thickly, the tear gas making his eyes stream, so the black greasepaint spiderwebbed down his cheeks. He tried to find an impulse, an urge, an inclination to point him in the right direction, whatever would get him to her.
Get her. Get her.
A police cruiser covered in graffiti and missing its passenger door came wailing up the street toward him, its flashing blue and red lights cutting through the haze of tear gas as it screeched to a stop at the curb.
Frost leaned through the missing door, waving frantically.
"Get in, boss!" he shouted over the noise of the mob and the horses.
The Joker staggered forward, only just keeping up with the moment in front of him as he dove into the stolen cruiser and collapsed into the passenger seat. Frost whipped them around in a sharp U-turn, the car's bald tires squealing reluctantly before they took off up the street.
"Pigs got Harley," Frost announced, swerving around a horde of men in clown masks armed with baseball bats.
Pigs got Harley.
Maybe it was the concussion or the eardrum damage, but it took a few long seconds for those words to sink in. The gory picture of Harley's bloodied remains was still flashing before the Joker's mind's eye, dragging him down, consuming him like quicksand. It was a blockade Frost's words had to struggle past. That she wasn't dead, she wasn't gone. Then like a fog slowly lifting, everything around the Joker suddenly solidified, becoming clear when he hadn't realized it was fuzzy in the first place.
He blinked hard, trying to keep up.
"All units! All units! Requesting backup on 8th and Broadway!" a handheld police scanner duct-taped to the dashboard squawked. "We need an escort to Blackgate Prison! All units!"
Get Her.
The Joker braced his hands on his thighs, ignoring the nausea and dizziness spiraling through his body—accepting it, unfazed by it as they swerved around a mass of rioters tearing down a traffic light. He narrowed his eyes at the smokey road ahead, singularly focused on Harley as they fishtailed onto Broadway, a broad avenue lined with luxury stores currently crackling with newly-lit fires.
Frost laid his foot down on the accelerator, his hands flexing on the steering wheel as they sped past protesters setting off fireworks at an armored car. This chaos, these moments of truth, this was what the Joker lived for. But when he spotted the flashing backlights of three GCPD cruisers racing south in tandem, everything else was pointless noise. There was only Harley.
"There," he barked, envisioning her in the back of the middle cruiser.
Frost dutifully held his foot down on the gas, the speedometer ticking up higher and higher, the engine whining under stress.
"I got a little something in the back for ya, boss!" Frost shouted as they drew closer, with less than half a block between them.
The Joker swung around to squint into the backseat, where no less than a Bazooka and five high-explosive grenades were waiting for him among a cache of automatic weapons. He growled happily and wrestled the Bazooka into his lap, nearly cracking Frost in the head with it as he loaded a grenade.
The police escort transporting Harley pivoted east onto 14th, and Frost followed close behind, undeterred. The pigs knew they were being chased, quickly detouring off 14th onto Crowne in an attempt to shake their tail. There was less than half a block between them when the Joker heaved the Bazooka up on his shoulder and leaned out the side of the car to aim, the wind rushing in his face, nearly blinding him.
There was a WOOSH! when the grenade launched, an arc of smoke streaming in its wake. It struck the police cruiser's back wheel on the right, followed by an explosion that made the entire street rattle. The cruiser flew up in the air, spinning twice horizontally before it crashed into the sidewalk, immediately bursting into flames.
"Frost, where the fuck are you!" Red's voice crackled through the radio as they followed the two remaining cruisers east onto 22nd, where an entire department store was engulfed in flames. "I'm on Swann! I just passed 21st!"
Frost grabbed the radio while the Joker loaded a second grenade in focused silence, his resentment for Red background noise just like everything else.
"Alright, Pammy, they're heading your way on 22nd," Frost rumbled as the Joker slung himself out the side of the car again, aiming the Bazooka at the cruiser flanking the vehicle he was sure Harley was in.
He pulled the trigger, and a second grenade launched into the night, striking the cruiser's back windscreen. It burst into flames as the front tires flew up, and the car flipped over backward, landing upside down on its hood and skidding across the street, forcing Frost to swerve up onto the sidewalk to avoid it.
There was only one cruiser left, and Harley was inside it. The Joker was sure of it. He dove into the back seat again, scrabbling through the collection of firearms until he found a sub-machine that would do the job nicely. He braced one hand on the roof to steady himself and hung his torso out the side of the car, his eyes narrowing as he aimed for the cruiser's tires.
The car swerved right and left, dodging the bullets spitting into the asphalt behind it, allowing Frost to draw closer.
They were about to speed through a massive intersection when a fire engine engulfed in flames crashed past an office block on the corner, nearly clipping the back of the cruiser carrying Harley as it crossed into the intersection. Frost slammed on the brakes to stop them crashing headlong into the fire engine, and they fishtailed in a semicircle before rocking to a sudden stop.
The Joker leaped out of the car without a second's thought, loping forward with the gun hanging loose in his hand. He dodged around the flaming fire truck, taking no notice of the clowns lighting Molotov cocktails off the blaze when he spotted the cruiser with Harley speeding away. Scowling, he raised the rifle again, a last-ditch effort to stop it, when an ambulance came roaring into the intersection impossibly fast, its lights flashing and sirens screaming.
The ambulance T-boned the cruiser, sending it spinning wildly out of control.
And when the battered vehicle finally screeched to a stop, a mob of clowns and protesters armed with bats and tire irons immediately swarmed it.
The Joker stopped short, taking a moment to drink in the carnage, his eyes darting between the ambulance and the battered cruiser, the blaze from the fire truck bathing everything in a dangerous orange glow.
Then he bolted forward into the fray.
Pam knew she was most effective in a behind the scenes capacity, and she was well aware that Harley preferred it that way to keep her safe. Infiltrating the power plant and depositing their hastily-made bomb was a breeze, almost what you might call too easy. But unlike Harley, Pam did not complain when something was easy, and she certainly didn't seek out violence or confrontation for fun.
No judgment, obviously.
But as Pam drove back to Gotham, the idea of heading straight to the rendezvous point began to make her feel like a coward, one thing she abso-fucking-lutely was not.
The presenters on Gotham City Radio reported the looting and arson taking place in Midtown and Downtown, turning the city into a dystopian hellscape the police were ill-equipped to handle.
Pam thought about Harley going off on her half-cocked mission with only the Joker and Ed for backup. Their plan to get this 'Anarky' character back via Roman felt slapdash at best, and when Pam pointed this out, Harley explained slapdash methods were the best kind of plans.
Well, that wasn't true, and Pam knew this aversion to well thought out plans was the Joker's influence rearing its ugly head again. Harley was well-organized and strategy-orientated, but she chose to believe giving into chaos and destruction was a better means of achieving her ends for some godforsaken reason.
Pam pulled off the freeway in Otisburg, determined to help whether Harley wanted it or not. But when she reached the North Gotham tunnel that led under the West River, she was stopped by a police barricade. Usually, this wouldn't be a problem. All it would take was a brief connection to convince an officer or two that they needed to let her pass.
"Hi there," Pam beamed up at the cop guarding the barricade as cars full of panicking citizens streamed out of the tunnel. He was wearing SWAT gear that covered him from head to toe, only his eyes and mouth visible behind the helmet—no flesh for her to touch to bend him to her will.
Fuck.
"Authorized personnel only, ma'am," the officer informed her coldly. "You're going to have to turn around."
"Fine," Pam agreed sourly, rolling up her window.
She drove aimlessly for a good twenty minutes, trying to find a creative solution like Harley would instead of relying on her abilities. Briefly, she considered lobbing the perfume bottle at the SWAT team, turning all of them into lovesick puppies so she could pass through unobstructed. There was more stored in a vault in Geneva that may or may not have had historical connections to The Third Reich.
Pam slowed down as she drove past Otisburg General Hospital, an idea coming to her. She pulled the little Nisson into the hospital's visitor lot and parked in a disabled spot, guaranteeing the car would be towed. Then she wiped her fingerprints from the steering wheel and gear shift and slid out of the car, keeping her head down so the CCTV cameras perched at the hospital's entrances would miss her face.
It was hardly a slow day for Gotham's hospitals, but there was still one ambulance waiting with two grim-faced EMTs standing beside it; a middle-aged woman with stringy blonde hair and a younger man, talking with their heads close together.
"Hey there," Pam greeted them cheerfully. She offered her hand to the younger EMT. "I'm Evelyn Rose from the board of trustees," she explained, prompting the man to shake her hand.
Pam felt her palm grow warm, and the EMT's face swiftly melted into a lovesick grin.
"Go home. Forget my face," Pam instructed him, releasing his hand and their connection.
"Of course, Ms Rose," he agreed, immediately spinning away to follow her order.
"Hang on, what are you—" the female EMT started to protest.
Pam's hand shot up to close around the woman's throat, making her gag as her eyes widened, then immediately softened when the connection solidified.
"Get in the back," Pam instructed her coldly, releasing the woman's neck but not letting go. She flexed her fingers, feeling the heat racing around palm like a thousand blinking lights.
Obedient and chipper, the female EMT opened the ambulance's back door and hopped inside, smiling as she followed Pam's instructions.
They were always happier when Pam was in control.
Every time, without fail.
Pam joined the woman in the ambulance and pulled the door shut, then checked her Casio watch.
Five minutes until the bomb at the power plant went off, and the city would succumb to darkness and chaos.
Pam looked down at the badge displaying the EMT's name pinned to her dark green jumpsuit.
P Fleck.
"P?" Pam raised an eyebrow at her.
"Penny," the woman beamed.
"Is there a camera in here, Penny?" Pam asked, and Penny happily shook her head 'no.' "Give me your clothes," Pam ordered, setting her bag on the floor before she kicked off her flats and unbuttoned her jeans.
Penny did as Pam instructed, toeing off her clunky black boots and shuffling out of her uniform before handing it over. Pam zipped the jumpsuit up over her camisole and shoved her feet into the clunky too-small boots, then transferred the contents of her bag— some cash, Lee's old BlackBerry, the handgun Harley demanded she take despite Pam's aversion to guns—into the canvas jumpsuit's pockets.
Then she turned her attention to Penny, who was waiting patiently in her socks and underwear.
Letting her run off like this would not be discrete.
Outside, there was a loud, whirring sound as the hospital's generator turned on.
The power was out, and it was time to go.
"Stay here," Pam ordered.
Penny eagerly nodded as Pam jumped back out of the ambulance, slamming the doors shut, and circling to the driver's seat. She slid behind the wheel and examined the unfamiliar dashboard covered in mysterious buttons, switches, and a radio.
"Fuck's sake," she muttered, pursing her lips as she turned the key in the ignition and worked out how to turn on the headlights. She checked her mirrors before pulling out of the emergency exit, wincing when the bottom of the ambulance scraped over a speed bump. Then she headed back to the police barricade at the North Gotham Tunnel, determined to make herself useful to Harley.
"Hey there," she greeted the cop guarding the onramp to the tunnel.
"Where's your partner?" he asked, squinting at the empty passenger seat.
"We're a little short staffed right now," Pam improvised, shooting the cop a knowing look.
"Don't I know it," he agreed ruefully. "You're gonna want to get those lights and sirens on," he advised while his colleagues moved the barrier so Pam could pass through.
"Thanks, um, buddy," she saluted the cop awkwardly, then pulled forward onto the onramp, wincing again when the heavy back of the ambulance ground against concrete.
With the power cut off, the tunnel was pitch black, the ambulance's headlights the only light source. Twenty minutes earlier, there had been cars packed with people trying to get the hell out of Gotham through this tunnel, but they'd since been cut off, trapped in the violent riots ravaging the city. And when Pam finally emerged from the tunnel Uptown, she was greeted with those cars full of desperate civilians, honking irritably and getting out to complain and rage at the officers blocking their path.
"Fuuuuuck," Pam murmured, staring out the window as she drove past them.
It was another riot waiting to happen. Chaos.
Without a plan of action, Pam pulled out the old Blackberry and found Jonny Frost's number, hoping to get an update.
"Hey there, Pammy!" Frost greeted her, sounding strained.
In the background, Pam heard the rattle of machine-gun fire and tires squealing, making her eyes widen.
"Imma little busy right now!" Frost added before shouting instructions to someone else.
"What the fuck is going on?" Pam demanded, tightening her grip on the wheel as she sped south.
There was an explosion that made the phone fuzz before Frost replied.
"Sounds like the pigs got Harley!" he shouted into the phone. "We got a guy saying they're takin' her to Blackgate for safe keepin'. Think you can help me out with this one, Pammy? While I find the boss and Ed?"
Pam found herself uncharacteristically speechless.
Save Harley from the police?
Possibly break her out of Blackgate Prison, a fortress on an island?
Firefights and car chases were decidedly not Pam's style, but there were few—none, actually—people she cared about like she did Harley.
"Okay, I'm coming now!" Pam agreed, her heart beating a little harder in her chest. "I stole an ambulance! I'm almost to Robinson Park."
"Alright, Pammy, those things should have radios!" Frost shouted over squealing tires and another explosion. "Tune into 84.4—it ain't safe to be on the phone."
Remembering what Harley said about the Batman's advanced tech and how the Joker was currently missing his hacker friend 'Anarky,' Pam rolled down her window and threw the Blackberry out in the street. She turned the radio to 84.4 and flipped on the ambulance's flashing lights and sirens, her jaw set in grim determination as she sped south toward Midtown.
"Pammy, you there?" Frost's voice crackled through the radio.
Pam scrambled to grab the receiver, the ambulance swerving when she lost her grip on the wheel.
"Yes!" she snapped.
"I see the boss," Frost announced. "I'm gonna grab him and head south to help ya."
"Okay!" Pam agreed, nervous energy suddenly racing through her, making her hands shake and her stomach twist.
The rioting grew more violent and destructive as the ambulance drew closer to the city center. Buildings on fire, store-fronts smashed, cars turned over, and people fighting in the street. The fires were the only source of illumination, tear gas oppressively thick in the air.
Pam released a shaky breath as she ducked down to check the passing street names, keeping her heavy-booted foot pressed firmly on the accelerator. She swore furiously when she realized she didn't know what the hell she was even looking for, let alone how she was supposed to stop Harley from being taken to Blackgate.
Then a few streets over, there was a blast that made her heart flutter frantically in her throat, the streets quaking and the ambulance rattling around her.
She grabbed the radio again.
"Frost! Where the fuck are you!" Pam demanded. "I'm on Swann. I just passed 21st street!"
The radio crackled with white noise for a few long seconds before Frost responded.
"Alright, Pammy, they're heading your way on 22nd," he informed her, the implicit instruction that it was up to Pam to stop them.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck," Pam chanted, spinning the wheel hard to the left when she nearly missed 22nd.
The ambulance's heavy back end swung out, the tires skidding on the sharp turn, nearly rolling the entire vehicle over as Pam clenched her teeth and focused on the smoke-filled road ahead. Once the ambulance righted itself, she stomped down on the gas again, searching the street for some sign of the police cruisers transporting Harley, though how she was supposed to stop them, she had no idea.
Then, less than half a block ahead of her, a fire truck engulfed in flames sped across a major intersection, crashing into the corner of an office block.
Pam sucked in a startled breath, fear and adrenaline racing through her in equal measure, making her light headed when she saw a cruiser zip past the fire truck. It crossed into the massive intersection with its lights flashing and sirens screaming.
That was the car. Pam knew it.
She tightened her hands around the steering wheel, giving in to whatever madness had taken hold of the city, giving into the chaos that hardly made sense to her. Her blood roared in her ears as she held her foot down on the gas and braced herself, crossing into the intersection and intercepting the cruiser carrying Harley.
The ambulance crashed into the side of the smaller car, the violent crunch of metal and shattering glass fighting to be heard over the noise of the riots. The impact sent the cruiser into a careening tailspin, its tires squealing helplessly as the driver lost control.
Pam's airbag deployed, smacking her in the face and nearly knocking her out as the ambulance rocked to a sudden stop.
Her head was pounding, and her ears were ringing. Pam blinked sleepily, trying to see, but everything was black and hazy. She took a shaky breath, the sounds of a chaotic mob descending growing louder, cutting through the ringing in her ears. The urge to lay there and wait for help was almost overwhelming, but Pam forced her eyes open instead, blinking hard as the airbag beneath her head deflated. She took another deep breath and counted to five, then pulled herself up, her head swimming as she peered through the ambulance's cracked windscreen, and tried to come to terms with the scene taking place in front of her.
Upwards of fifty people wearing clown masks had rushed the battered police cruiser. They were jostling it violently, each of them trying to get closer, their desire for violence as thick as the smoke in the air. They were going to rip the officers inside apart limb from limb, and the subsequent gunshots from the cruiser told Pam those cops believed that to be the case too.
Pam pulled off her seatbelt sluggishly, reminding herself of all the times she'd seen Harley get back on her feet, beaten and bruised, but relentless. She kicked open her door with a grunt and hauled herself up so she was leaning against it, half hanging out of the ambulance as she stared blindly at the chaos unfolding in front of her.
There were more gunshots from inside the cruiser when the clowns smashed the back windows, which was the exact moment Pam spotted the Joker fighting his way through the mob, a smear of purple and green in a sea of black.
"J!" Pam screamed, waving her arms as hope zig-zagged through her. "J! J!"
He swung around to look at her, his white face standing out among the expressionless clown masks packed around him, his black eyes blazing with raw emotion that made Pam's pulse leap.
Then suddenly, Harley's silvery-blonde head appeared above the mob of clowns, followed by her red dress and white boots as they pulled her out of the back of the cruiser.
Something deep in Pam's soul shivered as she watched them lift Harley's limp body, passing her over their heads like she was something precious to be preserved in a sea of destruction. A huge clown jumped onto the battered cruiser's hood, and the other clowns passed Harley into his arms. He straightened up to his full height and held her up, and the mob of clowns roared their approval, raising their makeshift weapons as Harley's head flopped back, her bloodied, painted face glowing in the light of the orange flames licking the buildings around them.
"Shit," Pam whispered, unsure what she was seeing, unsure what this meant.
She forced herself to look away to search out the Joker and saw he'd fought his way to the hood of the cruiser, his hands braced on the dented metal as he prepared to jump up and take Harley back.
A gunshot rang out, but this one didn't come from the inside of the cruiser.
The giant clown holding Harley collapsed as a bullet ripped through his head, killing him instantly.
There was a mad scramble over Harley's body, and automatic gunfire rattled through the horde of clowns, clearing a path for someone new. Pam spotted a pair of men hurrying away, Harley slumped over one of their shoulders, and Pam scrambled in the pocket of the EMT jumpsuit for the gun. Her hands shook as she turned off the safety and aimed it at their retreating backs, getting one shot off. But it was too late; they were already ducking into a BMW with Harley in tow, speeding off into the dark city.
The Joker was on the cruiser's hood, frantically looking right and left, trying to find Harley. Pam watched him bare his teeth and snarl like a wild animal as the remaining clowns cheered for him like an exalted leader.
"J!" she screamed again, desperately waving him over. "J!"
The Joker looked up sharply, his expression inscrutable. He lifted an automatic rifle and shot into the crowd of cheering clowns, clearing a path for himself as he jumped off the cruiser's hood.
Feeling dizzy and sick, Pam slid back behind the wheel and turned the key in the ignition, a burst of adrenaline giving her the strength to push through.
After a few false starts, the engine hummed to life just as the Joker threw himself into the passenger seat, his eyes so wild Pam shrank back from him.
"What the fuck are you doing here!" he demanded, his voice a threatening snarl that made Pam's skin crawl.
"Saving your fucking ass, apparently!" she shot back. "And—"
"Drive," he scowled, quietly but with such malice that Pam slammed her foot down on the gas without thinking twice. The battered ambulance flew forward out of the intersection, following the BMW the thugs had folded Harley into.
"I think Roman's guys got her," Pam croaked, her eyes darting between the road and the Joker. His shoulders were rising and falling sharply as he sucked in deep breaths, his eyes focused on the smokey street ahead with a terrifying intensity. "They were in a BMW."
"Yep," he agreed crisply, blinking hard and hunching forward.
"You think they're going east?" Pam demanded, and when he didn't respond, she scowled in frustration. "Are you just gonna fucking sit there or at least try to be helpful!"
Her voice leaped a few octaves, and he swung around to glare at her, his eyes two fathomless black pits as he released a low, throaty growl that reminded Pam of a prowling tiger.
She ignored him, focusing on the road and breathing deeply in a futile attempt to calm her racing heart. And then she saw it—the only other functioning car on the street lined with burnt-out vehicles. The back of a sleek BMW sedan, driving the speed limit as if they were trying to blend in.
"There," the Joker snapped, pointing a gloved finger.
Pam downshifted, urging the ambulance closer.
The BMW immediately sped up, its driver realizing their ambulance was in pursuit and probably guessing who was inside.
"The bridges will be up by now," Pam pointed out shakily, glancing at the Joker as he shrugged out of his absurd purple blazer and rolled his shoulders back. He raised the automatic rifle he'd brought with him and broke the window instead of taking time to roll it down. "What the fuck!" Pam snapped.
But the Joker just brushed aside a few shards of broken glass and hauled himself out, aiming the rifle at the back of the BMW and shooting at the tires.
The BMW immediately swerved right, bouncing onto the onramp to lower-5th, the always-under-construction tunnel that passed through Downtown.
Pam yanked the wheel hard to the right to follow them, whipping the ambulance onto lower 5th, its heavy back end squealing as it swerved wildly.
"Closer," the Joker snapped raggedly, his voice barely audible out the window.
Pam ground her teeth and held her foot down on the gas, willing the ambulance to move faster while the Joker fired a relentless stream of bullets into the asphalt behind the BMW ahead of them. It forced the driver to swerve to avoid getting hit, slowing them down so the ambulance could draw closer.
A second BMW zoomed down the onramp ahead of them, pulling in between the ambulance and the car carrying Harley. Pam shot the Joker a sidelong look, her heart thundering in her chest as she watched him pull a fresh magazine from his pocket. Then in front of them, one of Roman's henchmen appeared through the new BMW's sunroof, armed with a bigger, meaner looking version of the rifle the Joker was carrying.
"J," Pam warned just before the new henchmen started shooting at them, the rattle of bullets hitting the front of the ambulance making her heart stutter. "Do something!" she yelped as a few stray bullets hit the already-cracked windshield.
The Joker slapped the new magazine in and silently threaded his head and shoulders out through the window again, his face completely blank as he put a string of bullets into the henchmen shooting at them. The man's body flopped back against the BMW's roof, hanging there perilously until the Joker took out both of the BMW's back tires. The car swerved violently when the driver lost control, crashing into the tunnel wall.
"Christ!" Pam shrieked as the Joker fell back in the car and raked his sweaty hair off his face. "You couldn't have done that sooner?" she demanded, to which she received an annoyed scowl.
Before Pam could retort, a third BMW raced down the next onramp, cutting them off and forcing Pam to swerve out of the way, again letting the car carrying Harley get farther away. The new BMW veered left into the other lane, and when Pam pulled up alongside them, another burly henchman popped out of the sunroof, so close she could almost catch his eye.
The henchman started shooting at them, bullets ripping through the side of the ambulance and Pam's door, shattering her window.
She spun the wheel hard to the right until they grazed the tunnel wall, the screech of metal grinding against concrete ear-splitting. But the rattle of bullets didn't stop, and just as Pam managed to even them out, one tore past her arm. She yelped in surprise, white-hot pain blinding her, but she reacted faster than she knew she was capable of moving.
She released the wheel and whipped out the gun stashed in her pocket, firing four rounds and hitting the henchman in the neck. Without her hands on the wheel, the ambulance went careening across the tunnel again, prompting the Joker to grab the wheel.
"Shoot the driver!" he barked gruffly, spinning the wheel left so they slammed up against the BMW, forcing it up against the tunnel wall and keeping it there as they raced toward the end of the tunnel.
Pam ground her teeth to push past the acute, overwhelming pain in her arm as she awkwardly fired the last of her bullets into the BMW's passenger window while the Joker held the wheel. He was close enough that she could smell him—gunpowder, smoke, blood, tobacco, a disgusting combination that made her want to vomit. But then BMW's passenger window shattered, and the car lurched to a sudden stop, falling behind as the ambulance sped forward, catching up to the vehicle with Harley as they neared the end of the tunnel.
"What the fuck do we do now!" Pam demanded her voice emotional and shaky as she took back the wheel with one hand. She glanced down at her left arm, uncertain how bad it was, but the entire left sleeve of the EMT jumpsuit was rapidly becoming soaked in blood.
The Joker flopped back in his seat and raked his hair off his face, then leaned forward to brace his elbows on his knees, staring at the back of the BMW like he was deep in thought. He was out of bullets, but hopefully not ideas.
Pam couldn't have told you what was going through his mind, but she got the distinct impression that he was willing something to happen. As if the sheer force of his determination to get Harley back would be enough to give them an opening.
"J, what the fuck do we do!" Pam snapped impatiently.
He sighed through his nose and narrowed his eyes but didn't say anything.
The wailing of police sirens suddenly filled the tunnel, and Pam swore furiously when she saw two cruisers pull up behind them, their lights flashing.
"Keep going," the Joker snapped at her as if a little something like having the cops on their tail while they were unarmed in a busted up ambulance on its last legs wasn't something to worry about. "You got your voodoo," he added bitterly. "Those pigs ain't takin' you alive."
"How do we stop them?" Pam demanded, but the Joker didn't reply. He was out of ideas, Pam realized. "Fuck," she hissed, following the BMW out of the tunnel where it let out near Gotham Harbor.
They raced along the East River, coming up to the Downtown Tunnel to the Eastside. In the distance, Pam could see they were starting to raise the bridges, the ones connecting Uptown and Midtown to the Eastside already half-way into the night sky.
"They're gonna take her to him," the Joker predicted darkly, his eyes still on the back of the BMW.
"And how the fuck do you suggest we stop them?" Pam spat, looking between the Joker and the road, bewildered by his behavior.
"We don't," he replied crisply. "Harley can look after herself."
Pam nearly screamed in frustration.
"What the fuck does that mean!" she snapped.
"Whadya think she'd want, huh?" the Joker shot back impatiently. "She's sick of hiding from that piece of shit, and she doesn't need to be fuckin' saved. She needs backup."
"Backup," Pam huffed incredulously, watching the BMW turn into the Downtown tunnel. She prepared to follow them when the Joker stopped her.
"No," he said quietly, the sirens from the cruisers chasing them nearly drowning him out. "We'll find her," he added darkly. "Take the bridge."
"You better be right," Pam seethed, allowing the BMW to peel off without following. "What do we do about those guys?" she asked, glancing in the rearview mirror at their pursuers.
A smirk spread across the Joker's butchered face, and he shifted around to pull something out of his back pocket, holding it up for Pam to see.
A grenade.
Pam's eyes widened in disbelief. "You're just carrying that thing around!"
He chuckled throatily and shot Pam a knowing look.
"Harley said exactly the same thing once," he informed her smugly. "Take the bridge," he said again, almost lazily, and slumped back in his seat.
Pam eyed him warily but turned toward the Downtown Bridge nonetheless. There was a police barricade guarded by more cops in riot gear, and when she glanced at the Joker again, he was leaning forward, tonguing the scar splitting his bottom lip as he palmed the grenade.
Pam took a deep breath, praying the ambulance would make it as she sped toward the barricade.
The Joker pulled the pin on the grenade, and Pam braced herself when he lobbed it out the window. The blast lifted the ambulance's front wheels off the ground, making Pam's heart flutter wildly in her chest while her ears rang like church bells. The wheels slammed back down just as they drove through the remains of the explosion, dust, and smoke filling the ambulance, making Pam choke.
"Very good, Red," the Joker drawled resentfully.
Pam shot him a dirty look, coughing as they sped over the bridge, the cruisers falling back, letting them go.
It had been nearly an hour since Bruce and Dinah—since the Batman and Black Canary— left Vicki upon learning Gotham's three most-wanted terrorists were spotted at Roman Sionis' penthouse.
Alone and submerged in almost complete darkness apart from what illumination the fireplace granted, there was little else for Vicki to do but pace and scroll through social media, searching for answers as to what was happening outside. Occasionally, she would sneak whiskey off the bar cart, or more unproductively, peer out the window at the chaos in the streets below, lit only by flames and the floodlights of police helicopters glancing off clouds of smoke.
After another prolonged bout of pacing, Vicki forced herself to sit on the couch, sighing as she scanned Arturo Rodriguez's live-streams. He was trying to speak to the masked men and women engaging in violent civil disobedience, but they weren't interested in talking to him.
Vicki had a lot weighing on her mind at the moment, but watching Arturo reporting from the streets managed to make her feel even worse. Here she was hiding out in her soon-to-be ex-boyfriend's penthouse instead of doing her job.
The job she seemed to have lost touch with somewhere along the way.
She was considering dipping into the whisky again when the balcony doors banged open, a gust of wind sweeping into the sitting room. Vicki jumped to her feet, her eyes widening when the Batman appeared beside the helipad outside, his cape flapping around him, an unconscious Dinah in his arms.
Her mask was gone.
"What-what happened?" Vicki stammered, watching Bruce stomp into the penthouse and lower Dinah onto the couch beside the fireplace. She was bleeding from a gash on her forehead, a goose-egg sized lump already appearing near her hairline.
"Harley and the Riddler are in custody," Bruce grunted, his shoulders rising and falling like he was out of breath. "The Joker got away."
"What about Roman?" Vicki demanded, but Bruce shook his head.
"He can wait," he rumbled. "I need to find the Joker. He'll come for Harley."
Vicki bit her tongue, knowing she wasn't in a position to protest about who was the more dangerous rogue. She'd been as honest as she'd felt capable of being with Bruce and Dinah, telling them everything about Roman, Dagget, Hill, the blue poppies, and BO… But that honesty excluded a few critical facts beyond the Riddler's real name. Namely, Knox's murder and Vicki agreeing to sneak Harley Quinn and the Joker into Wayne Manor, along with the more personal details she was sure Harley would want Vicki to keep to herself.
"What are you going to do?" Vicki asked warily.
"The Riddler's at the MCU," Bruce grunted. "He'll give up the Joker. Harley won't."
Vicki was about to counter that she wasn't sure that strategy would work when Dinah started to wake up, her head bobbing against the couch cushion.
Bruce caught Vicki's eye.
"Keep an eye on her," he rasped, an order.
Vicki searched for Bruce behind the Batman's cowl, but she couldn't find any of the softness she knew Bruce to be capable of. There was only a cold determination to be effective.
And regret about trusting her, she suspected.
"Alright," Vicki agreed somberly.
Bruce nodded, lingering a moment longer before he turned and stomped back out to the balcony. He stood on the ledge, a current rippling through his cape, pulling it taught before he dove forward, over the edge.
Vicki released a long breath and looked down at Dinah, whose eyelids were fluttering weakly. It looked like someone had beaten her over the head with something heavy, and Vicki needed very few guesses to figure out who was responsible.
She grabbed a linen napkin off the bar cart and dunked it in a silver bucket of melted ice, then lowered herself onto the couch.
"Dinah," Vicki brushed a few sweaty strands of ashy blonde hair off her forehead.
Dinah lurched up, pitching forward and vomiting onto the marble floor. Vicki winced and gave her space to empty her stomach, patting her back in an awkward show of comfort. But she quickly got distracted by the feeling of Dinah's armor under her fingertips. It wasn't solid like she'd expected but made of shifting plates of rough kevlar-like material covered in what felt like latex.
Dinah turned to look at Vicki over her shoulder, her eyes narrowing suspiciously, and Vicki quickly pulled her hand away.
"Sorry," she muttered, feeling chastised, and handed over the damp cloth.
"What happened," Dinah croaked, wincing as she dabbed at her forehead, her elbow braced in her thigh to keep herself upright.
Even in the dim glow of the fireplace, Vicki could see Dinah was pale and sweaty, her bottom lip split and swollen, her head still bleeding, her pupils blown wide. She was definitely suffering a concussion.
"Uh… I'm not sure," Vicki admitted uneasily. "Bruce said the cops have Harley and the Riddler. He carried you back…."
Dinah nodded silently, her breathing rattly. She braced both her elbows on her knees and stared at the floor.
"I think you have a concussion," Vicki added, to which Dinah laughed bitterly.
"I'll be fine." She took a deep breath and released it slowly. "Harley saw my face."
"Shit," Vicki's eyes widened. "Well… what does that mean?"
"I don't know," Dinah shook her head.
"Did Roman get away?" Vicki pressed. "Bruce didn't say…"
Dinah turned around to look at Vicki squarely, her expression incredulous.
"Why do you think he's somehow worse than she is," she demanded, irritated. "Harley is a terrorist."
Vicki's eyes widened, feeling offended on Harley's behalf that neither of Gotham's vigilantes seemed to be taking the threat of Black Mask seriously.
"I met Roman's fiancee once," Vicki replied hotly, not bothering to hide her feelings. "Her name was Samantha Pierce. Roman cut her tongue out and tortured her to make her obedient. Then he killed her, and was planning on doing the same thing to Harley. He wanted her to be his slave."
Dinah looked taken aback for a moment, surprised even, then she sighed and shook her head, almost sadly.
"Harley tortures people too, Vicki," she said. "She is not better than Roman. She's objectively worse. She's made you think she's the victim."
"She is the victim this time," Vicki insisted.
Vicki wasn't sure why she was pushing so hard to defend Harley, but she couldn't seem to stop.
"Everything is strategic with her," Dinah said dully. "She's weaponized your empathy."
"No," Vicki shook her head, getting flustered. "I know what she is. I know what she's capable of, but what Roman wants to do to her is worse than death, and she does not deserve that. No one does. I can have empathy for her without being manipulated by her." Vicki scoffed impatiently. "You're the one sitting here pretending a rapist who tortures women isn't all that bad just because he isn't Harley Quinn. What is it about her that makes you so… so cold, huh?"
Dinah sagged back against the couch cushions, her brow furrowing like she was confused.
"Why do you treat her like she's superhuman?" Vicki demanded. "She's just a woman underneath all of it. Not a good woman, but she's a human being with feelings."
Dinah looked up sharply.
"Feelings," she spat, her voice thick. "I have seen her do terrible things." Her nostrils flared, and her spine straightened. "I helped her do terrible things because I believed she cared about me. She tricked me!"
Vicki's eyes widened at the sheer emotion in Dinah's voice.
And how young she sounded.
And suddenly, Dinah's virulent loathing of Harley made sense. It wasn't just because Harley was Harley Quinn, murderer, terrorist, and the Joker's paramour.
This was personal.
Vicki remembered how it felt to have Harley hug her in the alley and how she'd craved the numbness Harley inspired in her. What it felt like to want Harley to keep her safe despite knowing it was wrong, or evil, even.
She couldn't imagine feeling all that and being so young.
Vicki's iPhone started to beep and vibrate frantically—ding!-zzz- ding!-zzz- ding!-zzz—with notifications. She looked down at the screen to see Arturo Rodieguz was tweeting again, and her breath caught when she saw the grainy video clip at the top of his feed.
A mob of people wearing clown masks had swarmed a battered police cruiser, orange flames licking at the background as gunshots rang out. The clowns pulled someone out of the back window, lifting them overhead and passing her along.
It was Harley.
Vicki watched the ten-second clip three times, speechless and horrifically hopeful.
"What is that?" Dinah demanded.
"Um." Vicki considered lying, and she told herself she would lie because Dinah was injured and would insist on going back out to find Harley if she knew. But that wasn't the only reason.
Vicki pushed away the impulse to cover for Harley and turned the phone screen toward Dinah, who watched the ten-second clip grimly, her nostrils flaring.
"Where is this?" she hissed, ripping the phone out of Vicki's hand.
Another video started playing.
"Okay—okay, there's a lot of unrest right now, but it appears Harley Quinn has just escaped police custody. Or... or was taken from police custody. It's hard to say at the moment." Arturo was cut off by an explosion in the background, making the phone's speakers rattle, and when the fuzzing stopped, he was saying: "... appears to have escaped in a black BMW!"
"Black BMW," Vicki looked up at Dinah, her heart leaping in her throat. "Roman got her."
Dinah ground her teeth, her mind working fast. She jumped to her feet and circled the couch.
"What are you doing?" Vicki demanded anxiously, watching Dinah duck down to press her thumb against an otherwise inconspicuous-looking slab of marble.
There was a hiss as a section of the wall ejected, and a drawer appeared. Dinah scooped out a black cowl and shoved it on her head, her jaw set as its fastenings locked together at the side of her neck.
"Dinah, what are you doing? You're injured!" Vicki got to her feet as Dinah marched toward the balcony doors.
"I have to stop Harley," Dinah snapped.
"Stop her? Roman kidnapped her," Vicki pointed out. "How are you planning on finding him?"
Dinah stopped short, her shoulders heaving before she spun around to face Vicki, raw desperation blazing in her tawny eyes behind the mask.
"I have to," she hissed.
Vicki pressed her lips together, searching for the right words to stop Dinah from leaving while she was hurt.
"I know how it feels to be… horrified by yourself because of what she can get you to do," Vicki said weakly. "But getting yourself killed chasing her down won't make up for anything you did."
"I have to stop her," Dinah insisted emotionally. "If I can stop her, then…"
She trailed off, but Vicki understood.
If Dinah could stop her, she could find absolution.
"It won't be enough," Vicki croaked. "You have to forgive yourself. Getting yourself killed trying to find her won't help anyone. Please, Dinah, just let Bruce go after her."
Dinah shook her head furtively, stubbornly, and Vicki's face softened, sympathy bleeding into her expression as she realized there would be no stopping her.
"Try the Janus Plastics Plant," she suggested, her voice strained. "Roman has this dynastic obsession that motivates almost everything he does. That's a good place to start looking for him."
Dinah searched Vicki's face, and apparently, she found what she was looking for. She turned and bolted out onto the balcony, not hesitating before she swan-dived over the edge.
Vicki stared after her, feeling helpless and useless. She took a deep breath to pull herself together, trying to decide what her next move needed to be.
Her phone was still beeping and vibrating relentlessly with new notifications. Not just from social media, but her editors and colleagues, and sources too. They wanted to know where she was and what she was reporting on.
Vicki didn't belong in a penthouse while her billionaire-vigilante (ex) boyfriend saved the city. Vicki was supposed to be on the streets, getting the truth to the people.
And unlike Arturo Rodriguez, Vicki had some exclusive insight into these riots.
Her resolve hardening, Vicki rushed over to the secret drawer still standing open at the wall and peered inside. A second cowl and two Kevlar vests were on display there, and she quickly snatched up the smaller vest and pulled it on over her head, the velcro crackling as she strapped it around her torso.
Vicki checked her phone one last time. Seventy percent battery was enough to do her job, she decided. She ran for the elevator, not sure what she would find on the streets, but knowing it was her job to report on it.
Ed woke up to some very noisy rioters. They were pissed off, raging, still chanting, their voices like a maelstrom of garbage grinding through Ed's ears. He blinked hard, trying to push through the fog of a concussion, thanks to that little minx Black Canary. Low blow, BC, Ed thought sullenly. Low blow.
But once Ed's eyes were open, he instantly regretted it, the sharp glare of fluorescent lights blinding him. He moaned and turned his face into his sleeve, his moaning kicking up a few octaves when he realized he was laying on a cold cement floor, and his wrists were handcuffed together.
"Ah, fudge," Ed whined, his head pounding like a drum.
Eventually, he pulled himself together enough to prop himself up on his elbow and look around, and oh, the humanity! He was alone in a holding cell at what he could only assume was the GCPD's Major Crimes Unit, a generator humming noisily to keep the lights on. The cells around him were packed with rioters rattling the bars and chanting, still proudly displaying their civil discontent in incarceration.
Some looked like the anarchists and bikers associated with Alexandra Kosov's gang, but most of them were pretty normal-looking. College kids, white middle-class leftists, vegans. That cheered Ed up exponentially that they'd fallen hook line and sinker for his glorious master plan, putting on clown masks and whipping up some constructive chaos under his watchful eye.
Okay, maybe the Joker had done most of the talking, but it was Ed's evil plan.
But his momentarily-buoyed mood was ruined once he realized he was missing his beloved sea-foam green Dior blazer.
Ed's bottom lip jutted out in a pout as he looked around the cell again, his heart beating a little faster as he accepted that he was in captivity.
Oh, God. They were going to send him to Blackgate or Arkham.
There definitely wouldn't be any Dior there.
A few diabolical plans occurred to Ed as he fruitlessly searched for an opening. He just needed something to inspire his evil genius into action, some cosmic little something to set him in motion. And when that didn't happen, he tried to judge the likelihood that Harley and J would break him out. Hard to say. Maybe fifty-fifty. Maybe less. It depended on what happened to them…
"Riddler," someone sneered behind him.
Ed looked over his shoulder, his eyebrows raising when he saw a middle-aged Latina detective glaring at him from the other side of the bars. Her black hair had a pretty fabulous natural wave, and she was pretty in a dykey way. But her brown suit was cheap, cheap, cheap. Kohls, he was pretty sure. Ed instinctively recoiled, his hand flying to his heart as he gasped in pity and horror.
"You and I are gonna have a little talk," the detective informed him hostilely.
"Okay," Ed narrowed his eyes. "Hang on, am I technically under arrest? I don't think anyone read me my rights."
"You're a domestic terrorist," she sneered as a beat cop unlocked Ed's cell. "You're lucky you're feelin' anything below the neck."
"Get up, ya fuckin' clown," the cop snapped, grabbing the back of Ed's Prada shirt thoughtlessly.
"Clown?" Ed huffed indignantly. "Hello! I'm the Riddler, jeez."
"Yer a fuckin' clown in my book, buddy," the beat cop scoffed, marching Ed out of the cell.
"Hey, easy on the Prada!" Ed squealed, wiggling furiously.
"Prada, huh?" the lady detective raised her eyebrows as she looked Ed's shirt over, then promptly tossed the dregs of her coffee cup down Ed's chest.
He released a prolonged gasp of abject horror, looking between his shirt and the detective's smirking face.
"You bitch!" Ed accused, giving his best Alexis Carrington impression.
But the lady detective just shot the cop holding Ed in place a knowing look.
"Book him," she drawled. "The Riddler here's got some explaining to do."
The Janus Plastics Plant consisted of the old factory, where the plastics used to be made, and an office block attached to the eastern side of the building, where the business of selling plastics was done. All of it had closed down in the early 80s at the tail end of the depression, bought up and liquidated by Wayne Enterprises.
All day, Crane had been waiting in the plant's control room, which overlooked the old factory floor. It was lined with huge out-dated banks of computers, the kind that would take an hour to process what a cell phone could do instantaneously. He was left with a pair of well-heeled henchmen, ostensibly to keep him safe, or perhaps as a barrier to stop him from leaving. Roman was running low on allies. Not even Hamilton Hill would take his calls.
And once again, Jonathan Crane was out of options.
Sometime after midnight, Roman returned. He was limping, his face a bloodied pulp with one eye swollen shut, and his nose broken.
It looked like his plan to hand Harleen and the Joker over to the Batman had backfired.
You got no idea what she's capable of.
The Joker's words raced through Crane's mind as Roman shrugged off the help of a henchman and staggered over to a control panel beneath the viewing window. He fumbled in the breast pocket of his blazer for a baggie of white powder and shook some out on the desk, racking up two lines with shaking hands while Crane and the henchmen watched in tense, horrible silence.
The stench of desperation was undeniable, radiating from Roman like a noxious cloud. He snorted up two lines of cocaine, then wiped his nose furiously, spinning around to face them.
"I don't normally indulge," he sneered, looking off-kilter and unsteady. "But as you can see, these are not normal times."
Crane ran his tongue over his bottom teeth, fighting back a disdainful sneer at this pathetic showing.
"Jonathan," Roman tried to force a smile as he staggered forward and grabbed Crane by both arms, making him sway back. "Lucy is dead, and I need you to take her place."
Uncertain how to respond, Crane said nothing, trying not to recoil when Roman leaned in closer, his battered face hideous, his sunken eyes manic from narcotics and desperation.
"Rupert Daggett will replace his father, and we will take over Wayne Enterprises with Anarky's help," Roman insisted, though it sounded as if he was trying to convince himself. "And then together, we will… destroy the Joker."
Crane could do little more than stare back at Roman uncertainly.
"And Harleen—?" he started to say.
There was a commotion out in the factory, henchmen's voices, and the rattling of the metal platform as they jogged across it.
Roman forced another smile, shaky but confident. "She's on her way now."
Four burly thugs in expensive suits stomped into the control room, and Roman's smile grew wider, more manic and unhinged. He choked out a laugh and released Crane, spreading his arms wide in welcome to his minions.
"And here she is now!" he greeted them cheerfully, unsteady on his feet.
Crane turned slowly, inhaling sharply when he saw one of the thugs was carrying Harleen.
She was unconscious, her painted face bloodied and bruised, her red dress torn.
"See," Roman beamed as one henchman lowered her to the floor beside a structural pole and another zip-tied her hands behind it, her legs splayed out in front of her, her limp body slumping forward. "Everything always comes together," Roman sighed happily. "It's over now."
Dread crawled around Crane's gut as he watched Roman duck down to arrange Harleen's hair over her shoulder, almost lovingly, confident he'd already won.
But nothing Roman said would convince Jonathan Crane this was over yet.
You got no idea what she's capable of.
A/N: This chapter is kind of non-stop action. I have no idea how that really plays, considering you're reading it, not watching it!
Two big 'Joker' easter eggs that I hope some of you enjoyed.
Next: Pam and the Joker are forced to collaborate. Ed gets a visit from the Batman. Harley wakes up and isn't especially happy.
Please review! They give me life.
xo