A/N: Hello True Believers! Once again we have another Naruto/Comic cross, except THIS time, we are not visiting the realms of the Marvelverse, but the Worlds of D.C. I warn you, this is darker than most of my other works, but I think it's one of my best. I hope you all enjoy as Naruto meets the "Clown Prince of Crime" as it were.
This is set some time after the Uchiha Massacre and before the start of the Manga/Anime.
This was inspired, naturally, by the various threads that have popped up with Joker!Naruto ideas. Here is my take on the matter. Enjoy!
And now, on with the story...
Thunder crashed.
Lightning lit up the sky.
Rain drops beat down on the silent village.
Konohagakure no Sato, village of peace, prosperity, forgiveness, tolerance, redemption and friendship.
Or is it?
It certainly isn't for one little boy.
A small child with a burden forced upon him.
The day had started out like most others.
He left his grungy apartment- not that it was horrible, it just wasn't all that great- and went to the Ninja Academy like any other Shinobi candidate would.
Well... Not quite like any other prospective Shinobi...
Most others had parents. Though some, he noticed, only had one. Either a mother, or a father. In fact, only one other in his class was like him in regards to the fact that he had no parents. He was an orphan just like him. No mommy. No daddy. No one to look after him, nor to care for him. No one to come home to but an empty apartment.
Loneliness...
It was a harsh thing to deal with, day in and day out... Especially when things seemed to be designed so that you suffer.
Though he acted like it, an idiot, he was not. After all, could an idiot hide from the "most elite" Chuunin and Jounin in all of the Elemental Countries, especially one who had not even graduated yet?
No.
But, we're rambling, aren't we. We've been diverted off course, shanghaied, as it were.
Back on topic...
He had left his apartment, and gone to school. Just an ordinary day of boring classes, long lectures, glares from every adult he encountered and the ridicule and scorn of nearly every last one of his peers.
Yes, he was NOT an idiot, nor was he oblivious. He saw the disdain from the adults to him, he watched as they passed their opinions onto their kids. They judged him before they knew him. They carried out his sentence for crimes unseen, unspoken and unheard of. Punished him for those crimes in which he had no idea of what they were.
As was his routine; day in, day out.
It didn't matter to him. He would NOT let them win. They would NOT see him show weakness, and so he would plaster that stupid grin onto his face. He would hide his pain from those who either didn't know how to look, or those who did not care.
Though, there were times he was really creeped out by the white-eyed girl. She seemed to see through it. To be able to look what he kept hidden from others. Did she care? Or was she waiting like so many others? Waiting for him to fall, to crumble...
He wasn't sure he wanted to know, to be honest. After all, the best way to not get your hopes shattered is to not have them in the first place.
But that is neither here nor there...
As with most days, he would make a few attempts at making friends, but very few people (none really) were all that willing to let their children play with him.
Loneliness.
It was a festering wound. A weakness that was like no other. An affliction that could not be cured independently away from others. It just wasn't done.
Something was off this day though. He could feel it. It crept into the back of his mind, made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He shrugged it off, thinking it nothing.
Mizuki-sensei then offered to help him with kunai and shuriken throwing practice. Not quite an unusual request. Every now and again a teacher would be coerced into staying with him to improve his skills by the Hokage. Of course most of the time, he would escape, not really wanting to bother with the added scorn and ridicule of his teachers.
However...
The Loneliness...
It had been eating at him all morning. He didn't want to be alone. Not this night, and the Hokage was busy. It was an off day for him, as he really didn't have the energy for pranks on this night.
Kunai practice went better than expected, though shuriken were far from being his specialty weapon.
Once it was finished, he was ready to treat himself to some ramen. That heavenly goodness that was his ultimate vice.
Though he liked ramen, he wasn't as obsessed about it as he made himself appear. No, he kept frequenting the Ichiraku Ramen Stand because of the company. Teuchi-ojii-san and Ayame-nee-chan were the friendliest people he had ever met. The didn't glare at him or treat him like dirt. To them, he was the little boy who loved his ramen. Miso to be exact, though he had taken a liking to pretty much every type they had.
However, it seemed as if fate had other plans for him on this night. Mizuki, on a whim, decided on inviting Naruto to a poker game. Now, Naruto wasn't a fool. He knew Mizuki-sensei had probablly sen his stuffed Gama-chan filled to the brim, nearly bursting out. Mizuki and his friends would likely try to cheat him out of his money. To be honest, he didn't care much. He needed the attention. He CRAVED the attention.
He just didn't want to be alone anymore...
However, things didn't go as planned. Instead of getting cleaned out, much to the other's frustration, Naruto was steadily winning round after round.
And then what Naruto had not counted on.
Cheap sake, sore losers, people who mildly dislike you at best and waiting to see you dead at worst, and lost money were a bad combination.
Very bad.
Loneliness...
He hadn't wanted to be alone anymore...
But that night...
That night... He knew...
He KNEW he's always be alone...
ALWAYS...
Amidst the pouring ran, crashing thunder and crackling lightning, was a boy. A boy alone in a pool of blood. Almost none of it his own.
He sat alone, rocking himself as he sat in the dark...
Alone.
Just him and his now former teacher and a few of his teacher's friends. Or rather what used to be his sensei and his sensei's friends.
They were dead. Killed by his own hands.
They were dead. Each and everyone. They hadn't stood a chance.
Alone...
He was now alone... Alone in the darkness...
Rocking back and forth... Contemplating what they had told him. What they had revealed to him as they hurt him. As they cut him.
Repeatedly.
Over and over again, they cut him. Scarred his face, disfiguring him. Hurting him. Telling him things.
Secrets.
Telling him secrets. Things he isn't to know, but does now. Things that are forbidden.
Secrets.
Secrets that are whispered about in the background. Whispers that are talked about in the shadows.
The hatred, the scorn. For what? For why?
Was he the monster? Were they?
Did it matter?
Did what matter?
The pattering of the rain droplets echoed through the silent room. Thunder crashed, and Lightning brightly lit up the sky and he saw it.
A simple object, really.
Floating.
Floating atop the pool of blood that he was currently sitting in. Blood that wasn't entirely his own.
The 'Wild Card'.
The one with the creepy clown on it.
The... Joker...
It was laughing...
Laughing...?
Why?
Why was it laughing?
Was it laughing AT him? Or them?
He touched the scars on his face.
Those... Men... Those... Monsters...
They cut him... They hurt him...
The hated him... They hated his smile...
They cut... hurt... hate...
Repeatedly... They wouldn't stop. He begged. He pleaded.
They wouldn't stop. He killed them.
Joker...
It was exhilarating...
Laughing...
Liberating even...
Laughing... Why?
It had been...
Fun...
Naruto couldn't help but grin, not that he wasn't already. The scars on his face gave that illusion. Or at least he thought they did, in some twisted way as he looked at the broken shards of the mirror imbedded in Mizuki-sensei's skull.
He grinned. Slightly at first, but it soon became a full blown smile.
Joker... Smile... Laughter...
He felt this feeling in his chest. His shoulders were shaking.
"He...He... He..He.."
It came slowly at first, but then suddenly it came all at once as Naruto burst out in half crazed hysterical laughter.
All this time...
All this time it had been him...
The 'Wild Card'...
Joker...
All this time HE had been...
The Joker...
Wiping his hand on the bloodstained floor, he watch in morbid fascination as the blood moved with his hand.
He lifted his hand, looking at it as the blood dribbled off of it, back onto the floor where the rest was pooled.
Blood that wasn't entirely his own.
With a quick swipe, he ran his hand across his mouth, staining his jaw line and mouth with blood not entirely his own.
Checking himself in the shards of the mirror embedded in Mizuki's skull, he smiled, a true... genuine smile.
The Wild Card...
The Joker...
The Fool...
If it was a clown Konohagakure wanted...
It was a clown Konohagakure was going to get...