Life and Death

Chapter 9

"Your mother said to pick the very best girl
And I am"
Tag You're It - Melanie Martinez

Getting near the clown prince's daughter was like kneeling down and waiting for the execution. Still, if they somehow, in a theoretical, alternative universe got away with this, they could do just about anything. The mobster henchmen tried to stay optimistic.

She was such a strange kid. After the initial biting and struggling when they pulled her into the car – and damn, she had a mouthful of teeth she tried to bury in the flesh of anyone who came close – they had knocked her out.

Frank wrapped a cloth around his bleeding hand. "She's like some fucking attack dog."

Jerry, the driver, rolled his eyes. "She's gotta be breathing. Don't be too rough."

The girl was slowly regaining consciousness. She was placed against the back wall in the van, hands bound and duct tape placed over her mouth. With her primary weapon gone, she just resigned to glaring daggers at them. Those grey eyes were strangely malevolent for belonging to such a small child. No sign of fear or hysterics.

Ryan glanced at her. She still wasn't crying. Weren't they supposed to do that after something like this? She just played with the hem of her ballerina tutu.

With their boss Gambol still in a private hospital recovering from gunshot wounds that almost cost him his life, their orders were clear. Despite the numerous freaks in costumes the Joker kept around, his trips into the city were done without his crew, which made it easier to get to the girl. Not that it had been easy to begin with. Luck had been on their side, finally, and she was reckless.

Ryan sat across from her, keeping watch of her during the car ride. After a while her glare faltered unless someone directly looked at her, but it turned more and more into a strange calm. He was pretty sure kids did not act like that after being forcefully tied up and gagged. She just sulked, sometimes looking up at them to give them another murderous look as if she wanted to claw their eyes out.

He almost felt bad for it, especially after she started fidgeting after a while. But they had all seen the determinant rage in those tiny arms and legs of hers, how she was capable of kicking and clawing. So they kept her tied up.

xxx

Jaylie Quinn was absolutely seething.

Normally when she got into one of those moods, she'd pick up her favorite toy, a small knife or her bat, and act on it. Never on Mommy or Daddy, of course, but there was always another guy around that she could stab, hit, or bite. It was funny to see how much she could do before they fell to their knees and started screaming, but most of all Mommy and Daddy's pleased faces.

She had dropped her knife, the one she had kept stashed beneath her dress was taken from her and she had no weapons. It was terribly frustrating to not even be able to bite.

She was aware of her situation, but she hated herself for falling into it from the very beginning. All because she broke The Rules.

There were plenty of rules, and being almost five years old she was well aware of them. The Rules were annoying, but she had to follow them, or Daddy would get mad and not let her go outside for a while.

First, she recalled, never get out of Mommy or Daddy's sight when not at home. She often got to go outside, and she had stayed with them like a good girl.

Until the car pulled up, and she was used to big, shiny cars – new sparkly cars every day, taking her and her Mommy and Daddy somewhere. Mommy had told her to wait outside and the car was there. She had approached the car, it was so boring to stand outside and wait for them. The guy in the car even waved at her, maybe it was Panda.

But the car didn't wait for Mommy and Daddy, and when she got in, they suddenly yanked her arm and sped away. After that she couldn't really recall what happened, but she had broken the next rule:

Never go away on your own. Always have Frosty or some other guy follow.

Now she was sitting there, furious, at the rules she had broken. And the guys who she fought with, they had pulled her hair and kicked her around. They had forgotten that she was a princess. They had taken her from her kingdom and she wanted to kill them for it.

Third rule was always ask Daddy or Mommy for permission before playing with someone. How was she supposed to play with them now? Her arms still ached.

One of the men carried her out of the car and she was put in a windowless room.

She sat still with bound arms and legs, making no attempt to move. She knew when Daddy tied some guy up to play with him, they never escaped. Instead she watched the men who surrounded her.

When Daddy was thinking, and Mommy bothered him he got mad at her. Jaylie watched him instead; it was a far more effective way to get his attention. She would sit silently as a mouse and watch him as he thought out some game for Batsy.

Daddy always held something in his hand when he thought. Sometimes his Purple Cane, that Jaylie was not allowed to handle, or a knife or another toy. He always noticed her staring, no matter how silent she was or if she tried to hide out of his sight in various places. Sometimes he pretended that she didn't exist, other times he mocked her or told her to come out. She would climb into his lap and look at the computers and Ipads in front of him.

She loved those times the most, when he was in deep thought about Batsy or some other plan, and she was allowed to be near and watch. It made her excited, it made her feel important like Mommy and Daddy, to watch them prepare. Daddy would tell her about his plans for the night, letting her in on the secrets.

She noticed that two men stayed to guard her and a third one came in now and then. She waited as the time passed by, watching the men watching her.

x

Several hours later, one of the men was leading her back to the room after having escorted her to the bathroom – on the condition that her hands remained bound in front of her. At the same time, the guy who drove the car and several others came in to the room.

One glanced at her. "There's been an explosion not long from here," he muttered. She concluded he was not feeling well, he was starting to get a layer of sweat on his forehead. "The clown's on our tracks. Boss needs to hurry up. Don't let her out of your sight."

He stomped out, followed by the other men. One of the guards scowled. "We should have had the ransom exchange by tomorrow."

Around midnight, the men returned. Jaylie had fallen asleep on the concrete floor, but their loud entrance woke her up. She felt cold and her legs had fallen asleep from the uncomfortable position, a crawling sensation in her legs.

"As soon as we get the word, we're moving her," the sweaty man ordered.

"Are you kidding me?" another man hissed, putting down his box of Chinese take-out. "After all the damn trouble we went through to get her here?"

"Shut the fuck up. If she's here when the lunatic comes, we're dead meat."

"Move her where?" a man asked, the one she knew was called Ryan.

Sweaty glared at him. "I don't give a fuck, just put her in a hole somewhere until the clown pays up, got it?"

When Sweaty and his men had left the room, Ryan and the other guard seemed to relax. Ryan moved closer to her, holding a blanket in his hand.

As soon as he came within her range, Jaylie lunged at him, still bound, trying to smash her head into his chin. She growled through the duct tape, signaling at him in the hyena language she had read about - if you come any closer I will rip your throat out.

Ryan backed off and the other guard laughed. "If she does that again, knock her out."

She pretended she was a wolf, retreating back after a successful kill. Soon she fell asleep again, curled up on the floor.

Someone was shaking her awake. The men were back, their loud voices hammering against her head. She didn't want to move yet, she was dizzy and sleepy, but they dragged her upright. She kicked them, they had released her legs to make her walk, and shoved her out of the room. She tried to bite them through her duct tape and received a slap in return.

Cold air surrounded her as they pushed her outside. It was still dark outside and she saw nothing until she was thrown into the car again. She landed on her stomach and all air was pressed out of her as she crawled into a corner. The car started moving.

She was jerked forward when the car stopped. Someone roughly grabbed her hair and arms and lifted her out of the car. She let her body go limp, playing dead. Voices nearby caught her attention.

"Open the goddamn door."

"I'm trying to."

The man who carried her put her down on the ground, keeping one arm around her. She pretended to be sleep-walking, hanging limply in his grip. The duct tape had almost fallen off her mouth due to the saliva gathering around her lips. She poked her tongue out repeatedly until it fell off.

She gazed through her eyelashes and saw a large metal door, leading into darkness. She thought of the wild hyenas in the jungles, the wolfs in the forests. I'm a hyena, Mommy. She turned and bit into the man's forearm, closing her jaws around him as hard as she could, pretending she was crushing her prey. He cursed and let go of her.

She ran.

Heavy footsteps followed as she sprinted, using the last strength in her small, tired body. Large containers and dumpsters were showing up on every side of the street. The men were coming closer. She remembered playing Tag with Mommy and Daddy once. If she tried to run, they would always catch her. Daddy was fast but Mommy was quicker than him, leaping up in the air like a ballerina. Jaylie had her own strategy - she hid. When she didn't want to be found, they could never find her.

She rounded a corner, squeezed herself in between some garbage cans, and crouched between the brick wall and a large container. She was completely out of breath, nauseous and dizzy from the sprint, hungry and cold and most of all she missed Mommy and Daddy. Curling to a ball with her arms around her knees, she let the exhaustion take over.

xxx

Joker stalked into the room, his eyes wild and crazed like an animal.

"Where is she?"

"Wh-where is who, boss?" The henchman, one of the lower ranks, swallowed nervously as his heavy breathing Boss' face came right into his view.

"Whoooo?" Joker echoed, forcing the man to press himself against the wall.

He put his gun against the trembling man's chin, stroking it slowly, then he raised it and thrust the gun into his mouth. The goon gave a startled yelp.

Joker growled low in his throat, his face right in front of the man, his entire body rigid. He pressed the barrel of his gun against the man's fleshy throat.

"Where. Is. Jay-lie."

"I- I don't know boss. Someone took her away -"

"Ding-dong, wrong answer."

With an annoyed hiss, Joker pulled the trigger. He then turned around, put it back into his holster and wiped some brain substance off his face. "Jonny!" he hissed.

His right-hand man glanced at the rest of the assembled henchmen before looking back to the jester. "Yes, boss."

Joker stared in front of himself. "Bring the car around."

Harley had been a hysterical mess ever since they found out Jaylie had been taken. She had been continually lost in her head, battling the voices, tears and mascara streaming down her face. Joker growled as he followed her out to the street once again.

The reason he allowed her to bear that child to term was because of this - to keep her out of that state of mind that she returned in after Belle Reve. The days spent in comatose, the place inside her head where he couldn't reach her. And now, because of the brat, she was back in that state again. He hated them both for it.

Another part of him knew the kid was allowed to exist for another reason - she was his. A heir to the madness he had created. And she was gone. The girl had slipped out before them and when they got to the street, no one were in sight, just a now deceased henchman saying he had seen an unmarked car speed away.

He ground his teeth together as the fury threatened to overwhelm him. Any goon in his sight that wasn't intensely engaged in the hunt had gotten a bullet to the head. Whoever dared to steal his property was going to pay.

It had been a full day and he couldn't sleep, couldn't focus, just tried to get Harley's wailing and sobbing out of his head so he could think of the next course of action. He considered knocking her out.

As usual, her only plan had been equivalent to her impulsive instinct - to search frantically, and violently, for her lost child. This resulted in endless casualties but no success. Joker on the other hand focused on tracking down everyone who had any involvement in this. An eye for an eye, make no mistake.

The blood lust had taken over completely. The urge to enact his revenge on everyone who dared to take from him was overwhelming. They had taken Harley away, and by doing so she had lost their kid once already. He was filled with merciless rage, refusing to let another one slip away from his grip, refusing to let Harley slip away. She was his, the kid was his and he was going to get her back, with his hands covered in blood.

His vengeful fury helped him, as always, powering his body, his mind, to think up brutal schemes. He would let everyone drown in his vindictiveness. He would pour hell down on them.

He knew the brat would cause him trouble sooner or later, just like Harley, a pain in the ass. She had become a permanent part of their day-to-day life.

It was almost funny, ironical, the Joker worked up because of a brat. One henchman had quietly expressed his disbelief of the situation, and that was the last time he ever had an opinion - he was strangled by his furious boss.

Jonny Frost had rarely ever seen his Boss in such a state of disarray and rage - the Joker's gone crazy. It reminded him of his violent fits after finding out about Harley's location in Belle Reve.

Frost had been involved in enough hostage and kidnapping situations to know the drill. They had received an anonymous ransom demand for a couple of million dollars but the Joker had not even considered paying. When Harley disappeared six years ago, Joker would have gladly accepted any ransom, just to murder the recipients later, but this was different.

Harley was fully capable of defending herself or killing anyone that got in her way. A child on the other hand... no matter if she was Boss' daughter, she had a clear disadvantage in this world, a world that was completely unfit for a child. She could not hold her own and that made the situation much more urgent.

She had been pulled into a car and that was that. Frost doubted they would ever see her again. Gotham's streets were no place for a child, not even a hammer-wielding one.

Truth to be told, she didn't stand a chance.

He stepped over the bodies littering the floor and followed after Boss and Quinn to hunt for the girl. This was going to be a field day.

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