A/N: I want to thank all my reviewers. I really appreciate your taking the time to read and review. Now brace yourselves. Rated M for mature (and not in a good way!)

XI.

"Rachel, I don't have time for this." Harvey was jumpy, unhappy, the lines in his face grim. Rachel knew he'd been unhappy that Bruce had locked him up during the disaster at the fundraiser, and was even less pleased to find her being treated for cuts and bruises after she'd been thrown off a twenty-story building. Harvey rubbed his tired eyes. "Between Batman and the Joker's demands, a second-rate chemist in a costume—"

Rachel held up a hand. "I know, Harvey, I know. You weren't in Gotham yet, you didn't see what Crane did to Carmine Falcone, to this city. Now that he's back at Arkham, in a straitjacket, I feel a lot safer."

A rictus grin overpowered Harvey's better judgement, and he smothered it with a hand. "You feel safe, Rachel?"

Rachel threw Harvey a plastic bag with a test tube inside it. "Take a look at the evidence. Crane's latest toxin. This could have had devastating results if unleashed on Gotham, Harvey. Or, as I think is the case, the rest of the world."

Harvey picked up the evidence bag and gave it a cursory inspection. "Yes, very deadly—"

Rachel got to her feet. "But I don't think this is the full extent of it. There were things he was testing in the last few weeks—we don't even know what he was doing. We've all been so distracted by this . . . Joker stuff—"

"See, you can't even say his name without wincing, Rachel!" Harvey cried.

"My point is," said Rachel, "if we question him, I'm sure we'll track down the people working for him. If we don't try, we've got no chance."

Harvey looked through the two-way glass at Dr. Crane, captured for a second time with Batman's help and confined to the very insane asylum over which he once presided supreme. He was bundled up in a straitjacket and sat, staring at the glass with unnerving stillness, cool blue eyes unshielded by glasses. All of a sudden he began humming a song out of tune. Fascinated, Harvey stopped his rant. Rachel stood, glued to the glass. "Jean de Nivelle a un valet,

Jean de Nivelle a un valet.

Il n'est pas beau, il n'est pas laid,

Il' n'est pas beau, il n'est pas laid

Il a cherché une pucelle,

Hé, avant, Jean de Nivelle!

Hé, hé, hé, avant,

Jean de Nivelle est triomphante . . ."

He dissolved into shivers. "Quick, someone write that down," said Rachel. "It's French, we've got to translate it."

"It's gibberish," said Harvey. "I'm sorry, Rachel, while the Joker's on the loose, we just don't have time to play Little Orphan Annie. We have to get ready for Commissioner Loeb's funeral."

Crane looked up, appearing to have heard, and chuckled minutely to himself.

"There are three things I get asked all the time." Luc froze from where he was about to cross the street and take the next right to the apartment complex he had until lately shared with Cécile. He recognized the Joker's voice at once, even though they had only met briefly before, and Luc had of course caught glimpses of Gotham's most famous criminal on TV—most recently assassinating Gordon and trying to assassinate the Mayor. He was standing in full daylight in his ridiculous costume, leaning against a flickering lamp post. If Luc didn't know any better, he'd say it was with a come-hither stare.

"One is the, uh, you know . . ." He made an expansive gesture that could mean his scars or his makeup. "Two is, who is your tailor, and I think you know the answer to that one."

"What do you want?"

The Joker rubbed his gloved hands together. "Yep. That's the third thing. Like people just can't cope with not having motivation. I don't know what it is. Like there's gotta be a reas-on for everything. That's why I'm constantly having to reinvent myself, come up with a better and better story for why I am the way I am."

Luc ran forward with a cry of hate and took out a gun from his jeans pocket, thrusting it into the air and pulling the trigger all at the same time as the Joker and he tumbled into a narrow alleyway. The gun went off, harmlessly diverted. The Joker grabbed Luc's wrist with one hand and held a hand-made detonator in Luc's face with his other. "What do I care about being blown up?" screamed Luc, jockeying for his gun.

"With your girlfriend preparing lunch in the apartment complex across the road? I don't think so."

The Joker grabbed the gun and smacked Luc hard across the face with it. Luc flew against the concrete, blood gushing from the piercing in his lower lip. The Joker tossed the gun onto a fire escape about twenty feet away. "Let's be honest here, Luc," he said, circling him. "You weren't cut out for this line of work. You're too smart to be a stooge, but you're too dumb to be anything more than Crane's henchboy."

"What do you know about it?" asked Luc, sullenly, rubbing his cracked jaw.

"You thought it was fun for awhile, but when Crane got tossed back into Arkham, you weren't so keen on being the guinea pig, now were you?" The Joker leaned down and rocked on his heels. "I know everything. Crane tested his truth-or-dare serum on you, then decided you'd make an excellent candidate for what, in the old days, they'd call martyrdom." The Joker leaned down and seized Luc by the t-shirt and lifted him bodily off the ground. He reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out his wallet. Luc leaned against the brick wall, nonplussed. "Biological warfare, guerrilla terrorism on a micro-chemical scale, et cetera, et cetera." The Joker tossed the dollar bills out of the wallet and onto the ground, then removed the cheap photo booth prints within and gazed at them.

"Crane's a hell of a lot smarter than you give him credit for."

The Joker rolled his eyes. "Of course he is. That's why he's in there, and I'm out here."

"Not for long."

The Joker turned and held up the tiny photos. They were of Luc and Cécile in New York City before they'd reached Gotham. Taken in some mall. "The Scarecrow's got a naughty streak, too, getting you to spread the virus like a good ol' S.T.D." The Joker tsked. "No doubt just the kind of reunion with Marie-Cécile that you've been aching for." He brought the one shot of Cécile by herself to his lips and licked it. "And I totally get it, 'cause she tastes really good."

Luc got to his feet and lunged for the Joker, slamming him in the stomach. They fell into the alley, wrestling, before the Joker brought his knife up against Luc's throat. Luc froze. "But did you ever stop to consider who Scarecrow was hurting—besides you, I mean?" Luc fidgeted and cried out in pain as the Joker cut a very thin line across his throat. "The city, of course, 'cause he's got contempt for it. And Batman, because Batman considers himself protector of the city, and of course he's the one who got Ichabod locked up, yes?" Luc could only grunt in assent as the Joker cut another thin line just below the first on his throat. "And I flaaaaatter myself to think he wants revenge on me. Why? I think he's a little upset I took his pathetic crime ring away. All for the greater cause, of course. And he knew he could get to you, and through you to Cécile, and to me because your girlfriend—"

Though it tore another line in his throat, Luc kicked the Joker's ankle, hard, and doubled over, thrusting him against the wall. He scrabbled for the knife and plunged it into flesh. The Joker managed to throw him off at the same moment, so the knife only stabbed deep into his upper arm. Luc bashed the back of his head against the opposite wall and lay still, blood oozing from the front and nape of his neck. Cracking his neck, the Joker removed the knife and advanced on Luc. "Normally, I'd be a big fan of what Crane is trying to do. Throw a wrench in the works, chaos for everyone." He got down on one knee next to Luc, hefting the knife, weighing it, rubbing his gloves in his own blood. "But not now, when I'm so close to exposing who Bats really is. He's supposed to turn himself in, did you know that? So I've got a date with the city holding cell later today, which is why I'm gonna have to wrap this up."

With a savage twist, he thrust the knife into Luc's chest. He leaned close and held the dying man in his arms. "There's just one thing I wanted to ask you, Luc, before you went. And don't tell me to go to hell or anything like that. It's a simple question, and because of the situation, I'm hoping you're going to tell me the truth."

"What?" Luc managed to gurgle.

"Who was the father of Cécile's baby?"

Luc's eyes streamed as he stared up at the clown face, the curves of his red grin turned up with real blood. "And don't pretend not to know what I'm talking about. She was going to have a baby, and then she got rid of it. And don't ask me how I know, I guessed. I'm good at that." He reached down and squeezed Luc's hand. "Look, if it makes you feel better, I'll tell ya: I wanna know because I'm jealous. If you want motivation, there you go." He grinned, exposing his yellowed teeth.

Luc laughed, a grating, dying noise. "It was her father's."

The Joker became very still. "You're lying." Luc shook his head slowly. "Hmm," said the Joker. "Did she tell you this?"

"No. I guessed. I'm good at that."

A/N: Guhhhh. This was so hard to write. The murder is brutal, and the revelation so sickening even the Joker is taken aback. Feel free to write in the flames. But it was an awful idea for total abomination that grabbed hold of the gnome on the tricycle in my brain and wouldn't let go.

"Jean de Nivelle" is a French Renaissance song recorded by the Baltimore Consort on their album La Rocque'n'Roll.