DICLAIMER! I OWN NOTHING; I TAKE NO CREDIT FOR ANYTHING BUT MY WRITING. THIS IS SOLELY FOR ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES AND NOT FOR PROFIT!

[A.N. Here's chapter one! This chapter is told in third-person Joker perspective… if that makes any sense xD I really tried to capture his morbid sense of humor as well... so it's a little gruesome and has some swearing as well. I wasn't sure if a "T" rating would be right for this, so if you think it should have been given a higher rating please let me know!]


Chapter 1: A Taste for Theatrics

"I don't wanna die!" the pimply-faced teenager whimpered between sobs. He had been unfortunate enough to have picked Gotham's very own mass-murdering clown for his daily pick-pocketing. Little did this boy, Bud as he was called, know that the Joker sometimes got a wild hair up his bum, compelling him to walk the streets of his favorite city with no makeup, and perfectly civilian clothes. Seeing as there was a considerable amount of citizens nowadays with tell-tale scars of their encounter with the Joker, people didn't even give him a second glance. And you might ask, why would a psychopathic man such as him do this? Well it was simple. He never liked to be predictable. That, and the fact that he had a part of him that was to an extent- slightly sane and delighted in partaking in activities he had once enjoyed during the saner, more emotionally stable part of his life. Of course though, he would never let anyone know that was the real reason he hung around Gotham going to plays at the local theater. It was just too bad for Bud that he had tried to mug a very irritable clown exiting the Gotham City Production of Romeo and Juliet with a van of henchmen waiting nearby to pick him up.

A sneer crept up over his painted face as he looked over at his newest play-thing. They had only been playing for a little over 3 hours and he was already bored. This pathetic excuse for a living being was just like all the helpless victims he'd played with lately: Cowards. The kid was unbelievably thick-headed and was a screaming, snot-covered bloody mess by the time he had sliced his ol' wormy pick-pocketing hand off. Come on! It was just one hand. He had another perfectly good one on the other arm! It wasn't like he was making him watch as he gutted him and played with his intestines. Hmm, On second thought, that sounded like a lot of fun! It was enough to turn his sneer into a small fit of excited giggles.

The sound of him giggling only made Bud scream louder. It was beginning to give the man a massive headache.

"He's talking again..."

"Oh joy." He muttered under his breath as he turned to face the annoying little prick who was babbling on about something that the Joker frankly, had no interest in listening to. Now was looking like a pretty good time to finish things up.

"Lemme go, you... you freak!" Bud screamed, putting extra emphasis on his insult as he watched his captor begin to circle him like a lion about to devour fresh meat.
At this he flinched. Okay now, that was just plain rude. He'd had just about enough of this little dipshit for one night. It seemed that Bud thought that making a psychopath wearing clown makeup angry was the correct way to make him let you go.

Haha, how naive.

He feigned a look of deep hurt and stopped his circling, taking a step closer to Bud. "Aww now that wasn't very nice." he said as if scolding a child "You might hurt someone's feelings with that kind of talk." He walked closer to the teenager so that they were face to face.

"I don't give a shit! Just let me go!" and with that said, Bud spit directly in the Joker's face. He continued staring at the idiot, looking completely unfazed. But something about him was different. His eyes had grown darker and more ominous like someone else was currently occupying them.

"You could hurt someone... kinda like the way I'm going to be hurting you with this." He flicked out his switch blade and waved it in front of the now deathly terrified teen. "Only my way is much more fun." His crimson smile grew and he laughed. As if on cue Bud resumed his original sobbing and terrified trembling.

"P-please, no, don't! I-I'm sorry!" He screamed.

"Oh you're sorry?" He said in mock simpathy. Bud nodded frantically, but in vain. "Well Buddy boy, I don't think sorry is going to cut it this time." He whispered into the boy's ear, his voice now incredibly dark and completely void of emotion. "Because, you see, you hurt me real bad with that nasty remark. Hurt me right here." He pointed to his heart and nodded as if agreeing with himself. All the while, Bud's cries and pleas were becoming more frantic and desperate. "And you know what? EYE FOR AN EYE BUDDY BOY!" And with that he plunged the blade directly into the youth's chest.

He watched As the blood came surging out of his chest with the removed switchblade and Bud's screams and sobs slowly diminished into a sorrowful whimper… then quieted forever.

"Now that's more like it!" he said gleefully, skipping around in a little circle in the pool of blood that now surrounded the dead body. "Hey, this really is an improvement for you! Oh yes it most certainly is Buddy boy." His mood was now considerably better than it had been a few hours ago.

He reached his gloved hand into the pocket of his trench coat and pulled out a small purple camera, it was the kind that spit the picture out the bottom as soon as you took it. "Say cheese!" he exclaimed and took a picture of Bud's lifeless body and pocketed the camera and fresh picture. With a fresh batch of chuckles in his throat, he continued out the door and skipped past the henchman waiting for him outside the torture room. "He's all yours!" He called over his shoulder and continued down the hall of the old warehouse and into his bedroom.

The room was a mess of his various favorite colors to a point where he often felt it reflected the insanity inside of himself. It was a windowless room with a ceiling that was pitch black with green and purple light fixtures dangling down, surrounded by all four walls painted a blood red color with scribbles of his erratic handwriting littering them from top to bottom. One wall was entirely dedicated to his crimes with pictures or newspaper clippings to display his endeavors and above it in big sharpied handwriting said "Jokes!" The floor was made of a dingy stained white tile that continued into the bathroom in the far corner. His bed was made of a rickety iron frame that squeaked when shifted by the slightest movement. There was a bedspread with a pin-striped purple design with dark blue sheets and shaggy green pillows. Next to the bed there was a chipped, wooden desk with a large drawing board resting on top. In the corner there was a large green leather armchair which he proceeded to toss his jacket upon and fell onto the bed with a soft plop, earning a few squeaks from the bedpost.

"I'm bored." He shut his eyes and sighed. "Just as should have been expected, Buddy boy was a disappointment." He growled in anger. "Well bah humbug! I haven't had any real fun in ages. Oh it's just not fair!" he pouted, and crossed his arms over his chest like an upset child. "Life is not fair. Not even for the Joker." He said curtly, his brow furrowing in irritation. "Even those actors at the play today were a disappointment."

He began recalling the play he had gone to see earlier that evening and scoffed. You would think that a play hosted for charity would get some decent actors and actresses to play their characters. The actors had all been pompous pricks wouldn't know acting if it hit them upside the head with a dead cat. And they were supposed to be considered the "best". Pfft, he could have done a MUCH better job.

"Although, I thought Jayne Parish did an interesting job as Juliet..." He mumbled softly to himself. She was really the only reason he had bothered to sit through the entire show. Jayne was a rising star who had been in several movies and sitcoms lately. This, he knew only because he had caught a glimpse of her on the television set up in the warehouse's rec-room and heard a few of his henchmen saying something about wanting to "do" her. Personally he never bothered with movies or television. He had always been more of a theatrical person, and anyone who doubted it need only to take a glance at his appearance and methods of killing to be reassured.

"I must say if I didn't know already what a death scream sounded like, I would have to say hers was the closest any living person could get to the real thing." He nodded in agreement and wondered what it would be like to actually watch her die? A giddy smile stretched his Chelsea Grin and the wheels of his imagination started turning ever so delightfully.

He had never gone after actresses or actors to use for his own personal form of "entertainment" before simply due to the fact that the vast majority of them were spoiled, shallow cowards. Even he knew that peeling away their psyche would be nothing but a wasted effort. But this girl, he thought as he recalled her performance, this girl was not one of your run-of-the mill actresses, no, no, she had completely lost herself in the performance. He saw her as she believed in every raw emotion that her character felt as her own, welcomed it, and even saw the very beginnings of a psychotic breakdown the moment she laid eyes on her "dead" Romeo.

The clown was now no longer grinning, but positively beaming.

"Oh my, how fun it will be to see the real her, to see how she can take real madness."
He rolled over on his side as a giggle fit threatened to take him over. "Bye bye boredom! Hello Jayne!" He exclaimed leaping off his bed.

The Clown Prince of Crime had work to do.

[A.N. Hurrah! Chapter 1 is done! :D I'd didn't really like writing this chapter all that much, I felt like a lot of it sounded forced and didn't flow as well as the prologue did. Hopefully you guys like it though. I'm sorry Jayne wasn't in this chapter, but I did mention her! Don't worry though, the next chapter will be all about her ^-^ I'm not sure how long it's going to take me to put chapter 2 out, I'm really busy at the moment with school and I'm kind of at a standstill of how to introduce Jayne's character and whether or not to write her in first or third person perspective Dx Anyways, Please send me any critiques you might have on this chapter, or if you liked it, what you liked about it :] feedback makes me write faster! Also, Please rate as well, it makes me uber happy ^^ 3]