Harleen Quinzel gracefully stalked down the empty, dimly-lit corridor. Her high heels made resounding clicking noises as she went, creating a rhythmic pattern. Click, clop, click, clop. As she walked, she held open the criminal and pyschiatric records of the madman who called himself 'The Joker'. He was a recent addition to Arkahm Asylum after having recently been caught by Batman, but there wasn't a Gotham citizen who didn't know of him.
Dr. Quinzel gazed upon his file with interest. Here was a man with no name, no matches on fingerprints, dental imprints, he had virtually no known associates, and yet he had demonstrated genius tactics and skill.
Harleen heard footsteps approaching from behind her. "Good evening, Doctor," she said politely. It was Dr. Robert Greene, the Chief of Medicine at Arkham Asylum.
"Good evening to you, Dr. Quinzel," he replied. Dr. Greene was a much older man, perhaps of about 55, yet he was very handsome. His once dark hair was now slightly peppered with white, and a few lines appeared on his face, but he was still charming. He also happened to be the man Harleen found it necessary to sleep with in order to obtain The Joker case. Only by doing something so drastic could an intern be granted such an important case. But Harleen did what she had to do, and she couldn't say that she didn't enjoy it.
"Where are you headed?" he asked, strutting alongside her importantly.
"It's my appointed time with The Joker," she said coyly, hoping that he remembered all she had done for him to receive such status.
"Ah, yes," he said, and she knew he was quite certainly remembering. She smiled. "Would you be opposed to a drink, afterwards?"
"Not at all," replied Harleen. Dr. Greene suddenly stopped her by the arm, and they stood still like that in the corridor for a moment. Then he gently backed her up against the wall, looking around to make sure no one else could see them. He placed a hand on her thigh, and ran it up her dress. Harleen groaned in reply.
"I'll see you tonight, sweetheart," he whispered in her ear with a chuckle. And he went down the adjacent corridor, leaving Harleen against the wall.
Dr. Quinzel cleared her throat and pushed her tight white dress back down to where it belonged. She crouched down and gathered up the folder which had fallen out of her hands during the encounter. As she did so, The Joker's mugshot was staring her in the face. There was a fleeting moment within her of something like adoration, but before she could completely notice it, it was gone from her.
She continued her walk towards the visitors area, where her session with The Joker would occur. Dr. Greene had thought it best that Harleen counsel The Joker from behind bulletproof glass, at least to start with. But Dr. Quinzel knew how she would earn the right to see The Joker face to face, but that was for a later time. For now she would take what she could get.
The white light in this area of the Asylum was almost blinding. It made Harleen's hair appear almost silver, and she squinted her eyes.
When The Joker was chaperoned in, Harleen was a bit...surprised. He advanced with slow, careful steps, his head tucked into his chest, hiding his face completely. His dingy blonde hair, still clinging onto some traces of green, hung down limply, swaying slightly with each step. In his orange jumpsuit, this man appeared so unassuming...although he still had not looked up.
He took a seat on the other side of the glass, the bright lights harsh on his form, his cuffed hands laid gently in his lap.
"Mr.-" Dr. Quinzel began, but before she could think of what to call this alleged madman, she was startled out of speech.
The Joker had slowly risen his head to look her in the eye, his greasy hair falling lifelessly around his ears, and some remaining stuck to his face. He looked perfectly ridiculous, like an incredible joke.
Harleen studied his face for a moment, noticing remnants of white paint which clung to his hairline and red lipstick which was left embedded deep in the cracks of his unnourished lips. Perfectly mad, perfect chaos, amazing, wonderful. Harleen had a hard time deciding just what he was, but she knew he was important. Then she allowed her eyes to wander, to where the scars were on both sides of his mouth, in his cheeks. She noticed the curve of his mouth-slash-scars widen into his dimples. He was smiling maniacally. He licked his lips and leaned forward with a jerk, putting his elbows upon the table and steepling his fingers.
"Horrendous, aren't they?" he asked with a deep, mocking tone, his eyes darting around at her face, hair, breasts, and the charts which lay before her upon the table. He chuckled. "You wanna know how I got 'em, Doc?"
The Doctor, as if awoken from a trance, regained focus on her eyes, and, finding that she couldn't stand their all-knowing stare for too long, looked back to her charts on the table. She shuffled them nervously.
"If that's how you'd like to begin, then yes. Tell me."
The Joker let out a mad chuckle and licked his lips jerkily. "It's funny, I've never told this story without holding a blade to someone's face." He cackled again. "But for you, Doc, I can make an exception."
"When I was a young boy, my mother abandoned me. Never mind why, because I'm not even sure that I know. I was taken to a Catholic orphanage. The nuns never did quite...like me. But nuns don't like anyone except God, do they? Anyway...when I was about 12 they planned a night at the church where people who were interested in adopting could come and meet the kids at the parish. It was sort of like an orphan show and tell." He laughed.
"Well, when the night was over and the gawkers had gone home, Sister Mary Ann took me aside. Now Sister Mary Ann was a particularly fierce parochial broad who frequently gave myself and the other boys a few good whacks with the paddle, but that was all. She believed in good hard discipline. She told me that she'd heard too many comments from my potential parents about how morose I looked, about how I was a sad looking child who ought to smile more. She told me that nobody would ever want me unless I got happy. I saw the knife gleaming behind her back, but I didn't move."
Harleen stiffened. She could sense where this story was going, and she wasn't sure she wanted to hear the rest. The Joker probably sensed this too for he pressed ahead with a reckless, sadistic vigor.
"She brought the knife to my face and told me not to scream. The cold metal ripped and tore at the flesh of my young face. I didn't scream." He howled with laughter. "That's the funny thing! Now I'm always smiling."
Dr. Quinzel knew enough to know that she should probably wipe the look of complete shock from her face, but she felt frozen. She did her best to take her expression back to neutral, but the man before her already knew he had unnerved her and that was all he needed.
"Is that true?" she finally asked him, attempting to sound removed from the situation, as would befit a professional in her field, although she sounded more concerned for the him from so long ago which he had described; the sad little boy in the orphanage.
"Of course it is, babe." He emphasized the word facetiously. "Look at this face," he said, putting his face uncomfortably close to the glass and pointing to his grinning countenance. "Would I lie to you?"