Hey, all! This is my first Joker-y fic, and I don't think I did Heath's Joker justice. But I tried. It helps a little bit if you picture him narrating it . . . that's what I do, anyway. .

Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

There is a method to his madness.

(Well, it's not madness, not really, but that's what everyone thinks, and why bother to correct them? It's so much more fun to watch them squirm and try to understand and smother their desires to stick him under a microscope and observe him forever.)

The make-up, the suit (which really wasn't cheap, given that it was custom-tailored. He does have some taste, no matter what the mob may think.), the way he executes his ideas, down to the smallest detail—as much as he refuses to admit it, he has it all planned out far in advance, with every possible misstep accounted for. He's a schemer himself, but his plans are so much better; they make so much more sense than all the other schemer's pathetic ideas.

(He just wants them to see, to understand exactly how idiotic their ideas are compared to his. After all, what good is precise, boring order compared to glorious, perfect chaos?)

Take, for example, Harvey Dent. The Joker knew that without its White Knight, Gotham would be complete chaos.

And there is nothing he craves more than chaos.

So he plans and he schemes and he has Harvey's pretty little girlfriend killed (because it's not part of the plan, and he knows it will drive Harvey insane). He lies to Harvey in the hospital, weaving him tales of how fair chaos is, and really, doesn't he need to avenge that Rebecca girl?

No one notices him, just as he planned, because they're all too busy evacuating the building to be looking for that charming grin. He twists Harvey, bringing him down to the level of complete madness.

(And it really wasn't that difficult—he was so close to snapping anyway, him and that coin. The scars helped push him over the edge a bit; scars have a way of doing that.

But his scars don't make him crazy—because he's not crazy, he's NOT. He's saner than the rest of the world put together; he's a Picasso painting in a world of stick figures.)

He knows that he's nowhere near insane. He just understands that society's "ideals" are one bad joke that really needs to be made funny, and fast.

And who better to deliver some smiles than a clown?