Second Chapter! Thanks soooo mush to the people who reviewed the first, it made me dance around my room!
Disclaimer: Storm(from X-men) AAH! DEMON!
Me: Calm down!
Storm: AAH! DEMON TALKING!
Me: Well, so much for that… (makes Storm vanish back to Marvel with wave of wand.) I do not own DC or Warner Brothers, but I do own my computer, Bragi. Say hello to our great audience Bragi!
Bragi: HELLO. AM VERY MICH PLEASED TO MEET YOU.
Me: Good girl! (throws Bragi a floppy disk.) If I get more than three reviews I'll update within a week!
Oh, nearly forgot; I made a mistake in Jervis' nightmare, since I had just been reading Alice in Wonderland. L should be C in the last thing he says before he wakes up.
Hope you enjoy!
APRIL
17
"Daffodils!" Harley squealed, clasping her hands happily. "They're so pretty!"
Jervis had not even known that daffodils grew outside the bookstore before, and it was nice to share the discovery with someone who took so much pleasure in the finding. He smiled at her before returning his gaze to the brave yellow flowers. "Beautiful," he agreed, then a wind brushing past him reminded him of caution. "We should move inside. Two more days and we set a record of keeping out of Arkham without some sort of pass; three months and eighteen days."
18
"So close to making the record," Harley sighed, slumping against the wall of her cell.
"Yes… just one more day. Who knew that the bat would be so adept at tracing phone calls?"
"Sorry about that, I just wanted to let Mom and Dad know that I'd broken up with the Joker."
"No need to apologize, Harley."
25
Jervis saw the dim white figure of the Joker flick past the door of his cell at three a. m, pausing at Harley's door. "Come on, let's go!" he called merrily.
For a moment, Jervis feared that the young woman's resolve would collapse, but was soon put to ease as he heard her voice replying coldly. "In case you forgot, Mistah J, we broke up."
There was a moment of absolutely baffled silence, then the Joker said "So? I always forgive you, pumpkin pie."
"Forgive me for something I didn't do and wasn't my fault? That's funny for ya. Get away from my door and get out of my life!"
The clown's face tightened into a snarl for a minute, then his head turned as he heard footsteps and he was gone in an instant. The moment he was half of the rogues gallery broke out into cheers.
"Way to go, Harley!"
"Finally, some self-esteem."
"That was tellin' the clown!"
MAY
4
Jervis was not sure exactly where along the line Harley, to the general public, stopped being 'the Joker's girl' and became 'the Hatter's girl'; perhaps it was because of their joint breakout following the news of Harley's breakup with the Joker and the fact she had helped him while he was trying to obtain some necessary equipment from a technical lab. However, Harley didn't seem to mind.
"Hey Jervis!"
She sat down across from him. They were back in Arkham (one of the security guards at the technical lab had been smart enough to call Batman instead of trying to face the supervillains himself) in what the Gallery called 'the mutual agreement' room, that held the Great Peace-Keeping items; namely, the television set and the chess board.
"Oh look," called the Riddler "it's a report on you, Harley."
"Me?" Harley and Jervis turned to face the television set, where Summer Gleason was talking with her usual half-smile on her face.
"-and another popular subject of discussion this week is Harleen Quinzel, better known as the infamous Harley Quinn. After the multicolored minx-"
"Nice."
"SHHH!"
"-left the Joker for the Mad Hatter, it's been a hot topic whether she's gone for good or this is just another phase-"
"She makes it sound like I'm dating Jervis and that I'm a dame!"
"SHHH!"
"I am not a dame!"
"Harley!"
"-Time will tell whether she's changed her colors for good. Next up on Gotham insider…"
Harley and Jervis turned back towards each other with almost identical sighs. "Don't they have anything better to do then constantly discuss matters that are entirely our own affair?" muttered the Hatter.
"But it reminded me of something," said Harley, crossing her legs. "We're kinda like more partners now, aren't we? Not partner partners, more like… partners in crime."
He took a moment to think about it, then nodded. He could live with that definition.
"Well then, I think it's kinda odd for me still to be Harley Quinn. I mean, I've nearly always been nicknamed Harley, but the 'Quinn' was the Joker's idea, and I want to leave that behind. So I thought a new name might be in order. D'you have any suggestions?"
The Hatter was surprised for a moment at her decision, then faintly pleased; he could not exactly pinpoint the source, and dismissed it as gladness that she was forgetting that bandersnatch of a clowning thief so quickly.
"Well, my dear, I'm not sure. Lewis Carroll's books actually have a lack of female characters…"
"And the ones he did have were usually either really bad-tempered or, well…" Harley paused. "Taken," she muttered quickly, then moved on before he could figure out what she meant. "So I could use the name of one of the guy characters, as long as it's not too obviously, you know, a guy name."
"Indeed. Well, there's the March Hare…"
"But that's Professor Crane. And I don't care for the Dormouse… You're kinda like both the Mad Hatter and the White Knight. I s'pose I could be Lily… but she was a crybaby. Wait, I know!" She shot upright, a large grin appearing on her face. "The Cheshire Cat!"
"The Cheshire Cat?" An interesting choice. She smiled a lot, certainly, and was just as graceful as a cat… "Certainly, that could work."
"You better start calling me Cheshire now so I can get used to it."
24
HARLEY QUINN GOES WONDERLAND; MAD HATTER AND 'CHESHIRE CAT' ROB MUSEUM.
Humming, the girl once known as Harley Quinn ripped the headline and picture out of the newspaper and stuck it up on the refrigerator with an anti-Batman magnet. The picture was pretty good; one of the people they robbed apparently had had a camera, and they had caught Jervis with one hand on the brim of his hat, the other holding a 10/6 card and a crazy smile on his face. Cheshire stood a little behind him, grinning and holding a small pistol up by one shoulder; her revamped costume was now gold, purple and brown, with a utility belt and a hair band with brown-and-purple cat ears she had swiped from a costume store while they were procuring more hats to add to Jervis' collection.
She could hear him in the next room; they had found a building to their liking inside that looked about to collapse on the outside, and a few mind-control chips, a 'Condemned' sign and some ghost rumors later, the place was all theirs. It was nice to have an actual kitchen.
Jervis was whistling something… after a moment, she identified it.
'Twas the voice of the lobster; I heard him declare
"You have baked me too long, I must sugar my hair."
Cheshire giggled. Lewis Carroll's delightful nonsense wasn't exactly funny, and definitely not the slapstick cream-pie-in-the-face Joker style of humor, but it left her with a warm, happy feeling, a kind of security, that made her want to laugh.
Tugging absent-mindedly on a strand of her newly shoulder-length hair (it had wanted cutting) she poked through the fridge. Jervis had surrendered all power relating to food to her; the only thing he could make was tea.
"Lessee… chicken? Fish? Tacos… nah, Jervis wouldn't eat that. He'd try, to be polite, but…" She moved on. "I need to go shopping…"
The phone rang.
"Cheshire my dear, will you answer that? My hands are full."
Backflipping into the Hatter's makeshift lab, she picked up the phone from the wall. "Hello?"
"Hi, H- Cheshire. I just got out of Arkham; you mind if I stop by for dinner after I shake Batman off?"
"Hold on." Cheshire covered the mouthpiece and turned to Jervis. "Poison Ivy wants to know if she can come to dinner."
"If she promises not to poison anything or shriek at meat."
"Thanks." She went back to the phone. "Sure, Red, see you later." Hanging up, she contemplated.
Jervis had just finished making a particularly tricky connection when Cheshire perched on the table next to him. "Would you be OK with mac and cheese, Jervis? That way I can just separate some pasta out for Ivy before I add cheese."
"Of course." He did wonder slightly at how his hideouts had changed in a little more than two weeks from places that none of the other rogues would go except under duress to practical halfway houses. It was probably Cheshire. Most of everything that had happened lately was because of the bubbly, friendly girl.
Like Harley's new name? I just didn't like calling her Harley Quinn while she wasn't the Joker's any more. I adore reviews, but please keep flames to candlelight!