Disc: I don't own Batman or any related things.
Sorry, I haven't written in a while, but I've been busy, and I go through periods of time like that. I'm also quite sad to inform you this story is coming up to it's inevitable train wreck ending, and I wish I could write more, but it's getting late, so enjoy this for now.
Trish drew her hand back, as both stood stunned for a split second, but as it seemed, the Joker was always quicker. She managed to hold onto a small, private moment of triumph however, at managing to catch her crafty foe, the most unpredictable man alive off guard.
A gloved hand went around her wrist painfully tight, and she felt the cold bite of a steel object brush lightly against one finger. "Don't go trying anything now." A softly snickering voice warned her, and she nodded, it was best to look for a chance to escape in the future, right now she'd just get hurt. "What do you want with me now?" She asked quietly, "I'm not campaigning against you this instant!" Her questions were answered with gleeful giggles, "Why Wedding Girl, I'm just bored, just too awake to waste the night on wine and sleep…" Trish drew a deep breath, a bit sceptical about how safe she was if the Joker was bored. "I'm sure to bore you sooner than later." She offered. "Then you'll have to kill me and you'll be out of fun things to do!" She abruptly shut her mouth, kicking herself for proclaiming the inevitability of her own death, she should have just hoped for the best and tried to resist, but Trish had always been secretly cynical. Her captor broke into a fit of laughter, and she was completely sure she'd just ordered her own headstone, until he regained his composure slightly. "Have I told you sweetheart? You're priceless, just priceless!" He put a hand under her chin and lifted it in mock tenderness, "And you need not worry about me getting bored, I think you'll be more than amusing enough to keep yourself alive." He laughed some more, the same mocking, hysterical laughter Trish had desperately been trying to clear from her head, but it seemed she'd have no such luck.
Where are we going! She thought bitterly as she was dragged rather roughly back through the park, the soles of her shoes making a dull scraping noise as she dragged them along. No one was out, no lights flickered in the houses, either she'd been out stalking psychos through the woods longer than she'd thought or the Joker had killed the power to the whole damn neighbourhood! He ran and skipped as he dragged her along, humming a vivacious tune and giggling childishly once and a while. "Oh wedding girl!" He scolded as she stumbled, trying to keep up with his uneven pace, "Can't you ever just have some fun?" Trish wrinkled her nose, ignoring the question and went about trying not to trip, but her captor persisted. "You know I'm going to have to feed you to my clowns if you keep refusing to smile like that." He jeered, turning and somehow skipping backwards so he could look at her. "And I know how much you love the circus…" A smirk crossed his face, "But you're just too funny and you wouldn't believe how ugly and tasteless they are." He laughed some more, sounding as intoxicated as ever, and pulled out his knife very casually. "Of course, the clowns also like their dinner carved for them." Trish bit her lip; "You're threatening me into skipping?" She said in disbelief, she was dealing with a child, she really was, a rather cunning and violent child, but a child just the same. Still, she didn't wait for him to follow through on his threat, but gingerly took a step and sprung into a skip. "There you go wedding girl!" Came the praise, "Now you've got the idea!" He started humming, the same tune Trish had been whistling in the park, and to her surprise, she joined in without reason or much thought at all. You always wanted people to appreciate you whistling, she thought, here's someone who does.
"Yes!" The Joker called out, quickening the pace. "The ugly
evil clowns, unbelievably ugly." Trish momentarily wondered if,
within his shredded mind, the Joker stored any evaluation of his own
beauty. He probably honestly thinks his face is the newest most
wonderful statement made to the world, and he probably knew they
thought he was ugly, but didn't care likewise. Do you think he's
ugly? She asked herself, do those scars alone make you hate him? She
shook her head grimly. Her hate lay only in people's deeds; she was
an activist, not a beautician. "Why so glum little wedding girl?"
She realized their gleeful skipping had come to a halt, and they were
standing in another abandoned construction site. "People are
wrong," Trish glanced around aloofly, hoping to change the subject.
"You do have a pattern, you seem to like torn up, gutless things."
She smiled tragically, the image of a pair of theatre masks
momentarily flashing through her mind. "Wrong!" The Joker
exclaimed, grabbing a bit of her hair, she stifled an "ouch" and
frowned at the abusive behaviour. "I don't like this place
because it's broken and twisted, I like it because it's ugly,
ugly deep down in a way that can only be seen as beauty from the
strangest eyes. It has a twisted blackness that can never be made
pure, it's a rotted corpse before it lives, and it can NEVER be
beautiful, EVER!" He grabbed her arm and pulled he up so she was
close to his face. So I can hear every sin, and taste the "ugly"
on his breath, Trish thought, astonished, and for an incredible, long
moment; there was silence.
"That's why I like you!" He explained, smiling in the most innocent way. "Your pretty, pretty little Trish, pretty little wedding girl!" He almost sounded sad, or genuinely happy, but Trish could tell she'd hear worse. There was always a calm before the storm. "Yes, pretty little ms. Constitution." He teased, and then innocent turned malicious and sadistic, as joyous humour turned hateful. "But you're really ugly!" HE screamed in her ear, "You're ugly like this unspeakable place, ugly deep, deep down inside where no one can see it, but it's there! Oh, it's there, I can see it! You're ugly on the inside…" His voice softened "Just like me!" Trish starred in near terror, ugly? On the inside? Was this how he saw her, how everyone saw Trish Winslow, as an ugly, tormented wolf in politician's clothing? That fact alone nearly broke her, but apparently the vicious onslaught had just begun.
"Yes!" The joker continued his verbal assault, dragging her away from the concealment of the unfinished building and into the street where the passers stared. "One the outside, your Trish Winslow! You care, you feel, you preach! But on the inside…" He swung his arms up to the sky. "On the inside you call yourself Trisha, not Trish, Trisha, and you're so ugly…" He leaned close, smiling malevolently as he whispered. "And you're so sadistic and cynical that you drove someone insane…" He turned to the police, who'd shown up a few seconds ago, "To think this poor creature would have the mind, would have the black, heartless disposition to mentally abuse to the point of insanity! Unthinkable, but true!" Trish was nearly cowering from the man she'd actually grown to know, and feel nearly comfortable around, not the same way she treated Dave, not the way she treated Bruce Wayne. This was retreat from shear pain of knowledge. And she couldn't hide it, her college days flooding back.
The man in her dream, that was who her deranged captor spoke of, but how could he know? That man, he was college sweetheart, her best friend and he was the guy that was serious, but knew how to laugh. It was truly a repressed memory, but it flooded so lucid into her mind now that she remembered every day, every detail. She remembered a fairy-like creature, full of pranks and good spirits, dancing and campfires; good fortune and good spirits. She remembered that desperation as if it were here own, and not something she could barely just grasp. She remembered long happy days, and warm perfect winter nights. It was to cliché and beautiful to take in all at once. She had to take a moment to savour each memory as it passed, and then vanished into the montage of pictures normal memories held. And at last, after sirens and the Joker's voice were all but gone, the slamming of a door. The madness, the dreams she could not wake him from, a life slowly slipping from her grasp as they dangled happily from a tiny thread. Insane, you drove him insane; the idea echoed ever so painfully, but a she slowly suffocated under the smoke of a lost saga in her life, the figures around her looked to the sky, pulling her out of her cloak, as a figure in a cloak of his own plummeted toward the earth. Batman had come!
Of course, In the next chapter, I'll be gracious enough to get into these memories more, but until them, this will be a good , quick finish for this chapter.