Chapter Ten - Desolation

Jason finally made it back to the cabin he & Harley had been staying at, parking the motorcycle he had stolen off of the street in the dirt driveway. He had thought that by turning Harley over in exchange for Joker would make him feel different. But he had been set up, & now Joker had Harley. His conscience nagged at him, snapped at him, & broke him down completely. How could he have done that? Slowly he trudged up the steps to the porch to open the front door. At first he heard the excited noises of her hyenas rushing to greet him, their bodies swaying with the motions their tails had taken to happily greet him.

But they saw him. It was like they could smell the guilt on him. Bud stopped & backed away slowly as his ears lowered along with his head. Lou bared his teeth as he took an aggressive stance. "I know," Jason muttered, sighing heavily as he made his feet somehow move up the steps towards the bedroom after tossing some large slabs of meat for the hyenas. They both sniffed at the offered meat before they backed away from it, still watching Jason's retreat warily.

How could he have been so stupid? His jaw set as he went straight for the bed, tossing his helmet to the side carelessly to let it crash & bounce on the hardwood floors, the noise echoing throughout the empty house. They had been happy here, he & Harley. In the brief span of time they had been here, anyway. He had known what it was like to feel completely at peace, to understand what it felt like to be truly loved. Harley would kill for him, would give her life for him. He knew that. It was more than Bruce would ever do for him; he had proved that time & time again. & Jason had fucked it up carelessly with only revenge heavy on his mind. He threw away the one thing that had mattered.

To feel her in bed next to him again, to just turn back the hands of time, to never have taken the bait that he walked right into blindly, handing over the one woman who had offered him everything he ever wanted. Some detective he made. He let his revenge & hatred for Joker cloud his vision, causing him to make the worst judgment call he had ever made.

His hand moved to his face so he could drag it down slowly as he stared at the ceiling of the log cabin. He could still feel her presence; her clothes were still lying on the floor of the bathroom. The closet had her costume, the drawers held her clothes the way he had carefully folded them to put away for her before he went to break her out of Arkham. Her mutts were still downstairs, he could hear them pacing & walking around uneasily. He had thrown everything away to rush into Arkham to save her, & he in turn handed her over to the person she had grown to fear the most.

Jason couldn't sleep as he tossed & turned, hearing her voice echoing in his head as they fell from the cliffs of Arkham. "I love you." She did love him, he knew it. In her own twisted little way, he could tell that her devotion was real. Now she'd never tell him that again.

He was so devastated by the consequences of his own actions that he never heard the alarm downstairs going off, or the garage door being broken open.

..::*::..

Harley curled up on the bed, hugging the pillow Joker had gotten her tight to her chest. It was too hard, not nearly soft & plush enough for her to ever be able to sleep on. But it was good to hold on to. She cried so much, that she had no tears left yet still she cried.

She had to forget about Jason Todd. He betrayed her, had thrown her to the wolves. She had known it was too good to last all along. Still, her heart had broken into a thousand pieces & every jagged edge cut into her deeper & deeper the longer she dwelt on it.

She was angry, but not at Jason. Jason had done what she had expected Jason to do from the beginning. She was angry at herself from falling for it. She shook with silent sobs, causing the tears to flow anew. A knock sounded at the door & she looked up to see a goon enter, looking over her in her distressed state. "The Boss wants me to make sure you're ready for the party," he said apologetically before he moved over to the small closet in the room & opened the door to tug out her old costume. He spun the hanger in his hand & set the zipper between his fingers so he could draw down the back of the outfit for her.

"I ain't goin' to no stupid party," Harley shouted, which caused him to wince as he hung the costume on the back of the closet door before he moved over to grab her.

"Sorry, Harley, but I'm not dying because you refuse to play nice," he said sternly before he shoved her towards the closet. "Now get dressed, unless you'd rather have me do it for you. I'd love to." He grinned, showing a gaping maw of missing teeth, the rest that remained were blackened from neglect.

"Like it matters!" She shouted to him again before she plucked the costume from the door to go into the closet & shut the door so she could undress in the dark. Anywhere was better than the prying eyes of that goon. She pulled off her leather, knowing that Joker would have it destroyed the second it left her sight. She didn't care anymore, nothing was worth caring about. She had learned what happened when you truly cared about someone, & she hadn't been satisfied with the results.

Harley finally stepped out of the closet, dressed in her old one-piece, form fitting black & red costume with the white frills around her neck & wrists, black pointed shoes capping off the outfit. The goon pointed to the dresser where her hood sat & she moved over to tug it on to conceal her blonde hair under the two floppy points of the jester's hat. The points seemed match her mood as they, too, flopped down towards her neck more than they usually did. She fixed her face paint where it had smeared before she moved to the door & let him grab her roughly before he shoved her out of the room.

"There she is!" She heard the delighted cackle of the Joker as he saw her emerging from her room. "We were starting to get worried, Harls. You know I said to not keep me waiting," his voice held a sharp undertone, but she didn't seem to react to it at all.

"I'm here now," she huffed, keeping her swollen & red eyes downcast as he looked over her. He got up out of the arm chair he was in & moved to her, sliding his hand over her hip. She flinched, but didn't move.

"You look much better like that, Harley. You look like my Hench Wench again. I have a surprise for you," he grinned as he spoke into her ear. She kept her eyes averted; she hadn't wanted Joker to see she had been crying. He pulled away from her & snapped his fingers so that a few goons moved forward to grab Harley, pulling her from the lair. She didn't flinch & she didn't struggle, but merely let them move her along until they were out of the lair & Joker was shoving her into a car.

He got in next to her, the goons piling into the back & in cars behind Joker's own purple & green Cadillac. "Like the good ol' days, huh Harls?" He said as he leaned back into the white leather of the interior & set his arm across the backseat as he pulled the car out from in front of the lair. "You'll like your surprise, I promise."

..::*::..

It wouldn't be long before the procession of cars pulled up out front of an abandoned building, a few other cars parked along out front. "I told you it was a party," Joker grinned his maniac grin before he leaned across Harley to push open her door so that two of the goons from the back seat could get out & grab her, hauling her to her feet & bringing her for the building.

It took her a few moments to register anything in the darkness as her eyes adjusted. The goons started to drag her forward again as she looked around at the emptiness. Was he going to kill her? She couldn't find it in her to care, however the fear finally spiked through her system with the adrenaline & she began to struggle against the goons. "Now, now, Harls, there's the fighting girl I love!" Joker cackled behind her as she was dragged up a flight of stairs. She didn't scream, she wouldn't give him the satisfaction, but she cursed & tried to pull her limbs away from the goons. They finally brought her into a room that had a lone light bulb illuminating the dingy interior. Her skin crawled at the sight as her heart started to thud louder in her chest.

Tied to a chair, bound, gagged & bloodied, was Jason Todd. & it didn't look like he was breathing.