High fives all around! Jack and Selina, I hope, were pretty easy to recognise as Catwoman and the Joker, and all of you got it right! The villains don't really have any significance to the main plot but just to piss off the main characters ...and to give you guys little brain teasers from time to time. Is that too mean? ;)

( Tick tock. )

The next morning Richard went baggy-eyed and sullen-faced down the stairs to the cafeteria where breakfast was being served. He hadn't slept properly, not when the nightmares and memories kept replaying in his head. He was no sooner to finding out the real truth behind of what he might have done to his parents and younger brother, and every day he woke up realising it was a day closer to his scheduled head-drilling. They were going to tighten screws into his skull or use leeches to suck the 'bad blood' out, trying to physically fix the mental problem in his head. The worst of it was knowing he couldn't even fight back. Gotham was a town built on its reputations. Who would listen to the cynical, bitter rants of a young man thought to be a murderer? He was pathetic. It made him sick.

As he ate his cold servings and tried to count the minutes away furiously, the nurse that had accompanied him, sat across from him with a deadpan look etched into her face. Nurse...? He couldn't even care to remember her name – every day they were different so patients wouldn't grow an attachment to one. Sometimes having attachments made them do crazy things. Richard furrowed his eyebrows and ran a thin hand through his messy, raven hair trying to clean it back over his skull – he hated looking non-presentable, no matter what position he was in.

"Good morning, Richard!" a voice bounced on his right ear. Turning to the source, he watched as Korina walked by with a small wave and a metal try in her hands. She smiled warmly as she proceeded to the serving table. Luckily her scheduled eating times were the same as his – it gave him comfort knowing he could at least see one of the only decent people in this place. Perhaps if he worked at it well, one day he wouldn't need a nurse supervising him and he could come into the cafeteria by himself. Then he could sit with Kory because patients making progress were given such privileges.

Ugh, there was that 'P' word again. Richard hated it.

He watched with sharp dark blue eyes as Kory began conversing with the servers at the breakfast table. Her warm green eyes twinkled as she happily commented on what a lovely day it was. Richard had to keep from rolling his eyes. It was cloudy and dark, like every day – he swore the hospital was surrounded by an entity that never allowed the sun to shine. It might as well though, considering who was locked up in here. He believed that a lifetime ago, Kory might've been the girl for him, back when he was... But not anymore. Richard had grown too withdrawn, too bitter and cold. Sunny dispositions like her now made him want to vomit and push her away. Life wasn't anything to be happy about when someone ended up like this.

Not feeling hungry anymore, Richard dropped his spoon carelessly into his bowl, neglecting his cold, bland porridge. The action broke the nurse out of her daze and she glared at him. Richard eyed her coolly for a moment before linking his hands together on the table. He looked away from her as he spoke.

"Indigestion, ma'am," he said with a bored tone. She sighed irritably and stood up, all but yanking the bowl out from under him and walking away to return it. Richard furrowed his eyebrows as he stared at a new patient arriving.

The new patient was lead by two nurses, a man and a woman. He had a lanky, skinny figure that reminded Richard of a tall bird he'd seen painted on china. Short hair, wrinkled skin, and bony-fingered, the newcomer eyed everyone in the room with an intense gaze. His black eyes passed over Richard's briefly, but it was enough to send a deep shiver down his spine. It was as if the man had just taken a photograph of his soul and was laughing at it. Richard watched uncomfortably as the patient approached the breakfast table, eyes nailed into Kory's features.

"My, my, my..." he said like a rich connoisseur taking pride in his wine. "I get the honour of meeting little miss sunshine today. That's twice in as many weeks."

Richard didn't like his tone. He was taunting her. Kory turned her neck up and away from the man.

"I would rather not speak to you this day, Mister Crane. Your comments do nothing but upset me."

"Oh, but I mean nothing but the best, Dear Corina. It is your own reactions that drive you to such 'unpleasantries'."

"I'll see to it that you do not harm my heart or emotions today. You don't even deserve the crumbs left of my respect," she spat quite gently.

"And why, pray tell, should that bother me? I do not care for what comforts you."

Richard lifted a brow. Was this man always so high-horse with his vocabulary?

"Then leave with your nurses," Kory said calmly back. Although she said it as gently as she could, Richard could tell she was holding her tongue. "I'm a progressive patient. The securities I have built are not for your reaping. I'll do better off without you."

"Funny you say that," he said with a tease and a spring in his step as he walked away from her. One of the nurses said his name warningly. Then he chuckled to himself. "Isn't a line best used only once?"

Kory stiffened noticeably. The nurses were hushed, afraid of who to silence. Spineless and stupid.

"Pardon yourself."

"Haha, there you go again, using lines you've already spent on another."

Kory wasn't even looking at him as she placed her tray back onto the table. Her voice dropped an octave. "Be quiet."

"I don't have to ask to know where your insecurities lie, Dear Sunshine. You can know a lot about one from the words they use."

"Your voice is bile to me."

"Hehe...are you scared of what I might say next? You should be. Heh, I like it when you're afraid, Corina."

A male nurse finally stepped out of his shell.

"Alright, patient. Enough, you're not in control." Funny, Richard swore he was. Crane knew it too, he ignored the order.

"Now tell me...was it savage beating?"

"You will do best to hold your tongue in my presence."

"You're not the almighty, love. Heh, or perhaps... 'accidental' manslaughter?"

"You vile man. Y-you! Arghh...!"

"Murder? ...Heh, tell the loved one I say hi, in your next nightmare."

"JONATHAN! NO!"

"You r-raging, insolent son of a BITCH!"

Richard gasped and jumped away from his table as Kory, who used as much strength as she could, leap before Crane and shoved him into the table he had been eating at. Red hair danced like fire and fingers bent like gnarled branches were wrapping themselves around the older man's neck. He laughed maniacally as Kory tried to squeeze the life from him.

"You mongrel! You're nothing! You think I give a DAMN about anyone here seeing me like this? Heh, a-anyone who even so much as TOUCHES me is-! I-I HATE YOU. GO TO HELL, ALL OF YOU! LIKE MY SISTER, THAT UPPITY WHORE!"

Crane's laughs quickly transformed into gasps for air. He tried to get Kory's hands off from around his neck but the young woman had too much strength. Nurses in the cafeteria finally decided to take action and pry her off of him. As they pulled her away from Crane and towards the table where Richard and a couple of the other patients who had just arrived were standing behind him. Kory screamed, red in the face with fury and eyes blazing.

"YOU SOCIAL DOGS, GET OFF OF ME! I-! ARRGGGH, LET ME GO!"

"Hold her down, Penelope!"

"James, where are the restraints?"

"No time, give her the ether!"

As one of the nurses, at which this time there were five holding Kory back, and two trying to remove Crane from the room, Kory screamed again and shot out her legs in a fight. She didn't hit her desired target, but the blow was same as any. Her long leg jutted out like a cannon, knocking a nearby patient down onto their knees. Richard instantly dropped down beside her to see if she was alright. Kory had kicked her in the stomach.

As he placed his hand gingerly on the girl's shoulder, he looked up at Kory with a fresh wave of astonishing fear. How could a girl, so polite, graceful and warm... could suddenly become this violent bitch with incredible strength in three seconds? Sure, Crane had said terrible things but—

"You have her head?"

"Yes, now hold it back."

Kory tried to fight back but the weight of four arms on her neck was too much.

"NO! STOP! I SAID STOP!"

A cloth was quickly covered over her mouth and nose. Richard watched terrified. He had never seen anything like this in his life. Kory frantically looked for Richard's eyes, trying to reach out to him in her restraint, but in a matter of seconds and muffled screams, her eyes drifted to sleep and she fell limp. The nurses sighed exasperatedly before proceeding to carry her unconscious form away.

"Dr. Slade isn't going to like this," a voice said above Richard.

When he looked up quickly to find the source, he was met with the cold, hard face of a skinny young woman who looked about his age, with long blond hair and crystal blue eyes,. She was dressed in a nurse uniform and had her arms crossed tightly. She wasn't even aware of him staring at her. Apparently the comment had been meant only for her ears. She walked away back out of the cafeteria, as did most staff and other quiet patients. When he did a quick look around, he also saw the woman, Selina, among some of them with a smirk on her face as she left with a female nurse.

"Rachel, are you alright?" a new voice said beside him.

When he turned, a shaky nurse with a wide-eyed gaze was proceeding to kneel slowly in front of the girl who had just been knocked over by Kory. When she turned at the response, she noticed his hand on her shoulder. He was met with large brown eyes, a pale heart-shaped face, and a slim-malnourished figure of a teenage girl. She looked about his age and was slightly shorter than him, but he didn't say anything afraid she would blow up in his face like Kory. She had a mark on her forehead. His heart was still pounding.

"Your bruise..." she whispered in a raspy voice, more to herself than him, but Richard heard her anyway.

"Wh-"

Before Richard could say anything more to it, the nurse attending to her butted in and slapped his hand away from the girl's shoulder. She glared at him but her lip was quivering.

"Don't!" she whispered almost terrified. "She doesn't like to be touched!"

And before Richard could say anything to that, the nurse hauled the distraught girl off the dirty floor and ushered her quickly out of the door.

"See what happens when you decide to leave your room, Miss Rachel? Bad things happen. Terrible things! You shouldn't come out again!"

And when the doors of the cafeteria swung shut, Richard remained kneeling on the floor, feeling afraid and furious all over again.

Maybe kicking someone, like Kory had, wasn't such a bad idea after all.

( When do you snap? )

Here's a new little waldo: Find out who Crane is. ;D Cliffhanger! More to come I hope within the next couple days, week tops!