Chapter 3: Mad as a Hatter

Hell's favorite patrons had slipped their cuffs and shanked the guards, or at least, that's what the soundtrack would imply. Their cries and screams and laughter echoed down the long corridor, muffled by the weighty door to the room, just enough for the noise to seem distant, as if he were a curious child with his ears pressed to the earth, listening in to the party below - the image was enough to make him smile.

But he kept his laughter bitten down, caught in the back of his throat and it tasted like gurgling acid, but even that…that restraint, couldn't ruin his good mood. It had been week, months, of boredom behind these bland walls, listening to people call him crazy, and while he was enjoying his current project - the Joker's black rimmed eyes darted up to give Dr. Quinzel an amused glance - it was nothing compared to this.

This was chaos, and, oh, what a beautiful thing it was! It brought out the very best in people.

He'd heard talk, because that's what dumb animals did when standing next to madmen. They talked. And threatened and chuckled and hoped days like today existed only in their nightmares - and by 'they', he meant, of course, the beaten, messy sacks of flesh laying down on the job. Or, more precisely, laying down on his bed and his floor while Dr. Quinzel tried to bring them back to consciousness.

A hee and maybe a hoo left his lips like a whisper as one of them, the one he'd taken the uniform from, moved slightly. But that pitiful pig didn't dare open his swollen eyes. He'd been warned, after all.

Where was he?

Oh, yeah - talk.

He'd heard talk about what was coming. Money. Money was the easiest way to bring a man's monster to surface, and if that didn't work, a bit of violence did the trick. As soon as he realized what the plan entailed, what the guards, and that fat orderly with the happy needle, were being paid off to do, the Joker had smiled his biggest smile - because, hey, it was good to hear his pal Zsasz was gainfully employed once more.

And then he'd told dear ol' Dr. Arkham how very much he'd love to confess to his buddy Spencer Reid where he'd left a few sliced up hobos. Like in most jokes, the timing had to be just right…Which reminded him.

He tapped the guard's broken watch - it had been nearly two hours. That should have been long enough for the others to start making a ruckus in Gotham.

Letting out an exaggerated sigh of boredom, the Joker drew his legs up, the guard's uniform pants stretching uncomfortably, then he jigged his leg, letting his knee smack against Dr. Reid's enough to get his attention. The boy didn't react, but the Joker could smell the fresh sweat from where they sat, shoulder to shoulder, their backs against the wall. Just a coupl'a guys hanging out. Waiting for the blood puddles outside to get cold.

"Well, this isn't hardly as fun as I thought it would be," the Joker announced. "I think we need to take this, eh, party elsewhere, don't you?"

Dr. Reid swallowed hard, eyes flashing up to the woman across the room.

The Joker's jaw hurt from grinning so hard, he leaned his head over, voice at a whisper. "We're ditching the dime, and the guards."

Spencer should have said "no" or "I think it's safer if we stay together", but the Joker could see the thoughts rolling through Dr. Reid's smart little noggin. The kiddo knew, knew the Joker would turn either of those answers into a joke he wouldn't like very much. And poor Dr. Reid still thought keeping the others alive was somehow important to his happiness. Beneath that, beneath the practiced behavior of saving people, was a monster made of instinct. It was the curiosity that ate the cat; it wanted to know how the Joker knew what he did. It wanted to follow and see where the path led. It wanted to see the chaos.

"Where are we going?" Reid asked, instead.

That's the spirit! "Oh, kiddo, it's, uh, it's a surprise."

The boy swallowed hard again, his Adam's apple bouncing with anticipation, and he gave Dr. Quinzel one last worried glance. The Joker snorted, but didn't bother to assure him she would be fine, because maybe she would, maybe she wouldn't - that was the fun part.

What Dr. Reid needed was to lighten up…By the end of this day, he'd have him grinning. From ear to ear.

The molded blade skid across the brick, the shiv sharpening with every inch it slid over the rough surface, with ever step closer to the treatment room at end of the hallway, where Carmine Falcone was restrained and awaiting transfer to an interview that would never take place. The boss could have arranged for a better weapon to be left, one that still couldn't be traced back to her, one that wouldn't point in any way to this being a hit, but Zsasz had assured her that it was unnecessary. This, this broken piece of metal that a guard had 'dropped' near him while he was undergoing his weekly exam, was all he needed to take out a pathetic, doddering zombie like Carmine Falcone.

Not that he thought his new boss was any different, any more worthy of living, than her father, but still…he took opportunities where they presented himself. And if it had been arranged that he'd have a way out and a fat paycheck when all this was done, all the better. Maybe…maybe he'd even get a chance to run a slick, professional blade against that giant of a woman's neck once he was out. If the price was right.

Zsasz reached his free hand beneath the collar of his jumpsuit, feeling the line of scars beneath and counting them. Four and diagonal. Four and diagonal. So many filled up tallies, so many bodies he'd left behind over the years, some for work, others for pleasure.

He counted again, tried to find another tally that wasn't crossed out, where he could put the slash that would stand for Carmine Falcone.

No one stopped him either.

The other inmates, they didn't dare do so much as make eye contact as they ran down the corridor, pulling along the broken body of a guard who'd been caught in the lockdown. And they wouldn't try to stop him - they were mad, but they knew him for the predator he was. They feared their own scars being cut into his body, just like the zombies outside the asylum.

He was a few feet from the room when he saw a man out of the corner of his eye.

It was the color of their clothes that caught his attention gave them away, the clown and the boy. Zsasz tucked himself behind a column, watching as the Joker walked, head hunched down, smile on his face, past the corridor, a hand gripped on the shoulder of the skinny young man he was steering.

Zsasz squinted, recognizing that face. He wasn't a patient…No he knew him from the report he'd watched, after he'd been caught. His zombie, the beautiful blonde he'd ran his knife over, the FBI agent that Batman had saved…This was one of her teammates. The one the Joker had taken.

Jennifer Jareau had lived. He'd heard the news while he was being booked for his 'crimes'. He'd seen a photo of her, a smiling zombie, and that boy, another. Their faces. He'd blacked out when he saw their photos. When he'd come to, it was with the booking officer's blood in his mouth and drugs in his system, and he'd taken yet another one-way trip to Arkham.

Zsasz felt a scar across his skin, a slash he'd made with her in mind. It burned beneath his fingertips, and he knew that pain wouldn't go away until he took her life, like he'd always intended.

And that boy with the Joker…He would know where she was. He would help find her.

Zsasz moved out from his hiding spot, shiv gripped tight enough to break the flesh over his fingers, and he followed the pair. His hit would still be here when he finished.

"This isn't part of your job, J.J. You don't have to do this."

"No, Derek, but keeping our family together is part of my job. If it's going to help, I want to do it."

Derek Morgan sat the folder down on the small table, but J.J. was the first one to break eye contact, her blue eyes set on the fragile mind in the other room. The space they were in was dimly lit, the majority of one wall a wide two way mirror with another, slightly larger and far brighter, area for interrogation on the other side. At the center of that room was a table and sitting at the table was one Jervis Tetch, a gray blanket thrown over his shoulders and handcuffed arms. His hat sat awkwardly on his head, looking as if it might, at any time, topple off. The man didn't look very formidable, but Agent Morgan knew better - a broken psyche could be the most dangerous kind.

"It's hard to believe he was once considered a genius," J.J. said, quietly.

Derek resisted the urge to pick the man's file back up - of course, J.J. knew what was in it better than he did. She'd been the one to compile it. Still, he shook his head. "Genius might be pushing it. This man has suffered a full break with reality." He let out a breath. "But he seems to have a good memory when it comes to those books…"

The door to the closet-like space opened up, Commissioner Gordon and Agent Emily Prentiss walking in, the sounds of phones and busy chatter following them until they closed it again.

"Sorry I couldn't make it here faster - I was in a meeting with the Mayor. You can guess what it was concerning. Three other known criminals from Arkham have been spotted in the city. Citizens are moving past panic and into outrage over not hearing about the 'breakout' that apparently occurred under our noses," Gordon said, patting Derek's shoulder in welcome. It was as close to a proper greeting as he could manage.

"The good news is, the escapees were apprehended before they had a chance to do much harm thanks to a few 'anonymous' call-ins from a raspy voiced mystery man," Emily piped up.

Gordon nodded. "Agent Prentiss was just catching me up on your meeting with Batman, but I'm still not quite sure what he expects you to get out of Tetch of all people. He's probably the most disturbed of the group of inmates who got out... And, frankly, knowing your patience, Derek, I half expected to get a phone call that you were already pounding down Arkham's doors."

Derek gave him a slight smile, but it didn't reach his eyes. "That's my next stop," he promised. "Batman better send us a text with a plan in the next thirty minutes or I'm blowing my way into the asylum."

Gordon blinked, as if he wasn't sure the other man was joking. "Text?"

"We'll find out what Tetch has to say," J.J. interrupted, sounding more confident than she had a right to be. "Batman wouldn't have left him with us without a reason." She gave her teammates a reassuring glance, then stepped out of the room, reappearing in front of the two-way mirror a moment later.

"Is it safe for her to be alone with him?" Gordon asked.

Derek only frowned in answer. Just because he wasn't stopping her, didn't mean he liked this idea. He had a feeling, though, that Batman had her in mind when he dropped Tetch off with them. Dick, Derek thought, bitterly.

"Dr. Jervis Tetch," Derek began again, for Emily and Gordon's sake, and slid the file toward them. "Formerly a well respected, if socially awkward, neuro scientist and engineer. Tetch had a breakdown after loosing his job, and his grant, due to misconduct, which served as a trigger for most of his personality changes. If you dig a little deeper, you find out that he was recruiting children to take part in his experiment, without parental permission. The parents found out, and they accused him of every crime in the book, including pedophilia."

"Were their suspicions founded?" Emily asked.

Derek raised a brow. "When Tetch was finally arrested and then sentenced to Arkham, it was because he was repeating those experiments with runaways he found on the street. He wasn't convicted of sexual abuse, but we've seen this kind of profile before. If he'd continued on his course, the experimentation would likely have fallen outside the realm of science."

"And his fixation with Alice in Wonderland? That was what he was quoting, right?" Emily asked.

"Tetch is obsessive compulsive and highly delusional. And he has an immature self-image, so he feels he communicates better with children than adults." Derek turned toward the mirror, looking at the subject as J.J. took a seat across from Tetch, pretending to study the folder in her hands. He didn't want to make eye contact with Gordon, not just yet. There was no reason for the man to know that the Joker had given Tetch his daughter's picture. Derek knew how he would react in Gordon's shoes; they needed Tetch conscious and in one piece in order to question him. "Somewhere along the line, Alice is the tale he hung on to, a combination of all his characteristics showing up in his rhyming speech, his quotes, his obsession."

"He sees himself as the Mad Hatter," Emily realized. Her gaze narrowed. "And we're casting J.J. as Alice…"

Derek raised a hand to cut her off and then turned up the speaker so they could hear what was going on inside. Jervis Tetch had raised his head at the agent's self introduction, a cautious smile on his face, as if he didn't quite believe what was in front of him.

"Why is a raven like a writing-desk?" he asked.

Gordon huffed in annoyance, but Derek shook his head to keep the other man quiet.

Inside the interview room, J.J. cocked her head, the blond hair she'd pulled down spilling in a long curtain against her heart-shaped face, a thin ribbon acting as a headband. In that moment, even Derek could see how young the wide-eyed agent could look in the right situation. If she were a child, she would have looked the part exactly.

J.J. frowned slightly. "I think you might do something better with the time," she quoted, "than waste it in asking riddles that have no answers."

The man's demeanor brightened. "Alice," he sighed, delighted. "I thought it was you."

Derek leaned closer to the window. "She's got him," he said, softly. He felt a vibration against his leg, and pulled his cell phone before it could ring, giving it a quick glance, before rereading the message across the screen. "Son of a bitch," he muttered.

Emily raised a brow at him. "Batman?"

"He's on the rooftop, and he says he knows who started this." Derek chewed his bottom lip, finally coming to a decision. "Prentiss, you and Gordon should go meet him. I'll stay here with J.J. And, I swear, if Batman doesn't have something useful to say, tell him I'm arresting his ass." He stopped Emily before she could reach the door. "Be careful. Batman might have good intentions, but he doesn't do things the way we do."

She gave him an odd look but didn't reply to the warning, following after Gordon.

For one bewildering moment, Agent Aaron Hotchner lost contact with his reality and wondered if, perhaps, this was a dream. It would explain the distance he felt from the world around him, the sense of confusion laced between his too-vivid, too-alert thoughts. No, this was not some strange nightmare, but it would be a fitting subject for one.

He moved close to the wall, giving enough space for Cash to move beside him, the security guard keeping his head down, keeping his face and the taser gun tucked at his side hidden as best he could manage. They were not themselves, in this moment. Gone were the FBI agent and the guard, replaced by two more patients in orange jumpsuits wandering the halls.

Hotch felt naked without his suit and tie, bare without his weapon on hand, but his anxiousness didn't show on his face. He kept his expression decidedly hard, his brow low and his dark gaze steady on the corridor in front of them, as if the smear of blood on the wall or the fallen, dead inmate shoved in the doorway of one room didn't bother him in this least. He hoped that Cash was able to do the same. If either of them showed fear, played the part of prey, the would never make it to Dr. Arkham's office. And if any inmate was daring enough to actually look past Hotch, to look Cash in the face and recognize him…

Hotch's plan didn't allow for that. They had to move and moving met being one of the bad guys.

A skinny patient with broken teeth and a wild, boyish laugh, bound past Hotch, shoving him into Cash, but the patient didn't so much as give them a second glance, another of his fellow inmates following after him, shouting something about bringing back the meds.

So far, they'd been lucky, and that should have made Hotch feel as if he were somehow winning this, but he didn't. Because, not running into trouble also meant that he hadn't had to save Reid. He hadn't found Reid, or a way to the other corridor. The further he got from it, the emptier he felt. While he was certain the young man was intelligent enough to stay alive, he knew the inmates' actions could not be easily predicted if anyone in law enforcement was found. And at the moment, they'd had no signs of when help would be on its way, but Hotch knew the odds. If this played out like my prison riots, they were likely in for a longer wait as the negotiators outside attempted to come to a peaceful resolution. That was if the cops outside even knew of a way in - Hotch wasn't sure.

Cash's fingers gripped his elbow, slowing him down, and the guard jerked his head to the right. The corridor opened into a false foyer where two out-of-place looking double doors were waiting.

Hotch's instinct was to turn around. He could feel it, in the pit of his stomach: this was too open, too easy a target.

"What now?" Hotch asked.

Cash stepped past him, gesturing toward the next door. It looked as if it could be a patient room, but it was on the wrong side of the corridor and too far from the other quarters. An examination room, then.

"It connects to Dr. Arkham's office," Cash whispered, then moved past him, pulling free the taser. Hotch took the cue, a tube of the guard's pepper spray tight against his palm as he raised his arm, then used his free hand to open the exam room's door.

Hotch stepped aside, letting the taser enter first and watching the corridor. So far, they hadn't attracted any attention, and judging from the noise down the corridor they'd left, the inmates had found something else to entertain them for the time being. He scoped out the room, staring at the dark corners past the examination table, the shadows off the medical cabinet against the pale tiled walls. But it seemed the room was truly empty.

"Where's Falcone?" Cash asked, to himself.

So this was the room where the assessment was supposed to take place. Hotch shook his head. "Perhaps he wasn't moved."

He reached back, holding the door to let it shut silently. Cash moved ahead of him, fast now that they were close to their destination, and over-eager. Hotch didn't blame him. Hours spent weaving in and out of rooms, trying to both avoid and blend in with the inmates, had left his nerves ragged. He was ready for a break as well.

There was another door past the examination room, one beside a mirror that Hotch, seasoned in interrogation, recognized to be two-way. He had to stop himself from jumping at the sight of his own dark reflection. The man he saw in the mirror didn't so much as flinch. It was unnerving to see himself like that. It felt as if something was watching him from behind the glass.

Cash gestured for him to hurry up, and Hotch crossed the room, repeating the same stance at the next door. This time, though, when he opened the door, he was met not with an empty room but the barrel of a pistol.

"Hello. Agent Hotchner? Dr. Arkham has told me so much about you," the shadows said.

Then it leaned forward, and Hotch realized it wasn't a shadow behind the gun, it was a man in a dark mask. A scarecrow's mask.

"Please," the scarecrow said, "join us." He aimed his gun past Hotch's shoulder. "I wasn't talking to you," the Scarecrow corrected, and fired.

Hotch felt the spray of blood on the back of his neck and heard Cash grunt in pain as he hit the ground, but he didn't have time to turn back to the guard. Dr. Crane's gun was already aimed back at him, the ringing in Hotch's ears blocking out the sound of the Scarecrow's reply. Hotch didn't need to hear him to know what was next - two other inmates stepped around the Scarecrow, grabbing hold of the agent and pulling in into the other room.

Emily stepped out onto the rooftop, somehow surprised by the sun shining down on her. The gray overcast blocked most of it out, but, still, she'd forgotten that it was daylight. They'd been in Gotham for all of an hour, but it felt like they whole day had been wasted trying to formulate a plan. Was this how victim's family's felt? When they were stuck in the Purgatory between losing their loved ones and finding them again?

"I'm going into Arkham."

She didn't jump at the sound of the gravelly voice behind her and Gordon didn't so much as pause, taking another step away from them before planting his hands on his hips and staring at the Batman from over Emily's shoulder.

"About damned time," Gordon replied. "Is there a reason you haven't already? Because Derek Morgan is downstairs, and he sure as hell is going to ask."

Emily raised a brow at his frankness but agreed. Batman stepped past her, closer to Gordon.

"I needed to find out who was behind this and what they were planning before going in."

"Since when are we rational?" Gordon scratched his temple, letting it drop. "I assume you did find out who put this together?"

"Whatever the Joker's intentions were, he wasn't behind the lockdown, and it wasn't supposed to serve as a distraction. It was a means of covering up an assassination." Batman paused, giving Emily a weighted look. "The FBI agents visiting Arkham did trigger this, but not in the way thought. Agent Hotchner had been called in to evaluate Carmine Falcone. The crime boss who took over for Falcone put a hit on him. It's supposed to be carried out during the lockdown. It might already be too late to save Falcone."

"Who put out the hit? The new Russian?" Gordon asked.

"Sophia Falcone Gigante. And she has guards at Arkham in her pocket."

Gordon's eyes widened. "Isn't that Falcone's daughter? How did you find that out?"

Batman didn't answer. "You need to speak to Mario Falcone. Carmine's oldest son. We had a…long talk about his sister. He didn't know about the hit. He's willing to work with the police to put Gigante away."

"If you know who's behind this, then why are we interviewing Tetch?" Emily snapped. "Why are we wasting time?"

"When I caught him, Tetch said something I thought was interesting. Something you'll need to get on record if you're ever going to prosecute. It's about Dr. Arkham." Batman hesitated. "And, I needed your team to stay put while I went over the blueprints Garcia sent me. I know how Tetch and the others escaped, but if a team goes in - "

"More people will get hurt. And taken hostage, if they aren't already," Emily agreed. "But that didn't give you a right to keep this from us. You underestimate the BAU."

"And you overestimate your team's objectivity," Batman growled. "I can go into Arkham and find Dr. Reid and Agent Hotchner, get them and whatever civilians are trapped with them to safety before the SWAT team infiltrates."

"No." Emily shook her head. "You're not going in alone. I might not be objective, but neither are you, so don't use that as an excuse. Plus you're going to need the extra help."

"I don't -"

"You do," she interrupted. "If you want to get back out of Arkham after you get in, I suggest you take me with you. You're going to need someone to misdirect the authorities so you can get back out - places like Arkham don't like to let men wearing bat suits leave."

"And how exactly are you going to explain you being inside to your superiors?" Gordon asked.

Emily smirked but there was no amusement behind her eyes. "I'll just say the Batman made me do it."

The room was vastly different from every other one on down this corridor, a place obviously meant for both work and pleasure, for greeting visitors and taking notes. Lit with candle light and not privy to the glowing red emergency lights in the corridor outside, the windowless space felt almost gothic. It was an office, walls painted clean, a wide mahogany desk at center, every book on every shelf a bit too straight, every surface a bit too clean, every item in its place and at its perfect angle. It said much about its owner, Dr. Jeremiah Arkham. Who, Agent Hotchner presumed, was the other hostage in the room.

He could barely make out the man's face from his seat behind the desk, tied to the wide chair there, but he could see the outline of his straight, bowl-cut hair, his narrow, sunken face. The administrator was alive. Beaten, but alive, and breathing heavily through the tie being used as his gag.

Hotch was pushed down into the guest chair, his hands pulled behind him. The inmates holding him down tied him in place with something cloth.

Agent Hotchner took in the details, looking for anything he could use as a weapon. Gideon had once told him that the profile, that was his greatest weapon. But the gun in Dr. Crane's hand looked formidable.

The Scarecrow dropped the weapon down to his side, his head cocked as he stared at Hotch through the tiny holes of his burlap mask. "I know all about you, Agent Hotchner. I asked Dr. Arkham who was left in this wing, and he was kind enough to tell me about you and your fellow agent from the Behavior Analysis Unit…What an interesting job you must have." He nodded at the two inmates and Hotch heard them step away, back toward the door to the examination room. "Good. Now, we're all colleagues here. We study the same field, don't we? Fear, and what it does to people," the man finally said, sounding chipper. He reached up, pulling the mask off.

He stared at it affectionately before sitting it down on the closest shelf. "I found my mask inside Dr. Arkham's desk," Dr. Crane explained, as casually as if he'd been discussing the weather. "Like it was some sort of…trophy. I also found a bottle of Scotch I'd bought him three Christmases ago and this." He lifted the gun, smiling tightly at it. "It was just sitting there, waiting to be used. Dr. Arkham hadn't even taken it out when I barged in. And it wasn't because he's such a pacifist, and it wasn't because he'd forgotten about it. Oh, that's far from the truth, now isn't it, Dr. Arkham? No…He didn't have it out because he didn't truly fear me."

He paused, turning his attention fully on Hotch. "What do you think of that, Agent Hotchner? What do you think of a man who doesn't fear someone like me? Does someone that idiotic even deserve to live?"

It was electroshock therapy.

Spencer let out a shaky breath, wanting to step back out of the room he'd been tossed into, wanting to remind himself that it was actually called electroconvulsive therapy and that it was a common psychiatric treatment, so there was a perfectly logical reason for it being in this wing of the asylum. That didn't stop the blood from racing through his veins, and it certainly didn't stop his first thought from being about the Joker and all the 'fun times' the lunatic could have with this equipment.

"Don't be shy, kiddo. Go on in," the Joker said, reminding him that he couldn't step back into the corridor. The clown was at his back and gave him another quick shove out of the doorway, out of sight from any of the other inmates who might have spotted them.

The space was small as any of the rooms used as quarters, not quite the 'torture chamber' that its earliest incarnations had been, but still, Spencer recognized the table, the charge box. Even the paperwork for an incoming patient had been left on a stool, awaiting attention. Spencer wondered, absently, what had happened to the orderly who'd probably left those sitting there.

The Joker circled around him, hunched forward slightly, his grin seeming to lead the rest of him. He forced a fake frown onto his face. "Oh, you don't think this is for you, do you, kiddo?" He lowered his voice to a stage whisper. "Or does this place just remind you of dear ol' Mom?"

Spencer glared at him, but the Joker only found that amusing, a sharp laugh bursting out of him in reply.

"Sore, eh, subject still, I see. Sorry…sorry, kiddo." But he was back to grinning widely. "I got something to show you."

The Joker crossed the room and then Spencer saw what had his eye. The table had been moved, judging from the clean marks on the dingy tile. It had once been over a wide sewer drain. It was an oddity, the side of the grate, square and big enough for a person to fit through, and it must have been an original because he'd never seen one that large used in a modern facility.

"Ya see," the Joker said, stomping hard on it. The metal jumped at the touch, showing that its once-welded caps were cut and loose. "I showed a few pals of mine this place. Heard about it from a friend of a friend," he paused to say the rest behind his hand, "of a friend, who needed a bit of, uh, persuasion."

Spencer's brow wrinkled. "It's a way out…the flood tunnels running into the river? But they would have been patched years ago when the facility was updated."

"I forgot to mention," the Joker interrupted, "that 'friend' has 'friends' with deep pockets." His smile widened, and he took a too-quick move up to Reid. "Now, Dr. Reid, this is the part where you ask me why I haven't left yet."

"I already know the answer," Spencer replied, swallowing hard. He took an uneasy step backward. "You want me to go with you."

The Joker shrugged, then pulled his taser free. "Join me or die," he said, then chuckled, lowering the weapon. "Just kidding - no, see, kiddo, I'm going to give you a choice. You can't stop me from leaving - no, you can't do that…" His expression darkened. "But you can choose to follow…Because, let's face it, that's the only way you'll ever be able to keep me from having a bit of fun on the streets of Gotham."

The Joker kicked the grate aside and the metal squealed against the floor. "I'll even go first. Your choice, Dr. Reid. Better make it fast."

Spencer stood his ground, watching the clown slowly ease himself down into the hole in the floor. He knew what this was, and it was no choice at all. The Joker knew Spencer would be able to hear what he hadn't said, that any lives lost because of the madman's escape would all be on his head. That Spencer could have saved people, if only he'd followed - that's what he wanted Spencer to believe, at least.

Going would be giving the Joker what he wanted.

Spencer took one step forward and stopped, a sharp pain shooting through his side. Confused, he glanced down to see a hand covered in blood holding something flush against his shirt. Another arm wrapped around his neck from behind, holding Spencer against his attacker.

"Shh, zombie…or I'll spill you on the floor."