Chapter Ten
Let the bodies hit the floor.
-Drowning Pool, Bodies
One week later, it was dark, cold, and raining, and I was struggling to maneuver my car through Gotham's slick streets to get to Arkham Asylum for an emergency.
I'd spent the previous days attending sessions with the Joker, talking with him about everything from what he would do if he was the mayor of Gotham (he got a dark look on his face and started muttering about reforming patent laws) to the upcoming presidential election and what he had to say about everything in between. There had been a conspicuous absence of the rather intimate conversation that had been the norm beforehand, though, and I suppose each of us had our reasons for not pursuing it.
For my part, I didn't want Stratford to see how truly intensely personal these sessions had become. The doubts about humanity, this sudden belief in something called destiny and the carefully constructed chaos of fate—it was hitting me particularly hard, and I feared that if I got into any more dangerous discussions with the Joker, then it would become obvious to more than just myself. I was trying to maintain the delicate balance right now. That meant not talking about personal issues.
The Joker, on the other hand… who knew? Maybe he'd gotten everything he wanted out of me. Maybe he was biding his time, waiting until I was completely off-guard before he sprung some giant surprise on me. There was no telling.
He hadn't worn his makeup. I had given it to Howard to give to him, but he hadn't shown up with it once yet. I hunted Howard down to make sure he had actually received it, had received opportunities to use it, but he said that the Joker showed no interest in wearing it. I was a bit bummed at the news.
At any rate, our sessions had been completely ordinary, the kind of stuff a normal therapist would discuss with a patient that was close to completing rehabilitation. I should have known that something would happen to upset the status quo sooner or later.
I was sitting at home with a carton of carry-out Chinese, in my pajamas and considering going to bed despite the fact that it was only 9 PM, when my phone had buzzed with a text.
STRATFORD, the screen read. Frowning, I checked the message.
Need you here now. Hury up
The misspelling wasn't like him. Admittedly, he and I didn't text regularly, so I had no way of knowing if he was a stickler for grammar like Pam and I were, but he was the director of Arkham Asylum—it wasn't like him to misspell anything, even in something as unimportant as a text message. It communicated urgency.
I pulled on a pair of jeans and a black v-neck, long-sleeved shirt, forgoing makeup, just running a brush through my hair and brushing my teeth. I grabbed the only umbrella I could see (a ridiculous little thing that Pam had gotten me as a joke; it was white with hideously colored smiley-faces all over it) and ran out into the rain.
Gotham City's streets were harder than most to navigate in bad weather. As well as the usual conditions, there was the pollution factor—there were more oil spills and the pavement had deteriorated more than in other places. It wasn't conducive to fast driving, but I did my best.
Arkham's parking garage was almost completely empty, and I felt a stirring of misgiving as I climbed out of my car and headed inside the building. I had been practicing my gymnastics more than ever as of late, without Pam to distract me in my off time, so I felt as if I had a chance in warding off any potential attacks. Still, gymnastics weren't martial arts. They kept me in good shape but I still had no form of self-defense to speak of. With a little tweaking, though… I thought I might be able to turn my routines into weapons. Still, that didn't help me now.
I pushed the thought away as I reached the building and checked in. "Where's Doctor Stratford?" I asked a nurse who was passing by.
"Um, in his office, I think," she answered uncertainly.
I felt a surge of relief, and realized that I had reflexively worried that this was about the Joker. It couldn't be too bad if Stratford was in his office instead of anywhere near the infirmary, the examination rooms, or the Joker's cell. Feeling encouraged, I went swiftly for the office.
Stratford was there, and so was his buddy Jack Daniels. The second I caught sight of the half-empty bottle, I sighed, slumping against the doorframe. "Doctor. You've been drinking," I said quietly.
He looked up. His gaze, to his credit, was only slightly bleary. "Only a little," he mumbled.
"A little is too much," I snapped. I had nothing against drinking in general, but it was general knowledge that Stratford was an ex-alcoholic. As far as I knew, he hadn't touched a drop of alcohol in seven, eight years. "What's the occasion?" Even as I asked, I realized that it had to be something bad, and the understanding sent a cold chill down my spine.
"Have a drink," he invited me.
"No, thanks," I said. He shrugged and poured himself some more.
"Well then come in, sit down," he said, waving vaguely at the chairs in front of his desk. Exasperated, but figuring that the best way to find out what he wanted would be to play by his rules, at least temporarily, I came in the rest of the way and sat on the edge of one of the chairs.
"You're aware, are you not," he said slowly, deliberately, eyeing the glassful of amber fluid that he held, "that Doctor Wilson has, as of late, opposed your assignment to the Joker case… quite spiritedly?"
"Mmhm," I acknowledged.
"He believes that the Joker will cause irreparable damage to your psyche should your sessions continue," he said slowly. I waited, saying nothing, and finally, Stratford sighed and took a drink. He didn't even grimace at the burn of the alcohol. "Last week, he made copies of the tapes we have of your sessions with him and took them to a friend of his… Danielle McQueen, you know who she is?"
"Isn't she the director of the state asylum?" I asked, getting a terrible sinking feeling in my stomach.
Stratford laughed shortly and nodded. "She agreed with him. They're taking us to court. They want custody of the Joker."
My heart stopped for a second, and then restarted again, faster than ever.
Why? He's made it pretty damn clear that the only person he's going to talk to is me. Are they really going to insist on testing him again? Next time, he might not be so generous. Next time, someone might die.
I tried forcing my voice to remain calm, though I could hear a slight quiver in it: "Well, do you think they have a case?"
"Well, that depends, doesn't it? It depends on how stable and capable you come across to the judge. It depends on if he dislikes the idea of a rookie taking on the most advanced case we have, which he very likely will. It depends… on… a lot."
I felt like I couldn't breathe, but I forced myself to take one deep breath, used it to steady myself, and went on. "They'll have no luck with him. He feels connected to me. He won't play their games, just like he wouldn't play yours."
"Yes," said Stratford, staring down into his drink. "My games."
Without lifting his eyes, he said, "I had a session or two with him, Quinzel. I'm sure you've seen the footage. He saw far more than I was comfortable with."
"You mean when he called you a pathetic drunk who enjoyed playing power games to prove to himself that he was in control of his own life? Yeah, I saw that," I said. Maybe it was a little bitter. I was panicking. I didn't want to deal with this. It could take weeks, months, and the judge could take the Joker from us for protective reasons until a decision was reached.
Maybe if I asked Wilson to stop…
I didn't realize that Stratford was staring at me until he laughed and I was startled into looking up at him. I was met with the most malevolent look I'd ever seen on his face, and he slammed the glass on the desk and stood up.
I sighed. "Look, I didn't mean that the way it sounded. I'm just tense."
"Tense… I know," he said, circling the desk and sitting on it in front of me. "They might just take away your new… crush."
Not him, too.
Okay. It didn't matter that I was attracted to the Joker, mind and body. It didn't matter that, in effect, I did have a crush on him (though the word seemed so insufficient, so childish). What mattered was that I would never, ever act on it, even if I got the opportunity. It pissed me off that people apparently couldn't see my self-control, though they certainly could see the attraction factor.
"He's your prize patient, Stratford," I said shortly, a little disrespectfully. "Maybe you should be a little more… tense… than you are." I cast a scornful look at the glass.
"I remember when I was the subject of your infatuation." He crossed his arms and stared at me. I rolled my eyes.
"Please, Doctor. If this is jealousy—"
"Not jealousy. Curiosity. What is it about him that makes you go all… weak at the knees?"
"You're drunk," I said flatly, standing up although it had the unfortunate side-effect of bringing me face-to-face with him. "And I didn't sign up to deal with a drunk boss making inappropriate insinuations after hours."
At that moment, there was a sharp clap of thunder and the electricity cut out. Everything was pitch black for a few seconds, and I gasped sharply, looking around. My first, irrational thought was that Stratford had orchestrated this, but then I realized that he was probably too drunk to even piss straight.
"Oh, don't worry," he slurred, "the generators will kick in within a few seconds."
As he spoke, there was a loud humming, and some sickly green lights flickered on and filtered in through the partially-open door, though his office remained very black.
"We should check to make sure that the doors are secure and the patients are still calm," I said, starting towards the door.
Stratford caught my wrist. "I wasn't done talking," he said sharply, pulling me a step or two back.
My first instinct was to jerk away, to call him an asshole and sway away in self-satisfied movie-heroine style. I remembered quickly, though, that those movie-heroines often got attacked when they turned their backs on volatile men, and decided to take a more subtle approach.
"All right, then," I said gently, pulling my arm out of his grip. "What did you want to say?"
He seemed disarmed by my tone, momentarily at least. He looked around in the blackness and then leaned back on his desk once more.
"You're a pretty little thing, Quinzel," he said, the smooth tone he was going for rather obliterated by the slur in his voice. "I bet when he saw you… he saw fresh meat. He saw bare throat. And he went for the jugular."
He wasn't making much sense, but I was able to piece together the gist of this latest sulkfest. "He saw someone who was willing to look at him not as insane, but as different," I corrected my superior. "I looked at him as someone who took a different approach to life from the start, and he appreciated that. There's nothing else between us."
"Which is why you just had to touch him, hmm?"
"That was a moment of weakness. You get offered a chance to touch a mass murderer, you're curious."
"No, no, no," he said, voice rising exponentially with each negation. "That's not a normal approach, Harley; most people would run and hide if they got 'a chance,' as you put it, to touch a creature like him. Something in most people just screams 'he's dangerous, get out.' Not so much with you. No, not with you—because you want him."
"If you resort to vulgarities, Doctor, then I will leave."
"You do," he said, and he might have sounded gleeful if his face hadn't been so damned dour. "You want him in more ways than one. You want him in every way a woman can want a man. You want him in the same ways you wanted me. Once upon a time."
I'd had enough of his faux-mournfulness, his moping because I had moved on from my temporary infatuation with him. I decided to set the record straight. "If you're so upset about it, Doctor, then why didn't you make some display of affection—even kindness—when I still had a bit of a thing for you? I had no idea you would get so territorial once you thought I might be moving on, even if it was to a mass-murdering psychopath."
"Wouldn't have been proper," he mumbled. "I'm your superior."
"Bullshit. You enjoyed the fact that I liked you because it gave you some form of power over me. I submitted timidly to whatever you told me. Now that I can see you and your smallness a little more clearly, I'm not likely to do that, and it pisses you off."
I had forgotten my don't-act-like-a-horror-movie-victim strategy. Stratford grabbed the hem of my shirt and jerked me into him, twisting us around so that my butt dug into the side of the desk and he was blocking my way to the exit.
"I could have done anything to you," he snarled, voice shaky with anger. "And you would have bent over and taken it. That's just the way you're made, Harleen—submissive." I could feel his alcohol-drenched breath washing over my face, and I turned my head to the side, wedging my hands between us and shoving. He had looped his hands around me, though, clasping them around the small of my back, and he wasn't letting go.
"That's why we're losing the Joker. That's why I'm losing the most important case of my career—because of your obsession with him. Because of your inability to stand up to him—and that's why he pretends to like you, because you let him get away with things."
"Michael Stratford," I hissed, "if you don't let me go and step back this second, then I will hurt you." He smirked and didn't loosen his grip, and I positioned my knee, preparing to drive it up between his legs.
Suddenly, though, he froze, and I mirrored him, because I heard what he was hearing. Footsteps, slow and deliberate, coming down the hallway—coming close.
Stratford covered my mouth with his hand—as if I'm foolish enough to think crying out could do any good. I knew who was coming. The power outage was too much of a coincidence, and I realized who the footsteps must belong to right away. They were teasing, almost playful, and something about them was entirely too ominous.
My suspicions were proved right when the door was pushed the rest of the way there, and the Joker stood there, looking curious.
He still wore the Arkham jumpsuit, but instead of the bare face I'd become accustomed to, he met us now wearing his carefully disarrayed mask of paint. It was the first time I'd personally seen him in makeup, and I marveled despite the dim light. You could barely see any of the man he once was. The flesh tone had made it easier, but now… he was the Joker. Just the Joker. It was impossible to imagine that he'd ever been anyone else.
He was also completely free of any type of restraint, and there was knife in his right hand, the blade so long and large that it was almost garish.
He took in the sight of me pressed back against the desk with Stratford covering my mouth, and raised his eyebrows. "Uh-oh," he sing-songed. "Am I, uh… am I interrupting anything? I could come back later."
Stratford let go of me and stumbled backwards, tripping over the edge of the rug. He looked between me and the Joker, looking scared out of his wits. "Quinzel… talk to him. Do something," he hissed.
I wasn't exactly feeling courageous, myself. Every time I'd met with the man, he'd been restrained somehow and unarmed. Now that the tables had turned, I had no assurance that I would be shown kindness. In fact, I got the horrible feeling that I could count on the opposite.
Spending my last moments being a bitch to the boss that had been pushing me around for so long seemed like a good idea at the time. I pulled myself to a sitting position on the desk and looked at Stratford, feeling a surreal sense of calm wash over me. "You said he was just twisting me for an opportunity to escape. He's obviously escaped. He doesn't need me anymore, so I doubt I'm going to be able to save us."
Stratford widened his eyes at me. The Joker chuckled before the good doctor could argue with me, and prowled into the room.
Freedom suited him. There was a sort of coiled energy in him now, erratic but very visible and rather flattering, in a you've never met a person more worth fearing in your entire life kind of way. He took a step towards Stratford. Stratford took a step back. The Joker took another two steps.
Two steps back.
The Joker giggled delightedly and danced towards Stratford at a rapid pace, backing the doctor up against the wall. I tilted my head and watched, morbidly fascinated. Stratford was drunk and in his forties. He was also a little heavy where the Joker was painfully skinny. The skinny guys always put up the best fights. I didn't want Stratford dead, but at the same time, I doubted he had much of a chance, and the survivor in me coldly noted that if I tried to prevent it I'd probably just make things worse for myself.
The Joker gracefully flicked his knife up, pressing it lightly to Stratford's temple. "We meet again… Doctor."
"We… we're just trying to help you," gasped Stratford, hyperventilating in fear. "We only want the best—"
"Oh, no no no no," the Joker purred. "You have helped me, Doctor." His voice switched to an animalistic growl that I hadn't heard before: "You have."
"J," I said softly, unable to just stand by and watch.
His head turned slightly, just so I was able to see his profile, and peered narrowly at me out of his one visible eye. "Justaminute, Harley-darleying. I'll deal with you shortly. For now, shhh. Daddy's working." I lapsed into silence. A slight needle of fear pierced through my emotional numb. It was sharp and very effective.
The Joker turned his head again, bringing his face within inches of Stratford's. "Now, Doc," he sang playfully, "You know what? I get the feeling… that you've been less than helpful during your little—" he swung the fingers of his free hand from one side to the other—"um, sojourn here." His voice dropped to a growl again, though it wasn't nearly as primal as before. "Now, this fiiine asylum needs a director worthy of it. You should be… the best in the country, and you're just… not."
He patted Stratford on the shoulder. "Don't take it personally. You just… didn't make the cut."
He looked over his shoulder at the door, and then back at the terrified Stratford. "Aaaand. On that note."
I saw the knife flick gracefully towards Stratford's throat, and the fear suddenly overpowered me. I whimpered softly and turned my face away violently. He's killing him. He's killing him. He's killing him.
There was a sickening sound as the steel tore deep through flesh. Seconds later, I heard Stratford hit the floor, gasping and gurgling, and I almost threw up with the knowledge that he was dying not ten feet away from me and I had done nothing to prevent it.
"Well," said the Joker in self-satisfaction, "that's that." I looked over to see that he was stooping down to wipe the knife sloppily clean on Stratford's shirt, and I quickly averted my gaze again. "And now…"
I wriggled away from the desk, stumbling swiftly towards the back of the room. I didn't know where I was going, exactly, but I felt that I would be at a marked disadvantage if I was sitting while he was standing.
Then again, there was a good chance that I'd be at a marked disadvantage no matter what happened, but my instincts wouldn't tolerate me sitting quietly to await my fate. I had to at least try.
"Going somewhere?" questioned the Joker, amused. I reached a wall and flipped around to find him slinking stealthily towards me. He'd carelessly left some blood on the knife, and it glinted black in the sickly green light.
I pressed my back hard against the wall, keeping my eyes on him, willing to direct them anywhere as long as they were averted from the slumped form that used to be Dr. Mike Stratford.
The Joker stopped a foot shy of me and twisted his mouth into a faux-frown, cocking his head. "Well, Harley, ya don't look happy to see me. I mean, personally, I thought you'd be thrilled. After all… we never exactly got a chance to get… up close and personal. I thought you'd like that."
Don't get me wrong. The torch I carried for the man kept on burning, despite the fact that I'd actually witnessed his casual method of murder firsthand. There was still silly, stupid attraction—but it smoldered beneath this blanket of fear currently draped over my psyche. Just because I was drawn to him by no means meant that he felt the same way. As a result, I was very much at risk, and my human survival instinct realized this, even if my instinct for mental self-preservation wasn't functioning correctly.
I didn't say anything. Maybe if you don't move he won't see you, my brain told me, stupid with fear.
He kept talking, his eyes diverting to the right, looking out the window, apparently oblivious to my stricken state. "Oh, and… I just wanted to thank you for the paint. I was running a little low and it would have been such a shame to stage this li'l breakout without a bit of window dressing."
When I didn't respond, he moved his eyes back to me suddenly. His face was cast in shadow, spectral because of the paint, but his eyes still had that dangerous spark in them.
"Hey," he said softly, and stepped forward, reaching for me.
The self-control that had been keeping me from bolting from the room snapped. I brought my hands up rapidly, lashing out, hitting at him, desperately trying to fight him off. I felt dangerously inept, blinded by fear, completely at a disadvantage as I shrieked and fought. I got a hit in to his stomach, but that was the only blow that may have done the least bit of damage, and he laughed it off as he pinned my arms to my side, gouging my wrist with the knife in the process.
"Hey hey hey," he rasped in protest at my response, forcing my arms down to my sides and taking one final step forward, now entirely too close for comfort—if I took a deep breath, if he did, then our chests would be touching. He ducked his head so that he could look at me, and I screwed my eyes shut and threw my head to the side with a sob.
Yes, I was crying by that point—terror for your life tends to do that to a person. Try being scared for your life while in the room with the source of your fear, who also happens to be the one person you're attracted to, who also just killed your boss, whose body also happens to be in the room. That'll really mess you up in the head.
"Shushushushushush," he said, all at once, sounding a little put out at my response. "Look at me, little Harley Quinn."
I didn't have to be told twice. Slowly, I turned my head back, blinking away stray tears and glancing up at him briefly. I couldn't endure the stare for long and quickly ducked my head again.
"Well, I mean," he said, sounding exasperated, "did you really think we were done here?" I kept my head down. I didn't trust myself to try and respond at the time; I was an emotional wreck.
He let go of my hands but there was no room to pull back and hit him—plus, I didn't figure I was going to get brownie points for trying again. He had subdued me once already, I doubted he'd have trouble doing it again, and I thought he'd be a lot less forgiving the second time around.
One of his hands went to the back of my head, the long fingers ensnaring themselves in my hair and twisting, stopping just after they got just tight enough to be uncomfortable. The other hand drifted to my face, grasping my chin, the gentleness of the touch at total odds with its source.
Carefully, as if trying not to break me, he pushed my chin up, up further, until my head was tilted back and I was staring straight into his down-turned face.
There were mere inches, if that, between our faces, between our mouths, and as I stared head-on into his inscrutable eyes, not breathing, not moving, just staring, I wondered what he was thinking.
Is he going to kiss me?
Any girl would have thought it. The position was unmistakable, and I couldn't think clearly—would I fight? Would I not? Was this something I wanted or not?
The thought seemed to break whatever spell had held reign over the room. He stepped back, released his grip on my hair, and grabbed my by my bleeding wrist.
"C'mon. We've got a party to attend."