Right after she breaks, Michelle is almost like a child.
"It's getting sort of, you know, late," Joker tells her as she clings to his arm, walking in step with him. She's been there for a good hour or two and honestly, he wants her off of him. He's tired, and a clingy woman coupled with that natural insomnia isn't going to help him get that hour or two of sleep he usually runs on.
"Can I come with you?" She asks, loosening her grip on his arm as he pulls free of her, folding her hands in front of her as she keeps at his heels. He walks down the hallway and to a large wooden door, and when he jerks the door open, Michelle sees that the room he stays in is dirty, almost as dirty, if not even dirtier, than her own room is. She sees broken glass glinting in the low light off of the floor and loose papers thrown about helter-skelter. She walks in after him, or is about to, when the door slams shut in her face and locks.
"No." Joker tells her from the other side of the door in a gruff, terse manner, and Michelle stares at the door. She can walk back to her room, but…she can't stay there, no. Not when that stained mattress is where her heart was broken. And she's too afraid that it's a test; a test to see if she's really loyal to Joker, if she'll persevere just to make him happy. So she sits down next to the doorway, on the floor, and pulls her knees up to her chest, crossing her arms around them and leaning her head on her knees. She's so tired, but she's not going to fail this test. He's probably testing to see if she can stay awake too. She's not going to fail him.
Around six hours later is when Joker finally leaves his room again; he only slept about two and a half hours, but the other four hours were spent wondering what sort of hell he should raise next. He has no plan, no schemes; the way it should be, of course. He is, however, getting ideas. He throws open the door, letting it swing hard outwards to slam into the wall like it always did, and instead, hears it bounce off of something that's not a wall, and hears someone groan.
"Huh?" He leans out of the doorway, looking at the foot of his door, and sees Michelle sitting there, now looking up at him. Her eyes have dark circles under them, and she's rubbing her shoulder where the door collided with her. She's stayed out the entire time, waiting for him. Like a kicked puppy. It's darkly hilarious and sickeningly pathetic at the same time.
That's perfect.
"Michelle." He smiles at her, and the scars make his smile look ghastly and huge, but she doesn't seem to notice and instead perks up slightly, standing up.
"Did I pass?" She asks, her eyes wide and hopeful and so very nervous, and he cocks his head very slightly, looking confused. "I mean the test. I tried not to fall asleep, because I didn't know if that was a part of it too, but I dozed off for a minute or two. Did I still pass?" She leans forward, her eyes plaintive and worried, and the attempt at a non-threatening smile fails as his smile turns devious. Poor girl has convinced herself that he tests her to make sure she's completely loyal. Saccharine. Sickening.
"Well," Joker begins, struggling to keep his face serious as he seems to ponder it. "You did pass the main part of the test…falling asleep though; that's a little disappointing…" He watches with untold mirth as Michelle's expression becomes alarmed at his wavering decision. "I suppose you did. Go figure." He finally says, and she lets out an audible sigh of relief. She's so paranoid that she's convinced herself he cares enough to test her.
"I'm so glad," She sighs, walking forward and leaning against his chest. "I was worried for a mo-" She's cut off as he places a palm flat on her left hip, before giving her a hard shove that sends her sprawling across the concrete floor.
"Did I tell you that you could do that?" He asks, in an annoyed deadpan, and she sits up, a hand on her head right about where it smacked against the floor. She's confused.
"Um…huh?"
"I didn't tell you that you could touch me."
"I'm…sorry?"
He walks past her, almost ignoring her completely except for a pat on the head as he passes, almost like he's patting a dog. "Good girl." He keeps walking, and when he doesn't hear her following him, whistles. He hears her scramble to her feet and soon walk behind him, and he knows that he's going to have to temper this attachment like steel. She needs her own individuality so that she can do what he tells her to, and make decisions on her own without his constant guidance. It's going to be a process, like everything is, but he's going to turn her into a finely tuned weapon if it kills her.
"Why am I doing this again?" She asks in a deadpan tone, as he presses the keys into her palm.
"You're not intimidating enough," Joker tells her, curling her fingers over the keys to the black SUV out front. "You look like any other joyless dog of Gotham. You," He smiles, "Need to be more…cheery. Colorful. Dramatic." It's been a few days since she broke down, and now she's less afraid that he's going to lose interest in her. She trusts him that he's going to still want her. The tempering is going along well.
"Like a costume?"
"Smart. Yes, a costume, outfit, anything; make yourself look different, special." He doesn't need to add, "Like me", because it doesn't need to be said; that's just a given. She nods, and looks back at the SUV. He's given her the address to the guy that did his…unusual suit, somebody that deals in eccentric clothing for people that can fork the cash up for it. He tells her that if she goes to this guy, she just needs to tell him that the Joker sent her and he'll get her what she needs, payment to be delivered later on. She turns around, walking around to the driver's side of the SUV, and hears him call her name.
"And Michelle; try and escape, and believe me, I will know, and I blow the car sky high." He shows her a detonator produced from his pocket and arms it, to show her that it's real, and disarms it before putting it away. He doesn't stop smiling eerily, threateningly, as he tells her this. She nods, shakily, before starting up the engine and beginning to drive into Gotham.
She spends the day hunting through shops, a scarf around her neck and mouth, a hat on her head, and her long black coat wrapped around her. Nobody recognizes her as she walks the streets and through the shops, hunting through various masquerade and Halloween stores for a perfect costume, while trying to decipher exactly what the Joker meant by 'dramatic'. All the costumes she finds at the costume stores are too bulky, too slutty, or too fragile to do anything in. Joker told her to be back by night, and it's getting a little close, and she doesn't forget for a moment the fact that he has the car wired with explosives. She doesn't even consider the fact that she could run if she wanted to, and abandon the car to be blown sky high, and try and get away. She could. She just doesn't want to, not in the least.
Finally, she drives to the shop that the Joker had recommended her, a small shop tucked between two towering buildings. She parks and walks in, hesitantly, to see a bored looking man at the counter.
"Excuse…me?" Michelle asks, trying to get his attention. "I'm wondering if I can look through…special costumes."
"What?" He asks, looking at her sharply. She pulls something from her pocket; a calling card, the Joker told her, that could get her into the back room where she wanted to be. She hands him the Joker card with blood smudged onto it, and the man tosses her a key and points towards a back room. "In there. Hurry up."
As soon as Michelle walks into the back room, she knows what the Joker was talking about. There are so many different outfits that seem to have been made as backups for other people; a suit covered with question marks, black latex skintight suits, a red and black-checkered skintight harlequin suit, and in back, a purple coat in a long box partially obscuring a dizzyingly-patterned vest. There's even a spare suit for the Joker; so this is probably where he got that new suit from after busting out of Arkham.
"I need a motif." She murmurs, trying to think of something. It's going to have to be esoteric, eccentric, all of those wonderful e words signifying mental sickness. She digs through the clothing, trying to find something that means something to her. Something…important. Something that just sticks to her, something that…that…
Michelle sticks her hand in something silky and, for no real reason at all, grabs it and pulls it out. She sees what it is, and her eyes widen, and an ironic smile tugs at the corner of her mouth.
"You're joking." She breathes, before looking up at the ceiling, as if she were staring at God himself, if he even exists, and giving him a look that says, 'Really? You're a sick bastard, you know that?' She looks back at the outfit in her hands and sighs, under her breath, before picking up all the pieces of it (they're all together, at least, closely enough).
"I think I have what I want," She tells the man behind the counter, and he glances back at her.
"Are you wearing it out?"
"…I think I am."
The Joker is getting impatient. It's dark, and she's still not back yet. He's not a very patient man, and is currently thumbing the detonator between the armed and disarmed positions, idly. She has five minutes…
The sound of a car engine pulling close and then cutting off sounds out from outside the building. She's back. Joker's anticipating something completely stupid and hilarious. She's probably going to pick something clown-themed too, and if she picks a mime, he's going to slap her. Nobody likes mimes. He sits on his desk and moves around to the seat behind it, waiting, as footsteps grow closer to his office. Is that wolf-whistling, too? What the hell? The door opens, tentatively; just a crack.
"Can…I come in?" Michelle asks, and her voice is shaking slightly; she's horribly nervous, and from what he can see of her cheeks, they're bright crimson. This ought to be good.
"Come in." He can barely hide his giddiness. The door is pushed open, she walks in, and he just stares. Of all the things he expected, he didn't expect this.
It's a black and white skintight suit, probably latex, and it's just as complicated as possible. The pants are low on her hips and go down to her ankles, the right leg entirely black, and the left leg entirely white. The top's colors are reversed; the left sleeve is black, and the right sleeve is white, and those colors end at her shoulders, though the sleeves are very long and hang down to her palms, the ends open in a wide bell shape. The part covering her torso is entirely white, though, and has a deep black Rorschach inkblot spot in the center, across her chest. The back is entirely black with a white Rorschach inkblot. She's wearing heels colored white and black too, and they clash with her pants; the right shoe is white, the left shoe black. Her gloves are much the same; left glove white, right glove black. Just looking at her hurts a person's eyes. She painted her face, too; though Joker doesn't know it, it's her Pagliacci makeup, though with a change; when she was out, she got a tattoo that ate up the rest of the daytime; a black star beginning at the top of her facial scar, with an inch-thick line running down the length of the scar, ending at her cheekbone where the scar ends. There's another inch-thick line on her other eye, though no star, and it starts right under her eyebrow and ends at the same point the other one does.
"…That's…" Joker starts, not sure how to phrase what he's thinking of. She's got red on her lips, so she's not a mime, and he doesn't get to slap her for that. Even through the paper white grease paint she's got smeared over her face, he can almost see the blush on her face. The suit is kind of tight; doesn't leave much to the imagination.
"You probably think it's ugly, right? Ugh, I knew this was a bad idea." She hangs her head, before stopping, because she can hear Joker beginning to laugh. She stops, staring at him curiously, dejectedly, as he speaks to her through his giggling.
"I never said that it was ugly, Michelle, but why, if you'll be so kind?"
"Uh…I…used to work as a birthday…clown…" The last word is very quiet, but he hears it, because his laughter increases tenfold.
"A clown!! That's irony for you!"
"Y…yeah…eheh…anyway, I thought that something complicated and white and black…couldn't hurt? I don't know." She hangs her head, dejectedly, before he walks up to her and puts a hand on her shoulder. He can feel her body heat through the material.
"Got a name for this identity?" He asks, an arm around her shoulders as he leads her out the door and down the hallway. He's noticed that when she walks, she's less jumpy and talks easier for some reason.
"Yes, actually…I was stuck between, 'Pastiche', 'Pagliacci', and…'Schwarzwald'. But I might change it later."
"Quick of you to pick a new identity so fast. It takes some people forever to finally just pick something."
She smiles now, at that bit of pseudo-praise, and nestles under his arm a bit more. "I think I like Schwarzwald best. I couldn't use Rorschach, now could I?"
"It'd make sense, but…well, look at what happened to the last guy that called himself Rorschach."