A/N: Melvin Reipan is based on the likeness of actor James Franco. Sam Moretti is based on the likeness of actor Bruce Campbell.

"I'm gonna go take a leak, Jerry," Alan Watts said shifting in his seat and looking at his partner who seemed half-asleep.

"You sure you want to leave me alone with," Jerry tilted his head toward the doorway and made a mock shiver, "the Joker in there." Alan shook his head and chuckled.

"I think you can take a guy who's tied to a bed." Alan snorted and rose, heading down the hall to the bathroom.

Watts had been on the force for fifteen years and though the Joker was the worst they'd seen, the guy was not threat at the moment. The Joker had planned out everything he'd done over a year ago and carefully executed his crimes with the aide of roughly a hundred guys, mob and crazies alike. All of his men who hadn't died had it out for the Joker. Everyone had it out for the Joker. Should the Joker do so much as poke his head outside, he would have a hole in it before he knew what hit him.

Gordon had the hospital under heavy guard with officers patrolling every floor and squads stationed at each entry point outside the building, both to keep the Joker in and anyone who wanted at him out.

Not to mention that the Batman had reappeared in recent weeks. It was night and Watts suspected that the Bat was watching as well.

Watts took his time in the bathroom and once he'd finished there he'd made his way to the coffee vendor and plunked in his change to get two steaming paper cups of the finest of machine brew. He passed the nurses' station and paused for a couple of minutes to flirt with the cute one he'd been eyeing all night. During that time she'd noted an irregularity on the screen in the Joker's vitals, but chalked it up to glitches they sometimes had when patients shifted in their beds.

Satisfied that he would have Nancy's number by the end of the shift, Watts returned to his post outside the Joker's room and frowned when he didn't see Jerry there. He set the cups down on the seat and drew his service weapon and ducked inside the room. In the dim light he saw the Joker's restrained sleeping form hooked up to the various monitors. Deciding that Jerry had gone off to take a leak himself, he returned to his chair outside and picked up a cup, leaving one on Jerry's seat.

"Paging Doctor Stone to ICU, Code Silver; Doctor Stone to ICU, Code Silver," the voice called over the intercom.

Harleen's eyes snapped open at the words and she sat up, heart pounding as a harried officer entered her room and looked at her before speaking into his radio.

"All clear in 315, Doctor Quinzel is in her room." He blurted and looked into the hallway and then back at her nervously.

"What's wrong, officer?" Harleen asked knowing full well what the emergency codes meant. They had discovered the Joker had escaped.

"Nothing to be worried about, Doctor Quinzel," the officer stammered as another one entered the room.

Harleen lay back on the bed and looked at the clock. Six and a half hours had passed since she had released Joker from his restraints. He had taken his time to escape. She realized the officers were there to protect her from him. She closed her eyes and took calming breaths, assuring herself that she had made the right decision in setting him free.

Gordon listened to the APB being called out over the radio and removed his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. At five-thirty in the morning, the Joker had gotten loose of his restraints and subdued one of the officers guarding his room. He had then tied the officer down in his place and switched the monitoring leads to the officer and taken his uniform and waltzed out of the hospital undetected.

He had just finished reviewing the security tape from ICU after interviewing the officer's partner who swore he'd left the man alone for only a few minutes. Gordon had learned long ago that the Joker worked quickly and could pull off a lot in little time. They were searching for the car the Joker had stolen from the staff parking lot.

He thought back to three nights prior when he'd wandered out onto the roof of headquarters to clear his head, and draw on some nostalgia of a time when a man in black had visited him and given him aid in his fight against organized crime and corruption in Gotham.

He hadn't seen Batman in more than a year and had decided that the crusader had given up his fight in the wake of the Joker's crimes and Harvey Dent's death. That was, until the night a little over a month ago when he'd delivered one of Carmine Falcone's sons to the GPD in the same manner in which he had the Roman himself. Gordon had drawn a sort of pride and satisfaction in the knowledge that Batman had returned.

In the same manner as he had in the past, Batman had appeared before him once again that night. He had questioned the D.A.'s decision to make the Joker's hearing public and given Gordon words of caution that no good could come from doing so. For obvious reasons, Gordon couldn't tell Anthony Hall that Batman thought his public hearing was a bad idea. As predicted, everything had gone wrong and now the Joker had escaped once more.

Gordon spied the dawn light through the glass-walled hallway and regretted that it would be hours before Batman could begin his hunt.

Bruce Wayne entered the spacious, marble bathroom in his luxurious penthouse after another sleepless night. He splashed cold water over his face before reaching inside the glass-enclosed shower and turning on the water. Steam began to fill the chamber as he removed his clothes and a heavy weight burdened his shoulders as he recalled the radio traffic.

After leaving Selina asleep in his bed he had donned the bat suit and held a vigilant watch over Gotham City Hospital. Hours before he had watched as the Joker had collapsed from a heart attack in the very courtroom he had stormed out of years before when Joe Chill had been murdered.

Doctor Harleen Quinzel had rushed to the Joker's aide and Selina had been absolutely beside herself when the woman had collapsed as well. As much as he had desired to do so, he could not rush in and assess the situation himself. Instead he had endured a police interview and comforted his girlfriend who despaired at not being able to tend to her friend. All the while he had recalled the events of the day, each detail keenly registering in his mind as he analyzed the event.

The Joker's lawyer had been taken into custody under suspicion that he had poisoned the Joker himself. But Bruce's instincts told him that the man was a pawn in the game. He'd kept an eye on David Rubinstein ever since he had been assigned to the Joker's case by the court. Though he was ambitious, the man was fighting for a lost cause and he knew it. Perhaps he had decided that the best recourse had been to go along with the plan of whoever had approached him to kill the Joker. He reasoned that if any of the crime families of Gotham were behind it, then they would have promised Rubinstein that he would be rewarded handsomely for his actions.

"Go out for a run?" Selina's voice asked tiredly as the woman joined him in the shower. At his insistence she had taken sleeping pills the night before, allowing him to go out on his patrol. Undoubtedly she had woken in the morning before he had returned and found him missing.

His return as Batman had been complicated by his relationship with the woman. They spent more nights together than they did alone anymore and that made his career as a vigilante harder to disguise from the woman who already suspected that he was up to more than he was telling.

"How did you get these terrible scars?" She had asked when their relationship had become intimate. He had been evasive, telling her that he had endured a difficult life in the time he had been 'missing'. While not a lie, it was not the entire truth either.

He knew she had her share of secrets as well, not limited to her longtime, close friendship with the woman who had been treating the Joker for the better part of a year. It had been very difficult to prod her for information about Harleen Quinzel and the Joker without arousing her suspicion. He had been working out a way to get Selina to introduce him to Harleen once he learned who she was. He doubted the woman would react well to a late night visit from Batman.

"Yeah," he replied as Selina slid her arms around his waist. He moved further beneath the water falling from the ceiling fixture so she could move beneath it while she began planting soft kisses on his shoulder. A smile spread across his lips and a sigh escaped his lips as her right hand slid down his body.

It was going to be a long day.

Sam Moretti rocked absently in his desk chair as he filled out the week's schedule. He ran a hand through his short, graying hair and grabbed his coffee cup and took a long drink. It wasn't his longtime favorite blend with a shot of whiskey as he had decided to cut back on the drink when things had begun to go to hell in his life four years ago. As bad as being extorted by the mob had been, the resolution taken by his protégé had been much worse. The kid had fucked up badly, and left him with more trouble than he'd had to begin with.

Such was the song and dance in the world of love, pizza and the mob.

He'd caught the little bastard nearly two decades before trying to steal from his till while he was kneading dough in the back of his first shop. He'd heard the kid clumsily jacking open the register and come out of the back armed with a shotgun. He swore that the skinny kid had nearly wet himself when he found himself staring wide-eyed at the double barrels.

Instead of turning him over to the cops he'd made the kid mop floors and clean up in his shop in his own version of an 'after-school' program, paying the kid under the table. The kid's dad was a drunk and didn't give a shit what he did so long as he was turning over his cash to him. He'd tried to make an honest man out of him, but it was not to be. Once he learned of Sam's 'association' with the mob, he'd been fascinated and never looked back at the life he could have had.

He'd taught the kid all he knew of his 'trade' while he made him work in his kitchen. The student had excelled and become better than his teacher. For some this would have instilled pride; as for Sam, he hated himself for making Jack Napier into a killer. So he'd taken to the drink while Jack had gone off to work for Falcone.

Sam glanced up when he heard the sounds coming from the back door. He always kept it locked when he was alone. Someone was working on the lock. He took another drink of his coffee and rose from his chair, his back aching. He rubbed his sore lower back with one hand while grabbing the familiar gun with his other. He made his way out of the office to the back door and took aim as the last tumbler in the lock clicked into place. The door opened and a man in a blue uniform entered the kitchen and then stopped in mid stride and regarded Sam with a sideward glance. Sam got a look at the man's face and lowered the gun, shaking his head bemused.

"You little shit." He said laughing as the Joker closed the door and pulled off the policeman's hat and running a hand through his short curls.

"I've, uh, had a hell of a day Sam," Joker smirked as he removed his coat and held up a folder.

Sam gestured toward his office and Joker went inside while Sam poured out another cup of coffee which he sat on the desk beside the younger man who was reading over the file now spread open on the desk. Sam took his seat and watched the other man reading, feeling a spark of happiness at the familiarity. He wasn't about to pepper the man with questions and adulations of 'they said you were dead.' Such sentiments were lost on Joker as a lot of things had been in the years following the death of the woman who had married Jack Napier.

"Some light reading?" Sam asked and took a drink of his coffee. Joker sat back and tapped a page with his forefinger.

"Are you still taking those heart pills?" Joker asked. Sam nodded and Joker nodded with him.

"I've been advised to seek continuing care for my health problems," Joker said sarcastically. "I need to find someone to give me the same meds as they have in here," he said shoving the file toward Sam.

Sam picked it up and regarded the charts from Gotham City Hospital, surprised that Joker would take his medical records with him when he escaped.

"I know a guy," he said and Joker shook his head.

"Any guy isn't good enough. I need someone who isn't going to hand me over to, uh, any Tom, Dick and Harry with a few dollars to throw around," Joker said narrowing his eyes.

"You think I'd screw you over?" Sam said, his tone growing dark and frowning when Joker shrugged flippantly.

"I don't think there are many people out here who have my best interests at heart," he said looking at and then drinking from the cup beside him.

The door to the kitchen from the stairs opened and Joker jumped to his feet, drawing a gun and stepping to the doorway. A man wearing a wrinkled shirt over jeans with a disheveled mop of blonde hair shuffled into the room and stopped short when he saw Joker. Joker frowned and put the gun away as a look of joy spread across the other man's face and he fidgeted with excitement.

"Jack, Jack!" The man cried and dove at Joker, wrapping his arms around Joker who shrank back, enduring the embrace and patting the other man on the back in a placating manner.

"Yeah, yeah, Melvin; what did we say about calling me that?" Joker said pulling free of the other man's embrace. The other man frowned and sunk in his stance and looked at Joker with a hurt expression.

"Joker, don't say Jack, say Joker," Melvin Reipan mused and looked at the other man, clearly desiring affection from the other man as he tried to hug him again. Joker caught his wrists and held them in his hands in front of Melvin.

"Very good, Melvin; remember you don't want to call me that, ever again," Joker nodded until Melvin nodded with him.

Sam sighed inwardly feeling bad for Melvin and his disappointment in his reunion with the only family he had. There had been a time when the two had been close, well, closer. Joker had at least still retained a semblance of interest in his autistic cousin's wellbeing; even if he did so solely to use him for his own purposes.

Joker sat at the bar of the closed restaurant and rubbed his forehead to ward off the headache he'd had since yesterday. Sam had given him some of his own medication before returning to his office to secure him a doctor who would play along and had enough sense to not cross him. He'd sent Melvin away a few times while he pretended to take a deep interest in his chart, writing on it with a pen.

He was trying to organize his thoughts on paper and having his cousin bother him with inane babbling was not conducive to his endeavor. He'd set Melvin up with Sam years ago to get him out of the crappy group home his folks had sent him off to. Jack had been living in Chicago and couldn't keep an eye out for Melvin there so he'd finagled it so Sam could do so in his stead.

He drew circles on the chart in his inability to focus. Things were strange and he wasn't sure what he was going to do. He'd made plans to get out of Arkham, and get himself here but didn't have anything past that laid out. He needed to regroup and find out who was still on his side. Then he needed to study the board and see what positions the other players were in. He would figure things out from there. He would start with whoever had tried to kill him.

He also had to decide what he was going to do about Harley.

Harley had tried so hard to save him, to fix him. He had no idea why she'd let him go but he was happy that she had.

So beautifully complicated, she was a mess and whole all at once.

He smiled as he clicked the pen closed and panned over the bottles on the shelves behind the bar. His eyes settled on a photograph he had personally flung across the room a few years back. Reprinted and nicely framed was a smiling blonde woman standing behind this very bar, an apron snug around her pregnant belly.

"What are you doing here?" He had asked after he'd stalked to the bar upon seeing her that night long ago.

"I can't just sit around the apartment for the rest of my life, Jack," Jeannie had replied, a frown marring her delicate features.

Sam had assured him that he would personally look after his wife while she worked there, and he had. The regulars loved Jeannie and she was always tipped well. He remembered how people had reacted when she had died, had been murdered. They had missed her, had felt awful that the poor woman had befallen such a terrible fate. Surely it was her husband's fault, if he'd been there…

Joker's hand was bleeding and shards of glass were stuck in his skin when Sam shouted him back to the here and now. He looked at the shattered frame on the bar and his blood smeared across the wood and the photograph. He looked at Sam blankly and then casually returned to his seat on the other side of the bar.

"Perhaps you should take something and lie down," Sam suggested with a slight tone of anger in his voice. "Melvin!"

Sam and Melvin escorted Joker upstairs to the small sleeping room Melvin occupied. Joker picked out the glass with a pair of tweezers and washed his hand before wrapping it with gauze. He then sat on the lumpy cot and he spied a photograph pinned to the wall of a small blonde girl with hazel eyes, smiling and holding an ice cream cone. He snatched it from the wall and peered at it closely and then regarded Sam with quiet anger when the man returned with a bottle of pills and a glass of water. Sam sighed heavily and handed them over to Joker.

"Yeah, the grandparents came to Gotham a month back looking for Jack," Sam said as Joker took the pills. "Someone went to Chicago asking questions about him and they got it in their heads that he was still here. That's Alice, she likes strawberry."

Joker handed the photograph to Sam and lay down, closing his eyes and trying to ignore the faces of his wife and daughter dancing in his mind. Melvin sat beside him, telling him all about his pet goldfish.

A/N: Melvin Reipan is from Legends of the Dark Knight.