The first thing Batman ran into after leaping through the doorway was a metal platform, one that ended with a railing. Off to his right was a metal staircase, easily six steps down to the ground. Eyes forward, he stared right at a giant tank, a catwalk circling around it at its lower third.

The room was large, though there was a distinct lack of windows. Either they were in the middle of the steel mill, or were somewhere beneath it. At this point, it didn't matter.

Unfortunately, there was no sign of the Joker. Knowing him, he was heading for an exit and the only one Batman saw was to his right, situated on a second level with a large staircase leading up to it. About halfway down, the staircase split into two separate stairwells, one going left, the other right. This was mostly due to a conveyor belt that emerged out from underneath the stairs and extended out onto the storeroom floor.

The lighting was dim, something the vigilante found strange. It was almost as if the lights had just been turned on, the generators slowly powering up until they were able to put out adequate voltage.

No, the Joker was somewhere in here. He had kept the lights off for a reason and only just now wanted them on. Slowly, Batman walked down the nearby staircase, his head turning from side to side as he searched for any sign of movement. Eyeing a corner of the room that looked much like a workshop, he began walking towards it, heading towards the conveyor belt. He didn't get fair as a soft sound caught his attention.

Body stiffening, Batman jerked his head to look to his right. There was a nearby wall with a red box hanging from it. Jagged pieces of glass lined what had been the face of the box, broken shards lying on the ground in front of it. There were a couple of thin wooden pieces sticking out from the back, an outline of an ax indicating what had been resting on the sticks. It seemed someone had wanted the emergency fire axe. Staring at it, he noticed a dangling piece of glass barely hanging onto the red box, gravity finally breaking it off and causing it to fall to the floor, making the same soft sound he had heard earlier.

Tearing his eyes away, he continued on his previous course, leaping on top of the conveyor belt once he reached it. He was about to drop off of it on the other side when he heard another sound, this time a sharp whistle.

Jerking his head, Batman found himself looking at the large tank, warily noting what looked like a skull appearing its surface. It was almost as if the contents on the tank were warning anyone and everyone that it was something bad. There were no distinct lines, so much as the image was fading into-rather than out of-existence.

However, what really got his attention was the Joker standing on top of the tank, moving his hands to cup around his mouth. "Whatcha doing down there, Batsy?" he called out in his manic manner. "C'mon up, the party's over here!"

The madman then vanished from sight as he backed away from the edge of the tank. Pulling out his grapple, Batman fired it at a catwalk that hung above the tank, hearing the claw clang from impact. Hitting the retraction button, he flew up into the air, releasing the line once he had enough momentum to soar until he landed right on top of the vat.

He froze the moment he touched down, his eyes widening in shock. Forming a circle on top of the tank were the members of the Justice League. Each hero stood as still as a statue, their bodies frozen in various poses. The closest one to him was Green Lantern, who was standing as straight as a rail, his ring hand extended out in front of his chest while balled into a fist, his other hand gripping his wrist.

Off to Lantern's right was Flash, who was in a running man's pose. His balance had to be perfect considering he was only standing on one foot and barely touching down with the toe of his other foot, leaning forward as he appeared to be charging, and wasn't so much as trembling from holding the stance. Next was Superman, he too standing much like John Stewart, except his hands were both fists and were pressed into his hips. His head was even tilted upward as if he were looking to the ceiling.

Slowly, Batman began to walk by them, looking at the others. Diana was next in the circle, one of her hands extended out like Lantern's; the exception was that instead of holding her wrist, her other hand dangled at her side, a toy spear in her grasp.

J'onn's pose seemed to lack the creativity of the others, his cape enveloping him, hiding his body from the world. Lastly, Hawkgirl's seemed the most precarious as she stood on one foot, her other was bent at the knee and elevated. Her wings were spread out as if she had been flying, one of her arms extended above her head and holding a toy mace.

However, despite all of their poses, each one had markings on them. They were more noticeable on the women than the men due to their costumes exposing more of their skin, but due to that, he was able to observe the redness of the symbols. Standing next to Hawkgirl, he studied the markings until he smelled a very familiar smell.

Blood.

The vigilante's face hardened. So this was what the Joker had used the blood for. Though the symbols held no real significance that he could make out, they were obvious there for decoration. Not only was the skin painted, but so were the clothes. A lot of people died just for this aesthetic idea.

"Now, now, Dork Knight, don't admire the Bird Goddess too much—Cheeks might get jealous."

Tearing his eyes away from his comrades, he found the Joker standing on the catwalk above his head. How he had gotten there so quickly, he didn't know, but it honestly didn't matter at this point. "What have you done?" he demanded.

"I'm so glad you asked," the clown jeered. "As you've probably realized, I've been experimenting with my Joker Venom. Ya see, I wasn't sure the original was going to pack the same bang as it did in Gotham, so I wanted to see what else I could do with it. What you see before you was a byproduct of one of my experiments—a paralytic agent that can stop the mightiest heroes in the world!"

That explained why the League members weren't moving. In fact, as his attention returned to the Leaguers, he could clearly spot their eyes staring at him. The sclera of their eyeballs were taking on a pinkish tint, if not becoming completely red due to irritation. They were completely unable to blink.

The dark-clad man could only imagine what went into such a concoction that could hold even the Flash at bay. However, that got his mind thinking and the thoughts he was receiving were not ones he liked. To have this effect, either a massive dose was given, or the potency was so great that permanent paralysis could be induced.

"Now I know what you're thinking: how much of that lovely potion did I give them?" the Joker said, interrupting his thoughts. "And I'll tell you! I gave them so much that they have literal minutes before they're frozen like Greek statues for the rest of their days—and probably right up until their bowels explode from pressure and their insides rot. Is this not my greatest masterpiece, or what?"

God damn it. No wonder the Joker had wanted to spend so much time with him. He had been wasting the time away until the effects of his toxin became permanent. And knowing the maniac like he did, there was no antidote to reverse the effects either. That meant he needed to come up with something fast with no time, or materials to make a proper cure.

So lost in his musings was he that he didn't notice the shadow growing at his feet. Fortunately, his body sensed approaching danger, which caused Batman to react instantly and leap to a side.

A moment later and the Joker landed a foot away from where he had been standing, the head of an axe colliding with the top of the vat and splitting it like a log. Well, to be honest, it just left a large crack on the surface, but it took a very powerful swing to cause that much damage.

"Oh honey!" the Joker called out as he hefted the axe up off the tank and held its shaft with both hands. "I have a question I'd like to axe you. Tell me what you think: if I let you have full custody of the mini-Bat, would you give me half of everything else—including your body?"

Without warning, the madman lunged at him, swinging the axe from right to left. Immediately, Batman backed away, avoiding the attack only to back up again from the back-swing. Over and over, the Joker swung at him, forcing the vigilante to continue retreating to avoid each strike.

However, it seemed the psychopath had very little patience with not actually hitting him. Tiring of the side sweeps, he then swung the axe high above his head and then brought it down. Again, Batman backed away, allowing the head of the axe to bash onto the top of the tank. This time, though, the dark-clad man bounced back, stepping on the shaft of the axe just below the head with his left foot, pinning it down.

Pulling back his right fist, he then threw it forward, slamming it right into the Joker's face and knocking him backwards. The pale man even lost his grip on the axe handle, leaving the weapon sticking out of the vat as he sailed through the air, landing on his back hard on the tank and skidding across it until he came to a stop.

With his right foot landing back on the tank, Batman made to charge at the Joker; however, he was once more reminded how quickly the man could recover from blows. Before he had taken two steps, the Joker suddenly flung his upper body up, bracing it with one hand behind him. The other one shot up and grabbed the flower on his suit jacket.

An instant later a spray of green acid flew from the flower, causing Batman's eyes to widen before he spun to a side, his body twisting as he followed the acid spray flying by him. Horror appeared on his face when he watch the fluid land on the vat, as well as covering a part of Diana's plastic spear. Even more alarming was that the stream had landed close to the dark-haired woman's hand.

Batman rushed towards the Amazon, skidding to a stop in front of her as he grabbed at the toy spear and pulled it out of her grasp. Tossing it away, it disappeared over the edge of the tank as it flew to the floor below. At the very least, that stopped the acid from eating its way up the spear and actually burning Diana's hand.

Turning around, the Dark Knight spotted the Joker back on his feet. He was over by the fallen axe, picking it up once more. Glancing to Diana and back, the vigilante knew this fight could quickly get out of control. If the Joker wanted to, he could start hacking at the paralyzed heroes instead of him, doing who knows how much damage. A legless Flash, Green Lantern without hands, Hawkgirl without her wings—there were too many terrible scenarios that could ruin any one of their lives.

He needed to take this fight elsewhere.

As the Joker raised the axe up, Batman pulled out another bat-shaped shuriken. As quickly as he could he began to tap his thumb on its body, entering a set of coordinates into the embedded computer. Finished, he then threw the shuriken at the green-haired man, the projectile spinning through the air towards its target.

For once, the Joker froze at the incoming weapon. However, the shuriken passed right by his head, strands of his hair waving from the passing wind. The Joker blinked his eyes rapidly, unsure of what had just transpired.

Then he sneered at the vigilante. "What was that?!" he spat out incredulously. "I know you're dressed like a flying rodent, but I didn't think you were actually blind like one! What, did your bat-sonar have a glitch? I mean, I was standing still! You couldn't have had an easier target!"

However, far behind the clown, the shuriken began to slow in its flight, seeming to hover in one place for a whole second. It then began flying back towards the two men until he collided with the back of the Joker's head, causing him to cry out as he stumbled forward.

Rushing towards him, Batman kept his hands at his sides until the last moment, when he shot them out to grab the axe at the handle just below the head. Yanking it to a side, he spun to a side and rammed his elbow into the Joker's chest, knocking him back and fortunately causing him to let go of the axe once more.

Jumping back a step, Batman made sure to put more distance between them as he raised his leg closest to his foe and lashed out with it, landing a sidekick to the Joker's abdomen and sending him stumbling as he tried to recover his balance and breath at the same time. In the meantime, the dark-clad man twisted his upper body to his right, holding the axe as far as he could with both of his hands on it. Jerking to his left, he hurled the axe into the air, sending it sailing over the edge of the tank and watched it fall to the floor below.

With the weapon out of action, the Dark Knight turned himself to face his opponent once more. However, he caught the man pulling something out from beneath his suit jacket. Before he had time to wonder just what was going on, the Joker threw the object at him.

Instinctively, Batman shot his hands up and caught it, feeling the odd, rubbery softness of it. He only had a second to realize he was holding a whoopie cushion, right before his squeezing hands caused it to expel the air within it, a loud farting noise being made. Unfortunately, a green gas was blasted out with the air, hitting him right in the face. Immediately he dropped the whoopie cushion, coughing roughly as he began to stumble. He felt a tickling sensation begin to grow within his chest and abdomen, growing stronger with every cough he made. Even had he not felt that strange feeling, the scent of the gas alone told the vigilante just want he had been exposed to.

Joker Venom.

His body began to tremble as a chuckle worked its way up his throat and out of his mouth. The chuckle grew stronger until he was actually laughing heartily. Losing his balance, Batman dropped to one knee as he wrapped his arms around his quivering belly.

"That's it," the Joker's voice cooed from somewhere behind him. "Laugh. Give in to the laughter. Embrace it and become what I've always known you could become."

A harsh burst of laughter flew out of Batman's mouth as he leaned forward, trying to brace himself over the involuntary laughs. Faintly, he felt the Joker's presence behind him. "Oh, that's so great," he said with joy. "I've never heard you laugh, Batsy. It's like music to my ears."

And then, Batman stopped his laughing. Gone was the urge as it was crushed within his body. Balling his right hand into a fist, he flung it up, the back of his hand slamming into a face right by his right shoulder.

There was a surprised cry and a moment later Batman stood up on his feet and slowly turned around. The Joker stood a short distance away, his hands clutching his nose as his face was twisted with pain. "I think you almost broke my nose!" he screamed with rage before his sunken eyes focused right on the Dark Knight. "Why did you stop laughing?!"

"Because I wanted to," was Batman's reply. "I figured you'd use your Joker Venom at some point, so I inoculated myself with the antidote before I came."

Hate glowed from the Joker's eyes as he glared daggers at him. "How dare you play with my feelings. All I wanted to do was make you great again and this is how you repay me?"

A smirk appeared on the dark-clad man's face. "I thought you wanted a divorce."

He had expected to see anger, if not more loathing from the clown. However, that all changed when a smile appeared on his face. "Touche, Batsy. But unfortunately for you, you're out of time. In case, you've forgotten, your Boy Scout Troop are now my merit badges. My paralytic should have taken full effect and they're stuck as oversized Barbie and Ken dolls."

Slowly, the Joker began to edge his way to the edge of the tank, where the top of a ladder was bolted. "So, it doesn't matter anymore whether you see things my way, or not—you have no choice now! Well, actually, I know you're going to try and free these suckers anyways, so you better get to work. Who knows, maybe you have two more seconds before you have to have a mass recruitment drive."

Batman clinched his hands into tight fists, yet remained rooted where he stood. This entire time, the Joker had been delaying him, trying to buy time for his toxin to do enough damage that there would be no way to reverse the effects. And with no actual antidote, there wasn't much he could do to save the rest of the League.

Think, damn you, think!

He needed something to buy himself some time. Much like using a sedative so that the Joker Venom didn't kill its infected, he needed something similar to either weaken the poison, or outright null its effects. Considering the toxin was purposefully inducing tetanus, it was possible that if he used something to reverse those effects, that would be enough to overwhelm the paralysis.

Fortunately, he could think of one thing that had to potential to do such a thing; unfortunately, he only had a limited supply—read: one—of such a countermeasure. That meant he had to use it on the right person.

Reaching to his belt, Batman pulled out a syringe, his thumb depressing one of its ends. At the opposite end, a long, sharp needle shot out, it's point gleaming in the light. Sparing a glance to the Joker, he caught sight of the clown climbing down the ladder and disappearing from sight. At least there wouldn't be any more delaying tactics.

Immediately, Batman stormed over to Flash. Kneeling down, he held the syringe in front of the man's chest, the needle hovering over his heart. "Listen carefully, Flash, we're out of time as it is," he hissed into the speedster's ear. "I'm about to give you a dose of epinephrine. This should allow you to burn through the toxin the Joker gave you and let you move."

Without further warning, Batman plunged the needle into Flash's chest, depressing the other end of the syringe again and injected the epinephrine. The results were instantaneous.

With a loud gasp, Flash collapsed on top of the vat, or would have had Batman not caught him. Pulling the Epipen out, he dropped it to the ground as he slowly laid Flash down. Over and over, the red-clad man panted, fighting to catch his breath.

Unfortunately, Batman couldn't let him have it. "Flash, you're the only one fast enough to get your hands on six Epipens. I don't care where, or how you get them, but you need to get them injected into the others five seconds ago. Get on your feet and go—now."

"Yeah...yeah, I'm going," Flash gasped out. At first it seemed the speedster wasn't even going to move, content on catching his breath. However, before Batman could issue a reprimand, the red-clad man disappeared in a red blur, wind blowing his cape wildly to a side.

Despite the man's known immaturity, Batman knew that if there was anyone that could pull off this stunt, it was going to be him. Standing back up, the vigilante moved to the edge of the tank, catching sight of the Joker finishing his climb up the staircase and heading right for the exit.

Eyes narrowing, the Dark Knight knew what he had to do.


This wasn't how it was supposed to go.

Everything had been going along so well too. The Justice Dorks had been falling into his hands, Batsy seemed like he was seeing the light. They were in the fourth quarter, runners on third and first, and all that ingrate had to do was hit the damn free throw!

Running down the hall, the Joker flew passed doors and turns, not even bothering to slow down until he had to make a sharp right. Skidding across the floor, he forced himself into the new corridor, one that was short and came to an abrupt dead end. Which was okay—he had his reasons for wanting this place.

Rushing towards the wall, the green-haired man hit a lonely button on the wall and immediately the cement divided right down the middle, the two parts sliding in either direction. A steel cage appeared in sight, the Joker grabbing the front gate and shoving it to a side roughly. Stepping into the elevator, he closed the gate behind him and jab one of the buttons on the floor panel.

The elevator began to rise, the depressed clown leaning against the back of the elevator as he hung his head. They had been so close to a happy ending, you could practically taste the rainbows and unicorns. They were magically delicious in case you were wondering.

But then Bats had to call in that little brat, who dared to wear the iconic bat on her flat chest—at least he was assuming she was flat; you really couldn't tell because of the armor. And then he had the audacity to try and save—save—those hapless losers. A clown could cry from all of the injustice.

How did everything go so wrong, so fast? He didn't understand! He had made a plan; it had worked without a hitch; it should have been a success! Yet, it was crumbling all around him. Why? Why, why, why?!

He sighed then. Oh well, back to the drawing board.

If there was anything to take out of this, he had been so, soooo close. All he needed to do was fine tune a couple details here and there and badda bing, he'd be back in business. The Joker raised his head up, a smile appearing on his pale face. Next time, he chanted in his head, there will always be a next time.

Coincidentally, the elevator came to a jarring halt. Grabbing the gate, the clown pulled it to a side just as the wall in front of him shifted to a side. Once he was able to, the Joker entered a garage, where a couple vans were parked. At a quick pace, he hurried to the closest one, jumping into the driver's seat and lovingly caressed the set of keys that were in the ignition. He loved it when someone was kind enough to leave keys in a parked car. You never knew when you needed to escape in a hurry.

Now that he thought about it, hadn't he himself left the keys there? My, he was very thoughtful.

Revving the engine to life, he shifted the gearshift into drive. Before he could punch the accelerator though, something bounced off the hood of the van. Because he had been looking at the gearshift, the Joker missed what it was, jerking his head up way too late to see whatever it was. All he knew was that the truck was softly rocking from side to side.

Hmm, this seemed like the opening to a bad horror movie.

Well, unlike the mindless twits in those movies, the Joker knew just what to do. Pressing hard on the accelerator, the van lurched forward. He didn't even attempt to open up the garage door, opting to ram the front of the van through it. The flimsy metal door shattered apart, jagged edges scraping against the side of the van as it plowed through the newly-made hole. A dark, dank room was soon replaced with the great outdoors, not to mention a lovely gate up ahead. Bumper, don't fail me now!

Unfortunately, that's when things took a decidedly sideways turn. At that moment in time, the sound of loud POP!s rang out, followed swiftly by the van turning to a side. The Joker tried to correct it by spinning the wheel the other way, but found his truck going too far in the other direction, which caused him to turn back the other way.

Huh, I do believe I have a couple flat tires.

That was the first thought to cross the Joker's mind. The second was the van spinning out of his control, causing him to yell in surprise. "WHHHHOOOOAAAAA!" Due to momentum though, he was also skidding across asphalt with no idea what was going to happen.

The world spun around him, making the clown want to hurl. Oh Lord, make it stop! Too much spinning! Too much spinning!

Thankfully, the spinning did stop. Not so thankfully, it was because the back of the van slammed into the gate and stopped all movement from it. Not that he was complaining mind you, but when you had a getaway car, you really didn't want it stopping just before you got out of the driveway.

However, that gave the Joker a good luck back at the garage, and wouldn't you know it, that little girl in Daddy's hand-me-down Bat-gear was standing in the hole of the busted garage door. Two and two made four at that moment and the Joker realized just who was responsible for his flat tires.

"Why that little, insufferable, pint-sized Bat-bitch! You owe me new tires!"

The Joker even shook his fist at the little girl, so that there was no way she could mistaken his outrage. He would've gotten out of the van and showed her what his favorite handgun liked to do too, when something large and black landed on the hood, blocking out the sight of the girl-Bat.

The Joker only had a short moment in which to notice the Bat Symbol on the black thing's chest and mutter, "Uh oh," right before a fist punched through the windshield and grabbed him by his shirt. He was helpless as he was dragged over the steering wheel and through the broken glass window, causing it to shatter completely.

The next thing the green-haired man noticed, was that he was being held by Batsy. "OW!" he shouted at the lout. "Do you have any idea how much that hurts?!"

"Not as much as this," Batman growled back, right before he leaned his head back and swung it forward.

The stars the Joker saw following the headbutt didn't quite make up for all the pain he felt in his face. The ooey-gooey blackness to come with unconsciousness though, that was something special.


To Manchester 789: A small moment here, perhaps. At least he cares.