Bruce Wayne awoke to feel his body in pain. That was odd, he thought, as his mind returned slowly to wakefulness. The Joker hadn't got many punches through last night that he could remember, certainly nothing to bother Batman's armor, anyway. But his body ached as if he had been beaten to within an inch of his life. He stirred, trying to flex his muscles, and that's when a familiar voice said, "Good morning, puddin'."
He froze. "Harley?" he said, his eyes snapping open to see Harley Quinn naked in bed next to him, cuddled close and holding a whoopie cushion.
"Thought you might be in the mood for some playtime, puddin'," she purred.
"Harley…" Bruce gasped, stunned, his mind racing for some kind of explanation. He would never have slept with Harley Quinn voluntarily, and she would never have slept with him – neither of them were that crazy. Harley was obsessively in love with the Joker. The idea that she would ever willingly sleep with someone else was utterly ridiculous. And the idea that he would sleep with his nemesis's girlfriend was also ridiculous. So what the hell was going on?
"Aw, c'mon, puddin', don't look so surprised," murmured Harley, kissing him. "You know your Harley's been eager for a nice, hard revving for weeks now. And I love you playing hard to get sometimes, but the joke's a little old now, huh? How about we just go for a ride?" she whispered, climbing on top of him and pinning him down.
Bruce reacted instantly, slamming his fist upward and hitting her in the face. "Oh…puddin'!" she gasped, her eyes shining. "You wanna play rough, huh, baby? So do I," she whispered, punching him across the face in return.
"Harley, stop it!" shouted Bruce. "I'm not having sex with you! Why would you even want sex with me?!"
"I always want sex with you, puddin'," she purred. "Always. Because you're just the sexiest, hottest, most gorgeous guy in the whole universe! Every gal in the world is jealous that they don't have a boyfriend as sexy as my puddin'! Now, c'mon, baby, I got the whoopie cushion. Why doesn't Daddy punish his bad girl?"
Bruce didn't see anything for it as she simply wouldn't get off him – he punched her hard again, and Harley groaned. "Oooh, that's it, Mr. J!" she gasped. "So good! Hit me harder!"
"Mr. J?" repeated Bruce, stunned. "Harley, I'm not Mr…"
But he suddenly noticed his hands as he struggled to fend her off, and saw that they were bone white. And then the horrible realization struck him.
"Oh my God," he whispered.
"See, puddin', I knew you'd enjoy it…" began Harley, but she shrieked as Bruce suddenly shot up, wrapping his arm around her neck and flipping her off the bed, slamming her down on the ground and restraining her arms behind her back.
"Jesus, puddin', you ain't usually this efficiently violent!" snapped Harley. "That was like a Bat move…"
Bruce ignored her, tying her arms behind her back with the bedsheet. Then he headed into the bathroom to stare at his reflection in the mirror and confirm his worst fears.
"Oh my God!" he cried. "How could this have happened?!"
"What, Mr. J?" asked Harley from the floor in the neighboring room. "What is it?"
"Harley, I'm not the Joker!" cried Bruce.
"Sure you are, puddin'," she said. "Who else would you be?"
"I'm…I'm Bruce Wayne," he stammered, turning to face her.
Harley stared at him. "Puddin', I didn't hit you that hard…" she began.
"No, look, Harley, I don't understand it either!" snapped Bruce. "But I just woke up and suddenly I'm in the Joker's body! I don't know why or how or what the hell is going on, but you have to believe me!"
"Puddin'…if this is a joke, it isn't funny," said Harley, slowly.
"It's not a joke, Harley," retorted Bruce.
Harley studied him carefully. "Where was our first kiss?" she asked.
"I don't know," retorted Bruce. "I told you, I'm not the Joker!"
"What's our safety word? Where did we have sex for the first time? What's our favorite sex toy? What do I want our kiddies' names to be?!" she asked, desperately.
"I don't know!" repeated Bruce, angrily. "And God, please don't ever tell me! And reconsider having children, for the sake of humanity!"
"Oh God, you've got amnesia…and you think you're Bruce Wayne!" cried Harley. "Oh, puddin', I dunno how this happened, but whatever's wrong your Harley girl will help fix you…"
"I've told you what's wrong!" snapped Bruce. "And unless you have some idea how this might have happened, I doubt there's anything you can do! I gotta get home," he said, storming toward the door.
"This is your home, puddin'!" exclaimed Harley. "And if you go out there in broad daylight, you're gonna get arrested for sure! Who knows, the Bat could break his nocturnal habits and be out there too!"
Bruce paused as a tremor of horror shot through his body. "Wait…if I'm in the Joker's body…that must mean…that he's in mine," he gasped. And that meant that the Joker could easily find out all about Batman, including his secret identity as Bruce Wayne.
But he couldn't very well just stride up to Wayne Manor in broad daylight looking like this – Harley was right. He'd get arrested without question. And neither Alfred nor Dick would probably believe him if the Joker showed up claiming to be Bruce Wayne trapped in his body. They would probably think it was some sort of sick joke. But Bruce wasn't laughing.
He sat down slowly on the bed. "I need to think," he muttered. "I need to think…there's gotta be someway outta this mess."
"Well, can you untie me while you do that?" asked Harley. "I don't mind being tied up usually, puddin', but you clearly ain't in the mood so I dunno what the point of me being tied up is."
"It's so you don't jump me," retorted Bruce.
"I won't," she said. "Cross my heart and hope to die."
He nodded and untied her. "Now go get dressed," he said. "Believe me, seeing you naked is an image I'll try to block from my mind forever."
"Why's that?" she demanded. "I'm an attractive gal! And you've seen it a lotta times before, Mr. J…"
"I'm not Mr. J!" shouted Bruce. "For the last time! I'm Bruce Wayne!"
"Ok, whatever makes you happy, puddin'," sighed Harley, heading over to her closet to get dressed. "Gee, I dunno if it's a joke I'm not getting, or an act to get outta sex, or if you really are sick somehow."
Bruce tried to ignore her, racking his brain to think of some way out of this. There was always a way out, but he didn't have any facts to work with. He didn't even know how this had happened. And he couldn't seek help or information from any of his usual sources as the Joker. He would have to adapt, and use the resources the Joker had at his disposal to get himself out of this mess.
"Who are the smartest people we know?" he asked Harley.
"Smartest?" she repeated. "Well, you, puddin', naturally."
"Aside from me," snapped Bruce.
She shrugged. "I guess that would be Johnny Crane or Jervis Tetch. Eddie Nygma thinks he's up there too, but he ain't really. Making up riddles ain't a sign of intelligence – it's a sign of OCD."
"We should go see them," said Bruce. "Right now."
"O…K," said Harley, slowly. "But maybe we should call first, huh? It's kinda rude to stop by unannounced…"
"Harley, this is an emergency," snapped Bruce. "Just take us to them immediately."
Harley shook her head. "Boy, you are in a mood this morning, ain't ya, Mr. J?" she sighed. "All bossy and cranky. Y'know, if we'd had sex, you'd probably be in a better mood."
"I definitely wouldn't," retorted Bruce. "So why don't you just drop it, Harley? Are you always this obsessed? Dumb question, I know, but he must be crazier than I thought to put up with it."
"Actually, he'd enjoy it if he'd just stop pretending he's Bruce Wayne," snapped Harley. "This is the worst thing you've ever done to get outta it, puddin', and I include that time you started a fire in the kitchen so the alarm would go off and nearly blew up the house! You could just honestly say you're not in the mood, and I'd wait until you were in the mood, as usual. But I don't know why you're making up this story about Bruce Wayne. You don't even like Bruce Wayne. You're always calling him a rich twit, and a waste of skin, and making plans to kill him, or kidnap him, or ransom him, and making jokes about how his parents were shot…"
"That's enough," snapped Bruce. "Let's just go see Crane and Tetch. And please try to be silent – it's really impossible to think when you're constantly talking."
Harley shook her head again. "You're some piece of work, you know that, Mr. J?" she demanded. "You can't even just tell me to shut my yammering mouth like you always do – you gotta pretend to be all polite because you're 'Bruce Wayne'," she said, making air quotations marks. "Just like you hit me earlier to subdue me, not to get me more in the mood. It ain't right, I tell ya! I hope you snap outta whatever this is soon, because I miss my regular Mr. J! He'd know how to refuse a girl properly, and how to insult her, and how to hit her! I'd like to see 'Bruce Wayne' do that!"
She stormed from the room and Bruce sighed, following her. He could only pray that this ordeal ended soon – he already knew much, much more about Joker and Harley than anyone could ever want to know.