Taking Back the Crown

by JCMorrigan

Mozenrath. Archibald Snatcher. Roman Torchwick. Mad Madam Mim. Yzma. The Huntsman. Wuya. Ayam Aghoul. Their mission: take over the multiverse, or look fabulous trying. Rated M for swearing, steamy implications and VERY bloody battles. Contains slash and het shipping.

33. Old Emperors, New Joker

A/N: Trigger warning for suicide.

33. Old Emperors, New Joker

If Mozenrath had remembered at all who Discord was, he might have blamed the architecture of his current location on that wily spirit. He figured himself to be in some sort of town, if only because he was surrounded by buildings and people. The buildings, however, barely seemed to qualify for that. Some of them looked to have been constructed entirely upside down, no window or door was in the right place, and no two adjacent walls were the same color. They were arranged in a jumble that sometimes allowed for something like a "street" to run between them and sometimes simply did not. As for the people, they were making a fashion statement that made Mozenrath cringe. They wore towels and curtains as dresses, barrels as shirts, paper as pants, buckets and boxes as hats. All of them carried odd items and wagons filled with knickknacks reminiscent of the "clothing" they donned, and all of them seemed to be in a hurry to get somewhere with these things, but none of them seemed to know exactly where that somewhere was.

And the only thing they all had in common was that all were human.

Mozenrath couldn't for the life of him remember how he had gotten to such a place. He remembered falling asleep in his apartment in the Ivory Tower, but not even waking up. He had simply arrived in the midst of the chaos.

Annoyed already, he began to storm into what he perceived to be the heart of the city, hoping to find a very good answer to the question of why he had been ripped from his new stronghold in apparently the dead of night to be dropped off in such a patchwork place.

"Greetings!" a voice called out from behind him. "I must say I'm surprised. I haven't seen one of your lot since…well, I don't know when. You're the only one of your kind here. You should be proud of it for so long as you can remember it."

Mozenrath whirled around to see who was talking. Perched upon a low fence was a small gray monkey. "My name is Argax," the monkey stated. "And yours, if I recall correctly, is Mozenrath."

"Great," Mozenrath groaned. "A talking monkey. Exactly what I needed right now. I've always hated monkeys." Though, come to think of it, he couldn't remember exactly why, or what it was about monkeys that grated upon him. The possibility that he had a half-brother who had carried a particularly vocal one around didn't even seem credible to him.

"You seem to be the sort of person who hated a lot of things," Argax replied. "Everything but power. What's really sad is that it seemed you had something else – someONE else – to care about, once. But your desire for power got in the way. If it didn't, you wouldn't be here. If you'd just been satisfied with living out your life with your friends as a commoner, or even a hero, you might have stood a chance, seeing as you didn't even have AURYN. But it looks like you just didn't need AURYN to get here, did you? You paid your entry fee all on your own."

"Stop talking NONSENSE!" Mozenrath yelled, reaching out to grasp the monkey around the neck with his right hand. Shaking Argax violently, he screamed, "WHAT AM I DOING HERE? WHERE IS THIS PLACE?"

Argax remained calm. "This place has no name," he explained, "but most just call it the City of Old Emperors. This is where humans go after they use up all their wishes and their memories of the world they came from while trying to become Emperor of Fantastica. Every human tries it at least once when they come here. And those who value ruling this world over returning to their own end up in this city, having wished all their memories away. They simply decided that nothing was more important to them than being Emperor, and they chose to forget their world and themselves."

Mozenrath flung Argax to the ground hard enough to kick up a cloud of dust. "That doesn't make any sense!" he snapped. "Why am I here? I don't come from any other world!"

"Yes, you do," Argax coughed, righting himself. "But you don't come from THEIR world. I know where you come from and what you truly are, and, as I've said, you're the first of your kind to come here. The rules probably had to be bent a bit for you. No AURYN necessary."

"Explain," Mozenrath growled, glaring down at Argax. He had the powerful urge to fling his right hand at the monkey, but he wasn't quite sure what effect that would have.

"Everyone else here is a human," Argax explicated. "Though in their current state, they're what I like to refer to as a Know-Nothing. They come from the human world. But you come from another Realm of Storytelling. There are infinite Realms of Storytelling, you know. Most just think of each other as other worlds, not knowing how separate they COULD be from each other and only focusing on how separate they ARE from each other. You come from another tale that was told by humans, much like the tales of Fantastica. The Realms do not often cross and generally stay quite separate. How did you ever come to – no, you won't be able to answer that. You've probably forgotten. But let me just say that if you were able to step outside the confines of your own Realm and enter another such as Fantastica…or even those of your other friends…you must have had great power indeed. Great power, great ambition, and a little luck backing you that you got the right story told."

"I don't believe you," Mozenrath growled.

"I didn't think you would," Argax admitted. "Any other questions?"

"How do I get back to the Ivory Tower?"

"You don't," Argax told him. "You get to stay here. This is where they all end up. Usually, they have to walk, or take a horse, but you just seemed to show up. That's what I meant about the rules bending for someone from a Realm of Storytelling."

"You said every Emperor forgets everything in order to be here."

"Humans use AURYN to wish their desires to reality here in Fantastica," Argax replied. "Those you see here realized they didn't want to leave, and used up their wishes to stay here instead of returning home. But every wish made equaled a memory lost. You didn't make wishes. As a character from a Realm, you didn't have to. All you had to do was want to make your claim here more than you wanted to go back to your Realm. You made yourself part of a story you weren't supposed to be part of, let alone such a big player as an Emperor. And that has no consequence in any Realm but this one. After all, this is where stories are born. All other Realms owe their existence to this one, so you'll understand if the laws of magic here are somewhat…protective of Fantastica. And all this could have been avoided, mind you, if you hadn't wanted to make this your ultimate claim. If you'd stuck to other thrones, you could have made your own story." Argax thought it over. "Since the rules were so different for you, maybe you won't end up succumbing to the same fate the humans did. But then again, you probably will."

"And what FATE am I succumbing to, exactly?"

"Losing your mind, of course," Argax informed him. "They wished away their memories. You just decided yours weren't as important as being the Emperor of the land that your own Realm owes its existence to. So you'll become like them. Do you see them all, collecting items for the sake of it? They don't know why they have them or what they want to do with them. They don't know where they're going. They'll wheel their barrows around town a few times, then discard them and find something else of interest. I find it all terribly amusing to watch. They all think they're doing something incredibly important, when really, they're doing nothing at all! But that's not even the best part! Come this way now, with me! Take a look!"

Argax sped off into the crowd. Mozenrath, deciding he was tired of this piecemeal city, opted not to follow, instead making a beeline for the outer wall of the city. He was getting back to the Ivory Tower one way or another, he decided, and nothing a monkey said was going to have any effect on him. His agenda was to return to his throne, have the traitors…

Have the traitors…

What traitors? Had there been traitors? Did something need to be done with someone?

And the thoughts trickled right out of Mozenrath's mind like water through a sieve until such time as he finally reached the earthen wall that surrounded the City of Old Emperors. He stared at it for a while, trying to remember where he was even going. Having no recollection of anything important outside the wall, he figured it was better to stick with what he knew, and turned back to walk into the depths of the city again.

In some time, he came across an open area where a crowd of people knelt on the ground, toying with a multitude of blocks spread out before them. The blocks had letters printed on them. The people pushed the blocks around, rolling them and arranging them into words that weren't really words at all. All the while, Argax's chipper voice cut through: "That's it, my children! You're all doing so well at the jumble game! Don't give up now!"

Mozenrath stormed toward the monkey. "All right," he sighed, "I'll bite. What's going on here?"

"Took you long enough," Argax huffed. "Tried to rebel, didn't you? But you forgot what you wanted on the way out. You're not so different from a human after all."

"Tell. Me. About. This."

"The jumble game is very simple," Argax explained. "They've forgotten how to talk, so they try to use the blocks to write things. But they've forgotten what words mean altogether, too, so they just end up writing – well, take a look for yourself!"

Mozenrath craned over one particular man who'd arranged a semblance of a paragraph out of the cubes: ALAHOI EUYAGIUUBNA WLIEUYIUAH OUHGAUHUH AQWZNA WPOEAMBH WOISASDKPOS AAUHHNXYZMAAAOIWJMZOIM. Something in the last word caught Mozenrath's eye for a moment, sparked some remembrance of meaning, but for the life of him, he couldn't figure out what it was. He paced around the perimeter of the area, observing people spelling out such nonsense as ZZHUOAGN and OOZBWIZN and AWIMCOMS, as well as one man who was persistently writing BIEKBIEKBIEKBIEKBIEKBIEK as though it were a profound statement that needed to be heard by the world.

"Idiots," he huffed.

"That's what they all say at first," Argax interjected. He then called out over the field: "Don't listen to him, children! You're doing so WONDERFULLY!"

"Why are you encouraging them to act like idiots?" Mozenrath asked, turning his attention back to the monkey.

"You can't tell me you don't find this amusing," Argax prompted. "I'm guessing you had your own set of minions you used to like making bumble around. Perhaps something undead and expendable?"
"Whatever minions I had like that would have been actually humorous," Mozenrath retorted. "Yours are just boring. And I see you don't reap any of the side benefits." He shook his head. "I'm leaving."

"Again? So soon?" Argax grinned widely. "But where are you going?"

"To…" Mozenrath paused. Then, in frustration, he screamed, "I'LL FIGURE IT OUT WHEN I GET THERE!" He took off running.

And yet again, when he reached the wall, he found himself with no idea of what was beyond it, what was desirable. He'd forgotten why he was even fleeing in the first place.

He wound through the spaces between the oddly cobbled buildings, looking around at everything worth taking in.

"I knew you'd be back," Argax taunted from a windowsill.

Mozenrath turned to regard the monkey with confusion. "And you would be…?"

"So it didn't spare you after all," Argax said with a growing grin.

"What exactly didn't 'spare' me?"
"Have you heard the term 'Realms of Storytelling' anytime within the last few hours?"
"No. Stop…STOP MAKING ME LOOK LIKE AN IDIOT!"

Argax simply flipped into the window and out of sight.

"Good riddance," Mozenrath muttered under his breath. He had to figure out what he was doing. He had to find something to do.

Someone had abandoned a wheelbarrow piled high with crystals. Mozenrath found the look of the shiny objects pleasing and took ahold of the wheelbarrow's handles, deciding to take advantage of the unattended objects and bring them back to his abode. Realizing he didn't even know where he lived, he resolved to stake out a home somewhere within the city.

He wondered briefly why only one of his hands was covered by a gauntlet. But the covered hand wasn't warm or uncomfortable, so he didn't bother peeling the garment off. Within a few minutes, it didn't even occur to him that gauntlets usually came in pairs.

...

Ragdoll had been prepared for the second verse of the same song the next night his branch of the WHAM ARMY (or perhaps "GRAMPA") was out and about in Gotham. They'd had to switch bases to an abandoned warehouse that was on the small side, and the sum of their valuables had to be built up from scratch. The bus had gone down in flames with the museum, but that didn't mean the six couldn't still split up to commit their respective crimes, then reunite later.

At the moment, Ragdoll was committing a rather daring crime. Gotham's premier fashion house was putting on a show downtown, with supermodels strutting their stuff along the runway wearing outfits that ranged from tastefully quirky to downright ridiculous. The gowns were worth a fortune each, and that was the reason Ragdoll had cited for picking out this particular venue to loot, but he had an ulterior motive. After all, thin as these models were, Ragdoll was of proportions comparable enough to comfortably fit any of their ensembles, and he did so wish to settle whether miniskirts or long, flowing trains suited him better.

So, while the models gathered backstage and their makeup artists flitted back and forth, Ragdoll silently slipped from shadow to shadow, making his way toward a clothing rack that held a plethora of desirable pieces. Ferrying them out through the ventilation system one by one would be difficult but not impossible. And "difficult but not impossible" was Ragdoll's favorite mode of operation.

He lay a hand on an enticingly green and fluffy gown.

The wall broke open, and a veritable army of human-sized plushies with bulbous heads and sharp metal claws marched into the backstage area. The models and makeup artists were sent into a tizzy, screaming and running about for the sake of their safety.

"Well, there's something you don't see every day," Ragdoll remarked.

Cosmo Krank, perched aboard his levitating board known as the Cosmo Flier, zipped into the room, taking a look around. "Looks like we're playing a game of diddly-doodle dress-up!" he laughed. "Now, normally I'm not into the whole doll craze, but these wardrobes will fetch me millions!"

His eye then landed on the clothing rack that was seemingly moving of its own accord toward the wings. He zoomed down toward it, planting himself in the rack's path. "Now, don't tell me you don't want to play with my Zoom Pets!" Cosmo laughed, indicating the plushies. "They now come with extra-murderous action!"

Ragdoll peered sheepishly out from the clothing on the rack; he had been hoping the chaos would allow him a getaway. "You know, the more newfangled these toys get, the more they make me nostalgic for when a teddy bear was just a teddy bear," he said rather sheepishly.

"Wait a minute!" Krank let out a chortle. "RAGDOLL? You're Ragdoll, right? Were you trying to steal these for YOURSELF?"

"I don't quite see the conflict here," Ragdoll pointed out. "You always seemed like more of the revenge-driven sort of villain. When did you turn to petty thievery?"

"When my new boss gave me a Get Out of Arkham Free card," Krank replied. "And since the new Joker in town wound my career back up, I figured why not play his game? Though, like I said, I'm really not into playing with dolls." He produced a remote control from his pocket, pressing a sequence of buttons. The Zoom Pets advanced upon Ragdoll.

"After this," Ragdoll told him with a grin, "you're going to absolutely HATE it."

The Zoom Pets converged, several of them slashing out at Ragdoll at the same time. Ragdoll reached backward, gripping one of them by the head, then flipped himself up on top of the pet, catapulting himself backward out of the line of fire. The Zoom Pets all turned to give chase, only for Ragdoll to catch hold of an empty wheeled clothing rack and give it a shove into the crowd, knocking several of the Zoom Pets over; their overlarge heads made it difficult for them to stand back up.

"So you want to have some flim-flammery fun, do you?" Krank laughed, soaring high. He directed the Zoom Pets to follow Ragdoll, slashing out with their multitude of claws. Ragdoll bent and twisted around the strikes, giving the Pets a string of near-misses and becoming more and more giddy each time he evaded certain doom. He rolled into a handstand; his legs wrapped around the head of another Pet and he used the captured plush as a bludgeon to knock down several others. Letting go, he flipped back into a standing position. By now, the remaining Pets had gotten awfully close, and Ragdoll adopted a look of concern, standing frozen in place.

"Awwww, I hate it when toys break this easily!" Krank crowed, forming the Pets in a circle and making them charge.

At the very last moment, Ragdoll hit the floor, and the Pets tore into each other with their claws. Ragdoll rolled through a cloud of wiring and fluff shrapnel in order to grab onto the loaded clothing rack, attempting to run it out the hole in the wall Krank had created.

"NOT SO FAST!" Krank taunted; the impromptu exit was suddenly filled with tiny toys, barely higher than an ankle, known colloquially as "Krank Bots." A myriad of missiles clicked into place on the Bots' backs.

"Oh dear," Ragdoll muttered before every single missile deployed, seeking heat. He flipped, ducked, and rolled, forced to let go of his prized dresses. His nimbleness paid off; each missile struck empty wall or ground, exploding harmlessly.

Krank hammered the buttons on the remote, but the Bots had run out of ammo. "Let me guess," Ragdoll teased, making his way back toward the rack of dresses. "Refills sold separately?" He laughed as he steered the rack right through the bots, upending several of them on his way out to the open road. "TOODLES!"

As Ragdoll bolted down the street with his prizes, he mulled over what Krank had said in his head. What could Krank possibly have meant about there being a new Joker? And if someone had hired Krank to his side, who else did they have at their disposal?

Ragdoll was made very aware of the sound of a revving engine behind him. It belonged to no car. He twisted his head about to see a giant yellow spinning top barreling down the street behind him, closing the distance, with Krank perched atop it, cackling madly. "TAG!" Krank yelled. "YOU'RE GONNA BE IT!" A pair of mechanical arms emerged from the top, reaching out.

Ragdoll knew he couldn't outrun the eccentric vehicle. His head snapped back forward as he sought a means of escape. It came in the form of a sewer grate. He wouldn't be able to take the whole rack of dresses down – he'd have to surrender his score to Krank – but he could take at least one and get away safely.

Swiping a sultry number with a slit up one side of the skirt off the rack, Ragdoll let go of the rest, somersaulting toward the grate and prying it up before disappearing down it with the dress wrapped around one arm.

Dropping into the sewers and hoping he wouldn't run into Killer Croc – for all Ragdoll knew, Croc was working for this "new Joker" too – Ragdoll began to map out the city in his mind, taking the subterranean route back to the warehouse. Hopefully, Krank would be happy with the high-priced outfits Ragdoll had left behind, and it would definitely take him a while to figure out his own way into the sewers, by which time Ragdoll's trail would be long cold.

Hopefully, Ragdoll thought, the others would have better success than he had on their respective missions. And he did, after all, have one dress to show for his night's work.

...

A section of the wall of a car dealership show floor fell away with smoking edges, and Firefly walked in to take a look at the pickings. With the last vehicle out of commission, Firefly had volunteered to pick a new one. It wasn't that he didn't find Ragdoll's propensity for odd vehicles endearing; he would just rather drive something sportier than a tractor.

Knowing full well his priority was to find something classy that would seat six, Firefly, already knowing that "classy" and "seats six" were irreconcilable terms, decided to take a little detour, popping open the door of a bright red convertible. He then realized his gas tank, which also functioned as his propulsion system for flight, would get in the way of him being able to sit properly, so he momentarily detached it, letting it thud down into the back seat. As Firefly slid into the front seat, running his hands over the wheel, he muttered to himself, "Niiiiiiiice. Huh. Y'know, maybe I could make this work. One car for me and Peter, one car for the other guys. Why stop at one sports car when you can have two? Yeah, that settles it. Definitely taking this one and coming back for another." He reached beneath the dashboard, lamenting that no one was around to hear him say "You've heard of HOTwiring…"

As Firefly muttered to himself, he failed to notice a car on the far end of the show floor morphing from a white sports car to a bright, gleaming yellow racer and slowly turning toward the red convertible. He did, however, hear the loud revving of the engine as the yellow car careened toward the red.

"WHAT?" Firefly yelled as his reflexes kicked in; he struggled out of the front seat and leapt over the dash, springing off the hood, to hit the ground and roll as the vehicle Nathan "Gearhead" Finch had commandeered collided with the convertible, pinning the front end against the far wall of the show floor.

The side window of the yellow car rolled down. "I thought you were supposed to be the fast one," Gearhead taunted. "I didn't think you'd be that easy to make roadkill out of."

"In case you missed it, I WASN'T," Firefly insisted, pointing both wrists at Gearhead's car. "You, on the other hand, are going to roast like a marshmallow." He clicked both triggers, with no result. It then hit him as hard as Gearhead's car nearly had; his tank was still in the back seat of the convertible. Luckily, only the front of the convertible had been mangled, but there was still a very dangerous obstacle standing in between Firefly and his primary weapon, and that obstacle was turning the car around to aim it at Firefly himself.

"…Oh, crud."

Firefly waited until the last moment to leap out of the way of the car, going around the driver's side and latching onto the open window so he could throw his free fist in and deal a solid punch to Gearhead's face. The momentary diversion caused Gearhead to swerve; the yellow car smashed into a cinderblock pillar and the engine began to smoke.

"Not so tough without your ride, are ya?" Firefly laughed as he let go of the car, rushing for the convertible.

Gearhead made a hasty exit of the car, bringing into hand several long tubes. "At least I have a backup plan!" he yelled, throwing half of them one by one at a lineup of motorcycles against the wall. "That's more than you can say right now!" The other half went toward a line of ATVs on the opposite wall. As each tube connected, the vehicle it attached to was struck through with nanotechnology that glowed orange on the sides of the metal. The motorcycles and ATVs all turned upon one target.

Firefly hopped into the back seat of the convertible, picking up his tank to reattach it. He became aware of the legion of motorcycles and ATVs headed his way. "Come on, come ON!" he muttered before settling the tank into place and blasting off. The motorcycles and ATVs collided with the convertible in a great twist of scrap metal.

Firefly, playing a hunch, glanced down at the wreckage. The floor was rapidly becoming damp with leaked gasoline. "Well, would you look at that?" Firefly announced. "You don't have a car…and I have my firepower back. Looks like you're goin' out with a bang."

Gearhead just gritted his teeth, making a run for a motorcycle that wasn't yet demolished.

Firefly zipped backward out through the hole in the wall he'd made as an entry point, aiming both wrists at the shrapnel and gasoline surrounding what had once been a red convertible. He let twin blasts fly. As he zoomed to safety, the entire dealership went up in a great explosion.

Firefly laughed to himself just as Gearhead, seated aboard a blazing yellow motorcycle, came zipping out of the smoke, riding the shockwave, staying just an inch away from the flames. "NICE JOB BLOWING UP THE PRIZE, LIGHTNING BUTT!" Gearhead yelled, his smile a mile wide. "I HAVE THE LAST BIKE! AND I'M NOT PUTTING IT TO WASTE!"

He readied another tube in one hand, tossing it expertly. It stuck on Firefly's tank, jolting it through with nanotechnology. Firefly's entire propulsion mechanism suddenly went wild, jolting him back and forth.

"Heh," Gearhead chuckled as he rode past. "Speeding ticket."

"YooooouuuuUUUUUUUUUU – " Firefly growled as he was thrown far off course, careening off to the side and down a back alley. Finding himself heading for a wall at full tilt, he frantically detached the tank, landing roughly on the ground as the tank propelled itself into solid brick, exploding upon impact.

"Ugh," Firefly groaned as he looked up at the damage. Hopefully Mim would be able to fix him a new tank; it seemed within her realm of expertise. "THAT guy just made my LIST," he muttered as he got up and dusted himself off.

...

Archibald Snatcher's duty of the night was pure reconnaissance. He stalked the alleys and strode the streets, looking out for potential venues for robbery. Shops whose lights were too bright, whose window merchandise was too tempting. He began to miss the steam-powered wagon he'd used in the past to proclaim curfew in Cheesebridge; he could certainly make an impression from that. As it were, he had to make his rounds on foot, which was certainly a lot more inconspicuous. As he passed people who didn't even look him in the eye, he wondered if anyone at all suspected he was a high-ranking member of what he believed to be Gotham's most prolific crime ring.

He had no idea about how wrong he was about to be proven on that front when he entered one alley in particular to find himself staring down three people: two hulking gangsters and one small, meek-looking man donning a wooden ventriloquist's dummy on one hand.

"That's one of the guys!" the Ventriloquist said through Scarface. "The new Joker mentioned him! Tall, ugly, and wearin' a red hat!"

"Mr. Scarface!" the Ventriloquist chided, his voice shaking. "That was rude!"

"RUDE?" the dummy – no, Snatcher had to remind himself, the Ventriloquist using the dummy as a mouthpiece – snapped. "I'll show you a thing or two about rude! How about I take one of those four eyes of yours outta commission? You think that's RUDE?"

"Yes, sir," the Ventriloquist replied. "I mean, uh, no, sir!"

"Well," Snatcher remarked. "It seems I've interrupted something I'd rather not know the context of. Though I am rather interested as to who gave you my description." The words "new Joker" weren't lost on him.

"Don't think you're just gonna walk away from this!" Scarface threatened. "The new Joker wants the WHAM ARMY taken outta play! And that includes you, fatso! Rhino! Mugsy! Take this guy to the cleaners!"

The thickset thugs flanking the Ventriloquist moved forward. Snatcher unchained his weapon from his waist, prepared for a fight. Rhino was the first to throw a punch; Snatcher did a small pirouette out of the way before slamming the hammer of his weapon up against Rhino's temple. Snatcher was then able to sidestep behind Mugsy as the latter drew a knife; the chain of Snatcher's weapon ended up wrapped around Mugsy's throat. Snatcher only abandoned his attempts to strangle Mugsy once Rhino charged him with another knife. A burst of lightning marred Rhino's dominant hand, causing the knife to be dropped to the ground. Mugsy spun around to find the barrel of the Dust-powered gun aimed directly at his face; he shrugged it off and charged before Rhino pulled him out of the way just in time to avoid being blasted point-blank.

The shot, instead, collided with Scarface. One of the dummy's wooden arms was severed, hitting the ground. The Ventriloquist gasped in horror.

"Don't just stand there, dummy!" Scarface growled. "MAKE HIM PAY FOR THAT!"

"YES, SIR!" The Ventriloquist lunged forward, dodging another lightning blast and the hammer. While Wesker wasn't all that impressive in a physical fight, he did know the easiest places to attack someone to get the upper hand. The hand not holding up Scarface balled into a fist, connecting hard with Snatcher's celiac plexus. And while that had him distracted, the Ventriloquist had the opportunity to kick Snatcher right between the legs in the universal weak spot.

Snatcher dropped to his knees, and Rhino and Mugsy saw their chance to intervene, kicking at him until he lay on the ground, gathering bruise after bruise. Rhino picked up Snatcher's fallen weapon; "Hey, Mugsy! Whaddaya say we give him a taste of his own medicine?"

"Yeah!" Mugsy agreed. "Give it to him!"

The chain of the weapon wrapped around Snatcher's neck. Snatcher, genuinely terrified, saw only one way out of the situation, and hoped desperately it would work. He put all his effort into clawing at the chain, making strangled noises; this part wasn't hard, as he actually was choking from the tightening metal. The hard part was slowly transitioning into silence, slowing his movements before going completely limp, making it look as though he had died long before he actually would have. When he went silent and motionless, the chain was removed, much to his relief. He held his breath, not wanting a single giveaway to his state of being. Hopefully, the Ventriloquist and his gang would be too careless to check his pulse.

"You think he's…?" Mugsy rolled Snatcher over with a foot.

"I'm not gonna take any chances," Scarface ordered. "Shoot him in the head."

"But…sir!" the Ventriloquist rebutted. "There's no way he could have survived! Just leave him alone. I don't want to…" He paused, swallowing hard. "I'm just sure he's dead."

"This better not be you chickening out because you don't wanna finish the job," Scarface growled.

"Please," the Ventriloquist pleaded. "The new Joker wouldn't want us to waste our time here. He'd want us to move on to other things!"

"All right," Scarface relented. "Let's get a move on."

After the small band of thugs left the alley, Snatcher knew it was safe to breathe again. He did not, however, actually make a move to get up for some time. His entire body was wracked with pain, and he needed a moment to simply wallow in it without exacerbating it. Finally, laboriously, he peeled himself off the ground and began to limp back to base.

...

Mim had decided she wanted a pet. A cat, to be specific. That was what brought her to the zoo after hours, peering into the enclosures of the panthers, the lions, and the leopards in an attempt to figure out which was best for her. Of course, all of them had an equally strong chance of mauling her teammates when she wasn't looking. Aghoul could easily be patched up, she figured, and she could sweet-talk Mozenrath into bringing the others back from beyond the grave later, but she supposed that after having his face ripped off by a tiger the first time, Roman wouldn't take too kindly to her having a companion after that. Still she looked into cage after cage, judging the danger factor of each big cat.

The sound of rapidly approaching footsteps excited Mim: a hapless victim. She wondered what shape to take in order to best bring them down. It occurred to her that a surprise attack was probably the best course of action, so she first became a hummingbird in order to slip through the bars of the fence surrounding the tiger enclosure, then morphed into a tiger, biding her time among the zoo's native residents.

She watched as a tall man with bright red hair and a face that struck her as quite memorable appeared in between the fences. "No security cameras here, huh?" he remarked. "Too bad. Good thing I always bring my own around now…"

He plunged a hand into his own chest, which became the consistency of clay in order to admit his arm. From the recesses of his body, he withdrew a small camera, which he nestled in the branches of a decorative tree, stretching his arm up to twice its length to do so. Switching the camera on, he announced to the lens, "In a few hours, Gotham is going to be plagued by a host of wild animals that escaped from the local zoo. Two questions are going to be on everyone's mind. One: 'How can I avoid meeting a terrible fate in the stomach of a beast?' And two: 'Who could have done such a depraved act?' Well, in order to clear up any and all confusion, it was ME! BASIL KARLO! Also known as Clayface. And not that wasted potential goody-two-shoes REFORMED Clayface. I'm the bigger, better, BADDER Clayface!" He spread his arms for dramatic effect. "Now, you might wonder: what does Clayface have to gain from letting out a horde of dangerous animals? Well, I'm currently under new management. Seems Clayface isn't the only one to get a sequel. We've got some clown calling himself the new Joker! Time will tell how THAT one pans out. He ordered a plate of chaos, and I figured, why not kill two birds with one stone? Make a scene for him; STEAL the scene for me! You getting all this, Gotham news channels? Because I'm doing this aaaaaaaall for you! Well, for me, but you know you're going to air this footage anyway. What am I still soliloquizing for? It's time to make Gotham's citizens an endangered species!"

He reached out with his right arm, morphing it into a hardened clay mace covered in sharp spikes as he did so. The mace rammed the fence of the tiger enclosure, breaking a huge opening in it. "And this little WHAM ARMY thinks they're the top dogs of crime," he joked, looking pointedly up at the camera as he retracted his arm.

"Actually, right now, it's more like top cats," a very magenta tiger said as she approached the exit point Karlo had just made in her enclosure.

Karlo flinched, putting both arms up in front of his body in a defensive position. "It TALKS?" He then looked back up at the camera, giving it an overblown shrug. "This is the most pathetic-looking cereal mascot I've ever seen!" He paused, leaving a space for studio audience laughter.

"You know," Mim said, reverting to her human shape, "you just might be the ugliest person I've ever seen." She said this with a sweet smile, practically salivating as she drank in Karlo's visage.

"Oh, yeah?" Karlo retaliated. "Well, you're no prize yourself." He transformed both arms into long, sharp blades, slashing at Mim from both sides.

She jumped up into the air, standing on completely nothing as the blades passed harmlessly beneath her feet. "Trying to kill me while returning my compliments?" Mim gushed. "Now, YOU'RE a hunk of a man!"

"Ewwww," Karlo groaned as he swapped both arms into maces. "Get a life, lady!"

Mim just marched three paces forward on thin air, leaned in, and planted a sloppy kiss on Karlo's cheek. She then transformed into a hawk so that she could flit out of the way of the immediately flung maces in her direction.

"I guess it never would work out between us, would it?" Mim sighed, dodging blow after blow. "I'm with the WHAM ARMY, you're with…wait, did you say there's a new Joker in town? Ragsykins is NOT going to like that…"

"Yeah, I said 'new Joker'!" Karlo insisted, taking swing after swing and becoming increasingly frustrated with each miss. "And he's gonna dump all you WHAM ARMY brats in the river to drown! Though I'm guessing YOU'LL just turn into some kinda fish."

"You know me so well already," Mim teased. "Are you sure you don't want to reconsider you and me?"

"THAT'S IT, LADY! JUST HOLD STILL AND LET ME SMASH Y – "
Both maces came down hard on the shell of a gigantic magenta armadillo. "Sorry, sweetie," Mim replied, "but it looks like I'm the one who has to smash you." She balled up, rolling right over Karlo, flattening him against the ground. She unrolled and spun around to get a look at her work.

The flattened clay on the ground peeled itself up and re-morphed into Karlo's body. "Nice try," he huffed. "You're not the only one who can play the shapeshifter game." He morphed into a sharp-tusked boar. Mim rolled back up to test her strength against his, speeding hard against him. His tusks dented her shell, and he lifted her up upon them, flipping her into the air like a pancake. She came down hard behind him, bouncing a couple times before unrolling and taking on the tiger's shape once more. As the tiger, she lunged.

Her claws sank into amorphous clay before Karlo reformed into an animate steamroller. "Let's see how YOU like getting run over!" he laughed before charging full steam ahead.

Mim knew another animal wasn't going to cut it. In order to survive, she transformed into a decorative throw rug, lying flat on the ground and waiting it out until Karlo had finished trying to squash her. Once he was past, she sprang up again, now in human form, giving a hop as she pointed at Karlo and flung a bolt of electricity from her extended finger. The lightning jolted him, and he morphed back into human form as well.

"What part of CLAYface don't you understand?" he raged. "Flattening me doesn't work. Lightning bolts don't work. NOTHING YOU CAN DO is going to work – "

An explosive bolt of plasma collided with Karlo's head, blowing it up into droplets. Mim waited smugly while he collected himself from where he'd been scattered and re-forged his head.

"Okay, that only works TEMPORARILY," Karlo informed her. "You know what? I'm not going to waste my time on you. I'm getting what I came for." He forged both arms together into a massive block, swinging it down hard on the nearest fence; the lions suddenly found themselves with an exit point. Immense wings of clay sprouted from Karlo's back, and he beat them to propel himself into the air, grabbing his camera out of the tree on the way as he sped into the depths of the zoo, using a bladed arm to sever the bars of every fence he passed.

"You're not getting away that easily!" Mim cried, launching into the air as a peregrine falcon to give chase.

"No, no, no…" Karlo muttered, looking back over his shoulder to see Mim following. He twisted the camera around to frame her: "Might as well let you see the dramatic chase scene while I'm at it." His free arm chopped at fence after fence as he led Mim into the depths of the zoo, a fixed destination in mind and a plan taking shape in his head.

Over the polar bear enclosure, a temperature-controlled environment with icy waters for the bears to play in, Mim caught up with Karlo, sinking her talons into one of his wings. He performed a barrel roll, and as he did so, he let a glob of clay come loose from his body, wrapping around Mim like a tight chain. Mim struggled as the clay cuff hardened; she dropped into the cold water. "Let's see you survive THAT!" Karlo laughed as he straightened out his flight pattern. He turned the camera back on his face: "A murder AND the release of more dangerous animals than you can shake a stick at! How's that for a show, Gotham?" He slashed at the polar bears' fence, letting them free.

Mim, contrary to Karlo's belief, didn't drown under the water, nor was she at any risk of hypothermia. She surrounded herself with a bubble of air at which she floated at the center while she tried a few different spells to get the clay binding her to crack. Freezing it made it brittle enough to snap apart, and she gladly did so as she reverted to human form, surfacing from the water. "Talk about playing hard to get," she huffed as she dragged herself up onto solid ground.

By that time, she had no bearing on which direction Karlo had gone. Furthermore, several of the animals were getting curious about the new doors in their enclosures, though just as many didn't even notice and remained comfortably in their favorite resting spots.

"When those animals get into the city," Mim realized, "it's going to be absolute chaos! Chaos…THAT I DIDN'T CAUSE!" She stomped on the ground angrily. "I DON'T CARE HOW ADORABLY UGLY YOU ARE! I'M GOING TO MAKE YOU PAY FOR THIS!" She took to the skies once more, this time as a harpy eagle, keeping an eagle eye out for any trace of Karlo.

...

In a jewelry boutique that had been given a shakedown for "protection" by Snatcher not that long ago, a momentous occasion was taking place. A beautiful brunette man bent down on one knee as he slid a diamond onto the finger of a raven-haired man.

"Zac!" the black-haired man gasped. "You shouldn't have!"

"Martin," Zac replied, "will you make me the happiest man on earth?"
"Oh please tell me you're asking me to marry you oh please tell me you're asking me to marry you – "

"I'm asking you to marry me, Martin."

Martin was stricken speechless, overcome with joy.

"Looks like I've arrived just in time," a new voice said from the doorway. The happy couple and the employee running the counter all turned to see Ayam Aghoul framed there. "I always did love weddings. It's the aftermath of them that I can't stand."

"EXCUSE me?" Martin snapped.

"Oh, don't mind me," Aghoul said, pushing past the pair to get to the employee. "It's none of my business who you pick to be the old ball and chain. I'm just here to collect. You see, the WHAM ARMY counted your protection fee, and you came up short."

"Short?" the employee swallowed hard. "But…there's no way. I gave you everything you asked for!"

And he had, but Aghoul knew that desperate times called for easy lies. "As recompense," he demanded, "I'll be taking everything in the whole store. Try and stop me, and I'll send you all to an early grave."

A new voice, deep and female, cut in from the entryway: "I see we're preparing for a wedding. You know, it's nothing without the bouquet."

Aghoul whipped about to see a redheaded woman, skin tinted the palest of yellow-green, clothed in a dress made of leaves. She walked delicately into the shop. "I don't generally go for rocks," she sighed. "But the new Joker was very clear about what he wanted, and he did promise me a greener Gotham, so what's the harm?" She glared at the employee. "I'm taking the jewels."

Zac and Martin had by that time gotten the good sense to make themselves scarce, bolting down the road.

"Well, aren't you a pretty little thing!" Aghoul gushed. "And so…" He took a whiff of the air, which had become filled with the scent of flowers upon her arrival. "Alive!"

"Wish I could say the same for you," the woman replied with a disgusted scowl.

"I don't suppose YOU'RE looking for another husband?" Aghoul said with a sly smirk as he approached, taking the woman's hand.

She ripped her hand away and slapped Aghoul across the face. "I'm here for business, not pleasure. And when you ask like that, the answer's always going to be no."

"Well, that's a real shame," Aghoul told her, "because that means we'll have to settle who takes home these jewels the messy way."

"Fine by me," the woman said with a smirk. "But I think you'll regret taking on mother nature herself."

"That would be you?"

"In a manner of speaking. Though I'd prefer it if you called me 'Poison Ivy.'"

"I'd prefer to call you my little Venus Flytrap."

"You want Venus Flytraps?" Poison Ivy taunted. A pair of thick plants burst through the floor, sprouting from soil miles below. "You've got Venus Flytraps!" Both plants revealed themselves to have snapping heads ringed with spines; they reached out to try and entrap Aghoul. He backflipped out of the way as the plants tried repeatedly to ensnare him, taking two skull-shaped bombs into hand and launching them. Each Flytrap got a mouthful; they exploded in a shower of green.

The employee had by that time crawled out the back doorway, no longer caring who got the jewels so long as he survived.

"That does it!" Poison Ivy snarled. "You're plant food!"

"I've been called worse!" Aghoul snapped back before realizing the ground was falling away beneath his feet to make way for a new plant. He recognized it immediately as he fell into its cup of a mouth: a pitcher plant. Aghoul was entrapped in a fleshy prison of green as acids began to pool beneath him, stinging his skin, and the cap of the plant slammed shut over top of him, muffling his struggling.

More plants erupted from the floor, taking on the shapes of flowers. "Grab the jewels," Poison Ivy commanded, "and let's go." The flowers began to scoop up as many diamonds, sapphires, and rubies as they could into their blossoms.

The blade of Aghoul's scythe tore through the pitcher plant's skin, and Aghoul rolled unceremoniously onto the carpet, acid dripping from his body. "Summertime is over," he growled. "Winter is coming. And before that, the HARVEST!" He swiped off the heads of several of the flowers with the scythe.

Poison Ivy sighed to herself. "I really didn't want to go the easy route. It's so much less fun."

Vines burst from the floor, taking Aghoul by the wrists and ankles, squeezing so hard he dropped his scythe. Poison Ivy strode right up to him, blowing him a kiss; a wave of miniscule spores, visible only as a pink cloud, was carried on her breath into his face. While breathing wasn't a necessity for Aghoul, he inhaled out of habit, and suddenly, he felt a lot less inclined to struggle, let alone fight.

"You just stay there and think about what you've done," Poison Ivy commanded.

"Yes, my little Venus Flytrap!" Aghoul replied, ready to comply.

He watched docilely as she called up new plants to gather up the rest of the gems. Then, when she'd finished, she bade the plants pull themselves up by the roots to follow her out the door, where she was taken up into the branches of an immense walking tree; the garden of thievery set off down the road.

Within a few moments, Mim burst through the door. "THOUGHT YOU COULD HIDE HERE, DID YOU?" she cackled…only to see that she hadn't found Karlo, but a bound and brainwashed Aghoul. "Ghoulie? What happened to you?"

"She told me to stay here and think about what I did," Aghoul said dreamily. "So I'm staying here and thinking about what I was doing."

"You snap out of it!" Mim huffed, literally snapping her fingers in front of his face. She recognized mind control when she saw it, and so she gave the snap a liberal dose of magic; as it showered Aghoul, he suddenly recalled that Poison Ivy had basically taken his prize right out from beneath his nose. "Why, that little…" He struggled against the vines.

Mim transformed into a wolf, snapping the vines apart with her toothy jaws. Once Aghoul had been freed, she resumed human shape again. "You wouldn't believe it," she huffed. "I found the most delightfully ugly and overconfident man, but just when I thought there could be a spark between us, he humiliated me and swiped my victory! All in the name of this 'new Joker'!"

"I thought the same thing about a beautiful lady who really knew her deadly plants," Aghoul said with a nod. "But she apparently wasn't interested! She was too caught up in using her precious plants to commit a robbery for some new Joker!"

Mim and Aghoul each realized what the other had said; the same name had come up. "Roman will want to know about this," they said as one.

...

Roman, however, was learning about the new Joker the hard way.

Since a grocery store had gone so well last time, Roman had decided to try emptying the tills of another. This one, much like the last one, also featured displays of canned fruit stacked into pyramids, which Roman found amusing. He approached the first register, twirling the Cudgel around one hand. "Well, hello," he greeted.

"Can I help you?" the cashier asked.

"Sure," Roman replied. "You can start by handing over the till."

"Or you'll what?" the cashier replied cockily, smirking.

"Or I'll pull the trigger on this baby," Roman said as he raised the Cudgel, flipping open its barrel, "and your head goes boom."

The cashier began to sweat, popping the register drawer.

At that moment, a heart-shaped grenade fell upon the nearest pyramid of cans. Cans, it turned out, that were not filled with fruit, but with fake snakes. And these snakes, as they sprang free of their prisons in the blast, glowed red-hot as they showered over Roman, each one burning him where it made contact with his skin.

Roman staggered back, crying out from the pain, as a pair of high-pitched laughs sounded from behind him. The snakes settled on the ground, where they fizzled out; Roman turned to see the new Joker and a very familiar Harley striding toward him.

"Oh, great," he sighed. "Can't you just let it go, Harls? I didn't kill your boyfriend. I really wish I did, but I didn't. Now, can you just let me rob this store in peace?"

"Not gonna happen, pal!" Harley snapped. "You think I'm gonna let you off that easy? Well, guess what! I've got a NEW Puddin', and he – "

"Ahem…Harley," Joker interrupted, "this is MY moment. How about letting ME speak to our…well, 'archnemesis' is far too complimentary of a word for THIS lowlife."

"Sorry, Mr. J.," Harley said meekly.

"Roman Torchwick!" Joker greeted, spreading his arms wide. "It looks like you just got torched yourself!"

"Just got torched," Roman repeated, deadpan. "If that's the best you've got, I really don't need to worry about all that much, do I?"

"It seems your name's been on everyone's lips," Joker continued. "Something about a 'WHAM ARMY.' Baby's first criminal undertaking, and he's trying to take over the entire Gotham underworld!"

"This isn't my FIRST criminal undertaking," Roman hissed. "I have experience. Just not where you'd have heard about it."

"Let me guess," Joker replied. "Parallel world?"

"How did you – "

"Funny thing: I come from one of those too!" Joker laughed. "And on my way, I ran into a friend of yours. Tall, mysterious, green, wears a horned hood, was last seen obliterating your base in an eruption of green fire?"

"Great," Roman sighed. "You're working with Dragon Lady. Wait a minute…that's a little TOO convenient. You teaming up with our archnemesis EXACTLY the same time she gets turned against us to go on your side?" He waved toward Harley. "How long have you been planning this shitshow?"

"Ooooh, language!" Joker mocked. "I assure you, it's complete coincidence. Though if you don't like how those events line up, you're REALLY not going to like when your little friends report back in to you about the status quo of their crimes across Gotham."

"Okay, WHAT did you do?"

"Me?" Joker placed a hand on his chest, faking an innocent smile. "I didn't do anything! I've been setting up those cans waiting for YOU all night! And now I'm about to do…oh, what was it you did to the Bat the other day? Beat him up, then let him go so he could tell all his playmates your name and why you're not something to be taken lightly? Well, I'm about to do that to you."

"Oh, no, you don't – "

"Harley?" Joker gestured to Roman. "Would you like to do the honors, seeing as he's the one who put you back on the singles market?"
"With pleasure!" Harley charged, brandishing a baseball bat.

Roman charged from the opposite direction, and the shaft of the Cudgel collided with the bat. Roman pushed forward; Harley parried, stepping back before shoving at him with her own force, and Roman was the one forced to step back and parry. She faltered, missing a blow, and Roman whacked her in the side with the Cudgel. She followed up by taking advantage of the opening to bludgeon him in the face with the bat. Roman could feel the area around his left eye swelling up as he swung with all his might, the Cudgel just colliding with the wood of the bat.

Harley's purse containing all of her grenades swung back around into Joker's reach. "Don't mind if I do," Joker said to himself as he swiped one. He watched Roman and Harley go back and forth for a little while, mostly an equal match in swordplay, each occasionally striking flesh on the other but not hard enough for either to give up the match. Then, when he got bored, Joker pulled the pin on the grenade and hurled it at Roman.

The blast flung Roman to the ground, and he was easy pickings for Harley, who descended upon him with the bat. She hesitated to bash anywhere that might cause his death, but the majority of his body was fair game: his chest, his limbs. The Cudgel was lost, skidding across the ground.

"Well done, Harley!" Joker congratulated as he stepped in to look down upon Roman. Harley ceased her beating and moved aside to make room for him.

"You cheated," Roman grunted.

"That I did," Joker admitted. "But you would have done the same, wouldn't you? Pot, meet kettle." He withdrew a gun from his jacket, pointing it directly at Roman's head; Roman flinched in fear.

"Mr. J.!" Harley gasped. "You're not gonna – "

Joker pulled the trigger, and Harley and Roman both winced.

A tiny flag reading "BANG" popped out of the end of the gun. Roman stared at it in utter disbelief. "You are not serious," Roman groaned.

"I never am," Joker replied as he moved the gun a few inches lower and pulled the trigger again. The "BANG" flag leapt forward, a sharp spike that impaled itself in Roman's shoulder.

Joker leaned down close to Roman's face to whisper in his ear: "Run along now like a good boy before I decide to bring out some real ammo. And don't forget to tell your friends about me."

Roman knew when to cut his losses. He rolled to the side, picking up the Cudgel and pointing it behind him as he booked it. He let one last blast fly; Joker and Harley dodged to both sides of it as it knocked over a stack of cardboard cereal boxes, showering them in marshmallows.

"Look, Mr. J.!" Harley cried, picking up a plastic car that had fallen out of one of the boxes. "I found the prize in the cereal box! And I want you to have it!" She presented it.

"Oh, really, Harley, you shouldn't have!" Joker cooed, taking the car into his own hands. "You really are a girl after my own heart!"

Outside the store, in the nearest town square, Poison Ivy's walking tree met up with Krank's spinning top, Gearhead's borrowed ride, the winged Karlo, and the Ventriloquist gang. Karlo pointed his camera at the reunion: "You see here the cast of characters of our little drama. Specifically, the villains. I, of course, am the most powerful of them, but Poison Ivy likes her delusions of grandeur."

"I'll just let you go on believing that," Poison Ivy replied.

"You get what we came for?" Gearhead barked.

Poison Ivy waved her hand over the assorted flowers following her; the blossoms opened to reveal the sparkling treasures. "And you?"

"This is the last bike," Gearhead told her.

"We didn't get anything yet," Scarface grunted, "but we killed one of those WHAM ARMY wimps!"

"Looks like we're winning this game!" Krank laughed as he spun around with one of the stolen gowns in his arms.

Karlo's attention was caught by a speeding car in the distance; "Huh?" He turned the camera to see the Batmobile approaching at top speed. "It looks like the wannabe hero of our show is putting in an appearance!"

"Right on time," Gearhead said with a smirk. "Krank. Give me a lift."

One of the mechanical arms of the spinning top reached down to grab Gearhead, pulling him up to the driver's spot. Gearhead's mechanical arm connected to the top, transforming it into a sleek, yellow gyrating weapon of death. "And it's all battery-powered, too," he called down to Ivy.

"That's what I like to hear," Ivy replied before beckoning toward Ventriloquist. Scarface's missing arm was immediately replaced by a sprouting thorny vine; a network of other vines plugged into and squirmed out of his back like tentacles.

"Mr. Scarface!" the Ventriloquist gasped in horror.

"Now this is REAL power!" Scarface laughed.

Karlo shifted into his most monstrous form, the one that had come to be associated with the Clayface moniker, as his hands became twin maces; the video camera settled right in the center of his chest to capture the action. "Bring it on, Batsy," he said with a smirk as the Batmobile parked in the center of the square and the Batman, Robin, and Batgirl exited.

...

"We've searched every inch of this tower!" Yzma cried in exasperation as she paced back and forth before Xayide and the Huntsman in the gardens. "WHERE is he? Even when he's in his right mind, it isn't like Mozenrath to miss an exiling of people he has a grudge against!"

"Too terribly true," the Huntsman agreed.

"There…is a place he may have gone," Xayide realized. "The City of Old Emperors."

"The who-now whatnow?" Yzma repeated.

"Explain," the Huntsman demanded.

"There is a city to which all humans become condemned when they have tried and failed to rule Fantastica," Xayide stated. "Once all of their memories are wished away, they have nothing left, and they are brought to the city by fate so that they may live out the rest of their existence there. Perhaps…Mozenrath found his way to that city over the course of the night."

"How far is it from here?" Yzma asked.

"Variable," Xayide answered. "As is everything else in Fantastica. As I told you, the geography of the land changes. It may be a day's journey. It may be a year's."

"Then pack up for a year," Yzma huffed. "We're going after him."

"You don't understand," Xayide argued. "Once people enter the City of Old Emperors, they never leave."

"Well?" Yzma reminded Xayide. "You've been saying all this time that Mozenrath breaks the rules. He didn't have AURYN! He lost his memory in a different way! You even seem convinced he isn't actually human! Maybe he CAN come back!"

"I am not hopeful," Xayide sighed, "but there is a chance."

"If there is a chance," the Huntsman insisted, "we must take it. Gather your suits of armor and – "

"NO!" Xayide cried, recalling the loss of Bastian and how her armor had gone rogue, trampling her to death. "If we go, it is without the armor. We go on foot."

"In THESE heels?" Yzma protested.

Xayide flicked a finger at Yzma's feet, changing her shoes to sensible boots. "You are now wearing something more suited for walking."

"And less fashionable," Yzma grunted.

"We walk," Xayide insisted.

The Huntsman was in no mood to argue. "What will he remember of us?" he asked, drawing a vial of shimmering liquid from a pocket.

"Very little," Xayide informed him. "But it is likely he will retain the animosity he gained of us when he forgot we were his allies."

The Huntsman's grip on the bottle tightened. He hadn't wanted it to come to that, but he knew a way to relieve Mozenrath of that animosity. It would come at a terrible price, but one that was already mostly paid.

"Moreover, he won't wish to leave the City of Old Emperors," Xayide went on.

"Leave that to me," the Huntsman said, pocketing the bottle.

"What," Yzma spat, "you think you can break the spell with a true love's kiss?"

"Something far less contrite," the Huntsman answered. "We must leave as soon as possible if our destination is truly that indeterminately far away."

"But my shoes…" Yzma pouted as Xayide and the Huntsman began their walk.

"Use the boots you were provided or be left behind," the Huntsman warned her.

Gritting her teeth, Yzma stormed after the pair.

...

Garfield paced back and forth in the warehouse that GRAMPA had set up as base, not nervous but still not looking forward to the eventual reunion of his team. Peter, Mim, and Aghoul had returned around the same time; Garfield was the most banged-up of the three.

The door slammed open, and Roman Torchwick, adorned with a fresh black eye, stormed in. "Oh, boy," Garfield sighed. "Here we go."

Roman's first move was to rip a small metal spike out of his shoulder and fling it across the room. "Mim," he growled, "potion me. Now."

Mim removed a small vial from her purse. "We only have a few of these left, you know," she said as she flung it toward Roman.

Roman nearly fumbled catching it. "Then maybe you shouldn't THROW IT AT ME," he huffed. "I thought we brought a ton of these."

Garfield wasn't about to tell Roman they'd spent one potion already tending his minor scrapes. The others, judging by their silence, agreed this was a good move.

After downing the potion, letting the bleeding around his shoulder heal, Roman yelled, "WHAT THE HELL WAS ALL THAT?"

"So I take it you know," Garfield told him.

"I don't know exactly WHAT happened to the rest of you," Roman said, "but I have it on good authority that SOMETHING did. Now spill."

One by one, the stories came out. Krank breaking into the fashion runway. Gearhead trying to mow down Firefly. Karlo stealing Mim's thunder. Poison Ivy leaving Aghoul tied up and defenseless. And every story but one brought up a name: the new Joker.

"Gearhead might not have brought him up," Garfield pointed out, "but given everything else, it's probably related."

"I'll bet," Roman huffed. "He said as much."

"Who did?" Aghoul asked.

"Who do you think?" Roman groaned. "The fucking new Joker himself."

This earned him four identical cries of "WHAT?"

"You heard me," Roman insisted. "Whoever this clown is that took over as the Joker. First of all, he claims to be from…the same circumstances as me, Mim, Aghoul, and Archie."

"Where is the big guy, anyway?" Garfield wondered out loud.

"Probably still on recon," Roman answered. "If any one of us was safe, it was him. He wasn't trying to pull anything."

"You're not worried at least somewhat that he met with a horrible fate?" Peter prodded.

"Nah," Roman said with a wave of the hand. "He's a big boy. He can take care of himself."

Nobody dared point out that Roman thought the same thing about himself and yet had come home with a spike impaled through his shoulder.

"Anyway," Roman went on, "if he's right, him claiming to be the Joker might be more legit than everyone thinks. But moving on, you're gonna hate who he's teamed up with."

"Don't say Harley Quinn," Peter said hurriedly.

"Well, now I apparently can't say who he's working with," Roman grunted.

Peter and Garfield gave groans of frustration; Garfield followed up with a "Harleeeeeey…whyyyyyyyy…why is your taste in men so terrible?"

"But you know who ELSE he has on his side?" Roman continued. "Remember how it was kind of obvious when Dragon Lady torched our base? Yeah, that's related too."

"MALEFICENT!" Mim huffed, puffs of literal smoke coming from her nose.

"So basically," Roman recapitulated, "we not only have another Joker as top dog of crime humiliating us, but he has a team of superpowered maniacs, your old friend is hanging off his shoulder and feeding him all our weaknesses, and our longtime archnemesis is funding him. This guy needs to go DOWN. HARD."

"Ooooh, is this the part where we kill him?" Mim asked gleefully.

"No," Roman informed her. "He did to me what we did to Batboy. Beat me up and let me go to tell the tale. I say we pay it back in kind. We leave him alive enough to remember us, to tell all his flunkies about us, and to live with the knowledge that we cleaned his clock."

"But I want to kill him," Mim pouted.

"Isn't it going to be SO much more satisfying to let him live a life of COMPLETE HUMILIATION?" Roman egged on. "If you REALLY want to kill somebody, we'll pick one of the flunkies. The clay guy."
"Can't kill him," Mim reminded Roman. "I tried. Also, I'm not letting a piece of man like THAT go to waste."

"Then we kill the car guy," Roman sighed.

"Now, THAT I can get behind," Garfield agreed.

"So, how do we do it?" Roman asked.

"You're the one bent on unseating him," Aghoul reminded Roman. "Not to mention the de facto leader of this operation. Shouldn't YOU have the plan?"
"If I may interrupt," Peter brought up, "I spent some time at the Fourth Circle listening in on current events. That was how I learned about the fashion show. There was also talk of a certain grand unveiling tomorrow at the history museum. Pottery that dates back to the Roman Empire. Everyone wanted to get their paws on it, but was talking about how security would apparently be too high. Now, I don't think it'll be too high for two sorcerers, two master arsonists, a silver-tongued negotiator, and a nimble contortionist. Do you?"

"Not one bit," Roman agreed.

"But here's the thing," Garfield pointed out. "No matter where we go, if we make any kind of fuss, the Bat is going to follow."

"Maybe not," Roman realized. "There's only one of him."

"Well, there are his two little brats," Aghoul pointed out.

"Yeah, but they're a team unit," Roman reminded him. "Say we got them tied up somewhere else. For example, if Gar decides to vandalize a…no, wait. Wait. Idea incoming."

"This is either going to be the best or the worst idea," Aghoul whispered to Mim. "There is no in-between."

"It'll be entertaining either way," Mim whispered back.

"We get another villain to do the dirty work," Roman suggested. "Somebody just big-time enough to keep Batboy busy."

"Okay, sure," Garfield agreed, "but I absolutely refuse to work with Riddler, Penguin, or Mr. Freeze."

"So who's left?" Roman asked.

"That's big enough to actually distract the Batman?" Peter answered. "Riddler, Penguin, and Mr. Freeze."

"There's Catwoman!" Garfield argued. "She can distract him in more ways than one."

"You know if we involve her, she's only going to team up with him and come after us," Peter pointed out.

"Ugh," Garfield groaned. "I wish you weren't right. Okay, so what we have left is three people I'd rather not touch with a ten foot pole, NONE OF WHICH will agree to work with the WHAM ARMY."

"Unless they don't know they're working with the WHAM ARMY," Roman muttered. "There's one person we can deploy to ask for a favor that they CAN'T refuse. And that's Madame Frou Frou."

"Madame Who…Who?" Garfield asked.

"Archie as a woman," Roman answered. "If anybody can talk one of those jerks into doing something for us without him realizing he's doing something for us, it's Archie. Who, by the way, I am still not worried about."

"Then why bring it up?" Peter asked.

Because it's been a while, Roman thought, and my thoughts might actually be getting the better of me. "End of discussion: he. Is. FINE."

The door to the warehouse slammed open again. "See?" Roman said as he turned around. "There he is right n – HOLY SHIT!"

Snatcher collapsed to his knees, holding onto the doorknob so as not to fall completely over. "I'm all right," he gasped. "Just…need a moment." He was obviously in worse condition than Roman had been; not one but both eyes were blackened, and rips and tears in his clothing gave away other bruises. His entire demeanor portrayed fatigue, and his breathing was heavy.

"Shit, shit, shit…" Roman hurried over to Snatcher's side, kneeling next to him. "What did they DO to you?"

"Just roughed me up a bit," Snatcher tried to assure him. "Tried to strangle me, but I fooled them. Made them think they'd already killed me, and they didn't have the stomach to make sure I was good and finished off."

The abrasions on Snatcher's neck became all the more obvious to Roman. He turned back to Mim, screaming, "POTION! NOW!"

Mim withdrew a bottle from her enchanted purse, drawing back her hand –

"And don't THROW IT!"

Mim calmly walked the potion over to Roman, who handed it to Snatcher. Snatcher couldn't hide the desperation with which he downed the contents of the bottle. "That's…much better," he sighed as he set about standing up.

Roman wrapped an arm around Snatcher, propping him up as he stood. "Easy – "

"I'm perfectly all right, Torchwick. It's…appreciated, nonetheless."

Roman let go of Snatcher, who straightened out his clothing as best he could. "I suppose in the time I've been gone, you've already concocted a revenge scheme against our new foe," Snatcher commented.

"Yeah," Roman said with a nod. "We did. There's just…one change of plans."

"And what is that?"
Roman's face set in a hard scowl. "We're definitely killing him."

...

Xayide, Yzma, and the Huntsman's journey had taken them across lands both rough and calm, populated and empty. They lost track of how long they had been walking. They finished up the rations they had brought with them and strongarmed more food out of local shop owners. It seemed as though they had been walking for three years, but somehow, the Huntsman had the feeling it had been no more than a few hours by the time standards of most worlds.

At last, they came upon a bleak marshland, clouded in mist and studded with crooked trees that, in the misty distance, looked at first like great crooked creatures ready to shamble over to Yzma, Xayide, and the Huntsman and cause them harm; the Huntsman drew his weapon before realizing the true nature of the shapes.

Xayide was stricken with grief. "We have reached the Swamps of Sadness." Yzma looked to her just in time to see a tear escape Xayide's eye and travel down the length of her face.

"What?" Yzma sighed. "Did your horse die here or something?"

"No," Xayide said softly. "I have just now realized what my fate is to be."

"Our fate is to find Mozenrath," the Huntsman insisted. "Is the City of Old Emperors somewhere in this swampland?"

"No," Xayide answered. "But I fear we may not survive the crossing. The Swamps of Sadness engulf all who are swallowed by the sadness that pervades. Travelers of this place cease to remember their purpose or meaning, only seeing the worst outcome."

"Can we go around it?" the Huntsman asked. "Or will this world's shifting geography put it back in our path?"

"I think you know the answer to that as well as I," Xayide told him.

"Then the only way is through," the Huntsman stated.

"Or we could forsake our quest," Xayide suggested. "Mozenrath is as good as lost. There is a good chance that even if we reached the city, we could not recover him. I respected him – no, more than that. I was…as fond of him as it is possible for me to be, and that is not much, but it is still something. He carried with him my hopes and dreams for conquest of Fantastica, and with him, those hopes and dreams have died. If we attempt to cross the Swamps of Sadness now, I fear that the two of you, having such proximity to him as you have, will be overcome by the loss of him and find yourself sinking – Yzma, STOP!"

Yzma had already begun to storm into the swampland. "For once," she grumbled, "I'm actually glad for these ugly boots."

"Huntsman," Xayide implored, "do not cross. I know of your attachment to Mozenrath, and your longing for him will surely – "

"Drive me forward and across the swamps," the Huntsman interrupted. "I am in no danger. It seems to me that the one you are most truly worried about is – "

"I am not," Xayide insisted. "I worry for no one. Least of all myself."

"Perhaps that is what you believe," the Huntsman said before starting out after Yzma through the sticky swamp.

Xayide inhaled, then exhaled. She knew what fate Fantastica had planned for her, and she realized she might as well succumb to it. She had already cheated death once, and that was more than enough. She walked after the Huntsman, gently lifting her skirts to avoid dampening them in the swamps for as long as she could.

Which was longer than she figured. Focusing only on following the two people ahead of her – and listening to one of them gripe about how much she hated swamps of all sorts – she made it a fair ways into the swamp before she realized both of her shoes had been sucked off as though by a toothless mouth. She had to work harder and harder to pull up her feet, but why even do so, when there was simply no way she could ever fulfill her desires of conquest, and without that, she was empty? Bastian had failed her. Mozenrath had failed her. She had failed herself by betting on either of them, no matter their similarities, no matter their differences. Fantastica's natural order was simply not something to mess with, and Xayide had tried to advise someone to do so twice. Her worst mistake was on the second go-around, when she had actually let herself come to respect Mozenrath.

She realized she had stopped walking. She had sunken in up to her knees.

"How much further through these infernal swamps?" Yzma growled. "Xayide!"

Xayide didn't dare answer, tilting her face upward in haughty pride. If she were going to perish, she would go out without betraying her weakness to her companions.

The Huntsman was the first to turn and see that she was sinking. "Xayide!" He recoiled in shock.

"And WHAT do you think you're doing, sinking when we need you?" Yzma hissed, scurrying right up to the Huntsman's side.

"Doing what is destined," Xayide answered. "As it happened before, it shall happen again, and I shall meet my fate with grace."

"The death Mozenrath brought you back from," the Huntsman realized. "It was here."

"No," Xayide corrected. "When Bastian was overthrown as Emperor, I followed his trail all the way to the City of Old Emperors. Once I realized he had either become lost within or found his way back to his own world, taking with him my chances of ever dominating at his side, my armor stopped following my will. The suits walked on without my permission. When I called them back to me, they trampled me to death."

"You KNEW they could malfunction like that," Yzma barked, "and you LET US RIDE AROUND WITH THEM THIS WHOLE TIME? WE COULD HAVE BEEN KILLED THE SAME WAY!"

"No," the Huntsman realized. "It wasn't a malfunction." He looked Xayide dead in her mismatched eyes. "They didn't escape you at all. You lost sight of your path, and you willed yourself dead, seeing no other fate for yourself."

Xayide did not answer.

"And now it is happening to you yet again," the Huntsman observed. "The sadness of the swamps is playing upon this belief you have that Mozenrath is truly lost to us forever. You have lost the empire yet again, and now, you wish to die."

By that time, Xayide was in up to her waist. "Perhaps there is truth in what you say," she admitted. "See it not as sentiment, but as a lack of purpose. I cannot simply return to Horok. I will always wish for more, but each time I choose someone to ascend to the throne, that person shall meet the same fate. I was always meant to be the villain of the story. What can happen to the villain besides defeat?"

To Xayide's surprise, Yzma darted forth, yelling, "GRAB HER BEFORE SHE SINKS ANY FURTHER!" Yzma's bony fingers settled around Xayide's forearms, digging in. The Huntsman knelt near Xayide, placing his hands just above her waist, the lowest he could without plunging into the swamps, and attempted – futilely – to hoist Xayide upward. Failing that, he simply held on, refusing to let her go lower.

"Why do you insist on attempting to save me?" Xayide asked, baffled.

"Because you, like most people we hire, have the ANNOYING habit of being likable and useful when we really don't need anyone else around," Yzma sighed.

"You are a powerful mage, a skilled diplomat, and a trusted ally," the Huntsman added. "Think of it not as sentiment, but as a desire not to lose potential."

"I have perhaps asked the wrong question," Xayide realized. "How is it that the two of you have not yet sunk even a little?"

"I believe the answer is simple," the Huntsman told her, thinking about how what he was about to say applied not only to himself and Yzma, but to Mozenrath, to Mim, to Aghoul, to Roman, to Snatcher. "We seem not to know when to give up."

"We are GETTING you out of this swamp," Yzma insisted, "we are GETTING Mozenrath, we are FIXING whatever in his mind is broken, and we are going home, but NOT empty-handed! I swear, we are not leaving this world without SOMETHING to show for it! We've been through too much! I demand this world pay us for it!"

"You cannot demand Fantastica pay anything," Xayide replied. "You really do not know when enough is enough, do you?"

"If it is truly your wish to sink, then you may sink," the Huntsman informed Xayide. "However, it seems to me your talents would perhaps be better suited among our company. You may never advise the ruler of Fantastica, but there are countless other worlds awaiting us that we may take advantage of. There is something for you to rule. Now make up your mind before we waste further time. Are you going to sink here, or are you going to come with us?"

Xayide was simply awestruck. The Huntsman and Yzma had to be complete and utter fools to have such hope in them that they could withstand the swamps. But if they had hope, perhaps there was reason for her to do so as well. And the extension of an invitation by the Huntsman didn't hurt. It was another path besides death or falling into a neverendingly repeating cycle. She struggled, kicking her feet in the mire, and she was able to propel herself upward a little bit.

Sensing this, the Huntsman and Yzma both hauled upward, and Xayide was pulled free, coated in slime and grime, to stand upon the surface of the swamps. "You only get one of those," Yzma informed her. "Next time, we just let you sink."
"You are both fools," Xayide practically whispered.

"Yzma, perhaps," the Huntsman told her. "I am no fool. And chasing Mozenrath is no fool's errand." He resumed his path forward, and Yzma followed.

Xayide set out after them with renewed vigor, her bare feet squelching against the surface of the swamp but never once sinking in, and after some time, they hit solid earth at the other side.

...

Alfred Pennyworth was not surprised to see Bruce Wayne, Barbara Gordon, and Dick Grayson stumble into the living room of Wayne Manor in torn costumes, sporting several fresh bruises. He was nonetheless concerned. "Bad night?"

Barbara flopped down on the couch. "Would you believe Gearhead, Cosmo Krank, Poison Ivy, the Ventriloquist, AND Clayface all at the same time?"

"Move over!" Dick commanded; Barbara shuffled to make just enough room for him to rest there as well. "We tried our best, but they kicked our butts."

"We just need to strategize," Bruce said, settling into a chair. "We haven't had to deal with all five of them before. Now that we know what we're up against – "

"Didn't you guys take on way more villains than that at once that one time with Rumor?" Barbara asked.

"We had a tactical advantage," Bruce admitted. "Namely that our foes kept getting in each other's way. We also had cells to imprison them in open and at the ready. This time, they had a field advantage. Especially with Gearhead having access to Krank's toys." Bruce shifted, sitting up a little straighter. "Something about this doesn't seem right. They don't have anything in common except that they've all served time in Arkham."

"Maybe they just made a lot of friends in there," Dick suggested.

"Pam, making random friends?" Barbara scoffed. "Not her scene. Not unless all of them declared they were going to eliminate greenhouse gases."

"Well, maybe that's what happened," Dick replied.

"I've seen the reports of Krank Co.'s pollution output," Bruce pointed out. "It isn't likely. And all this right after Roman Torchwick showed up."

"You think it's related to him?" Barbara asked.

"I definitely don't think we should rule it out," Bruce insisted.

"I highly doubt it's a mystery you'll solve tonight," Alfred broke in. "Especially in your current condition. You'll want to ice those bruises. And I see I have my work cut out for me in repairing your costumes. Might I suggest taking your minds off the case with a little television?"

"TV would be great right now," Dick sighed. "Mind turning it on?"

"The remote is literally right next to you," Barbara groaned, spying the control balanced on the arm of the couch.

Dick made a show of trying to lift his arm. "Oh, owwwww…my arm…hurts…too…much…to move…"

"Gimme that." Barbara sat up, reached across Dick, and swiped the remote, turning on the television.

The set flickered to life just as an advertisement began to play. Scenes of the interior of a history museum panned across the screen. A calm, British female voice stated, "The Judovits-Sabara History Museum is proud to host the traveling exhibit of a lifetime." The camera focused on several pieces of exquisite pottery. "Artifacts uncovered that date back to the Roman Empire will be on display for your viewing pleasure. These items are practically priceless."

"Well, THAT'S an invitation for supervillains," Dick commented.

"You're right," Bruce realized. "Between Roman Torchwick's gang and the lineup we faced tonight – which may or may not be the same thing – they're not going to leave this alone. We have to be on our guard."

"Maybe we should call for backup," Barbara suggested, talking over the rest of the exposition about the pottery. "You do have a few friends who can pack a bigger punch, right?"

"Right," Bruce said with a nod. "And it just might be time to ask for a helping hand."

They all missed when the advertisement ended, a chipper male voice stating that it had been brought to television by Gwynplane Entertainment. It wouldn't have meant anything to the Bruce Wayne of that world, anyhow.

...

From high above Wayne Manor, the Joker smiled as he watched the television screen set in the dash of his airship broadcast the advertisement he and Maleficent had recorded. The Roman artifacts were all items Maleficent had conjured, and the Joker was simply waiting for the perfect moment to slip them all inside the museum.

"The thing about the Roman Empire," he cackled, "is that it always falls."

...

The small army of heroes from Agrabah arrived at the citadel doors unscathed; Kairi's map and Papyrus' puzzling had brought them through the city safely. Their next challenge was how to enter the citadel without detection.

Genie whipped up a small telescope that he put up to the immense double doors, eyeing the other end; it allowed him to see through into the atrium hall, which was empty. "Coast is clear!"

Nora shoved the doors open, and the band stepped inside. "This place looks enormous!" Vida commented.

"Maybe we should split up to search," Sora suggested. "But into groups, so we'll still be safe."

"Good plan!" Ruby gave him a thumbs-up.

"We're sort of split into groups already," Nick pointed out. "Mystic Rangers for one, alicorns for another, Keybearers, Beacon kids, and the Agrabanians. That leaves Stork, Papyrus, and Yuffie."

"I'll go with Nora!" Yuffie burst out. She then hoped no one would pay any mind to how definitively she had screamed her choice; no one did.

"I'VE NEVER HAD TO PICK FROM THIS MANY FRIENDS TO GO WITH BEFORE!" Papyrus realized. "I BELIEVE I SHALL GO WITH…" He spun round and round in circles like a top, making a point of not looking at his surroundings. When he halted, he extended a hand, pointing at the person in front of him. "YOU! SORA!"

"I'm with Sora too," Stork decided.

"Should we really split up without any way to communicate?" Riku wondered out loud. "If any one of us finds Even or runs into trouble, we need to be able to call everyone else."

"Got it covered!" Genie held out a hand, fanning out five small hand mirrors. "Magic mirrors! Perfect for communication! Now, if you add three people to our new Friends, Family, and Heroic Allies plan, you get the fourth completely free!"

Sora, Ruby, Aladdin, Luna, and Nick each took a mirror. "That's more like it," Sora muttered as he stored the mirror away using the same technique Kairi had used to carry her sketchbook.

"We must hurry," Luna insisted.

Sora, Riku, Kairi, Stork, and Papyrus went one way. Ruby, Jaune, Nora, Ren, and Yuffie another. Cadance and Luna another. Aladdin, Jasmine, Abu, Sadira, and Genie another. And Nick, Vida, Madison, Xander, and Chip another.

Sora's band of five headed upward. "If I was an evil villain…" Sora began.

"Can't see that ever happening," Kairi joked.

"Let's face it," Stork added. "The only person here who I'd have a harder time believing going evil is Papyrus. Actually, the only person here who'd go evil is probably me."

"You'd be surprised," Riku replied.

"What," Stork asked, "you have blood on your hands?"
"Some," Riku replied. "Yours?"

"A little."

"TELL US MORE ABOUT THIS EVEN," Papyrus suggested. "WHAT EXACTLY ARE WE LOOKING FOR?"

"Well, we're looking for someone blond and very tall, with green eyes," Kairi answered. "But if you want to know what he was really LIKE…I didn't know him for all that long when I was younger. And I barely got to know him again in the Restoration Committee. But he was very strict, and he had a short temper. He was NEVER sentimental. He was also VERY smart. It's a close call between whether he or Ienzo read more books. Even knew a little bit about everything."

"I remember him better as Vexen," Riku volunteered. "Back then, he was cold, literally and figuratively. He saw everyone as part of his grand experiment. He was smug, and even though he didn't have a heart, I think he felt the closest thing he could feel to joy when he outsmarted someone or beat them in a fight."

"But that was him as a Nobody," Kairi added. "Things have changed now. HE'S changed. He always was a part of my Radiant Garden family, and that's what he is now. If Ienzo or I was captured by Maleficent, he'd be coming to save us, the same way we're doing for him."

"I DO HOPE WE FIND HIM," Papyrus said solemnly.

"I'm starting to think that's not likely," Stork sighed. "It's a miracle any of the other Storm Hawks survived Maleficent. If she wanted him dead, then he's d – "

Papyrus elbowed Stork hard in the stomach, and Stork realized what he was doing. "D…efinitely got a chance," he corrected. "A small chance, but a chance."

"I know what you meant," Kairi said rather mournfully, "but thank you anyway."

A muffled voice suddenly sounded from beyond a closed door: "Hello? HELLO! Who's out there? Somebody, help me!"

"SOMEONE NEEDS OUR HELP!" Papyrus cried, turning toward the door.

Stork seized him by the shoulders. "That is DEFINITELY a trap!"

"We have to take the chance anyway!" Sora said as he rushed past, throwing open the door.

A long chamber lay beyond, with a tall, thick sparkling crystal reaching from floor to ceiling at the far end. Within that crystal, a figure was trapped, pounding on the inside of the stone with a fist and looking ever more worried.

"EVEN!" Kairi cried, bolting toward the crystal; Sora, Riku, Papyrus, and Stork followed.

"Kairi?" Even said in shock, ceasing his banging on the stone. "Is it really you?"

"It's me," Kairi confirmed, placing a hand on the outside of the crystal. "I'm here. I came to save you."

"Thank goodness," Even sighed. "But what about Maleficent's allies? How did you make it past them?"

"With a little luck and some good friends," Kairi said with a smile.

"If I'd have known you'd try to invade the Black Sands to save me…" Even shook his head. "I suppose there's no sense in worrying about you. You're already here." He put his own hand up on the inside of the crystal, matching the position of Kairi's on the outside. "And you're safe."

"How are we supposed to get you out of there?" Sora asked.

"It's very simple, really," Even explained, lowering his hand. "This is a Crystal of Ix. It is designed for the sole purpose of holding anyone or anything with a fair amount of magic in it. I'm afraid my ice powers made this an optimal prison for me. There is a very simple incantation to let me out, but unfortunately, I can't use it on myself. One of you will have to cast it. It will be a simple matter, though."

"Tell us!" Kairi urged.

"Wait a minute," Stork interrupted before Even could open his mouth again. "Can we have a…Keybearer-Papyrus-Stork conference for a second?"

"I don't see why that's necessary," Even remarked.

"Why can't we just let him out?" Sora asked.

"I will TELL you in the CONFERENCE," Stork said with gritted teeth, making a jerking motion with his head toward the far wall of the room.

Sora, Kairi, Riku, and Papyrus followed him toward that wall, where Stork spoke in a hushed tone. "Okay, that guy is nothing like what Kairi just described," he hissed. "Didn't you just say Even was supposed to be strict, short-tempered, and not sentimental?"

"He is acting a little weird for Even," Sora realized. "But being Maleficent's prisoner would bring that side out of anyone."

"I'm not so sure," Riku countered. "Something about this isn't right. Stork's onto something. Even doesn't sound like himself at all."

"ARE YOU SUGGESTING IT ISN'T HIM?" Papyrus asked.

"Who else could it be?" Sora added.

"I don't know!" Stork hissed. "But I'm still one hundred percent certain this is a trap, and if we let him out, we're about to seal our horrible, horrible fate!"

"There are plenty of spells that could make anyone look like someone else," Riku added.

"A prisoner of Maleficent?" Sora countered. "Why would one of our enemies be locked up inside a crystal? Why would they need US to let them out?"

"I don't know!" Stork reiterated. "All I know is a trap when I see one!"

"I can sense something wrong," Riku added. "There's too much Darkness in this place."

"Of course something's wrong!" Sora told him. "This is one of Maleficent's strongholds, and it used to be Mozenrath's! There's no way there WOULDN'T be Darkness here!"

"I don't think we should let him out," Riku stated.

"What do you want to do instead?" Sora asked. "Just leave him? What if it is the real Even, and we'd be abandoning him?"
"Well…I…" Riku didn't have an answer for that.

"I SAY WE LET HIM OUT!" Papyrus emphasized.

"Two for, two against," Stork counted up. "Kairi?" He already knew, however, what she was going to say.

"We have to let him out," Kairi stated firmly. "The only reason he's acting weird is because he's afraid. We can't just leave him behind."

Stork sighed. "All right. Just don't say I didn't warn you."

"What are you blabbering about over there?" Even barked. "Hurry up and free me!"

"That does sound more like the Even we know," Riku admitted.

They turned back to the crystal. "What should we do?" Kairi asked.

"Lay your hand on the crystal," Even commanded. "The incantation is 'Ixtabor.'"

Meanwhile, Aladdin, Jasmine, Genie, and Sadira, with Abu riding on Aladdin's shoulder, crept through the lower levels of the citadel. A sudden movement ahead startled all of them.

"Don't worry," Cadance said as she and Luna came into view, horns aglow. "It's only us."

"We felt as though it made the most sense for a dungeon for prisoners to be located in the basement," Luna added.

"Good call," Aladdin said with a nod. He looked to a small locked door, inset with a metal grate, in the adjacent wall. "I think you're onto something."

Abu quickly fished a lockpick from his vest, scrambling to the door. As soon as he inserted the pick, he was wracked with a powerful magical shock.

"ABU!" the others cried as the monkey fell limply to the ground.

Abu put up a hand and squeaked something that sounded like "I'm okay."

"There's no use trying to get through that with any ordinary lockpick," a nasal voice sounded from the other side. "There are at least three layers of magic keeping us in here."

"It can't be," Jasmine said softly.

"Someone you know?" Luna asked.

"Someone they KNOW?" the voice parroted. "Why, only one of their greatest archfoes! None other than Mechanicles, greatest of the great Greek geniuses! As well as his imbecilic past cohort."

"Hey!" another voice barked. "NOBODY calls me a COHORT!"

A deep voice replied, "It simply means an acquaintance. I would take more offense to 'imbecilic.'"

"No way," Sadira said, stunned.

"More of your enemies?" Cadance asked.

"Abis Mal and Haroud Hazi Bin," Jasmine confirmed. "All three of them have tried to take over or destroy Agrabah more times than any of us can count."

"I'm here, too," another voice sounded.

"Nobody CARES about you!" Abis Mal barked. "I still don't even know what you're doing in here with the rest of us! Did you ever even try to take over Agrabah ONCE?"
"I tried stealing from it multiple times," the fourth voice recounted. "Not to mention being contracted to steal the Sultan himself."

"You're a disgrace," Mechanicles snapped. "Highly unmemorable. I can't even be bothered to remember your name."

"FOR THE LAST TIME, IT IS AMIN DAMOOLA!"

"These enemies of Agrabah seem to all be named after very bad puns," Cadance whispered to Luna.

"All right, what's the trick here?" Genie asked. "How is you being locked up down here supposed to kill us all THIS time?"

"This isn't one of OUR plans!" Mechanicles insisted. "This is the result of a failed attempt to dethrone Maleficent! We forged the grandest alliance of thieves and conquerors ever seen in the Seven Deserts! But look what's become of us!"

"There's a bunch more of us down here," Abis Mal spat. "Bet that makes ya feel all smug, Aladdin. All but four of your worst enemies locked up so you don't have to do any of the dirty work."

"All but four?" Aladdin repeated. "Jafar, Mozenrath…who else?"

"Jafar?" Amin said in a panic. "JAFAR? I thought he was dead!"

"Who do you think has been patrolling the cells since the takeover, idiot?" Abis Mal snapped.

"I had thought four seemed like a high number…" Amin muttered.

"Ayam Aghoul deserted us when we were overpowered," Haroud explained. "His wives, however, were captured and remain in these very cells. I can imagine they're none too happy with him."

"Wait," Sadira interrupted. "So did you happen to see if there was anybody else down here? Like maybe a…"

"A tall, blond man," Luna recalled from a description Kairi had given her. "He wields the power of ice."

"Say wha?" Abis Mal replied. "There's nobody down here but us so-called scourges of the Seven Deserts."

"Who's the fourth person who got away?" Jasmine asked.

"She didn't get away," Mechanicles explained. "She was simply imprisoned somewhere else with higher anti-magical security. Somewhere in the upper levels, I believe."

"This better not be who I think it is," Aladdin stated, feeling his stomach sinking.

Light shimmered around Even as he stepped free of his crystal prison. "Thank you, Kairi," he said, sounding quite grateful. "I knew I could count on you."

"I'm just glad you're okay!" Kairi wrapped Even in a tight embrace.

"As am I," Even insisted, his fingers reaching up to weave into Kairi's long, red hair. "As am I."

"Sora!" Sora's mirror cried out with Aladdin's voice. "Sora, can you hear me?"

Sora brought out the mirror, looking at a very panicked Aladdin. "What's going on?"
"There's a powerful evil spirit locked away somewhere up there," Aladdin explained. "She'll use any trick she can to get you to set her free. Be careful!"

Too late, Kairi felt the body in her arms change shape. The hand in her hair tightened its grip, latching onto her locks and yanking. Kairi let go, startled by the sudden pain; she was tossed aside, thrown with immense force against the wall by her hair.

"I knew I could count on you," a new voice said, a deep female voice. "That is, to be sentimental enough to fall for that trick!"

Sora, Riku, Papyrus, and Stork all flinched, backing away one step by instinct. Sora and Riku's blades leapt to their hands; Papyrus called several bones to hover in midair before him. Stork merely quivered, frozen in place. Kairi looked up to see the true form of the one who had disguised herself as Even: a tall, anthropomorphic black cat clothed in a bodice and skirt of crimson.

"Who are you?" Kairi asked, somewhere between terrified and livid.

"My name is Mirage!" the cat cackled. "Embodiment of all that is evil! I must say, that crystal was uncomfortable. I suppose I owe you my thanks…but I'm not going to give them to you. Instead, I'm going to let you know the hard way just how bad of an idea letting me out was."

Sora and Riku charged; Papyrus surrounded each of them in a circling wall of defensive bones. As both boys struck out with their Keyblades, Mirage swiped the air with her hand, making a great green claw mark of energy that threw both Sora and Riku back across the room.

"We're dead," Stork muttered, quivering even harder. "We're dead we're dead we're dead – "

"Oh, even I know taking on three Keybearers is a bad move," Mirage commented. "But I know someone that will make short work of you." She snapped her fingers.

Five large crimson cats, each as high as Mirage's waist, manifested out of thin air. Their fur was aflame, and they yowled with hunger. Cackling madly, Mirage vanished.

Kairi scrambled to her feet, calling up her Keyblade. One of the flame-covered cats lunged, and she knocked it back with her weapon. Sora and Riku had also regained their balance, just in time to fend off attacks from two more of the beasts. Papyrus flicked bones left and right, calling up walls of them to stymie the cats.

However, it was Stork they seemed most interested in. Three of them backed him up against a wall, menacing him with swiping claws and snapping jaws. Stork pressed himself against the wall so hard he wished he could simply be absorbed into it, trying to figure out how to attack something that was perpetually on fire when he had no weapon. He had an aerosol can of bug spray tucked away on his person, but he knew that would only make the flames worse.

He then observed a horrifying phenomenon: the cats that had him cornered were growing in size. They became nearly as tall as the room itself before reaching out with massive paws to swipe at Sora, Riku, Kairi, Papyrus, and Stork.

"Sora!" Riku yelled. "Kairi! Blizzard, now!"

All three Keybearers pointed their weapons at one of the large cats, screaming, "ICE!"

Frost and chips of ice hailed upon the cat, but this had no effect on its fire. It charged Papyrus, who turned and bolted, knowing one strike with intent to kill could spell his doom. The cat swung a paw toward him.

Riku sped into the paw's path, taking the brunt of it; he was flung against the wall, flames lighting up his clothes.

"RIKU!" Sora, Kairi, Papyrus, and Stork yelled.

Riku quickly doused the fire upon his clothes; Blizzard seemed to work on the flames once they were separated from the cats. "GO!" he yelled, launching into a Dark Splicer just long enough to make a mad dash for the exit.

As he, Sora, Papyrus, Stork, and Kairi charged into the hall, Sora's mirror was suddenly filled with voices crying out. He held up the mirror, saying in a panic, "What's happening? What's wrong?"
The perspective began with Nick: "We're surrounded by cats! They're on fire! We can't fight them! Vida and Maddie already tried to use wind and water on them, but nothing worked!"

"We have cats too!" Ruby yelled, the mirror switching to her perspective. "Our weapons don't work on them!"

"Only one thing does!" Aladdin announced, his face filling the mirror. "They feed on fear! We have to not be afraid!"

"NOT BE AFRAID?" Stork yelped, not realizing he'd said it at the same time as Chip and Jaune.

"That's it?" Sora replied. "That's easy!"

By that time, the giant cats, as well as their smaller companions, had burst through the wall, barreling down the hall. Sora turned and stood still. "I'M NOT AFRAID OF YOU!" he yelled, pointing his blade at them.

The cats skidded to a halt and began to grow smaller.

"Nice one, Sora!" Riku complimented. He took his place next to Sora: "He's not afraid, and neither am I!"

"Me either!" Kairi stated as she joined them.

"ME EITHER!" Papyrus added.

But the cats knew exactly where to get their fix. Now reduced to their original size, they leapt completely over this wall of four, making a beeline for Stork. As they approached him, they began to grow again. One, large enough to hit Stork with a paw, did so, almost doubling in size in the process; Stork was caught by another cat and volleyed right back.

"STORK!" Sora yelled. "YOU HAVE TO NOT BE AFRAID OF – "

"I!" Stork yelled back as he was passed from cat to cat. "KNOW! THAT! OW! I! YEEEEEEP! CAN'T!"

"We have to save him and get out of here!" Riku decided. "They're only going to get stronger off his fear!" He made use of the Darkness once more to splice forward, catching Stork in between volleys and propelling him out of the range of the cats. He quickly doused the flames that Stork had been picking up with a light Blizzard spell.

Kairi and Sora stood on either side of Papyrus, casting Blizzara to either side and forming a pair of ice walls that protected the trio as they barreled after Stork and Riku.

"We can't do it!" Nick yelled through the mirror. "They're getting too powerful!"

"For us too!" Ruby added. "We can't be as not afraid as we'd like to be!"

"We're making a run for it!" Sora informed the rest. "Just get to the door!"

"What about Even?" Ruby asked.

"He is not here," Luna answered. "We are, of course, taking the word of thieves and destroyers, but it seems to be sound."

More cats sprang up throughout the halls of the citadel. When the group met up at the door, doing a quick head count to make sure none were missing, they took off out the door.

"The magic detectors!" Sora realized. "They're gonna pick us up, and we don't have a plan!"

"I think we have bigger problems," Stork pointed out.

The streets were lined with the fiery cats into the distance; more and more spawned at the behest of Mirage.

"Get ready for a fight!" Nick said, holding out his sword.

"This might actually work to our advantage," Ren realized, looking up.

"HOW?" Jaune and Stork practically shrieked.

"The cats are setting off the crystals," Ren explained. "If they've infested the whole city, that means every crystal is going off and there's nothing to pinpoint us. The cats can be our cover. Which means all we have to worry about…" He cocked both pistols of Stormflower at the cats already approaching. "Is them."

"We'll take a roundabout route anyway!" Jasmine decided. "We can't have Jafar finding us out now!"

"GO!" Sora yelled, and the entire troop charged out to meet the horde of cats and fight past them as quickly as they could.

It took several back alleys and a battle against almost innumerable cats, but soon they were out of the city, and no felines seemed to have shown up outside the city limits. "Looks like they're staying in the Black Sands," Aladdin remarked. He allowed himself a smirk: "That oughta give Jafar something inconvenient to put on his to-do list."

"Let's just get back home!" Sadira insisted.

As the group made haste back to Agrabah, Stork couldn't help but feel as though his fears had sabotaged all of his newfound friends and allies, and he had the sense of being simply rotten, through and through.