Shard
He released his arm from around my neck suddenly. My body, moments before on the verge of unconsciousness, gulped in oxygen thankfully. I wheezed and coughed, stuffing as much of the salty Gotham harbor air into my lungs as possible. Oxygen was the only thing that mattered for several suspended moments, so much so that I didn't even feel The Joker move away from me.
When I opened my tear-filled eyes again, he was flicking some switches on the dashboard of the boat calmly as if nothing had happened. I was content to let him forget me for a moment as I recovered and processed what he said.
You belong to me.
Nausea clenched my stomach.
And isn't that just too bad for you?
It was too fucking bad for me that, out of all the people in Gotham, this insane pervert had somehow become fixated on me. What were the chances, the odds? That, out of the hundreds of thousands of us Gothamites, we would cross paths, let alone interact enough for him to think twice of me?
I thought of what Blake had said a hundred times over: I'm a tragedy magnet.
And then, when The Joker was getting to the climax of his obsession with me by raping me, I made the game more interesting for him by nearly killing him and getting him locked away. He's had years of careful thought behind bars to find out the best way to punish me.
The boat pressed forward with a quiet snarl from the engine. I did my best to sit up so I could face him. He was standing with his back to me, piloting the craft that would surely take me to my doom.
If I could find someway to untie myself when his guard is down and he's facing away from me…
I closed my eyes and calmed my still-hectic breathing from the assault that had just taken place.
Focus.
I pulled hard against at the chains behind my back. There was no give, no hope of breaking the chains without my toolbelt. My fingers were entirely numb, surely purple by now considering how tight the chains were.
Maybe I can use the numbness to my advantage.
My hands were exposed, the restraints pulled tight around my wrists. But my hands were small. The only real obstruction to just slipping my hand up was my thumb.
Are my thumbs really numb enough that I could break them without crying out? Only one way to find out…
Pushing down as hard as I could with my right hand, I simultaneously pulled my left elbow up awkwardly behind my back for extra leverage. I felt resistance, though I couldn't feel the chains catching on my thumb directly because of the numbness.
Just pull a couple times, as hard as you can, and maybe the thumb will break.
"Bla-aaaze," a taunting voice interrupted my concentration.
I opened my eyes instinctively to see The Joker sneering at me over his shoulder. He was driving straight, though our momentum had slowed considerably as we skidded along the Gotham harbor.
I realized my mistake as soon as I made it – my instinctive reaction to my name.
"You're slipping, cupcake-kah. Don't make me regret keeping you conscious."
He studied me curiously for a moment, a challenge in his eyes, before readdressing the open harbor to his front.
Glaring at the back of his head, I made a painful, jerky movement with my wrist and heard a dull thud that echoed up my arm. I clenched my teeth as roiling dull pain began to simmer and mix with a harsh pinprick tingling in that thumb. I managed to remain quiet. There was the tiniest bit of give in the chains now that the obstruction of my thumb was eliminated.
I didn't get to explore my new hope quite yet, though. The boat shuddered to a sharp halt, the inertia pitching me forward again. I readjusted to see The Joker securing the boat to a small wooden dock with a thick rope.
Oh, god, what does he have planned now? What does he hope to gain from all of this? Holding me prisoner like last time or killing me in some spectacular fashion?
The Joker extended his arms overhead in an overexaggerated stretch before revolving to face my huddled form. He was still standing on the dock, hovering over me.
"You look like you're in the mood for a romantic walk while we wait for our chariot… So far tonight you've been easier to predict than water being wet," he leaped back into the boat rather gracefully considering his newfound bulk, "Let's see if you can surprise me." His voice was low, lascivious.
He lurched forward suddenly, his hands reaching for me. I was ready for him with my legs slanted his way. I brought my joined feet up hard into his sternum when he leaned down and they impacted with a huff from him. His huff turned into a hyena-like laugh halfway through, his voice echoing strangely in the shallow boat.
"I keep forgetting about you're a halfway decent fighter now. That oughta spice things up a bit."
"Untie me and I'll show you how decent of a fighter I am."
He cupped his chin, drumming his long fingers on the edge of his taunting Glasgow smile, "And, what? Have you piss all over my parade this early in the night? Oh, no, baby, our time to tango isn't quite here yet," he stood again sharply, a shade of darkness touching his gaze though his wild grin remained, "When it's time, I'm going to let you fight me with everything you have in you."
My eyes narrowed at him. He always had a plan… "And what would be the point of that?"
I stiffened my legs, trying to bring them between us so I could kick him again. A long arm shot out and restrained my legs at the thigh. He made no other movement toward me as he spoke, his nearly-there smile filling me with dread, "When I'm ready for you to know why, you'll know why, toots. In the meantime," his hands gripped my waist hard. Before I could react, he was slinging me over his shoulder like a ragdoll. I growled, wriggling as much as I could, "I've got us a reservation for a dinner date."
I felt him step onto the deck, his movement jostling me and digging his hard shoulder into my gut. My wriggling wasn't accomplishing much and the bastard was walking on completely unburdened by the 115-pound squirming human on his back. With no other option, I sunk my teeth into his back as hard as I could through his stale-tasting shirt. I forced my jaw to clench as hard as I could. I nearly jumped as I felt a tear and tasted his blood seep through the fabric into my mouth.
"Ooooo," he cooed laughingly to my horror.
He gave a harsh slap to my ass and chortled again when I howled in frustration. I removed my jaws from the flesh of his back when I felt his slap turn into a caress of my bum, which was situated unfortunately right next to his face. "Save it for the bedroom, Bat Babe. You should know by now that things like that have the opposite-than-intended effect on Big Bad over here."
I was powerless to stop his hand as he continued groping my bottom. When I continued to struggle, he murmured, "Mmmmm," before dipping his hand between my thighs.
"Get you fucking hands off me!"
"You stop, I stop," he jeered cheerfully.
I grumbled in humiliation and forced myself to stop wriggling. His hand fell away from me and he giggled lowly, "Good girl."
I watched his feet meet pavement instead of gravel, trying to force myself to think ahead instead of drowning in the horror of the moment. Where the fuck are we going?
His brown shoes crunched on for a few beats calmly before he commented lowly, "I've always kept my word with you, haven't I, Blaze?"
"I don't know who that is."
"Hah! You don't get to play games with me like that, sweet pea. Not after I felt those telltale scars on your hips on the boat."
"Do you know how many times I've been stabbed? There's hardly anywhere on me without a scar."
"How about that bottom lip, hm? Or did you think the lipstick covered it up?"
"I don't know what you're talking about! Let me go now before I manage to break out of these chains and –"
"Remember, Blaze. I don't like lairs."
"I don't care what you like."
"You should, honey bun, because I'm the man you're going to spend the rest of your life with and if you don't make me happy there may be consequences-sah."
"What?!" I snapped, hysteria mounting in my chest again. What the fuck is he talking about? The man I'm going to spend the rest of my life with?
"You heard me, toots. But don't try prying an inch more from me, I've already given you a glimpse of my cards and we're barely in the first round."
He didn't have to worry too much about that. My upset stomach had me wishing I could know less, not more.
"Oh, good! We're here!"
Light was bleeding into the dampness on the gravel below me. Light was bad. Light meant civilization… victims for The Joker to torment along with me.
Before my thoughts could crescendo to full-blown hysteria, he shifted his weight forward and placed me on my feet. Blood rushed down from my face dizzyingly. I looked around to see that he had set me down on the stoop of a late-night diner by the docks. The diner was in an aluminum trailer and the neon red signage in the few windows harkened back to a simpler time in Gotham. My eyes caught movement inside and I wondered how many people were inside chowing down and completely unaware of the terrorist waiting outside the front door to rain hell upon them.
I regarded The Joker again with another pang of dread. His fingers were at my navel, reaching toward my zipper. I tensed, but he only began to slowly zip my jumpsuit back up to my neck.
When he met my gaze, his eyes were lidded. He smiled a lustful smile, his pupils swelling as his eyes fell to my lips. He was close, too close, his chin inches away from the crown of my head. I moved away from him, but could only lean against the diner door behind me. He stretched a long arm out against the wall towards my back and sneered down his nose at me as he finished zipping me up.
"Don't want the lovely patrons of this little rusty spoon to get an eyeful of what's mine, do I?"
"What are we doing here? Your issue is with me, not these people."
"Issue? Make no mistake, little red. Your stubbornness, as boring as it is, is the axis on which my plan tonight rests," his fingers pulled a curl of my hair from my temple and twirled it. "Your stubbornness opens you up to so many more games. It's not an issue for me, it's my biggest aid," a hint of a smile touched his lips as he tucked the strand of hair back.
"But why? You could take off my mask whenever you want? Why involve others?"
"You know me well enough to know the answer, sweet pea. I want to see if I can iron out some flaws in this character you've crafted, might as well have some fun while I'm at it."
He reached around me, his hand aiming for the door handle.
"Wait - !"
Before I could utter more than that word, his hand clamped down on my mouth. His palm smelled of sweat and metal. His fingers pressed hard against my lips, forcing my breath in and out of my nose in harsh gasps. His black gaze glowered down on me as I tried to twist my head away to no avail. I grumbled into his palm as he forced my face forward to stare up at him. He seemed to be waiting for me to accept that I wouldn't be able to wriggle out and face him.
His mood shifts were dizzying – one moment he was darkly giddy, the next genuinely enthusiastic like he was reuniting with an old friend, the next like a starved wild dog.
A hint of... amusement - no, that wasn't it - pleasure? fell back across his features when I eventually did give up my struggling. Hand still on my mouth, he leaned his head down to press his forehead into mine. I growled against his palm at the gesture, but could do little else except listen as he snarled intimately, quietly, "Do not. Ever. Tell me to wait again. You know what you have to do for me to stop. Let me hear your name. Before things get messy."
His hand fell away from my face. He let me shake my head away from his and pulled his face back to regard me more fully.
"What if I don't? What are you going to do to these people?"
His eyes fell from my eyes down. He bit his lip, pupils swelling again, his thumb touching the throbbing bruise on my jaw absentmindedly. He was so much more... earnest than I'd expected. When my mind had rebelled against me to imagine this moment, it could have only fathomed a furious beast let out of its cage. Instead, there was a softness to him that I couldn't place. Of course, he was still a sadistic monster. I studied him, trying to put a name to his expression as he studied me in turn.
"I like the look of my mark on you," he murmured, breathy and earnest in his distraction.
I wretched my face away from his mockingly-loving ministrations instantly, snapping back to reality. That earned a sharp backhanded slap from him. My head flew to the side and into the metal door. It wasn't the hardest hit I'd ever taken, but enough to make a warm trickle of blood fall from my nose over my lips as my gaze settle again on him.
"What happens to them? If I don't say it?" my voice was rougher, my vision skewing slightly when I returned it to him.
He chuckled lightly to himself, distracted yet again, as he absently watched the drop of blood fall down the bottom half of my face. His tongue shot out against his lips again as he raised his eyes back to mine with some effort. That weird expression was back and I only half-listened to his words as I tried to place his strangeness, "You'll see, because I already know your answer. You wear the mask and parade around like some big hero – but when push comes to shove, you'll choose you and your boy toy's life over theirs. It's going to take a toddler dangling by the ankle over a deep frier before you actually say the words that we both know you're going to say: I'm Blaze Plissken. Say it now, and you and I can keep it a secret. Just 'tween us girls-sah. Say it later, and the diner full of people will hear it too and countless others will get hurt for the same end result. Can you imagine the going rate for the name of the Batwoman? Do you really want to see how much these people care about you, after all you've done for them?"
Fuck.
As much as I hated to admit it, he had me cornered. Was there any part of him that still doubted my true name? Any hope of escaping from this as anonymous as I thought I was at the beginning of the night? I doubted it. It seemed as though the second he landed his eyes on me tonight, any harbored doubts in his mind died. But to tell him my name so directly meant that he would know Blake's as well. He would presumably use this information to have Blake killed, or worse.
But, then again… he seemed to have heavily suspected our identities from the jump. And, yet, there were no news broadcasts of his gruesome face sharing our secrets with the world, nor masked men at our doorstep. Perhaps it wasn't his plan to reveal our identities, after all. Perhaps he wanted our identities confirmed as leverage over me to accomplish another, less concrete goal. My thoughts swirled around his statement from earlier: the man you're going to spend the rest of your life with. Was this how he hoped to accomplish that, to keep me as his slave? With the threat of exposing Blake's identity?
"What happens, if I say what you want to hear?"
His eyes danced across my face for a moment. His head bobbed toward a big SUV at the corner of the sparse parking lot, "See that car? You and I will drive away from here and the last thing you will have ever done as Batwoman would be to save these people from me."
I studied him through narrowed eyes. The silliness in his demeanor had apparently faded, replaced with a halfway-normal man for a moment. I tried to look past the dominating things about him, like how he hovered over me and intimidated. I tried to look down to search for guns, knives. I knew of the one he held in his pocket from earlier, but he didn't appear to have a gun anywhere on him unless it was masked somehow by his vest. I was grateful that he wasn't wearing his big purple coat, which would have made it so much more difficult to size up his preparedness.
"You really think you'll be able to hold up a diner with just a tiny little knife? Do you know what the people of Gotham have been through in the past decade? Probably everyone in that diner is packing."
He split a condescending smile, less-than-charmed by my tone, "You're just like Batman one-point-oh, cupcake. Always assuming that the whole truth is apparent at first glance. Should I call my boys out from their meal inside? They're at a table near the back exit, assault rifles tucked into their backpacks, waiting for me to enter with you."
I couldn't stop myself from regarding him with wide eyes, dread trickling down my spine, "You'd go this far just to force me to say a name?"
His smile was cold when he heard the disbelief in my voice. His hand gripped my chin and, in my shock at his next words, I forgot to pull away, "I'd go further."
"Why?"
"To teach my little peach another lesson," I flinched at the unexpected vitriol in his tone and extra pressure that he exerted on my chin. He seemed suddenly angry and I wondered why. I remembered our last "lesson" in the boat and didn't think that I liked the sound of another.
"Why can't you just leave me alone? Find some freak that actually wants to play this game with you?" I spat, riding my own sudden surge of anger.
His fingers tightened around my chin again at my words and his black eyes narrowed, glowing with the red from the signs, "You've brought this storm on yourself, there's no bargaining out of it now, sweet cheeks."
"But why?" I demanded almost desperately, "Why go through all this trouble?"
His smile was cold, "I'd go further to make you realize that you can't hide from me in any sense of the word."
"What?" I murmured ineloquently, the wind ripped away from sails in a flash of regret at having pursued this line of questioning.
He continued, "Not physically, not in name, not any part of yourself. This is the second lesson in this new life of yours: when you lie to or disobey me, other people will suffer and you will eventually do what I want anyways."
I nearly screamed, my mind spinning in a sickening eddy.
He must have been stupid as well as insane to think that I could ever be forced to go along with such a thing again. Does he know I'm fucking Batwoman? I'm not a victim anymore! Even in that moment, I felt the chains begin to give at my back and knew that I was moments from slipping out of them.
His thumb began to stroke my chin as he gave me a chilling smirk. I worked to wipe the horror that I felt twist my face without much success.
I finally had the presence of mind to rip my chin away from his hand and snap, "You're fucking crazy if you think I'm going to entertain this – this delusion that you can have some kind of power over me for any length of time! You think I give a shit about your fucking lessons, about your ultimatums?! You can't expect - !"
Without warning, his hand closed around my throat. My head banged hard into the metal door to my back for a second time. My vision flashed white for a moment. As the world filled back in from the whiteness, The Joker was half-snarling, half-smiling right in my face. My feet fought to find purchase on the ground as I struggled to breathe. I looked down to see that The Joker had lifted me a full foot off the pavement with one hand so I matched his height. His hand was clenching harder still around my neck and my hypoxic mind imagined myself being decapitated by his hand alone. The strength in his hands made me realize that he was only using some of his newfound power as he strangled me with his arm on the boat. One twist, and he could snap my neck. Only a few moments more of this, and I would be incapacitated.
I felt a curl of pure fear at his unexpected strength. How is he doing this?
The snarl melted away as he saw the fear play out on my face. He laughed a very natural laugh, not some dramatic facsimile, as he enjoyed my reaction to his almost-superhuman strength.
He stepped closer to my struggling form, so close I feared he would kiss me and I felt his breath was across my gaping lips, "Scared already, little red? Ready to say uncle?"
I shook my head mechanically as I desperately jerked my arms behind my back in an attempt to free myself from the chains. Even in my weakened and immobilized state, I couldn't let him think that he had won.
At my denial, his lip curled and his hand gripped impossibly harder around my throat, "Then it looks like it's going to be a bad night for the diners, doesn't it? Let's see how many of these innocent souls I'll need to maim before you say what we both already know."
I shook my head again violently, causing him to pause again as he went for the door handle. His attention flicked back to me. A small smile that I doubted he was aware of curled his lips as his eyes touched back to my lips and then back up to my eyes smugly.
"What's this? A change in heart from Batwoman?"
I nodded emphatically, my vision beginning to dot black now from the lack of oxygen. Anything to make him let go.
Finally, he released me. Without his hand to support me, I fell onto my side with a painful impact to my left ribs. My fall moved my arms in such a way that I felt the chains give slightly, a fact I barely processed as I coughed and sputtered in an attempt to restart my brain. I was sure I would have brain damage from the many times he'd strangled me that night.
When I opened my teary eyes, I was staring at The Joker's brown shoes and patterned green socks. When I looked up, he was looking down at me coolly, hands in his pockets, not a care in the world.
"You fucker," I wheezed, barely audible. I moved my arms in such a way that I felt the chains give even more. A few more movements and the chains would fall with a heavy clatter to the ground, giving me away.
To give myself the best chance, I needed him to be within arm's reach. My legs would still be bound so my chances of getting the best of him would be slim. Especially with his insane newfound strength. But I had to try. But how to get him closer?
"Freak!" I screamed up at him before I could think it through too much. I knew that would garner a reaction, my only hope was that his reaction would bring him closer.
Instead of grabbing me as I'd hoped, he leveled a hard kick to my ribs. What little air I managed to build up in my lungs left me with a sickening crunch as at least one of my ribs surely broke.
Well, that didn't work…
His voice was sickly sweet and lightheartedly exasperated, "Where's this little outburst coming from, little red? I thought we were getting somewhere?"
He bounced down on his knees as I struggled to catch my breath again, this time twice as painfully. He was closer now, but I needed him as close as possible.
His voice was playful and I felt his fingers sink into my hair. He lightly tugged on my hair, "Are you going to make me ask again?" A fat raindrop fell on my jaw. Another on my back. Within moments, a light rain began to fall on Gotham.
I pretended to be more hurt than I was, grinding my face into the dampening pavement for a moment as I curled in on myself. I muttered something breathlessly into the ground.
He chuckled, his voice taunting, "What's that, little red? Ready to give me what I want? Keep resisting and I might just decide to blow the place sky high to see the failure in your eyes." I felt his weight shift forward next to me as he leaned closer to better hear my reply over the rain.
Does he have the placed rigged to blow up too? Oh, god…
With one movement, I wretched my arms painfully from their shackles and hooked my arms around the back of his neck. I caught a satisfying moment surprise on his face before I ripped him forward in a faceplant on the cement, aided by his imbalanced leaning.
I scrambled awkwardly to aim several more brutal fists into the side of his head facing me. I grabbed the fallen chains from behind my back and moved to put my body on top of his.
I was just reaching forward to slide the chain under his neck to strangle him when he finally had a moment to react. He cracked an elbow back directly into my nose and I yelped at the unexpected bite of pain to my already-damaged nose. When I opened my eyes, The Joker had flipped over onto his back and had just enough leverage to lunge forward towards me. He straddled me and cocked a fist back.
I growled as I barely deflected his punch with my elbow and clapped my cupped palms into his ears in the same motion. At that, he gave a short grunt before snapping out his hand to catch one of mine with unexpected speed. His grip was iron, twisting the bones in my forearm. In an attempt to redirect him from breaking my arm, I cracked my free hand into his exposed gut. His body curled in at the hit and he huffed. His huff soon morphed into laughter as he regarded my wild form beneath him.
I found myself staring, shocked, up at him for a moment as I processed his laughter. That weird expression was back on his face again. A genuine smile twisted his gruesome scars up and there was a warmth to his gaze. A horrible realization began to form in the back of my mind like the beginning stages of cancer. Trying to ignore the realization I felt fighting for my attention, I used the arm in his grip to yank him toward me suddenly. Instead of the gut, this time I punched him as hard as I could in the throat. Or, at least I tried to, before his other hand shot out and caught my fist in another bone-crushing grip before it could land.
Instead of looking angry or deadly as you would expect a man in a fight would look, this fucker was laughing again. Right in my face, too. As I pulled back on his grips on my limbs, he leaned forward and pinned my arms to the dampening gravel on either side of my head.
His gruesome grinning face hovered above me as I thought through my escape strategy. Rain fell from his hair onto my neck and cheeks for a moment. He stared down at me, biting his lip as his laughter simmered down to a chuckle. He had this look in his eyes, like Blake did when he managed to pin me down when we wrestled. There was a genuine warmth there in his gaze.
The cancer, this horrible realization that I had tried to choke down into the back of my mind, sprang suddenly forward as undeniable fact.
This expression that I had caught glimpses of throughout the night was not mocking, it was not joking, it was not false for the sake of fun in his mind. The look on his face was fondness.
Fondness. My mind spat the word as I processed it like a woodchipper would a tree. I dissected it from every angle, tried to reel back and reconsider, but in the end I was sure.
The Joker was fond of me.
This is a nightmare.
My analytical mind screeched to a halt as I began to process this new development. Is this how he expresses his fondness? In his mind, is he considering all of this romantic somehow?
Oh, god.
I have to get out of here.
He was tipping forward, bringing his face toward mine, eyes lidded. He was trying to kiss me.
That was enough to break me from my shock. I snapped my forehead into his nose as hard and fast as I could. I was rewarded with a satisfying crack and the release of one of my arms.
I whirled my elbow around hard and impacted him right on the jaw. His grip on my other arm loosened, but not enough for me to wretch it free. For good measure, I brought my knees up hard into his groin. He rolled to the side with a giggling huff that made me want to peel the skin from his face.
Fondness.
"Is this funny to you?! You sick asshole!"
I lunged at him, pressing my arm down as hard as I could into his windpipe. He was still fucking smiling as I snarled into his reddening face. He still had that awful look in his eyes, that sickening fond look that made me want to scrub my skin raw. I had to look away.
I felt a cold blade kiss my neck. I looked back down at him and paused for a suspended moment. And then, I pressed my arm down even harder in his throat, feeling the blade slice through and likely draw blood.
"Do it. You think I care anymore? Do it!"
His smile widened even more now and his hand not holding the blade touched to the other side of my face affectionately.
I reflexively pulled away from him. He took advantage of the movement by cracking me with a full-strength punch right to the cheek.
White overcame my mind again as my brain resettled in my skull. Fuck, how did he get so strong all of the sudden? I wondered to the vacant blizzard in my mind.
As the white oblivion faded, pain and a whirring kaleidoscope took its place. And then, as the crush of pain dulled, the world filled in around me.
I was sure I had been out only for a second or two. Yet, when I opened my eyes, the whole scene was changed. Though the rain still fell above me, the previously-dreary parking lot was flooded with light. I chanced a look up to see Blake's motorcycle's blinding headlights.
Sounds of fighting were coming from my right. I sluggishly looked over to see my Batman and The Joker locked in a dizzying tussle. Even over the rain and the grunting, I could hear the grind of bones and snaps as flesh hit flesh. The moments I observed of the fight were gutwrenching in their violence. The Joker looked particularly hurt, his arm rubbed raw with what looked like road rash. His vest was open and his shirt much more tattered than a few moments before.
Despite the sickening spinning in my head, I sat up. I was met with a dizzying protest in every muscle and joint in my body. But I didn't have time to hurt.
My feet were still bound with chains. With my hands free, I could now reach down and painfully wretch my feet out of my boots. The chains fell with a clatter just as I heard a strangled scream from their fight. Blake had The Joker in a headlock on the ground. The scream had come from Blake, who's neck was burning red as he put all his strength into suffocating The Joker, the man who had caused him and I so much unhappiness. The Joker, who would bring even more unhappiness if he was allowed to keep breathing.
I slipped my boots back on with fumbling fingers. I started to run over toward The Joker to help finish him off when I remembered. The diner. I looked back to it instinctively and saw hurriedly-moving shadows inside.
"Get them away from here!" Blake screamed, nodding his chin toward the diner. "I've got this!"
I eyed him and The Joker. The Joker was smiling at me again despite Blake's big arm crushing his windpipe. The Joker was almost intentionally still in that moment, barely pulling against Blake's arm.
Something's not right. Why isn't he fighting back more?
But Blake was right. For all intents and purposes, The Joker was subdued for the moment and the patrons of the diner still needed saving.
Or, so I thought until I saw The Joker's hand clutching something small with a black button on the top. His smile was sharkish and I suddenly understood what was so funny to him. I remembered his words from earlier… I might just blow the place sky high… The Joker's thumb flicked up over the button.
I dove toward him, but knew that I would be too late.
His thumb slammed down into the button and I was instantly pitched to the side. The explosion caught me mid-dive toward him and redirected my momentum entirely. I flew back into Blake's motorcycle and felt the handlebars impact my shoulder blades violently. The motorcycle and I clattered to the pavement. I looked up to see the previously-untouched diner in flames, the first lush curls of smoke still swirling up.
"No!" I couldn't help but scream, my voice strangely distant in my ringing ears. The diner was silent in its destruction, no cries of pain from within to say that someone had survived. But I had to hold out hope. Hope that at least not everyone in the diner had to die because of me. If I could save even one of them…
I struggled into standing and was stumbling toward the wreckage when I remembered.
I looked up to see Blake's still body on the pavement. My feet rushed me to him before I could even fully process the sight of him lying in the rubble. I fell on top of him, fighting to not to instinctively scream his name in case anyone was still in earshot. He remained still and unflinching as Gotham rained indifferently on his mask. Both nostrils trickled blood from a recent hit and I wondered if that was how The Joker escaped Blake's hold. There was still a pulse in his neck waiting to reassure me when I pressed.
I looked up to see the SUV that The Joker indicated earlier pulling out of the parking lot. When I looked back down at Blake, his eyes were closed again. I stumbled painfully into standing again and staggered towards the SUV with a surge of indignation. It was stopped just at the edge of the lot.
"Come back, you coward! You're gunna kill all those people and then run away?!"
"Don't worry," a voice interjected from behind me.
I spun around to face The Joker. His silhouette was massive and menacing against the roiling flames and rain to his back. He looked like a demon at the gates of hell, waiting with a smile to welcome me to an excruciating eternity.
"He's just our getaway driver."
With an enraged scream, I launched myself onto him. I didn't have or want my batons. I wanted to kill him with my fists and fists alone. For the murders he just committed without a second thought. For the suffering he caused to my little family. For his smug fucking attitude and the nerve of him to look at me fondly after everything he has done and plans to do.
I spun my newly-freed legs into a furious kick into his chest, which he dodged easily. His arms hung lazily at his side as I struck out against him with my elbow. He evaded that as well and took the opportunity to smack my ass hard as I stumbled from my lost momentum.
His smile was wide despite the bloody marks all over him that must have hurt like hell. I wondered if Blake had hit him with his motorcycle when he saw him standing over me, "Come on, let's play, hellcat," he taunted laughingly.
Seeing red, I screamed as I lunged at him again. This time, I went for a kick to the knees as my fist flew toward him from the other side. My kick landed, albeit without the desired effect as he used the inertia from my punch to catch my wrist and twist my hand behind my back. His warm torso touched to my back as I struggled with gritted teeth.
"You have to make a choice now, cupcake," his voice was low and playful in my ear, as if we were in the midst of a ballroom dance instead of a fight.
I bit down the pained scream that threatened to come out as I felt his considerable strength threaten to snap my arm. I knocked my head back into his chin. He grunted as my head made impact, but didn't let go. I felt his lips go to ear, his head off to the side where I'd have a harder time headbutting him.
He spoke into my ear, his warm breath and words making my stomach twist with nausea, "You get to choose: chase me as I make my getaway or stay to scrape together what's left of your boyfriend and the diner patrons."
Getaway? Has he abandoned his plans for kidnapping me tonight?
"What's in it for you?" I ground out, feeling my bones twist just to the point of nearly breaking inside my arm.
"I changed my mind. I want to see what my little bird does if I let her go free."
I looked over at Blake's comatose form. There was a piece of glass jutting out of his ribs and a chunk of the diner's cement foundation near his head. I wondered which object was responsible for his sudden lapse in consciousness, or if it was a hit from the monster to my back.
"And if I stay?"
Though I was facing away from him, I could feel him smile, "If you stay, then everything is on the table. You'll try to plan ahead of me and it'll be pointless. You'll try to find a way out, but some part of you will know that I can come for you, or him, whenever I want. Come with me now and I won't touch him."
With a furious growl that surprised even me, I grabbed his hair and swept my leg back simultaneously. His weight shifted forward slightly after getting his feet cut out. At the same millisecond, I wretched his upper body over my shoulder and assisted him in a massive flip of his body onto his ass in front of me. He impacted the wet ground with a painful-sounding thump and a huff. Broken glass added insult to injury.
He was momentarily stunned, having hit his head just right against the pavement. I aimed short, lethal kicks to his torso and head, screaming wildly with each blow.
"You won't touch him regardless because I," I aimed a kick at his kidneys, "won't," another kick to the back of his head, "let you!"
I was met with a frustrating lack of reaction on his part, though I knew my blows were powerful. Do these blows even hurt him? He intercepted my foot during its next descent to his smug, now blood-smeared face and looked up at me with excited eyes.
"So, I'll take that as a 'no' for coming with me."
He ripped my boot back so hard that I went sprawling to the ground. Before he could try to get on top of me again, I lashed out blindly with my other foot and caught sight of his head snapping back from the blow I'd managed to land.
One of my hands got tripped up on something next to me as I scuttled up to stand. I looked back to see a huge shard of broken glass from the shattered window partially embedded in my glove. I yanked it out and noted that it was about the size of a small piece of pizza.
In a cold rage, I got to my feet. He was just shrugging into standing as well, his big shoulders shaking with laughter as he was silhouetted again by the extinguishing flames to his back. He didn't seem the least bit nervous about the shard of glass in my hands. The sound of distant sirens fluttered towards us.
"It's been nice catching up with an old flame, but I really should be going."
I squared my shoulders between him and his getaway vehicle. "No. This ends here." Backup was coming. If I could stall him until the police showed...
Annoyance touched his self-assured grin, "You don't make the decisions around here, toots. I would've thought you'd learn that by now. Or did you forget what I did to you in that bathroom?"
My lip curled and I barked it without thinking, "Did you forget that I ended that with a shard of glass, t - ?"
I cut myself off, realizing my slip-up too late.
His grin stretched his scars up his face in an unnatural curl not dissimilar to the Cheshire Cat.
I had inadvertently acknowledged my identity with my statement.
He cannot leave this parking lot.
"Blaze, Blaze, Blaze."
I began stalking toward him, shard of glass gripped too tight in my fist. I heard a metallic click to my right. A clown mask frowned at me as the man behind it brought the shotgun he'd just cocked to Blake's temple. My feet stopped.
"The power of having good back up," he gestured accusingly to Blake's still-unconscious body.
His hands went back into his pants pockets. His skin was marred with blood and road rash, a slice to his forehead torrented blood from my many kicks. Despite his ragged appearance, he looked smug enough to have taken on an army singlehandedly. He strolled lazy steps toward me. I stiffened, but didn't dare move a muscle with such a threat hanging over Blake.
His boots scuffed to a stop nearly flush with mine. His tongue darted out of his lips again and his voice was soft, only for him and I, "Last chance."
The glass shard bit into my skin through the glove. I studied the thin scar to his neck. One strategic swipe and my Joker problems would be over. But so would Blake. The glass was stabbing into my palm and I threatened to shatter it.
Thinking past my rage, I remembered the tracker I slipped into his pocket earlier and I knew that I had a fighting chance if I played things smart. I wondered if, without that little gem of hope, I would have actually considered giving in.
I fought to keep my voice level, "I will never go with you willingly."
At that, he raised an eyebrow and tried to stifle a grin. He leaned forward and spoke conspiratorially, "I'll have fun making a liar out of you. And you know how much I love to punish you when you lie," his black gaze crawled all over me again. I felt the sliver of air between our body hum with desire - his to touch me and mine to end him. I saw his hand rise up in the corner of my vision. I moved to slap his hand away, which was on a leisurely path towards my face. At my rejection of him, his other hand shot out and gave me a sharp backhanded slap that nearly made me topple over.
His tone was deceptively soft as he smiled warmly down at me, "I'll be seeing you, Blaze."
With that, his footsteps scuffled away. His hands were back in his pockets, his head bowed as if in deep thought. I gripped the glass again with a sudden urgency as I noted that his guard was completely down. It would have been the perfect moment if not for... I switched my attention to his henchman like a hawk. The man waited until The Joker was opening the driver's side door to peel the gun away from it's perch against Blake's temple.
And then he was gone and I was momentarily free.
He actually let me go!
Then why was my stomach churning with dread?
The Joker is fond of me.
The thought turned itself over in my head again and again like blood through the body.
Every muscle fiber in my body aching a deep ache, I took slow steps toward the blaze that I - no, The Joker - caused. My only hope was that they would have heard some of the commotion outside and evacuated out of a back door before the explosion.