"Why did you do it, Jack!" Joe Chill almost screamed this as he and Jack Napier faced one another in the alley, their breath forming clouds that mingled in the cold air between them. "Christ," Joe whimpered, "We weren't looking to kill anyone! Just rob 'em, scare 'em! Oh, shit, what've we done?"
Joe Chill was not a good man. He knew that. Would he ever have willingly involved himself with a man like Jack Napier otherwise? Jack Napier, who once told him that he had drugged, tortured and killed his own parents as a teen. Jack Napier, who looked at him now with a cold smile, his teeth brilliantly white and said, in a voice like honey mixed with acid: "You can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs, Joe."
Joe may have been bad, but he still recognised the purest, most unadulterated evil. He saw it now, heard it and loathed it, and loathed himself for having encouraged it all these years. Not looking away from Jack's beady eyes, he said "I'm done, Jack. I'm going to the cops, I'm turning myself in."
Jack already had the flick-knife in his hand when Joe began to speak. "A little late to start developing a conscience, Joe," he whispered sibilantly as he stuck the blade deep in Joe's heart. "Time for you to dance with the devil in the pale moonlight." The last thing Joe Chill saw was the face of an evil monster.
OOOOOOOOOOOO
Eleven-year old Bob sat alone on his bed in his room, in the small, shabby apartment lived in by himself and his mother, and listened through the closed door to the man called Jack, his father's friend, talking to his mother about how he would find whoever had killed Joe and make them suffer dearly. Soon he was sitting beside Bob, a paternal arm round the boy's shoulders, and saying "Bob...You may not know me very well, but your dad was a good...very good friend of mine. And you know what he once told me?"
Bob looked up at him and nodded. "I know."
"I want you to know," Jack continued, "I'll always be here for you. You can count on me. One day, I think you and me will do some great things together, Bob."
OOOOOOOOOOOO
"Bob," the Joker said. "The gun." Bob withdrew his firearm and placed it in the waiting hand of his benefactor, the man who had brought him up for so many years, and who commanded his unshaking loyalty. Without a moment's hesitation, the Joker fired a bullet straight into Bob's chest. Thudding to the ground, Bob's last thought was, surprisingly, of his father.