Psycho Babble ((LitShark & Mephistophelily))

[LitShark]

It had been roughly four hours since J had started trying to stare a hole through the far wall and cushions of his tiny, padded cell. In spite of his complete and utter dissatisfaction with his circumstances, the hug he was getting from the rough strait jacket, and the mundane, complacent cocktail of boring drugs that were pumping through his system, he was still smiling- ear to ear, to wide to stop the steady stream of saliva that was dribbling out of the wounds on his face and tickling his chin that couldn't be scratched.

Solitary was the only thing that made J miss the shock therapy. At least "Riding the Lightning" was good for a few chuckles. Even if it did scramble his eggs something wicked.

A light chuckle escaped the long corners of his mouth, watching as the dingy, off-white cushion unthreaded itself slowly and began to seep out an imagined glut of blood. The chuckle grew more shrill and repetitive as J imagined the cushion filled with the fillings that bodies are full of- entrails following the flood of midnight crimson blood, slinking and stinking and full of shit.

J was laughing loudly now, his peals of high pitched laughter echoing within the tiny cell. The entrails spilled for a long time, uncoiling rapidly as they stretched their serpentine coils and burst in places, losing their greenish brown bounties of bile and partially digested, indistinguishable food stuffs.

Kicking up his heels in irreverent, mad glee- splashing his heels in the imagined pool of blood and gore that was flooding the tiny cement floor around where he sat. Just as J saw the long, purple edge of a liver poking out from the padded wall, the latch on the door clicked loudly and the spell was broken. Trapped in a boring padded cell once again.

Two orderlies came in together, observing their ridiculous routines for handling him. The orderly that J had dubbed "Big Black" grabbed him hard around the shoulders, wrestling him through the cloud of his own laughter to his feet.

"Stop your damn cackling clown boy, or else you get the sleep needle again." Big warned the prisoner sternly while Whitey-Baldy wheeled in the upright strap board they used to transport him.

"Ohhh-ho-ho-ho-ho!" Jay chuckled, trying to contain himself. "Are we off to ride the lightning now, Big Black?"

"I told you not to call me that. It's Rodney damnit." Big Black reiterated again, strapping in his middle tighter than it ought to have been as a physical reminder. "You're going to talk to someone."

"Ohhh Christ! The-Rape-Me? Bo-Ring! Lock me back in, Solitary was just getting good!"

"I told them this was a waist of time." Whitey-Baldy whispered under his breath, strapping in the legs before BB began to wheel forward. "Little miss know it all had to see for herself..."

"Ohhhhh! A bitch head shrinker?" J squealed, suddenly like a kid on Christmas. "I haven't seen a bitch in months."

At that, J burst into fits of wild and creening laughter that echoed through the asylum, bringing other inmatients to their tiny windows, some banged fists, others banged heads, but everybody made a riot when the clown rolled through.

 

[Mephistophelily]

It had taken weeks, weeks of studying his files, reviewing previous sessions from others that had attempted to find any point of sanity inside that mind. There was a part of him that had to see some touch of reason, some glimmer of normal. But that same question had to raise in her own mind; what exactly constituted as normal? Everyone's perceptions of the world around them could be so easily swayed. To him, the madness he revelled in WAS sanity. A world he liked so much more.

Something inside him had to have just cause for creating that other view.
She wanted to find out what it was.

"Right there. You see? Right there. Look at the way his eyes light up." She pointed to the television screen, tapping it lightly with manicured nails. A tiny twitch to his gaze, a spark of something that his mind attempted to recognize. "What was in that they were talking about?"

The other intern looked to his notes, frowning slightly. "How he slit someone's tongue from their mouth. Graphic detail of the incident was recanted. He's simply enjoying his own escapades from an outside view." The notebook was closed, the young man looking over to his collegue with a shake of his head. "Why don't you just study the effects of horticulture therapy on Isley? That's a fairly unorthodox thing, and certainly has a curious aspect to it."

"I'm not interested." She shook her head, glancing over as the orderlies passed by with her straight-jacketed patient. "He has far more to him. I don't want the easy case, I want the abnormal. The questionable. I want to look deeper, maybe try something that no one else has thought of."

"And that would be..."

"I haven't thought of it yet." She picked up her own clipboard from the desk, a pen slipped behind her ear as she readjusted her glasses. Straightening her white coat in the mirror, adjusting the little black dress beath before taking a deep breath and smiling to the man sitting at the desk. "Well, wish me luck."

He said nothing, just sighed and shook his head. This idea of hers was terrible, her desire to try and figure the man out. There was nothing to figure out; he was the perfect case for arguing inherent evil, that the idea of chaos could be completely engrained in a person's psyche.

But that stubborn girl simply wouldn't listen.


She waited for the orderlies to secure him, to make certain her safety was mostly ensured. "We can't make any promises, Miss," the larger fellow commented as he stepped out of the room. "He's like a dog on a chain. If he wants to go after something, we can't guarantee he won't try."

"I can take those risks. Thank you, Rodney." She started into the small white room, pausing only as Rodney reached out and pulled the little hair pin from her bun, letting her pale blonde hair fall free. "Excuse me-!"

"Sorry, Miss, but somethin' like that... We can't let it around him." He shrugged, waiting for her to head in further.

She sighed, trying to readjust her hair a bit more as she went to the bolted down table in the center of the room. He was set on the opposite side, still wrapped in his provided 'formalwear'. Being without her pin was frustrating. Instead, she decided to simply use her pen, quickly wrapping her hair back up and shoving it through. "Good afternoon, Mister- Well, I'm not quite certain what I should be calling you. They don't want me referring to you by THAT name. They say it may encourage disruptive behavior." She tossed her notebook onto the table, shaking her head. "Though I'm sure that's not the case with you. From what I understand, just about anything can make you... disruptive."

 

[LitShark]

J hated the Observation Lab, all puke-green painted steel, padded concrete and mirrored glass. Reflective surfaces and cold, unfeeling colors, a room meant to force the criminally insane to look inward, or backward- in either case, neither was a direction that interested him. Forward, onward, upward, outward- that was the way that J wanted to go. Outward most of all.

Just as J was considering trying to get another decent rise out of Big Black, the new headshrinker made her appearance- high heels clicking, lips puckered in puzzling thought and her silken, golden hair neatly pinned back in a mound at the back of her skull. Below her sterile, white, lab-coat she was wearing a black skirt that looked as though she must have been poured into it. Just the sight of her was enough to rend a playful and appreciative chuckle out of J, and when BB snagged the pin from within the neatly arranged chaos of her hair, it spilled down around her face and shoulders in a slow, liquid cascade. It reminded him of the entrails...

"My God..." J sighed into the collar of his strait jacket. "Someone upstairs must owe me a favor."

At that, J laughed out loud, only halted from a full-blown fit by the headshrinker's delicate, sing-songy, East Coast Elitist voice addressing him directly. She wanted to know what she ought to call him, and also to let him know that she'd read his file. They always wanted to let him know that they'd done their homework, as though those thin, flimsy manilla bound pages could ever tell the story of J.

"Call me Mister J." He said casually, conversationally- perhaps even rationally, if one didn't know better. His bloodshot, yellowed eyes following the journey of her pen up into her hair. "And you? Or should I just call you Legs?"

Never shy about laughing at his own jokes, J tittered, a high pitched, little, demure, dinner-party laugh that he would have covered with his hand if he'd been permitted the freedom of hands.

"You're the one that's supposed to fix me. Yes? Well let me ask you, what exactly constitutes disruptive behavior? What is it that I'd be disrupting? Aren't you supposed to lift the lid and see inside my noggen- tell me what's wrong and make it better? How could my behavior be disruptive to that? Hm? What that paper you have calls 'Disruptive', I would define as 'Constructive'. But what the hell do I know? I'm crazy."

At this, J just smiled at her. His most rational and comforting of smiles. He could see in her eyes how she saw him, but she still didn't see him, not in the ways that mattered. She thought that she could label him, split up his problems into categories until she found a root cause... She had no fucking clue. She was the cause- it was him that was the solution.

 

[Mephistophelily]

Her gaze raised to his eyes as she sat down, a surprised raise to her brow. "Mister J, then? I suppose I can make due with that." She was already quite pleased at his demeanor with all this. With her. Based on what she had seen in the videos, already she had achieved more than most managed to get through. "Me? Oh. Well... For now... I suppose Doctor Quinzel would be fitting." She paused, rethinking that statement as she glanced to her open notes and listened to his growing laughter, waiting until the dissipated and simply watching him. She tried hard to keep the firm demeanor she was trained to use.

Still... There was something in that laugh...
It brought a tiny, faint smirk to her own.
Damn it...

His stopped sound, the look in his eyes as he continued- he could switch so easily between the two. Fix him? That was one way to put it. She listened as he gave his thoughts on the matter, how he saw the exchanges between them, his take on disruptive, constructive...

"You're fascinating."
The words were whispered as he smirked at her, a gaze from a man who seemed to have every light perfectly lit inside that mind. The exact wattage needed for every bulb. "Maybe you are crazy. I'm not really sure. There must be something... unique.... for you to be here, I'll agree to that much. But I don't know if I would call it insanity, Mistah J." She paused, cleared her throat with that sliding accent. "We'll find at some point, hopefully, exactly how constructive or disruptive you truly are."

She thumbed through her notes, scribbled thoughts of her own that had been taken in regard to the videos and transcripts, the collected information on the man who sat before her. Her plan had been so meticulous back in her own shared office, every word planned out perfectly. It all seemed to wash away the moment she saw him. It was so much different to be face to face with him. Seeing that grin for herself. Hearing his voice directly into her ears, the echo of that laugh in the tiny space- even the scent of him. Surprisingly, for someone who had been locked in a cell for most of the day, he didn't... smell like an inmate. Not the scent she expected at all. It was hard to explain.

Certainly not something to be thinking over in the midst of her supposed session with one of Arkham's Maddest.

"I want you to feel you can trust me, Mister J. You've given me something a bit different than you've given others, it seems. This moniker you wish for me to use. In that case, I'll let you use one for me that I rarely let others know." She took off the name tag, her intern badge that held the embossed "Doctor Quinzel" upon it and a bewildered look in the picture printed.

"You can just call me Harleen." She smiled. "You see? We're reaching Constructive Behavior. Just as you said."

 

[LitShark]

At her mention of her name, J couldn't help himself. He broke into a fit of the kind of laughter that usually got him injected into slumber. He bit it back as quickly as he was able looking at her as he gasped a perhaps 'Disruptive' answer.

"Doctor Quinn, medicine woman! That's you, huh? Does that mean that they let you write scripts from that little book... Xanex, Percoset, Vicoden, Ambien, Oxycontin..." J's voice trailed off, imaginining the sweet caress of fun drugs once again. Perhaps he was hoping for too much. When Dr. Quinn muttered that he was fascinating, silence fell.

Compliments was it? Crafty cunt.

"Well you have a beautiful smile." J countered, tossing out the compliment as though he'd blocked her shot in a pickup game. "Ha-HA!"

Coherent and genuinely interested eyes watched her first attempt at engaging him- they all did this differently. She was of the non-judgemental, buddy-buddy school it seemed; not so much the "admit you have a problem"-ologists that his previous two therapist had been. That made J happy. Buddy-buddy shrinks wanted to get close in order to get at his subconscious- Dr. Quinn was the first that he actually wanted to get close. Proximity often afforded liberty which afforded opportunity.

"I'm Destructive most of all. Surely those papers at least say that!" J interjected after she took up the constructive/disruptive concept. He looked and sounded worried, terrified even and achingly, urgently and abruptly curious to know what that file was saying about him. What had he been doing with his life if 'Destructive' wasn't the first page of his bio?

He listened, a look of concern still etched over his features... Gotta get a look at that file. But when she mentioned a desire to earn his trust, his smile relaxed again and his attention was undivided. J only ever worried about anything for about as long as a dog feels guilt.

"Harleen, huh?" J tasted the name on his tongue, savoring it like a piece of hard candy. "Harleen Quinzel... Harley Quinn. Ha! That's it! Like the old French clowns! Harley. Harley. HARLEY! HARLEY! Ha,hah,hah,haaa!!"

J laughed until he ran out of air and then felt himself aware of something he hadn't really thought of.

"Alright, Doc Harley-Harley-Harley. In the interest of keeping things constructive, avoiding the disruptive. I've been locked down in Iso for the past six hours and I need to piss like a goddamn race-horse, but there's this strap- see?" J's eyes bolted down to his groin where a broad leather strap parted his legs, bits and pieces of his twig and berries bulging out around the strap which had been tightened after some particularly hurtful words with BB. "One more laugh like that last one and things could get very disruptive indeed. Hee-hee-hee."

 

[Mephistophelily]

She blushed slightly at the smile comment, brushing a falling strand of hair from her glasses' view and clearing her throat again as she realized this was merely another part of his little games with her. "Moving on," she noted softly, glancing to him in surprise as he seemed genuinely concerned on his files' mentions of his motives and personality. "Mister J, 'Destructive' is one of the kinder terms used to describe you in a number of these reports. An overwhelmingly large number of refernces to that term, but one of the nicer ones. Psychotic. Disturbed. As one of your earlier psychiatrists noted in a recorded interview regarding your case, 'A fucking madman'. You certainly made an impression upon him." She closed the pages once again, frowning slightly as she shook her head.

Her name did something for him. A whole slew of somethings. Giggles and chuckles, guffaws and teasings on the references he could pull from it, a version he seemed to prefer far more than the one she gave him. It made her nervous at first, the way he played with the name, toyed with different syllables... but the more he said it, the more she found it curious to come from him. She finally giggled softly herself, hiding the miniature smile between her hand. God, if that made it onto the film, her supervisor would have her head!

She looked at him curiously as his own smile dropped away, his voice still playful as he explained his current predicament. The slight readjusting in his chair, the problem of too-tight strappings making things a touch too close for comfort. She hesitantly glanced towards the locked door, then back to him. "I'm really not supposed to have any physical contact with a patient," she started slowly, her frown returning as she tried to debate this. All he wanted was a restroom break. To deny him that would break the attempts of trust, not to mention risk him medical harm with those straps so tight.

"A slight loosening. And then I'll get Rodney." She stood up, circling behind his chair to find the proper strap. "A trip to the men's room wil obviously require some supervision, Mister J. I'm sure you can understand why." She found it, undoing the buckle slowly and letting it out a bit. "That better?"

 

[LitShark]

J was smiling as Harley moved out from behind the metal table and crossed over to him, scooting his chair out from the table loudly and moving his hips toward her as she approached. He was wearing his winningest smile, the one he donned for people from whom he wanted something, even if he hadn't fully decided what just yet.

"Much better." J grinned, grinding his teeth as his voice rattled over itself in his throat. "Don't worry about Big Black. I'll bring him."

With that, J kicked out his legs fiercely enough to kick over the heavy metal table and slide down in his chair. The leather strap slipped harshly through Harley's slender fingers and with two loud pops, J dislocated his shoulders in practiced tandem and slipped down to the floor, using the lip of his chair to drag the jacket up his back. A few more writhing squirms and a layer or two of skin left around the collar and J was free, popping up to his feet in a hop and quickly backing Doctor Quinn into the far corner of the room, just below the camera. He pressed his body against hers lightly, turning his body sharply to throw his left arm back into socket loudly, pushing the other back into place next.

Despite the ache that this little trick always reawakend in his "Trick" shoulders, J felt like a million bucks. The soft, subtle curves of her high, firm breasts pressing against him and the fleeting freedom of having his arms free. Gently, sweetly and in total control, J laid his palm against her cheek, an index finger lightly brushing a lock of blonde hair back from her eyes as he leaned in to whisper into her ear.

"You want me to trust you? That's fine, I do. If you want to actually help me, I need you to trust me too. I could have killed you eight- No! Nine ways by now, but that's not who I am. That's not what I want from you." J whispered huskily, his breath stirring her hair lightly around the nape of her neck. "I want you to help me. I need help and I know that you can give it to me. But first you have to trust me."

The door burst open then, Big Black leading the charge with Baldy-Whitey and Mexi-Can't behind him in riot gear. J didn't even look at them, instead he just peered into Harley's expressive light eyes and raised his arms into the air, taking a slow step back.

"I didn't touch her." J said flatly, still staring holes through his therapist as the orderlies charged him. "I didn- Ah! I DIDN'T TOUCH HER! I-oof! I didn't-!"

J lost eye contact when Big speared a broad shoulder into the ribs. The two men landed on the concrete with a sickening, fleshy splat and as J looked up to look for Harley's reaction, he only saw Big's white-clad elbow coming crashing into his nose. Then a fist, and another fist, and then a boot, another boot, then the nightstick across his shins. They loved the nightstick across the shins.

"Rodney King!" J bellowed, writhing and laughing in the midst of the violent hail storm. "Rodney King! Rodney King! Rodney King!"

Then as Whitey's boot certainly cracked one of his ribs, J lost control of his bladder. Pissing himself in front of a lady- Fresh Trauma. He needed a session.

 

[Mephistophelily]

It felt like seconds. Not even a moment, and that offer of 'help' was uttered, his sudden freedom, the crumpled jacket on the floor. The crack of his sockets popping made her cringe, her quick closing of eyes providing him unseen movement as he pushed against her. Harleen's eyes shot wide, panic and fear quickly slapping her hard.

Another crunch and click, his arms no longer looking like a defunct doll. "Don't kill me," she choked out, shaking her head, his hand touching her cheek. It was far warmer than she expected... That grin was unending, even through all that. His voice scared her as he leaned in, hissing to her on how he could have killed her... But it wasn't who he was. She wanted to believe that, but with everything those papers said- everything that others had said.

He- He actually wanted her help?

Harleen's eyes were wide, staring at him in shock, confusion racing through her. He was absolutely right on the killing her, she knew that. It was something he could have done within those first seconds of being free. She wasn't sure if he had even needed to be free, really. She swallowed hard, trying to find some part of her that she could make move. Her heart was pounding, but her veins felt so cold.

His escape from the jacket may have taken seconds, but the entry of the orderlies felt like an eternity. Mister J backed away, still staring at her as he declared his innocence. "He... he didn't...," She started meekly, shaking her head. "It's true, he didn't do anything..."

She wasn't loud enough. They didn't care. Something.
He was to the ground, Rodney atop him, beating against him as the other soon joined in. Harleen stared at them in horror as they beat down against him, clasping her hands over her mouth for a moment, shaking her head. His howls only seemed to encourage them, their nightsticks drawn and used as well. Finally she gave a shriek, grasping for Rodney's arm as he swung up for another punch to Joker's face. "Stop! STOP IT!," She screamed the words, cringing as the others kept going.

Wetness upon the floor. A groan from somewhere in that pile.

"Get off him, get the HELL off him!" Harleen shoved at Rodney, grabbing onto Harold's shirt and yanking him away, trying to claw her way to the patient underneath. A bloody, bruising mess, his jumpsuit soiled as he lay there. Harleen gave a soft cry, stooping down beside him and trying to rub his cheek. "Mister J? Are you alright?" She glared back at Rodney, still trying to cradle Joker's face. "He didn't do anything, I was trying to get you to come help him, not beat him up, you bastards!"

Rodney scowled, rubbing at his own shoulder from Harleen's nails digging through his shirt. "We're doin' our JOB, Miss."

"And I'm doing MINE. You touch a patient of mine in that manner again, I will have your job." She stared up at him, her eyes narrowing.

 

[LitShark]

"My hero..." J gargled from his aching throat, he'd swallowed a tooth... again. "Excuse me."

J made certain to turn his head away from his Harley in shining Labcoat before hawking and wretching that jagged, yellow chicklet onto the cement floor in a spray of blood. Rodney wasn't much of a conversationalist, but he was a goddamn Michelangelo with beatings. Arkham didn't pay their orderlies enough.

"Don't threaten their jobs, these men work very hard." J insisted, blissfully delerious in the arms of his lovely therapist, turning his swelling, bloody face into her chest, tucking himself in between those firm mounds like a baby seeking out a nipple. "They're good at what they do too, Rodney King there could be making three times as much on the streets as a muscle thug."

"Doctor Quinzel, I understand and respect where you're coming from, but you really shouldn't be close to him like that." Rodney insisted, reaching more gently this time for the inmatient. "We need to get that jacket back on him. Shit like this, he thinks its funny- murder, mutilation, RAPE- those things are even funnier. I understand that you've got a job to do here, but we're under strict orders to show him that this shit ain't funny."

At that, Rodney grabbed J's arm and yanked hard, trying to disentangle him from the young woman. J wailed and resisted and complained loudly of his shoulders, his ribs, his face, his throat.

"AWW Ow! Ow! Ow! Mister J's poor arm! Oh, his poor broken ribs! His shattered male ego! His hopeless depression! His incessant self-loathing! Ohhh they ache me somethin' awful Doc!" J cried and wailed and wrapped the one arm that Rodney wasn't wrestling with around Harley's back and pressed his face harder into her sternum as Rodney continued to try. "Don't let Daddy beat me! Don't let Daddy beat me! Don't let him do it!"

 

[Mephistophelily]

"By trying to kill him?," Harleen asked, her voice cracking slightly with the words, shaking her head. "I know you have a job to do, and I realize that he is a mad man. But you can't change someone's ways by beating them into a bloody pulp!" She was still holding him, nearly oblivious to exactly where he had decided to rest his head as her fingers rested against the matted down green hair.

Rodney didn't seem to hear. He grabbed onto the patient, yanking at him, trying to get him free of Harleen's grasp. The man's howls, screams, sobs of pain nearly broke her heart. Insane or not, no one should be forced to be hurt like that. She tried to grasp him closer, almost a tug of war with the orderly as Rodney kept tugging on him.

She knew Joker's words were mostly for show. She knew it.
But there were parts to it that almost seemed too real. Parts that made her wonder, and question.... Just how much of this was an act? Was there really something deeper inside him? Was he trying to tell her?

"Just let me have a few more minutes with him, PLEASE!" Harleen pleaded up to Rodney, shaking her head. "You can stay in here, fine! But please, just let go of him, you've done enough to him! Can't you see he's in pain?" A sudden pang of guilt ran through her. It was her fault he was even up here. Her incessant demand for a session with him, to try and study him. And what happened? The poor guy was beaten to a pulp because he had to use the restroom. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," She whispered into his ear, still smoothing against the green clump of hair beneath her palm.

The pleas for his father. Harleen's eyes widened with that, looking up to Rodney. "Look what you've done, you've sent him into recall! You're making things so much worse... Please, just let him go to the restroom, get him a new jumpsuit- I need to talk with him, please. Cuff him if you feel the need. Stay in here, bring a damn taser in with you. Just don't hit him like that again."

 

[LitShark]

At Harleen's plea, Harold just scoffed, mocking the Doctor's words under his breath. Change his ways. He had been doing this job too long to have any such foolish notions about the merits of therapy, but he still nodded toward Jesus to retrieve the shackles from the lockup.

Joker's Shackles as well as his backstock of clean jumpsuits were set up in a locker near the showers which bore the same numerical code as the shackles and jumpsuits. Changings were without fail a shit show in Arkham, the violent, criminally psychotic, forced into nudity before a team of loathed oppressors who had to maintain control and dominance at all times. If the Doc wanted a glimpse of trauma, maybe she ought to change him. Not to mention the looming mutual dread of shower time... They didn't pay him enough.

Give them an inch, and they take your life was a favorite quote that Harold always told the rookies. Joker was the worst of all, crafty and manipulative beyond measure and untouchable... The beatings, the long hours in Iso, the revocation of all privileges, starvation. The worst they could think of was always a joke to him. At least when they beat him he had to laugh through broken ribs.

"In either case, he's gotta let go, Doc." Harold said flatly, reaching into the doctor's long, unbound hair to capture Joker's pinky finger between three of his own and bend it back on itself, using that to unwind him from the slender girl's body. "Come on, Mr. J. Let's change those piss pants of yours."

The clown squealed and brayed about his shoulder some more, but Harold would have none of it. He'd done that to himself to have some fun with Little-Miss-Hot-Doc, he didn't get pity for it now.

"I'll be good! I'll be good! You'll see. Five minutes, I know the routine. Just let me go." Joker cooperated quicker and with more lucidity than Harold had ever seen, much less in this latest two years of his ever growing list of life sentences. "Thanks again, Harley. I'll go easy on these chumps this time."

Jesus clamped down the wrist restraints, tight enough for them to dig into the skinny clown's out held wrists. Harold had learned to be overly suspicious when Joker cooperated easily. In his experience it preceded a particularly well-planned escape or murder attempt. This business with his shoulders was more like a parlor trick. Maybe he was trying to impress the pretty new shrink. It was a waste of time to try to guess, maybe the clown himself hadn't even decided yet.

Once the shackles were also uncomfortably tight around his ankles. It was a waste of time anyway, Joker had shown them many times in a variety of ways that he could escape from these any time he pleased. Shackled Joker was only two motions removed from free Joker.

It was a welcome relief when Joker held out his arms to be uncuffed, removed his arms from the soiled jumpsuit, held out his arms again to be cuffed before holding out one leg, then the other leg, then holding out his arms again to put on the clean, faded orange jumpsuit. It was a point of pride among the crazies which of them had the oldest, most faded out jumpsuits. The coarse fabric felt softer and the colors less disruptive and after so many wears and washes, the garment fell neatly around it's owner's familiar frame. Well behaved, lucid and polite. Harold didn't like it one bit.

"Can we go back now, Whitey?" J asked, glancing back over his shoulder. "We were making good progress there for a while I think. I think there's something really special about this head shrinker. I do!"

"Yeah, I know what you think's so damn special." Whitey seethed, taking hold of Joker's arm. "Wish this place would give me some hot blond to talk about my problems with."

"Don't cheapen what I have with Harley with your shriveled, old, worthless cock!" Joker snapped, showing his true face for a moment before returning to the Eddie Haskel routine. "I just... I'd really like to finish my session."

Harold, Rodney and Jesus went through all the protocalls to ensure that Joker was properly secured, they led him back to the Observation Lab. When they crossed through the door, Joker exaggerated the short stride, hobble step that the ankle shackles forced him to adopt and began rocking his steps back and forth, mechanically, mimicking the motion with his arms and balled up fists- imitating a toy soldier while his forever smiling face had a dead-pan flatness to it like the expression, scars and yellow eyes were just painted features. He sat back down the same way.

"We'll be outside. If you're making so much progress, make him understand that leaving that chair again would be a bad fucking idea."

 

[Mephistophelily]

She watched all this with curiosity, hesitancy. Joker seemed to be more agreeable at the moment than she had seen and read, leaving her with a touch of hope that she was actually making some significant progress in this short time. She had told him she wanted his trust. And he had asked for hers in return. Actually giving it- was that all he had wanted?

As Harold peeled him away from her, she gave a smile at his promise of good behavior, nodding at his oath to be back soon. The added promise of 'going easy' worried her a bit, but she took that to hopefully be a good thing. Her patient led from the room in a far easier manner than she had hoped, she stood up from the floor, readjusting her glasses a bit and trying to smooth down her hair. The pen had vanished at some point, her glasses seemingly askew now thanks to someone slapping them in that whole fiasco. Simply taking them off, she squinted a few times, trying to see if it was possible to make it through this without them.

Looked like she would need to get her contacts out again. The lopsided frames would have to make due for the rest of the day- trying to go without was going to leave a massive headache in its wake. Picking up her folders and notes, fixing the knocked table, she tried to get the room back into some sort of order. He certainly did leave a reminder, didn't he?

She restacked her papers upon the desk, settling back into her chair before peeking at her watch. It seemed like they had been gone forever. A sudden fear raced down her spine. What if those three had started into him again? He really seemed to be trying, at least in her eyes. If they ruined any type of progress she had attempted, made him lose that trust in her that he had claimed to have-

The door reopened, Mister J hobbling back into the room in a new uniform and overly-shackled. She frowned slightly, glancing to Harold as he growled a warning to her. "I'll take care of my patient as I need to, thank you very much." She waited for the heavy door to come to a close, looking back to him with a deep sigh.

"I'm sorry about all that, I really am." Her voice was gentle, concerned. "They left you alone, I hope? No more trouble?" She tried to study his face, to see past that overwhelmingly large grin he kept. "You said... Your father. You mentioned your father.Did Harold- Did all that dredge up an old memory for you?"

She was trying. There had to be something in there to dig into. Something she could try to understand. It was just a matter of finding the right box in his mind to tug open.

 

[LitShark]

J twisted his scarred mouth up to one side, his tongue darting after an accumulation of drool in the corner of his disfigured face. Asking about his father, he thought she'd like that. Shrinkers always wanted to know about "Daddy Dearest". They all asked like it was their secret, but everybody knew.

"I dig his sorry corpse up when I want to see a shrink again, you lot are too predictable with the Freud shit. It was all theatrics by then Doc, but I will tell you more about his... handiwork." J answered grudgingly, he hadn't even really thought about what he shrieked when it was shrieking time. It was theatrics, wasn't it? Of course it was, stupid clown! "Nobody ever believes the guy with a smile when he says he needs depression meds. I tried to tell you, but you don't buy it, I laugh too much to be depressed, like being serious never fucking occured to me."

J rattled his chain faintly under the table, kicking his heels up and down. This joke didn't have a punchline. Where was he going with this? Oh, right. Beatings. J spat some blood discreetly onto the floor before going on.

"Sure, Whitey reminds me of Him when he beats me. Big Black too. The Bat? Don't get me started! The Bat can beat fifty shades of shit out of me, All while judging me and my life choices in an obnoxious voice. And still sleep like a baby, just because he always stops just short of killing me. Heaven-for-fucking-bid! That his Holiness of Gotham should sully his conscience while pounding fractures into my skull. Tosses me back in here like a crumpled bag and washes his hands. Then he lets the amateurs beat me for a while. I get beaten to sleep, beaten out of bed, beaten in the shower, beaten off to breakfast... It's the only way I keep track of days. After we're done here, I'll probably get to see you three or four beatings from now! Meanwhile, you'll go home, read your papers, sleep without an injection, take a shower in privacy, choose your own clothes..."

J trailed off, suddenly hearing himself. This wasn't funny at all, it was pathetic, was he really this soft? Long legs and a set of tits, after only two years of Arkham Boot Club, now he was blubbering all over himself like a needy infant. Fuck that.

"Your turn now, Harley." J smiled, the deep churning emotion that began to peek through in his ramblings washed away, only a smiling facade left in the wake. "What do you do, when you're not curing crazies? Quid Pro Quo, mutual trust. Who'se stuffing that tight cookie at night?"

 

[Mephistophelily]

Harleen frowned a bit as he confessed that the mention of his father had been more a ruse than anything else. It made sense, unfortunately. He wanted to stay out of his cell, and considering what happened once he was brought there, she didn't blame him. The part that did surprise her, though, was the fact he actually confessed it. He actually told her it was a ploy.

He was actually giving her that trust.

"So this was simply a tactic to stay out of your cell," she noted softly, tapping her fingers against the table. Her brow quirked as he confessed that the incidents did actually raise past wounds for him, even giving details on just how the incidents effected him. Her annoyance with the orderlies and guards grew a bit more upon hearing exactly what happened when left alone with him- but the worst, the one that upset her tremendously, was to hear how horribly the great Hero of Gotham treated him.

How did causing such pain to others prevent anything? How did batman expect to make such a 'good impact' on the city when all he was, was basically an over-glorified thug himself? No wonder so many officers actually seemed to hate the man. He was simply another crazed man in a costume, one who deemed himself to be doing good.

In Joker's eyes, the things he himself did were most likely things of 'good' too.
Good for himself, anyway.

She picked up her notes, jotting down a few things, a couple of heavy jabs of the pen against the paper- thoughts on the man who had put Joker in here. Now there was a man who needed sessions alone. And a straitjacket. And a few good injections.

Her eyes raised quickly as he leaned forward, turning the focus of their conversations away from himself, passing the ball to her. She balked slightly at that, setting her pen down and nervously glancing to the door. "My personal life isn't-"

No, they had talked about mutual trust. If she wanted him to be honest, she neded to be too. A slow breath was taken, her notebook pushed closed. "We're not all without demons, Mister J. You get beaten physically every night. I get reminders on what's supposed to happen in my life. The scripted plan my mother seems to have on everything. I'm behind schedule, ruined part of it." His way of asking if she was seeing anyone was certainly a unique one. "I dumped my last boyfriend 2 months ago. Mom was absolutely devestated. You'd've thought I'd broken up with her...." She gave a light laugh at that, then shook her head. "Some social elite, mistermoneybags- but absolutely no clue on common sense. I just couldn't see myself stuck in that. So, I suppose, in answer to your question, I would have to say... no one."

She reached across the table, leaving her fingers close to his. "I would like to have another session with you. But, as Harold said... It would mean you'd have to stay on good behaviour. If they feel I'm having a negative influence on you, they won't let me anywhere near you." She tried to study his face, to see into those confusing eyes. "I don't want that to happen, Mister J."

 

[LitShark]

J was trying so hard. Trying ever so very hard to keep himself contained and rational, but things had taken a turn for the boring. The Boring. BORING! While J tried to listen to his new friend Harley, she used about twice as many words as she needed- like a good therapist, and burned through the time. She was hijacking the rest of his session. He understood what she was telling him, heard and recognized the story right away. Not living up to expectations. That was her cross to bear. It seemed quite light in contrast, and much less original.

She said: "Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz- my mother. Zzzzzzzzzzzzz devastated my mother. Zzzzzz- Mister Moneybags."

Money. That's what women wanted, not laughs. Not a headcase. J chuckled as she came to the point at long last; "No one" was warming her bed, sharing her life, relishing in her taughtness... It could be him. It should be! Why shouldn't J have a shot at that life, the good life, the American dream, a slice of the pie!

Don't kid yourself Spazz. That bitch don't want you.

His father always had a flair for comic timing. J laughed in helpless and frightened admiration for his own Prime Evil. His Demon. His Daddy Dearest.

Fine ass pussy like that, she's gotta beat better men than you back with a stick. Smart ass cunt, too. Just aching for some REAL man to put her back in her place. She wants it, just look at her- Not from you though. Not some skinny, broken, doll-loving faggot like you. Bruised up and broken. You think that's what she's looking for? Fuck no. She's just like your mother, a victim. That's all she is, and that's all she'll ever be to you. You wouldn't even know what to do with a woman.

J knew what to do! He knew because he'd done it, not just once but several times, sometimes with more than one at a time! J was a Non-Con-Cassanova! He grit his teeth sharply over eachother, rattling faintly as the bottoms clattered over the space left behind by the one he'd swallowed. While J was distracted by his father, Doc Quinn had already started bargaining, telling him the lie about how it was up to him whether they saw eachother again. He'd need to behave, he'd need to be better- In other words, Goodbye.

Sure, sure, you can keep a stiffy up when they're squirming, screaming and punching you. That's a horse with different meat. I mean real sex, sex that she wants too. You never had that, not in your whole life. I know you haven't because you took MINE! You don't even deserve the life you have, it should have been you! HA HA- I mean, if she spread them legs for you right now and said "Come get it." What would you do? I bet you wouldn't even know what hole to put it in!

"I know what hole to put it in!" J shrieked at the voice in his head, only realizing too late that Harley was still the only one in the room. He raised his hands up from his lap, the wrist restraints tumbling from his arms like poorly made jewelry, he slammed his unrestrained fists onto the table hard enough to leave dents behind, remaining seated all the while. "You- you- you- you- YOU! That's all I'm hearing. Let me guess, our time is up? What about what I want? Where is the universe where that matters? Hm? Where's the case worker who really wants to help make my life better? What about what I Need? Parlement extra slim, pancake base, fingerpaints, paper, magazines, glue stick, razor blades- Xanex! Xanex! Xanex!"

As J screamed Xanex, he bashed his head into the table in between his fists, denting the thick, metal surface with his forehead, over and over again. Trying in vain to silence the voice in his head or at least get himself under control enough to stop screaming. At least he'd stayed in the chair, that was something at least.

There goes the little Spazz I remember. Go on, spazz-way-the-fuck-out. Ha Ha HA! Bitches always love when you spazz out on the first date. Let Papa have a shot next. Let Papa make it all better. You really trusted this one- He-he-he-HA-HA-HA!!!

"I should have killed you when I had the chance!" J seethed, eyes mad with rage, watching his therapist recoil, suddenly embodying every girl he'd ever loved, from womb to this room. Especially his mother, she reminded him of his mother most of all- eyes closed, braced for the pain. J heaved the jingling bundle of chains against the observation window which had been replaced by thick plastic years ago, the chains tumbled against the window with a series of hollow thuds. "Go on then Doctor Quinn- Run away, I won't fucking chase you! Promise! Bring the boy's in, where they at? Bring it on you pussy-ass faggots! Ha-Ha-HAAAA! We're both ready for you."

J picked the chair up, his ass still glued to the seat and turned his back to his therapist, facing the door and putting up his fists in front of his face. The thin, pale arms reminding him of the picket fence that would never surround him and Harley. J & Q- The Audacity of Hope. American Psychotic.

 

[Mephistophelily]

"I'm sure we can find an additional time to m-" His sudden outburst surprised her, Harleen's eyes widening at the odd screech he gave. Hole? What was he even talking about? "Mister J?" The sudden slam of his fists against the table made her cringe, drawing her chair back a bit and shaking her head. What had happened? They had seemed to be doing so well. He had asked about her. She had answered. Wasn't that what he had wanted?

The tirade of anger over her revealing so much left her staring at him, her notebook raised over her face slightly to peer around it, afraid of what he may do even with those cuffs still attached. Wait. No.

He had them off... And yet, he had never moved, until now.
"We can set another session...," She started meekly, her eyes wide as he ranted again, demands on what he needed and wanted spilling out. His sudden decision for self mutilation, personal damage- She shrieked, tossing the notebook aside.

"Stop! Mister J, please! You need to stop, please!" She was begging him now, unsure on if she should try to grab him, or try to stay away. Call out for the men? They had scoffed at her for even trying this. Would they even bother to come? He was going to bruise himself, cause more bleeding, leave behind terrible injury if he didn't stop this.

He suddenly ended it himself, glaring at her and snarling out furiously. She hastily sat back, nearly toppling her own seat as she cringed. She didn't understand at all. This had been going so well, she really thought it was going so well- The chains were thrown, a threat shouted to the others, a demand for her to get away.

Both... ready for you?
Both?

She watched him hesitantly as he flipped his chair about, ready to fight anyone who came in. But he never left the chair.
He never left it.
He listened to her on that.
He was actually HEARING her. At least, in some form...

"Don't you dare come in here!," She shouted to the men waiting, shaking her head as she slowly got to her feet. She was shaking, she was certain of that, her feet having trouble finding the floor in those heels, causing her to stumble slightly. She kicked them off instead, losing a bit of the added height from them as she stepped over to him in stockinged toes.

"I thought you didn't want the pills, Mister J." She tried to keep her voice firm, to keep the waver of fear away. "You have things you want? Then tell me. I will do my best to get them to you. We both know razorblades are not getting past those gates. Your make up? Fine. Gluesticks? I can do that. I'm not ending the session to get away from you. You scare me, I can't deny that. But I'm not judging you. I'm not." She stopped, still a bit of a distance away from him as he sat there, but trying to keep her gaze upon him. "I don't think you would have. You'll threaten me, but I don't think you would have." She really, truly hoped she was right on that. Saying it was easier than actually believing it.

The door slammed open, Harleen's eyes tightly closing as she turned away, not wanting to see as the three men forced their way into the room. "Be careful with him."

"On him? Are you crazy? After what he just-"

"I was talking to him." She interrupted as she glanced at Harold, shaking her head. "About you." She pushed her way past them, shivering slightly. Maybe it was time to go home, to do those things he spurned her for.

His words were already repeating back into her mind. All those things he had said... all those things he had screamed.

She already doubted she would sleep tonight.

 

[LitShark]

J snarled at the door, as his therapist wailed and moaned as only the victims could. She was lucky. Lucky she looked so damn good. When the door burst open, J was impatient already. He lept from the chair, charging at Jesus the moment he saw his good-looking, serious face. Joker charged at him, but Jesus was charged too- a tazer gun. Ten million volts of agonizing, white lightning passed through Joker's body the moment he left the seat and his body went rigid, a toppling, skinny plank.

"'Bout time you fuckers!" J laughed despite his pain, his limbs replaced with rigid, limb sized cramps.

After that it was only laughter, his bladder let out again. Worst part about riding the lightning, it always made you lose your bladder before they let off the juice. Doctor Quinn stepped by him, making her way out. Going to wash her hands.

When Jesus finally disconnected the plastic firing mechanism from the main pistol grip, Joker thought that he could feel smoke leaking from his ears. He giggled suddenly which made his legs kick out, still trying to remember how organic synapses differed from weaponized electricity.

At least Pops had shut up. The lightning was one thing that even the Old Man feared.

J wanted to say something, call after sweet Harley, apologize for his outburst, beg to see her two beatings from- no, tomorrow. He was a person, he needed to take back the sun. Take back his days. Take back control. He didn't ever get words of parting past those scarred, smiling lips. Only shrill, desperate, staccato bursts of laughter escaped him. A cry for help as Rodney and Jesus strapped him against the rolling board, after fixing his shackles back on.

***

Parking Lot:

Harold was smoking again, his wife would be livid at him when she smelled it, but working in the Loony Bin carried a type of stress that Martha would never comprehend. At least smoking subtracted days of living. Less days of laughter- Harold had had his fill.

No one understood what it was, dealing with that... that thing, day after day. The way he can just look inside and drag out the darkest, most private and most fragile parts of you and play them in a tragedy like marionettes before his eyes! No one, except her.

Things had finally calmed down enough for Harold to clock out and change into his real clothes. Whitey no more, but balder every day. He hated that, how even his clothes went back to him. Always back to him. Always laughing. Now he was hiding in the shade of one of the Arkham Elms that loomed over the parking lot and entry staircase.

When Harold spotted the young, blond, shrinker- on her way to her car, he flicked his Parlament cigarette and strode quickly and silently to the other side of the vehicle. As the lights flashed and the locks leapt up, Harold swung open the passenger side door, leaping in opposite her. In the same motion that he leapt into the car, he pulled his regulation Glock .9mm from it's under-arm holster. He'd taken to wearing it home, wearing it to bed, wearing it in the shower, his daughter's birthday... nowhere was safe from the laughing.

"Shut the door and throw your keys on the dash. I don't want to hurt you." Harold insisted, pulling his own door shut while keeping the barrel in line with his reflection in Doc Quinn's glasses. "I just need someone to talk to. You're the only one who knows what it's like."

***

Joker had been shown back to his cell with markedly less chaos than what was considered average. "His cell", not the inhuman Iso box they locked him in when he was bad, but his own place where he could be left alone, at least by Arkham standards.

They were filming, always filming- little, black, dome, fish eyes- always watching. But he was deleriously free of uncomfortable crotch straps and unreliable shackles which allowed him the rare privilege of his full range of motion, after the orderlies had left, of course. Any privilege J had ever been offered or granted had been abused and subsequently revoked, so the puke green, cement walls of his cell were completely unadorned. A polished piece of metal served instead of a mirror which had been strictly forbidden him. Below that, a metal sink, that only ever slowly leeched brown, metallic, crunchy water. Below that, the unbearably cold metal toilet. Like a hulking metal mockery of a human digestive system.

J threw himself over the robot's shiny, metal ass and wreched. He wreched again and dry heaved. It felt like he'd swallowed another tooth. When he stuck his knoby fingers into his throat, arched his back and finally summoned a flood of yellow stomach acid, it carried with it a small, metal, missile.

A pen? J didn't remember eating that. Who had put that in his stomach? How had they? Were they trying to send him a message? J turned the small piece of contraband between his fingers, lightly wiping the slime from the surface, finding initals embossed over the metal clip, meant to hold it against a pocket. HQ, it was from his Harley! He knew she was special.

J set the pen onto the sink, trying to understand what the significance of the pen could be, could have been. What did it mean? J looked up to the hazy, bending, funhouse mirror for an answer, his Father looked like he'd been waiting all night.

Spit it out.

What did he even want to say? Oh God, he was freezing up again, just like he always did. His father's voice would quell no arguement, but he still didn't understand. Was it related to the pen?

Spit it out!

J lifted out his bottom lip on instinct alone, pulling it low and making his smile look grotesque by sheer scale. The fingers on his other hand started picking at what looked like a burn inside his mouth, and soon there was blood. Glorious, vibrant, iron rich blood. Drops in the silver basin, a masterpiece. After some more lovely blood, J pinched the corner of a concealed razor blade and slid it slowly out from the small, wound pocket that he'd made in his chin.

Setting the bloody square of metal on the other side of the sink, opposite the regurgitated writing tool. The duality of the situation made him giggle. Every day was Christmas when your own mind gives you presents. Now he just needed to understand. One tool of communication, one of destruction.

Oh for fuck's sake! Send her a message. Send that bitch a goddamn message Spazz. I'm bored of you already.

Somewhere in the ether, a door slammed shut and Father was in the cell no longer. Now it seemed so obvious. Of course, she'd sent him a message, now it was his turn. J hid the pen and went over to the wide, undecorated cement wall.

"I'll send you a message." Joker laughed, pushing the razor blade against his arm.

Following long lines of old scars from previous attempts, the blade cut smooth, opening his practiced veins from his wrist to the end of his forearm, unfurling a curtain of midnight blood down his arm, dripping around his bare feet on the tile floor. That task done, J dipped the ring finger from his other hand into the flow and began to write a letter on the wall.

Dearest and Most Cherished Ha-Ha-Harley Quinn (Medicine Woman)

 

[Mephistophelily]

She returned to her shared office, a heavy sigh leaving her lips as she dropped into her chair, pushing her glasses up slightly from her face as her hands ran against her cheeks, under her eyes. She could still hear him. At least, her mind thought she was hearing him. Screams. Laughter. That cackle of pain.

"It's harder than you thought, isn't it?"
Harleen ignored him, the other intern sitting at his own desk across the room. He stood up, a smug smile on his face.
"Come on. Be honest. It was harder than you expected, dealing with that lunatic. He's too far gone, Quinzel. You're only going to torture yourself trying to get in that mind."

"Shut up, Matthew." She glared at him as her glasses fell back down, a furious look on her face. "I made progress with him. For one thing, look at me." She held up her hands, shaking her head. "He never harmed me. And he actually listened to me."

"He's playing with you." He sounded certain of that. "Quit while you're ahead."

She went back to ignoring him, instead making notes in her own new paperwork in regard to her session. Her pen had vanished at some point, the one used to pin back her hair for the first half of their session. She still wasn't sure what had happened to it. Her hair had fallen sometime around his outburst, the moment he attacked her. No, it wasn't an attack. It was a plea. She saw it now. He was begging for her, in his own way. He simply didn't know how to say it. Something had killed that inside him.

She blamed the Bat.

Her notebook was a mess of ink and scribbles, impossible to read but making sense for her. So much to get out, get on paper. All those notes. All those thoughts, all those little things he had given away. The things he had begged for. Maybe, just maybe, she could get them for him. All of them, somehow.

---------------------------

Exhaustion was setting in by the time she could head home, her briefcase hanging lazily over her shoulder as she set out from the locked doors. Her car felt a million miles away tonight, a tiny yawn stifling through as she pushed the doorlock on her keys. If only it could drive itself home, she mused. A tiny laugh slipped at the thought, opening her door and sliding in-

And horrified as she was suddenly face to barrel with a passenger.
Her heart jumped as her eyes widened, staring in confused shock to the man levelling his gun at her face. One of the guards. One from earlier. "H-Harold?! What- what the hell-?!"

He demanded her keys, for her to close the door. To listen to him. She didn't understand at first, but did as he requested; the door slammed shut, her keys set upon the dash as she continued to watch him. "I don't know what's wrong, but this not the way to go about it. Harold, if there's something you feel the need to talk about, then... I'll listen. But please put the gun down. There's no need for that."

Matthew had voiced concerns on her safety with Joker... a patient...
...He never mentioned actual members of the staff pulling a gun on her.

"What it's like. What what is like, Harold? Fear? I'm quite afraid right now, if that's what you mean." The guard was frightening her, that gun the main thing she saw, nearly oblivious of the man behind it. "You're having issues with something. I get that. But if you want to talk about it, you need to put that down."

 

[LitShark]

Harold took a deep breath, really processing what it was he was doing. She was right, she wasn't the problem. She was the solution. Still, best not to let the pistol stray too far. Pistol had gained a mind of it's own lately, always moving silently toward the temple.

"I'm not crazy, okay? I know, I just- I needed you to understand how serious it is." Harold said, the level tones of a rational man returning as he laid Pistol to rest on the dashboard of the car. "It's the laughing. Always laughing..."

Harold shook his head slowly, he could hear it now, rattling over and over on an infinite loop of side splitting glee. Every inmate in Arkham had their "Realm" for tormenting the orderlies, but most of them had cures. When Iseley haunted him, he learned to love concrite, Dent forced him to become Single-Minded in all things. For Joker, he hadn't found a cure just yet, at least not one that he was willing to consider.

"I'm a papa, you see? My little girl, she's everything to me, why I work so hard, why I do this thankless, shitty job." Harold began, his words growing faintly more coarse and wild. "She's four years old, smart as a whip... But the laughing. She's always fucking laughing! She laughs at the rain, laughs at the sun, laughs in the morning, laughs her way though her afternoons. And he knows it. I have no fucking clue for God in Heaven how, but he knows! He asks about her, has a way... a way that he can laugh just like her. You heard it! He's mocking me, and it's always- it's always her laugh before he tries something ugly! So now when I go home, playing with my daughter in the park. I'm looking over my shoulder! Flinching from my goddamn daughter! And the blackouts! I hate her so much when she's laughing that I black out and when I wake up again she's crying, and I'm so grateful that she's not laughing anymore that I don't even realize she's crying because I'm shaking her!"

Harold hadn't even realized that he was shaking Dr. Quinn, by the shoulders as he shouted the last few words of his shrieking confession. When the ring of his cell phone broke through his screams, Harold flinched like he'd been shot and retreated back to his side of the car. He stared at her in horror of what he'd said as he slowly lifted the phone to his ear.

"What did he do now?" Harold asked, not needing to look at the Call ID to know who was calling and why. "Christ! How? A Razorblade? Fuck! The goddamn lock up... crafty motherfucker."

Harold slammed his cell phone hard against the dash, shattering it into pieces that tumbled through his fingers. He grabbed his gun off the dash and slipped it back into the holster.

"Good thing I caught you, Harley." Harold said, distracted with securing his gun carefully and with obsessive ritual. "Your boyfriend just opened up his arm again. Hope you didn't have plans."

At that, Harold opened up the door and stepped out of the car. He was laughing, had been laughing since he was still talking, but it didn't feel like laughing. It felt like screaming. Loud, in vain and from total frustration, Harold screamed laughter at the outside walls of Arkham Asylum, while the patient who wouldn't let them leave screamed with laughter within. Harold laughed all the way to the door, he had to laugh to keep from crying.

 

[Mephistophelily]

"I never said you were," Harleen started slowly, trying to see the man past the gun. "I'm supposing it is rather serious if you felt a need for a.... a private session like this." She narrowed her eyes just slightly as he spoke of what was bothering him. Laughter. There was more than enough of that in the building, not just from Joker. Nigma's visits, even when Cobblepot made his inevitable stays. Pamela was a giggler, a rather disturbing sound when it came to playing in the asylum gardens.

Tales of his home life. Things they weren't really supposed to talk about, but if it was what was effecting him, it was best to get it out. She tried to listen, lost by both his flying words and the waving gun. Problems with laughter. Joker had really gotten to him... She tried desperately to listen, to understand, try to find something, anything to give him in return to calm him and take away some of this pain.

Instead, he grabbed hold of her, the gun held upward as he drove his hands into her shoulders. Her eyes widened, frozen for that brief moment. Twice in one night, attacked by a man... She tried to speak, only managing to give a quick cry of shock as his phone went off. He hastily drew back, leaving the woman beside him to raise a shaking hand and brush the fallen hair from her eyes. A hesitant glance was given his way as he spoke, the one sided conversation she caught bringing a frown to her face. Something was wrong back inside.

Speak of the devil.

She cringed as his phone found her dashboard, jumping slightly back towards her own window. He seemed oblivious, wrapped up in his gun once again as he put it away. Well, that was a plus at least.

"Opened his arm? Cutting?" She sighed heavily as he slipped out of the car, the sudden sound of cackling laughter causing her to freeze up once more as her own door simply hung open.

He had made it outside?
No. No, that was... That was Harold.

She slowly drew out of the vehicle, hesitantly looking to the hysterical man, watching as he headed back for the heavy doors. This was Joker's doing. A bi-product of that man's insanity. He was almost... infectious. Was that even possible?

No time for questioning that now; at the moment, he was in there, inflicting self damage once again. She ran to catch up with Harold, finding that he was already headed for Joker's cell. She hurried down the halls, reaching for her pass to slide the electronic tag through the various locks.

She'd left it behind in the interview room.

She sighed, shaking her head, then gave a pleading look to the guard beside her. He used his own, letting her on her way to her patient.

"He wants you," One of the orderlies standing outside the door to Joker's room growled.

"He's asking for me?" She stepped forward, but the man pushed her back as he shook his head.

"He ain't SAYIN' it, Doc. He's WRITIN' it." He glanced back to the window, a disgusted look on his face. "How the fuck he hasn't fainted yet is beyond me. That's a damn novel."

"Let me in!," She demanded, trying to shove past him, stealing a glimpse inside. Her name, in red, upon the wall. Words upon words following after. Joker jotting away with his own unique ink. Her stomach twisted at the sight, cringing and shuddering at what he was doing. "Let me in to him, please. Let me in to see him. I have to get him to stop, so you can bandage him up." She paused, then held out her hand. "Give it to me. Let me do it. He may try to slice one of you, if you go in there. I don't think he'll do that to me."

She hoped he wouldn't, anyway.
He had told her to trust him. This was a test of that.

 

[LitShark]

Narrator's Note: It's impossible to accurately convey the full gravity and chaos of the writing that Joker left on the walls of his cell, however, parenthetical descriptions will follow throughout, in an attempt to allow readers the opportunity to visualize the Madman's Masterpiece. It was written in long, wide arcing lines across the walls, moving from left to right and then back right to left, the letters upside down and backward on all even lines, a detail which will be omitted for the sake of legibility. Also, some portions of frantic writing were overlapped by gluts of blood from the clown's arm, other portions went directly through puddles on the floor which were indecipherable. What follows is the legible text that remained.

Harley, Ha he Ha Ha Harley! Happy, Happy, Happy to meet a Ha Ha Harley.
Happy to say goodbye. Ha Ha Ha Ha (indecipherable)
Have to stop. Can't see Harley. Still See Harley. See Her, See Me. Always watching. =D
Smile! You're on camera! Ha Ha Ha EYES! (indecipherable)
Would only kill he he he her. Only know how to kill. Killing is love 0.0 (indecipherable)
HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA (indecipherable)
Everyone wants me to die. The guards, Gotham City, the Bat (*M*), Me most of all =D
Die Die Die Die Die Die Die Die Die Die Die (indecipherable, but the gist was "Die")
Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha (A chaotic collage of smiling and laughing faces filled a great deal of empty space from the lines above, with more "Ha's" of all sizes and inflections)

(Here there was a long, jagged, shapeless smear where J had slid down the wall, his bloody finger and hemorrhaging arm had left two wide fingered palm prints under the last line that bled down the wall, fingers on one hand leaving wavering smears, while the other left a full bodied, ruddy brush stroke as his heart pumped a spray onto the wall which his hand slid through. He continued on the floor through much wider puddles which had accumulated when he was writing on the wall.)

(Indecipherable, but there were smears through the puddle where it was clear that he had continued writing.)

He'll kill you! He wants me to let him! But I won't. I'll protect you like I couldnt (indecipherable)
She's dead now, and you will be too. I'll kill you, not like I'LL KILL YOU, I just (indecipherable)
(indecipherable) Kill you! Kill you! Kill you! Kill them all!!! (indecipherable, something about laughter)
The best times in your life, you weren't crying, you were laughing, laughing is like taking Christian heaven, grabbing it out of the sky, pulling the pin out and swallowing it right before it explodes.
Heaven in your mouth, heaven on your tongue. heaven blasting your teeth across the room.
(After this, the writing started moving in a spiral around the room, moving inward and inward toward the center of the room.)
Goodbye Harley, thank you for trying to help me. You deserve a lifetime of laughter, not just a hilarious death. Only I need a punchline, maybe this time I've found it at last. Crazy falls in love with this therapist and kills himself to impress her. Ha Ha Ha! (Here he'd drawn a heart, but not the stylized versions most people identify as a heart. It was shaped like the African continent and crossed by large arterial veins that led out to places where he'd written "Ha" where the "Heart" ought to have pumped blood to other organs.)
Thanks for the laughs, puddin'. But the cheese stands alone.

After this, there was more, but it was indecipherable as the last few lines surrounded the place on the floor where Joker sat, cross legged, his sliced arm in his lap where it had bled into a pool around him, wiping out lines as it expanded. When Dr. Quinzel came rushing into the cell, J could only muster a weak little laugh. All this was to protect her, but she charged right back into the jaws of the beast. The irony was hilarious.

"Doc, you shouldn't be here." J muttered weakly, his good arm lifting the bloody one from his lap. "I fucking fired you. Didn't you read my note? Oh, good. You brought Harold back, sharp street clothes 'Papa'. Ha Ha hoo... Papa, be a sport and bring Mr. J a nice crash bag. There's a good chap. Jesus! Jeeeee-Zus! Get the damn doc away from that crazy! He's bleeding all over her, she's not even wearing gloves."

Then his eyes rolled back and a light, little girl's giggle escaped him as Harold rushed into the cell with a bag of transfusion blood and an IV tube.

 

[Mephistophelily]

She opened the door slowly, shoving past the guards and orderlies that tried to get in her way. Small, but fast. Demanding and refusing to let her patient, the man who fascinated her so much, made an impression on her already, simply be left to bleed out in his cell. They would hurt him. Ignore him.Goodbye and good riddance.

Harleen wouldn't let this happen. He wasn't just a madman to her. He wasn't just a patient. He had said to trust him. She had to make sure he could trust her.

Her rush had been intended to be straight to him, take him into her arms, try to stop the bleeding. He needed help. But the view she found, not just the fallen man coated in blood- the entire story scripted onto his walls, a letter left to whoever found it. No... This was to her. Her name, apologies everywhere. More stories in broken bits scrawled and slipping, the ink he used far too precious for all of this. A full mind with not enough to let the words flow. Harleen's hands raised slowly, fingertips pressing hard into her lips. "Mister J...," She choked out, finally looking back down to the barely conscious man curled upon the floor.

She dropped down beside him, shaking her head. He was spewing words now, ranting away at Harold, telling her to go. "Stop," She whispered, moving closer, wrapping her own hands against the wounded arm, trying to stop the bleeding as Harold returned. More words, some uncomprehensible. She understood enough. Flurried words on her doing this, his want for her to go. "Joker, please, stop. I can't help you if-"

The laughter. That laugh Harold had told her about. A laugh of a child, so frightening to be coming out of a man like him. Her eyes widened,quickly looking up to the man beside her, holding the supplies Joker desperately needed. "Just drop them and get out!," She snapped at him, shaking her head again. After what he had done in her car, the last thing she wanted was for him to stay near that laughter any longer than he needed to.

She took the bag, the supplies, and tried to get the infusion started. Plunging the needle into his opposite arm, trying to keep him still as she worked on wrapping the gash on his open forearm. "Someone else! Please! Get in here!" She glared back as the men outside hesitated, the pouch held above her head as she pressed her hand, wrapped in part of her jacket, against his wound. "You can't just let him bleed out like this, please!" She was pleading now, fear and fury in her words.

One of the guards heaved a sigh and came in, simply taking the bag and holding it for her. Another tossed in a roll of gauze, starting to walk away. "Bastards, the lot of you," she whispered angrily, tightly wrapping Joker's arm with the roll. Her mind was racing now, all those words he had written, the concern he seemed to pour into them with his own blood. A message for her, straight from the heart- far more than anyone else had ever done, could ever do. Straight, straight from the heart. Words that flowed completely from it.

He confessed so much in those words so hard to read, both from how they were written and the pain he had poured into it. Things that said so much, but they (the damnable THEY) would say was a trick on his part. A lie to make her listen and believe him. Then why all the fear in it? He actually seemed afraid for her, afraid of what he might do. The other he... the one he talked about before.

Joker was still laughing, that disturbing little laugh. She could hear Harold in the hall. "Get him out of here!," She called over her shoulder, tying off the tightly bound wrapping she had done to Joker's arm, already starting to bleed through. "Come on. You need to go to the infirmary." Harleen took his good arm, trying to get him to his feet.

"You are NOT leaving this cell with him without cuffs!," one of the guards barked angrily.

"And just where the hell do you intend to put them?!" She pointed to Joker's wrist, glaring at the guard in her way. "Follow behind, keep an eye on us if you want, but you are not cuffing him! They'll only make things worse!" Arguing and arguing. Bitch bitch bitch- this was getting no where. He was getting worse. "Just... just do whatever you want, just let me get him someone who can actually help him!"

 

[LitShark]

While Harley's mind may have been racing, J had never felt more at ease. In the arms of his own personal savior, with Jesus left holding the bag- poetic. The more Harley raved over his well-being, the more in love J fell. The Pen, of course! That's why she'd slipped him the pen. With his blood pressure low, the other voices were silent. The pain: local and familiar. He could see everything that had ever been or ever would be all at once. He knew it would never get any better than this, this moment.

J took a moment to cherish it.

"Only you can help me. Don't you remember?" Joker whispered softly against Harley's neck, his good arm coming up to caress her face with smudged fingers. "I'll get us to the infirmary. Don't you worry. Tonight we're going to both help each other."

With the bandage wrapped and the life restoring plasma flowing through the needle, J raised his hands dutifully toward Harold. The old man had already produced the set of "Joker Cuffs", an invention that Harold had designed himself specifically for it's namesake. This wasn't Joker's first time trying this razorblade stunt, nor was he the only one who did it with regularity. On Jesus' first day there had been three, this was the Doc's initiation. Harold felt thankful she hadn't seen more patients.

The cuffs were a steel and copper imitation of Chinese Finger-Traps, with a large, intractable central lock and keyhole. As J slid his fingers into the darkened holes, Harold turned the key in the middle, tightening and expanding a series of inward facing metal spikes. No one had yet figured out any way to pick out of the Joker Cuffs, but some had injured themselves severely trying to pull free.

J winced slightly as the spikes bit warningly into the old scars in his fingers, he had no desire to wrestle the alligator today. J turned his face upward, toward Harley as his eyes drifted shut. No way would he be able to try this with the old man in his head. Now or never. Now or never. Now or never.

Leaning up, quivering, scarred lips pressed against lush, youthful ones and he kissed her, ever so gently on the mouth. He had no idea how she would react, but if history was any gauge, the kiss would succeed where his letter had failed in chasing away the doctor. The palm against her face pulled her into his lips, just lightly running the very tip of his tongue over her bottom lip before Harold forced him up to standing.

The whole collection moving in unison toward the infirmary.

 

[Mephistophelily]

Her eyes were wide as he whispered to her, trying to study his face, confusion mostly taking her own as she listened to him. Only she could... Oh god, she felt like she was abandoning him now, passing him off to the belly of the beast. She wanted to say something, anything, but all she could do was let her mouth hang open, lips trying to stumble out words in silence. The touch of his bloodstained fingers against her cheek spooked her only slightly, more from the coolness of them now than anything else. Us. Them? He and She? "I can't help you there," She whispered to him, shaking her head. "I can't. They'll take care of you, I swear. If they hurt you, I'll- I'll...."

She couldn't do anything. File a complaint, bitch and moan. Raise hell in offices and a tirade of papers that no one would read. Joker had been deemed simply a case of pure insanity. A madman in a cell, with intent only to harm.

The marks on his walls now would only push that case further. No one else would read past them, would they? Harleen could see it. She read it clearly. A plea for help. A man lost inside, lost to his father, his pain. He needed someone to see it. It was why he wanted her to go, wasn't it? He said he fired her. It left her even more determined to stay.

She looked away as Harold slipped closer, her angry words on standard cuffs having no reasoning to him. He had his own ways of dealing with the man she held, it seemed. She didn't want to see how those things even worked, simply closing her eyes as she turned her head away, drawing a breath as she heard them click into place. A tiny, barely noticeable sound came from Joker's lips, her gaze slowly easing back towards him. Locked in place. Was this really necessary? She glared up at Harold, shaking her head slowly as she kept her arm about Joker's shoulders. It seemed more like putting a choke chain on a chihuahua at the moment, in her eyes.

She glanced down again as J stirred in her arms, trying to see if he was still conscious. So many words... so eloquently written for a so-called insane man... She shook her head at the thought, starting to peek back up to them-

Cut off by Joker's lips.
Frightening, shaking lips that touched her own so cautiously at first. The motion surprised her, starting to pull back, his hand still upon her cheek keeping her from straying too far. She closed her eyes a moment, brows coming together in a confused press as he ran his tongue against her lip.

She felt it. The hole, the mess. What he had done to himself-
Harold yanked him from her lap, a gasp leaving Harleen's own lips as she was left with a reddened coat and empty arms. her fingers clenched at empty air, simply trying to find her breath.

He had hidden away something terrible in those lips. And he let her find his secret. He tore it open to tell her something. This mess, this message scrawled so heavily on the walls in his own truly from the heart words. She stayed on the floor as they filed out of the room, shaking softly on the cement surface as she peered up at the walls, then back to the pool of his blood left at her knees.

Her fingers touched her lips, the linger of his blood there as well. She was covered in him. Everywhere.

He told her to leave, yet seemed to be begging her to stay. It was impossible to simply forget him, now. He had marked far too much of her, not just with his words. The blood, the images he left in her mind.

Even if she wanted to... She simply couldn't just leave him. She could go home, she could try to sleep. But she wouldn't be without him.

Her legs helped her to stand, shakily bringing her to balance. She wanted to follow after them, but was afraid on what that may cause for the medical team. Back to her office. Regain her head. Try to find some composure and reattempt going home. Hopefully they could give him some drugs for the pain, to help put him into sleep for the night. She wondered if even she might need something of that variety for herself...

 

[LitShark]

While none of J's keepers, handlers or head-shrinkers would sleep that night; J drifted effortlessly off to sound, dreamless, silent sleep. He might have taken to sucking on his thumb if his hands hadn't been fettered by Harold's finger-cuffs. Rodney was using a high-pressure washer to rinse out J's cell, Jesus was watching the clown sleep through bleary eyes and a black & white monitor. Harold was awake giggling into his pillow, unable to close his eyes without seeing the cell. It was actually pretty funny.

J didn't remember being wheeled back to his cell, but in the morning, he woke up there. His restraints had been removed, his jumpsuit changed and dissolving stitches inlaid into the wounds on his arms, the whole mess wrapped in clean bandages.

Oh what a beautiful morning.

The buzzer sounded, loud and grating as the reinforced steel door slid open and Rodney came in, flanked by Harold, both already strapped into their riot gear. They didn't need it, J was still weak and had no will to fight. He allowed himself to be shackled and led from his cell.

"Where we goin' today fellahs?" J laughed easily. "Another head-shrinker audition day?"

"Nah Funny Man." Rodney muttered grudgingly. "The blond is back. She wants to talk about last night."

"Harley?" Joker asked incredulously as he allowed himself to be led back into the observation lab. "I could have sworn I scared that bitch off already."