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Dark Humor	By : xxnadsxx Category: zMisplaced Stories [ADMIN use only] > Batman (All Movies) > Batman (All Movies) Views: 2361 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own the Batman series, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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Dark
Humor
Four
Justice
is balance.
--Ra's
Al Ghul

Only five minutes ago, Rachel had
begun to race.
What was she racing? The clock that
ticked away with vicious rapidity every millisecond, stealing her breath each
time she dared to glance at the electric digits in her car? Or maybe she was
hoping she would intercept Bruce on his way to Harvey's funeral�if he wasn't
already gone, dragged off somewhere, hurt. If anything, she wasn't
racing against him, the madman who had initiated the latest batch of
chaos in the first place. He was waiting for her, and the thought that he
always knew where she was, had been watching her as she lived day-to-day
chilled her to the bones.
Ten,
fifteen minutes in traffic.
Cars zoomed past in blurs of color as she cursed wildly, slammed a heel against
the gas, and floored it. There were no policemen around; they were all
stationed outside the funeral home, doing their customary mournful walk before
the actual ceremony. Typical of Gotham, the most corrupted place on Earth, to
take its crime fighters on another day off as if it was a welcome privilege.
But then again, it was also an acknowledgement of failure; a celebration for
their enemies.
She passed glaring red lights
without stopping, fucking annoying pedestrians that screamed even when she frantically
beeped them out of the way, stop signs that she would have rather plowed
through in all her hurry than abide by. The funeral home zoomed into sight like
a rapidly budding pinprick of black against the horizon, magnified twice its
size every second with her relentless speed. As her car skidded to a halt
outside the already crowded area, Rachel pulled herself from the halted vehicle
and stared across the asphalt to the nearly-finished parade.
There were countless people there;
standing outside of their homes or gazing out of windows at the procession,
clustered across the sidewalks in rows upon rows of heads, as all Gotham�s
sizable police force lined in rows of navy blue, badges glinting in the evening
sunlight, weapons in hand with the rigid formality of soldiers. Within the
group was the remarkably long-living Mayor Garcia, his lifespan a phenomenon
throughout such chaotic times; Commissioner Gordon at his side, his eyes
darting pensively across the crowds as if sweeping for potential threat. Rachel
should have been in the procession herself, she knew, but she hadn�t formally
been named head D.A.; it was just an informal fact that she was now in such a
high position. For now, she was better off watching from the sidelines, better
from keeping her panic isolated from formality and tradition.
He wouldn�t attack them all outside.
He�ll wait until we�re all closed together; suffocated, cramped. Until we can�t
all get out at once. We could run out in the open, escape.
She was thinking as predator, as an
animal�it was the only way she could possibly predict what they would very soon
inevitably face.
Dehumanize yourself, and you can
almost understand him. It�s all just power play. It�s all just chaos and
anarchy. Marking your territory with blood instead of other fluids�
As she thought, the heavy black
coffin came into view, flanked by police officers. Rachel turned her head aside
amidst the crowd and shut her eyes, her breath shaking. She struggled with all
her ‑�
might not to see the coffin�s inhabitant, what lay within,
even if it was the man she had loved. It was an object, now; a solid
block of black, a slab of stone. There was no Harvey there. He was outside of
it; he was in her memories and with her, nothing more, nothing less.
Comforted by the thought, Rachel
stared at the passing coffin�s back, at the miniature flood of more navy-blue
outfitted officers that followed. She broke into a quick run at the side of the
road, where the grim funeral building lay before.
She still hadn�t seen Bruce.
oOo
She was searching. Close friends and
officials clustered throughout the massive funeral home as if it were a
miniature city, united in its black mourning. The men were dressed identically
in their crisp suits, making it almost impossible to distinguish one from the
other. Ten, fifteen minutes ticked voraciously by in which she forced herself
through close-knit crowds with elbows and frantic shoves, receiving grunts and
rude retorts but never truly hearing through the pounding in her ears, never
seeing the faces that turned to stare. Rachel knew somehow that she would
recognize Bruce if she ran into him, despite being tangled in the ocean of
black-clad people that, in her panic, seemed to inhabit every corner of the
funeral home's cramped entrance hall. She was glad she wasn't claustrophobic;
even then, everything seemed to be pressing down on her as she walked quickly
forward, pushing into her from left and right and behind as if the people would
extend their arms and grab her, hinder her from finding Bruce, drag her back
and away into nothingness.
Forcefully she pushed through the
remainder of inhabitants, who gaped and glared at her as she passed, reaching
blessedly empty air near the main room in which they would all be sitting soon
to suffocate each other yet again. There were too many people here, their
bodies seeming countless like swarms of black ants, all of them coming to pay
tribute to the late D.A. and undoubtedly even now gazing with curiosity upon
his former fianc�e. But of course he would choose the most populated place to
play his little games�where did she expect him to go and blow things up, an
empty field?
A few more people stood before her
as she advanced; men with their backs turned, adamantly blocking her way in
their stiffness. She didn�t have time to waste; she pushed between them,
causing them to turn and stare. It was only until a hand grabbed her by her
wrist that she turned and stared straight into the face of Gordon, watching her
with an almost equally panicked look she knew was obvious upon her features at
that very moment.
�Gordon,� Rachel gasped,
her voice almost cracking, while the two other policemen that had been at his
side watched her curiously.
Gordon�s face seemed just as weary
as she felt; he held the tops of her arms and watched her intently, studying
her telltale expression,
�Rachel. What�s wrong? What did you
hear?�
�He�he called me,� She
replied quietly, and he pulled her towards a corner as she spoke, fighting back
the urge to raise her voice in her panicked ire, �He told me he�d be here�but I
haven�t seen him, I don�t know where he�d be, he�s inside though,
Gordon, he has to be��
Gordon nodded, his eyes wide behind
his glasses yet glazed over with sharp determination,
�Of course, you�re right�he�s here
somewhere. I�ll stand guard with the others in outside while it�s happening,
there are already a few in the room�everything will be okay, we�ll get the
bastard.� He paused as he motioned the officers he had been standing with to
come forward, just as the dozens of guests began to file through the opened
doors,
�Did�he say what he was after?�
She said nothing; her throat caught,
her eyes conveying the answer before her lips could. He stared at her for a
solid minute before understanding filled his face, which then twisted in almost
violent ambition,
�We�re not letting him get to you,
Rachel. Go with the guards. We�ll seal the door and watch everyone who files
in.�
Hesitantly, she nodded, wanting to
protest; wanting her own gun, at least. Something akin to skepticism filled her
gut; perhaps it was instinct, knowing that somehow the plan that Gordon lay
would turn on itself, or perhaps never even work in the first place. They�d
been through too much to be overly optimistic�
Rachel had learned a long time ago
it was no use to believe in miracles when there was no God in Gotham to grant
them.
oOo
Surveying the people that filled the
long aisles with a sweeping gaze, she wondered just how many of them could
escape in time. Policemen filled the aisles intermittently between Harvey�s
relatives and close friends, city officials in such variety as judges,
politicians and high-ranking lawyers, the Mayor himself sitting flanked with
two officers on each side. The aisles were filling up fast, so fast that she
had barely caught the familiar sight of Bruce, relief flooding her in wild
currents at his strongly comforting frame.
For a moment she tried to reach
him�she didn�t know if he would talk to her, even, or if it was worth telling
him of the potential threat. The Joker may not even be able to get through the
door; his scars would mark him apart from the others, make up or not, all the
mobsters able to be identified by plain sight. Besides, if anything were to
happen�well, Batman would find a way to leave, to come back and aid them all.
Comforted by this logic, she crossed her legs and took in a deep breath as she
sat at the foremost aisle, the only one that had not been completely inhabited,
her eyes still catching on Bruce�s side, as if internally begging him to look
in her direction, if only to really be sure he had been untouched.
Crossing her arms against her
overcoat, she bit her lip and anxiously watched the first few people speak,
repeating words they had spoken while at the parade; Mayor Garcia, the police
alert to attention at the sides of the rooms, pacing slowly and deliberately;
prominent district judges; city officials who she failed to notice and
recognize in her mental preoccupation. Where could he possibly be, where could
he possibly make an entrance? Her mind strained to think along the edges of his own; the best trick, the most malicious arrival
possible�
�Rachel,� A voice whispered in her
ear, breaking the tense silence for a moment.
One of the officers who had been
sitting next to her was staring at her, his kind gaze watching her intently as
she focused on reality; she took in the hushed crowd of people around her, the
cold wooden surface of the aisle against her hands�everything seemed to be
tense, taut, waiting. It was then she realized half of the reason was because
they were waiting on her, because sometime or other they had called her
for the closing eulogy, and she was expected to stand and speak. Coughing
slightly, the District Attorney straightened her dress and pulled herself to her
feet, making her way towards the foremost section of the suddenly very cramped
hall.
She was standing at the podium, her
heart racing frantically in her ribs, pounding so hard it felt hot and raw. Her
eyes swept the endless rows of people once, twice, spotting Bruce again, who
was sitting with a mixed look of rapt attention and saddened resignation on his
unknowing face, a flash of Mayor Garcia with his eyes savage and stricken with
a hint of a paranoia as his black-clad men took their posted seats at the end
of each aisle, a few of Harvey's close and distant relatives, sobbing into
handkerchiefs or looking off into the distance...
Every other face seemed to shift
into an endless conglomeration of skin against black fabric; she couldn't make
any sense of which one was stark white with those ghastly eyes and reddened
lips--or, if he wasn't wearing his war paint, she couldn't even see his scars.
The doors had been tightly sealed shut, flanked on the outside by officers, by
Gordon, whom she vehemently prayed was still alright. Behind her, Harvey's
coffin lay against a flat wall, sealed shut. There was no way the bastard could
escape. There was no way all of them could escape at once.
And Batman himself was trapped in
the room with them all, just as much as victim as the rest of them were.
She squeezed a fist against the
podium, smiling tightly with a feigned mournfulness to hide her panic. He was
here, somewhere, smiling that permanently carved Glasgow grin, out of sight yet
never entirely far from her, his knife glinting and ready in whatever darkness
he crept. For a fleeting moment Rachel met Gordon�s gaze through a slight crack
in the heavy doors and saw the constant tenseness that was oblivious to all
others flooding the room; they were mourning, yet they would never fully
understand its true nature until the day died.
"Harvey Dent. What can we say
about him that hasn't already been said?"
She began from pure unplanned
speech; something ached in her chest as she said the name she hadn't fully
wanted to acknowledge from anyone else's lips, but as it flew from her own it
was like a betrayal. They could have been saying Rachel instead; there
would be nothing to accompany her own funeral to match the degree of stringent
trepidation in this room that made ‑�
the air noxious and thick. Her eyes swept across the room
again, again; all with that tight smile, each time going through every face
before her and wondering what lay beneath the collared shirts, the lowered
heads.
"As his former fianc�e, I knew
him much more personally than most would have the privilege to say. And I can
tell you he was truly a great man, through and through, dedicated to protecting
Gotham and its people. Harvey wanted not to be its sole protector, however; he
wanted to be a symbol. He wanted to encourage everyone to stand up against the
crime that ravaged our beautiful city, he wanted us to remember his examples
and live by them. And we need to do that...starting today."
With every word, her apprehension
grew; her voice shook at the end of the last sentence, one that could be easily
masked by sympathetic funeral-goers as genuine sadness for Harvey's passing. Of
course, part of that was true, yet at the moment she couldn't even think
of the man behind her when a much more menacing one lay somewhere, mere feet
before. Taking a very deep breath, she watched the unmoving crowd and gripped
the podium's surface, digging nails into wood, the half-moon crests decorating
the wooden angle. She could feel Bruce's eyes upon her as he read her open
gaze, sensed her panic as only their intuition would allow; and before he could
catch her own with a questioning look, she turned her head and continued,
shutting her eyes,
"Harvey wanted us, and still
wants us, to fight back. Although I am now a more prominent District Attorney,
we can all be�we have to stop standing back and take action in any way
we possibly can. We have to be justice for our Gotham, for Harvey's
memory. We need to stand strong in spirit, to stand united together and face
the criminals as we would have had Harvey still been with us and Batman�"
As she constantly looked around, at
the rows upon rows of nods and approving murmurs, a flash of black stopped her
dead in her speech. Out of the corner of her eye, Bruce gazed frantically his
seat, and he, too, noticed what more and more people were beginning to respond
to with bursts of outrage and annoyance. A man was out of his seat; an
average-looking man, harmless had he not been running across the aisles at
breakneck speed towards the cluster of policemen that had gathered before the
podium.
"Batman is a murderer!" He
screamed so loud his voice was raw and hoarse, his mouth foaming, his
face a bulging red and eyes wide with nothing but chaos, "Batman murdered
Harvey Dent!"
He was coming closer to the
officers; their fists clenched around their shotguns as they held them steady,
the three of them just as stunned and taken aback at the remainder of the crowd
that still clustered the aisles, standing still like a black sheet.
"Stop where you are! Freeze!" They screamed in unison, their shotguns
cocked, yet the man continued to run blindly up the long path, his hands
waving, body shaking as if in convulsions�
Another man was running horizontally
across the end of the room; another crept from a corner aisle, silent and
still. Her body froze; she eyed every one of them, unmasked, average. Her gasp ‑�
was echoed across the silent room,
and she could see Gordon through the doorway, debating on whether to run
through the door or stay still, Bruce at the desperate edge of action with his
palms flexed against the seat's surface, his knees bent�
And then all hell broke loose.
The screaming man lunged at the
nearest of the three officers; the hail of bullets penetrated the silent air
like miniature bombs, and Rachel found herself watching with transfixed horror
as his body shook and convulsed full of the artillery, holes bursting across
flesh and blood dribbling like a fountain.
"Stop that! Stop at once�ENOUGH!"
Gordon screamed from his position,
his face pink with a mixture of rage and horror as the wide-eyed frightened
policemen continued to shoot in their panic. Screams echoed across the aisle
ways as people rustled and jostled one another, ducking their heads in their
seats, each contemplating leaving the funeral yet none daring to run amidst the
gunfire. Bruce was watching the other two men who were prowling, seemingly
unnoticed, amidst the panic; as did Rachel, her breath hitched and shuddering
against the microphone, her voice as steady as she could keep it amidst the
constant quivering,
"Everyone...stay calm. Stay in
your seats, please. There are people armed in the back of the room�"
Her reflexes acted before she could.
As the hail of bullets from the two men's guns, pulled from their suit coats,
pored across the podium, she jerked herself beneath it, her head ducking under
her forearms. She found herself crawling rapidly across the small expanse of
ground to reach the back of Harvey's coffin. They wouldn't have been able to
see her; she pulled herself behind the wood, gazing out with widened eyes and
frantic resolve across the now wild, panic-stricken crowd. The men stopped
firing yet all eyes were transfixed upon them; at their leering, seemingly emotionless
faces, devoid of anything but apathy.
In an instant, the rows of once
indiscernible, still headed people were reduced to wide-eyed, screaming masses.
They couldn�t stay in their seats for long, despite the men who threatened them
with guns, the strangely unresponsive officers, every scream from every person
heightened, magnified, until it formed unanimous, hysterical cries of pure
fear. A wide-eyed man, shuddering wildly, suddenly caught her gaze as she found
him creeping across the aisle way, the policemen still sitting with straight
faces, the two prowling figures oddly silent and inert.
It didn�t take long to realize why
they didn�t keep him from escaping through the aisle. As he jumped across its
wooden edge with the intent of running as rapidly towards the door as he could,
his mouth uttered a strange, gnarled cry. The sound of something beeping filled
the room, overtook the screams as all eyes were upon him, as she made out the
thick, almost wiry line that extended across either end of each aisle way,
something he had tripped�
His body burst into flames as he hit
the wall nearby, having flung himself into its hard surface in panic as the
aisle bomb ignited. Instantly, the other hysterical, screaming people lining
the same aisle grew more and more frantic as their own bodies burst with the
hungry fire, and she realized it had been a bomb that man had tripped,
as the wooden seat ignited in a miniature wildfire, the civilians scorched
before countless panicked eyes.
Rachel bit back her own terrified cry
at the sight, covering her mouth with her hands, watching Bruce�s equally
horrified stare.
They were trapped.
They were being held and confined in
their seats, the unwilling audience to a show of horrors.
She eyed the two men at the end of
the room again, the men whose guns had not faltered in their aim or their
bodies in all its quiet stillness.
They were staring ahead at
something.
At first she thought it was herself,
and she hoisted her body behind the coffin again; then she was aware that it
was moving slightly, the edge quivering as if vibrating from within.
Vibrating
with high-pitched laughter.
She couldn't move; she was paralyzed
with outrage, fear, terror. All at once these emotions that had not at all been
present before built up to a horrific clenching in her stomach; she pushed her
hands hard against the wooden floor, used it to spring up slightly on her
knees, scrabbled against the wall as the coffin suddenly jerked violently
upwards and began to swing slowly, steadily opened. The laughing continued, reduced to a low, yet even more violently
shuddering cackle. The men at the end of the room began to rustle and shuffle
their feet almost unconsciously as the coffin's top hit its creaking, whining
edge to fully reveal the body within it. By the time Rachel could twist her
head properly and watch them, their guns still pointed towards her hunched
body, they were wearing clown masks, as well as the policemen who had been
shooting them minutes before.
Her eyes met Bruce's, held his gaze
steady. He was staring back at her with unabashed terror.
She could see the side of the
inhabitant figure clearly; her hands shook and ached to lunge and attack it as
she took in the full view of what the rest of the crowd perceived at the very
same moment. The purple-suited thing seemed sleeping peacefully, his
eyes clenched shut, the lacerations of that never-ending grin standing up red
and puffed and almost bloody in the fluorescent bulbs of the funeral home. His
arms were crossed upon his torso as he lay there, mockingly inanimate; and then
Rachel saw what he was lying on top of, and an angry, almost inhuman snarl
wrenched its way from her throat.
Around him lay multicolored boxes,
strung with green ribbon in all their various jeweled shades.
Explosives.
Her stomach flipped. Bruce's eyes
hardened from the corner of her gaze, his face dripping with acid hatred and
extreme frustration. The familiar frustration of powerlessness; Rachel had
known it all too well throughout her lifetime, and now she felt it quite
achingly, with the clown bastards' guns pointed straight at her and every
single individual, including Batman, potentially wired to an explosive
in his seat. Not to mention the bushel that lay beneath the clown prick's still
form.
Everyone is wired but me, she suddenly realized, and desperately, her breath taut
in her throat, she pulled herself to her feet.
The clowns lowered their guns that
had been cocked and ready for her head. She gazed at them in both confusion and
suspicion as she stood straight behind the coffin, her feet aching to walk
away, shuffle across the gaze of hundreds of terrified eyes and sadistic
accomplices and dread-filled loved ones to safety. To Batman.
But even Batman comes with a little
death this time, doesn't he?
As she took a careful step to the
side, a loud, fervent clapping rang from the opened coffin. The Joker snapped
his eyes wide and grinned beneath his hideously deformed scars; he jumped
lithely from his laying position to sit roughly upon the edge of Harvey's
coffin, chuckling lightly as he continued to clap with growing fervor.
"Brava, brava, brava!"
He shouted enthusiastically, his tone as always glazed over with genuine
amusement and feigned praise, "A wonderful, thrilling show you've
put on for us my darling little D.A.! Poor wittle fallen Harvey's wishes
echoed in the words of his broken-hearted mistress, the talk of defending
Gotham and taking up the mantle for dramatic effect, and..."
He gestured towards the frozen
crowd, the two of his own men, the sealed doors; then, his grin widening until
his scars appeared about to rip, he turned his head with the slow,
deliberateness of a snake lewdly closing in on prey, his painted eyes meeting
her own,
"The
horrible irony of it all.
Hilarious!"
With a ringing peal of laughter that
echoed across the never ending aisles, the Joker slapped his thigh and
resettled himself in his seemingly comfortable position upon the cushion that
was the late Harvey Dent�s coffin. Rachel's form quivered violently beneath her
dress; she held her tongue between her teeth to keep from lashing out at the
madman with her fists and enduring the unpleasant barrage of his accomplices'
bullets within her body at her outburst.
Bruce Wayne was fuming. Gordon even
more so, as she saw him standing at the very front of the sealed door, his men
pounding frantically at the other end. His face turned purple, glasses nearly
going askew with the strength of his scream,
"You
cowardly son of a bitch! Holding
us all prisoners with your antics at a funeral home?! My ‑�
men are going to rip your hide in half when they manage to get
to you, you motherfucking sadistic clown!"
The Joker's eyes, boring and icy as
always, flicked from Rachel's at that moment to Gordon's hysterical expression,
an expression of twisted darkness looming over his chalk-white face for one
unsettling moment. Then his fleeting frown twisted wildly against his face and
he was shaking with giggles, giggles which echoed across the tense air and made
it slick and hot with her own burning hatred.
"You know...that's the most colorful
I've heard your vocabulary, commissioner! Perhaps it's because you are so,
ah... pathetically weak right now? Being held captive by a scarred up
circus-clown must really be damaging for that inflated, pompous ego�"
Gordon pulled out a pistol from his
jacket, aiming with a shaking hand,
"I'll show you damaging,
you--"
"Ah,
ah, ah, ah, ahhhh!"
He sang in a crooning voice; in an
instant he made a sweeping gesture and pulled a crudely made detonator from his
pocket, throwing it up and down with careless abandon against his palm.
A gasp swept across the room by the
horrified civilians caught within the cross-fire; at their unanimous fear, he
cackled again, his serpentine tongue running over the red slit of his scarred
mouth,
"You might want to be careful
with how sweetly you want to persuade me, commissioner. Your words might
have...a lasting effect."
With a smirk, he pulled himself from
his makeshift throne upon his explosives and stood upon his feet, stretching
exaggeratedly like a cat. Rachel watched his casualty with growing frustration;
she stared for a moment at Harvey's coffin, the body undeniably lost, her heart
quivering dangerously with the threat to explode in on itself at her
realization her lover had been crudely violated.
"What do you want, Joker?"
Gordon inquired quietly, his eyes ablaze as they kept themselves fixed upon the
figure which paced back and forth across the coffin's front, looking quite smug
and pleased with himself.
A giggle in response; excited, as if
it were a young child having been asked to display his perfect report card,
"What do I want? Why
thank you for asking, but the answer is quite obvious even for
nitwits�"
As he spoke he flicked his gaze
towards Rachel, again, cocking his head as a smirk played through the war
paint, a smirk that she returned with a violent glare she desperately hoped
failed to showcase any flicker of fear.
"I want Gotham to burn,
turn into pretty little ashes from the bottoms-up! This entire city is
just a sick joke that's been allowed to run for too long!" He
giggled after every exaggerated emphasis of a word, his tongue flicking across
his mouth as his excitement bubbled and threatened to burst, "All these
stupid officials thinking they can stop the corruption when every
single person in this room..."
He paused for a moment, turning his
body completely towards Rachel's inert frame. His eyes penetrated her own for
the first time since the other day; brooding, violating, raping her frail,
rage-shaken control. They held knowledge in them as he stared, some smug
perception of her that couldn't possibly be true but made perfect sense in his
twisted mind. With a flourish, the psychopath held a hand out towards her; she
refused to take it, continuing to stay still, and he growled and grabbed so
hard at her wrist his nails dug into her flesh. He twisted her forwards with
violent force, too strong for her to do anything but follow, a shriek escaping
her mouth as the pain set her nerves ablaze. A chuckle bubbled against her ear
as she found herself pressed forcefully in front of his torso, his hot breath
on her neck, tickling her skin that prickled as uncomfortably to the touch as
if acid had been poured upon each and every pore. She felt the sharpness of his
knife digging gently against her back, as he held both her arms backwards,
twisted together uncomfortably in his surprisingly strong grip,
"Including,
if not especially, our lovely D.A. here. She�s corrupted beyond belief!"
Gordon�s eyes were wide and
murderous; he held his pistol at aim, still, yet had no chance of shooting at
his distance and missing Rachel�s body which was so tightly pressed against the
Joker�s. She willed him to just shoot, begged him in her mind, didn�t
care in the slightest if the bullets penetrated her own body and killed her
outright but God, not all these people�
"Let her go."
A pause; a
fleeting, deadly quiet of recognition that sent dread through Rachel's spine as
soon as she sensed it. The hot
breath that ran along her neck was replaced with the horrific feeling of the
cold, uneven skin of a scar pressed up against the back of her throat; he was
smiling against her, tauntingly, the other end of his Glasgow grin pointed in
Bruce Wayne's direction as she felt the Joker gaze upon him for the first time.
His words haunted her again, came
back as high-pitched and sadistically painful in its accuracy as it was now, as
he held her so close that one flick of his knife in the right place could end
her life in seconds:
Bait.
"Funny," The Joker
replied smoothly, his voice suddenly devoid of a chuckle, down to a quiet hiss,
"I thought my jokes were bad. You expect me to listen to you,
when you're not locked up in your fancy little manor, delusional in your
pitiful little thinking that you have any semblance of power when I
could fucking blow you sky-high right now?"
Bruce's dark gaze mirrored the
Joker's as he stared straight at him for a time that felt frozen in eternity.
Her body was quivering against the knife upon the small of her back, and the
Joker responded to her automatic quivering with another grin of spreading scars
against her goose bumped flesh. Slowly, he raised his knife carefully enough
from her back upwards so as to not tear clothing yet to send a revolted chill
up her spine; she twitched in his grip in protest, but that only elicited a
shudder from her mouth when the tip of his knife jabbed against the top of her
back, just beneath her shoulder blades. Then, as if settling on a position in
which to torment her best, he cradled her chin forcefully in a gloved hand
while using the other to press the blade against her jugular vein, stroking
lightly up and down across the wildly beating pulse point.
Rachel didn't want to look at anyone
in the hushed crowd; her eyes burned with the shame of being shown on display
by this madman, twisted into another object for his own sadistic ends.
Does this mean I should fight back,
and die now, or stay still and die later?
Her mind played with the thought
darkly, disgusted at the own helpless vulnerability it implied. Her breath grew
heavier, hotter; her limbs tensed. Every part of her ached to reach backwards
and kick him; yet he could thrust himself forward and stab the blade straight
through, and she would collapse in a heap of her own blood against the ground,
defeated. She couldn't let such a thing happen, especially when...
What? Especially when Bruce is
watching? Are you sure he would mind? Or do you just want to live through
another day so you can bury that knife in the Joker's gut yourself?
Instead of resisting, her eyes met
Bruce's again; his hard, seething stare grew more and more enraged with every
passing moment. His cheeks were flushed red, his brows pressed together; she
realized what the bastard behind her was doing, and that was intentionally
provoking Bruce into saying the wrong thing, into provoking him. She
wasn�t the target; Bruce was.
If she fought back and he attacked
her, would Bruce lose his nerve and jump from the seat, only to be blown into
nonexistence with the bloodied, charred aisle on the other end? Gordon was
taking deep, shuddering breaths, the people surrounding them merely watching,
transfixed with fear and grief amidst their own captivity.
Please Bruce, don't lose your nerve.
Just let him do what he wants...just for now. Batman can't help right now.
Batman isn't you right now.
Her eyes were silently pleading, his
own stricken over with hardened pain. Bruce's fingers trembled against his seat
at the very end of the aisle as he never looked away; with a low, bestial purr,
she felt the ice cold blade's tip run up her throat and behind her ear,
brushing at her hair, sweeping it away from the side of her face. Keeping his
knife poised along the spot between the side of her chin and throbbing, pulsing
heartbeat, the sadistic snake giggled and ran a cold, slippery tongue along the
point his knife had marked. A jolt ran through Rachel and she whimpered in
frustrated protest, her whimper becoming a gasp as the tip of the blade sank
along the saliva-slicked line, cutting it through in a shallow, reddening
wound. Blood slid from her white neck; slowly, dribbling down across her
collarbone, searing hot and painful against her clammy flesh, and Bruce bit
back a howl of rage at the sight of it. Her neck throbbed as the tiny ‑�
trace of pain seared against her frantic pulse, yet she refused
to give him the satisfaction of displaying any fear other than her wildly
pumping heart.
"Tell me, does it...excite
Gotham to know that its...thirst for violence has been slaked by the death of
the almighty Dent?" He asked casually as he continued to trace her skin
with his blade; not cutting now, but teasing, struggling to intimidate
the quiet, still girl in his grasp,
"Does it please you all to see
even your newest D.A., the next defenseless human from the pathetic hordes of
Gotham city, being offered up here like a sacrifice? Well, as long as it
isn't any of you, then it doesn't matter who dies! When
everything goes according to plan, you're all happy with your bloodshed.
And I'm about to prove that."
His voice was dangerously low, then;
he leaned forward and twisted his knife in a spinning circle across her
collarbone, as if it were some sort of drill that never truly penetrated its
intended target. With another giggle, he twisted her hair roughly behind her
head in a tangled knot in his fingers, pulling her backwards; she twitched
slightly in his forceful grip yet refused to reply yet again, her gaze as he
met her own unerringly defiant.
Those goddamned eyes were boring
into her again; his prodding gaze stiffened, darkened before flickering into
hollow amusement. It was a game. It was another one of his games, a game to
crack her, to make her break, to make her scream. It was being played in
front of Gotham itself, orchestrated perfectly in the way he flicked his knife
against her skin like a conductor's stick. It was being played in how many
people she loved he could bring down before she would give in.
She wasn't willing to see Bruce's
dead body added to that pile.

"You see," The Joker continued,
eyeing Gordon and Bruce's trembling faces with a twisted leer of triumph,
"I have certain ways to make all you people reveal your true little
twisted selves. You're all out for yourselves, but you don't really know
it yet, not until you're put in a situation. When little Smarvey Harvey was
wired to his fireworks, ready to go BOOM!�you think he honestly cared
about his little squeeze on the other end, or about surviving for the well-being
of anyone here?"
"Enough with the lecture,
Joker," Gordon hissed from his seat, even while the two of the Joker's
drones raised their guns and cocked them in warning, "Tell us what you want."
A satisfied grin broke across the
painted face, wide black eyes suddenly fiery with hunger,
"I want Gotham to burn,
didn't I say that already, you damned idiot?!" A giggle broke across his
lips; he eyed Bruce again, and Rachel could see he was fighting his every nerve
not to lunge for the two of them and explode into pieces in the process,
"But why speak in generalities? I want the new District Attorney, of
course! I want to teach her a lesson! What a better way of, ah...initiation
than to carve up that pretty little face--"
"And what if we don't let
her?!"

‑�
The Joker watched as Bruce's eyes
narrowed while Gordon asked the obvious question, beginning to reach a
semblance of a breaking point. Rachel's body burned in aching suspense as she
realized he was actually giving in to the clown's provocations;
she bit her lip and shook her head against the knife that suddenly inched its
way up to her lips, tracing their outline as it ran along to her jaw, the
hollow of her cheek. His giggle became a hysterical cackle.
"Let her?! Let her?! I
could carve her up right now if I wanted to!" His knife pierced the
surface of her cheek, another dribble of blood running along her skin, as thin
and delicate as a tear. Her cheek ached against the consistent pressure of his
knife, yet she refused to flinch, to show him the least bit of fear or pain to
satisfy him. Hostility flashed in her eyes, however; she couldn't help the
pervading rage and desire to strike him that constantly filled her, growing
until erupting; a potential, deadly mistake. His eyes flickered towards her,
feeding on that rage, appearing almost thrilled by it.
I win, his painted smile seemed to leer, I win and you�re going
to play my little game the way I want.
"You see," He continued,
his voice low and rattling with perverse excitement, "There's no choice
in this matter. Because the other choice...is every
life in this room!"
A strangled gasp again; the entire
silent crowd appeared to moan unanimously. A terrified child burst into tears
against the silence, yet the Joker made no move to silence it. It seemed to
excite him, this visible display of fear that emanated across the prominent
populace crammed into the tiny room,
"Either
Rachel Dawes, the pretty little D.A. of Goth-ham, comes along so
we can, ah...have a little chat, or everyone else is blown into little itty
bits and pieces from Smarvey Harvey's fireworks! Now does that sound like a fair deal?"
Even Gordon seemed to grow quiet,
his discolored features sinking into a disheveled slump as the aisles shifted
in their silent assent. Rachel's heart went cold, her veins freezing as the
absolution dissolved over her. She would have to go with him. There was
no choice; there had never been, ever since she had brought her gun to the
bastard's head the other day. She would put up a fight, of course, when they
were alone...but not while everyone in this room was strapped to a bomb,
not while they all stared at her with their terrified, pleading eyes, and Bruce
himself was on the verge of doing something extremely unwise and most likely
enough to get him killed.
After dead stillness, Rachel opened
her mouth to speak, feeling the Joker's already rumbling, triumphant laughter
deep within his chest as he shoved her as forcefully against his body as he
could manage. But as the words of surrender shaped along her trembling lips, a
quiet voice interrupted them.
"You don't have to go anywhere,
Rachel."
She wanted to scream in frustration.
Instead she turned her head in unison with the suddenly ‑�
unnerved madman that held her, feeling his body grow tense, her eyes
prickling with unshed tears.
"Bruce," She pleaded, her voice a long, disparate sigh. She shook her
head, tendrils of hair flying about her frantic face, her skin shuddering
against the Joker's still-firm knife scratching deeper across her flesh,
"Bruce, please don't do this. You don't want to do this. Just let
me go. Please."
"No," Bruce barked back,
his eyes bold and angry as they met her own, almost overwhelming, "You
can't just give into this bastard! You can't let him win, Rachel!"
"Bruce, please,"
She said as the tears threatened to break, the Joker's snarl ripping from
behind her like a bloodthirsty beast, "Please listen to me and let
me go. Gotham can't go like this. You know there's no other
choice."
Bruce was still shaking his head,
his gaze as adamant and unyielding as endless eyes stared upon the two of them
in incredulity. Why would he sacrifice their lives for her? A girl that
he had originally forsaken...
"Let�s us three get a bit more
acquainted before I vomit," The high-pitched voice interrupted
them, and he was walking, grabbing her hair so hard her scalp stung, pushing
her rapidly forward, captor and captive coming closer and closer to Bruce's
still body. Rachel felt the terror grow, the possibility that he may not make
it through this night alive along with herself sending images of horror
through her mind. What would Gotham do with its masked vigilante dead? What
would it do with its second D.A. dead within days?
As if he were reading her mind, the
Joker giggled again, turning her head and thrusting his knife from her delicate
skin to the air before him.
Bruce was inches away from the knife
that gleamed with bloodlust in the Joker's hand, his still frame eyeing the
blade that ran its way along the side of his cheek,
"Wanna know how I got these
scars?"
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