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Chapter 13 – The Joke Between Us
"Ahhh–hhhhhAchooo!"
The sound cracked through the silence of the padded cell like a gunshot dressed as comedy. Jack Napier—no, the Joker, the patient the guards already feared to whisper about—snapped his head back, rubbing his nose with exaggerated flair.
"Someone, somewhere, is thinking of me," he said, voice pitched like a carnival barker dragging his audience into the show. "Probably dear ol' Batsy up on his rooftops. Brooding. Frowning. Thinking. Always thinking of me. Hhhah! He loves me—he just doesn't know it yet."
The guards outside didn't laugh. They never laughed. But he laughed for them, rocking back and forth on his cot, hands pulling at the edge of his straitjacket like a magician waiting to reveal the final trick.
Arkham. The place smelled of bleach and regret. A palace of madness dressed as medicine. And he had made it here not by chance, not by weakness, but by choice. He had walked into the lion's den because lions needed taming, and he was the tamer.
The rattle of keys. The heavy clunk of the reinforced door. And there she was.
Dr. Harleen Quinzel.
White coat crisp. Clipboard tucked neatly under one arm. Blonde hair tied tight, but not tight enough to hide the stray strand that fell across her forehead. She was young—too young for Arkham. Her steps were confident, but her eyes betrayed something softer. Naïve. Hopeful. He could smell it on her.
"Good morning, Jack," she said, voice careful, professional, as if speaking to a storm.
"Ahhh, doctor doctor doctor. There you are. Come to cure me? Patch me? Fix me? Hm?" He leaned forward, grin wide, teeth catching the fluorescent light. "Or maybe… maybe… come to watch me dance?"
She pulled a chair and sat opposite him, measured, calm. "We're here to talk. Nothing more."
"Talk," he repeated, rolling the word on his tongue as though tasting wine. "Such a dull, dull word. Talking is for… boring people. We don't want to be boring, do we, doc?"
Her pen clicked softly against the clipboard. "Yesterday you told me you see the world differently. That laughter makes the pain go away. I'd like to know more about that."
He tilted his head, grin faltering into something sharper. "More, more, more. You doctors always want more. Pick, prod, peel away until there's nothing left but bones and giggles. You think I'm… sick?"
"I think you've been through trauma," she said carefully.
He laughed. Loud. Abrupt. Mocking. "Trauma! Hhhah! Doctor, you sweet little dove, trauma is what you call a paper cut. What I am, what I've become—it's not trauma. It's birth. The world cut me open, split me wide, and from the blood and bile… I came laughing."
She scribbled, pen scratching paper. He watched her hand move, eyes narrowing.
"Write, write, write. You don't see me. Not really. You're writing the version of me you want, not the one that is."
Her eyes flicked up. "Then show me who you really are."
Silence. A heavy pause.
Then he stood, or as much as the straitjacket allowed, leaning across the table until his breath fogged the metal. His voice dropped low, almost a whisper.
"I am the joke the world played on itself. I am the punchline no one wanted but everyone deserved. And when they laugh at me… they're really laughing at themselves. That's the truth, doc. That's the funny, funny truth."
The hairs on her arm rose, though she didn't flinch. Instead, she asked softly: "And the Batman? What is he to you?"
That laugh again. Broken. Unhinged. A hyena's cackle dragging its claws across sanity.
"Batsy! Ohhh, he's the straight man to my act. The order to my chaos, the silence to my punchline. He thinks he's stopping me—hah!—but really, really, really, I'm setting the stage for him. Without me, he's just another man in a mask. With me…" He pressed his forehead against the table, grin widening. "…he's legend."
Dr. Quinzel studied him, her professional mask steady. But somewhere deep, her pulse quickened. His words crawled under the skin, sticky, venomous.
She cleared her throat. "We're out of time today. I'll see you tomorrow."
"Tomorrow, tomorrow, always tomorrow. That's what people say when they're afraid to live today. But I'll be here, doc. Waiting. Laughing. Whispering."
As the guards moved to drag him back, he called out, voice echoing down the sterile hall:
"Oh, and doc? Don't bother calling me Jack anymore."
He straightened, grin painted across his face like a mask carved from madness.
"Call me… Joker."
The guards shoved him inside, the door slammed, but his laughter seeped through the cracks like poison gas, curling around her as she walked away.
And though she wouldn't admit it—not to herself, not yet—that laugh followed her long after the session ended.
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