Who Giggles in Gotham? Part Three
Completed: December 11, 2008

There was screaming.

He was sure. But had no idea whose strangled screech was ripping through the silence.

Or he did.

It didn’t matter. It was just noise now. Like buzzing in his ears. Buzzing in his brain.

The quiet kids are the ones you should look out for. Fear. Worry about. Who knows what goes on behind those quiet smiles.

That buzzing again.

A swirl of colours. Nothing solid. Nothing still.

Red.

- - - -

Undisclosed years later…

Feet propped up on the small, cheap coffee table. Dirty shoes without a coaster. He was waiting in the darkened apartment of one E. Nygma.

He laughed. The boy had made an effort. It had amused him a little.

Still he waited. No need to be formal, or flashy. He’d just wait until the little rat scurried home. They always come back to their hole. Besides, little Eddy had no where else to go. Scared little rat.

Soon, a key slide into the lock, and a moment later the light clicked on. The rat managed to enter, and close the door behind him before he noticed the other person’s breathing in his space.

“You!” Edward shrieked, dropping his meagre bag of groceries on the floor.

“Me,” the Joker agreed from his seat, “Hope you don’t mind, I let myself in Quizmaster – but since you’ve helped yourself to something of mine I thought it was permissible.”

“I…I don’t know what you mean,” he stuttered; clearly nervous as he attempted to collect the food spilled out at the doorway.

The Joker smiled, “Such a grand leap you’ve made from swindling fair-folk to murder.”
“Mmmmurder?” he again dropped the poor bruised apple that had fallen.
“Murder,” again the Joker agreed, rising to his feet.
Edward flattened himself against the door, despite the gap of space between them.

“You’ve been playing with my things,” the Joker rubbed his hands together; twitching, itching.
“I…I have no idea what you’re talking about,” blindly, desperately, Edward grasped at the door, searching for the knob.

The corner of the Joker’s mouth twitched, “Blonde, Yah high,” he gestured a rough height with his as he took a step closer, “Deadly smile.” He sneered.

Recognition flashed in the wide blue eyes of Edward Nygma. “She…she was yours?” he gulped, “I didn’t know. Thought she was Bruce Wayne’s. You know, nothing personal. Business.”

“Guess the jokes on me then Eddy-boy,” he pulled a gun from the waist band of his purple pants, “But I don’t see anyone laughing.” Instantly he was close enough to press the gun under Edward’s quivering chin. “You have to be careful who you kill in this town, big bad Ed.”

“It…it wasn’t me,” Edward snivelled. He went weak in the knees, and it felt as if the gun shoved under his chin was the only thing keeping him upright, “I didn’t kill the poor girl. She was already dead when I spotted her in the water. Who knows what demon slithered out of that hell to kill the little darling?”

“Did you see which miscreant did it?” he bared his yellowed teeth. “Think carefully now,” he tapped the end of the gun against Edward’s temple, “tick, tock.”

Edward swallowed the large lump in his throat again, his eyes darted around frantically, “I…I...no. No. She...she jumped. Head first off Gotham bridge.”
“Tisk, tisk. Which is it Eddy?” the Joker was clearly losing his patience.

Nygma just nodded, causing the nervous sweat to roll down from his brow.

“What you need Ed, is more style,” the Joker waved his gun around as if it were a natural extension of his arm, “That would be the best way to avoid this confusion in the future. And it really doesn’t do to piggyback someone else’s. Taking credit for someone else’s work is no way to start a career. Got it Quizmo?”

Edward nodded like a bobble head doll in the back of someone’s car.
“Good – but too bad this is a wasted lesson,” he aimed the gun between Edward’s beety blue eyes.

Edward screwed his eyes tightly shut, praying to something for it to save him. Anything to save him. He felt a swift rush of air past his nose and heard the Joker hiss in pain.
He opened his eyes to see the clown clutching his purple clad hand, the gun limp on the floor and the Batman standing in his living room. If he wasn’t inclined to faint before, he swayed than.

“Now, now. I was just saving the over-worked clods of the GCPD some work,” the Joker rationalised, “You heard him… He touched my stuff!” He raged, pulling a knife from his oversized coat and lined it up with Edward’s pale skin, “Just let me cut him up, nice and pretty, like he did little Ruby.”

“I can’t let you do that,” Batman growled, his eyes carefully passing between to two men, studying the scene.

“Come on. It’ll be our little secret. It’ll bring us closer together – Like blood brothers!” He pressed the tip of the blade into Edward’s cheek, a bead of scarlet broke free, “Tell me Ed, what’s the best medicine?”

The other man’s lip quivered, “Laughter?” He replied with an almost hopeful smile. Scared, but hopeful.
“Funny,” the Joker pulled back slightly, letting the nick in Edward’s skin weep, “I was thinking revenge.” He moved to plunge the knife into the other man’s soft body. But the Batman moved first – springing at the clown and knocking them both to the floor.

Edward laughed then. Nervous laughter spilled out of him. “How could I guess if it wasn’t in the form of a riddle?”

His laughter ended with a quick puff of breath from his lungs as the Batman forced him against the door.
“No riddles. No games,” he growled, “Why’d you hurt the girl?”
This time the Joker laughed – which was difficult having had the wind knocked out of him, “hoho, answer the good man Riddle-master.” But he made no attempt to get up. In fact he seemed content waiting to see just how dark the Dark Knight could get. Having had a taste of that familiar darkness lurking just under the surface, he waited to see just how much it took for the man under the bat suit to crack. Or crack more, as the case may be. It only takes one bad day, as the Joker rightly knew, and he was curious to see if the Bat had any days left.

He sat, expectantly as a child, cross-legged on the floor. Waiting. And watching.

“Like I told the clown,” Edward clawed at the Batman’s grip, trying desperately to scurry away, “I never hurt her.”

“You just watched a woman jump to her death?” the revolution rolled off the caped crusader, “You stood there and watched?”

“Well, yes,” Edward was shocked by how suddenly he was released. “The girl was a mess – drunk, blubbering. Why should I stop her? What good would it have done me?”

A large, Kevlar-lined fist crashed into the wall, grazing his ear. He let out an inhuman whimper.
“Bats would have been on your side,” the Joker’s stale breath hissed, “But instead...” the veiled threat hung in the air as Batman grabbed hold of Nygma’s lapels and tossed him into the opposite wall. The two things happening in a blur together. Choreographed.
“But you pulled her from the water to deface her body!” his gravelled voice boomed in the small, confined space of the one bedroom apartment.

“Not...exactly,” his beety little eyes darted back and forth before the two men. “She did that herself too. Quite convenient really. Blubbering on to herself about wining and dining clowns – or some garbage.”

Internally, Bruce Wayne cringed at the replay of words, though the Batman was stoic as stone.

“She broke into a horribly off-key version of Put on a Happy Face, than cut herself a smile. Before going head first into the water, of course. ”
The Joker smirked; his mouth twitching at the amusing image dancing in front of his eyes. He’d see it as a tribute. A kick to his ego.

Batman saw it as a cry for help. One he was too late to answer.

“Explain the note.”

“Ah, well, that. Yes, that I did do... nasty business,” Edward grew quiet, reliving the extent he went to. Having to wait until the body resurfaced, wadding out to retrieve her and then planting the smoking gun, as it were. He smiled; madness clouding his usually clear blue eyes, “But it served a purpose.”

“Framing me?” the Joker popped up to his feet, a few casual steps behind the bat, who himself had moved slightly. The Joker took another step closer, antagonising the other man with the condescension of his stature.

“You’re Gotham’s Clowned Prince of Crime,” he snarled, the very though sickening him, festering in him, “You blow up a few hospitals and everyone knows your name. I’ve been robbing Amusement Mile blind and no one takes a second look!”

“Then why fed my fame?” the Joker cocked his head at an odd angle to get a closer look at the crumbing sanity.
“I hoped they’d shoot you on sight for exterminating one of Wayne’s pets,” he leaned in close to the clown’s smug face, challenging him.

Quickly, Batman pushed him back against the wall with more force than necessary, as the Joker’s teeth snapped at his nose. A fraction closer and the there would have been one bloodied mess.

“You have a twisted mind Nygma,” disgust was obvious in the vigilante’s eyes, an inability to understand.

“A real riddle,” the Joker cracked, and Edward snickered.

“That’s me; a real Riddle,” his eyes beamed with pride.

“No...not so much a riddle,” his lips curled up over his teeth, before snapping; “You coward! Nothing but a coward!” the Joker lunged at Edward, anger bubbling in him, over him. “Snivelling, slimy,” spittle sprayed from his mouth.

Despite the Batman’s quick reflexes, the clown got a few good hits into the soft flesh of Edward Nygma before being pulled off of him.

Soon enough, a select few members of the Gotham City Police Department would be beating down the door to this shabby apartment. And both creatures would be put back into cages. One of them a little worse for wear.

And a third dead.

A girl who had gotten in over her head. A girl with misplaced affections. A girl he had carelessly tossed out.

It was a mistake. It was human error. But the Batman can’t afford to be human. It leaves too many things venerable, too many people venerable.

Too many people suffer.

Too many have suffered for him to learn.

No, Batman could not afford human frailties.

He quickly secured the pair, and dangled them out the already broken window. A waiting gift for the overworked members of the GCPD. And he would be there. Waiting, watching. Ensuring that the right man maintained the right order.

Commissioner Gordon gave the order to toss them both into the paddy wagon, as unsure himself as the deputy had been.
“Do you think I should separate them?” The commissioner questioned the patch of shadow next to the building. The Joker’s smile took on a darker twist as he watched Edward being loaded into the van. Like he had found his prey. And he had no intention of letting a little thing like leg-irons get in his way.
“No,” Batman replied. Something had passed between him and the clown. A shattered understanding, that he chose to ignore, “I think they might have things to discuss.”

Gordon sighed, running a chafed and chapped hand across his neck, “A girl’s life traded off in some lunatic version of a pissing contest. What’s...” he stopped himself before letting his real question leak out, “What’s the new one calling himself?” He saw the scrawny man cower deeply into the hard, plastic seat.

“The Riddler,” the answer was short and harsh.

“Looks like we’re building a playing deck,” Gordon sighed again, “Maybe we’ll get lucky,” he didn’t wait for the Batman to ask him to continue, “They hired a new psychiatrist at Arkham. Maybe she can do them some good.”

“She?” Batman croaked.

Gordon nodded, seems something had made it past the Dark Knight after all, “Dr. Harleen Quinzel. Top of her class, and eager to get her hands dirty,” Gordon took a quick glance at the paddy wagon with the two crazies secured inside, “So to speak.”

“Hmm,” the Batman stepped further back into the shadow as he watched the vehicle roll away, “We can hope.”

End.