Author's Note:

Like I have previously warned, this is not to be taken literally.
It is my metaphorical take on one of the facets of the relationship between Harleen Quinzel and one of the personalities of the Joker I have percieved.
So it might be confusing.
But Harleen isn't Harley Quinn yet. So bear that in mind. :D

However, I hope you will enjoy it, as it was such a joy to write.
And I'm going to try and draw something even remotely close to what is going on here.
So you can see. But I'm not good at drawing, so don't expect the Mona Lisa. xD

Hades and Persephone are of the mythological Greek legends.
The Joker and Harleen Quinzel belong to DC Comics.

Enjoy!

Listen to:

Tourniquet by Evanescence.

The depths of the Underworld were cold, damp and unkempt like the lurching, constant shadow of his imperishable eyes. The further I walked, the lesser the light behind me. But the fathoms of his eyes, intricate and woven like spider webs of the netherworld deep, drew me nearer, a hand outstretched to pull me closer into his world. Such a world it was, a chaotic void like nothing human life could ever dream of.

But I have seen it; I have delved too deep in the chasms of rich and lovely darkness.

Creatures of innovation cackle and shriek around me, dancing around the light of the cold, blue fire of extinguished life. Banshees, with their cold, desolate eyes and faces devoid of human likeness, scream into the eternal night, driven from their caves by the call of their undead lord of being.

But within me, even as chaos ensues and death grows cold and sharp as those switchblades around me, those knives he carries, there is only calm, enveloped by the eye of the storm.

He is the storm. He is the cyclone which destroys all in its path, the ripping, terrible force which never gives life, but only takes it away. He is the lord of death, the bringer of chaos and relentless torment.

"Come to me, precious Persephone. Come to me!"

Even in the darkness and decay of this haunted lair, I can see the firelight sashaying in his eyes, sitting upon his intricate throne devised of gray skulls and breathless demons of the deep.

It weaves and flickers, that hellish flame in his iris, like the enchantment of the gypsy's twirl, around and around, until my head feels an otherworldly lightness on the verge of fainting. But still he pulls me close, the chains around me too fierce and biting for hope of escape. Pulled away from my mother Earth, who weeps, who cries out her sorrows as I leave her cooling presence and drowns in the wake of her bitter tears.

The hiss of a serpent fills the vague stupor of my head, the eyes flaring with vivacious flame with each pitch of his derisive voice.

"So, you have a choice, my precious pearl – come with me, come knowing that someday, I'm going to kill you when ya cease to be of use to me. Or die right here, right now. Choose wisely, my pearl, choose wisely."

Every fiber of my being screamed for wakefulness, every nerve tinged with the desire to flee, to run away from this serpentine monster, a face as white as fresh fallen snow, but eyes as hollow and black as charred brimstone.

The weight of the world's pulsating blood painted scarred flesh, and the lips of Hades grew taut with an impish grin of delight. He held forth his hand, dripping in purple decadence, and outstretched one finger, flexing it toward him with an air of perfect, unsettling ease.

With each contraction, my body seemed to jerk, as if he pulled me with the force of dainty thread.

"It is always natural to find interest in the unnatural."

An unnatural this fiend of death certainly is. There is not even the slightest film of humanity that taints his perfected darkness, his image inflicted by depictions of purple, green, black and red. Upon his head, a crown of wreathed, roaring flame which excites the vibrant jealousy of his curling locks and dons the purest sign of purposeful evil. His sinew is draped in folds and furling wisps of majestic robes, reflecting the color of plum and envious jade, embedded with the coveted gems of mother earth in the gossamer cloth. In his hand, a staff festooned with floating blue fire, holding a power that could ensnare the earth and destroy it with hardly the slightest effort on his behalf.

He is beauty, but he is dreadful. He is glowing, but he is darkness. There is a dichotomy in his figure which represents the trickling, insubordinate stream of human weakness in his veins. But the hard, calloused surface gives no inclination to that weakness; only the sovereignty which emanates about his ruthless form.

It is pure, solid rock, like a lovely gargoyle garlanded in cloth and charms.

"Come to me…"

The ground beneath my feet grows terribly laced in the blaze of the underworld, and the flesh begins to crawl and simmer with the encroaching heat.

Still, with wavering surrender, my hand extends to the shade of a figure who sits before me upon his throne of anarchy, green, twisted roots of hair crawling down the sides of his insipid countenance. The slither of a ruby red tongue comes forth from the grottos of his devilish mouth, it hisses, like a snake rustled from hiding, a viper disturbed from his predatory sleep.

He takes my hand, the creeping chill of fatality coursing through my arm with the quickness and fragile cold of the river Styx through my erected arm. Spider-like fingers gather a pale, indecent hand into its blood-encrusted palm, and the gliding murmur of a hysterical chuckle creeps from behind a painted throat.

Henna festoons his olive-bared skin, etches of blood-red ink a reminder for every soul he wrongfully stole from each unwilling victim. It trickles down his arm in elaborate design, the incarnate of pure sophisticated sin, the figure of inhuman evil. Mortality seemed to dash across each feature I could find in that terribly merciless face, especially in the untarnished fire of his kohl-lined eyes.

"You can't live by morality, darling, if you want to win the charlatan's game."

But to what extent would I go to defeat the affections of a breaching monster? I wished to escape, to liberate the freedom of the eternal soul and abandon this hellish monster who breathed terror into the very pigment of my being. He consumed me, ravaged every last inch of goodness which inhabited my decrepit body.

With every breath of his forsaken lungs, I faltered, smothered and crushed by his formidable power. There was no escaping Hades once his serpentine eye caught sight of a newfound desire, a new plaything to appease his relentless tedium.

He took what he pleased, he did what he pleased and the world was to concede to his irrational will. The edges of lunacy were eternal within the mind of the lord of death and destruction; there was no trace of sanity left in those immortal eyes.

With each heavy step, my feet grow cold and the desperate cries for return begin to fade, mere colors of voices splashed amongst the canvas of my faltering existence.

Another spell seems to intertwine its spiraled tendrils within me, and I watch the god of the dead lift to his beguiling, garnet lips an equally crimson pomegranate, the virgin flesh of the fruit glistening in the light of surrounding destruction. Incisors, long and dripping with yellow venom, unveil from his scarlet-embellished lips, and in one swift motion, penetrate the ruby shimmer of the pomegranate's pure, hallow pelt.

Crimson fluid drains from the unlucky fruit, and he slowly chews, seeds and all, until the entirety of his mouth is full of the alluring presence of the pomegranate. I wish, I beg, I insist upon the whim to merely taste those sodden lips, just to savor the aroma of the shredded skin.

"I'll admit willingly; you were a tricky puzzle to finish…but I've got you all sorted out, dear one, now that I've caught the notion of the way you are arranged. You're a bomb just waiting to go off, and I adore explosives."

The decimated fruit rolls languidly from his careless hands, the fabricated images of extended fingers rolling back to release the bleeding carcass. Another contraction of that infernal finger and I am willingly yielding to his demonic will.

From his eyes there comes the burning desire of his command.

Come, Persephone. Come, come to me.

With every bated breath, I wish to cry out to him.

I am coming! I would capitulate to your dominion so willingly!

The voice of reason and desperate return has admitted defeat. Its ghost now lays saturated in fire on the fields of mayhem, stretching for miles until it recedes to oblivion.

I crawl, crawl like the inferior monsters which inhabit his wonderland of misery. His knees are hard and cold as stone, deprived of all meaning or purpose of life. Only acting on whim, never scheming. I feel as if I am on fire, burning, seared by the infidelity of my consent.

I am coming, Hades. I am coming!

I can hardly feel the smoldering of my human skin. I have only eyes for those alluring orbs of unending chaos. There is an otherworldly splendor in his eyes, and I can feel the ominous energy begin to devour me whole. I am slowly diminishing, beginning to submit to his supremacy.

The moment my lips touch his, I am overwhelmed by the sweetness of the pomegranate. Its rich vigor fills the entirety of my mouth, stings my tongue with its potency and sways softly over my clouded mind.

My eyes are closed, but there is a world so unlike Earth and this reign of bedlam he has created. It is a world only Hades can see, and now, without discretion, he unveils it to me.

It almost burns my eyes from their sockets with its devastating realization. It is a vast nothingness, a starless sky, a blackened, soot painted earth. Golden sunlight replaced with the scorching, blood-red light of fire and human decay. Hades sits upon his skeleton-framed throne, and Ares, savage and lusting for war and vitality, streaks across the crimson sky.

This is his vision of life on Earth. This is his purpose, his plan.

When the chips are down, these civilized people will eat each other. You'll see. I'll show you.

Now I have tasted the devil's fruit, have indulged in the sweetness of death's immortal kiss. I fall from his knees and understand…now I have condemned the world to its mournful fate.

Hades cackles, the heightening vigor of his madness shaking the foundations of his chaotic wasteland. The demons and banshees, monsters and titans, the ghosting souls he has unleashed from their fleshy prison all tremble with fear as the ground moves and trembles with the heedless, screeching victory of Hades' scheme unfolding like an earthquake. The soil feels as if it comes to life, breathes, and the disturbing laughter awakens the shattered land.

The world will perish in fire.

The world will perish in ice.

It will expire in chaotic desire.

And for that you must pay the price.

Demeter had all but faded away, and the Earth had turned to darkness. Cold, swirling storms played over the trembling mortals and the sun refused to shine. How could I so easily betray familiarity and warmth for the adornments of a queen and the taste of that fateful pomegranate?

You have taken the seeds of the pomegranate. Now you must yield to me, Queen of the Underworld. Persephone, divine beauty of the immortal Earth.

For the love of a monster, I revoke my privilege to feeling, to sagacity and to the hopefulness of human existence.

For the love of a monster, I invalidate my humanity, and in one indulgence, lose that freedom for eternity.

Forbidden fruit always tastes the sweeter.