The Joke's On Us

[Jason Todd]

Arkham Asylum. It was like the set of a horror movie. The kid he'd once been would probably have called it a wretched hive of scum and villainy, but that wasn't him any more. If any of that boy remained, it had soaked into the concrete floor of the warehouse where he'd died, too deep for even the strongest industrial bleaches to scrub it out. Too much blood, the forensic report had said. No way he could have survived.

Bruce hadn't even tried to prove it wrong.

He'd become the Joker's plaything since then. Every bone in his body had been smashed and broken by crowbar beatings, and it had broken something inside as well. Jason had never been a happy kid. Never been patient. Never been all smiles and restraint. Bruce had tried to teach him better. Bruce had tried to train that out of him. But that rage, that anger, that seething capacity to hate - that was all the Joker left him with. That was what Bruce had abandoned him to.

But okay. So maybe Bruce had been too distraught to think straight. Maybe the Joker had succeeded where Bane had failed, and actually managed to break the Bat in a way he couldn't recover from. Jason almost believed it; he wanted to. Anything to make the truth hurt less. One day, the Joker had just grown tired of breaking his same toy over and over. Instead of killing him though, he'd released him. Maybe it was just the final leg of his torture. Maybe it had been the plan all along; break the Boy Wonder so bad that Bruce couldn't face the guilt. Jason had come home. Scavenged his way back to Gotham. He wanted to walk up to that door, walk up to Wayne Manor. He wanted to see the joy in Alfred's eyes when Master Jason returned from the grave. Wanted to see Bruce show some damned emotion for a change.

Jason barely made it off the train before he learned the truth. Batman and Robin, still in action. He'd been replaced, so seamlessly that most people didn't even seem to realise the difference. That was when the final straw had snapped, the final nerve broken. That was when he'd conceived his plan. Batman fought and fought and fought against the criminals in Gotham, risking those he laughably called family, and for what? Nothing made a difference. Crime never changed. More rose up to take it's place. But Batman never changed his tactics. His principles held him back. His cowardice to do what needed to be done held him back. So Jason had done it for him. Infiltrated the gangs. Seized control. Turned them on each other. Red Hood, they had called him. He'd taken the criminal underworld by the throat, and brought it to it's knees.

How did Bruce thank him? By treating him the same as all the other scum. He'd talked to him as if he was still that same kid from all those days ago. You don't get to talk to me like that, Old Man. You abandoned the right to talk to me like that. But Batman had been better. Of course he'd been better. Taken him down. Thrown him into a padded cell in Arkham. But that wasn't the worst part. The worst part was the visit. The worst part was the promise. Keep my secret. You can't tell them who I am. For the sake of Gotham. Not a request, but an order. Jason was a fool, but he'd obeyed.

And so here he was, trying in vein to make the battered old fold-out chair feel comfortable, slouched against the metal pad, bare arms folded across the chest of his prison tee, orange overalls knotted around his waist, sitting here in some utterly pointless support group listening to this guy and that guy bitching about how the Clown Prince of Crime had been mean to them. The victims he could cope with. Those he could sympathise with. But the lackeys? The minions? The thugs who'd made the idiot mistake of falling in with utterly the wrong guy? Where did they get off? What right did they have to act hurt by comparison to him? What utter steaming pile of -

"Jason?"

His eyes snapped up, deviating from the stained patch of floor he'd been glaring at intently. It took a moment to realise that one of the shrinks was talking to him. He shot her a questioning look.

"You seem like you might have something to say to the group."

Really? Jason's expression countered, fixing her with an indignant look. She didn't seem to waver. Smiled encouragingly even. Well, lady, you asked for it.

"Only that you're all a bunch a' bitch-whining cry babies, and this whole little support group thing is a bunch a' crap."

[Harleen Quinzel]

This was her punishment. Not the cell or the somewhat permanent residency at Arkham or the questions or the looks or the bad food or anything else. It was this. It was sitting here and being forced to listen while every pipsqueak, sorry, jealous bastard who had fallen from Mr. J's good graces had the audacity to say anything about the boss behind his back. It was enough to drive a girl crazy!

Most days Harley stayed quiet, offering at most a scoff or a roll of the eyes as someone went about giving some false sob story in an effort to feel better about themselves. Oh poor me. I was a nobody until the Joker made me somebody and then I was too inept to avoid getting caught by the Bats and it's all Joker's fault. Boo-frikin-hoo.

Was the same thing every time. Same absolute garbage. Except today wasn't the same at all, apparently. There were only two people in the whole group who had any right to say anything about Mr. J and that her and the Bats' former little birdy. She never met Jason before Arkham, which was surprising considering she was sure things overlapped which meant that Mr. J never told her about him but all things considered it was probably for her own protection in a way, meant that if Bats ever got his hands on her she couldn't go spoutin' about where her Puddin' was keeping the guy.

That was the thing no body here understood. Yeah, okay, so sometimes Mr. J had been a bit heavy handed with her, and sometimes he yelled and sometimes he left her behind but it was always for her own good. And he always came back for her. Always.

Except when he didn't.

But he would.

Eventually.

As Jason got his bit of encouragement to speak his mind all Harley could do was reply with a high pitched, "Ha!" He was right, in a way, this was crap, but probably not for the reasons the former Bird Wonder was thinking. The lady in charge of the whole thing didn't seem too happy with what had been said though, oh she was trying to maintain professionalism but Harley could see right through it.

"Is that how you really feel?" The psych finally managed to ask, her voice calm but hinting oh so badly at the fact that Jason had said something unexpected.

"Of course it is!" The petite blonde shouted out before anyone else could get a word in. "First bit a truth spoken here the whole time an' you're gonna question it? What kinda shrink are you?"

[Jason Todd]

Jason flinched a little at the sudden outburst from the Joker's little lady. Didn't have the same kind of cringe-inducing reaction that he would've had if the Joker himself had chimed in, but then it hadn't been Harley Quinn's voice blabbing at him for every painful second of every painful day. Well, except the countless, endless seconds spent in total darkness and borderline starvation when one of the Joker's schemes was in action or got him busted, and he hadn't bothered to leave someone behind to feed his pet.

Harley still provoked some sort of reaction though; maybe because he wasn't used to hearing that voice come out of such a normal-looking face. That was exactly how Harleen Quinzel looked right now: normal. No costume. No make-up. No hat, not even pigtails. Regular little lady. Kinda cute little lady truth be told; not that the skin-tight outfit and the gymnastics routine hadn't gone and made things a little conflicted for him back when he was a hormonal teenage sidekick. Sure, she was a crazy-ass bitch who was more likely to bite things off than do anything useful if they'd had any alone time, but if Batman could have his secret fondness for Catwoman that he refused to admit to, Jason sure as hell wasn't going to feel guilty for crushing on Harley Quinn back when he was just a dumb kid.

Now though? It was almost sad, seeing her like this. No, not sad. Pathetic. Here she was, still fiercely loyal to the psychopathic asshole who'd pretended to care about her even though anyone with a shred of sanity could see that he didn't, despite the fact that he had abandoned her to this hell hole and wouldn't be doing a damn thing to bust her out - he'd probably moved on already. Rumour had it he'd upgraded to twins lately. Whole thing was like looking in some sort of freaky, gender changing, accent changing, personality changing mirror.

"Might wanna check what your house is made of before you start throwin' those stones, Doc," he shot at Harley, equal parts smug and gruff. That was how the story went, right? Doctor Harleen Quinzel had been on the staff here at Arkham once, until one psychotherapy session too many with the Joker had driven her ass-over-ankle into crazytown.

"You ain't exactly the poster child for ethical psychology practices."

[Harleen Quinzel]

"I'll have you know that my house is just fine, thank you! Weren't like I kept practicin' once I got involved with my patient. Got more ethics than these goons, that's for sure!" Harley finished by folding her arms across her chest and letting out a loud huff, lips puckering to the side so she could blow a sharp stream of air upwards that barely ruffled the disturbed bit of blonde that had fallen in front of her eyes with her outburst.

She didn't care if the psychiatrist overseeing the session was getting flustered by her and Jason's little tiff, Quinn had enough with keeping quiet. If they all could rant and rage about how horrible her Mr. J was, then she could rant about Arkham's staff and fellow patients. They all thought they knew her, knew her story and about how Arkham had been her first real assignment and it was only on account of how she'd performed during her residencies and how she passed her certification with flying colors. She wasn't some two-bit hack, she was smart. Smart enough to see things in the Joker that no one else had been capable of, to see the poor soul underneath that no one else could understand. How couldshe not have fallen for such a beautiful person?

Okay so there were rumors he had only been using her and that all her devotion was nothing but a joke to Mr. J, but they were rumors. No one knew the truth but her and her Puddin' and it could stay that way until the end of time for all she cared.

"Miss Quinzel, that's enough. You know this isn't the time for those sort of grievances." Finally the woman spoke up after it seemed she had determined she wasn't in danger of imminent chair throwing. "If you like, we can discuss this during a private sess-"

The shrink was cut off by a loud thhhbbbbbb as Harley stick out her tongue and gave the lady a good proper raspberry for her suggestion.

[Jason Todd]

See, this was why Jason didn't belong in this place. On the one hand you had him, a man with the sense thoroughly knocked into him. Sure, he'd lost his sense of humour mostly, and he didn't really have anything left to care about any more, but that gave him clarity. That gave him logic. It was the needs of the many: better a few dead mobsters and gangsters than a bunch of dead cops, a bunch of dead innocent bystanders. That was the whole point. That was the vision he'd tried to bring to Gotham City. That was the lesson he'd tried to teach the Batman.

Sometimes assholes deserve to die for what they've done.

But no. It was okay for cops to gun people down if they needed to. It was okay for soldiers to shoot dead the enemy, and no one even blinked. So why wasn't it the same for Gotham? Why not the same rules of engagement for this war zone as for all the others? It only made sense, and he was about the only one in this whole damn town that was thinking straight. It was the people who put him in here with the rest of these freaks - they were the crazy ones.

Freaks. That went double for Harley Quinn. That turn of phrase, involved with a patient, threatened to overturn his stomach and deposit the tasteless generic swill that they fed them all here all over the grimy floors. There was nothing about the Joker that was anything but monstrous. Anything but repulsive. How did someone like Harleen Quinzel, someone smart, someone analytical, someone discerning, get suckered in so hook line and sinker? How did a rational person fall under that kind of spell? And what had the Joker done to the poor girl to turn her into this, some bratty child stubbornly defending the man who the rest of the world could plainly see didn't give the slightest damn about her.

"You'll have to excuse us, Doctor Quinzel," Jason grunted out. "None of us have the benefit of havin' been screwed an' screwed up by the Joker. All we got was screwed over."

[Harleen Quinzel]

For some reason it kept bugging her when he called her that. Doctor. No body had called her that in a long time. Doctor Harleen Francis Quinzel, M.D. Yep that was her all right. Except it kinda wasn't anymore. She'd been that person once, a respected member of society, someone who had a normal life. Then He had entered it and she never looked back, never wanted to, never needed to. Didn't they all get it?? She was better this way, being able to laugh, to not take things too seriously. They loved each other!

"He'll come for me," Harley muttered, not really caring if they heard at first but... why shouldn't they?? "You'll see! You'll ALL see. My Puddin' will come for me. You're all just jealous you ain't got no one like that!"

[Jason Todd]

Jason genuinely laughed out loud.

"Really?"

His voice was indignant and dismissive, almost mocking Harley for her assertion. "You think there ain't some manipulative psychopath in my life, who filled my head with a ton a' crazy thoughts and ideals, moulded me into the kind a' person he wanted me to be, an' then just up an' abandoned me when I needed him? Who left me to be all broken an' changed without even the faintest hint a' givin' a crap?"

An angry breath drew in through his nose, his jaw clenched too tightly closed to sneak one past his teeth any other way.

"They don't give a damn about you and me, Harleen. They're just gonna leave us here in this hell hole to rot, because they don't need us any more. We're expendable. Obsolete. Served our purpose. Hell, they've already replaced the both of us. So your Mister Jay?" He shook his head, shrugging dismissively with his lips. "He ain't comin'."

A shaking pause followed, a grip of emotion wrapping around his chest, needing effort to force his words past.

"He don't love you, Doc. Mine don't love me, neither. Tellin' yourself anythin' else is just a lie."

[Harleen Quinzel]

"You take that back!" Harley didn't explode but she certainly felt like she was right on the edge of it.

Who did the former bird-brain think he was saying things like that?? He didn't know anything about her or Mister J. All he knew was all the stupid stuff that had been drilled into his head by his boss - who apparently had done him wrong. He was wrong though, he just needed to realize just how much he was!

"Bats ain't nothin' like my Puddin'. You seem t' be forgettin' somethin'! You weren't th' first Robin anyway! The last one got too old for the gig and so did you."

Her stare was challenging and it was darn good thing the doc and the other patients weren't trying to come between the two of them because Harley was pretty sure that only the two of them were immune to the death stares they shot at each other.

"I'm the only one Mista' J's ever loved. You can't take that away from me."

[Jason Todd]

Too old. The muscles in Jason's jaw bunched. She was just spouting out insults with no aim, he knew that, but that one in particular struck close to a nerve by accident. He'd been older than Dick had been when Bats first took him under his wing. Had been something Bruce regretted, more than once. Harder to train. Slower to learn. More bad habits in need of breaking. More bad attitudes. Stubborn. Argumentative. Teenager. It wasn't wrong that Jason had been all of those things back then; but damn if he wished he hadn't heard it all pointed out by Bruce so often.

If he'd been too old back then, he certainly was now. Too much life stolen away by the Joker. Never finished school. No skills worth a damn. He'd come full circle, in fact; was kinda funny in a way. Before Bruce, Jason had been young and stupid, making his way on the streets, stealing for money, for food, and for kicks. He'd got the idea into his head to try and jack the wheels off the Batmobile. Bruce had caught him; lifted him up out of the gutter; given him an actual home, an actual cause. Joker hadn't broken just bones; not just Jason's spirit; he'd broken his whole life, and dumped him back in the criminal cesspit he'd started out in. Except now he was too old to climb out of it. What was he supposed to do, get a job working at Big Belly Burger, flipping fries for a living? Go back to school and get his diploma, learning alongside all the dregs and refuse of society; all for, what, an office job if he was lucky? He wasn't cut out for that. Wasn't capable of a normal life any more. All thanks to Mister J. This dumb broad was gonna sit there and act like the Joker was some loving and caring nancy instead of the murderous psychopath he'd proven himself to be, time and again? Bitch please.

"If your puddin' really loves you, then why the hell are y' still here, Harleen?"

He glared defiantly at her. She might not have been aiming for his nerves and emotional weak spots, but Jason didn't plan on showing the same kind of restraint.

"How many times have y' busted his pasty white ass out of this place? How much expense? How much have you done for him, willingly or not? You've proven your loyalty an' your worth so many damn times. So if he loves you, where is he? How can he bear the thought a' bein' without you? How can he bear the thought a' you bein' trapped in this place? Where's your rescue? Where's his loyalty t' you? Hell, Harley -"

He looked her dead in the eye.

"- he even sent you so much as a damn letter all these months you've been in here?"

[Harleen Quinzel]

Somebody - she couldn't remember who exactly - had once told her that you couldn't argue with facts. Well, you could, but you were kind of a crazy person at that point. Which, Harley supposed, she sort of was in a way but not that way.

But just because something was the truth, that it was fact, didn't mean that you had to like hearing about it. Jason wasn't the first person to point it out to her, either. It had been on another one of her visits to Arkham when Ivy had asked the question about why it was that Harley never so much as got a letter or a phone call or a visit or anything from the love of her life. Red had also pointed out the whole... every time Harley wound up in Arkham how her getting out never had anything to do with Mister J. Hell, some of the times she'd come back home and he'd act like she hadn't been gone at all. The one time he'd acknowledge it was met with a "And where the hell have you been?"... there was no denying that it had stung a bit, but her Puddin' was a busy man, you couldn't expect him to keep track of everything. Right? He wasn't some ungrateful bastard who treated her like she wasn't worth anything...

She felt her eye twitch, whether it actually did or whether she just pictured it happening was up for debate, though. In the next second she was off her chair and across the room, though. "I SAID, TAKE IT BACK!"

While their little verbal sparring match had taken place, apparently the psychiatrist in charge hadn't been entirely lazy. She must have signalled for the guards to be ready just in case... well, this should happen. Harley felt her arms behind grabbed by the two men who actually seemed to have a bit of trouble containing the little blonde woman who continually tried to hurl herself at the former Boy Wonder.

"I'LL KILL YA!" She screamed as she kept fighting back. It was losing battle, even as they were dragging her out of the room and back to her cell, but Harley didn't care. If she could have she would have ripped Jason's pretty green eyes right out of his skull at that point. Stupid birdie. Stupid Mister J. Stupid Arkham! They'd all pay for this. They'd all pay!

[Jason Todd]

Jason watched with a bemused smirk as Harley Quinn was dragged off - quite literally kicking and screaming - in the arms of several burly guards and orderlies. He probably shouldn't be deriving satisfaction from this; shouldn't be relishing the fact that he'd found and stepped on Harley's nerves. She was a victim of the Joker, the same as he was. Her pain, her anger, her distress; it was just a mirror for his own suffering, the same broken psychosis in it's own zany flavour.

But there was something satisfying about it, a fact he'd no doubt feel guilty about later. He couldn't do anything to hurt the Joker himself, and so if Harley was going to insist on arguing the guy's corner, sticking up for him, trying to make out that he was anything less than the most detestable scum of the earth, then screw her. He wanted her to hurt the way he did every time that name was mentioned; and if he couldn't make her feel the phantom pains of the brutal beating that echoed in every one of his once shattered bones, then he would make it hurt in her heart, and in her soul. The Joker may have made her what she was; but he'd made Jason who he was now too. Only fair that their mutual programming and conditioning was left to play out uninhibited.

He watched as Harley was dragged from view, and in the last moment as her venom-filled eyes met with his, Jason smiled; winked; and waved.


* * *

Jason stared up at the ceiling, wishing that he was Kryptonian. He probably would have wasted the power if he was; wouldn't have used it to punch his way out through the walls, or used his freeze-breath to turn the door of his cell brittle enough to shatter with a single nudge; wouldn't have used his x-ray vision and his enhanced hearing to monitor patrol routes, learn pass codes, or do any of the other things it would take to plan an effective escape.

No, if he was Kryptonian, he would have used his heat vision to burn that stupid smudge off the ceiling above his bed. That stupid smudge that looked like the bat symbol. He hadn't noticed it the first few days, but now he couldn't unsee it. Maybe it was nothing, maybe it was just a smudge, and it was some sort of Rorschach crap that was making his mind interpret it that way. Maybe it was a cruel prank by the staff at Arkham, or some underhanded tactic by his head-shrinks to convince him that Batman was on his mind far more often than was healthy; trick him into talking about his feelings like some pansy-ass nancy. It wouldn't work though, he was determined of that. He hadn't mentioned it to anyone; he just lay in his cell, and glared at it.

A strange sound caught his attention; the skritch of something scuffing across the floor, a faint rustle brought along with it. His vision turned, catching sight of a scrap of paper being shoved under the bottom of his cell door. That was Arkham in a nutshell - all the real money went to making sure the dangerous crazies were locked up tight, while the regular crazies were slammed up in cells where the doors didn't even fit properly. Sure, unless you were Kyle Nimbus or Clayface you didn't exactly need an airtight seal on your cell, but still, it didn't exactly leave Jason feeling like he was trapped in some impenetrable and inescapable fortress. Plus, it was drafty as hell.

Curiosity piqued, Jason rolled gently to the side, dropping to the floor with all the silent stealth that Batman had drilled into his head years ago. Keeping low, he made his way to the door, avoiding being seen through the tiny barred window at about head height. He lifted the scrap of paper cautiously, barely making a sound, and unfolded it. The writing was neat, ish, what would probably have been fancy lettering were it not for what it was written in - Jason's rusty detective skills had seen enough ransom and suicide notes to know when something was written in blood. It would have been creepy, were it not for the words themselves.

Sorry I went crazy at you, birdie. You're right, by the way.

Jason frowned, a sense of disbelief taking up residence on his face. "Doc?" he asked, loud enough to be heard through the door, but not much further. "That you?"

[Harleen Quinzel]

Harleen had escaped her cell... again. For all that Arkham claimed to be the finest in handling those who were criminally disturbed, their lax security was nothing but a joke. "Lights Out" was equivalent to Last Call, when the weirdoes went to sleep it all off and the rest of the residents had themselves a bit of a walkabout before retiring for the evening. It was time to shake off whatever had irked you that day and the guards were relatively understanding, so long as you were back in your cell for roll call the next morning they didn't care too much. Depended on how much trouble you went about causing, she guessed. Girls like Ivy and Kyle? Yeah, they talked guards into all sorts of stupid things and so were kept under lock and key. Harley, though? Well, what harm was the Joker's girl going to do when the man himself wasn't in the same building?

It wasn't like she didn't know all the codes and keys anyway. Oh sure, they had changed things since she worked there... but little good it really seemed to do. All in all, she was one of the more harmless types, one of the inmates that was glared at when caught, dragged back after the second warning and so on. If she avoided people though, well... that left her to her own devices. Which meant paper could be found. No pens though, no crayons neither. How rude. She'd found a small thumb-tack though that must have been dropped from someone moving around one of those official posters in the break room the actual people who got paid to be there had. Harley could remember them sometimes, the ones that told you about fair wages or sexual harassment or who to call if you felt you weren't getting treated right. They never mentioned who to talk to when you started feeling like your patients were smarter than the system though, who you should talk to instead of listening to them tell their stories to the point where you felt it. Their pain became their own when you started caring too much and no poster could tell you what to do when that happened.

What a doop she'd been. The Joker had played her and played her good. It didn't stop the fact she loved him, but it did put everything into perspective a bit better when she realized in those brief moments of sanity that for all the love and loyalty she freely gave, nothing had been given in return. She'd given her heart away and gotten it shoved back down her throat, chopped into little bits and pieces for all her troubles.

"Yeah, it's me." Harleen barely had the strength to answer, her voice was still higher pitched than it had been back in the day when she roamed these halls as a doctor instead of a patient, but all of the pep had been taken out for the moment.

Seemed her body had felt the same way ever since she slipped the note under that small space in the door. Her finger had still hurt from where she'd pricked it to get the ink and she had slumped against Jason's door, using it to rest her back against while she stuck her finger in her mouth until she got the nerve to head back to her own little space. She hadn't planned on him still being awake, hadn't planned on him reading the note and reaching out to her like he had, that was for sure.

"Guess I just wanted t' say sorry. Wasn't your fault I kinda went kapow earlier." Harleen let out a breath and felt the back of her head slip away from the door's cool solidity until the side of her skull rested against her shoulder as she drew her knees up against her chest with her arms. "Not gonna kill y'. I ain't ever killed no one, y' know? Not directly. Just watched Him do it. Not that that's much betta or nothin'."

[Jason Todd]

This was... weird. Harley had gone from madness to mournful; and instead of finding one of the psychologists or whatever to open up to and share her feelings, she'd come to find Jason. For a fleeting moment he wondered how the hell she was even here; but then he considered how easy it would have been for him to bust out of his cell if he'd wanted to. No reason to presume that the Joker's girl wasn't just as resourceful as Batman's boy wonder. After all, they were basically weird and twisted reflections of each other: someone young, dumb, and impressionable, seduced by a crazy man into being their hapless bitch.

How was less relevant than why, though. He briefly considered the possibility that this was all a play, all a ploy, trying to avenge her hurt feelings by trying to lure Jason into opening up just a little - enough for retaliation in kind. It was a dumb plan, but it was a Harley sort of plan. The Red Hood, the man that the Joker had broken and beaten him into, he didn't much care if Harley was being honest or not; the Hood wanted him to climb back into bed, ignore her until he went away. The boy he'd used to be before, Jason Todd the street kid, he didn't much care either: Harleen's problems were her problems, not his. But there was a tiny glimmer of something better; a few shredded scraps of red and yellow and green, wafting about like flags on the breeze in the back of his head. Tiny remnants of Robin: tiny pieces of the better person that Batman had made him aspire to be. Didn't matter that Bruce had screwed him over and betrayed him: didn't stop that better person from seeming every now and again like someone Jason wanted to be.

One of those now and again moments took hold, and Jason gently eased himself into sitting, back leaning against the reinforced steel door that separated him from Harley Quinn. "Sorry I said what I said," Jason offered back quietly. He wasn't, but he knew he should be. His words had been honest, but he'd used them wrong. Robin would never have intentionally used the truth as a weapon like that, never intentionally set out to hurt someone with it. He closed his eyes, a hand gently resting across the bridge of his nose and both temples, trying to remind himself what it felt like to wear the domino mask that hid the asshole Jason Todd, and painted the Boy Wonder across his face instead.

"Guess he did a real number on the both of us, huh?"

[Harleen Quinzel]

"Yeah, sumpin' like that."

Was funny how her voice trailed off, kind of wistful in a way and yet all kinds of full of regret. Moments of full clarity were a rare sort of thing for her, had been for a while, and truth was Harley was glad for it. Being lost in the madness of it all was far preferable to the reality that actually existed nowadays. A world without the man who she loved and hated in equal measure, a world where she was just a washed up criminal instead of someone fairly respected. She'd been a nice girl once, though maybe not really deep down. After all, it hadn't taken much to tip her right up and over the edge to where she had fallen squarely on her butt now. Harley wasn't sure when the joke had stopped being funny, but she was one of those who was determined to still laugh about it most times. Right now though? Now it all felt heavy and gross but there was no way to just wash it off, either.

Her mildly injured finger was used to drag the edge of her mouth upwards, tugging a forced half smile on her face as if she'd done gone and forgotten how to do it on her own - impossible - but right now it felt really difficult to do. The expression stuck, mirroring itself properly on the other side of her face as a dreamy sigh left her.

"Y' ever wonder what'cha gonna do if y' ever get outta here?"

[Jason Todd]

Jason's eyes climbed to the roof, settling for a moment upon the bat-like ceiling smudge. That felt like the easiest answer; the obvious answer. It was the answer that all the head shrinks up in this place would be expecting. Something something Batman. Revenge. Confrontation. Something.

But was it an honest answer? Jason wasn't sure. His head was a conflict, a quagmire, a confusing maelstrom of conflicting urges, and there was no way to know which one of them would take hold. Would his broken mind drive him towards Batman? Would he act out his dreams where he found the Dark Knight, hunted him down, herded or lured him to the familiar rain-soaked asphalt of Crime Alley, and tossed a handful of broken pearls at Bruce's feet; forced his last thoughts to be the loss of his parents, and the realisation of how much he'd failed the boy who was supposed to be like a son?

Except he wasn't, and Jason knew that. If anyone was Bruce's boy, it was Dick; Jason had just been a replacement, a rebound, a proxy abandoned as soon as he served his purpose. He was nothing but a failed experiment; so what then? What urge would that realisation guide to the fore? Would he revisit his old antics, trying to complete the great work he'd begun: resolving crime in Gotham with the firm hand of leadership, rather than a stranglehold? That had been his vision. Crime was a constant, inescapable state of being for this city. Batman fought against it, but it was a futile effort; a fight that would never end. You couldn't defeat the darker side of human nature; especially not in Gotham. But that was where Bruce had it wrong. He fought to fight, not to win. That was why villain after villain, Joker, Riddler, Penguin, Bane, all strode in and out of Arkham and Blackgate as if their sells had a goddamn revolving door. Bruce talked the talk about justice, and saving the city, but when it came down to it, he said it best himself: he was vengeance; he was the night. It was almost like he didn't want the war to end; almost like he needed it, needed the half measures and the temporary fixes, so that the scared little boy he'd always been was too busy fighting to take a look around at what he'd done, and who he'd become. The lesson Bruce needed to learn, the lesson Jason had tried to teach, was that sometimes the bad things just needed to end up dead.

But not always. That had been Jason's mistake. Two polar extremes, when the truth lay somewhere in the middle. How did the quote go? You die a hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villain. Jason had done both; gone off the deep end; sunk to their level, guilty of the same tactics that those he'd pursued were. That was the flaw in his great work: you couldn't control crime in Gotham by waging war; because the people who truly suffer in war are the ones stuck in the middle. He'd turned crime into a thing, an institution to be demolished, a series of actions by criminals when in reality, crime was the effect that it had on the victims. Controlling crime didn't save anyone; it must made it a little less bad. It was a tonic to alleviate the symptoms, but a long way from a cure. During his time in Arkham he'd gained distance; perspective. Shit. Was the damned therapy actually working?

A chuckle escaped from him, a tug of a smile forming at the corner of his mouth.

"Honestly?" he responded, with a hint of a sigh. "Beer and a burger. Maybe a slice of pie. After all this time, all these masks, and costumes, and master plans, I think I've forgotten what it's like to just be normal, y'know? Boring as hell, sure, but I kinda miss boring. Figure it'd be nice to just be Jason for a little while."

His gaze shifted downwards, attention focusing once again on the blood-scrawled note still held in his hands.

"How about you, Doc? Any unfinished business waitin' for you on the outside?"