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Laughter in the Dark	By : FlameWolf666 Category: DC Verse Movies > The Dark Knight Views: 9317 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own anything from the Dark Knight or the Batman franchise. This story is just for fun and no profit will be made from it.

Chapter List
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- 16
Author’s Note: I just wanted to say, once again, that I am flattered by how much you guys are enjoying this fic. It’s nice to know you are having a lot of fun reading my hard work! *hugs*

Chapter Fifteen: Storm Brewing
    A bloody knife held in a shaky grip. Anguished cries as life ebbs from two pairs of eyes, one young while the other is old. He had been trying to protect her and her father had stabbed him. Daddy had stabbed George! She had to! She had to! Oh God her mother was screaming and she could feel her world tilting and shifting before her. All this blended into a harsh shaking sensation and she became aware of screams leaving her mouth. “Mommy I didn’t mean to! Mommy I’m sorry!” called a grown-up voice twisted into the guise of a child’s voice.
    “Marie!” called a voice from very far away, sounding muffled by either water or cotton. Then she was being jostled as she found herself back in reality with a sickening jolt.
    “George,” she gasped out in a tear filled, lost voice as she became aware of a pair of arms wrapped tightly around her body.
    “Shh, shh,” soothed a very familiar, groggy sounding male voice in her ear. Her heart still raced in her ears as she turned her head to see the make-up smeared face of Joker. The mass murderer’s hazel gaze held frustration with just a touch of sympathy. His bare hands were under her pajama shirt, resting on her skin as they moved languidly; the soothing movements a sharp contrast to the expression on his painted visage.
    “I killed my father,” came out of her before she could stop it, the nightmare feeling more real than what she knew to be true. Her father had disappeared when she was very young, a relief to both her, her sister and her mother. The man had been scum during both of their tween years, turning into a borderline molester that only stopped short of having sex with the two sisters. Then he had simply disappeared one day, her mother never telling her what had happened.
    “Keep talking. Try to remember,” urged a nasally voice as a dim light clicked on and temporarily blinded her.
    “He was hurting me and George heard me screaming for help. He started to beat up daddy and daddy shoved him away. Then he grabbed his hunting knife and stabbed George. My sweet George screamed and screamed but daddy wouldn’t stop. I had to! I had to! Blood! So much blood! Mommy I didn’t mean to!” she replied in a childish voice, her grey eyes wide and unfocused as she relived the confusing terror inside her head. Some part of her brain was aware of what she was doing and who she was with but she had no control, it was as if the child she had once been had taken over entirely. She was feeling so much terror that she even began to wonder if she was experiencing repressed memories. Could her confused, jumbled nightmares hold more truth than she gave them credit for?
    “Who’s George? How did ‘daddy’ hurt you? What did you do Marie?” Joker rasped, sounding much more awake as he shifted into a slightly upright position and pulled her against him.
    “Daddy always hurt me. Touched me in bad places. George was a friend, more like a brother. He came over to visit and heard me calling for help. When daddy started hurting George, I... I... don’t know what happened. Next thing I knew I was holding a knife and there was blood. And mommy was screaming,” the shaken female whispered, slowly coming back to lucidity. As the words left her mouth, the memories came flooding back in a rush and she let out a strangled noise as she struggled to free herself from the criminal’s arms.
    She saw flashes of the butcher knife she had held plunging down into her father’s back over and over, blood arcing up every time it pulled back. She could hear his screams as well as her own. Under all the chaos, she could also hear George’s fading voice pleading for her to stop. Then there was shaking and she came back to reality with a snap, hearing her voice whispering ‘no’ again and again. She didn’t want to remember this! She didn’t want to know any of this! Releasing an anguished cry, Marie gripped her sandy haired head in her hands in an effort to stop the flashes, the screaming inside her mind. “Marie!” came a sharp, commanding voice, then she felt a harsh slap and everything halted.
    Silence, blessed silence. Her gray eyes still wide, Maire panted heavily as she covered the stinging spot on her cheek. “Thanks...,” the shaken Psychologist whispered, still feeling a bit muddled from all that had happened.
    “Now, tell me exactly what you just remembered,” the clown urged, his hands landing on her shoulders to prevent any attempt at escape. A strange light shone in his hazel eyes as he stared at her expectantly.
    “My father... my father molested me and my sister a lot as children. He... he never had sex with us but he came very close many times. It was a nice summer day and I thought dad had left to go fishing with his buddies. I thought it was safe to come downstairs and color,” she began, unsure of why she was telling him this but unable to stop herself. Joker only tensed, the expression on his face becoming as serious as a heart attack.
    “I never even knew he was there until I felt his hand go up my dress. He started to... and I started to struggle. I called for help and my best friend heard it. He had come over to visit and was outside when things started to happen. He came charging in and jumped on top of my father to get him off me. Dad knocked a twelve year old boy to the ground. Then he took out a hunting knife he wore on his belt and began to stab George,” she whispered, her voice sounding distant; almost as if she was trying to disconnect from this memory.
    “I couldn’t stop to think. I just grabbed a knife from the kitchen and started stabbing, screaming for him to stop hurting George. I could hear my best friend pleading for me to stop with his last breaths,” she finished, tears streaking down her ashen cheeks as she began to shake heavily.
    To her utter shock, the mass murderer was tugging her into a tight hug; harsh exhalations leaving through his nose. “Sounds like you reclaimed a memory,” he hissed in a tense voice, everything in his body language screaming with violence. If she didn’t know any better, she could swear her story had triggered him in some way.
    “Wh-what are you doing in here?” she found herself asking, despite the terror and confusion still swirling within her head. She was still distressed and highly confused but not so muddled that she didn’t remember he had never come up here to sleep before.
    Her response seemed to amuse the clown as he gave a terse chuckle in her ear. Then he was pulling back to give her a slightly amused look. “This is my room you know,” he reminded her, a slight smirk on his painted face despite his serious expression.
    “Well, I know that. It’s just that you’ve never slept here before,” Marie replied, using their current conversation to distract herself from the horrifying memories still playing through her mind. She could smell the blood and hear the screams as if they were happening right that moment, making her almost feel like she was going to go mad.
    The look on his disguised visage was half amused and half infuriated but that fury was nowhere near directed at her. “Crane was worried about you having nightmares if you were in here alone. I came in here to, uh, keep ya company,” he responded, his verdant eyes searching hers for something.
    “Ya seem to be handling the fact that you murdered your father rather well as well as the fact that you recovered a repressed memory,” he remarked in a quiet voice, his lips pursed as his orbs continued to search her for something. It was almost as if her lack of reaction had worried him greatly.
    Marie could only stare at the ‘Clown Prince’, at a loss for how to explain that one. She could only chalk her outward calm to years of wearing a professional mask around her patients. Yet it went beyond that. The only thing that truly bothered her wasn’t the fact that she had killed her own father but that she had to relive her best friend’s death as well as her mother’s deep distress. She could easily use the excuse that the man had molested her as an easy excuse for her feelings but that didn’t excuse all of it. “I... I don’t feel much regret for killing him. What was traumatizing was seeing someone so important to me to die, let alone hearing my mom screaming,” she replied quietly, perplexed at herself. What kind of person was she really? Could this mean her memories about Evan and his death were also false?
    Joker only stared at her, looking just as confused as she was. “Ya just keep surprising me Doc. I wonder what else lurks in that pretty head of yours,” he rasped, poking her forehead a bit too hard to be playful.
    “I... I don’t know,” the blonde replied in a lost voice, feeling her heart constrict in her chest painfully. The criminal beside her shifted some more before he draped a bare arm around her and pulled her against his side as he laid on his back. It was at that moment she became aware of something very important, the man was naked from the waist up.
    Blushing, Marie did her best to shove away from the half naked killer; only to have him tighten his arm. “My sister was molested too,” he whispered softly after a few moments of silence, drawing her shocked, stormy gaze.
    “My father was a good man until he started drinking. He started off being a little too affectionate but it quickly escalated to much worse. One night, when I tried to stop him from raping her again, he decided to give me these as punishment,” he continued, his hazel eyes gaining a far away look as his scarred lips pursed. His bare fingers dug harshly into the skin of her upper arm but the trapped Psychologist didn’t dare make a sound lest she turn his anger to her. What he was revealing to her had no doubt been traumatizing as well as extremely personal, there was no telling what he would do if he decided he had told her far too much.
    “He left me bleeding in the kitchen. My mom had left long before then but didn’t bother to take us with her. I’ve never forgiven her for that. It was my sister who called 9-11. When I awoke, my father was there. He told me my sister killed herself and that it was my fault but I knew the truth. Trish couldn’t live with the guilt of what happened. She would always see it as her fault that I got permanently disfigured. The first night I got home from the hospital, I killed my father. Slit his fucking throat and watched his blood drain out of his body. I was fourteen,” he finished, his voice no more than a gruff growl as his muscles twitched with restrained violence.
    To her surprise, the murderer didn’t explode like she expected. Instead they laid there in silence, his callused hand roving over the bare skin of her arm as the anger slowly bled out of him. “Why did you tell me that? What happened after your father died?” Marie asked in a timid voice, her neck beginning to get tired from looking up at the man next to her. She couldn’t lay down or get comfortable without fear of laying her cheek on his surprisingly well muscled pecs. He wasn’t buff by any means but he was lightly toned, as if he had done just enough to build up his strength.
    “Did you forget our little deal already Doc? Gotta tell ya, I’m surprised our time together didn’t leave much of an, uh, impression. As for what happened, let’s leave that for another time,” he murmured in a roughened voice, his eyes staring at the far wall as his hand moved from her arm to the back of her head and began to push down.
    Not really having the strength to fight him, the sandy haired femme laid her milky cheek on his slightly warm chest. At first she was confused about what he was talking about, then the realization smacked into her head like a brick. He was talking about the exchange of information they had going back in Arkham. Why? What was the purpose? The main reason for doing it, to build trust between them to make him easier to deal with, was no longer existent. “Wh-why are you honoring that deal still? You’re no longer in Arkham and I’m now aware of you wanting to make me into Harley 2.0,” the blonde whispered.
    Joker stiffened at her response, the hand on her head tensing for a moment before moving down to rest on her back once more. “I do believe you already gave the reason for this exercise but I guess I’ll, uh, remind you. I believe you said you wanted to build trust,” he replied, his voice a tad gruff. The look on her face in response must have been priceless because the killer burst into a brief fit of his empty laughter.
    “But that makes no sense whatsoever! You said just yesterday that you wanted to brainwash me, now you’re acting as if none of that had ever happened. None of what you’re doing makes any sense!” the former doctor responded a bit more heatedly than was probably wise.
    To her surprise, the criminal holding her only laughed harder; the sound causing chills to run up and down her spine. “Oh you’re going to be a lot of fun!” he cackled, using his free hand to wipe away the tears streaming down his make-up coated cheeks. His laughter slowly tapered off as Marie could only give him a deeply confused look before yawning loudly. It was still late and her body was exhausted from everything that had happened. Soon she found herself drifting off to sleep, the feel of his hand moving over her back lulling her. She was so tired that she nestled into Joker’s pale chest, forgetting who she was with for the time being. It wasn’t too long before the ex-Psychologist was fast asleep, effectively using the killer as a pillow.
    The scarred male could only stare at his former ‘doctor’, a strange look on his decorated visage. The fact that she was sleeping as if he wouldn’t harm her threw him severely off balance. The longer she was around, the more he was sure he wasn’t going to go through with his original plans. Not to mention the similarities in their pasts. Heaving a sigh, the villain simply closed his own eyes and allowed Marie’s scent to lull him back to sleep. For once in his life, he slept deeply.
    Harley paced the room she had been given with a scowl on her make-up coated face. Mistah J was upstairs with that... that hussy! First he was letting her sleep in his room, now he was up there with her and was doing Lord knows what with the slut. Snarling, the spandex wearing female grabbed her favorite gun, a rifle she had painted with red and white hearts and had named Reginald, the blonde stormed out of the warehouse and into the streets. Right now she felt a powerful need to kill something and if she wasn’t careful that something would more than likely be the bitch her companion called Marie. In her rush to get out, she never noticed Jonathan watching her closely.
    Heels clicked on the concrete as the female jester stormed down the winding alleys of Gotham. Her jaw was set and her blue eyes were full of fury as her belled cap jingled quietly. She never noticed she was being followed until a hand settled over her mouth and a muscled arm wrapped around her thin waist. “I know you’re with Joker. Tell me where he is so I can rescue my girlfriend,” hissed a gruff voice in her ear. Of course, Harley reacted before she could process what he had said; stomping the hard heel of her shoe into his foot and biting his hand at the same time. Her attacker released her with a heated curse, allowing the blonde to put some distance between them as she leveled her rifle at his chest.
    Both of them froze, the hulking silhouette seeming to be staring at her. “Rescue your girlfriend? Are you talking about that woman that Mistah J brought in?” the suspicious criminal hissed, wrapping a finger around Reginald’s trigger. The much taller, more muscular man only sighed before giving a nod.
    “He left this card,” the shadowed man murmured, bringing out what looked like a playing card.
    “Come forward enough for me to see you,” Harley demanded, narrowing her cerulean eyes. Her possible partner came forward, revealing a bulky, built male that looked like he had been in the army. His eyes held the far-away look that most soldiers had and told her everything she needed to know. His blue eyes were narrowed and held a steely edge as he presented her with a ‘Joker’ card.
    All at once, she realized that the answer to all her problems was standing right in front of her. She just had to play her cards right and make sure the big moose wouldn’t hurt her lover. She was sure that once the intruder was gone, everything would go back to normal. “I’ll help you as long as you’re willing to do things my way. I don’t want my puddin’ gettin’ hurt. If ya can give me some time, I might be able to lure her out of the building,” she offered, slowly lowering her weapon.
    “Fine, but if he’s hurt her I’ll make sure your ‘Puddin’’ suffers immeasurably,” the dark haired man snarled before turning and leaving. Harley watched him until he was out of sight, then simply continued on her way. As she walked, she brainstormed ways to quickly gain the whore’s trust.
    Crane had been preparing a few of his gas canisters when the black and red clad female came back splattered in blood. Despite seeing proof that she had only been blowing off steam, the former Psychiatrist found himself suspicious of the bright smile on his face. ‘Scarecrow’ rose up like a black cloud in the back of his mind but for once the two of them were in agreement. Harleen would have to be watched closely. Taking a deep breath to keep his more violent side at bay, Jonathan turned back to his work as if he had never seen her. From now on, he would be like her shadow.
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Laughter in the Dark