#17: Hizzoner, The Joker! (HoM / Tupper)

The banners draped down from the ceiling, balloons were placed in every corner, and party poppers exploded one after the other, as James Gordon stepped into the squad room, holding himself up with a cane. “WELCOME BACK, COMMISSIONER!”

Before he could think to say anything, he smiled. He motioned to them to stop cheering, and then Sarah Essen hugged him tightly, only to release him when he cringed in pain. He motioned to his chest. “Uh, bullet wounds Sarah…”

She smiled awkwardly. “It’s been rough but I’ve kept the department together in your absence.”

“Thanks Sarah.” He smiled and looked over to his right as Petite approached him, grinning from ear to ear.

“Good to have you back Jim! I’m glad to see you on your feet!”

“I think we all are!” Sam Merkel looked up from his newspaper and saluted his old friend. “Good to have you back, Commish.”

Jim nodded back at his old partner. “Thanks, Sam.”

Harvey Bullock stood by the window, glancing from the skyline to his partner as everyone hugged him. His chest still ached where he had been stabbed, but he, like James Gordon, was healing. He looked back out to the city outside. It was quiet. Arkham Asylum was visible in the distance, over the buildings, a black silhouette on the red horizon.

“Harv?”

Harvey turned to see James Gordon standing behind him, his hand outstretched. He took it, shaking it slowly. “What’s up, Jimbo?”

“I want to thank you for having my back. You saved my life back in the hospital.”

“Hey, you’re my partner… If I wasn’t going to have your back, who was? It’s what I’m here for.”

“Still, are you alright? You basically took a bullet (or sword if you want to get picky) for me, and…” Gordon looked around, embarrassed, and then grit his teeth. “Seriously, thanks Harv.”

“Don’t mention it.”

James scratched the back of his head for a moment, and then looked back at his partner, a wry smile on his lips. “Are you blushing?”

Harvey looked up, and shook his head vigorously. “No…”

“Now look, I wanted to talk to you about something…”

Jeremiah Arkham scribbled something on his clipboard and looked at the two orderlies clad in white inside the security booth. “Any problems?”

“Killer Croc was banging his head against a wall a while ago, complaining about how his stomach hurt. Moaning that he was hungry for sweet meats. We didn’t ask, we just doused him in sedatives, and they kicked in a while ago… He put up more resistance than usual. Weird.”

Arkham nodded. “We’ll have to up the dosage. Wait… Do you hear that?”

“No… I don’t hear anything…”

Jeremiah nodded. “Exactly. Did you have to sedate him?”

“Doctor Arkham? What do you mean?” The orderly shook his head. “Who?”

The chief psychiatrist looked at the two security guards in the booth at the top of the long corridor that lead down to the major case cells, tapping his foot impatiently. “Do you hear laughter? Do you?”

“Uh, no Sir… You kind of blank it out on the longer shifts… Maybe he went to sleep…”

“You idiots! The Joker doesn’t ever sleep… Get your gear, we’ll need to check on him.”

The two men sighed and picked up their batons and shields. “Yessir.”

Jeremiah Arkham led the way as they approached the cell furthest away from the security booth. He took a key card from his pocket and swiped the mechanism next to the door, and watched as it swung open. A strong breeze hit the three men, and they saw the massive hole in the wall of the cell. Jeremiah sighed heavily. “Oh, no.”

“Sir, should I start the alarm…?”

“Don’t bother, he’s long gone now… I need to call the Commissioner…”

He landed silently, and approached the glowing light that projected the symbol into the sky. The bat upon the clouds. James Gordon puffed on his pipe, and tapped his foot impatiently.

“Commissioner.”

“Hrm?” James span round and his eyes widened, the pipe slipping from his lips and cracking in half on the ground. “Gah.” He leaned over and picked up the two pieces, and then rolled his eyes, pocketing them.

Batman smiled dryly from within the shadows and began to speak. “I’m sorry about that, Commissioner.”

“I’m still getting used to it…” He shook his head. “Commissioner. I heard about the breakout.”

“I expected you to. There was an explosion at Arkham Asylum.”

Batman nodded grimly. “Any details?”

“Orderlies found evidence of an explosion in one of the inmate’s cells. By evidence they mean a hole in the goddamn wall… Inept…the cell belonged to--”

Batman didn’t even ask. He knew. His gloves creaked as he clenched his fist. His words sounded stiffer than usual through gritted teeth. “Joker.”

“He’s loose on the city once more, and we only found out now…”

Batman froze to the spot. Julie. Dick. Barbara.

“Jeremiah Arkham deserves to be put away for the way he allows the inmates to come and go as they do… Are you alright?”

Julie is dead. Has been for two years. She’s at peace now.

Dick is better than ever. Grown into an identity he can claim as his own. Out of the shadow of the bat into a new, different, better spotlight.

Barbara has come into her own with the help of Ollie and the New Outsiders.

Ouch. He suppressed a smile. Now wasn’t the time.

“I’ll be fine. Any idea how an explosion was generated?”

“Harvey has taken Merkel down to Arkham. They’re reviewing security tapes.” James placed his hand on the switch that turned off the light. “They’ll report back to…” He didn’t turn around. Batman was gone and he knew it. He smiled slightly before pressing the switch. “Good luck.”

“I need visitor records from when he last came in.”

Jeremiah Arkham sighed heavily. “I have them here, Detective Bullock.” He dumped a small pile of papers in front of the large police officer. “We’ve been through this many a time.”

“Yeah.” Bullock began to thumb through the pages. “You really should do something about that.” He looked over to Merkel, who was already well into his pile. “See anything?”

“Your usual loon chasers.” He rolled his eyes. “I hate this crap. The amount of women who have nothing better to do than to write letters and visit the crazies… It’s insane.”

“Do I sense some pent up resentment there, Detective Merkel?” Jeremiah leaned toward the bearded police officer, and smiled smugly. “Some unresolved feelings towards your mother maybe?”

“Lay off, Arkham. Don’t pull your psychobabble with us,” grunted Bullock. “If you could keep ol’ Smiles McGee in side for longer than a month at a time, we wouldn’t have to be here…” He shook his head and continued to look through the logs. “Anything you could help us with here?”

“He must have blown the hole in the wall when Waylon Jones was playing up. His… ‘episodes’ are loud enough to create the kind of cover you need to mask an explosion.”

Bullock groaned. “Great.”

“Wait…” Merkel put up his hand and motioned for Bullock to hurry on over. “I’ve got something a bit weird… Joker was visited by a Ms. T. Todd a week ago…”

“Yeah?”

“T. Todd? Thelma Todd? She was a famous actress that worked in Marx Brothers films. I loved her in Horse Feathers…”

“Oh, God…” Bullock looked through the release she wrote. “I’m guessing that if we compare these fingerprints to Harleen Quinzel…”

Merkel nodded. “We’ll have a match.”

“I got you your favourite flavour.” She pointed to the guards that examined the thin plastic stick she had given them.

Joker pressed his hands against the glass and smiled. “Oh, Thelma, darling, you didn’t did you?”

“Yes puddin’.” She leaned in close to the glass, and whispered into the air holes. “I bought you a stick of highly undetectable plastic, courtesy of our new employer…” She leaned back and smiled. She couldn’t help but fidget in her chair, barely containing her excitement at the thought of what was going to happen next.

“Thelma, baby…” He shook his head. “I don’t like this guy giving you orders… I want you to make me a promise… Next time you see him, you tear his head off, you hear me?” He paused and then shrugged his shoulders. “We’ll do the job, we’ve already got paid! But you blow. His. Brains. Out.”

“Yes sir, Mister Jay.”

He blew her a kiss and then stood up. “See you on the other side.” He waved and then headed back to his cell, escorted by a guard.

When the guard and the Joker had turned a corner, the man smiled and began to speak. “Hot piece of ass there, Joker.”

The Joker stopped walking. “Any other day, screw… And I’d tear your eyes out with my teeth. I’d decorate my cell with your blood. But today?” He smiled. “I can’t get that hot piece of ass out of my head.” He continued began to skip forward. “RIDE ON, SILVER!”

“This is getting boring. You’re not making any noise!” The Joker fumbled his hand into his pocket, and brought out a CD with purple writing scrawled on top of it. “Yay. It’s still here.” He placed it into the CD player and began to press the forward button. “Duran Duran…? Nope. ABC…? Nope… Erasure…? Nope… Ooo. I’ve got it. Track… Seven…”

“Track seven?” Harley smiled in glee and put down the scalpel. “I love track seven!”

The music began to play. Armand’s eye opened wide. He was numb all over. He couldn’t feel his hands or his feet. He was trapped in himself. But he could hear the music, and he could hear Harley and the Joker sing along.



Krol would scream if his mouth wasn’t gagged.

“Still with us, Armand?” Joker pulled over the car and stepped out the drivers seat. “Still breathing?”

Krol groaned, blood dribbling down his shirt and sleeve. His face was sticky, and he couldn’t see out of one eye. Everything was dark. Harley looked to Joker and tore off the duct tape that covered his mouth. “You… You…” He looked at his hand and his eyes widened. What was left of his hand. “You..”

“Lucky for you my beautiful assistant administered some beautiful anaesthetic before she proceeded with surgery, else you’d be screeeeaming in pain right now.”

“You won’t… Get away… With this…”

“Or what? What are you going to do?”

“It’s not… What I’m going to do Joker… It’s what Batman is going to do… When he finds you…”

Joker frowned, a sad look covering his face. “Oooo, don’t be mean Armando. I’m not scared of Bats, in fact, I’m looking forward to meeting him again!” He leaned in close to the butchered Mayor, and smiled. “Want me to tell you a joke? That’s part of my shtick and all… Best not upset the masses, you know?”

“Screw… You…”

Harley slapped the Mayor across the face, and then picked up the bolt cutters, gnashing them once more. “You keep it up Mayor, and you won’t be able to screw anything for a while, you get me?”

Joker rearranged the Mayor’s bloody clothes, and smiled. “A man walks into a bar and orders a drink. He goes to the bartender… ‘I can have any woman in this bar that I want’, so of course the bartender is curious. He’s a lonely man. Sure, he talks to the clientele, but are they interested in him? No. He’s a tap to them. Something they can get beer out of. So he asks the newcomer ‘What’s your secret? You want to help a guy out?’ and the man, who smiles at being asked this question, leans in close, close to the man’s ear, and whispers: ‘I’m a rapist’.” The Joker bursts out laughing.

“That’s…” Krol grimaces as a twinge of pain rushes through his leg. “That’s sick…”

“Bite your tongue!” Joker jerks up, and grabs the sides of the Mayor’s face. “Or I’ll do it for you.” The Joker flashes his teeth and clicks them together. “Yum-Yum-Yum!”

Harley grabbed the Mayor and pulled him out of the car. Krol hits the muddy ground hard, and rain hits his cheek. Blood mixes with mud, and Krol groans as his body is dragged across grass and muck, until Harley pauses. “This is where you get off, Mayor A.”

“What are you… What are you doing?”

The Joker swiftly pulled up his purple trousers and crouched next to the shivering Mayor. He began to whisper in the man’s ear. “Are you going to bargain, Mayor? Are you going to trade your fortune? Your wife? Your socks?”

“Go and… Go and die, you grinning freak…”

The Joker stood back up, his gangly frame towering over the mutilated Mayor. He grabbed the spade next to an open grave, and leans on it. “Do you know I have trouble sleeping, Armand? I have…” He moved his finger around his head. “I have trouble turning off. My mind is a constant cacophony of thought processes. The doctors have never seen anything like it. They’ve strapped me to machines, bought with the funding you’ve provided, and studied me, but no. Nothing. They ask me: ‘What are you thinking, Mr Joker? What’s going on in that head of yours?’ And I never tell them. But I’ll tell you, Armand. I’m thinking. I’m going through the ways I can kill you. Kill everyone. I’m a dynamo of homicidal tendencies. Yet the system gets me off every time. Your system. Your government. Your civilized methods of law. ‘Oh, he’s insane, he can’t be held accountable’ or ‘oh, he’s a cute guy, lets throw him in a padded room, that’ll keep him safe and warm and cosy’… Thank you Armand. For making my life livable.” Joker kicked Krol hard, rolling him into the coffin at the bottom of fresh grave.

“Don’t forget these.” Harley drops a plastic bag full of ice into the coffin. Armand’s eye opened wide. He realised why everything was dark on one side of his face. He screamed and he screamed and the coffin door slammed shut, but he still screamed. In the dark he knew that something inside that bag was staring back at him. He screamed as dirt hit the lid of the coffin, and he screamed as everything turned numb.

“Disgusting. Disgusting establishment.” He waddled into the grimy bar and hopped atop of a barstool. “You. You there.”

“What can I do for you, squire?” The bartender turned and his eyes widened in shock. “Penguin! Uh! Ah!”

“Excuse me?” Oswald Cobblepot placed his umbrella on the bar top. “What did you call me?”

“Mister Cobblepot! Cobblepot! What can I get you?” The man eyed the umbrella and breathed in deeply. “On the house!”

Cobblepot smiled smugly. “Champagne. Your finest. Don’t worry, I’m not expecting some Dom, but try hard. Bring the bottle and two glasses. I have a guest who I’ll be meeting.” He sat there for a moment, and then a beautiful blonde stepped up from behind him, and snatched his top hat from atop his head. “Hey!” He span around with his umbrella prepped, and then watched as the blonde placed the hat atop her head. “Oh. You.”

Harleen Quinzel sat next to him and tipped the rim of the hat to her. “Hello, Ozzie.”

“Oswald,” he corrected.

“That’s what I said.” She took the glass that the bartender placed in front of her and downed the sparkling liquid. “You called, so talk to me, Ozzie.”

“Os--,” he paused. “I want you to break your boyfriend out of Arkham.” He took a small black pouch out of his dinner jacket, and placed it on the counter in front of Harley. “Plastic explosive. Undetectable by Arkham’s measly means. Give this to him.”

“Why should I? What’s in it for you? And what’s in it for me? Or us?”

“I want your boyfriend to kill Mayor Krol. Spread some anarchy. Be bloody and brutal and take as much time as you want. I’ll give you half the fee up front, half afterwards, when I see Armand’s body in the morgue. You following me so far?”

“Sure. Why Krol? Why not Gordon? Or the Bat? Or anyone?”

“Because I can’t be Commissioner or the Bat. But I can become Mayor, if I put my mind to it… Or get someone in a position to become Mayor who I have my claws into.” He flexed his hands and took a sip of the champagne. “So do you want the job or not?”

“I’ve been wanting to break him out since he last got in so… Sure.” She finishes the drink and nods. “I’ll call him. And ask if he wants in. Then we can go forward with this shindig.”

“Thank you Harleen.”

“Thank you, Ozzie.”

“This is going to be fun.” The Joker smiled as he loaded his gun. Harley squirmed in delight. “A real hoot.”



“He’s going to be in surgery for the next few hours, officers.” The nurse shook her head mournfully. “The surgeons should be able to reattach what was… Removed… But his eye… The nerve endings crystallized… There’s no hope for it to be reattached.”

“God…” Gordon slammed his fist against the wall. He turned to Hawke, who leaned against the wall. “You’re still here?”

“Sure, Commish.” He pushed himself off the wall and approached the Commissioner. “Do we have any information on what Krol was supposed to be doing today?”

“Dinner with some people. Golf. In an hour he was supposed to host the disability awareness ball at the Hyde.”

“Hyde…?” Hawke paced the hallway. “Hyde.”

“You’re thinking…”

“I need to change my clothes.” Hawke began to run down the corridor. “Call your men. Have them surround the building. If he senses something is off he’ll go underground and it’ll be Las Vegas all over again. I want to finish this. Tonight.”

“Alright… Hawke.” Gordon flicked open his cell phone and dialled the number. “Harv, listen up…”

“Some announcements to make before we continue with our rudely interrupted celebrations…” Gordon smiled and hushed the assorted police officers. “With Captain Reed transferring to Star City, we have a need for a new shift commander. So, presenting you with someone you should all, unfortunately. be familiar with…. Captain Harvey Bullock.”

The squad room cheered as Harvey took off his fedora and smiled at Gordon.

“Better watch out, he might cry!”

“Hey!” Bullock threw his hat at Merkel, who laughed as he grabbed it and ran off. “Uh, thanks for trusting me with this, Commish… I won’t let you down.”

“You best not!" Gordon told everyone to get back to their celebrations, and went to his office. He took his broken pipe out of his coat pocket and then sat in his chair. He arched an eyebrow. In front of him was John Hawke’s transfer details. And a new pipe. He looked at the open window, with its curtains flapping about the office, and he smiled. “Thank you.”



Gotham City quaked. Buildings shivered in the cold, thunder cracked high above and wind howled down below. A maelstrom of chaos borne from the soul of the city.

Alive

Batman smiled, and leapt into the abyss.

Another night.

Just like any other.