stranger things | dick grayson

thirty nine

word count: 1.6k

~

She turned her head away from the offer.

'Oh, come on, it's not poisoned! I may be insane, or a monster, or a psycho, or a freak, or a murderer... But I wouldn't offer you food and kill you with it. That's way too cliche,' Joker grumbled as he tossed the takeout at Eleanor's feet. She remained still.

'You wouldn't offer me kindness either. So I'll pass on the happy meal,' Eleanor said, finding it somewhat difficult to talk through her busted lips.

The Joker let out a loud cackle and sat down in the chair that was placed across from her.

'That was a good one! I see you're finding your sense of humour little one... It's only a matter of time before Batman stumbles in here, blazing glory, shooting up the place to come save one of his beloved orphans, but here's the twist that you've seen coming— he'll be too late!' Eleanor turned her head to look at the Joker to see a smile on his face as he shook his head from side to side slowly. 'You see, I have men at every access point in this tunnel. Nobody is coming in here without me knowing, and when they do, bam!' Eleanor flinched as he jumped at her and shouted in her face. 'I'll blow your brains out.'

'No, you won't.' The Joker's face fell. 'That's too easy for you. You're not an explosive kind of guy, blowing my head off is too easy,' she muttered and rolled her head back to look him in the eye. 'You've got something else planned.'

The Joker moved back and stared at her for a few moments in silence. It was deeply unsettling for Eleanor to hold eye contact with him for so long, but she knew any sign of submission to him would have her right where he wanted her.

'You know, you're the smarter one of Batman's delinquents aren't you?' The Joker slowly moved towards her and flashed his blade once again. 'Do you want to know what I'm gonna do next?' He asked her.

Eleanor clenched her jaw together tightly as he moved his mouth closer to her ear. 

'Yeah? What's that?' She asked through a grunt as he pushed the tip of the blade into her shoulder.

'You really want me to tell you?' He asked and leaned3 back, their noses were centimetres away from one another. She could smell the acid on his tongue and the mould in his teeth. 'Now, where's the fun in that?'

The rest of the blade sank into her skin slowly.

+

Bruce turned around and glared at both Jason and Dick, and if looks could kill they would have been dead before Bruce even opened his mouth.

'She's been missing for over two days and you still can't find her? Have you any idea what he would do to her in that time? We're lucky enough if he hasn't killed her already!' Bruce put his hands on his hips and turned back to face the monitor. 'Dick, you're coming with me. We're going down there and we're not coming back up until we find her, got it?'

Dick nodded, pursing his lips into a thin line. He wanted to say so much to Bruce, better yet scream at him. It wasn't like he was doing nothing the whole time he had been there. He had barely slept in those two days for he'd been spending most of his time in the sewers looking for her. He couldn't function knowing she was still out there. Dick was doing everything to keep himself from throwing up every single time he thought about her, and the constant calls from Kory wanting to know what was happening weren't helping ease his sickness.

'What about me?' Jason asked, standing up and turning to face Bruce who was now walking away.

'No, you stay. We had a promise, Jason, and you broke it.' Bruce never stopped, nor did he turn around. 'You need to go look after Zoe. She's scared... as she should be.'