Bad Jokes (JokerxHarley Quinn)

as you melt into my mind

What gave me this power to construct you?
Your guess is as good as mine
If you'd like me to return you to the stones from which I brought you
Well, you have to do your time
But for now, put down the gun—start having fun
Forget the sun turning and you will keep burning
As you melt into my mind
-The White Stripes, Cash Grab Complications on the Matter

I didn't lurk in J's room for long. Eventually, I had to emerge, and emerge I did, pausing in the hallway to take stock of my surroundings. I frowned a little when I saw that there were even more guys gathered in the loft room than I'd ever seen—what are they, multiplying?—but shrugged it off, figuring that the Joker was still newly escaped and in the process of rallying his troops. I didn't see the man in question anywhere, and I wasn't exactly at my ease, considering that I was the smallest person (not to mention the only female) in a room full of big guys, and strangers, at that.

Still, I told myself, you're not going to get anywhere if you cower in the corner the whole time. I put some steel into my spine and strode into their midst, heading to the kitchen area and going straight to the coffee pot.

It was full of cold coffee, and I restrained myself from rolling my eyes. Why turn the machine off and leave the coffee to grow cold? For that matter, why make coffee that you weren't planning to drink? I dumped the pot into the sink and threw away the cold grounds, starting over, willfully pretending that I didn't notice the fact that I was the subject of about ten stares now, and neatly, as I hunted down some filters, I liberated a pair of kitchen shears from a drawer and set them on the countertop between me and the wall, just in case.

I finished setting up the machine, powered it up, and then froze when I felt the air shift behind me, felt the presence and body heat of another person standing way too close—and something told me it wasn't the Joker. Instead of turning around, which I instinctively sensed would put me in an even more vulnerable position, I skipped two paces, closer to the wall, and then flipped around and put a hand out to command some distance.

The guy who'd crept up on me had turned as I moved, keeping his eyes on me. I looked him over, quickly, warily, bracing my free hand on the counter beside me. I didn't recognize him and thought he might be a newcomer—he was young and very tall, with long, lank hair and piercings studded through his eyebrows and septum. This approach was completely different from the timid, almost frightened aura I'd gotten from the men yesterday—something had changed. None of the others looked at all concerned by the way he was acting. There were no furtive glances; nobody was keeping an eye out for J. I gathered that he wasn't expected back for a while.

"May I help you?" I asked sharply.

"The Joker finished with you?"

"I'm sorry, what?"

His nose twitched in annoyance. "You deaf?"

I held back from snapping "You dumb?" in response—just barely—and instead looked him over again, this time unable to hide my disdain behind caution. "I think," I said, as calmly as possible considering the fact that I'd been cornered by a greasy behemoth, "you don't understand how this works."

"No," came his brilliant rejoinder, "I think you're the one who doesn't understand how this works."

I sighed. The temptation to tell him to go straight to hell was lessened by the facts that he outsized me, that the Joker was nowhere to be found, and that the accumulated men had no loyalty to me and no apparent reason to come to my aid (even if a few were frowning as they watched us). "Fine," I said, bringing up my other hand defensively as he impatiently shifted his weight and lessened the distance between us. Stall until you come up with something. "Why don't you tell me how you think it works and we can compare notes?"