This is love to me

Chapter three: Meanwhile in Arkham

While Freddie Benson was dealing with his need for love, In a darker city not far away, a madman with no love in his heart stirred in his cell.

Jerome Valeska, the most wicked and most completely insane man in Gotham city, and possibly the entire world, paced in circles. Jerome was talking to himself, forming a plot and he was smiling, always smiling. He was remembering things. Things that he had forgotten, that had been beaten and burned out of him. About his family, his life, and his pain.

Jerome had been brought up in a gypsy circus, alongside his brother Jeremiah. Jeremiah had tortured Jerome psychologically, and had tricked their mother Lila and uncle Zachary into believing Jerome was a menace. Eventually Jeremiah had left the circus and went to a private school in the city while Jerome stayed with the circus. His mother was a depressed alcoholic who was as prone to crack a bottle as she was to crack it across the back of her sons head. his uncle Zach taught him about all of the joys of sadism, as he would pour scalding water over his back repeatedly out of sheer enjoyment for his nephews pain.

But as the old saying goes, we all can go insane with just one bad day, and Jerome had nothing but horrible days everyday from his 10th birthday to his 21st. Eventually he was pushed too far and he cracked, he hadn't snapped, but this was just the tip of the iceberg, and the fault ran its course from there. Jerome killed his mother with an ax, it was slow and it hurt him as badly as it did her yet it was the most satisfying thing, and her death was the best gift she had ever given him. His estranged father who also worked in the circus helped him hide the body. After Jerome's father had outed him to one Detective James Gordon and the GCPD, Jerome finally broke, shattered, and revealed his true colors, laughing through his confession. Jerome was hauled into Arkham, the city's infamous asylum designed for the criminally insane.

Jerome had lived an interesting life since then, from breaking out of Arkham and going on a killing spree with like minded maniacs, to having a cult founded around his message that sanity is a prison, to having his face carved up by disrespectful thugs, leaving him with a permanent smile, and many other scars around his eyes, cheeks, forehead and jaw. That was how he remembered it, anyway, he was always fuzzy on exactly how his face had been scarred up. He had probably blocked that memory out. Some said that his face had been cut off, others that he did it to himself, but the story of his horrifying scars and his crooked, jagged rictus, was to most people best described as... multiple choice.

It didn't take long until Jerome heard it, the sound of the lock on his cell door opening, the heavy metallic gates creaked and separated and he emerged from the shadows to stand before his two cohorts, Jervis Tetch the Mad Hatter, and Dr. Johnathon Crane, the infamous Scarecrow. They grinned widely as he approached, further into the light and he grinned even wider, his hideous Glasgow smile creasing his pale, mangled visage. his green eyes flashed to the keys in his companions hands and a plan began to form in his brain. A plan for a diversion.

"When I say three hairs past a freckle, I do not mean five hairs past, You're late," Jerome said, fainting disappointment on his sunken features. He ran a hand through his ginger hair and offered his punchline. "But better being late to the party than being the late Ms. Tortuga!" he said in reference to the security guard lying dead behind them.

"Let's not squabble. I trust you will follow through on your promises," Scarecrow rasped out through his burlap mask. "An empire of terror in this shadowy city."

"And a piece of Gotham pie!" Hatter chimed in "One both sky and high!" he finished in true rhyming fashion.

"That's the spirit, boys." Jerome uttered in his raspy, growling tone. " think big, and berserk. Now! Let's free our underlings and blow this pop stand."

There they went, Jerome and his two acolytes freed all of their fellow prisoners and made their way to the gates of Arkham, prisoners bowing to them as they went. Behind them, horrified guards were being canibalized, fire were being ignited, and felons were running amok with scalpels and electroshock therapy equipment.

Jerome's type of party, they were wild cards, one and all.

 As they exited through the rusted front gates of Arkham Asylum, Jerome saluted his fellow madmen, and told them to march onward, and to go ham on Gotham. Tetch and Crane commandeered an armored car and Jerome hopped into the open back. He slammed the doors shut, and began to formulate a plan, and from his lips emerged laughter. Peels of maniacal cackling, and hyena-like cries that echoed in the chill night air.

He was finally back, The king of Gotham had returned!