Slipping Into Entropy - Part 42
When Bruce finally laid down, clearing his mind as best he could, shutting Maroni out more than anything, a tentative plan began to come together. It......would be risky, but it was his best shot by far. Unable to sleep, and fearing the way his thoughts would turn should he think of anything else, he laid there for hours, putting the pieces together, setting it up.
As much as he tried to lean over and flail at the machine, attempting to hit something to shut it up, the cursed thing just kept making a fuss. Joker knew it was only a matter of time before a nurse, a cop, or both came in to check on what was going on.
Only a few seconds later Joker heard the door open just as he was trying to reach the heart monitor again, turning his head to catch sight of a nurse gaping in horror before she disappeared out into the hallway again. Mouth turning downwards, he sighed, leaning back against the pillows and waiting while he heard the muffled shouts and running outside his room. ...cops, it is.
Commissioner Gordon, not wanting to leave the scene on the first night they'd gotten the Joker back, and with there being a good chance someone might come looking for him, had been catching a few hours of sleep in one of the unused recovery rooms the doctors had allowed him. It wasn't far from the contained criminal's room, so when a nurse and the guards stationed down his hallway began moving outside, he woke to the noise, quickly finding his feet, pulling a gun at the ready, and rushing to see what the commotion was.
A couple of officers had already filed into the room, guns in hand and pointed at the exasperated-looking patient who seemed to be offering no resistance. The nurse who'd found him seemed reluctant to get too close and hook up the wires again now that the man was awake, especially since he'd inexplicably managed to get out of the restraints.
That was what Gordon noticed immediately while the doctor on duty hurried into the room just behind him. Fortunately, he was braver than the nurses and with the Commissioner, with the gun, at his side, began moving toward the Joker to hook him back up. It was at least obvious to everyone in the room that he hadn't actually gone into cardiac arrest. "What happened?" Gordon asked, eyes on the Joker, but truly hoping for an answer from anyone should the criminal not be so inclined to respond.
"I... the alarm went off and I thought maybe something had happened with... the surgery or the medication, but when I got here he was loose and doing something to the machine," the nurse explained, still trying to keep out of Joker's reach as much as possible. "I don't know how he got out. We gave him enough painkillers and sedatives he should have been out..."
"Well, he's awake now. Better get him strapped down again," the Commissioner added with a pointed jerk of the head toward the cops lining the room. Reinforcing their courage, they stepped forward to hold his arms and legs down and fumble for the straps, so that the doctor could hook up the IV again. Gordon watched, both hands still holding his Glock at the ready.
Joker glared at the approaching cops, leaning away from them and finally putting up a fight against being tied down again, teeth bared in a snarl. "Don't talk about me like I'm not here. What, you're that afraid of a man with no legs?"
Gordon eyed his restraints suspiciously as the doctor muttered something under his breath about about not seeing how the Joker could've gotten out of them. When they were back in place, the cops and nurses looked visibly better though there was still a heightened sense of unease about the room. ".....how did you get out of those?" Gordon finally spoke up.
"I'm not telling you anything," Joker snapped in reply, beyond irritated at being tied down again like some sort of rabid animal. "If all you lot came in here for was to figure out more ways to keep me drugged and helpless, you can all leave." He glared at the other officers still in place in the room, the hospital staff having left after checking that nothing was amiss and fixing the wire leads.
Gordon turned to them, nodding toward the door. "Go, I need to speak with him a moment." Waiting for the cops to file back out to their posts before he spoke up, Gordon put away his gun and relaxed a little. "He was here, wasn't he?"
Jerking on the padded cuffs and straps, Joker eyed Gordon cautiously. "Bat said to tell you that we have an agreement, and he'll talk to you about things soon." He didn't trust the cop any more than the man probably trusted him. If the man had his way he'd probably be stuck in a cage for the rest of his life, or killed "for the good" of a society that was already so poisoned and twisted that it wouldn't make a bit of a difference.
"Dammit," Gordon swore under his breath. He knew this was going to happen, even with guards. The second he turned his back the Batman had slipped through their defenses. At least the Joker was still here, and besides losing his restraints, there was no other sign that anyone had been anywhere near the Joker. He had no weapons, nor anything else suspicious stashed away around the room or in his bed, which made Gordon all that much more suspicious. "Just what is this agreement between the two of you?"
The question made Joker stare at the man in obvious distrust. "...I don't see that it's any of your business unless Bat decides to tell you." He recognized the man not only as one of his main questioners and head jailer from the times he'd been captured before, but the man who'd jumped in front of the mayor during his brief stint impersonating a copper. "...I'm not allowed to kill anyone, which is all you probably care about."
"And what do you get in return?" Gordon asked, eyes going serious. That certainly was.....something. It was hard to imagine the Joker willingly agree to a term like that, not unless there was something big in it for him. And that made the Commissioner worry.
Joker glared at Gordon, bristling at the question. "It's none of your business what I get in return. You're a cop. All you care about is what goes on in your precious city and all the little laws and regulations scribbled down in Town Hall. Bat continues to do what he does, and we keep our deal. You don't need to know."
Gordon tried to stare him down. From what he was hearing, that sounded like a pretty good deal, but it was what he wasn't hearing that made his skin crawl. He found it distressingly coincidental that the Joker before him, furious and indignant now, was beginning to remind him a whole lot of Harvey Dent. Standing at his bedside made him feel like he'd had this conversation before. It looked like he was about as close to calming the Joker as he had been with Dent. He sighed. "Get some rest."
"Like hell I can in here. It's like Arkham with a fresher coat of paint, and a bunch of trigger-happy cops in the hallway. That's provided the nurses don't decide to make a little mistake and bump the sedatives up too high. Nothing to do but stare at the blank walls and wonder if a vindictive bastard is going to come and pick me off while I can't do anything before Bat-" His jaw snapped shut, realizing too late that the painkillers were making him ramble and reveal too much.
Gordon, at the door, whirled around. His eyes trained in on the Joker, who looked like was stuck somewhere between angry and startled with his own words. There was a light haze that had taken hold of his green eyes. "Before Bat-what?" Gordon shot back.
"Nothing," Joker growled, his jaw setting into a stubborn line. Goddamn drugs. "You just use him like a tool, anyways. The moment he 'cleans up' your city enough that you think you can handle things on your own, every single fucking one of you will turn on him and try to take him down and put him in a padded cell, too."
A muscle in the Commissioner's tightened jaw quivered as he stalked toward the Joker. "Not if I have anything to say about it." He stopped just short of the beside. "You don't think I know what he does for this city? For everyone? That's real rich, coming from you you know."
"You'd think so, wouldn't you?" Joker sneered, unable to even sit up with the straps holding him down. "You have no idea. I don't buy into his theories, but we're more alike than you could even fathom. If any of you ever touch him, I don't care how angry Bat will get with me. Our deal is off, and I'll make someone pay in blood." As manic and insane as the light in the man's eyes was, it was eerily protective.
Frustration seeped through Gordon's pores. He was getting absolutely nowhere. So the Joker now felt some kind of strange loyalty to Gotham's knight. It had been obvious from the start that he'd been after Batman, that he'd wanted to match him, best him, but this......wasn't what Gordon remembered from the last time he'd spoken with the Joker. He threw up his hands and stalked back out the door, telling the cops on duty to check in on him every fifteen minutes.
Joker ended up being just as frustrated, stuck in a place he had no desire to be in, unable to move, and constantly bothered by officers now peering in on him. The one thing he was able to do was keep track of the time, quickly figuring out the spacing of the visits. He eventually decided to feign sleep whenever footsteps drew near, trying to think of a way out of this mess through a haze of sedatives.
On the other side of the city, Bruce had been catching hours of sleep here and there, but found himself constantly waking after short intervals. He tossed and turned until the sheets were tangled around him in disarray. Already one pillow had fallen off the bed, one was somewhere at his knees, and the other was crammed in between his neck and shoulders, until he turned again. The clock at his bedside slowly progressed, hour to hour, during the periods between letting his eyes shut and opening them again.
Eventually, the sun began to rise again. With it came a very weary Bruce Wayne. He ran his head under the sink that morning, skipping both shower and breakfast, stopping in front of the mirror only long enough to shave and wipe at the dark circles forming under his eyes. Going down to the lair, he dug through supplies, finding a lot of the makeup he'd given to the Joker and pulling it out quickly.
Waiting was slowly driving the Joker insane, more than he already was. The feeling of being strapped down was bothering him more than he wanted to admit, and every time his checkup squad left he tried to fight against the chemicals numbing him, enough so that he could get his wrists free. He couldn't quite get his hands close enough together to dislodge his thumbs and slip through the loops.
When hours passed and nothing dire happened, the cops and hospital staff began to relax slightly, though the nurses still refused to enter the room without protection whether Joker appeared to be sleeping or not. Checkups still happened, but it seemed that as the morning progressed the doctors began to pay more attention to their normal routines and less to their unusual and unwanted patient kept under guard.
After darkening his skin into a light shade of brown and applying a good amount of facial hair, Bruce brushed his normally swept back hair down over his forehead. He added both contacts and thick-rimmed eyeglasses and tugged on a new shirt until he could stand in front of the mirror and almost not recognize himself.
When he was ready, Bruce packed a briefcase full of the files he'd kept on the Joker, printing a copy of portions of his Arkham record, and hauled on a dusty white jacket that looked like it had seen better days.
It was still early by the time he made it to Gotham General Hospital, introducing himself at the front desk as one of the Joker's caretakers from Arkham. Fortunately, he had the ID, albeit forged, and papers to prove it. He took the halls at a quick pace as directed until he ran into the cops lining the hall.
The madman actually began to drift in and out of sleep despite himself. Wanting to keep watch in case one of the officers or doctors tried something was one thing - trying to do it while they'd upped the doses on his medicine was another. From what he'd overheard outside the hall, Arkham had been informed of his capture and had passed along information about his resistance to drugs to the hospital, something that had resulted in a doctor promptly entering the room and replacing the IV bag with a different one. If his chances of getting himself out were slim before, they were next-to-none when he was this disabled and doped besides.
Joker was expecting to have to wait until at least nightfall, if not longer, before Bat would come back... and even then, there was no guarantee he'd be able to get out of there. After knowing that Arkham had now learned where he was and was stretching its arm out to dabble in what care he got, the madman was more than a little nervous. He didn't want to go back to Arkham, back to being kept in a stupor, arms in a straitjacket, his mind picked and prodded at by doctors and students alike. Locked in the lightless Solitary room when they felt he wasn't cooperating enough, which was always.
Out in the hall, Bruce was having a lengthy discussion with the officer in charge about how he'd been sent over from Arkham to determine the patient's condition and mental state. All the while he hoped the real Arkham wouldn't get the same idea. It was just a matter of time. When he was cleared, he declined the protection of one of the officers going in with him. That more than anything took a bit of work. Before Gordon had finally left for the morning, he'd given clear instructions not to let anyone see the Joker alone. Fortunately, Bruce had the authority of Arkham on his side, and was able to convince the cops that he wouldn't be able to perform the necessary psych tests on his patient with their presence distracting him. He was given strict instructions not to give the Joker anything nor tamper with his restraints for any reason, but eventually, they caved. With a great amount of both relief for the moment, and apprehension for what was to come, Bruce opened the door to the Joker's room.
Having heard hushed arguing and discussion outside, Joker was already watching the door when a man in a lab coat entered. This wouldn't have normally been a cause for concern except that it wasn't any of the doctors or nurses who had been checking on him before, and the man had entered the room without any of the usual guards. Casting a wary eye on him, his gaze flickered over the folder in the doctor's hand, trying to piece together what was going on. "...what do you want, then?"
Bruce made sure the door was securely shut behind him before he stepped forward, pulling up a small chair next to the Joker's bedside. "Oh, I'm just here to check up on the state of your mental health," he said peering at the dubious clown between a dark curtain of bangs and the rims of his glasses. A small smile curled at the corners of his lips.
Joker looked like he was going to have a sharp reply to that before he peered closely at the doctor, recognizing little hints here and there from his own extensive work of altering himself in the mirror. "....it's you, isn't it? What... what are you doing?"
"I'm getting you out of here," Bruce replied, eyeing the IV drip. "Right now, I'm giving you a number of tests to determine what kind of condition you're in. In about.....ten minutes, I'm going to head back out there and request to have you transfered back to Arkham. And then, depending on how well that goes, the van they come to take you away with is going to be hijacked."
Swallowing, Joker's eyes flickered from Bruce's disguised face to the doorway. "I thought Arkham was going to grab me before you had a chance to come back. I think they've already had the doctors alter what they're giving me. It's stronger, keeps knocking me out."
"For all I know, they could be on their way, which why we need to hurry." He sighed, eyes gaining a serious, distant quality. "If all goes well, you won't need to be lucid for this to work." He glanced at his watch and got back to his feet, pushing the chair back where he'd found it. "That's long enough."
Watching Bruce leave the room to try to con his way into getting them to attempt a patient transfer, excitement twisted inside him and sped up his pulse despite the drugs saturating his system. He's going to get me out. I don't have to stay, Arkham won't get me, he's going to get me out... No more cops, no more restraints, no more Commissioner digging around for things.
None of the cops knew what to do with Bruce's request once he'd made it. He did get the clear from the doctors that physically, the Joker was fit to be transferred, provided he was kept on the hospital's meds. What they needed was the go-ahead from Gordon, and this is where Bruce knew things were going to get dangerous. When they gave him the call, he refused to let anyone move until he came in and oversaw the process.
Joker tried to stay awake and sharp, tried to listen for clues from the sounds outside his doorway, but his mind was too muddled to make much of anything. Every minute that passed made him more certain that something had gone wrong - that one of the cops had refused, that one of the doctors had caught on, that Bruce's disguise had malfunctioned, that real Arkham doctors had arrived... and there was nothing he could do about it. Bruce was on his own for finding them a way out of here.
Waiting for Gordon to arrive was a tense situation, but less so than when Gordon actually did arrive, forcing Bruce to hide behind his files as much as possible throughout their conversation, both playing up the socially awkward doctor look and not allowing Gordon, a man who'd seen his profile under many disguises, to look at him for too long. The Commissioner didn't like what he had to say, but it all did at least sound very legitimate, and he was itching to get the criminal out of a public hospital. They set it up so that the Joker would be carried in an unmarked van, followed by a squad car and led by Gordon himself.
Joker startled when the door to his room opened again, internally cursing when he realized that he'd lost consciousness again at some point during the wait. Feigning confusion as more cops and nurses filed in to start the work of getting him ready for transport, the bulk of his attention was saved for the two men who walked in together - Gordon and Bruce, the latter still seemingly passing for a legitimate Arkham doctor. "...what's going on?"
"The police and doctors here have agreed to let us take you back to Arkham," Bruce answered, his eyes swiveling over to Gordon with whom he was standing shoulder to shoulder, watching as the staff brought in a wheelchair. "If you give us any trouble, we'll have to sedate you further."
"...I don't want to go back to Arkham. You'll just drug me up and toss me in another hell hole to forget about me, like all the rest in Solitary." He glared at the two of them, knowing he'd be expected to at least put up a verbal fight about it.
Bruce looked a little agitated, though whether it was because he supposedly didn't like being called a quack in front of the Commissioner, or because of some other reason unknown to the rest of the room, was debatable. "Don't worry. I'll make sure you're cared for properly." His smile was a little strained. Gordon, imagining working with the Joker every day, couldn't blame him. The doctor, nurses, and cops nervously unstrapped him.
The man in the bed jerked his arms away as soon as they were freed, rubbing his wrists where the bindings had rested and glaring at the hospital staff as they backed away. "Sure you will. Up until the point Jeremiah overrides you." He held his hands up and ducked his head slightly as one of the nurses stepped forward with sedative supplies. "Ok, ok. Jeez. You don't need to drug me any more. I can't even run away."
"Alright, let's go," Gordon broke in, not liking the anxiety in the room and wanting to get people moving as quick as possible. He stepped back and gestured the way. Bruce, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose nervously, stepped out of the path as well. There were straps on the arms of the chair once they got the Joker into it; his momentary freedom revoked. With three of the cops walking ahead, and Bruce and Gordon taking up the rear, they wheeled the mad clown down the hall.
The straps on the chair just seemed to add insult to injury, and Joker was positively furious at being strapped down again. His murderous attitude must have shown in his eyes - everyone that crossed paths with the entourage paled and quickly moved away as fast as they could, with or without their dignity. After winding through the hospital passageways, trying to steer clear of the normal patients and waiting areas, they finally made it to a loading bay.
A mid-sized white van was running at the ready, back doors open and waiting. The nurses, with the help of a hydraulic metal lift, loaded him into the back. One of the officers was set to drive the van, and two squad cars were waiting by its side. "Soooo....." Bruce began, rocking back on the balls of his feet and glancing at Gordon out of the corner of his eye. "Who am I riding with?"
The Commissioner waved him along into his car. Apparently, he and Bruce would be taking the lead, and the other squad car would follow the van. Like a miniature procession they drove away from the hospital.
The wheelchair strapped into the car like all the other boxes in the cargo hold, Joker didn't even get to see where Bruce was going as the doors shut on him. Someone got into the front of the van and started the engine, but he couldn't get a good look at who it was. Goddammit. I hope you know what you're doing, Bat. It might have been easier to shove me out a window.
They started the ride in silence. Gordon kept checking his rear view mirror at the cars behind him, and for the first few minutes, Bruce pretended to look out the window. He then began to check the mirrors, mimicking Gordon so that after another few minutes, the Commissioner started to relax and watch the road. Arkham Asylum was fortunately a good distance from the hospital. Waiting until they'd neared the asylum, where the roads around it became longer and less populated, Bruce took a look at one of the mirrors and suddenly spun around in his seat. "What? What is it!?" Gordon asked, jumping to attention.
"The door is open!" Bruce shouted. "The back of the van, I just saw the door swing open!" It took less than a second for Gordon to get on the radio, ordering the procession to pull over. They did in a hurry, and as Gordon was pulling to a halt while taking his seat belt off at the same, Bruce gave him a good, hard elbow to the forehead. The Commissioner slumped forward in his seat, unconscious as Bruce jumped out of the car and ran toward the van.
Joker's internal tension had already begun to wind up the whole duration of the ride, only increasing when the van suddenly jolted as someone hit the brakes, turning sharply and coming to a halt. C'mon, Bat. This is an easy gig. Don't screw it up just because you're short a mask... He could hear more doors opening outside, shouts as the other officers tried to determine what was going on.
Bruce made it to the driver's side of the van, just as the cop was opening his window to see what was going on. As he did so, he was bodily pulled through it by the unassuming, bespectacled Arkham doctor, and with a swift punch was out as cold as Gordon. Unfortunately, it was then that the officers from the rear vehicle arrived around the bulk of the van to see what was happening. Bruce came at them without hesitating. They were taken by surprise, but got their guns out in a hurry and wrestled with him to the ground. He managed to kick one of the guns out of a hand, but was met with a black rod in the kidneys a moment later. They scrambled around for a while, but eventually Bruce managed to render the two of them unconscious. Wasting no time for anyone to wake up, he jumped into the driver's seat of the van and pulled out onto the street.
The van suddenly lurched into motion again, making Joker's stomach clench as the tires squealed and the vehicle sped away. "What's going on?" he yelled, hoping that Bat was the one in the front seat... but not about to give up the game by asking directly.
While getting as far off of the main roads as possible, Bruce twisted in his seat to fumble with the latch between the cab and the back of the van. Eventually, it slid open and he shouted back through it. "Were making a run for it! When Gordon wakes up, he'd not gonna be happy." He wasn't sure the Joker could see him, and he couldn't take his eyes off the road long enough to check.
Sighing and relaxing slightly, Joker leaned back in the chair. "Dammit, Bat, I thought you weren't going to be able to pull it off with the Commissioner sticking his nose into everything."
"Tell me about it," Bruce agreed, checking the mirrors for signs that they were being followed. He knew the men back there wouldn't be out for very long. It was good thing that it didn't take them long to get to the cover of the docks. The lift normally reserved for the Tumbler hauled them down into the lair, and Bruce breathed a sigh of relief as the steel doors closed overhead. When they were on the ground, he jumped out, went around to the back of the van, and opened the door.
When light hit him again and Joker saw the familiar sight of the warehouse layer, he couldn't help but grin and laugh. "We'll turn you to a life of crime yet! Ahah! What should the headlines call you, hmmm? The Patient Pirate?" His eyes wandered more thoroughly over Bruce's disguise now that they were alone. "Does Freddy know about today's little adventure?"
Bruce cracked a tiny smile as he punched the button for the van's lift. "I guess I haven't told you everything about my time in Asia." When the chair hit the cement floor, Bruce unstrapped the Joker's wrists and untied the chair from the rest of the van. "And no, Alfred doesn't know."
His freed arms immediately wrapped around Bruce's waist, his shoulders still shaking with quiet laughter. "Oh, a surprise. He's going to be thrilled. And he gets someone to wait on all day! You're so thoughtful, Bat." Tilting his head even more than usual to look up at Bruce, a giddy, childish smile lit up his face. "I like this much better than Arkham."
Now that the Joker was free, now that Bruce had him back and the strain of it all was settling, though grateful that he was, Bruce could feel an icy cold spreading through him. "What did they do to you?" The green haired man, still drugged, but looking happy as ever, was a complete mess.
"What? Oh. You mean all this." Oblivious and thoroughly saturated with pain medication, Joker shrugged. "A number of things. They broke a lot of bones and then moved things around because they thought that'd make me talk, or at least scream appropriately. Cuts and digging open old wounds didn't work either, so they they decided to try that thing with the hammer and nails. It was creative, I'll give them that..."
Bruce just looked at the Joker with a sort of glassy eyed expression. One of his hands ran up the man's neck, over his jaw, tracing a jagged scar covered in red grease. Everything inside him told him that he should have gotten there sooner. Sinking down to his knees, he studied the man's face, then swept his gaze over the new bandages. His legs were in casts.
The edges of his smile fading slightly, he leaned forward to return Bruce's stare, completely ignoring the pricks of pain from his ribs. "What, Bat? I've been through this sort of thing before. Hasn't killed me yet. We just can't play anything too rough for awhile. Look at it this way: when you tell me not to come along next time, I won't have any choice!"
If the Joker was trying to lighten the mood, it wasn't working. Bruce's expression only tightened further. He didn't like this. He didn't like what had happened to the Joker. And he didn't like what he had done. "If I had come one minute later...."
Joker shrugged. "But you didn't, so it doesn't matter. You need to stop angsting about the past and 'what if's, Bats, and concentrate on the now. I'm here now, we made it out of the hospital scot-free, and I get to annoy Freddy for months. The only downside is that we don't get to have a repeat of the kitchen table," he laughed, still trying to pull Bruce out of the dark, sulky mood he could see inching into place.
Bruce tried to pull himself back together a little. He stood back up, dusting off his pants and taking off the glasses. "I need to clean up," he said, wiping at some of the dark makeup on his cheeks. "And......your clothes came today."
"HAH. Lot of good that will do, trying to fit over these," he gestured at the casts, rolling his eyes. "I can't even crash your social parties now."
Jaw clenching, Bruce had nothing to say to that. "You're waking up a bit. ....let me know when the painkillers wear off." He walked over to a supply cabinet, peeling away the fake facial hair and stowing it away with the glasses. When he shut the locker, he raked a hand through his hair and sighed heavily.
"Oh yes. That's going to be lots of fun. Marconi's thugs had no idea what to do," he giggled quietly, watching Bruce's movements. "No idea. What are you going to do when they wear off, hmm?"
Grinding the palm of his hand into his forehead, Bruce suffered through the mental image of the warehouse. It took him a moment to answer the Joker's question. Tension ran through his limbs. "I've got a supply of vicodin. If it's not enough, I'll find something stronger." He didn't mention where.
Testing the maneuverability of the chair, Joker wheeled himself over until he was next to Bruce. "And if I end up having something else in mind?" he asked, teasing, watching the shivering ripple of muscle as the bigger man bunched up under the stress. "...Bat. Stop worrying so much. No one's ever come back for me before, much less put their life on the line." I owe you one.
Bruce couldn't meet his eyes, and he damn well couldn't talk about what had happened like he'd done something noble. A brief flash of anger passed through his expression at the injured man's praise. He shook it off as quickly as it came. "I need a shower."
Joker smiled wryly, holding his hands up in defeat. "I'd offer to come with for another try, but I'm not certain how well that'd work at the moment." The idea of even trying to get into the stall with all the awkward casts and wrappings, even as large as it was, just made him smirk. Gotta look on the bright side. I may have trouble getting around, but I get a legitimate excuse to drive the butler mad.
With an intake of air and a palpable gathering of his nerves, Bruce nodded. "Right. Well. Glad we made the most of it then." His eyes finally fell on the Joker again. "You could at least change out of the hospital gown."
"Mmmm. Going to help me with that, or leave me to struggle with it myself? I can't very well stand up with two bad legs."
"Your clothes are up in my room," Bruce replied, moving around behind the other man and pushing him along. Up until then he hadn't been sure whether the Joker would refuse his help if offered. They took the elevator to the top of the penthouse, and Bruce wondered if the Joker was surprised at finding it once again impossibly clean. He wheeled the man into the master bedroom where Vivian's package still rested on the table, unopened.
He was surprised at seeing it clean again so soon, but he merely smirked and said nothing, chalking it up to Alfred's obsessive caretaking. Truthfully, he didn't know how to react, either to his injuries or to Bruce. He'd never had both legs broken at the same time before, even as extensive as his experience was with physical trauma, and he'd never been in a position where he was somewhat helpless but being cared for.
It made Bruce uncomfortable, too. He had never been in the position to care for someone else, and especially not like this. It was strange having the same Joker he had seen two days ago looking up at him from a chair. Ironically though, with his thoughts drifting to Maroni at every turn, it probably made dealing with the Joker easier than what it could have been. At least it took his mind elsewhere. It just wasn't an elsewhere he wanted it to go. Taking the package off the table, he handed it to the other man to open. "I'll be right back," he added, stepping toward the bathroom.
Watching him leave, Joker's fingers worked automatically at the box, his long fingernails making quick work of the tape discreetly holding the sections togethers. Tossing away the lid and pulling out the pieces inside, he turned them over with a critical eye. ...well. There actually is a tailor who can follow instructions.
In the shower, Bruce got the water running hot and scrubbed away the dark makeup on his face and hands. It felt good after not taking one in the morning, not to mention the tension and scuffle of his little plan to take the Joker out of Gordon's hands. But as the strain in his body eased, it left him feeling weary and disjointed. And more guilty than he'd felt in months.