Two cannibals are eating a clown

[killswithapen]

Who: Yagami Light, Miles Edgeworth, a few NPC police cronies (Can be Joker/Edgeworth all up in here too if you like?)
When: Saturday 3rd April, during Joker downtime
Where: Edgeworth's apartment
Summary: Clown Light has a wanting for a cravat, and Joker told him just where to get one. Now he and his police pals have a mission.
Warnings: Rope and

Comments

[mentis_reae]

Staying at the office was too hazardous; that had been made clear from the very first moments of this assault, when the Joker had taken over City Hall itself. That did not, however, give any excuse whatsoever not to work. Edgeworth was not so reckless as to dare a foray into his office, and certainly not so reckless as to send anyone else. Fortunately, he had a few files at home and was able to work from memory on a few more, but he knew he was running out of tasks he could accomplish.

This assault had to end soon, lest he be overburdened with free time and nothing to accomplish with it.

When he heard the buzzer, he stood up a bit too quickly, then frowned at his restlessness. He stepped over to the intercom - one of the few luxuries in this apartment, a working intercom - and pressed the button to transmit.

"Who is it?"

[killswithapen]

"Maybe, but that really suggests that I gret it right now, and I'm not entirely sure what that is."

It was a lame attempt of humour, said unevenly as Light rubbed at his ear with the heel of the gun and stepped away into the corridor, leading the procession down the stairs, out through the broken door and to the big police van parked in the street--there would be plenty of room for Edgeworth in there, and nobody would even question it. Of course Light couldn't drive, but he was a passenger in the front none the less, not relishing the thought of another moment listening to Edgeworth yapping at him about regrets and morality and crimes.

In fact, sitting up front the ride to City Hall was peaceful, and the van backed right up to the steps before the passengers bailed out, Light keeping his gun down out of sight.

"Hurry up. Get in there, before Edgeworth's friends come rallying. They move fast, you know. Superhuman speeds. Move it."

[he_is_wild]

The Joker sat back in the foyer while a clown stood close by, fanning him with a palm leaf. He was not quite sure where she had gotten the leaf, exactly, but figured it was best not to ask.

"Someone's here, boss," she said, uncertainly.

He rolled an eye open and stared at the door. Outside, the din of vehicles honked into the air.

"NO SOLICITORS!" he yelped. Then he remembered that he had placed an order for a certain city prosecutor.

With a groan, he dragged himself to his feet and pushed the door open just in time to see Edgeworth be shoved out of the police van.

"Miles!" he crowed, and walked towards the other man, his arms spread open. "Just the fella I wanted to see!"

[mentis_reae]

Edgeworth lifted his eyes to see the Joker. He was seized with a wave of trepidation mixed with anger. The Joker, as he'd discovered in the past months, was not necessarily the most malicious criminal in this city, but there was no question that he was the most unpredictable - and, in this situation, unable to escape from amongst the man's dozens of followers, Edgeworth would have preferred the malice. He would have preferred the certainty of knowing that he was going to be kept as a hostage, or tortured, or even executed, because then he could have started making plans.

Here, he didn't know what to do.

He was still tied to the chair they'd taken from his home, and he detested that for the way it robbed him of his ability to stand. Nevertheless, he looked as haughty as he could from his position.

"Congratulations," he said with a sneer. "You've now seen me. Will that be all?"

[he_is_wild]

"Snooty as always, I see," Joker stood aside as his men carried the chair into the council chamber of City Hall.

Despite the fact that Edgeworth was holding his chin up, he seemed a bit spooked. Light had probably done something. In all likelihood it involved a gun...this needed some testing. Soon, yes, soon. First, down to business.,

"Now, Milesworth," Joker crowed and slid into the chamber with a flourish of his faux silk cape. "Do you know how to be a clown?"

[mentis_reae]

Edgeworth narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the Joker. Those words implied that he'd be using the same substance on him that he'd used to convert Yagami and the others to his cause...Yet if that were the case, why would he not simply have had Yagami use said substance back at his apartment? It would have saved effort, for then Edgeworth would have come willingly. Perhaps he wanted to make a spectacle of the conversion from attorney to one of his followers - but even so, it seemed overelaborate.

"The question is not, 'Do I know how to be,'" he answered warily. "It is, rather, 'Would I ever be.' And the answer to that is an unambiguous No."

[he_is_wild]

"Yes," Joker cooed, "I rather suspected you'd say that."

He reached under his cape and withdrew his pistol, brandished it, then aimed it between Edgeworth's eyes as two clowns stepped forward from the corners of the room. One of them, a burly man the Joker mentally referred to as "Cowlick" started untying the lawyer.

"I see my dear little Kirakins was a tad overzealous in his efforts to restrain you. I do apologize for that."

[mentis_reae]

There was never any question of trying to escape. Even had Edgeworth been so reckless and desperate as to attempt it, he simply couldn't. That gun, trained on his forehead, paralyzed him even as he snarled at himself to hide his damned fear, conceal his weakness. He just stared down its barrel, just waited as they untied him.

Move, he told himself, spat at himself, but his muscles didn't work. His only triumph was that, after a long minute, he turned his eyes to the side and muttered:

"I doubt that."

[he_is_wild]

"It's true!" Joker gasped.

"Anyway, moving right along here, you're gonna need an outfit. Luckily, there are plenty of clowns here to help with that and they put together something I'm sure you'll simply love."

He shifted away from the podium and started walking towards an oaken chest on the other side of the chamber, near the portable refrigerator.

"It's nothing fancy, mind you, but it'll do the job. Here, hold this."

As he passed Edgeworth he pressed the gun into his hand.

[mentis_reae]

Edgeworth's eyes went wide as he looked at the object in his hand. He knew what the Joker was trying to have him do. He wanted Edgeworth to try to shoot him...An action that was out of the question. But if only he knew how to disassemble something like this. If only he knew how to remove the bullets, or...

He'd not had a loaded gun in his hand since the day he'd been framed for murder.

He felt ill and nauseous at its weight. Slowly, he bent over and set it down on the ground - carefully, deeply afraid of it going off. He didn't even hear what the Joker was saying, his mind full of imagining the ways it might kill.

[he_is_wild]

Joker dug around in the chest, pulling out over-sized spotted pajamas, a frill, a green wig and a red rubber nose.

No giant clown shoes. Oh well, he'd have to make do.

"Got your new suit right here, counselor," he said as he lifted the garments into his arms. "I'm sure they'll fit with room to spare."

As he crossed back over to Edgeworth, his heel came down on the pistol. He'd seen it there and calculated his steps with precision.

*CRACK*

The pistol fired off a shot and Cowlick dropped, clutching at his foot and howling in pain.

"Oopsie," said Joker to his fallen comrade. "Sorry about that! Some buffoon left a gun in the middle of the floor. Careless, if you ask me."

[mentis_reae]

Edgeworth stared in sheer horror at the man writhing on the ground. His mouth was open and felt dry, and there was a ringing in his ears. He felt faint.

But then he looked up to the Joker, and he felt ill from another source entirely.

His nausea focused into a single point of rage, and a moment later, he had surged to his feet. One more moment, and he was launching himself at the man, struggling to form a fist to strike him.

[he_is_wild]

Joker took the blow and his head snapped back as laughter peeled out from his throat. It was not a terrible punch but it certainly wasn't Batman material. Nobody could hit like the Bat did...

Suddenly, he missed being beaten into a body cast on a regular basis. Part of him wanted to egg the lawyer on. To keep taunting him to see how violent he'd become.

Once the laughter died down he smiled at Edgeworth, blood trickling from the edge of his mouth.

"Thank you," he said, mildly. "Are you quite finished?"

[mentis_reae]

His hand was throbbing. Somewhere, in the back of his head, he felt guilty. He'd assumed that he'd simply be held back, that the blow would not connect. But none of the Joker's cronies had moved to stop him, and now he'd appeared to be a violent brute...

He tried hard to collect himself.

"That man needs medical care," he finally grated out. What he wanted to snarl was a recrimination. He wanted to spit about how it was the Joker who'd shot him, and how he'd done it deliberately, and how it was not Edgeworth's fault - but the desperation in his voice would reveal too much. So he resorted to this instead. "Unless you wish to have killed one of your allies."

[he_is_wild]

He tilted his head to the side and looked at Cowlick. He'd killed two of his own men already today, what was one more?

"I'm afraid," Joker sighed, "that the poor dear has no insurance. Let's just put him out of his misery, eh?"

With that, he twirled the gun on the floor with his toe and stepped down again. Another shot rang out and Cowlick went limp, the wall behind him stained with red and brain matter gray.

The other clowns in the room went silent.