by Paul Dini
“More tea, luv?” Harriet shoved Pamela aside and brandished a broken mug. “Just half a cup!”
Harleen turned her face away and saw the guard on the floor, tightly wrapped in vines from head to foot, unable to move or call out.
Eager hands grabbed at her throat and she realized belatedly she had forgotten to take her necklace off. Harleen felt the chain cutting into her neck as Magpie yanked on it. “Shiny! Shiny!”
“I did-unt mean to!” sobbed Mary Louise.
Harleen saw Pamela Isley push herself in front of the other women just as everything went black.
Harleen opened her eyes, then sat up with a start.
“Relax,” said Dr. Leland. “You’re safe.”
By some miracle she was on the leather sofa in Dr. Leland’s office and, as far as she could tell, only slightly the worse for wear. Strands of hair hung in her face, her neat French roll was one big snarl, and her clothing was rumpled, but she wasn’t hurt. Even the glasses in her blazer pocket were unbroken.
“The guard didn’t come out quite as well,” Dr. Leland added.
“Will he be all right?” Harleen asked.
“He’ll probably suffer from a green plant phobia for the rest of his life but he’ll live.” Dr. Leland gave her a glass of water.
Harleen suddenly realized she was dry-mouthed and thirsty and gulped it down. “How did I get out of there in one piece?” she asked.
“Pamela Isley,” Dr. Leland replied, refilling the glass for her. “She saved you.”
Harleen shook her head, thinking she hadn’t heard right. “No, Isley was the ringleader,” she said, sipping the water more slowly this time. There was still a funny taste in her mouth from the tea, or whatever it had been. “She freed the others so they could all attack me.” She felt for her necklace and discovered it was still around her neck: another miracle. “Mary Louise was hitting me with this incredibly heavy doll when I passed out.” She gave a short, humorless laugh. “I’m sure she did-unt mean to.”
“The doll’s head was stuffed with rocks,” said Dr. Leland. “Pamela Isley loathes and despises all of humanity, singly and as a species. But apparently she loathes and despises you less than everyone else. Quite a lot less. She held off the others and called for help. All four are confined to their cells indefinitely. And, needless to say, they won’t be participating in any more group sessions. Nor will any other patients.”
Harleen nodded glumly. “I’ve learned my lesson—no more therapy sessions where I’m outnumbered.”
“And while we’re exercising hindsight,” Dr. Leland went on, “I should never have allowed a meta-human inmate to participate without a whole lot more security. And better personnel watching the monitors, people smart enough to notice when a pre-recorded loop has replaced the live feed.”
“But it wasn’t recreation, it was therapy,” Harleen said. “Or it was supposed to be.”
Dr. Leland sat down on the sofa beside her. “I bear all the responsibility for what happened. But I confess, I wanted you to be right—that treating them like patients rather than the characters they pretend to be would force them out of their role-playing and give us a way to counter their illness.”
“That was the idea.” In spite of everything, Harleen felt pleased that Dr. Leland understood. “I thought all I had to do was persist and I’d get through to them.”
Dr. Leland sighed. “Well, we can dream.”
They sat together in silence for a few seconds. Then Harleen said, “You knew, didn’t you? That it wouldn’t work.”
“Like I said, I wanted you to be right,” the other woman told her sadly. “I thought maybe your being a new face with new ideas could make it happen. I hoped that having a new staff member work with them would remind them that, as much as Arkham might feel like limbo, time passes and things change and maybe they’d start thinking they didn’t have to just be dangerous criminals in permanent lockup. That they might actually want something better.”
“Sometimes Arkham does feel like limbo,” Harleen said. “It’s out in the middle of nowhere. The patients have no human contact except with the staff and each other. There’s no internet or social media—”
A small line appeared between Dr. Leland’s eyebrows as she frowned. “People sent here are too dangerous for a maximum security penitentiary, and too sick for a locked ward. They’ve been declared too toxic for even the most polluted environment, as if they poison the air just by breathing it.”
Harleen blinked at her. She could barely believe this woman had just been talking about wanting to improve the inmates’ lives.
Dr. Leland gave her a sidelong look. “That’s me on a bad day,” she said.
“Not everyone here is hopeless,” Harleen said. “Some people get better and leave.”
“Sometimes,” Dr. Leland said. “It’s an increasingly rare occurrence. Perhaps because the world is getting crazier, not saner, and Thomas Szasz was right.”
“You mean about insanity being the only sane reaction to an insane world?” Harleen asked.
“Got it in one.” Dr. Leland rose and went to her desk. “And, no, he’s no relation to Victor Zsasz. That I know of, anyway.”
Harleen moved from the couch to the chair in front of Dr. Leland’s desk. “But if that were true,” she said slowly, “it would mean there’s no point in trying to help patients recover their sanity. And I ain’t buyin’ that for a minnit, hon,” she added in her tough-Brooklyn-cookie voice.
Dr. Leland laughed a little. “Good for you. Take the rest of the day off and tomorrow as well, just to make sure whatever they put in the tea is completely out of your system. Rest up and come back the day after. There’ll still be windmills to tilt at.”
“I can’t understand how they managed to drug me,” Harleen said. “They were all in restraints until Pamela’s vines—” she cut off. Was that really what she had seen or had it been a hallucination?
Dr. Leland shrugged. “It’s not the first time inmates have done the impossible here. They’re a clever bunch, even the ones without, ah, abilities.”
Harleen got up from the chair. Suddenly she felt very tired. “I really thought I was doing something for them,” she said.
“Now do something for yourself for a change and stay home tomorrow.”
“But I don’t want to look weak,” Harleen said. “I won’t have any credibility with the patients if they think Pamela Isley can knock me on my butt whenever she wants.”
“Don’t worry about Poison Ivy,” Dr. Leland told her. “Remember, she hates you less than the rest of us. That’ll work in your favor. A lot of inmates follow her lead, and they’re not all women.”
* * *
Harleen went back to her office to pick up her things, including a few patient files. If she was going to stay home, she might as well be productive. She was trying to decide which files to take and whether to focus on personality disorders rather than diseases as she struggled with the stubborn lock on her office door.
When she finally got the door open, the first thing she saw was the rose in the bud vase on her desk.
Harleen stood in the doorway, transfixed. The rose was a rich dark red, in full perfect bloom, its elegance underscored by the simple, clear vase. The idea that someone would want to give her something so lovely made her heart lift, the way it did when she launched herself into a gymnastics routine to her favorite music. This was meant to bring her joy. It seemed like forever since anyone had done something like that for her.
Get a grip, girlfriend, said a small, sensible voice in her head. It’s a flower, not a pile of gold bullion or the Hope Diamond or even a pay-raise. Did you notice that’s a plant? Remind you of anyone?
All the little hairs on the back of Harleen’s neck stood up. Would Pamela Isley—Poison Ivy—try something else so soon? Or was it a peace offering? Sorry we tried to kill you. I won’t let it happen again.
Oh, God, what if Poison Ivy didn’t merely not hate her but wanted to be friends? What wou
ld that be like?
No, Poison Ivy didn’t cut flowers—to her, it was like killing them. She wouldn’t do that for anyone.
Then who had sent it?
Maybe it was booby-trapped.
She felt silly. How could anyone booby-trap a rose?
Ask the inmates, she thought; they can probably booby-trap air. They’re experts.
It could be electrified. Or maybe it shot poisoned thorns. Maybe when she bent to smell its fragrance, it would squirt her in the face with vinegar. Or something a lot worse.
She reached her desk without anything blowing up or crashing down on her and saw there was something else on the desk—a playing card, turned face down. Without giving herself time to catastrophize, she picked it up.
Harleen stared at it for a long moment; then she laughed, feeling all the tension drain out of her. She should have known. This wasn’t from Poison Ivy or any other woman.
The card was a Joker. Under the grinning cartoon face was the message:
Welcome! Why don’t you come down & see me sometime?—J
“Well played, Mr. J,” Harleen said aloud in her tough-Brooklyn-cookie voice. “Pun definitely intended.”
The single perfect rose was a male thing. Only a man would think that one perfect rose would make a woman so blissfully weak in the knees she wouldn’t miss the other eleven. Someone had to disabuse Mr. J of that notion, and she was just the woman for the job.
Tomorrow.
She didn’t want him to think she’d come running at the drop of a rose.
Dr. Leland looked surprised and disappointed when Harleen came into work the next morning.
“I thought we agreed you were going to take another day to recover,” she said.
“I have recovered,” Harleen assured her. “I feel too good to justify taking time off work.”
“I still think you should,” Dr. Leland said, her concerned expression deepening.
“But I really don’t need to,” Harleen said. “If I did, I’d be home right now. But I’m fine! No after-effects from drugged tea, and I’m not traumatized.” It was an effort to keep the impatience out of her voice. Sometimes Dr. Leland seemed more controlling than concerned. “I just want to get on with my work.”
Dr. Leland looked doubtful. “All right. You win. But if you get shaky—”
“I’ll go straight home,” Harleen said. “I promise. But I won’t. There’s no reason to leave you shorthanded when I’m not sick.”
Her remark about being shorthanded had probably persuaded Dr. Leland to give up and go off to her rounds, Harleen thought as she settled down behind her desk. The rose and the card were untouched; she moved them to one side so she could spread out her planner and see what her schedule looked like. She had patients to see, medication regimens to review, reports to write. And somewhere in her busy schedule, she would deal with the Joker.
Early in the day was best, when she had more energy. And she couldn’t just wing it—she had to think carefully about what to say, the points she wanted to make. This wasn’t just some two-bit smoothy who thought a grand, inappropriate gesture would get the pretty lady-doctor’s attention, even though she wasn’t his doctor. How cheesy!
The more she thought about it, the angrier she felt. How stupid did this clown think she was? And how stuck on himself was he to think she’d take one look at this pathetic overture and fall into a swoon?
She would definitely do this right away, while she was fresh. The boost she’d get from putting him in his place would make the whole day a win. Nothing succeeded like success.
Harleen jotted down a few ideas in a small notebook—writing things down always helped her remember them better. She read them over, added a couple of things, and tucked it away in her blazer pocket.
She put on her no-nonsense glasses, made sure every hair in her tidy French roll was in place, and, armed with the status, professionalism, and fortitude characteristic of competent women, she marched out of her office and down to the sub-sub-sub-sub-basement where the Joker was waiting for her with all his fully weaponized charm on display.
* * *
There was nothing the Joker enjoyed more than a great trick. A great trick was a rare thing. There were plenty of good tricks, and even more that were so-so. A great trick was a work of art, elegant and irrefutable.
According to many people, the greatest trick of all time had been achieved by no less than the Devil himself by convincing the entire world he didn’t exist. What made this trick truly great was the fact that everyone knew about it and they still didn’t believe he existed! The Joker thought it rated first place in the Hall of Fame. It made perfect use of human nature’s most enduring features—the tendency to believe something despite there being either evidence to the contrary, or no evidence at all.
The Joker had yet to pull off something that perfect. Nonetheless, he had some moves and they weren’t too shabby. He had something very special in mind for the heady mix of brains and beauty that was Harleen Quinzel. It wasn’t new or innovative, but it was a classic.
It wouldn’t be easy. He was going to have to work hard to put this one over, but when he did, it would be a masterpiece. He could call it: “The Greatest Trick The Joker Ever Pulled Was Convincing Harleen Quinzel He Was Worth It.”
Not short and pithy, but it wasn’t that kind of joke.
* * *
His beautiful target marched—literally marched—into his cell and told the guard who followed her in to get lost. And buddy-boy didn’t argue; she glared him out the door through black-framed hard-ass spectacles. The doctor knew how to take charge—pick the biggest guy in the room and cut him down to size. The guard was an enormous brute who made the Joker seem positively dainty by comparison, but one look from Dr. Quinzel and he gave like a wet paper bag. The Joker hadn’t seen such an effective display of dominance in a very long time.
Even better, she’d done it wearing a tailored suit with a kick-pleat and sensible shoes, not a leather corset and thigh-high boots with five-inch heels. Perhaps this was a sign of things to come. Was Certified Public Accountant the new sexy?
* * *
“So glad you’ve finally come to visit me down here in my lonely cell,” the Joker said in a cordial purr.
“It’s only fair,” said the formidable presence that was Dr. Quinzel. Her straight posture made her seem taller than she was. Anyone would have thought she was in full command of all she surveyed.
He made to get off the bed but she raised one hand sharply. “Don’t bother—I’m not staying.”
“Whatever you say, Doctor.” Smiling, he stretched out on his side, propping his head up on his fist. “How can I help you?”
Dr. Quinzel produced the playing card he’d left on her desk, making it snap. “Care to tell me how this got into my office? My locked office?”
“Well, I put it there, of course.” His smile widened.
“You did?” She made the card disappear. “You personally?”
“I never do anything impersonally. I think it’s rude.”
Of course, the beautiful lady shrink didn’t crack a smile. “I’m sure Dr. Leland and Security would love to know how you escaped from your cell, procured a rose in a vase, left it in my office, and returned to your cell without anyone knowing.”
“I’m sure they would,” the Joker said. He sat up and put a pillow between his back and the wall, then patted a spot on the bed, inviting her to sit. She pretended not to notice. “But I’m certainly not going to tell them! And if you were going to rat me out, you already would have. So I guess they’ll never know.”
Dr. Quinzel’s expression didn’t change, and he knew she’d never snitch on him about anything.
“You’ve made quite a name for yourself around here already, you know,” he went on.
“Oh?” She looked down her perfect nose at him. “What have you heard?”
“That you’re mighty handy with a fire extinguisher,” he said cheerfully. “Though less good at tea parties.�
��
Her face went a little pink but her expression didn’t change.
“However, at least one Looney Lady of Gotham admires your nerve—your pluck,” he went on. “As do I. In fact, all your patients give you high marks. I’d say your true strength is in one-on-one treatment, not groups. Never had much use for group therapy myself, especially here. Get a group together in Arkham and they all start one-upping each other, trying to be the biggest badass. Which is pointless.”
“Because you’re the biggest badass?” Dr. Quinzel said.
“Well, I don’t like to brag.” He looked down for a moment in ersatz modesty.
“No,” Dr. Quinzel said, “you love it.”
“Ooh, ya got me, doll-face,” the Joker said, clapping a hand over his heart.
She bristled immediately. “My name is Dr. Quinzel, not doll-face.”
“I beg your pardon,” the Joker said. “I have a tendency to be inappropriate. That and my penchant for braggadocio have made me bad at winning friends, good at influencing enemies, and very difficult to talk to. I’m not so much a person anymore as I am a cross to bear, which few care to do. Thus I sit in my lonely cell on the bottom-most level of an institution that is itself rock-bottom.”
“Which is where you should stay,” Dr. Quinzel said. “In your cell, that is. No more illicit jaunts.”
The Joker pretended to think this over. “All right, Dr. Quinzel, I’ll be a good boy, as a personal favor to you. I ask only one thing in return.”
“You’re in no position to ask anything of me,” Dr. Quinzel told him loftily. “But just out of curiosity, what is it?”
“That you come back and visit me again,” he said, doing humble now. “You have no idea how brutal the monotony is—every day like every other, never changing, always predictable. I sit in this cell and see nothing and no one I haven’t seen before, while the seconds march past in lockstep like they did yesterday and all the days before, and like they will tomorrow and all the days to come.”