Started on: 14/8/16

He leaned across the table, arms still taped across his stomach, eyes glowing with..greed? lust? I couldn't tell. He was smiling at me, red lips parted and stretched, smiling at me. I couldn't help smiling back shyly, letting a strand of my hair fall in front of my face as I looked down at the table and blushed. How did he have me like this? So perfectly in love, in love with a madman.

"I need a favour...just an itsy bitsy little tiny favour..." He breathed, eyes still locked onto mine, head tilted to the side, green hair slicked back and glistening.

"Anything" I breathed back, then corrected myself "I mean, sure".

"I need a machine gun" . I swallowed hard. A part of me, the part that was still professional - medical school Harley - told me no. Stop. But in reality, he could have asked for anything and I would have given it to him. I just wanted him to love me, to need me like I needed him.

"Ok..ok...a machine gun"

He leaned back in his chair, grin still plastered onto his face."You're amazing Harleen Quinzel"

I grinned at him, letting my foot slide towards his under the table.

"But you still need fixing."

I stopped, inhaled sharply. "Why..why do I need fixing?" He slid his foot the rest of the way under the table so that the tips of our toes were just touching.

"Because you, Harleen Quinzel,...are not your true self...and you need to be your true self" He lifted his foot above mine, "to be with me." he slammed down his foot and I gasped and drew back. He turned his head up to the roof, his shoulders shuddering with laughter while I gripped my pen in pain. But all that was in my mind was what he had said...to be with me...to be with me...to be with me...us. I could imagine that, being together, his hand in mine, him the king of the underworld, and me, me, Harleen Quinzel, or whatever he wanted me to be. I couldn't have made it up if I wanted to.

"I'll get you your machine gun Mr J" I said, almost in a trance, his laughter my backing music. With that I left, left him laughing there in that chair and in that dark, dank room.

I could barely function without him, my days were just flashes, time only slowing down when I was with him, looking into his electric blue eyes, the deep crease of his smile, his wild and unhinged laughter.

When I got back to Arkham, machine gun tucked under my lab coat, it was already in chaos. You could hear the spray of gun shots, loud and sharp, from the staff car park outside.

I sat in the drivers seat of my Range Rover, gripping the steering wheel, flinching at each shot and explosion. There were people, staff members, running down the fire escape, clutching wounds and screaming. This wasn't like the fire drill we had had a few months earlier. I could remember it, chatting to a kitchen lady as the staff from Ward C walked calmly down those bright red metal stairs and onto the dark tarmac to regroup as the whiny sound of the fire alarm soared overhead.

Now look at them...they were all just hurtling down, feet a blur, clothes whipping in the wind.

I gritted my teeth, my knuckles a harsh white against the black of the leather wheel. A man, dressed in some kind of grotesque Mickey Mouse costume, ran after them, a gun in his arms spraying bullets into their soft bodies. It was almost beautiful, the pop of the gun and how their eyes widened and their mouths stopped emitting that high pitched sound of fear and pain. How they fell, gracefully, not fearing the concrete, and how their bodies bounced as they came into contact with the cold concrete. Sarah. Deepika. Jerry.

I closed my eyes. These were the people I had worked with for years.

Breath. Breath. There's only him. There was that growing feeling of guilt, that somehow it was my fault. You're a psychologist. Sort yourself out, Harleen.

It was obvious that the Joker had gotten out somehow, and his team were now shooting down the facility from the inside out.

Get out. Get out of the car.

I couldn't. My brain was sending my body instructions but for once in my life they didn't obey. My eyes were transfixed on the bodies on the ground, the pavement painted a deep red - almost black. The shooter, whoever he was, turned and - for a split second - locked eyes with me, the woman in the parked car 50 metres away. I inhaled, and didn't move a muscle, but he simply ran back inside to continue the carnage.

You need to be your true self to be with me...look at the gun. "Oh Jesus. I can't" I sobbed, my breaths now short and shallow. "I can't do this." Look at the gun. "Oh god...oh Jesus they're dead." LOOK AT THE GUN. I tore my gaze away from the bodies and looked beside me. There it was, the sub machine gun I had bought two weeks ago from a small shop down the street from where I live. It had almost called to me, hoisted up on the concrete wall, smack bam in the middle. I had bought it within the minute I had stepped in the place.

Now it lay on the white leather, which exaggerated its pitch black exterior. God it was so pretty... and glistening...urging me to put my hands around it, to pick it up and hold it to me. It was scary how easy it was to acquire something like that; a tool of death. And it was scary how much I wanted it.

The guns were still firing. It was now or never. My hands came off the wheel, like a corpse still holding onto its bouquet, and I unclipped my seatbelt with shaking hands. Now or never, now or never. My breath caught as I picked the gun up. It was cool and smooth to the touch, electrifying me with its subdued power. I felt in control. This is what they all were feeling, I thought, remembering all the patients, and how they went on and on about how they felt so in control when they did it, when they murdered Bob or raped Mary or tortured Jane. This is what they felt. I clutched the gun to my chest with one hand, eyeing the safety lock, and opened the car door with the other. I was in control.

I couldn't ignore the blood as I walked over to the entrance. I rushed past the bodies, making my way to the main entrance, but in my peripheral vision they were staring at me with those glassy, lifeless eyes, saying this is your fault, and watching me in my white coat clutch a machine gun and run towards the doors to escape them.

The glass doors were shattered and all that was left were the metal outlines. I kept my head held high and held the vomit down as my shoes crunched over broken glass and something soft. I didn't look down, and tried not to look at the blood spattered walls. It was strange how real this felt, as if the rest of my life had been a dream and this, this was the first moment that I was alive. The blood didn't look like I had ever seen it. Normally it was a bright red, oxygenated, healthy. This blood was black, and everywhere. It was pooling underneath the slumped guards, on my shoes, and somehow it was on my coat.

I hurried down the hallways, the ones I had walked down every morning for the past five years. My hands were sweaty, and the gun was suddenly heavier than I could cope with. I stopped and leaned against a wall, breathing deeply. Somewhere near me there were deep voices and high pitched screams and that constant sound of gunfire. My head shot to the left as a figure appeared, and my eyes made out a woman I knew: Elaine. She was a junior therapist, the one who never spoke much and was always calm and collected. Unlike right st this moment. She stood frozen at the end of the hallway, underneath the flickering yellow lights, her white lab coat drenched in red and her eyes mad, crazy. She took a step towards me and then, a split second later, tumbled forwards towards the ground, a gaping hole in the place where her chest used to be. I whimpered at her collapsed body on the ground, then looked to the man behind her, another one in costume. He looked at me, paused, and then ran back down from where he came. I stood there, chest heaving, eyes shifting between his receding shadow and Elaine's mangled body on the ground. Why didn't he shoot me? And then I smiled. Jesus, I didn't want to smile, I really didn't, but the thought just popped into my head. He's protective. Protective of me.

Somehow I found the will to carry on. I stepped over her body, dry retching as I the clumps of flesh and exposed bone and tissue. I turned a left, stumbling now, my footsteps echoing down the hall. I didn't care what happened now, I just wanted to find him, the Joker, to prove that I was still loyal.

It was as if he could hear my thoughts. He somehow formed at the end of the hallway while I was clutching my stomach and kicking disembodied limbs out of my way.

I looked up and saw him, his green hair glowing in the dim yellow light at the end of the hall, a mad look on his face, his head down and eyes focused on me, his hands balled into fists and his chest heaving up and down. He didn't have his restraints on now, all he had were those bright orange pants. He was wild, I could see that, he was wild and yet...yet I wasn't scared at all. I felt more alive then I ever had before. I could see the black inky tattoos on his chest and arms and I could feel his anger pulsating through the air. I gulped, and breathed shakily. Something about him got me weak in the knees.

He took a step towards me, then another. Now he was walking towards me, faster and faster, but never breaking into a run, restraining himself. I stood, machine gun dangling in one hand, aware but not in control of the shock written on my face. He didn't even stop. I let out a strangled noise as he reached me and slammed me to the side of the wall, his hands gripping my neck, tightening with each passing second. My hands instantaneously dropped the gun and went up to my neck, scratching at his hands to get them off me. He was looking deep into my frantic eyes, watching them flicker with desperation. My circulation was cutting off.  I opened my shivering lips and let out a silent scream as I felt the blood in my head thrum. The corners of his lips lifted, just a little. He was enjoying this, watching me suffer, watching me die. The world was spinning now. I lifted my eyes up and away from him, to the blackness behind my eyes...and he released his grasp.

I fell to the ground, clawing at my throat and gulping in air. I could see the thin white scars on his ankles, where his restraints had once been. I stayed down there a moment, feeling cold air run down my throat into my aching lungs. "Mr J,..." I wheezed, my voice gravelly "What was that fo-"

"Get up." I pulled myself up and looked at him, still holding my hand to my neck. He licked his lips and tilted his head to one side. I shivered under his gaze, and let my eyes roam downwards, over his sharp jawline, his throat. I so wanted to touch his chest, his tattoos, his neck, feel his hands on my body, feel his lips on my lips. I pressed the machine gun into his hands instead. The same hands which had been wrapped around my neck a second ago. I didn't understand. How could he change his mood so quickly? He smiled, as if detecting my own thoughts. I smiled wearily back, unable to stop myself. He leaned in close to me, so that I could feel his hot breath on my lips, and I felt my hand drop to my side, my body move in closer to him instinctively, my eyes fix on his stretched red lips as they moved to form words.

"Thankyou, Harleen Quinzel" He reached down and picked up the gun, the paused, staring at me. I stared back. He took off my glasses, letting his thumb graze the side of my head. Then he tossed them on the floor, turned, and started to walk away. I followed, walking quickly, lab coat fluttering around me. Almost all of the lights were dead, bullet holes gaping through them. My eyes adjusted to the darkness, but it was strange, strange how he seemed to glow despite the lack of light. It was like he was an angel.

We were turning a corner when I felt a hand grab my ankle and tighten around it. I screamed in shock, and then in pain as I felt fingernails digging into my skin, breaking through. The hand dragged me down to the floor and I saw it was a guard, his eyes desperate and crazy. I opened my mouth to say something, and then there was a bright flash. Blood spattered up and onto my face, coating me. I glanced up to see The Joker standing over him, beside me, and I quickly nodded my thanks. He grunted, and grabbed my arm quickly, pulling me up roughly onto my feet before walking off again down the cool, concrete hall. I breathed hard, staring at the back of his green hair, his back outlined with muscles and tattoos which represented things that I didn't understand. I could feel my heart fluttering, and I began to walk after him.

We walked to the end of a hallway, where his team was waiting, grotesque looking masks covering their faces. On seeing me, and a quick gesture of his hand, they grabbed me. I cried out.

"Hey, get off me! Get the hell off of me!" They pushed me into a room which I now saw was the place where we gave electro therapy. Shit. They pushed me onto the table and I lay there, breathing heavily. The Joker came in.

"What do we have here? Oh, Harleen Quinzel. Nice to see you again."

I shook my head and laughed. "What, are you gonna kill me Mr J?"

"What? Oh I'm not gonna kill ya" I winced. "I'm just gonna hurt you...really...really...bad"

He put the brown belt into my mouth to stop me biting down on my own tongue, before placing the electric shock zappers onto the side of my head. They started and my body contorted as I drifted off into insanity.