Ch 2. The First Interview
I pulled into Arkham parking lot ten minutes early for work, something I did rarely. I got out of the car with a brand new notebook, and a piping hot cup of coffee. My heels clicked on the wet pavement as I made my way towards the sliding doors of the main entrance. I wore red heels with dark blue jeans and a light pink turtleneck. I had stopped wearing my more attractive clothing to work when I had gotten vomited or pissed on a few times. It also is considered better to dress conservative around patients.
We doctors like to think that our patients sexual urges won't be directed towards us if we dress plainly. I knew that wasn't true, I had two years under my belt after all so the veil was lifted. Yet the stigma of attractive clothes at work still persisted here at Arkham. I was actually sent home twice when some staff complained my skirts were too short, at knee length. They weren't even pencil skirts.
Even what I was wearing right now would be considered graphic to my co-workers. They all wore clothes like paper bags and gray knit. So maybe, just maybe, I wanted the Joker to think of me as attractive? I could justify it by saying that it's a ploy to get him to open up to me. But, deep down, I knew it was because I was meeting a powerful character of Gotham society, and I wanted to impress him just a little.
Not to be vain, but I know that I am perfect ten walking into any bar on any given night. Conservative clothes couldn't hold down me down!
This mental pep talk had me entering the building with a confident swagger in my step. Judy the secretary noticed right away, I could tell by her frown. Because some people were hopelessly predictable and open faced. I smiled at her brightly and walked by without so much as a pause.
Inside my head I told her she better keep her fucking mouth closed.
As I made my way to my office which was down four other corridors I ran into Jed. His face was tense even while he smiled to greet me. "Hey Doctor Quinnzel." He stopped his journey wherever he had been going to talk with me. He had a small med kit with him. "Good morning Jed, how have you been?" I hadn't seen much of him in the last couple days, I had been doing some personal paperwork in my office since my patients haven't been roudy.
"I'm fine, it's just... The new patient... He really puts me on edge."
Usually Jed had no qualms about spilling the dish on patients, it worried me to see him so uncomfortable. "What do you mean?"
He looked down at the floor a minute, then looked at me, his expression was pinched. "Since he got here wednesday, I have had to tranquilize him six times. He is already at his max dose for the week." He took a pause to think, but I could tell he wasn't finished so I didn't interrupt, just nodded my head. "He also tried to bribe me, and threaten me, in the same sentence."
"Wow." I was kind of impressed, it usually took a few days or week before the bribes come along. "Fast talker I guess?" Jed nodded "I need to report it to the security commander for him. He needs to know that Joker is serious about bribes, he offered me ten thousand dollars Doctor!" My eyebrows went even higher. It was a high enough amount that he might really be able to persuade someone here to help him. "You are right to talk about it Jed, you should tell the security guy today." Jed nodded and moved past me a little, telling me with body language he was ready to move on. "See you later Doctor Quinnzel." I waved to him and stepped into my office moments later.
On my desk were two boxes of files, the side of the boxes labeled "The Joker" with sloppy penmanship. I sat down in my little wheely chair and start fingering the file title heads. It went by decade and big events. 1940-1950's, His other persona called Red Hood, 1960-1980's, The poisoning at the U.N., 1990-2010's. If he had been about twenty years old when he started his criminal life then he had to be around 96 years old now. I dove into the files.
I learned a ton about the Joker, although it didn't give a great description of his personality. Most of the paperwork came from decades of police reports on him. He has killed easily 2,000 people and over, but never saw any long term jail time. He had been put in Arkham asylum dozens of times and had escaped or been set free every time according to incident reports. I started to realize that he never seemed to stay anywhere more than a few months to a year, even when he is lawfully committed.
--- 3rd POV
Harleen felt a deep sense of the invisible hand at work in the Joker's life. That bigger angles were turning in Gotham than people really understood. Or, maybe the whole system is inept and corrupt, she didn't know.
