Half Jack

Jay

"Riddle get in contact with you yet?"

"No."

"It's been over a week. This is... not the way we planned it. You'd think he'd send a thank you note... somethin'."

I nodded.

"Take that fucking cloth off your face, kiddo, you're with me now."

I did as I was told. The Penguin wasn't angry often, but when he was, you got out of the way. And you damn sure didn't become the cause of it.

He inhaled deeply on his cigar, "People these days. You gotta do everything yourself. Didn't the clown say that? Before he croaked?"

I stood up, shot up, from the leather chair in front of his desk, "Don't you dare say that about him. I don't want to hear that. I don't--"

"There we go, a little anger. That's what we need to see," Penguin pointed like he was making an offer, then opened up a little drawer and pulled an ancient looking newspaper out. It was folded up.

"Few years ago the sucker showed me this newspaper, and I was lucky to nab it from him before..." He paused, huffing, "Anyway, I took a long look at it and saw he'd circled this."

The Penguin flipped the newspaper open, twisted it so that I could see and pointed.

What is it with crazies and newspapers? Is anyone using google anymore? Maybe villians aren't very tech-savvy...

I digress.

Among other oddly scribbled things in sharp green ink and hidden away between codes which I could now solve easily, there was a wide circle encompassing a tiny article in the obituaries. A bad quality mugshot of a teenaged girl in mime facepaint stared at me, placed tastefully next to an announcement that her funeral service would held alongside Harvey Dent's.

"Now..." Penguin said softly in a firm voice, "A little birdie friend of mine tells me there's this rumor flying around that that little girl in the newspaper grew up to be someone familiar to you. Cosette Jean... am I pronouncing that right?"

"It's pronounced like 'John'..." I answered quietly, a million thoughts racing across my dark face. Did I just say that aloud? I'm certain I did.

"So you know her." Penguin affirmed.

"No." I said. But it wasn't a response to my question, it was a declaration. A refusal, to drag Cosette into this. I was keeping alienated from my friends for a reason.

Penguin stood up now, leaned in close to me,

"Kid, you want Riddle dead. Like I want Riddle dead."

I nodded. Penguin's eyes gleamed unpleasantly, like the backs of bronze coins rolling dryly across a table top.

"Then we're going to have pull some strings, see? Strings that need pulling. I need you to talk to this broad. To get some information. She was the kidnapped victim, yeah? It was all over the news."

I nodded numbly, turning to leave. Maybe I could just sit down and approach this subtly...

"Oh, and Gambol?"

I turned my head slighty as I headed for the sturdy door frame to let him know I was listening. And I did not respond, could not respond to what he instructed me to next:

"If she knows anything, kill her."

Cosette

I picked The Joker's old make up bag gingerly from the shining floor. I looked around, superstition haunting me as I stared down the lonely, cold hallway. Apartment buildings generally creep me out. The halls are endless and perfectly symmetrical, too clean and filled with people that you know nothing about, living their lives in a proximity too close to be comfortable and too far off to be friendly.

So I retreated into my own space, shutting the door behind me quickly. I wasn't aware of how much I began shaking until I got to the table, and set it down in front of a large flower centerpeice---something one of my false celebrity friends had sent me yesterday. I wasn't aware of what flared in my brain when I opened the black flap (hanging on by three threads) and stared strangely into the contents of the bag for a few minutes. They were pretty mundane containers of costume-style make up--jumbled and disorganized, a little dusty and smudged from being grabbed up so many times.

But I recognized each one clearly, and each one held a moment. In response, without even thinking, my own hands lashed out and swept the cursed thing off my table, and all the makeup clattered, flying off everywhere.

"What do you want from me?" I heard my voice yell darkly, "Hm? WHAT. DO YOU. WANT. FROM ME."

There was no answer. Just a small, tattered black bag opened like a grinning mouth, its zipper teeth watching silently against my perfect white wall.

"It's over," I told it, "I can't do this anymore, you win, okay? You hear that?! Whoever found this? The joke's on me! HA!"

My phone blared like an alarm from across the living room and I acted like a startled animal, picking up every item out on the floor and depositing it back into the bag, which now reeked strongly of gasoline. I suppose I reacted in such a way because I felt guilty, suddenly having the thing in my possession, or paranoid the caller would "see". Perhaps it was both.

I finished and put the bag back on the table, picking up the phone and pressing talk shakily.

"Angel." I answered automatically.

"Cosette... you sound weird."

"People are playing tricks on me." I laughed shortly.

A pause, "What kind of party is this we're talking about."

"A funeral party." I could no longer stop myself.

"Stop." She said, "Friday. You remember Friday? You're... force--inviting--me along."

"Oh yes. It's just a Bruce Wayne party. Did you know my first was when I was 16... I wore... a lot of make up." My eyes found the bag on the table again.

"What do you mean?"

"Nothing."

"Cosette..."

"What." I sighed.

"...Nothing." She sighed now.

We said our goodbyes.