Body Count

"It's none of your business what we talked about!" Shane said angrily, for what felt like the three hundredth time. "Now stop asking!"

Stone knew better than to disobey a direct order, but he still stared at her curiously all the same. Something behind those hazel eyes was burning to know the truth, and she was quite sure he was working on a way to worm it out of her. The thought didn't greatly concern her.

Cliff and William had both remained silent from the moment she walked out of the office doors and onto the main floor. They had been standing uncertainly near the doorway, but she shook her head. "We're sleeping here tonight."

The silences she heard from the two men were very different. Cliff remained haughtily silent, as though her shenanigans with The Joker were not worthy of his precious ears. He shuffled around for a while, glaring at the ground, before suddenly throwing himself onto a pile of sheets - those seemed to be abundant in the warehouses - and closed his eyes, apparently asleep.

Will, on the other hand, only remained quiet because he knew she wanted him to. She could see this in his troubled expression, the way he no longer stared right at her but glanced from her to the door constantly. She'd caught him in this act the last three of four times she'd happened to look over at him.

"It wasn't serious, was it?" he asked abruptly, his eyes flicking yet again from the distant door and back again on to her. Stone looked up interestedly, and Shane, looking over, saw Cliff's breathing become much less pronounced than it had been a split second before.

Shane considered the question, formulating an answer that would stop their badgering and not be a lie at the same time. After a few hurried seconds of deliberation, she said, "It was about as serious as The Joker can get."

William nodded, and his shoulders slumped in a sort of defeated and relieved way. He, too, fell over onto the pile of sheets.

Stone sighed once, puffing out his cheeks as he did so, and crumpled down onto the floor where he stood. At second glance, they all looked rather tired and care worn.

Seeing their exhaustion seemed to trigger her own, and her limbs felt unexpectedly leaden. She dropped to her knees and crawled over to the sheets, a little away from the others and hidden from view by the mountain of linen between them. Her eyes closed of their own accord. She slept.

Her sleep was dreamless. It was the kind of sleep where one hovers in a comforting, engulfing darkness that goes on forever. Her mind felt full and hazy. The darkness stretched on before her closed eyelids, drawing her into the abyss and out of her own pathetic reality ... the darkness that couldn't be stopped ... unless something very large and heavy hit the person who was drifting through it.

Shane let out a great roar of pain, and sat up quickly, kneading her eyes with her knuckles and rubbing the back of her head. Already, she could feel a lump rising there, and it was painful to the touch. Stars had erupted before her eyes when the thing had struck her head, and she blinked furiously, trying to get rid of them.

"Get up!" a voice ordered. She was struck around the side of the head, and sideways into - a desk. She prodded her temple gingerly, and felt hot blood there. "Up!" Another blow, this time to the shoulder.

Shaking slightly with rapidly fading tiredness and fear, she got to her feet, and looked around to where her torturer stood.

The Joker, his face screwed up into a ludicrously painted mask of anger and revulsion, was staring at her with a metal frying pan raised high above his head. His breath was coming in short bursts, and his mouth was tight shut. He seemed to be trying very hard not to yell.

"What?" she said feebly, blinking a drop of blood out of her eye. "What did I do?"

"You FELT!" he bellowed, swinging the pan down to make contact with the very top of her head. She wobbled, and her vision was skewed for a moment. "You felt, you dim-witted girl!" He struck her hard across the ribs, and she doubled over, panting.

"I'm sorry!" she said wildly, still bent over, one arm around her stomach. Pain radiated from nearly every point in her head, and now breathing was hard to accomplish. "I didn't mean to!"

"You could have STOPPED!" he said, hitting her in the other shoulder. She looked up to see him screaming, "If you could CONTROL all your little ... FEELINGS, we wouldn't BE in this mess, WOULD we?" He dropped the pan, and curled his fists to punch her square in the nose. Blood spurted all over his bare hand, and dripped down her face and onto her neck.

She whimpered.

"Don't you dare cry," he threatened, grabbing a hold of her hair and pulling it cruelly hard. "You'll take this with every ounce of pride you have! You will not cry in front of me! Never! Again!" He emphasized the last two words with a vicious punch to the stomach.

Shane bit her tongue so hard she tasted copper in the back of her throat, and tried to swallow her tears along with her blood.

"Good girl," he said, releasing her hair and stepping back. He was hunched over, his arms curled out slightly, his face set. "Now ... stay still."

And he lunged at her.

Every feeling, good and bad, Shane had ever felt for The Joker seemed to be pummeling her to within an inch of her life. He was venting it all, shouting random snippets of their last conversation with every punch and kick he dealt. She tried to stand still when he came at her, but the punch to the side of her head sent fresh waves of pain rushing into her skull, and she fell back over the desk. He pulled her back up by the collar of her dirty, lank shirt and punched her again in the nose, and she felt it break. She cried out, but forced back the tears. Evidently enjoying her pain immensely, he smacked her smirking scar with the back of his hand, and grinned as she fell once again to the desk top.

Both of them were breathing raggedly. Shane's nose was throbbing horribly, sending rivers of blood down into her mouth with every piercing stab. Her head was ringing.

But he wasn't done.

After pausing for only a few seconds of breath, he jumped forward and kicked her hard in the shin. The force of it brought her back to her feet, bent down and clutching her leg in pain. Blood dripped all over the floor. She saw his foot come flying out of nowhere, and it hit her stomach, bringing her momentarily off the ground. And then it was gone, and she fell flat on her face. She stayed there.

Taking advantage of her new, more vulnerable, position, he kicked her again in the stomach, and then in the groin, and the chest. He jumped and brought a fist down hard on her face, landing in a crouch next to her.

Shane was screaming in pain, her mouth wide, blood spouting from both ears, her mouth, and her nose. She looked up at him, horrified, and gulped back another mouthful of blood and spit.

"Did that," The Joker said, stopping to catch his breath. "Did that about express all those feelings you had?"

She choked on her own thick, coppery blood and gurgled, "No."

He froze. "No?"

"No," she said again, trying to ignore the stabbing pains breathing caused her. "It about expressed some of the feelings that I have."

He stared at her, his hands coated in her blood, his face flecked with it and bearing a strained and confused expression. Finally, his face twisted into awe. "You're insane."

She smiled. Despite the pain that he had caused her previously, and had just caused her now, she smiled. With the blood coating her entire lower face and her badly-healing scar, the effect was quite alarming. "Insane?" she said lightly. "Thank you."