plotting to unnerve her

[self_composed]

Bella finds Milliways in the moon palace instead of one of her balconies.

"Huh," she says aloud.

Then, to Alice, Libby, Elena, and Mary, and Lazarus except he autoreplies with a busy message, [Hey folks, Moonstone Palace grew a bar that I don't remember putting in, come check it out.]

Comments

[self_composed]

"If I can't even teleport to just outside the room I'll be about twice as alarmed as I am right now," Bella says. She flickers up and down, and, yes, there are conventional doors off conventional hallways, plenty of patrons have to get around by walking. "I can do that much. I can take passengers. But Alice doesn't want to listen to me, the Joker certainly won't, and I don't see his shrink or his Batlady anywhere. Well, maybe the shrink is here and I just don't recognize her, I don't suppose you know who she might be?"

[edgeofyourseat]

Roberta looks deeply uncomfortable.

"You might want to think again about the Batlady."

[self_composed]

"I guess she could also be here and I could not recognize her if -"

Bella stops.

She frowns at Roberta.

"Are you or are you not the Batlady?"

[edgeofyourseat]

"Please don't spread it around," sighs Roberta.

Upstairs, Alice climbs back onto the Joker's bed.

[self_composed]

"I don't think I have a reason to. If things get bad up there again, and I teleport you up and conjure you a bat costume and whatever else, will you try to draw the Joker out?"

[edgeofyourseat]

"Can you conjure the suit without having seen it?" is the first thing she wants to know.

[manofmyword]

The Joker follows Alice, and he brings the knife.

But all he does at first is snuggle.

[self_composed]

"Unless you've got some magic preventing mine from consulting your brain, or you have a bunch of different suits and don't know how to distinguish them," Bella says.

[edgeofyourseat]

"In that case, yes, I'll do it."



Alice finds the scar on the Joker's hip and smooths his hand over it.

Then he says, softly, "I want you to hold me down."

[manofmyword]

"Oh, sweetie," he murmurs. "You sure?"

[self_composed]

"Well," Bella says. "This could be sooner rather than later. But they're fine for right now."

[edgeofyourseat]

"Somehow I don't find that very comforting," says Roberta.



"Yeah, I'm sure," he says. "I want you to fuck me like he fucked me. Like he fucked you."

Because it'll be awful, but right now awful is what he wants. Because he knows that's at least part of what the Joker wants him here for, and he accepts that, he's fine with that, he wants to see what the Joker will make of him.

[manofmyword]

"Mmmkay," he says, kissing Alice's forehead. "Since you asked."

[self_composed]

"Right now Alice is exhibiting the ability to form preferences," Bella says, "and the Joker is exhibiting the ability to abide by them. The fact that the preferences in question are disturbing was never in question. It will not be necessary for you to break down the door until and unless Alice can no longer form or enforce preferences."

[edgeofyourseat]

Roberta frowns.

"If the Joker is pretending to abide by anybody's preferences, it's not for friendly reasons," she says.

[self_composed]

"Oh, I don't trust the Joker as far as I can throw him, and I haven't even bothered adding super-strength, so that would just be aikido trickery if I did decide to throw him," Bella says. "But it doesn't matter whether he's got fucked-up reasons for doing what Alice wants as long as Alice is still in a position to want those things. My problem is that I know less about Alice's psychological tolerances than I do about his physical tolerances and he won't let me check with him conversationally. So if it no longer looks like he wants the things and stays put anyway, while this could go under 'Alice likes things he doesn't like' - it could, he's twisted like that - it could also go under 'Alice does not like things he doesn't like but he's paralyzed'."

[edgeofyourseat]

"You seem to be de facto trusting the Joker not to traumatize your boyfriend," says Roberta. "And I'm not sure I agree. In fact, I'm sure I don't."



Alice shivers. He's frightened, but he likes being frightened, likes the way it makes him want to squirm and hide.

[manofmyword]

The Joker presses Alice down into the bed and drags the knife slowly along his hip, tracing the scar that isn't there.

[edgeofyourseat]

It wasn't slow, the first time. The first time it was fast.

He moans and presses his face into the pillow, wanting wanting wanting.

[self_composed]

"His telepathic answering machine told me to fuck off," Bella says. "However rude that is, it's also clear. I'm only going to ignore him if I'm farther out of my comfort zone than this." She pauses. "On the other hand, if you asked me for a suit right now for what could be unrelated reasons and managed to get his room number from the bar I would not dream of denying such a harmless, trivial request or of interfering with your freedom of movement."

[edgeofyourseat]

"Bar?" says Roberta.

No napkin appears. Roberta sighs. "It was a long shot anyway; there is a specific bar rule forbidding people who are enemies outside the bar from bringing their grudges here."

[manofmyword]

This time it's slow. All of it. The knife, his hand on the back of Alice's neck, his weight pressing Alice into the bed, holding him in place.

This time, it's going to last.

[self_composed]

"I'm surprised the two of you are even here at the same time, then," Bella says, staring into the middle distance glazedly as all her attention is on another channel of vision.

[edgeofyourseat]

"Me too," says Roberta.

As for what's going on in Alice's head: he realizes, for the first time in a while (at least consciously), that Bella is still reading him. On reflection, he's okay with that, although he worries that she won't like what she's about to see. And he's sorry he told her to fuck off, but he's not taking down his busy message; it fucks with his head when she interrupts him in the middle of this stuff, and two people fucking with his head at the same time - only one of whom knows what they are doing, because Bella might be able to read his mind but she's never lived in it - is bound to end badly.

[manofmyword]

"You still here, sweetie?" the Joker murmurs.