Endless Epitaph

The Players : Xander
Where : Chicago, IL
When : February 3rd, 2009.
Rating : PG-13, but could go higher. Depends on what goes down.
Notes : Forget notes, just give me some cowbell.

The day started out fine.

Xander had a good breakfast, worked out for a bit. He was starting his new job at The Tool Box, a local hardware store and home decour place, in a few days.

After the death of his boss from the bar, it was closed by his family who had no interest in owning a bar. So he and his friends were out of a job. It was just as well, Xander mostly worked there for a lack of anything else available at the time.

But when he got home from the grocery store, that’s when things took a turn.

He placed the bags on the counter and turned the police scanner on, he often listened to it, just in case anything sounded supernatural.

Wished it were this time. But it wasn’t.

The scanner went off with a loud siren sound. And it only took one sentence to give him pause.

“Attention all units, attention all units. We have a 187 at Hailey’s Comics. Suspect is a male, green hair. Believed to be the Joker and his accomplice Harley Quinn. All units be advised…suspect is armed and very dangerous. Proceed with caution”

187…Xander raced through some of the police codes he had written down so he’d recogonize them. He stopped cold when he realized 187 was a murder.

“Alli…” Xander whispered to no one but with fear in his voice.

He dropped the eggs he had been holding to the ground as he raced out of the apartment and headed to the comic book shop. It was about a mile away from his place. No way would he get near that place fast with all the commotion that would be surrounding the place.

It took about ten minutes, but he got there. Crowds were gathered around the barricades trying to see what was going on. Whispering to each other what they heard.

( Read more... )

The Players : Harley Quinn (open)
Where : Metropolis, Kansas. Lois's apartment.
When : February 3rd, 2009.
Rating : PG13.
Notes : Harley hears that the Joker has a new playmate.


Harley sat inside Lois’s apartment and watched television. After getting back from her midnight visit to her mother and sister’s graves, Harley had thought long and hard about what she wanted to do with her life now. And… She was no closer to making a decision that she was when she started.
Days passed and life continued with Lois leaving to do her job and Harley was left behind in the apartment to think and regret.

She had committed crimes while with the Joker and even though she had been heavily drugged and programmed by him she couldn’t just so easily dismiss what she had done. She needed to pay for those crimes but how? Going back to Arkham would be a death sentence for her and even if she were to survive she would probably end up more insane than they already thought she was.

“They call themselves doctors in that place? How come not a single damn one ever noticed I had drugs in my system or recognize the signs of brain washing the Joker put me through?” Harley suddenly said out loud.

Getting up Harley started to pace. “I could go to prison for the crimes but then no one gets helped, I’m locked up for what I did but wasn’t really responsible for.”

Letting out a frustrated groan, Harley sunk to a chair in front of the T.V. “What I need is some way to make amends for what was done by me but things done when I was not in control.” Looking up at the ceiling Harley made a half hearted appeal to God. “How about some kind of sign on what I should do?”

Hearing no grand voice from above or seeing any of the plants in Lois’s apartment burst into flames, Harley sighed and turned her attention to the television.

“This just in from our Chicago affiliate. It would seem the clown menace of Gotham has decided to make the windy city his newest plaything along with his criminal sidekick of Harley Quinn. A series of brutal murders this last week was thought to be the work of the Joker as the victims were found with their faces twisted in a gruesome parody of a smile but police officials were not completely convinced.”

Harley winced remembering those people in the alley she had helped to kill before shaking her head violently. “I was under the Joker’s control. It wasn’t my fault… Entirely.”

Then came security footage from a museum showing the Joker not even attempting to hide his face. Eyewitness reports state that at that time his sidekick Harley Quinn had helped a newspaper reporter to escape from the Joker’s grasp.”

Harley smiled remembering that moment as being the beginning of her breaking the Joker’s control over her.

“But whatever change of heart the murderous partisan of the Joker had must have been short lived because we now have footage of a comic book store massacre that Harley Quinn participated in.”

Harley’s face turned white. She didn’t help kill anyone at a comic book store did she? Sure her memories were a little scattered from the drugs Joker had kept her on but Harley loved comic books, surely she would have remembered having been in one.

“Here is the footage from the security camera that was shot just last night. You can see Harley Quinn has modified her costume and makeup, perhaps in a badly conceived notion of throwing off the authorities? In any case you can clearly see the Joker taking from her several packages and thanking her for suggesting ways of killing innocent patrons of the store. The packages later exploded killing several emergency workers and firemen called to the scene…”

Harley feeling the intense need to throw up turned off the T.V. and stared at the now blank screen.

“That was not me!” She yelled at the off set. “Mr. J. replaced me so quickly?” Harley shook her head. “So not the point! The point is, I’ve stopped being his punching bag and crime accessory and I’m still getting blamed for it.” Harley’s face turned pure white as the implications of the newscast fully set in.

“It also means some poor probably innocent girl is being force feed drugs and brainwashing and is being molded into being the Joker’s newest plaything. I… I… Can’t let that happen. Not again, not to someone else.”

But what could she do? She couldn’t go to the police and tell that that. They would lock her up on sight.

Suddenly Harley remembered that the Joker had kept a ‘safe’ house in Metropolis. He kept such safe places to hide in many major cities in case things got too hot in Gotham and Harley just remembered where the one in Metropolis was located. There she could find some of her old costumes to wear when she confronted him and a cache of money she could use to get back to Chicago.

But first she would need to seek out some of Metropolis’s more criminal members and purchase one last thing. A high powered hand gun. Whatever it took Harley vowed to herself that she wouldn’t let another person suffer at the hands of the Joker like she had. It was time that the clown went down.

Harley paused as she started to rush out of Lois’s apartment and for a brief moment she thought about writing a letter to Lois explaining where she was going and what she had to do and how much Harley appreciated everything the woman reporter had done for her. But Harley knew the letter would be too much like a suicide note because Harley fully expected she probably wouldn’t survive her confrontation with the Joker, but as long as she stopped him permanently that was all that mattered.

“If I leave a letter Lois is bound to come after me to stop me, and I can’t have that.” Harley finally said out loud to herself. Walking to the door she turned to look back at the room. “So I guess this is goodbye. With luck you’ll think I just took off and won’t know where I went till everything is settled.” With a tear in her eye Harley told the empty room. “Goodbye L.L. You were the closest I ever had to having a best friend.”

Quietly Harley turned the knob that would lock the door behind her and leaving the apartment she shut the door.

The Players : The Joker and Alli
Where : Chicago
When : February 3rd, 2009.
Rating : PG13 – R just in case.
Notes : C sharp and F flat.



The Joker walked the streets of Chicago bundled up in a trench coat with a hat jammed over his head to cover his green hair from being seen.
Who the coat and hat belonged to, Joker had no idea but the evening news would have a report about a man found in the snow dead but with a large smile on his face.

Joker's search for the annoying reporter and his rebellious rag doll Harley had gone nowhere and he was getting frustrated. And a frustrated Joker was a dangerous Joker. Not that the Joker was ever 'safe' in the first place but right now he really wanted to kill someone, preferably Harley Quinn or Lois but they weren't around at the moment.
But Joker was the type of person that fully believed that if you couldn't kill the ones you wanted to, kill the ones you were with.

He had just about decided to randomly walk into a department store and start killing when he spotted a flash of blue hair in a comic book shop. Pulling to a halt, Joker stared through the window and tried to remember what was it about blue hair?

Suddenly an image came to him of the night the reporter Lois Lane had escaped from him the first time. He remebered a blue haired woman whom he had shot at and had called him....What was it again? Ah yes, Kermit the Clown.

Joker's smile grew even more sinister looking as he watched her through the window. He needed a victim to while away the time until he found Harley or Lois Lane and he had found his 'volunteer'.

Whistling slightly off tune, he opened the door to the comic shop and strolled in.

The Players : The Joker (open to any who want to play)
Where : Abandoned meat packing warehouse, Chicago, Illinois.
When : January 28, 2009.
Rating : PG13 – R for possible language.
Notes : The Joker has a chat with himself.

The Joker stormed around inside the abandon warehouse and cursed to himself as he did. All afternoon he had traipsed around Chicago looking for Harley or that reporter Lois Lane but never once did he spy anyone that looked like them.
He held an image of Harley in her costume so tightly in his mind, he forgot to even look for her out of costume and didn't even realize he had walked right past her earlier in the day. Finally, he returned to the warehouse in the hopes that Harley would return there. To come back after making him so mad wouldn't be the smartest thing for Harley to do but hey, what woman in her right mind would have hooked up with him in the fist place?

"Where does that two bit hussy get off trying to save one of my playthings?" The Joker ranted. "Hell Harley herself is one of my playthings! You would think the ingrate would appreciate me bringing someone else into our play... Until they died of course."

The Joker paused for a moment in his pacing to stare off into space a moment before looking up and addressing no one. "Its days like this, that make me wish I hadn't already killed her family so I could do it again. Sometimes it's the little things that are enough to make my face hurt just smiling."

The Joker paced back over to where Harley had stashed her meager belongings in the warehouse, just to make sure they were still there, even though he had just checked them a few minutes ago. "Harley! Where are you?!" He shouted. "You are making me very cross. You are turning this Master of Mayhem into a Harlequin of Hate!"

The Joker paused and his grin grew a little. "Harlequin of Hate? I like that. Harlequin of hate... Harlequin.... Harley Quinn!" The Joker suddenly screamed in rage and hauled off and punched a metal locker door where meat used to be stored when the warehouse/plant was in operation. A normal man would have shattered his wrist doing such a thing, but the Joker had the strength and resiliency of a truly insane person so he hardly felt the blow. The door however, now had a huge dent where his fist had hit it.

"Go ahead and run my little rabbit. The big bad Joker wolf will find you sooner or later and when I do....Any and all around you are going to suffer as well. After all, it is the only sensible thing to do...."
The Joker began to laugh and his maniacal laughter echoed in the warehouse.

As the Joker's laughter died down to a few giggles, a noise caused him to glance up to see a stranger standing in the doorway to the warehouse.
The man was dressed in gaudy overdone clothing, in other words, fashion the Joker could appreciate.

"Ah, Mr. Joker. I have a card for you." The man said holding up a card for the Joker to see. The Joker could see that the card was the Fool card from a Tarot deck. While the Joker could appreciate the artwork on the card and even the subject matter he still frowned.

With a flick of his wrist he sent one of his own razor sharp Joker cards at the man hitting him dead center in the forehead.
The man with a surprised look on his face fell backwards letting his card drop to the ground at his feet.
The Joker walked over casually and looked down at the dead body. "Thanks. But I have my own cards."
Stepping over the body the Joker walked out of the warehouse.

The Fool card lay on the floor for a few moments after the Joker left until a foul smelling breeze swept through the warehouse picking up the card and carrying it out a broken window into the night.

The Players : Lois Lane, the Joker, Harley Quinn.
Where : The Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, Illinois.
When : January 27, 2009.
Rating : PG13 – R.
Notes : Oh Lois, she just can’t stay out of trouble these days.

Lois stood in the Field Museum of Natural History’s Egyptian exhibit with a frown. She had an appointment with a curator, and yet he was at least fifteen minutes late. Her patience was wearing thin as she pulled out her cell phone. If she was going to be forced to wait she could at least kill some time. She dialed Chloe’s number but when she received her voice mail, she hung up. What was going on with her cousin? She tried the number to the Talon apartment, hoping that maybe she could catch her there. She was pretty sure Jimmy was on the mend enough to be moved back to Metropolis but now, so maybe they were in the process of doing that. Unfortunately, Lois got the answering machine. She sighed and almost hung up, but decided against it. “Chloe? Hey, it’s Lois. Just called to check in and find out how you were doing.” She frowned at how it sounded too simple. She was starting to worry about Chloe. Was she having some PTS from the wedding incident? Had Jimmy gotten worse? "Is there something wrong? ..Just call me back when you can, alright?"

She hung up with a concerned frowned. When she got back to Metropolis she going to try and sit Chloe down for a talk. Whatever was going on, she wanted to help. After all, Chloe was her family.

“Miss Lane.” Lois looked up at the cultured sounding voice and slid her phone back into her pocket as an older man in his forties walked over to her. He adjusted her blazer and then offered her a hand to shake, which she did. He gave her a sheepish smile as if embarrassed by his own tardiness. “I’m sorry to keep you waiting.”

“It’s not a problem, Dr. Jameson.” She replied, forcing herself to play nice and to ignore her own irritability. “So why don’t you get started and tell me about this new addition to your exhibit.”

“It’s a fascinating discovery actually...” He led her toward another spot in the exhibit as she tried not to roll her eyes. Somehow she highly doubted it was as fascinating as he thought.

It was moments like this when she would hope for something more exciting to happen. The sooner she got this over with the sooner she could be doing something useful, like helping Xander and stopping a supernatural psycho. She still wanted to make it to Curious Goods before it got late.

The Players : Joker, (open)
Where : Chicago, Illinois.
When : January 27, 2009.
Rating : PG13 – R for violence.
Notes : A sharp and C minor

The Joker hugged the shadows of an alleyway as he avoided as much as possible the light of day. He usually had Harley to do these things for him but she was all tied up at the moment... And hanging from a meat hook in the abandoned meat warehouse like a giant pinata.

The Joker was searching for information. Information on the people who thwarted him last night.
A loud mouth, obnoxious blue haired woman, a guy with a patch over his eye like some pirate wannabe and most importantly the reporter Lois Lane.
Not because he had any reason to hold a vendetta against these people, only because they had crossed the Joker's path and had the nerve to survive the encounter.

As the Joker pulled a hood up over his distinctive features he crossed from the alley over to a hotel entrance. Nodding his hooded head at the doorman at the entrance to the hotel, he showed the man a copy of the Daily Planet.
The Joker had gone back to the home of the person who had a subscription to the Daily Planet in Chicago that Joker had found this morning and persuaded the man to find a copy that had a picture of Lois Lane in it. Then to thank the man for his time and effort he sprayed him with SimleX and then shoved him into his own refrigerator.
After all, didn't everyone want a 'cool smile'?

"Is this woman staying at your fine establishment?" He asked the Doorman.

The man glanced at the paper but shook his head. "We are not allowed to give out information on who stays here buddy." He said figuring the Joker was a rival reporter or something.

The Joker held up a hundred dollar bill, that was carefully folded so the man couldn't see that the figure on the bill was not good ol' Ben Franklin but was actually that of the Joker himself.

The Doorman snatched the bill and replied. "Nope. She's not at this hotel. She's probably at one of the fancier ones downtown being a reporter and all."

The Joker nodded his head and started to walk away but stopped. Turning he faced the Doorman. "It must be boring standing here all day, just to let people in and out. Do you ever take time to stop and smell the flowers?" The Joker then lifted the lapel of his jacket holding out the flower that was there.

As a fine mist sprayed out into the Doorman's face and he started to giggle, he noticed a smile gleaming from under the Joker's hood.

"I can see though that your job keeps you tickled!" The Joker laughed as he walked away as the Doorman fell to the ground outside the hotel and started convulsing with laughter as he died.

The Players : Lois Lane, Clark Kent
Where : Chicago, Illinois.
When : January 27, 2009.
Rating : PG13 – R for language.
Notes : My dog ate my notes. May I have extra credit anyway?





Lois was curled up in a chair sipping her coffee as she stared at her morning paper. A content smile was on her lips as she looked at The Daily Planet. Her editor had been true to his word, giving her the front page. Her byline was there with an actual photo of the Joker and Harley Quinn standing over their handy work in the alley. It had made last night’s drama worth it. Of course, she realized it possibly made her a target of the Joker now but as a reporter, Lois knew that was bound to happen, one way or another. She could however do her best to keep others out of it. Despite the fact she had planned to mention Xander and his friend Alli by name, Lois had decided against it as she wrote her final draft. She kept them unnamed and hoped they’d understand. She didn’t want them to be targets anymore than they had made themselves last night.

Lois glanced at her now charged and working phone with a frown. She wondered what anyone back home would say about this. She hadn’t called them to let them know what happened. She’d probably be chastised for getting into trouble in the first place... but god had it been worth it. Especially since it had officially removed her from the fluff piece she had originally been assigned. And on an even more bonus level with the bit of info she picked up from the Joker and Harley’s conversation when she was playing Sleeping Beauty, maybe the cops would finally catch the freak.

She took a bite of her bearclaw and debated on calling Xander now. It wasn’t too early, but Lois was still basking in her moment she was sure the Simon situation would bring her back down to whatever constituted as reality these days. Thinking about reality made her wonder how Chloe, Jimmy, and even (or especially) Clark were doing. She set the pastry on its plate and picked up her phone, ready to dial. All she had to do was follow through.

A moment and a sigh later, the phone was back on the table, but instead of making calls, she had settled for sending a few text messages to people to reassure them that she was indeed fine and that no the Joker hadn’t done any permanent damage. That made her thoughts turn to Harley and she set her phone back down. The woman was obviously nuts, but she had one hell of a weird complex going on. Lois couldn’t help but feel somewhat sorry for her. Part of her told her to leave it be, but she had to wonder if there was something more she could. She owed Harley something. Without Harley, she may have been worse than dead by now. She had mentioned her family and the Joker’s threats. Maybe she could at least help with that.

She slid her laptop over to her and started her research on everything Harley Quinn. The only way to know if she could help was if she did some research.

*********

Lois stared at her screen with a frown. She’d managed to find quite a bit on Dr. Harleen Quinzel, including were her family lived. It was none other than Metropolis. Unfortunately, they were victims of a brutal murder around two months ago. “Damn.” There was no way it was a coincidence. If she were back home she’d go check out the scene to see if there was anything the police missed. As it was, she couldn’t just abandon Xander and this weird Simon thing.

On instinct and a bit of reluctance she picked up the phone and dialed the first number that came to mind.

The Players : The Joker, Harley Quinn, and happy happy people. (Open to anyone who wishes to play with the Joker)
Where : Chicago, IL
When : January 26th, nighttime
Rating : R (violence)
Notes : The Joker and Harley in this borrows from all their predecessors but bows to none of them. (In other words, they are my take on the characters so don’t be surprised if they are a little different.)

A cold crisp clean wind blew through the night, so one could be understandably confused how such a clean breeze found itself lost in a back alley of the large sprawling city. The alley was as dank, decrepit and despair filled as could be found in any large metropolis. Winos lay sprawled unconscious on crushed down cardboard boxes as drug dealers a few feet away plied their trade on the desperate to escape reality. Near the edges of the alley, hookers tried their luck with the lonely and the desperate, while their pimps watched on from the shadows.

Into this perfect picture of urban decay and despair came the strains of music. Music that sounded suspiciously like it came from some broken music box. The individual notes would speed up, slow down, stop and start in a drunken fashion, so much so that was nearly impossible to determine what the tune had originally been but now had a Frankensteinian existence all its own and the tune wasn’t a pleasant one. Several hookers near the entrance to the alley moved further into its dim recesses, risking glares from their pimps as they attempted to escape the ominous sounds.

As the entrance to the alley cleared of its inhabitants, a man appeared in the middle of the street. At first, the denizens’ of the alley mistook the man for another pimp looking for his hooker. After all, he was dressed in the flamboyant style some pimps favored. The man was wearing a large coat that seemed to be made up of multicolored scraps of cloth sewed together. From the glow of the distant street lights and the full moon in the sky it appeared to the onlookers that his hair was colored in a punk style of green with a few braids of different colored hair mixed in to accent the strange style. A large smile in a too pale face sized them up before the man began to move into the alley towards them.
As the man began to stroll casually down the center of the alley, the other hookers, pimps and drug dealers gave way before him and moved further into the alley to stay ahead of him. He wasn’t a particularly dangerous looking individual but the denizens of the alley gave way to him as animals will when they recognize an ‘Alpha’ individual had entered their territory.

Some of the hookers frowned as they noticed the music they had been hearing didn’t increase as the stranger drew near. It was just naturally assumed that the stranger was the source of the music but it appeared they had been wrong.
The man reached about one quarter of the way into the alley before he stopped and frowning glanced over his shoulder at the entrance to the alley.

“Harley.” The man spoke only the one word but while his voice was commanding it still conveyed an not unpleasant tone.

A woman appeared at the entrance of the alley and just as the male had before, took the center of the alley and began to slowly enter the alley. While the man’s pace and demeanor showed no hesitation or lack of resolve, the woman’s showed timidity, nervousness and a desire to be anywhere but there. As she neared the first interloper into the alley, everyone noticed the music they had been hearing increase in volume showing she was indeed the source of the tune. The woman was wearing a long jacket that covered some kind of black and red one piece suit causing more than one pimp to consider trying to woe her way from her current assumed pimp. Short blond hair framed an almost childlike face but was more than offset by the brief flashes of voluptuous curves that were revealed as her hips swayed as she walked and the edges of the jacket flared open and shut.

The man dressed in the multicolored jacket continued to frown at her over his shoulder and once barked only one word. “Sing.”

The woman pulled the sleeve of her jacket back revealing some kind of gauntlet on her arm and pressed a few spots on it. Instantly the drunken music box tune was replaced by a steady drumming beat and something that sounded like horns playing.