Couple of screws loose (quite_vexing) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2020-06-20 02:44:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, david xanatos, harley quinn |
Who: Harley and Xanatos
What: At the party
When: At the party
Where: At the party
Status: Complete
Rating: PG-13
“Listen. Listen” Harley said, leaning in close, “There’s nothing I like more than a good party, am I right?”
The plant said nothing, as plants were wont to do, and Harley nodded, “Of course, of course, the strong silent type. I getcha.”
Grinning, she spun around and made her way to the bar to get herself another drink. Her hair was in a ponytail and died all the colors of the rainbow, and her top matched and glittered (the glitter was important). Her pants were leather, also dyed the colors of the rainbow.
“Hey yo gimme whatever that green stuff is,” She pointed.
When one of Xanatos’ security guards moved toward the brightly coloured woman who was talking to a plant, Xanatos stopped him with a raised hand and a shake of the head, even as some of his more prominent guests gave her dirty looks and a wide berth.
She stuck out like a rainbow-coloured thumb, and Xanatos was going to get as much amusement out of watching her as he could before she managed to start a fight or to throw up on a thousand-dollar dress.
When she moved toward the bar, he followed, and when the bartender opened his mouth, presumably to cut her off, Xanatos cut in. “Make that two,” Xanatos said, and the bartender promptly closed his mouth. “Though, I’m not quite in the mood for peppermint schnapps. Make mine a chardonnay instead.”
“Yes sir,” the bartender said smartly, and turned toward the bar.
Xanatos turned from the bartender to his guest. “I don’t meet many people willing to drink straight peppermint schnapps,” he said, a twinkle in his eye. “But I’m glad to see that someone is taking advantage of the open bar.”
“Someone has to, right handsome?” She turned towards him, somehow having the air of someone who wasn’t drunk (yet) but also not entirely lucid at the same time. But being lucid was for chumps when they were on the clock, and Harley? Was so not on the clock tonight.
“Didja know that plant over there is poisonous?”
Xanatos’s lip twitched. “I do make a point to make sure I know which of my plants are and are not poisonous,” Xanatos said, trying, but not quite managing, to affect an air of seriousness. “I find it important for me to be aware of where most of the poisons in my own home are. There’s no helping it if someone tried to sneak a vial of something in on their persons, but other than that…”
“Just checking. Dated a botanist.” Granted, Ivy was actually a plant in more than one of her dreams (the jury was still out on the World War Two set), but it still counted, as she did in fact have a PhD, like Harley did. “So you pick up all kinds of interesting tidbits about plants and the like an’ most people don’t pay attention. Like lilies are poisonous to cats! Get your mama a nice flower for Mother’s Day an’ then you kill her cat!.”
She stuck out her hand. “Dr. Harleen Quinzel-Wells, atcha service! But you can call me Harley.”
“It’s truly amazing how important knowing about certain types of plants can be.” For a billionaire, Xanatos spent quite a lot of time out in the wilderness looking for artifacts that were rumoured to be magical. He had always thought that it was important to know what could and could not kill him when he was exploring.
“I’m David Xanatos,” Xanatos answered, taking her hand. Most people called him ‘Xanatos’ though a few used ‘David,’ and he had no preference either way. “A doctor, huh? What are you a doctor of?”
“Brain matter,” Harley said. “Though more or less what goes on inside your brain instead of the actual brain cells an’ shit. Got daddy issues? I’m your gal!”
“Luckily, I’m free from any such issues,” Xanatos said. It wasn’t his fault that his father continued to dig in his heels and obstinately refused to recognize any of Xanatos’ accomplishments or any of the financial help that he’d offered when he was younger. Xanatos was able to manage just fine without his father, thank you. If anyone had issues, his father had son issues.
No doubt he was jealous that Xanatos had made something of himself while his father was still a poor fisherman in Bar Harbour, Maine, who kept repeating that Xanatos would have been better off if he’d remained impoverished as well.
“A psychologist though. That must be an interesting job, especially in a place like this where people consistently talk about their dreams as though they were real.”
Harley nodded at him, not entirely believing him, but he wasn’t paying her and she wasn’t in the mood to psychoanalyze people tonight. At least not for serious reals.
As soon as he pressed on the subject of dreams, her smile widened. “That’s my speciality!”
“Is it?” Xanatos asked, intrigued. “I don’t suppose there’s anything you could tell me about them? Nothing that would infringe on patient confidentiality of course; I’ve just heard so much about them and I have to admit, it’s piqued my curiosity. Is it a shared psychosis, do you think?”
“Nope.” Harley shook her head, “Too many dreams are unrelated to the other. The only similarities is how realistic they are. And that many tend to be fantastical or with advanced technology. Exploring new worlds and the like. But when you have one of these dreams, it’s like you’re there, and when you wake up, reality feels like a dream.”
“Fascinating,” Xanatos said. “And you, Harley? Do you have these dreams as well?”
Harley tapped her finger over her lip, eyes flashing with mischief, “And then some. Lets just say my paper-white skin ain’t body paint.”
Xanatos had wondered at that. She looked a little like a clown, though he had assumed that had been part of the look, something to contrast that colourful hair and to draw the scornful looks of his wealthier guests. If that had been her goal, Xanatos couldn’t really hold it against her; he’d wished he could do the same on a number of occasions.
But if it wasn’t her goal at all… He rose his eyebrows. “Are you saying that the dreams changed your appearance?” he asked. He’d heard rumours of something like that happening, but he hadn’t thought he’d be lucky enough to encounter it on only his second night in the county. Yes, the party really had been a good idea. “How?”
If it made him feel better, she’d have scandalized his guests anyway. “I used to work in an asylum. Turned out one of my patients was workin’ me while I was treating him. True love, you know? Make yourself your girl’s world, dump her in chemicals, start a life of crime together.”
Harley grimaced, “Took me … her years to get out of that. An’ beat the shit out of him eventually, that was a nice dream!”
“That sounds like the origin story of some sort of comicbook villain,” Xanatos said, raising an eyebrow as he took a sip of his drink. “It sounds as though he deserved to have the shit beat out of him though,” Xanatos added, the swear sounding almost foreign coming out of his mouth, the way it did for anyone who didn’t commonly swear in their daily conversation. “Really, a chemical bath hardly sounds as though he were professing his undying love.”
Harley in fact had a collection of posters, comics, statues and action figures in her house, and she knew very well it was a supervillain origin story. “Doesn’t it? Both the origin story an’ the beat down. But we was a thing, a theme even. Mistah J for Joker, an’ Harley Quinn.”
Xanatos frowned to himself; for the second time that night, the names tugged at some part of his memory, but when he tried to grasp it it was gone. “I hope he hasn’t shown up here,” Xanatos said, a hint of a question in his voice.
“No, he hasn’t, and thank god for that.” Harley shook her head. She was one-hundred percent certain she’d try to kill him if he did. Didn’t matter who he might be in this life, she wasn’t going to let the world suffer; or herself.
And murder was a lot different than the crime sprees she’d been on, no matter how she might have joked about Pammy’s pastimes in her dreams.
Even if people like Jeff Bezos deserved the Poison Ivy treatment.
“Well, if he ever does, I hope you have people you can count on to help sort the matter out.” However it might be done. “You mentioned that your dream shelf was a criminal? What about here?” Then, he laughed. “Well, I suppose you wouldn’t answer that even if you were more than a psychologist, would you?”
“I am one-hundred percent straight and narrow,” Harley assured him. “Well, criminal record wise at least!” She threw her head back and laughed, then finger-gunned.
“Your vast fortune is safe! I’m independently wealthy an’ all.”
Xanatos couldn’t help chuckling a little at Harley. She was certainly a character, and he found that he was already fond of her. He had a feeling that things were rarely boring when Harley was around.
“Oh, trust me, my fortune is quite safe even if you were a criminal,” he said. He had full confidence in his security.
Oh? Oh. Challenge Accepted.
“Lucky you!” She grinned at him then leaned up on her tippy toes to kiss his cheek, “Listen, I gotta make the rounds and freak some people out. But this is a hell of a shindig, you should be proud!”
Xanatos wondered if he saw a glint of competitive spirit in her eyes “Try not to scare anyone too badly, and do try to refrain from telling anyone else where the household poisons are,” he said lightly, grinning.