CHAPTER 13

The air was dry in the interrogation room, and Jim Gordon was aware of it more than usual. He was also aware that, within the span of three days, the world had changed. Now that he had seen his wife leave him (a sight he’d thought he would never live to see), and had been forced to wrap his mind around riddles like a school boy in a game, Gordon’s mind was alerted to a lot of changes in his environment.

They brought in Calabria first, his hands cuffed in front of him as he sat down in the steel chair. As if Fate and Destiny had conspired to remind him of how quickly changes to his environment could be, Gordon was now sitting in the same interrogation room where he had initially interviewed the Joker. Mere minutes after that meeting, the whole world had not just changed, but buckled and cracked, like an old ship fighting Poseidon’s wrath.

Calabria was still bruised from his brawl with the bat, and his nose was taped. He also had a cast on his left arm where he’d been shot by someone. He sat across from the commissioner, and glanced at the one-way mirror, smirked, and then looked at Gordon. “Nice place you got here,” he said. A second later, he snapped his fingers and added, “Lawyer. Now. Go fetch, little doggie.” He smiled.

“Sorry, Mr. Calabria,” Gordon said. He interlaced his fingers and laid them on his stomach, which had gained a few extra pounds from the hard work of sitting behind a desk. “I’m afraid that the lawyer you specified is unavailable. So is the second lawyer on your list, and the third. It would seem your friends have all abandoned you. The same goes for Enrique Gutierrez, and even Victor Hughes.”

Calabria’s left eye, which was swollen and scabbed around the edges, winced. “B.S. Hughes wouldn’t talk to pigs.”

“Not yet, admittedly. But he will,” Gordon assured him, leaning in. “He’s kept his mouth shut concerning the details of his knowledge prior to the attack on the Muslim Center, and of any involvement in what happened with Patrick Tralley and his family…but he’s been very adamant in saying that everything he’s done was under your orders.” That was a stretch, all Hughes had said in his interrogation was that he was Gaspare Calabria’s man, which spoke to his loyalty, not betrayal, but the minor exaggeration wasn’t something likely to get either himself or his people on the force in trouble. “I can play you the tapes if you want to hear it from both Hughes and Gutierrez,” Gordon went on, pressing the bluff. “Or we can cut the crap and get down to discussing what you knew and when you knew it.”

“Lawyer. Now. Go fetch, I said.”

“I told you about your lawyers, Mr. Calabria. They’re not responding to our calls. Could it be someone took them out? Maybe Nate wants to cut all ties?”

“Nate takes care of his people. That’s why we’re so loyal.” Though it must have hurt him to smile with a busted lip, he did so anyway,

“You’ve met Nate in person?”

“No,” Calabria said. “But I don’t need to. I talk to his people, and they don’t brag about where he’s hiding. We’re professionals.” He leaned in to meet Gordon’s gaze. “See, that’s what professionals do for each other when they follow a code, Commissioner. They look out for one another. They don’t abandon ship, like some pigs I know,” he chuckled. “I hear you guys are having a hard time finding and keeping good help these days.”

“Not so much as you might think,” Gordon said. “The feds are coming to town, Mr. Calabria. If you don’t believe that either, I can give you the name of the woman leading the task force—her name’s Sarah Essen. I expect her here in a day or two. You can deal with her and her people when they get here or you can deal with me, right here, right now. I can tell you this, though, you’re gonna get a better deal working with me. Start cooperating now, and I can guarantee that it’ll be softer on you.”

“You don’t have anything on me.”

“We have video of you discussing certain business matters with members of the Juarez cartel.”

Calabria scoffed. “Given to you by the bat, I’ll bet. Inadmissible. He’s a vigilante, a criminal wanted by this very department. Anything he brings you can’t be used in court. It’s inauthentic, and is as good as doctored footage from some punk using a computer in his parent’s basement.”

Gordon sighed. “C’mon, Mr. Calabria, you and I both know that there are ways to make them admissible.” Gordon was walking a fine line here; the tapes were running, and he had to make sure he didn’t say anything that could get him in trouble when replayed later. “Especially once the FBI gets involved and sees that the voice analysis and face-recognition all match. Right now, this footage’s origin is officially unknown.” Perhaps later it would be labeled as footage garnered during the stakeout of qualified officers? That was what he hoped Gaspare Calabria was smart enough to conclude.

“Piss off, Commissioner!”

“You’ve had some problem with the feds before, haven’t you, Mr. Calabria? That’s what your file says here,” he said, reaching to his right and opening the folder. The rap sheet was quite impressive. “You’re a career criminal. No dummy, either. You’re a recruiter, right? A specialist who brings in new blood to dwindling organizations. You started out helping Cosa Nostra, but got loaned out to their friends in the vory v zakone in Russia. You developed a reputation that took you all through Europe, and now you’re touring the States, it seems.” He looked up from the file. “Selling your wares and services here now, eh?”

“Piss off. Lawyer. Go fetch.”

“Word gets around fast, just like your reputation did years ago. Funny thing about a reputation, though, it can be ruined fast with even the slightest rumor of flipping for the cops. I know that’s very important to a man like yourself, so you can’t just tell us what we need to know because it would ruin your business.” Gordon shrugged. “That, and we all know what people like Nate and his employers do to snitches.” Gordon smirked, and ran a finger over his mustache. “Tell you what, work with us, and we can see to it that you maintain the appearance of staying true—you’ll go to prison and everything, there’s no getting out of that now, I don’t think, not with the case we’re building, but it’ll be a nice prison. Plush. And, years can even be shaved off for assisting us. Special Agent Sarah Essen is a personal friend of mine. We can make arrangements.”

“Piss off. I’d still have to testify.”

He’s mentioning testimony as thought it’s his last reservation, Gordon thought. I’m getting somewhere. He talks about loyalty, but it’s just an act. He wants free and clear like the rest of them. Who wants to go to a hard pen for decades on end? Worse yet, who wanted to be tried for having a hand in a serious act of terrorism? “No testimonial would be needed, Mr. Calabria. See, we know you’re not the ultimate brains behind what happened. We only want two things from you: Nate’s location and the name of the person who contracted you to assist them in the attack on the Muslim Center.”

Calabria looked at him long and hard. “Mm-hm. And, in return, what do I get?”

Not so cocky now.

“We charge you with aiding and abetting known drug smugglers, the Juarezes, and probably a pair of charges for kidnapping. To be perfectly honest with you, we can’t pin the murders of Margot Tralley and her daughter on you, but we’ve definitely got you for the kidnapping. Gutierrez says that your people left them alone and alive—I tend to believe him. I think someone else showed up after your people left. I think that person was the person who you did the job for, and I believe they were the ones who arrived later to kill the Tralleys.” Gordon shrugged. “You assisted in the abduction which led to their deaths, but you did not kill them yourself. How’s that?”

“I want that in writing,” Calabria said at once.

Gordon feigned benevolence. “Of course, Mr. Calabria.” Got him. A few minutes later, the Station Chief appeared with a document drawn up. These days, the GCPD had these generic forms just sitting around on computers, only needing slight changes here and there depending on the thing being confessed or consented to, and after Calabria had reviewed it and watched Gordon sign it, he signed it himself.

A few minutes later, Harold Palnick, a public defender that Gordon had known for years, stepped into the room from where he’d been waiting to finish his part of the theatrics. These days, Gordon had to play every trick he knew. “Sorry I’m late,” Palnick said, playing the part of rushed legal defense. “Had a meeting with the city health inspectors all the way across town. What’d I miss?”

Gordon pretended to bring Palnick up to speed, and Palnick pretended to be catching up. Once he introduced himself to Gaspare Calabria, Palnick assured his client that the document would hold up in court as long as he followed through with his end.

It was important that they rush this, or else Calabria would have time to think about everything and back out. Their behavior here wasn’t very ethical, but the criminals of Gotham had pushed them to desperate measures. “Now, Mr. Calabria,” Gordon said, “the name of the person who handed you this job.”

“Just so’s we’re clear, by ‘this job’ you mean only the kidnapping of the mother and the girl, right? Nothing else?”

“That’s correct.”

Calabria licked his lips, hesitated, then spoke. “I didn’t get his full name,” he said, glancing sidelong at his new lawyer. “I spoke with him only once over the phone, but it was a long call, where he gave the names and places, all the instructions.”

“If you only ever spoke to him once, then how did you hear of this individual?”

“I got his number from the owner of a nightclub. Some guys from Tony Zucco’s crew had worked with the nightclub owner before, and they vouched for him.”

“Which nightclub?”

“The Iceberg Lounge.”

Gordon nodded. “That’s that new joint out on Cape Carmine, right? Been around for a while but got bought out, renovated, and renamed.”

“Yeah. The owner knows things. He’s kind of an information broker.”

“The owner’s name?” Gordon could look that information up himself, he was only asking so he could watch Calabria’s face when he said the name. It was a minor detail, but important in testing the validity of a criminal’s claim. When they start ratting, they’ll say anything to get out of trouble.

Calabria had what appeared to be a moment of trepidation, and perhaps regret. Was he already regretting how fast he’d folded? Then, figuring a lot of his cards had already been revealed, he said, “Cobblepot. Oswald Cobblepot.”

“Could you spell that?”

“C-O-B-B-L-E-P-O-T,” Calabria said. “But that ain’t what people call him around the Lounge.”

“What do they call him?”

“A lotta the guys call him ‘Bird Man’, on account he’s a bird lover, some kinda collector, keeps robins, ravens, hawks, larks, all sorts o’ birds in his home. He’s got some in special cages throughout the Lounge, especially on the upper floors where he keeps these large emperor penguins.” Calabria snorted. “Some people call him the ‘Penguin’, but he hates all his nicknames.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s short, fat, has an ugly crooked nose and looks ridiculous in the black tuxes he always wears.”

“No, I meant, why does he hate the nicknames?”

“Because it reminds him that he’s short, fat, has an ugly crooked nose and looks ridiculous in the black tuxes, of course.”

* * *

THE FIRST ATTACK came from Alan, who swung the padded focus mitts at Bruce’s head so hard that it rattled his brain when it connected. An instant later, both Sergey and Don attacked him with their pads. Bruce brought his hands up to his head in the pensador position, covering himself from the rain of blows.

The pads slammed against his arms and elbows, almost none of them hitting his head, which was the point of the drill. The three men he paid for private instruction were masters in various arts—judo, aikido, jiu-jitsu, silat, kali, muay thai, and KFM—and together had helped develop a hybrid art of all of those systems specifically for Bruce, ostensibly because he was rich and important and feared threats from kidnappers or just some random mugger like the one that had taken his parents from him.

Blow after blow rained down while he remained in the middle of the training room, acclimating himself to the chaos of an actual fight. He moved around them, ramming into them, reaching out every so often when he saw an opening to perform a hard grab against their skin or clothing, pulling the limbs hard and wrenching limbs to the point that they nearly hyperextended—Bruce had incredible control, and knew when to ease back on the power. Alan, Sergey, and Don all knew how to train intelligently and safely, as well, without suffering serious injuries, although minor scrapes and bruises were very common under this kind of intense training. It was also expensive training, costing three hundred dollars an hour per instructor.

Today, Alan and the guys were pushing Bruce through shin-pressing drills—each time his leg interacted with one of theirs by happenstance, he trained it to be an automatic reflex to press his shin into theirs, and then reap the foot out from underneath them. Knee-bumps also helped in the off-balancing of opponents, and because of this Bruce was able to blend his judo training to perform better throws.

Bruce’s thoughts were both here and there, both now and then, sometimes touching on the no-mind territory that he had originally been trained to search for so many years ago when he started down the path of martial arts training, and yet a focused rage was also washing over him. He tried not to think on it too much, but it was there, a small fragment in his brain, an irritant driving him insane no matter how much he tried to ignore it. Alfred had told him he was overworked many times before, and, for the first time in all the years since they had started this venture together, he was starting to believe the old man. And even that knowledge enraged him further.

He was going fast, much faster than usual, when he suddenly lashed out with an elbow and hit Don hard in the side of his temple. “Whoa! Time out!” hollered Alan, and they stopped to check on him.

Bruce, panting and still feeling the adrenaline coursing through him, blinked to see what was the matter. In the frenzy of mock melee, he hadn’t noticed Don’s left eye bleeding. It wasn’t a large cut, but it was a bleeder. He went over and knelt beside him. “Whoa, I’m sorry, Don. You okay?”

“Yeah, Mr. Wayne. Just fine,” he huffed. “Been doing this a long, long time. Hazard of the job, happens all the time.”

“Yeah, but never with me. I usually have more control than that. My apologies, sensei.”

“Already forgotten.”

Despite Don’s nonchalance, Bruce knew it was his fault. It was. In martial arts training, the injury was the fault of the person who threw the damaging attack, especially if the other person had only been coaching with pads on.

“What’s say we tone it down a bit for the rest of the day?” Alan panted, wiping sweat from his brow. “Maybe work on some kicking? But I suggest hydrating first, Mr. Wayne. You’ve been working very hard this morning. Too hard.”

The big kicking pads came out, as did the body shields. Bruce hydrated as per his sensei’s command, and after a brief rest period he started timed rounds on kicking, throughout which Alan shouted at him to roll his hips more. “You’re too tense today! Remember, loose! Roll the hips! Loose, loose, loose!” Normally, his kicks were powerful enough to knock Alan backwards, even with the body shield, but it was hard to relax with so much on his mind, and power came from relaxation and throwing the various strikes with snap—force equals mass times speed, after all, and speed only came from a relaxed state.

After thirty minutes of that, Alan finally said, “All right, I think we’ll call that a wrap.”

“Actually, I was hoping we could go a little over today,” he said. “Just some light, technical stuff. The last time we spoke, you were showing me grappling and choking methods using the sarong. I’d like to see some more of that, if you don’t mind.”

“We could swing that.”

The sarong was a piece of clothing like a sash, common in Indonesia, and used in the art of silat. The sarong was used for extremely devastating grappling maneuvers. Constantly on the lookout for ways to improve his overall tactics against the scum of Gotham’s underbelly, Bruce had been thinking of adapting the sarong training into a method for using his cape for more than just a distraction in a close-quarters combat situation. Bruce had used the gi in many grappling arts before to perform collar chokes, but sarong training opened up a plethora of new opportunities.

The instructoin took another hour, with Alfred coming in intermittently to look in on the training. Bruce felt the butler’s reproachful gaze from time to time, knowing what it was about. Finally, after Alan and the others had finished giving Bruce a variety of new drills to play with, they broke from training and discussed the next time when they could meet up and do some more work together.

“You mustn’t beat yourself up over this, Master Bruce,” Alfred made clear, once they’d all left. “I won’t allow it.” It was late. The story had been on the TV all day, including new rumors that Commissioner Gordon, already a controversial figure when he took office (because of his relationship with the bat, of course), had sought out the Batman for help in the Riddler case.

And there it was. He had a name now. The Riddler. It was official. No turning back. They had given him what he wanted, and that was recognition for his efforts. Now that he had that, the addiction would be on him. It might sate his ego for the time being, but eventually he would have to seek out his next big fix.

On top of all this, the trial had been going on for the better part of a day and there were constant updates online in various forums from journalists who had been granted admittance into the courtroom. The Gotham Informer was actually revealing texts from their journalist on the inside every three to five minutes, and other news stations were scrambling to catch up.

“How do you expect me to feel about all of this, Alfred?” he said, wiping himself off with a towel before throwing it over his shoulder. “Things were getting better there for a time, I thought we were making real progress, then he came along, and now this city’s turning into a circus. His behavior and the attention he got has attracted sufferer’s of the same diseased mind, and now…here we are.”

“Here we are.” Alfred held up a bottle of water, which Bruce took without thinking. “Certainly some of this is because of your arrival on Gotham’s scene, but do you really think all of this is because of you? I had no idea you were that vain.”

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Bruce snorted, and took a long swig. The water drooled down his chin and he wiped it off with the towel. “It’s not vanity speaking. It’s reality. Alfred…I’m thinking of backing off.” He looked at the old man. “From my work, I mean. I’m thinking…of calling it quits.”

“You’ve talked like this before,” he said. “But look at all the good work you’ve done, sir.”

“Undone in an instant. As soon as the clown took center stage, Gotham took on a whole new meaning. It’s something else now, a different creature. A maniac kidnapping random people and putting them through torture and traps…Gotham’s different now.”

“This city has a long and storied history,” Alfred reminded him. “And sordid. Did you know it was founded by a Swedish mercenary in 1635, and that it fell into a kind of chaos and lawless hell during the Revolutionary War?”

“Of course, I did.”

“Did you also know it was home to a great deal of occult sects for a time, and that a terrible lot of them had to be squashed out before order could be restored?” He smiled. “This city has overcome a great many things in its time on this earth, sir. So have other cities in other parts of the world. Have you ever heard of Louis Dethy?”

Bruce thought that sounded familiar. After a moment of thinking, something clicked. “A Belgian guy, right? Went crazy and tried setting up some traps in his home?”

“He had a wife and fourteen kids, sir, and he cheated on his wife and lost everything in the divorce. After that, he was removed from his mother’s will. Suffering from depression and worried that he might get evicted, Dethy rigged his entire home with shotgun-loaded traps that would blow someone’s head off if they entered—one such was a cooler that, if filled with enough beers to give it weight, would blow the user’s head off. Dethy wrote numerous riddles and clues to himself to remember where they all were, but he must’ve forgotten because he finally messed up and blew his own head off.”

Bruce smirked. “I remember now. It took a full military bomb squad to find nineteen of the traps, yet Dethy’s notes said that there were twenty in all. People say that means one trap still remains in the Dethy home to this day, cocked and loaded.”

“And there were the Collyer Brothers, Langley and Homer. Homer, who was blind, was seen to by Langley, an engineer who designed their house to be filled with tripwires, traps, and a maze of trash, all to keep people from getting into their home and taking his brother Homer away from him.”

“Sure, Alfred, people have always found reasons to concoct traps and kill others with them,” Bruce said. “But there’s a difference here. The Riddler’s designing traps to attract people’s attention, not to make them leave him alone, not to dissuade them. He’s a dynamic thinker with a variety of skills, and he’s issuing a challenge directly to me.”

“My point was, sir, that these menaces you’re dealing with now aren’t anything new. Oh, sure, they come with a new modern-day twist, but as long as the world has been going on, there have always been men such as Vlad the Impaler, Richard ‘The Iceman’ Kuklinski, Carlos the Jackal, and any number of others who gave themselves violent monikers, or were awarded those monikers for strange behaviors or abilities that others perceived as powerful; this also awarded them some level of legitimacy and respect among their peers, and of course drew the attention of sad, attention-starved people in the public who became their fans. These things are cyclical. Why should it bother you now, just because it has happened with your arrival?” His smile widened. “You should be flattered.”

Bruce blanched. “Flattered that I’ve inspired carnage?”

“Flattered that your enemies envy your power. Flattered, that they see you as a symbol so worthy of respect that they clamber to achieve the level of greatness and authenticity you have.” Alfred looked down at his feet, and shook his head. “If you want to stop now, that’s your choice. I won’t stop you. But I’m disappointed that I have to point it out to you, young man, that you’ve done something no one else has done.” He looked back up at Bruce. “You came through and made a significant difference, against all odds and even Gotham City’s police and politicians standing in your way. They’ve been after you for so long now, yet you’ve consistently eluded them at every turn.” His smile widened. “Not even the Joker accomplished that, and he knows it. You don’t think that tears him up inside?”

Bruce had nothing to say. He honestly hadn’t thought of it like that.

“Now, think of the power you wield over this scum, and tell me you still feel like quitting,” Alfred said. “If you do, I’ll still support your decision, but I feel that needed to be said.”

He set the water bottle down, and wiped his face again with the towel. “Then, if I don’t quit—”

“If we don’t quit.”

Bruce nodded. “If we don’t quit, what steps do you see us taking next?”

“That’s not my decision to make.”

“It is since you insisted on we,” Bruce said, smiling back at him. “I want an answer from you, old man.”

“Forget the Riddler for now, sir. I mean, not entirely, of course, for how could you? How could anyone? Certainly not myself. But let the police handle it for now. Commissioner Gordon and his people now have more evidence in their possession than you do—certainly they have the materials of the various traps, and will be tracing their possible origins and any fingerprints or other DNA evidence present—so that means they’ve got all the forensics covered for now, and if anything comes up I’m sure the commissioner will inform you. In the meantime, you can focus on what you were initially focused on before this maniac came into the picture. That would be my advice.”

“Put focus back on Nate and the Falcones, you mean?”

“Them, and others. Like perhaps Tony Zucco, the Juarezes, the Shukurs, the whole bunch.”

Bruce thought about it. Zucco was relatively small-time at the moment, but the others were certainly deserving of his attention. His job as Batman practically forced him to focus on investigations in stages, and like a detective he constantly had multiple cases going on at once, and any one of them could use his attention right now. “But what if there’s more to the riddles we already have? What if another clue leads to some other missing person? What if it’s some clue he’s already given me, one that I haven’t discovered yet?”

“There exists that possibility, Master Bruce. I was only making a suggestion. Take it as you will.” Suddenly, as though just remembering a pie he’d left in the oven, Alfred turned and stepped out of the training room, leaving him alone.

Over the next few minutes while he hydrated, Bruce considered his life, and wondered at the parents he’d lost in Park Row, or Crime Alley, and all the right decisions they had made in raising him until the moment they left him. Now he considered the decisions they had both made in their last will and testament, specifically the one that left him in the care of Alfred Pennyworth, and marveled at their intuition.

* * *

“The state now calls Dr. Harleen Frances Quinzel to the stand, Your Honor,” said Helena Kingsley, rising from her seat.

Sergeant Roy Higgens turned his head along with all the others in the audience to watch the pretty young woman in the red dress take the stand. She was a tiny little mouse of a woman, yet she looked quite composed and confident as she approached the stand. All eyes were on her, the jury’s included. At the single step up to the witness stand, it looked like Dr. Quinzel tripped ever so slightly, and then bowed her head as if to start crying, but turned back to the face the audience, completely fine.

Poor girl must be nervous, Roy thought. Then he reminded himself that this was one of the two main doctors trying to prove the Joker’s insanity plea had merit, and his sympathy for her evaporated almost instantly.

The clerk approached the witness stand and held out a Bible. The doctor reached out, hesitated, but went ahead. It was a motion perhaps missed by everyone, or else immediately written off an instant after it happened, but Roy caught it. What’s her problem?

“Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?” asked the clerk.

“I do,” she said.

The clerk walked away, and Kingsley approached the stand. “State your name for the record.”

“Harleen…uh…” She swallowed, cleared her throat, and started again. And then, to Roy, it looked as though the mousy little woman glanced off to her immediate right, to where nobody was, and made a gesture to shoo something away.

A fly? he thought, and immediately disregarded it.

“Dr. Harleen Frances Quinzel,” she said finally.

“How old are you, Dr. Quinzel?”

“I’m twenty-seven.”

“Where do you live?”

“At 44 East Street, in the Sunny Cove townhouses, near Robinson Park.”

“And what is your occupation?”

“Uh, I’m the ACA, or assistant chief administrator, for the rehabilitations wing at Arkham Asylum.”

Kingsley stood about three feet away from the stand, speaking loudly so that the jurors could hear. “And what do your duties include at Arkham?”

“Uh, I conduct interviews with the patients, or am at least present for the majority of the interviews, and help determine whether a patient is faking it or not—some people do fake symptoms for attention—and if they’re not faking, I then help determine whether a patient should be admitted to the general help wing, or if they ought to be enrolled for more long-term care in the institution.”

“Define long-term care,” Kingsley said, folding her arms.

“Well, uh, the focus is on rehabilitation, of course, not punishment. Um, you can expect to see patients taking up sewing, knitting, meditation, or even playing an instrument or taking foreign language classes. Um, John Doe, for instance, is enrolled in both a music appreciation class and a sign language class. He so far seems to have taken a liking to Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata and has asked for access to a keyboard so that he may try to learn to play, and has shown incredible speed at learning sign. Our patients are encouraged to search for these creative outlets to express themselves.”

“I see. And what criteria determine whether a patient should be admitted to the general wing, or given this sort of long-term care?”

Dr. Quinzel sighed, and smoothed out her dress. To Roy, it looked like this was the fifth or sixth she had done this. She also glanced to her left, at the judge, staring at him for a moment, but then blinked and remembered herself. “Um…well, we have a series of questions we ask both the patient and any other healthcare providers they’ve ever had, including their personal physician, and we also examine the patient’s medical history.”

“And what are you searching for there?”

Dr. Quinzel licked her lips. “Um, anything that might lead us to a conclusion about the extent of physical damage done to the patient’s brain.”

“For instance?”

“W-well…there’s any sort of head trauma, say from a recent car accident or even a serious bicycle accident when they were younger. We also look for signs of strokes, as those can cause serious damage to key portions of the brain, affecting not only motor functions but also personality and reasoning abilities.”

“And emotional trauma?” Kingsley asked.

“Uh, for emotional trauma, we’re looking for anything in a patient’s history that has been proven in numerous studies to have negatively influenced growth of the brain in the pivotal developmental years,” Dr. Quinzel said. “These can be, uh, um…” She went blank for a second, swallowed hard, and then snorted. No, not a snort, Roy thought. Was that a titter? Did she just laugh? He glanced at the clown, and saw that he was looking up at the witness stand with great interest. Finally, she collected herself, and said, “Um…these can be events such as divorce, abuse by a parent, legal guardian, or other authority figure, or abandonment.”

“Constant institutionalization throughout their lives is also taken under consideration, I understand?” Kingsley posed.

Dr. Quinzel looked up sharply, and the look on her face said she already knew where this was going. Roy Higgens certainly did, and he respected Kingsley more for mentioning it. “Sometimes it is, yes,” said the doctor.

“And why would previous institutionalization matter so much to the doctors at Arkham?”

“Because not all institutions are the same.”

“I see,” Kingsley said, seemingly satisfied, and then changed directions. “There’s a maximum-security wing of Arkham Asylum, isn’t there?”

“Yes, ma’am, there is.”

“And what would a patient have to do to get in there?”

Here, Dr. Quinzel gave pause. “I’m sorry, ma’am, have to do?”

“Yes, what would they have to do to warrant admission into the maximum-security wing at Arkham?”

“Well, we don’t actually weigh the crimes of what a patient has done, per se.”

Kingsley raised an eyebrow, and put her hands in her pockets. “So, to be clear, you’re saying you don’t actually care what sort of crimes a patient has committed?”

“W-well,” the doctor said, licking her lips. “Certainly we take criminal history into consideration whenever we’re trying to find a list of behaviors for the patient, so that we can have some idea of patterns.”

“I see. So, you’re looking for patterns when you look at a patient’s criminal history, nothing more?”

“It helps separate us from approaching the patient with a…vengeful attitude. We’re not out for justice for criminals, ma’am, we’re out for rehabilitating the sick.”

Kingsley nodded thoughtfully. “Uh-huh. And, in your estimation, the defendant John Doe is sick?”

Dr. Quinzel nodded eagerly. “Very sick, ma’am.”

“Did you come to this conclusion by looking at his medical history?”

Dr. Quinzel shook her head. “No, ma’am.”

Kingsley shrugged. “Why not?”

“Because there is no known medical history for Patient Two-one-seven…er, I mean, John Doe.”

“No known medical history?” Kingsley said curiously.

“No.”

“What about his personal history? Divorce, childhood abuse, abandonment at a young age, past institutionalization, all that?”

Roy smiled, nodding along with the other officers around him.

Dr. Quinzel was forced to say, “No, we couldn’t examine any of that.”

Kingsley said, turning to look at the jury curiously. “No examination of either past medical problems or serious emotional trauma during the patient’s developmental years? But, Dr. Quinzel, I could swear you just told us that all of these decisions were made through careful examination of a patient’s medical history, their childhood, and any sort of past institutionalization in those pivotal developmental years.” Dr. Quinzel remained perfectly silent, but her eyes were fixed on the prosecutor in what looked to Roy supreme suspicion of motives, like a hyena waiting to see if a lion was going to leave the rest of the zebra for others to eat.

“Dr. Quinzel, you’ve made the recommendation that John Doe sitting there is not only a certifiable psychopath, but he’s also in possession of something you call ‘super-sanity’.” Kingsley walked over to the prosecution table, and opened up a folder, where several passages were highlighted. “You say here, quote, ‘ultra-sensory perception in Patient Two-one-seven has created a mind so finely tuned to its environment that it has become inundated, and thus overwhelmed, by the amount of data streaming in.’ Those are your words, Dr. Quinzel. Do you still stand by them?”

“I do,” the doctor said after a moment of pause. “This patient is unique, and in ways that are not immediately obvious unless you’ve gotten to know him.” She turned to address the jury. “That much would be clear to any clinician who cared to examine the—”

“Ah, so he’s not just unique because he has a history we know of, but he’s also unique in ways ‘not immediately obvious,’ which means in ways we can’t see. That’s interesting. And why is he so unique, Dr. Quinzel?”

“Because he has no known history at all.”

“And what about this super-sanity, Doctor? What’s the history of those studies?”

To Roy, it looked like Dr. Quinzel chewed on the inside of her cheek a moment before answering. “There are no in-depth studies into it,” she said. “Mine was to be the first. The results of which were to be published for peer review later—”

“Wait, whoa!” Kingsley laughed. “So this super-sanity has absolutely no previous study besides what you’ve done on it? And only recently?”

“Myself, Warden Sharp and Dr. Bates at the asylum have done extensive work on the theory, examining the brains of patients under new advanced CAT scan equipment.”

“Including John Doe’s, the defendant’s?”

“Yes.”

“And what did you find?”

“Uh, well, we found interesting hormonal shifts in both the parietal and occipital lobe regions, and a strange fluctuation in the transference of brain signals between the thalamus and the neocortex, where sensory information is passed on for processing.”

“Uh-huh.”

“You see, recently it’s been found in studies that cortical inhibitory cells, which suppress communication, are relatively insensitive to inputs from the thalamus region compared with excitatory cells, which encourage communication—”

“I don’t mean to interrupt you, Doctor, but could you please explain what exactly that means so that a layman could understand?” she said, nodding to the assembled jury.

Dr. Quinzel licked her lips again, and sighed. “That part of the brain is responsible for sensory perception, generation of motor commands, uh, spatial reasoning, language and conscious thought,” she said. “Misfirings combined with hormonal shifts in that region of the brain, and even minor damage done to the corpus callosum, it can produce aberrations.”

“But that’s it? Just ‘interesting’ hormonal shifts, that’s all you found,” Kingsley confirmed. And then she looked at the jury and shrugged. “Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve read numerous articles on the human brain in my time, and, correct me if I’m wrong, but those aren’t so uncommon. In fact, perfectly normal, functioning members of our society suffer from misfirings in the brain or hormonal shifts such as the ones you’re describing all the time and still conduct themselves in a lawful manner, isn’t that right, Doctor?”

She nodded. “That’s right, yes.”

“So what should make the Joker’s case evoke sympathy from the people of Gotham City?”

Dr. Quinzel shifted uncomfortably in her seat, and her face reddened. Roy wagered that, like any scholar, she didn’t like her work called out in public like this. “There are other factors. We’re still conducting experiments and working on the theory.”

“So, you’re still just working on this thing, which may turn out to be nothing at all?” Kingsley shrugged. “So, why should we listen to you at all, Dr. Quinzel?”

“I thought I heard my name called to take the stand.”

A light chuckle rippled through the assembly, even a couple of jurors smirked. Touché, Roy thought, and had to give that one to her. What he didn’t like was that the clown had tittered again, and his lawyer, Beckett, gave him a reproachful look.

“And so it was,” Kingsley agreed. “And you think your work has been sufficient to prove—”

“I don’t think my work’s been sufficient to prove anything,” Quinzel countered, suddenly taking the offensive. “Actually, the work is still ongoing, but it’s a slow process, much like the legal system, but now that the trial has kicked off I’ve been forced to sound my opinion earlier than I would’ve liked, before I have all the facts, Mrs. Kingsley. So, before you sentence a man to die or spend the rest of his life amongst true monsters, I thought I’d weigh in before years from now we look back and discover what a mistake we made.”

But Kingsley was good. She had trained under Harvey Dent, and she could not be derailed so easily. “So you’re telling us that you, a well-educated woman who was valedictorian of Brentwood Academy and graduated as valedictorian from GU, and who just got finished telling us about the important process it takes to thoroughly understand a patient’s history, are making a judgment call on John Doe, the ‘Joker’, based on no known personal history before he showed up in Gotham City years ago, no known medical history at all, and based on a theory of some ‘super-sanity’ that has only emerged relatively recently from you and a handful of doctors in Arkham Asylum. Is that about right, Doctor?”

“Every so often, an aberration does emerge that forces the medical community to rethink its stance on many items it had previously believed set in stone,” Dr. Quinzel said calmly.

“You were attacked by this man while interviewing him, weren’t you, Dr. Quinzel?”

She shifted again. “I was.”

“That must’ve been very frightening.” Kingsley was now approaching the stand.

Dr. Quinzel nodded. “It was.”

“Because I’m wondering what an educated woman such as yourself could see in this man to want to rescue him from justice, Dr. Quinzel,” Kingsley said, walking until she stood a couple of feet from the doctor. “This man, who attacked you, attempted to kill you, and yet you’re here defending him.”

“My duty is to the patient, ma’am, not to you or the justice system.”

“You’ve got a book coming out later this year, don’t you?”

At this, Dr. Quinzel cocked her head sideways, curious, but silent. The courtroom was dead silent while they waited for her answer. When finally she spoke, she said, “What has that got to do with anything we’re here to discuss, Mrs. Kingsley?”

“I’m wondering if you, or the doctors at Arkham Asylum, haven’t recently developed an unhealthy infatuation with these ‘aberrations’ as you call them,” Kingsley said, raising her voice. “Is it to sell a book? Perhaps you’ll add a chapter to your new book, or you’ll write a completely brand new book filled with intriguing insights about the Joker, and you’ll be the toast of the psychiatric community.”

“Objection!” shouted Beckett, standing to his feet.

Judge Cavanaugh glanced up and waved a hand. “Overruled.”

“Dr. Quinzel, are you planning to write about the Joker in any future works at all?”

“I don’t see that that has any relevance. It’s quite common for clinicians to chronicle their experiences for the benefit of others in their field, who may learn from—”

“Answer the question, Doctor. Yes, or no. Are you currently working on any works at all based on your time spent with John Doe the ‘Joker’?”

Roy watched closely. The doctor fidgeted, licked her lips, and fidgeted some more. “I…I am,” she said meekly.

“And this book will take a sympathetic view towards the Joker, won’t it? It’ll try and paint him in a way that satisfies your super-sanity theory, isn’t that right?”

“Objection, Your Honor!” Beckett cried. “Leading the witness!”

“Sustained,” said Judge Cavanaugh.

“I’ll rephrase the question, Your Honor,” Kingsley said. She turned her attention back to the doctor, who, to Roy Higgens, looked just possibly on the verge of tears. “Dr. Quinzel, will this book, which you’ve already admitted includes sections based on your work with the Joker, attempt to prove your new super-sanity theory?”

“It…it will…but—”

“No further questions, Your Honor,” said Kingsley, turning around and heading back to her table. “Your witness,” she said to Beckett.

“Don’t talk to her like that,” someone said. Beckett was about to rise when he looked around, realizing it had been his client speaking.

Everyone in the room paused—Judge Cavanaugh, Beckett, Kingsley, the bailiffs, the jurors, everyone. Roy turned to look at the clown, who was looking up and rubbing at the top of his shaven head with one hand, and looking in the general direction of the prosecutor.

Kingsley looked at the Joker. “Excuse me?”

“Don’t. Talk. To. Her. Like. That,” said the Joker in a voice so low Roy barely heard it. “She’s been very kind to me, so don’t talk to her like that.”

Kingsley looked at Judge Cavanaugh, who said, “Mr. Doe, we are in session, and you will not speak out of turn again in my courtroom, is that understood?”

“Just as long as she and I have an understanding,” the Joker said, looking up at Kingsley.

That caused a ripple of shock, a few gasps from audience and jurors.

Cavanaugh might be a large, mostly asleep sort of judge, but he certainly didn’t like anyone else commanding his courtroom. “Mr. Doe, you don’t make stipulations like that in my courtroom,” the judge said. “Do you understand?” The Joker said nothing. “Give me some sign that you understand. Are you capable of that much?”

Everyone watched in awkward silence, and a few of the guards at the other side of the room looked tense, as though they suspected something might go down at any moment. Roy thought, With the Joker, I can understand their anxiety. He was suddenly made angry all over again at his new permanent place in a wheelchair, because if he wasn’t condemned to the thing he could be standing there beside them.

Ultimately, the Joker said, “I understand, Your Honor. I prostrate myself before the court and beg its forgiveness.” He said it all with a supreme air of sarcasm, and gave Kingsley one last look before he gazed back at the table in front of him.

Tensions eased, and Beckett finally stood up to cross-examine. While the minor drama had played out, Roy had looked around the courtroom, and he was certain that almost everyone else missed it since their focus was on the clown, but the doctor, who was still on the witness stand, seemed to be smiling…affectionately. Now, with Beckett approaching the witness stand, Dr. Quinzel stopped smiling at once and took a deep breath, composing herself. Roy glanced around the courtroom, wondering if anyone else had caught the momentary strangeness written on the doctor’s face, but if they did nobody was discussing it with anyone else.

For once, I wish cameras had been allowed inside the courtroom, he thought. I’d like to see a playback of that.