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Edward didn’t actually like pain. It’s an accusation that was levelled at him frequently, given his regular tendency to leave a man who enjoys causing pain a trail of breadcrumbs to his exact location, but it’s not true. If he enjoyed anything about his confrontations with Batman it was the intellectual sparring, not getting his face slammed into a wall until part of it broke.
So, it was unfortunate that this plan had inevitably required Batman beating the shit out of him. Joker hitting him in the nose with a lamp had felt slightly less necessary, and thus that much more annoying. But Joker was on the floor on the other side of the room now, and Batman had Edward all to himself. Which of course meant pummeling him into the floor.
A crack echoed across the room, the sound of a blow not muffled by the synthetic fabric of Batman’s gloves. Edward could see Joker glance up in surprise from where he was currently relocating his shoulder against the wall. Batman paused in his onslaught, reaching up to test the spot on his jaw that Edward had nailed with a punch. Edward could tell just by looking that it was going to bruise.
Fuck.
Batman punched him into the window, the glass shattering at his back on impact. Before he could fall, the Bat grabbed his collar and dragged him back to safety for a blow to the side of his face, right where Edward had hit him. So much for turning the other cheek. As Edward staggered at the force of the collision, Batman whipped around to slam his armored elbow into Edward’s ear, sending him tumbling to the ground.
Okay, that was enough. At least, it had better have been enough. Edward hadn’t taken any painkillers before this, the way he usually did before an anticipatable Bat-beatdown. Technically speaking, he’d been piloting an aircraft a few minutes ago, which had seemed like an ill-advised activity to be hopped up on opiates for. Now, he was beginning to think he should have just risked the possibility of crashing his kite into a building.
“M-Mercy,” he gasped out, squirming to avoid another blow to his face. Batman’s fist hit the tile floor with a force that Edward could feel where the back of his head touched the ground. “Mercy, please,” he tried again. It was impossible to move out of the way of the next punch, the weight of Batman’s entire body now on top of him, pinning him down. “Mercy!”
The Bat stopped, staring down at him. Either his thirst for violence had been quenched, or he’d just finally heard Edward’s begging over the sound of his own fists. “Mercy,” he agreed.
Even though that single word was spoken in the same gravelly monotone that the man said everything, it managed to sound so condescending that Edward wanted to scream. The fact that Batman pointedly wasn’t moving from his position pinning Edward to the ground hadn’t escaped his notice either.
God, Batman was such an asshole. If Edward had a weapon on him, he didn’t know if he could have resisted taking a surprise shot at that stupid square jaw and starting the fight all over again. For once, he was happy to be unarmed, since that would have been unproductive.
“Yes,” Edward muttered, trying and failing to pull himself up onto his elbows. “I lose. You win. Fine! Marvelous. Now, tell me, I can’t see over your... thighs...”
He really couldn’t. They were simply enormous. If Batman had any sense between those pointy black ears of his, he’d go into a much more profitable business than vigilantism. Edward tried to twist his body to see around them, but the sheer length of the Bat’s legs meant that they literally obscured his entire field of vision.
Batman was staring at him. Edward realized he’d trailed off in the middle of his thought. He blamed his developing concussion.
“Is he laughing?” Edward asked. It was possible that the pause had put too much of a disconnect between his question and his last statement, but he’d rather sound disoriented than deign to repeat himself.
There was no movement in Batman’s expression. Or, unfortunately, his body. “What?” he asked, and Edward would have wailed his fists against the man’s stupid giant thighs, if only he could move his goddamn arms.
“The Joker, you imbecile,” Edward gritted out. “He should be laughing. Is he laughing?”
This, for some reason, was what got Batman to get off of him. He rose in a single smooth motion, stepping to the side and pulling his cape out of the way of Edward’s view. Everything was fine in his world now, Edward supposed. It was occasionally disturbing how casual Batman could be after he thought he’d won, in comparison to his seemingly limitless capacity for violence while victory was still in question. As if their business transaction was over, now that Edward had been beaten to a bloody pulp.
“I don’t know,” Batman said, tilting his head to regard Joker himself. There was no discernible amusement in Batman's blank expression or monotone timbre, but Edward felt like he could sense some regardless. “What do you think?”
Joker was, rather obviously, not laughing. He’d risen to his feet at some point— meaning Edward was now the only person on the floor, which was annoying— and was currently in the process of trying to rub blood off of the knuckle of one of his purple gloves. His tongue poked out of the side of his mouth in his concentration.
He looked up from his glove, seeming to notice that the only other two conscious humans in the room were staring at him. He looked from Batman to Edward, then back again.
“I’m making it worse, aren’t I?” he asked, raising the back of his hand for their examination.
“Yes,” Batman said.
“No!” Edward shouted. They both looked at him like he was insane. Which was ridiculous, coming from them. He would have laughed himself if he wasn’t too busy being furious.
“It should have been enough,” Edward growled, forcing himself back onto his feet. “Wage an entire war, destroy half the city, only to lose because of Kite Man?”
Charles made a strangled groaning sound from where he was lying on the floor. Batman glanced over at him, seeming slightly concerned. Was Kite Man still conscious? That was almost impressive. Or it would be, if it didn’t mean that Charles was so stupid he didn’t even know how to take a chair to the head properly.
“Do you know how much work it takes to create a foil named Kite Man?” Edward demanded, marching over to Joker. “To set him up as an informant, to kill his son— who was literally named Charlie Brown— to manipulate Batman into leaving him for last, because I knew you were coming here, to the top floor of a building that could be accessed by kite?”
Joker scratched his head. “Can’t the top floor of any building be accessed by kite?” he asked, confused.
“That’s not the point!” Edward roared, grabbing the clown by his lapels. “Me, begging mercy from Batman, because of someone who calls himself Kite Man? That’s funny! You should be laughing!”
“Enough,” Batman said, presumably bored now that everyone’s attention had been off of him for longer than five seconds. Edward whirled on him, unwilling to tolerate the interruption.
“This isn’t about you, you idiot!” he shouted. He picked a paperweight off the floor and threw it at Batman’s chest. It bounced off and clattered on the floor. “Do you really still think all of this is about who gets to kill you? That anyone involved in this was bothered by you being alive?”
Batman didn’t respond. Edward could practically see the gears turning in his head. Fucking neanderthal.
“I could kill you at any time,” Edward said, sneering. “Easily! Shooting you in the head would be considerably less complicated than herding you from riddle to riddle.”
Joker nodded sagely, holding two fingers up to his temple as a pantomimed gun. “It’s all the time you spend unconscious,” he said, conspiratorially. “Very difficult to dodge bullets when you’re not awake.”
“I keep you alive, for the same reason we all keep you alive,” Edward said, jabbing a finger in Batman’s direction. “You’re a riddle we’ve all already heard, that we return to even though we know the answer. Because you’re fun. Even if you’re not as complicated as you think you are.”
The Bat leveled a withering glare in his direction. The exact emotion behind the expression was indecipherable, even by his standards. There was a low growl in his throat, but he didn’t speak, nor did he move forward for an attack.
“But you,” Edward said, satisfied enough to turn to Joker. “The man who laughs at everything, who now can’t laugh at anything? That’s a puzzle that only the Riddler could solve.”
“Is that a riddle?” Joker asked. He seemed distracted, tapping his lips with bloodstained fingers. “I could have sworn it was a joke. Doctor, it hurts when I... no, that’s not it.”
“You think HE could have solved it?” Edward asked, gesturing wildly behind him. “Even if he cared— which he doesn’t— the man doesn’t have a comedic bone in his bitter, bat-obsessed body.”
He snuck a quick glance behind him, just to make sure Batman wasn’t going to object to that with a display of physical violence. Unnervingly, Batman seemed to be staring down at the floor. Edward wasn’t even sure if he’d been listening. To his irritation, Joker didn’t seem to be listening either, too busy muttering something about two children playing doctor.
“That’s still not it,” Joker said. He hit the side of his head with his palm, like if he rattled his brain enough he could shake out whatever he was looking for.
“Making up a war, losing the war in the most ridiculous way possible,” Edward continued, trying to draw back Joker’s attention. “Didn’t you get it?”
“Mama called the doctor and the doctor said...” Joker trailed off, shaking his head. “That’s not even a joke!”
“Do I have to explain it to you?” Edward demanded. “Are you that stupid?”
Joker clapped suddenly, startling him. “Of course!” he exclaimed. “A man goes to the doctor. He tells the doctor he’s so miserable he can’t sleep, can’t eat. He feels all alone in a world where his future is vague and uncertain. He begs the doctor to help him. And the doctor says, hey, what’s that in your hand?”
“What?” Edward asked, confused. Then he realized that Joker was looking behind him.
Edward whirled around. Batman was standing much closer than he’d been the minute before. In his hand, he was holding one of the knives Joker had been disarmed of during their fight. His stare was still inscrutable, and it was targeted directly at Edward.
“You destroyed half of my city,” the Bat said slowly, “to tell him a joke?”
It was difficult to resist asking him what made it his city, exactly. But it was starting to occur to Edward that he might have been spending a little too much time today provoking the violently unstable vigilante.
“You never— Batman doesn’t—” Edward started and stopped, his mind racing as his mouth went dry. “That’s hardly necessary,” he said eventually, deciding to try and defuse the situation with humility. “I was wrong. Isn’t that punishment enough?”
Batman answered by thrusting forward with Joker’s machete. That was on Edward, really, for phrasing his argument as a question. His body failed to move as quickly as his thoughts, barely managing to wince before the knife came colliding with his face.
Warm blood splattered across Edward’s skin a mere instant after he closed his eyes, and his terrified heart nearly beat out of his chest before it occurred to him that spurting blood was usually only half of the experience of being stabbed.
He opened an eye experimentally, more than a little worried that he would be rewarded for his trouble with a blade through his cornea. The glimpse of the sight in front of him made both his eyes widen in shock.
The Bat’s arm was still extended, holding the knife so close to Edward’s face that the tip was just barely grazing his upper lip. He looked as shocked as Edward felt, and were they in literally any other situation, he probably would have found the widened stare of the cowl’s white lenses extremely comical.
Instead, his attention was somewhat fixated on where the knife was embedded through Joker’s hand, preventing it from coming any closer to Edward’s face. His purple glove, already stained from the fight, was now a wet and nauseating black around the metal piercing his hand. Blood dripped out from under the cuff, falling to the floor in droplets that sounded deafening in the dead silence of the room.
Joker stared at his hand, enthralled.
“Now that,” he said, his previously strained expression transforming into a familiar grin. “That’s funny!”
Edward stumbled to the side, catching himself against the wall as a hysterical peal of unforgettable laughter echoed throughout the building. He took deep breaths, trying to refocus himself. It didn’t work. He watched as Batman let go of the knife, staring at Joker with a look so horrified that you’d think he was the one who’d been stabbed.
Then his gaze turned to Edward, and something new entered his expression. Fear? Disgust? An apology? Edward decided it didn’t matter. Nothing would have satisfied the painful feeling of betrayal that was growing out from the pit of his stomach. He wanted to walk right back over there, yank the knife out of Joker’s palm and carve up the Dark Knight until he knew exactly how sorry he should be for this.
But the sound of Joker’s laughter kept him pinned in place. It smothered the room, an affront to Edward’s senses all the more for the fact that he’d been seeking it out only minutes before. He clung to his anger, refusing to let that miserable thought extinguish his need for reprisal. It wasn’t enough for the Bat to betray Edward’s trust, forcing him to make the humiliating realization that he’d put any trust in Batman at all to begin with.
He just had to make Joker laugh while he did it.