Author: Merlinchylde

Rating: PG

Warnings: Semi-slashy undertones, if you want to interpret them that way.

Disclaimer: I don't own the Batman franchise. Obviously.

Light and Dark

I have lived with fear until it has become almost the blood in my veins. I have my schoolyard tormentors of long ago to thank for acquainting me with that most potent emotion. It was they who drove me into the dark corners of the human mind, and there I have stayed and made a home for myself.

Scarecrow, my tormentors called me. The skinny, gangly boy whose only true love was science. Scarecrow, an ugly creature made of straw and not flesh and bone, unlike they. I used to despise the name. Now, I am the tormentor. Now, I relish the disgust they have for me. I don the mask and am transformed. I make them feel what I have felt my entire life. See if they can survive it as I have learned to. See if they can learn to love it. Most collapse. And they thought I was the weakling.

It was not my fault that I am what I am now. Most of the time I don't think there is anything wrong with me at all, but there are these shocks. These glimpses of something harsh – a slant of light slicing into the dark corners. A comment by someone that makes it clear that I am a Bad Person in their sense of the world. I ought not to care; I am accustomed to the disapproval of others, I have sufficiently distanced myself from any emotion that is not useful. I have learned that it is impossible to please others. I am not built for pleasing others, and it is only foolish to try. But sometimes, somehow, something gets to me and I think, Oh – would Mother be ashamed of me? Then it is difficult for me to believe, again, that I had no choice in becoming what I am now. That it was the world, their cruelty, their lack of acceptance, that forced me into creating the Scarecrow.

The Batman holds me very close. His cold hands are on my wrist, my face. In my drugged eyes he is a demon. If I were younger, less experienced, or someone else, I would be paralyzed with fear. But fear, like science, has become one of my only loves. The Batman cradles me with rough hands, and through my new eyes he is beautiful. He is the embodiment of what I have lived with all these years, what I have studied and even created.

I stare at him. He asks me something, but I only briefly register it. The sound of his voice is lovely. I don't know if I answer. I want him to hold me closer. I want to feel my heart beat faster. I want to taste that metallic tang, that special flavor that is Hell's ambrosia. I want him to make me scream. I want him to press his sharp teeth to my throat and finally, finally take me fully into where I truly belong. That darkness. That fear.

But he doesn't. He throws me away, and as my consciousness dims I have one of those glimpses again, one of those shocks. I have labored all my life to know fear, to create it. There is no one who knows fear as I do, no one who loves it as I do. Yet the Batman, that most perfect personification of fear, has thrown me away. I chose him, but he did not choose me. We are so alike, but he is different. Somehow he has chosen a path that diverges from that of true darkness.

Was there a chance I could have stepped away from the darkness? Could I have forgotten all their taunts, brushed them away instead of embracing them? Was it weak for me to walk this path?

But my vision, it darkens, no matter how I try to see light. There is a disconnecting within me, a crumbling... I feel a part of me dying, killed by the toxin of my own making. Jonathan Crane, that weakling, is disintegrating. Only the Scarecrow will be strong enough to survive.

I know that this is the last glimpse I will ever have. There will be no more light. And though the light was always harsh, I feel almost sad that it will be gone forever.

Author's Note: This is the second piece of fanfiction I've ever written, so I'm still getting my feet wet. The first one was a while ago... so I don't know if this is any good. Opinions appreciated. :)