FIFTEEN
Downloading, distributing and possessing the pornographic video that had started it all was made a criminal offence with penalties ranging from a five-thousand dollar fine to a year in jail. This action was not taken out of any respect for its famous stars, but in order to avoid a recurrence of the untimely death of any who might possess it.
Naturally, the video thrived on the underground market with the most creative of measures to disguise it undertaken; not simply to avoid the law but to avoid the Joker's attention. One of these measures included the video being inserted halfway through an otherwise intact version of Milo and Otis.
Daniel Leggo was offered a collective fee of fifty million dollars from various media conglomerates for the exclusive rights to his harrowing experience.
He turned them all down. Strangely, the sum total of profits from the sales of Crazed Ecstasy had also equalled fifty million dollars. These profits were confiscated by the police.
Daniel sold all of his computer equipment, his entertainment unit and his extensive pornography collection for a total of ten thousand dollars, changed his name and moved to the Torres Strait Islands where he eked out a humble living painting "authentic tribal masks" for the rest of his days.
Annie Maul was offered three more pornography contracts and one straight acting contract with an emerging Hollywood studio. She took the acting contract, staged a high-profile rehabilitation and starred in a biopic of her own life, as herself. It was revealed she was a surprisingly good actress with excellent business sense who went on to have a highly successful career in cult cinema, padding out her sizeable income with various convention appearances. Ironically, of all the many men who'd fed her that line throughout her life, Joker really did make her career.
In her memoirs, slated to be published after her death, she revealed that she had known all along the Joker's murders were real and had faked drug-induced ignorance so that she could avoid persecution.
Dick Grayson brought Barbara Gordon her cannoli and she showed her gratitude by replacing memories of the Joker and Harley Quinn's amorous exploits with a few of her own.
The Joker and Harley Quinn were kept strictly separated at Arkham Asylum for the duration their incarceration lasted for before their next escape. They didn't seem to mind and Poison Ivy noted that mysterious bruises continued to appear on Harley's body at irregular intervals. Despite a thorough investigation by the Arkham board, it remained undiscovered how they had both escaped from their cell that fateful night and both inmates were completely uncooperative on the subject.
Harley learned about the Joker's revenge and spent the next three weeks of therapy sessions with Dr Leland swooning endlessly over how romantic it was while Dr Leland increased her daily intake of alka-seltzer.
The Joker paraded around Arkham like cock of the walk, enjoying the jealous stares he was now the subject of. The next time he saw Two-Face he gave him a grinning thumbs-up, before moving his fist vigorously up and down in the air, thumb pointed directly at the former District-Attorney. Two-Face snapped the table tennis racquet he'd been holding.
One day, four weeks after the sordid events had reached their finish, Batman discovered Tim Drake rifling through the Bat-Cave's video files.
Tim Drake claimed he had been looking for recordings of news reports of the incident for a school project.
Batman had replied he'd deleted all the files from the case.
They both knew the other was lying.
END
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Hey everyone and thanks so much for sticking with me on this one until the end!
Props must, as always, go to zhinxy for both contributing specific ideas, some lines of dialogue and lots of support and encouragement, acting as a sounding board for other elements as well. She is unbelievably AWESOME.
I wrote this fic simply because the idea of it amused me. That's how it began. My original vision was far simpler and probably wouldn't have involved the Batfamily or gone on for as many chapters, but it kind of grew a mind of its own.
I'm a hardcore shipper, as you all know. I love JxHQ for the psychology and intensity and outright weirdness of it. I also love, very much, exploring their sex lives (the majority of that fic is hosted elsewhere, at the JokerxHarley fanfiction archive).
But I have a good sense of humour about it all. As much as I love this stuff, I'm aware it's all pretty ridiculous as well. You can't take it TOO seriously even when you do, if you know what I mean.
So through this fic I had the opportunity to make fun of myself and of fandom obsession with the sex lives of our favourite characters. It's hardly unique to JxHQ; fans everywhere wonder obsessively about how our fave characters would choose to bump uglies, and spend a lot of time pouring over it in exquisite detail, living our fantasies vicariously through fanfiction and fanart.
So this story became an opportunity to poke gentle fun at this preoccupation. It allowed me to parody fandom theories and philosophies (many of which include my own), the characters' potential reactions and the passion of the fans. I LOVE FANDOM! I love being a part of it, creating and sharing and adding to it with my own contribution. BUT IT IS EFFING FUNNY, as the saying goes.
We are voyeurs in our way. There's nothing wrong with that. The ability to laugh at ourselves makes it even more enjoyable. I had so much fun writing this story and I hope you enjoyed it as well!