* { @goremade sent } ⸻ ' I need you to stay awake for me, harleen. keep your eyes open. '
safety has always been in somebody else’s arms. harleen has bounced from lover to lover since she was eighteen years old, gravitating towards men older than her, stronger than her, crueler than her. if their scarred hearts can learn to beat only for her, then she is pretty enough, smart enough, worthy enough. ‘ daddy issues, ’ she once joked to hannibal. ‘ there. that ought to cover about a year’s worth of therapy. ’
see, it’s easier for harley to blame every rotten thought in her head on someone else. it’s true ⸻ she’s suffered and suffered and suffered. but lately she’s started to wonder if their sins have been absolving her of her own -- covering her greed, her pride, and that gaping black hole in her chest that's destroyed everybody she’s ever loved. maybe she was always going to end up this empty. maybe nobody put her on this path but herself.
there are good people in gotham, but harley quinn's given up on being one of them.
[ text: hannibal lecter ⸻ 11:38 pm ] help me
by the time hannibal arrives, there’s blood pooling outside harley’s unlocked door. the foundation of her apartment’s always been slanted -- you can’t drop anything without it rolling away from you. it’s never been a problem until now. inside the apartment, the trail of blood branches ⸻ footsteps into the bathroom, marks on the way to the kitchen.
in the kitchen: marian drews, joker’s latest lover, the new harley quinn. her entire body is covered in burns, her clothes melted into her skin. there’s a syringe & a bottle of morphine on the kitchen counter. marian’s dead but not cold.
in the bathroom: harleen quinzel, joker’s ex-lover, the only harley quinn. she’s sitting in the shower, water beating down on her face, knees pulled up to her chest. she’s still wearing a black & red bodysuit. it’s hard to tell if the red tint the water pooled around her is taking on is dye or blood. her head hits the wall, and everything goes black.
‘i need you to stay awake for me, harleen. keep your eyes open, ' hannibal says, and she shakes her head. she won’t. she can’t. she’s so fucking tired of other people telling her what to do. she’s so fucking tired of people dying.
but harley’s tired of fighting, too. she presses her hand to her stomach; when she pulls it away, it’s covered in blood. all she says, flat and numb, is “ i took an oath, ” but it’s not enough. she’s never going to be enough.
when she shrugs out of the top half of her costume, a jagged red mark is revealed, slicing all the way across her stomach. next to it is a mark from a needle. no wonder harley doesn’t feel anything.
for a brief moment, harley looks as if she’s about to cry. her lips press together, her eyes well. she opens her mouth as if she’s going to say something else, but it dies on her lips just as marian drews died on her kitchen table.
instead, a smile begins to form ⸻ wicked, empty. “ can you imagine the look on his face? when he finds out i beat him to it? ”