#why did i kill him

[inkskinned]

it's extremely critical that you see the photo of the perp walk for luigi mangione as being propaganda. i've seen so many people wave it off and instead fawn over his looks. and trust me, i know it ended up being kind of pathetic and weird - but please don't brush it off as a "modelling opportunity" for him. it's a fucking terrifying message the police are sending.

i want to make a few comparisons here, in case you're not from the US or familiar with why the perp walk thing is something to pay attention to. just to set the groundwork for why this is a purposeful, unusual, and cruel act by the nyc police - for why this is not a common occurrence and for why that matters.

the prosecution alleges the show of force is due to the charge of "terrorism." for comparison, in june 2015, tsarnaev was found guilty for the boston marathon bombing, which killed 3 people and injured hundreds. his actions are considered to be an act of domestic terrorism. i have spent the last hour looking through google for pictures of similar to mangione's perp walk - and so far, i have found zero. i also just do not personally remember a moment like that, despite living in boston at the time.

they allege that luigi is a stone-cold killer who carried out a longterm plan, making him particularly dangerous. again for comparison: in nyc, recently cory martin was found guilty of the killing of brandy odom. the murder was planned and premeditated to steal insurance money. and yet no staged perp walk. why didn't her life matter enough for a "show of force"?

but mangione gets paraded by a veritable army of police officers as if he is a rabid animal. for a single citizen who allegedly killed one other single citizen, the "largest perp walk ever" occurs.

so what is the "strong message" that the mayor and the police were trying to send here? the mayor speaks as if mangione is already convicted of terrorism. there is a very thin number of people who feel threatened by the CEO's death. none of us felt like mangione needs to be under massive armed guard.

the message is that you shouldn't resist. they are trying to "make an example" of him - that if you behave badly and kill a single rich person, you'll be treated as if you killed hundreds of people. you will be treated worse than a man who was found guilty of terrorism. you will be considered guilty without trial. the message is that the rich are a protected class, and you cannot touch them without massive punishment. they are trying to prevent a revolution by showing dominance and force against you.

the message is that the police are a puppet of the wealthy and that the law is not equally applied across class disparity. it is "some are more equal than others." it is "one life is more precious than another."

the show of force wasn't for luigi. it was for us. it was a warning. they are trying to remind us who is really in control.

[muffinlance]

Consider: Post-canon Zuko wakes up in the body of his childhood self, the morning of That War Meeting. Would he still speak against the plans, knowing his fate? What do you think he would do differently the second time around?

"Turned away at the doors, Zuzu?"

"Shut up, Azula," her brother sulked. But sulked weirdly, after staring at her too long and too wide-eyed, not like she'd surprised him but--

But like he hadn't expected her to be there. At all.

He turned away. ...He turned back. "Hey, Lala? Do you think you could help me practice that one set?"

He didn't meet her eyes.

She narrowed hers. "Which set?"

"The one I'm bad at."

She scoffed. Pushed away from the wall she'd been leaning against. "That's all of them, Dum-Dum."

He didn't shout or stomp or yell about the nickname. His lips twitched.

"It's okay," he said. "If you're afraid you won't be a better teacher that my instructor..."

It was the most obvious manipulation ever.

Perhaps if he proved an adequate firebending student, she'd work on his courtly survival skills next. Honestly, it was good that not even Uncle Gets-Cousins-Killed had been fool enough to take Zuko into that war meeting. She could only imagine how terribly that could have gone.

"Keep up," she said, and turned her steps towards the training grounds.

He did. There, and during the katas she ran him through.

Azula kept her eyes narrowed.

"Hey," he asked, "do you know how to bend lightning yet?"

As if he could have missed it, if she'd been able to get more than sparks. "I will soon," she said.

"You will," he agreed, and flowed through his next set. The one she'd only just mastered.

Father didn't notice how weird Zuzu was being. Uncle never noticed anything. Zuko ate dinner and asked a servant for seconds and didn't stutter or flinch or lose his appetite when father asked, coolly, what he'd done with his day. Azula's shoulders tensed, because one mention of how she'd squandered her own training time teaching him--

"Azula hogged the training grounds. For hours," Zuzu scowled, exactly like a petulant thirteen year old.

Exactly like he hadn't been acting all day.

By the time Father was looking her way, Azula had her usual smirk in place. "I'm sure there would be room for both of us," she said, "you're not afraid of a little friendly fire, are you, brother?"

Zuko sulked. And ate his seconds, like he was enjoying each bite. There was something in his eyes, like a joke no one else was getting.

---

Father died that night. A heart attack. There were the faintest of burns to either side of the treacherous organ; the royal physician hypothesized that he'd grabbed at his chest, fingers burning hot in his final moments; so hot they'd only exacerbated the problem.

The royal physician would never have been brought any victims of lighting strikes. Those that occurred in the capital did not generally require a doctor in the aftermath.

Zuzu ate a hearty breakfast.

He didn't order seconds. Azula gave him points, at least, for not being tacky.

---

The sages named Iroh as regent.

They named Zuko as Fire Lord.

"No," the tiny Fire Lord in his perfectly miniaturized Fire Lord robes said, sitting at the head of his war council. "We're not doing that. And I'll be reviewing all recent battle plans, as well. What's this I hear about a division of new recruits being deployed to the front?"

He did not mention how he'd heard of the 41st Division. No one asked.

"Prince Iroh, surely--" one of the generals tried to appeal.

The young Fire Lord's regent was looking as startled as the rest of them, for a moment. Then he sipped his tea, and smiled.

"Your Fire Lord is correct, of course. A change in our leadership--a change the other nations may mistakenly view as weakness--will necessitate a change in our strategy."

"Now," said their lord, "what, exactly, is our overall objective in this war?"

War, the new Fire Lord decreed, was not an end unto itself.

---

The new Fire Lord continued to have time, to pretend to be trained by her. Azula watched him. Adjusted her footwork. Did not tolerate, and was not offered, any commentary on who was teaching who.

"What did you do with my brother?" she asked, as they flowed from one set to the next. As her hands, poised to throw fire, just so happened to be pointed his way.

He missed a step. It didn't look like an act.

"I'm, uh. Right here?"

She didn't bother to dignify that.

He didn't bother to look worried about her hands, one movement off from a true attack.

He looked around, then grabbed her sleeve, and tugged her further from any walls that may hide ears. The royal family's private training grounds were wonderfully large, and wonderfully open.

"It's me," he said. "It's still me. Just. More of me? Longer of me?"

She narrowed her eyes. A familiar expression, by this point. "Explain."

"...I found the Avatar," he said. "And this is definitely his fault, but--but I guess it started at a war meeting, when I was thirteen."

Azula listened. It was a very Dum-Dum story.

[sunderwight]

Scum Villain AU where Shen Yuan and Shen Jiu transmigrate by swapping lives (i.e. Shen Yuan wakes up in Shen Qingqiu's body on Qing Jing Peak, post-fever, while Shen Jiu wakes up in Shen Yuan's body in a hospital in modern China) but it doesn't quite work right.

The system glitches or something and they end up having to jointly time share their lives. Every time a certain moon phase or something (cyclical) comes around they abruptly switch back.

So they spend the entire time trying to undo everything the other one has been up to while everyone around them is just desperately attempting to figure out wtf is going on. Shen Yuan does the skinner quest and stops Luo Binghe's abuse, and Shen Jiu gets a job with a rival company and starts showing up Shen Yuan's brothers. Then they switch back and Shen Jiu is like "it's woodshed o'clock for the beast" and Shen Yuan resigns. Then they switch back again and Shen Yuan saves Liu Qingge's life and gets poisoned defending Luo Binghe, and Shen Jiu creates his own start-up and blackmails his eldest brother about the mistress he's just uncovered. Then they switch back and Shen Yuan gets his brother and his sister-in-law into couples counseling and Shen Jiu embarks on a quest to either cure himself without Liu Qingge's help or die trying.

Eventually they just start leaving bitchy messages for one another to find and doing things that won't cause lasting damage but are incredibly petty. Shen Yuan keeps trying to tell Shen Jiu to read PIDW but Shen Jiu takes one look at his merch-filled bachelor pad and immediately decides that his opinions aren't worth anything, so it takes him a while to actually do it (he is really mad about this when he finally opens the novel and it turns out to be extremely relevant information).

[fincherly]

my gf was looking through wesker's wiki page (as you do) and sent me this

and i lost my shit bc it just seems like they're looking at him like girls look at a weird bug

[nixthelapin]

I find this dichotomy so funny:

Odysseus, who has been in war for years and is quick to be crafty and trick his enemies: *laments and mourns giving up mercy and being forced to become the monster*

Telemachus, the one with a reputation of being small and weak with a good heart: *kills a man from behind while they’re distracted without any hesitation or remorse*

[beastlyidiocy]

Feuċ, súile Dé go fuireaċ air

[teshiee]

i did not think this out much...at all, but drawing it was a lotta fun!

also i almost made lloyd veronica but i changed it to nya before i even started working on the. actual heather trio so yay!!

[starry-bi-sky]

Blood Blossom Au: Baby's First Commissioner Meeting :)

TL:DR This Post: Danny (orphan) gets poisoned with blood blossom extract by Vlad. He runs away from him and ends up under the care of one Pre-Robin Battinson Batman! Starry is loudly pushing her batdad agenda.

(Also known as "Late At Night, When The Nightingale Sings" on my ao3!)

This was a fun rough idea I've been sitting on for weeks, thinking about how Commissioner Gordon and Nightingale's first meeting might go.

---------------

Commissioner Gordon likes to think that he's adjusting to the new normal of Gotham very well, -- the new normal being grown men running around dressed like bats, in military-grade strength body armor, committing acts of vigilantism, -- and slowly, little by little, he was no longer being surprised when this new normal pops up out of the shadows like the world's most terrifying daisy. His shaving lifespan thanks him for it.

....

The kid is a surprise though.

Granted, he seemed to be a surprise to the Bat too.

There's been a string of murders lately, -- which, in Gotham, is kind of like saying there's been another storm during monsoon season. And there's just been another; in some dilapidated building down in south Gotham, with the broken, boarded-up windows and mildew-crawling walls to match. The victim is a man in his thirties, multiple gunshot wounds to the chest, left in the center of the room for the blood to pool out around him.

The place is already secured when he arrives, the building swarmed with officers and the forensic detectives. The Bat emerges shortly after he does -- or, he might've been here the whole time, hiding someplace dark and shadowy. For his own sanity, Gordon doesn't think about it too hard.

The kid is a surprise, and he appears like a bolt of lightning.

He shows up in the middle of a conversation Gordon is having with the Bat.

A whistle, sharp and loud, slicing through the air, meant for open air rather than a confined space. Gordon's ears pierce and protest the sound, and the solemn, murmured chatter floating through the room abruptly cuts off like the swing of a gavel. As he turns towards the sound -- as they all do -- he swears, up and down, that he sees Batman's shoulders jump, just slightly.

At the source, perched on the window, is a boy. A boy in a gray-blue scarf and an oversized black hoodie, one that hangs off his frame and has ace bandages wrapped around the wrists in some attempt to cinch the sleeves. The hood is up, big like the rest of it, and threatens to swallow the upper half of the boy's face whole in the fabric. What upper half Gordon can see, is smeared with some kind of opaque, black face paint. He's holding onto the side of the frame with one hand, on his hip is a grappling hook. A familiar grappling hook.

Gordon has multiple questions, and his officers tense up.

Martinez puffs up, brows furrowing as his face shapes into a frown. Shoulders rolling back. "You can't be here, kid--"

The reaction is immediate, like a spark to gunpowder, the boy yanks his fingers from his mouth and his mouth twists into a scowl. Head snapping over to Officer Martinez, his hood manages to stay on but Gordon swears that as he bares his teeth, the glint makes them look sharper than they should be. His voice is rasp and quiet and harsh; snappish in its hissing; "Put a fuckin sock in it, Martinez. I'm not stayin."

Martinez reels back, and the boy immediately veers his attention off him. Like a switch, his demeanor drops. Despite half his face being covered, his mouth twists into a cringing, apologetic smile. Slanted and off-beat, embarrassed. It'd be disarming if this wasn't Gotham, and if he didn't just hiss at Martinez like he was about to bite his head off.

"Sorry." He whispers, voice deceptively polite and softer now. Gordon has to strain his ears to hear him. "I was looking for him."

He points his finger towards-- Gordon? No, Gordon follows the direction, and finds himself looking at -- the Bat.

The Bat, who always looks stiff as a pole, now looks even stiffer. Somehow. Well, the explains the grappling hook attached to the boy's waist.

"What are you doing here?" The Bat says, gruff and unable to completely smother the stumble of surprise in his tone.

The boy still holds a sheepish smile, and slips off the window ledge. His feet hit the creaky boards with a near-silent thud, the Batman finds his feet and rapidly begins crossing the room.

Gordon notes the slight tremble in the boy's legs as he straightens. He adjusts his scarf, which droops close to his knees now that he's standing, and slings a backpack -- how long has had that? -- off his shoulders. When the Bat reaches his side, he does as he always does, and looms over the boy like a spectre. A threatening mass of shadows cloaked in all-consuming black. Standing next to him, the boy looks teeny in comparison.

The Bat is a man who terrifies even the most hardened criminals, Gordon has seen grown men shiver in fear at the mention of his name. And yet when the boy looks up at him, he doesn't even flinch.

Instead, his sheepish smile melts away like ice under the sun, holding only traces of his previous embarrassment. It remains as a shadow on his face, a small upturn at the corners of his mouth. The boy pushes his hood back just enough to reveal glinting, ice-flint eyes surrounded in tar-black face paint. He holds the backpack up with one arm. "You forgot this."

[wishchip106]

i genuinely want to know what Erik’s routine was when he was in prison because they clearly managed to keep his hygiene up somehow

i’m still trying to wrap my brain around it HOW DID THEY TRIM HIS HAIR AND SHAVE HIS BEARD WITHOUT USING METAL?? REALLY SHARP PLASTIC???

it’s also sad but funny comparing him to the man who wasn’t in prison for ten years but still Erik manages to look better then him 😭 that’s what depression does to you though so 😔✊

also another thing the government hadn’t even built the plastic prison when they captured Erik so for some reason this man (who’s one of the most powerful mutants on the planet) managed to escape and then get caught SEVERAL times before they threw his ass in his cell

i thought you were better at this Erik come on man….

[sableprince]

doodlin again i guess ??

scraps under the cut

[nikolaj-costerwaldau]

JAIME LANNISTER in every episode: 1.03 // Lord Snow

[sharffffff]

Pangi: I know that, Pili. Because you can't kill me.

Pili: Are you sure about that?

Pangi: (takes off armor and totem) Go on.

Pili: I have the opportunity to do the funniest thing right now.

Pangi: Go on.

Pili: Wait. Where's my thing?.. Okay, how would you like to die?

Pangi: (sighs) However you'd like.

Pili: Why are you so quiet? Why are you so quiet?

Pangi: Here, I'll even put my bed here, you can kill me three times now. Go on. Do it.

Pili: You look so naked right now.

Pangi: Kill me! You said you could! You said you would! Do it! You said you would! I'm literally a one shot for you right now, Pili.

Pili: That's a crazy sentence to say.

Pangi: Is it wrong?

Pili: No... You know, maybe the Derapchu effect is real-

Pangi: No, nononono, where did your big talk go, Pili? Where did your big talk go? "I could kill you", "I would kill you", "Yeah, let's kill Pangi!", huh?

Pili: (starts punching Pangi with a fist) See, I'm doing it!

Pangi: Yeah, go for it!

Pili: Why do you have no knockback?

Pangi: I don't know.

Pili: Why do you have no knockback, this is not fun, I can't push you into the water. I can't push you into the water! This is not fun!

Pangi: So when are you going to kill me, Pili? I'm waiting.

Pili: Why are you so... suicidal? You are-

Pangi: No! Nononononono, don't make this about me, don't make this about me! You were just like "Oh, let's kill Pangi, let's kill Pangi!" Nono, this isn't about me. You were just a second ago "Let's kill Pangi, let's do it, let's do it, let's kill him, let's kill him, I would kill him, what if I join the yellow team? What if I kill him?"

Pili: (still punching Pangi with a fist)

Pangi: There you go, you're almost there, you're getting there, you're getting there. Fi- si- five hearts. Come on. You got it. You were like "I'm gonna kill Pangi, I'm gonna kill Pangi."

Pangi: But you can't.

Pili: (stopped hitting him, laughs, continues to hit him)

Pangi: But you can't.

Pili: It would be so funny if I killed you, wouldn't it.

Pangi: It would be really funny. Two hearts.

Pili: (stops hitting him) But you will also get really pissed off at me... (walks off)

Pangi: (chuckles) That's what I thought.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Let the revenge games begin.

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[lightgamble]

DAREDEVIL: BORN AGAIN | 1.09

Karen arrives.

[threepandas]

Bad End: Happy Wife

Thirteen servants were dead; Two estates on fire.

I never even made it to the gates.

The smell of smoke lingered in the air. Clung to his hair and skin, even after bathing. Because no amount of scented oils, scrubbing, could erase his sin. The scent of iron and cooking flesh. Cruel scents of ancient houses ablaze. Innocent people being slaughtered. For... for the crime of trying to help me.

It was all my fault.

Last time, I had escaped alone. Or... more laughably, he had let me escape.

So he could hunt me through the forest like a brightly colored deer. Some pretty prey to stalk and torment. Letting me exhaust myself. Run and run until I could no longer, before casually strolling up to come collect me. As though letting me get it out of my system. A man, merely humoring his wife's tantrums and overly dramatic, willful ways.

I never should have accepted help. No matter have lonely I was. How desperate my despair. Because... because-!

"I'll get you new ones. Don't be upset, Love." The monster that was my husband, said idly. His voice a low rumble like thunder, his so called 'sweet' tone. "Servants that can't obey their lord, can't be trusted. Shouldn't be kept. They were scum. I'll get you better ones."

Ha ha... more like, servants that obeyed him. Feared him. Had no shred of mercy or honor, left in their bones. Gods... I... I had condemned thirteen good souls. All for trying to help me. Save me. Just for trying to get me out of this hell and away from this man.

I would never forgive this life's sperm donor, for handing me over. Because... because after a betray like that? After I had begged? Begged and screamed, rioted and tried to run? And STILL he handed me over? He was no kin of mine. I had no family.

Not in this life.

My family may not have been perfect. May have been flawed. But they would never have handed me over to a psychopath. Sold me to the highest bidder, like chattle. And... and honestly? I would take them at their worst, over these bastards at their best.

I never should have read that STUPID book. Yeah, maybe, it had nothing to do with anything. Maybe, all it would have done is left me ignorant on top of being stranded. But? I had to blame something. Or I'd go insane. So it was the fucking book's fault.

Recommend by an internet friend. Historical fiction. Lots of complex characters and some spicy yandere. How FUN. Court intrigues! Poisonings! Bastards and hidden births! Great to read... literal hell to live through. Everyone wanted everyone fucking dead, and all I wanted? Was to marry far, FAR into the countryside. Live a boring ass life.

But apparently I blinked funny. Or was standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. Wore the wrong fucking dress (well, not dress, but you get the idea). Because next thing I knew? Yandere Sr., of Yandere and Yandere, is looking at me! And not in that "oh, what an interesting bug" sort of way! Look looking!

I didn't know shit about him! Yes, his son. But him? Nothing!

Well... aside from the fact he was a VERY convenient Widower. Like... the SECOND he got a kid out of his arranged wife. It was all very "everyone suspected but no one could prove shit" Sort of thing.

And? Said son? Becomes a major antagonist in the book. Until he "embarrasses" his Father by going too far. Implied gruesome end to follow. Plot moves on. Which? Is all well and good FOR THEM. But what about me?! I had nothing to go on! Aside from "Aaah ha ha ha! Run." Which? Didn't fucking help, in the end! Still... s-still ended up married.

Though, my new "son" ended up dead, in relatively short order. Apparently wasn't too pleased to have a step-mom. Tried to do something about it. Disappeared between one day and the next. And now no one is allowed to so much as talk about him. But hey! It's apparently fine! Because at some point? We're gonna make a better one!

"Your thoughts are far away, Love. Should I help you concentrate?" Husband muses, from the edge of the bed. I jerk back as I jolt violently to the present, focusing on the threat. He looks pleased. "Better~, this wife should focus only on her Lord. And yet... once again she's wandered. Tried to run. This lord wonders what he should do, hmm?"

Scrunched up in a ball on the bed, I hoped the answer was fucking "nothing". Or maybe, perhaps, "leave". Inching backwards, like the hunted animal I felt like, I wasn't fast enough to avoid the hand that shot out. Capturing my ankle in shackle strong grip.

It wasn't crushing. Left no bruises. Yet the touch felt scalding, as his hand imprisoned yet cradled my ankle. Dragged my leg free of my curled up little ball of self. I froze, as I felt his other hand gentle running the tips of his fingers up and down my shin. Up and down, up and down. As though just feeling my skin.

"Should he make sure his wife can not run?" This grip tightened, nearly bruising. His other gripping farther up my leg. As though casually preparing to snap bones. "Or perhaps, he should chain you away? Hmm? This Lords wife is a troublesome girl. Causing trouble as she does... ah~, what to do with her..."

Terrified, sat froze. Mind numb. Please. Gods. Please, please, please! D-Don't. I was shaking. Could feel tears starting to build. Watched, helplessly, as he examined me. Something pleased, satisfied even, creeped into his expression. And without breaking eye contact, he lifted my leg towards his face, to gently kiss the skin right above my ankle bone. It could have been tender... if it didn't feel like a threat.

"This wife is so very lucky, that this Lord loves her so. That he would never."

It was almost mocking, in how sweet the words curled. As though suggesting that because this one thing was too far, he was a good man. As though suggesting that he would do far worse to others, in my place. But don't worry. You won't be hurt. See how benevolent he is?

"But come, let us not discuss your punishments tonight, hmm?"

Like a predator, stalking his prey, he crawled up onto the bed. Closer and closer. There was no where to run. Was this it? W-was this the day he... he-? Looming, on his knees, above my curled up ball of fear, he effortlessly worked his arm in and around my waist. Dragging me closer. All but into his lap.

"You are tired. Upset. Have made such messes for this husband to clean." He murmured, face pressed close. Breathe ghosting against my neck, my ear. All I could smell was rich soaps and smoke. "We can deal with this tomorrow. For now, it's time for bed. So go ahead, rest sweetly in my arms, Love.

"It's where you belong."

[stars-obsession-pit]

Hello! Can do a chapter fic off this fic prompt Danny phantom x dc: https://www.tumblr.com/corkinavoid/767516270934556672/dpxdc-legal-power?source=share

This isn’t a one-to-one recreation of that dialogue but it’s based on that as a framework/premise

Batman dropped down into the room behind a pair of figures—a teenage boy and a slumped adult—letting his landing create an audible thump to alert them of his presence.

If the teen noticed, he didn’t react. Even as Bruce approached, he continued to stare impassively at the wheezing figure on the ground, an old wooden bat with flaking green paint on its side loosely held in his right hand. Bruce had already suspected who the figure would be since he arrived, but seeing the Joker so broken was still bizarre. No laughing, no schemes. He didn’t even seem to be attempting to escape his binds, just… lying there, almost as if pinned in place.

Bruce paused a step behind the teen. “I don’t know what the Joker did to you, but this isn’t the right way to go about this.”

The teen scoffed, and Bruce felt a painful lurch in his chest as he was reminded oh so strongly of his son Jason. “And what, let him go kill more people?”

“I know he deserves to face justice, but not like this. Everyone deserves a right to fair trial. No one person should be judge, jury, and executioner.”

The teen turned to look at him with glowing green eyes, and Batman felt himself freeze. He had faced gods before, yet even using that as a comparison felt like an understatement. The boy’s eyes belonged to someone far older than his teenage form implied, and they radiated power. Inevitability.

When the teen—no, the entity—spoke again, his words carried an unearthly echo. “Perhaps, but I’m not acting for just myself.” He paused, glanced down at the Joker, then asked almost conversationally, “Do you know how many people he’s killed?”

Another pause, but before Bruce could even try to answer, the entity continued, “Eight hundred and fifty-six. He’s ended the lives of eight hundred and fifty-six human souls. I can tell you about every single one, if you want. About who they were, what their dreams were before he killed them. About the pain they felt at his hands.”

He punctuated the word ‘pain’ by raising up the wooden bat in his hands and ramming its end down onto the Joker’s arm. He let out a wheeze, muffled by the gag in his mouth.

“I have a duty to my people. I am the King of the In-Between and of all the souls that pass through it—even ones whose stays were as brief as his. I am the rightful arbiter of his fate. And with that power, I sentence him to death.”

He raised the bat again, adjusting his grip so he’d hit with the side rather than the end this time, then paused and let out a chuckle. “Of course, just because it’s based on some justice doesn’t mean I can’t have a bit of fun with it too.” He swung the bat down, slamming it into the Joker’s side, then hooked it under the clown’s torso and flicked him up through the air to slam into the wall. “We all really hate this guy.”

With the entity’s attention fully turned away from him as he sauntered towards the Joker’s slumped figure, Bruce could finally unfreeze himself.

Even if the Ghost King did have the right to pass judgement on Joker, Bruce still couldn’t let torture go on like this. He wouldn’t win a direct fight, but he could hopefully at least grab the Joker and bring him over to the police. Carefully, he reached for some of the smoke bombs and batarangs on his belt and readied his grapple. He’d have to do this very, very fast.

But before he could move, another figure entered the scene. Red Hood, emerging from the shadows on the far side of the room, an unexpected bit of a pep to his step.

“Nice to see someone else who gets that that bastard needs to die. But if I may make a suggestion, how ‘bout you use a crowbar instead of that old bat? It’d be a bit more… fitting.”