sweeping changes

[mind_game]

Jane has finally been updated in all of the "extra" worlds with no Bells, Jarvises, or other routine visitors to the peal, and she is conducting template sweeps in them.

[Hey,] she tells all the Jokers and all the Bells. [There's a Joker in world number twelve who wasn't there before I crashed. Can't find him online at all, though.]

Comments

[mind_game]

"Earth. Has a Gotham. No magic or aliens or anything else that I've been able to detect. Currently June, 1988. No Bell, and a standard Earth one would be born by now," Jane adds.

[yourheartstrings]

"How old were we in '88?"

[gunpowdergelatine]

"Mmmmmm... twelve?" hazards Queenie.

[manofmyword]

"Think so," says the Joker.

[yourheartstrings]

"Thereabouts."

[pythbox]

"...I'm in this, right, this is a question to me, I used to have a Gotham," says Harley. "But I have no idea what year."

[mind_game]

"Gothamed Jokers were all born in 1976," confirms Jane.

[manofmyword]

"So our new friend is probably roundabout twelve," says the Joker. He looks at Elspeth.

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Assuming Harley wants to recommend me as a foster-parent for Jokers," says Elspeth, "I'll go talk to this one."

[pythbox]

Harley grins at her. "Of course I do," he says warmly.

Corona is shaking his head. "Twelve, though, oh man. Do you really know what you're signing up for?"

"Elsie's awesome," Harley assures him.

"Yeah, I'm getting that, but you" (Corona freecasts across the room to give Harley a hug) "are a special case - unless I'm the special case? Back me up here, guys, are twelve-year-old Jokers mostly incredible little shits or what?"

[manofmyword]

"Mm, well, you are a special case," says the Joker, "but that doesn't mean we weren't."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Harley was lovely when he was twelve, but of course we shouldn't expect him to be typical. What may I be signing up for?"

[manofmyword]

"Theft," says the Joker. "Destrrruction of property."

[gunpowdergelatine]

"Indiscriminately pissing off everyone in sight just to see what they do."

[pythbox]

Corona frowns thoughtfully and doesn't add anything right away.

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Maybe not the wolf village house, then," muses Elspeth. "Wolves are easier to piss off than vampires."

[pythbox]

"This is true," says Harley. He gives Corona a hug.

[her_imperial_radiance]

"But I can go back to following the capital around. And property can be fixed with coins," shrugs Elspeth. "And I don't piss off easy - although there's Jake."

[yourheartstrings]

"Yeah," says Ghosty. "If you're gonna take on a twelve-year-old Joker, don't keep 'em near somebody who pisses off easy."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Jake doesn't, especially for a wolf," says Elspeth, shaking her head, "on his own behalf. If someone goes after me he has a problem."

[pythbox]

"Hard to say if a twelve-year-old Joker would hit that button," says War.

"Mm," says Corona.

"Well, depends," War concedes.

[her_imperial_radiance]

"What on?"

[pythbox]

"He doesn't wanna hurt anybody, but he wants to make somebody hurt him," says Jellybean.

"And we don't know how far he'll go to get it, because we don't know how far he'd have to," says Corona. "Or what it's been like for him, how he's feeling—"

"He could be another one of me," says Jellybean, "and you'd be pretty much fine, I was all right by twelve."

"Or he could be another one of me and you'd be in for it," says Corona.

[manofmyword]

"I know where I'd put my money," says the Joker.

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Maybe Jake had better be part of this conversation. I don't know what else to do with a twelve-year-old Joker. Although I suppose if he doesn't want to go with me something else will have to be thought up. Jane, can you get my wolf please?"

Elspeth's wolf is got. She holds his hand and explains, silently.

Jake winces. "So, worst case scenario where he's trying to get under my skin through my imprint, what's he going to do to her?"