Harley can no longer remember how many nights she has been celebrating.
A few days ago, her dearest Little Pudding sent her a letter through someone from Arkham. The envelope was scribbled with incomprehensible language and symbols, with many lip marks left in red, like blood.
But she knew it was real. It was a way of communicating that only the two of them could use, like a code or a secret signal, a little secret just for the two of them. Thinking of this always filled her heart with sweetness.
When the trembling prison guard handed the letter to Harley and then screamed and ran out of the circus grounds, Harley joyfully clutched the thin piece of paper to her chest, twirling happily around the room.
The Jester had been caught by the Bat and thrown into Arkham for over half a year now, and Harley missed her dearly.
Upon receiving the letter, she recalled the joy of receiving Christmas presents as a child, the sweetness of tasting chocolate for the first time, and the glee of wearing high heels for the first time.
This joy made her forget about smashing the letter carrier with her mallet, which she had initially planned to disguise as a prison guard to infiltrate Arkham and rescue the Jester.
With one hand gently twirling her hair like a bashful young girl in love and her other hand inexplicably producing a kitchen knife, she eagerly opened the envelope.
Sadly, the joy vanished as soon as she opened the letter. The words on the paper made her involuntarily scream, "Oh no! This can't be real!"
This is what the Jester wrote:
"Dearest Little Pumpkin, how have you been lately? I have some good news to tell you: the world is ending, and we're all going to die! Aren't you excited?"
"Oh, death, such a wonderful word. I've already dressed, ready for the appointment!"
"Today I ate a shriveled roast goose. How about you?"
"My Mr. Soup Spoon hasn't been talking to me much recently."
"Before you die, could you bring the Bat to see me? I'd rather die with her; you can cab home yourself."
"Well, that's it. Do it quickly, muah muah."
While the paper couldn't capture the Jester's signature hysterical laughter, from the messy handwriting and disjointed content, she was still herself.
Among the crooked words were her casually drawn weird doodles, looking like smiling faces, with what seemed like dried snot or drool stains on the paper, indicating she was in high spirits when writing the letter.
But Harley, the recipient, was not in good spirits.
The long-awaited letter turned out to be like this, which made her very sad.
Though knowing everyone is going to die and experiencing the ultimate chaos of people facing death, that thought brought a bit of joy...
Overall, her emotions were complex.
The Jester still had her mind full of the damned Bat. It's as if she were just a driver or an errand girl. What about them being each other's little treats? What happened to Little Pumpkin and Little Pudding always being together...
With hysterical laughter, Harley set things on fire, smashed things inside the house, venting her dissatisfaction. But in the end, she did as the Jester suggested, after all, they were good sisters, right?
Harley never doubted her. Isn't the world's end just a small thing? It must be true.
Not only she herself, but even the circus had been dispatched to search for traces of the Bat in Gotham City.
However, the usual methods weren't working. No matter how much chaos they stirred up in the city, only the boring police showed up; Batwoman never appeared.
For three consecutive nights, Harley went out to cause trouble as if going to work and returned exhausted only when daylight came. Yet, the Bat seemed to have disappeared, not even her shadow showing up.
"Maybe she's gone abroad on vacation. I occasionally think about going to Paris or someplace else."
Harley left large signs on rooftops where the Bat frequently appeared, with cartoon fingers pointing towards her home. She knew that Bat would be able to sniff her out.
Afterward, she returned here, waiting for the Bat's arrival every night.
Initially, she just read while waiting, but that made it too easy to fall asleep. Harley thought this wouldn't do; she wouldn't even know if the Bat came by.
So the next day, it became reading while drinking.
On the third day, it evolved to dancing while drinking.
Gradually, she seemed to forget her original purpose and instead turned the nightly celebrations into a new habit to celebrate the impending destruction of Earth.
But the circus members didn't dare to play with Harley and disliked having hammers smashed on their heads.
This made Harley feel lonely, so she called her friends over to stay and join in the twenty-four-hour-a-day revelry.
Meanwhile, the Jester in the madhouse was driven crazy by the wait. She had no idea what exactly was happening outside, nor why Harley hadn't brought the Bat yet, leading her to laugh more hysterically in her room.
Days later, a mysterious tape got taken out from her room by a prison guard, eventually reaching Deathstroke's hands, and Cindy also took on the task of finding the Bat. This was what happened before Su Ming and Cindy met.
..............
Harley, breathless, clung to a pole, staring at the person on the couch, and then they both started laughing. Harley laughed so hard that her legs went weak, collapsing crookedly onto the couch, seemingly wanting to play with her friend.