Originally Posted by
Man of Steel
"Wanna know how I got these scars, pretty lady?"
The Joker's tongue tentatively prodded at the scars he spoke of, at either corner of his mouth. The appendage seemed to have a mind of its own, seemed to seek reassurance that the ugly lines of scar tissue hadn't suddenly vanished. His grin widened.
"I wasn't always a . . . criminal, you know. I used to be quite the guy. You'd have liked me."
He nodded, as if in response to a voice only he could hear. The tongue tested the familiar scars again.
"Oh yes, I was quite the guy. I had it all; money, women, cars—everything a man could ever want. I thought it would last . . . forever . . ."
Here a nostalgic sigh interjected its way into his monologue.
"But some "friends," of mine, they had other ideas."
His voice rose, became less timid, more assured.
"They thought I was too high and mighty, and needed to be taught a . . . lesson. So they hired a man. A clown. A clown who liked to start fires. Who liked to watch beautiful things burn. They hired him to come to my twentieth birthday. Then, during my party, the . . . clown . . . set my home—no, it was more mansion than mere "home"—ablaze."
Deep in his memories now, the Joker paused as if to remember what came next.
"Oh, it meant little enough to me. I could always buy another mansion. I laughed it off. This made my . . . "friends," very unhappy, to see me so happy. So in a fit of rage, my best "friend" took hold of my current girlfriend's arm, like this—"
He grabbed her arm in a vise-like grip and pulled her in to him, his white-painted nose burying itself in her hair for one deep breath before he raised his head to continue.
"—and pressed her face to the grill of the nearest barbecue pit. The smell of searing flesh filled the air. Not the sweet perfume it is now, but the stench of my lover's face burning off. My laughter disappeared."
His face took a turn from suddenly grim to almost playful, in a split second.
"He tossed her to the ground like a piece of meat, walked right up to me—about as far as you are right now—pulled a knife from his pocket, and then he asked me, in the most cruel tone you can imagine; that of a friend betraying a friend: "Why . . . So . . . Serious?"
With that moment the brunt of the Joker's true insanity came to bear, as his grin spread yet wider, and the glint in his eye magnified.
"He put the knife blade into my mouth—"
With this, he inserted the point of his own knife into the corner of his mouth, blade facing out, and carefully enunciated around the sharp blade, "—like this—"
Removing the knife from his mouth, he continued, after letting his tongue roam the corners of his lips again.
"—and pulled as hard as he could."
In a jerky motion, he mimed the action.
"Then he did the other side. And then he turned and left. I burned him alive in bed with his wife a year later."
"So, you see, that's why I can never be . . . serious, again."
The Joker's maniacal laughter penetrated the very walls.
