The Scarecrow Plot - Part 1
The Scarecrow Plot - Part 1
by Toketsu Puurin
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don't own the Scarecrow, Bruce Wayne, The Joker or any other character in this fic.
Summary: What happens when The Batman's deepest fear takes hold of his life? What happens when it's not a fear he's ever been prepared to deal with?
The Scarecrow Plot
Part 1
Jonathan Crane had a plan.
It was a good plan.
He had absolutely NO idea just how good of a plan it was. After all, if he had... he just might never have done it.
Jonathan was tired of losing to the bully. That cursed bully of a Bat. Oh, he enjoyed their little escapades to be sure. In fact, lately the fights with the Bat were the ONLY things he enjoyed. He still loved his books, absorbing knowledge and new ideas... but they didn't give him the rush, the thrill.
Jonathan was addicted to fear. And like any addiction it took more and more of the drug to give him that high. He'd tried everything he could think of that wasn't Bat related.... well, everything that didn't involve the risk of massive bodily injury and death. He was still a coward after all. He'd even stooped to dosing himself with his own gass just before the Bat arrived... simply to make the rush higher. It wasn't helping. Slowly but surely he was losing the edge.
And of course, in Jonathan's twisted little mind... this was all the Batman's fault. The Batman was a cruel, vicious beast. He knew... oh, yes... he KNEW precisely what it was Crane REALLY needed. And for no other reason--NO OTHER REASON AT ALL--than to be cruel, he was--DELIBERATELY--witholding his full ability to terrify.
It was enough to drive Jonathan mad.
So he formulated a plot. A plan. A marvelous, wonderful, glorious scheme. One that would FORCE the Batman to play the game at his full potential.
The concept was simple.
The Batman obviously controlled himself well enough to deal with the halucinations that the ordinary gas created. He was able to shrug off his neuroses and psychoses like water from a raven's back.
Crane had noticed a very simple correlation. The more terrible a fear the Batman faced, the more unholy he was when he shook it off and pulled Crane back to Arkham. The solution therefore was simple. Crane simply had to unlock the Batman's deepest, most personal fear. One that was so deep, perhaps the Dark Knight didn't even consciously know of it himself.
...which meant that it had to be cultured.
...which meant that first, he had to FIND it.
-----
Crane threw himself into his work with an obsession that went so far beyond manic it went around a second time.
He read everything ever written on the Batman. Every book, every theoretical psychological paper (there were 43), he even went so far as to break into the police archives and steal case files relating to Batman. (He had done that very carefully and subtly indeed to ensure that no one noticed they were missing, and he had returned them when he was finished.)
He had even gone so far as to raid Hugo Strange's old hideouts. Hugo was completely off his rocker with the Bruce Wayne thing... but Hugo also had a very good idea of what made the Batman tick.
After six months of utterly exhausting work, Jonathan had extensive psychological dossiers on everyone who was connected to Batman in a crucial way. He knew how they thought, what they ate... He knew about the past between Batman and Harvey Dent. He even knew how and why the Joker managed to so thouroughly get under the Batman's skin. He actually knew far more about the Joker's thought processes than he wanted to... but it was *Necessary*, because he knew that the Batman knew it--which meant he had to know it as well.
In the end he made a number of conclusions.
The Batman had to be thouroughly dedicated to Gotham. to the utter exclusion of all else. - He could not use this directly against the Bat. It had happened before and the Bat had overcome.
The Batman was at the very least a masochist... Crane thought it likely that he was a sadist as well. The man simply had to have a phenomenal tolerance for physical and emotional pain to do what he did. But he obviously sought it out... If he wasn't so thrououghly convinced the Batman delighted in this pain then he would have thought that it must have been some kind of pennance for some horrible sin in the Bat's past. Then again... considering just how twisted of a soul the bat really was... It just might be anyway. The Bat might actually enjoy taking pleasure in his own punishment... and then punishing himself for feeling pleasure for it. Obviously the Bat had issues.
The Batman was the perfect example of control. Everything about him was cold, calculating and efficent. He showed little to no emotions. In fact the only time he ever seemed to display anything besides irritation was when the Joker pushed all the right buttons. He even displayed the same regard for his supposed allies, using them and manipulating them without a second thought.
What, Crane wondered, could this calculating exterior contain?
The answer, he concluded, was simple. A creature of intense passions. Something so filled with anger and cruelty, rage, devotion, yes even some twisted form of love, that the only way he could ever hope to function was to lock it all deep within himself.
The Batman, Jonathan finally concluded, feared nothing so much as his own heart.
And the only defense the Batman had against that... was his control.
And, as evidenced by the Joker many, many a time... the Batman's control was a very tenuous thing indeed.
That was what Crane had to remove... Just for a short time. Just long enough for the Batman to realize the depth of that fear. Just long enough for him to stare into the abyss of his soul and tremble. Then the Bat would return more terrible than ever... and Jonathan would finally get his fix.
Unfortunately, these plans always work better in theory.
by Toketsu Puurin
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don't own the Scarecrow, Bruce Wayne, The Joker or any other character in this fic.
Summary: What happens when The Batman's deepest fear takes hold of his life? What happens when it's not a fear he's ever been prepared to deal with?
The Scarecrow Plot
Part 1
Jonathan Crane had a plan.
It was a good plan.
He had absolutely NO idea just how good of a plan it was. After all, if he had... he just might never have done it.
Jonathan was tired of losing to the bully. That cursed bully of a Bat. Oh, he enjoyed their little escapades to be sure. In fact, lately the fights with the Bat were the ONLY things he enjoyed. He still loved his books, absorbing knowledge and new ideas... but they didn't give him the rush, the thrill.
Jonathan was addicted to fear. And like any addiction it took more and more of the drug to give him that high. He'd tried everything he could think of that wasn't Bat related.... well, everything that didn't involve the risk of massive bodily injury and death. He was still a coward after all. He'd even stooped to dosing himself with his own gass just before the Bat arrived... simply to make the rush higher. It wasn't helping. Slowly but surely he was losing the edge.
And of course, in Jonathan's twisted little mind... this was all the Batman's fault. The Batman was a cruel, vicious beast. He knew... oh, yes... he KNEW precisely what it was Crane REALLY needed. And for no other reason--NO OTHER REASON AT ALL--than to be cruel, he was--DELIBERATELY--witholding his full ability to terrify.
It was enough to drive Jonathan mad.
So he formulated a plot. A plan. A marvelous, wonderful, glorious scheme. One that would FORCE the Batman to play the game at his full potential.
The concept was simple.
The Batman obviously controlled himself well enough to deal with the halucinations that the ordinary gas created. He was able to shrug off his neuroses and psychoses like water from a raven's back.
Crane had noticed a very simple correlation. The more terrible a fear the Batman faced, the more unholy he was when he shook it off and pulled Crane back to Arkham. The solution therefore was simple. Crane simply had to unlock the Batman's deepest, most personal fear. One that was so deep, perhaps the Dark Knight didn't even consciously know of it himself.
...which meant that it had to be cultured.
...which meant that first, he had to FIND it.
-----
Crane threw himself into his work with an obsession that went so far beyond manic it went around a second time.
He read everything ever written on the Batman. Every book, every theoretical psychological paper (there were 43), he even went so far as to break into the police archives and steal case files relating to Batman. (He had done that very carefully and subtly indeed to ensure that no one noticed they were missing, and he had returned them when he was finished.)
He had even gone so far as to raid Hugo Strange's old hideouts. Hugo was completely off his rocker with the Bruce Wayne thing... but Hugo also had a very good idea of what made the Batman tick.
After six months of utterly exhausting work, Jonathan had extensive psychological dossiers on everyone who was connected to Batman in a crucial way. He knew how they thought, what they ate... He knew about the past between Batman and Harvey Dent. He even knew how and why the Joker managed to so thouroughly get under the Batman's skin. He actually knew far more about the Joker's thought processes than he wanted to... but it was *Necessary*, because he knew that the Batman knew it--which meant he had to know it as well.
In the end he made a number of conclusions.
The Batman had to be thouroughly dedicated to Gotham. to the utter exclusion of all else. - He could not use this directly against the Bat. It had happened before and the Bat had overcome.
The Batman was at the very least a masochist... Crane thought it likely that he was a sadist as well. The man simply had to have a phenomenal tolerance for physical and emotional pain to do what he did. But he obviously sought it out... If he wasn't so thrououghly convinced the Batman delighted in this pain then he would have thought that it must have been some kind of pennance for some horrible sin in the Bat's past. Then again... considering just how twisted of a soul the bat really was... It just might be anyway. The Bat might actually enjoy taking pleasure in his own punishment... and then punishing himself for feeling pleasure for it. Obviously the Bat had issues.
The Batman was the perfect example of control. Everything about him was cold, calculating and efficent. He showed little to no emotions. In fact the only time he ever seemed to display anything besides irritation was when the Joker pushed all the right buttons. He even displayed the same regard for his supposed allies, using them and manipulating them without a second thought.
What, Crane wondered, could this calculating exterior contain?
The answer, he concluded, was simple. A creature of intense passions. Something so filled with anger and cruelty, rage, devotion, yes even some twisted form of love, that the only way he could ever hope to function was to lock it all deep within himself.
The Batman, Jonathan finally concluded, feared nothing so much as his own heart.
And the only defense the Batman had against that... was his control.
And, as evidenced by the Joker many, many a time... the Batman's control was a very tenuous thing indeed.
That was what Crane had to remove... Just for a short time. Just long enough for the Batman to realize the depth of that fear. Just long enough for him to stare into the abyss of his soul and tremble. Then the Bat would return more terrible than ever... and Jonathan would finally get his fix.
Unfortunately, these plans always work better in theory.