The Clown Prince of Crime narrowed his eyes at the imposter, and reached for the green loon's outstretched hand.
Harleen's eyes flicked to the Joker's own gloved hand, and she wondered, Hang on - has he got the joy buzzer?
As she watched, the men's fingers threaded with no incident, and the Mask lifted the Joker to his feet.
Camera flashes erupted across the club as reporters madly jotted down notes and captured money shots.
Civilians across the club reacted as might be expected. Those who had tumbled to the floor from the force of the Mask's whirlwind picked bits of champagne glass out of their hair and evening garb, and gingerly climbed to their feet. Several left in a huff. Most, though, found their eyes glued to the unfolding spectacle and ordered more hors-d'oeuvres from any dazed waiters that stumbled past their tables.
Some stout, rich men loudly criticized the shoddy service their hard-earned money had bought, stood indignantly, and squeezed the creamy shoulders of their paramours. While the older women piously departed with their husbands, the younger set yanked their husbands' ties, anchoring them to their seats in order to watch the developing scene.
Most of the club musicians cowered behind their instruments. Tina crouched behind a large, artificial palm tree, and sighed heavily. Stanley, what are you doing? This had better be worth it...
The Mask stood a few inches taller than the Joker, even without the snazzy yellow fedora, and the Joker was none too happy about this. He regarded the impertinent fake with a hooded, suspicious gaze. He adjusted the man's black-and-white Pop Art tie, and flicked away an imaginary piece of lint.
"Darling," the Joker drawled. "On the night of your junior prom, didn't your mother tell you that it isn't polite to copy the King's style?"
Harleen noted that while any other man would have hot-bloodedly swatted away the Joker's invasive hands, the Mask only stood with arms akimbo, brought a lit cigar out of nowhere, and jammed it between his teeth. It flapped as he replied, "Well, ya know what they say, Sonny Jim, about imitation and flattery..."
With a flick of his wrist, he was suddenly proffering the Joker a second cigar.
The Joker corrected him, with a tight little laugh: "Joker, if you please. And yes, I do." He glanced at the second cigar, and brushed away the gift. "No, I'm afraid you and I aren't there yet. Besides, my lungs are critical for my work."
The Mask shrugged, and tossed away the cigar; it vanished. Like a revolver, he righted his own cigar and blew out the tip before disposing of it as well. "Shame, Clown Man," he admonished. With the voice of a 1930s Hollywood gangster, he added, "I don't pull any punches with the sacred cigar."
The Joker hmmmpphed. "Well, I would." He folded his arms, and smiled with satisfaction. "It seems you have some ways to go before you perfect your imitation of me."
"Is that so?" the Mask challenged, highly amused.
It was then that the Joker lifted his jutting chin, and his gaze became distant and reflective. His voice made a discomfiting transition to a lilt.
He conceded, "But perhaps I also have much to learn from you...."
The corner of Harleen's mouth turned up. She settled herself back into her chair, folded her arms, ready to watch her 'Puddin' at work.
The Mask arched an articulate eyebrow at this admission from the obviously untrustworthy man in front of him.
"So, in the interest of perfecting my own imitation of you," the Joker continued, his voice moving theatrically. "Why don't you show me what else you can do? What sorts of things you can..." - he let out a low, sinister laugh - "...withstand."
The Mask folded his arms, and took a wider stance. He considered the Joker's request. A miniature Mask, no larger than a Barbie doll, appeared on his broad yellow shoulder.
"Whaddya think, Mini-Me?" he asked the homunculus. "Can the Clown Man deal with my awesome?"
"He can't handle the truth!" the little figure shouted, before disappearing in a puff of smoke.
The Joker's mouth fell open as he realized how beautifully he had fallen into that one-liner. He stared with pure indignance at the place where the little man had sat moments before.
Harleen burst into a fit of giggles, and the Joker snapped, "Har-ley!"
The Mask smiled serenely, and let out an inane giggle. "Well, that's one opinion! But tell ya what," he added. "I'm feeling generous."
Not to mention I've got nothin' better to do until the B-Man shows up, Stanley thought.
"...So, I'll let you have a good ol' look-see at the tricks up my sleeve," the Mask finished.
With that, he rolled his yellow sleeves up to his elbows, and replaced his flesh-toned hands at his hips.
"I only have one question for you, sadistic clown man," he said. "Have you got a giant mallet?"
The Joker blinked in surprise. "You mean you don't have one?" He was immediately smug. "Look, if you're gonna be me, Toots, then that's an embarrassingly basic oversight-"
"Oh, I have one," the Mask assured him, grinning. He reached into his trousers pocket, and heaved out the mallet with both hands, resting the cartoonish implement against his shoulder. "I just figured you'd wanna use your own," he explained.
He dropped into his gangster voice again, somehow artificially simulating the effect of a cigar jammed in his jaw. "Ya know, in case I pulled any funny business..."
The Joker allowed himself a smile of noblesse oblige. "Well put, my odd green man."
The Joker flung out a gloved hand. "Harley, the mallet."
Harleen reached under the table and retrieved the comical instrument. "Here ya go, Boss!"
The Mask gave himself a cloud of mussed gray hair, a huge nose, some horn-rimmed glasses, and a white lab coat. "Now, ze scientifik experts vould call me 'fffysikly impervious'," he lectured, in a bad German accent. "Do you know vot zat means?"
"Yes, I bloody well know what it means," the Joker hissed, as he widened his stance and prepared his swing.
"Zenn haff at me," replied the Mask, his scientist garb evaporating. He spread his arms and legs wide, and stared at the ceiling, as though he expected any moment to be raptured. Hurry up, Dark Knight, he thought. This is gonna be a real drag...
In her hiding place crouching behind the palm tree, Tina stared in horror at the masked Stanley. What are you doing? Why are you just letting the creep do whatever he wants? She had a sudden thought, and her passion cooled. Don't tell me this is a bid for sympathy, Stanley...
The Joker tilted his neck left and right, working out the kinks. "With pleasure, Big Head."
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125,009 Literary Works • 672,837 Reviews
Hey there, sinsitercutlass! Interesting name, by the way! RagingLive here to review your chapter for Review Day! Go Team Tardis!
First of all, I think that you have a very good opening line. Nothing will grab a readers attention more than an opening line, because in those few moments that they're glancing over your story you only have a few seconds to pull them in. I haven't read any of your other chapters, so I apologize ahead of time if I'm ever out of line. This review will be based solely on what I know from this chapter.
A little bit of a problem here. I'm not sure if you're speaking of the Mask and Joker's fingers threading, or if Harleen's fingers are threading. If you're speaking of Harleen's fingers threading, you'll need to remove the 'and'. But after I reread it a few times, I think you're speaking of the former and I think that you need to rephrase:
"As she watched, their fingers threaded with no incident, and the Mask lifted the Joker to his feet."
This should help it make more sense to other readers.
I think that you described what unfolded after this capture very nicely. You detailed each type of person from the waiters, to the upstanding citizen, to the older crowd versus the younger crowd. Very well done!
Call me nitpicky, but it's terribly hard to laugh while talking, and by saying that the Joker corrected him with a laugh, you're saying that the laugh is how the Joker corrected the Mask, not by the dialogue. Also, the colon makes this look like more of a script and less of a novel. I suggest you edit to something along these lines:
"With a tight little laugh, the Joker corrected him, saying, "Joker, if you please. And yes, I do."
Make more sense?
Since the Joker continues talking after the description of what he's doing, you really don't need a new line. In fact, the new line is simply confusing because we think that the Mask has begun talking. I also saw a few other places throughout this chapter where you could put this into practice.
Second, the 'hmmmpphed' looks amateurish, so I would suggest that you change it to either, "The Joker snorted" or say something like, ""Humph, well, I would."
The ellipses here aren't necessary because when breaking into dialogue with hyphens you need only the quotation marks, no other punctuation.
Since this observation is from someone else's vantage point, you need to say 'as if working out the kinks' since we don't really know that he was really doing that since he didn't narrate it to us.
Very interesting story! I liked your imagery and your dialogue, you seem like a talented writer! I want to advise you to keep a look out in your writing for split paragraphs that didn't really need it. I counted multiple of these, so you'll want to revise this chapter as well as proofread your future chapters.
Keep writing and keep on smiling!!
~RagingLive
Hello there! Overall, this is a great piece, and I really enjoyed reading it.
I just have a few nitpicks, and it's up to you whether you take them or leave them. I hope you take them into consideration
"Civilians across the club reacted as might be expected." This wording is a bit awkward, in my opinion. I'd change it to something like: "Civilians across the club reacted as you might expect."
"Those who had tumbled to the floor from the force of the Mask's whirlwind picked bits of champagne glass out of their hair and evening garb, and gingerly climbed to their feet."
I love this line!
"Some stout, rich men loudly editorialized the shoddy service their hard-earned money had bought," I like this sentence, but "editorialized" sounds a tad out of place. It could just be me, but I would replace it with "criticized" or a synonym of it.
I love the ending!!
I don't see any other nitpicks I'd like to point out, honestly! This was a spectacular story, and I hope to review some of your other works in the future
Great job
Happy writing,
Kali Lennon
Joker!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And Harley!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Okay, my fangirling is done.
I don't know about you
but I'm feeling 22but I when write fanfiction it's just for fun, so I'm not super concerned about making it the best thing that is ever written.That being said, I'm going to critique this like you did want it to be a work of art because fanfiction is a great way to improve your craft. But if you just keep writing gems like this, you'd be golden.
My first comment is about your point of view. It seems you've taken on an omniscient point of view as you bounce in and out of many characters perspectives. This narration style is of course fine, it's just very tricky to pull off. I'll admit I've never tried it because it intimidates me. If you like it then go for it, just know that for me as a reader, it made me a bit confused. It was really hard to keep track of everything that was happening and it made me feel like I was getting jerked around through this scene, and not necessarily in a good way. If you really like writing this way here are my suggestions.
1. Focus in on only a few perspectives. You are allowed to use any character you want in omniscient POV, but it helps to stick with only those that move the story along. Too many makes it feel jumbled, such as the description of the other people in the club. Maybe instead of just describing them, have one of your main character's(tina, joker, Harley, etc...) notice what they're doing. Then we at least know what's happening, but the focus isn't being pulled away from the Joker and the Mask.
2. Flesh things out and slow down. The other reason I felt so lost is things we're happening so quickly. You could use a little more description of what's happening. Not just what things look like, but also what they sound like, taste like, feel like, etc... You could also spend a little longer in each characters head before you switch to another POV. Give us more of what they're thinking and observing. Let get established with a certain character before we move to the next one.
Of course, you don't want to go overboard with this and slow your story down, but a well-phrased sentence here and there go do wonders.
My other question is about Harley. Since she's in her alter ego persona, wouldn't she think of herself as Harley and not Harleen? I found that a little confusing.
I also found this confusing.
I'm confused. Who asked for the mallet. I would assume it's Joker since Harley called him boss, but making a new paragraph for a line a dialogue is an indicator that it's a new speaker, meaning it couldn't be Joker. If it is Joker write it like this. 'The Joker allowed himself a smile of noblesse oblige. "Well put, my odd green man." He flung out a gloved hand. "Harley, the mallet." ' When the same person is speaking you don't need to make it a new paragraph.
And that's all I can think of. I love how the Joker can't wait for B-man. Those two are my favorite OTP.
Thanks for sharing!
-Art
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Dear Cinistercutlas!
Here comes Eros to review your beautifully written Novel! I ran through the previous chapters of the novel " This Business Of Love " written by you. All of them were reallly very meaningful. This is a creative work and has a good humor and full of action and adventurous scenes. The story is interesting and is written in a beautiful style. All the characters are very well described. I am curious to know what are the answers to the questions
"What are you doing? Why are you just letting the creep do whatever he wants?"
You are writing great! Keep it up, Cutlas!
Write the next chapter soon and let me know when you publish it...
Thanks!