Arkham Daily Life (Part 1)

"Name?"

"Philip Best".

"Okay, Jack."

The Joker lay in the hospital bed, Schiller stood beside him with the medical record. He said, "You'd better hurry up and bring out your psychologist persona and describe your symptoms, or I'll just write something wrong."

"Untie my right hand, I want to have a smoke," Jack said, tossing his hair. Schiller walked over and untied Jack's right hand from the bed rail. Jack made a gun gesture with his hand and then aimed at Schiller.

Schiller moved a chair, sat down next to his bed, and then took out a tape recorder and a blank cassette tape from the cabinet. He put the tape into the recorder and pressed the start recording button.

"Alright, tell me about your life."

Jack pursed his lips, glanced at the tape recorder, then looked at Schiller, and said, "My name is Philip Best, and I'm a truck driver who works for the Anta Gang..."

Jack rambled on and on about his mortgage and car loan, how he stocked up at the supermarket on weekends, how his neighbor's house caught fire, and so on.

Schiller pressed the record button and then said, "Okay, next."

Jack looked at him, and he looked at Jack. The two stared at each other for a long time before Schiller said to him, "Why are you looking at me? Hurry up and make up another one. I need it."

Jack tilted his head back and shook it, rolled his eyes, muttered a few words in Schiller's tone, and then made up an origin story for himself.

And so, after Schiller had the Joker make up a dozen or so origin stories for him, he took the tape off the tape recorder with satisfaction.

As the saying goes, trash is just a resource in the wrong place. The Joker's origin story is not only realistic and reasonable, but also rich in detail and quite vivid. As long as the historical background is changed, it can be used as a well-developed false Character Design.

Schiller hadn't forgotten that he had quite a few agent planted in Marvel's Arkham Asylum, and this fake identity would come in handy.

Jack turned to the side, craning his neck to look at Schiller, his eyes wide. He said, "You know what? I hate two kinds of people the most: those who are too ordinary and those who are just like me."

"And you, you're clearly someone just like me, yet you strive to be an ordinary person. But Jack, the world's most professional psychology master, tells you, you can't do it, hahahahahaha!"

After he finished laughing, Schiller smacked Jack's injured hand with the spine of the notebook. Jack cried out in pain, then burst into an even more maniacal laugh, saying, "I hit the nail on the head! I hit a nerve! You'll never be a normal person, hahahahahaha!"

Schiller took a deep breath and said, "After today's consultations, you get out of here and go to a regular ward. Do you know how precious these beds are? Don't waste my time making money."

"Money? Hahahaha!" Jack laughed even harder, the hospital bed shaking from his laughter. After a while, he choked and started coughing violently, then reached out to Schiller and said, "Water, Thank you."

Schiller didn't hand it to him, and he didn't mind. Instead, he stopped laughing, collapsed on the bed, and gasped for breath. He said, "That joke was really funny, wasn't it? If there were a movie theater where you could actually buy tickets with popcorn, I would buy tickets for a whole week straight and watch all the movies I hadn't finished watching."

Suddenly he became serious, sighed, and said, "It's ridiculous that they're chasing after money, isn't it? What's even more ridiculous is that the money they're chasing is no different from popcorn..."

"And the most ridiculous thing is, hahaha..." He started laughing again, laughing so hard he was shaking. "The most ridiculous thing is that there's a madman who knows money is just popcorn, but he still chases after it, hahahahaha..."

"Why? Because he's gone mad! He thinks... he actually thinks that as long as he pursues fame and fortune like ordinary people, he can become an ordinary person, hahahahahahaha..."

He noticed Schiller watching silently. Jack grinned and said, "Why are you so serious? Weren't you laughing happily in the theater earlier?"

"Because the reason Hell jokes are funny is because it's someone else's Hell." Schiller stood up again and said, "Watching Batman make a fool of himself is certainly interesting, you think so too, right?"

Jack wiped away the tears of laughter with the hand that had been released. He didn't act as crazy as he had in the theater; instead, he seemed quite normal, yet even more bizarre.

"Honestly, I didn't expect you guys to be so supportive. I really love this place!"

"You should thank the Court of Owls. Their continuous downpours have affected the residents here to some extent, and all of them. Even if they don't get wet, they can't help but inhale moisture from the air when they breathe, so everyone is a little crazy."

"I know, of course I know... otherwise why would I announce my plan on TV? I know someone will come, a bunch of annoying people..." Jack was gritting his teeth one second, and the next he said in a humble tone, "Oh, no, I mean, esteemed viewers, someone will definitely do me the honor of watching this poor Joker's comedic performance..."

"Except for Batman, who didn't want to come, I insisted on bringing him along."

"That's what I hate most about the Court of Owls. They created a rain that can drive people crazy, but it's the only thing that doesn't work on Batman. Those idiots," Jack said viciously.

"You're lying again. If this rain really worked on Batman, the Court of Owls would be a thousand times worse off than it is now."

Jack whistled twice, pouting, as if to cover up his lying. He shifted his body, leaning against the pillow, and said as if he had found a kindred spirit, "See, you think so too, right? Batman is actually a madman, but he won't admit it. If some external factor made him mad, that would be too boring."

"Do you think he really wanted to laugh during yesterday's performance?" Jack blinked, his somewhat cloudy eyes filled with anticipation, and his tone became excited again. "I hid in the alley and secretly watched him several times, watching him break the arms and legs of those robbers."

"But he's so serious," Jack complained. "Can't he be a little happier? How can he not be happy listening to the robbers' screams, hearing the criminals he hates most begging for mercy in his hands? If he's happy, why doesn't he laugh?"

Whenever Batman was mentioned, Jack would go on and on, but Schiller had no interest in listening to his nonsense. He tapped the side of his notebook with his pen and said, "I also have two kinds of people I hate the most: one is the person who causes me trouble, and the other is the person who causes trouble and then acts self-righteous."

Before Jack could say anything, Schiller continued, "It seems we happen to be the kind of people the other hates the most. Since we can't stand each other, let's have less contact. Tomorrow, you can move to the next ward and live with Cobblepot."

Jack snorted and said, "You copycat."

The next day at noon, Schiller had just returned from lunch in the cafeteria when he found Jack squatting at the door of the ward, crying. He was leaning against the door frame, covering his face, and crying very sadly.

Schiller walked past him without looking at him, and Jack grabbed his white coat and said, "My God! How can there be such a boring person in the world? How could you put me in the same room as him?"

He gripped Schiller's white coat tightly with One Hand and wiped away non-existent tears with the One Hand, saying, "He just told me a joke, but even that joke was incredibly boring."

"He actually said he wanted to open a restaurant, you know? And then he actually wanted to put an iceberg in the restaurant, oh my god..."

"I always thought dressing up as a bat was weird enough, but someone actually wanted to dress up as Penguin, Penguin, hahahahahaha!"

"Doctor, they've all gone mad! You have to save me!" Jack began to tremble. "I don't want to be with these lunatics!"

Schiller bent down, grabbed his wrist, and pulled his hand off his clothes. He bent down and said to Jack, "First of all, this is a mental hospital. If you or one of him weren't insane, you wouldn't be here."

"Secondly, this is not a time for fresh air. If you dare to run out of the ward again, I will expel Batman from Gotham University and send him to study at Metropolis. You will never see him again."

Jack nimbly got up, ran to the hospital bed, and lay down, pulling the blanket over himself. He hummed a lullaby, saying, "Little Jack is going to sleep now, hum hum hum... let me sing a lullaby..."

He closed one eye, pretending to be asleep, while secretly opening the other to peek at Schiller's reaction.

Cobblepot sighed deeply and looked at Schiller by the door, saying, "Doctor, I suggest you move him to the next room."

He pointed to the wall behind him with his thumb and said, "Evans must have a lot in common with him."

"More importantly, if this madman stays any longer, I'm definitely going to beat him up."

"Alright, he can go stay with Evans tomorrow."

The next day, Schiller returned after lunch and found that Jack had somehow climbed onto the observation window high up on the wall. He was sitting on the window, clumsily moving his body, as if trying to climb over.

Before Schiller could even ask what was going on, Evans roared from inside, "You actually like those musical comedies?! And you even insult classicism?! I really misjudged you, those new operas are a complete blasphemy against opera!!"

"You're the one who's crazy!" Jack yelled, waving his fist as he sat on the observation window. "Those Baroque opera are all outdated stuff! Monteverdi is complete garbage! They have no sense of humor whatsoever!"

As he spoke, he shook his head and imitated a few lines of singing. His dry voice, combined with his strange singing style, was full of emotion but lacked any technique.

He stood high above the observation window, spitting as he rattled off a list of Baroque opera and Classical opera masters, which infuriated Evans, who threw a pillow at him.

Putting everything else aside, Evans was quite strong. He stood below and slammed a pillow into Jack's face. Jack, whose arm was already injured, couldn't hold onto the wall and fell straight out of the ward, landing in front of Schiller.

He was still angry and tried to get up and rush back to the ward to continue arguing with Evans, but Schiller grabbed his clothes and said, "Do you want to go back and get beaten up? You don't really think you can beat him, do you?"

Jack was furious. He shouted, "He doesn't understand music at all, that idiot! Classical opera is just pointless whining, can you imagine? There are still old fogies who like that stuff these days. Only comic opera and musicals are interesting!"

Evans leaned out of the doorway, leaning his upper body against it, and shouted, "You're the one with no taste! You damn lunatic!"

"You're the crazy one!"

Schiller stood by, speechless, partly because he didn't understand opera very well, and partly because he didn't understand madness very well either.