[video]

[velocette]

[He's been mulling this over since he met Hannibal, really.]

What was the first turning point in your life? Do you even remember who your real heroes were, when you were a kid? Or maybe some people do actually idolize their parents. For me, the only idols are the ones who can't become real, but it's been pointed out to me before that it's possible to worship someone in spite of their faults.

Comments

[ichoosefight]

No, never. Not even in an airplane. I've never been out of Gotham.

[velocette]

If it helps...the cities are all pretty much the same. People don't change very much, county to county.

But I'd still like to fly. Maybe some port, huh?

[ichoosefight]

God, I hope not. I hate to think of a hundred cities just like Gotham.

Yeah, maybe. Here's hoping, right?

[velocette]

I'll try to send the word out, if we get somewhere it can be done.

[Or he'll try to remember, anyway.]

What's so bad about Gotham?

[ichoosefight]

The crime. Someone tries to destroy it, take it over, or both at least once a year. And the rest of the time isn't that much safer.

[velocette]

Take it over in the sense that Capone took over Las Vegas? Anything more ambitious than that seems like it would be a waste of time--the biggest city can't fend off the rest of the nation, probably not even with help. I mean look what happened in 1861.

[ichoosefight]

Well, the people who try to take it over are legitimately psychotically insane, so I don't think they care much about fending off the rest of the nation.

And then there are the people who just want to rack up as big a death count as they can.

[velocette]

Sometimes, a person being perpetually short-sighted has its perks for the heroes, I suppose.

Do we have anyone like that here? People who simply want to kill?

[ichoosefight]

[ She opens her mouth to say 'Scorpius', but decides against it. Her personal grudges won't help anything, and they certainly won't help her graduate. ]

I don't know.

[velocette]

[He notices her hesitance, though, and gives her a sad, sympathetic smile.]

Why? Why hold back?

[ichoosefight]

Because I don't. [ She shrugs. ] Most of my friends are wardens. I don't get all the juicy gossip.

[velocette]

But you also don't get the perks of being a warden. That's...a tricky place to be. Most prisons, that would get you stabbed.

[ichoosefight]

[ That makes her grin. ] My friends aren't the kind you want to piss off, but I'm not exactly helpless. A serial killer tried to stab me once, I took his knife and broke his wrist.

[velocette]

[He perks up a little, oddly enough, at the mention of violence. Or maybe at the mention of her victory.]

That serial killer, he still around?

[ichoosefight]

Zsasz? He's in Arkham last I checked.

[velocette]

[He tries to say the name but it comes out a little slurred, a little lisped, too tricky for him.]

Never heard of him.

[ichoosefight]

He's from Gotham. Apparently it doesn't exist in a lot of universes.

[velocette]

Yeah. It does in mine, just...not the same way as yours.

So he's in Arkham? Not on Death Row?

[ichoosefight]

Arkham's an asylum for the criminally insane.

[ It's where we stick all the bad guys we like too much to kill off! ]

[velocette]

Guess New Jersey's still pretty liberal, then, huh? Oklahoma--we just got the death penalty back. Hasn't turned into a madhouse yet, unless you count the street executions we do ourselves.

[ichoosefight]

Not really. It's just that the insanity plea is really effective when you're obviously completely insane.

[velocette]

Mmhmm...it's hard to feel anything but pity or disgust, maybe fear, for someone who's clearly out of their head. Someone who knows what they're doing, who sees the world the same way you do, well that person is easy to hate. Easier to kill.

Are they really trying to fix him?

[ichoosefight]

I guess so. That's what it says on the tin anyway.

[ Steph doesn't exactly have warm fuzzies for anyone in Arkham. ]

[velocette]

You can't fix a brain.

[He sounds much the same way.]

Once it's damaged, once it's splintered, it's- that's it. You're stuck with what you get.

[ichoosefight]

You're probably right about that. I guess the question is, with mental illness, how much of it is unfixable?