Epilogue

"I love you."
Brows raised.
(Ace of Spades)

***

And maybe he did love me. Out on that building overlooking his city, glistening, perfect, his arm around me, my arm around the dog. He'd said it like he meant it, like it was obvious. A given, a reward for all my arduous suffering. And I thought I'd spring to my feet and twirl and cry, and ask him to do something silly like- like marry me- but the emptiness coiling inside me only grows by the moment, each time I imagine what he said that night to be true.

The love of a killer. A supposedly glorious thing. Me, the exception to the blind, unflinching, unscrupulous eye of Death- special. Special. Could I be, then? If I win the love of an evil man; if he can love, is he even evil at all?

(Does any of it matter?)

And oh, things... things, just- just silly little things... that's all my world was ever made of. Things. Silly little pretty little things, all glittering and frayed like glass in the wake of the ruin he'd wrought. The mess he'd made of me, of everything. My life, my world, reduced to nothing but a mere casualty in the wake of his chaotic illusions, to destroy anything and everything that I could possibly ever love- so I'm left, alone, with him.

And I look at him now, sat next to me. Half-drunk. On the edge of that scaffolded, unfinished, dilapidated building.  It feels, to me, more complete and whole than I myself have ever been.

The rottweiler- Daisy- whines in my arm. It's as if she cries in place of the tears I can no longer shed, exhausted, excited, terrified all at once. I look at him again, my madman lover, and wonder about all the things I'd sacrificed on the road to his seemingly holy confession, the affection I'd coveted from him these long, infinite months. My studies. My art. Mom, Cassidy. And the... the bodies... how much blood had I stood back and allowed him to shed, so that he would witness my indifference and praise me for it? How hard I'd bit back my tongue and held my stomach, willing myself to be as numb to the violence as he was; for how long had I watched him dirty his own hands, so that I might lick the filth clean from his fingers? And thank him for it? It seemed to me that the price of love- whatever shape it took in his deluded brain- required a sacrifice I might not ever be ready to make, and so I let others die in my cowardly stead. A life for a life- and it's a life that I'm starting to doubt I'm even fit for. Hungry gods must be fed, after all. And oh, how he starves for the chaos it's all wrought.

And it's strange, watching him so still now, how earlier he had walked in languid circles over cold SWAT corpses, waiting as each worried, repressed thought slowly dawns on me as though his final admission- of a love that may not even be real- had been what they were waiting for. Fears that require some love to suck dry. Mites that feast on the bones of my blind, abject joy. This feeling will eat me alive. Such is the price for happiness.

Though, it suddenly strikes me... that this- is an epilogue. The culmination of dreams, restless nightmares baring shades on every wall that casts a shadow; and the future looms like the interminable, uncertain mouth of some odd, unnameable oblivion, but I already know of one such oblivion, of an unknown so infinite, and it does bare a name, and he chose it himself. It is the scarred mouth that engulfs me beneath its tremulous weight, his words to which I cling, wear like a second skin, tread like the fresh, unmarked earth buried beneath snow.

I try to picture the future when I see his face. I can't.

This future terrifies me, but to know that it might all begin and end with him- it's difficult to discern the fear from trembling, frantic, delirious glee- when he touches me, when he careens around the back of my neck with bared teeth and says my name like it's his, there's little difference between life and death, comfort and pain- between him and a god. So unmoving in his cruelty, so just in his chaos. Is dying even death? Wouldn't my blood lavish his fingers all the same? (Would he still let me taste them?)

I know now the virtue in acquiescence. Surrender so sweet it cloys. The frightful ease of letting myself fall through slip-fingered sanity, sand into dust, into dust, into nothing. All would call me strange and deluded, laying my head down in the lap of a vagrant like my Joker, gazing up with dulled innocence into eyes that cannot see. Maybe months ago I'd have second thoughts about relinquishing my autonomy for a man who might not even feel, horrified at the idea that I'd so easily trust someone who'd sooner kill me than kiss me; but this waking nightmare, this- this faded, desaturated, unearthly dream- each moment I'm in his hands I'm more lucid than I'd ever been in my entire life. The years wasted just... sleepwalking... more ghost than girl, whispering to ceilings and walls and hollowed floorboards and now to call them all by his name... Joker, Joker, Joker...

My existence in this dream, this backward world he's fashioned of bloodied mouths and gored tongues, it's... it's almost...

"Let's go," he tells me, finally rising to his feet. I await a helping hand that never presents itself to me, and remain sitting, staring at his back. "Let's go home, Stella."

...sweet.

***

***ramble below, updates, and a big thanks!***

***

So, this is weird.

I'm not sure how many people are actually gonna read this, seeing as how when AoS was deleted I'd already long stopped posting on Wattpad, life got busy, mental health got bad, etcetera... coming back to Wattpad (which, I don't particularly like but I had a place here) it kinda just feels like everyone had left, moved somewhere else, or forgotten the Joker completely. And when AoS was removed from Wattpad, barely anybody interacted with my account or my stories (which are basically all on hiatus jdskjdhjs) besides asking me about AoS. The removal of it happened during one of the worst several months of my life, too, so it all felt like the cherry on top of the shit-covered cake for me, and I won't lie- I reminisce on AoS quite bitterly.

But... I owe a lot of what I have now to Ace of Spades. I mean, I was fourteen when I started it and sixteen when it finished. Despite the sleepless nights I stressed out over drafting chapters and unprompted death threats I got when I made it very public that I hated Leto's Joker, I remember that time in my life with great fondness. Every single comment I got on that story over the years encouraged me to write no matter what, even when family members ridiculed me for writing, even when I was alone at school, even when I was grappling with the abusive nature of the relationship that spurred me to write AoS. My friends, some of whom met me through this shitty website, and people that message me on Twitter just to tell me they loved AoS- it all makes me feel so happy and humbled and unspeakably thankful. Any Joker fic I write in the future (which, I know I suck at committing to any promises for) will always be somehow indebted to the 'success' and love that AoS received from those who read it. If you are one of those people, I cannot express to you how thankful I am for your support.

So, now the cheese is out of the way... I know this 'epilogue' isn't great. It doesn't make sense, it's not really a story, it doesn't tie anything up- if anything it leaves things more open- and it's a big fat prose dump because I'm pretentious. Also I wrote this back in January(?), maybe earlier, so it's not as clean or up-to-date with my writing style now, but hey. If AoS was ever anything to me, it was the culmination of Stella's emotions, and her experience with the most dangerous man on Earth. This epilogue... is just that. Stella's ever-derailing train of thought. I'm not sure if this epilogue comes off as slightly darker or ambiguous than the original AoS, but I did intend to keep it quite 'loyal' to the source text, as I feel AoS was told heavily through the naive lens of Stella's lovesick psyche; however, my attitudes towards writing romance and the Joker especially have changed quite drastically, and I'm a huge slut for the dark, unrequited, borderline worshipping love. For what is more terrifying than a man who is more than a God? Lol.

Anyway, enough of me trash-talking myself... I just hope someone out there finds even the slightest bit of enjoyment (or even nostalgia!) when reading this garbage sjhdjkdhjks. As for the status of Ace of Spades itself, I'm... really not sure. I've had a couple of dm's from folks that have access to the base text, but things are complicated, and I lost track of a lot of things because of my final year of undergrad and ADHD etc etc

BUT if AoS WAS to ever make a comeback- no promises- it would likely be a rewrite. Problem is, I personally cannot stand the tone and abysmal 'plot' of the original AoS, which I'm aware is what many people loved about it in the first place, and so a future rewrite would likely not have much in common with the original. Joker would be darker, far less forgiving, Stella a little smarter (thank God), and the whole story a lot, lot shorter. Most chapters some may remember as 'iconic' (lol) might be straight up yeeted out of the rewrite because of my personal tastes. In any case, if you wanna discuss the potential of an AoS rewrite and what you'd like to see in it, feel free to let me know!! I'd love to hear y'all's opinions!

FOR NOW though, I am... actually working on a Joker fic I have fallen a little in love with. I'm hesitant to even mention it, because whenever I 'reveal' something I usually jinx it and fudge up the process and abandon it, but this... is genuinely a passion project. Those who follow me on Twitter might know (@/thekillingj0k3, btw), but for now I've dubbed it the "roadtrip au",,,, which isn't even really an au at all lmao. It'll be completely different from any Joker fic I've ever done before, and is more in the vein of Velveteen (which was kinda experimental anyway) than anything else. It is Joker x Reader, which, I know, ew, but as I've said before, none of that y/n bullshit. The 'reader' is more of just an objective carriage for the story- Joker is the main star and the focal point entirely, as any Joker fic should be. It's a prequel to The Dark Knight, set roughly in the year before the Joker shows up in Gotham, and before he's donned the Joker persona entirely, save for the scars on his mouth and characteristically strange behavior. I won't delve into it too deep- which isn't hard, since the plot is actually very simple, disjointed and loose. I've been trying out a new format which better suits my writing style, preferences, and most importantly my ADHD lol. No more 50+ chapters here folks. It'll be a decent length, but chapters most certainly won't be 6k-10k like AoS was. Ambiguous, episodic, relying heavily on both the Joker's character, the mystery surrounding him, and the themes of isolation, manipulation, dreams, identity, nature and civilisation, America, chaos, abuse, etc etc. Spooky stuff. It's inspired by some of my favourite fics I've ever read, and most of all by movies like Lolita (without the creepy shit), Cape Fear, Candy, westerns, arthouse films, 80s serial killer 'vibes', and even certain video games. It's truly just a mesh of all the weird shit that inspires me and an attempt to portray the Joker in a way I never have before, and I am so fucking excited to work on it and hopefully one day, post it. It 100% won't be for everyone, but I'll sure as shit be proud of it.

So anyway, now that all that rambling junk is out of the way- pretty sure this is longer than the epilogue in its entirety- I'd just like to say thanks to whoever reads this (especially if you've made it this far!) and to everyone who read AoS, Apples, Velveteen, any of my other shit, and everyone who's supported me. JTLC and my coven- yall know who you are. Even my irls who I'm too pussy to show my writing to. Thank you so much, and I hope to post more writing soon

Also, I have a bachelor's degree in English Lit so. Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesh

ttyl,

-tkj <3