The Joker had taken Jim Gordon to the Amusement Mile where a series of tortuous devices were lined up for him as if watching his daughter get shot and a murder happen in his own house wasn't enough. 

He had not yet recovered from the shock when he was thrown into a cart that was bound to pass through the entire amusement park, hurtling down each stage of trauma the Joker has designed extensively.

The glaring lights of the park were almost blinding and Jim squeezed his eyes shut, a constant replay of Barbara crashing through the coffee table and sprawled on the ground with her hands clutching the bloodied wound flashing behind closed eyelids.

He was cuffed by the neck, dragged along by Joker's men as they threw him in front of a pedestal at the top of which Joker was seated in a halo of sinister orange lights.

"What am I doing here!"

"Doing?" Joker's eerie voice reached him and he looked up, "you're doing what any sane man would do in your appalling circumstances. You're going... Mad!"

His haunting laughter echoed through the vast premises of the park but Jim's eyes only narrowed as he looked at the murderer in front of him descending the pedestal, the man responsible for so many deaths, the psychotic criminal responsible for that traumatizing show he had set up in the Commissioner's own apartment.

And yet that was still not the limit.

"You..." He tried to speak up, eyes flashing accusingly but the Joker's cane struck him hard in between the shoulder blades making him drop to the ground.

"You don't get to do the talking here," he snapped, voice eerily authoritative, "this is my show, I am the one on the stage and you are the unfortunate audience. So shut your trap and brace yourself for the entire performance. Chop chop, off you go!"

He clapped his hands and the Commissioner was thrown back into the cart that started moving towards the giant door looming ahead with a jester's face embossed on the metal.

"You can't get away with this!" Gordon threatened but he found his own voice failing him, the uncertainty of Barbara's survival clouding his judgement and the resigned look of defeat on Neal's face as he had stood facing the countless bullets flashing in front of him every now and then.

"Oh really?" The Joker's laugh swelled with every passing moment as if he was thoroughly enjoying himself, "ah but who are you to pass that verdict? This is not the rest of Gotham nor the GCPD headquarters, this isn't Arkham and hell, this definitely isn't the court! This is my turf and nothing sane survives here much longer."

The heavy iron gate parted letting the cart in then closed with a deafening slam, engulfing Jim in utter darkness. But then a glare of colorful lights shot up and he found himself in a narrow tunnel with screens on both sides and the Joker's repulsing features showing up from everywhere.

"Welcome Commissioner Gordon! Here everything is tailored to your extreme discomfort. We have a very special menu including pain, fear, terror and of course our main attraction: Madness, a cuisine even colder than vengeance and twice more flavorful! Our top specialty, the Chef's favorite if you please... Served with an extra hot spice of past memories and future regrets! A dish topped only by the dessert of intense trauma, coming right up for your taste buds to analyze." 

The tormenting voice echoed in the tunnel loudly and Jim had to cover his ears but to no avail. 

"Soon you will be going to a place where you don't want to be. Somewhere dark and cold filled with damp ambiguous shapes of things you would rather forget. So when you find yourself locked into an unpleasant train of thought, headed for places in the past where screaming is unavoidable, remember this... There's always madness."

The laughter died down replaced with a serious but conniving look on Joker's features, equally as haunting as his manic laughter.

"You can just step outside and close the door on all the dreadful things that happened. You can lock them away forever... Madness is the emergency exit!"

The lights went out again popping up unexpectedly with Joker's face looming on each screen closing in on Jim from all sides, driving him to the edge of his wits. And then the cart caught speed as Joker's shrill laughter echoed through the entire tunnel and Jim tried to force out the terrible sound by clutching his head tightly though to no avail as he hurtled down the eerie pathways of horrifying darkness. 

There seemed no escape, only madness all around him. And he was no longer certain whether he would be able to keep himself sane through all of that or if he had already started descending the hatch of insanity himself.

***

Fatigued green irises looked up at the blank white ceiling and she blinked twice to clear her vision. There was nothing but a smoky white engulfing her, the tears welling up in her eyes had clouded over all that she was supposed to see.

Her lips parted to speak but no word escaped her for her throat was parched and raw due to the anesthesia that had been given in order to perform the surgery and remove the bullet from her spine. And though everything in her head was nothing short of a hazy blur earlier, a spark of ocher lit up followed shortly with a dash of red and she tensed, eyes opening wide in shock.

The haze was fading but the scene it cleared up to show instead was one Barbara had no strength to envision once again.

Neal's face swam in front of her once again, the way his eyes had dimmed and turned glassy as the bullets penetrated through him, the way he fell limp into a pool of his own blood yet his hand still reached out towards her.

And to put the final straw, Joker's manic laughter throughout the entire scene rang in her head and she almost screamed in despair.

"No... No!" She would have sat up with a jolt but found herself unable to do so and it was then the horror intensified, she could no longer feel her legs nor move them.

"Barbara," a soft voice reached her and her hand was clasped in between unfamiliar palms however she could not tilt her head to look at the person sitting beside her.

"Neal... He shot Neal... He... Where..." Her voice was breaking and her eyes were wide open, a traumatized look etched on her face. 

Kori left her seat and edged closer, her hands clasping Barbara supportively, "Barbara, look here. Please."

"He shot him... He was there and he was... He was... Where is Neal?"

Kori's eyes were glimmering in sorrow as she gently turned her face towards her, trying to calm her down, "take a deep breath, honey. You're going to be fine."

"I don't care if I am fine or not!" Her voice rose to an alarming pitch, shaking uncontrollably for all she could see in front of her was the glassiness of Neal's ocher eyes as he had fallen lifeless to the floor, "where is Neal? I have to go see him!"

The door opened and Richard stepped in though seeing Barbara in such a state pierced through his heart. Her eyes locked with his blue irises and her hand reached out towards him which he clasped firmly, helping her sit up.

Her hands had closed on to his wrists, her eyes looking at him entreatingly, "Richard... Please tell me Neal is alright. Tell me he's fine... He is alive, isn't he? He didn't... He didn't..."

His features were reminiscent of the pain he was going through as he wrapped his arms around her trembling frame, holding her close in an embrace but could not bring himself to voice out the reply to her question.

"He got shot right in front of me," her voice was muffled and her tears stained his shirt, "he was bleeding and... And in pain... Richard, please take me to him... Please..."

But he could say nothing though his eyes reflected the helplessness he felt right then. His best friend was crumbling down into a traumatized mess yet he could do nothing to help her out just then. Because the person she was demanding to see was no longer alive.

How could he take her to see Neal when he and Jason had themselves organized his funeral and in a few hours, the service would be held and Neal Hastings would finally be lowered to his grave?

And yet how could he bring himself to tell her the truth when she seemed in no state to hear it?

She pulled apart but her hands still clutched onto his shirt as if scared to let go, "why are you so silent? Why don't you tell me where Neal is? Why?"

He opened his mouth but no words came out, concerned blue eyes looking down in her terror stricken green irises.

"Richard, what happened to Neal!"

"He... He's..." Yet it was so difficult to voice it out loud and even difficult to see her breaking down. Kori had clasped his shoulder reassuringly but even she had no idea how they were going to handle Barbara.

"Is he alive or not? Tell me! Tell me right now..." Her voice had risen to an alarming pitch, her eyes wide in fear and uncertainty as she shook Richard, demanding the answer from him.

"No..." The word escaped his lips at last and she froze upon hearing it, her pale features draining of color even more, making her look like a ghost. "He's not... He's no longer with us."

The words were no less than a disaster striking her hard and her grip on Richard's shirt loosened as her head swayed once again. He quickly reached forward to steady her but she passed out in his arms, traumatized green eyes falling shut yet the painful expression on her face still lingered.

***