Laughing American comics, I am becoming more and more like a clown

"You know what I mean." Under the cover, Lucian's five fingers kept plucking, as if he was playing some light notes.

Jack hesitated, not knowing whether he should say it.

"Since I brought it up, it means I anticipated it. Don't treat me as an enemy—we are friends."

Jack restrained himself from scoffing… but agreed with the first half of the sentence. Finally, his gaze shifted toward the curtains. As the morning light faded outside, he recalled his dream:

……

Sea, beach, sunset, wooden chairs.

The scenery remained unchanged, I couldn't go out, and I spent many years sitting alone on that precarious wooden chair.

The emptiness and confusion were unforgettable, until a skinny red-breasted robin flew over the horizon, flapping its wings and gliding tiredly.

He was able to wake up.

"Do you know what that is, Jack dear?"

Lucien leaned forward with his hands on the edge of the bed, his face calm, but his breath couldn't hide the heat: "That's where you and I meet."

Jack's pupils gradually dilated and he remained silent for a long time. Then, as if he couldn't bear it anymore, he pulled back the quilt to give a vent to the cold sweat he had been suppressing.

"……what?"

Then he asked slowly.

"Is it hard to understand?" Lucian's eyelids twitched uncontrollably. He said sincerely, "Do you think resurrection comes without any sacrifice?"

He studied Jack's expression carefully, and saw what he wanted from it. Then he stood up again and walked away: "Don't tell me you really think so."

"Oh, my God—child."

Jack felt his eardrums swell as if filled with water, blurring Lucian's next words. "Resurrection comes at a price—how is it possible to return from the dead with your body intact, your sanity intact, and nothing else? I've been observing the price you've paid. You're not crazy, and your body has no flaws, so this is only natural."

"You will be influenced by me."

"This dream you had wasn't a coincidence or anything—it was my dream."

……

Jack is a clown in a way and not a clown in a way.

He's closer to the Joker than Arthur in the previous world, but he hasn't had a bad day, a tragic experience, or been hostile to Batman.

It can be said that he has the abilities of a clown, but not the madness and unscrupulousness of a clown. Even his conceptual understanding is not as good as that of the clown's son.

He is somewhat like the Pale Knight, but lacks that kind of heroism and high moral standards, so he can neither be considered a "knight" nor a "human being".

(People refer to Two-Face, Penguin, and Scarecrow)

"I don't think a dream can affect me." That's why Jack could say such childish words.

"Of course this won't affect you at all. I don't want to and won't use this dream to affect you, Jack. I said, we are friends, and I have no ill will towards you."

"But this isn't something I can control. Whether you'll be changed by something isn't something I can decide. On the contrary—I still pity you, I sympathize with you, and I'm really looking forward to you getting rid of this."

After all, Lucian is the Joker recognized by the Joker himself, and that is Lucian's original spine - even the bats that drink his blood will change, so how could Jack, who has his spine replaced, not change at all.

Even if he is a clown in this universe.

Lucien originally thought that Jack would go crazy or undergo other unusual changes due to the Dionysus factor, but unexpectedly, Jack was very normal, even more normal than before his death.

It wasn't until now, after Jack had this dream, that Lucien understood the reason.

……

Many days passed, and Jack did not resist violently to see the Silent Bat, but accepted the status quo calmly. He often read books of vague poetry, philosophy, mythology, and the Bible.

Compared with science, liberal arts and literature can only cultivate sentiment, but cannot even make words meaningful.

Jack began to become a little sad and less cheerful, like a literary young man who had just graduated from college.

Tagore, Chekhov, Nietzsche and Shakespeare are lingering on his lips.

Lucien watched as Jack turned into his former self.

He recalled the love words the Joker once said to him: "Madness is my blood, gunpowder is my flesh, and you are my bones."

He saw himself resurrected in Jack's body.

……

Jack was unaware of his own changes, but he was too bored in the cage, and these were the only things that could relieve his boredom, and he found pleasure in literary works.

He didn't think there was anything wrong with what he did.

……

Lucien repaired the TV, connected the antenna, patted it, and turned it on... This was the first time that the TV was used for its real purpose.

"Gotham News Today: General Louis was attacked and seriously injured. The criminal is currently on the run. Citizens, please pay attention to your own safety."

Jack didn't respond.

"Alfred Pennyworth, the current heir of the Wayne family, has been summoned to court. We will once again confirm whether he has the legal right to inherit the Wayne family."

Jack raised his head, looking over as if waking from a dream, and looked towards the TV, frowning: "When will you start your plan?"

"Plan? What?" Lucian thought for a moment: "Are you talking about that joke? Oh - it's not time yet. If I do it now, I'm afraid of being caught by the army and conducting human experiments."

"The opportunity hasn't arrived yet. Don't worry, Jack. After all, I didn't abuse you."

So Jack lowered his head again.

This was truly unusual, so unusual that Lucian couldn't help but ask, "What are you looking at?"

Jack held up the book in his hand. "I want to dive deep into life, suck out the marrow of life, live a solid and simple life, eliminate everything that does not belong to life cleanly and neatly, push life to the extreme, and use the most basic form, simple, simple, and simple again."

Thoreau's words.

He said, "There are your comments on it."

Slowly read out: "Bullshit."

Lucian did not feel ashamed. He had the habit of making comments casually, and his comments were not always carefully thought out. They were more influenced by his emotions at the time.

It wasn't important, so he asked, "What do you think?"

"What do I think?"

"Do you think it's like to live the life you want to live?"

Jack ignored it and just said, "If you want to use this as an entry point to induce me to do something."

"You think I'd do that?"

Lucien was about to laugh out loud the next second, but he paused, restrained himself, and took the initiative to walk over to see what Jack was reading - it was a literary bound volume, and an unknown editor had simply collected simple sentences together.

One second you are sighing, the next you are crying; one second it is romantic like a fairy tale, the next second it is a heart-wrenching description of the endgame.

Lucien remembered complaining at the end of the book: This editor strives to let readers smell the fragrance of flowers in a sea of ​​flowers covered with shi.

"Why, you sit here looking like an unaddressed envelope?" Lucien said slowly.

"I didn't expect you to adapt it in front of the author." Jack said sarcastically. This was Mark Twain's "An American in Paris". Lucian changed the "there" in the original words to "here".

"Because I see the emptiness inside you, Jack. Don't you see it yourself?"

Jack closed the book and suppressed the irritation rising in his heart: "What do you want to say?"

"Don't think I haven't noticed the way you've been looking at me these days... Heh! Pity! What the hell are you doing so high and mighty for?"

He tried to control himself, but his emotions got more and more out of control, so much so that Lucian asked in surprise, "Why are you so excited?"

"I'm excited? You don't even know the look in your eyes - it's like you're looking at a dog, a lab mouse, or a junior." Jack simply expressed all his dissatisfaction with Lucien these days.

Lucian didn't expect his expression to be so obvious, but he knew he wouldn't care. He asked curiously, "Don't you think there's something wrong with you, Jack? Have you ever cared about this kind of thing before?"

"Don't you think you're abnormal?"

Jack put the book aside, took out a cigarette and lit it: "Why not just say what you want to say."

This actually made Lucien uncomfortable - he was used to being the riddler and the one being riddled, so much so that he said he didn't know where to start.

Looking at Lucien's expression, Jack sneered, holding a cigarette, and opened the book again.

But before he could turn the page, he heard a gentle voice that was completely inconsistent with the atmosphere just now:

"I don't know how to tell you, Jack - you are now in the state I have always dreamed of. In my mind, this is what I most want to be."

"But I don't know what you think. You may like it, or you may not... That's why I hesitated, Jack. I have always been respectful of others, so I must remind you. I must show you and give you a choice - so I have to ask you."

Lucian paused. Jack didn't look at him, but he didn't turn the book in his hand. So Lucian smiled and asked, "You really don't realize how you've changed?"

……

There is an ancient philosophical debate topic called "The Ship of Theseus". A ship is damaged over time and its parts are constantly replaced until one day all the parts are no longer the original ones. Then, is the ship still the original ship?

Jack is like this, he is like a ship whose parts are replaced so quickly that the speed of change is visible to the naked eye - just like the clown virus that Lucian experienced, which can turn a person into a clown in a very short time.

And now, it is about transforming a person into Lucian's appearance in a very short time.

Lucian also took the time to think - maybe he could learn some chemistry and biology, and try to learn from the Joker virus to make a Lucian virus.

After all, it is easy to tell who is more threatening, the hipsters or the antisocial criminals.

……

But just like Batman struggled to realize that he was abnormal, Jack is also challenging this level of cognition.

After a long silence, he seemed to wake up from a dream and said, "...What should I do?"

"You want to get rid of this?" Lucian tapped his chin lightly, thinking seriously. "Apart from suicide, maybe you could explore your own fears and desires, try drugs or terrifying gas? You care about Bruce a lot... maybe you could do something about it? Like, let Bruce stimulate you? Alfred should be able to do it, too."

Jack interrupted him and pursed his lips: "I mean...how can I maintain my current state?"

Lucian was surprised by this, so surprised that his pupils, which had remained unchanged, wavered. "...Are you sure this isn't affecting you too deeply?"

"No." Jack was very sure. He finally looked up at Lucian and met his gaze. "I like this."

……

Lucien suddenly realized something - he was a clown, but not so crazy that if the clown was affected by him, the symptoms would be - alleviated?

Maybe one day, when he encounters a clown spreading laughing gas all over the city, he can develop "crying gas" to deal with it and achieve acid-base neutralization?

Maybe he'll be back to laughing like a madman, and when he encounters a newly infected Batman, all he has to say is, "Hey, man, give Lucian the virus a try."