Diabolical | T. Drake ✔

[28] Internal Conflict

He should have gotten used to the darkness.

His cell was devoid of light and it rendered a very caged feeling that he couldn't escape from. The basement at Drake Manor had been dark too but he hadn't felt as trapped there as he did back in his cell.

The fact that it was dark and silent around him amplified the voices in his head, making him want to get out of that confinement badly. But he couldn't leave, he reminded himself, he shouldn't if he wanted the Scarecrow to stay bounded.

For the past few days, Jonathan had been very detached, feeling as if there were long periods of time when he wasn't in control of his body and mind. It felt as if he was slowly succumbing to the darkness around him, his mental defenses falling weak to the preying of isolation and loneliness.

And whenever he was in control of his body, his mind would be flooded with unwanted thoughts and loud voices that he could not get to shut up.

There was one particular image that he was unable to drive out of his head, no matter how hard he tried. He could see it as clearly as if he was still there in Drake Manor's basement, trying to shake Tim into consciousness while feeling the guilt of being responsible for whatever the boy had suffered. And it certainly didn't help that Scarecrow took pleasure in tormenting him about it.

"You are still moping about that boy? Did you forget what he did to you that time he created the so-called antidote?"

He tried to shut out that scratchy accusatory voice but to no avail. He hadn't forgotten his first encounter with Tim as well as the five days after that in which the boy had painstakingly recreated the fear gas and come up with an antidote for it. He hadn't forgotten despising the vicious little menace for using the gas on him and then letting him rot away in Arkham.

But after he had escaped and taken refuge in that basement, he met the boy again in entirely different circumstances. He had started to see him as an equal; a young mind that was interested in finding out the solutions to already existing problems. A boy who wanted to help him and was willing to work with him and figure out the solution.

"He's just a boy... He shouldn't have gotten hurt. I should not have let you take control..."

"You were letting me take control? Jonathan, why do you keep insisting that we are different? I am as much a part of you as you are a part of me. We are one, we are the Scarecrow."

"That's not true..."

"Or did you honestly believe Timothy's explanations? He's just a boy, as you said so yourself, what would he know?"

Shutting his ears or stuffing them with his fingers would still not silence the taunting remarks playing on repeat within him. 

"You are the Scarecrow, Jonathan. Embrace it. The fear you instill in others is power, and power is everything. Don't underestimate the hell we can raise together, the world we can conquer by becoming one."

He clenched his fists tightly, still trying to resist the malefic whispers. "No... This is not what I want, you are not going to steer me in your darkness again."

"You can't escape me, Jonathan, no matter how hard you try. Didn't you see what happened when that boy tried to help you? Does it not serve as a lesson for you to stop interfering? You keep underestimating yourself and I am sick of this foolish sentimentality! You always believed that fear is the only true power in this world, the only thing that can grant you release, so why are you backing out now?"

"Because it's not... There are other things worth living for..."

"Maybe for other people but for an insane convict like you, I don't think so."

He closed his eyes, trying to focus on something, anything, that could serve as a temporary distraction. His cell was bare and devoid of objects that he could train his attention. The only thing he could do was pick a memory from his past and focus on it hard.

He picked a memory from his childhood, trying to detail out the image in his head in order to shut the Scarecrow's voice still trying to lure him into the darkness.

A plain vast field formed in his head, nothing to be seen for miles except tranquil grass and the golden stalks of wheat calmly dancing in the breeze. He could feel himself standing there, the rays of the sun caressing his skin and making him relax.

Slowly those voices faded in the background and he was able to pay more attention to his surroundings. A country house loomed behind him but he turned his back, not wishing to go there just yet. He would stay out in the field for as long as he could.

But then the sun got engulfed temporarily by a haze of black and he turned to see a flock of birds charge towards him.

Ravens. Black like the night and with beaks sharp enough to pluck at his skin.

He opened his eyes with a start, his breathing frantic as he looked around in the darkness that resembled the shade of those birds. He was not in the field, the birds weren't real and he was in Arkham.

He repeated that in his head again and again and again, rooting himself to his present.

He was in Arkham, right where he was supposed to be. And there was no one else who could release him from those chains that gripped him mentally.

His childhood, his adulthood, and his present life; none of those stages had been a pleasant time for him. All he had wanted was an escape but in his pursuit of finding his release, he had been trapped further in the dark webs of evil that ended up in him being subjected to Arkham.

It was as if he was doomed to be that way, a shunned recluse spending his life in an asylum even though it was extremely easy for him to escape.

But escaping from there had brought with it even worse consequences and he did not want to face it again.

"Pathetic... You are so pathetic, Jonathan. You could have led a very different life if only you let me in sooner. You can fix that mistake now too if only you let me help you."

"I don't need your help," he spoke through gritted teeth, "if you want to help me out, just cease to exist. That would make things a lot easier for me."

"Cease to exist? The only way I can cease to exist is if you stop existing yourself. You can't get rid of me, not as long as you're still alive."

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