PLEASE KEEP COMMENTING YOUR REACTIONS TO THINGS THAT HAPPEN DURING THE CHAPTER AND JUST THE CHAPTER IN GENERAL
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A clown mask was placed perfectly on Jane's face as she watched from the trees all of Jerome's old followers raise a glass to him. They were gathered next to her brother's grave and didn't notice the small girl watching them, as it was in the middle of the night. Her hair was up and hidden away to help hide her identity. Jane had very strict instructions, and she feared what would happen to her if she didn't follow through perfectly.
Earlier that evening, Jeremiah had come to Jane, who was a bloody, sobbing mess on the floor. She was tired, hungry and in an insane amount of pain. Her stomach was still a mess; the giant "J" branded on her skin was healing at an extremely slow rate and ached anytime Jane moved. That whole moment of Jeremiah coming to her and doing that was the most humiliating thing to ever happen to her. She couldn't run now.
Anyhow, when he saw his younger sister on the floor, he was extremely satisfied and smug. To Jeremiah, Jane was finally perfect. She was fully broken down and was willing to do anything now - just so he wouldn't hurt her again. After two and half days of torture, Jane was ready.
When Jane noticed him standing in her cell, she started shaking and attempted to get as far from her brother as possible. But as soon as she moved her body, her face twisted in pain.
That had made Jeremiah's mouth slightly turn upward before rose his hands up. "Woah there tiger. I'm not here to hurt you." He kneeled down to her level. They were close, only about a foot between them. "You're right where I want you now." Jane was confused. What did they even mean? Why was she here?
He stood abruptly and dropped a notebook to the floor. It had belonged to Jerome before he died. Jane often watched him laugh and draw and write in it while they were in Arkham together but Jane knew better than to ask him what it was. Jane's good hand hesitantly went to the book, but she stopped before she could actually touch it. She looked back up to Jeremiah for permission to touch it, scared to do anything that would upset him.
Jeremiah nodded. He loved how controlled his sister was now. "Go on. Read it."
Jane picked up the book, flipping it opened to a page of a drawing of what was supposed to be Jane drowning in a pool of acid. According to this drawing, she was supposed to be dipped in over and over again. Jane stared in a disgusted fascination. She turned the page to see another drawing of Jane being pulled by her hair by elephants.
Jeremiah finally spoke, "These are some of the ways our brother wanted to kill you, Janey." He kneeled down to her again, and she looked up to him. Fear glossed her eyes. It wasn't news that Jerome had wanted to kill Jane, she knew that. Jane was more concerned on why Jeremiah would show this book to her. She was already petrified of him, wasn't that enough to keep her on his side?
Jeremiah, who prided himself on being an intellectual, could see the question floating through her mind. "I'm showing you these so you know I'm not like our brother. If I wanted to kill you, I would kill you. I see the potential in you. That's why I took you back."
Took her back. He was acting like she was some kind of object that could be stolen. Despite that thought coming up, it was shot down just as fast.
Jeremiah stood one final time. He stood tall and proud and looked down at his feet at her. "You're going to have to prove to me your worth. Just because I can see something deep down, doesn't mean you can rise to the challenge. Do as I say, and I won't kill you."
That was the reason why Jane stood in the cemetery, staring at Jerome's old followers with a clown mask. Finally, after another moment of observing, Jane decided to make her presence known. She kickstarted a small motorcycle Jeremiah had told her to use and rode up to the group. The group's head had turned to her, most glaring.
She kept the light on as she hopped off the bike and stood in front of them, trying to be as confident as she could be.
"This affair is invitation only." A voice called out to her.
Jane didn't respond, only kept standing. That made the group laugh. Jane really didn't want to do this.
"Well, that's alright, you're welcome to stay." The same man spoke. "But you won't be leaving." He tossed a knife in the air and caught it before throwing it at her.
Jane anticipated that and dodged it quite easily. In her bad hand, she held a megaphone. She rose it in the air and a loud noise rattled through it, making the group yelp. Then came Jeremiah pretending to be Jerome. "Why so sad, bozos? Did you think they could get rid of me so easily? " The group's ears peaked in excitement. They would easily fall for this. "Well, okay. So they did. I'm dead, but let's not dwell on negatives. I have one last party to throw." The group started laughing. Jane felt so emotionless under her mask doing all of this. "First on the list... Dig me up." The group didn't react until the second "Dig me up!" Then the group went crazy. They all were on top of each other, digging with their hands, wanting to get closer to their beloved leader.
Jane, who was supposed to leave right after, paused and stared at all the maniacs digging because a fake Jerome voice told them too. She couldn't help but think. How did her life get to this?
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It was halfway through the plan when Jane's next instructions came. Before they did, Jane was required to sit and watch everything else go down. She watched as Jeremiah fooled poor Bruce Wayne into thinking he was going crazy and seeing Jerome everywhere. She watched as the poor young billionaire tried to reason with Jeremiah when he was convinced Jeremiah thought Jerome had taken over Bruce.
She waited for her time. She stayed silent, and she stayed the good little girl she was supposed to be. She hide behind some tombstones, still in her clown mask and her hair all up and hidden. Even though she wanted to step in. She wanted to tell Bruce what was happening. She wanted to help him stop Jeremiah.
But she didn't. She stayed and watched.
Until she saw Jerome's old followers running up to the two, tearing Bruce off Jeremiah. Jane then stepped out from the shadows and joined her brother. Jeremiah was laughing hysterically at something Bruce said to him. Jane showed no emotion under her mask, just stood there next to Jeremiah like a good soldier.
One of the followers then starting chanting. "Long life Jerome! Jerome is victorious at last!" Jane's heart dropped. That poor idiot. Jane glanced to her side to see Jeremiah's face drop and a gun get swiftly pulled out of his pocket, shooting the poor idiot in the head. Blood went scattering on both siblings' faces. Jeremiah didn't even flinch taking that man's life. It sent chills down Jane's spine.
Jeremiah waited a moment before speaking over the now silent group. "Jerome victorious? Are you serious?" Another moment of silence. No one dared to speak. "He's dead. Haven't you been paying attention." Jeremiah swiftly took his glasses off and threw them to the ground.
Jane handed him a napkin to wipe the blood off his face. Jeremiah accepted it before seeing his sister's bloodied mask. "Take that off. There's no use for it now."
Jane did as he said immediately. Jane reached behind her head and took the mask off and then let her hair down. Her long red locks came tumbling down making the group and Bruce gasp, for two different reasons. The group, because of all the stories they heard of Jerome's little sister, a girl who used to be all dull and boring but had evolved into a psychopath thanks to their great leader.
Bruce had looked very confused and let out a small whisper. "Jane?" That made Jane want to shrink herself.
Dramatically, Jeremiah had taken the napkin Jane had given him and wiped half of his face with it, revealing his now paler complexion. He then went towards their brother's dead corpse that had been uselessly sitting next to his grave and kicked him back in. Jane didn't look to see. She didn't want to see Jerome's dead body.
Once he was down wiping his face, he turned back to Bruce. "Look, Bruce.. Like everything Jerome set his mind to, his insanity gas failed. Other than some mild cosmetic effects, he might as well have sprayed me with water. You all need to see Jerome for the utter dud that he was. So, I donned the mask of madness to show you how feeble that is compared to actual greatness. Behold, the true face of sanity."
Jane stood, facing all of them. They were invested in what her brother was saying but little did they all know, they were in the presence of someone even crazier than Jerome. Whatever Jerome could do, Jeremiah could do better.
Jeremiah shrugged. "But.. looks aren't everything." He pulled out Jerome's book, the one he showed Jane earlier, rather casually. "I have a compendium of Jerome's obsessions and goals. I will outdo every one of them. Jerome wanted to turn Gotham into a madhouse. But to truly build something, you must first tear down what is already there." That had peaked Jane's interest. Jeremiah hadn't mentioned anything of his plan to her, not that she thought he would. But this was giving a little insight of what he was planning. He was going to destroy Gotham.
Bruce seemed to not believe any of it. "Jeremiah, the gas worked! Think about it. You want to carry out Jerome's crazy plans sanely? Dragging Jane into it to help you? What could be madder than that?"
Jeremiah shrugged and opened up the book. "Madder.. Let's see." He flipped to a random page and showed it to Bruce. "Jerome wanted to slather you in honey and have you eaten alive by corpse beetles. Now that's mad. Me, if I want to kill you, I'll just kill you." Jeremiah threw the book and was reminded of Jane standing near him. "And Janey here-" He motioned towards her. "She was sick. Our brother twisted his way through her and left her a psychotic mess. I fixed her." Jeremiah went back to his original topic. "See, I don't want to kill you, Bruce, because I want to show you how much I've changed things. How much we've changed things. Because I could not have done any of this without your help."
Bruce stood confused. "My help?"
Jeremiah's mouth twisted into a sick smile. "See, those generators that we built with your money, they work even better as bombs."
Jane knew this part of the plan and it made Jane feel sick to her stomach, especially when the giant explosion went off. Jim Gordon was dead.
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Jane stood behind her brother with Ecco at Wayne Enterprises. She still had to prove her loyalty to them and there was a task that still needed to be done.
"Good evening, gentlemen."
Jeremiah's soft voice echoed to the two security officers. It was dark so Jane couldn't really get a good look at them.
"Hey there, Mr. Valeska. You alone, or you got Mr. Wayne with you?"
Jeremiah sighed and walked down the dark hall, closer to them. "No Mr. Wayne. But I'm not alone."
He stepped to the side so Jane could step forward with a gun, shooting them both in the chest. It hurt Jane immensely, but the fear of Jeremiah outweighed the guilt.
Jeremiah's hand was placed on Jane's back as they continued walking down the hall to their prize. "Nicely done, Janey."
Ecco and Jeremiah opened the sliding doors to reveal the reason they came all of this way. Lining up and down the hall were Jeremiah's generators, the amazing bombs he told Bruce about. There were so many. Jane couldn't help but think of all the people that would suffer, all the people Jane would let Jeremiah kill.
Jeremiah's voice echoed through the hall as he stared in glee at them. "It's time to give Gotham City its new face."
omg what a longggg chapter. but its finally out! yay!
a little better of a chapter for little jane don't yall think?
i know a lot of you wanted to them to have a good brother sister relationship after he had his laughing gas since jane was a little psychotic, but never forget that although jane had her moments of freedom, she's still jane and feels everything to the fullest :) i love her
i'm a huge astrologer nerd, so for all the rest of yall, i'm pretty positive i've written jane to have these big 3 (unknowingly btw!) pisces sun, cancer moon, leo rising. she's definitely water dominant (like meeeeee) lmk what yall think :)
PLEASE COMMENT!
i'll probably be back with an update on thursday so look out for it!