The Death Knell

"An ant fell into the water, struggled for a while and died, just like an old aunt, la la la..."

Accompanied by the made-up ditty and crazy laughter, the clown staggered into Luther's laboratory with his arms around the laughing point and a smile. He threw a silver grenade up and down in his hand and returned happily:

"Little Lailai, what do you think of the funny part? The ant and aunt jokes, haha! Phew! She always understands my itch."

After saying that, he happily touched Xiaodian's head, like a beloved pet, and Xiaodian also clung to him with a docile expression, rubbing against him and smiling coquettishly, like a possessed female ghost. Same.

Unfortunately, Luther never had much of a sense of humor.

The bald man sitting on the chair stood up and stretched out his hand to the clown: "It seems you got the thing, give it to me."

"Actually, I quite like that silly big guy John. Although they are both Green Lanterns, he is more like a Gothamite than Hal. He is more honest." The clown stretched out his hand holding the X metal, and raised it again in mid-air. He retracted and teased Luther with a funny expression on his face: "I guessed with my left eyeball that he hid the cannonball in the lamp furnace, so I secretly did something for him to drain the energy of his ring. While he was taking out the lamp to charge, I hit him with my car. The classic car robbery always works, hahaha..."

Bald Luther exhaled from his nostrils expressionlessly: "We shouldn't further intensify the conflict with Zhenglian. You should have disguised yourself so that no one can recognize you, and you didn't kill him easily, right?"

"What? Oh, my dear Lex, you don't understand me anymore." The clown looked aggrieved and threw the cannonball over: "I will not kill people when there is no audience. Comedy is only interesting if there are people watching it. Yes, even if the ring is out of power, a Green Lantern will not die that easily."

Lex caught the metal. It was much lighter than expected, radiating some kind of energy he didn't know.

"Okay, you can go and rest for a while. I need to find a way to use this metal and then add it to the serum. There is a strange energy in the viruses currently cultivated from these corpses. My intuition tells me that it has something to do with it. The opposition of energy carried by metal X is the key."

"Why are you telling me this? I have always believed in you, little Lailai." The clown left with a smile on his face. He handed over the precious X metal as casually as throwing away a takeout box: "Yes Now, if you are done with your work, come to me. I have recently obtained some new information from Zhenglian through a 'completely reliable informant'. Regarding the crisis energy, well, you'd better come quickly. I'm not sure about that. How long can I remember so many lines, hehehe..."

Luther's brows furrowed, his working hands suddenly stopped, and he turned to look outside the door.

After thinking for a moment, he paused the research and development of the serum and decided to listen to new information, because after all, the healing serum was just a way to make up for the situation, and only by mastering the information could one be one step ahead.

.................................................................

Through the iron bars of the cage, Batman's two corners of his mouth curved downwards, looking at the person performing the dance for him in the prison.

Although he had just stepped off the final machine and the pain in his body was still torturing his nerves, the previous injury that had broken a quarter of the bones in his body had been healed.

"who is he?"

Batman turned around and asked the clown next to him, because beside him, there was also a clown dancing with the clown in the cage, just like looking into a mirror.

"Hehe, he is me. You are so stupid, Batman."

The clown outside the cage burst into laughter and performed a high-speed tap dance on the spot. Now he was different from the man inside. The clown in the cage became displeased because of this.

The Dark Knight asked again: "Then who are you?"

The clown in the cage answered this time. He came closer to the cage and tilted his head to one side: "I am your other side, I am you, and it is you who made me who I am."

Hearing this statement, Batman couldn't help but narrow his eyes, and he stopped dancing.

The clown outside the cage disappeared like a phantom. It turned out that it was Batman himself who danced with the clown in the cage...

"What did you do to Gordon?" Bat Glove pointed at the man with blind eyes in the corner of the cell. Gordon was lying there with his eyes wide open and looking at the ceiling, neither laughing nor screaming, as if he had lost all awareness of the outside world. all perceptions.

If it weren't for his chest still rising and falling, and his body shaking or twitching from time to time, people who saw him would even think he was dead.

The clown in the cage suddenly became happy again. He put his hands behind his back and walked around the cell with limited space: "Did you see it? Yes, you saw it. I cured him. He was as calm as a dead man. It's really Cute, hee hee..."

"Host, take a blood sample from Gordon and send it to the science department for research."

Batman gets the information he wants and orders the computer to do something.

A mechanical claw protruded from the prison wall, executing the order perfectly, and a small robot then went out with the blood sample.

However, he still stood in front of the cage and looked at the clown inside. The clown didn't look guilty at all, and even took the initiative to make eye contact with Batman.

After a moment, he knew it was the real Joker.

Although the outline of his facial features has changed somewhat, his crazy eyes and changeable personality are exactly the same as before.

So here comes the question. The clown who died before was the real one, and the one that later resided in his heart was also the real one. So what happened to the one in front of him? Clones? Or something else?

The corners of his mouth curved downward even more, and he simply approached the fence, habitually using body language to exert psychological pressure on the clown:

"We need to talk, what do you want?"

"What do you want from me? Are you fucking stupid?" The clown suddenly became angry and moved his pale face closer. He spat at him through the fence and cursed: "I want you to get rid of the Laughing Bat. Let everything get back on track, the story should belong to both of us and be ours!"

The lighting conditions in Batman's private quarters area are very problematic, but the cage is so bright that Batman has to squint his eyes.

He nodded slowly and then left simply.

At this time, new information came from his pointed earphones. Deathstroke left the Dark Zhenglian headquarters underground in the Hall of Justice and had lost its position.

"Death Knell..." Bruce sighed and whispered to himself, without stopping: "Start memo, 31739, continue recording, Death Knell has hidden a possibility from everyone, that is, the maniacal laughter. There is a possibility that Bat himself may 'become a crisis', and the purpose and consequences of his actions remain to be seen."