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Part Twenty: Chapter 145: Testing

That night Bruce Wayne had a banquet to attend at the Mayor's house. This left Jason alone in Wayne Manor. He lay on his bed, staring up at the ceiling. He couldn't stop thinking about what the Joker had told him. But it wasn't some game or a set up. Jason saw the truth in the Joker's eyes. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out the vial that the Joker had given him. With a sigh he pushes himself up off his bed and makes his way into Bruce's room. He needed a DNA sample for Bruce. He goes into his bathroom and pulls one of his hairs from his comb and sticks it in a Ziploc bag.

He turns to leave but hesitates. He knows it's wrong to snoop through Bruce's things, but something inside of him told him it was the only way to get answers. He didn't at all know what he was looking for, but he knew he would know if he found anything. So he carefully rifled through Bruce's walk in closer. Then he carefully starts going through drawers, making sure to get nothing out of place. Finally he sits on Bruce's bed and pulls open the top drawer of his nightstand. Crossword puzzles. Notepad. Condoms, lots of condoms. Sleep aid. Nothing uncommon, but when he lifts a magazine in the back, he finds a flash of green. It was a picture. A picture of Bruce and the Joker kissing. Jason's jaw gapes as he stares at the picture in his shaking hand.

He quickly slides the picture into his pocket as his mind reeled. He goes down to the bat cave. He runs DNA on the swab the Joker gave him. Then he ran a sample of his own DNA and cross referenced it with both of them. The Joker hadn't lied. They were brothers. Then, just because he had to know, he tested the Joker's DNA against Bruce's. They weren't a match thank god.

Jason looks at his watch, Bruce wouldn't be home for hours still. Jason pulls out the phone that the Joker had given him and stares at it in his hand. He had a million questions and he knew that the only person who had the answers was the Joker. His index finger twitches as he pushes one. He brings the phone up to his ear. His stomach does somersaults as the other end starts to ring.

"You actually called," a voice answers on the third ring, "I take it you've conducted the tests and see I'm not lying."

"Yeah," Jason swallows hard. "Can we meet somewhere?" He asks.

"5150 Harbor Way. Room four," the Joker says and hangs up.

Jason takes one of Bruce's motorcycles and soon finds himself in the Narrows looking at the digit four on the door of some cheap motel room. He takes a deep breath and nervously straightens his clothes. He brings up his fist and knocks at the door. A moment later he can hear the door unlock. Then it opens. He's face to face with the Joker, looking as he normally does. The Joker sticks his head outside to make sure Jason hadn't led an ambush to him.

"Come in," he says and steps aside for Jason to enter.

Jason walks in and looks around. "I never expected to see you in a place like this. I figured you'd be in a penthouse at the Hilton or something."

"Which is precisely why I'm in this shit hole, because it's unexpected," the Joker says and motions at the only chair in the room, offering it to Jason.

Jason sits in it and the Joker sits on the end of the bed. He leans his weight back on his palms and looks at Jason with his head slightly cocked. He watches as Jason looks him over as of it's it first time. But then, Jason was seeing him in an entirely different light. They were family.

"I take it you have questions for me?" The Joker finally asks.

"How did you find out I was your brother?" Jason stares at him.

The Joker looks across the room. "My memory has been affected by psychiatric drugs, experiments, shock therapy, and the chemicals I fell in. Things come and go from my memory often. Sometimes something might trigger a memory. Sometimes memories come back to me in my dreams. I had a dream of going with my mother to meet a man. He was in a suit and he didn't seem to like me very much. They argued. Something about money and something about his wife and kid. Later that day I had another memory come to me. This one was of being with my father as he committed a crime. He shot a rich man and his wife. And as I watched the news that night I got a recollection of seeing my mother pregnant. I knew you had to have been the rich mans kid. So I looked up the most prominent men in Gotham that fit the time line. That's when I ran across a picture of Thomas Wayne. From there I hacked into the state files on my mother, which led me to you," he simply shrugs.