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“Heya, Harv!”
Harvey hardly had a moment to look up from his book before a chessboard was SLAMMED! on the table in front of him. He was so startled that he nearly fell out of his seat, regaining himself to find a slim woman with blonde pigtails beaming at him from the other side of the table.
“H-hey, Harley. How can I help you?” Harvey calmly spoke, attempting to hide his initial fright.
“You’re a chess guy, right? I hear you play some weird, one-turn-a-night game with the Bat!”
Harvey’s demeanor shifted, and it was Two-Face’s turn to speak.
“How’d you hear that, clown?” the gravelly voice retorted.
“Oh, a girl just loves to gossip. I know a buncha stuff goin’ on! Like how Bruce Wayne is helping to fund the recovery of the snowman’s wife, and that Eddie’s assistants got arrested, and that-”
“Harley!” Two-Face growled. “I don’t care about that stuff. What didya slam the board down for?”
“Isn’t it obvious? Let’s have a match or two! I’m bored.”
Two-Face groaned and checked the clock. About half an hour left- too much time left in the rec room to reject her offer based on the length of the game. Fine, whatever.
“Okay then,” Harvey continued, “We can play. What’s with the sudden interest?”
“Well, before I got locked up this time, I watched this Netflix show in between schemes-”
“You have a Netflix account?”
“Well, it was Selina’s, and even though she’s runnin’ with the good guys now I don’t think she’s ever noticed- I’m gettin’ sidetracked. Anyway, it’s got this young chess prodigy, and she was stickin’ it to all those old guys, an’ I’d be lyin’ if I said I wasn’t a little inspired! I wanna learn the game, and you’ll be my opponent! For now, at least.”
“I see.” Harvey calmly remarked. In his head, he briefly weighed the pros and cons of playing chess against the Clown Princess of Crime, and ultimately decided it was better than having to play against the Riddler. God, could that guy prattle on. He was good at the game, the only other Arkham inmate who could really challenge Harvey, but the way he ran his mouth was simply not worth it. And don’t even get him started on the Cluemaster! “Well, what are we waiting for then? Let’s go.”
The two prisoners began to assemble the pieces on the board, and Harvey had to gently correct Harley on the placement of some pieces.
“No, Harley, you’ve put the knights in the wrong places. The bishops go next to the king and queen.”
Harley slid some of the pieces around. “So the horsies go here, then?”
Two-Face chuckled. “Knights, Harley. And yeah, they do.”
“I know what they’re called, dummy. I’m just tryin’ to have a little fun!”
Once the board was set, Two-Face found himself with all the white pieces, so he took the first move by sliding his pawn forward two spaces. “Pawn to E4,” he announced in that famous gruff tone. “So, Harley, you ever played before?”
Harley pointedly put her finger under her chin, hemming and hawing about her opener. Only 20 possible first moves, yet so many possibilites. “Well, Harv, I probably played a little as a kid, with my siblings or my grandma, but not much since then. All the chess players in college were dorks, and even I wasn’t that much of a loser.” She laughed at her own joke.
Finally, she moved one of her black pawns forward two spaces- blocking Harvey’s. This drew a rather loud reaction from the former district attorney.
“Geez, Harley! It took you that long to think of that?” Harvey teased. Harley giggled.
“Hey! You be careful teasin’ me, or I’ll make the other half of your face match!” Harley paused after this jest, realizing the insensitivity of what she just said. “Oh, Harv, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean-”
“Don’t sweat it,” Two-Face asserted, “it’s not a sore spot. Not anymore. With how long I’ve been in this business, working alongside a guy named the Joker… I’ve learned to stop caring.”
Harley winced at the clown’s name, but she then spoke, softly and remorsefully. “If that’s the case, then I hope you don’t mind me askin’- what’s the whole Two-Face thing like? For you, I mean. Is it hard on your mental state?” She almost seemed to revert to Dr. Quinzel with that last remark, even going so far as to dial back her thick Gotham accent.
“Oh, well, we-” Harvey gestured to both sides of his face, “have been together for long enough that we’re basically on the same page.” In an instant, Two-Face took his turn again. “At this point, the only significant difference between the two of us is a voice, mostly. Although I’m not the one with a law degree, as Harv likes to say.” After this brief interlude, he once again made his move, with a firm “Knight to C3.”
The two inmates went back and forth for what felt like a long while, exchanging glances and pieces, with Harvey taking significantly more of Harley’s pieces than she took of his. Harley, in traditional Harley fashion, began to pout when her pieces were taken and celebrated raucously if she managed to capture one; Harvey, by contrast, was almost entirely stone-faced the whole time. Eventually, Harley was whittled down to merely two pawns, a bishop, and the all-important king, while Harvey had more than double that remaining on his board. Harvey moved a rook just one space, and uttered a single word:
“Check.”
“What?!” Harley exclaimed. She scrutinized the board with fervor. Sure enough, her king was currently held in place by a rook threatening one direction, and Harvey’s queen threatening another. The options for safe squares were running low, and Harley cautiously moved the king diagonally to avoid the threat.
At this, Two-Face grinned. Harley gulped, fearing exactly one word. She quickly scanned the board- where could she have made a mistake?! Finally, she saw it. A lone bishop, all the way on the other side of the board.
“Checkmate, Harley.”
“Oh, damn it!” Harley dramatically fell backwards, slinking onto the floor and eliciting a laugh from Harvey. As if on cue, the guards stationed by the door called out to the inmates, letting them know it was time to wrap it up and return to their cells. Harvey began to file away the pieces, and Harley quickly uprighted herself to help. “I really appreciate ya playin’ with me, Harv. If it wasn’t you, I would’ve had to play against Eddie, and that would’ve been a whole thing.”
Harvey returned a chuckle. “Believe me, I know. And the pleasure was all mine; I always like to help someone new trying to get into the game. You’re a faster learner than Waylon, that’s for sure.” After he said this, he smiled.
For the first time in a very long while, Harvey Dent smiled.
__________
Later that night, Two-Face was in his cell, lying on the dingy cot as the rain pattered against the metal on the outside of the building. Keeping track of the time in his head, he leaned over the edge and pulled out a chessboard from underneath, several turns deep into a game.
“Knight to E4,” he uttered calmly to no one in particular.
After a brief silence, a voice returned. A deep, almost booming voice that Two-Face used to associate with getting busted, or getting into a fight.
“Pawn to D5.”
“What are you planning, crusader?”
“You’ll have to wait to find out, Harvey. I promise I won’t take as long as Harley did.”
“Wait, how’d you hear about that? Batman? Batman?!”
There was no response.
“Please don’t tell Riddler,” Harvey quietly pleaded.
All he heard in return was the familiar sound of rain on metal.