Content Warning: Mention of institutional brutality

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"We can avoid them easily. There's an underground reservoir below the asylum. We can trace it a ways to the sewers, which should lead us downtown, if memory serves."

"And then we climb up through a rabbit hole?"

"Precisely."

Patients #000473 and #003490—that is to say, Mr. Tetch and Dr. Crane— stood with their backs pushed against one of many white walls, sharing the cover and peering around corners. This time, it was not a matter of what to do with the guards, but rather how to avoid them. And Jonathan Crane was very good at avoiding things.

Well, most things.

He offered Jervis his hand, no longer finding it in him to cringe when they touched. After a final glance about the area, the coast was deemed clear enough for the pair to proceed, and Jonathan lead the way to the building's store room, the blessed warehouse through which they could escape covertly.

Hallway after hallway, Tetch trailed behind him stalwart as could be, though still somewhat dazed by a number of things. His medications, for one. Though intended to quell his anxiety, at best they did nothing for his lack of lucidity. It was early morning too, that is, too early to be jostled awake and made to sprint through a dark, labyrinthian building. But that was also the best part really, that Jonathan had gone out of his way just to fetch him. It would have been so much easier for the professor if he'd only opted to leave alone; oh, how much simpler the task would have been were the Scarecrow's heart so small and cold as he so often claimed it to be. Now it was plain to see, at least from Jervis's vantage point, that Crane was indeed beholden to at least one emotional tether, and he was it. He was that tether! Why else would this otherwise horribly aloof man take all of those risks just to have veritable deadweight like doddering Jervis Tetchalong for the ride? It had to be love, the Hatter thought, wishing for a pause that he might have the opportunity to display affection in his own unique way. The classical way. The gentlemanly way. Something sweet. Something that involved tangled arms and tender conversation, kisses on the knuckles, on the cheek, the brow…

He longed for something romantic to remark upon.

"Is the, uhm—the sewers won't be too unkempt, will they?"

Jonathan shushed him, striding with purpose, practically dragging the smaller man along behind him. Jervis kept up in a stumbling sort of way, clutching his partner's hand with the five little vices that were his fingers.

The halls were desolate and dark.

So far so good, but the place was still crawling with orderlies and security personnel; both breeds of jailer were often bored and sadistic enough to fancy a good spot of corporal punishment before returning escapees to their cells. Jonathan knew this from experience, as did Tetch, but with any luck, those memories would somehow fade like the bruises with which they were born.