A/N: Hi there fellow Joker lovers! This is my first fic, so please don't hate. I thought it was interesting how there aren't many Jack Napier origin stories on here, so I decided to start one! I think I shall say since Heath Ledger was 28 when he... excuse me, *sob* *sob* died in 2008, that Jack Napier was born in 1980, and that the story starts in the year 1996. I HOPE you like this first chapter...

Gotham was an interesting place to live. One street you turned onto was full of crime and the homeless, then the next was overbearing with the elite and high class. Hope Miller had lived in Gotham her whole life, and it had always confused her so. The system was obviously corrupt, and it seemed like no one had any interest in changing it.

Hope had lived there for sixteen years, along side her mother Holly, and her identical twin sister Faith. Yes, her mother named them Hope and Faith. It was a request from their father, who lost a seven year battle to pancreatic cancer before they were born.

Hope looked at herself in the mirror that was perched upon her dresser, carefully stroking her green hairbrush through her soft blond hair. She loved watching the strands of her hair fall every so gently onto her shoulders. She heard a low groan come from behind her, and spun her head around to see Faith impatiently hovering in the doorway.

"Hope, you have been brushing your hair for ten minutes." She spat at her sister. "It's my turn." Faith had always had an obsession with her looks, and if Hope had a longer time in front of the mirror, oh how she would blow her gasket.

"I'm sorry Faith." Hope gave into her sister as she usually did in their morning routines. "But it's just that I was going to do a little more than just brush my hair today." Hope had wanted for so long to experiment with her sisters endless amounts of makeup, more so when she realized some of the guys at her school had started to take an interest in her. Oh well, maybe another day. She removed herself from the seat at the mirror, grabbing her usual purple-rimmed, circular glasses that seemed to take up her entire face.

Faith went right into her morning essentials, piling on product after product, looking always like she did as a goddess. Faith and her were exactly the opposite. Faith was one of those preppy girly girls who seemed to have the world on their shoulders. She had the looks (even though they were identical twins), and she had all the popularity at their school, Gotham High. Well, what do you expect from the head cheerleader? Hope on the other hand, was a loner that hardly paid attention to anybody. She was the nerd of the school, who got the highest grades and then passed through the halls unnoticed.

The only person who talked to her at school was Faith, but that was only because she was her sister and was morally obligated to.

Hope watched from the other side of their shared bedroom as Faith finished prepping herself for school. She always looked so gorgeous; Hope always wanted to look like her sister did. She could if she tried hard enough, but Hope took pride in her excelled grades, and would rather have her nerdieness than a beautiful physique.

"So…" Faith had begun, applying her usual deep shade of red lipstick, "Luke Tanner has been asking me about you."

Catching her attention, Hope exchanged glances with her sister, a wry smile forming at the corners of her mouth, "Really?" Luke was one of the football players, and oober hunky. "What about?"

"Oh…" Faith giggled while applying her charcoal eye shadow. "He wanted to know if he could borrow your history notes this week. He's so stupid, but you gotta love him."

Hope felt her smile fade into a scowl. She hated when Faith would tease her like that. It was one of the things that diminished her self esteem. Faith only laughed it off, returning to the mirror to complete her work while Hope climbed onto her bed to pack her backpack.

Faith checked herself over not once, but twice to make sure she was nothing shy of perfect, "Hey Hope, you should get a boyfriend." She turned to give a wide smile to her sister.

Her? A boyfriend? She had to hold back a laugh. Hope never dated. She'd never even had a boyfriend before. Unless her boyfriend in kindergarten she was with for a week before he spilled grape juice on her counted. Sure she found some guys attractive and she wouldn't mind being with someone, but she never had time for that. She was convinced it would make her grades drop, and besides, she liked going unnoticed. She was like a breeze in the wind; you can't see it but you know it's there.

"Come on. Just look at me and Ryan." Faith added, boasting about her perfect relationship with her perfect jock boyfriend.

"Ryan and I." Hope had to butt in, being a grammar freak. "I'm fine. Besides, who would want to be with the nerdy girl?"

"Hope, don't degrade yourself like that. Any guy would be lucky to have you as his girlfriend." She tried to sound peppy, but even she couldn't hide the bit of lost hope she held for her twin. Faith loved her sister, but Hope was a helpless dork, and she knew it.

In sync, they wrapped their bags around their sides, both fighting to get out the door first. Ms. Miller saw the playful antics of her daughters, trying to calm them down before they walked out of their house. It was nice having a decent place to live, and since their mom worked at Wayne Enterprises, they were never without money. They weren't rich by any standards, but they could get along easily.

Both girls slid into Faith's pink, Malibu Barbie corvette, and pulled out of the driveway. Hope clung nervously to her over sized grey sweater, while Faith superbly guided the car along the busy roads. It was funny for Hope to think about the odd fashion choices that her sister made. She always had on these skimpy skirts or dresses, while usually bearing a tight tank top and way too high heals. She didn't want to call her sister a slut or anything, but sometimes, she just looked like a real slut. Hope felt content with her normal look; big lumpy sweater with a t-shirt underneath, fitted boot cut jeans, and her favorite pair of black converse.

Within ten minutes they made their way into the crowded school parking lot. Every parking space was filled with a different clique, ranging from bikers to jocks and cheerleaders. Before school, majority of the students would pile into their cars and just hang out since it wasn't time to go in yet.

Faith, being the most popular girl in school, immediately had her best group of girlfriends meeting her at the car. "Hey guys!" they hugged incessantly, like they hadn't seen her in a year, even though it had only been a week end. "Bye Hope!" Faith squealed while meeting her boyfriend Ryan. She jumped into his arms, giggling like a child. Sometimes it made Hope want to puke at how cutesy they got with each other.

Hope stumbled from the car, bringing her backpack over her shoulders. She silently made her way to the stairs that led into the school, seating herself down on the bottom step. She pulled out her favorite book, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, a classic she never got tired of reading, and flipped it open to where she left off the day before.

Hope scrambled to get to her locker, squeezing her way through rough housing guys and couples swapping spit in the hallways. She got to her locker, which was sadly in between two sweaty guys from the wrestling team. Hope had only just begun to pull her chemistry binder out when one of the guys had accidentally shoved her trying to get to the other guy. Her binder went flying along with all her papers, spreading evenly out along the hallway.

"Oops." Came from the bulky men standing above her, before they ditched without even offering to help. Assholes.

She was likely to get a bruise on her back from being hit in the back by the wrestler, but she only shrugged it off. She crouched down to collect her things, when she noticed a pair of ragged tennis shoes like hers was standing deathly still in front of her.

Hope slowly lifted her gaze, eying the piece of paper the guy held in his hand. He was holding it out to her, but she didn't take it right away. Her gaze traveled upwards to see just who the person was. She saw his structured body; he wasn't built like one of the football players there, but was definitely fit. Her eyes darted to his curly, dirty blond hair which had begun to fall into his face as he waited impatiently for her to take her papers.

She reached out, gripping her homework and tugging it out of this new kid's hands lightly. "Thanks." Hope said as she stood up, noticing how tall this guy was. He was over six feet for sure, because even as she stood up he towered over her 5"7 frame.

He didn't even give a "your welcome" as he darted away. Hope watched this new guy curiously as he brushed his blond ends back, revealing a breath stopping scar along the side of his mouth. It was long and gruesome, extending to nearly his cheek, and made Hope take a step back, smashing right into her locker door. If she didn't have a bruise yet, she certainly did now.

The immediate thought of how he got the horrid scar began to flash through her mind, but she quickly threw it away because she had no time to think about such things. She would be late to class if she was distracted by something like that.

Hope's first class was chemistry, a class she had always excelled in. She found working with science fun, and hoped to one day become a chemical engineer.

She took her normal seat in the back of the room, passing Faith, who was sitting with one of her cheerleader friends. Hope never paid any attention to those girls, even though deep down she secretly wished she could be one.

"Good morning!" The teacher, Mrs. Montgomery spoke in an all too peppy tone. "How was everyone's weekends?"

The class hooted and hollered, each person trying to speak over the other. Hope never bothered to join in, considering her weekends were usually filled with staying home and studying, so she stuck her head back into Huckleberry Finn.

The door opened, but Hope never looked up, too enriched with the words she was reading. Every sound in the room came to a skidding halt, and you could really be able to hear a pin drop.

The whole class, exempt Hope, had their mouths dangling open, peering at the guy in the front of the room. He had an annoyed look on his face as he handed Mrs. Montgomery a note, gradually scowling at the rest of the class.

"Class," Mrs. Montgomery jolted her class awake from the obvious lack of focus. "This is Jack Napier. Jack, class. Class, Jack." Was her informal way of introducing him. "Now where to put you? Hm…. You can sit at Hope's table."

Hope had no idea what was going on as she was in too deep within the pages that surrounded Finn.

"Hope can you raise your hand please?" no response from her direction. "Hope?" zip. "Hope?!" Mrs. Montgomery growled in frustration, finally getting her attention.

It had startled Hope to say the least, causing her to drop her book onto the table, losing her page, "I'm sorry. Yes ma'am?" her eyes wandered over to Jack, looking over the boy who had given one of her papers to her. Her gaze couldn't help but fall back on his scar, but her mouth didn't gap open like everyone else's did.

"Jack, if you could take a seat next to Hope please." She perked up, patting him on the shoulder. He apparently didn't like that, giving her a sour glare as he staggered over to Hope's empty table. He plopped down in the seat next to hers, leaning back in his chair.

Hope eventually found her place in the book, and left a gum wrapper as her book mark before thrusting it into her messenger bag.

"Okay guys, pull out your labs from last week." The shuffling noise came from all around as the students searched through their belongings to find their lab. Mrs. Montgomery looked over at Jack, "I don't have any extra copies. But you can look on with Hope. Okay then, let's start the lab."

The lab they were doing this week was experimenting with melting points of different types of metals. Hope felt uneasy as Jack leaned closer to her, eyeballing her paper. It wasn't him that made her feel weird, it was his scar. She peered at him through the corner of her eye, examining the course skin, realizing that it made him look like the right side of his face was smiling at her.

"Ahem." She averted her gaze when he cleared his throat, noticing she hadn't started the lab yet.

"Sorry." She mumbled in his direction, pulling her sweater off and setting it along side her bag. Her Pink Floyd shirt was revealed from under the mess of yarn, alongside something else. On her left arm, and deep scar was placed so perfectly, in an exact line stretching from her shoulder down to the elbow. It was rigid and rough, and gave a dark pink color, almost matching the color of Faith's car.

It had happened over the summer when she did it. A construction crew was renovating her home. She accidentally tripped and her arm skid along a nail that hadn't been hammered down yet. The cut formed along the top half of her arm; she not only had to receive over one hundred stitches, but an excruciating tetanus shot for the rusty nail.

She felt self-conscious about it all the time, and always wore her sweaters to cover it up. Maybe that's why Jack's scar made her uneasy, it was because it had reminded her of the one along her arm, and of the immense pain it had brought her.

Hope grabbed two pairs of goggles, handing one to Jack, and putting the other on herself after taking her plush blond hair back into a high ponytail.

She could feel his eyes burning holes into her side, knowing he was tracing her long scar with his eyes. She disregarded him though, getting the supplies ready for the lab. She collected everything they needed, which included two test tubes, a Bunsen burner and six small cubes of the metals they were going to be melting.

Hope looked over the directions, turning the burner on to 92 degrees Fahrenheit. She placed one of the test tubes in the holder, and placed it over the flame to heat it for the first metal. Gallium was first on the list, and both waited patiently for the tube to heat.

"How did you get that scar?" Jack seemed to break the awkward silence from between them, but he never made eye contact with her.

Hope's hand instinctively shot to her cut, stroking its coarse texture. She was hesitant to tell him, but figured since they both shared such massive scars, she could let him know, "I slipped and fell onto a nail, and it um… it cut up across my arm." Her voice was cold as she silently replayed the horrid memory in her head. He took a last look at her arm, and she thought about asking him the same question. "What about you?"

Jack let out a sigh, reverting his eyes to the burner, "The temperature's too high." Giving her no response to her question, he turned the knob on the burner, decreasing the heat to a mere 85 degrees.

"What are you doing?" Hope couldn't help but ask. "The directions say specifically to put it on 92 degrees."

"The glass is going to break at 92." He said matter-of-factly, giving Hope a sly grin, and in return, she gave only a confused look. "Just watch."

Okay. She thought. Is he like an expert on fire or something? Within only a few seconds, a loud shattering sound came from the front of the room, along with a few screams. Then another tube broke, and another until all were nothing but broken pieces, except for Hope and Jack's.

Hope watched stunned as Faith jumped out of her seat, screaming for dear life, blood streaming down her hand. Mrs. Montgomery immediately jumped into teacher mode, grabbing paper towels and holding them to Faith's hand roughly. She led her out of the classroom, escorting her to the nurse's office.

Everyone was stuck not knowing what to do since the teacher had left, and ended up just chatting with each other about the craziness they had just witnessed.

With a shocked expression on her face, one from her sister having been hurt and another from this guy next to her, knowing exactly what was going to happen, she questioned her own knowledge. How was it that he, a brand spanking new student, knew to decrease the temperature and she didn't?

Mrs. Montgomery sprang back into the room, instructing her students how to carefully and properly dispose of the broken glass. She didn't even notice that their test tube wasn't broken.

Hope immediately shot up, begging to hear word of her sister, "What's going on with Faith? Is she okay?"

"Yes," the teacher assured her. "Your sister's going to be fine. She's just going to need a while to clean it all up and get a few bandages."

That was good to hear. But it was weird; she could feel a sting in her hand, as if the glass had cut her. It most likely had something to do with twins and how they can feel what the other one is feeling sometimes. Hope sat back down in her seat, eying Jack negatively.

"You guys twins or something?" he spoke. "Hope and Faith? Such, gen-u-ine names for twins." His gave her a sarcastic tone, which only displeased Hope even more.

She gave him a loud scoff, "My dad named us that right before he died thank you very much." He only rolled his eyes. This Jack guy was starting to rub her the wrong way, but she had to know how he knew about the temperature being too extreme. "How did you know that was going to happen?" she asked in just above a whisper.

He brushed his scraggly blond hair back, giving her a smile that distorted his scar, which gave him a sinister look, making Hope's insides churn, "Kitten, I never reveal my secrets."

So, tell me how I did. Review, follow, and favorite please! Well, I mean you don't have to, but I'd really appreciate it.