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The Joker held a small break with his ring finger where the card was placed. As he switched hands, he switched the break to his thumb. Then, he went to work.

Double undercut. The card was now on top of the deck.

Controlled riffle shuffle. Still on top.

Two Triple Z cuts. Flashy, eye-catching, and left the card on top each time.

He quickly turned the deck over in his hand, and then asked Thaddeus to hold out one hand, palm up.

Thaddeus did what he was told, and continued to watch the boss, his thoughts to keep an eye on the woman completely forgotten.

The clown then executed a false double cut, using Thaddeus' hand as a table surface, then picked the cards back up. He performed on last cut, and held the break with his pinky, so that he knew where her card still was without showing it.

"Hope you remember that card, because your about to see it," the Joker teased, as he adjusted his grip, using his 'free' hand to mask the position that his fingers were taking. In the space of a second, he had her card in between two halves of the deck, slightly bent. His hands hid this fact quite nicely.

Quickly, he pointed the deck at Thaddeus and said, "Bang!" The card shot out from the deck, and went halfway into Thaddeus' neck, severing his jugular artery.

Thaddeus clutched at his neck, and knocked the card out of the wound. This was the worst thing he could do, as the blood now had no obstruction. His hands keeping the crimson life from flying out in spurts, instead ran out from under his hands. In a matter of seconds, he was on the ground. Less than fifteen seconds later, he was unconscious. By then, he'd lost so much blood that his hands going limp didn't reveal a fountain of life force so much as a steady stream. Seconds later, he was dead.

The Joker didn't watch a second of it. Instead, he picked up the card as it hit the ground with one hand as the other put the rest of the deck in his pocket, and once Thaddeus was on the ground, he wiped off the card on a relatively clean portion of his dying henchman's shirt. "Should have listened earlier. I DID say that paper cuts were painful. Heh heh heh..." The Ace of Knaves wasn't even looking at Thaddeus when he died, as he was too busy holding the card in front of him, its face towards Gossamer. "This your card?" He hadn't even looked at it.

...Gossamer watched Joker do his thing with the cards with a small smile on her face. Honestly she'd never seen someone play with cards like this before. Which... for how much she'd been in casinos and bars, was a bit surprising. They just did simple shuffles though. Nothing fancy. Her smile quickly turned into a frown though when the man suddenly shot the card out of the deck and into the henchman's throat. Purely more out of surprise than anything else. It wasn't the first time she'd seen someone slit their throat, and it wouldn't be her last.

She watched the unfortunate man fall to the ground and bleed out. She looked away from the man only when Joker moved to clean off the card on the man's shirt, then kept her attention on him. Her eyes flickered over the blood smeared card he held up, and her grin returned.

"Queen of Spades... That would be it." she replied. "Not the sort of card trick I had been expecting." she admitted. Then she frowned thoughtfully and looked over the card again. Now that she thought about it... that had to have been one mighty throw for a piece of paper to go through someone's neck like that.

Gently, she reached out and picked the card out of his hand to inspect it better. Her finger tips brushed the edge of the card, and she noted that the edges were... heavy. Sort of like there was something different to the edge of the card. When she slid her finger over the clean edge of the card, she found out exactly what was different about it. The familiar little sting of a blade slicing through her flesh.

She pulled her thumb back, and watched as a thin line of blood began trickling down her hand. "Bladed.... nice touch." she said, her smile growing a bit.

.........Gossamer looked down at the pool of blood inching it's way towards where she had been standing, then grinned a bit. ”These old things could use a bit of color.” she said a she looked down at her high heeled boots. ”They're dirty, but they could use a bit of blood to match the rest of my outfit.” She smiled a bit and looked back down at the bleeding man. ”Do you always loose your employees like that?”

.........Gossamer glanced in the direction the Joker had indicated. She pursed her lips a bit, then raised her hand to begin pointing towards the buildings. Most of them were unfamiliar to her, so she had no idea what buildings exactly the Joker was unsure of. She began pointing off buildings and replying back to him. "Nope...nope.... definitely not... kind of familiar... generic looking building... nope... that whole street is new... those all look the same..."

Then she paused a moment as she looked over the skyline. Past the buildings that were nearby and into the tall skyscrapers in the distance. She narrowed her gaze in on one or two of the skyscrapers. ".... those... all the way back there though.... they look familiar." she replied. "Not surprising though, there are tons of buildings in New York that are beyond forgettable, and a handful of fancier buildings or land-mark-ish kinds of things." Then she placed a finger under her bottom lip. "Actually... that black one looks an awful lot like... one of my old employers homes." She said, gazing at a tall black tower in the distance.

.........Gossamer paused and glanced over at Joker. She let her eyes scan over him thoughtfully for a moment before responding to him. He was a... far cry from the usual type of person she enjoyed hanging around with on a physical level. But... he was rather interesting. At least he seemed interesting. It could be worth her while. It would be good to have an allie in this new city anyway. "I'm sure he wouldn't mind a little visit as long as we're on our best behavior while inside his building." she added, then smiled at him. "And... as far as the getting to now each other better... I suppose it wouldn't hurt. If New York is over there, I wouldn't mind exploring your town as long as I had someone to show me a fun little tour."

"Well... last I recall we were on fairly good terms." The last time she had worked for Blackstone, all of her jobs had gone over well. She made him happy, he continued to give her jobs. ...ahem. And other little tasks if she felt like getting a little bonus.

.........Gossamer smiled a bit as she glanced down at the late henchmen. ”Is it now? Hm... that could be a slight problem. My old boss tends to have a problem when his employees are injured while on the job. Money out of his pocket and bad image and all of that happy crap.” she said. Then she placed a finger up to her bottom lip and looked back towards the black tower.

”Well... it is a fair walk away. Suppose we have plenty of time to go over what you should do and shouldn't do when we get to his building.” she said, then looked back to the Joker with a small grin. ”He's not a good employer to piss off. Trust me. He's not the “no more money for you” or the “I'm gonna hire someone to kill you” type of boss as much as the “I'm going to scare the s**t out of you and then destroy your life if I don't decide to just kill you where you stand right now” type of boss. And if he had the surprise I just did, He's got a lot on his mind right now. Dealing with people like us re-decorating his office is not going to sit well with him.”

.........Gossamer let out a loud, sudden laugh before throwing a hand over her mouth. Then she giggled, her eyes twinkling before calming down enough to speak. ”HIM crack a joke? The closest I've ever herd him crack a joke was a passive aggressive insult. The only time I've ever seen him smile is when he's trying to be polite or charming. The only time I've heard him laugh is the little chuckle he gets just before he's about to scare the living hell out of someone.” she said, then smiled and crossed her arms. ”Trust me... I don't think you're going to have a problem with him in that department.”

Then she turned her gaze back to Blackstone tower and grinned slightly. ”As for the killing you thing, unless you're immortal, he'll find a way. Even then he'd probably find a way to get you as close to dead as he could. Powers and all. I wouldn't want my newest acquaintance to be turned into a pile of acidic gunk in the middle of Blackstone's office.” she said. Then she paused for a moment in thought, and turned back to Joker. ”Speaking of which... you honestly were in situations like those? A shark attack?”