the mirror shows not

by sciencefictioness

Summary:

It’s later when Tim realizes that he’s never really been afraid of Joker— not as a child, not as Robin, or anyone else. All the Joker could do, really, was kill him. Tim has never been afraid of dying.

Tim has always been afraid of failing, more than anything else.

Notes:

Or: let me sell you on timjokes in twelve thousand words, i promise you'll have a good time. source: trust me bro

Chapter 1: the pull on my flesh

It’s later when Tim realizes that he’s never really been afraid of Joker— not as a child, not as Robin, or anyone else.  All the Joker could do, really, was kill him.  Tim has never been afraid of dying.  

 

Tim has always been afraid of failing, more than anything else.  

 

Even that first time, there is no genuine fear.  The last time Joker got his hands on everyone, he’d gone to excruciating lengths to make sure no one was hurt, because he’d learned his lesson.  It is the same lesson that a lot of different people have learned over years, when they tried to get close to Bruce for one reason or another; because they loved him, or because they hated him.  Because they wanted him dead.  Because they wanted to keep him alive.  

 

Killing Bruce’s children was more trouble than it was worth in the long run.  It’s an unspoken rule Joker learned before most of the rest, and goes to great lengths not to violate nowadays.  

 

It’s why, even when Tim is waking up from the drug he’s been hit with that first night, tied to a chair in some ruined building along Amusement Mile, there is no true terror.  The makeshift hood that’s been draped over his face is yanked away with a flourish to reveal the Joker, his makeup smeared and his hair messy in a way that tells Tim he’s been yanking at it, and the first thing Tim feels is resigned.  This again, he thinks.  It’s nothing Tim expected, but maybe he should have.

 

Every now and then Joker tries to come at Bruce’s family instead of Bruce himself, and it has been awhile, except this isn’t the kind of dance number that usually starts with Tim of all people.  There’s been no sign of Joker up to anything big on the streets, though; no messages in neon spray paint in Gotham alleyways, no body parts showing up on the doorstep of Wayne Manor in ruined paper bags.  Things have been quiet.  

 

Tim was chasing down a lead of his own on a case that’s been bothering him for a while, one Bruce doesn’t think warrants further attention but keeps Tim lying awake at night.  He’s learned that it’s usually easier if he gets the answers for all the questions his mind won’t stop asking, even if those answers are boring and useless in the long run.  The knowledge itself might be worthless, but the knowing is not.  

 

He’s been running after intelligence on a shady slumlord and gotten too focused on his prey to realize he is also being hunted, until the air is full of green smoke and the sound of distant laughter.  

 

“Don’t worry, little bird!”  

 

The voice comes first, before the hands on his face, and buried in his hair.  Joker is there, too close, so close that Tim can feel every breath.  

 

“I’m only here to ruffle your feathers a bit!”

 

Sleep is taking Tim so fast that there is nothing he can do but yield to it.  Eventually, he will think of this as the start of something larger.  It’s so much bigger than closing his eyes.  Going limp.  

 

The first gift that Joker gives him is sleep.  

 

Then, when he wakes in something that might have once been a house of mirrors but is now a house of broken glass and the faint, distorted music from a calliope, the next gift is clarity.  Joker has never been all that secretive about his motivations, or even his methods.  It is always about theater, comedy, and decay.  Predictable, maybe, but Tim doesn’t mind that.  

 

There are so many worse answers for the question of who was responsible for taking him than Joker, and he can’t think of a better one, really.  The League of Assassins have nicer digs for the imprisonment and torture of vigilantes, but they’re not much for conversation, and Tim has always been good at talking his way out of things. Any of the other villains Bruce has been after would only be holding Tim as bait, and that is both boring and a little grating.  Disrespectful is the wrong word, but it’s the one coming to mind.  

 

Tim blinks through the fog of the drug coursing through his system, mind already working to try and figure out what it might be, how long it will last, how he can make it stop.  

 

There’s confusion, then confinement; Tim pulls at the ropes around his wrists, pinning them against the back of the chair he’s sitting in, tied by someone who knows what they’re doing.  His ankles are bound, not with his feet flat against the ground to give him leverage, but pulled back underneath the chair with only the toes of his boots scraping against the mirror shards and sawdust and grime blanketing the concrete.  

 

There’s nothing to push against.  Tim could throw himself onto the ground, but it wouldn’t do anything to help him get free right now and there are so many sharp edges waiting if he tries it.  The chair is metal, and solid.  Tim had been captive enough times to know when it’s time to fight, when it’s time to rest, and when it’s time to think.  

 

Joker has him.  Plucked him from a Gotham alley like some over-ripe thing waiting on a tree, snatched and stolen away so quickly that it is impressive in a way that gets on Tim’s nerves.  Focus, Tim thinks, but it’s hard.  

 

Joker has him, and has drugged him with…. something.  

 

Something that isn’t the sleeping gas from earlier, or Joker’s usual laughing gas.  There’s an ache in his shoulder, like he’s been given an injection.  It’s got his bones sore all over, or maybe that’s the way he’s tied.  

 

Tim’s sweating all, heartbeat pulsing in his mouth, and between his thighs.  His cunt is aching, wet enough that he wants to close his legs in some sort of embarrassment even though he’s still dressed, but the ropes won’t let him do much more than strain against them.  Tim groans, and huffs out a rough gasp.  

 

Ivy, is what Tim thinks next, but that isn’t exactly right.  Still, enough villains have access to different pharmaceutical-grade aphrodisiacs that it doesn’t take a detective’s skills to figure it out.  Tim’s cunt is drenched and his skin is hypersensitive.  The position he is in is awful, not because he cannot get away, but because he cannot touch himself.  

 

Joker has him, drugged and desperate.  Tim could get himself free, maybe, if he weren’t so empty inside.  He’s never needed to get off so badly in his life, not even in the beginning of his transition when the hormones were hitting like a goddamn truck.  Not even as a teenager in his bedroom fantasizing about heroes.  

 

The need to come is blinding, and through the fog of it something falls into place.  It’s like solving a puzzle in some game, watching things begin to open, shift, and unravel.  

 

Joker has him like this so he will really, truly listen.  Tim swallows, and tries to catch his breath, looking up at Joker and seeing him for the first time.  

 

He’s sitting on a couch that looks like it came out of the dumpster behind an abandoned arcade, springs jutting through faded black fabric with splashes of stained neon here and there.  There’s a scattering of items on the cushions beside him— more rope, some gas canisters, a bloody knife.

 

Tim isn’t cut anywhere, he finds himself thinking inanely, wondering whose blood is on the metal.  He hasn’t taken Tim out of his Red Robin suit, or even out of his mask.  There is no point in an unmasking when he knows who Tim is, and does not care at all.

 

Joker is dressed in a deep purple suit, the jacket tossed over the back of the couch, long sleeves rolled up over his forearms.  The moment Tim’s gaze clears and settles on him, Joker lights up, grinning.  

 

“You always were the smartest little birdie of the bunch, Timmy.  Can I call you Timmy?”  Joker jumps up to his feet, crossing the room to crouch in front of Tim.  “Listen, you know I’m not a fan of brute force— that’s Batsy’s gimmick, not mine.  I’m just looking for a good show, a solid joke to end the night, and a healthy round of applause, but he just doesn’t want to play anymore.  What’s the deal with that, huh, little red?”

 

Joker stands, putting a hand on one of Tim’s shoulders and circling him, leaning down from behind to rave directly in his ear.  

 

“See, that’s the thing you’ve always understood!  After what happened with your big brother— sorry about all that, my bad. I did not realize he was going to get his panties in such a twist about it, but Batsy was running around solo, and you, you…. YOU!”  

 

Joker has been tapping on his shoulders with all of his fingers, like someone tapping their fingernails rhythmically against a desk, but now he lays his palms over them like it is him, and not ropes, holding Tim down in his seat.  His voice is lower, more manic.  

 

“You know that sometimes Batsy needs help, even when he doesn’t want it.  That he needs a little nudge in the right direction, sometimes!”

 

Tim is trying to pay attention, partly because it’s important if he wants to find an opening to escape, but knows it’s almost impossible.  Even just the warmth of Joker’s breath on his skin, the pressure of his hands, is enough to have Tim whining in his throat.  Suddenly Joker is straddling his lap, a hand on either side of Tim’s face.  His pupils are black, and wide, his smile unhinged in its euphoria.  

 

For a terrifying moment, it feels like a mirror reflecting something that Tim has always fought to keep buried.  For all his insanity, his lack of a grip on reality, his absolute inability to see reason, Joker has always agreed with Tim on one important thing.  

 

It is Batman’s job to keep Gotham from falling apart, and he cannot do it alone.  

 

“I’ve been kicking around down here on my own trying to figure out the theme of our next row, Batsy and me, and I got to thinking about you, Tim!”  Joker drags his palms down Tim’s chest, leaning forward to meet his eyes for emphasis.  “I feel like we never really got a chance to get to know each other!  When you showed up Batsy played hard to get for so long— what a fucking bummer, am I right?  And then it wasn’t that long before the little baby bat came along and ruined everything.”

    

The most infuriating thing, or one of them at least, is that Joker’s plans are always so convoluted; he’s given Tim the most powerful aphrodisiac that he’s ever encountered, with absolutely no desire to take advantage of it, other than the fact that Tim can’t think straight to get away.  

 

Joker has gone to some absurd lengths so that Tim will be quiet, and still, and pay attention.  He hates that it makes him want to focus.  

 

Makes him think maybe there is something worth his time buried beneath all this want and fanaticism and bullshit.   Tim swears under his breath, rocking up into the weight of Joker in his lap without thinking.  He whimpers again, muscles tensing all over as he struggles for some sort of relief and finds none.    

 

“Oh, sorry about that, darling,” Joker says almost absently, shoving a hand between Tim’s thighs to give him something to grind against.  “You’re just very good at what you do, and I can’t go having you run off before we have our little talk, you know?”

 

Tim doesn’t know anything.  He rolls his hips, and Joker moves his wrist, shoving against Tim with the heel of his hand in time with his movements.  It’s nothing at all, and it shouldn’t be enough to get him off, but after a few moments he’s shaking through it all the same.  He huffs ragged little breaths through his nose, and his ears ring, toes pushing as best they can against the ground underneath him but sliding in the grime.  

 

“Might’ve erred on the side of uhhhhh, way too fucked up, on your dosage, but we’ll get through this together alright?  It’ll wear off pretty fast, even if it’s pretty intense!  Or that’s what they say, I’ve never taken any, but that’s neither here nor there.”

 

“Shhhhhhhhut up, for a second, shut the fuck up,” Tim whines, hips still moving in jerky little movements.  He’s going to come again, if only Joker will stop talking.  

 

Joker tucks Tim’s face against his chest with his free hand and pets through his hair, pressing back against Tim’s cunt to help work him through his second climax.  It feels like it does not even occur to Joker that he could fuck Tim right now— that Tim would let him.  That Tim might beg him, if he wasn’t giving him anything at all.  

 

“I’ve just been thinking we could make a good team, me and you.  If Batsy doesn’t want our help, it doesn’t mean we can’t still help him, yeah?”

 

Tim is shaking his head, not because he agrees or disagrees but because Joker is holding him tighter now.  

 

Because he is about to come again.  

 

“We can just do some of his work for him, you know?  The graveyard shift takes over, does a little dirty work, keeps everyone else’s hands clean.”

 

Joker’s fingers have to be drenched now; Tim knows that he’s soaked through his uniform.  

 

“You’re always working so hard, sweetheart.  A co-worker with a sense of humor goes a long way, I promise.  We could be good together, me and you.”

 

Tim could be good for anyone, is what he is thinking, but does not say.  

 

“You’ve always been my Robin, Timothy.”

 

It’s stupid.  It’s pathetic that someone like the Joker can praise Tim and his starved sense of self-worth drinks it up almost as eagerly as if it had come from someone who mattered.  

 

What Tim imagines it would feel like coming from someone who matters.  Bruce does not know how to encourage anyone.  Dick is busy running from Gotham, and Bruce, and the ruins he’s made of their family.  Jason is trying to find the line between the guns in his chest holster and the crowbar in his hands.  

 

Damian is trying to prove himself to Bruce, just like the rest of them did; it will be a while before he learns better, no matter how hard they try to teach him.  

 

Tim has never been anyone’s Robin, not even when he was supposed to be Bruce’s, and it seems like it doesn’t matter who is saying the words.  Drugged and shameless with glass in his shoes and Joker’s fingers in his hair, all that matters is that someone chooses him.  

 

It doesn’t matter if they’re choosing Bruce first; Tim is choosing him first too.  

 

Some of the mindlessness eases back when he finishes again, face hidden in Joker’s chest, listening to him rave about being Batsy’s left and right hands.  It’s the only part of the night that has made him feel afraid— the fact that Joker is making sense.

 

That when Tim thinks about what he’s saying and sifts through the mania, Joker is not wrong.

 

When the drugs begin to fade it is obvious, and Joker brushes his hair away from his face, and kisses him on the forehead.  He promises they’ll talk again soon, popping a fresh canister of gas to put Tim to sleep as he vanishes into shifting shades of green.  

 

Tim wakes up in an unfamiliar bed, in an unfamiliar hotel room, but he knows he’s still in Gotham.  He’s still dressed in his filthy uniform, sore like he’s been in a car wreck, or fallen off a roof, or both.  Tim has lived through a lot of hangovers for a lot of different questionable substances and overall, this one isn’t the worst.  When he drags himself upright and peeks out the blinds, Tim can see the flickering neon light of the motel sign.  

 

Joker has left him somewhere called the Red Bird Inn.  

 

Tim has to admit, it is funny.  

The room is paid up for a week, and Tim doesn’t want to put too much thought into that, but he does collapse back onto the bed and go back to sleep for a while.  He’s buried in the heart of the city but the sun is shining, and in Gotham that’s good enough.

Chapter 2: stifled the choice

Tim does not tell his family.  

 

Tim does not tell a soul.  

 

Nobody knew he’d been taken, drugged, or held prisoner.  Tim had been looking into things off the record so to speak, and there was no reason for anyone to worry when he supposedly wasn’t even patrolling that night.  Tim wakes up in a strange bed mostly unharmed, itching and restless, he tells himself it is the remnants of the drug and not the things the Joker did to him.  

 

The things Joker said to him.  

 

Coming clean feels like telling everyone about something stupid he did when no one was watching.  Like he is telling on himself, instead of Joker.  He was keeping things from his family, got sloppy, and let someone get the better of him.  Even if Tim left out parts of the story, the omissions will be obvious.  Bruce will want to run tests on Tim, because it is what Tim would want if the situation were reversed.

 

What Tim will do, buried in a lab in Wayne Enterprises while Bruce isn’t looking, but the results will be for Tim and not Tim and all of his allies.  It will feel more like going through the motions than doing any actual investigating— the drug is a pharmaceutical grade aphrodisiac, synthesized from compounds that are similar but not identical to those in Ivy’s toxin.  Nothing that should exist, in Joker’s hands or anyone else’s, but it’s still no surprise.  

 

Tim cannot find the strength to walk up to Bruce and the others, I was lying, fighting on my own again, and all the things you warned me about came true.  

 

Time and time again they’ve told each other that it is better to face things together than alone, and Tim knows it’s the truth, but at the end of the night it feels like a choice that he should be allowed to make for himself.  He closes his eyes and thinks of how it felt, overwhelmed and pathetic and it was not even his fault.

 

Joker told Tim everything he’s been wanting to hear; from Bruce, or Dick, or Jason.  From anyone in their family, if only they would really look at Tim.  He tells himself that praise from a liar is meaningless, and tries to forget that he is a liar too.  

 

Tim cannot find the words to say it; someone took advantage of me, and it is all I ever wanted, except from you instead.  

 

Tim has been starving for affection for so long that it seems he will take it anywhere, from anyone.  

 

Even someone who killed Jason.  

 

Tim gets sick to his stomach when he thinks of it again and decides it is his business, just one more thing for him to deal with; this is none of his family’s concern.  They should not have to clean up his messes, or account for his failures.  

 

Tim keeps telling himself it is his own business when it happens again.  

 

-

 

It feels less like his fault, this time.  He’s still hunting targets on his own instead of involving his family— they have enough on their plate, he tells himself, and then suddenly his own is overflowing.  

 

Tim takes a blow to the head in a fight and instead of a follow up swing from the thug he’s trying to overpower, there’s the pop of a gas canister in the alley.  It draws the attention of Tim’s opponent for a moment, and that’s long enough for Tim to knock him out, but he’s already breathed in enough of the gas that he’s falling to his knees alongside his enemy.  

 

“Awwww, that’s no fun, little red!  I was gonna take credit for this one, geez!  How can I be your knight in shining armor if you go beating up all the dragons before I can slay them?”  

 

Joker slips through the fog of green smoke, crouching in front of him and using the cane he is holding to lift up Tim’s chin.  

 

“Let someone hold the door for you now and then, gorgeous.  I know you’re a strong and independent bird, but didn’t Batsy ever teach you any manners?”  Joker laughs brightly, snorting and covering his face with his palm.  “I guess he’d have to learn them himself first, am I right?”

 

Tim’s head lolls to the side, and he tries to break his fall when he sags forward but Joker is there to catch him first.  

 

“Awfully forward of you,” Joker says, looping Tim’s arm over his shoulder and heaving him up to his feet.  “Buy a girl some flowers first, Timmy.”  

 

Joker leads him down the alley towards the street, the two of them weaving back and forth.  The car he’s stolen has a sticker on the back window, My Son Is An Honor Student At Gotham West Elementary.

 

That isn’t saying much, Tim thinks, but hears Joker snort a laugh and realizes he said it out loud.

 

“See?  SEE?  There’s a reason you’re my favorite.”

 

He’s been manhandled into the backseat of enough cars to know what’s happening, except he is in the front this time, buckled carefully into the passenger seat before Joker climbs bodily over him to get behind the wheel.  Joker puts it in drive, hitting the gas for a moment before slamming on the brakes; the force of it slams the passenger door shut and almost throws Tim into the floor.

 

Joker’s got a palm over Tim’s chest, grinning and holding him upright so he isn’t tossed around.  Tim looks down at his fingers, blinking through the drowsiness of the gas that’s settling in earnest now, then back up at his face.  

 

“Don’t worry darling, I am an excellent driver.  Much better than Batsy, I’ve seen the way he goes through cars.”  

 

Tim’s eyes close for what feels like only a moment, but then he’s slumped onto the console, cold fingers in his hair.  

 

“There you go, baby, that’s the way.  It’s a long trip.  I’ll wake you when we’re home!”

 

He wants to ask where home is, but whines instead.  

 

Even with sleep taking him he can already feel heat blooming between his thighs.  

 

-

 

Tim wakes up in bed this time.  

 

He knows, he knows it isn’t Joker’s bed in any way that matters— that the king sized bed with purple sheets does not belong to him.  The room that can only be described as vintage but neglected isn’t his own.  Joker does not come back here night after night to rest, or plot his schemes at some rotten desk nearby.  Whatever apartment building they’re in is on the lower east side, Tim’s brain notes idly from listening to noise outside the windows.  

 

It doesn't matter where they are, because it feels like he has woken in Joker’s bed, and that is all that counts.  That is all that ever counts, when everything else is burned away.  Right and wrong are meaningless.  

 

Outrage, however righteous, is always about the way someone feels, and not the things that have been done.

 

Joker has drugged him again, the same substance from before, but the sensation of blinding need is noticeably less intense.  Everything is much the same as it was last time, location aside; he’s in a soft bed bound with strong ropes, intricate knots that feel out of place considering the person who must have tied them.  There’s warmth between his thighs, and Tim is wet in his uniform again, trying and failing to close his knees and find some friction.  

 

The light isn’t bright enough to hurt his eyes, and he’s still wearing his mask.  He’s feverish and sweating, desperate to get off, but he doesn’t feel sick to his stomach.  Doesn’t feel like he’s going to start seizing if he doesn’t get what he needs.  

 

Doesn’t want to beg, yet.  

 

Joker didn’t make him last time.  That is the second terrifying thing; Tim has a feeling that Joker will never make him beg.

 

Tim has a feeling Joker would give him anything.

 

“‘But Joker!’, I hear you saying, ‘I was so close to catching the bad guys and saving the city or the country or whatever, blah blah blah’.”  

 

Joker’s voice is what finally lets Tim blink through the drowsiness and focus his gaze.  He’s crouching on top of the mattress at the foot of the bed, still dressed in his suit jacket this time but he’s not wearing socks or shoes.  The soles of his feet are absolutely filthy, bloody and beat up like he’s been walking through Gotham like that for a while.  

 

He crawls up the bed on his knees, shoving one of his thighs between Tim’s purposefully, and as soon as there is something for him to grind against the relief is instantaneous.  The noise Tim makes would be embarrassing, except the only person here is Joker, and Tim refuses to entertain the emotion for him.  

 

He shoves his overheated cunt against against Joker and moans, rolling his hips to chase more of the feeling.  Joker is looming over him, eyes glittering, sifting through Tim’s hair with his long fingers.  His nails are ragged, dirt underneath them, patches of worn black polish in the center and cuticles that have been bitten bloody.  

 

“Well, don’t you worry your pretty little head about him any more.  Joker has already taken care of it.  Least I could do if I was going to steal you away so we could have another little talk, right?”  

 

Tim fists his hands and pulls on ropes around his wrists, just for the feel of it.  There’s enough give that he can ease the strain in his shoulders, but he isn’t getting free without a lot more fight in him than he possesses at the moment.  By the time he makes enough progress in escaping that it matters, Joker will be through with him anyway.  

 

It is so much easier to just let it happen, and so Tim does.  

 

Tim rocks against Joker more insistently, and he gives back just enough pressure to have Tim seeing stars.  

 

“Anyway, the boys at GCPD have your perpetrator all wrapped up like a gift on their doorstep courtesy of Batsy himself.  That’s what the note I wrote said anyway, and I’ve been practicing his handwriting this time!”

 

Joker tilts Tim’s chin up with his fingers, head cocked to side as he watches him writhe, listens to him whine.  There is something hungry flashing in his eyes.

 

“Batsy and his boys haven’t been taking good care of you, have they, kitten?”

 

Tim shakes his head; it isn’t Bruce’s job to take care of him.  Not like this.  Not at all.  

 

It’s his job to take care of Bruce.

 

“Shhhh, it’s okay.  You just take what you need, and I’ll tell you all about how our little partnership is going on my side of things.  There’s so many stray vigilantes around it’s hard to get anything done.  I mean, at least Nightwing had the decency to carry himself off to Bludhaven like a dutiful baby bat.  Jason, well… I’ll let him have this one, he still has some bones to pick around here.  My bones, probably, if we’re being honest, but I still think he’ll come around!!”

 

His thighs are shaking.  His hips are starting to ache.  Joker leans down, brushing sweaty, tangled hair back from Tim’s face.

 

“I think when he sees what good friends we are, even Jason Todd will be forced to consider letting bygones be bygones.  Water under the bridge, you know.”

 

Tim is losing his mind, and his grip on reality.  

 

Tim is about to come, and in that moment, it is everything he needs.

 

“Usually you blow up the bridge before we get there.  Makes things a little difficult.”  It’s the first thing that comes into his head, and he regrets it the moment he says it out loud.  

 

Then Joker laughs, loud and genuine and Tim’s chest hurts.  

 

“God, you’re perfect.  WHAT was he thinking, honestly, letting that little mail order baby take your place.  Well, that’s why we’re here, isn’t it?”  Joker holds his face in both hands, thumbs brushing back and forth over Tim’s cheekbones.  “Help him see the truth of things.”

 

He cannot breathe.  Joker smells like sweat, whiskey, and gasoline.  

 

“What truth?” Tim asks, gasping the words more than speaking them.  

 

Joker presses more of his weight down on Tim, giving him something more substantial to move against, and Tim can’t help but make a wounded sound and move even more frantically.  

 

“Isn’t it obvious, darling?”  Joker’s looking down at him, soft eyes and an indulgent smile.  “Batsy needs us just as much as we need him, and the way he keeps pretending otherwise just isn’t funny anymore.”

 

Tim shoves his face into Joker’s chest, eyes wrenched shut and jaw falling open as he comes, trying to get further into Joker’s space.  Seeking closeness instinctively, because he is starved for it.  Joker lays on top of him, nuzzling into his hair.  

 

“Now there are some gangsters in town, new to the city and trying to operate out of the harbor,” Joker starts, but Tim is barely listening.  

 

He regales Tim with news of the various criminal elements in Gotham, much of it things that Tim has already learned, but there is enough novel intelligence that it’s only the drug that keeps his mind from whirring around it endlessly.  Joker is… alarmingly proficient at what he does, sometimes.  When his goal is nothing more than ‘clean up the streets of Gotham by any means necessary’, without too much extra theater, it is scary how fast he can get things accomplished.  

 

Tim lets himself absorb as much of it as he can to worry about later, because right now it doesn’t matter.  There is nothing for Tim to do but endure this, and he has endured far worse things in the name of protecting Gotham City.  

 

There’s a weight lifting from his shoulders.  The things he’s learned tonight from Joker would have taken him weeks to dig up on his own.  The big bad he was after is in cuffs, and Tim has enough information to close the files on some of his cases, while breaking other investigations wide open.  

 

Right now he’s absolutely useless, nowhere to go until the drugs wear off, and it is not his fault.  Tim melts into it; he cannot help himself.  

 

It is the same impulse that leads him to obey Bruce’s orders in a fight without hesitation, or fall into line behind Dick and follow his lead.  The same reason he gives Jason the benefit of the doubt even when it feels like willful blindness, or doesn’t hit back when Damian lashes out against him.  

 

If it isn’t Tim’s decision, then he isn’t to blame.  There’s no guilt for him to bear.  

 

Tim hides in Joker’s rumpled clothes, grinding to get himself off again and again until his cunt is sore but he still can’t stop.  Joker is whispering all the while, grand plans and safehouses and new targets for them to run out of Gotham.  It sounds less like the ramblings of a madman, and more like a religious fanatic trying to show some heathen the miracles of their gods.  

 

It takes longer for Tim to come each time.  He has to work harder and harder to get himself there.  He whines, and swears, and when he cannot finish and needs it like air he asks Joker to use his fingers.  

 

Joker shushes him, getting a hand in Tim’s suit and pressing two fingers into him at once— he does not fuck Tim with them, but lets him fuck himself, and that’s more than enough.  He jerks his hips.  Bites at Joker’s clothes to keep himself from screaming in frustration.  

 

Comes, sobbing, shaking in Joker’s arms.  

 

Joker talks him through it, telling Tim that he’s doing so good, just like that, easy does it darling, I have you.  

 

Joker talks him into sleep, making promises that Tim cannot remember, but knows he will keep.  He drifts off, and knows he’s safe.  

 

Tim knows without a doubt that Joker won’t hurt him, and that is the next thing that makes Tim afraid.

Chapter 3: better not to breathe

Weeks pass between their meetings.  Months, sometimes, but when Tim finds himself drowsy and desperate underneath the Joker’s familiar weight, it always feels like only yesterday they saw each other last.  Tim can tell Joker is fine tuning the dosage on the drugs he’s using, keeping Tim just addled enough that he doesn’t try to run, but coherent enough that he will listen to things Joker wants to say.

 

Joker takes care of whatever targets Tim is hunting down and takes him to bed.  

 

Joker whispers in his ear that he is perfect, brilliant, fantastic.  They’re doing incredible things together, he says, and it is true whether Tim wants to admit it or not.  He’s putting away villains and thwarting plots faster than he ever has on his own, thanks to Joker’s intel and the help he’s receiving under the radar.  Bruce and the others have less work to do in the streets at night, or in the cave on the computers, because Tim is handling more of it on his own.  

 

He isn’t going to tell Joker that he’s right, but he cannot honestly tell him that he’s wrong, either.  Tim doesn’t decide to work with Joker; he is just following up on the leads he’s given.  The only way to keep from playing into Joker’s hands would be to ignore the information he’s offering, except that lives would be lost, and Tim cannot abide that.  

 

Bruce did help raise him, after all.  

 

Both of them are getting a little lazy with their execution.  Joker gives him less sedative, less aphrodisiac, half-asses his ropework, because Tim simply isn’t trying to get away.  He’s so tired of fighting all the time, and at least with Joker like this, things are easy.  

 

Tim goes out on his own as Red Robin to follow up on leads and then some nights Joker finds him, and there is no more frustration.  No rush of annoyance.  No adrenaline-laden hypervigilance.  

 

One night Joker steps up behind Tim, wrapping an arm around his waist and pressing a rag over his nose and mouth, something stronger than chloroform making his knees weak at the first sharp breaths.  

 

Oh, thank god, Tim finds himself thinking.  

 

I’m so fucking tired.  

 

When Joker takes him, there is bliss, and sleep, and everything is easy.  

 

He’s lost count of how many times it has been now.  The criminals they’ve brought down are starting to blur into one another.  They’re not even fighting together, but working with Joker by attacking a problem from two fronts feels normal nowadays, even if he’s keeping things from his family.  

 

Bruce has noticed something, and for a while Tim is walking on eggshells.  It looks like you’ve been getting more sleep, Bruce says with a strained smile one morning before dawn in the cave, both of them still in uniform.  I’m proud of you, is what he means, but knowing and hearing are not the same.  

 

Dick and Jason have been… distant.  They’re better at reading Tim than Bruce has ever been, and they’ve undoubtedly noticed that something has changed— with the dynamic of Gotham’s criminal element, and with Tim himself.  Bruce sits at the computer in the cave and pores over numbers and statistics and police reports, trying to make sense of the strange patterns, but it is Dick and Jason throwing Tim long glances from across the cave as Bruce thinks out loud.

 

They are at a disadvantage, because unlike the two of them, Bruce didn’t teach Tim everything he knows.  Tim is better at covering his tracks than even Damian, who has been killing for as long as he can remember but is used to having someone come clean up after him.  It is obvious that Tim has something to do with it somehow, but only if you know where to look.

 

Bruce has spent so long looking anywhere else but at Tim that it does not seem to occur to him.  That still hurts, but not as much as Tim expects.  

 

There’s Joker’s euphoric laughter in his ears, they don’t deserve you, baby.  

 

Tim knows how it would sound to say it out loud, so he doesn’t, but he also knows how it feels.  Joker has always been in love with Batman, and Tim had never really thought about what that meant beyond predicting his behavior or tracking him down.  

 

Joker loves Tim too, and it is like finding himself adored by a snake.  Tim likes it in a way that feels illicit— it hits too hard to be right.  Makes Tim feel powerful in a way he should be allowed.  He is not sure if Joker knows how thin of a line he is treading, or how dangerous it could be for Tim if he makes a misstep.  

 

Tim wakes up one night and knows that he’s underground.  Some basement in Gotham, maybe on the outskirts of town.  He’s laying in a bed that is dressed all in purple, but the sheets and blankets have been well used.  They’re soft, slept-in, holes in the fabric and stuffing coming out or stitches in the quilting coming apart at the seams, but there are so many that it doesn’t matter.  It is less like a bed and more like a nest some animal has made.  Tim is listening before he’s really awake, the distant, distorted music centering him on the map in his head like a pin in the sprawl of one of his investigation boards.  

 

He’s back in Amusement Mile somewhere, a basement Tim hadn’t known about, even though he thought he’d seen every nook and cranny of the place.  That is less surprising than the rest.  

 

There are no ropes this time.  Just Joker’s weight holding him down.  

 

“The blankets smell like you,” Tim slurs inanely.

 

It’s true.  Joker smells like sweat, makeup, and an endless rotation of other different things— kerosine, gunpowder, and fireworks.  Ether, sawdust, and spray paint.  There is something else underneath it all, and Tim wouldn’t have been able to pick out, except now he’s surrounded by it.  Joker just smiles.  

 

“Should I have changed the sheets?  I haven’t had company in a while but I suppose maybe it is time for some housekeeping.”

 

This is Joker’s bed, buried underneath the Mile.  The warmth hasn’t really hit him yet, but Tim is sure it’s on the way.  There’s something twisting low in his stomach, making his heartbeat erratic.  It’s the drugs, he tells himself; the aphrodisiacs Joker has been using are powerful things.  

 

It will be later before he realizes there’s no ache in his shoulder from an injection, and no fever in his skin.  That tomorrow, no hangover will come for Tim.  

 

It will be when his bloodwork comes back mostly clean before Tim realizes that Joker put him to sleep, but the want in Tim was all his own.  

 

There is time for everything later.  He’s never had to worry about where to put his hands, but it is natural enough to grab Joker by the biceps and tug him down as Tim rocks his hips upwards.  Usually Joker’s hand is between his thighs, or Joker’s knee, but just the lean lines where they’re pressed together will more than suffice.  

 

Joker blinks, eyes wide, smile shifting into something surprised.  

 

“Oh, darling.  I wasn’t sure if we were cutting this scene or not, now that we both know our lines, and all.  Should I take care of you first?”

 

Joker spews nonsense like Tim should understand, but he’s needy, and he won’t be denied.  

 

“Don’t you always?” Tim asks with a whine that is not his fault, and Joker huffs a laugh.

 

“Anything for you, Timothy,” Joker says.  

 

What makes Tim feel afraid is that he means it.  Joker positions himself like he’s going to fuck Tim, but they’re both still wearing clothes as he grinds down against him.  It is all Tim needs— all he has ever needed when Joker has him.  Tim can tell that Joker is hard, and that’s a first, if only because he’s never been clear-headed enough to notice until now.  

 

Tim has to do most of the work himself, but that’s easy enough with him limbs free.  He pulls Joker down against him, rocking urgently, able to control the pressure this time.  

 

He’s able to shove his face into Joker’s throat, fisting his jacket in both hands.  It feels so good to be able to hold onto him this way.  

 

Tim knows how it would sound if he said it out loud, so he doesn’t try.  

 

Joker doesn’t expect him to speak.  Joker doesn’t ask anything of him.  Tim is so easy that he should feel pathetic, but he doesn’t.  Thinking of what he does feel is worse.  That is another thing about Joker.  

 

He doesn’t need Tim to think at all right now, and so he doesn’t.  Joker holds Tim’s face when he comes, dragging his thumb back and forth across his mouth.  

 

“You’re always surprising me, little bird,” Joker says, while Tim is still shaking.  “That’s one of the things I love about you.  The big one is so predictable, and the baby bat is even worse.”  Joker makes a disgusted sound, pressing a kiss to Tim’s temple.  “I guess I can’t complain.  If you want something done right, do it yourself and all that.  If you want something done well, you ask Joker.”

 

He says it as though he is talking about someone else, but it doesn’t matter.  Tim isn’t going to try and retain the things coming out of his mouth most of the time.  He laughs, because he cannot help himself.  

 

It’s the drugs that pull him back to sleep, tangled up in purple sheets in Joker’s bed under Amusement Mile.  That is what Tim tells himself.  

 

For a while, he even believes it.  

 

-

 

His labs come back.

 

Tim runs his bloodwork after his run-in with Joker, just like always.  His brain is broken, and he’s past trying to fix it.  There are some sedatives in there, both his own and those the Joker has given him by force, but there is no sign of any aphrodisiac.  Nothing that would have made Tim mindless, the way he felt mindless the previous night.  

 

He knows it isn’t as simple as that; Joker has been conditioning him.  Tim is so eager for intimacy, and there is nowhere for him to turn for it that doesn’t hurt.  Or there hasn’t been, until now.  Tim is lonely and desperate for recognition and no one is looking at him.  No one except Joker, and it is not Tim’s fault that he wants to keep him. 

 

That is what he tells himself, and it feels like the truth.

Chapter 4: when i open

Tim doesn’t realize that he’s been waiting.  

 

Weeks have passed.  Tim has exhausted all his leads, and run down his loose ends, and he’s been waiting.  

 

Tim is in the middle of a fight with some traffickers’ low-rent goons when the last one almost gets the drop on him.  He’s about to take a hit, moving to try and make it hurt less when it lands, only to see the guy he’s up against stagger instead.  He reaches up to his neck, pawing at something that looks like a dart; it comes free in his hand, but he lets it fall to the ground.  

 

Then he falls to the ground too, laughing so hard he looks like he’s going to be sick.  It starts out as a snicker, then gets louder, until he’s laughing with his whole body.  Tim looks around, eyes seeking through the darkness, but there’s nothing to see.  Joker was there, but he’s gone now.  

 

Tim picks up the dart from the ground in front of him.  There’s a piece of paper wrapped around the shaft, pastel stationary that looks as though it was torn from some little girl’s diary.  Joker has drawn a shaky heart in purple crayon.

 

He doesn’t bother telling himself he isn’t disappointed; even Tim isn’t that good of a liar.

 

Joker isn’t there the next time they cross paths either, not in the flesh.  Tim is tired, and sloppy.  He is distracted, and he knows it is because of Joker, but there is no use fighting it.  Tim won’t seek him out, but he  can’t stop himself from checking every shadow, every alley, every rooftop when he is in a fight.  He’s losing sleep, and that is something he can’t afford.

 

When a car is running on fumes for too long, it dies; vigilantes are no different.  

 

It’s no surprise someone gets the drop on him that night, when it’s hard to keep his eyes open even through the rush of adrenaline.  There’s the flash of a muzzle pointed right at Tim, but no sting of a bullet wound.  They missed, he thinks, until he tackles them to the ground and gets a look at their weapon. It’s a pristine nine-millimeter.  

 

There’s a little flag sticking out of the barrel, which is smoking like a cap-gun that’s just gone off.  Tim unfolds the fabric, a miniscule triangle, letters written in permanent marker.  He can still smell the ink.  

 

BANG!

 

Tim glances around in the darkness, but there is no one but a stray cat watching from an alley and the buzz of the city all around him and Tim wants to scream.  He starts to think that this is the only way they’ll interact with one another from now on— protecting Gotham and helping Bruce from their own ends, instead of Joker drugging him, pinning him down, and whispering plans into Tim’s ear, fingers in his cunt, calling him darling.   He hadn’t wanted to admit it was something he needed but now it has been taken away.  

 

When he sees Joker next, they’re both in an alley on the lower west side.  Tim is outnumbered, but not badly enough to worry him.  It will be a rough fight, maybe, but Tim has had worse.  

 

Then one of his opponents jerks and collapses, taking a blow to the head from behind.  Joker is there, gun in hand— he’d pistol whipped the guy who had been next on Tim’s fight card, and there are only two left.  Tim handles the one closest to him quickly, and when Joker notices that Tim is about to go after the last man standing, he goes wide eyed.  

 

Throws his weapon, which smacks the guy in the face, letting Tim knock him out effortlessly.  When he looks up, he can’t help but smile.  

 

“I had that,” Tim says, and Joker shrugs theatrically.  

 

“Can’t let you outclass me on our first team-up.  I’m no slouch, little red!  I’ll do my part!!”

 

Tim opens his mouth to speak, but the screech of sirens cuts him off, and Joker bows.  

 

“That’s my cue, darling!”

 

He backs around the corner without turning around.  

 

When Tim rushes to the rooftops to look, Joker is gone.  

 

-

 

It’s like that for their next several encounters, which is still frustrating for Tim, but fighting beside Joker feels better than nothing at all and so he’ll take it.  Tim will be in the midst of a fight that’s not dire, but neither is it easy.

 

Joker shows up to remedy that for Tim, time and time again, stepping into a brawl that was going to be frustrating and handing him the win on a platter.  Joker steps out of alleyways into the street, and emerges from stairwells onto rooftops and, on one memorable occasion, drops down from overhead and almost breaks his leg when he fails to stick the landing.    

 

There are canisters of laughing gas popping at just enough distance to let Tim get his breather on, and more darts in the necks of men it would be no fun to fight.  

 

There’s a huge crowd of goons in front of Tim one night, and he’s thinking about bolting until a car careens out of nowhere and bowls them all over like pins, Joker waving excitedly from behind the wheel when Tim manages to get a look.  

 

Things between them become even more familiar before long.  Tim gets in a real scuffle, and he’s thinking of calling Oracle to get some backup when Joker arrives.  He doesn’t have a weapon this time, no gun or cane at the ready, but he is still there.  

 

Tim has never seen Joker throw a punch like that, and when there are bodies on the ground all around them, men clutching at their broken noses and fractured ribs, Tim has the overwhelming urge to kiss him.  

 

Joker is panting for breath, hands on his thighs as he’s leaned over, exhausted from the fight.  

 

“I’m too tired to do the exit, darling, do you think you could close your eyes?”  Joker gasps, and Tim blinks in confusion.  Joker motions at his face, like he is trying to clear the air in front of it.  “No peeking, okay?”

 

Tim wishes he could stop himself from smiling, but it is fucking impossible, and so he closes his eyes.  

 

When he opens them Joker is gone, and there is a wilted flower on the ground.  

 

-

 

It’s second nature now to trust Joker at his back when his chips are down.  Tim tries not to factor it into his plans, because if he expects help and gets none things could go sour really quickly, but sometimes he cannot help it.  Joker’s weight presses against his shoulder blades from behind.  Joker reaches out and pulls him to his feet.  

 

Tim had been trying to scrub any footage of the two of them that Oracle or Bruce might be able to dig up, but it is always gone, and so Tim has stopped worrying about it.  Joker looks like a bumbling idiot and it feels carefully crafted, because the more Tim learns about just how terrifyingly competent Joker can be, the less he feels afraid; of Joker.  

 

Of anything.  

 

Bruce, Dick, and Alfred keep casually mentioning that if he’s seeing someone he can tell them, if there’s anything going on that he feels like talking about they’re always around to talk.  Jason isn’t saying anything, but he’s looking at Tim differently, and showing up on his patrol routes more often to help.  Dick and Bruce have also taken a more active role in the cases Tim is investigating, where before they often thought he was chasing ghosts.  

 

Batman and Nightwing popping up on the streets with Red Robin has been such a common occurrence that they’ve covered it in the newspapers, wondering if some big catastrophe was looming.  Tim wants to laugh.  

 

Tim wants to cry.  

 

He needs them less, and so they need him more.  Part of him wishes it hadn’t taken something so extreme as Tim almost vanishing from their lives to make them pay attention, but that would mean he and Joker wouldn’t have spent all this time together, and the thought makes his chest hurt.  

 

Tim has never had an easier time getting things done.  At first he worries that Jason, or anyone else for that matter, might show up while Joker is around, but it becomes readily apparent that isn’t going to happen.  Tim doesn’t want to know how Joker does it.  

 

Knowing would ruin the trick.  

 

Even when Tim was tied up, drugged, and assaulted, he wasn’t afraid.  Wasn’t in danger, or at least not any danger that felt real to Tim.  In all the times they’ve fought together, no matter who they’ve been up against, he’s never really felt fear.  Then, it happens twice.

 

Tim is in a real fix the first time, and it’s his own fault for being too eager to act on some intel without doing enough research beforehand.  He truly hadn’t been counting on Joker’s help, because he hadn’t thought he’d need it.  It’s not the first time he’s grossly underestimated an opponent but it might be his last.  If he gets killed investigating this little nobody gangster who stumbled into a cartel weapons cache, he’s going to be furious.  

 

Joker does show up  and for a moment it feels like it still might not be enough.  There’s no other help coming;  Tim’s communications have been fried thanks to a localized EMP these idiots used.  The absurdity of it is so overwhelming that Tim starts to laugh.  

 

It feels like animals at the zoo are spraying him through their cage bars with a waterhose— someone isn’t doing their job, or these guys wouldn’t have access to this shit.  

 

It’s his laughter that distracts Joker.  

 

Tim is laughing like someone absolutely deranged, and it must take Joker off guard because he is looking over and letting himself get distracted, a smile on his face that looks just as stupid as Tim feels inside.  One of the thugs they’re fighting is behind Joker with a knife in the air, and Tim’s body is moving faster than his thoughts.  Faster than the air in his lungs.

 

Someone is about to slit Joker’s throat; then Tim’s arm flies out, and there’s a flash of silver through the air.  It whizzes past Joker’s face, so closely that he goes wide-eyed watching it streak by and sink into his would-be assailant’s jugular with a spray of red.  The rest of the fight happens in what feels like an instant.  It is a series of impacts, like some vicious percussion instrument, until everything is still.  

 

Especially the man Tim killed, he finds himself thinking.  He doesn’t need to check to know he’s dead.  Doesn’t need to look at the body, red pooling thick underneath it.  Tim looks at his hands.  Looks at the ground.  There’s a panic threatening to swallow him up, and he knows why, even if he doesn’t really.  

 

He is supposed to be broken now.  That is what Bruce has always said, even if not in those exact words.  When someone takes a life it changes them, but Tim does not feel different.  Tim does not feel bad.  

 

They were going to kill Joker.  The rationalization comes effortlessly.  It doesn’t feel like an excuse; it is just the truth.  Someone was going to kill Joker, and Tim couldn’t allow it.  

 

Laughter breaks through the sudden quiet, Joker rushing towards him and taking his face in both hands.  

 

“Holy fuck, baby!’

 

Then, Joker kisses him.  His lips are scarred.  Tim can feel it in the way his lips move.  He’s holding Tim still and kissing him and Tim never wants him to stop. 

 

His whole body goes tense, then relaxes so fast that Joker is wrapping an arm around his waist to keep him on his feet, pulling back with a wide grin to say something except he doesn’t get a chance.  Tim surges forward to bring their lips together again, grabbing both Joker’s lapels and tugging him down the scant few that separate them.  He opens his mouth.  Presses forward with his tongue.  

 

Joker makes a noise of surprise and kisses him back, shock more than hesitation making him slow to react.  When they break apart it is to the sound of sirens, but Joker is still smiling.  

 

“You saved my life, red!  God, you fucking killed him, baby, and that’s SO incredibly attractive to me, personally, but you gotta get outta here before Gotham’s finest show up.  I know they’re your buddies and all, but—”

 

 Tim kisses him again, and he stops talking, but only for a moment.  Joker groans into his mouth, then tugs away and puts some distance between them like someone who is trying not to be convinced to do something that’s already as good as done..  

 

“Listen, you make VERY solid points, but who’s gonna bust us outta Arkham if YOU’RE locked up?  Come on baby bird,” Joker hisses, making shooing motions with his hands.  “Get back to your little nest, let me clean up this mess.  It’s the least I can do.  C’mon, scamper away.  Shoot your little gun, do the disappearing bat trick you all love so much.  I’ll find you, yeah?”  Joker grins, then stands up straighter, tilts his head to the side, and holds his hands out like he’s the one who’s done a trick.  “I always do.”

 

Tim wants to argue with him.  There are a thousand better ways to handle things than how they’ve been proceeding, but all of them require Tim to think about what he is doing in a way that implies an uncomfortable amount of agency, and so he takes the easy way out.  That’s what Joker is always giving him.  

 

An easier way.  Tim frowns, looking at the body on the ground that used to be a man, looking into himself for the guilt he knows should be waiting.  He’s not happy about killing someone.  He feels a little sick, actually, but this isn’t any of the hundred things Tim will lose sleep over.  He’d do it again in a heartbeat.  

 

That should be the terrifying thing, but Tim is not afraid.  

 

Still, he goes.

Chapter 5: i breathed a lie

Weeks go by with not a word from Joker, but a lot of long looks from his family.  Tim is antsy, and uncertain.  He doesn’t know when Joker will show, or what he will do, or say.  If he will feel differently about kissing Tim after some time apart.  Rejection is hard enough to stomach when it doesn’t come from a degenerate clown.  

 

If Joker gives Tim an ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ speech he might have to jump off a fucking roof without his grappling gun.  

 

Work is there to keep him busy— a lot of work, suddenly.  There are signs of something brewing in the city, and everyone is scrambling to figure out what.  The papers are being proven right after the fact, but when chaos hits Gotham, it’s blessedly targeted.  That’s what Tim thinks at first; even if it is not Scarecrow behind it, in the end, he’s to blame.  

 

Someone is going after rogues and vigilantes.  The details will matter when Tim has them, but right now all that matters is containing the fallout so Gotham civilians don’t get caught in the crossfire and make everything so much worse.  The best thing Tim can do right now is get away from all these people, and he’s trying, but Tim isn’t fast enough.  

 

They surround him on the ground when he flits down a fire escape, cloth bags over their heads and gas canisters in their hands.  This particular strain of the fear toxin is old, but that doesn’t make it less dangerous.  

 

It just means to administer it, someone needs to get in close.  

 

Crane has managed to gather himself enough brainless, toxin-addled miscreants to pose a real threat.  Sheer numbers are hard to combat, especially for a herd of vigilantes that refuse to take lives.  Tim can’t get away before gas fills the air, but that’s probably for the best in the end.  

 

There’s no one around, and Crane’s goons likely have gas masks under their hoods; there’s no one to get hit but Tim.  No one else to cause collateral damage.  He can’t keep from breathing the toxin, but he can keep them from taking him.  Tim has a few panicked thoughts of the others, scattered all over the city, being targeted by other groups of these freaks.  

 

He takes to the rooftops, and that’s rough this far on the outskirts of town.  The buildings are further apart in places, with more variation in height, many of them in disrepair.  Metal creaks under his weight, and he has to go to ground sometimes before he can climb back up again.  

 

The fear is setting in; Tim has experienced the toxin before, in more than one form, but that does not make it easier.  The sky overhead wants to swallow him whole, but so does concrete.  Shadows spill from the mouth of every alley.  Tim can hear people screaming, but they are very specific people, and none of them are close.  

 

His hands shake, and he’s sweating all over, until his hair is soaked with it.  He’s lost his gloves somewhere, and his grip is trying to fail him.  He is too high in the air for that.  

 

Tim has to hold on a while longer.

 

There are halos around every point of light in his vision, trails of color dragging as he moves frantically towards— he does not know.  He’s been moving on instinct, but for a moment he can’t pinpoint where that instinct has been leading him.  The manor is too far away, the Wayne building even further.  There are safehouses and little hole-in-the-wall hiding places all over the city, many of them Bruce’s, but Tim, Jason, and the others have safe havens of their own too.  

 

Tim cannot think clearly.  There are so many places he could go, and none of them come to mind, except that his body is already taking him somewhere.  He’s on the asphalt again, bright lights refusing to come into focus ahead as it dawns on him.  

 

The fear set in and Tim ran as fast as his legs would carry him, straight to Amusement Mile.  He’s still running full tilt, headed towards a large gap in the dilapidated chain link fence around the Mile, when a handful of figures slip out of the shadows to block his way.  Tim skitters to a stop, knives in both hands before he can stop himself. 

 

He’s outnumbered, and one of them is big enough that it’s almost cartoonishly funny to imagine fighting him right now.  It’s obvious these are Joker’s boys, but Tim cannot find the air to speak, and what would he say?  

 

Do you know who I am, Tim thinks indignantly, but through the fear it just comes out like a whimper.  

 

One of the smaller figures steps forward, what looks like a golf club in his hand, but the bigger one closes a palm over his shoulder to stop him.  The giant is wearing a worn leather vest, a smear of red face paint on the tip of his nose, some Batman pajama pants, and nothing else.  There’s a gas mask looped around his neck, and Tim wants to laugh but he can’t make a sound.

 

“Wait,” he says, jerking his chin towards Tim.  “That’s the one.  Boss says hands off.”

 

“I dunno,” Golf Club says, scratching his head.  “That don’t look like him to me.”

 

The giant shoves him and he goes flying several feet through the air and slams into a derelict ticketing booth before hitting the ground.  He gives Tim a nod and steps back, the other few goons following his lead.  

 

Tim does not turn his back to them until they’re out of sight, but once they are his instincts take over again and he is not thinking; he is just running.  

 

Joker is many things, but mysterious isn’t one of them.  If there’s a bit involved, he’s going to commit every time.  Tim heads to the south end of the Mile and finds Clown Alley.  Joker’s room is underneath it— Joker’s bed is underneath it.  Tim does not make it that far.  

 

There’s a door flush with the ground leading to the basement of the building ahead of him.  It flies open and out from the darkness erupts Joker.  The fear toxin is still rushing through him and Tim startles, flinching backwards, but then Joker has him.  

 

He slides something over Tim’s face; it’s a gas mask.  Joker presses something on the side and a haze of something chemical fills it, so there’s nothing for Tim to do but breathe.  It’s not the same sort of antidote Bruce and the rest use for the toxin, but it’ll do just fine, even if the hangover is foul.  The relief isn’t instantaneous, but the fear does start to ebb back. 

 

Joker tucks Tim’s face into his chest, wrapping his arms around him.  

 

“Oh, I’m so glad to see you, red.  I know most of the little bats made it back to their nest, but none of my guys could track you down.  I maybe possibly definitely shot one guy about it but he’ll probably be fine.”

 

Joker’s leading them both down the stairs, tugging the door shut behind them and staggering towards his bed.  Tim finds the button on the side of the mask and takes another hit of the antidote— he’ll regret it tomorrow, but he is still shaking all over.  Joker pulls it off after Tim gets a lungful or two, tossing it on the floor before guiding Tim to collapse onto the mattress.  

 

It takes some pushing and shoving for Joker to get Tim where he wants, which is laid out on a pile of  pillows on his bed under the Mile.  Tim laughs, and it’s manic, even if it comes out too softly.  

 

He’s looking up at Joker, who hasn’t laid down yet, but is sitting between his feet instead.  Joker tugs one of them into his lap and starts working the laces of his boot, babbling as he goes.  

 

“People call me all SORTS of names but Crane is one of those real freaks if you ask me.  I’m just having a laugh, you know?  If you wanna make someone afraid, do it the old fashioned way!  Put in some work!”  Joker throws one of Tim’s boots onto the ground, then starts unlacing the other.  “These intellectual types don’t have any personality.  It’s boring.”  

 

Tim’s second boot hits the floor, followed by the socks he’s wearing, peeled off and discarded.  Next is the mess of Tim’s utility belts, but Joker doesn’t seem too stymied by it, unfastening buckles and straps as though he’s done it a thousand times.  

 

“I think maybe the good doctor is going about this all wrong.  If he wants to understand fear he needs to feel it, yeah?”

 

Joker is more careful with Tim’s belts, easing them gently down onto the floor.  Then he is in Tim’s space, leaning over him to let his hands hover over his mask, fingers dancing.  

 

“Do you mind, darling?  Last time I got gassed my skin almost melted off— well. Melted off… worse, I suppose, and I think Batsy might be upset with me if I let anyone ruin your pretty face.”  

 

Tim draws his brows together but gives Joker a nod, and he touches the edges of the mask and pulls it free.  

 

“Anyway, like I was saying, I think maybe some of the boys will go visit our friend the doctor, see if he’s open to listening to some… dissenting theories, if you will.”  

 

Joker wipes at his face with something; it’s a rag soaked in some sort of chemical.  Tim listens to Joker rant about Scarecrow while he scrubs his face, and hands, and pulls his filthy uniform off.  It’s the first time he’s been unmasked in front of Joker, and when he’s finished getting Tim most of the way undressed, he’s in Tim’s space again.  

 

“The city is going to be a wild place tonight, little bird.  I think you should sleep off the gas down here with me, and you can fly home to your cave tomorrow, yeah?  I can’t exactly walk you home right now, but I’m a great sleeping partner! I don’t snore, I do steal the blankets but there’s plenty to go around, see?”

 

He lifts one up, as though to show Tim, who is beginning to feel that second hit of antidote.  It’s laced with a sedative, to help negate the jitters of the fear toxin, and right now it is putting Tim to sleep.  

 

“Thank you,” Tim mumbles, pulling Joker closer, nuzzling into his throat.  

 

“For what, baby?  You did all the work bringing yourself here.  All I did was put you to bed.”

 

Less than an hour ago Tim was running through the streets, alone and terrified.  Now he’s drifting off in bed, hidden in Joker’s blankets, heartbeat steady and muscles lax.  

 

“You always take care of me,” he slurs, then stops fighting the exhaustion.  

 

“That’s certainly a lie,” Joker says, but Tim is already gone, and there is no point in arguing anyway.  

 

Not with Joker.

 

-

 

When he wakes up, it is to the sensation of being watched, even before he opens his eyes.  Tim blinks to clear his vision and Joker is there, propped up on one elbow in bed beside him, smiling wide.  

 

“How long have you been… doing that?”   

 

His voice is ruined, like he’s dying of something.  Joker squints one eye, looking around with the other as though seeking an answer in his own head.  

 

“Time is sort of relative, though, isn’t it?”

 

Tim has his fingers in Joker’s hair, smiling at him.  It’s involuntary, like someone is plucking at his nerves.  It is not Tim’s fault, none of this, because Joker has very carefully taken the blame for himself.  

 

He cannot help but smile.  

 

“I missed you.”

 

Tim pulls Joker down against him, bringing their mouths together.  Joker groans at the contact, then presses himself tighter against Tim, like getting closer is all he can think to do.  He shoves a knee between Tim’s thighs, and Tim grinds down against it instinctively, then lets out a rough breath.  What happens next is just as automatic as running headfirst towards the Mile the previous night had been.  

 

He flips Joker over onto his back, landing on top of him and kissing him again.  Tim gets a hand between them to find Joker in his boxers— he’s hard, and he rocks into the touch, and so Tim tugs him free.  Listens to Joker hiss as he takes him in hand and strokes.  Joker starts laughing somewhat hysterically, rocking into Tim’s fist and hiding his face in his throat.  

 

“God, don’t tell Batsy on me, okay?  He’d never forgive me.  This is dead Boy Wonder levels of upset that he’s going to experience, if he finds out about this.”

 

Tim rolls his eyes, yanking his underwear to the side and easing Joker inside.

 

“I promise you it isn’t that serious,” Tim hisses.  “Bruce doesn’t want to fuck me.  This isn’t about him right now, yeah?”  He takes all of Joker, grinding down against him and listening to him swear under his breath.  “This is about you and me.”

 

Tim rocks his hips and Joker bucks into him, grabbing his waist with both hands.  

 

“Yeah, yeah yeah yeah, it is, red, god you’re so smart.”

 

They’re pathetic together.  Joker is shaking, whining like he’s the one getting fucked and not the other way around.  They cling to each other and rock, choking on nothing, trying and failing to kiss some more.  Tim shoves his mouth against Joker’s for a moment, but then it drags across his jaw, Tim unable to maintain the contact as he rides Joker faster.  

 

“Ohhhhh, Timmy, you, you, you—”  Joker twitches all over, groaning.  “God, you’re a fucking riot, baby.”

 

There’s already that tight, gut-clenching feeling in Tim’s stomach, thighs jittery as chases the sensation.  

 

“Don’t stop,” Tim says, well aware that Joker isn’t doing anything really, but hoping he gets the message nonetheless.  “Keep going.”

 

It’s been a long time since he’s fucked anyone, but Tim knows he won’t be able to carry himself through his own climax without some help.  His rhythm falters, and Joker makes a noise in his throat and picks up Tim’s slack, grinding into him as best he can.  He whimpers and squeezes Joker tighter and comes, face buried in his hair, shivers running down his spine.  

 

“Oh,” Joker says, like someone’s put a knife in his stomach, and then Tim feels his hips jerking as heat fills him.  

 

They keep moving together for a bit, following the vestiges until the feeling drifts far enough away that Tim can think again.  He’s laid out on top of Joker, blankets and pillows still surrounding them.  Tim reaches for the corner of a comforter and yanks it over them both.  Joker is looking at him, wide-eyed and adoring, lips parted like he’s awestruck.  

 

“I think I’m in love with you,” Joker says, like it’s something he’s realizing right now, at this moment.

 

Tim shoves his face in Joker’s chest and starts giggling, little huffs of air through his nose.  The hangover from the antidote is both not as terrible as he expected, and worse than he thought.  He’s so goddamn tired, there is no way he’s going to make it back to the manor before nightfall.  

 

He also doesn’t care.  He’s… maybe not as safe as if he were home, but safe enough that falling back to sleep will be easy.  

 

“You think?” Tim asks, all the ridiculous, absurd things Joker has done to help him over the past months running through his mind.  “You’re just figuring this out now?”

 

Joker sucks air through his teeth and looks at Tim indignantly.  

 

“Oh, I’m sorry?  We can’t all be as smart as the incredible Timothy Drake-Wayne the fourth.”

 

Tim laughs harder, trying to keep his face from looking the way it is trying to look, which is absolutely stupid.  

 

“It’s NOT the fourth—”

 

“Oh, the third.  My mistake.”

 

Tim grabs his face in both hands, brows raised.  

 

“Joker.”

 

Joker just smiles.  

 

“Esquire?”

 

Tim kisses him, and he finally stops talking.

Notes:

say nice things to me about timjokes

Notes:

say nice things to me <3