Life is so much better when you're dead

One could compare a city's streets to human veins, the criminal element starring as antigens, the brave and righteous folk as antibodies. The seediest, darkest area is a blistering tumor and your memories of it are merely metastases. The disease of one particular occurrence spreading into your bones and sinews, replicating itself until it calls you its home. Though there are instances of the host simply forgetting of the squatters, of them ever interrupting his integrity. The host basically transgresses to a different plane of being where the tumor has never started to exist. The world of medicine calls those instances unexplainable. Everyone else calls them miracles. Bruce could safely wager to say he was halfway to experiencing one of those.

Joker had insisted upon them going back home by the means of one of Bruce's bikes, particularly the one that Bruce had employed to get to Joker in time before the fear toxin had the chance to turn him into an overgrown vegetable. It was really quite laughable, them having something significant to their budding relationship, something tactile such as the bike in question. Other people had diamond rings and dried roses, they had this. And that one empty syringe Bruce had kept for some reason. Anything that had pierced Joker's skin was worth keeping, in his less than rational opinion.

Joker had also insisted upon doing the driving, and Bruce really didn't see a problem there. Still unshowered and with the black make-up half-assedly wiped off his face, he grabbed his leather jacket, conjured up two helmets and settled behind the other man, wrapping his arms around him without any second thoughts. As the lift took them up to the ground level, Joker slowly rode through the shipping yard, stopping every once in a while, making sure to lock everything up behind them. Then, they charged into the city, and it really did feel insanely good to let the madman do the driving. Bruce clung to him, knowing it was the same man he had been more or less literally clinging to for the past two years, breathing the air he had been breathing ever since he was born, and feeling lightheaded because despite everything, holding on to Joker didn't hurt anymore. Taking Gotham's air into his lungs didn't burn anymore. He could give in and enjoy the ride, along with Joker's surprisingly proficient bike-handling skills.

The reason it didn't hurt was simple and quite pathetic, really. Bruce knew as soon as he would get home, he could ask for cleansing, and it would be delivered. He could afford to forget his metastatic memories and doubts because he had the tool forged specifically for the task of forgetting. Also, he had the best surgeon available.

Back home, Joker had begun to grow suspicious. Bruce was taking a bit too long in the bathroom for his liking, and as he listened to the quiet rustle of running water behind the closed door, he tried his best to simply sit on the bed and read the evening newspaper. His fingers were tingling, but he held on to the printed sheets for dear life, humming to himself to keep his cool. Something about the way Bruce had clung to him, about the way he had looked and smiled at him before he disappeared in the shower kept him on edge. And so he read about the reins over importing Italian shoes going from the freshly deported Mario Falcone to his extremely legitimate sister, Sofia, and as he engrossed himself in the various intricacies of the Falcone Imports stockholding, his throat grew tighter and tighter.

On the other side of the plywood door, Bruce was toweling his hair. He checked himself in the mirror and noticed the slight smears of makeup remaining close around his eyelids. He decided not to bother and slicked back the few locks that fell on his forehead. He appeared different to his own eyes, yet he couldn’t quite place a finger on it. It wasn’t the matter of bitemarks or weight loss. Something about his features seemed more distant and more familiar all the same, almost as if the guy doing all the staring in the mirror suddenly started to look from a bigger perspective. It didn’t matter; he was clean and ready, so he turned the knob and left the bathroom.

Joker’s gaze shot up immediately, and the scarred lips nibbling on an unlit cigarette stretched in a nervous smile. He folded his newspaper and put it aside, saying nothing. The friendly voice in the back of his head kept laughing at him announcing a showdown, but he couldn’t pay attention for too long. He changed his position from sitting Indian style and placed his feet on the floor, watching Bruce come closer. The man was only wearing his boxers, shamelessly displaying the wound-mottled planes of his body, and once again, Joker’s breath hitched at the sight. He should be well accustomed to it by now, but maybe half a dozen days spent together weren’t enough to grow desensitized. Maybe half a century wouldn’t be enough, but who could tell if they had that kind of time ahead of them. Joker sighed when Bruce nestled between his slightly spread thighs and wrapped his arms around his waist, pressing his face into the crook of his neck. The spit-soaked cigarette was still dangling from his lips, forgotten in the sudden rush of blood to his head. He slid his hands up Bruce’s shoulders until they met behind his back, completing the embrace.

Quiet and simple, that’s what it was, but to Joker it suddenly seemed cruel and too much. He could sense what was going on inside the man in his arms, he felt those pesky larvae of anxiety crawling just beneath his skin, and it was quite contagious. His own core was rippling with those little bastards. Bruce tilted his head back to look at him and smiled at the undoubtedly pathetic sight. Joker was aware his expression spoke volumes, but he kept silent. Bruce pulled the cigarette out of his mouth and threw it next to the newspaper, and then he leaned in, his palms moving up Joker’s chest until they arrived at his shoulders, fingers tightening a little over the fabric of his shirt. Joker fought bravely to keep his eyes from rolling back and kept them trained on Bruce’s, trying to figure out his next move.

What came next were Bruce’s soft lips on his cheek, then on his earlobe, the fingers moving to his collar, pulling him a little closer. And then that voice that would normally give Joker the chills of the most pleasant kind regardless of its message, lowered to a half-whisper, warm and tickling against his ear, telling him, “I want you to tie me up and fuck me”. With no hesitation, no self-consciousness, like a blow right to his jaw. It felt like one, only with a slightly different outcome, resulting in him getting painfully hard in a split second. Joker waited a few beats, let out the breath he had been holding in for some reason and attempted to catch Bruce’s gaze, to tell him that of course, he was right on it, but again, he got stopped in his tracks. Bruce looked amused, if the small smirk was any indication, but the evident vulnerability was nothing short of disarming. Especially when in cahoots with the raging hard-on that apparently had no intention of going anywhere.

Joker nodded and tried to swallow the tension in his throat. His mouth was dry, the pinpricks of heat bloomed down his back and in the pit of his stomach, his heart pounded like a piston, but he knew he had to deliver.

“Yeah, uh… just give me a second.” He patted Bruce’s arm and swallowed again. Bruce knitted his eyebrows, giving him a puzzled look, so Joker glanced down as if it would explain everything. It sort of did, and elicited a little laugh from the other man. Joker inhaled, exhaled and lifted his hands, at first unsure what to do with them as they twitched awkwardly around Bruce’s face before they cupped his cheeks, thumbs brushing tenderly over the bruised skin. He placed a chaste kiss on his forehead and made an attempt to stand up, wincing at the unfortunate placement of his fly. He adjusted it, reducing the discomfort a notch.

“You just wait here for a minute, I gotta… You know.”

“Yeah,” Bruce laughed and sat on the bed with his hands flat on his knees.

Joker stumbled to the bathroom and braced himself against the sink, staring himself deep in the eye. Five minutes had to pass before it dawned upon him it was no staring contest between him and his reflection, and finally he took another deep breath. And then he splashed some cold water on his face, and then a little more for good measure. Having done that, he decided to focus on clipping his nails. He knew what Bruce asked for in not so many words demanded surgical precision, a steady hand and a sober mind, so to speak. Just a few days ago Joker had to slap him around a little and use every last bit of his persuasion skills just to tie him down to a chair. Now, Bruce was asking for it. Nicely.

Joker left the bathroom and his eyes were automatically glued to him, sitting on the bed still like an oversized doll, watching him with a smile. He smiled back, trying to ward off the tugging in his guts, and paced to the other side of the room where lay his clothes and everything else that might prove useful. A few minutes of digging through various treasures filling the measly shelves beyond their capacity produced a satisfactory length of jute rope and a one-piece leather wristwatch belt. All the while Joker tried not to think what purpose those would serve. He tried not to think of the things going on inside Bruce’s head, of all the things he had encountered in the past few days, of the way he had dealt with them, of his ever-changing approach and all the threats it entailed. Joker searched his mind’s deepest recesses for the most unappealing imagery, just to keep a relative clarity. He thought of Sofia Falcone importing Italian shoes. Sofia Falcone was a surefire way to kill any unsolicited boner.

Gripping the rope and the belt in one hand, he grabbed two random neckties and turned around. Bruce didn’t change his position, facing away from him, his shoulders slightly hunched. He seemed so relaxed in some respects, as if he had complete faith in the medication about to be injected. Still trying to think of Sofia and therefore remaining calm against all laws of logic, Joker knelt down on the bed behind Bruce and placed his equipment at the side. He couldn’t resist now. His hands wandered to Bruce’s sides on their own and smoothed across his stomach. He rested his head on the man’s shoulder and squeezed him gently in a silent promise that it will be alright. Bruce leaned into his embrace, and again, it felt like too much, and yet none of it was nearly enough.

Joker clenched his eyes shut and inhaled the scent of Bruce’s skin. He wanted to remain calm for his sake. It had always come so easily, but now it was virtually impossible. Nothing was going to be that easy ever again. He grabbed his forearms and pulled them behind his back, trying not to marvel over his compliance, but as expected, he couldn’t quite control it. He kept coming up with at least a dozen little ideas per second, inventing new ways to reach deeper, to see more, to maybe get burned like he never had before. All for the sake of seeing relief in Bruce’s eyes at least for those precious few moments, for the sake of knowing it will be only temporary, and will require increased doses until something breaks or distorts its nature for better or worse.

Joker took his time with the rope. He had always enjoyed working with strings and yarns, respecting their versatility and unjudgemental aiding and abetting to his most nefarious endeavors. He tied people down, he strangled them, he rigged his explosives, all by the means of knitting wool or other similarly formidable inventions. Now he was putting together a set-up far too complex than the purpose it would serve, but he just couldn’t say no to this weird urge. It helped him gather his composure. Even though his mouth kept watering every time the rope would bite into Bruce’s skin a little deeper, he was happy with the simple act of tying knots and forming loops until it resulted in a rigging as intricate as it was inescapable.

The coarse jute seemed to erode Bruce’s flesh, already tinting his skin bright red where it rubbed against it. Joker swallowed, feeling the heat pooling between his legs all over again, mainly because not a word had been spoken, nothing had disturbed the malleable softness they were both suspended in. Everything was definitive, in place, inescapable for both of them. Joker took one of the ties in his hand and passed it between his fingers before he brought his arms around Bruce’s neck, holding him intimately, letting his lips rest against his temple. Then, he forced the tie into his mouth, maybe using too much strength, maybe tying the knot a little too tightly, but Bruce let out a quiet moan and shuddered against him. Apparently, everything was just perfect. Maybe too perfect.

Joker glanced over Bruce’s shoulder and to his half-relief, half-horror he realized the man was just as aroused ad he was. It wasn’t helping. He gritted his teeth and blindfolded him with the other tie. This was about to take some time and exhaust them both to the point of a near-death experience. It was also going to be unnecessarily agonizing if he couldn’t find a foolproof formula to keep his urges corralled. But with Bruce everything always felt like a sticky, unhinged and embarrassing first time. It sort of felt like finally being forced into the pubescent phase since Joker seemed to have missed some of its perks the first time around. He squared his shoulders and counted to ten. He stood up, walked in front of the other man and gave him a careful look. His hair was mussed and damp, his head hanging, his entire posture telling he knew nothing apart from what Joker had in store for him, and that he didn’t wish to step forward even an inch without being told to do so.

Joker felt numb and restless; his heart alternately pumped fire and ice into his veins, or rather straight into his brain and all the other parts interested. He had to take things really slowly, one hurdle at a time. Puffing out a sigh, he placed his hands on either side of Bruce’s head, allowing himself to relish the sensation of his hair against his fingertips, and then he pulled. Not very hard, but enough to force a small groan out of the man’s throat.

“Stand up,” Joker said. He did a great job at making his voice sound flat and composed.

Bruce obeyed, rising from the bed while Joker’s fingers kept clutching his hair. Then, they released him and flitted down his sides until they hooked beneath the waistband of his boxers. Without further ceremony, Joker pulled them down, urging Bruce to step out. He threw them onto the bed and trying not to look at what was unveiled, he placed his hand at the nape of Bruce’s neck, pushing.

“Kneel on the floor and wait,” he said.

Again, Bruce didn’t put up an ounce of resistance. He knelt on the dusty, wooden planks, his head slightly bowed. His mind had blanked out by this time, as he gradually found it easier and easier to rappel down the edges of what he used to call his waking state. Being awake and in control had become much to complicated nowadays. He tuned himself to every little sound and touch coming from Joker, and he didn’t need anything else. As he sat patiently, he heard some commotion originating in the bathroom, the water running, the clank of the cabinet’s door, and then there was a gust of cool air laced with Joker’s scent, something he supposed was a water-filled bowl being placed on the floor beside him, and the overwhelming heat in his core, his faith in the medication.

Bruce couldn’t remember the last time he had felt so safe. He revised his day, his week and his entire life, almost enjoying the bile it spurred, knowing it won’t be long until it’s sucked dry out of his system. He could tell Joker was sitting really close as he sensed the familiar warmth. His entire body was already tingling, but he found a bit of comfort in his ropes. He had been told to wait, so that’s what he was doing.

Then, he felt Joker’s long, dry fingers trace his jaw line, slide across his stretched lips, sneak underneath the tie, slither over his tongue. Moist lips nibbled on his earlobe, raising goose bumps on his arms and stomach. The fingers pushed deeper, moving lazily before they retreated and smeared a bit of saliva down his chin. Joker pulled his head closer against his mouth.

“Maybe I should take this time to tell you a few things, hm?” he murmured into his ear. A swarm of shivers marched down Bruce’s body. Without knowing, he inclined his head for more of the soft scar tissue and hot breath, but Joker had already pulled away from him, his hands stopping on his chest, unmoving but pressing fire into him none the less.

“I’m sure you used to think of me as some sort of, uh, garden-variety emotionally impaired sociopath. Well, maybe you still do.” As Joker spoke, he trailed patterns over Bruce’s torso absently, as if oblivious to the small tremors of pleasure erupting under his touch. “But to tell you the truth, my empathy works overtime.” His thumbs moved over Bruce’s nipples. If Joker had noticed his cock twitching, he did nothing about it. His hands went still, squeezing his sides gently. Bruce felt a few stray tufts of hair ghosting against his neck, the heat of lips just inches away.

“It used to give me the worst headache, y’know? All those feelings slung around like projectile vomit. People don’t know the concept of personal space when it comes to emotions. They never stop to think somewhere out there might be a little somebody who can actually feel their burden whether he likes it or not.”

Bruce heard a hissing sound, and then there was something cool and soft being spread over his chest. He recognized the smell; it was shaving foam. He felt a pang of amusement deep down, quickly eradicated with the hard edge of a straight razor gliding casually over his jugular vein, merely grazing over his skin without breaking it.

“And you know, all those people trying to write dissertations on my abhorrent behavior, and I’ve read quite a few of them, they all share this miscarried notion that I do what I do because I can’t seem to adjust and put myself in the shoes of people I apparently toy with.”

A long, smooth sweep of the blade across the plane of his chest gave birth to even more tingling anxiety. The movement of the razor seemed lackadaisical yet the pressure was perfect, right on the verge of sinking a little too deep but never quite crossing the barrier. Bruce heard a quiet splash of water when Joker rinsed the blade, and found himself surprised how eager his body was for another stroke. Funny how every little thing works for you when you’re in the right hands.

“Truth is, sometimes I just get tired. Some people pride themselves in being able to read other folks, when all they can do in all reality is read a few self-help books on body language, or whatever.”

One more slow glide. This time Bruce was almost sure the cold metal would dip into his flesh, but no dice. It felt weird, actually wanting to be cut, but something told him Joker would never use anything apart from his own tooth and nail to tear his flesh. Knowing this made him warm and a little dizzy. He listened to the other man, letting his words drown in his dulled mind and spread like a drug.

“It’s nothing to be proud of, but I can actually feel what they feel. I would feel them lose their marbles every time I gave them attention, I would feel their horror, and disgust, and hatred, and despair. Everything. So it’s not like I’m unable to put myself in their shoes because I am in their shoes every single time. God knows I never found anything remotely fun in it. But at least they would finally learn some humility. And they would shut up.”

The foam hissed one more time, and this time a warm hand spread the dollop over Bruce’s groin, slathering it generously around the base of his cock and balls. Again, Joker didn’t seem to make anything of the twitching. Bruce tried not to jerk under the matter-of-factly touch; there was nothing sensual or teasing about Joker’s behavior and that’s what made it all the more agonizing to stand. He felt sweat dewing the skin of his back when the razor started to rake down the wisps of hair on his lower stomach, moving leisurely in small increments, lower and lower.

“You wanna know why I like to wear gloves most of the time?” Joker leaned in conspiringly, his mouth close to Bruce’s ear again. “There are days when if I touch something, my skin crawls until I wash my hands. Especially when I have to shake someone else’s hand. It’s madness.”

The razor was close to the base of his cock now. Bruce gasped when Joker grabbed the shaft, his touch impersonal like a doctor’s, angling it, his other hand moving in graceful curlicues, the blade rasping softly, threatening and tickling, stopping every once in a while to be rinsed. It was getting hard to keep still.

“Basically, that was the case with just about anyone. Sometimes I would just touch people out of mere curiosity. No matter how righteous, no matter how pure at heart they would advertise themselves to be, my skin crawled. Then, I would usually kill them. Except for Harvey, maybe. He extended me the courtesy of putting up a little drama. Still had to help myself to a dab of sanitizer, though.”

Joker was now paying attention to his balls, somehow managing to avoid bloodshed and keep the small wrinkles intact, pulling and tugging at times to get better access. Bruce tried not to whimper, and most importantly, not to shudder.

“And so I was living my life happily, slicing and dicing every once in a while to get a little respite, until you came along.” The razor plunged into the bowl, and Joker placed his hands on Bruce’s sides, tightening his grip until the man let out a quiet whine. Joker smiled and started nipping with his teeth on the flesh beneath his jaw, finally giving in and sucking indulgently. He pressed his lips to Bruce’s ear, and his voice fell to a hoarse whisper.

“With you… I could keep my hands on you for the rest of my life, I could bury them into your flesh, snapping at your veins and rolling your bones in my fingers, and I guess that alone could make me come time and time again, and I could never get enough. Even when I fuck you, and when I have your blood on my tongue I feel you’re too far away from me.” Joker licked and kissed Bruce’s neck, wet and burning, digging his nails into the skin of his arms. “You’re one mean bastard,” he laughed breathlessly. “You’re the only one who makes me feel, not just empathize.” Then, his words lost their momentum. “Sometimes I think I could probably eat you, literally. Just thought you might wanna know.” He patted his shoulder, absurdly casual.

To Bruce, listening to this was like being force-fed burning coal and loving every single bite. No more parallels between him sitting here now and him existing at any given point in the past. He could almost feel his skin crackling with need, the heat from the inside seeping out and slicking his body. He shook and shivered, pushing against Joker, and there was absolutely nothing he could or wanted to do about it. His head was swimming.

Joker smoothed his hair and kissed his cheek. He reached for the discarded razor and resumed his painstaking work. His main objective at the moment was to ignore the glistening beads of precome going down Bruce’s cock in slow, sticky rivulets, just begging to be kissed away. He shouldn’t have spilled himself like that; now it was twice as hard, figuratively and literally.

“Of course, I wouldn’t actually eat you,” Joker sighed and looked up, tilting his head to the side and waving the razor in the air in a dismissive gesture. “You know you’re just a bucket of fun, and I would never, ever do anything to jeopardize having you around. At this point I guess I’d kill myself if you died, you know that,” he announced flatly. His tongue darting out, he leaned in a little to get a better focus on the finishing touches. “See what you’ve done?” he murmured reproachfully. “You’ve won the battle, at last,” he chuckled.

Now it felt like having barbed wire shoved down your windpipe, or maybe it was the urge to cry; Bruce couldn’t tell. Joker seemed to be finished, accentuating the completion with allowing the razor to drown in the bowl with a splash. He wrapped his arms around Bruce’s waist and bit on his chin playfully.

“Don’t get too carried away though, we’re not quite there yet.” He bit on the tendons of his neck, this time not so playfully. Bruce screamed, and his hips jerked. He wished he could beg for more and make an idiot of himself. There was no space left for caring. Joker snarled his fingers in his hair and yanked, pulling his head towards the bed. Bruce took the hint and shifted his position, bending over and leaning his upper body over the Michael Kors. Joker spread his thighs forcefully and retrieved the can of foam and the razor. He made a mental note to allow himself to smoke an entire carton of cigarettes as a reward; no human being should ever be subject to so much strain in such a relatively minuscule amount of time. If he could, he would just rip his pants off and bury himself balls-deep into Bruce without as much as a warning. He would probably come at the first thrust, or maybe even halfway in. But unfortunately, he had to play doctor a little longer. If anything, he despised being anti-climactic.

“What I could never understand… I mean, I kind of could, but still, it’s baffling. How does someone like you even come to existence?” Joker pondered, slathering the foam between Bruce’s asscheeks, praying for strength to remain deaf to his little sighs at every little touch. “You don’t seem to even be aware what you’re made of, you know?” He furrowed his eyebrows, trying to concentrate; fortunately, his hands would rarely fail him and he did right to keep faith in his own dexterity no matter the challenge. “There’s all this guilt, gallons of it, there’s self-deprecation, as if you were unworthy of your own… I don’t know what to call it, greatness? You’re a great, great person, Bruce,” Joker laughed as he maneuvered the razor over the soft flesh. When he slid it down Bruce’s perineum, he had to stop for a moment due to a sudden spasm that took over the other man. Joker gulped and cleared his throat.

“Like I said, touching righteous people makes me feel, um, unsanitary. Like digging through a dumpster and never knowing what sort of filth you’ll excavate. You can only guess why. You, you’re homogenous. You could never truly hide anything, because no matter what you choose to bury deep down, it’s just more of the same, maybe more condensed.” He was close to finishing, so he slowed down a little. Appreciating the perfect curve of Bruce’s ass didn’t really encourage taking things slow, though. Quite the contrary. “I think you just don’t like the idea of possessing these so called good qualities. When you think ‘good’, you think ‘Rachel’, you think ‘your father’ or ‘Jim Gordon’. It would be blasphemous to put yourself in line with them, hm?” Joker smiled at the small hitch of breath at the question.

“You on the other hand, you’re the monster driven by rage and vengeance, and you never give yourself any credit because all the good, or as I’d rather say, productive things that come out of it, they’re all circumstantial, am I right now?” Joker leaned in expectantly as if there was an answer coming his way. There wasn’t any, just silence and shivering flesh under his fingertips. “Now, I don’t wanna embarrass you, God forbid, I just want you to understand something,” he confided with a flourish. “The reason the good people of Gotham do all their good stems from Pavlovian training. When you’re trained to act a certain way, it feels obvious to you, doesn’t it. No matter what taught them, be it the upbringing on the socially imposed urge to make a difference. In the end, it all comes down to self-gratification.”

Joker was finished now. He grabbed Bruce’s shoulders and pulled him up from the bed, tugging him closer until he was leaning against his chest. Leaving a trail of kisses down the nape of his neck, he continued.

“The reason you suffer so much is because you feel for those poor bastards, just the way I do. You want to help them, but not because it makes you appear righteous in your own eyes. It doesn’t make you feel better. No, it makes you feel awful, but you still do it. Instead of silencing them, you want to take their burden and carry it for them. No matter how many kicks to the head you take, you still want to save them and give them all you’ve got. And since you want to hate yourself so much, for all the wrong they’ve done, you kick yourself even harder and harder, you seek out castigation hoping that in hating you others will find some peace of mind. No one ever had to teach you to be this way, no one had to scare you into being this, even if you think otherwise. It’s simply the way you are.” Joker closed his eyes and nuzzled his face into Bruce’s shoulder. “You’re the only good person I’ve ever met,” he laughed. “So cut yourself some slack from time to time.”

Bruce felt his blood cloud everything, from his hearing down to his breath. He felt it hot and sticky, flooding him, its tides crashing against what little was left of his mind’s integrity with every stream of words leaving Joker’s mouth. Some of it almost came close to angering him, but he couldn’t give in to anger, knowing it was merely because it was all true. He wanted to give in to him, and so he did, and he had to accept everything as his own and agree to his truth. It left him raw and exposed. He knew he had nothing left to stand between the two of them. The sheer panic it brought rivaled maybe only the burning need to be taken in every way possible, right now.

He was shaking with every breath that he sucked in, being left alone for a few seconds while Joker paced to the bathroom just to return with a cold, damp washcloth. He used it to wipe away the remains of the shaving foam, his movements still deliberately impersonal. Even though the cold made him shrink a little, Bruce already felt the difference; there was nothing to guard his most sensitive parts from the overload of sensations that was surely coming next, if he knew Joker at all.

Joker pressed the washcloth to his own forehead for a few seconds before he threw it aside. It helped a bit. Then, he picked the wristwatch belt and calmly fastened it around the base of Bruce’s now half-erect cock. It seemed that he was done with all the preparations. No real reason to hold yourself back now. He unbuttoned his shirt and practically tore it off his body, immediately feeling better. There was just too much heat. He also unzipped his pants, and after a few seconds worth of pondering, he decided to get rid of them too. Cool air might be of assistance, after all.

He scooted closer, kneeling with one thigh wedged between Bruce’s, and he pressed himself snug to his chest. He let his hands roam across the man’s lower back while his lips were finally allowed the field day they'd been waiting for. He sought out the pulse point on Bruce’s neck and sucked, long and hard. His tongue was insatiable, and it only took it a couple of seconds to make the man rock-hard again. Kissing his way down, he started to bite at the taut muscles of his chest, gradually increasing the dosage of pain. His fingers slid between his asscheeks, spreading them and squeezing, and when he let them flit over the underside of Bruce’s balls, he was rewarded with a small moan. He smiled at the job well done; Bruce was back on the edge, where he was supposed to be.

His mouth descending steadily but slowly, he closed his lips around one of Bruce’s nipples, caressing the other one with the side of his thumb, rubbing in small circles. His other hand went to his groin to rest there, and maybe just to ghost over the now defenseless, smooth inner thigh every once in a while. Joker just loved how bothered Bruce had become; if anything, it was his favorite thing ever to have him reduced to such a shivering mess. His tongue kept teasing his nipple, sucking and nibbling, and that alone forced a small whimper out of his throat at a few second intervals. And there were no inhibitions left. His entire body was writhing and arching for more, without a trace of shame.

Bruce had no place left in his head for shame or any other thing that wasn’t Joker’s hands and mouth on his flesh. He didn’t know anything that wasn’t Joker, around him, inside of him, devouring him, having him at his behest. He felt safe with his own desperation, and so he pushed, and writhed, and exposed himself as much as he could just to get more, and more. He moaned for it, he screamed and cried when Joker dragged his nails down the small of his back just to dig them into the flesh of his ass a second later, sending a surge of tingles right to the base of his spine and then straight to his already strained cock. He felt it pulsate against the makeshift cockring, and he couldn’t decide whether its presence made it better or more unbearable.

Minute by minute, everything stared to melt into one, long, agonizing ordeal. Joker would touch him everywhere, he would lavish him with his teeth and nails, drive him crazy with his tongue slithering down the skin of his stomach and inner thighs, now moist with sweat and flushed with impending insanity, all the while happily ignoring the increasing tempo of his panting, and the more and more insisting jerks of his hips. When Bruce felt the moist breath against the head of his cock, he was peripherally surprised at how whiny and high-pitched his voice had sounded, but he couldn’t enjoy his own astonishment for more than a split second as Joker chuckled, letting the air he exhaled sharply ghost past the yearning flesh. Enough was enough. Bruce arched his body pleadingly, letting his chin fall to his chest as he bit down on his gag. Finally, Joker relented.

The first touch of his tongue against the leaking slit of his cock felt like pure electricity. Bruce wailed and tried to push into the barely parted lips that gently kissed and sucked away the precome, but Joker gripped his thighs hard enough to bruise, keeping him at bay. His head lolling back, Bruce felt himself drowning in his own blood as it throbbed in his trussed up arms, pounded in his skull, pooled in his abdomen and literally converged in cock, as it rushed quicker and quicker with each long, slow lick up and down his shaft, with each open-mouth kiss to the bundle of nerves on its underside, all the while Joker’s hands took care of his balls, prodding gently at his asshole from time to time. It was all much too slow, too cruel, and in his shaved state he was much, much too defenseless.

Then, Joker engulfed him in his mouth, but he didn’t move much, just sucking in accord with his heartbeat. A dry finger buried itself deeper and deeper into him, but somehow the lack of lubrication didn’t bother Bruce in the slightest right now. He tried bucking his hips a little, and Joker gave him one warning as he gently pressed his teeth to the vulnerable flesh in his mouth. When Bruce stilled, he continued on his languid sucking. The finger didn’t want to go in much deeper, just as the tempo Joker hollowing his cheeks and massaging the best spots with his tongue wouldn’t go up even a notch. The only thing that was going up was the volume of Bruce’s anguished moans, until the mouth released him after a few minutes, leaving him panting and purple.

Joker pulled away and clenched his eyelids, counted to ten, and then one more time. When he felt he was good, he scurried behind Bruce and grabbed the back of his neck, pushing down until the man was pressing his cheek to the floor, his ass in the air. Joker raked his nails down the soft skin and then he spread him, inching forward. The first lap of his tongue resulted in a delicious convulsion and a startled whimper. That was the idea.

If the tremors were on the verge of knocking Bruce down before, now they were quite successfully bringing the siege to the final stage. The lack of hair chipped in to his plight, and the firm, deft tongue seemed to just go on and on with its leisurely torture, sometimes moving in fast little circles, sometimes pushing inside, sometimes sucking and kissing the puckered flesh, letting warm strings of spit trickle down his balls. Bruce had never felt so grateful for having something in his mouth in his entire life. He bit down hard, groaning and gasping. Every single muscle in his body went into spasms, and he felt the pressure sear to new heights against the tight ring of leather, when suddenly Joker stopped and reached for his hair, yanking hard, hands grabbing his shoulders and repositioning so he was leaning his back against the side of the bed, still kneeling with his thighs spread and slicked with various bodily fluids, his upper body arched as Joker kept tugging at his hair, holding his head to the mattress.

Bruce tuned himself to the rhythm of Joker’s breath against his body, and he wondered if he was able to take it much longer. He had no say on the matter. The way Joker started to kiss him, sucking and biting on his exposed neck and chest, oblivious to the previous wounds—it felt like the man was indeed going bite off a piece at some point, but Bruce wasn’t afraid, or even remotely apprehensive. If anything, at this point, he would enjoy it and there was no question. He didn’t even try to stop himself from arching into the assault of teeth and bruising grabs and squeezes, trying to worm his way into more and more.

There was a short pause during which Bruce heard a soft click and then Joker was pushing lube-slicked fingers into him, not caring about his comfort. And Bruce was thankful for that, rocking against the rough, invasive burning with a delighted cry. The tempo Joker adopted right from the get-go was something that normally would bring ten times more pain than pleasure, but this time it was perfect, and Bruce could only lie back, his hair still pinned to the mattress, his chest and nipples sucked and gnawed on while the long fingers thrust into him faster and faster, rubbing him in all the right places until he found himself swaying precariously over the edge. When Joker pushed the fingers of his other hand past the necktie into his mouth, it was only a miracle he didn’t come on the spot. It was deadly apparent to the madman, so he stopped and harshly turned Bruce around so his face was buried in their designer sheets.

Joker did a quite perfunctory job at spreading the lube over his own cock, mostly for the sake of reducing the stimuli to the absolute minimum. He was already soaked with his own precome anyway, and Bruce was already more than ready to take all that he had without any further nonsense. He grabbed the man’s hips and pulled him roughly away from the side of the bed, just so only his torso was leaning on top of it. A small precautionary measure to prevent any unwanted humping. He positioned himself and started to push. His throat and lungs seemed to have unlocked as he buried himself deeper and deeper in the tight warmth. The way Bruce pushed back against him, the way his body writhed almost sliced him to pieces with the little blades of near-death pleasure, swallowing him whole until his vision went white for a few seconds.

A deep breath helped to stave off the overload. Bruce wasn’t helping to make it last longer, but Joker still had so much to give him. He wrapped one arm around his chest, the other one going to his hip for leverage, and started to fuck him. His thrusts were harsh and his tempo was gaining right from the start, but Bruce’s screams were nothing short of utterly ecstatic. There was still one more thing before Joker would finally let them give in. Joker pulled Bruce up so his back was to his chest and held him close without losing his momentum. He wanted so badly to just tear him open, get deeper and then even fucking deeper until he would be entrenched in him, wrapped and soaked, and yet all he could do was to tighten his hand around the man’s throat and experience it vicariously.

The last moan that managed its way out of Bruce’s mouth before his breath was cut off still resounded in Joker’s ears. He slowed his thrusts little by little, in accord with Bruce’s slowing heartbeat. The fact the man was so relaxed despite being strangled seemed so wrong, and yet feeling him yield like this nearly brought Joker to the edge of sobbing, as inappropriate as it was. He had strangled enough people back in the day to know when to let go, and so he pinpointed the perfect moment to give Bruce the opportunity to breathe again. As his strained veins choked on the oxygen and his heart went into racing mode again, Joker began to fuck him faster and harder. Bruce had become limp in his arms, but his hips kept canting to meet the incessant pounding. His moans seemed to be unfiltered by any kind of awareness. He had never sounded and felt so unbridled, but there was still a slight hint of tension in his muscles, as if the barrage of sensations was too much for him to handle. He shouldn’t want it to be over, he should just go with it. Joker gripped his throat once more, and once more, he slowed down until Bruce’s pulse was on the verge of dying away.

When Joker released him, Bruce didn’t know the difference between pain and pleasure anymore. In fact, he barely knew anything. The pressure behind his eyelids colored his temporary blindness red, then black, then it submerged him in white, cold heat. His body was euphoric with the sudden air influx, with the feel of Joker’s feverish body so close to his, and with his arms serving him dying and revival so tenderly. It was the overwhelming sense of safety that did it; Bruce tilted his head and pressed his face to Joker’s cheek, and his body took over the helm, riding the other man and angling his own hips to get the most of it without even realizing. Joker held him tighter and unfastened the ad-libbed cockring. He stroked the slicked flesh, slowly working up a tempo to match Bruce’s rhythm. He buried his face into the shivering skin, getting high on the spasms and screams, marveling at how effortlessly Bruce seemed to take it. Each of his movements was infused with something Joker had never seen in him before, and when he finally came, in Joker’s eyes he was at his most beautiful. It would have scared him if he wasn’t already taken over by his own release. Holding on to Bruce for dear life, he moved his hips a few more times with no rhythm or finesse, their screams mingling until they fell to raspy, breathless moans and then just eased into heavy panting.

After that, it was just a jump-cut sequence of images, the fringe awareness of cutting through ropes and removing the gag and the blindfold while Bruce lay the upper half of his body against the bed, his eyes still closed and his mouth slightly parted. It took Joker a good few minutes to be able to experience reality in a fairly consistent manner, just in time to see Bruce’s eyelids lift with laziness. He watched the man right himself and turn to face him, and the poor organ he called his heart took yet another stab at the sight. He had no idea if Bruce had ever looked at anyone the way he looked at him right now. The gag had pressed itself into the sides of his mouth in a mocking image of his own scars, the blood mixed with sweat and spit ran down his bruised and rope-burned skin, the bitemarks and hickeys threw in a slightly obscene touch, and yet it was the pure, childish happiness in his eyes that seemed the most perverse. That, and the way he reached for Joker and pulled him close, the way he threw his still slightly numb arms around him and melted into an embrace that seemed so ill-fitted to everything that went down just seconds before. Innocent, warm and gut-crushing all at once. Joker’s head was swimming anyway, so he didn’t dwell on the bizarreness of it all and just hugged Bruce tighter, since it seemed that the purest things would always grow out of the worst kinds of filth and there was no need to question it.