I did not expect to write more of this and yet here I am. For some reason ended up listening to a 'Drumming Song' (by Florence + the Machine) half the entire time I wrote this, and 'Batman: The Animated Series' (on Prime) the other half.

Day 22: Glory hole | Collaring | Scars

When Bruce woke up, he wondered which fact said more about him: that he wasn't bothered by emerging from a drugged sleep, or that he could recognize that he'd been drugged at all. Although, the blurred edges to the world around him was probably a dead giveaway of the latter. Not that knowing he'd been drugged helped at all - he had little to no information to work with to puzzle out what he'd been given, how long ago, and where he'd been taken after. Even if he had the information, his mind was molasses thick and molasses slow, processing the world around him at a glacial pace. It took too long to realize that his arms and legs were unresponsive because they were tied down, that he couldn't see well because the only light in the room - warehouse? - was a good distance from him, that he couldn't hear because there was nothing to hear, that he couldn't smell because there was a scent smeared under his nose. The only thing he could be sure of was that Bruce Wayne, not Batman, was tied to a chair, his mouth was duct-taped shut, and the rise of his heat was a simmering burn under his skin.

He tried to organize his mind pull himself together so he could reach any of the little tools sewn into the sleeve of his suit jacket, but he must have faded away again because the next time he blinked, his mind felt clearer, there was a light on directly above him, and there were two men in the room - warehouse - with him, watching him. There was nothing particularly memorable about them, they looked like every other two-bit criminal he'd ever taken down, which made the flash of memory, of arms around him, pulling him into an alley on his way home, and a needle jabbing into his neck, all the more insulting. Bruce scowled. At least the drugs were finally fading.

"It looks like our illustrious Mr. Wayne is awake," one of the men, the taller one that stood like a beta with something to prove, sneered. Bruce stared him down and began to pick at the seams of the insides of his sleeves. "I hope you'll find our five-star accommodations to your satisfaction."

The other man, average height but with the confidence of a life-long alpha, was frowning at Bruce. "Didn't you say he was a beta?"

The tall beta turned towards his companion. "No one knows what he is for sure, they just think he's probably a beta."

Frown deepening, the alpha stepped closer, nostrils flaring. Instincts had Bruce wanting to tense at having a strange alpha creeping closer when he was so close to his heat and when he was immobilized, but he was careful not to let it show. It wouldn't have mattered if he had though, the alpha wasn't really concerned with him, more concerned with trying to parse the scents in the air, Bruce's heat likely leaking through the scent blockers he wore. He'd been heading home when he'd been taken, he always left early on the day of his heat, and his scent blockers weren't meant to last through a kidnapping. All it took was for the alpha to bend down close enough, the tip of his nose brushing the side of Bruce's neck.

"Holy shit," the man breathed, breath wafting across Bruce's sensitive skin, scent filtering past whatever was blocking Bruce's ability to smell. He did his best to suppress a shudder at the arousal that came in loud and clear, but he couldn't be sure of his success. Part of him wanted to breathe in deep the scent of alpha attraction, but it was a small part, overshadowed by the side of him mated and bonded. As much as he could barely stand the Joker, could barely stand the scent or taste of his skin, it was his pheromones that Bruce craved, only his pheromones that Bruce wanted when he was like this.

The alpha was still breathing deeply at his neck, and Bruce tensed at the hand that landed on his belly.

"Holy shit what?" the beta asked impatiently, and finally the man leaning over Bruce stood up and turned towards his companion again.

"Bruce Wayne is an omega."

It was strange, hearing those words. Not the tone, necessarily, he never expected the declaration of his secondgender to come out any other way than disbelieving, but hearing the words at all. It was enough of a surprise that he nearly cut his finger on the little knife in his sleeve, finally exposed. Almost no one he knew knew what his true secondgender was, and the ones he'd told, alphas before the Joker that he'd spent his heat with, were calm and collected, taking the reveal in stride, never surprised or demeaning. It was information that Bruce had mostly planned on taking to his grave, if for no other reason than secrecy, and as Batman, anonymity, gave him an edge over his opponents.

"No fucking way," the beta scoffed, but he was already looking doubtful of his own disbelief. Bruce gathered himself and carefully began to saw at the ropes around his wrists with his little blade.

"Yes fucking way, come smell," the alpha shot back. A hand fisted in Bruce's hair, yanking his head to the side, exposing his neck.

The beta strode up and bent down much quicker than the alpha, pressing almost the entirety of his face right against Bruce's neck. It felt like a deeper violation than the alpha scenting him by himself, the hand in his hair forcing his neck into vulnerability.

"Holy shit," the beta breathed after a minute snuffling at Bruce's neck, his nose less susceptible to the pheromones of omegas and alphas. His scent also lacked any kind of appeal to Bruce's instincts, his scent bland where the alpha's had an edge of enticement. "Bruce fucking Wayne is a fucking omega."

"Fuckin' told you," the alpha said, finally letting go when the beta stepped back to stare down at Bruce. Bruce could only scowl back up at him even though the heat in his skin was slowly starting to melt his bones.

"You think he's hiding a mate too?" the beta asked, gaze intense like he was trying to unravel Bruce's secrets just by looking at him.

A hand at the back of his head shoved Bruce's chin to his chest, exposing the back of his neck where his prosthetic was covering his mating mark. He closed his fist around the little knife and hope the alpha didn't notice the fraying of the ropes either.

"Nah, back of his neck's clear," the alpha started to say as he swiped a finger across the skin, and then he paused, his finger pushing down harder. "Wait…"

The prosthetic meant that Bruce couldn't actually feel what the man was doing, but he could feel it in a phantom-touch way, the fingernail scraping over the fake skin, easily at first and then harder, until it peeled away.

"The fuck is that?" the beta asked, stepping closer, nearly sandwiching Bruce's body between the two men.

"It looks like fake skin…" the alpha muttered, sounding disgusted. "Hiding a mating mark," he continued, trailing off as his thumb brushed the scars left by the Joker's teeth. The touch made Bruce shudder, and involuntary response of arousal and disgust at having his bond bite touched, but not by his mate. "Christ, how much do you think someone would pay to know that Bruce Wayne was hiding his secondgender and a mate this entire time."

"Idunno man, maybe the mating's new?" the beta asked, bending over Bruce to peer at the back of his neck.

"Nah, lookit it, thing's old," the alpha dismissed. "It ain't the first one either," he said, tracing a fingertip over the individual lines left from every time the Joker had mated him. Each touch made Bruce shudder again, disgust making his skin crawl even as his body got hotter and wetter. "He's either got a possessive alpha or he goes through mates like he does lovers."

"Look at him though," the beta said, stepping back just enough to put a little room between him and Bruce. But then he leaned forward and started unbuttoning Bruce's shirt and Bruce had to concentrate on not struggling away from his touch. Luckily, the alpha stepped around in front of him too, finally taking his hands from Bruce's skin and leaving Bruce free to resume sawing at the thick rope with his small blade.

Under the beta's hands, Bruce's white dress shirt parted and the halves fell apart, exposing his chest on inch at a time. He carefully breathed through his nose even when the beta paused, the tips of his fingers tracing the lines of scars across Bruce's skin. He could no longer remember where he'd gotten them all, he had no idea which ones were caused by the Joker, or which ones he'd gotten from the Riddler or the Penguin or any number of criminals he'd fought against in his years as Batman.

"You're right, he's not exactly omega-perfect," the alpha said as if Bruce was no more animate than a couch to be measured and to be judged whether or not he fit in the other man's life. "He's almost got an alpha build and those scars - not cute." Even as he spoke, he reached forward to touch too. "I wonder what they're from, and how many he has."

Bruce's suit jacket and shirt were shoved down his shoulders, leaving his front bare and sending a faint breeze across his shoulders and between his shoulder blades.

"Jesus, even his back is marked all to hell," the beta said, circling around Bruce, forcing him to halt his discreet attempt to escape. "What alpha would even want defective goods like this? I guess he's cute, and rich, but that's about it. Alpha body, alpha attitude. What alpha would be possessive over someone like this?"

"What alpha wouldn't be possessive over a pretty thing like that?" a new voice asked. Or rather, cackled. It sent the hair on the back of Bruce's neck to stand on end and his head snapped up. He knew that voice.

"Hey boss," alpha and beta chimed in unison, and then just the alpha, "We got you a present."

The Joker stepped into the light and Bruce went rigid.

He'd wondered about it, of course he had, the Joker finding out his identity. More-so in the beginning than recently, when the alpha had shown no indication of caring who Batman was under the mask after three years, three years of heats where Bruce was left vulnerable at the Joker's hands and his knives. He'd wondered about telling his alpha, about his alpha finding out, and he had made plans for any of it, and yet, seeing his mate here and now when Bruce was so restricted that he couldn't even fight back, when the revelation wasn't his choice, wasn't the scenario he'd ever thought it would be.

"I see that," the Joker said, stepping forward. There was something alarmingly calm about him, his typical eracticism nowhere to be found. It was a quiet, focused energy Bruce had only seen in the deepest part of his heats, when the Joker had dropped the knife and was bound and determined to hurt Bruce through the power of his words and his hands alone.

Bruce couldn't help but flinch when cold, pale fingertips pressed to his belly and trailed up his sternum to his throat. He looked up into wild eyes and found no recognition as the alpha circled around him, palm gliding around Bruce's neck without leaving it, like he was being circled with an imaginary collar. When his alpha passed over his bond bite, it sent a violent shudder through Bruce and a harsh exhalation out his nose. When the Joker's circle completed and he was standing in front of Bruce again, the alpha surprised him by swinging a leg over his and plopping down in Bruce's lap, looping his arms around Bruce's neck.

Fingers buried in Bruce's hair, combing through the short strands, twirling and gently pulling at the ends, and the touch was so surprisingly soft, especially in comparison to how the Joker usually touched him, that it had Bruce's eyelashes fluttering and his heat rising drastically. He didn't want to press into the touch, but when his alpha was this close, the thick scent of his pheromones filtering through whatever was smeared under Bruce's nose, the touch of his skin against Bruce's made Bruce pliable, his eyes closing and his head tilting back, exposing the front of his throat.

"You really are a pretty thing," the Joker murmured, weight shifting forward and the tip of his freezing nose dragging along Bruce's jaw, his touch like an icicle. "My pretty thing."

Bruce's eyes snapped open but even if he could have spoken, even if there wasn't tape over his mouth, the alpha that had taken him was already talking.

"Er, yeah, he's definitely for you boss," he said, trading confused looks with his beta partner behind the Joker. "We figured we could get a good ransom for him or something. And I bet the Gazette would pay a lot to know that Bruce Wayne is an omega. A mated omega."

"Bet his alpha would pay more to keep it quiet," the beta said, as if it was some grand idea. If only he was right. If only Bruce's alpha was some high class member of society like Bruce was. If only his alpha wasn't a madman with a secret past and a desire to hurt Bruce as much as he knotted him.

"What was it you said about his alpha again?" the Joker asked, pressing his face into Bruce's neck. His lips and nose were pressed to the curve of Bruce's shoulder, right where the beta had shoved his face to try to get a whiff of Bruce's heat scent through his blockers, and brushing maddeningly back and forth, scent-marking Bruce. His skin was so cold that it was almost a relief against the heat of Bruce's, a singular counterpoint that had him shivering, his cock hard and trapped and his hole leaking. "That he might be possessive?"

"Yeah," the alpha said, though there was a tense line to both his body and his friend's. They were beginning to catch on, that something was wrong with the Joker now, that he was never this relaxed, that he was never not-crazy, and they were shifting uncomfortably from foot-to-foot, wringing their hands. "You should see the back of his neck."

One of the hands in Bruce's hair slid down to cup over his mating mark and clamped down hard, and Bruce shuddered again, forcing himself to release his exhale long and slow. The seat of his pants felt soaked, an altogether unpleasant situation, but more pleasant than the possibility of being knotted in front of these strangers, these strangers who knew who he was, who were going to tell the world what he was, one more of his secrets revealed.

"Hardly necessary," the Joker waved off, finally sitting up but without releasing the back of Bruce's neck. In fact, his nails dug in, their sharp, jagged edges biting into Bruce's skin until the first layer of skin broke and wetness trailed down from the four points. It as the first blood drawn this heat, but it wouldn't be the last by far. "I have to wonder what a possessive alpha like that would do to someone that touched their omega."

"Psh, even the Batman can't really touch you, boss," the beta said more confidently than it looked like he felt. "What can some richie alpha do?"

The Joker giggled, loud and high-pitched, the sound a jarring break from the unusual stoicism he'd affected since his arrival. "You hear that, honey?" he asked Bruce, head tilted to the side and sudden smile dark and sharp like the nails cutting into Bruce's skin. "He thinks Batsy can't touch me. He thinks your alpha can't touch him."

Bruce grunted when the Joker finally let go of the back of his neck, and again when the duct-tape was ripped from his mouth harshly, jerking his head sideways. The Joker's other hand was inside his own jacket, like he was reaching for a weapon. "Don't," Bruce rasped, even as the Joker pulled out a pistol.

"Thought you knew ol' Joker didn't share, cutie," the Joker said, smile sharpening as he held his hand up, gun pointed at the ceiling. Behind him, his underlings were trading glances and backing away, their faces pale. "Woulda done this to the last alpha that touched you if you weren't so hush-hush about it." He suddenly leaned in and bit at the curve of Bruce's shoulder, hard enough to draw blood, hard enough that Bruce had to bite off a sound of pain. "I can still smell them on you, Batsy," he whispered as he sat back up, licking Bruce's blood from his lips. "Gonna have to fuck it off you."

"Don't-" Bruce started again, but the Joker turned and fired, twice, the shots echoing off the warehouses walls and ceiling as the bodies of the men who'd taken Bruce crumpled to the ground. Even after decades, gunshot deaths still made his chest feel cold, but at least they didn't make him freeze up anymore. Possibly worse, it was terrifying how good the Joker was when he wanted to be, and how aroused Bruce was at his competence. "You killed your own men."

"They shouldn't have touched you," the Joker said with a shrug. "Night, night, Batboy."

Bruce frowned, not understanding, but then a fist full of gun was coming at his face and he had no way to dodge it.

Joker's faint surprise at the front door of Wayne Manor opening under his hand was mitigated a moment later when he was greeted by the cocking of a shotgun in the hands of an elderly beta in a penguin suit.

"Ya gonna shoot?" he asked with a grin, even as he stepped inside and closed the door. Being back inside made the heatscent of his mate, draped over his shoulders, even more prevalent and Joker took a deep breath, taking it into his lungs. It wasn't something he got to smell often enough.

"Master Bruce?" the beta asked stiffly, hands tightening on his gun.

Joker reached up and slapped his omega's perfect ass, fingers trailing over where his pants were wettest then waving them in front of his nose before licking his fingertips. "Toots here went into heat. You gonna let me mate him right here? Looks like this marble could do use some shining."

The beta's face tightened, but he quietly led the way up the stairs and to a bedroom. "I'll be back with refreshments later," he said tightly. The door closed behind him with a soft click, and then Joker was alone with his mate again.

He dumped Batsy on the bed and started cutting his nice clothes off of him, shredding the cloth and leaving all that skin streaked with red, crisscrossing the silver of old scars. Batsy groaned and shifted as Joker shifted and tugged until his omega was laying naked on his belly over the soft sheets. His chest and back were smeared with his blood, leaving marks on the sheets, and the backs of his thighs were shiny with his slick that Joker could hardly tear his eyes from. His mate's unconsciousness was a rare opportunity, since he usually had no other choice than to fuck Bats unconscious and by that point, they were knotted together and Joker didn't get the chance to indulge in what he wanted to indulge in. But indulge now he could and indulge now he did.

Slick was a rare treat, but perfect match slick, mated perfect match slick? Ambrosia. Joker bent down and buried his face in his omega's ass, pushing his tongue into the source of that taste. He hummed as it slid across his taste buds, coating the inside of his mouth. It wasn't the first time he'd had it, he made sure to indulge every heat, but an omega's heats were quarterly and four times a year was hardly the desired frequency.

He saw Batboy constantly, fought with him throughout the year, and before his omega's ill-advised attempt at fighting his perfect match at the beginning of the heat, Joker had thought it was perfect. He'd never had more fun than when he was in a battle against the Bats. He still loved it, loved nothing more than laying down a puzzle and watching Batman frantically trying to solve it before anyone died. He loved hand-to-hand with him too, when Batsy eventually caught up to him and tried to beat him into the ground. Joker had no problem with admitting he liked that part too. There really was nothing like getting punched by Batman.

His omega groaned, hips pushing unconsciously back against Joker's tongue, and Joker grinned as he pulled away, licking his lips. The taste of Batsy's slick would stay with him for hours, but he'd have to make sure he tasted it again before his mate's heat was over. He pulled his cock out of his pants as he sat up and shuffled closer, holding the tip to Bats' hole without pushing inside. Then he leaned over his mate's scarred back and stuck two fingers past unresisting lips.

There was no one who knew how awful his skin truly was. No one alive, that was. His pretty wife, her memory faded with time, but impact everlasting, had killed herself to get away from it, from him. It wasn't as if he hadn't gone mostly crazy from his inability to tolerate it himself. He still wasn't sure if he wasn't high half the time, like gas fumes rising from his pores. But his omega, his mate, him Joker would force to take it until he got used to it or killed himself to get away from it too. Either way, Joker won.

For now, however, the taste of his skin was better than smelling salts, his unconscious mate twitching, brow furrowing as he tried to get away from the taste in his mouth. Joker just pushed down on his tongue harder, forcing his taste buds to accept the chemical tint of his skin. Batman came awake suddenly, jerking backwards, trying to get away from Joker's taste, and impaled himself directly onto Joker's waiting cock. Grin widening, Joker curved his fingers like a fish hook and pulled, yanking old Brucey's head to the side where he was met with startled eyes and then a scowl.

Joker slid his free hand up Batsy's spine and around the side of his neck, up his throat to cup under his jaw, fingers digging into the joints, forcing it open. He didn't pull his fingers out as he leaned forward, laying his weight across his mate's back, pinning him in place, until his mouth took Batboy's. Who fought him, at first, as he always did, but after a tightening of the claw of Joker's hand, and a long moment of his tongue pressing against his mate's, his omega eventually settled down. It had taken a little trial and error to determine that the taste of his tongue was more acceptable than that of his skin, but that was a treat to be used sparingly. And/or when Joker wanted a kiss.

"Morning, cutie," he said as he finally pulled back, smug in the dazed look on Batman's face. And what a face it was. Who Batman was had never been as important as what he was. Joker hadn't cared about the who, but that didn't mean he couldn't appreciate a pretty face, especially when it was attached to the body he was fucking, especially when it was attached to his mated omega.

Batman blinked at him, the gears in his head turning even as Joker clamped a hand down on his mate's shoulder, pulling his omega backwards as Joker fucked forward. His omega's skin was fever-hot, burning against Joker's lower body temperature. His hole around Joker's cock was like a furnace, and sometimes he wondered if his skin would melt off just by touching an omega-in-heat. Sometimes he wondered if Batman's skin felt so warm when he wasn't in heat.

"You brought me home," Batsy rasped, voice rough and gorgeous mind working in overtime, processing their surroundings. "You already knew, didn't you?"

"What kind of alpha doesn't know who is omega is?" Joker asked, a slight sneer to his voice as he rocked into his mate in a steady rhythm. The heated walls wrapped tightly around his cock spasmed and his steady rhythm faltered for a moment as arousal curled like lava in his belly. He had never missed sex, after his wife, but sex with Bats during his heat was… something else. A fight in a fuck like no one else could deliver.

"You never attacked me at home." It was as much of a statement as it was a question.

"I want to play with my mate, not Bruce Wayne," he said baldly.

"They're the same person."

"Oh honey, no, they're not."

Batsy, strangely prone to in-depth thought for such a physical fellow, continued the tradition by remaining silent, even with Joker fucking into him. It went on for a moment, long enough for Joker to get bored, and then Bats spoke again.

"Alfred?"

The idea of toying with his mate brightened Joker's interest and played at the fringes of Joker's mind for a minute before he decided he could do it later. If his mate thought Joker had hurt his maid, then their time together would turn into a proper battle. And as much fun as a pre-fuck fight was, especially when succeeded by a heat fuck, he was reluctant to do so on the first day of his omega's heats. It was when Batboy was the most wild, the most desperate, before the soreness and the exhaustion set in. It was when he still fought being knotted, even after three years. When Joker's blade got the most use.

"Your little toy is safe," he said, delighted at the tension to his omega's body in the intermittent silence, walls growing tight around Joker's cock, pulling him back in every time he pulled out. Maybe he should make his mate tense more often - it felt fantastic around his pistoning cock. "Couldn't very well play with a mate to take care of."

Batso's lip lifted, a silent snarl, like it always did every time Joker mentioned their relationship, but he no longer growled. Joker wondered how long it would take him to stop snarling entirely, for his Bats to seek him out first, how long until he showed up before his heat was too far in for him to handle, when he needed Joker. And when he wondered about the future, he inevitably started wondering about…

Joker leaned over his mate, scraping his teeth along a shoulder blade as he slid one hand around his omega's waist to palm the muscled stretch of his belly. Brucey, who had started to tentatively rock back into his every thrust, went stock still again, but Joker's motions kept his omega. With his free hand, Joker pulled a knife and slid it under Batsy's neck, forcing his head up.

"Ya ever wonder, Batboy?" he whispered, still plowing into the stiff body under him. "Ya think about it at all?" He curled his fingers and dragged his ragged nails across the scarred skin, straight across where Batsy might swell one day.

His mate growled, the low sound rumbling through his chest and into the muscles under Joker's hand. "No."

"Shame, sweetheart," Joker cooed, curling his claws all the way around Batsy's side to his back. "We'd make quite the pup."

Batman grunted and shoved hard back on Joker's cock, as if he was trying to shut him up. Joker grinned, amused, and shoved down hard between his mate's shoulders, drawing his knife over the curve of the man's shoulder, opening a thin line of skin as the man's face was pressed into the sheets. The corner of his lips were still curled in a silent snarl, but the only way he fought back was shoving his hips back harder, meeting every one of Joker's thrusts almost violently.

"You're right," Joker continued after a moment, drawing another line down the side of Batsy's spine. "Could hardly have a good fight when it's dangerous for our pup just to throw a punch."

"Shut. Up," his omega snarled, reaching back to strike at him.

Joker caught his wrist and pinned it back to the bed, and then buried his knife in the bed to pin his other wrist down. "No," he whispered into his mate's ear, biting sharply at the lobe as he set to making his mate shut up instead.

Every thrust jarred the body under his wildly, slowly moving Brucey up the bed until Joker used the wrists in his hold to pull him back down again. There was a soft grunt each time, and blood bloomed on his omega's skin as Joker scraped his teeth over every inch he could reach. He'd bruise before too long, skin mottled with Joker's touch. And despite rejecting the demand for silence, in Joker's enthusiasm, he did indeed shut up, though his teeth remained bared in a vicious grin.

His knot was swelling and he waited until it was almost too big before he bit into the back of his mate's neck and pulled him back hard onto his knot. Batsy bore it initially in silence, but when it forced its way past the tight right of muscles, Batsy hissed in pain, tendons in his wrist tightening when his fingers curled into the bedspread. The sharp tang of blood was thick over his tongue, mixing with the blooming pheromones in the air, the satisfaction of an omega well-knotted as his mate came on his cock, trembling under him and pulling Joker's own orgasm from where it was coiled low in his belly.

Afterwards, when his omega lay shaking beneath him, the first round of his heat passed and the first of Joker's orgasms passed, Joker sat back on his heels, running his hands up Batman's back, over the scars he'd left. He traced them one at a time, each letter long and thin, unreadable from any other angle than Joker's: knotted in his omega with his mate's ass in the air and his shoulders pressed to the bed.

J - O - K - E - R

FIN

I wish I could draw what I see in my head for the last paragraph... I dont't think there will be a c3 - I think I may be as dissatisfied with this chapter as the last one, but hopefully y'all like it as much anyway. :*

Don't forget: like the thing? reblog the thing (themadkatter13fanfiction tumblr, tagged/No-Rehab-for-Gotham-White).