author's note: this fic is also available on ao3 under the same title, published under the username itallstartedwithdefenestration. warnings apply in later chapters for graphic violence, sexual situations, implied past rape, and suicidal thoughts.

I woke the same
As any other day except a voice was in my head
It said seize the day
Pull the trigger, drop the blade
And watch the rolling heads

— "The Day I Tried to Live," Soundgarden

Come as you are
As you were
As I want you to be
As a friend
As a friend
As an old enemy…
And I swear that I don't have a gun
No, I don't have a gun

— "Come As You Are," Nirvana

September 2008

Bruce was driving down I-78 going at least twenty miles over the speed limit in his father's '75 Plymouth. The police scanner he'd installed was crackling as was his brain as was the sky which streaked over New York in the distance with lightning. He had the windows down despite it was raining and the water splashed inside and soaked the interior and his arm and his hair. Driving down in slanted sheets it kept easing up then crashing back down and Bruce couldn't see past his headlights. He knew he should slow down but he just couldn't — quite — make himself.

The police scanner burst firecracker-loud in the close space. After a moment Bruce recognized Ramirez's voice reporting on a shooting on Henderson; then O'Brien reporting a drug deal in the lower harbor; then Landry asking if anyone was up for a game of radio chess, all frequencies invited, he was bored, it was a fucking dull night, there was nothing —

"Hey, heads up." Stephens. "All units. Breakout at Arkham."

Ramirez, tiredly: "Who is it this time?"

Laughter crackling in the static with the lightning and Bruce's mind —

Stephens: "It's the Joker."

Abruptly the laughter ceased. There was a sharp inhale from a rookie and himself Bruce was swinging his father's car across the empty lanes so hard he nearly fishtailed —

— not that he'd care if he did —

— before getting into the service lane, putting the car in park, and waiting.

"He's stolen one of the guard's cars," Stephens was saying. "License Charlie Delta Oscar three-oh-six. White Bronco — "

"Who the fuck does he think he is," O'Brien cut in, "O.J. Simpson?"

A few nervous giggles.

"He's heading north on 78 and — "

Bruce dove out of the car. He had the suit in the trunk; he hadn't run as Batman since July but sometimes (he couldn't really help it, burning compulsion) he drove around with it just in case — well, just in case of things like this. The rain had let up enough he could get his civilian clothes off and into the Kevlar with very little trouble. His hands trembled as he fastened the clasps. It had only been two months and he knew it would be dangerous if he got caught but this felt necessary. He didn't know why there was this pull, this urge to run after the Joker, the man who destroyed everything Bruce had known, everything he'd loved for so long —

— Rachel —

— but it was there guiding his hands as he pulled the mask on dragging it down his face, the blunt edges of his nails catching the skin of his cheeks. He was shaking and listening to the wind as it howled through the empty streets. It was so dark, it was almost two in the morning and Bruce had no idea what the hell he was even doing out here —

The police scanner made another noise he heard through the open window —

— right. North on 78. He got back in the car, turned around at the next interchange, and got back on the other side. He was well south of Arkham and didn't know how long it would take to catch up to the Joker but he planned on catching him no matter what, even if he didn't reach him until they were in New York, tailing him through Manhattan and into the Atlantic, anything to catch him, to make him pay, to get him around the neck and shake and get his fist in his face —

— but Bruce was going one hundred miles an hour and therefore caught up to the Joker pretty quick because he was going a sedate sixty-five, weaving gently between lanes so that the few cars they passed kept their horns going, steadily constant string of F-notes through the night, through the still darkness, through the rain as it hit the asphalt and the hood of the car with its constant guttering sound like gunfire in the distance. Bruce swung his car alongside the Joker's and through the open window yelled at him to pull over but either he didn't notice or else he was just ignoring Bruce because he kept driving. Bruce cut in front of him with his foot heavy on the accelerator until blinded by his headlights he slammed on the brakes forcing the Joker to jerk his wheel to avoid crashing into Bruce's bumper. Bruce watched him spin out in his rearview mirror. The stolen car spiraled on the wet concrete. Even through the dark Bruce could see the Joker's outline in the front seat and he could see he was laughing. When at last he came to a stop he was facing away from Bruce and Bruce heard his engine gun and protest momentarily before he skidded out with violence and so Bruce turned too, leaning on the horn, watching his taillights as they receded and sped up faster and faster between the white headlights of passing cars as their horns screamed and tires burned rubber shifting to the sides. Bruce chased the Joker down 78 going south now feeling the same blind rage as he had back in July when he'd chased him on the motorcycle, the same directionless unmoored violence, the same urge to hurt, to push too far, to get his foot in his chest and his hands around his throat and squeeze —

— to just break him down, to destroy him, to beat him until he was bleeding out broken, until he finally stopped, and stopped fucking laughing —

— until he'd paid for it all, for every life he took, for everything he'd taken from Bruce. For everything he'd taken from Gotham. Bruce allowed the rage to build and build until it was channeling through him, all he could hear or see or think or feel, red all around him, a siren in his head, tunneling his focus. He couldn't see the other cars, only the Joker's, in the dim piercing glow of his headlights and the rain coming down harder and faster again, swirling along the road in white rollercoasters that sprayed the other cars as Bruce's tires smacked the puddles. The Joker was going and going and both of them were still passing the other screaming cars blowing at them and Bruce didn't care, he didn't care, he had to catch the Joker, he needed him to bleed —

The Joker slammed into another car going seventy, maybe seventy-five miles per hour, and the Bronco was pulled upwards by the force of it, the back wheels lifting off the ground as the front end twisted itself. Then the whole car was flipping over, skidding along on its side before its momentum pulled it completely upside down as it came at last to rest near the guardrail. The wheels still turned in the air like a flailing incapacitated animal and smoke rose from the engine. Bruce pulled in alongside him on the driver's side watching the smoke rising from the crushed engine, the glass glittering on the road in the rain, multiple shards throwing off bright scattered reflections of light from the streetlamp overhead. He got out of his father's car and made sure the other driver was okay —

(shaken but unhurt; she started to smile at him before her eyes focused and she realized who he was, and then she spat and said his name with such venom, and all Bruce could tell her was the police were already chasing the Joker and would be here soon)

— and then he walked to the stolen car. The driver's side door had been twisted in the crash and Bruce didn't think he could get it open, but he was able after some maneuvering to brace his legs and arms and wrench it open with force and then there he was.

The Joker.

He'd been knocked unconscious by the force of the crash. His temple was bleeding where it had smashed into his window and his mouth was bleeding where it had smashed into the airbag. He wasn't wearing a seatbelt. Bruce was shocked he hadn't gone through the windshield. He hung upside down with glass in his hair, soaked in blood, and Bruce started to reach in to haul him out but his eyes snapped open (Bruce realized distantly he wasn't wearing his facepaint) and when he saw Bruce he let out a sharp angry sound more like a bark than a laugh and lowered himself down before crawling out of the car. It was a visceral sharp reminder of when he'd flipped the eighteen-wheeler in July, the way he'd barely needed time to recover before he was shooting again, and he barely needed it now either as he struggled to his feet and stumbled a little before catching himself. He was clad in his Arkham-issued orange jumpsuit, number 012406 stitched into the pocket, and only one shoe; the other foot was bare and rested in a puddle. Bruce noticed for the second time that he wasn't wearing his facepaint and this time with the light full in the Joker's face Bruce could see that without it he was almost shockingly young, and strangely familiar. Without all his regalia — his overcoat and suspenders, his filthy shirt and trousers and that ridiculous watchchain — he was just… nearly normal. Nearly human, except for the manic edge in his eyes suppressed under layers and layers of drugs and the fury and the rage balling his hands into fists and the unhidden scars pulling at the corners of his lips.

"Well," the Joker drawled, looking Bruce up and down and licking at his mouth, "we just keep running into each other, don't we." Then wildly he swung out with his free arm, catching Bruce in the jaw. The force of his knuckles flooded pain up through Bruce's teeth, rattling his skull, but he was still able to maintain the presence of mind to reach out as the Joker's arm fell and grab his wrist. He shoved him backwards so that he slammed against the wreckage of the car. The Joker laughed as his head thudded back against the metal.

"Oh yeah," he said, "just like that — "

Bruce's jaw was still throbbing and he let it carry him, let it tighten his grip on the Joker, caging him in. He could still hear the scanner in his car going. He stood body shadowing the Joker in the glow of his headlights and the rain was still coming down, misting now, zigzagging in the light and gathering in the Joker's hair, the half-grown greenish streaks of it. The seats in the Plymouth were going to be ruined, Bruce thought; the window was still rolled. Sorry, Dad.

The Joker was staring at Bruce's mouth; it was the only part of his face he could see. He was smiling, he was fucking smiling and Bruce wanted so badly to hit him he could feel it rushing down his arm, the echoing pulse of it in his jaw. He was remembering the way it felt in the interrogation room at Gordon's, how his hits crashed through the walls again and again and the Joker's laughter crashed along with them, the way he just took all of it laughing and letting Bruce do it, letting him do whatever he wanted. He was remembering all of it and he wanted so badly again to fist his free hand in the Arkham collar and haul the Joker forward, get his fist in his unpainted face, but he forced the urge down — though it felt like opening a drain to oil — and he said,

"Gordon's men are coming."

"Oh," the Joker said. "That's interesting. I didn't think you'd want to be here for that."

He was baiting him. He was baiting him and he shouldn't respond, he couldn't —

"Why not?"

The Joker tilted his head. "They hate you," he said. "Don't they. Just like the rest of this city. Didn't I tell you this would happen? That the second you proved just how much of a freak you really are they'd throw you out of their little exclusive club you've been so desperate to be part of. Like a kid on the playground watching the popular group knowing he'll never really fit in — "

Bruce hit him. He couldn't help it. He'd let go of the Joker's wrist and his fist struck before he'd even realized what he'd done. The Joker staggered sideways laughing against the ugly twisted wreckage. "There's that good old repressed violence," he said, blood running down from his temple to his cheek and over his mouth and now from his nose where Bruce had hit him. "Let it out; you know you're not going to have a chance when Gordon gets here and it's time to prove to him just how normal you think you can be — "

Bruce grabbed his forearm again and twisted his wrist, feeling the bones move against each other, the pressure of his skin, the racing pulse. "Shut up," he snarled, shoving him against the car a second time. He had cuffs he pulled out from the suit, dragging the Joker's other wrist up so as to lock them together. I should've done this the first time, Bruce thought, watching the Joker's face shift with something like triumph in his eyes. The rain had started back up and it hit the metal, cooling it off, catching in the hair on the Joker's forearms, dampening his uniform so that it clung to him, the tense sinew of his body. Bruce was honestly pretty shocked the Joker hadn't tried to run yet but in the glow of the headlights and up close like they were he was starting to notice other things, too, like that his eyes weren't all the way in focus, and he was swaying a little where he stood in Bruce's grasp.

He smiled down at the cuffs. Then at Bruce. "You can pretend all you want," he whispered. "It'll never make you into one of them — "

Bruce hit him again, across the jaw this time, same place the Joker had hit him. He heard his teeth strike together but he was still fucking laughing, laughing, body twisting sideways from the force of the blow. His foot was turning purple in the puddle where it rested and Bruce could feel him shivering so he jerked him forward, closer to his father's car. The girl the Joker had crashed into was still sitting in her own car watching the two of them with undisguised curiosity so Bruce angled his body away from her and said,

"I'm not pretending."

The Joker's lips twitched. He didn't say anything which of course made Bruce even angrier than if he'd spoken and he was winding up to hit him a third time when his head dropped a little. It was only for a second but it was enough to bring Bruce out of it. He stared at the Joker's eyes and closer to the light he could see the pupils were blown and his eyes were shifting, staring over Bruce's shoulder. His tongue darted out. His hands were trembling.

"What are you on," Bruce asked.

This earned him a neat eyebrow raise. "You looking to score or something? Thought you got coke for free with the scary voice — "

"I know you just got out of Arkham and I know they have you on drugs, what did you take before you left."

The Joker snorted. "'course I'm doped up; I'm always loaded when I'm there. Makes the place more tolerable; if you ask me they're doing me a fucking favor — "

Bruce was still gripping his wrists even though he was cuffed. He squeezed down on the bone through the metal and slapped the Joker's cheek. His eyes snapped to Bruce's:

"Oh, I didn't know it was like that,"

and he was laughing again. The manic fox's cackle of it mixed strangely with the police sirens in the distance.

Police sirens.

Shit.

Bruce looked over his shoulder. In the far distance he could see red and blue flashing lights in sailing arcs coming steadily closer through the rain. They were coming closer and they were coming fast. The girl in her car was getting out her license and insurance and the Joker was half in Bruce's arms shivering and high and laughing, soaked in blood, bruised up already because of Bruce, and he didn't know what to do, so he shoved him. He shoved him harder than he'd meant and the Joker stumbled but he stumbled in the right direction which was towards the '75 Plymouth. Bruce was shoving him towards his father's car and he didn't know why.

"Get in," he said, and the Joker gave him a look. Even through the drugs it was level and measured and almost lucid.

"I'm not really interested in dying in your giant weird car — "

"Okay," Bruce said, feeling his jaw tighten, "you can wait here in the rain for the GCPD to come and put you back in Arkham or whatever the fuck they want to do with you; really I don't know and I don't especially care — "

Except he did, obviously. Or else he wouldn't have asked the Joker into his fucking car.

The Joker was watching him. "And how is that any different from you doing whatever the fuck you want with me," he asked.

"I don't know," Bruce said, shoving him again towards the passenger side. The police scanner was still going inside:

Unit 173 we have a visual on possible suspect, vehicle crash up ahead on 78 —

"Why is Batman helping to aid and abet," the Joker asked. "What are you hoping to gain from this. Certainly not Gotham's favor — "

"I don't know," Bruce said again, "I don't know, just get in the car," and the Joker surprised him by getting in, tugging the door shut, sitting in the passenger seat. He sat and for a moment Bruce stood outside in the mist with the cape flowing around him and the mask tight over his face and wondered what the fuck he was doing. He had no idea what he was doing. He hadn't had any idea whatsoever of what he was doing since July, the last time he'd done anything as Batman, the last time he was able to show this face in public. He had no idea what he was doing and no idea who he was. He'd thought if he could get his hands around the Joker's throat, if he could just land a few punches the anger would snap, it would bleed out and the blackness would recede, but it had only grown worse, red pulsating in the corners of his vision, white noise screaming in his head, rage rage rage blind fucking constant rage boiling in him always, every day, every second, every hour, not just since Rachel died either but years, Bruce had lived years like this and had only ever seen it reflected in one other place —

— and it was looking at him now through the car window, through drug-glazed eyes, and Bruce didn't know what he was doing but he swept around the car, got in, and put it in reverse. The police scanner was still going and Bruce turned it off; he couldn't listen to it, he couldn't hear their voices. The sirens were getting closer and closer all the time. He watched their lights in the rearview mirror as he pulled out, away from the wreckage of the smoking car. He watched the Joker in the passenger seat with his head on the window, smearing blood on the glass, hands resting in his lap as he watched Bruce's own hands shake on the steering wheel. Bruce straightened up and put the car in drive. The little Thomas Wayne that had lived in his head since 1985 whispered,

You won't come back from this,

and Bruce whispered back,

I know,

and he sped out onto the road.

"So where are you taking me," the Joker asked. He attempted a grin which didn't quite fit on his face. Bruce didn't worry — he told himself he didn't worry — about the mental or physical state of the man beside him because after all he was the fucking Joker, he deserved to suffer, he —

He was holding the cuffs up and trying to grin as Bruce exited 78 and began the drive out to the Narrows. "Suppose it'd be too much for me to hope this means we're going to your secret hideout to have whatever fantastic kinky sex you like with the cuffs and that leather — "

"It's Kevlar," Bruce said, for no apparent reason, "and please stop talking."

The Joker was still grinning. He slid his hands into his lap again and started picking at the skin around his nails as best he could within his limited range of movement. At a stop sign Bruce glanced over and was again startled both by how young the Joker was and how different he appeared without the greasepaint. Trying not to think about it he said,

"Actually, I'm taking you back to your place,"

and he could see he'd surprised him. The Joker bit his lower lip, teeth indenting the skin and turning it white. He stared out the window at the rain and the darkness and the blurring lamplights through the steamed up windows (Bruce had finally managed to remember to roll them up after driving for five minutes with water in his face; the interior was completely fucking ruined). The Joker stared out at the city scratching himself with his blunt nails. For no reason Bruce remembered how long they'd been in the interrogation room.

Finally the Joker said, "I'm not telling Batman of all people where I live."

"That's fine," Bruce said, voice tense. "I don't really want to know. Just an approximation is fine."

The Joker just stared at him. Bruce rolled his eyes.

"Do you want to go back to Arkham," he asked, "because that's fine too; I can take you there right now, it'll be a lot faster — "

"Just keep going straight," the Joker said. "Turn right on Anderson,"

and for a while that was the only sound in the car outside of the heater, the faint white noise of the scanner where it was still turned all the way down, his erratic breathing, and the rain hitting the glass. The bruising pulse of the windshield wipers. Just his voice every so often giving directions in a strange flat monotone. Bruce was still trying not to worry about him of all people, the man who had pushed Rachel out of the window, who had orchestrated her death, who had lied to Bruce purposefully to trip him up, to prove some point. Bruce knew he could've made other decisions regarding her and she might be alive right now if he had, if he had just chosen the city over himself, if he had just placed the city first like he'd always thought he did, like the Joker hadn't wanted him to, like the Joker had expected he wouldn't, like Bruce had proved he was incapable of doing. Bruce had no interest in worrying about the man responsible for all of that but the farther into the Narrows he got the worse the slur in the Joker's voice got. The farther into the decadent filth sprouting from the sewers, the drug deals, the hookers leaning against light poles, against fire hydrants in their fishnets and corsets, lipsticked mouths lurid and smiling in the ghostly misting rain. Finally when Bruce pulled up to a stoplight on Roosevelt he couldn't help it any longer; he looked over at the Joker and asked,

"How did you escape Arkham in your state?"

The Joker's eyes flashed in the red light a mixture of irritation and dry amusement. He didn't answer. Bruce tried again:

"What are you on?"

and this time the Joker's head turned towards him very slowly. Even without the greasepaint his mouth was deeply, almost startlingly red. "What?"

Bruce felt something tighten in his jaw. "What do they have you on at Arkham that's making you act like this?"

"Maybe this is just my very own winning personality."

No, Bruce thought, jaw tightening further, hands trembling on the wheel. He remembered boundless rage anger hatred darkness violence blood; a voice like firecrackers booming, pop pop pop, and the guns and the manic laughter and the terror and the consistency of it, the pulse, the trigger, the lashing electricity uncontained, uncontrollable… How he was like a rabid animal loose in the woods, like a fighting dog too long in the ring, whipped into a bloody starved frenzy, shaped by cruelty, savage and vicious. Something beaten and brutalized until it burst forth in dark glittering victory, the triumphal scream:

(without cruelty there is no festival)

— no, this isn't you, Bruce thought, but he couldn't say it. He sat listening to the Joker's erratic breathing and watching his leg shaking idly against the seat and finally he said,

"I just want to give you drugs to combat the symptoms."

This earned him another snort and an eye roll. "You're always trying to fix things. Fix people. Your problem is no one's ever told you no, I don't want to be fixed. Or maybe they have," he mused contemplatively as the light turned green, "and you just didn't listen."

Bruce breathed out. "It'll even things out a little until — "

"Wanna know how I got these scars?" the Joker asked, as though Bruce had not spoken. "It was a bar fight, some guy told me he didn't like how I laughed at the bartender's joke and I told him I didn't like how his mom fucked me but we all have to deal with life's little disappointments. He grabbed me by my hair, slammed my face into the bar, broke his bottle, and carved these — " tilting his head — "into my face.

"Or maybe," he murmured, twisting his hands over and over themselves, "I got them at Arkham. I was playing cards for months with the same group until one of them had enough sessions with his psych he discovered how to use rational thinking. He found the cards I hid up my sleeves and paid the guards to hold me down while him and his buddy knelt on my stomach and sliced my mouth open — turn left here," he added as an afterthought, gesturing vaguely to Primrose, and Bruce jerked the wheel so hard he hit the curb. The Joker was still pistoning his leg and knocked his head against the window but did not react to any of it. Bruce looked over at him:

"Joker — "

"And what if nothing happened to me," the Joker whispered, so quiet Bruce almost couldn't hear him over the rush of wind outside the car windows where he'd stopped again at the intersection of Primrose and Cooke. "What if I'm just fucked up like this because I want to be. What if mommy and daddy gave me milk and cookies every night and I always brushed my teeth and got good grades, chess club and Boy Scouts and whatever else, but something just… slipped. I stuck the razor in myself one day because they were out and I was bored." He looked at Bruce directly and under the drugs and the possible concussion and the exhaustion there was that familiar spark of lucidity, of mania, of barely concealed fury. "What if there's nothing to fix? What would you do then?"

Bruce didn't answer him because he couldn't. He thought he knew what he wanted to say but it frightened him, it wouldn't leave his tongue. He stepped on the accelerator though the light hadn't yet changed. He saw the Joker smiling to himself in his peripheral, but he ignored it. He ignored everything.

The Joker was quiet for the rest of the ride, humming softly under his breath, shaking his foot, giving directions, until at last he had Bruce pull off to the side of the road beside a massive abandoned warehouse. In the dark its entryway was cavernous and threatening. Bruce could see rusted corrugated steel hanging off the support beams and moonlight in the puddles inside from the leaking roof. Then he realized the clouds had parted enough to let out the moon. The rain had let up entirely and as Bruce killed the engine he heard insects.

"So what are you on."

"Thought you said you didn't wanna score."

The thing in Bruce's jaw felt ready to snap. "I want to know what you're taking so I can give you the right things to — "

"To what. To help me? Didn't we just have this conversation?"

"I have drugs in my trunk that can — "

"You just can't let go of the idea of saving me, can you." The Joker sounded exhausted. Annoyed. "What do you hope you're going to accomplish by this, exactly. It can't possibly help you feel better about yourself — "

"Look, if you want to keep feeling like this — "

"Maybe I do." The Joker's jaw was gritted the same as Bruce's, tight enough he could see his teeth grinding. They were both quiet for a bit. Bruce could hear a couple down the street arguing in Spanish. Finally he said,

"Okay," and he smoothed his hands down his thighs. He was still shaking. "Then get out of my car, I don't have anything else to — "

"It's chlorpromazine," the Joker said. He was glaring at the floor and Bruce wondered what the admission was costing him. "You have to — " he held up his cuffed wrists — "anyway, so you might as well…"

Bruce didn't push it. He went to his trunk and retrieved the case of pills that would combat the symptoms of withdrawal and the pills that would combat the overdose and he brought them both to the Joker. He opened the door and the Joker swung his legs out over the side. Bruce was briefly surprised to see he was still wearing only one shoe. He explained what each bottle was for, then helped ease the Joker out. He handed him the pills. He unlocked the cuffs. The Joker stood for a moment rubbing at his bruised wrists and Bruce thought —

But then the pills were clattering to the wet asphalt and the Joker was grabbing Bruce, knocking him in the nose with his forehead. Pain burst along his bones and into his skin as the edges of the mask cut his face. Pain radiated up into his skull and Bruce staggered backwards furious with himself for not seeing it coming. By the time he was able to straighten up again and blink the black edges out of his vision the Joker had disappeared. The bottles were gone too, though, so Bruce closed the trunk, unclipped his cape, and slid into the driver's seat.

It's better this way, Bruce thought. Better to just go home and forget this ever happened; try not to dissect it to yourself or anyone else. He tossed the scanner into the back and flipped through the stations on the radio until he found something that sounded like how he felt, gritty and unstable, and he turned on his headlights, and he drove away.

October 2008

The fundraiser was for the refurbishing of Gotham General. The city wanted to do a sort of upscale version of it, with an adjacent children's hospital and a special ward with grief counselors and a nicer chapel than the one they'd had before, which had hardly been used anyway on account of its draftiness and general gloom. Bruce was hosting it at his penthouse; he could have rented out a ballroom, but it was easier this way, and anyway he had the grand piano (hardly used) which he'd commissioned for the evening to be played by the city's virtuoso pianist, with whom he enjoyed occasional and very vague flirtation so as to keep up appearances. The caterers had served wine and cocktails and hors d'oeuvres and Bruce had already made his preliminary speech and was now mingling on the outer edge of his guests and wishing he didn't have to do this.

Not for the first time he found himself unexpectedly missing Rachel. It was a different feeling somehow than the blank raw grief he remembered consuming the months following his parents' deaths until he'd learned to pull the shutters. It was more like something he was watching happening to someone else very far away. It came and went in sharp bursts and normally — when he could get out of bed with it — it sent him to the gym to race the feeling off with a weak and less than fulfilling simulation of the violence and physicality he'd come to rely on, running on the treadmill until he was nauseous with overwork or weightlifting until he strained a muscle or wrapping his knuckles and beating the shit out of one of his punching bags, pretending it was the Joker, or else sometimes (guiltily) that it was Harvey, because he'd taken her from him… but since he could do approximately none of those things tonight he only stood mouth pressed in a tight smile listening to the head of the psychiatric department at the former Gotham General talking about what he would do with the new wing, and who he would hire. A very distant voice in the back of his mind whispered, if they'd just put this much energy into Arkham perhaps people wouldn't break out of it so often and there wouldn't be as many suicides. But of course he didn't say anything. Bruce Wayne didn't think like that, after all.

Eventually Alfred came by to see if Bruce or his companion wanted a drink. He gave Bruce an inscrutable look, slight furrow appearing between his eyebrows, before suggesting to the psychiatric head that he go speak to one of the other suits in charge of finances. When the man had departed Alfred said, quietly:

"Might I suggest you take a moment to breathe, Master Wayne."

It felt like Bruce was watching Alfred from that same strange distance. He kept seeing Rachel, the last time she'd been here, at the last fundraiser he'd thrown. Late July and the sun was setting behind the city skyline, bathing the buildings in burnished gold and crimson, and the river throwing off cool air into the otherwise suffocating heat. Harvey had been here too, but Bruce could only remember Rachel's anger, the way her face had pinched when he'd told the crowd Harvey could lead them, and lead them well. He'd been better at reading her emotions than his own, sometimes. Why had he never told her that?

"I'm fine, Alfred."

"Forgive my bluntness, sir, but I'm not sure there's a single person in this room, myself included, who would believe that statement."

Bruce reached up and touched his own face, wondering what he looked like; how he could not feel anything in the detachment yet express undesirable emotions upon his face. "I need to close some deals," he tried, and Alfred — gently, firmly, as he had for years — put a hand at his elbow and steered him towards the door leading out.

"No one will notice if you just step into the hall for a moment," he said. "The deals will still be there to be closed when you return."

As though given permission by Alfred the exhaustion suddenly overwhelmed him; it was all he could do not to lean against a wall and slump to the floor. Rachel was everywhere in this room; he remembered that window and how it had shattered; and Rachel on the balcony accusing him of lying; and Rachel standing just there while the Joker brutally, wildly fought Batman —

He stepped out into the hall and Alfred shut the door behind him. The sound of the crowd quieted and Bruce closed his eyes. It usually wasn't this bad; after all he lived here, he went into that room fairly often. He supposed it was just seeing the crowd here that had brought it all back. If he could just be out here for a moment he was sure he could get himself back under control —

He heard footsteps, and then from beside him a voice said, "Excuse me, Mr. Wayne, where do you want these?" A strangely familiar voice, lilting and brittle, and for a moment he wondered if it could only be his imagination; thinking of Rachel too much, perhaps, and the stress he'd built up lately without any form of release… But when he opened his eyes the Joker was there. He was wearing a waiter's outfit and he'd pulled his hair back in a bun — the loose curls falling — and he had a towel draped over one arm. Perhaps most surprising besides his actual presence was his lack of makeup; Bruce hadn't thought he'd go without it again after escaping Arkham, yet aside from little flesh-colored spots over his scars his face was totally bare. He was watching Bruce's expression for something, likely fear, but Bruce was first too surprised to remember he was supposed to show any, and then too angry. Even if he'd somehow managed to hear the Joker sneaking up on him from wherever prior to this encounter he wouldn't have had time to get to his suit and change. And there was nothing he could do now to get away and get it on because the Joker and all his guests would wonder where Bruce Wayne had gone and how Batman had known to show up. Bruce wasn't often stuck in positions like this and it made him even angrier to think that perhaps if he'd just left the bastard in the rain this wouldn't be happening right now.

He drew in breath to speak — he had no idea what he was planning to say — and the Joker dropped his towel and his little amused half-smile and grabbed Bruce by the wrist, pinning it behind him and shoving his foot between Bruce's, forcing his legs apart.

"I'd suggest," he whispered, breath ghosting over the back of Bruce's neck, "that you don't talk right now." Bruce felt the edge of a knife against his spine and went still; he had very little self-preservation left but he thought perhaps it would look odd if someone like him kept struggling when threatened. "I mean I haven't even told you why I've come to your little soiree."

Bruce bit down very hard on the inside of his mouth. Distantly he realized he could feel the Joker's nails digging into the skin of his wrist; they'd grown back out since September. The Joker waited a beat, then said:

"Better. All right. Now. Why don't we look at each other? I like eye contact." He tugged his foot back and pulled on Bruce's arm so that he turned. The knife was at his chest now, and Bruce was face-to-face with the Joker for the first time since September. His eyes were manic, the hellish green of them overpowering the hazel, and restless, and angry. In fact all of him was angry, radiating barely suppressed violence in the tension of his shoulders and in the line of his mouth. As it had been the night he escaped Arkham he was startlingly threatening even out of his usual regalia. Bruce wasn't really sure if he forgot because of the strange sloping way the Joker usually held himself or if it was something else (the suit had platform boots) but it always surprised him more than it should to realize how broad the Joker's shoulders were, and how tall he was. There was maybe an inch of difference between their heights. Bruce could feel his pulse jumping in his throat.

"So you're Bruce Wayne," the Joker said. He looked faintly amused again. "Gotham's sugar daddy."

Bruce nodded.

"You know who I am?"

"Sure," Bruce said, evenly. "You're the Joker. You've — " he cleared his throat. "You've been here before."

The Joker tilted his head. "Have I?" He slipped his knife up Bruce's shirt — the point of it caught his top button and snagged in the thread — and rested it against his chin, pressing up a little, forcing Bruce to lean his head backwards. "I don't remember seeing you around last time I visited."

Well it's my fucking house, so, Bruce almost said, but he swallowed it back. "My, uh — I have security footage from the night of Harvey's fundraiser." His mind was racing. "I couldn't be here personally but my butler was and I — he told me about you showing up. The fight you had with Batman." He was looking at the Joker down the bridge of his nose. He watched the strange tilted mouth pull into a smile.

"The fight I had with Batman," he murmured. "Yeah… I really fucked your house up, didn't I."

"Uh," said Bruce. "I mean, it's — I fixed everything." He couldn't tell what the appropriate things were to say or not say. He'd had the replacement panes flown out within a few hours of the incident but he doubted the Joker would care about the trivialities.

The Joker lifted an eyebrow. "Pretty and efficient," he murmured. "Too bad you're not a whore."

Bruce didn't know whether to be angry or insulted or if he should be anything at all. The Joker was after all a master at discomfort and baiting. Indeed he was watching Bruce with steadily growing amusement — the smile from earlier returning — and Bruce thought, do not react; he wants you to react. But the problem still remained that he didn't know what the hell was going on, or what he should do. Without the suit he was limited; he didn't have anything to defend himself against real weapons and even if he and the Joker were in a clean fistfight the Joker might come out on top because Bruce wouldn't be able to use his full strength else he should give himself away. For the first time in a while he felt a thread of real, genuine unease and tried to swallow it back or keep it from his eyes because if the Joker sensed it he knew it would all be over. He said:

"You wouldn't be able to afford me," and then winced; was it too much? But the Joker only laughed, a bit less raucous than normal, likely to avoid attention, and he said:

"You know what? I like you already." He flipped the knife over in his hand; pressed it again to Bruce's chest. "So I'm just going to make this very short and sweet for you. I've recently had an opening come up in my ranks and I'd love if you were the one who filled the gap."

Bruce's eyebrows furrowed. "You — what?"

The Joker rolled his eyes a little. "Much as I'd enjoy it I can't operate alone," he said. "One of my group recently found himself unemployed — not his choice — and I need someone to take his place." His tongue flicked out. He trailed the knife back up Bruce's neck. "I thought you might be interested."

Unemployed probably meant dead. Bruce knew Batman wasn't responsible; likely the Joker had just gotten bored with whoever it was, or perhaps he'd gone back to Arkham and been set upon. It happened, sometimes while the doctors watched. They didn't bother covering up for it anymore, though Bruce was himself on the board and often in the past had expressed his displeasure over it.

Then the full weight of what the Joker was asking hit him and he felt his pulse jump hard against the knife's edge. "I'm — " he began, slowly, and the Joker's amused expression tightened into something more dangerous, and more subtle.

"It wasn't really a question, you know," he said.

Instinctively Bruce glanced over his shoulder but no one else in clown masks appeared in the hallway to knock him out or else hold a gun to his head. When he looked back at the Joker he was studying him, animal curiosity. Again like clear water the strange familiarity passed through Bruce's mind.

"So you want me to join your gang," Bruce said. "Can I ask why?"

"Oh, it's really quite simple," the Joker said. "Bruce Wayne, billionaire, Gotham's savior. I enjoy, uh, knocking things out of order. Morality is only subjective. We're all just waiting to crumble."

Bruce was trying to keep his expression neutral, but it was hard — he knew the Joker meant Harvey, and he knew also that Bruce Wayne didn't know about Harvey Dent's plunge into darkness. He bit the inside of his mouth again.

"If I pushed you," the Joker said, "how far would you fall?"

"So it's — an experiment," Bruce said.

The Joker smiled. He knocked the blade of the knife against Bruce's jaw — he didn't do it hard, but Bruce flinched anyway, because he knew it was expected of him.

"What have you done for this city anyway," the Joker said. "You see a problem and what — you pile money on it. Handful after handful of it. You think you've fixed anything? You think this city is any better off than it was five, ten years ago? Look at what you're doing tonight. I blew that hospital up, you're gonna rebuild it, and I'll just blow it up again. You're wasting time. You're wasting Gotham's time, and you're wasting my time." He slid the knife down, and then he stepped back, unexpectedly. He was still gripping Bruce's arm; his hands were clean, except for the nails, which had traces of paint or perhaps blood in the beds of them. "You're just a trust fund kid with a hero complex," he said, and Bruce almost laughed, because if the Joker knew —

"My parents — " he started, and the Joker exhaled. God help him Bruce recognized the sound from past run-ins; the Joker was getting impatient, and also likely bored.

"Your parents are dead," he said. "I want to know who Bruce Wayne is when he's not solving other people's problems by ruining their fucking lives." He dropped Bruce's wrist; the place where he'd been holding him was sore, and nearly numb. "What are you going to do when money doesn't fix one of your problems. You've got to learn sometime. I'm just expediting the process. You could say I'm doing you a favor." He slipped his knife into his pocket, and picked the towel up from the floor. Again unexpectedly Bruce was struck at how young he was, and how tired he looked, in spite of his anger and the tension coiling outwards from every inch of his body. "You can tell me your final decision tomorrow." Reaching again into his jacket he pulled from it a joker card; it was creased along the middle and stained in blood, and he tossed it at Bruce's feet. In the time Bruce took to bend and pick it up the Joker disappeared down the hallway. Bruce would have assumed it was some type of horribly vivid hallucinatory dream except that his hands were shaking.

He looked at the back of the card. There was an address scrawled on it, messy capitals, some place Bruce didn't know in the Narrows, and a time. Bruce folded the card and slipped it into his pants. He took a second to breathe out, then he walked back to the room. No one looked up at his entrance; even Alfred had vanished somewhere in the crowd. He took up a glass of sparkling cider from a nearby table and stood for a long time watching them, and thinking, but in the end it was hardly a decision at all. Rachel's presence everywhere, and Bruce's mind still whirling from the rush he'd felt when the Joker had initially cornered him. Rachel's senseless death at the hands of the same man who had somehow broken into Bruce's house twice. If the Joker wanted an experiment, fine. But Bruce could experiment too. He knew just as well as the Joker how to manipulate and twist things for his own gain. If he infiltrated the Joker's gang it would be the easiest thing in the world, like slipping on the suit, simpler than breathing, to wrap himself up in their petty squabblings and their secrets, and to take them down from the inside, one at a time, until at last even the Joker crumbled.

In theory Bruce had wanted to pick a car that would seem less conspicuous in the Narrows. In practice of course this proved to be essentially impossible as all his cars were either antiques or they were Lamborghinis. He couldn't even take his second sturdiest car besides the recently renovated Tumbler (the Plymouth) as it was the car he'd picked the Joker up in back in September. In the end he picked his father's favored classic Mustang — blood red, with leather seats — and told Alfred he was going for a drive down the coast. He put the address into the GPS he'd forced himself to install and spun out into the road. Getting to the Narrows was about as bleak a trip as it ever had been; the sidewalks and buildings seemed grimier the further he traveled, and as he passed into the unofficial barrier of it he smelled through his air vents a certain pervasive odor which clung to every facet of his car and his clothes.

The further Bruce drove the more he recognized — this was the place, or approximately, where he'd taken the Joker as Batman. He began to be vaguely nervous that perhaps it was all a setup for the Joker to reveal he knew Bruce's identity and to blackmail him into something terrible or else just kill him outright. But when his GPS pinged his arrival and he pulled up alongside the curb nothing happened aside from a thin-faced kid sticking his head out a window in the next block to stare momentarily at his car. He didn't know if he was supposed to wait or get out but he decided that Bruce Wayne, billionaire, wouldn't make the choice for himself. So he sat looking out at his surroundings. It wasn't quite the same warehouse where he'd dropped the Joker off in September, but it carried all the same that air of abandonment and neglect. The air was chilly, not quite cold, and inside the car Bruce's skin felt clammy. The clouds seemed like to sink into the soaked ugly pavement.

There was a knock on Bruce's driver's side window and he startled, banging his knee on the underside of his steering wheel. One of the Joker's henchmen was standing there outside his car and though he had a clown mask pulled down over his face Bruce could tell he was being laughed at. He pushed down an unexpected surge of anger — heat rising in his face — and rolled the window down a little:

"Hi."

The henchman was not-subtly checking out the inside of his car. Possibly a little impressed by the make, but mostly just looking for weapons. He had one hand dangling at his side; the other was in his jacket, concealing a handgun. "Bruce Wayne?" he said.

"Yes," said Bruce. He wondered how terrified he should try and sound. Then he wondered if he was a little genuinely nervous after all; he had nothing with which to defend himself, and behind him in the rearview mirror he could see two other henchmen skeleton key-picking his trunk so they could look inside.

The henchman at his window made a noise. "I can't fucking — " he made it again, and Bruce realized he was trying not to laugh — "believe the boss actually wants you of all people — "

Bruce offered him a tight smile.

"I mean no offense but what the fuck can you even do for us," he said.

Bruce shrugged, one-shouldered. He held up the card. "He just said to come here," he said. "That's all I know. I'm not sure what I'm doing, either."

Through the tiny slits in the mask Bruce saw the guy roll his eyes. "For fuck's sake," he muttered, and then, "Okay, get out of the car." He gestured with the hand not stuck inside his jacket and Bruce opened the door and stepped out. There was a pat-down and a completion of the car inspection during which the first henchman stood beside Bruce like he thought he might try to run.

"It's a nice fuckin' car," one of the other henchmen said from under the carriage.

Bruce tried not to think about what he would do if it got stolen or if they rigged it to explode. He had certain devices concealed within that would detect basic alterations like a tracking device or something similar but if they cut the gas line or tied a bomb to the brakes —

"Relax, Wayne," said the henchman standing beside him. "Nothing's going to happen to you or your pretty fucking car. Boss doesn't do shit like that to his own and he don't let it happen to us either. Okay?"

His own. Bruce wondered what the fuck exactly he was doing here. Carefully, he nodded, and then his car was pronounced clean and they led him around it and into the warehouse. It was colder inside with the draft coming from the busted-in ceiling and no central heating, but they had space heaters plugged into a few outlets and the minute Bruce and the others were inside the door was shut. A couple of the men glanced up at the door opening and then down again. They were maskless and Bruce recognized a few of them from Arkham. They must have been told he was coming because aside from one or two slightly creased brows no one reacted to his presence. Or perhaps they were only too frightened of the Joker to speak out.

The henchman who had spoken most directly to Bruce outside told him to wait. When he had gone — the others standing close beside Bruce as though daring him to run or else, handguns concealed poorly beneath their own jackets — Bruce looked around, storing the layout and the placements of its various tools within his mind for later use. It was mostly an open space; clearly a work area, not for living in, though there were pellets on the floor. They had a weapons arsenal — guns, knives, bombs — and copious amounts of gasoline, and dynamite, and grappling hooks. In the back where the warehouse had once been functional Bruce saw a truck in the old loading dock, its back open, a couple of henchmen sitting inside counting goods on charts. There were maybe twelve men altogether not counting Bruce and his companions who were doing various jobs. It was, Bruce had to admit, really a very impressive operation.

Then from his left Bruce heard footsteps, and the familiar nasal voice: "Well, well, well. You actually came," and he braced himself, and turned, and faced the Joker. He was wearing his face paint for the first time that Bruce had seen him since late July; the red was smeared a little over his cheeks and his fingers were still colored with it, ivory and crimson. He was dressed as he had been at Major Crimes, the garish violet pinstriped pants and lavender shirt and green vest, sans overcoat, and he walked forward with the old strange loping grace.

"Bruce Wayne," he said, when he'd gotten close enough they could have shaken hands were this a normal business transaction.

Bruce cleared his throat. Beside him he could feel the presence of the other henchmen; even the ones he had not come in with had stopped what they were doing to watch covertly beneath their brows. His heart was thudding a little painfully against his ribs; he'd worn his most casual clothes and still he felt as though he'd come into a situation for which he was woefully unprepared. Likely he could punch all of them in their throats and steal their guns if he absolutely needed to but how dangerous of an idea that sounded to him, even now, just standing here and barely contemplating it —

"I'm flattered you squeezed this appointment into your very busy schedule," the Joker said. "No one else thought you were going to show up, but I had faith in you. Isn't that right?" He glanced at the others. No one answered. Bruce kind of thought he would shoot them out of sheer annoyance; his hands were twitching restlessly at his sides, but after a moment he only sighed exaggeratedly and said, "Do you have an answer for me?"

"Yes," said Bruce.

"I hope it's a good one," the Joker said. His eyes like flint beneath the paint.

"I guess it depends on who you ask," said Bruce, for the second time without thinking. Now everyone really was staring, hands poised over guns with oil-soaked rags for cleaning or filthy nails paused midway through the construction or deconstruction of a bomb. The henchman who had commented on Bruce's car sucked in a breath. But the Joker after a moment only huffed, short amused sound.

"Bruce Wayne," he said again. "You must have some kind of death wish, the way you talk to me."

"I do sit through a lot of really boring meetings," Bruce said.

The red-smeared mouth twitched. He was looking at Bruce with his head a little tilted and after a moment he said, "So are you going to keep us all in suspense or do we get to know whether the lofty deigns to leave his perch?"

"I — deign, yeah," Bruce said, glancing a little uncomfortably at the others. The Joker made a delighted sound and suddenly his hand was on Bruce's jaw, turning his head back to face him. Perhaps because their past two encounters had been off the Joker's turf or perhaps because he hadn't been in his traditional outfit or perhaps only because Bruce hadn't been looking for it but for the first time he caught the Joker's scent: gunpowder, and the faint chemical odor of his greasepaint, and of his hair dye; sweat, and blood, and gasoline. It was a heady mixture that did not for some reason immediately repulse Bruce and he had to take a second to reorient himself. The Joker had taken his hand off Bruce's jaw but he could feel the lingering echo of the cold dry skin on his, and the faint scratch of his long nails.

"Look at me when you say it," the Joker was saying. "Unless you're pledging loyalty to them," with a nod at his followers, who had some of them resumed their tasks with a perceptible air of reluctance.

"I'm not, no," Bruce said. He cleared his throat; it always seemed so dry around the Joker, for no reason. "I, yes, I want to join you. I'm here to accept the, the invitation."

Behind him barely audible he heard a rustle of fabric. The Joker's eyes cut over Bruce's shoulder, and then back to him; he said:

"Are you positive?" and when Bruce said yes, he really meant it, the Joker said all right, and then unexpectedly he lunged forward and grabbed for the first henchman's gun. He startled backwards and the Joker pointed the barrel over Bruce's shoulder and pulled the trigger. There had been a silencer on the gun but still there was a light ringing in his ears through which he heard a body fall. When he turned it was the henchman who had looked through his trunk. He was honestly surprised for the first time in a while (discounting last night's incident, in which the Joker had broken into his fucking house) and stared for a moment at the body with its head wound still bleeding freely and the smell of cordite in the air.

"Bruce is my guest," the Joker said, coolly. "No one's going to be looking at him funny or pointing guns at him or anything else. I thought we'd already agreed to that? Or do I need to repeat myself?"

Fuck me, Bruce thought absently. He was aware on some level that he was likely failing in his — whatever, awareness, if someone had just been pointing a gun at his back and he hadn't even realized it, but he put it down to having his whole focus on the man standing before him. The others were glancing at each other; a few of them shook their heads, but silence seemed to be answer enough. Bruce watched two henchmen take the body away; the blood trailed in overbright droplets across the concrete.

Handing the gun back to the first henchman the Joker stepped closer still to Bruce, so that he could see all the cracks in his greasepaint, the lines of his scars and the dark roots of his hair. "As far as you're concerned, Wayne," he said, more quietly, "you're on probation. You understand that?"

"Sure, yeah," Bruce said.

"You might be the prettiest guy I've ever hired," the Joker said. "But we've still got rules. If you're not useful enough to me, or if our little experiment fails — "

"I can be useful," Bruce said. He wasn't even sure what he was talking about. Bruce Wayne didn't have the same skill set as Batman, or anyway he wasn't supposed to. He wasn't sure how much he could get away with doing without giving everything away. Then again he also wasn't sure how long he'd have to fully infiltrate this operation and blow it up from the inside without getting himself killed first because the Joker got bored with him.

The Joker was watching him. Out of the corners of his eyes Bruce saw the other henchmen slowly going back to their jobs; the atmosphere was relaxing, by degrees. Outside the wind had picked up against the corrugated steel of the roof. The Joker's tongue flicked out against his mouth and he folded his arms.

"I certainly hope so," he said.

There wasn't much they wanted from Bruce on the first day. The Joker slunk off not long after Bruce's initiation to take care of whatever business he had and left Bruce with the two henchmen who had initially greeted him and inspected his car. They all went by nicknames, they explained, because the Joker liked it better that way. Like Holes, one of them explained, except deadlier.

"I'm Cornell," said the one who had tapped Bruce's window. "That's Reznor," indicating the man who had complimented Bruce's car.

Bruce almost smiled. "As in — "

"Right," said Cornell, who had lifted the clown mask off his face — he was a big guy, muscular, with close-cropped hair and a tight line between his eyebrows. "We also have a Vedder and a Kowalczyk and a Cobain… even a Byrne."

"Who — " Bruce hesitated. "Who did he kill?"

"Yorke," Reznor said, glancing at the place where the body had fallen — the dark stain in the concrete. "So maybe leave your Kid A at home for a couple days."

This was perhaps the least expected — like, the last possible thing Bruce would have ever expected to hear. He'd been away for most of the nineties but he knew the music, kind of, or anyway the more well-known pieces; it was good for when he needed to get out of his head, which of late was most of the time. The idea of the Joker sitting around and listening to it, though — naming his henchmen after the lead singers —

"So listen," Cornell said, handing Bruce another one of the joker cards; this one was a little less creased, and not covered in blood, though it did smell of cigarettes, and the material of it was discolored. "This is the time and place we're meeting next. You're coming and you're not supposed to, you can't say anything. Or do anything. You just stand there. You watch. You're on probation."

"I'm aware," Bruce said, a little dry. "I remember when the Jo — when the boss told me like, five minutes ago." Slow down, sport, said a voice in his head that sounded a little like his dad — the lingering bits of him he remembered, anyway. Sometimes it was still jarring to realize he actually could no longer recall either of his parents' voices, or really their faces, except in dreams — smudged oil outlines, and the shape of his dad's mouth, because Bruce's had the same shape. He wondered how long it would be before that started happening with Rachel.

Cornell narrowed his eyes further. "Look," he said, quietly. "It's what I said outside, Wayne. I don't know what the fuck the boss wants you here for. You get away with saying that dumb shit to him for whatever reason — but you can just cut it the fuck out around the rest of us."

"Yeah, you don't get your rich boy pass here," Reznor said.

The ugly selfish part of him he generally repressed — the part he drew on when he needed to especially promote his image as stupid billionaire playboy in the media, the antithesis of the equally hated part he drew on for his violence, and his unhingedness — snarled, my 'rich boy pass' keeps both of you on welfare with decent clothing and a place to put your filthy fucking heads every night. But of course he didn't say anything. His rich boy pass also kept them doped up and abused at Arkham, after all.

"Sure," he said, biting back the Batman-part of him (the violent antithesis) that wanted to bust their lips open and break their wrists, offering a tight smile instead as he pocketed the joker card. "Sorry. I'm learning."

Cornell and Reznor glanced at each other. "Just come to the fuckin' meeting, Wayne," Cornell said. "You don't wanna fuck up this early into it."

"Of course not," Bruce said, still smiling. He maintained it all the way out the warehouse — offering a wave to the others as he went, because why not — and up until he'd reached his car. He sat for a moment in silence with his hands white-knuckled against the steering wheel, feeling himself come down from it. He could still smell the cordite on his skin.

This was his life now, or part of it. He'd chosen to do this. Likely there were easier ways of taking the Joker's gang down. But Bruce had never found any, and anyway he was not unused to deception, to running around secretly pretending to be one thing or another. If he could handle being Batman, he could handle being this.

He just wasn't sure for how long.