Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The Batcave’s defenses are impeccably sharp, built by Bruce, and vastly improved upon by Oracle several times over, not to mention all the times Tim has practiced his coding skills by filling in blind spots only he’d noticed. It’s easily one of the most secure places on the planet, only allowing authorized vehicles inside. Their digital map clearly defines where each occupant is and if they are a Bat, a known ally or foe, or an unknown altogether. 

Bruce has set his cowl and many of his watches to beep, blink, or otherwise report to him when the Cave gets visitors, even when he’s expecting them. Call him paranoid but he’s firmly unwilling to let anyone, from another Leaguer on down to the lowliest of goons, get so close to his home—to his family —without him knowing about it.

(His watch beeping to let him know when Superman or one of his kids’ friends has come by isn’t exactly annoying, in any case.)

It’s a rare day that the systems fail to announce a new presence in the Cave, no matter who they are. But tonight… it does.

It’s late, late enough that Duke should be upstairs in bed, following his Alfred-mandated bedtime so he doesn’t pass out on patrol. But when he exited the elevator earlier, a little twitchy and claiming nightmares, no one could begrudge him that. They all know how nightmares kill the urge to sleep.

While Duke sits at the Batcomputer, reading old Justice League chatlogs (likely out of the need for a distraction), Bruce shows Damian how to properly clean batarangs without injuring himself. The display table is on the same floor level as the computer, though to work at it, they have to have their backs to Duke. Bruce looks over his shoulder every once in a while to check on him, glad they were still awake when he came down and Duke didn’t have to be alone. 

Any other night, Tim would be here, too—but tonight he’s off with his friends in San Francisco, hopefully having civilian fun for once like he promised he would. The older kids don’t live at the Manor and don’t end their shifts in the Cave under most circumstances. Though it would be nice to have them all together again, it’s better that they aren’t there. If they were, most likely it would be because they were injured. 

Alfred is on a higher level, up where they keep spare suits, probably stitching the holes in Damian’s suit back up. On slow nights like these, they silently agree to leave him be, let him work without any disturbances.

Other than him, it’s just the three of them in the Cave that night.

Quiet settles all around them. Other than the hum of machines, the occasional slide of cloth over sharp metal, the bats and their own breaths, there’s no noise. Nothing buzzing or beeping. No vehicles with their engines growling. It’s serene, having his two youngest with him, in a place he feels safe and knows inside and out.

But that peace is shattered when Duke suddenly sits up, the chair creaking near-silently under his weight. Just by the swift swish of the air, Bruce can tell it’s not a normal readjusting movement, and he looks over, concerned that something is wrong.

Then he turns to face Bruce, eyes wide. In a low whisper he’s never used here in the Cave before, he calls, “Um, B?”

Something is very wrong. 

Damian tenses beside him, his grip on the batarang turning careful to confident in a second. Together, soundlessly, they hurry to Duke’s side. 

“What’s wrong?” He asks in sign.

Duke isn’t fluent yet, but he knows that one well—it’s a phrase Bruce teaches early. He points to the computer, or more specifically, to the monitor on the bottom right. It’s one of several that show maps of the Cave. This one is for the driveway entrance, showing the long stretch of rock and up into the ‘garage’ area.

There’s a red dot, signaling danger, slowly making its way inside. Closer to them.

I JUST NOTICED, Duke types quickly, the words appearing on the middle screen in large font. The keyboard is special-made to be as quiet as possible, and if this intruder has superhearing, it’s best that they don’t speak. !!!!!!!!! WHAT DO WE DO

They aren’t wearing their suits. They don’t even have dominos on. Nothing like this has happened in all the time either boy has been with their family.

He decides in a split second. Leaning over Duke, he types, Get suited up.  

Not wasting time to explain his plan further, as simple as it is, he takes the chair as soon as Duke is up. While they hurry to the locker room on silent feet, he opens the security system. He curses not having Oracle at hand for this—she’s much better at it than him.

There are many, many cameras in the Cave, and it takes precious time to search through their feeds to find one capturing the intruder. The trouble starts with that—the finding. It should be easy, a few clicks to pull up any cameras recognizing movement within their scope. But none of them do. He has to manually click through the feeds until the correct one finally pops up.

It’s difficult to see the intruder. That part of the cave is exceptionally dark, with pathway lights only turning on when a certain weight limit is sensed on the rock. Bruce is far too familiar with the drive to crash, but he’s unwilling to risk his children just because they can’t see the road. 

Whoever this is, they clearly don’t weigh as much as a car or even a motorcycle. That much would be obvious enough on its own, but it doesn’t help that Bruce can barely make out the form, even with enhanced vision options. Switching to heat-signature gives him an outline at least, but a concerning one.

The intruder is small. Short and thin. They aren’t as warm as they should be… and if Bruce is right, if the smallest smears of pink on the otherwise purple backdrop are anything to go by, they may be bleeding. Heavily enough to leave a trail. 

It can’t be one of his children. They would call ahead, and anyway, of the ones not here tonight—Dick, Cass, Jason, and Steph—none of them are that small. Maybe one of their friends? But who knows about the Cave, that the Cave doesn’t know in return? 

No one comes to mind. 

He stands, watching the boys make quick exits, their suits on and nearly perfect. (A thought for later: he’ll need to drill them on dressing hastily and correctly. They can’t afford to have misplaced armor.) 

They share a brief nod as Bruce hurries to change, a practiced motion so familiar to him it takes no time at all. When he returns, he finds both boys in front of the computer, watching as the intruder gets closer and closer. Already, they’re halfway down the driveway.

Using hand signals, he gestures them to follow him. Either this is someone they will have to fight, in which case it’s better the Cave stays as uncompromised as possible, or they’re someone that will need medical attention. If that’s the case, Bruce will be able to carry them to the medbay and have a much easier time doing so than they would walking there.

They fall into step, swiftly heading for the garage bay. Under different circumstances, Bruce would relish the chance to get to work with Duke again since it doesn’t happen often. There’s no time to think about that, however; he focuses on the threat in front of them, gesturing for Damian to go around and block the exit as much as possible. 

Damian nods seriously and takes off ahead of them.

As soon as Bruce and Duke step onto the driveway, several things happen. Under the combined weight of the four of them, lights come on, highlighting the edge of the rock all the way down and out of sight towards the rocky entrance. Damian adjusts to the sudden brightness with ease, sticking close to the edge and stepping in the intermittent dark spots, though the tension in Duke’s body doesn’t loosen like he half-thought it might. 

But worse… that’s when the laughing begins.

Hitched, breathy. Wet—with tears or blood, Bruce can’t discern. 

Uncomfortably similar to that of laughing gas victims.

Bruce runs.

In all his time as Batman, the Joker has never found the Cave. He’s never been interested. There are plenty of ways to hurt Bruce and his operations that don’t revolve around his home base, and the Joker knows that, takes advantage of it every chance he gets. Why change things now ? Why when it’s five AM, when the Bats have clearly gone to bed for the night, when there’s only three of them here to fight him?

All fears of a potential hack are dashed in a moment as soon as he sees the intruder.

It’s not the Joker. It’s a child.

Chapter Text

JJ is alone. 

There’s no more Joker. No more Harley. Not even any of their friends. Not even the mean ones who tried to hurt JJ, or the meanest ones who yelled at Joker and said things like look at him, you know this isn’t right and Batman will hunt us all down! Don’t you care at all?  

There’s no more Batman, either. That’s what the people in the streets said when he was still in the city. 

All dead. All gone. 

The city was horrible. Bombs. Lots of bombs. The explosions were loud and made JJ think about the table. There were fires in the streets and smoke in the air. Lots of dead people. So much crying. 

No one was laughing. 

JJ hated it. He wanted to get away, so he walked and walked, his hands over his ears to drown out the crying.

He’s out of the city now and he’s walked very far. Every step hurts. He’s bleeding from the hole in his leg, but Joker said no one cares when he’s bleeding, shut up brat stop crying little birdie no one is listening , so he doesn’t do anything about it now. 

He just wants to get away. That’s all. Away away away.

He lets his feet take him wherever they want to go. If there’s no more Joker, then JJ is alone and he doesn’t have to stay anywhere he doesn’t want to be, not anymore. 

But without Joker, he doesn’t know where to go. He would go to Harley but she’s gone too. So he just walks and hopes he ends up somewhere with more laughter. That’s what he needs. Laughter. Joker would say so too.

He has to pass a bridge to get to where his feet want to go. When he climbs onto it, one shaking hand gripping the rail until his fingers are white, there are cars scattered everywhere all over it, with doors open and lights on bright. All he can hear are alarms, wailing and wailing, and they make his head feel funny, twisty and dizzy and sick. His fingertips tingle and his heart races. He lets go of the railing and he runs across the bridge, screaming out laughter that does nothing to drown out the blaring blaring blaring. 

At the end, the road is split, sticking up in places like tectonic plates. A dead body is laying on the ground, their hand clutching their chest but not in laughter. JJ trips over them as he runs and cracks his head. It hurts , hurts worse than his leg, but not worse than the table. Nothing is worse than the table.

No tears burn in his eyes—JJ doesn’t cry. JJ isn’t allowed to cry. 

Getting up is very hard. His head spins and aches, and he throws up all over the road. But he doesn’t want to be here with a dead body. He hates them. 

He presses his hands against the rough ground to pick himself back up, hiccuping out giggles. They hurt his throat but he doesn’t stop, can’t stop. He can’t cry. He can only laugh.

The other side is much quieter. Much quieter. There are no alarms. When he looks back at the bridge, there are no cars at all. No dead body. No crack in the road. No throw up. 

It’s just an empty road.

All alone.

JJ keeps going. 

He’s scared. He hates being scared. But it’s dark and cold, the sky open above him. There are no walls like there are at Arkham, no cells or doors. It’s very, very quiet.

There are big buildings here, all of them sitting far back from the road with big fences and lights on. There are cars and some have animals wandering around. Dogs. JJ is scared of dogs. He runs away from those places quickly, hissing giggles through his teeth as his leg and head pulse with pain.

Warehouses, he thinks they are. Joker would approve of a warehouse. 

Walking hurts. He wishes Joker was here. He wants to lay down and sleep forever. 

Some voice in his head that he doesn’t know whispers that’s a bad thing. Cold and lightheaded, bleeding and exhausted, that’s bad . Concussion. Sick. Get to safety. Bad bad bad.

JJ doesn’t like being bad. He doesn’t lay down. He keeps walking and walking until his legs feel like they’ll fall off. 

He doesn’t question it when his feet take him down a grassy path that’s not the road. It’s long but it’s quiet and there’s no smoke and no crying. There are trees on either side that shake in the wind and fill his nose with scents he doesn’t understand. He’s glad there’s no dead-body-smell, no chemicals, no electric sweat.

Good, that voice whispers. Home. So close. Home. 

JJ doesn’t know what that word means. He doesn’t remember where he heard it from anymore. Maybe Ivy. She was always saying things like that. He doesn’t belong here. He has a home and it’s not with the two of you! Get that through your head!

Ivy didn’t like JJ, though. She couldn’t look at him. Ivy was mean. She was always yelling at Harley and trying to get her to leave.

He isn’t sure home is a good thing. Still, he walks.

The path leads to a rocky cave opening. His heart leaps in his chest, not in the wrenching painful way but… some new kind of leaping. Almost. Almost there.

His fingers itch to touch the rock, so he does. He holds onto the rock for as long as he can, stumbling down another very long road, this time with something between him and the sky. Not a ceiling; more like a case made of rock, curved over him. He likes it better than being out in the open.

Even when the walls get further away and big drop-offs grow on either side, he likes it better.

It’s hard to see but JJ is used to the dark. He’s used to shadows hovering in the air, to being put in small, empty rooms where the only light comes from a sliver in the door. When the lights shut off outside, his little room goes pitch black and then he is all alone.

This place is much bigger. There are no shadows here; it’s already better.

His feet know the way. One more step. One more step.

He doesn’t laugh. For some reason, he thinks he should be very quiet. Wherever this is, he has to be careful. Danger is ahead, but danger is behind too. There are no good options. This is the best one.

He hardly notices as blood drips down his leg, hot and sticky as it fills his dress shoe and seeps out, leaving tracks behind him. 

He doesn’t care about his leg. 

If he cares, he’ll cry. He can’t cry. He shouldn’t laugh. So he doesn’t care about his leg.

His head aches and pounds. Each step makes it worse, the cold piercing him inside and out. He shivers, bumps rising along his bare arms. His pant leg is wet from the blood and sticks to his skin. He doesn’t have to see to know his pants are becoming stained; the purple pinstripes long ago turned black with blood. 

Blood. Not all of it his own.

He has to close his eyes at the thought, squeezing them shut as his mind is assaulted by memories. Mean people. Dead people. Joker, bloody, holding a gun. Helpless giggles, hands tucked close. No, please.  

(No guns. That was a rule, wasn’t it? No guns. JJ didn’t like guns.)

Joker. Frowning. It’s very bad when Joker frowns. His hands holding out the gun. Take it. Don’t you just want to have some fun?  

No. No, no… but yes. Joker still frowns. JJ wants to make him smile. He just wants to have fun. That’s all he wants. Fun. A laugh. Haha. He’ll be good. He’ll laugh. Haha. Please.  

If you won’t listen, little bird, then I’ll make you.  

A hand in his hair. A dead body left behind. The table. Someone crying. Blood on the table. Electricity. Someone screaming. Blood. The table .

Suddenly the room fills with bright fluorescent light, and JJ flinches, expecting his body to begin seizing any second. He laughs, laughs, laughs. No electricity comes. Nothing happens. No one is screaming. The only blood is his own. 

He crumples to the ground, shivering and shaking, giggling. The stone is so cold underneath him and so smooth. But there are no straps. The blood is his own. No one is screaming or crying. It’s not the table. 

He hears a sharp intake of breath from far away, feet on the ground. Heavy boots. Another set, and another. Three people. Three alive people. Dangerous? He doesn’t know. He hopes it’s not Robin. Robin is very dangerous. 

He can’t stop laughing. He’s terrified.

He wishes—he wishes he was home. That little room. He thinks that was what Ivy meant. He wishes Harley was there. Or Ace, who is mean but never bites him, the only dog JJ can stand to be around. Not alone. Not alone. 

Someone approaches. Someone big. 

Scared. So scared. He looks up.

Batman. 

Batman, staring down at him. He’s not smiling. Frowning. Joker says it’s bad when Batman frowns. So very, very bad. 

JJ freezes, caught like a goon stealing money. Joker said never to be around Batman, except when Joker was with him. Batman is dangerous. Batman will take him away. Batman will keep us apart and that would make me so sad, Junior. I don’t want to be sad.

Sad Joker is—no. It can’t happen. He can’t let it happen. They can be happy, can’t they? Haha. Hahaha. Don’t be sad. Please.  

He trembles like he’s been shocked. He can’t stop laughing.

But there’s no more Joker. …there shouldn’t be Batman, either. Those people, they said Batman was dead. They said everyone was dead.

He can’t be here. Can he?

Or… is JJ dead too?

Two others fall into step beside Batman. One JJ doesn’t know. The other… the other is Robin. He flinches back.

Robin is hateful, Joker said in that soft voice he only pulled out when he was being very serious. He’ll claw your eyes out and he’ll laugh. But that’s not funny is it?

N-no. He didn’t want to lose his eyes. He had to be useful. If he couldn’t see, how could he know where to aim his gun?

No, it’s not. Robin isn’t very nice. Robin doesn’t know which jokes to laugh at. Stay away from him.

Okay. Haha. I’ll stay away. Haha. 

Unless I’m with you. If I’m with you… you should show Robin you’re not to be messed with. Claw his eyes out, Junior. It’s what he deserves for being so naughty and mean.

But Joker’s not here. JJ is alone and Batman and Robin are here and there’s another of them and he cannot do it, he can’t he can’t—

Batman drops to his knees. His hands are up like he’s the one who could be killed right now. He speaks—he speaks to JJ — “Please, try to calm down, you could hyperventilate.”

He doesn’t know what that word means. The little voice whispers, bad . JJ doesn’t want to be bad. He doesn’t know how to calm down. His fingers claw at the ground.

Batman inhales. Exhales. He does it again and again. His allies back away after he waves his hand at them. 

“Follow me,” Batman says. JJ shouldn’t listen to him. He shouldn’t, he shouldn’t. But his body knows thing his head doesn’t. His feet took him here. His lungs listen to Batman and stop gulping for air. The dark spots in his vision and the pinpricks in his fingers and arms go away. 

The rise and fall of his chest slows in time with Batman’s.

He might be dead. He might be about to die. He’s bleeding and he’s alone, surrounded by enemies. But Batman smiles at him. It’s small. Not like Joker’s. Not like JJ’s. But it’s a smile. 

No one ever said what it means when Batman smiles.

He watches, frozen, as Batman reaches out a hand to him. He doesn’t touch, doesn’t pull or drag or push. “You’re bleeding,” he says, his voice sounding so much like it always does, the rare times JJ has seen him before tonight. Scared. Of JJ. ( For JJ? …no. That’s silly. Not even a funny joke. Just stupid.) “I have medical supplies. We can help you.”

“N-n-n-no,” he stutters. He’s not supposed to speak to Batman. He can’t help it. The little voice is whispering frantically but he can’t make out the words.

“We can. I promise you. It’s okay if you don’t want to hold my hand, we can—”

From far away, a very loud bang crashes through the air, interrupting Batman. It sounds like a gun. Like a bomb. Like an electric charge against the table. Batman and Robin and the unknown one jump, their heads turning in a synchronized move toward the sound.

JJ shrieks out a laugh.