Fic: Toxicity levels and possible persistent psychological effects

[liviapenn]

Toxicity levels and possible persistent psychological effects
by Livia
(for Mary)

Fandom: Batman Beyond
Pairing: Bruce/Terry
Rating: Totally shameless Terryporn.

I was originally inspired by basingstoke's awesome Bruce/Terry sex-pollen story-- in fact, I had 99% of this written at the time and then just never finished it. But what better occasion to finally dust off a story about love? *G*



The view on the main screen panned lazily as Terry scanned the stairwell. Terry's breathing was audible over the link, slow and even.

The view spiralled sideways as Terry dropped from his perch, making his way down through the stairwell, then out into the hallway. Bruce watched for a moment more, then turned away. Some of the video feeds from the East Side had been showing uncharacteristic Jokerz activity near the docks, and Bruce liked to double-check the Cave computers' pattern-matching. So he wasn't following Terry's progress when several alarms went off at once.

He twisted around. The monitor had gone white, displays under the main monitor flaring as Terry's heart rate and respiration spiked. Bruce reached for the feed controls and replayed the last ten seconds with the sound up. A thud and a clatter, something falling over the cam like snow. "Terry!"

"Fantastic," Terry said under his breath. He sounded more irritated than anything, but his pulse was racing. "Uhhh. Shit."

"Talk to me, McGinnis." The visual feed wouldn't resolve. "What are you seeing?"

"Huh?" A shaking streak of black made its way across the monitor as Terry swiped his fingers over the cowl's cam lens. "You mean besides the bucket of Love. Hhhh. Dumped over my *head*--"

Bruce snarled silently and flipped back the plastic shield over the console that held the suit's manual overrides. He waited a moment, then activated the field generator at the base of Terry's spine. The ionic charge it created was weak and temporary, but it would repel most of the white powder coating the surface of the suit. Terry twitched as it kicked in. The cam fuzzed out, then resolved.

"*Warn* a guy." Terry muttered.

The squat was messy, couches shoved up against the walls to make room for the works. There were potted plants in rows up against the window, which meant a water source nearby. "You should've done it before I had the chance. McGinnis--"

"That tingled." Terry complained. Bruce could hear the slick-rough slide of his hands against the still-faintly powdered surface of the suit.

"McGinnis. Get to the bathroom. Lose the suit."

"Losing it," Terry said. He was feverish already, his temperature spiking along with the rest of his vitals on the readouts along the base of the monitor. But he moved.

Love was an old-fashioned drug, a phenethylamine derivative with the hallucinogenic effects tuned and tweaked to a very specific frequency. Every sensation that Terry was feeling right now was pleasure, artificial and intense. Casual users took Love in clubs, or to enhance sex. But you always wanted more, and when you couldn't take more of the drug, you tried to make up for it by getting more sensation. Hardcore users hurt themselves, cut themselves or punched walls, and to their scrambled nerve endings it was all the same. Bruce grimaced as Terry slowed, dragging his fingers along the wall.

"McGinnis!" He cranked the gain on the subspeaker, and Terry flinched away from the wall, stumbling forward. "Take the speaker out of the cowl before you--"

"Strip?" The boy's breathing was getting rougher, every ragged inhalation distinct. He pushed open a door, stumbling into a dark alcove with a concrete floor that sloped down to a drain.

"Get out of the suit." Bruce repeated, looking away from the nauseating bounce of the monitor feed. Turning to another console, he started the car, locking it in to home in on Terry's location. "Terry!"

"Jesus," Terry said. "Do you know what your *voice* sounds like right now?" The monitor feed went wobbly and useless as he pulled the cowl off, removing the audio-com button and pushing it into his ear. "Oh, *man*." At least when Terry tossed the cowl aside it landed right-side up. Bruce had an angled view of him, crouched on the floor.

His face was turned away, but Bruce could see the flush spilling down his jaw and throat. The rest of the suit looked as though it had been splashed in flour. He was probably inhaling more Love by the second. Pure essence. "McGinnis."

Terry laughed and turned his head towards the sound, as if Bruce were in the room with him. "Go back to Terry."

"You're hallucinating. Get it washed off you, now."

"It feels *good*." Terry was smoothing his hands over the concrete. "It feels-- *Bruce*." he said, and his voice was tight with terror as he struggled for clarity. "Talk to me. Don't let me-- oh."

"Turn on the water!"

Terry ignored him. "You know how this feels, you gotta. Every part of you *alive*, when you're out there, when you're flying..." He pulled back to crouch on his haunches, hands smoothing over his own arms, running down over his chest. He dug his fingers into his thighs and grunted again. "You know. Just like this."

"Listen--!" Bruce bit back his frustration, pitching his voice lower. Softer. "Terry. Terry..."

"What?" Terry was tracing dreamy patterns in the white smears on his chest.

"It's warm, isn't it?"

"It is," Terry murmured. "It's hot."

"Take the suit off."

"Feels like I'm being touched," Terry said, breath hitching.

"It'll feel better when it's off," Bruce said. "You want to feel the air on your skin, don't you, Terry. Feel the water."

Terry moaned, but didn't move. "I can feel your voice, I can-- *Bruce*--"

"I can't touch you if you don't take it off," Bruce said, and Terry's back arched, joints cracking audibly as he shook, palms braced flat on the floor behind him. He'd feel that tomorrow. Right now he wasn't feeling anything but bliss.

"Oh... *god*." Terry shook his head hard, stripping off the suit. Briefs still on, he half-collapsed against the wall, gasping and arching back against the chill surface.

"Turn the water on."

"...harsh my glow, you know that?" Terry tipped his head back, working his shoulderblades against the wall. He was hard again, or hard still, not that it made much of a difference.

"It'll feel good."

"Already feel good." Terry stroked a hand up the bare inside of his arm and gasped, loose-limbed with pleasure. He was shaking with it as he dropped to his knees, and Bruce winced at the sound, at the grimacing smile on Terry's face as his knees hit the floor. He'd feel *that* tomorrow too. This had to end.

"I thought you wanted me to touch you," he said, and Terry shivered luxuriously. "Show me, Terry. Turn on the water."

Terry groped blindly behind himself for the controls. The shower came on, and he made a strangled sound as the spray hit, arching under it, swearing and coughing as the water poured into his eyes and his mouth.

"Lean forward," Bruce ordered, the rush of the water almost drowning out Terry's muffled coughing. "Breathe."

"I... I know," Terry said, dropping forward onto all fours again. Bruce had a better view of his face now, of the mingled bliss and struggle fighting it out in his expression. "Oh, God..." His voice was low, echoing off the tile. "You know... so fucking *good*." He coughed again, shaking his head. "Can't. It's too *much*." He reached for the suit, tangling his hand in a section of it that hadn't been splashed with the drug. "Just... Knock me out."

"I can't."

Terry's choking breaths turned into barks of painful-sounding laughter. "I *know* you still have that failsafe. Punch it, Bruce. Shock me." His hair was wet, plastered over his forehead, nearly masking his glittering eyes. "At this point I'll probably *like* it."

"In case you hadn't noticed, you're standing in a pool of water." Bruce gritted out. "Get as clean as you can. I'm sending the car."

Terry bit his lip and leaned back into the water, raking his fingers through his hair. His face was turned away from the cam, but Bruce could hear every stifled sound. Finally Terry crawled out from under the spray, grabbing a tarp from the corner and using it to gather up the suit without touching it. He managed to eject the monitor lens from the cowl before it went into the bundle too, holding the gel lens under the water, then sticking it against his forehead, over his left eye. For a moment Bruce was blind, the monitor dark.

He closed his eyes and listened.

"Damn it," Terry muttered, and Bruce heard the dusty carpet shift under his bare feet.

"Find some clothes," he ordered, tapping into the controls to re-activate the monitor lens. "Out in the main room-- there was a jacket, and a bag--"

"I'm kinda likin' the goosebumps... oh *man*." There was a soft zip, and then Bruce heard cloth shifting against skin. Terry wasn't trying to stifle the moans any more, or else it just wasn't working as well as it had been. "Fuck. Ask me what I'm wearing."

Bruce kept his voice even. "What are you wearing?"

"Cashmere comes from cats, right...?"

"Outside," Bruce ordered. The car was nearly there.

"Pants." Terry sniped back. Bruce tightened his jaw and finished entering the codes to reactivate the gel lens. When it flickered on he could see fairly well. He watched Terry's hands empty out the rest of the contents of the bag, then stuff the tarp-wrapped Batsuit inside. When he stood up, he was facing the white splatter of a few hundred thousand creds' worth of Love, framing a dented bucket. The view swung away almost immediately.

"Not a fucking word, Wayne."

Terry left the squat through the kitchen window, landing with a grunt and a tumble in the street outside. Bruce flinched, but Terry rolled to his feet easily enough afterwards. A head injury would cause near-immediate loss of balance, Bruce told himself. Almost anything else could be dealt with later.

"The car's just around the corner," Bruce said. "When you-- *Terry!*"

There was a club at the end of the street, the bass echoing through the hard streets and the colorful lights flickering. "Pretty," Terry said, and turned towards it, backpack over his shoulder. "Look at the lights."

Bruce slapped the autopilot off and brought the car around the corner in time to block Terry's progress, scraping a long dent in a dumpster on the way. Terry jerked back, and Bruce could see his pale, shaking shape reflected in the car windows.

"You need to get back to the cave."

"No." Terry said, his voice breathy again. Bruce had no way to gauge his temperature now, but it was obviously rising again. "I need to go..."

"Hey!" came a voice from the other end of the alley, and Terry turned, the lens blocked briefly as he brushed his damp hair back out of his face. "That your car? You nearly ran us over, jerkoff!"

"Evening, ladies." Terry said. "Feel like swapping fluids?"

The taller girl's mouth fell open in shock, and she started to sputter, but the shorter one tugged her back. "He's on Love, Reesie," she hissed, then raised her voice. "Go play in traffic!"

"Reesie, your girlfriend's mean!" Terry rubbed a hand over his forehead, every breath half-whimpered. He was sweating again, and he was getting further from the car-- trying to corner the girls, Bruce realized. Getting between them and the open end of the alley. "C'mon, don't mind my Y-chromosome."

"Back off, scut!" the short blonde shouted, stepping in front of her friend. Stupid move. You could beat someone on Love within an inch of their life-- and they'd enjoy every minute.

"Terry!" Bruce snapped, as the girl balled her hand into a fist. "Get in the *car*!"

"Hey!" Terry reached out, and the girl knocked his hand away. "Hey, hey," he repeated dreamily, catching her wrist, "come on, let's just be nice." The girl's mouth twisted in anger as he pulled her closer, and then there was a rattle and solid *smack* as Reesie's purse connected with the side of Terry's head.

"Oh, *God*," Terry moaned, going down on his knees, and the short girl kicked him in the stomach, and he grunted and cried out like-- Jesus, like he was coming.

"Fuck! That is *the most* disgusting thing I've ever-- Ugh!" Bruce saw a flicker of glittering shoes disappearing as Terry twisted his head, pressing his forehead against the street, and a faint "I'd kick him again if he wouldn't *like* it--!"

But the rest was drowned out in Terry's soft moans as he clutched his stomach and shuddered, gasping, half-crying with it. "Bruce," he said, "I'm losing it here, I'm losing it."

"Get up." Bruce said softly, watching the monitor. "Get in the car."

"I love that car," Terry said, panting. "I really, really do." He pushed himself to his feet, and the view from the lens wasn't shaky as much as it was completely loopy. "Did you heat the seats for me?"

"You think you're sitting in the front seats like that, McGinnis, you have another think coming." Bruce said. Terry bit down on a squeak, making a soft, tortured noise. "Stop poking your bruises!"

Terry made the noise again, louder. "You're such a top." He finally tumbled into the back seat, tugging the door closed behind him. "Call me your bitch, Wayne. Just one time. I know you want to."

Short-term memory loss was not one of the side effects of Love. Unfortunately. "You seem to think you think you know me pretty well."

"I've got you under my skin," Terry said, letting himself fall back on the replicant leather seats. Bruce couldn't see anything except the roof of the car, couldn't hear anything except the hum of the engines and Terry's satisfied moans as he arched back, squirming against the seats. "Or the other-- other way around. You tell me." The view jerked and there was a sharp crack, and Terry hissed in mixed agony and pleasure.

Bruce shook himself out of his mindless observation and flipped on the cams mounted inside the car. The monitor split in four, all giving various angles on Terry, damp and flushed and on his back on the seat, rubbing his head. He'd banged it on the doorhandle and was rubbing his hand over the sore spot now, white teeth worrying at his lip. "Stop that!"

Terry half-closed his eyes, aiming flickering glances through his lashes at the first camera, then the second, then the third. He propped his right foot up on the seat, letting his left leg dangle off the seat. One hand curled behind his head, still probing at the bruise, and the other curled on his chest, fingers toying at the weave of the salvaged sweater. "Make me."

Bruce closed his eyes, pressing his hands flat against the cold surface of the console. Fingers that had been broken far too many times over the years protested. He had nearly managed to convince himself that he was calm when Terry banged his head against the door again.

"Damn it, McGinnis!"

Terry had his tongue between his teeth now, eyes wide and watering, and Bruce wished he'd sent the Batmobile, even if it was more conspicuous than Bruce Wayne's towncar. He could've gassed Terry in the Batmobile.

"Tell me," he said, and Terry blinked, his bangs falling into his eyes. He'd responded well to the coaxing, earlier, so Bruce gritted his teeth and smoothed his voice out again. "I can't do anything if you don't tell me what you want, Terry." He never used this voice on Terry, slick and sweet and false. "Tell me what you want me to do."

It worked, though; Terry opened his mouth, running his tongue in an arc over his upper lip and then gasping for air. "God, I wanna..." His hands moved to the snap of his pants, and he shoved them down, pushed his boxer-briefs down just far enough to get himself in hand. "Wanna blow you, I want you *talking*-- talk to me, just--"

Bruce closed his eyes and listened to Terry moaning softly. Breathing far too deeply after the blow he'd taken to the stomach. Scratching one hand over his chest and fisting his dick roughly. "You sure, McGinnis? You might not thank me for this."

Every word sent shakes through Terry, and he actually took his hand off his cock to claw at the seat, fingers digging into the seams in the leather. "Go on, Wayne, fuck with me some more." He was on his back and writhing like he was being served up for dinner. "I am going to suck your dick like you wouldn't believe."

"Touch yourself," Bruce said generously, and Terry whimpered as if he'd forgotten, reaching down to his dick and squeezing so hard Bruce winced in sympathy. "No. Let go," he said. Terry whined in protest, flattening his hand against his thigh. Coming up the hill, the car rocked with every turn. "Bring your hand up to your mouth," Bruce said, and Terry obeyed, eyes closed, cheeks flushed. "Suck your fingers, Terry. Lick them."

Terry obeyed, his cock twitching as his tongue flickered over his palm and in between his fingers. The noises he made were perfect, desperate and needy. He could probably come, just from sucking his own fingers-- that and listening to Bruce's voice. His eyes were open again, searching, and Bruce soothed him down. "Go easy, Terry. Easy, now. Good boy."

Terry's eyes fluttered closed. He'd tangled his left hand in his hair, still sucking the fingers of his right hand obediently. "Now," Bruce said, and his eyes squeezed shut. "Touch yourself *gently*."

Terry's fingers pulled out of his mouth with a slick noise. "It all feels..."

"You know your own strength," Bruce snapped, and Terry's eyes flashed open long enough for him to look straight at one of the cameras and laugh. The fact that it was the same feed taking up three-quarters of the main monitor was a total coincidence, Bruce knew. Despite the feverish, knowing amusement in Terry's eyes. "Do it."

Terry jerked himself gently, obediently. His head lolled to the side, cheek pressed to the leather seat, shirt rucked up almost to his shoulders. The frantic edge seemed to be gone. For Terry 'gently' apparently meant 'slowly,' or maybe he was just worn out. Bruce would have to test the dosage of the Love that had gotten on the suit, when Terry got back to the Cave. Test the dosage, quarantine the suit. Put Terry under one of the chemical showers. Quarantine the car. There was a list. Bruce had priorities, and had them under control. As soon as the car got back to the Cave, he would be able to do something.

Something that wasn't sitting. And watching. Watching as the muscles of Terry's abdomen and chest undulated gently. Watching as he moved his whole body with the motion of his hand. Hips rolling, feet and hands twitching, head twisting slowly from side to side. A soft gasp escaped him, followed by another, but his hand retained its slow, lazy pace even as his breath caught and he arched further, come spattering over his fingers and across his belly.

He came silently except for the few short breaths, still rocking through the aftershocks, still stroking himself. The car turned in through the garage doors, and Bruce opened the floor hatch to let it descend down into the Cave's vehicle bay. Terry didn't seem to hear or notice, and Bruce forced himself to watch for a moment more, noting with a frown that Terry was still hard, that he hadn't stopped jerking himself off.

"You're here," he said, voice still low, and Terry grunted incoherently. "McGinnis! Put your dick away and get out of the car."

Terry took a few deep breaths, eyes wide and reamy. He looked like-- well. He looked like a twenty-credit whore dressed up in someone else's pretty clothes.

"Come on, Terry." Bruce let a little edge slip back into his voice. "You'll like the decontamination room."

Still silent, Terry straightened his clothes and crawled out of the back seat of the car, catching himself in a half-graceful tumble instead of falling into a heap on the floor. His image disappeared from the car cams, but now his ragged footsteps were echoing through the Cave.

Bruce stopped and waited for Terry at the top of the ramp, and Terry swayed towards him, barefoot and grinning. His hair was like a handful of black feathers, plastered to his forehead and across his eyes, and the very edge of his lip was bleeding, just a little.

"So," he began, and Bruce shot him in the shoulder with the tranquilizer gun, loaded with anti-dopa twelve. He hadn't forgotten that Terry would process the sensation as pleasure, but he hadn't thought the experience would be quite as intense as Terry seemed to be finding it. He clutched at his shoulder, stumbling and going down on his knees, falling forward to all fours, shaking and growling. "Do it again..."

"Get up."

Terry raised his head, grin so strained it was nearly a snarl. His eyes were brighter now that they weren't being translated through spycams and monitors, the dull darkness of the car's interior. "Yeah," he said, pushing himself to his feet again. He was shaky and graceful both at once, righting himself carelessly when he swayed a bit too far to one side or the other. Focused, though. Advancing on Bruce.

Bruce turned his back, leading the way back into the main Cave. He could hear Terry's bare feet on the stone, and he could smell him now, too. Musty clothes and hot sweat and the edged scent of sex and leather.

"I feel funny," Terry mumbled, following him. Bruce let himself laugh shortly, but he wasn't laughing when Terry took two quick steps and pushed him, trying to turn him so that his back was against a curved stone arch. He planted his feet and blocked him, holding Terry off with the head of his cane, planted against the boy's breastbone.

"No idea what I'm doing," Terry said. "So fucking fritzed. You *could* say I'm not responsible for my actions--"

He twisted and slipped forward, past the cane, but Bruce was already hooking it behind his knee. One hard pull dumped the boy on his ass. He landed with a thud, pushing himself up on his elbows and laughing, eyes bright. His pupils had been blown in the car, but the tranq seemed to be doing its work, cooling him off. He was coming back to himself, but it was probably still in his hair, in his skin, sinking in...

Bruce held his jaw tight, giving Terry a wordless order. Terry held his gaze. "Or not," he said, then rolled to his knees, his hand on Bruce's leg before Bruce could block him again. "No, I... I know what I'm doing. It's not Love."

He smoothed his hands up Bruce's legs. His eyes were very blue.

"McGinnis--" Bruce tightened his grip on his cane as Terry leaned in. Terry looked up at him with his usual ridiculous over-confidence, the boyish arrogance that Bruce had never been able to entirely strip from him.

"Tell me you haven't wanted this since I first took my top off--" Terry said. He stopped when Bruce pressed the flat handle of his cane against his throat, and then he just grinned. "And I don't mean tonight."

He tilted his head sideways, smiling langorously at something Bruce couldn't see, then pushed his arm out straight. Bruce's cane described a short arc in the air and clattered to a stop too far away for Bruce to reach. Bruce glared harder.

"Go on," Terry said. "Go on, Bruce. Tell me."

[end]

{afterword}

Livia: Really, in a non porn universe, Terry tumbles out of the car and Bruce darts him in the ass with a trank gun a couple of times.
Livia: He wakes up in a spare bedroom in the manor.
Te: I love how that's the non-porn version. Because... yes
Livia: "See, where *I* come from, when you go to a guy's house and pass out and wake up in his bed and your ASS is SORE..."
Livia: Bruce: *mini eyebrow raise*
Te: "I'm just saying."
Livia: Terry: "... yeah, I don't really have a finish for that sentence."