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#But she wants Danny too because he is blood
f0point5 · 8 hours
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Jealous Emilia after they get together plss I am beggingggg cook this for us plssssss 🙏🙏🙏
Not me rewriting this no less than four times and still hating it 😂 but it’s not going to get any better haha. This was hard to write because I actually don’t see Emilia as the jealous type. I kind of drew off a lot of her known insecurities and alluded to her kind of struggling with the “wag” role a bit so it’s not just her reacting poorly to Max being fawned over by a girl because I don’t think that would be true to her character. Anyway, I hope you enjoy it!
✨Set in Jeddah 2024✨
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And I’m highly suspicious that everyone who sees you wants you
If there’s one thing to be said for the Jeddah paddock, it’s pretty at sunset. You watch people moving through the paddock bathed in golden light. The ground looks like the yellow brick road. Even though it’s getting cooler now as it gets closer to qualifying, you still choose to sit inside Red Bull hospitality. You’re also sitting inside because Max said he wanted to hang out before quail. Even though he’s spent the last forty-five minutes talking to one of the hospitality guests.
Amy, something or other. She races GT cars in some series you’ve never heard of. You’re not sure what connections got her the invite to the garage but Max had been herded away by one of the media reps to take pictures with her so she must be someone’s daughter. They seem to have hit it off, you note. He’s in full maxplaining mode, bending down to the line of his own hand as he illustrates what looks like an apex. Amy isn’t even watching his hands, she’s watching Max. Hazel eyes just sparkling as she memorises every inch of him. Yeah, you know that look well enough.
And it’s not that you mind. He likes to talk racing, he likes racers. It’s not like you know what it feels like to driver a car at top speed, and more importantly you don’t want to know. The hot laps with Max were more than enough. You can’t be everything to him and you don’t need to be. You tell yourself you don’t want to be. It’s good he has other people to talk to, because it’s not like you can ever really understand his competitive streak. The man who knows nothing except how to win will not always be able to relate to the girl who has always been too afraid to lose.
No, it’s not bothering you that Max is talking to her. It’s bothering you that she has the most obvious crush on him since…no, actually, this is the most obvious crush ever. She’s played with her hair so many times you just know karma is going to make her bald someday. You hope you’re there somehow.
“Hey,”
You jump at the sound of Checo’s voice. He sits down at the end of the table, brandishing Kitkat, which he slides over to you.
“Max has made a new friend,” he says, nodding in Max’s direction.
You tear open the wrapper with far too much aggression. “So I see,” you say, trying to sound nonchalant.
“She races, right?”
You nod, biting into the chocolate. “GT, apparently,”
“Lots in common,” Checo says with a wiggle of his eyebrows. “You have to watch your back,”
You know he’s joking. You know that in no universe are you in competition with her. And yet, his words sink under your skin under your blood is curdling at the sight of Max laughing at something Amy says.
“I don’t have to watch anything,” you say with shrug, turning towards Checo. “If she can take him she can have him.” You push your hair over one shoulder and run your tongue over your teeth.
“Whoa,” Checo chuckles, throwing his hands up like he’s being faced with a hungry lion. You suppose since he has a wife, he knows the look well enough. “I was joking.” When you don’t react, he shakes his head. “It’s Max,”
You know what he means. It’s Max, not Chuck Leclerc. It’s Max, not Danny Ric. It’s Max, not Checo. But it’s Max. You don’t have to worry he’s going to lose his mind over the actresses or supermodels, but he sure seems to be respectfully admiring his female alter ego.
It’s like he can sense you thinking about him, it’s uncanny, really. Out of the corner of your eye you can see him walking towards your table with Amy in tow.
Fake smile, it’s fine, she’s just a fan.
Max introduces you, and you smile and shake her hand and ask her if she having a nice day, because you’re Max’s girlfriend, so you owe it to him to be polite. She has no such obligation, although you might be imagining her flinch when Max says the word girlfriend.
“I think it’s the best day of my life,” she says in answer to your question. The telltale flicker of her eyes in Max’s direction as they sit down almost making you roll yours.
Max doesn’t notice, he’s more interested in taking your Kitkat out of your hand and taking a bite. He bites it so that all four sticks have the end missing and you wear you’ve never been so disgusted by this man. For a second, you think Amy can have him.
“Amy races GT cars, like the ones we tested in Portugal,” he says to you now, his hand disappearing under the table to rest on your thigh and trace circles with his thumb like it’s a habit. “We are just talking about setting up a test for her with Verstappen com,”
Oh, great. So not only is she utterly bewitched by the ocean eyes, you’re making her dreams come true. Fan-fucking-tastic.
“Ah,” is all you say, sharing a look with a smirking Checo.
“That would really be such a dream come true,” Amy says, and you almost laugh. “I’m a big fan of yours, I think it’s so cool that you’re involved with things outside formula one. You should come to a race sometime. I owe you paddock passes,”
You met him three hours ago, and he isn’t even the one who invited you. Do you owe him a blowjob as well, Amy?
“Yeah. Our schedule is a bit hectic but yeah, it would be good to fit that in soon,” Max says, turning to you. “Right?”
What am I? The secretary? Because in case you didn’t notice, she didn’t fucking invite me.
You just shrug.
“GT racing doesn’t exactly draw the influencer crowd,” you are definitely not imagining the way her eyes slide over to you before she looks back at Max to say, “it’s really good racing,”
You zone out right then and there. It’s like your brain short circuits from the energy it’s taking not to reach over, grab this girl by her stringy extensions, and rip. If she and Max keep talking, you don’t hear it. You don’t want to hear it. You notice Checo noticing your discomfort, even as he engages the other two in conversation. For all his quirks, Checo reads human behaviour much better than Max. Though you don’t need to be a body language expert to see how much this girl likes him.
She looking at him like she wants to eat him, hanging on unspoken words, fingers twitching on the table like she’s desperate to touch him. And he’s nodding along, because they’re so aligned that whatever she says he agrees with, and the maxplaining is one-handed now but no less enthusiastic, and you’re about to dig your nails into his skin because he is not going to have one hand almost up your skirt while another woman is flirting with him.
All these thoughts are interrupted by the appearance of one of the Red Bull media managers.
“Amy, we were hoping to get some pictures of you with the car, if you’re free?”
“Yeah, sure, one second,” she says, turning to Max. “Which way is the garage again?” Like she doesn’t have someone who clearly just came from the garage standing right next to her.
“Just through there, keep going straight,” Max says, pointing to the corridor with engineers walking in and out. You give the girl the benefit of the doubt that she’s not that stupid, just desperate.
Reluctantly, she gets to her feet. “So, I’ll give you a call to set up the test?”
“Yeah, sure,” Max says. “Or you can call Raymond. He’ll put your team in touch with the right people,”
“Okay, awesome,” she says, leaning down enough that you can see right down her shirt. “It was really great to meet you. And I meant it about the GT race,” and then, as if remembering she can’t be rude, she glances at Checo. “You guys, too,”
You wave her off, and your smile doesn’t even fall. Because it’s funny. It’s funny that a grown woman would behave like that in front of a man’s girlfriend. It’s funny that a woman gunning for sponsorship would behave like you does regular shifts in something called the “Champagne Room”.
And it’s absolutely hilarious that Max turns to you, without a care in the world, and says, “I’ve got such a headache. I stood up into the cupboard in the garage, it hurt so bad,”
You give him tight smile and pull out your phone to text Lily to see if she’s still with Alex or if she’s free for a catch up.
“What?” You hear Max say above you. You ignore him. “What? She the-“ You look up just in time to see that Checo is mouthing something to Max. “Jealous?”
“I’m not jealous,” you snap, leaning back in the your chair to glare at both of them. They give each a mocking grin. “Yeah, very funny,” this sets them off snickering like school kids. “Fuck both of you.”
You get up and stalk through the room and back towards the garage. You don’t even know what you’ll do when you get there since being Max’s girlfriend had put an end to you just wandering down the pitlane and allowed in any garage. Maybe you’ll just try and find GP. If Max doesn’t catch up to you first. You can hear him calling you.
“Leibling, wait,” he’s right behind you now, and you hear him almost stumbling as he leans forward to catch you by the wrist.
You shrug him off, but stop at the door to his driver room and push it open, jerking your head to order him inside. He may be a dick, but he still deserve for the whole team to know his business. He steps into the room, reaching for your waist but you move out of his way and leave him to close the door while you lean against the physio table on the other side of the room.
He sighs when he sees how you’re looking at him. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to laugh. I mean, I did. Not at you. I didn’t think Checo was being serious,” he defends, and by the end of his sentence he’s fighting an incredulous smile and you squeeze the edge of the physio bench to stop yourself pulling your hair. Or his.
How can this guy understand complex tyre strategy but not basic human interaction?
“You didn’t think he was serious that I was annoyed by someone flirting with you in front of me?” You ask him, raising an eyebrow. “And that I wouldn’t be annoyed at you making fun of me for it?”
Max scoffs. “She wasn’t flirting with me,”
“Oh, please.” You let out a scoff of your own. “You didn’t notice me flirting with you for three years, do not pretend you’re an expert,”
“I noticed,” Max argues, “I just didn’t take it seriously,”
“Which is why you have no leg to stand on,”
“Right, because I was just supposed to believe that you suddenly-“
“It wasn’t exactly sudden-“
“For God’s sake,” Max groans, an expression of abject confusion twisting his face. “What are we even fighting about?”
“You enjoying Lella Lombardi over there slobber all over you, and enjoying it,” the exasperation gets worse when Max’s eyes widen like this is the first he’s hearing of this entire discussion.
“I’m- she- what?” He splutters, his head shaking in disbelief. “Is this one of those Tiktok pranks?”
“I get that she’s a pilot and that makes her automatically interesting, but until I hear otherwise, you’re still in a relationship,”
Max looks at you like you’ve grown a second head; shock, concern, and a good amount of unadulterated disgust. “You can’t think I was looking at her…like that,”
The way he says it, like he’s afraid to catch cooties, like it’s it’s inconceivable, like you didn’t still have bruises of your hips in the shape of his fingertips, takes all the fight out of you. Checo was right; it’s Max. It’s feels like someone’s let all the air out of a balloon. Your shoulders slump and you sigh.
“Because that would be crazy?” You lift yourself onto the physio bench as you speak. You’re not even really sure what you’re asking. “Max Verstappen, who likes only one thing on earth, that one thing being racing, attracted to another driver rather than his influencer accessory girlfriend?”
“Actually, I like two things,” he says with that boyish smirk that has been making your stomach do backflips for longer than you care to admit.
“Stop laughing at me,” you whine, fighting the urge to smile.
“I’m not. I’m sorry. I’m sorry that she upset you. I’m sorry that I upset you,” he says, taking a careful step closer to you, but he stops there. “Even if I don’t know what I did,”
He really has no idea. He is painfully, adorably clueless.
“Nothing,” you say, because you don’t know either. Sometimes it’s just inexplicably overwhelming being Max Verstappen’s girlfriend. “Just you being you, I guess,”
Max frowns at that. “I didn’t know being myself was so offensive,” he mumbles, and you instantly feel guilty. You of all people shouldn’t make him feel bad for how much space he takes up. You of all people know how much that bothers him.
“No, it’s not that. It’s not-“ you struggle for a way to explain it. Max takes the opportunity to cross the rest of the room and stand in front of you, his expression telling you he’s waiting for you to finish. “It’s not about who you are, but sometimes the way people act around you is just…and you’re so used to it, you don’t even…you just forget who you are sometimes, Max,”
He nods soberly. “Yeah. I do, and I’m sorry,” he says. He hooks his hands under your knees and pulls your legs apart and slots between them as he drags you to the edge of the bench so that you’re pressed against him, leaning back to look up at him. “But I never forget who you are, which is the most important bit,”
You can’t help but smile at him. He’s so simple. And not because he’s unintelligent, but because he’s guileless, because who he is has never scared him. He smiles back, and it’s unguarded and unbridled and you almost forgive that girl because you’ll be damned if you don’t have a crush on him, too.
“Was she really flirting with me?” He asks curiously, looking down as his hands find your and entwine your fingers.
“Oh, yeah,” you say, and he frowns, the wheels working in head as he tries to figure out how he didn’t notice. “Like me at your mum’s on Christmas Eve in 2020 level of obvious,”
“Well,” he says with a huff. “She just blew her chance at a test,”
“You don’t have to-“
“Wait, you were flirting with me at Christmas at my mum’s?”
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dcxdpdabbles · 2 months
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DCxDP fanfic idea: In 30 minutes or less!
Danny is a delivery man.
He got the job after realizing his resume was severely lacking in terms of working experience.
Also when he needed more money for his own purchases. There is a big difference between begging his parents for an allowance and earning his own spending funds.
The thing is, no matter where Danny applied, he was not getting a call back. Jazz warned him that a majority of Amity Park didn't hire them - as she also attempted to get a part-time job when she was his age - because of the Fenton last name.
She swore and hissed, but she couldn't prove that it was the reason they weren't hired. She just heard the talk around the town. They all said they wouldn't want to hire from the lunatic family.
That whenever a Fenton went , something bad quickly followed.
It stung, that not even Nasty Burger wanted him. That placed hired people under sixteen for Pete's sake. But Danny was resourceful. If Amity Park hadn't hired him, then he would just try the other place he had civilianship in.
The Infinite Realms.
Danny figured that if societies existed with the Realms, then they had to have a form of currency. He just needed to find one that used the same one as his world did.
FrostBite was more than happy to point him in the right direction. Since his people were the ones to spend generations attempting to map out the Realms, he had found a part of the ghost zone that Danny could blend into easily.
It was only a thirty minute commute from Danny's family portal. He could easily make that after school.
Thus, Danny flew to the portal location FrostBite told him about and ended up in a place called Central City. He found employment very quickly at Joel's Pizza, and for sixteen dollars a hour he was racing across the city to give some sizzling pizza pies.
. He was given a company scooter, but Danny preferred to fly. No one saw him as he never turned off his invisibly until he arrived at the destination. He got great tips for his speed, and his boss was fun to work for.
His parents are proud that he has a job and is not causing trouble. His friends also have their own jobs so Sam and Tucker have to plan their meet ups now- buts that's just a part of growing up.
The only thing that made his part-time difficult was the ghosts. Not all of them bothered him now a days but a few still did.
Like Young Blood. The brat didn't seem to care that Danny was going to be late to a shift since he had no concept of the importance of adult responsibilities. He was able to text his boss an apology using school as an excuse, but he was still thirty minutes late and sporting a black eye.
Joel stared at him for a long moment, muttered something in Spanish, before handing him five pizza boxes, and told him to take it to the central city police department. Danny was supirse he didn't even lecture him.
When he got to the station, the person in front told him to wait a moment since it was the forensic department that ordered food. He waited a few minutes until a blond man came down the hall, with a cheerful smile.
That smile fell when Danny turned to look at him. There was a brief flash of something dark that crossed his expression before the smile was back ten fold
"Hello," Danny said, standing up. "Order for Barry?
"That's me!" The man grins, holding out a wad of cash "Keep the change."
Wow. A fifty dollar tip!
"Sure thanks!"
"Welcome kid!"
Danny practically skipped away, Barry Watching him climb onto his scooter and slowly blending back into the traffic.
He turned to look at Officer Dawn "Is it just me or was that kid covered in bruises?"
Officer Dawn's mustache twitches with displeasure. "He definitely was. Looked fresh, too. Not only that but he works for Joel Pizza"
"This Joel a trouble maker?"
"The opposite, he was a foster kid. Once he aged out and got his own business, he started hiring teenagers in similar situations. Usually, his staff are all kids who are having a rough time. If things are too bad, he makes reports, but we try to avoid it. Don't want to lose one of the few trustworthy safe spaces for those kids." Officer Dawn's hesitates for a second before he carefully asks."A cop poking around may spook them, but a forensic chemist won't. Do you mind finding out what the delivery kid's deal is for me?"
"I look into it." Barry promises already knowing the Flash is also going to be following the boy just to make sure he safe.
He hates it when kids get hurt. Remind him too much of Wally.
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radiance1 · 4 months
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So, Ghost Prince Danny. Except that he also, ALSO, is Damian's younger twin brother who was sent to keep an eye on the Fentons because of their discovery of a substance that looked like Lazarus Water yet isn't Lazarus water.
In truth, it was really just Talia's way of getting Danny out of the way because he lost against Damian in the battle of heirs (No Danny did not hold back, Damian was just better than him) and she didn't want him dead so that was the next best thing.
Danny does pop up in the League at odd times, mostly to report about the research done by the Fentons. When he became half dead he's around a lot more, mostly to be monitored for his unique condition (somehow someway they don't know about Vlad) and because Danny can just come and go as he pleases cause ghost powers.
So, Danny gives Damian a flute that he handcrafted himself as a birthday present because really, what can he buy that Damian himself couldn't? Also, because he didn't actually want to spend money on his older brother.
They're brothers, but they don't have the most cordial relationship. They don't hate each other, but they don't like each other either.
So, Damian takes this flute and is like: "Fuck you gimmie this for I don't need this shit."
And then Danny is like: "Just take the gift you stupid ahh fruitloop."
So, Damian takes it while berating that Danny would give him something as stupid as this, but then does a full one 180 by keeping the thing on his person at all times.
Not that Danny knows that, really.
So, cut forth to Damian being known by Batman and taken in. Trying to kill Tim and being an overall little shit, I can see one of the Batfam coming across this flute just, randomly really, and then Damian is fucking pissed that they dared to touch it and then takes it back.
Leaving basically everyone stumped over the significance this random ahh wooden flute has but decides not to touch that landmine.
So then the Batfam don't know that Damian has a half sibling (Danny came from Jack and Talia, so he isn't blood related to Bruce but is to Damian) running around out there and Damian isn't gonna say anything and you already know Talia isn't since Danny AIN'T his kid.
Plus, he got a job to do that being with Bruce Wayne would make harder.
So then Damian becomes robin an allat, then the entire Batfam pull up to the Justice League for some big threat and then both Constantine and Zatanna are like: Yo why do you kid carry round an item drenched heavily in death energy to the extreme
Batman is obviously like: Excuse me?
Damian, meanwhile, just does not give a fuck about the flute given to him by his half-brother on his birthday is apparently drenched in death energy to the extreme because that is his and he isn't going to just give it up.
So then one way or another Damian ends up playing it, maybe he was told to play it by both Batman and Constantine just to make sure it isn't actually anything dangerous or whatever and also because Damian wouldn't let anyone else hold it, let alone play it.
Which Damian smirks at because he's played it before and literally nothing happened aside from very good music, but Damian hasn't played it since he came to the Wayne household and has missed it. So he reminisces over how he got it, thinking of his half-brother and their relationship.
He plays it, but this time, since he genuinely thought about Danny death energy just condenses in waves. Damian couldn't see it since he was too focused on playing and reminiscing, everyone isn't really that calm and tries to get him to stop but the death energy blocks them.
Then a summoning circle appears in front of Damian and Constantine recognizes it as being from the Infinite Realms category and it seemed to be a high-level summon circle too so he's like: Well fuck.
Then, contrary to their expectations of some eldritch abomination, it's just Danny. Who, fun fact, was in the middle of his coronation as prince and such, dripped out in royal wear.
Safe to say, Constatine goes: Well double fuck.
The tension is just broken, as all Danny does is cry. Like, genuinely, he just cries because Damian still kept his flute that he made, he genuinely thought the guy just threw it away since he hated it so much.
Danny: Ancients, my big brother actually liked what I made this is making me emotional.
Damian: Why the hell are you crying this thing is still trash btw.
Danny: Yea whatever you say big bro, you love it.
Batman: What do you mean big brother?
Danny: Who in the hell is that-
Damian: Right, I never told him about you.
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evilminji · 3 months
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Oh... Oh No(TM) :Dc
You know how occasionally? Ra's has to get dunked to rehydrate in that good, good Youth Soup? And probably comes out looking Damningly Fine AF, as a chisled warrior man in his late to mid 20s?
........okay, so HEAR ME OUT.....
You ever date a Hot Passionate Bad Boy, that you KNOW is probably bad for you? Because he is REALLY charismatic? Remembers all the important dates and details. Has Hot Blooded roof top sword fights and dramatic cliff side brawls, with you? Talks like the most Dramatic! Nerd! You have? Ever Heard! *mysterious musical sting by full orchestra*
Swishy cape?
VERY Impressive muscles.
But so High Drama that even you, "Commit To The Bit" Danny, of the Good and Noble House "WHY IS EVERYTHING ON FIRE!?" Fenton, find him... occasionally A Bit Much(tm)?
Just? A REALLY Bad Idea in attractively form fighting luxury wear.
You get too fight ninjas.
..........Danny's not SAYING he gave into his worst Dumbass Thirst Impulses... but, uhhh, he's also? Not NOT saying it?
And it's becoming a problem.
Cause apparently their whole family is CLINGLY (Bruce, in the background of the call: No. REALLY? You DONT SAY?) when they decide they've found The One. And he was unaware of the Murder Cult. Yes! He KNOWS! Should have asked where the ninjas came from! But in his defense...
Hot man, no shirt-y, Danny brain go Dumb and Drools.
He had a fancy sword and wanted to fight, Jazz.
Danny was FLUSTERED!
He refuses to be Mrs. Cult Leader, Jazz! You dealt with hot bad boy Exs! What does he do!?
And just? Jazz? So... so tired. Dear lord, she thought Dani was bad. But no. No Dani came by her... EVERYTHING, honestly, didn't she? It's genetic. It has to be. Danny what the FUCK? When she said "you should get out more and see the workd" this is NOT WHAT SHE MEANT!
Danny? Is not really feeling the helpful vibes here, Jazz. Fine. He'll hunt down Talia. She'll help him! Surely SHE won't want him to be her new step-dad! Hmmmph! *click*
And THAT! Is how the Bats meet their new Son/Brother-in-Law, Danny. Jazz's baby brother.
@hdgnj @nerdpoe @hypewinter @the-witchhunter @babbling-babull @lolottes @mutable-manifestation
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greenglowinspooks · 6 months
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(DCxDP) The obligations of a rogue versus those of a parent
Tw: vivisection mention (not in detail), bad Fenton parents
Will be crossposted to AO3 eventually
(Pt. 2 here) (Pt. 3 here)
(Masterlist/subscription post)
It was a dark, cold, miserable night, and Scarecrow, Jonathan Crane, wanted nothing more than to be home, covered in blankets with the heater set to max as he worked on his most recent strain of fear toxin.
Instead he was at the docks, standing in as backup for the Penguin as he made a deal with some sleaze-bag smugglers. Something about some sort of body armor for his hired help. Crane hadn’t really paid much attention to the Penguin’s words, only caring enough to show up because of the reward.
But honestly, he couldn’t care less about the money at this point.
He was cold, and miserable, and his leg hurt something fierce (he’d had chronic pains ever since being mauled by Killer Croc some time ago), and he was so, so close to a breakthrough with his new toxin, and he really couldn’t stand the Penguin anyways. The only thing keeping him there was his reputation as a rogue.
Just as Crane was deciding that the whole ordeal wasn’t worth it, he heard the sound of a chase a few blocks down. With a deep, heavy sigh, he moved from the wall he had been leaning against, looming in the alleyway as he waited for the potential threat to reveal itself.
A few moments later, a boy came careening into the alleyway, sliding to a stop when he noticed the Scarecrow, his eyes growing impossibly wide. Beneath the mask, Jonathan grinned.
The boy swore, loudly, glancing between Scarecrow and the exit of the alleyway. As the echoing sound of footsteps grew closer, he chose to face the way he came, turning his back to Scarecrow.
What an idiotic way to get killed. Either the boy was a complete and utter fool, or there was something out there worse (to him, at least) than the Scarecrow.
Jonathan Crane tilted his head slowly, considering. He could just cut his losses and leave, Penguin be damned, or he could stay and see what had the boy so spooked.
Eventually, unfortunately enough, his curiosity won out. He shifted, bringing a hand to his side where he kept several canisters of fear toxin.
Crane had to bite back a groan when the boy’s pursuers entered the alleyway.
It was those damned idiots in white suits.
They had been tailing him for weeks now. They were easy enough to fight, but they were annoyingly persistent, and always seemed to have a way to find him. (Not to mention, the Riddler had strong opinions on their outfits, and if he had to hear the white-suit-in-Gotham rant one more time he was going to throttle him.)
Led by the men in white was a woman in a teal hazmat suit. Jonathan had seen her around, too, though less frequently than the others. He had honestly assumed that she was just a new C-tier rogue and avoided her like the plague.
Her eyes went wide as saucers when she saw Jonathan standing a few feet from the boy. No one moved a muscle.
“Danny,” the woman spoke softly. The boy, Danny, flinched, glancing between her and Scarecrow, “come on, we can talk about this. Your father and I only want to help you.”
He was running from his mother?
Scarecrow paused after that revelation, choosing to fully take in the boy’s appearance.
He was lean, almost gaunt, and wearing clothes several sizes too big for him, probably stolen. His entire body shook, from fear and cold both, and he clutched his stomach with one hand. At first, Scarecrow assumed that it was due to being out of breath, but as he looked closer he could see blood staining the dark fabric of the boy’s shirt.
He was injured, underweight, and running from his parents.
Something that felt a lot like rage swelled in Jonathan’s heart.
“Danny, you don’t get it! We’re so close now. We can fix you, and then we can go home, and everything can go back to normal,” she said, smiling in a way that was clearly supposed to be reassuring. She took a few steps forward, the men behind her clearly readying their weapons.
The boy backed away from his mother, inadvertently coming closer to Scarecrow.
He glanced up at Crane again, his blue eyes shining in fear, but not of him.
Sickening. Sickening.
In one fluid motion, Jonathan grabbed the boy by the wrist, pulling him behind him, and threw a large canister of fear gas into the group who had been chasing him.
The liquid in the container turned to gas as soon as it broke open, billowing out and filling half of the alleyway with a thick yellow smog.
The boy gasped, pulling his shirt over his face in a pathetic attempt to filter out the toxin. It would have to do, though, Scarecrow thought, rushing forward to force the boy’s aggressors to breathe in the gas.
The fight that the men put up was pitiful. The few individuals who didn’t breathe in the toxin immediately were clearly unused to fighting hand-to-hand, and dropped like flies in Scarecrow’s wake.
Just as the men began to spasm and shout in their terror, as if on cue, the familiar wail of police sirens reached the Scarecrow’s ears.
He heaved a heavy, irritated sigh, fingers twitching for a cigarette. He was trying to quit as of late, but he felt that after today, he might deserve one.
Though now was not the time to be thinking of cigarettes.
Jonathan approached the boy, mindful of any signs he might run off.
The boy didn’t seem to notice his approach in the slightest, just staring at the woman in the jumpsuit as she writhed on the ground.
Right. That would most likely be traumatic for a child to see, wouldn’t it?
Scarecrow moved in front of the boy, blocking his line of sight. The boy looked up at him now, his face completely blank.
“The police are on their way,” Scarecrow spoke, his voice low. The boy didn’t acknowledge him in any way.
“You don’t want to be here when they arrive, do you?”
After several moments pause, the boy shook his head slowly. He looked numb.
Dissociation, most likely.
“You’ll come with me, then.”
It was a statement, not a question, but he waited for the boy’s response regardless. As soon as he nodded in agreement, Jonathan lifted him up, carrying him out of the cold, miserable alleyway.
Scarecrow paused briefly to warn the Penguin of the incoming officers through the comm he had been given, and then he was off, weaving through the streets and alleyways towards his getaway car.
The drive back to his safe house was quiet. The boy didn’t look over at him once, instead opting to stare out ahead of him.
Luckily, they were able to make it back without detection. Jonathan ushered the boy into his small apartment, sitting him down on the dingy couch that had come with the lease.
“Wait here, alright?” Jonathan said, the boy nodding once in response.
With that, he retreated into the small kitchen, looking for some sort of warm beverage.
It was nearly three in the morning now, so coffee was out of the question. He was completely out of the hot chocolate he had bought for whenever Eddie or Harley came over for a visit, so that was out too.
He supposed the only option was his chamomile tea. Did teenagers like tea? He supposed it didn’t really matter, the kid was on the run from his parents in the house of a Gotham rogue. Surely he had bigger things to worry about.
Jonathan made the drinks quickly, leaving the kitchen with two mugs in hand. He gave one to the boy, who looked up at him in surprise, before settling into his own seat.
It was an incredibly comfortable old leather armchair that he had gotten some years ago and stubbornly held onto ever since. He usually had one of the rogues he was at least somewhat friendly with pick it up when he entered Arkham.
Whenever Eddie and Harley were over, they would call it his old man chair, and he would tell them to leave.
The two of them sat quietly for a while, drinking their tea slowly. It was clear that the boy was leaving whatever headspace he had slipped into, becoming more alert (and uncomfortable) by the second.
“So,” Crane began, pausing before speaking more quietly when he saw the boy flinch, “you knew them.”
It was not a question.
The boy nodded, curling in on himself. He held the mug close to his chest, no doubt soothed by the warmth.
“They’ve been following me around for some time now,” Crane continued, “and you’re going to tell me why.”
The boy looked up at him, a pained expression written all over his face.
“You won’t believe me,” he murmured, curling up even further.
His clothes were soaked. Jonathan should have put down a towel before letting him sit down.
“Sure I will,” he said, ignoring the blood and water seeping into his furniture.
The landlord would not be happy.
“It’s gonna sound crazy.”
“I’ve been to Arkham.”
The boy paused, before mumbling something quietly.
“Again? I couldn’t hear you.”
“I said,” the boy huffed, quickly changing his tone when he remembered who he was talking to, “they…think you’re a ghost.”
“A ghost,” Crane repeated flatly.
“I told you it was gonna sound crazy!” The boy protested, before wrapping his arms around himself.
“Well,” Jonathan hummed, “it’s not the strangest thing I’ve heard in Gotham. Explain it to me.”
The boy paused, glancing up at his face, no doubt looking for some sign of mockery. He found none.
Then, he opened his mouth, and explained everything he could.
Ghosts, the portal to another world, the GiW, his parents. It was all incredibly far-fetched, but also far too consistent to be made up on the spot, and Crane could tell that the boy genuinely believed what he was saying.
“…but, if you don’t believe me, fine. I know it probably sounds stupid and fake,” he mumbled, looking away.
“I’ll believe you for now,” Crane said. The boy whipped his head up, staring at him in shock.
“If I do trust that what you’re saying is true, though, then why do I show up on their equipment as a ghost? I’m not dead, and never have been.”
“Um,” the boy hummed, looking somewhat nervous. Understandable, really.
“Well, have you by any chance been involved in any lab accidents recently..?”
Jonathan Crane froze, his face dropping. The boy noticed his change in demeanor, flinching slightly.
“Penguin,” he hissed out, his voice slightly inhuman. “Cobblepot, that motherfucker.”
“Wait—calm down! The angrier you get, the easier you’ll show up on the radar!”
Crane glared down at the boy, seething with rage. He once again flinched, looking away from him. With an extraordinary amount of effort, Jonathan slumped back down in his chair, breathing deeply in an effort to calm himself.
When he cracked his eyes back open, the boy was openly staring at him, curiosity written all over his face.
As soon as he noticed Crane looking back at him, he glanced away, straightening in his seat.
“Well, you’ve given me a lot to think about. In the morning, we’re going to discuss this in a lot more detail,” he said, standing up with slow movements. The boy stood as well, hands clasped together.
“For now, though, you’re going to let me take a look at that wound of yours, and then you’re going to take a shower and go to bed.”
The rest of the night went rather quickly.
The boy was rather hesitant to show him his wound, instead assuring him that it had been properly sewn up and that he was fine. Crane was having none of it, though, and gave him a once-over just in case.
It was, very clearly, the kind of cut used during an autopsy. Danny didn’t offer any information, so Crane had to assume that he was either back from the dead, or he had been vivisected. Either was possible in Gotham.
At the very least, Danny hadn’t lied about the stitches, and the wound was already beginning to heal.
With that, Danny showered quickly (he leapt out with a shriek the moment the hot water ran out), and went to bed in borrowed clothes without much complaint.
Thus, Jonathan was left with cold water for his shower, and slept on the still-damp couch so that the boy could have a bed to sleep in. Somehow, he found that he didn’t mind as much as he thought he would.
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rboooks · 11 months
Text
Child Support Part 2
Tim watched the other young heroes as they tried to look around the watch tower without seeming like they were. He's been here plenty of times, but the rest of the Teen Titans and a few of the Young Justice hasn't.
Much was due to the older heroes leaving the younger ones alone. Some not taking them seriously enough to welcome them at the big HQ as much as that made his blood boil.
They were taking the same risks. They were fighting the same good fights. Why was their age the main reason they weren't treated equally?
Some teenage heroes weren't part of a team per see, but they always answered when a call was sent. For example, Cass and Steph were present, speaking softly to Static Shock. Damian was standing next to Jon and his little friend Colin who was just getting into the swing of the hero business.
Bruce almost bit through his tongue when Damian told him Abuse would be joining Robin on parol, and he could do nothing to stop them. (Tim felt like he was watching Damian tell Bruce a paraphrased version of "But Daddy, I love him!" and it kept him smiling for weeks)
It was wild to see almost every young hero in one place. He doesn't think this happened since the last time Justice Leauge got mind controlled and almost destroyed the whole world.
"Any idea why we're here?" Kon asks to his right, lowering his shade to stare at the Outlaws. Jason's team stood to the side chatting iddly while cleaning over thier weapons.
Kon's always like their punk point of view, and he knows his best friend wants to go over there to talk to them. If it wasn't for the issue of the clone still being mad about what Jason did at the Teen Titans tower. Almost murder was hard to forgive for people outside the Bats.
"None. All I know is that John Constantine sent out a message to every teenage superhero group calling for a meet-up," Tim responds.
Bart whistles with a grimace on his right. "Must be bad if that guy is asking."
"I heard Hawkwoman tell Superman that she was worried and wasn't sure she wanted anyone of us mixed up in Constantine's mistakes." Cassie chimes in from where she leans on the couch. The three turn to her as she lowers her voice, attempting to keep the others from hearing. "Batman told her off for it."
"Batman did?" Tim asks, surprised.
Cassie shrugs, throwing a bit of her blond hair over her shoulder. "As much Batman can emote anyway."
Yeah, that sounded about right. Though it must have been something Bruce found disrespectful. His dad usually never reprimanded strangers unless they were saying something or doing something that sounded far too much like bigotry to him.
But to apply that to Constantine? Someone, Bruce generally disliked communicating with because the man tended to backstab his contacts? Yes, Constantine wasn't evil, but he wasn't pleasant either.
If Bruce had magical issues, he tended to contact Zatanna first.
Just then, the watch tower's zeta beams activate. Everyone who gathered turns to the teleporting pads where Constantine appears looking, for lack of a better word, absolutely exhausted. Even Tim knows that his eye bags aren't that bad, and he's usually going hours without sleep.
"Oh good, you all made it," Constantine says, sipping from a mug and wearing nothing but sweatpants and what looks like a nightgown. His signature trench coat was nowhere in sight. "I'm going to be quick about this. I need a team of young heroes willing to accept my son into their fold."
The room is dead silent. Constantine sighs. "Look, I've tried everything, but it's like Danny is allergic to laying low. He fought with a demon the other day over a child's doll- which you all know happens. People get haunted! But Danny refused to do it the right way, and now I had to beat off the demon's marriage proposal at least ten times. Not to mention his lack of social skills! No matter which one I stick him in, he can't seem to make friends in school. He got shoved into a locker on his first day! I thought that was an American exaggeration of the telly!"
Constantine pauses and takes a large gulp of whatever he's drinking before continuing his rant. A hand runs through his already messy hair, leaving it in bigger disarray as he speaks. "He's behind in terms of trends and technology cause his other father raised him outside of the typical timelines, so sometimes it's like talking to someone from the early two thousand, and other times it's like he's a modern Victorian era lad. His powers are also all over the place because the ectoplasm in our world is thicker, so when he breathes it in, he losses his control. Just the other day he accidentally made himself fly through our ceiling and almost reach the atmosphere before I was able to bring him back down."
A few of the fliers in the room wince. Jon nods and whispers under his breath, though his voice carries in the silence. "Yeah, been there before. Flying can be scary if you don't know how to come down."
Johns glances around at all the young people, eyes showing a tad bit of desperation. "He's sad all the time now, and I don't know how to help. If working with you could help him make friends, I would be grateful. He's a great kid. He just needs to adjust."
Tim had no idea what to do with this information; how do you respond to arguably one of the strongest Justice League Darks' heroes asking for a play date for his son?
"How old is the child?" Damian's voice rings out. Colin's hand is attached to his sleeve, a slightly nervous smile on the boy's face as he attempts to hide from the staring heroes behind his brother. Tim bets that if he wasn't wearing the domino mask, they would be able to see slight tears in Colin's eyes.
Damian's other hand goes across his body to cover Colin's hand, and Tim fights a shit-eating grin. His eyes lock with Jason, and the two send each other knowing grins. Looks like Bruce did have to worry about Damian having a secret boyfriend.
He can't wait to tease Damian later.
"He's fourteen....or well, physically?" Constantine answers eagerly.
"What does that mean?" Kon asks this time.
"Okay, so he's half human, half ecto-being. He sired him with his other father, Clockwork, which was only four years ago in this dimension, but since he was raised in the Infinite Relemas, times move differently there? " The British man says, and Raven goes rigid.
"Clockwork, as in the most powerful Ancient?" She asks, looking horror-struck when Constantine nods.
Before anyone asked what that meant, the zeta tubes activated again without permission. Someone had hacked into their systems which were ten levels bad. Everyone naturally fell into a fighting stance, only to blink when a teenage boy stepped out with a loud excited screech.
"We're in space!" The teenager runs to one of the windows, pressing his hands and face up against the glass. "This is amazing!"
Tim only relaxes his muscles once Constantine clears his throat. "Chum...what are you doing here?"
"Oh. One of your curse rocks things started proposing to me again, so I ran out of the House of Mysteries. Thought I see what you were up to." The teenager says, turning around with a smile and utterly freezing at the sight of the gathered heroes.
He had dark hair, wide blue eyes, and the most adorable face Tim had ever seen. Not as sexy as Bernard, of course, but darn close. Judging by the looks of anyone attractive to males, most heroes thought the same.
"Um...hi?" He says, offering the Godsmack teenagers a helpless little shrug. "I'm Danny Constantine."
"It is a pleasure, Constantine." Damian marches over to him with all his little twelve-year-old authority. He barely reaches Danny's chest. "I shall look forward to working with you. Are you formally trained in combat or strictly magic?"
"Um...oh, I can throw a punch or two? I'm mostly self taught. I rely on my powers a lot?" Danny fumbles to answer throwing a desperate look at his presumed father.
"No matter. I shall have you begin training. My Beloved also needs to work on his form. There is no shame in this" Damian nods, and Constantine lets out a large sigh of relief. He jogs over to place a hand on his son's shoulder, giving him a one-sided hug
"Yes, Danny, you will join Robin, Superboy, and Abuse on missions. They agree to help you settle and get used to your ghost powers." Constantine smiles. "I'll give me time to discourage all those idiots from trying to trick you into marriage."
"Oh...okay. It's nice to meet you all. Please call me Phantom on the field. Um, are you the team leader?" He asks Damian as the three youngest boys lead him further into the watch tower.
Constantine watches them go with the brightest smile he's ever seen on the man's face. He looks back to the group, who were barely starting to pick their jaws off the floor and makes a shooing motion with his hand. "You lot are dismissed."
Then the man vanishes in a green portal.
There is a ringing silence until Barts blurts out. "I'm pretty sure this is where the Phantom Fan Club first formed. A historical moment."
Tim wants to take a nap.
( Part 1 )
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luxaofhesperides · 6 months
Text
Accidental Bride Sacrifice ; requested by @starlightcat04!
Danny has long since gotten used to the feel of summonings. They don’t happen often, but sometimes the right components are put together to force him into answering, and he’d have to go as the new Ghost King.
Which no one told him was a thing! He hadn’t protested too much about the whole Ghost King deal when they finally told him about it after he graduated high school. It gave him a good excuse to ditch life in the living realm and not worry about college or a career, and let him really embrace his ghost side. 
The summonings are a problem, though. They always feel staticky and bad, like a dumpster that just got struck by lightning. The taste of iron on his tongue, a clear sign of blood being spilled, lets him know that it would be one of end the world for us summonings, because some people can’t put in the effort to do it themselves, apparently. 
But this time, the summoning feels different.
Danny pauses, eyes going unfocused in the middle of his conversation with Jazz. He had been looking forward to spending the week with her, now that she’s on winter break, but his luck is as bad as always.
“I’m being summoned,” he tells her, cutting off her rant about a transphobic professor she had. 
“Oh, no. Do you need me to do anything? Should I go with you to beat up whoever it is that’s summoning you?”
Danny tilts his head to the side, considering. The taste of blood is noticeably absent. In fact, this summoning pull doesn’t make him feel sick at all. It makes him feel warm, as if he’s just been wrapped in a hug.
“No,” he says. “I think I’m good. This one feels different.”
“A good different?” Jazz asks, worry clear in her voice.
“Yeah. A good different. I’ll come back soon, okay?”
“Alright. Be careful, Danny.” Jazz pulls him into a quick hug, then steps back to watch as Danny stops fighting the pull of the summoning and disappears into a swirling white rings that flashes into existence behind him, blinding her for a moment, and is gone when she manages to blink the spots out of her vision. 
For a minute, Danny drifts in a void of stillness, traveling through the realms as the summoning draws him closer to the correct realm. And then he’s rising out of the ground in a dark building made of concrete, candles of green flame scattered all over the place.
“Great One!” someone in a hooded cloak cries, raising his arms in jubilation. “Our calls have been answered!”
“I’ll fucking kill you!” a mechanical voice yells from farther back. When Danny looks past the cultists’ heads, he spots a man in a red hood and leather jacket chained to a pole, along with a bunch of other people in strange costumes tied up, desperately trying to free themselves. 
“Silence!” The leader of the cult, or who Danny assumes is the leader, snaps at the hooded man and gestures to the people off to his left. They force another costumed person forward, this one in yellow armor. He can see the blood running down their face from beneath their helmet and from their nose, dark lines of blood cutting through their brown skin. 
The cultists throw the armored person forward, forcing them to kneel. Then they bow to Danny and step back.
“Great One,” the leader says, voice unpleasantly reverent and grating, “Welcome to the mortal realms. We offer you this sacrifice to feed your strength. He will make a fine general for your undead army in your crusade to rid this world of its filth.”
The people in the back begin shouting all together, panicked voices overlapping, and Danny is left staring down at the cultists in shock.
The summoning had felt so nice. What the hell was this? He did not sign up for another ‘end of days’ insane cult. He just wanted to be hugged. 
His silence makes the cultists nervous. They begin to shift uneasily, whispering to each other, and the leader clears his throat, then pulls a large crystal dagger out of his cloak. “We shall prove our devotion to you through an offering of a hero’s blood!”
And then he moves towards the sacrifice and Danny snaps out of his shock to yell, “Wait!”
The entire room freezes. Even the costumed people in the back go still. 
Danny winces, then tries to smother his power, make himself more palatable to the humans of this dimension. “Wait,” he says again, and he sounds closer to human now. If he could, he would drop his ghost form entirely, but he knows better than to endanger himself like that. “What, exactly, did you summon me here for?”
The cult leader stares at him for a moment. “To… To rid the world of filth and allow your loyal followers to spread word of your power. You will be worshiped again, Great One, and serve as a reminder to man that Death shall always prevail.”
“Okay, I get that, but I was talking more along the lines of the summoning. What ritual did you use? What specifically were the summoning requirements?”
Normally, he’d be able to figure it out himself, but these cultists didn’t use a summoning circle. So they did something else, something less visible and therefore harder to figure out, in order to bring him here.
A woman standing off to the side speaks up, stepping forward hesitantly. “I had pieced together a few summoning spells from this book to bring you here. You had to accept our chosen sacrifice to your side in order for the summoning to work.”
“Hold up that book for me, please?”
She does, and Danny flies down to grab it from her hands. “Point out which lines you used,” he says, already reading a few of the words written down. It’s definitely ghostspeak written down, which should be near impossible for living humans to translate without being skilled in magic.
“Ah, these ones.” She points to each line, reading them out for him, and Danny starts understand what, exactly, went wrong.
“Is there a problem, Great One?”
Danny returns the book then floats over to the sacrifice and picks him up. The costumed people make alarmed noises, but quietly quiet down again when all Danny does is move him away from the cultists.
“Okay,” he says, “So. The lines you used to summon me were not translated properly. What you interpreted as ‘accepted to stay by the king’s side in loyalty and strength’ is not meant to be, like, him being part of my undead army or whatever. It’s a royal marriage vow.”
“They married us?” the sacrifice shouts, disbelieving. The cult leader buries his face in his hands and sighs.
“My deepest apologies, Great One. We meant no offense. We simply wanted to aid in your destruction of this depraved world.”
Danny scrunches his nose and shakes his head. “Yeah, that’s not gonna fly with me. I do not do the biding of random people, especially those who are ready to murder innocent people for no reason. Frighty, if you would.” He snaps his fingers, calling up Fright Knight who always enjoys getting to torment the people who summon Danny for murderous reasons.
Fright Knight appears in a swirl of darkness and screams. Shadows swallow the room, and when they recede, no cultists remain.
“Thanks, Frighty. Have fun with them. I need to figure out all… this.”
Fright Knight bows to him, then disappears. Danny lets out a breath, then floats down lower to be eye level with the sacrifice. “Hey,” he says gently, with a smile, “I’m so sorry they did this to you. I’m Danny. What’s your name?”
“Du— Uh, Signal,” the sacrifice says, sounding rather dazed. 
“Signal,” Danny repeats. “Like… a traffic signal?”
“No. I mean, maybe? But it is Signal. That’s my hero name, not my real name.”
“Oh, you’re a hero!” His getup makes more sense now. Danny checks him over for any signs of injuries. So far, only his head and nose seem to be injured, but his wrists are tightly bound behind his back. Carefully, Danny calls upon his ice and shapes it into a sharp knife, then cuts through the zipties.
He helps Signal up to his feet, floating by his shoulder. “All good?”
“Yeah, man, all good. Let me just get the others free.”
“Oh, I can do it!” Danny flies over to the other costumed people, who must also be heroes. All it takes is one link in the chain being frozen and broken for the entire thing to go lax, allowing them to free themselves. Hooded guy spares Danny a single glance, then hurries over to Signal to check on him. The other three, a man with a blue bird across his chest, a blond girl with a yellow bat outline on her chest, and a guy with bandoliers and a golden bird emblem, all watch him warily as he floats back towards the center of the room.
“So,” the blue bird man says, “If they summoned you with a marriage vow, and you accepted, does that mean you’re planning to steal Signal away from us?” He’s smiling, but it’s not a nice smile.
“No! I had no idea they did this! I am so sorry you all got caught up in this. You most of all, Signal.”
Signal shrugs, nudging hood guy away from him. “Nah, man, it’s all good. This is definitely the better outcome.”
“I don’t know, being married off isn’t really a good thing.”
“Hey, at least they married me off to a decent guy.”
“You don’t know that,” Danny says, “What if I’m secretly evil?”
“If you were secretly evil, you’d be destroying the world right now. I think you’re fine.”
The blond girl waves at him, demanding his attention. “Quick question! They were calling you ‘Great One’. Are you a god or something?”
“Not really? I’m the Ghost King. So I’m a ghost who rules over other ghosts and also a majority of the Infinite Realms.”
She nods as if this is all totally normal for her, then shoots Signal a grin. “Congrats on bagging a king! Not the worst way to spend a night, right?”
“Can you break the marriage?” blue bird man asks, the lines of his shoulders tense.
Danny awkwardly rubs the back of his neck, not looking any of them in the eye. “I honestly don’t know. I can look for a way! But I genuinely have no clue. This was unexpected.”
“But you accepted.”
“I didn’t know what I expected! It just felt like a hug, and I wanted a hug! I thought I was being summoned for something nice for once!” Danny curls up, bringing his knees up to his chest, and hides his pout behind his hands. He knows he’s being childish, but he can’t help but be upset that he couldn’t have this one good experience from being Ghost King. 
It’s always responsibilities and death cult summonings and fighting ghosts who don’t think he should be king. Sure there have been some good things, but they’re comparatively few when looking at all the other stress and pain that comes with the crown. Sue him for wanting to have a nice night for once. Hell, at this point, he’d take being summoned to help with some kid’s homework, because at least then he could have a quiet night helping someone.
“Hey, man, can you come down here?” Signal asks. 
He wants to stay out of reach, hiding himself away for a bit longer, but Signal is his new, surprise, accidental husband, so Danny lowers himself to the ground and peeks through his fingers to look at him.
He tenses when Signal hugs him, soft and warm and comforting. It takes a moment for him to realize what’s going on, and then he’s melting into Signal’s embrace, dropping his hands to wrap them around Signal’s back.
Distantly, he can hear the other heroes talking quietly amongst themselves. He blocks out the sound as much as he can, determined to enjoy this hug while it lasts.
Which is… fairly long. Signal makes no moves to end the hug, so Danny closes his eyes to really savor the moment. 
“So,” Signal murmurs into his ear, “As newlyweds, how about we get to know each other a bit better before we start working on fixing all this?”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Let’s ditch these guys and take some time to ourselves.”
“I promise I’ll get this fixed,” he says, just to make sure Signal knows. “Genuinely, I am so sorry to have married you through an old Realms vow when you had no say in it.”
“Hey, if it lands me a very nice, very attractive king, then I don’t mind at all. I could have done without the murderous cultists, though.”
Danny huffs out a small laugh. “Oh, for sure. Thanks for being so cool about this. Want me to fly us out of here?”
“Yes please,” Signal says. Danny smiles and tightens his grip on Signal, then lifts them both up. “I’ll see y’all later! Have fun with the rest of your patrols!” he calls out to the other heroes, who start shouting at him.
Danny flies them right out the roof before the other heroes figure out a way to kick his ass. The city they’re in is smoggy and dark, tall buildings rising up into the cloudy sky, and police sirens ring through the air. There’s no where that looks like a particularly nice spot to land for a conversation, so he asks Signal where he’d like to go and follows his directions from there.
They end up phasing through a building, then into the floor, which leaves them in what Signal calls The Hatch. 
Danny takes a quick moment to freak out over being in a hero’s secret hide out, the composes himself and finally pulls away from Signal.
“So,” he starts, looking around The Hatch and taking in the giant computer, the workstation, the motorcycle farther down the way, “What did you—Woah!” Danny spins around, slamming a hand over his eyes the instant he realizes that Signal is taking off his helmet, leaving his face bare.
It’s not like he’d know who Signal is anyways, being from a different dimension, but it’s the principle of the matter.
Signal laughs when he sees Danny’s attempt to keep from looking at him. A warm hand wraps around his wrist and gently pulls it away. “It’s okay, Danny, you can look,” he says. “It would be pretty weird if my own husband didn’t know my face.”
Slowly, giving Signal to change his mind, Danny opens his eyes. He moves his gaze up, going from Signal’s armor to his face, his very cute face and his warm brown eyes, and Danny stares for a moment. 
“Hi,” he whispers.
“Hi,” Signal says, fondness coloring his voice. “My name’s Duke. Are all Ghost Kings as cute as you?”
“Duke,” Danny repeats. “Hi. Um, no. The last one really sucked, actually, which is why I fought him. He was so bad the Infinite Realms didn’t want him anymore, so though I technically didn’t beat him in single combat, it was enough for the Infinite Realms to kick him out and get me on the throne.”
“Man, I can not wait to hear more of your stories. Think we got time for that while we search for a way to undo that marriage vow?”
Taking his chance, Danny says, “Sure! It’s a date.”
He’s awarded by Duke’s bright smile and idly wonders how long he can keep them married. Hopefully long enough for them to get into a real relationship where he can propose properly. And then he can get Jazz’s blessing too—
“Oh shit,” Danny realizes. 
“What? What’s wrong?”
“I need to tell my sister or she’s going to actually kill me.”
Duke winces. “And I should probably tell the others before Spoiler makes a mess of things… B is not going to be happy with me.”
They share a despairing look, already dreading the amount of scoldings they’re both going to get. He’s not looking forward to it.
“...Put it off until tomorrow?”
Duke nods. “Yeah. That’s a tomorrow problem. For now, how about a late dinner?”
“Sounds perfect.”
. . .
[send me a ghostlights prompt!]
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starry-bi-sky · 5 months
Text
i've mentioned in a few past posts about an au where Danny is a variant of Jason Todd. I haven't made a post about it yet because I need a good rhythm flowing however i've been listening to Gladiator by Jann and I have been having thoughts.
but first, let me set the au:
Danny Fenton is Jason Todd, or at least, a variant of him. A him from a universe separate to the major Batman timeline - but still Jason Todd, down to the structure of his face and his name itself. The only thing that changes, is who picks him up - and, that he follows old Batman canon, and was an orphan. Jason Todd steals the tires off the batmobile and wallops Batman with his tirejack, and then runs off. Shortly after, he gets picked up by the Fentons.
(Customary line break,,,, word count check: 5k)
And his name changes from Jason Todd to Danny Fenton. He doesn't care much for the new name change, it stems from his mute refusal to share his name to the people that picked him up; an attempt to make him untraceable should he get away from them, and to keep something of his to himself. So they name him something new. He grows to like it enough as he acclimates to his new family.
(He hangs onto the name Jason Todd like a secret - he may be 'Danny Fenton' now, but he'll never forget his time on Gotham's streets. He'll always be Jason Todd.)
(Jazz is the only one who he tells his name to in the family - she affectionately calls him Jay whenever she wants.)
He becomes friends with Sam and Tucker and deals with Dash and his bullying. And when Danny steps in during a fight between Dash and another student, Dash gives him a bleeding nose and mockingly says, "Do you think you're Robin just because you're from Gotham, Fenton?"
Jason looks him in the eyes and he bares his teeth, "Why not?" he asks, spitting blood, "being Robin gives me magic."
The nickname sticks. It's supposed to be an insult; Daniel Fenton is not Robin, he'll never be Robin. Not now, not in a million years. Jason Todd has always wanted to be Robin, so he takes the insult and wears it proudly. He buys a school varsity jacket and painstakingly undos the stitching of all the school's motif on it. On the breast of it, he embroiders in a black circle with the Boy Wonder "R" on it instead. It's not good stitching, but the next day Danny wears it down to breakfast and into school.
In normal au canon, Daniel Jason Todd-Fenton (its a mouthful, just call him Danny) only meets the Waynes after he becomes Phantom - an event that leans more towards Daniel Fenton's accident than Jason Todd's death, but traumatizes him all the same. (Is it too much to want to be mourned? His best friends like to deny that he died - and Danny - Jason? - wishes they wouldn't, even if he did come back.)
(The accident embitters him, even more when his parents don't seem to pick up on it. He stops calling himself Danny Fenton - he's always been Jason Todd. It shows itself in his ghostly form. He doesn't want to wear the thing he died in, not in something that belongs to the Fentons, and his suit reflects that.)
In this timeline, Daniel Jason Todd-Fenton, aged 13, meets Dick Grayson and Bruce Wayne after a mishap with magic on the other end of the reality sends the three of them careening through time and space, and spat back out on the other end, in a world not their own. And together.
Danny is paired with a very confused Bruce Wayne and Richard Grayson. Luckily, there's a few heroes there to help them. Danny can hardly comprehend the idea that he's in another universe - he doesn't know why Dick Grayson and Bruce Wayne are seemingly handling it well.
On their way to a secondary base with the heroes, Danny turns to Bruce Wayne and asks, "So, is it part of rich-person training that you're just totally chill with being sent into another universe, or are you just weird?"
Bruce Wayne huffs at him, rather than get offended, and he smiles that dumb lopsided billionaire smile that Danny's seen on every vogue magazine he's been in. "I'm not so worried with these skilled heroes here to help us get home."
Danny silently concludes that he's just weird. At least Dick Grayson is biting back a smile behind him. "Riiiight..." He says, dragging the vowel out dryly.
When they get to that secondary location -- a safehouse that one of the heroes had set up -- the three of them are sat in a living room-like room while one hero, Zatanna, goes and calls someone from the Justice League. The other two heroes stay with the three of them.
Within a few hours, Danny is face to face with Batman - someone who he hasn't seen since he whacked him in the stomach with a tire iron - and Nightwing. For a moment, Danny swears that the both of them look almost spooked by him.
Batman stares at him for a moment when he enters, and then he goes to speak with Bruce Wayne. Danny doesn't care enough to hear what they're talking about, he pulls out his phone as Nightwing goes to speak with Dick Grayson.
"Are you a fan of Robin, little man?" Someone says, and when Danny looks up he locks eyes with Dick Grayson -- who is leaning around Nightwing to talk to him, the both of them are smiling. And considering who Nightwing was, Danny finds himself turning pink to the ears.
But he will not hide his jacket. He forces a grin through his embarrassment, "Hell yeah, man, Robin's cool." He says, and pushes his arms down to pull out the hem of his letterman, showing off the emblem. "I made it m'self out of a school varsity after the A-Listers started callin' me Robin."
"A-Listers?"
"Popular kids," Danny corrects, loosing his hold on the hem and brushing invisible wrinkles out of the embroidery. "They didn't like that I kept stepping in when they were bullying. Dash asked me if i thought I was Robin because I was from Gotham."
Dick Grayson looks intrigued -- and concerned, and he leans forward onto his knees and raises an eyebrow. "What did you say?"
And Danny grins a shark-like thing, straightening back his shoulders with a burning sort of smug pride and all the sharpness of broken glass left in Crime Alley. "I told him being Robin gave me magic, and then I punched him."
Dick Grayson's smile widens, splitting into showing teeth as he leans back into his seat. Danny isn't sure why he's so delighted - but Nightwing looks incredibly amused, and he suddenly remembers that the Robin himself was there in front of him.
Danny's face burns anew and his arms fold themselves in front of him once again.
"I don't think I ever caught your name, Robin." Dick Grayson goes, his voice thick with laughter, and Nightwing steps off to the side as Batman and Bruce Wayne walk over to join them both. They're just close enough that Danny can see Bruce Wayne raise an eyebrow at them both.
"It's Jason." Danny says before he can think about it, and barely stops himself from frowning at himself for the slip. He amends himself, glancing over at Batman and Bruce as they get closer. "But everyone calls me Danny."
Dick Grayson's head recoils slightly, and he looks a little surprised. "Why Danny?" He asks.
"Why Dick?" He shoots back, and Bruce and Dick both smile at him, with Dick Grayson shrugging with an expression that looks like 'you've got a point.'
In the end, the three of them - yes, three - get sent to this world's Wayne Manor, and Danny is bewildered by that decision to include himself -- he's not a Wayne. Why not just send him to the Fentons?
Batman tells him that the Fentons don't exist in this world, and Danny falls silent. "Oh." He says quietly, a pit growing in his stomach with an ill-kind of dread. He can't keep Batman's gaze, looking away with unease.
No Fentons in this world. No Fentons. Where was he then, in the grand scheme of things? Where was he in this world? What happened to Jason Todd? Was he even alive? He can't keep the worry off his face, and he jumps when a hand lands on his shoulder. When he looks up, Dick Grayson squeezes him gently.
Dick Grayson is steadily beginning to remind him of his sister.
-
They end up driving back in the Batmobile. It's such a shock to Danny that he momentarily forgets the lack of Fentons. He makes a laugh sound, actually, and immediately he covers his hand with his mouth and stares at the car -- tank? with his teeth sunk into his lower lip.
"Jason?" Dick says, and hearing his name being spoken feels like someone touched him with a livewire. It's weird, it's foreign - he hates, in some way, that it's foreign - and it's so nice. Yes, that's me.
He drops his hand immediately. "Sorry." He says, realizing he'd stopped in his tracks, "I -uh, was just surprised."
"It's not every day someone sees the Batmobile." Dick agrees. Nightwing has his back to them but Danny swears he sees his shoulders shaking a little.
"Yeah," Danny nods slowly, dragging his eyes over the batmobile as Batman opens the driver's side and gets in. He thinks for a moment, of what he should say next - whether to admit that he's seen it before, or to pretend that he's seeing it for the first time. Snd as Nightwing opens the door for him, Bruce, and Dick, he chooses the funnier option; "The last time I saw it, I was stealing its tires."
To his surprise and unsurprise, Danny only gets two pairs of eyes on him. Nightwing gets into the passenger seat as both Bruce and Dick turn their gaze onto him; Dick's eyes big like they were going to bulge out of his head.
"You what!?"
So Danny tells an amazed Dick Grayson that he hit Batman with a tire iron after he stole his tires - something he is very proud about and also incredibly embarrassed about when he retells what happened in the backseat of the batmobile, with Batman and Nightwing listening in from the front seat.
(Bruce Wayne doesn't ever tell Dick shit, he's going to lord this over Bruce's head the moment they are alone.)
"Please tell me this didn't happen in this world." Danny groans behind his palms as he sinks into his seat. Dick Grayson is killing himself laughing on his left, and he saw Bruce Wayne stifling a smile before he obscured his vision with his hands.
Much to his luck, its Batman himself who speaks next, (Danny was being mostly rhetorical). "It did." He says, and his voice sounds like the rumble of the earth before a stampede. It will never not throw Danny off every time he hears it. "It takes quite a lot of spunk to steal the tires off the batmobile."
He can't believe it. Batman is making fun of him. Fucking, Batman.
He wants to die with embarrassment. He groans even louder as Dick Grayson's laughter crescendoes. Danny risks a peak through his fingers, he doesn't know whether to regret it or not because he can just barely see Batman smirk very faintly from his position in the middle.
(His world axis tilts five degree leftways seeing it; like someone dunked a bucket of ice water on him.)
"He ended up being adopted by the Bruce Wayne of this world."
Danny's hands drop with his jaw into his lap. Dick Grayson on his left chokes on his laughter and careens into a coughing fit. Bruce Wayne on his right chokes on air, and quickly recovers himself with a cough behind a closed fist.
"What?" Danny croaks.
-
Apparently, Bruce Wayne's family is much larger in this world than it is in his. Danny can barely wrap his head around the idea that he ends up adopted by the man, but now he has to learn that Wayne had several children in this world?
He's still not wrapped his head around it when the three of them wind up at Wayne Manor, finally, or even when he's standing in front of him himself. For his effort, Bruce Wayne does a good job at looking unruffled by it.
God, he's weird. Danny's starting to quite like it, actually. How human of him.
He still can't wrap his head around it when he meets the rest of Bruce Wayne's children, all of whom are already aware of the three of them. Danny thinks that someone from the Justice League might've alerted them before they got here.
It makes sense, he supposes.
It helps that they are just as weirded out as he is. A boy named Tim Drake sees him for the first time and blurts out; "Oh wow, you're tiny." In a tone like he's just seen a two-headed snake burst out of the ground.
Danny is still offended. He's still growing. It's not his fault he spent twelve years of his life malnourished. "I'm gonna be taller than you," he tells him seriously, "and when I do I'm gonna kick your ass."
Tim snorts at him.
The other Bruce Wayne -- Mr. Wayne's -- youngest looks at him up and down with a face of carefully controlled judgement. His name is Damian, he's Bruce Wayne's only biological son. Danny can't believe that there's only one.
If anything, Bruce Wayne himself looks surprised too.
"Todd, yes?" Damian says, his green eyes narrowed at him.
Danny feels like the specimen under his parents' microscope, he feels like he's standing on a platform that's being slowly spun by scientists. He looks over at Bruce Wayne in confusion, and then back at Damian. "I- yes?"
Damian Wayne nods, and then leaves.
Danny does not once see himself. That is unsettling in and of itself - surely Jason Todd would have been told about another version of himself in this world, wouldn't he? How old is he here? An adult, probably. Danny doesn't know if he wants to see him. What does he look like when he's grown up? He pulls his Robin jacket around him a little tighter, like a cocoon, like a shield.
"It's weird to hear them call me Jason Todd." He says aloud to himself, and it leaves a weight behind in his chest that shouldn't hurt the way it does. It shouldn't be weird to be called your name. It shouldn't cobweb up your throat to hear your name being said. It was his name. It was his.
-
Danny acclimates to the manor slowly. The house is big, massive. He's never been in a house so large before, he feels like a stray cat being taken in for the first time, again. He and Bruce and Dick Grayson are all given their own separate rooms - one of many inside this mansion - and the sheer size of his bedroom is bigger than his living room and kitchen combined.
it's daunting. Danny sits outside on the balcony and stares at the stars he can see - Wayne Manor is far enough away from Gotham that its light pollution doesn't obscure the sky here like it did in the heart of it.
Danny finds the constellations he can find and wishes he had his books with him. He finds the library the next day and buries himself in the back, curling up into a comfy armchair next and inhaling each book he can get his hands on.
Tim Drake wanders past him at some point, Danny would have missed him if it weren't for the fact that Drake stared at him strangely when he saw him. He walks away when he realizes Danny was staring back.
It's a rinse and repeat for the next few days. Danny doesn't go to meals, he sneaks food from the kitchen afterwards, and then buries himself in hundreds of books in the library.
Dick Grayson, the one from his world, goes and finds him three days later. Danny's eyes hurt with strain by then, but he is furiously halfway through a Jane Austen novel when Dick sits down across from him.
"Have you been here all day?" Dick asks, he drapes himself across the side of his chair, contorting himself into a position that Danny doesn't think is comfortable when he looks up at him.
Not that he looks up at him long - he hums absently and goes back to reading. Frowning when he realizes he lost his place on the page.
Dick Grayson raises an eyebrow, "Have you at least eaten anything?"
Danny hums. No, he hasn't, and he hadn't thought about eating all day. Until now that is, his frown ever deepening as his stomach pangs with a deep hunger.
"That's not healthy."
"Mhm."
"Are you going to eat something?"
"Mhhh."
And this gets Dick to frown. He straightens himself up, propping onto his elbows to stare at Danny. "Jason." He says strongly. And it's that that gets Danny to finally look up from his page, jumping like he'd again been poked with a live wire as he stares at Dick with wide eyes.
"Yes?"
"Put the book down." Dick orders, gesturing towards the side table next to Danny with a nod. "And come eat something." There's very little room for argument in his voice, he sounds like Jazz when she's trying to parent him, but instead he actually sounds authoritative. Not bossy.
Danny still frowns at him. "You're not the boss of me." He says, sinking back into his chair with a thumb bookmarking his page.
Dick gives him a look and makes a decisive noise, swaggling his head side to side while he does. "I'm pretty sure that for as long as we're here, me and B actually are the boss of you."
He's never really liked authority figures, not ones that tried to boss him around, that is. Danny doubles down, his lips curling into a shadow of a scowl. "Just because you're my brother in another world doesn't mean you can act like it."
"That's not what I mean and you know it."
"I don't want to go eat."
"It's not good for you to skip meals."
"Quit talking like Jazz."
"Danny."
Danny sinks his teeth into his lip and scowls darkly at him, shrinking into the back of his armchair in hopes that it'll swallow him whole. The idea of going into that large fucking dining room fills him with a dread that makes him completely forget his appetite.
"Your fucking- dining room is- it's too big." He grits out, finally closing his book and hugging it tightly to his chest.
Dick blinks at him. "What?"
"You heard me! It's too big. This whole place is too big. It's- what do you even do with this much space? I don't know how this- other me ever lived here."
Dick Grayson surprises him, and his expression softens. "Oh," he says, "I get it."
"You do?" The tension bleeds slowly out of Danny's shoulders
"Yeah, I felt the same way when I first moved in with Bruce. I lived with the circus for most of my life, but I slept in a trailer." He says. And he talks more.
The end result of their conversation ends with Dick Grayson offering to let Danny sit across or next to him during mealtimes, and that he can talk to him if he starts getting uneasy. But he can't keep skipping meals - it was making them all worried.
Danny agrees, and Dick takes him down to the kitchens for food.
"They look at me weirdly too." He grumbles as they leave the library, Danny's book returned to the shelf where it belonged. When Dick looks at him curiously, he scrunches his nose up. "The - your other siblings. They look at me like I'm- I'm someone else. S'weird."
"Isn't that a good thing?" Dick asks, "You are someone else."
Dany shrugs, staring at the ground with a heavy frown. "I don't know."
-
Danny seeks out Dick more after that. And vice versa. Dick reminds Danny of Jazz, and he latches onto the familiarity like a leech. If Dick is bothered by it, he doesn't show it, whether he's talking to his other world's self, to the Bruce's, or to one of the other Wayne kids.
Damian Wayne seems particularly keen to seek him out, Danny finds. He thinks it means that they're close in this world, and that Damian wants to see more of what a young Dick is like. That's what he would do, at least.
He takes up on Dick's offer of seating near him during dinner, and finds an open spot across from him. Unless he has something to show him, then he sits next to him.
("You can call me Jason." He tells him one day when they're in the Wayne's massive, fuck-off gym and they're both climbing over the jungle gym. Dick's showing him how to be more flexible. It's the most Danny's worked out ever, he likes the burn it gives him.
Dick looks at him in surprise, "Really?" he's doing a handstand on the bars and Danny's more than a little jealous at his balance.
"Yeah, dipshit," he says, rolling his eyes, "I'll even let you call me Jay, it's my nickname."
Dick happily takes him up on that offer, and much to Danny's embarrassment, starts calling him Jaybird. All because of his stupid Robin jacket.)
Danny has yet to meet his other self still, it's scaring him a little. Where was he? And matter of fact, how long until he could go back to his home dimension? The three of them hadn't gotten any updates since they arrived.
Speaking of, he was starting to talk to Bruce more, it was just... strange. Even stranger than talking to Dick. Bruce Wayne in another life would have been his adoptive father, Danny can't wrap his head around it for the life of him.
Whatever did Bruce Wayne see in Jason Todd that made him worth adopting? He's too afraid of the answer to ask. They start talking more after they run into each other late at night. Danny had been hit with a bout of insomnia and was going to the library.
He ran into Bruce on the way. He was just.. staring, out the window, with a faraway look in his eye. He didn't even look startled to see Danny standing there.
Danny asks him if he wants to go to the library with him. It was out of panic. He isn't expecting Bruce Wayne to agree, and they walk there in suffocating silence. Danny keeps looking at him from the corner of his eye.
("You're staring?" Bruce doesn't sound upset, Danny jumps anyway.
"Yeah, sorry." his voice sounds stilted, "it's just..." his jaw wires itself shut for a spell, "...you looked like you were about to disappear."
"Ah.")
When they reach the library, Danny leads Bruce Wayne into the science section and takes out books upon books about stars. He leads him over to the armchair and fire and they both sit down on the ground.
"When I lived in Gotham I would stargaze." Danny says, it's the first thing he can think of. Bruce Wayne looks at him quizzically. "Well, I would try to. The sky's too polluted for that. Mostly I would just watch the skyline and try and spot Batman and Robin, was the same thing."
That cracks a smile out of Bruce. It's a small one, barely there. "I hardly think the two are comparable."
Danny is still serious. "Not to me."
He goes on, talking about how after he was adopted he got his hands on every star book he could find. He loves english and he loves to read, but something about the stars drew him in like a song. He rambles about every star fact he knows with Bruce Wayne.
Bruce Wayne surprises him by telling him facts he didn't know. Danny soaks it up like a sponge, listening intently to him speak. And when they run out of star books to talk about, Danny tells Bruce that it was his turn to find something for them to talk about.
Bruce Wayne smiles again at him, a sly little thing like Danny's challenged him, and gets up. He comes back with a stack of film books, and they spend the next few hours going through them. Bruce Wayne rattles off every single movie fun fact he knows, and there is so much that he knows.
Danny is in awe, and moves to press against Bruce's side to see the stuff he points at in his books.
"You're smarter than people give you credit for." He says at some point, when his eyes hurt from being open for too long and his head leans against Bruce's arm for support. It follows with a jaw-cracking yawn that he tries and fails to stifle.
"Thank you, Danny." Bruce says, his voice soft and soothing and not helping with Danny's weighing exhaustion. His eyes drift, and then jerk open. "Do you want to go back to your room? You look tired, chum."
He bites back a smile at the nickname, and fails to keep it bitten. "No, no, I'm awake." He mumbles, shaking his head slowly. "I wanna hear-" he yawns again, "-hear you talking."
Danny swears he can hear the smile in Bruce's voice as he speaks; "Alright. Now, where was I?"
In the end, Danny falls asleep on the floor of the library next to Bruce Wayne. He doesn't even realize it until he wakes up the next morning. But it's not to worry, Bruce Wayne fell asleep too, an arm thrown around Danny protectively like he was his own kid.
This becomes a thing for them soon enough. When neither of them can sleep, they go to the library and talk and talk about whatever comes to mind.
There comes the dreaded night after they've finished whatever book they were looking at when Bruce, the little shit, turns to Danny and goes; "You never mentioned what happened after you hit Batman with a tire iron."
Danny groans, big and dramatic, burying his head in his arms, and ignores the low chuckle. "I thought he was gonna chase me down for sure." He complains, his voice muffled by his arms.
"Why did you hit him with a tire iron?"
The look Bruce gets is one of pure disbelief. "If Mothman suddenly showed up behind you while you were taking the wheels off his ride, you'd hit him too!"
"Last time I checked, Mothman isn't real." Bruce told him amusedly, and Danny flops over onto his back to stare him down. His arms sprawl out like a starfish, intentionally hitting Bruce in the shoulder.
"You don't know that, Batman's a cryptid and he's real."
Bruce roars with laughter, and Danny preens like a bird.
That next morning when Bruce passes by him for breakfast, he reaches over and ruffles his hair. It's the same thing he does for Dick every morning. It's the first of many, and it gets many stares from the surrounding family.
Bruce has a newspaper tucked under his arm, and when he sits down Danny stands up and skedaddles over to him, leaning over the side of his chair to peer at the paper.
"Any cryptids spotted, Buzz?" He asks, getting a startled laugh out of Bruce, who looks up at him.
"Buzz?"
"Well, yeah," and Danny states it as matter-of-fact. He gestures his head at Dick Grayson. "Dick calls you 'B', and B is for bees, and I can't just call you Bees, that's dumb. So; Buzz."
He grins triumphantly when Bruce laughs quietly, his shoulders shaking imperceptibly. "I know," he tilts his head up proudly, "I'm a genius."
Now he's actually laughing, dropping his head into one of his hands and trying to quiet himself as much as possible. Danny is positively beaming, ignoring the stares of the other Waynes as he flounces back to his seat just as the other Mister Wayne enters the room.
-
When Jason Daniel Fenton Todd meets Jason Todd for the first time, they both just stare at each other.
Danny recognizes himself immediately in the library, and he freezes up. His tongue ties to the roof of his mouth, and he's unsure of what to say.
He doesn't need to say anything at all, because when Jason Todd looks up and they lock eyes, they both just stare. And stare. Jason Todd is a large, hulk of a man, built like a brick shithouse, with a tired, traumatized look in his eyes and a white streak in his black curls. The same black curls that Danny himself has.
He has no idea what to say. Or if he should turn back around and leave.
Jason Todd sighs at him, "I know they told me you and another world's Bruce and Dickie were here," he says, but it sounds like he's talking to himself. Even moreso when he mutters half-heartedly, "-but I was hoping I wouldn't run into you."
Danny feels small next to him. He doesn't know why. "Sorry." He says lamely, his one foot skips back, "I can leave if you want." It's unlike him to be meek, he thinks. Not after years of Gotham living and dealing with the likes of Dash and his Jerk Jocks.
But this also isn't the streets, and this isn't other kids being dicks. Jason Todd shakes his head, and gestures with one large arm for Danny to come over. "You don't need to do that, you were coming to read, right?"
He nods, and tentatively makes his way over. When Jason looks at him, he sees him cast his eyes over his Robin jacket - he wears it everyday. Danny sees him narrow his eyes, just slightly. But he says nothing.
It's... a strange conversation. Interaction. Jason Todd doesn't talk to him much, and if he does it's stilted and awkward, like he doesn't know how to treat him. Like he's holding him at arm's length.
Jason's getting tired of being treated like a ghost.
They talk about their books. They compare lives. Jason Todd was picked up a few days after he stole the wheels of the batmobile. He wasn't an orphan, he lived with his mom and his stepdad before he lived with Bruce. They both like to read, only Danny has an interest in the stars.
("What do your adoptive parents do?" Jason Todd asks him, one arm slung over the back of the armchair, he looks relaxed. He looks tense. Danny feels like he's back in Crime Alley again.
"They're 'ectologists'." He says, making air quotes over the word. He rolls his eyes, "Ghost hunters. They study the dead and all things afterlife."
Jason Todd makes a dry laugh huff, a sarcastic half-smile on his face. He doesn't explain why he does, Danny doesn't ask why. It doesn't seem like his business.)
Danny wants to ask him where he got that white streak in his hair. It doesn't feel right. It feels like his parents' lab, and that isn't right. Nothing ever feels like his parents' lab.
Jason Todd leaves first after giving him a few book recommendations. Danny isn't sure how to rate the experience. Being in Jason Todd's presence was like standing in a liminal space. An empty parking lot at night. When he leaves it feels like much the same thing.
He struggles to read his books afterwards, unable to shake the feeling of being haunted.
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bluerosefox · 5 months
Text
Summoning the Summoner
Another summoning/long lost family au but with twist!
So Damian and his class are at Gotham museum for a small field trip for a school project. Thing is none of them knew until it was too late that the new museum curator was part of a cult that had plans to kidnap and sacrifice this class of kids for some ancient god/deity/spirit.
Damian barely manages to send a message to one of his brothers and to the cave before being knocked out when he sees his classmates dropping from knocknout gas.
When he wakes up the preparations for the sacrifice are almost ready. Damian being the most prominent person in the class is going to be the one chosen first. He is then taken to the alter and it begins after the whole villain speech. Damian does manage to get out of his bindings and tries to fight back, does lead them on a merry little chase to get more time for his family to come, nothing to Robiny though, but is forcibly restrained again.
Just as they bring Damian back to the alter none of them notice, or rather, care that Damian was bleeding from getting hit when they recaptured him. None of them notice when the blood dropped from his chin onto the summoning circle because the Batclan (any) just dropped into the room.
They did notice however when the summoning circle started glowing beneath them however.
And none of the cultists had time to finish the summoning chant.
Meaning the summoning circle was not under their control.
And before any of them could do anything, they are all ripped away from the Mortal Realm and everyone, Damian, his class, the cultists, and the Batfam in the room are pulled into the Infinite Realms.
They are no longer in the warehouse they were about to be sacrificed in but in a throne room. Surrounded by glowing floating people and some don't even look human.
And sitting on the throne was a teenager with a shoulder wrapped cape made of stars and galaxies, a crown of ice, stars, and aurora borealis lights shifting in between them, about Damian's age, with white hair and glowing green eyes who looked rather shocked.
The reason? Both him and Damian shared the same face.
-x-x-
Danny was annoyed as heck.
Ever since his crowning it was like every magic user from legendary to mediocre got a notice that a new Infinite Realms King had been crowned and that gave them the go ahead and try to freaking Summon him!
Luckily refusing a summons was well within Danny's Ghost King rights, he's King now he does what he wants (Sam's wise words), and the only summonings Danny answered were his friends and family (Dani is such a troll with it though, butttttt it does get him out of those annoying meetings sometimes and they get to hang out wherever she decided to stop at), sometimes he'd answer the odd teenage morons just to scare them (it's always fun)
Although there were a few summonings outside of that, that he had answered. Thankfully he could sense what kind of summoner was summoning him and intent was always a huge thing. And those that didn't feel like insane fruitloops well... Danny's curiosity often took over.
So imagine his annoyance when he felt another summon happening in the middle of a meeting with his council. But also imagine his surprise when the normally tight demands on the summoning wasn't there...
That meant...
Oh Danny was going to have a lot of fun with this.
This meant they summoning but don't have control on which way the summoning was going to go. Meaning, Danny could reverse summon them to him instead.
With a wide grin he instantly waved his hand and the meeting room shifted to his throne room, might as well pull out all the stops and play the "Big Bag Ghost King"
He could see his council (and good friends and allies) raise their eyebrows at him or tilt their heads but could also sense the attempted summonings power of him and knew he had something planned.
With a short laugh, Danny raised his hand, grasped on the invisible summoning line, and pulled.
Now he was expecting a good amount of people, the summoning felt large so that normally meant cultists but he was expecting so many! Heck some looked to be teenagers his age, and a few oddly dressed people besides the cultists! Oh boy did that mean sacrifices?! Well he'll be happy to put those cultists in their place if that was the case.
But first, find the summoner. Separate them from the group and -
Oh... why... why does he have Danny's face?!
Danny took a quick look at the normally invisible to everyone but him Summoning line and almost choked when he saw it was a sibling line, a blood sibling line.
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shdysders · 3 months
Text
mistake
pairing: tara carpenter & female reader
summary: in which tara makes a mistake she can't undo
word count: 3.4k
warnings: violence, blood, stabbing, blood & death.
author’s note: feel like my writing is deteriorating, so sorry this might not be the greatest.
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When you heard that Mindy and Ethan had been separated from the rest of the group, you immediately knew nothing was going to go according to the plan.
Everything had happened so fast. First accusation news about Sam had streamed on television, then Quinn's bloody corpse had fallen on top of you, then Anika wasn't able to make it across the latter, her bloody hands and Ghostface's shaking had made her slip. You had lost two of your friends in less than fifteen minutes.
You hadn't heard of the killings in Woodsboro until you had met Tara the first day of junior year, but she made sure to tell you everything that had happened the closer the two of you got.
Based on everything you had heard, you understood why Sam was so protective over Tara, the Carpenter sisters had been through more than normal people have in a lifetime.
However, even though you were nothing but nice and understanding towards Sam, she didn't seem to like you.
The first time Tara had brought you home to the apartment, Sam had kept a burning gaze on you for the whole time, like she wanted to burn you alive.
You thought that she would warm up and eventually trust you like she seemed to do with Anika, Quinn and Ethan, but she never did.
And it only got worse once Tara had called you her girlfriend in front of her, a huge disagreement broke out, so big that Sam had sent you out of the apartment.
You never got to know what Sam had said after that, but you did know that the glares you got from Sam only worsened and so did the small comments she would make about you when she thought you didn't hear.
Such as now, when Sam and Tara were walking in front of you, the theater being the destination. You had this gut feeling that Sam was currently talking about you. You just knew she was, even tho you couldn't hear her voice nor did you see her head moving like it normally did when she spoke, you knew.
But your mind changed thoughts when she rapidly turned on her heel, stopping when she was in front of Danny who had been walking closely behind you, alongside Kirby.
"Not you." She said, her voice cracking.
"What?" He answered almost immediately, like he had been expecting it.
"Don't trust anyone remember?" Sam replied.
You watched the scene with worried eyes, what Sam said reminded you way too much of something she had told Tara when she thought you weren't near. "We don't know you.. not really."
His face expression looked hurt, almost taken aback when Sam spoke. "You know me."
"You're not Woodsboro." She spoke quickly, rage lacing her voice.
Tara looked down at her shoes after that was said, her lips finding a home between her teeth. You knew she was scared, because you were as well. You had no idea how things were going to go down, you had never experienced something as brutal like this before.
You were seconds away from putting a comforting hand on her shoulder, before she looked up at you with tears pricking her eyes.
"That goes for you too." She swallows thickly, trying her hardest to look into your eyes.
You furrowed your eyebrows, panic rising through you. "W-what?" Your voice came out as a stutter, not believing what she had just made it's way out of her mouth.
Tara just nodded unsurely, her eyes looked sad and were filled with doubt. You couldn't understand why. If she was sad about it, why would she say it?
"Tara I- you can't be serious." You spoke again, voice growing shakier by the minute.
She knew very well how terrified you were about the situation as it was, and yet she still chose to leave you out of the plan alongside Sam's unknown fuck buddy? If it didn't make you shake out of fear you would've been infuriated.
"You're not Woodsboro." She stated, same thing as her sister but in a different tone, she'd tried to sound calm, but her voice was filled with uncertainty, shaky with worry.
You knew she was right. You weren't Woodsboro. You had never been to the place nor did you knew it existed before Tara came along. But the fact that she didn't trust you enough to know for certain that you weren't Ghostface, made you feel the need to fall apart. Did she really think you would kill your friends? Let alone hurt them?
The thought made your eyes sting, and before you had the chance to wipe the tears away, they fell.
"Tara please I promise I-" You felt embarrassed, being so vulnerable over basically nothing.
All eyes were on you as you tried to keep the tears from falling, you felt ridiculous. But you were terrified.
You couldn't stand the thought of being left alone in this situation. Not only because you were scared of being alone, but also because you had to protect Tara.
Although you knew Sam would do a perfectly fine job of keeping her safe, but you wanted to do it, you had to. You wanted to prove to Sam that you loved Tara almost the same amount as she did, you wanted to prove to Tara she could trust you with her life.
You could see that Tara wanted to give in, tell you that you could come along and that she trusted you with her whole being. Her eyes were filled with regret and doubt. But you could tell that she wasn't going to change her mind anytime soon.
She just watched you, biting her lips hard enough to draw blood. Seeing the look on your face just made her want to squeeze you in a hug hard enough to make you faint.
You looked so scared, and the fact that she knew how scared you were about the whole situation, made everything worse. She had noticed the terrified look on your face that hadn't left since the attack at the apartment, your trembling hands and the layer of tears in your eyes that never fell.
Tara actually thought that you looked more scared than both Sam and her combined.
"Y/n please just stay here." She tried to reason, as if she wanted this. But she did want it. She wanted you to be safe.
You wanted to argue, tell her that you would refuse to come along. But you knew that you wouldn't get anywhere with it, Tara was stubborn, she always got what she wanted somehow. And you didn't want Sam to see you argue with Tara, that certainly wouldn't help you get on better terms with her.
So you gave in, even though you knew Tara's life was at stake. Sam will take care of her, you tried to tell yourself.
You quickly wiped the tears on your cheeks with your hand, even though everybody had already seen them.
Tara's eyes never left your figure as she watched your trembling hands. "Fine." You almost spit, voice cracking with worry.
Tara nodded at that, happy to hear you give in. You didn't pay attention to anybody's reaction other than hers, they didn't seem to matter.
She walked closer to you, placing a kiss on your faintly tear stained cheek. "Be safe." She said, as if she wasn't the one that was about to walk into a situation that she would either leave traumatized or not leave at all.
"Be safe." You repeated, before you watched them all walk away towards the building.
Seeing as Sam turned her head to Tara and whispered 'good call', as they walked away.
But when you turned around to try and make a decent conversation with Danny, he was nowhere in sight. Making even more worry creep in your bones.
***
You had been pacing around in the same place and pattern for 20 minutes without any progress, Danny was gone, and your phone was dead.
The streets where dead and empty.
You had half a mind to just run to the theaters and do the exact opposite of what Tara had instructed you to. But you knew well enough that both of the Carpenter sisters would quite literally murder you if you stepped a foot into their plan.
But eventually the worry and stress got to you, like it always did. You didn't care if you were going to get murdered whether if it were by Tara or Ghostface, if it was for protecting Tara, it was a good reason.
However, before you had the chance to change your mind or consider the other options, a glove-covered hand landed on your face, covering your mouth tightly.
The yelp and screams you tried to make was inaudible, nobody could hear them.
You felt a surge of fear and panic, unable to hear your own scream. The street grew eerily silent as you struggled to break free, your heart pounding in your chest. Rush of intense vulnerability and confusion, as you desperately searched for a way to escape the grasp of the unknown assailant.
But you knew who it was. It was Ghostface.
You tried to kick them with your legs, but none of them seemed to hit. The person was holding a strong grip on your mouth, and the other arm was firmly placed around your waist. You were unable to move out of any of the grips, the person was too strong. And you weren't.
Your panic was making it harder to breath, and you were beginning to feel as if you were about to faint any second.
You tried your best to remove the grip with your hands, gripping hardly on the muscular arms, trying so hard to get them away from you.
The tightened arms had veins all over them, yet another reminder that it was impossible for you to get away.
It was Danny, you tried to tell yourself over the ringing in your ears. It had to be Danny. He had left the second you were alone with him. It had to be him.
Muffled screams and ringing ears were the only noises you could make out. If the person behind you was speaking in a voice changer to you or not, you had no idea.
The panic you felt was replaced with relief when the thought of using your elbow to hit the individual behind you entered your mind.
But you never got the chance to do that.
Seconds before your elbow was about to meet the Ghostface mask, you felt a sharp pain in your lower abdomen.
All of the movements you were making stopped the second you realized what it was.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Six.
Seven.
Seven times you could feel the sharp piece of metal enter and exit your abdomen. A gasp escaped your mouth after every single one of them.
You tried to scream, but nobody was around. Your wide eyes scanned through the street, yet again seeing that nobody was there. It was all empty.
Normally the streets of New York would be filled with drunk teenagers and late night workers, whether it was night or afternoon.
But when the news about the killers got out, everybody stayed inside. Some people didn't even bother to leave for work, and of course no parties. Even the homeless people seemed to have found another place to stay at.
You didn't realize that numbness was spreading through your legs until the potential male had slowly began to loosen the grip he had on your figure.
Before you had time to think, he had completely let go.
Suddenly you felt dizzy, you couldn't feel your feet, you couldn't feel your legs, you couldn't feel anything.
You could barely feel your legs giving up, nor did you feel your body hitting the ground as you tried to cover up the damage that had been made on your lower stomach.
Regardless the sharp pain in your body that almost made it impossible to breathe and the dizziness that got worse every time you moved, you tried to crawl towards the fence that was just centimeters away.
Your hands bloody from trying to add pressure to your wounds made trails on the asphalt.
You couldn’t tell if you had placed your hands on the right place, considering that the stab wounds were all over the place. And you didn't even dare to look down, because you could guarantee that it wouldn't be a pleasant sight.
Your eyes were starting to close by themselves and you were struggling to keep them open.
Everything hurt.
The pressure you were putting on the wounds was now becoming lighter, your hands didn't seem to have any strength left in them.
Tara would be here soon, you thought, desperately.
She would be here soon, everything would be okay; no more Ghostface attacks, no more Sam hating you, and no more unexpected death cases of your friends.
Your mind focused on Tara.
Her brown hair, her beautiful brown eyes, her dimples and her breathtaking smile. Her voice, her touch, and her joyful laugh.
Your eyes closed, and this time you couldn't stop them. The pressure on your wounds was no longer existent. The color in you was gone. You were gone.
Last thought being the girl you wanted to marry.
***
Tara left the building with a lump in her stomach, as big as a bowling ball.
Her body was filled with worry and guilt, but a part of her felt relief. She was relieved that everything was over now. No more Ghostfaces. She was done with them, truly.
Tara couldn't wait to see you. She was going to tell you that the decision she made was right, that she was happy you stayed behind, because you stayed safe.
But when Danny had walked into the theater, tackling all kinds of officer in his way, he was all alone. You weren't there, you didn't come with him.
Danny told them that the two of you had lost sight of each other rather quickly after they'd left, that you probably just needed to be alone and breathe for a moment.
Tara knew that you would be upset with her, for not allowing you to come with them, for not letting you protect her, like you always told her you would, even if it meant dying.
Although she had hoped for you to at least come to see if she made it out alive.
Danny had called the cops and ambulance to arrive at the place as soon as he got the chance. That's why the only thing in Tara's sight was ambulances, police cars and the fire department.
Chad had miraculously made it out alive, same with Mindy and Kirby. And even though that made Tara want to cry out in happy tears, she couldn't let herself feel anything until she had seen you.
Safe and secure. Like you should've been.
Panic began to rise within Tara as minutes passed without any sight of you.
Sam stood beside her, trying to sooth her younger sister with comforting words. But they didn't make anything better for her.
After the whole showdown, the two Carpenter sister's had talked, really talked.
Sam had tried to explain to Tara that she didn't actually hate you, the opposite really. She thought you were lovely and a perfect match for Tara. But she didn't want to take any risks.
She wanted to show you the walls to her trust weren't easy to break. And then she thought that if she acted rude towards you, you would eventually leave; meaning there was no need for Sam to let her guard down and open up to people she didn't know.
But Sam knew how much Tara loved you, she had been listening to her sister's rambling about you everyday.
That's why Sam could feel her heart sinking down her entire being when her eyes met with a stretcher where a body was placed, a morgue sheet on top of it, which was filled with blood.
Sam prayed that it was somebody else. That you had walked somewhere else to breathe just like Danny had assumed.
She felt the need to distract Tara before she had the chance to see it, but it was too late.
She had already seen it.
Tara screamed out your name in a sob, straight away assuming that you were the person underneath the white cover.
The woman who had been pushing the stretcher had stopped, turning around to try and give the man behind her any sort of information about the deceased individual.
Tara's legs moved faster than she could process, Sam following shortly after.
Heart pounding, hands trembling. With a swift of motion, she grabbed the edge of the wrap and pulled it upward, revealing your pale and peaceful face.
The vibrant hues that once painted your face were now gone, leaving behind a pale and ghostly visage. The colors had been drained from you, you no longer looked like yourself.
Tara could feel herself gasp loudly at the sight, turning around with a hand placed on her mouth.
A surge of sickness overwhelmed her. A gut-wrenching sensation, as if her stomach was about to revolt. She felt like she was on the verge of throwing up, basically feeling the acidic liquids rise within her.
It was you. Her girl. Dead. Gone.
Sam had the same reaction to the sight, gasping and putting her hand on her mouth, preventing from letting out any tears or sounds. Chills running down her spine.
Stop it. Pull it together. Tara. Tara needs you. Sam told herself.
Gaze shifting from your body and the bloody sheet upon you to her younger sister, who was sobbing beside her, about to fall down to her knees.
But when Sam put a hand on Tara's shoulder, she stood straighter. "No!" She shot up, voice raspy.
She looked at you again, but this time not caring for the feeling inside of her throat that threatened her. "She's not dead." Tara spoke again, trying to convince herself that you were alive, that she could save you.
"Tara-" Sam tried, but Tara had no interest in listening to her sister.
"Y/n. Baby, look at me." Tara gently brushed her fingertips against your cheeks, but quickly pulled away when she felt the chill that pierced through her body, for they were once a source of warmth and comfort, now distant and cold.
You were always warm.
The tears streamed down Tara's face, leaving even more mascara smudges on her cheeks, falling and leaving marks on her blue shirt. The shirt that you had gotten her.
"Sam, Come on! help me please" She begged for her big sister's help, still hoping that you could be saved.
At that sentence, the woman who had pushed you turned around, she seemed to have heard Tara's pleads and begs, filled with hope, wishing that you were alive. "Oh honey, this girl has been deceased for over an hour...we can't save her."
The woman spoke apologetically and looked at Tara with sorrowed eyes. "I'm so sorry." She ended. Tara was about to scream at the lady, yell at her and tell them to at least try, you weren't gone. There was no way.
But before Tara got the chance to argue, Sam had pulled her into her chest, embracing Tara with a hug. And at that, Tara broke.
The sobs left her mouth faster than she could take them in, she didn't have any space to breathe.
"She's gone." She cried, her tears staining the older woman's shirt. "And I wasn't there to help her." Tara rambled, talking rapidly before the next sob would escape.
Sam didn't know what to say. She just stroke her younger sister's hair, trying to soothe her sobs.
She had never seen Tara this vulnerable and emotionally ruined, not even when she had reunited with Tara at the hospital the previous year.
Tara's body shook violently as each sob left her mouth.
It was a mistake. It was all a mistake.
Tara had been so confident with her decision only minutes before. She thought she had made the right move.
But it turned out to be the biggest mistake of her life.
A mistake she couldn't take back, and had to live with for the rest of her time alive.
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Text
DP x DC AU
Danny's gonna adopt all the Halfas in Gotham whether he wants to or not, and it's gonna start with the little dead girl he found after crawling out of that portal in the league base.
Pt 2 here. My Au Art
...........................
There's a dead little girl sitting on the rug in front of Danny's coffee table curiously eating Cheetos.
Well, she's not all the way dead, only half, could even be a little less then that, Danny would know he's sort of the leading expert on being half dead.
Her skins blue, like comic book mystique blue, vibrant and impossible to miss. Shes got these big black eyes and a nasty split going straight through her upper lip to just under her right eye.
She's also missing her nose, it's just gone, no cartilage left over just the gaping nasal cavity like skulls have.
The little girl looks dead, she is dead, or she's at least as dead as Danny is which is almost exclusively in name only.
Her name is Curaré, Danny only knows it because it's been branded into the skin of the little girls neck, just under the curve of her bald skull.
Curaré is terribly thin, the little toddler sized T-shirt she has on hangs loose around her torso where baby fat should fill it out.
She's horrible to look at, a tiny nightmare, her corpse like coloring doing nothing to mitigate the appearance.
Curaré was neither a healthy nor normal little girl, there was no way Danny could have left that league facility without her.
Oh and she almost exclusively spoke in Spanish which made finding her dinner hard.
Not that Cheetos are really dinner, little kids need to eat more then that Danny was pretty sure, like 89% sure. Although they did have a lot of calories...
Danny tilts his head absently as he looks at her, the little demon being illuminated red and green by the glow of the TV. She's enraptured by the Scooby doo rerun Gotham's only spanish language channel is playing tonight.
As if she can feel his eyes she turns to him and tilts her head the same way.
Danny blinks at her, Curaré blinks back.
" Uh- " Danny starts, trying to remember anything from his Spanish elective from sophomore year. God, his teacher had been right he had needed to study more. " The Cheetos, you like them? They're uh...bueno? Oh! Son Buenos?"
He points his finger down at the snack sized bag in her grasp, her fingers are tiny , they must be so fragile, looking at the desperate grasp they have on the bag makes Danny's chest hurt. How could anyone be so small? Had Danny ever been that small?
Curaré blinks again, long and slow, processing Danny's words. She looks down at her Cheetos and back up at Danny then she carefully holds the bag out to him.
" Oh no that's ok they're for you kiddo" Danny insists.
Curaré shakes the bag at him, like enticing a stray cat with treats but he only shakes his head again.
She gives up after that, shrugging and turning back to her cartoons.
Inside her chest Danny can feel her ghost core vibrate placidly as Scooby and Shaggy run across the TV in a panic.
Danny's own core can't help but try to match it's frequency, a low contented humming echoes between them, safe it seems to say.
Curaré can't be older then 4, which means she was resurrected young and that she died even younger. Danny doesn't know how any of it happened, halfas aren't created easily, the amount of energy needed...
She's so small.
He hopes it was fast, whatever it was that did this to her, made her like him.
Danny also hopes that her injuries aren't permanent. Some ghosts keep the carnage of their corpses well into the after life but as a Halfa Curaré should heal, even if she got those injuries during her ressurction. For her sake it'll be much easier to find some sense of normalcy if she isn't always actively bleeding, even if the blood itself is just an ecto-echo of real blood.
Danny curls his knees up to his chest and hides his face for a moment just trying to breathe. He's too young to be taking care of a toddler, he's still six months away from turning 18 and hes got school on Monday. His eyes burn and his throat constricts as he tries to swallow.
No one else but Danny would know how to take care of Curaré, and she's got no family to try and stumble their way through it. Danny can't take her back to the league and he sure as hell isn't going to search for whoever put that brand on her neck.
Even if he dropped her off at the fire station Gotham only has one Meta focused orphanage, it's state run and all the kids in it have to wear little prison style jump suits. And the food sucks, Danny can personally vouch for that.
She doesn't have a home, she's just as out of place here in Gotham as Danny is. Danny really wishes, not for the first time, that he had an adult here. Like Jazz or hell even Mr. Fuckin Lancer.
Just anyone. Anyone who could tell Danny what to do about this. Who could help him out with the child he's suddenly acquired.
He wishes anyone else was here so it wouldn't just be him and Curaré. Two dead kids sitting on the floor of a studio apartment in the Bowery watching cartoons.
What a pair the two of them will make, oh God. Danny laughs as a few tears stain his jeans.
Curaré makes a curious little noise that has Danny forcing his head up. She's reached the inevitable end of her snack sized bag and she looks absolutely devastated. She turns to look at him, tilting the empty bag towards him as if to say ' can you believe this shit!'
Danny can't help but give her a watery smile, no more crying Fenton, and wipes his nose on the back of his hand.
" Okay, one thing at a time." Danny tells himself. " You finished your Cheetos and now it's time for dinner, right? Stop me if I'm wrong."
Curaré just looks at him.
Danny's not worried, they're gonna have all the time in the world to teach her to appreciate humour and also English.
" I'm going to take that as a yes. " Danny hops up off the floor and goes to find his phone, nobody does dinner like the local Batburger.
Little foot steps follow him into the hallway, he'll have to get used to that sound he's going to be hearing it a lot.
Food first, everything would be better after they ate.
...............
For BG I imagine he's been living in Gotham for a few months and found Curaré while popping in and out of different portals in Gotham. (Who woulda guessed that some portal in Gotham leads right to the lazarus pit)
Note: if u wanna see cool art for this AU it's all in the Danny and the little dead girl au tag on my pg!
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clockwayswrites · 1 month
Text
City Pigeons Part 12 CW: blood, past trauma and experimentation
Jason could almost go to sleep. He wouldn’t, not when he was the only Bat in the apartment, but it would be so easy to. Danny made a really good weighted blanket.
It seemed once the kid got over touching someone, he basically became a koala. Cass and Danny had spent the morning wrapped around each other on the couch. Cass was playing one of her weird clicking games and Danny, blue bear in his lap, was scrolling through articles on the tablet that Tim had brought him the other day.
Now, though, Cass was out on a snack run and Danny had slowly slumped over until he was laying across Jason. It wasn’t minded. Jason could admit he still had some trouble with touch himself, but it was easy to be there for Danny like this.
The problem was, Jason needed to get back to Crime Alley for at least a few nights. He was already past when Red Hood should have made an appearance. It he didn’t go back soon, rumors were going to start that he was dead. Again.
Jason waited for Danny to start searching for a new article to read to ask, “Are you alright with meeting someone soon?”
He didn’t expect Danny to tense like he did.
“Robin?”
“No, Dandelion,” Jason said, stroking Danny’s white hair. “N talked with Robin and he knows not to stop by like that without warning. We’ll have him over when you’re comfortable but not before.”
“Okay. Sorry. I don’t mean to…”
“None of that. He freaked you out,” Jason said. “I know he didn’t mean to, and from our guess it’s not his fault how he feels like to you, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t. It’s okay to set boundaries.”
“He… doesn’t feel weird to you?”
Jason sighed. “No. I guess I don’t sense it. I didn’t know you had died until you told me.”
“Oh.” Danny’s voice was small and quiet.
“But I knew that I had died— the others know it’s too,” Jason was quick to add. “It’s alright that you died. No one will think differently of you.”
“They might. It’s… you’re different than me, I guess.”
“I don’t know, because I don’t know what happened to you, but I actually hope so. The way I came back wasn’t pleasant.” Jason had to take a breath before he continued. “I was murdered by a rogue in town called the Joker. I woke up… we’re still not sure when exactly, but somewhere about half a year later. I didn’t have any of my memories, but I still had most of my injuries.
“I was picked up by some people you might hear us refer to— the League of Assassins. They put me back together about a year after my death by tossing me in something called the Lazarus Pits. Those things come with a price though, one that I’m still paying. Coming back was… hard, in a lot of ways.”
“Oh,” Danny said. He clung a little to Jason’s shirt, like he wanted to make sure Jason was still there. It was a feeling Jason understood all too well. “I, um, don’t think I’ve ever stayed really dead for more than a minute or two. At least not like… not like you were.”
Jason rested his hand on Danny’s back, feeling him breath. Feeling him… feeling him not breathe.
“…Danny?”
Danny clung tighter to Jason’s shirt. “Go ahead, ask.”
“Are you… somewhat dead right now?”
“Yes.”
Just one word. A simple answer.
“Okay. That’s— okay. I’m glad there’s a reason that you’re not breathing,” Jason said and pressed a kiss to the top of Danny’s head as he tried to calm his own pounding heart.
“I think B.B. knows. I usually… it’s habit to breath but sometimes I forget and—”
“She’s good at noticing things.” Jason would have to talk with her. “But that goes to what I said, right? None of the others will thinking of you differently.”
“Even if…”
“Even if anything.”
Danny sat up and Jason resisted the urge to reach for him. It took him a moment longer to release Jason’s shirt. Jason sat up slowly and waited for Danny to get the words out he was obviously working on.
“Can I show you?”
“Course.” Jason braced himself for anything.
“It might be bright, close your eyes.”
The flash still shown through Jason’s eyelids.
“Oh.” Danny’s voice wavered horribly. “I didn’t think of that.”
“Danny?” Jason was reaching forward even as he opened his eyes.
It was good he did.
He had to catch Danny as he wavered dangerously. Danny’s who hair was black. Who’s eyes were blue. Who looked all the more like Bruce’s son. Who was bleeding red.
-
“Jesus and Mother Mary,” Dick cursed, resting his forehead against his wrist’s.
Cass came over and peeled the bloody gloves off for him. “Breathe.”
“I am breathing,” Dick wheezed.
“Badly.”
Jason barked out a laugh at that. It was unstable in a way that reminded the room of worse days.
The door banged open and they all jolted, everyone but Cass, who was better than that, and Danny who was still out cold.
“Shit, fuck, sorry,” Tim rambled. “Is he stable?”
“Yes,” Cass answered. Her voice was calm, but but Duke could see the way that she fidgeted. For anyone else it wouldn’t be called fidgeting, but the way that she untied and retied and untied the trash bag in his visions told Dick otherwise.
Cass was as worried as the rest of them.
“Signal?” Tim asked. He came into the room, tablet already pulled up to record everything.
“Hard for me to say,” Duke said with a little shrug. He wished he could say, but he was still trying to understand what he was seeing. “The guy is… he’s like no one I’ve ever seen before. But I think he’s getting stronger.”
“That’s— holy fuck.” Tim paused as he finally got a look at Danny.
“Really looks like the old man like this, doesn’t he?” Jason asked. He was trying to hide how his hands were trembling by keeping his arms crossed. Everyone in the room let him pretend.
Duke sure wouldn’t have wanted to be the one Danny collapsed on like that. It was bad enough being the third one there as he swung over from his patrol. The cuts had still been appearing on Danny’s skin, ripping him apart like he was nothing.
He didn’t look much better all bandaged up.
“I think the cuts were ones he must have sustained before changing forms before he even met us,” Duke reasoned. “They… felt old.”
Dick rubbed at his face. “So the whole time they were there just waiting to bleed?”
Jason laughed again. “Waiting for him to be alive again.”
Slowly, Dick dropped his hands and looked up at Jason. “Jay?”
Okay, so they were at the point of forgetting cape-names now. That was a great sign.
Confusingly, Jason looked to Cass, who actually fidgeted.
“He doesn’t breathe. He does, not always. His heart beats, not always. It is like he…,” she twisted her hand as if trying to grab onto the right word. “Like he relaxes and forgets.”
Well that was weird. Dick nodded to the monitor that he had helped hook up. “He’s breathing right now and the monitor says his heartbeat is hella slow, but steady.”
“This is his alive form, I think. More alive form,” Jason said with a shrug. “His other form is his more dead form. He said he’s never stayed ‘really dead’ like I was. I think ‘really’ was the important word in that. He stressed it like it was… a technically or some shit.”
“Or a loophole,” Tim said. He was watching Danny with his head tilted just slightly to the right.
It was a pose that had Duke straightening up in attention. “What do you see that I can’t?”
Tim glanced at him and then back down at Danny. “The scars don’t match.”
“Ti—Red, please just say it,” Dick pleaded, exhaustion hanging on his words.
“Sorry, I was. I mean, the scars he has now don’t exactly match the scars he had in his— what are we calling it? Dead form?”
Jason flinched.
Dick’s eyes flicked from Jason to Tim. “Let’s go with… ghost. Undead, you know?”
Tim continued on valiantly. “His scars don’t match with what he had in his ghost form. There are a few like around his neck that I think are one-to-one and a lot of them are in the same place from what I can see and might be the same? I’d have to take photos and compare. But… he has more in this living form, I’m sure of it.”
“Okay, right, so that’s a thing,” Jason said. He slid down the wall he was leaning against until he was squatting. He hung his head between his knee and wrapped his hands around the back of his neck.
Duke could see Jason passing out with enough probability that he slipped out of the room to grab some sour candy for Jason and an icepack for the back of his neck. Being honest with himself, Duke could use the moment out of the room. It was a lot to deal with.
Man, someone would have to do something about the bloody couch too… Dick sighed and took the time to send a message to Babs about it as well as an update. Knowing her she had a list of all the furniture in all the safe houses and could get a slipcover ordered on same day delivery. At least he hoped so. Everyone was taking this pretty hard and they didn’t need the reminder.
Duke figured the bad reaction was pretty fair though, they had thought that Danny was getting better and now his healing was going to be set back. Dick would be guilty because he hadn’t been here, Jason going through his issues about kids and violence and death, and Cass already counted Danny as family. She was never good when family was hurt. It was even worse that Danny should have been safe, he was under their watch.
Duke set the pack of candy and ice pack down next to Jason’s foot, close enough that he should be able to feel the cold, and backed up to his corner. It was best not to touch right then. He wasn’t afraid of Jason ever hurting him purposefully, but he was also very aware for Jason it might not always be purposeful.
Cass joined him, leaning against his side, and Duke wrapped an arm around her. Tim was tapping away on his tablet, mostly muttering to himself, but Dick had gotten up to peer over his shoulder.
Jason tore open the packet of candies and popped one in his mouth.
They’d be okay.
It would take work, but they were Bats. They were stubborn.
Dukes wrist buzzed. The tracking number for slipcover flashed across his hud. It would be there by 9 pm.
They’d be okay.
-
Everything hurt. Everything ached all the way down through his skin and muscled and bones. His breath caught in his chest, ragged and frayed like his lungs were full of shattered glass.
He tried not to make a noise.
He tried to stay quiet.
They would notice him if he made a noise. He couldn’t take any more attention. He didn’t think he’d survive more attention. God, that thought was almost enough to kill him. Once he would have done anything for his parents attention and now—
There was a hand in his hair. It was gentle.
Oh, he was crying.
“…going to be okay. We have you, Dandelion, and we’re not letting them touch you ever again. The two Reds will make sure it can never happen again. Once you’re better they’ll take a little road trip.”
That was… that wasn’t… a sob broke through Danny’s lips and he didn’t stop it. He didn’t even try.
He wasn’t there.
He could make noises.
He was safe.
“Danny? Hey, are you awake.”
Danny nodded as much as he could manage.
“Hey there,” Nightwing said, voice so kind that it just made Danny cry harder. “Can you open your eyes for me?”
Danny shook his head.
“Okay, that’s okay, thank you for answering me Danny. How’s the pain? Um, squeeze my hand once if it’s okay, twice if it’s really bad.”
Danny squeezed it three times.
“Really, really bad, huh? Okay. Okay… we can give you some pain meds through your IV. We have you on a saline drip because you looked really bad. We didn’t want to give you any meds without your consent though. Are you alright with some pain medication? Once for yes, twice for no.”
One squeeze.
“Okay, let me go—”
Danny clung to Nightwing’s hand a tightly at he could. His breath stuttered around the glass.
“Not leaving, Dandelion. I’m going to text Red Robin, okay? He’s in the living room. Hood and B.B are out… running an errand. They’ll be back soon. I’ll text Red and he’ll bring the pain meds.”
Danny nodded. Nightwing shifted around, but didn’t let go of Danny’s hand. The breathing calmed, got easier. Danny let out a slow breath.
“Hey Danny,” a new voice said. “The medication will make you feel fuzzy and maybe disoriented. You’ll probably sleep a lot. We don’t want you to wake up panicked. Is there anything we can do to help you know you’re here with us and safe?”
“Bear,” Danny croaked. He wet his lips and tried to continue. “Smells that aren’t… Touch. Warmth.”
“Red will get your teddy bear as soon as the meds are hooked up and we’ll work on the other things. One of us will always be here with you,” Nightwing said.
Danny squeezed his hand again.
“Okay. We won’t leave you alone, Danny, we’ll keep you safe. You’ll be okay.”
Danny trusted that.
It was surprising.
He didn’t think he could trust anymore, but Danny trusted that, trusted them.
The warmth of that thought followed him back into the black.
---
AN: This all Danny's fault, not mine! He decided to reveal his form early and then... welp.....
...Stay delightful, darlings?
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dcxdpdabbles · 10 months
Text
The Royal Consort. Part 3
"Mr. Fenton! Will you be attending the Wayne Charity Gala with your husband?" A reporter demands, thrusting her mic into Danny's face.
"I-" He tries to say, but another reporter jumps in.
"Is it true Bruce Wayne is attempting to have his kids seduce your husband?"
"What?"
"Mr. Fenton, is it true that you could stop a war simply by batting your eyelashes?!"
"Hey, now that's uncalled for."
"What is the political climate in the wake of the disbanded Anti-Ecto Acts?"
Danny couldn't even tell where the questions were coming from. He tried to push through the crowd of new crews, but every step of the way, more and more people crowded him.
He should've stayed in the hotel room Mr. Wayne had rented for his family, but Danny had thought he could sneak out and explore Gotham.
After Dani had burst into the meeting room, in all her ghostly glory, the Justice League had allowed them a short recess so his parents could meet their "granddaughter."
He is still determining exactly what she told them, as he is too busy to dodge more of Batman's questions. He just hoped she could keep the ruse up in the face of his parents' smothering apologies.
His dad wrapped her up I'm his arms, sobbing the whole time while his mother was snapping pictures of Dani, crying about how much she had grown.
Thank the stars Jazz had pulled her "niece" to the side for a short conversation. When they came back, Dani had taken the princess role so well that she answered most of the Ghost Zone questions like the ambassador she was pretending to be.
Her age? Yeah, that was off cause the time zone difference in the Ghost Zone. She was only four years in human years but looked sixteen due to her half-blood and where she grew up.
The chances of war? No, her dad had appeased the war council after the United Nations called the USA on their bullshit.
Demands Phantom had? Respect the dead. Honor the rights of his people. Leave the natural portals alone, and if his subjects were causing issues call one of his to take care of it.
Did she not need an anchor? She's half-human, so she could pop between worlds at will, but only because the Ghost King allowed it.
Where had she been before Phantom took the throne? Danny was not in a stage of life to raise a child- he had only been fifteen!- so Phantom raised her in his lair. Yes, she came to visit Danny.
Did she practically say she was a child of separated parents? Yes. Did she regret it? Only when rumors about Phantom wanting to replace Danny sprung, and she had people trying to get her to introduce them to his "father."
How strong was she? Step into the ring, Wonder Woman; let's test it. (They did spar, and surprisingly, she gave Wonder Woman a run for her money, but in the end, the more experienced fighter won. The Amazonian offered to train her)
By the end of it, Danny and Dani left with stacks of possible legislation about peace among their people. They both promised to get it to Phantom.
Just as they left, Batman informed them that Bruce Wayne had invited them to the Gala. He also offered them asylum in Gotham by housing them in his family manor until the media died.
Danny had almost accepted, but Jazz had stepped in with sharp eyes and a cold smile. "Please tell Mr. Wayne we are honored by the offer, but we would prefer our own space."
Batman grunted. "Would a penthouse be predered?"
"Yes, thank you."
He loved Jazz.
His mom had whispered in Danny's ear as they were teleporting- the Justice League had teleporting technology!?- back to Earth. "Do you think the rumors about Bruce Wayne being Batman's lover are true?"
Danny had yet to pay much mind to Wes Weston's theories, but honestly, the way Batman was able just to promise things on Mr. Wayne's behalf.....well, if the Box Ghost and Lunch Lady could happen, why not a billionaire and a crime-fighting
Danny, Jazz, and Dani had been hiding in the pen house for about three days. His parents had returned home to secure their lab after the fifth time curious meddlesome reporters had tripped their house security.
Danny will admit he went stir-crazy, so using his powers, he turned invisible and went out when his sisters had been watching a show. He had made it for about five hours when someone saw him buying a coffee and tweeted his location.
His sightseeing had been cut short by the crowds of people that swarmed him.
"Mr. Fenton, what do you say about parents criticizing how early you married?"
Danny was pushed up against the wall by the crowd, wishing he could just turn ghost and drop this whole thing. He felt a burning sensation in the back of his eyes, and for one horrifying moment, he thought they were going to record him bursting into tears when a man broke through the crowd.
"That is far enough!" The man placed himself in front of Danny, shielding the eighteen-year-old. His British accent made the sharpness of his words even more scorching. "You all know that a press conference will be in a few days and that surrounding a royal could be an act of war! Get back!"
Danny had a moment of relief until someone snatched his arm. He flinches away, going for a punch, but it gets caught by the person tugging him through the crowd.
Danny could only blink at the smiling face of Dick Grayson until the man helped him into a car. The British man quickly came back, jumping into the driver's seat and speeding off as the crowd of reporters tried to get one last photo.
Danny's breaths were coming in short, fast puffs. He wasn't very sure what was going on. He couldn't think. There were so many flashes. So many voices. So many people-!.
A hand pushed his head between his knees, rubbing his back. "It's okay. You're okay. "
Danny gasped, tears finally falling as he tried to explain why he had done something stupid. "I-i just wanted to see- the landmarks- I didn't mean- I- I."
"Shhh. I know. It's okay. You're okay."
After a while, Danny was able to sit up. His saviors had asked him to name five things he saw, four things he could hear, three things he could listen to, and one thing he could taste to calm down, but it worked. Only then did he realize there were more people in the fancy car with them.
A boy his age sat on his right, having been the one to push his head down. It took only a second to recognize him: Tim Drake, teenage CEO and one of the most attractive men he had ever seen.
A blond teenage girl who also seemed their age sat in the passenger seat, though she twisted around to give him a warm smile. She was also very gorgeous.
Not to mention Dick Grayson, who had a warm hand on his back. Adonis must have returned as the first adopted son of Bruce Wayne because, goddam, that man was fine.
Even the British man was handsome for someone his grandfather's age.
Had he died (again) and gone to heaven?
"Here," Drake placed a cold water bottle in his palm, offering the gobsmacked Danny a small smile. "Drink. It'll help."
"Ugh...I.. thank you for rescuing me," He managed to gasp out.
"Don't mention it. We all know the hell of the paparazzi. Glad you alright. " the girl said. "I'm Stephanie Brown, but you can call me Steph. The guy to your right is Tim Drake, the one on your left is Dick Grayson, and this fine man driving us is Alfred Pennyworth."
"I'm Danny Fenton." He says, taking a swing. The cold water went down his throat and grounded him.
"We know. You've made quite the wave with your marriage." Grayson said though not unkindly. "We'll have to take you to our manor to switch cars; otherwise, they'll just wait for us at the hotel."
Danny thought it over before whispering, "Can I message my sister? She must be worried-"
A portal rips open in front of him. The other humans all let out cries of alarm but not as loudly as Danny when Phantom's head pokes out of it.
He has a moment to wonder how in the world that was possible until the ghost waves at him using one of Clockwork's necklaces. Oh, it's him from the future. Okay. That's happening.
"Darling! I felt you in distress! What happened?! Shall I punish everyone in Gotham? " Phantom questions in a tone Danny had never been aware he could make. It's smooth. It's all-knowing. It's seductive.
What the fuck is going on?
"There is no need for any form of punishment. Not to worry, your highness." Drake quickly jumps in. "We would never allow anything to happen to your husband. I will personally keep Mr. Fenton away from any danger. "
Danny watched in slight horror as his future ghost self gave the other man a long look before smirking. "I appreciate the offer, and you are certainly my type with that black hair and blue eyes, but I am fine with only one husband. Danny will decide to add you to the marriage if he would like to have more partners."
Drake blinks wide started eyes. "I- I beg your pardon?"
"I have a protection and ice core. Proclaiming to keep my romantic partner safe is the same as asking for my hand in marriage due to the customs of protective spirits. Were you not aware?"
"I wasn't!" Danny interrupts loudly. " I was very unaware that meant marriage proposals!"
Phantom gives him a cheeky smile, and suddenly Danny understands why all his Rouges had wanted to beat his face so often. He can be rather annoying.
"No one will be above you, darling. You are the embodiment of beauty, and I would never desire another. However, the royal family is allowed concubines. You may take human ones if you wish to. I wouldn't want to ruin any of your fun."
"Who told you to say this!?" Danny demands, forgetting himself for a moment. Or the watchful eyes of the Waynes swinging between them with prompt attention.
"Why just the royal advisor!" Phantom laughs, his white hair bouncing as he tilts his head.
Jazz. She was responsible for this. How could he have thought she was sane?
"I don't want a concubine!" Danny yells, face burning. He's never been more mortified in his life, including walking down. For breakfast in Superman boxers, only to find Superman at the bottom of the stairs.
What a terrible day that was to run out of clean pants.
Phantom smiles. "I love you too, darling. I shall see you soon. I do not wish to strain your body anymore."
He thrusts his head back into the glowing green portal, and with a soft pop, he's gone. The car is utterly silent until Grayson whispers.
"Does this mean Tim just got married through fae laws?"
Danny whips his head at him. "No! It does not!"
Drake lets out a small breath of relief. "Oh, thank God. Not that you aren't hot, Mr. Fenton, but I'm not ready for marriage."
Danny wonders if he can reach the door handle to throw himself out of a speeding car. He knows somewhere in the future. He is laughing his ass off at current him.
"Dude, none taken. Could you clarify how I ended up here? I just wanted to jump across Gotham roofs, and suddenly, I can marriage trap people."
Danny wishes he could kick his own ass- not counting Dan- as Steph breaks into uncontrolled laughter.
"Oh, Danny, you're going to fit in well!" She says between wheezing.
Grayson raises his hand, face glued to his phone. "Bruce just sent in the family group chat that none of us are allowed near Phantom."
"Why?" Danny asks.
Grayson shrugs. "We're all his type, and Bruce's heart can't handle that."
"Fair enough"
(Part 1) (Part 2)
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radiance1 · 6 months
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Danny was having a good night, laying down on his side and purring contentedly while his tail swayed lazily. He was living a good life nowadays, freed from his responsibilities as the eternal prince of the Infinite Realms and taking on the mantle of the head of a Familia.
Perhaps, one of these days, he should try and find the wizard who turned him into a cat and thank them for it. What would a wizard even like anyway?
He pondered on that for a moment, perhaps a magical artifact or another could suffice? He stretched. Oh well, it didn't matter right now, he wasn't going to do it so soon anyways.
He opened his mouth, a yawn escaping him as he finished his stretch, tongue peeking out to lick his lips. He changed his position to something more comfortable, sinking into the lavishly soft pillows and reminding himself to get Catwoman something once again for giving him this high-quality cat bed.
Custom made too, multiple times bigger than him, the softest pillows he's ever felt and smelling extremely good. Even when multiple others forced themselves into his bed, even though they had their own as a gift from her as well.
Perhaps another diamond is in order?
His ears perked up as the sound a crash echoed throughout the warehouse, and he lazily peeked an eye open as the sound of paws running towards his direction made themselves known.
His nose twitched, the familiar scent of iron controlling the air as he sighed.
Kevin.
"Graaaaaaaaaaaamps!" A cat of what was once white fur, now stained with blood, skidded to a stop in front of him. Danny sighed once more, other eye opening as he looked at his first, and what others call his second-in-command. "I'm not that old, 150 is still quite young Kevin." He spoke calmly, no real heat in his voice and instead, amusement.
Kevin, predictably, ignored him. "You won't believe what happened tonight." Kevin then turned cheeky, stepping forwards towards his bed, and Danny had half a mind to try and prevent him from staining his bed, before discarding that thought just as quickly. "Guess!"
Danny's stare turned flat, and he had an urge to facepaw. Instead, he sighed, staring at the blood staining the other's fur before resting his head back on his bed. "You died again, didn't you?"
"Yep!" Kevin stepped onto the bed, both face and reply cheerful as the sun. "But that's not it!" Kevin bounced his way over to the elder cat, bloody pawprints marking his path on the previously clean bed.
Danny sniffed, a faint unknown tickling his nose before Kevin flopped on top of him, the blood stains on the smaller cat rubbing off on him, causing Danny to shift position, one that would support the younger better. "Oh, really?" He inquired, reaching out to grasp a glass shard from Kevin's side and placing it onto the bed.
"Yea! I fought spark, the spark!" Kevin purred, tail swishing behind him. "Can you believe it!?"
Danny hummed, picking another shard of glass from his first's skin.
"She was suuuuuper strong! Not stronger than you obviously, but she was really tough, I almost couldn't keep up with her!" Danny used a paw to silently request for Kevin to turn, and he did, with Danny plucking another shard from his skin. "She went all woosh, and boom! And then I went swish, and whish and she could barely touch me!"
"Mhm." Danny shifted, gently lowering the other, younger cat from off of him and instead to his side onto his stomach, reaching over to pick the shards from his back. "Then, then she used her power and then I was going fwoosh! Then I crashed into a nearby window and then we had to scatter because the human inside was mad about it." Kevin chirped, easily moving through his story despite the biggest pieces of glass being currently taken out of his back. "Then I ran all the way here because I wanted to tell you about it!"
"That's nice Kevin," Once he was done, Danny reached forward to lick the other on his head, his tail moving forward-the fur turning from black to glowing white- and flinging the shards of glass up through the air and into the rafters. "However." Danny's speech turned from that of a cat to one of a more humane-like tongue, his eyes narrowing at the form of one of those vigilantes running around the city- this one seems to be the Robin, based on his description of the hero- took the thrown shards of glass as a sign to drop down onto the ground.
"It seems you've managed to have drawn one of the humans into our territory in your excitement." Danny rubbed his chin against Kevin's head, uncaring for the blood soaking into his fur. "I don't blame you, that strain of human is known to be quite sneaky when they want to be."
Robin stood up, cape shrouding his form from ankle to shoulders. He narrowed his eyes at the scene, and Danny, in turn, narrowed his own as the rest of his fur turned glowing white, toxic green eyes staring at the lone human in a den of cats.
A silent threat.
"Care to explain, human known as Robin?"
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Text
Mistaken Identities (dp x dc)
Danny had been doing his thing, looking around, making sure he didn't alter anything in the past, minding his own business. Officially, this was supposed to be a trip to gather more blood blossom samples for Team Phantom to study, but he had ended up being a little sidetracked. Apparently though, puritan times made for beautiful forests, sue him if he was enjoying a moment of peace in his otherwise crazy life. So here he was, relaxing for the first time in way too long when this guy just barged into the clearing. Danny straightened up with a yelp which had the guy stopping in his tracks before he turned to look at Danny.
"Be not afraid, child. I mean you no harm," the man said.
Danny squinted as he looked up at the half-shadowed face of the man that seemed vaguely familiar.
"Boy?"
"Uh-" Danny managed as he realized he was supposed to answer. "Oh yeah, no problem, man."
The man tilted his head which directed Danny's attention to his weird buckle-hat. Sobering up as he recognized the clothes from his previous jaunt in the past where Sam had almost gotten burnt at the stake, he mentally congratulated himself for turning back into a human before his nap. He really didn't want to end up trapped in blood blossoms by witch-finders again.
"Are you lost?" The man said, as he edged closer. "Do you require aid?"
The halfa jumped to his feet. "Nope!" Danny said before letting out a nervous laugh. "No aid, I'm all good. Thanks though."
The man opened his mouth to say something before another voice, higher pitched stopped him. "You are back!" A woman wearing a simple dress, with a few birds fluttering around her like a Disney princess approached them.
"Annie," answered the man.
"Come," she said before leading him away with only a glance towards the teenager. The man let himself be dragged away, but not before a last few words. "If you are ever in need of assistance, please do not hesitate."
Danny waved his hand. "Yep. For sure, dude. Thanks!"
Then before the man had turned away completely, the woman grabbed his hat playfully which revealed his face completely to the weak moonlight, and coincidentally to Danny's view. The couple disappeared between the thick foliage as Danny sat, struck dumb with what he had just witnessed.
"Oh my god," he whispered to himself. "That was Bruce fucking Wayne."
Danny had seen enough rag magazines and newspapers with his face printed on the cover to recognize the billionaire for sure. What the hell was he doing in Puritan times? Then, it hit Danny like a brick. Natural portals. They weren't common, or stable and they'd been known to spirit away people randomly. Clearly, they also had some pretty severe side-effects including amnesia considering the old-timey speech pattern Mr. Wayne was using.
There was only one thing for it, Danny clearly had to bring Mr. Wayne back to the present. Not only because it was the right thing to do, but also because a missing billionaire was bound to attract a good amount of attention and if anyone connected this to the ghost zone... Well if the GIW was bad now, Danny didn't want to know what other kind of unsavoury people would pop up if ghosts were better-known. Just imagining the Justice League getting involved was giving Danny the shivers. No, the best thing to do was get Mr. Wayne back to his time and hope he wouldn't remember much of what had happened and wouldn't dig into it further.
Just as he was nodding to himself, he heard a scream coming from not too far away. He transformed before flying towards the noise, only to find the woman he'd seen before with Mr. Wayne being captured by a bunch of men wearing the same kinds of hat.
"She's a witch! Burn her!" He heard someone yell. "Hang her dead!" Someone else said.
This was giving Danny some major flashback to Sam's very own witch burning and without wasting a second, he phased the woman right out of their grips and flew them away from the angry mob.
As soon as he landed and let go of the woman, she turned to him and gripped his arm instead. "You have to help him!"
"Help who?" Danny asked, wincing.
"Mordecai!" she said, her grip tight.
"Is that the man who was with you earlier?" the teenager asked.
The woman nodded before pointing southeast. "He is in the caves, fighting the dragon!"
Danny didn't waste anytime before flying in the direction she had pointed to. Going intangible helped with speed, and he phased through the ground, going straight for the aforementioned cave. He just phased through when he caught sight of Mr. Wayne. As he got closer, he could feel some sort of energy radiating from the man. Just then, the energy started building up and Mr. Wayne started to go transparent. Panicking, Danny did the first thing he could think of and absorbed the mounting energy to himself. It felt like a shot of adrenaline except way, way stronger and for a moment everything blanked out, before the world came into focus again. When he looked around, he couldn't find a trace of Mr. Wayne, but from the energy left over he could tell exactly when he had landed. The Golden Age of Piracy.
"Goddamit!" Danny yelled as he once again felt Bruce Wayne slip through his grasp as he stole away the potent energy from the billionaire's body before it could follow wherever he was going next. First it had been pirates, then the Wild West and lastly it was 20th century Gotham, clearly the natural portal had been all kinds of fucked up for Mr. Wayne to have been dragged from time period to time period. It was a miracle he was even still alive, the poor man! Danny let out a harsh sigh as he parsed out through the information the energy had left him with. This time he'd gotten the information for the two next time-jumps, which meant, Danny could get ahead of this for once and finally catch Mr. Wayne before he could jump again.
With a steadying intake of breath, Danny took out the Infiniv-map and set his destination before he let himself follow through. As he got through he could hear a bunch of different voices, all talking over each other.
"-distortions mean what I think it-"
"-not fair!"
"-time is breaking-"
"-only leave his body once he's dead."
Danny paid no mind as he locked eyes on Mr. Wayne who was lying in Wonder Woman's arms, in a black bodysuit, looking worse for the wear. The same energy as before was emanating from him, though this time it was even stronger. Danny approached carefully, invisible before he put a hand onto Mr. Wayne's chest and concentrated on drawing all the energy into himself. It wasn't like the other times, the flow was faster and he was having trouble staying focused as more and more flew into him. His brows scrunched in concentration, and unbeknownst to him, the invisibility dropped.
All the heroes in the room turned to look at the suddenly appearing white-haired teen who had a hand on Batman's chest. As they stared in confusion, the teen started to glow. It grew brighter and brighter before everyone had to shield their eyes as there was a pulse of bright light that died down almost immediately after. Wonder Woman had to blink the spots out of her vision as she felt the weight in her arms start to shift and let out a groan. "Bruce!"
She set him down and helped him put his head between his knees, as she gently stroked his back. Superman settled on his other side while Red Robin just sat in front of him, still half-believing Bruce was really back.
"What happened?" Bruce mumbled. "The omega radiation, I thought-"
"I'd like to know that too," Green Lantern said before he turned towards the glowy kid who was still blinking his eyes as if to chase away afterimages.
"His energy signature is the same as Darkseid," Raven said, her own eyes having not left the teenager since he had appeared.
"You don't mean..." started Superman as all the heroes turned to look at the kid slowly. The latter finally looked up as if sensing he was the focus of many eyes and cringed as he met the combined stares of the Justice League.
"Yes," Raven answered. "This is Darkseid's son."
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stealingyourbones · 9 months
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Just an idea I wanted to share.
Danny and Damian are clearly not brothers. What they are, is switched at birth.
Talia messed up, took a mission too close to her due date, and went into labor early so she wound up in a civilian hospital. The Fentons were researching nearby ruins for ghost history when Maddie went into labor.
Two nearly identical black haired little boys born to foreigners in a small hospital in the middle of nowhere. Mistakes happen, and the babies were switched.
The truth doesn't come to light until Damian shows up at Bruce's place when he's 13, nearly 14. (Canon timeline is full of wibbly wobbly stuff.) Of course, he cares for the boy immediately, but also does a DNA test assuming Talia is lying. Clearly Talia is lying because the results show Damian is neither Bruce's nor Talia's.
Damian nearly has a breakdown and together he and Bruce track Talia back down for answers, but she's as confused as they are. She carried this baby and Bruce was, not her first lover, but definitely the last. What do you mean the DNA doesn't match?
As Talia, Bruce, and Damian begin their search for answers, in a small town in Illinois, an eerily similar looking boy, who was routinely exposed to the Lazarus Pits in vitro and has since been routinely exposed to ectoplasm, is stepping into a failed portal on the dare of his friends.
fascinating. Damian 100% breaks down after the DNA test. When he was first introduced to Bruce he was absolutely obsessed and taught by the League that he must fill in his fathers legacy. Blood relations are VERY important to the Al Ghuls. Damian figuring out he's not the rightful heir would crush him.
Damian is fully devoted to the mission of finding Danny. Does he want to battle him for the true title of the heir to the League of Assassins? Or does he try to convince Danny to take his place?
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