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ametrictonofaudacity · 10 months

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Gaps Interlude

Warnings: stalking, implied violence, obsession, manipulation, written through yandere’s pov, delusion.

I’ve decided to do a short interlude for Gaps! All of the interludes will be told from one of the Batfam’s prespective, so enjoy!

Dick meets you in one of Gotham’s many coffee shops in the tourist section. The place is homey and warm, a personal favorite of his since it always seemed to lull Tim into a relaxed enough state that his little brother could be cajoled or bribed into sleeping when he got home, and the people are the same. Which is why you catch his eye so quickly.

You look exhausted. The sort of exhaustion that causes droopy eyes and a tired slump to the shoulders, that made your face seem dull and listless. You were pushing through it, though, staring at the laptop in front of you with a tired focus that reminds him of Tim on the days when his little brother simply had to finish a project. It’s barely even a brief thought, that flickers in the back of his mind.

(Later, Dick will wonder if that thought is what started all of this. Later, he will card his fingers through your hair as you sleep peacefully in your bed, unaware. Later, he will wait as Jason and Bruce bring home his newest sibling.)

But at the time, he doesn’t think much of the concern blooming in his chest. He approaches you, an easy smile on his lips, carefully keeping his body language open, so that he didn’t frighten you.

“Hey. You look a little out of it, everything alright?” He calls gently, and tired eyes glance up at him, lips pulling down into a frown. Now that he was closer, he could see your ragged appearance, more than just the lack of sleep.

Your clothes weren’t threadbare, but they were definitely old, the fabric of the joints stretched and worn. A grey hoodie, jeans, common wear for just about anyone in Gotham. If it wasn’t for the way you were clearly struggling, Dick doesn’t think he would’ve noticed you.

(Later, the thought feels impossible. Of course he’d notice you, you were his little sibling, even if neither of you knew it yet.)

“Oh, um.. working on a paper for my classes. I’m supposed to do an informative paper on how vigilantes have influenced measure of force laws.”

“Are you taking criminal justice? I had to write something similar when I was in college for my degree. Mind if I sit?”

“Nah, sure, go ahead. And no, it was a randomly assigned topic. I think she picked something so specific to see how good our research skills are.”

“Would you like some help?”

The offer surprises you. It surprises him, really. He doesn’t mean to say it, it sort of just slips out, which should alarm him because he hadn’t been this impulsive around new people since he got B’s training. It doesn’t.

You accept, even with your surprise.

And Dick helps you.

He keeps helping you, helping you when you needed to do a paper, when you needed to do just about anything.

(Later, he will continue to help you, even if you think you don’t need his help anymore. That’s okay. You were his little sibling, and he would help you whether you wanted him to or not.)

Over time, he notices things. He doesn’t mean to, he really doesn’t, but there’s only so much you can ignore when you’ve been trained by Batman and been through all the things he has. And it’s not like you do a very good job hiding it.

The first time he visits your apartment, there are meds in your bedside drawer, which is cracked open. He makes a note to read the scripts, later, so at the very least he could help you in the ways you needed him to. He waits until you are out of the room, sliding the drawer open silently, and looking them over. Meds for anxiety, depression, ADHD. A planner full of notes and reminders, a checklist of all the tasks you had to do to take care of yourself.

A journal, hidden in the back.

He slides it into his jacket without a thought, putting all the other items back.

Every word from the journal just makes the overwhelming need to protect you grow. You wrote about your memories, your struggles. You wrote about how hard it was to stay alive and sane in a city that so often turned out criminals and murderers. You wrote about how much it hurt, sometimes, being alone. You wrote about how you couldn’t trust anyone, even though you wanted to.

And you write about Dick.

The first time he sees an entry about him, he feels something curl in his chest, pleased and content. You had called him caring, had called him nice. You had called him sweet. Had admitted to wanting to be able to trust him, to appreciating his calls and his texts and his reminders.

And even Dick can admit that it makes him worse.

He calls you more often, talking about anything and everything. He reminds you to eat, or drink water, and even though you don’t like it, you listen, often complaining you were an adult even as he could hear you filling a glass.

(Later, Dick would look back on it fondly. You’d acted exactly like an irritated little sibling.)

He doesn’t start to follow you until later, and he’s amazed how quickly it becomes routine.

He just.. can’t help it. You’re all alone, in an apartment in Gotham, struggling and on your own. Any instance where a threat gets too close to you, it’s quickly dealt with.

He introduces you to his family. Damian first, of course, because he wouldn’t have it any other way, and it goes amazingly. You’re involved, treating his little brother kindly but without pity, and it makes him so happy to see his little siblings getting along. You tell Damian about a kitten you had, a Maine Coone named Momo, talk to him about past and current pets. By the time the conversation is over, he can tell Damian must adore you as much as him and the thought makes his heart soar.

He introduces you to Bruce, next. His adoptive father takes one look at you and he can practically see the man filling out the adoption appears already. He doesn’t think he expected anything less.

Jason introduces himself by breaking into your apartment, making you food, and having a two hour long conversation with you about literature.

And every sibling that meets you falls in love with you, and every one of them adore you, and it just makes Dick want to take you home even more because they’ve never all agreed on anything but they all agree you should be at home with them.

So when Bruce sends Damian to steal your ID, he doesn’t protest. When Bruce changes your meds from an anti-anxiety med for sleeping to a mild sedative, he says nothing. They had a plan after all. And a part of that plan was to make it so that you wanted to go home with them.

When Jason and Bruce bring you home, slumped in Bruce’s arms as the man watched you with a gentle expression, he can’t help the rush of joy in his heart.

He had never really been a patient guy, anyways.

#yandere dc #yandere platonic x reader #yandere platonic batfam #yandere dick grayson

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gretahayes · 1 year

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Favourite tim drake recs? :0

Assuming you mean fanfic recs, I've got probably the most for him and this is long, so it's going under the cut;

This is genuinely one of my favorites, it's set post-Red Robin, and deals with Tim's vigilante stalking habits, his family finding out, Cass realizing there's no photos of Tim, them setting out to take/find some of him (a much harder feat than you'd think) and finally, Tim seeing the photos. It's amazing and sweet, and I can't recommend it enough. (I especially like the Bruce & Tim and Tim & Damian in this)

This is by the same author, also set post-Red Robin. This is Damian and Tim focused, Damian POV, in which Damian sees Bruce's contingency plans for him and the rest of the family, and with nobody else to turn to, runs for Tim. Canon divergent in the way Bruce doesn't have a contingency for his children, neither does Tim for his team, or them for him, but it kinda makes sense in this setting. Their interactions are amazing here, and seems so real.

In this, Tim gets a tonsillectomy. An elaboration in the form of a long fic. A must-read, I feel. It's funny and has so many feels and such good characterization.

!!! Can't believe I almost forgot about this one! Tim is Bruce's assistant, not son, and never became a vigilante. He's incredibly overworked, but no less dedicated to the Waynes. It's heartwrenching and sweet and funny and—words can't do it justice. It's a must read. The Al Ghuls make a cameo but Tim knows how to deal with them. Tim's deeply sad but next to nobody knows and those that do just accept it (including him). Kon is the MVP. Cass. Damian and Tim have an odd bond built of mutual respect and disdain for everyone around them. Luthor tries to recruit Tim every year and fails.

This is funny and amazing—Tim lands in a universe where he's technically considered a drug addict, since coffee is a drug and in the regular universe everyone drinks it.

The YJ fic Ever. I've recced this at least three times, and I will continue to. It's amazing characterization all around—both YJ and batfam—and genuinely is so fun. I love everyone in this. When an unknown enemy threatens Robin, Gotham's vigilantes come together to keep him safe. Unfortunately, they're protecting the wrong Robin. Or: Tim Drake plans his own rescue. Things get complicated.

This is Tim & Damian—Tim gets his overprotective big brother moment :) love love LOVE the way everyone is written here.

This is short and hilarious—Tim has amnesia after a head wound (can only remember back to his YJ days) and tries to bullshit his way out of anyone noticing. He might have succeeded if not for Cass.

This is a time loop fic, switching POVs. Tim's stuck in a time loop in which Jason always dies. The loop before the one this was set in, he accidentally kills Damian out of stress and too-fast reflexes. He breaks down when he sees Damian again, the whole thing unravels, and they resolve to help him out of it.

THIS SERIES MAKES ME FERAL. Jack, Tim and sometimes Dana, set when Jack made Tim quit from Robin. Horror-type elements and beautifully poetic, but centered around Jack's POV of the son he realizes he doesn't know, and him realizing he may be a shit dad. Dana's the best stepmom ever, and Tim's far nicer to her than he is Jack. This is the first work, in which Jack tries and fails to understand this Tim, and realizes that this Tim is Robin, not Tim. This is the second (and last) work in the series, in which Tim hasn't fully quit the lifestyle even though he's not going out as Robin, but Jack has no proof he hasn't. Just a hunch and a few odd occurrences that us, the readers, who are familiar with Tim's hero life will find obvious, but Jack does not. Dana makes Tim happier, more Tim than Tim-Robin, than Jack does, and Jack hates it. Near the end, he starts calling Tim Robin, not Tim. I LOVE it. Even if you hate Jack (like I do) you need to read this, for the Tim characterization if nothing else. Outsider POV, except he shouldn't be an outsider. But he is.

This is so fucking funny. Tim gets a matching tattoo with Kon, and hides it from Bruce. When Bruce—and the rest of his family—find out, all goes to hell.

Remember when I said the Jack and Tim series was only slightly horror? This is horror. Bruce's got a habit of picking up monsters, and this one is about Tim. If you're sensitive to horror, please read the tags and maybe avoid it, because this is delightful but not for everyone.

In this, Tim becomes an unintentional sugar daddy to the caped community. It's a bit iffy in some places, but hilarious.

This is Dick and Tim (surprised it took me this long to rec one with them as the main focus tbh) and it's Dick checking up on his little brother. Pure fluff, and genuinely amazing.

This is Tim & Bruce but also Tim & Tam in some places. Bruce forgets Tim is the majority shareholder for WE and is thus invited to shareholder meetings, Tim finds this very amusing and is generally a menace. You can FEEL the teenager in this Tim. Amazing.

Tim's de-aged to a kid in this, and re-meets his family. Fluff and feels ensue.

This is Bruce and Tim. Bruce isn't prepared for his newest Robin's neuroses.

This has Tim & Cassie meeting at an archaeologist event as kids and having to fight a monster thing :) it's cute

GODDD this fic? This fic ruined me. Beautiful Tim characterization, a gorgeous look at Bruce and how much he fucks up despite caring, and Dick being a stressed but amazing big brother with gorgeous writing. I love their brotherly affections here, and Tim's weird neuroses being shown here. Tim & Bruce is how it starts, and it's very much centered around their relationship, but it tapers off into Dick & Tim, which I'm not complaining about. Kon (and Bart!) makes a cameo and is an amazing friend. Can't rec this enough. If you read none of the other fics, please read this one.

This is Dick and Tim again. Dick forces Tim to go undercover with him to an Elvis convention in a thinly veiled attempt to spend time with the brother who he doesn't think knows how much he loves him. It's set in Tim's POV, though, so until Dick says this, Tim doesn't know. Hilarious and short.

This is Dick and Tim (who's surprised? Nobody) where Dick goes to Robin!Tim's science fair because Tim mentioned it and well, nobody else was going. Short and sweet.

This deals with the batfam finding out about the shitshow that was Tim's BruceQuest. If you're a stickler for canon I'd recommend you skip this one, but if not, it's a great read.

This is Dick and Tim again, and it's amazing. Tim's alone on Christmas Eve. Dick finds out, and does something about it. It's Robin!Tim, so this is Dick, Babs and Tim. This author is amazing at writing their interactions, plus inside Dick's head is a tricky place to write and they nail it perfectly. Mostly Dick & Tim, but since he invites Tim to Babs' holiday party, Babs makes a good number of cameos.

This is Tim talking a jumper off the ledge while Damian watches. Then they talk about it. Tim from Damian's POV is always interesting, but this especially is amazing.

This is a core four fic, Tim's POV! Pure humor. Tim finds a dildo in the dishwasher and he drags them for a team meeting so he can sus out whose it is.

I've recced this before, I think, but I'll do it again. Red Robin canon divergence fic in which Bruce is actually dead, and Tim calls Dick to tell him he thinks he may have been wrong. Dick's POV, short, but the emotion in this is outstanding.

In this fic, Damian has trouble with the transition from Dick's Batman to Bruce's Batman. Tim, who's also had both, is surprisingly helpful. This has so many Tim and Damian feels that I'm literally bursting at the seams. Melancholy, camaraderie, and all the good stuff. Damian's POV, and since he sucks at so much as guessing at what's going on in Tim's head, it's all the more great.

This is Dick and Tim, a soft Christmastime fic.

This is Bruce and Tim. Bruce and Tim have a sort-of game that started when Tim was thirteen. Initially, it was Tim stealing sips (or occasionally whole mugs) of Bruce’s coffee, back when he was too young for Alfred to allow him to drink it. Now, though, Bruce is getting his own back, and steals Tim’s coffee when he can. Sweet and fluffy.

Here, Tim gets a headwound and only remembers back to his Robin days, and forgets to be awkward around Dick and Damian. Tugs at the heartstrings. Dick's reminded of how much he misses this Tim.

This is really funny. Remember that time during the YJ days where the adult heroes were de-aged and the kid ones grew to be adults? Tim didn't reach six foot. In this, he's mocked ruthlessly for it.

Here, Tim goes to high school again after dropping out :) it's core four and hilarious

In this, Tim accidentally kills his dad in self defense—or rather, thinks he does, Jack's still alive but he doesn't know that until Dick shows up—and scrambles to call Dick. He calls Jason instead. Dick eventually gets called and shows up, and the brotherly feels in this are amazing. Tim's in shock for a good portion of it, and it's his POV, so you've got to piece some stuff together. Bad dad Jack, as in worse than canon bad dad Jack. Tugs on the heartstrings, and have I said I love Dick in this? Because I do. Bruce shows up near the end, and to everyone's surprise, doesn't absolutely fuck things up and/or fail as a parent.

Here, Tim is sick and alone. Dick, after not hearing from Tim at all for three days, goes to his apartment, finds him sick, and takes care of him. Eventually he gets dragged to the Manor for some actual r&r. It's sweet, and this writer has an amazing way with words and an intriguing flow.

In this, Bruce knows Tim. They have a routine, have habits, they know each other. This is so so touching, and I love it so much.

Here, Tim and Steph give Bruce a headache. It's amazing.

I..can't even begin to describe this. Bruce is fresh from the timeline, and this is a sort of introspection/character study type thing about him and Tim and how Tim's changed. Mostly, though? Mostly, Bruce just gives his son a hug.

Here, Kon is Tim's work husband. Bruce suffers. Pure fluff and humor, with a touch of feels.

Here, Bruce takes Tim to get his wisdom teeth out. They're both worried, but together, they're alright. Tim cries while doped up on the drugs. He cries a lot.

Here, 90's!Tim Drake wakes up in his Red Robin body. Exhausted from a YJ mission, he chooses to focus on getting through a normal day so as not to disrupt things for his future self. But, y'know, his way. Hilarious and so in-character, if exaggerated for comedy.

This is Tim and Damian—Damian gets hit with truth serum on patrol, and a pissed off Tim has to come and get him. Damian resolves to not tell Tim he's been hit with truth serum. They get closer as a result. Love their dynamic in this.

This is core four again, but just general teenager superhero chaos. Can't rec it enough

Here, Tim tries to build a LEGO Gotham, but his family just can't leave it—or him—alone. He calls a family meeting to tell them to knock it off, and they do not. Fluff and humor.

Here, Tim has appendicitis and gets his appendix removed. The best mix of fluff, feels, and good old complicated family dynamics ever

In this, Bruce tries to navigate giving affection to his odd son, Tim. Touching and funny.

This is Tim and Damian—Damian crashes on Tim's bed in the Watchtower when injured, Tim finds him. They talk, and maybe bond a bit, even though they'd never admit it.

Here, Bruce hugs Tim. Really nothing else to it.

Another fic where Tim wakes up with amnesia and pretends to know his family so he's not rude. He's found out when he correctly deduces Bruce is his dad, but makes the mistake of calling Bruce dad.

This is Dick and Tim again. Tim gets de-aged into a six-month-old, and Dick takes care of him. Soft and so so sweet.

In this, Tim's trying to work in his apartment when his siblings keep showing up to distract him and get him to take a break. It's sweet of them, if very annoying.

This is Bruce and Tim. Tim's injured and lying in bed, Bruce gets him takeout. Feels fuzzy and just...good. You've got to read it to know what I'm talking about, no summary does it justice.

Here, Damian tries to make amends with Tim. He does it very oddly though, so Tim thinks he has a crush on him, and avoids him all the more for it because ew-gross-ew-ew.

In this, Tim gets his teeth knocked out and grabs Dick as a mediator so he tells Bruce. Short and funny-sweet. You can tell this is in Tim's Robin run, due to all the little hints dropped.

This is Tim and Kon, funny and nonsensical. Tim calls Kon in the early hours of the morning, drunk. Kon thinks he deserves sainthood for this.

In this, Tim has road rage and most of his family find that out in the most hilarious way possible.

Bruce and Tim—a test sort of fic? Interesting, definitely.

This is timkon, Tim has memory loss and is amazed by Kon all over again.

Core four go to a gala :)

This is Dick and Tim, Tim breaks into Dick's house, accidentally interrupts his nap, tries to leave out of guilt, and gets wrangled into hugs. So so soft and so so sweet.

Another de-aged Tim fic, but this time with six year old Tim and Bruce taking care of him. This is so melancholy and...ugh. I love them.

Here, Tim and Dick are thrown into an alternate universe and have to try and get back with no other support system and no way out. They meet this world's version of Bruce and Alfred, though.

CEO Tim, and hates it. He makes that Luthor's problem.

Timkon, in which Tim plans all his dates VIA corkboard and Kon is so attracted to that.

CEO Tim (again), except he's still a teenager and people end up thinking he's a communist. This is short and hilarious all the way through. Also, Bruce is there.

This is The kid!Tim fic ever. Tim, having found a weird hole after a storm, decides to go exploring ignoring the fact that This Is Gotham and They Probably Have Cursed Stuff Down There.Luckily, it was just a cave system that spans the entire Gotham underground. Unluckily, Tim is a very curious child. Tim's a sorta eldritch being at the end?? Amazing, 100 would recommend.

In this, Tim finds out he isn't his parents' biological son. This changes everything. This changes nothing. Can't say anything else without spoiling, but I can't rec it enough.

In this fic, Bruce is back in time in Drake Manor, and meets baby Tim. It's like you're frozen in time, and all that matters is Bruce and his infant not-yet-son.

Here, Kon and Tim date. Tim's a cryptid stalker that refuses to be photographed, Dick is a big brother that loves his little brother, and it's cute.

Sorry it took me so long to compile this list anon, happy reading!

#asks #anon #tim drake #fic rec #god this is. a lot #took me a while to compile

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tourettesdog · 9 months

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DPxDC fanfic recs part 2! (Part 1)

It's a Small World by halfagone

Sometimes you just need a goofy, fun one shot that throws the characters you like into a theme park and this is exactly that. I love it.

Security Guard? Nah, Blackmailed. by Olive_of_Vanders

Oli has a lot of fantastic oneshots, but I think this one might be one of my favorites. I just really love the premise lol; it's great crack.

A Little Overshadowing Never Hurt Anyone by Playedcrowdd5610

I absolutely adore the premise of this one. Overshadowing shenanigans are so much fun, and the specific way it's happening in this fic has all of my attention.

Knitting Connections by Aibhilin

This is such a soft, neat little oneshot. I love the POV for it and just the quiet scenes it paints.

30 Days of Kidnappings by Hyperintrovert

This one's just plain fun and funny, with some nice emotions and angst mixed in. There are so many kidnappings, as the name implies. Shenanigans abound.

Bat Ghost by Megaerakles

Twin fics have a special place in my heart and this is no exception. I love how focused in Amity Park this one is, and the background Superbat is a treat.

Queen Regent by Elizabehta_Beilschmidt

Gil writes a lot of great Jazz (and Hardcover ship) fics, and this one in particular is one of my faves. I might be biased based on the prompt, but I just love how this one is written and how much of a badass Jazz gets to be.

Wait a Second by Toriieffic

Mistaken identities mixed with sibling bonding-- such a great mix always. I love the setup for this fic and how it plays out, especially with Jazz and Damian's situation in particular.

Robin's Egg by Calix

Wonderfully written, adorable, precious-- with lots of emotions and angst along for the ride. I love fics with core shenanigans a lot.

Oh Northstar of Mine by Milaley

This one is so very sweet and tender. Dead tired ship has a special place in my heart and I love the relationship here with it.

Spelunking by SummersSixEcho

This is the first in a series and I think it might've been the first series I read from Summers (or at least the first DPxDC one). I love Danny's interactions with the batfam in this series, the shenanigans, the puns-- it's all so good.

Coffee Trip of Love by EyesOfCrows

This fic is just plain cute and fun. I love all of the pet names throughout it. I need to reread it pronto lol

Blooming Death, Please Love Me by Gremlin_bot

Hanahaki and blood blossoms? Yes please. I love blood blossom fics-- like a lot-- and mixing them with hanahaki trope... yes.

Another Duckin' Day by TheStarfishAlien

A lot of these on this recommend are dead tired ship, but like-- I love them, your honor. This one is just a ton of fun. Love some good pranks.

Wayne's Haunted Mansion by Tathartiel

This is such a sweet deaged/young Danny fic. I love the progression with Danny and the family with this, with the slow build of them earning his trust and figuring out more about him.

Danny Fenton's Guide to Scoring a Boyfriend by DisillusionedDanny

I just love the shenanigans and ship with this one. Enemies to lovers shenanigans abound. Dis has a Ton of great DPxDC fics, and while I haven't had the spoons to read most of their longer ones just yet, I love their stories and everything I have read.

#dpxdc #dpxdc fanfics #dpxdc fanfic #batpham #dogrecommends #dogposts #long post

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starry-bi-sky · 4 months

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ive been hesitating to ask this bc youve been on a roll with the clone^2au (which i am frothing over) but could i poke you for some childhood friend au? bc GOD i wanna see how danny reacts to reuniting w jason or how the rest of the batfam react to learning jason never told danny of his resurrection or wondering if dannys gonna put jokers dead body on a display/offering to jasons grave. i havent been normal about this since i first read it and was wondering. thank you for your writing.

RAAAAHHHH DON'T BE HESITANT I AM JUST AS FERAL OVER MY CHILDHOOD FRIENDS AU AS I AM WITH CLONE^2 I AM DELIGHTED BY THIS. Like.,,,, i literally love them,,, so much. I can't listen to The Crane Wives without thinking of them.

(which is my fault - the ao3 fic of them has literally only crane wives lyrics for each chapter title and summary (posted AND the ones not written) so of course im gonna associate with them.)

(if you wanna listen to some of their songs while thinking of cfau here are my recommendations: "Once & for All", "Here I Am", "Hollow Moon" is a Danny AND Jason song to me, this would be my go-to song for an animatic of CFAU if i had the skills for it. "Tongues and Teeth", "Curses" and "take me to war" is a heavy cfau danny song to me, and of course, "the moon will sing")

Like they're BEST friends dude, they're two sides of the same coin and when they were kids they would do this thing where their 'fingers crossed'/'double-crossed' was them hooking their index fingers in the fingers crossed gesture.

and i'm actually currently rewriting my original post into a more fic-like format, and when I'm done I'll post it on here under the cfau tag - with the original post still in tact. But its,,, gonna be so long dude,,,, the original behemoth was just over 9000 words,,, and I've written 3k words already of the new one and we haven't even reached Jason and Danny reuniting at the gala yet,,, i need to get back to that,,,

and then to answer your questions!! god im almost hesitant to answer because i dont wanna spoil the little fic i had planned for it but also like,, its not like im gonna spoil everything, right? and answering the questions isnt the same as writing the scene down so!!

i love danny and jason's reuniting, like i've thought about it SO much and I've thought about it happening after Danny kills the Joker. I know the reveal could have been before that, and it could have been equally just as dramatic but like??? Thematically, doing it after danny kills the joker is SO good. To me at least.

Because like?? Jason's been in somewhat denial about danny's plan to kill the joker for months. ever since danny told him that he wanted to at the gala. And from Jason's pov its not even technically a plan. He sees his best friend for the first time after five years and his best friend still isn't over his death. He hasn't stepped foot in Gotham since his funeral and now suddenly he's here.

And he's still so full of grief over his death that he tells a masked vigilante that he's going to kill the guy that did it, who lives in said masked vigilante's city. And danny's got that look in his eyes that Jason knows so well that means he's being serious. And yet he still doesn't know if he should believe him or not.

And then he does. Danny kills him. And Jason can't fucking believe it. And when he goes and sees Danny, Danny's hands are still covered in blood. And that reunion? God like a fucking firework show. Danny's so fucking angry, and pissed, and hurt, and so goddamn overjoyed that he's alive and here that he sends them both to the ground, and if he doesn't calm down he's gonna take out the power in a five block radius.

there's just so, so much yelling on Danny's end. And then so much crying, first from Danny and then them both. because god, you're alive. you're here. i've missed you so much. i'm never letting you out of my sights again.

and Joker's death! God I don't want to actually say too much about that, but the way I have it set up thematically makes me actually not want danny to take any part of the joker with him as an offering. and he may actually forego that particular ghost etiquette and offer something else as an offering to Jason in substitute to not bringing him the Joker's heart/head/ritualistic body part.

Because you know what the last thing a man whose been spending the last two decades of his life building himself up to be larger than life would want? A death that's unremarkable. :) and that's all i'll put on the matter for now.

and the batfam!! they technically already know that jason hasn't told danny he was resurrected, and plenty of them have mixed feelings on them. largely bruce and dick i think, considering they saw firsthand how close jason and danny were when they were kids.

Dick was honestly surprised at first when he found out that Jason hadn't told Danny he was alive - and on one hand he understands the reasoning for it, and on the other hand he isn't sure if it was such a good idea. Especially after he sees Danny again after he arrives back in Gotham and sees just how badly Jason's death was still affecting him. But it's not like he's going to try and convince Jason to tell him - he can make his own choices, even if Dick has questions about them.

Bruce has much the same thoughts as Dick, so there's not really much to add here other than he might bring it up once or twice to Jason like, vaguely. And then immediately drops it when Jason shuts him down. He might actually somewhat...?? prefer that Jason hasn't told Danny because that raises a lot of questions and could jeopardize their identities. However, again, Jason can make his own choices and there's not much Bruce can do about it other than disapprove from afar.

Tim who knew of Danny from stalking the Wayne family shares similars sentiments of being surprised that Jason didn't tell Danny, but again, yeah, understands the thought process to some extent. Doesn't bring it up ever.

Everyone else who hadn't seen firsthand how close Danny and Jason are don't really have much opinion on it -- Jason didn't tell his best friend he was alive, great, he also didn't tell them either so it's not like its that much of a surprise. It would've been more of a surprise to them if Jason had told Danny before he told Bruce and co. Damian may make a comment or two about Jason not telling Danny, but its not about how he can't believe he didn't tell him or anything like it.

#dpxdc #dp x dc #dp x dc crossover #danny fenton is not the ghost king #cfau #childhood friends au #danny and jason are such best friends i love them so much #BUT YEAH ASK ME MORE QUESTIONS ABOUT CFAU I'LL SCREAM #AND THEN TRY AND ANSWER THEM TO MY BEST ABILITY #like i could go on RANTS almost SPECIFICALLY about rath (dan) and then about jason and danny #and their friendship like i've thought about this au with a combined soulmate au and immediately hated the idea because no!#no! i can't call them soulmates. i can't it doesnt fit. their bond goes DEEPER than that. its *better* than that #this wasn't written in the stars it was forged in the back alley streets of gotham with all the broken glass under their feet #and the smell of nicotine weaving itself into the fabrics of their shirts. their souls aren't intertwined because the universe said so #they're two balls of yarn tangled together because they batted it at each other and decided to play cats cradle. and then never bothered #to untangle the string from one another. you'll never know where one ends and the other begins #i actually have a cfau miscellaneous facts post in my drafts that i need to finish too and i might do that today because of this ask <33 #the fastest way to starry's heart is through her ask box #asking me questions about my aus is the fastest way to make me make more content about them ajshld #see: clone^2 (i've been coasting off the fanart i got from them for the last two days) and now this #i need to stop more before i start waxing more poetic about jason and danny's bond with one another.#also also jason is equally as feral about danny as danny is about him (see: him plotting joker's demise since he was 14) its just not #showing as much since a lot of this is from danny's pov. like dw this isn't one-sided obsession its mutual.#see: jason seeing danny's scars and immediately wanting to find out who caused it and getting murderously angry about it #its not a starry post unless its long #idk maybe im just obsessed with the idea that relationships are chosen and forged with time and that the bonds we have arent because they #were predetermined but because we made them to be. Like how clone^2 said 'i choose to be brothers' and how danny and jason said #'i choose you. i will always choose you. you're my other half. the one who watches my back. i choose you.'

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kaitlynpcallmebeepme · 2 years

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Late Night Talking

Damian Wayne x Reader

Idea: Damian wayne x reader where he gets kicked on her fire escape and knocked out. She takes him in and tries to patch him up. His brothers get scared about his disappearance and go to find him not wanting to leave her company (she could be wanting to be a veterinarian and he's listening to her talk about cow's 4 stomachs (completely Dr. Pol knowledge, not actual veterinarian knowledge))

Requested: Nope.

Author’s Note: I tried to start this during my night shift, but I'm really tired right now and I work again tonight, so I need sleep (I ended up finishing this about a month later). This is Reader POV most of the time. Both reader and Damian are about 16, but I’m still thinking of the art and costume style of the Batman vs Robin animated movie instead of JDL: Apokolips War Damian. Family dynamics are based on the Batman: Wayne Family Adventures Webtoon series where they all have a somewhat working relationship. I have ideas in the works, but requests are still OPEN. Feedback is always appreciated, especially since I don’t know if I characterized Damian correctly. Also, tell me if you want to be part of a Tag List and I’ll tag you when I upload something new.

Warning: Injuries and blood mentioned, Veterinarian knowledge (that’s completely Dr. Pol based, should not be used for any factual diagnosis), a shirtless Damian, the Batfam crashing the party (although you only hear Batman and Nightwing talk), tell me if I missed any warnings

Word Count: 2,111

Curled underneath a cave of blankets, I was reading Murder on the Orient Express for the ten billionth time. Snow was falling outside of my room in Gotham, building up a layer on top of the fire escape outside of my window. I needed a break from reading all of my other Veterinarian books. I haven’t even applied to any college for undergrad much less to be a Veterinarian yet, but if I was going to get an internship somewhere before school, then I wasn’t going to limit the animals that I worked on. I’m currently reading about a cow's four stomachs.

**THUD**

What the fuck was that. It sounded like something dead hit my window, but louder. It better not be another bat. I got in trouble from my parents trying to help one that was almost dead on my fire escape. I put down my book, grabbed a baseball bat I kept by my bed for intruders, and made my way toward my window. When I opened the blinds, there was this dark limp figure spread out over my fire escape. Through the darkness I could make out an R in a lighter color on his chest. Robin. Wow, Robin is almost dead on my fire escape. I opened the window and tried to assess what I could of his current condition. A sword layed next to him and his face was cut and bruised up with a pretty bad one around his eye as the snowflakes started to cover his unmoving long eyelashes. I poked his ribs with the end of my bat. He groaned in pain. Well he wasn’t dead, at least that’s good. Figuring it was a better idea to have Batman and Robin on my good side, even though I couldn’t think of a reason I would be on their bad side, I decided to help the injured boy instead of leaving him vulnerable to the jaws of Gotham.

I grabbed Robin’s wrists, hoping that they were not broken, and started to drag him into my room. He groaned out of pain every time I pulled, but he didn’t fight me. Probably didn’t have the energy anymore. I needed to figure out why he was so weak. I picked him up as best as I could with my weak arms and laid him on my bed. I didn’t care if he got my sheets bloody, they would wash out. I quickly went back to the window, whipped all the snow off my balcony so no one suspected anything, shut my window, latched it, and closed my blinds. No one is seeing this vulnerable Robin. The city needs him and the rest of the Batman group to be strong and fearless.

I looked at the rise and fall of his chest, ok he’s breathing. No hugely bleeding spots that I can see, but I’m not sure if he’s going to let me take off his suit to get a really good look. I slowly move my hand toward his neck, but retract it before I can get too close. Best to try to see if he’s awake now and establish at least a working relationship.

“Robin.”

“What?” He didn’t sound confused, so that’s good. He kinda sounded like he was giving me the cold shoulder, but I’m not going to take it too personal. He probably had a rough night.

“Ok, well, my name is Y/n. I’m not going to hurt you or fight you. You landed on my balcony half dead and really hurt. I’m not going to force you to do anything, but is it okay if I take off your suit or parts of it to make sure you’re not extremely hurt or bleeding anywhere else?”

“No.” I was expecting that. “You’re asking me to drop my guard and be a defenseless civilian.”

“First of all, even in your REALLY battered state right now, I’m pretty sure you could kick my ass if you wanted to, not gonna to lie. Second of all, would anyone who’s trying to help you hurt you?” That was probably a stupid question. He’s probably been double crossed countless times.

“In my line of work. Yes.” Figured.

“Okay, it’s your choice to bleed out if I can’t figure out if you’re bleeding at all.” I picked up whatever book was closest. Dang it, some of his blood got on the cover. Well, it made Murder on the Orient Express more murderous. I just kept reading my book on the floor. He could leave if he wanted to. I couldn’t stop him. I didn’t even turn when I heard him grunting through the pain and rustling my bedspread. I thought I was going to hear his boots hitting the ground next to me to make his way out of my room, but that’s not what I heard at all. It sounded like the clicks of a keyboard and then the sound of metal hitting each other and the soft thud of it hitting my bedspread. I turned to look up at him. He was sitting on the edge of the bed with his chest plate armor off along with his cape/hood, but his domino mask was still on. That would be enough. His chest was littered with old white scars, purple and green bruises at different stages of healing, and some new red cuts that he probably got tonight. I put my book back down and grabbed some exam gloves while he heaves himself to lay back on my bed. “Anywhere you’re super concerned about?” Figured it would be better to ask. I’m pretty sure he hurts all over, but I couldn’t tell that, and I currently can’t see any gushing blood on his skin. Just some pretty purple bruises that scored his ribs, some small but long cuts that were bleeding near the top of his chest, and a couple of white scars painted his lower abdomen. For someone you assumed who’s been through a lot to be his age and fighting with Batman, he didn’t look too bad. He shook his head no at me.

I left him on my bed and returned with a small bar soap and a small plastic bucket, which I use to shave my legs with, filled with tempered water, and a couple washcloths.

I got the washcloths wet and dabbed them on the soap so it wouldn’t sting his cuts too badly, but clean his slightly dark skin so there would be a less chance of infection. I kept looking up at his eyes. His emerald green eyes. Part of my brain wants to look at his eyes just for pleasure and the other wants to make sure his nervous system is okay.

“Why do you keep staring at my eyes? Do I look that bad?” Even though his facial expression was completely serious, I couldn’t tell if it was a joke or not. I decided to play it safe and repeat the first logical thing that came to my head.

“Well, I’m watching the skin behind your eyes because I don’t know what other people hit you over the head tonight. So if the skin behind your eyes turns black, also called racoon eyes, it could mean you had severe head trauma and your cerebrospinal fluid, which is the fluid surrounding your brain and spinal cord, is leaking and you need way more care than I could provide. You would need a hospital at that point.” His facial expression to me couldn’t tell whether to be impressed or offended.

“You seem too young to be a doctor.”

“You seem to young to be Batman.” Damn my big mouth. I was SURE he was going to march out of my room. He did stare at me with an ‘if looks could kill, you’d be six feet under’ look. Better try to explain myself quickly. “Both of my parents are ICU doctors who specialize in trauma, and since I want to be a Veterinarian, some of their knowledge rubs off on me.”

I tried to avoid his eye contact after that because I couldn’t tell whether I was on his good side or not. I couldn’t do much with my limited current skill, but I squeezed his skin together to make the skin as close together as possible before I put some gauze and bandages over them, which were Superman bandaids ok, don’t judge me. I look up at him while finishing my work to find his deep emerald eyes focusing behind me where my books lay. I turned over my shoulder to find him staring at my Veterinarian book.

“You like animals, because you keep staring at my Vet book?”

“They’re nicer than people sometimes and that’s the reason why I’m a vegetarian now.” You’re just glad the thick air between the two of you has broken. He was actually becoming a better person to talk to.

“You just gotta make sure you replace your nutritional intake that you would have gotten from meat. That’s the main mistake people make when going vegan is they become too deficient in protein.”

“Why do you want to be a Vet, may I ask?” I sat next to him on my bed as I was done patching him up and we were just talking like old friends at this moment.

“Animals are just so complex it’s really cool. For instance, cows have four stomachs and if they have gas trapped in their 4th stomach, how you fix it is you twist their head so their sense of balance gets off, roll them on their back, listen for the stomach which would sound like a balloon, sew it to the belly wall, then roll them right side up so the stomach stays in the correct place.”

“I actually have a cow that I rescued from a slaughterhouse.” He shared this fact before thinking that maybe he shouldn’t mention it. What was she doing to me?

“WOW Really?!?! I mean, I don’t think you would let me see them because that would reveal your identity, but that’s still really cool.”

**BANG!!**

A noise of someone landing not so gently on my fire escape silenced the room. Robin put his finger to his lips and I nodded in response not wanting to move or make a sound.

He silently got off my bed and crept over to the window, making sure to stay crouched out of sight. He slowly moved the curtain to peek through the glass. After a moment he threw open the window.

“What are you doing here?”

“Your tracker was off and you weren't answering any of your calls. We tracked your last location to around here and found the balcony with significantly less snow on it figuring you had to go into hiding.” Ok that HAD to be Batman, there was no way that deep scary voice wasn’t him. Even though you haven’t had any interaction with him before, and you’d like to keep it that way, that’s just what you’d imagine him sounding like.

“Who you got in there birdie that you had to take your shirt off for?” Ok this was a completely less mature voice than Batman. I suspect it’s one of the other and maybe former robins, but I couldn’t tell which one without being able to look out the window.

“I didn’t want to leave her company. I’ll be out in a sec.” Robin closed the window with more force than you think he intended.

“So there IS a SHE! We were scared you were dead again.” You heard muffled through the window glass and THAT you couldn’t help but laugh at.

I picked up Robin’s suit as he turned back towards me and I helped him get it on without messing up my stitching job too much. As the final pieces of his hood came on and he picked up his sword, he turned towards me in the darkness of my room.

“So this is goodbye I guess.” I say with only a little sadness behind it. I mean, what else am I supposed to think. He landed on my balcony by accident. He has no obligation to me, nor would I think he would want an obligation.

“Don’t be certain of that beloved.” Woah, I like that nickname. “I might just crash on your balcony on purpose next time.” He said with a smirk. He turned and opened my window and left without a trace. Well, not exactly, because I heard multiple metal clanks of the fire escapes from multiple people jumping on them. Maybe tonight wasn’t the worst night to get lost in a book.

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ao3sbatfamily · 27 days

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thank you for doing god’s work

may i please ask for help finding an outside POV fic where likeee a random civilian woman shot the joker because he was just right there and the batfam are helping her get protected or something

if you can’t, i’d appreciate some other outsider POV batfam fics from you!!! thanks!!!

'but there's robbers to the east, clowns to the west' by ab_inito

“You have to understand Ms. Smith, we legally can not let you go as there is irrefutable evidence of your murder,” Commissioner Gordon said.

“Then can you at least let me take my AP Calc AB exam here? I’ve been working towards it all year and AP exams are a bitch and a half to reschedule,” She replied. Commissioner Gordon sighed.

“Ms. Smith, you murdered a man–”

“The Joker,” she interrupted.

“The Joker is still a man. One whom you murdered. I’ll see what I can do but you will have to face legal repercussions for this.” Emery stared down Commissioner Gordon. She was going to take her AP exams and she was going to get a five on all of them. The law couldn’t stop her.

#ao3 #fanfic #fic rec #batfam #batfamily #dcu #batman #jason todd #bruce wayne #oc #red hood #batkids #batdad #james gordon

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frownyalfred · 4 months

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truly, woke up, first thing i saw was the reblog of sever the blight and read it as a little treat 😭and it was great. i definitely think batfam-in-space is a great like... fic subgenre? that isn't explored enough and i'd loved to see more if you were going to continue sever the blight's scenario or write another standalone!

i can't imagine what the interactions between the boys were like being stuck on a planet for 20+ days with little to no food and distractions other than what bruce put them up to.

I'm glad you enjoyed! It was such a fun little world to explore. I knew, while writing, that if I tried to shift POVs to the boys I would be writing 10k or more, so I had to restrict it to Clark and his interactions with Bruce to make sure I actually went to bed last night. Lol.

I always think there should be more Bats out of Gotham fic! Sometimes the best way to draw contrast is to do it literally -- put your blorbos in a situation they don't like, don't normally end up in, don't mesh with. Juxtapose. Draw contrast.

That contrast, I've found, is even more satisfying when the batkids appear normal and comfortable in new situations. There's nothing that can flummox them -- they're kids of the Bat, and Bruce is confident and everything is fine. Outwardly, there's barely a hint of any discomfort. Dick is smiling, Jason is at ease, etc etc.

But they know. And they knew, at least instinctually, that something was wrong. But Bruce trained them well, and they're not going to give it away to the others. Or even to themselves, if they can avoid it.

#asks #myfic #theresurrectionist #batfamily #sever the blight #clark kent #dc #bruce wayne #batman

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slytherin-ghost · 1 year

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Hope you are having a good day/night?

I was wondering if I could request Batfam x lil child theif GN (their scrony from lack of nutrition) the kids an orphan who's been fending for themself for awhile a few tricks. They come across the Wayne Manor in the middle of the night, they just want to steal some food right. Well they get lost and find the batcave! But we all know curiosity killed the cat someone finds them hiding and either get punched/kicked to the balls!

Lol my brain been thinking about this all day

You always have the best ideas!

Raccoon

You've been looking around for awhile. For what exactly? Someplace to find food. Life hasn't been kind to you. Your a child, with no parents and no home. Sure orphanages existed but you ran away from your last one, not the best option.

While you were in you thoughts, you stumbled into a rock. Quickly, you picked yourself up as the rocks opened, revealing an entrance to someplace. Entering you walked until you were inside a cave. You looked around amazed as bats flew over your head. Taking a few more steps in you stopped something out of the corner of you eye. A tray, with some food on it.

You grabbed some food eating it before exploring more. You froze as you heard footsteps. Quickly running to hide.

-Jason POV-

I entered the Batcave after hearing something or someone. "Anything done there?" Dick yelled down "I'm looking!" I called back. There was definitely something done hear. I saw a pair of feet, I turned looking over there. The (hopefully human) person quickly hid their feet. "C'mere kid." I said, I carefully grabbed them pulling them out from their hiding place.

"Jason, Im coming down!" Dick yelled. I was about to say something before the little sh-, the child kicked my balls. "Ow!" I winced in pain. The child, quite scrawny for their age made a run for it. Quickly, Dick caught them.

Dick carefully but the child in a chair just as Bruce returned from patrol. "Bruce we kinda have a problem here." Dick said.

-No ones pov-

It was intimidating that the Batman was standing in front of you. The other two boys had left and gone upstairs. You considered running but knew he would catch you. "Where's your parents?" He asked "You shrugged "I don't know they left me at an orphanage." You said. "Where's the orphanage? I'll bring you back there." He said "I ran away." You told him.

Bruce looked over at you. You were rather small for a child your age, not to mention scrawny. Just by looking at you Bruce knew that you have had some to little nutrition in the past month. He went through an internal conflict in his head. He knew that you had no where. He sighed "C'mon kid." He said. You followed him. He lead you to a room. "This is where you'll stay there should be clothes. I should be back in a minute."

Jason who was on the couch in pain. "Your keeping them?! They kicked my balls!" Jason said. "Deserve it." Dick smirked. "Shut up!".

Bruce smirked knowing at least he knew had something to keep Jason in line.

#dick grayson #jason todd #tim drake #bruce wayne #damian wayne #batfamily #gn!reader #bruce wayne x reader #dick grayson x reader #jason todd x reader

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bluejaysandblackbats · 3 months

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Catch and Release

Fandom: DC Comics, Batfam

Summary: AU where Jason doesn't die in the explosion and he and Tim end up attending the same high school months later.

Chapters: 6/?

Characters: Jason Todd, Bruce Wayne, Alfred Pennyworth, Tim Drake, Dick Grayson, Barbara Gordon, Sebastian Ives, Jack Drake, Janet Drake

Relationships: TBA

Additional Tag: Jason Todd Lives, Jason Todd-centric, POV Jason Todd, POV First Person, Tim Drake Has Issues, Tim Drake Has Issues, Tim Drake is Not Robin, Jason Todd is Not Robin (Anymore), Bruce Wayne Needs a Hug, Alfred Pennyworth is the Best, Alfred Pennyworth Knows, Stalker Tim Drake, Jason Todd Has Chronic Pain, Jason Todd Has PTSD, Angst with a Happy Ending, Unlikely Friends, Injury Recovery, Emotional Baggage, Rage, Bruce Wayne is Bad at Communicating

Chapter Six: Visiting Hours

I woke up from an antidepressant-induced sleep to Bruce setting my schoolwork on the desk. "Sorry, I didn't mean—."

I pushed my palms into my eyelids to keep from crying. "It's okay... I'm okay," I lied.

"I can stay home tonight if you want," Bruce offered. I shook my head.

"You're good," I mumbled. I wanted Bruce to stay, but I knew he couldn't. Bruce offered only to see if I'd permit him to leave. I could've been honest about my pain and made him stay, but I let him go. There was no way for him to know that I was lying. He didn't think to ask twice. I lay awake until I could drift back to sleep.

As soon as I fell asleep, I woke up with a jolt to a tap, tap, tapping on my window. I wasn't easily startled, but the thing was, there were no trees near my window. I pulled myself out of bed and grabbed a pen from my nightstand before approaching my window. I parted my curtains just enough to see if someone was out there, and sure enough, there Tim was. He'd climbed up the trellis to get to my window. I opened my window and pulled him in, despite every nerve in my body attacking me all at once. "Tim, what are you doing here?" I asked as I slid down to the floor. Tim didn't weigh much, but I was in so much pain getting out of bed took half my strength. He smiled and sat next to me. "You know I think you're insane, right?"

"I know... But I was worried you got in trouble for being out so late last night, so I decided to come and check on you," Tim whispered. Pulling him in the window sent my back into spasms which meant I couldn't stand, even if I wanted to.

"Tim, you didn't have to do all that. I didn't get in any trouble... I just—. I'm not feeling well," I explained. Gross understatement.

"You can't get up, can you?" Tim asked. He was so coolheaded about it I couldn't move myself to lie. I nodded. "I know you don't want any help, but I'm pretty sure I can't leave you on the floor like that."

I begrudgingly reached out for him, and he pulled me up. I winced, and he profusely apologized as he helped me to bed. "My dad threw his back out last summer and got stuck at home with me for a whole week... It was pleasant," Tim whispered as he pulled my blankets over me. I thought that would be it, but he pulled up a chair and dug in his backpack for something.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Hanging out with you... Unless you want to be alone—."

"I definitely don't want that... But do your parents know you're here? It's pitch black out there," I said out of concern for his safety.

"My mom and dad left the morning after they got back. They don't stay home for long," Tim answered. I frowned. At least I saw Bruce every day. He plugged up a projector and asked me if I could see okay from that angle. I nodded.

He set everything up and put the movie on. He sat on the floor, and I looked over at him. "Tim, there's a folding bed and blankets in my closet if you wanna spend the night... And I've got pajamas in my bottom drawer that might fit you," I offered. Tim thanked me and asked if he could use my shower. I nodded. The movie was some 90's sci-fi thing, but I didn't mind.

I fell asleep before he came back, but it wasn't such a deep sleep that I didn't feel him pull my blankets up. I faintly heard the creaking of the fold-out bed and Tim's gentle series of sighs. I think he was asleep too. Things were fuzzy after the movie. I was in a deep sleep by that time, only waking to the sound of Alfred bringing in breakfast. I turned on my side to see if Tim was there. His limbs hung limply toward the floor as he slept on his stomach, mouth agape. "Alfred, I can-."

"No worries, Master Jason. I'll bring up a second tray shortly," Alfred smiled. Alfred was good at keeping secrets. I winced as I pulled myself up to a reclining position and ate breakfast, waiting for Tim to wake up.

Tim took a sharp inhale and turned toward me. "Feeling better?" Tim asked. I nodded. It wasn't a complete lie. At least I was able to sit up. "Thanks for letting me spend the night."

"Thanks for being a good friend," I whispered, "Stay for breakfast. Alfred's on his way up with a tray for you." Tim nodded.

"Mind if I come back tonight?" Tim asked. I nodded.

I could tell he had something on his mind. "Did your parents say goodbye before they left?" I questioned.

"Mhm... Mom woke me up and sat with me for a few minutes, and Dad said his goodbyes on the way out the door," Tim whispered. He seemed detached from it all. I know how I felt when Bruce went away, but Tim didn't feel anything. If he did, he kept it under wraps. He changed into some of my clothes, and I chuckled.

"This must be what it's like to have a little brother," I laughed without thinking. Tim lit up like a Christmas tree. I don't think I've ever seen him so excited about anything. He stayed for breakfast as promised, and Alfred took him to school, leaving me alone in the manor.

I hated being alone. It was terrifying. So terrifying it forced me to call Dick. I hated being afraid. Anger was a much simpler emotion to piece together. I called Dick in the middle of a panic attack. "Hello?" Dick answered the phone.

"Do you remember when I met your friends?" I asked. It was all I could manage to say without sounding panicked.

"Jason, do you want to FaceTime?" Dick asked. I made a soft noise, and he initiated the call. I answered and took a breath as I looked at his face. "Hey," Dick smiled as he whispered in a horse-taming voice. "Stuck in bed?"

I nodded. I couldn't look at Dick and speak at the same time. He'd seen me like that a few times, but I think it calmed him to see me feel something other than anger. He always knew how to pull me out of it. "Alfred's out?" Dick asked. I nodded. "Ohh... Okay, I see. Alfred's coming back. He always does... Until then, I'm not going anywhere. I'm just making a grilled cheese sandwich and avoiding my responsibilities. I heard you've been coming home from school later and later... Girlfriend?"

I shook my head. "Boyfriend?" Dick questioned.

"No," I mumbled. Dick grinned. He managed to distract me long enough to get me to talk. Dick might have asked a hundred questions if that's what it took to get me to relax.

"I like the secrecy of it all," Dick chuckled, "But I hope you're not doing anything dangerous. Can you promise me that you haven't done anything dangerous?"

I nodded. "I promise. I've been doing homework every day after school," I answered, "Most dangerous thing I've done is take a cab home every night."

"Dangerous for you or the taxi driver?" Dick laughed. I smiled and shut my eyes. "Want me to stay while you sleep?"

I nodded and sank into the pillows. I could hear Dick fiddling with plates and shaking a bag of chips in the background. I fell asleep and awakened to the feeling of someone taking my phone off my chest. My eyes shot open, and I grabbed their wrist. To my shock, I realized it was Bruce. "It's alright. Your phone's dying," Bruce reassured me. I wondered how long I'd been asleep. I looked around the room for a clock, and Bruce pushed my hair back.

"You've been asleep for hours," Bruce whispered, "Want me to stay tonight?" I shook my head.

"Bring back ice cream? Doesn't matter what flavor," I whispered. Bruce smiled and nodded.

"Okay... It's not that late yet, though. We've got a few hours. I wanna talk to you," Bruce whispered. He sat on my bed next to me, and I tensed up because I knew he knew something. "You talked to Dick today... Right?"

I frowned. "Yeah, Alfred had to go run errands, and I—. Bruce, I'm okay. I lost my grip for a second. Only a second," I whispered.

"I know... Jason, remember how we talked about the dangers of you telling all you know to a psychiatrist?" Bruce questioned. I nodded.

I thought psychiatrists were off the table. They were a liability that neither of our alter egos could risk. "What if you told bits and pieces? Do you think it would help?" Bruce asked.

"Can't I just talk to you?" I questioned. Bruce went slack-jawed, and he looked me in the eyes. I think we were both terrified. "Bruce, please."

"Jason, I love you, but—." He stood up and left me alone. Bruce abandoned me.

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batsandbugs · 1 year

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Bruce Wayne's Headache Classification System Chapter 4

IKEA Verse

AN: I'm so sorry for disappearing for months again, things have been very hectic for me, but I finally got this done so at least I'm starting off the new year strong. No promises as to when the next one comes out. I hope y'all enjoyed this fun little look at the girls. I wish I included them in the first story, but I wasn't thinking at the time. I choose Steph for the POV because I felt her internal snide commentary could help balance Cass's more quiet reserve. There was an alternative ending for this that had Marinette using her powers more, but I decided to go with something softer and mushy. It felt in line with where Marinette would be comfortable showing the depths of her powers and continuing to drive the Batfam insane by not finding out how her powers work.

Chapter 4: Interlude - The Stalking of Daminette, a Treatise by Steph and Cass

Slate grey skies hang heavy over Gotham promising rain. The city isn’t any less busy for it, especially not during the day when most sane people agree, on average, it’s safer to conduct one’s business. Steph thinks that’s boring of them, but eh, she parkours over rooftops and punches goons as a night job, so maybe she’s the crazy one.

Wait. Weather. Grey Skies. Rain on the horizon and all that jazz.

Not the best of circumstances for a stakeout, but they’ve survived worse.

The rooftop they posted themselves on is comfy at least. No bird’s nests, piles of beer bottles, or scattered needles. Not too high they can’t observe the streets below. But not too low to the ground for people to notice they’re hanging out up here. Which is, strictly speaking, not exactly legal.

Also, they don’t want Damian to spot them.

Steph sighs, peering down at the coffee shop she knows Damian is sitting at, but she can’t see. She pops an M&M in her mouth and nudges Cass. “Pass me the binoculars?”

Cass lowers the equipment with a blank face stare. Well, blank face to anyone who wasn’t siblings with her. Steph is familiar with her pseudo-adopted sister’s micro-expressions. This one read clear as day, ‘why didn’t you bring your own?’

Steph blows out a frustrated pout, “I forgot, okay? Damian slipped out of the manor all wily and suspiciously and we followed him on a whim. I didn’t think to grab them. Couldn’t figure we’d pull a stakeout on our own little brother.”

Cass signs, “I had mine with me.”

“Yeah, well we don’t all hide stakeout equipment on us at all times like over-paranoid busybodies!”

“You had snacks on you.”

Without a trace of guilt, Steph grabs another M&M and places it in her mouth. “Snacks are not surveillance equipment. They’re a normal thing to keep in your bag.”

“Your bag also contains mace, a taser, and smoke pellets too.”

“It’s Gotham, sis. That’s just best practice.”

Cass rolls her eyes, but hands over the binoculars.

“Yay! Thanks.” Steph places them to her eyes. It takes a second to adjust before she focuses on the cafe down the street. Damian sits at an outdoor table, alone, sipping a drink out of one of those tiny white teacups.

Pshh, what a pretentious little twerp.

“Wonder who he’s meeting?”

“IKEA girl?” Cass says aloud softly since Steph’s looking down the street and can’t read her hands.

Steph grins wildly, searching blindly for another M&M with one hand, holding the binoculars steady with the other. “Oh, I hope so. Timmy’s frantic rambling over her is the most entertained I’ve been all year. And Jay’s spittin’ steam over her little trick on him.”

“Dick’s worried.”

Steph waves a hand clutching three pieces of candy with a careless air. “Dick’s always worried, Cass. He’s a serial worrier. He doesn’t know how to do anything but worry.”

Steph pops the chocolate into her mouth, watching Damian peer up from his phone and scan the street with keen eyes. She’s, like, seventy-two percent sure he doesn’t know they’re watching him. After all, they’re halfway down the street, fifteen stories up, lying belly down on the roof of an office building. But it is Damian. The League and Bruce trained him. Steph’s still convinced the little brat has the psychic power to know when he’s followed.

“No info.”

Steph sighs at the short-remark reminder of her family’s tendencies to stick their noses fucking everywhere. “Yeah, well maybe she has decent cyber security for her life. More people need to do it these days.”

Silence.

Groaning, Steph grabs another few M&Ms out of pure stress. “You went looking too, didn’t you?”

“Little brother.”

Good lord, this family. They’re lucky she loves them so much.

“Yeah, yeah, I care about the brat too, doesn’t mean he needs his hand held constantly. He can make his own choices. Including hanging out with people, regardless of if his extremely invasive family managed to compile a dossier on her entire life.”

“You said we follow.”

Steph scoffs through a mouth of chocolate, “Yeah, ‘cause he was actin’ sus, just because I think we should leave her alone doesn’t mean I don’t think we should annoy him by stalking his date.” She focuses back on Damian. “Plus,” she mutters. “I don’t want to deal with Bruce bitchin’ about that car chase we pulled with the Volkov Family gang members, so this seemed like the better option.”

It wasn’t their fault the stupid goons running point from the pet shop’s back room decided to run on them.

“We helped,” says Cass resolutely.

“I don’t think B will see it that way.” Steph readjusts the binoculars and notices Damian’s attention sharpening. He looks out onto the sidewalk, eyes focusing on a person drawing closer. “Oh, oh, oh I think she’s here!”

There, approaching the café, in the cutest little yellow dress, a woman approaches and pauses by Damian’s table. Thanks to the high-tech binoculars she can view every emotion flickering across Damian’s face as his newest acquaintance greets him. He places down his cup and vacates his seat, pulling out the opposite chair and allowing the young woman to sit, before retaking his own.

Steph whistles lowly.

“Hmm…” prompts Cass.

“I- I don’t think the others are joking. He- he just pulled out her chair for her.” They are all capable of manners. Alfred made sure of that. Even for those in the family who’d joined later. (The disparity between the manners the Drakes’ taught Tim and the actual behavior expected of a Wayne was night and day and not in a good way. Meanwhile, people like Cass or Damian needed teaching ground up how to interact with people without pulling weapons on them. Quite frankly so did the rest of them, but Alfred was unafraid and whipped them all (metaphorically) into shape.)

So, yeah, manners.

Something they all could do.

But not necessarily likely to be performed by all.

Especially Damian.

Damian is like a feral raccoon who wields a bowie knife when it comes to Untested People. Short. Prickly. Rude in the way where you know you’re getting insulted, but the conversation already turned the corner and you stand there, shell-shocked, that this kid verbally bested you six ways to Sunday.

Of course, Damian isn’t much of a kid nowadays.

Standing as tall as Bruce and starting to shake off the lankiness of his teen years, Damian was growing into, as a posher person might say, 'a fine young man’. Steph still remembers him as that little feral kid, who only smiled when besting others or petting furry creatures. But no, now he’s smiling at other things. Adult things. Things that happened to include pretty French girls.

“She’s dangerous,” says Cass.

Steph pulls down her binoculars to find Cass peering at the seated couple with her phone, camera mode engaged, and zoomed in to see their interactions.

“Why didn’t you use that in the first place?!” Steph asks, annoyed. Reaching towards the candy wrapper her fingers find empty plastic. Damn it.

Cass narrows her eyes at her screen, ignoring the question. Steph huffs. Rude.

“What do you mean dangerous?” Replacing the binoculars, she focuses back on the couple. If she didn’t know who Damian was, her eyes would slip over them as another pair of lovebirds, eking out a final moment of good weather before Gotham’s stormy ways crushed the vibe. “She’s a little slip of nothing.”

“So am I.”

Steph rolls her eyes. “Yeah, but you were trained to fight since birth. She looks like the human embodiment of sunshine.” And the woman does. From this angle, she sees both their faces while they talk. The girl, Marinette, has sleek black hair possessing a blueish shine. Striking bright blue eyes and a smile that lit her face like the summer sun contribute to the overall impression this was a very normal, very friendly person.

“Looks are deceiving.”

“Of course, they can, and I’m not sayin’ she’s not sus, but…” she gestures down. “Look at them! This is the most normal I remember Damian acting in his life. Would he do that, could he really do that if he thought she was dangerous?”

“Hmm.”

“Don’t ‘hmm’ me! I’m serious! Sure, she might have powers, so what? Lots of people are magical and metas these days. Doesn’t mean she’s inherently dangerous.”

“No info.”

“Good security.”

“Something to hide.”

“A healthy sense of caution.”

Cass snorts. “She moved to Gotham.”

Steph pauses. And yeah, when you consider where the girl came from (Paris! Freaking Paris) and what she was studying… Moving to Gotham for a fashion degree sounds like moving to Las Vegas to join a nunnery.

“Yeah, okay that’s weird, I fully admit that. But maybe she has, like, I dunno? A danger kink or somethin’?” Steph shrugs. “Which, you know, is kinda good 'cause I think the demon brat has one too, so they’re like a match made for each other.”

Cass shoots her a highly unimpressed look.

“What!? At least I’m trying to think of somethin’ plausible, instead of jumpin’ to the doomsday scenario like the rest of you paranoid weirdos.” She turns back to her binoculars and her long-distance observing. “Listen, doin’ the whole overbearing intrusive family routine maybe isn’t the best way to act the first time Damian has, voluntarily, shown interest in a person more than complimentin’ their fightin’ skills.”

She places the binoculars back up to her eyes and watches Damian and Marinette chat. Damian’s smile hasn’t disappeared yet. In fact, it’s grown even larger. Marinette says something, her accent strong enough to throw Steph off on the exact words, and Damian throws back his head in laughter.

It’s a normal human reaction, laughing with such abandon. But it’s so not for Damian, that Steph’s mouth drops open in shock.

“Please tell me you took a picture of that?” she asks. Dick is so bound to freak the fuck out when he sees this.

“Mh hmm,” Cass hums in agreement.

They probably spend another thirty minutes watching the young couple. Cass takes pictures, and Steph makes commentary whenever Damian or Marinette looks sickeningly sweet. Cass sends the photos over to Steph’s phone, and in turn, she sends them to Dick. Most people would probably find it mind-numbingly boring, but both of them spend hours casing joints and running point of stakeouts before, so less than an hour is easy. But as the top of the hour approaches, the grey skies grow darker, and rumbling thunder appears.

Steph watches Damian blink as if shocked the weather suddenly turned bad.

Shit. Bruce would so kill him for that lack of awareness. “He’s in so deep,” she mutters.

“No covering. Will get wet,” Cass warns about their own situation.

Steph sighs, placing down her binoculars. “Shit, yeah, you’re right. Damn it, I wanted to keep watching them.”

Cass tucks the phone into her pocket with a sly smile and signs, “I took plenty of photos. We should go and find cover. Can’t head home yet because we took the bikes.”

“Yeah,” Steph mutters. Quickly though, she grabs the binoculars again and looks back at Damian and Marinette. The couple grabs their umbrellas – smart of them, too bad Steph didn’t think of those when she impulsively decided to follow Damian – and head off down the street. Together.

The date, apparently, isn’t over yet.

“Do we wanna trail them?” she asks Cass. “Any chance you stored umbrellas in that bag of yours?” Half joking, half serious. What? You never know.

Cass shakes her head though. “No, but I do have ponchos. Do you want to follow them? They’ll be heading inside. Damian will surely spot us.”

Steph snorts, highly doubting it. “He’s so damn distracted at the moment, I’m pretty sure an alien invasion could happen down the street and he wouldn’t notice unless little-miss-sunshine started screamin’.” She grins, wide and mischievous. “Pass me a poncho sis. We’re not giving up this hunt yet.”

Despite the high-quality ponchos, they still end up quite soaked. That’s the tradeoff for having an unnoticed trail high above their intended targets. Sharp stabs of water bite at their faces, as they race across the rooftops. Steph’s shirt clings stuck to her body, damp and humid between the poncho and her chest. Damn, a shower is gonna feel soooo good later.

For any normal person, the weather would make it impossible to follow the young couple. Not to mention the distance from the ground. But Steph and Cass were trained by the best hunters in the world, following their prey was simple – if very wet and uncomfortable – matter.

Rain pours from the sky even faster, thunderous noise drowning out all other sounds, and quickly empties the streets below. The typically numb Gotham populace seeking shelter from the crappy weather. Eventually, Marinette and Damian duck into an older building, the overhead awning buckled in from the rain collecting on top. The windows are dimly lit, and a cracked and faded sign flickers reading:

MAGNUS ANTIQUES ~ EST. 1902

Cass and Steph cross over the street with a quick grapple line. Both wouldn’t dare under normal circumstances; it’s the middle of the day and they aren’t even in domino masks. The slip in procedure would hardly endanger them with nobody around, heavy clouds turning the early afternoon dark as dusk, and the rain pouring thick sheets, obscuring even the highest tech cameras. They land on a building next door, and carefully climb down the siding, landing in the alleyway, behind the antique store.

A young man, in his mid-twenties, slouches against the brick wall a few feet down the alley huddled under another old and tattered awning that barely keeps him dry as he vapes. The shop’s back door sits propped open with a crate, and it takes all of a second while the man leans against the old brick façade with his eyes closed enjoying his few minutes of damp peace for Steph and Cass to slip quietly inside through the back door.

Score!

An old, musty smell hits them as they creep through the back entrance. Piles of boxes line the walls, old antiques half-boxed, or laid on shelves. The store is dark and stale. All of old Gotham oozes an aura of grime and darkness to it, like no matter how hard you scrub the walls and floors will never be clean, the shadows grow thicker in corners, and the cold lingers even in the depths of summer. But that might just be the fault of an old store with even older objects inside. Steph’s never put much stock on that old fairy tale of Gotham being cursed and all.

Under a worktable sits a box – of what she could generously call towels but would more accurately call rags – and they wriggle out of the rain-soaked ponchos. Steph stuffs the soaked ponchos in the box and pulls out a handful of the least questionable-looking rags. Handing one to Cass, Steph does her best to sop up the worst of the water.

“I’m gonna get blisters later,” Steph whines softly, her toes wriggling in soaked-through socks.

“You always have blisters, all of us do,” signs Cass, drying the front of her shirt.

“No, we have calluses, we haven’t formed blisters since we were teeny tiny baby vigilantes who didn’t know shit and our bodies thought they had the right to strike about their living conditions.” Steph tries to wrangle the water out of her hair. “We wear waterproof suits though, so my feet don’t get regularly soaked.”

“Well, sorry for not having pocket rainboots too,” Cass signs sarcastically, rolling her eyes.

“How unprepared,” Steph shoots back, gaining another eye roll in return.

Steph pulls her hair into a ponytail and wrings out her shirt and feels slightly more human now they’re back on dry land. Cass, with her pixie cut, vigorously scrubs her hair with a towel before it flops out, mostly dry. Lucky.

Quietly, both of them creep out of the back workroom. A glistening crystal doorknob attached to an old wood door sends Steph cringing when it creaks open into the store proper. Dim lighting flickers above, a high wine pitch of electricity crackles in the old wires. Tall shelves chock full of nick-nacks and blasts-from-the-pasts cast the store in even deeper shadows. Heavy rain pounds the building’s walls, mixing with the hum of electricity. Barely any light pierces through the charcoal clouds, which traps the store in an evening aesthetic rather than the middle of the afternoon.

Steph turns to Cass, signing, “Spilt up? Or stick together?”

Cass shakes her head. “Stick together, two chances to spot us are worse than one moving target.” Steph nods in agreement.

The store is quiet, minus the rain and a faint sound of classical music drifting from the front. Steph pads softly over wooden floorboards, which look like they’ll creak if you look at them wrong, and Cass follows behind, silent as a mouse. Rows of shelves stretch from front to back, ladened down with objects, Furniture and old clothes pile up on the sides. It is a chaotic, yet organized mess. None of it’s her style, but she’s sure Tim would enjoy it in here.

Slowly, ever so slowly, they creep from aisle to aisle listening for the low drawl of Damian’s pretentious voice. The store’s chaos turns what should be a straightforward search into a winding maze, but eventually right before they turn a corner, Damian’s distinctive scoff rings through the air and stops Steph and Cass in their tracks before giving the game away.

Ducking into one of those separated booths – the kind most antique stores were made of, creating tiny stores within one big one – a genuine score, because Magnus Antiques only sported a few. Fully cluttered with racks of mothball-smelling vintage clothing, the booth made for a perfect hiding spot, while also allowing them full-view access. Steph swipes a dull scarf off the table and ties it over her head, helping to disguise her distinctive blonde hair, as she hides halfway into a rack of big, dull winter clothing. Cass, using her smaller size and an all-black outfit, gracefully climbs an antique dresser and camouflages with an elaborate black feathered bouquet.

Truly, masters of stealth.

Damian and Marinette walk into view; fully focused on the shelves before them, and completely oblivious to the stalker duo creeping in on their date.

“I can call us a car. We do not need to linger until the storm passes,” Damian says with that highly entitled vibe he always gives off, despite Steph knowing Damian’s pretentiousness is mostly a font these days.

“Oh, come on Damian,” chides Marinette, crouching low to look at the bottom shelf. Her accented lilting voice is soft but carries in the quiet store. “It’s just a little bit of bad weather. There’s no reason to call a person to drive through it, we don’t want anyone hurt in an accident. We can wait it out here.”

Damian’s face contorts, “Here?” Eyeing the shelf full of porcelain dolls with dread – which, you know, totally fair. They were creepy as fuck.

But Marinette rolls her eyes and shifts through the pile on her side. “Yes, here. It’s like a treasure hunt, you never know what you’ll find.” She pushes a large black blanket off a cardboard box and smiles wide. “Ooh, see, a whole box full of ribbons and trim.” She fully falls to the floor and starts pulling rolls out of the box.

“Careful, we are likely to find germs.” Damian swipes a finger across the shelf and pulls it away covered in dust. He grimaces. “Or tetanus.”

Marinette giggles, like actually giggles, and not out of politeness either. She genuinely finds Damian’s offbeat, dry-as-a-bone, humor funny. Steph, safely out of sight, rolls her eyes. Oh, good lord, they’re perfectly horrible for each other.

“Says the man willing to climb into a box store air vent shaft at the drop of a hat.” Steph watches as Marinette sets aside a number of trims to buy.

Damian places a hand against his chest, offended. “That was tactical. This is stubborn desperation.”

“We were on the run, sounds a bit like desperation to me.”

“On the run? We were hunting our prey.”

Marinette’s face turns questioning, “Oh I’m sorry, did you not get chased by Jason with a nerf gun through half the store and the back areas? Was I not barely outrunning Dick before I took out the store’s electricity? We won by luck and the skin of our teeth. That does not sound like apex predators to me.”

Damian turns to the shelf he’s standing on, and, with a mutter, Steph barely makes out, says, “We could have taken them.”

“Sure, in a fight,” says Marinette without skipping a beat. And oh, isn’t that interesting. Steph knows the boys don’t tone down their personalities and skills the same way Bruce does (he doesn’t so much as tone down, as does a complete one-eighty, but it works for B, so Steph ain’t hatin’) when out of costume, but even they wouldn’t be so stupid as to act completely like their vigilante selves. It’s still, you know, not a lot, and Marinette probably saw more than most due to the game’s competitive nature. So, for her to say she could take them in a fight, with certainty, means she thinks quite highly of her own skills.

She could totally be overestimating herself.

Or… the rest of the family could be right, and Marinette is very dangerous indeed.

“… but we weren’t trying to take them in a fight, we were trying to outlast them. And anyway, it’s a moot point, we won, they lost, and now they hate me.”

Well, at least she was perceptive, Steph would give her that.

“They don’t hate you,” Damian shoots back.

Marinette rises from the floor holding an old roll of ribbon, bright emerald green, the lettering faded and worn on the cardboard spool. She lets out an inelegant snort, “Fine, Dick is suspicious, Tim is frustrated, and Jason hates me.”

Oh, she’s very perceptive.

Damian pauses for a second, then tilts his head and smiles thinly. “Yes, it is quite likely Todd does hate you. But he should blame me, not you. I told you what to say. He’s directing his anger all wrong.”

Steph blinks. That was… a shocking amount of self-reflection from the demon spawn. All directed towards this tiny little slip of a woman who looked like she could barely harm a fly, much less impress the likes of Damian Wayne. At this point, Steph has to believe this girl is magical because this shit is just unreal.

“Perhaps, but what I said obviously scared him-”

“That’s what we were trying to accomplish,” Damian mutters, mulishly.

“And one day I will learn the context of it, so I can properly apologize.” Steph watches Marinette’s eyes; focused and regretful. “I know I do not have their trust, and I do not have the right, but when I do, I will.”

Damian’s face flickers through emotions faster than a roulette wheel, eventually settling on a variation of soft and amazed Steph’s only seen on a besotted movie protagonist. And barely makes out his words. “I have no doubt you will earn those secrets. Your heart is big enough, and your will strong enough to melt my family’s own.”

Oh.

Steph's mouth falls open in complete shock. Damn… just, damn.

This isn’t just a crush.

This is full-on, head-over-heels, besotted beyond belief, in love.

Damian is implying Marinette is important enough to earn the details of Jason’s death, to know why he was so scared of his family being hurt and dying and him unable to help (yeah, Jason ranted to her about Marinette’s little speech; yeah, it was harsh, but what else could you expect from Damian, he doesn’t do shit by halves). All of that implies she’ll learn of their identities, the biggest secret their family kept under lock and key. Only a handful of Justice League members and assorted friends (and enemies) knew of their full identities.

This is a girl Damian met two and a half days ago.

Steph, nearly so lost in her own shock and incredulity, almost misses Marinette’s reaction.

Face flushed and eyes tilted down, Marinette’s smile conveys embarrassment, joy, and a hint of sadness all at once. “Has anyone ever told you, you’re very sweet?”

Sheepishness seeps into Damian’s face and body, as he raises a hand to rub the back of his neck, a move making him look exactly like Dick. “Most people say the exact opposite, or they are in the middle of cussing me out.”

He’s not wrong.

Marinette's smile grows wider, “Well, I’m-”

“Not most people.” Damian and her finish together with a look building the foundation of an inside joke.

“No, all the more I learn of you,” Damian says, tone fond. “I find you are definitely not most people.”

“I aim to impress,” Marinette says, with a sly and besotted smile, and Steph doesn’t know if she will pass out from the sweetness or vomit, and at this point, it could go fifty-fifty. The woman looks over Damian’s shoulder. “Looks like the rain stopped.” Steph vaguely sees weak rays of light coming from the store’s front. The kind indicating the Gotham sun, a rare and noteworthy presence, has burst through the clouds to shine upon rain-soaked streets. “I should probably head back to my apartment before it starts again; I have a commission project to work on.”

Damian readjusts himself, folding away the soft, besotted emotions until he looks more like himself again. “And I need to return home as well, my father’s back from his business trip and will wish to speak with me.” He winces, “He is most likely already speaking with my brothers, which means I need to run interference before they blow the entire situation out of proportion.”

Marinette smirks, unrepentant and teasing, and for the first time Steph understands why Jason kept ranting ‘she’s just as demented as he is’, “To be fair, we did set Tim on fire, and break the store multiple times.”

Damian smirks right back, and “First off you broke-”

“We, don’t forget your part with the display and tying up a security guard.”

“-second, we set fire around him, he wasn’t hurt. No one got hurt. Except for their pride.” He pauses, and amends, “Well, perhaps that unpleasant woman at the end had an aneurysm with her screaming, but that’s hardly our fault, so it shouldn’t count.”

Both of them laugh until it fades into a contented silence. Then, Marinette places a dainty hand on Damian’s arm, and says, “This was fun. We could… do it again sometime?” For the first time, uncertainty crosses the young woman’s face.

Damian’s face, on the other hand, is as eager as Steph has ever seen it. Wow, what must his head and chest feel like with all these new intense emotions bandying about? “Uh, o-of course, yes, this was fun. We’ll… text?”

“Sounds like a good idea.” Marinette leans down and picks up the small pile of trimmings and ribbon she found in the box earlier. The spool of emerald ribbon balanced on top.

“You took the bus in? I can walk you to the stop?” Oh, kid; if he had a tail, it would be wagging.

Marinette tilts her head, “Didn’t you ride in on a motorcycle? Shouldn’t you take advantage of the break in the rain?”

Damian shrugs off the offer, “I drive in far worse than a little rain regularly..”

“Don’t compromise your safety for my own, I can take care of myself perfectly fine,” Marinette says.

“I’m sure you can, but I want to,” insists Damian. “I parked near the bus stop’s location, it will be no trouble.”

“Alright then, maybe on the way you can tell me more about that art store you mentioned was down my way, I’m looking for a new set of brushes; mine became damaged in the move.” They walk down the aisle and swiftly out of view and hearing range.

Steph doesn’t move, and neither does Cass until Marinette pays for her purchases, and they hear the door to the shop open and close with a creak and a chiming of bells. A second more passes by, before Steph slips out of the clothes rack, and Cass descends the dresser, and they stand in silence for a moment.

“Whelp,” Steph says, popping the p. “That was certainly something. I don’t quite have the words for it yet, cause my brain’s still rebooting. How about you Cassie?”

Cass shakes her head, then pauses, contemplation playing across her features. “I still think she’s dangerous. Her body has the grace of a fighter, with years of practical experience moving quickly and efficiently. But I don’t think she uses her magic, whatever it may be, to influence Damian.” Cass smiles, now looking like a cat holding a canary between her lips. “That’s all due to him being very, very in love.”

“Great, so I wasn’t the only one seeing literal hearts in Damian’s eyes, cool, cool, cool.” She stretches her arms high above her head, spine popping brutally, as she tries to get feeling back in her limbs after observing the two lovebirds for long. “Well, I’m not in the mood to deal with Bruce and his game of twenty questions, so what say we go eat? How ‘bout the new Italian place that opened near my apartment, worse case it starts raining again and we head back there, we covered and hid the bikes well enough.”

Cass nods and they leave the store, passing by an ancient old man seated at the front desk totally absorbed in a creaking leather tome. Summer sun barely peaking through gaps in the clouds. It hasn’t truly stopped raining yet. The sky drizzles a small smattering of rain, and fog mists up from the pavement. It’s a pleasant change from the chaotic, faint oppressive feel of the antique shop.

Steph’s brain turns over the interactions she witnessed between Damian and Marinette. It shouldn’t be such a big deal. People meet, flirt, and fall in love all the time. But it just is because it’s, well, Damian. Even as a little kid he always seemed so removed, he really wasn’t, but he was good at pretending. Steph never pictured him falling in love, not because he wasn’t capable of it, but because she always thought he’d be too prickly for anyone to break through his walls. And certainly not a civilian who had no clue about their double lives.

Steph hopes everyone comes out on the other side, lives, and emotions relatively intact, and in the meantime, she plans to wring this situation for all the blackmail material it’s worth.

#daminette #maribat #damian x marinette #damianette #marinette dupain cheng x damian wayne #the ikea verse #headache classification system #cass and steph are here!#mlb crossover #maridami #ml x dc #damimari #the great ikea game #marinette dupain-cheng x damian wayne

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somefanficrecomendations · 29 days

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March Monthly Roundup

A belated St. Patrick’s Day, and Happy Easter if you celebrate! Sadly, I had a busy March, so this month’s rec list is short and sweet!

BATFAM Too Close to Rotting to be Alive by alicecrow6 (gen), <1k, Damian Wayne-centric, Angst The thoughts of a rotting corpse not yet placed in his grave.

pull up the ladder when the flood comes by mintchocochips (gen), 4k, Cass Cain-centric Black Bat is operating in Hong Kong. Bruce is dead. A hell of a lot of people are dead. Cass is trying her damnedest not to drown. She doesn't want anyone else to drown either. She just wants to be good. She is maybe, just maybe, not okay.

charity by Valkrin (gen), 7k, Different First Meeting, Bad Parent!Drakes The biggest downside of being adopted by Bruce Wayne is putting up with rich people events, including one where Jason will be in a room with a bunch of rich kids for a couple very long hours while Bruce goes to the adults' meeting. Jason is ready for a very bad time but the Drake kid listens to him from the start and keeps backing up Jason's ideas even though they've never met. Jason warms up to Tim Drake long before Mad Hatter tries to take over the meeting and Tim backs him up again.

the picture frames have changed and so has your name by Zahri (gen), 24k, Case Fic, Hurt/Comfort There’s something wrong with Dick. Tim thought everything was getting back to normal. Bruce was alive and back in their timeline, the Birds of Prey were once again operating out of Gotham, Dick had the city well under control as Batman and even Damian had been less obnoxious than usual. And then during a firefight at a warehouse by the docks, Tim was almost hit by a flying boomerang. And Dick never noticed. When something is wrong with your big brother, who else do you turn to but your big sisters?

Fatherhood for Dummies by Havendance WIP, (gen), 6k, Batman Comics, POV Jack Drake When Tim runs away to No Man's Land, it takes Jack far too long to realize that he's gone. Once he does though, he'll do anything he can to get him back.

THE WITCHER Flung to Catch a Star by inexplicifics WIP, (Eskel/Geralt/Jaskier), 63k, Accidental Warlord AU Morvran Voorhis, first-ranked prince of Nilfgaard, has been sent to Kaer Morhen on a diplomatic mission. His tasks are twofold: first, negotiate a nonaggression treaty between the wild barbarian Warlord of the North and the Nilfgaardian Empire. And second, ingratiate himself with the mysterious Warlord’s daughter and heir apparent, Princess Cirilla. Sir Cahir Mawr Dyffryn aep Ceallach, a Vicovaran knight, has been assigned to protect young Prince Voorhis on this mission. Prince Voorhis may be the best of a bad lot, but Cahir’s still not looking forward to the threats or the temperature of a winter in the distant North. They both know their mission is a dangerous one. But they don’t know where the true danger lies…and while they know how to navigate Nilfgaard’s treacherous court, they are not prepared for Kaer Morhen. This is a mission they might not survive…and if they do, they might be changed beyond all recognition.

HARRY POTTER Three Body Problem by cabezas_de_vaca (gen), 43k, Alternate Hogwarts House Sorting To the girl with the bushy hair and the hungry mind, the Hat says RAVENCLAW; To the boy with the scar and the ask of otherwise, the Hat says SLYTHERIN; To the sixth son who has already chosen the two others, from a chance encounter on a train, the Hat says HUFFLEPUFF; and Flitwick is delighted and Sprout is intrigued and Snape is resigned, to say the least. Or: Perhaps the trio is inevitable everywhere, but in this variation, none of them are in Gryffindor, and they do their best to build things anyway.

CROSSOVER While You Were Missing by basil_coffee_and White Collar x Batman (Jason Todd/Roy Harper), 23k, Accidental Baby Acquisition, Jason!Neal A familiar redheaded child darts across the bullpen with a shout of “PAPA!” and barrels into Jason’s arms. “Lian–” He breathes. Jason's undercover work as Neal Caffrey is difficult for several reasons. He didn't anticipate that single parenting would be one of them, though.

#batfam fic rec #the witcher fic rec #white collar fic rec #batman comics fic rec #AWAU #harry potter fic rec #Cass Cain-centric #Damian Wayne-centric #POV Jack Drake #words: 0-5k #words: 5-10k #words: 20k #words: 60k #WIP #fic #words: 40k

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lurkinglurkerwholurks · 8 months

Text

He's Shorn, We're Torn

First posted: October 22, 2018

Focuses on: BatFam (Bruce POV, focused on Dick Grayson)

Favorite bookmark: "Didn't know you could make me tear up over Dick's hair, but here we are."

Tier: Within my top 30 fics in terms of metrics, shockingly

This is my "behind the scenes" series where I indulge myself horribly by annotating my fics. Link to the fic itself above. Thoughts below the cut.

I really hecking hate that title.

As I said in the opening note, this was around the time the "Ric" storyline was playing out, and while I don't read canon, I did hear all about it and thought it was egregiously stupid. But it did get me thinking about (and maybe talking about? I don't remember) how Bruce as a parent might feel emotionally about his beloved son losing his trademark hair. Because that's his kid.

Bruce Wayne didn’t like to putter. He found it an inefficient movement, undignified, and an unnecessary tell. As a billionaire, Bruce could afford any number of eccentricities, including puttering, if he so chose, but a billionaire businessman should never display the uncertainties that puttering revealed. When Bruce walked, he strode, propelling himself decisively from Point A to Point B. If he must move as Brucie, the silly playboy, he could saunter. As Batman, Bruce wouldn’t dream of puttering. He had trained himself in the way of total stillness, of letting his anxiety and restlessness sink into himself and then dissipate, leaving him as immovable and obdurate as stone. It was a hard mentality to shake, even inside the walls of the Manor, away from unfriendly eyes, and Bruce wasn’t one to give in for the sake of mere comfort. So although his calf muscles strained and his hands remained wrapped around his coffee mug, he counted his breaths and held still. He didn’t fidget. He didn’t rise from his chair. He didn’t follow the tug of his heartstrings up the stairs. He waited, and he breathed.

So many of my slow openings (and I have many) are just me talking myself through a character's psychology. Sometimes I'll have a flash of a first line that tells me... something. And then I have to figure out if that something is right or not and I have to figure out why it's right or wrong. I don't remember here if my first mental image was of Bruce moving and fidgeting and that felt wrong, or of him being still and waiting just like that and that felt right. Whichever path it was, here we are.

Damian, for all his preternatural maturity, had no such compulsion. Bruce’s youngest blew in with all the focused energy of an avalanche. “Where is Grayson?” Damian demanded. “Is he not up? Why are you allowing such slothfulness?”

I had to figure out what order the other family members would appear in. I had my line to build toward (we'll get there), but everything before that needed to make sense. Really, Alfred should have been there first, but because this fic was about focusing on the kids' reactions (I didn't really have a grip on Alfred as a person yet instead of A Figure), I sort of left him out. Damian being the first kid down made the most sense.

His hair was askew, so Bruce reached out and smoothed out the errant strands. Damian ducked away and set about reordering his hair. He’d let it grow longer recently, not raggedly so, but enough that he could let it swoop and wave over his right eyebrow. The longer hair made for some interesting bedhead, and, at least in this moment, a good distraction for them both.

Oh, there were conversations about hair. I don't remember who all was involved, but we definitely joked about Damian growing his hair to match Dick's. Tada.

It had been a long month for him, for all of them, without Dick.

I had a whole sketched-out backstory for where Dick was, why he'd been gone, why it had been so dangerous, why it required the buzzcut. I just never got to it in the fic because it wasn't important to the story itself, just the logistics underpinning the story. This is @audreycritter Disease.

Knowing how badly Dick would need to rest, Bruce hadn’t intercepted his path up the staircase. He did, however, step out of the shadows just enough to let Dick know he was there, that someone had marked his return home, that someone had waited for him.

this is lowkey so sweet oh my goodness Past Me

Damian whirled, nearly rising on tiptoe as he restrained himself from bolting to the door. The corner of Bruce’s lips quirked upward despite his best efforts. There were times he forgot how very young Damian was, and it was a soft delight to be reminded.

he's just a baaaaaabyyyyyyyy

“‘llo to you, too,” Tim muttered. His voice was thick and crackling with sleep—or perhaps exhaustion, Bruce conceded, taking in Tim’s jeans and wrinkled t-shirt. “All-nighter?” Bruce asked as his middle child nudged over a chair and slumped into the seat. He thought he’d kept his voice perfectly neutral, but Tim held up a warning finger. “No lectures.” Tim rested his elbow heavily against the tabletop and dragged his long fingers through his hair. “I’m too tired and it won’t change my behavior anyways.”

I am still leaning heavily on fanon Tim here. We all have to start somewhere. (But also I am partial to "piano fingers" Tim for some reason.)

“No doi.” Tim yawned so widely that his jaw popped, then blinked twice and scrubbed a hand across his eyes.

Wow. I really dated myself with that one. Does anyone actually say no doi anymore? (Also, I now know it's written doy because I tried to google it.)

He rested his hand on the back of Tim’s neck and squeezed gently. “You should head to bed.” Tim yawned again, leaning into Bruce’s touch like a cat. It still surprised Bruce how affectionate his sons could be when given the opportunity.

This was a gift from me to me.

Bruce leaned back in his chair, keeping his hand on the back of Tim’s neck, his thumb methodically digging into the knots in the muscle, and pulled back his other arm. When Damian hesitated, Bruce wrapped his arm around the boy and carefully pulled him in.

This was also a gift from me to me, both the affection between them and also the overall sensation of Tim resting on his arms while Bruce massaged his neck with one hand. My dad's done that more times than I can count, and writing about it was a little like feeling it. Phantom sense. Brains are weird.

Dick stood in the doorway, his easy smile underscored by the dark shadows under his eyes and the lines on his face that ran deeper than they had a month ago. Bruce quickly catalogued the other, subtler signs of trouble. The loose way his pajamas hung on his frame, the slight shifting of his weight off his right leg, the fading marks on his wrists, the new sharpness to his cheekbones.

Like I said. A whole backstory.

When Damian still hesitated, he pushed himself upright and shrugged. “That’s alright. I bet Tim’ll hug me.” Tim had been staring along with Bruce, but he shook himself from his daze and stepped forward tentatively. “No, back off.” Damian hurled himself forward and wrapped his arms around Dick’s waist.

Damian's "no, back off" is a line I can hear in my head like it's from a movie. I suspect the delivery paired with what I see in my head makes it way funnier to me than it does anyone else.

“Hey Tweedledum and Tweedledumber, pipe down.” Jason shouldered his way into the kitchen, laundry basket perched on one hip. They both ignored him, so he crossed over and smartly smacked each on the back of the head with his free hand.

I stole that line from some form of media, I'm pretty sure, but beats me if I can remember where. Also can't you just see Jason with a laundry basket on his hip? He doesn't live at the Manor, so he needed an excuse to be there.

“You let them act like this in front of guests?” Jason asked. He snorted, then flipped a loose curl out of his eye. “Dang, B. You’ve gone soft.” Guests? “Are you for real right now?” Dick asked, exhaustion momentarily wiped away by amusement. “Listen, pal, I—“ Jason froze, mid-sentence and mid-step, his face going slack.

This is one of the two emotional beats I was aiming this fic toward. The dialogue is wholesale fiction, but this really did happen to me at work once. I got my hair cut into a fauxhawk, showed up at work, and my coworker straight up did not recognize me from behind. Ma'am we have worked together for over a year.

A myriad of expression passed across Jason’s face, fluttering like the dappled shadows of leaves in a breeze. Even Bruce, as well as he knew that face, might not have been able to track them if the emotions hadn’t been echoing in his own chest for the last ten minutes. Surprise deepening into shock. Simple, stunning confusion. The sickening, swooping drop of realization. And more than a touch of sorrow. All recognizable, but not what Bruce had expected to see.

I love Jason feeling things.

Bruce remembered, suddenly, standing just outside a bedroom door, listening with held breath as his ward and his newly adopted son talked. He remembered defensive banter, quiet laughter, and the fruity fragrance of hair gel as Dick fixed his own hair, then carefully helped his new little brother with his. It had been one of the very few brotherly moments they’d shared before Jason’s… before Jason had gone away.

I revisited this years later in Steel Blues.

“It sucks asphalt, Dickie,” he said, even as he stepped forward and hooked a meaty arm around Dick’s neck. “You look like a trauma patient. You look like a Furiosa look-alike contest reject. You look—"

Finding alternative swears for Jason was always a bunch of fun. I should go back to that more often.

“Alfred’s tea? The oolong?” Jason asked, dropping the basket to the floor as he stepped away from Dick and toward the other two boys. “Don’t you dare. You idiots don’t have the skills. I’ll make it.” “Fine. I’m going to—“ “You aren’t going anywhere. You’re going to take this tray to the table, and Demon Brat here’s going to pop the plate of eggs back in the oven to warm them up. No, the oven, not the microwave, you beast.”

Writing overlapping dialogue is a difficulty but also sometimes fun. It's just dictation, in the end.

“Hey B,” Dick murmured. “G.I. Jane,” Bruce replied.

Jason's final insult, delivered by another.

Bruce felt a bit like the sitcom moms he had always mocked, the tightly wound, pearl-clutching women who bemoaned their rebellious teenage daughters hacking off their beautiful hair. Dick’s soft, shining waves of hair, gone. The strands Bruce had kissed goodnight, pressed his nose into during the rare hug, pushed off sweaty skin in illness, tousled in play… gone. Knowing that it hadn’t been Dick’s choice only made the loss ache more. Dick looked older without his hair. Harder. More serious. There was no ridiculous pompadour or boy band bangs to distract from the fine wrinkles around his eyes or the creases in his forehead. Not for the first time, Bruce wondered where his goofy little acrobat had gone.

I think it made my dad sad when I went to the fauxhawk. He was always really good about hiding it, though. It definitely made his mom sad, because she liked to play with our hair and now there was nothing for her to play with. She was also good about hiding it. Also, I'm 83% sure the inciting hair conversation was with @starknjarvis27 again. Probably. It might have been @audreycritter but I'm not sure we were friends yet.

“And what about you? Are you jealous, too?” Are you upset? Are you feeling just as weird as everyone else but hiding it better? Did you miss me? “Hardly,” Bruce replied. He kept his hand on Dick’s shoulder, palm flat against warm muscle as he guided Dick to the kitchen table. “My hair is a national treasure. So says People magazine.” I’m fine. Of course I missed you. Every second of every day. And Alfred said they had trouble communicating.

I am also a big fan of this trope and do it kind of a lot. I am not sorry.

Instead of recoiling from Dick’s lack of hair, Cass’s smile widened into a grin as she reached up and almost reverently ran her palm along the side of Dick’s head. “Fuzzy,” she announced, then did it again twice more before kissing Dick’s cheek and bounding away.

Cass's reaction is the most correct one.

It's a super sappy ending, but I like it.

#fanfic bts brain dump

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