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absolutely-esme · 7 months

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Monster!Tim Coraline AU Idea

This idea would not leave me alone.

It’s a cross between a meta!/magic!Tim au and a Coraline au.

Before I get into it, I feel like I should explain. I was on a bit of an Eldritch!Batfamily and Cryptid!Batfamily kick. Then I found a collection of supernatural Tim aus. Then I stumbled across a Coraline au. There’s probably also some inspiration in there from vampire au fics.

It didn’t really jell until the idea occurred to me of a scene where some frightened villain asks Tim “What kind of monster are you?” and Tim says “The hungry kind.”

...

The idea is that somewhere back along the way, Tim’s family tree includes some kind of supernatural creature which may or may not have been an eldritch entity.

The supernatural heritage allows Tim to acquire abilities from other entities he has defeated, and Gotham is absolutely full of the supernatural if you pay attention.

Of course, Tim’s power isn’t all sunshine and rainbows. It actually comes packaged with some pretty nasty side effects.

One of those side effects is perpetual Hunger. Tim is always Hungry. There is no way to stop it. He eats enough to stay healthy, but he still feels Hunger at all times. Increasing his food intake will not help and will screw up his metabolism and cause him to need more for normal function. If this was allowed to spiral out of control it could eventually reach a point where he was physically unable to eat the amount of food he needed to function and starved to death on a full stomach.

Fixing it is stupid hard because this particular sort of magical inheritance is really fucking inconvenient. And, of course, whatever is up with his biology also makes him insanely susceptible to addiction, so no coffee for him unless he wants caffeine withdrawal symptoms all the time for however long it takes to fix that. The constant Hunger also makes it difficult to get enough sleep. Have you ever tried to go to sleep on an empty stomach? Not easy, was it? Imagine that every night.

The Hunger is fairly central to the nature of the magic. Whatever supernatural entity he’s descended from, it is the Hungry kind. The ritual of defeating another supernatural entity, taking a bit of the defeated entity’s power, and incorporating it into himself serves as a sort of metaphorical devouring, (and metaphors matter more to magic than they do to normal biology). That’s why he’s able to gain power and abilities from defeated foes.

...

Tim’s relationship with his parents is complicated. His supernatural heritage comes from his mother’s side of the family. She did her best to teach him about it and how to cope with it, but a lot of knowledge was lost over the generations due to persecution forcing those like them into hiding more than once. There may have been a few individuals who spiraled out of control and caused small-scale famines before losing their lives. It only takes a few cases for people to decide that a specific category of people is simply not worth the risk of having around. Janet always referred to herself and Tim (as well as anyone else sharing the condition) as “those afflicted with Gluttony.” This is the closest they have to a name for the condition.

One of the important things Janet Drake teaches her son is to pursue his passions. It is incredibly important for individuals like them to have things outside the self that they can draw satisfaction and fulfilment from, things that keep them going in the face of the relentless Hunger. This is what leads Tim to his night-time photography of Gotham, and eventually to his fascination with the Bats.

Janet’s passions are archeology and travel. Unfortunately, traveling from dig site to dig site is not a particularly stable or safe environment to raise a child in. She needs to do these things to remain in good health. Without her external coping mechanisms, she could start spiraling. If she starts spiraling, it might trigger her son to start spiraling too because children in their developmental years are delicate, and this type of hereditary magic is fucking inconvenient (there might be ways of managing things that make it easier to live with, but between the knowledge lost and the risks that come with experimentation, they don’t have much info on how anything works). She comes home as much as she can without the risk of compromising both their health.

She also taught Tim how to calculate appropriate portion sizes based on nutritional data so as not to screw up his metabolism, and how to fix it if he does mess up. She also stayed and managed the process the first time it happened because the process of returning the metabolism of one afflicted with Gluttony to normal after it’s gotten out of hand is difficult and unpleasant and Tim wasn’t old enough to handle it by himself. The nanny that had overfed him hadn’t been malicious or unreasonable, she’d just been operating on the assumption that he had standard human biology. It took months to get Tim healthy again. It took several hefty bribes to keep things under wraps. Janet doesn’t know if there are still people out there hunting their kind, but she’s not willing to risk it.

Janet may not know about the aspect of the family magic that lets them gain powers from defeating other entities. It’s possible that she was holding off on explaining this until he was older and more ready for the responsibility of multiple superpowers. It’s also possible that the knowledge got lost somewhere along the way and Janet didn’t discover it herself because she didn’t spend her childhood running around Gotham at night and was more the sort of person who would stay home and read when she had trouble sleeping.

...

Tim discovers his ability to gain abilities from defeating other supernatural things fairly early on. The type of defeat can vary, but it has to be something of significance. A fight will work for most, but there are other particular challenges that will work for specific cases.

The first things a young Tim is able to beat are these small things, invisible to most, that gain power from learning secrets. What that power is used for, I couldn’t tell you. They don’t seem to do much other than sneak around and learn secrets. Tim doesn’t know if there’s a proper name for these things or not, but he calls them Secret Hunters. They are absolutely everywhere in Gotham.

Secret Hunters are invisible to most, but Tim is able to see them. It might be because of his own supernatural nature, or it might be something else entirely. If it’s hereditary it must have skipped his parents’ generation. Neither of them seem to be able to see them. Tim gains improved stealth and a sense for when something is hidden from catching Secret Hunters until they wise up and start avoiding him. (Catching them works in place of a fight because secret hunters primarily operate on stealth and evasion.)

He can’t just magically know secrets, but he can tell when there is a secret. (He still figured out Batman’s and Robin’s secret identities on his own merit. The most this ability would have done is alert him to the fact that they had secret identities if that hadn’t already been obvious from the fact that they were wearing masks.)

He also gets various other abilities from other things he encounters while scrambling all over Gotham at night. Nearly doesn’t get out of some of the scrapes he gets himself into. He gains the ability to cut with his fingernails as if they were razors from something that nearly killed him. He gains the ability to climb like a goat from a Jersey Devil. Etc.

...

At some point, Tim is targeted by a beldam. He doesn’t get the kind of warnings that Coraline does, but his ability to sense secrets lets him know that the Beldam is hiding something, and any child raised in any part of Gotham knows to be suspicious of things that seem too good to be true. Tim doesn’t have a convenient seeing stone from the neighbor, but he does have the advantage of his own supernatural nature which the Beldam doesn’t know about.

Tim finds a button-eyed doll that looks like him after his parents leave on yet another trip, and thinks it’s a gift they meant to give him before leaving. They do often bring interesting souvenirs. It wouldn’t be at all unusual for them to find an artist who sews dolls to look like people and have one made based on pictures of him. Later on, he discovers the key.

This Beldam is older and more powerful than the one from Coraline. She has more power and more past victims to work with, so she’s able to make a larger, more populated world.

Oh by the way, I head-canon that the Other versions of people in the Other world are actually past victims of the Other Mother, remade and dressed up for whatever role she has them play. The three ghosts were just the three most recent and not fully processed for use yet. That’s why the Others are able to act against her sometimes (Other Wybie saving Coraline from the mirror, Other Father tossing the eye to Coraline) or say things she doesn’t want them too (Other Father says “so sharp you won’t feel a thing” and Other Mother kicks him under the table).

The Other Mother doesn’t know all that Tim knows, so the Other World has inconsistencies like Other Batman and Other Robin sitting across the table from Other Bruce and Other Jason. She doesn’t know they’re the same people. She just knows that they’re all important to Tim. She also tries to tell him to “eat as much as he wants” when his real mother was the one to explain the dangers of attempting to eat to fullness for people with their condition.

There isn’t a cat to warn Tim but he doesn’t need it. He can sense hidden intentions in everything, and he’s fully capable of uncovering the hidden secrets himself.

Tim doesn’t have a cat, but he does have Other Robin, who might have been made from whatever remained of someone close to one of the people mirrored in the Other World made for Tim. He doesn’t remember his life, but somehow he feels incredibly motivated to help a boy who cares dearly for whoever and is willing to let him know that they're living a good life out there in the real world.

Tim discovers the nature of the other world and sets out to free the souls trapped there. He fights the Beldam will all the viciousness and desperation of someone who knows they’ve only got one shot. He takes everything he can from this fight as he makes sure she won’t ever hurt anyone again. He doesn’t stop until the beldam is well and truly dead. Then he unravels Other Gotham and spills all of the souls out into the world where they can move on and rest.

This is how Tim learns to Sew. He can’t make entire populated worlds like the beldam, but that’s mostly because he refuses to do what she did. He can control things he’s made (though there’s limits on how much) and even see through buttons he’s sewn (onto cushions and such, he's not the Other Mother). He also gets some minor illusory powers that let him make things look a bit brighter/nicer/cheerier than they are. It takes quite some time before he’s comfortable with using these powers. Trauma is a bitch like that.

Part of the reason this version of Tim was so desperate to do something about Batman losing it out of grief is because he already has Evil Batman trauma from Other Batman, and he doesn’t need that shit happening in real Gotham.

By this point Tim has a collection of powers that allow him to navigate the more dangerous parts of Gotham largely without fear. Now he has to learn how to manage without using any that he isn’t one hundred percent certain he can sneak past Batman, which means he’ll have to divide his attention between learning from the training and not letting himself do things the supernatural way. This is going to suck.

It does, in fact, suck.

Oh, it turns out some of the rogues are a bit supernatural. He gains a bit of an intuitive understanding of the health of plants from Ivy. He gains the ability to taste emotions from Scarecrow. (Also, Johnathan Crane is a freaking weirdo, fear tastes like spoiled milk!) The rogues with supernatural tendencies are freaking terrified of the new Robin because he always seems like he wants to freaking eat them. The non-supernatural types don’t get it.

Eventually, Red hood breaks into Titan’s tower. Tim, by this point, is very good at deciphering how supernatural entities work and is packing an extensive inventory of powers. He realizes quickly that this is some kind of manipulative entity that feeds on rage and pain attached to an unwitting host. When he realizes that the unknowing (and therefore unconsenting) host is Jason Todd, he tells the Lazarus Entity in no uncertain terms to give Jason back or perish.

Jason, who does not realize he has a malicious, mind-warping, supernatural parasite and believes there to be no one other than himself and Tim present, is understandably confused.

Tim decides that the Lazarus entity has had its chance and springs into action.

Jason is treated to the terrifying sight of just what Tim Drake is like when he’s not expending conscious effort on not being something out of a horror movie. Suddenly he’s in the middle of a spider’s web and no matter how hard he tries to fight back everything around him is under the control of his opponent. Furniture flies around on puppet strings. Getting too close puts him in range of the freaking claws this kid apparently has!? Trying to get away just leaves him caught in strings and the more he struggles the more entangled he becomes! The new Robin is skittering and gliding around in a decidedly inhuman way.

Jason honestly thinks he's going to die when he finds himself bound with Tim standing over him. He passes out when Tim rips the Lazarus entity away from him and destroys it.

Tim gains the ability to heal from defeating the Lazarus entity.

Jason is surprised and confused when he wakes up bundled in a handmade quilt with his head in Tim’s lap and a cool compress on his forehead, feeling sore but more well and whole than he has since before he died.

Jason later decides that his memories of the fight at Titans Tower must be some kind of weird fever dream caused by his body purging the last of the Lazarus Water from his system. It goes along with Tim's account of things.

According to Tim, Jason entered the tower, initiated a lock-down, and then collapsed on the floor. Then, Tim moved him closer to a wall where he was less likely to get stepped on than in the middle of the walkway and did his best to take care of him there because Jason was simply too large and heavy for him to carry all the way to the med bay by himself.

This is far more believable and less of a mind screw than what Jason remembers. Obviously this tiny, baby-faced kiddo who played nursemaid for a stranger who broke into the tower and now looks up at him with wide, starry eyes couldn't actually be the terrifying, predatory creature from the nightmare. It was all just a bad dream.

He's honestly glad he collapsed before he had time to do any harm. The poor kid will never have to know what Jason went there to do. Jason knows, though, and he'll do his damned best to make up for it. He may have flubbed first impressions, but he is going to be the best damn big brother that ever big brothered.

...

Tim might or might not go full on feral cryptid when Bruce is lost in the Timestream. I haven't decided. He will probably pick a fight with the Lazarus Pit much to the confusion and alarm of everyone around.

That’s all I’ve got so far.

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batfam-fanfics · 28 days

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Echoes by 1RainbowFlute

1 Chapter - 7211 words

No one said it was a good idea to leave an eight year old home alone, unsupervised.

It’s not Tim Drake’s fault he found a weird, sometimes-glowing bracelet! Or that said bracelet seems to have caused him to get weird dreams. Or weird sensations that lead him to vigilantes. Or hearing voices. Honestly, as far as he’s aware, all of these facts are completely unrelated. Correlation does not equal causation, right?

He just wanted to play Architect. Like his parents.

(AKA 7k words of How Baby Tim Drake Becomes A Cryptid By Accident)

#tim drake #kid tim drake #cryptid tim drake #dick grayson #sentient gotham #fanfiction recommendation #batfam fic rec #batfamily fic rec #fic rec #oneshot

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the-purple-possum · 2 months

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Just posted my first chapter of my first fic! Here's to praying I don't end up in any car crashes tomorrow, or develop cancer.

Also here's my fic if you're interested!

Its a Tim centric fic, tho not much happens in chapter 1. I'm planning on 3 chapters currently, so who knows

#the batman #batman #cryptid tim drake #not beta read #ao3 #writing

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brucewaynehater101 · 3 months

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When a Robin sheds their uniform to uptake a new role, the goons and Rogues cry out in fear.

Robins are absolutely feral demon spirits that cause unparalleled levels of chaos. Batman may terrify criminals, but Robins are more likely to steal your actual soul. They aren't as bad as the Dark Knight, but somehow that shadow creature is the only reason Robins don't obliterate everyone and everything. Somehow, those traffic light colors prevent the kids from becoming worse. Robin is a symbol of hope, and the child in the costume tries to live up to that.

After the current Robin sheds the mantle?

Now, there's a "new" vigilante with less rules and less supervision. Also, chances are extremely high that another Robin will pop up by the end of the week.

#dc comics #dc universe #dc robin #batman #tim drake #bruce wayne #damian wayne #dick grayson #jason todd #the bats are cryptids #robins are feral

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ditzybat · 22 days

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joker: how did you find my super secret warehouse, let alone that i escaped arkham?!

bruce: you really need to stop posting your criminal activities on your private story, robin is one of 12 people added

joker: because he’s my son! my lil junior

tim: ignoring the fact that that hasn’t happened in this timeline, you have to unadd me, i don’t think i can take seeing your cheesy knock knock jokes circulating my feed again for the sake of my sanity

#i love cryptid tim drake #when he knows about all the timelines n stuff #dc #joker #tim drake #bruce wayne #robin #red robin #batman

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veryrockyraccoon · 3 months

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I think the Batfam acts differently outside of Gotham than they do in Gotham

They’re more intense in Gotham, lean more heavily into the cryptid/eldrich horror thing. They move in a way that’s not quite human, their words are just too close to chirps and whistles.

Outside of Gotham they behave like normal humans, well as normal as they can be with all their training.

This leads to theories that they’re all pretending to be human but because Gotham is their home or because of all the cursed/supernatural things there they can’t hide their own supernatural nature aswell. People also believe this is why they’re more aggressive in Gotham.

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violent138 · 2 months

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I feel like the Robins probably watched horror movies to really up their game, taking notes on the gestures and body language that would creep you out. "Criminals are a superstitious lot", so yeah the guy in full body armour that could beat you up would suck, but a small child, somewhere in the dark, with an echoing laugh all around you as you fire off a hail of bullets, somehow dodging everything and gleefully messing you up. That's psychological warfare.

#I love when people add cryptid lore to the batfam #so I one hundred percent see some of the robins as some scary as fuck trickster stuff before they evolve into something else #batman #batfamily #dc robins #did stephanie giggle? Idk but I'm adding her to the roster of terrifying child hero #dick grayson #jason todd #dami definitely wouldn't giggle #but he'd spook you in that inescapable relentlessly spooky unaffected ghost kid way #dc comics #tim seems like he'd do some unhinged shit #tim drake #steph brown

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puppetmaster13u · 1 month

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Hear me out: Demon Batfam but Bruce gets them as babies because people won't stop trying to sacrifice their children and he is So Tired

And it is semi-early Batman Bruce too.

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deadsetobsessions · 3 days

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Sea Cryptic!Danny Phantom- pt. 8

If I had a nickel for every time I’ve been to the hospital in the past three years, I’d have enough money to buy a bag of skittles from Target. Most of it wasn’t for me though lol I’ll add this onto the list in a bit, but I tend to do that from my desktop but I’m still currently attached to an IV drip. I’ve also never been this hydrated in my life lmao

——

Danny poked a puffed up pufferfish. The poison floated through his ghost form and did nothing but give him a little zap. Danny chuckled, wiping away a bit of oil that had gotten onto the fish from a nearby oil spill. Jesus fuck. Danny knew that bald headed, easily drawn Vlad wannabe from across the river would do something terrible to Gotham’s waters (not that it needed help being atrocious to Danny’s clean water appreciation).

The puffer fish- Danny gave up on understanding Gotham’s water ecosystem, having realized that it was a cursed mix of saltwater and freshwater and swamp- gave a fearful little wiggle and Danny let it go, turning to the oil particles floating around.

Danny took out his phone.

“Danny? Why the hell are you calling at three in the morning?”

Danny raised a hand and blasted out some ice, gathering the oil up. “Hey Sam. If I got you into contact with Poison Ivy, do you think you could team up to get rid of Lex Luthor’s new holding company in Gotham?”

“Danny, are you asking me to commit an act of ecoterrorism?”

“That’s not even the weirdest thing I’ve ever asked you to do.” Danny placed a hand on the ice mass and flew it, the oil, and himself across the river to Metropolis.

“Deal.” Sam’s voice gets further away as she pulled her phone from her ear. “I’ll text Tucker, see if he could futz with Luthor’s taxes. I heard her doesn’t even give his workers a livable wage, and that’s so not gonna fly.”

“Perfect! Thanks! We could totally meet up and hang out with my new friends!”

“Hah! That Tim guy? The one that wanted you to introduce Phantom to him?”

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, goth girl.”

“Sure, dork. I’ll swing by Friday?”

“Sure! Want me to pick you up?” Danny phased through Lex Luthor’s frankly ridiculous amounts of security measures, still completely invisible and towing a giant mass of oil covered ice.

“Cool. Now hang up. I actually need sleep.”

“Ah, you must be dead tired. I get it.”

Sam hung up, and a second later, Danny got a pic of her holding up a middle finger with her signature purple nail polish.

Danny stared down at the sleeping billionaire. Gross. He let his face re enter the visible spectrum and lowered the temperature of the room drastically. Luthor groaned, waking up as he shivered like a hyped up chihuahua.

Danny bared his teeth, glowing green skin reflecting the black holes of the universe and imploding stars and burning planets as he leaned towards the frozen two bit villain.

“RESPECT THE PLANET,” Danny snarled. He unmelted the invisible ice as he simultaneously made the oil visible, the entirety of the oil spill coating every single inch of Luthor’s penthouse bedroom. Danny winked out, but not before snapping a quick picture of Lex Luthor’s absolutely covered in his company’s oil spill.

If Danny had made sure that there were fish droppings mixed in with the oil… that was his own damn business.

——

Danny floated over to a brooding Batman.

“Do you have two hundred dollars on you?” Danny asked in lieu of a greeting.

Batman grunted a yes.

“Two hundred dollars for a photo of Lex Luthor being hit with karma.”

Batman instantly handed over the cash and received a printed out photo of Lex Luthor (in his Lexcorp pjs) covered by fossil fuel.

"Is this..."

"The oil from his oil spill? Yes."

Batman stared at the picture.

"Why was this more expensive than ID'ing corpses?"

"Cause it's funnier. And dead people deserve more consideration than a egg looking ass polluting everything he touches."

Superman zoomed into the space in front of them, face eager.

"I heard you had something about Luthor?"

Danny figured that Batman probably contacted the hero, and confidently said, "$200 for personal use, $300 for commercial use."

Superman quickly got together three hundred dollars in cash and quickly forked it over. Danny gave him another physical copy of the photo and a usb drive with the photo in a digital format.

"I am so pinning this up." Superman muttered.

"Get out of my city." Batman said flatly. Superman waved a hand, beamed at Danny, and left.

"Did you know Gotham's waters is a mixture of freshwater, swamp, and saltwater habitats?"

Batman grunted.

"Also, please stop stalking Danny Fenton. It's odd."

Batman swiveled his head over. "What."

Danny stared him down. "Stop. Stalking. Innocent. Bystanders. Or else I will recreate the phrase "drowned rat" with you as the subject."

Batman stilled.

"I don't kill, by the way. I can, however, dunk you in the sea and lift you up like a goth version of Simba."

Batman relaxed minutely. "I can't."

"And why not?"

Batman gave him a despairing look. "Have you met my children?"

"... Point."

#dcxdp #danny phantom #batman #tim drake #lex luthor #lex luthor is hated in gotham #bamf danny phantom #sea cryptid danny phantom

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fandom-lover-extra · 10 months

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DP X DC Prompt: Conspiracy Cryptids - Soultouch

Soulmate bonds were looked upon as a blessing. For they were rare and few and far between.

With the added presence of extraterrestrial lifeforms, there was a guarantee that it made it even more difficult to find any potential Soulmate that someone might have.

And of course, not all Soulmate bonds were the same, most differing in variety. The point being, it was very difficult to find one's soulmate if one did have them.

However, the media stated that it was always worth the effort. Soulmate bonds always worked out, either that be platonically or romantically, soulmates would be with each other for life.

So, what exactly did one do if their soulmate kept dying over and over again?

Tim, Bernard, Danny, and Wes all shared a soulmate bond. A touch-bond based Soulbond. They could feel anything their soulmate physically came into contact with. Skin on skin. And they could also feel any injuries their soulmate acquired.

Which, wasn't inherently an issue.

At first, the group couldn't actually tell how many soulmates they had once they realized what the soulbond was. The general consensus amongst them all was that they at least had more than one soulmate.

Danny didn't look to deeply into it. Wes and Bernard had been curious but had also left the detail alone. And Tim was the one that had been the one that had actually spent hours upon hours of sleepless nights trying to figure out just how many he had.

(He had even learned morse code in the hopes of communicating with his soulmates, but not being able to actually get his soulmates to do the same thing had more or less ruined the point.)

Everything, other than that, had been fine for the most part. Besides the general occasional scraps and bruises, everything had been fine. That was a normal occurrence amongst a touch-bond based Soulbond.

And then, Tim Drake became Robin at thirteen years old. And the injuries got a bit more severe. They were much more serious.

This started Bernard down the path of looking into Gotham's vigilante's. It was no secret that Batman took on Young prodigies, that other heroes at times would do the same. With the injuries his soulmate was receiving, Bernard began his search.

Danny and Wes had considered that their soulmate might be apart of an abusive household. But besides hugging themselves, they couldn't add much for comfort.

And then, Danny died when he was fourteen. His end of the bond going quiet. Tim, Bernard, and Wes all assumed one of their soulmates had died. That was until Danny's end of the bond came back as if nothing had happened. Sometimes with even more bruises they didn't feel happen originally, or completely unharmed.

Tim and Bernard assumed their soulmate was in the hospital, going in-between life and death. Tim doing more than a few illegal things in an attempt to find one of his soulmates. Wes had thought the same until he had saw Phantom bleed once. Noticed how Phantom always appeared when that end of the bond went quiet and was nowhere to be seen when it came back. He drove himself insane looking for Phantom.

Danny decidedly, did not in fact know of the frenzy he was putting his soulmates through. Or the fact that he was apart of making his soulmates as insane as they are about their conspiracy theories.

#danny fenton #dc universe #dp x dc #dp x dc au #dp x dc crossover #dp x dc prompt #dps fandom #Tim drake #conspiracy cryptids #bernard dowd #wes weston #soulmates #soulmate au

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absolutely-esme · 5 months

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Monster!Tim Coraline au part 3

I had more thoughts on the au from here and here.

First off, It's called Hungry Monster Tim au unless and until I come up with a better name.

That's the tag that will help you find related content. I titled the post the way I did so that people who found the au before it had a name could recognize it. I'm hoping this will minimize confusion.

...

Now, I figure I'll talk a bit about how others view Tim.

The most of the earlier additions to the Batfam have mostly interacted with Tim in Emotional Support Tim mode.

Emotional Support Tim is pleasant and comforting. He is not overly exuberant and joyful in a way that would grate on fresh grief. He is also not joyless in a way that might make a hero feel obligated to worry about him. He is gentle and competent. His patience seems nearly endless. He can tolerate both being coddled and being leaned on. He can tolerate both being clung to and pushed away. He can tolerate switching back and forth at unpredictable intervals.

Tim approached Nightwing in his standard state of "tired, low on patience, and possibly about to do something stupid," once before Tim realized he was also grief-stricken and in no fit state to get Batman under control. He might have an inkling that Emotional Support Tim is an act, or he might just think Tim was having a bad day.

Bruce thinks Emotional Support Tim is what Tim is actually like. By the time Bruce was functional enough to not need so much managing, he'd gotten attached enough to the facade for Tim to have concerns about dropping it.

Alfred can tell that Tim is putting on a facade. He can tell that the role Tim has taken on is wearing on him. He doesn't like it. He feels guilty for allowing it to continue. He can't bring himself to put a stop to it when it's keeping his adoptive son alive.

Barbara initially meets Emotional Support Tim, immediately clocks the act, and pulls him aside to make sure there isn't something sinister afoot. Babs has reservations about every aspect of Tim's involvement, but agrees that something had to be done about Bruce. She lets him carry on for now, but she's ready to pull the plug if it seems like it's getting too much for him. She insists that Tim drop the act when it's just the two of them.

Babs doesn't know about the supernatural stuff specifically, but she knows there's more going on with Tim than what she knows about. She may learn that he has some hereditary health stuff that requires him to be extra careful about his food intake. She makes a point to not be weird about it because people being weird about her wheelchair annoys the crap out of her.

I like to imagine that Babs and Tim have a certain amount of solidarity over being the sensible ones who keep all these unhinged, dramatic bitches in line. They also have solidarity over ignoring the fact that they are just as dramatic and unhinged as the rest of the Bats.

Steph meets Tim in Regular Tim mode because Bruce isn't with him. Instead of trying to discourage Spoiler, he introduces her to Babs. Steph knows Tim as a tired smartass who kind of always seems like he's a bit hangry and trying not to take it out on anyone, but apparently he's just like that.

They don't date, but do become friends. Part of this is because grouchy, eternally hungry, constantly done-with-this-shit Tim isn't attractive to Steph but is kind of hilarious. Part of it is because Babs points out that there is no possible timeline where the kind of power imbalance from only one member of a couple knowing the other's secret identity doesn't turn toxic.

When Steph eventually encounters Emotional Support Tim, it creeps her out. She uses the term "pod person" when asking what the heck that was.

Steph's disastrous stint as Robin doesn't happen because she's already got her own thing going. She already has a mentor and appropriate protective gear. Babs and Steph actually get along better because they start their mentorship as Oracle and Spoiler without any of the complicated emotions of taking up a mantle.

I like Steph as Spoiler the best because it always seemed a little messed up to shove someone who already had their own original Identity into two legacy mantles. Let her do her own thing. She doesn't need to be a successor to Babs or Dick when she's already the OG Steph. Instead of giving her the Robin gear or the Batgirl gear, get her some upgraded, Bat-quality Spoiler gear.

Steph doesn't start a gang war or fake her death in this timeline, because the circumstances that caused it do not exist here.

Jason initially encounters Tim in Feral Cryptid mode, then writes that off as a fever dream after waking up to Emotional Support Tim. Once free of the Lazarus parasite, Jason makes it his mission to be a good big brother to Tim. Tim seemed a little stand-offish at first, but warmed up to him. (As soon as Tim realized that food was part of Jason's love language, he rearranged his meal plan to let Jason feed him without triggering supernatural problems with his metabolism.)

Jason eventually manages to earn Tim's trust enough to meet and get to know Regular Tim. Jason is both honored and concerned. Putting on such an extensive facade for the comfort of others has got to be exhausting, and Tim seems so worn down underneath it. Well, he doesn't have to do it for Jason anymore. Jason will happily hang out with and support any version of Tim.

When Damian shows up, he mostly sees Emotional Support Tim. Then he starts trying to kill him. Eventually, Tim's patience with the pint-sized murderer wears thin (possibly due to Damian hitting a PTSD trigger), and Tim goes Feral Cryptid mode. This freaks Damian out. There is no video evidence (which the rest of the Bats assume to be because Damian tampered with the security system in an attempt to get away with murder).

It doesn't happen again.

Tim doesn't bust out his powers or cryptid form against Damian again, but now that he's seen it, Damian sometimes sees traces of Feral Cryptid Tim lurking below the surface. Various little things he'd ignored that hadn't seemed significant on their own now seem to stem from the nature of what lurks inside the human skin.

Damian stops the murder attempts early. It's not because of ethics (which will take time to learn). It’s because he has no idea how to kill whatever sort of unearthly thing Tim is, and he recognizes how unwise it would be to continue attacking something he cannot kill. For now, Tim seems content to leave him be whenever he's not directly under assault. Damian doesn't want to risk becoming enough of a pest to be worth the effort of swatting.

...

I also had thoughts about Tim's post-Robin period.

When Tim goes on his quest to retrieve Bruce from the time stream, he doesn't take the Red Robin suit. He's going to be outside of the Bats' scrutiny, so he gears up with a suit and equipment he'd secretly made with his supernatural nature in mind. It's got Bat-standard armor and padding, but modified to accommodate a bit of form shifting without compromising protection. It's got a patchwork thing going on.

Tim sewed it himself, which allows him to manipulate it. It's also got buttons sewn in strategic locations to eliminate blindspots. (Taking down the beldam gave him the ability to control things he made and see through buttons he sewed).

His utility pouches are full of both Bat-standard equipment and things relevant to Tim's abilities. Also, he makes his pockets bigger on the inside, so he can carry a lot.

Tim isn't around the other Bats, so he's not being Emotional Support Tim. He's not using the minor illusion powers he got from the beldam to make himself look pleasant. He only makes the effort to be comforting when dealing with victims. He's just being the semi-feral scrungly dude he is.

...

Tim keeps in touch with Jason, Babs, and Steph while he's off on his quest to find Bruce. He occasionally pitches in with stuff that can be done from a distance.

Tim didn't say that Bruce was still alive before he had evidence. It's not because this version managed to predict that they wouldn't believe him, but rather because he thought he might have to do some supernatural stuff to get him back and didn't want witnesses. He just told the other Bats he needed to investigate something and would tell them more once he had figured out enough to know what to tell them.

This means that the other heroes don't think he's crazy, and Tim can use hero resources for his investigation.

I haven't decided yet if Tim will interact with the League of Assassins at all. On the one hand, I think this Tim might not need to work with them. On the other hand, Hungry Monster Tim terrorizing the League of Assassins and fighting the Lazarus Pit would be funny. Maybe Ras doesn't try to recruit him. Maybe Tim just shows up, fights the Lazarus Pit, and leaves without explaining anything to anyone.

Either way, I think that Tim is pretty much done with keeping up the Emotional Support Tim facade by the time he comes home after saving Bruce. It's been long enough to justify the change.

Babs, Jason, and Steph are happy for Tim because they can see how much better he's doing without the added strain of keeping up the act. They are also glad that he feels comfortable enough to just be himself.

Bruce and Dick are more in the horrified/concerned neighborhood because, from their perspective, Tim started off gentle-natured and glowing with health, got fired from Robin, disappeared for a while, and came back gaunt and world-weary.

...

I'm thinking about whether or not Tim should tell Babs, Jason, and Steph about the supernatural stuff he's got going on.

It would have come out at some point. If he tries to keep it secret forever, you can bet some kind of dramatic, high-stakes threat would force the reveal. That's just how the Bats' lives are.

What I am debating with myself is whether or not to have Tim choose to share a secret he's been keeping for as long as he can remember for fear of the danger discovery might bring with the people he trusts most without something forcing his hand.

If he does, I think he would tell Jason first. Jason has seen that side of him, and Tim allowed him to think it was a nightmare. Tim wouldn't want to risk Jason hearing about it from someone else. Tim would probably be scared. He doesn't know if Jason will still like him once he knows that Tim really is the Monster from his nightmare. He doesn't know if Jason will forgive him for lying about it.

I think this would happen after Tim comes back to Gotham after saving Bruce.

#Hungry Monster Tim au #dc #batman #batfamily #cryptid tim drake #feral tim drake #Eldritch au

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