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snaileer · 6 months

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To Play Pretend

(PhantomVision Revised)

Let me out! Let me out!

This is isn’t real! It’s not real! Accept it, play along play along. Get out! Convince him, you have to convince him! Get out! Wake up! Snap out of it! Play along play along play along

Wake up! It’s not real wake up wake up accept it wake up wake up wake up get up get up get up

Bruce sits bolt upright with a haze of fog still between his skin and his mind. Immediately, his gut feels off, the way his shoulders are loose with the lack of anxiety and paranoia that he’s grown used to, the way his vision is not quite aligned to his senses.

And yet.. he can’t seem to raise the right sense of alarm. His mind stays slow and calm, even as he mentally screams to start investigating. Someone, something is messing with his mind.

He turns his head to the side of the bed he’s in-another thing he does not recognize- surprised to find Diana laying next to him.

How is she here? No, they were on a mission, investigating.. something. Why can’t he remember? He’d had Oracle on comms, Wonder Woman at his side, it was a Justice League mission- why is he-

Bruce winces, sharp pain running across the front of his brain. What was-

The door slams open, a boy he doesn’t recognize standing there, dark black hair, and blue-green-blue eyes. His mind jumps to son, a shallow feeling of family bubbling up that makes Bruce want to recoil, this isn’t Damian, it’s not Tim or Jason or Dick or Cass- this isn’t his son! This isn’t his family! he wants to yell out.

And yet, his mouth calls him Danny, a name he doesn’t know and says with such familiarity.

“Dad! Babs is being a know it all again!”

Bruce feels his face smile without his permission just as he sees Barbara step around the doorframe.

She’s standing, she’s younger, she looks just a little different, hair pushed back by a teal blue headband- Bruce wants to scream, something is wrong!- instead he smiles more as she ruffles Danny’s hair.

“Little Brother, you’re going to be late for school,” Barbara says, despite the fact that she had always, always been an only child.

Diana sits up beside him, and Bruce can’t even turn away from the two in front of him, no matter how much he tries, barely managing a wide eye look from his peripheral. He can’t tell if Diana even catches it. He can’t move, can’t interrogate the only unknown here, kid or not, can’t research or ask Oracle for more information. Barbara hasn’t been able to reply to him any more than he has.

Within a blink, they’re downstairs-how did they get here, what’s happening, is there a time distortion as well?- and Bruce is standing at the stove top, a pan of broken eggs with small bits of shells in them in front of him.

It’s manageable. He could still finish these eggs- unbidden he steps aside, a jovial laugh as Diana goodnaturedly scolds his cooking abilities, emptying the pan and starting anew.

Bruce turns. Danny and Barbara are both sitting at the table, Danny the picture of teenage recklessness, homework spread in front of him.

Every word looks like scribbles, staring too hard makes his brain hurt.

The toaster dings. Danny looks up at it, glaring. Bruce swears his eyes flash green-

“All done! Enjoy!” The clink of plates hitting the table makes them both look over as Diana sets them down.

Barbara and Diana share a look even as Diana stiffly turns back to the counters.

Bruce looks at the toaster.

Empty.

“Come on, Babs we’re gonna be late for school!”

Barbara hesitates, a pained look hidden just behind her eyes, “Danny, I- my legs hurt right now okay? I can’t drive us to-“ The words sound like a struggle to get out. And Danny stands stock still in the living room, looking at her with unnatural stillness.

“But you always drive us to school.”

Bruce watches Barbara’s body snap back to that same stiffness as before as she moves to stand from the kitchen table.

Bruce forces a step forward, smile on his face, “How about I drive you today, kiddo?”

“Okay, Dad!” Danny smiles, movement returning to the room. He moves to grab his backpack left against the wall and Bruce throws another look at Barbara from the side of his eye. She’s okay for now, body more natural as she returns the look with wide eyes herself.

Still, she stands and follows after them as his feet lead them to the car out front.

It’s an old station wagon, a stereotypical family car.

Even as Bruce walks around to the driver door, keys somehow already in his pocket, he catches Danny staring at the car with narrowed eyes and suspicion.

Bruce looked back at the car- truck, had it always been a truck, no, no, no, it changed it changed, things were changing.

Danny climbed into the backseat like nothing was different and Bruce did the same, Barbara behind him in the backseat.

His body is autonomous on the drive, even as Bruce tries futilely to jerk the wheel or slam the pedals, they continue to go forward on the road, Bruce’s face as calm as ever. It’s almost familiar, the two of them bickering in the back seat, chattering like his own children, there were his own- no! They weren’t! His kids were out there! Not here! Not here not here-

Bruce stops, awareness heightening abruptly, his limbs his own.

They’re at a stop light, despite there being no other cars around.

The backseat is silent.

Bruce turns back, surprised to see Danny staring silently out the window. He looks at Barbara next, grateful to see real emotion, pain, panic, on her face, not just hidden behind wide empty eyes.

Danny continues to stare out the window.

Bruce follows his line of sight across the street to a closed down burger restaurant. The outside looks clean, but the sign looks burnt and destroyed. Yellow caution tape flaps in the wind across the entrance.

“Danny, what are you looking at?” He asks, surprised to hear the words come out, completely of his own volition.

Danny doesn’t move.

“We don’t go there anymore.”

Bruce narrows his eyes, clues filing into order, “Why, Danny. What is that place?”

“We just don’t.”

“Why Danny, why is that place so-“

“We just DON’T, okay!” Danny shouts, face angry as he turns around to yell, and there- his eyes, that flash of neon-

Bruce is facing forward again. The light is green. The car moves, sound resumes.

His chance is gone.

Bruce wants to grit his teeth, clench the leather of his gauntlets beneath his fists. He barely manages to tighten his hands around the steering wheel.

Too quickly they arrive at the school. Barbara slowly getting out even as Danny practically races up the steps. Bruce wants to help her, surprisingly, his body follows. Allow him to support her under a hug, a fatherly hand on her opposite shoulder, fingers supporting her armpit as they go up the stairs.

Danny looks at them with a tilt of his head and furrowed brows.

Words fall from Bruce’s mouth, unbidden, as his feet force him backwards, “See you after school, Danno! Bye, Babsy-pants!”

The look vanishes from Danny’s face.

Seconds later, a man approaches them, eyes zeroed in on Danny.

“Ah, Daniel, glad to see you’re on time!” The man says, and Danny looks at him, blinking harshly with confusion apparent.

“You must be young Daniel’s father… Jack, was it?” The man smiles slightly and turns to Bruce, grey hair tied in a ponytail behind him, “I am his teacher, Mr. Lancer.”

Bruce’s neck tingles, an odd sense of familiar paranoia prickling his nerves, “It’s Bruce, a pleasure to meet you,” he shakes the offered hand automatically, watching as the man’s smile sharpens at the edges.

“And the same to you… Mr. Fenton.”

The name rings hollow in his memory, barely scratching a memory before it is buried under fog and stuffed cotton.

“I just have so much to teach him,” Mr. Lancer smiles again, watching as Danny finally walks fully through the school doors, turning down a hallway.

Even under whatever spell this is, Bruce is wary of this teacher, though he can do nothing to show it, even feel it past a surface notion of wrongness. But still, his feet carry him down the steps without his permission, away from a kid he is ostentatiously supposed to protect.

As he gets closer to the car, Bruce feels the cloud over his thoughts get thicker, step by step, each clogging his mind more.

He catches sight of the school’s announcement sign, the date.

Mid-October, the numbers hard to read, but he caught enough.

They were months into the school year already. How long had he been here? How long before he’d even woken up enough to know it? How long had he been away from his family?

His fingers clasp around the cool metal of the door handle.

Bruce blinks.

The bell rings.

Faceless, unfamiliar kids flood out of the doors and Bruce gets out of the truck- car, it was a car, it was a car-greeting Danny with a hug, Barbara with a helping hand.

They leave almost immediately, the two of them in the backseat as Bruce drives.

Occasionally, Bruce will look in the rear view mirror and find a completely different sight, the road cracked and broken, buildings abandoned, streets empty; and yet when he checks again, it’s gone. The reflection the same as the road before him.

He can only see it like a translucent image in his peripheral.

Somehow their route home does not take them back past the burger restaurant again. Bruce has used and discarded three different mind strengthening techniques by the time they are back in front of the house.

He parks, noticing for the first time how the air shimmers in front and top of it, the light shifting like a curtain covering furniture when he doesn’t look directly at it.

Diana is sitting on the couch in the living room when they come in, a laptop perched on her lap, looking for all the world like a stay at home worker.

The seemingly blank pieces of paper on the coffee table are discarded as she gets up and moves towards the kitchen.

“Welcome home Danny, how was school Babs?” She says, food preparations already set out around her.

Bruce walks towards her, a hand across her shoulders; the picture of loving parents.

He hopes the feeling of solidarity gleams through anyways.

Freedom of movement snaps through his body so suddenly he nearly staggers. He looks at Diana, a thousand words in one glance, then turns to Danny.

The boy is staring at the door on the side of the kitchen. By its placement, Bruce would guess storage, a pantry, a basement maybe. He hesitates to break the unnatural stillness in the air.

Diana is already halfway to the door, Barbara is at the table, thumbs flying across her phone screen.

He makes a decision, throwing away the facade, “Danny, where are we? Why are we here?”

Danny’s face furrows, head tilting in confusion, but his eyes don’t leave the basement door, green light seeping from the edges.

“We’re… at home. Right? I just wanted… I wanted to go home..” Danny says, eyes flickering that damning bright green.

Bruce presses on, he needs answers, “What happened here Danny? What is this? Why are we here?”

“I…” Danny’s face furrows further, “I don’t…”

The doorbell rings, snapping Danny’s attention to it. Taking with it his mind and movement, fog sliding over his senses.

Bruce’s looks at the basement door from the side of his vision, any hint of green light gone.

“Danny, your friends are here!” Diana’s voice calls out.

Bruce’s vision jumps to the front door, thankful that he follows Danny as he leaves the kitchen.

No no no.. no no.. not them, leave them alone, leave them out of this!

Tim and Stephanie stand at the door, plastic smiles on their faces as they high-five Danny.

“Hey guys! Ready to play Doom?!” Danny says, a wide smile on his face, leading them both inside.

Straight past Bruce.

They walk right past him, shallow words and teenage garble trading between them like it’s natural, like it’s real. Why wouldn’t it be?

NO! Not them! None of it’s real! Let them go!

“You know it Danny! I got new mods, maybe we’ll finally beat Steph!” Tim says, loud in way he never is, pulling a bulky PDA from his pocket.

Stephanie laughs, elbowing the both of them, “Not in a million years, T!”

Bruce watches, helpless to stop them as they go past him, raging against his own body.

Tim casts a desperate look over his shoulder before they disappear up the stairs.

He manages a glance at both Diana and Barbara, each returning the tense undercurrent of urgency that runs through them all.

Even as the fog thickens, submerging his thoughts like polluted waters, he forces his mind to center on one thought, even if that’s all he can do for now, he will not be locked back into this lie they are trapped in.

He will fix this.

Somehow.

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