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#Batman: (holding his sons dead body)
jasontoddsguns · 2 years
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The Joker is what happens when “it’s just a joke” kids grow up.
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deadsetobsessions · 4 months
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Tim Drake, Danny’s human identity in this universe, is a boy trapped in an empty manor with absentee parents a low socialization.
Danny Phantom, on the other hand, is Gotham City himself. He could fly, he could interact, he could be the heart of his city like he needs to be. From the lowest of the lows to the highest of the highs, Danny loved the people that were his. Well, most of them. Child molesters often found themselves crossing paths with a vengeful, mostly recovered Robin.
He is the city, he is Gotham. And with his status came more changes, ones he welcomes more readily that the changes that came with his title of Ghost King.
Being a city couldn’t change him as much as it would have, had he gained the title before becoming King. But now, his shadows are dark, curling around his shoulders and curling away what little light he allowed into his city. His skin, having once glittered green with stars and galaxies and black holes, clouds over just a bit. It gives him a misty quality. His hands become sharper, stronger. Gargoyle-like. He wonders what he looked like to Batman, holding his broken son cradled safely to himself. He’s crueler, now, but that’s easily balanced by his years of being a vigilante himself.
He loves these changes. They are loved in a way changing into Dead Danny Phantom and Ghost King Danny Phantom will never be loved. And even though his human features are different in a way he never had to deal with as Danny Fenton, because it was his body that he died in, Danny finds himself enjoying the distinction. And he enjoys when they combine, because in the end, they’re just facets of who he is, now.
Gotham flies through his city, and enjoys it as a whole. A bigger picture.
Tim Drake walks through his city, and enjoys it as an individual. The smaller picture.
Being Gotham reminds him of what he had to protect as a whole. A duty he gladly bears.
Being Tim reminds him of the people he’s meant to help, the stories he doesn’t get as Danny. A connection he gladly encouraged.
Gotham is power. He is duty, he is fierce love. But for the good of the whole.
Tim is kindness. He is choice, he is gentle devotion. But for the good of the individual.
He’s both.
Danny. Danny Phantom.
Phantom glides through the smog.
The ebb and flow of people is his life blood, the thrumming of life and death and fear and hate and love and everything the city is sung through him and Danny sung back with everything he had. Danny is the gargoyles perched high, watching everything. He’s the stone curves of the sewers, sheltering his rats and mutant murderous crocodile man. The is no love comparable to a city’s mutant rats and their sewers. Ancients, he loves his city.
It would be nice, Danny thinks wryly, if they’d love me enough to stop blowing up buildings.
The sting of destruction to his city would hurt much more, had he not also been King. Regardless, every time there’s an explosion or general large scale property damage, he feels a stab of mild pain. Catching sight of his Bats, Danny stays invisible while following them. He wills the shadows to cradle them, to hide them further. He softens the stone, the mortar, the steel, just a hint. Their footsteps, silent and aided by the city himself. The wind steal away the noise of the grappling guns, so when Danny’s favorite vigilante duo (a fascination he shared with original text!Tim) broke into the building, not a single soul aside them are aware of the intrusion.
Batman skulks across the support beams, Robin following with an anticipatory grin. Danny floats, invisible, undetectable, besides them.
“C’mon!” A goon grunts beneath them. Danny tilts his head. A… Dresden Aberthy. Wow. That’s one hell of a name.
“Hurry it up! Boss said Batman’s going to get here soon!” Another goon- Robbert- said, waving around a gun like a moron at the terrified hostages. Danny could tell half of them were part of a tour bus, mostly because the other half were his Gothamites, bored and unfairly used to this kind of thing. The tourists… He’s fond of them, having kept track of their progress through his city. He doesn’t care for intruders on his haunt, but tourists like to appreciate his city and its doubtlessly Sam-approved architecture. Most of them. Rude tourists get pigeon shit on their heads and food stolen by his lovely rats.
He’ll have to make sure none of the bullets hit the tourists. He likes this group, even if he has enough awareness to question their sanity in choosing his city to sightsee. He knows it’s a mess. It’s Danny’s mess though, so whatever.
——
All said and done, Batman whoops ass and Robin rescues the hostages just fine. Danny grins proudly as Robin knees a guy in the crotch and punches a lady’s throat in order to incapacitate them.
After they tied the goons up, and interrogated them for Two Face’s plans- explode a quarter of Gotham to distract the Bats from his diabolical plan to murder half of Gotham’s judges and lawyers that have been going after him and his people- the duo retreats to the rooftop.
“Didja think Gotham saw that?”
Batman goes to reply, but Danny beats him to it, coming back to visibility with a wind touched laugh.
“I did, little Robin.” Danny smiles, fangs and shadows on display as his vigilantes startles and whips around to face him. “You did well.”
Robin- Jason!- gapes at him.
“I see you’ve recovered, little bird.”
“Gotham! Oh. Wow. People always said Gotham was a lady, but you’re a guy!”
“It was a Lady,” Danny confirmed. “It’s complicated, little bird.”
“So, you’re really… you’re really Gotham? The city?”
Danny looks at Robin with the weight of the city behind his gaze.
“I think you know the answer to that. But yes, I am your city.”
“Constantine,” Batman starts. “He said that city spirits only appear in times of grave danger.”
There is deference in his words. Batman is Batman for Gotham, after all. Danny just wishes he could… well, be friendlier with his knights. May this is a good place to start.
Are you in danger? What threats do we need to handle? How can I help? How can I protect? Please, let me help.
His Knight always felt more than he ever says. Danny smiles.
“Was Robin’s wellbeing not in grave danger?” Danny floats closer. “I am your city. You protect me, it is only right that I protect you, no?”
“Thank you for saving me, Gotham!” Robin’s grin is a touch more sincere than usual.
“Of course, Robin. You are loved.”
“Is there… a reason you’ve shown yourself today? Gotham.”
Danny chuckles, understanding the awkwardness that was Batman addressing someone with deference.
“I wanted to tell you that you did well tonight. Those tourists weren’t harmed in the slightest. Well done.” Danny gave Robin a playful but sincere thumbs up.
“They weren’t a match for us!”
“No, they weren’t.” Danny ruffles Robin’s hair, noticing how still he grew at it. “Robin was too fast for them. That maneuver at the end was masterfully executed.”
Batman clears his throat and Danny resists the urge to laugh at him. It would be mean.
“Thank you, for the… praise.”
Fuck it. He’s played well behaved for too long.
“Yes. I read in child rearing books that positive reinforcement is necessary for healthy development. You did well, Batman.”
Despite trolling Batman- and somehow holding a straight (and hopefully wise face)- he meant every word.
Allowing a small smile to slip at Robin’s chortles and Batman’s quiet sputtering, Danny moves on.
“Where is Nightwing, Batman?”
“He’s still on a mission...”
“If it is awkward to refer to me as Gotham, Phantom will do.”
Batman dips his head once. “In space, with the Teen Titans.”
“I see. Please tell him I request his presence,” Danny barely waits for Batman’s oddly acquiescing agreement before summoning a pigeon.
“Follow her,” Danny instructs the duo. “She’ll lead you to the places with explosives. I will guide you through her, to Harvey Dent.”
Danny winces as another explosion rings out.
“Your face is cracking!” Robin exclaimed, worried. He surged forward to stare at the hairline cracks appearing on Danny’s jaw.
“That would be the explosives. Any damage to the city will be shown on me.”
“Well take care of it.” Batman growled, shoulders straightening once more into an imposing symbol.
“Yeah!”
“I know you will. Stay safe.” Danny disappears, spreading his awareness and directing his Birds to the explosives that will go off the fastest.
Batman and Robin share a glance and leaps off the roof, ready to save their city once more.
——
Tim Drake wanders around Crime Alley, and meets a blonde nine year old trying to throw hands at her absentee Riddler knockoff of a dad. He dodges the brick en route to his face and kicks the guy’s knees out.
“You okay?”
The girl blinks. She stares at her dad, groaning on the dirty street of crime alley, and flicks her gaze back up to Tim, who waits casually.
“Yep. I’m Stephanie. We’re gonna be friends now!”
She grins at him, a baby tooth missing, and Danny melts.
“Heck yeah. Tim!” He introduces himself for the first time in a long time.
Maybe with Stephanie around, he’ll finally use the name Tim? Maybe he’ll get used to it, finally!
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bluerosefox · 6 months
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Bellatrix Star
A TaliaxDanny idea that came to me.
Damian, Bruce, and the rest of the bats discover the Talia al Ghul they had been fighting against, the one that cloned her own son, had the clone kill him, plant a control device in him when he broke his spine, etc etc was actually not the real Talia al Ghul.
Turned out Ra's had cloned her and killed the original when she discovered his little plans to take over Damain's body and she confronted him about it. Ra's had to make a clone when after tossing a dead Talia into the pits but never returned (he meant to kill her as a warning, as a "you may be my blood but will not hesitate to end you Talia.") It explains so much to Damian when remembers how out of nowhere his mother changed, her training him changed from harsh to deadly, the soft motherly love she would give him when behind closed doors suddenly stopped, the tales she would spin for him about his father no longer whispered to him for bed.
How this was find out?
Well it's hard to ignore the facts that when your foolish grandfather in his quest for immortality summons an eldritch being known as the Ghost King into the Mortal Realm and uses Damian as a sacrifice while his (not) mother watches emotionless.
When the being appeared, plunging the room from green glowing flames and the glow of the Lazarus Pits into darkness before a cosmos exploded to life, its glowing green eyes snapped open in the stars and stared at them all. Making every single one of them feel small, so very small.
It took a single glance around the room before stopping on the al Ghul's. It's eyes widen before a steel and firm look entered them. Just as quick as the cosmos sprang to life, it suddenly swirled away into a ball, putting them all back into the Lazarus room,and reformed in front of them to a more humanish height and body.
When the body, around the height and build of Batman, was done forming it took a step forward and suddenly as one blinked a man stood in front of them. Or rather floated. Snow white hair that flickered and wisped towards a crown made of fire and ice, glowing green eyes that held none of the madness but all of the power the Lazarus Pits could give. His clothing were tailored made that were tastefully a mixture of black and white with some silvers and greens, clothes fit for a King one would say. The cosmos that once engulfed the room had shifted into a cloak that hanged around his body, on one side more than the other (think like how CW wears his only the hood is down).
This, this was no doubt the Ghost King, he stood tall and regal and made everyone in the room feel the need to look down, to bow ones head for even just a moment. Even Ra's had trouble disobeying the urge to do so.
"Well..." the being said, his voice deep but not as gravely as Batman's was "What an interesting way to meet my In-Laws and Step-Son..."
He has said that as he looked towards the al Ghul's. Damian flinched back with a frown of confusion and disbelief while Ra's looked panicked for a second when the words registered into his mind, meanwhile Talia... looked emotionless and barely even twitched.
"What the fu-?" Someone began only to stop when the King lifted his hand and with a snap of his fingers a green portal appeared, it looked almost like the Lazarus Pits but it felt... cleaner? Less angry?
"My Bellatrix, my warrior star. I believe I've been summoned to your home dimension. And judging by the looks of it your father created a barely functioning Mirror of you and planned on using your son as a sacrifice to me." He spoke out towards the portal before holding his hand out.
A hand appeared from the portal, a slender hand and with green and black painted nails manicure to perfection before someone walked through it as they took hold of the Ghost King's offering hand.
Standing in front of them was another Talia, only this one looked a tad older than the one in the room. She wore clothing that matched the King to a T but even then, as always, Talia looked deadly in it. Beautiful but very deadly. From the heels she wore to the crown upon her head, a crown made of not ice and fire but of stars and black jewels. Her eyes were sharp as she stared at everyone in the room, frown on her painted lips, but her eyes lit with a small soft joy when she saw Damian only for them to turn poisonous when they landed on Ra's and the other Talia nearby.
"I should had know you would had created a Mirror of me instead of admitting to my son you killed me Father." Queen Talia spat out. "The least you could had done was not make my Mirror so cheaply, it doesn't even have a proper soul attached to it."
#danny phantom#danny fenton#blue rambles#crossover#writing ideas#random idea#danny phantom dc#dpxdc#dcxdp#i forgot Danny and Talia's ship name#Talia was killed when she confronted her father when she found out his plans to take over her son's body#she was tossed in the pits and was meant to return to life but a portal opened up as she was brought back#she landed in Danny's garden and in a Pit Rage attacked any ghost in sight#Danny was called in noticed the Rage and knocked her out before taking her to Frostbite#they find out she is very liminal#like near halfa levels like she just needs something to kill and bring her back at the same time levels.#Talia raged and wept when she woke up#she was told she was in the Infinite Realms and what the Lazarus Pits actually were and that they were going to try to find her a way home#but because the Infinite Realms were well Infinite it was like looking for a needle in haystack#it takes a while and some talks with Jazz but Talia eventuality begins to try to make the most of her life within the Infinite Realms#and the only world is was always connected to#she does eventually fall for Danny though. things happened and Talia can sense her love for Bruce fizzle out and begin to grow for Danny#who never once asked her to change her deadly and swift ways#Danny was the Ghost King now. he understands that sometimes a quick and hard hand needs to be used.he is a fair and just King not a doormat#Danny accidentally called Talia Bellatrix one day. after the female warrior star in the sky. she is deadly and beautiful to him#Talia liked it a lot and well showed him how much she liked it#eventually they date and get married. Talia is in charge of the spy network for the Kingdom encase of anyone gets any bright ideas#Talia loves her new life. the one without her father or Bruce trying to control or changer her. She wishes for Damian though still.#Danny's been on the look out for her world when she told him everything. He wants to meet and learn about his step-son#he hopes he'll like the 'I'm sorry I married your mother without your permission but I would love your blessing.' gifts he had commissioned
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nerdpoe · 11 months
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story prompt: children of villains au
Jack and Maddie Fenton, after college and prior to having their first child, were highly-effective super villains. Mad scientists the likes of which Luthor could only dream of achieving.
They were so fucking frightening that this is what drove Vlad away. He wasn't biding his time, he was goddamn hiding from his ex-best friends so that they wouldn't dissect him.
Shit man, they'd nearly done it to him when he'd been fully human. If they found out he'd become part of their obsession?
So yeah Vlad went to ground.
No financial backing, no morals, only science. Everything was a science experiment, full stop.
Then they had a daughter, and like...huh. This. This wasn't an experiment. This was perfection? A mix of both Jack and Maddie, in one tiny perfect body. She was adorable.
And the government, knowing that if these crackpots were dangerous before, holy fuck they'd be unstoppable now cuz protective parent mode go, offers them a deal.
Stop attacking people, stop experimenting on people, stop being villains, make weapons for the government. Do this, and the government will set them up in a house, let them continue experiments that do not infringe on human rights, and the kid gets a full ride scholarship to whatever college she wants, however many times she wants to go.
The Fentons took it; shit man a free scholarship is nothing to laugh at, they'd been to college. That debt was the driving force to them turning to villainy in the first place.
By the time they had Danny they'd fully acclimatized to being strange, ghost-obsessed parents.
The accident happens, Jack and Maddie don't know, shit goes down, and the GIW find out before they do. Then Danny goes missing, after his last known location was being shot down by the GIW.
Now Jack and Maddie, their kids are perfect. Small, cute perfect little kids. Theirs and theirs alone. If one of them managed to become half of the thing they were obsessing over, then they would learn to live with that, because he was their son.
The GIW had hurt their son.
So they made sure Jazzy-pants was secure, protected, and safe; and then proceeded to get all of their old super-villain gear back, decimate the GIW, and commit multiple war crimes.
The government, thinking that they've gone back for no reason, freaks and calls the Justice League. The Justice League who had never had to fight the Fentons, as they'd retired just before the League formation. The older heroes that had fought them are either dead or in retirement.
They know Superman's weakness, they know how to deal with Flash, they can even handle Wonder Woman. Whatever hero the Justice League throws at them, they know exactly what to do.
They are Batman levels of insanely prepared, but with the insanity to be just unpredictable enough that Batman can't tell his friends how to work around the Fenton's plans.
Meanwhile, Jack and Maddie have managed to find out that their baby boy is not being held by the GIW. In fact, it looks like he's gone to ground, smart boy that he is.
They track him to his last known location.
Gotham.
In Gotham, Jason snaps at the street kid he'd taken in to hold the fuck still, since stitches were hard. Danny tries, but stitches feel weird and he's ticklish.
In Wayne Manor, Jazz stares down Bruce Wayne; conclusive evidence in front of her to prove he is Batman. She demands he finds her brother before her parents tear the world apart.
In the Bat Cave, Sam stares down Damian, and Tucker gets stared down by Alfred. They just wanted to find their friend, and what better way than a tracker on the BatMobile?
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beingsuneone · 6 months
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Memories & Delusions
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PART ONE | PART TWO | PART THREE
SYNOPSIS: Jason Todd is dead, you have to remember that; even if the newest villain in town is both incredibly sexy and reminds you of the boy you used to love.
FANDOM: DC
PAIRING(S): Jason Todd x Fem!Reader
RATING: PG
CHARACTERS MENTIONED: Bruce, Alfred, Dick, Tim
GENRE/AU: fluff, different timeline AU (not mentioned in detail but the timeline is different than canon), canon divergence, reader is kind of like Stephanie so NOT Bruce’s kids but she does live in the manor.
WORD COUNT: 3.9k
WARNINGS: Swearing, mentions of blood and injuries.
A/N: I could fs do a part two to this ;)
DEDICATIONS: Myself for having this idea for more than two years and finally getting it out in writing in some way
CREDITS: N/A
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“Jesus Christ! Who the fuck is this guy, Batman?” You exclaim, panting hard through your mask; whoever this Red Hood guy is… he really knows your team's weaknesses. It’s disconcerting.
Weirdly enough, he’s left you mostly alone.
Bruce shrugs from across the room. “That’s what we’re trying to figure out.”
It’s a blur of movement as Red Hood tries to attack mostly Bruce, only attacking Dick or you if you get in the way.
He’s said almost nothing since this fight started.
After a few minutes, Bruce sends a signal and jumps out of the half destroyed building; Dick follows and jumps out shortly after.
Leaving just you and Gothams latest criminal.
You’re about to turn to jump again, when suddenly your wrist is caught in Red Hood’s hand.
The familiarity of it makes you gasp and freeze.
He stares down at you, intimidating and silent through his red helmet.
Returning his stare, with as much fiery energy as you can muster, you try to pull your wrist away; His grip is like iron and you can’t.
“Don’t get in my way, Y/n.” He says, making your heart drop with the use of your civilian name. “I won’t choose between you and my goal.”
Your back is rigid and you’re breathing has stopped… if he knows your name, that means he probably knows everyone else’s too.
Fuck.
He finally lets go, brushing past your stiff body.
You’re too shocked to follow him.
….
“He knew my name, Bruce!” You say, feeling panicked. “Do you know what that means?”
Bruce nods curtly. “It means you aren’t suiting up until we’ve taken him down.” You try to protest but Bruce holds a hand up to cut you off. “It’s not up for discussion.”
You fidget with the small red pendant hanging around your neck, something you do whenever you’re feeling too many emotions.
It reminds you of Jason, the first boy you’ve ever been in love with and also the last; Jason was also Bruce’s second adopted son.
Jason Todd died five years ago.
But when he was alive… There was something special about him. He was always so eager to help Bruce by being robin.
That was back before you had your own suit; really, you’d only gotten a superhero identity so you could hunt down the joker and get revenge for Jason, but Bruce had managed to convince you not to do that in the last five years.
Probably for the best, even if seventeen is too young for someone to die; even if having a strong bond ripped away from you before it could become anything still hurt so badly.
You follow Bruce down into the batcave. “What do we know about Red Hood? Do we have any idea how he originated? It seems like he just popped out of nowhere.”
Bruce contemplates his answer as he unlocks the bat computer. “All we know is that he would have had to fly under our radar for months in order to take over the whole underground drug ring.”
You over hover his shoulder, trying to see what’s on the screen below him. “I don’t understand how we wouldn’t hear anything about him? With that many people who work for him, you’d think one of them would mention something.”
He hums in response. “They must be terrified of him.”
Alfred inserts himself into the conversation and ushers you back into the main part of the manor. “Alright, Miss. Y/n, You’re officially off duty indefinitely.” He pauses. “Like Master Bruce said, it is safer if you disconnect yourself from your hero identity.”
You frown. “If he knows my real name, he probably knows where I live.”
“He also told you, quote ‘don’t get in my way’ end quote.” Alfred tuts. “He clearly has no intention of hurting you as a civilian.”
You huff and head up to your bedroom, feeling like you really need to be out there but not really knowing why.
You suppose you don’t know what to do with your time anymore, now that you’ve been superhero-ing for so long.
When was the last time you read a book? Or watched a movie, just because you wanted to? It’s been too long…
Your bookshelves mostly carry decorative encyclopedias and other books that would bore you to sleep, so you leave your room and head just down the hallway.
The door creaks as you push open and clicks when you push it shut; then, you’re left in the silence of Jason Todd’s bedroom. Unchanged and untouched from the last moment he was in here.
It’s a little messy but nothing out of the ordinary for a teenage boy; the bed was never made, and his clothes were ever put in his drawers despite them being washed.
There’s books pulled out and just scattered in places, schoolbooks, comic books, novels… finally you spot what you wanted to find.
It’s a very old and very worn copy of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, something the two of you used to read together when you’d sneak onto the roof of the manor at nighttime.
You’d watch the stars and one of you would read the book out loud, until eventually you both would pass out and give Bruce a heart attack the next morning.
Maybe it was time to revisit that tradition, even if you were only reading to yourself.
Bruce and Alfred are in the Cave so you find your way into the roof and lay back. The shingles are definitely more uncomfortable without Jason to lay on, but it’s still a nice feeling nonetheless.
Just the act of laying under the stars with that book in your hands, makes you feel a kind of warmth that you haven’t felt in years.
You close your eyes and take a long, deep breath of night air; It’s fresh and ever so slightly damp, but in a way that makes you feel nice. The cold nips at your body in all the right ways.
Unfortunately, all bliss is momentary, and someone clearing their throat makes you jump a couple centimeters upwards.
You’re met with the bright red helmet of Red Hood.
“Pride and Prejudice, huh?” He says casually, though you're pretty sure he has a voice changer on, which makes his voice sound more irritated than it probably is.
You back up a few inches. “Bru-” Red Hood slaps a hand over your mouth before you can finish yelling for help.
You squirm in his grip, but he just maneuvers you so that your back is to his chest and you can barely move which makes your body lock up again— you can’t help the feeling of familiarity that settles in your stomach, or the way your body reacts to his.
Worst of all, he smells just like… no, it must just be where you are.
Jason Todd is dead.
And yet.
“Relax, Y/n, I’m not here to hurt you.” Something about him makes you listen and you relax your body. He kind of half-scoffs in response. “Are you done?”
You nod as best you can. He releases you.
“Who— why are you here?” You say, trying to ignore the fact that everything about this masked man reminds you of Jason.
Your chest rises and falls irregularly as he stares at you.
His head snaps away randomly. “Why should I tell you that?”
“Don’t answer my question with a question.”
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to.”
There’s a look of defiance shared between the two of you, or, at least, on your end. You can’t actually see his face so you’re really just assuming.
You spin away and blow out a labored breath. “God, I must be going insane…” Even the way he talks with you sounds like Jason.
“You’re so short, you look like a bunny who lost its carrot.” He says with a laugh.
“I do not!” You exclaim angrily, your mouth dropping open. “Okay, that’s it, I’m calling Bruce.” Your hand slips into your pocket to pull out your phone, and just as it's out of your pocket, Red Hood grabs your wrist; he traps it in one spot and yanks the phone from your hand.
He gently sets it on the ground. “Tell that fucker whatever you want, but wait until I’m gone.” The tone in his voice sends a chill down your spine. He seems so angry…
With that, he leaves, taken the same way that you took off the roof.
You stand there until you hear the roar of his motorbike, and then you finally retreat from the roof with the book clutched tightly to your chest.
…..
“I’m going with you, Bruce. You can’t stop me.” You say, already moving to try to grab your suit.
“No, you’re not.” He says sternly, blocking your path. “You need to stay out of this fight.”
You raise your eyebrows in challenge. “I’m going whether you let me wear that suit or not.” Bruce apparently doesn’t like this because he frowns even harder than before. You continue, “You can’t go alone. Dick is out of town and Tim is at school. Let me come.”
“You forget I did this by myself for quite a while before I adopted Dick.” He says firmly, leaving no room for argument.
Bruce doesn’t need your help, you know that; helping him isn’t your real goal.
Ever since the rooftop incident with Red Hood you’d gone into some sort of obsessive spiral over his similarities to Jason.
You feel like you need to talk to him again, touch him again… just to see why he’s so familiar; you feel insane.
The deepest parts of your brain scream at you that it’s not just similarities, that he really is Jason but… he can’t be; you watched them bury Jason’s body.
“There’s something else going on with you.” Bruce says, basically sizing you up.
You stiffen, which unfortunately gives away your next lie. “There’s nothing going on with me.” No excuse comes to mind so you don’t say anything more.
Bruce pauses for a beat.
“This has nothing to do with Red Hood.”
“Okay? Why would that matter?” You say dismissively, but also way too fast. “I don’t think keeping me locked up at home helps anyone.”
He sighs and finally caves. “Fine, you can come.”
…..
You aren’t sure how this situation devolved so quickly, but your communications got cut off a while ago and you haven’t been able to find Bruce or navigate very well through the rubble.
You’re bleeding heavily from a few different cuts and you’re pretty sure you sprained your ankle.
The faint cackle of the Joker makes you dive under a fallen piece of concrete, because if he comes this way he’ll surely kill you.
But the laugh recedes so you crawl out and sit against it instead.
You’re just about to start sobbing from the pain when you hear footsteps again; you go silent and try to move but you don't allow that.
You see a flash of red, and then Red Hood turns a corner into your line of sight.
“Christ’s sake, Y/n.” He mumbles. “What happened?” He approaches and drops down so he’s sitting on his feet, he stares for a moment, and you assume he’s assessing your injuries.
“You can’t call me that— here.” You hiss when he presses a finger against your ankle.
He stands up and takes both your hands, completely ignoring what you said. “Up. But don’t stand on your bad ankle.”
You grip his hands and stand up, holding your bad ankle in the air; Red Hood scoops you up bridal style not a moment later.
You squeal. “What are you doing?”
He stops walking and turns the face of his helmet directly toward you. “I’m taking you back to my base so I can help you get fixed up.” He interrupts you before you can speak, answering the question you were going to ask. “Batman isn’t here anymore, he went to follow after the Joker.”
It’s a rough walk to his bike, and it lasts for about ten minutes; ten awkward minutes of you being carried by Red Hood.
Red Hood who’s supposed to be a criminal and your enemy. Red Hood who brings you more comfort than he should just because of who he reminds you of.
He settles you onto the bike, pulling out an extra helmet before he speeds off.
…..
“Jesus, you sprained your ankle really badly.” He curses, performing whatever medical procedures as you hiss and whine at the pain.
He’s already stitched and/or dressed any of the open wounds you had and he saved the worst for last.
“Okay,” he says absent-mindedly. “I can’t do this properly with this thing.”
He reaches for his helmet but you stop him. “You’re taking your helmet off?”
He hesitates, then nods slowly. “I have to. If you don’t want to see, then shut your eyes until I’m done.”
You nod and squeeze your eyes shut.
He sighs softly and gets back to working on your ankle.
…..
“I swear to god, Bruce, it’s him. Red Hood is Jason.” You say, purposfully making your voice flat and void of emotion. “He has to be.”
Bruce just stares.
And stares.
Sympathetically, softly. But he stares.
“Jason has been dead for a long time, Y/n, and you know that.”
“No— I know, but he can’t be— that has to be him.” You back up into one of the chairs in the batcave, trying to calm your racing heart; you still try to keep a calm outward facade.
“What makes you think he’s Jason?” Bruce asks.
You weakly gesture at nothing with your hand. “Just look at him. He’s— everything about him is the same.”
Tim snorts from the computer. “The running drug rings and murders?”
“Not appropriate, Tim.” Dick says flatly and Tim’s face falls quickly.
You don’t blame him, you probably would have made a joke like that too.
Shaking your head, you stare at the floor past Bruce. “They sound the same, they talk the same way, they look similar— hell, they even smell the same.”
Bruce’s brows furrow. “How do you know what he smells like?”
“Uh…” you stall. “You know, close combat.”
Apparently, he drops it even though he clearly doesn’t believe you, because he asks another question. “We’ve never seen Red Hood unmasked, how do you know they look similar?”
You shrug. “They just do. There’s just something about him. I haven’t been able to shake the feeling for a while.”
It’s silent again for several long moments.
Then Bruce shakes his head absentmindedly.
“Jason is dead, Y/n. No matter how much we miss him, he can’t come back.”
But he’s wrong, he has to be.
Because no one is that similar to someone. You’re sure of it.
……
Your cheeks are wet and your eyes are starting to become raw from you rubbing at them.
Sobbing pathetically on the rooftop of the manor because you had to be reminded about a death that happened a long time ago is not the highlight of your day.
It’s stupid, going from sure of yourself, to telling yourself you’re so stupid for ever thinking it could be true in the first place.
There’s footsteps beside you, but you don’t look up. You don’t care enough to see who it is.
You fidget with the necklace around your neck as you sniffle into your knees.
Something clicks and then hisses as if air pressure is being released before you hear a tiny thud, and then someone pulls you into them.
You know who it is now.
“What’s wrong?” He asks quietly. You know you could look up and confirm your suspicions at any moment but you just can’t bring yourself to do it.
It’s not true, after all, because it can’t be. It’s not possible.
You shrug against him. “I’m reopening old wounds for no reason.” You pause. “Why do you trust me?”
He’s silent, contemplative for a while. “You’re you.”
You laugh dryly. “That doesn’t explain anything.”
“You haven’t even bothered to look have you?” His hand strokes lines in your hair. “You could. I don’t think I’d mind.”
“I don’t want to know.” You say, wrapping your arms around his waist. “I’m not ready for that.”
He nods, you can feel the movement through his body, even though it’s subtle.
You sit, wrapped up in his arms for a long while before he clears his throat softly and asks, “what old wounds have you been reopening?”
Your eyes well again, but you choke back the tears. “An old… friend, I guess. He died.” You start to pull back but you don’t look at his face.
Instead, you bury your face in your hands again. He lets you pull back. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
You shrug. “It was a long time ago, he just meant a lot to me— and it’s really hard because you remind me so much of him.”
He makes a sort of strangled sound and then clears his throat again but more rough this time. “Why do you say that?”
His voice sounds even more similar without the helmet and voice changer. This man is going to be the death of you. Maybe literally. “I don’t… I don’t know. It’s just everything.” You shake your head and laugh sardonically. “It’s driving me insane.”
“How did he die?” His voice is darker than before, and there’s a sort of undertone you can’t place.
“Brutally.” You stop, take a deep breath, and offer only a bit more context. “The Joker.”
He hums. “The Joker‘s alive and ruling this dumb city.” He pauses. “How do you think your friend would feel about that?”
“Probably about the same as I do. Sick.” You run a hand through your hair, purposefully trying to avoid seeing his face. “That’s why I became a hero, you know. I wanted to kill the joker because he killed Ja- um, my friend.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“People stopped me before I did something I couldn’t come back from.” You say, wrapping your arms around your legs. “I hope the joker suffers a terrible death, but I don’t think it should be by my hands. He wins if I spend the rest of my existence regretting it.”
Red Hood picks up his helmet and clicks it back on. “Right.” He stands and stares down at you. “I have to leave now.”
You shudder at his sudden coldness, and stand abruptly. “Okay, I— um, goodbye…?” You want to smack yourself at how unsure you sound. “Did I say something wrong?”
He shakes his head. “I just don’t know why you would ever regret ridding the world of someone like The Joker, that’s all.”
Stiffly, you nod and wipe your hands on your pants.
“Sorry about your friend.” He finishes, before leaving you alone on the roof again. “Too bad I didn’t know him.”
Basically, crushing any hopes you might’ve had that he was Jason.
……
This is an atrociously stupid idea, you know; driving directly into the den of Gotham's biggest drug lord is the smartest thing to do.
But Gotham's biggest drug lord is Red Hood, and you’re fairly sure he won’t hurt you. Mostly.
His lackeys though, don’t seem so forgiving.
“Who the hell are you?” The man who barks the question at you, is raggedy looking and has the worst, most distasteful tattoos you’ve seen in your life.
“I’m here to see Red Hood.” You amend quickly, “I’m a friend of his.”
“Yeah, right.” The other guard says, a bulky looking woman who is also insanely beautiful… unsettlingly so. “A fragile little thing like you, friends with our boss… please.”
You scoff. “Trust me, I’m not fragile.” Stopping, you contemplate whether it’s a good idea to start something, considering your ankle is still healing. “Just call him.”
She rolls her eyes. “Fine, whatever.”
An old phone hangs on the wall and she picks up the receiver and quickly dials a number. “Hey, I have a woman here who says she’s the bosses friend— her name? I have no clue— Oi, what’s your name?” The woman barks at you.
“Y/n.”
“Her name’s Y/n.” She’s silent for a minute while we all wait, then she hangs up the phone aggressively and yanks your arm into her grip. “Lucky. Let’s go.”
The corridors are a bit confusing to navigate, but you’re mostly just following the woman, who seems very familiar with them.
After ten minutes you reach a door, it matches almost every other door, but it has ‘boss’ written crudely on it in spray paint.
“You’re on your own from here.” She says gruffly before stomping away.
You take a moment to collect yourself before you knock, and the door swings open before you can even finish knocking.
“Why are you here?” Red Hood sounds breathless behind his mask, as if something winded him. “How did you remember how to get here?”
“I’m… actually not sure.” You chuckle quietly to yourself as Red Hood pulls you inside.
He sits down at a desk after pulling a chair out for you to sit in. “Again, why are you here?”
Your heart seizes for a moment as if the reason why you’re here hit you all over again. “I want you to show me who you are.”
“Are you sure?” Red Hood questions slowly, his body locking up. “You’re not going to like it.”
You nod curtly. “Yes, I need to know.”
He takes a deep breath and stands up, coming right up close to you. Far enough that you could see his face clearly but close enough to have your knees buckling.
He reaches up and presses a button you can’t see. The helmet hisses and opens, he pulls it off.
And your jaw drops.
Standing there, in grown up glory, black hair, green eyes that used to kill you, is Jason Fucking Todd.
“You’re— You’re not— dead.” You stammer, almost reaching out to touch him before you yank your hand back.
You’re so irrationally angry and also relieved and devastated all at the same time.
Jason sets the helmet down. You can’t decide whether to hug him and never let go or slap him for waiting so long to tell you. “That’s a… complicated story.” He pauses. “I promise I’ll tell you that story but I just— can’t get into that right now.”
You nod slowly. “Okay… that means I can get fucking pissed now.”
You’ve clearly confused him when you wrap your hands around his waist and squeeze tightly while also cursing him out. “I can’t believe you waited this long to show me.”
You can see the smart-ass comment on the tip of his tongue but he bites it back. “I knew you’d find out eventually.” His eyes caress your body and there’s a look of longing lingering in his eyes; he seems to be contemplating something. “Fuck it, I’ve been waiting too long to do this.”
You barely have time to react as Jason lowers his face down to yours and kisses you; As soon as you realize what he’s doing, you kiss back.
His hands go to rest on your hips, as you slowly get pushed back into his desk behind you. When you hit the ledge of if, Jason lifts you onto its surface, and pulls back.
“I’ve wanted to do that since we were kids.” He says quietly.
You gently touch your lips, almost in disbelief. “I’ve been wanting you to do that since we were kids.”
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All content belongs to @beingsuneone , do not repost, copy or post on other platforms without my permission.
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I'm obsessive over my Constantine Jr Au (which still needs a fic name for, I'm open to suggestions) because
this is a cranky danny. he's spent years fighting with no end in sight, with parents who he can't trust and his only companions never truly understanding what he's going through.
he vapes CBD for the pain he's constantly in. he drank alco/hol once to help him sleep, but his parents smelt it on his breath and, just like with their research, took that to believe EVERYTHING they'd ever suspected about danny to be true: that he drinks, he does dru/gs, he's in a gang. the only thing they've never suspected their son of--being a ghost--is the one thing he actually does.
then, right on the cusp of eighteen and freedom, he gets outed. AND transformed into a seven-year-old.
this is not a danny who is willing to play at being a child. and if anyone tries to, they're in for a foul time.
Danny was 17, transformed into a 7 year old and hides in Bludhaven, and is 8 when the police finally figure out that, hey, this weird kid who keeps altering us to crime scenes is usually right on the money about who the killer is, we should investigate that. Officer Grayson is on the case!
And discovers that he absolutely can't STAND this kid.
He thought he liked kids! Everyone thought he liked kids! but this kid...
This isn't called the Constantine Jr AU because Danny is a supernatural detective, or because Danny might be Constantine's kid. Its because Danny is an unrepentant little bas/tard and he makes it everyone's problem.
Danny vapes and blows bubblegum smoke in Grayson's face.
He takes out a flask and Grayson's grabs it, learning its full of orange juice. Danny then takes out a second flask, this one with vod/ka.
He wears a trenchcoat he found in the trash (the same trenchcoat Nightwing wears in DC vs Vampires, if you know you know) but the end and the sleeves are cut off for his hands and legs. the pockets are roughly around his knees.
Grayson is desperate to figure out more about this kid, but he doesn't go to batman because, time-line wise, this is right before red hood starts running around. Jason is dead/alive-in-hiding, Tim is Robin, and Dick is mad about it. (ages-- Bruce: ? Nightwing: 24 Jason: 19 Tim: 15 Danny: 8 Damien: 7-8)
he doesn't really bond with the kid until they're both kidnapped by a gang for hostages, and Danny's big kid emotions get a hold of him (he thought he could escape them bc he's an adult, he's gone through worse, but nope! child brain chemistry). Grayson is worried that he's hurt and in pain, but Danny confesses that he's always in pain. he has nerve damage all over his body, and the only thing he really trusts is CBD. He feels like shit for taking his juul away, but more importantly, because he's been treating Danny like a irritant and just a little kid.
they get rescued and Grayson tries to take him back to his home, but Danny reveals he's homeless, saying something like "I sleep where it suits me, just drop me off whereever."
Absolutely not, Grayson is taking kid back to his place for a bed, food, and a shower, in whatever order the kid wants.
Danny stays semi-perminantly at his apartment, but Nightwing tries not to push it, because this kid practically screams flight risk. unfortunately, the paparazzi have nothing better to do and snap a pick of Grayson and Danny getting dinner together, speculating that Dick's taken after Bruce
Danny doesn't care too much; I think his ghost form is the same, if glitchy, so his parents don't know about the deaging. Grayson is mildly panicking, but its not like he HASN'T been considering adopting the evil troglodyte. Even Bruce, Tim, and Alfred aren't the problem.
No, the problem is the Red Hood, a crime boss who just cut 8 people's heads off, seeing what looks like Nightwing pulling an innocent kid into the neverending fight against crime and Seeing Green.
Edit: Had to censor sh!t because ths wasn't showing up in the tags
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ijustthinkhesneat · 5 months
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Okay but realistically imagine what Bruce would do when Jason came back.
Chasing this knee criminal who keeps referencing his dead son. Pushing his buttons. How dare he presume to know anything about Jason. The lost light of his life, his baby boy. He can feel that darkness creeping around the edges of his mind. That pit of anger and murderous rage he is scared he will never pull himself out of.
Hearing that robotic voice taunting him about failing Jason, failing to avenge him. He tried, god he tried. He was so close he had the knife against the jokers throat. And then he was being pulled away. Clark stopped him. Told him that he wasn’t acting like himself.
God he loves Clark but he can still feel that small pit of resentment fester whenever he thinks about bleeding that clown.
How dare he say he never loved Jason. He would have given everything to have him back for even a moment. His wealth, his status, Batman, his soul, Gotham itself. There were only three things he would never trade away. His sons. His precious boys. He would destroy himself without a second thought for their happiness. If there was anything he could give, any price he could pay to just see his baby one more time he would do it happily.
Then they are alone. He’s cornered the Red Hood. An abandoned warehouse, a bomb. He should tear him apart where he stands. He dares to make a mockery of his greatest failure? How he failed Jason. His son. His baby. His world. He will make him suffer.
Then the helmet comes off. A young man. Gentle black curls with a shock of white running through them. A domino mask over his face. It can’t be. And the mask comes away. And Bruce sees them. Those beautiful blue eyes that have haunted every sleepless night. Filled with hatred. Swimming with green fury.
But none of it matters. All the anger in Bruce is gone. He tears of the cowl, he has to see, has to see his baby’s face. Jason has a gun leveled at him, but it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters because Jason is here. He is alive in front of Bruce. Every wish, every regret is washed away in that moment.
Bruce falls to his knees, it’s too much, more than a wretched creature like him deserves. Jason is stunned. His hand shakes slightly. He moves forward, places the gun against Bruce’s temple and still there is no fear, just wonder and adoration in Bruce’s eyes.
“Is it you Jaylad? Please this has to be a dream, please let this be real.” Jason is shocked he expected anger, disappointment, bargaining, but all there is is a father, a broken man looking upon his life’s purpose renewed before his eyes. Bruce reaches up, slowly, reverently, like at any moment Jason will disappear, he takes Jason free hand and holds it against his cheek and then Bruce’s weeps. Not silent tears or stoic crying. He weeps, snotty and red, hiccuping sobs wracking his body. He can only repeat Jason’s name like a prayer.
Jason doesn’t even realize he has dropped the gun. His Dad is caressing his hand, wailing and babbling apologies and platitudes. Jason feels himself sink to his knees. Tears spilling from his own eyes. His Dad still loves him, never stopped, he doesn’t even care that Jason had only a week ago filled a duffel bag with human heads. He is holding onto Jason like he is sacred and he can feel the anger breaking under the desire to be engulfed by his father.
In that moment they both know that no matter what happens, they’ve come home and for the first time in a long time they both feel whole.
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faeriekit · 1 year
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The Firstborn Son
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dp x dc | Batman 👻 tw for: dead body, brief reference to human trafficking
(Part II available now!)
****
Once upon a time, there is a boy who dies forever...mostly.
****
Once upon a time, there is a man who wants to live forever.
He does.
****
Once upon a time, there is a daughter born to an immortal man.
"I need an heir," her father commands.
She gives him one.
****
Once upon a time, there is a King.
(He is a dead boy.)
(Most do not know that.)
"My heir, for a hundred years of your power," the immortal offers; the King accepts.
****
Once upon a time, there was a family of acrobats.
There isn't, not anymore, but the son still loves his mother and father, and gravity cannot steal his wings forever.
He sleeps restlessly, and rarely in his own bed. The allure of flying is too much to resist. At night, when the world is quiet, the acrobat joins the black darkness of an endless sky, and claims it as his own.
His guardian is one with the night.
The petit Robin is bright light and spectacle, no matter how well he hides his colors. He is spotted first.
****
Dick didn't really remember waking up from his nap. Alfred had put him down for a cold; his head hurt, and he was sleepy all the time, so B was out without him and Dick was stuck in a too-big bed in a giant, dark mansion, all alone.
Except. At some point, Dick must have gotten out of bed. Because now he's in the chandelier.
Dick doesn't remember jumping to the chandelier. And jumping to the chandelier is hard work; it's not something he could have done in his sleep. It requires weight, heft; the shirking of gravity. The night is dark around him; there are no street lights outside of their windows to light up the hallway. The darkness makes the grand persian carpet so much farther away than it is in the daytime-- entirely, unfathomably far below him. Pale moonlight flickers across cut shards of crystal. It's Dick's own little bird's nest.
Dick and the chandelier gently sway. He doesn't notice the-- the ghost, the illusion-- for a whole minute. It just looks like moonlight, until it doesn't.
It's a body. A boy's body-- not much older than Dick. Suspended, midair.
His heart drops. But Dick doesn't scream.
For a second, there are two boys midair, silent and still in the morning moonlight.
The body raises its head. Hello, Richard.
Dick doesn't move.
I have a question for you. The body blinks sightless eyes. Does your guardian treat you well?
Dick...doesn't know what that means. He rolls his weight forward, careful, so careful not to tip himself over the edge and send him plummeting.
"...Why are you asking?"
I need something looked after, the body says. Its limbs sway in wind that isn't here. It is very precious to me.
"Oh." Well, B is Batman, sometimes. And when he's not Batman, he's Bruce Wayne, and he is in charge of a lot of people. "Yeah, he's respons- reponsbile- he does a good job. Can I see it?" Dick's interest is piqued.
The body stills. And then-- like a zombie clawing its way out of its grave, it reaches through the rotting skin of its own stomach and removes. Something.
It's a baby.
Dick leans so far forward that he almost does go toppling but he's gripping the silver of the chandelier so that he doesn't, and, look! It's a baby! It's so small and tiny and it's still purple!
"He's so new!" Dick gasps, and releases one arm from its death grip to make a grabby hand. The body only floats close enough that Dick can pet the baby's cheek with a careful finger, can feel the softness of the baby's hair.
He is my charge, the body explains. As such, he is precious to me.
The baby is so small. Dick wants to bounce him, like he's seen mamas and papas do with their little ones. "Can I hold him?"
The baby disappears back into the body. It looks like a maggot burrowing back into the corpse it's eating, and Dick is heartbroken and sick about it. No. Not until I know it's safe.
Dick pouts. Also, he needs to know how to get the baby away from the...body. Babies need a lot of light and warmth. A dead body monster can't give him that.
Your guardian played his part in making the little heir, the body says. This baby was given to me by his grandfather. His mother passed him onto her own father, and her father sold him to me.
"Oh no!" Dick gasps. That is one of the things B has had to explain to Dick, one of hundreds of terrible things that happens to people in Gotham. And it happened to B's baby?
Yes. The body floats sightlessly, thin skin sliding over too-pale eyes. I must know if he is safe before I leave the baby in his care. Will you help me?
Dick...doesn't know what that means. He bites down on the soft presence of his lip. (He tastes blood.) "How?"
The body and the baby inside it are still. Quiet. Dick is two stories off the ground, midair, and any wrong motion could be his-- his-- Dick can't even see the ground. It would hurt so much. He's so high up from the distant hardwood floor and with only ghosts to keep him company.
...It would be very scary.
Dick swallows.
Do you trust that he would come get you, if you were in danger?
Dick knows so. He nods.
Do you trust he would be smart enough to find you? Mean enough to defend you? Care enough to comfort you? the body asks.
Dick nods.
The body floats closer. Closer. Until they are almost touching-- limp limbs entangling on the crystalline arms of the chandelier. It would be very scary, if you said yes, the body admits, as heavily weighted as any corpse that cannot help you hold it. But you would be in no danger. Should your guardian succeed, I will entrust him with this precious thing.
One circus boy's fears for the safety of B's baby. It's an easy choice. Dick is Robin. He is always going to pick helping people over maybe getting hurt.
His pinky touches the cold, dead flesh of the body's.
And then Dick wakes up sweating and heaving in bed.
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ebonyheartnet · 1 year
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Danny Phantom prompt w/ optional DC! :D
Corpse AU where Danny sheds every time he accidentally burns out a body.
As ghost king and ancient of balance, aka space, Danny’s being run ragged. The sheer amount of duplicates he has to pump out to hold the line as the GIW advance into the zone is nearly soul crushing. Black haired, blue eyed, washed out bodies are piling up like sand bags at this point. Danny can smell the char on them every time he gets close, and it makes his eyes water. He just uses them like rebar to make the ice walls even sturdier.
One day, Danny realizes that the bodies can recharge if left in the zone long enough.
One day, Danny realizes that he can command a thousand strong army of corpses armed with the basics, a lack of pain, and a protection obsession big enough to swaddle worlds.
Meanwhile, Batman watches an army of dead boys with Jason’s face swarm research facilities. He wishes he had time to be horrified, to save them all as he watches his son be murdered several times over, but he doesn’t. Something in his chest is screaming to help them, so he follows his gut.
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samgirl98 · 7 months
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Forgotten Demon Twin 5/?
Prev | Next
“Are you going to tell mom and dad?” Danny asked, effectively killing the silence in the car.
“I should,” Jazz said while tightening her hold on the steering wheel. She sighed, “but I’m not.”
Some of the tension melted from Danny’s body.
“You are going to tell me everything, though, right? Or at least the cliff notes version? Just so I can have some peace of mind.”
“Smooth, Jazz.”
“I’m serious, Danny. You told these people your secret identity. Before telling mom and dad!”
“I didn’t mean to! Skulker attacked, and I had to have access to my full powers to protect them!”
“You were reckless. Why didn’t you wake me up before leaving the house?”
Jazz’s voice was starting to rise higher.
“You could’ve been kidnapped!”
Danny snorted.
“I’m serious, Danny.”
“I’m fine, Jazz. I can take care of myself.”
Silence reigned in the car again. They made it back to Fenton’s Work, but neither sibling made any moves to get out.
“What I’m about to tell you can kill you, Jazz, so this is your only chance to back down.”
Jazz said nothing and folded her hands over her lap. Danny sighed.
“I was born high in the Himalayan Mountains in a hidden city called Nanda Parbat. I wasn’t born normally. I was made in an artificial womb; I wasn’t supposed to exist. My mother is the daughter of the leader of a cult called the League of Assassins.”
Jazz took an audible deep breath but kept quiet.
“My brother was supposed to be the only one born. The perfect heir to the Demon’s Head, Ibn Al Xu’ffasch. The Son of the Bat. I was named the Spare,” Danny said bitterly, “I could never measure up to my perfect older brother. I cried after I killed. I wasn’t good at fighting; I was too soft, too weak.”
“Damian was perfect. Why would they need the runt of the litter? I was exiled at seven. My grandfather is, was over 500 years old. We think. He lost track of his actual age. He used something called the Lazarus Pits; now I know it is ectoplasm. He bathed in them to keep himself alive.
“You’re using the past tense.”
Danny nodded, “Damian told me he’s dead.”
Danny took a deep breath and continued.
“Since I was a waste of space, he sent me away to see how scientists interact with the Lazarus Waters outside the League. He ordered me to kill the first three people I ended up with. I don’t know why he didn’t with you guys, but I’m glad.”
“You, mom, dad, are the only true family I’ve ever known. I sent ‘reports’ that were the most basic of basic. They can be found online. Eventually, after being here for three years, they stopped writing back. I was so relieved that they seemed to have forgotten me. I understand if you think I’m a monster. I’m a killer, Jazz.”
Jazz hugged Danny.
“You’re not a monster, Danny, and you’re not a waste of space. You’re my baby brother, and I would kill for you,” she declared, meaning it.
She noticed how Danny talked about himself compared to Damian. He believed himself lesser. She didn’t believe it. Her little brother had taken up the mantle of protector of Amity and had become the Ghost King after protecting their small city from the threat of Pariah Dark. He was a hero; he deserved to be treated as such.
“Thanks, Jazz,” he hugged his sister back, enjoying the warmth.
He let go after a while.
“There’s more. There’s a reason Damian is known as the Son of the Bat. His, our birth father, Bruce Wayne, is Batman.”
____
Damian didn’t sleep that night. He wanted it to be morning as quickly as possible so his father would call the Fentons.
How did he go from forgetting his brother to being impatient to see him? It didn’t help that he felt…something when he saw how easily Danyal followed Jasmine.
(How would it have been if he had been close to his brother? Would Danyal have looked at Damian the same way he looked at Jasmine?)
He wasn’t jealous. He wasn’t!
Damian walked into the sitting room. Father was already there, drinking a cup of coffee. He sat before his father and started chewing on some fruit.
They had gotten rooms in a themed hotel. Three guesses as to what the theme was. The whole damned city seemed obsessed with ghosts.
There was a picture of Phantom smiling into the camera.
Damian had done some research instead of sleeping. Apparently, Phantom was the main hero of Amity, though there was another heroine called the Red Huntress. There were mixed reviews of his brother. The younger generation viewed him as a hero (as they should.), while the older generation saw him as a menace.
There had been an article when Phantom had done a string of burglaries. Because of his red eyes, Damian had concluded his brother had most likely been mind-controlled. It happened. Even Superman has been mind-controlled.
“So, father, when will we be calling the Fentons.”
His father sighed and put down his coffee.
“Soon, Damian, but we must consider how we will approach this. Danny has already expressed his wishes. He doesn’t want to come with us.”
“He doesn’t know what he’s talking about. I’ve read into the Fentons; they’re menaces. The father has news segments for when he’s on the road! The mother has gone on record stating that all ghosts should be studied and are evil. Their papers are heavily prejudiced, with no scientific evidence to back it up. It’s clear Danyal is in danger here.”
“Damian, he’s happy here. He has people who love him.”
Damian crossed his arms, “He’s being a hero without any adult backup. He’s here alone facing Justice League-level threats.”
Bruce sighed. Damian brought up good points, but Bruce knew his son wasn’t thinking about Danny. He was thinking about assuaging his guilt. A part of Bruce wanted to do the same thing.
He could take care of Danny; he had the money. He had years of experience in the vigilante/hero business and could get other heroes to mentor his youngest son (God, another son he had failed.), but he had to consider Danny’s needs.
Bruce took a deep breath, “I’ll get your siblings. It’s time to call the Fenton.”
____
Danny woke up with a twisted stomach. It was so bad he couldn’t even eat his cereal. But he couldn’t leave either. He wanted to be there when Bruce called. Jazz sat in front of him and gave him weak smiles. Her bags were almost as bad as Danny’s.
Both Fenton siblings jumped when the phone rang.
Neither elder Fenton noticed their children’s mood.
“Fenton household,” Maddie answered.
“Hello,” Bruce’s smooth voice came through the phone. Danny thanked his advanced hearing, “May I speak to either Madeline or Jack Fenton, please?”
“Maddie Fenton speaking,” his mom said, “to whom am I speaking?”
“My name is Bruce Wayne,” his mom cut Bruce off.
“Bruce Wayne, as in Wayne from Wayne Enterprises,” his mother asked excitedly. Jack Fenton got up and put his ear close to the phone. Danny’s stomach got heavier.
“Did you finally take a look at our inventions and want to have a meeting to sponsor us?”
Considering Danny had destroyed any message his parents had sent to Wayne Enterprises for the express purpose they would never meet, the answer was no.
“No,” Bruce said, “Well, it’s hard for me to say, but I recently learned from my youngest that he has a twin. I have another son.”
Maddie and Jack looked at each other, confused.
“Yes, what does that have to do with us?”
“I have reason to believe that Daniel Fenton is my biological son, and I wish to take a DNA test.”
Next up, the Fentons officially meet Bruce and Damian Wayne
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itshype · 1 year
Text
Mother of the Year (DC x DP)
Here is the link to my DC x DP masterpost, and one of my last notfic I posted here was Gaslight, Gatekeep, Girlboss, Godhood where Danny and Vlad try to manipulate and mansplain their way out of trouble with the JLA.
OK I know we do a lot of John Constantine's soul being owned by King Phantom in this fandom. And that makes sense because it's canon he sells his soul a lot,
but like, hear me out, Talia al Ghul has access to the Pits and has used them multiple times. She has reason to believe she may never die. So, what if in one of her many political manoeuvres she sells her soul for a boon. She doesn't know enough occult to do what John did (sell it to so many people that he can't die because a war would start over who actually got hold of it) but again, she thinks she might be functionally immortal.
But hey, we could even make it not one of her many political manoeuvres. I mean Damian Al Ghul was supposed to be his Grandfather's new body. Why would Ra's care if he got emotional fulfilment by moving to Gotham and training under his dad? Why would he want notorious family-man Bruce to even know about the boy and have him taken to a place Ra's may never be able to extract him from? (Yes in some canon he doesn't know, I am aware thanks).
So, she knows her father's body is failing and she's always been loyal to him (above and beyond what you could imagine FYI non-DC fans) but he'll never let Damian go and in this AU she loves her son more, and so she trades her soul. She trades her mortal soul to the King of Lazarus, the Ruler of Everything Beneath the Water in exchange for Damian's life, for his safe and unnoticed passage to Batman's side and beyond. If her father breaks free of the compulsion not to notice he will kill her without hesitation but if she has failed to secure Damian's safety and mind then she won't care.
Talia tracks down ancient texts held by the All Caste. She makes the trade late at night over her Father's biggest Pit in Nanda Parbat. She thinks the power of the Lazarus Pits will keep her safe but she didn't really read the fine print.
So about a year after Damian goes to meet his Dad, Talia gets Danny in her Assassin bedroom ready to whisk her off. Not to the afterlife, but to Illinois, America. She, as an indebted, quasi-immortal now owes this "'representative'" of the Throne of the Restless Dead near unlimited favours. And the representative's half-ghost clone has just hit a rather... radioactive puberty.
Danny figures that a liminal maternal figure will be invaluable for Dani who is struggling. Sure Sam and Jazz can help sometimes but this girl needs actual raising.
Damian, however, is not impressed that his mother is apparently raising his secret older sister in secrecy on the side when Talia seemingly sent him off to live without her.
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sangwooooh · 1 year
Text
Why won’t you speak?
“As I am standing over your dead, rotting body, I wonder: are you cold?”
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Story: between Dick and Jason, Bruce adopts another hurt boy. M/n was around before Dick left, so he really considers him his older brother. When Jason comes around, M/n can’t help but feel jealous. After all, M/n is weak. He can’t be Robin.
Warnings and additional notes: M/n is using crutches to walk because of a car accident in which he took part at the age of twelve, the car accident that killed his parents. Bruce Wayne takes him under his wing, making sure he gets all the medical support he needs, making sure he is cared for. M/n is envious of Bruce’s soft spot for Jason. Major character death. Canon compliant… ? There are things added by me, of course.
—. —
The large doors of the library open with a burst of uncharacteristic storm.
“When has Batman died and put you in charge.” Jason’s shoes make an almost soundless approach in M/n’s direction.
M/n chuckles, “Oh my, aren’t you an opinionated little brat?”
Jason’s tongue clicks. No. He ain’t doing this shit. He takes a few more steps towards his tormentor.
“ I am Robin.” He points towards his chest. “Me. Not you, M/n. I should be in charge, not you.” He might not be in his suit, but he is Robin. And not even this bastard could take that away from him.
“Yeah, yeah. Listen here, you little asshole. You need to calm down. I don’t like you getting in my face. You annoy me. ” M/n rolls his eyes, and crosses his arms, leaning on the windowsill. The library is getting too crowded for the both of them. “Well, you don’t really have a choice. I’m older, more responsible. Don’t you have to listen to me or something?” Jason locks eyes with his fake brother, watching the words fall from his lips like boredom in the wind.
“You’re only two years older. Don’t act superior just because you’ve been here a little longer than me.” Jason wants to scoff, instead he draws back. Only to rethink his decision and bite. “Even so, I am Robin. And you’re just sickly prickly M/n. Nothing special there.”
There is a crack in M/n’s smile. Small, but noticeably there. Almost makes Jason regret it. Almost.
M/n scoffs, hiding the hurt, “You need to calm down, little asshole. It’s Alfred who holds the rule anyway. Don’t even know why you’d think it’d be useless, little me.” M/n tilts his head tauntingly, picking up his crutches and making his way out of the library. “Congratulations though. You’re pathetic.”
Jason rubs his eyes in exasperation. They will never get along. Never.
“Master M/n, is everything alright?” M/n tries to calm himself, almost bumping into Alfred. He feels like he’s gonna burst, but he can’t let the tears fall.
“Oh, Alfred… Sorry. I didn’t see you there.” M/n forces a smile. And he is sure it doesn’t fool Alfred. The elder man always knows.
“It’s quite alright, Master M/n. My question stands, however. Is everything alright?”
M/n averts his eyes, “Of course.” He stumbles a bit with his crutches as he tries to pass Alfred.
“You should try and get along with Master Jason. He is family. You two are family now, Master M/n.”
M/n doesn’t even feel like protesting. This Jason boy came after Dick left, almost as if their father was trying to replace his oldest son. And M/n can’t bear the thought of that. Of course he doesn’t like Jason. They’ll probably never get along.
“Alright then.” Alfred smiles and helps M/n down the stairs. “How about some tea?”
M/n relaxes slightly in the comfort of Alfred’s warm arms, “That sounds great, Alfred.”
Going down the stairs is becoming harder and harder for M/n. It’s like his legs are becoming lazier and lazier, which is normal considering the doctors already informed them about the changes waiting to happen. M/n doesn’t dwell on it most of the time. However, there are those moments of silence in which he can’t help but want to hit his head with something or accidentally drop one of those candles onto his own clothes. Jason had caught him in one of those moments in the library earlier. M/n gets nastier in terms of behavior around then, and truly he doesn’t have any interest in insulting Jason that much (just a little). The little prick just knows how to find his moments.
They get to the bottom of the stairs, but Alfred doesn’t let go. The man really knows everything.
When Bruce gets home, things haven't necessarily changed in any way. Alfred meets Bruce in the foyer, as it usually is when Bruce comes back from business. And then there is Jason who runs ahead of his brother and forcefully throws himself at Bruce with all his young years and fire thrumming in his veins, like he owns the world and Bruce, as well, with it. The man once young boy himself remembers owning the world once, it was not bare then. Behind, with struggle unfit for a child, M/n staggers forth with his ebony crutches. Jason does not let go of his hugs easily, in fact he holds on as if Bruce would disappear if he ever dared to let go earlier than he should. Thus, the man lets his son hug him tight. Moments later, Jason reluctantly lets go, making way for his older brother, who visibly stumbles on an uprise in the carpet.
M/n yelps as one crutch gets caught in the crimson material. He falls in front of everyone's eyes, but is caught by Alfred who is nearer to him. Bruce wants to reach out, he would've reached out. Yes. If, just so, he were closer to his son. Alas, distance is great in between them.
They head into the living room where Jason tells Bruce all about his exploits around the manor and how Bruce’s bedroom is actually haunted when he isn’t there. That gets a smile out of the man, rare as they are. His life has become increasingly livelier since Jason became part of the family. After all, the quiet of Dick’s departure was sadly difficult for one little M/n to fill, though the efforts were there. Bruce just… couldn’t make himself meet his son halfway.
After dinner Alfred corners him in the emptiness of Bruce’s study (not his, his father’s study). The older man wears that look on his face, the one he shows only to Bruce and especially when he ‘s done something bad, like stealing a cookie when he was younger, or choosing to dress up as a bat.
“You should talk to him more.” Alfred keeps his eyes on Bruce and the man once boy under that gaze doesn’t know if he should look away or try to dominate the stare down. It’s an automatic response, he reckons. It would never work on Alfred, either way.
“Jason is fine, he talks to me now.” That gets another smile out of Bruce. He fears these days he is getting stiffer, body hardening with the darkness and the years. Maybe he is actually growing softer?
“It’s not Jason I’m worried about, sir.” Alfred leans forward and places a tray with two cups and a teapot on it. It smells good, roses and camomile?
“M/n? Should I think there’s something wrong with him?” Bruce raises an eyebrow.
“I don’t know, sir. Should you not?” Alfred continues to look at him, almost as if his eyes harden. It’s hard to tell, even with the bat’s experience.
“Is something wrong with him?” Bruce takes a seat on his father’s old leather chair that was once black but now tints to brown. The chair sighs underneath him with tiredness becoming of age.
“Why don’t you ask him yourself, sir?”
Bruce would ask. He really would. He should… but it’s late. The boy probably sleeps already. “It’s late, Alfred. Some other time, perhaps?”
Alfred scrutinizes him, yet ends in a half concealed sigh. He wasn’t going to tell his Bruce, the stubborn and with years worth of guild child he so much wished fulfillment to about how his son still stands at the dinner table, ashamed to ask for help and beating himself down over how he would never be good enough to help his father the way his younger brother does. No, Alfred shall deal with that himself, as he always does. Foolish master Bruce. He ends with a, “You know best, sir.”
Bruce doesn’t know best. He’s never felt himself as holding the power of knowing whats and ifs and what ifs. The ‘what if’ of the situation, it always arises at the time when his weakness fills him with the dread of what has been. What if he’d said “let’s stay for another movie” the night his parents died. What if he’d spent more time trying to talk with Dick instead of arguing foolishly and towards nothing, like the boy wasn’t the son he so cared for, like he hadn’t been the only once. What if he’d listened to Alfred and talked with M/n more, mended the disruption between him and Jason. What if he’d protected Jason the way he should’ve protected him, the way his soul screamed to keep the boy safe because how can you let someone else suffer when it is you who should have been? It should never have been Jason. Not his Jason. Not his boy. Not his hope and his dreams and the one he holds as if he were holding his younger self. Not the Jason who laughed so hard whenever something remotely funny came to light. Not the Jason who ran to the door to welcome Bruce, jumping into his arms with all his young years and fire thrumming in his veins, like he owns the world and Bruce, as well, with it. ‘Welcome home, dad.’ Not… Not Jason. Not Jason, God, please, not him. Don’t let it be like this, Bruce’s soul screams as it trashes and shoves and splits, stabbing and scratching and killing to get out.
Jason Todd, beloved son and brother, full of fire and full of life
with all his young years and fire thrumming in his veins, like he owns the world and Bruce, as well, with it
The morning Bruce has to come home and let Alfred and M/n know that Jason won’t be home for dinner tonight or any other night, the sun shines on a clear sky. It smiles upon the Wayne lands, over the gardens and the pond. M/n is there with the flowers, reading a book. ‘The three musketeers’ the title reads. Does M/n enjoy reading? Maybe he does. Bruce isn’t around enough to figure out a pattern.
M/n’s eyes raise from the pages, smile a bright one, as the sun above them with a glint in his eyes and hair tussled with sleep and the ends of dreams.
Bruce must look all the wiser and the better and the all powerful because his son’s smile becomes smaller with what Bruce can only read as surprised… a little concern as well.
“Welcome back, dad.” The boy speaks, voice carried by the breeze and the petals of the flowers.
Bruce says nothing. He can’t bring himself to. Because how can you ever begin. How… How do you tell your son his brother has died before they even had the chance to make up after an argument? How do you let your son know, he will be in a quiet house yet again? How do you tell your son you’ve killed his brother?
M/n’s smile falters yet again. And he must sense something because he looks around. Behind Bruce, to the gate, to the flowers and to the door where no one but Alfred stands.
“Where is Jason?” His smile is gone by now, replaced by something akin to curiosity. “Did he get lost?” A small laugh bursts at that.
M/n locks eyes with Bruce again.
Bruce isn’t smiling. His lips haven’t even twitched. In fact, Bruce thinks he is getting worse by the second and it must be showing in some way because M/n forces himself to keep a smile on as he struggles to get up with the help of a crutch. He almost falls twice, but stands almost straight soon, book closed in hand, a finger inside to keep the page. The boy is pretty far into the book. Bruce doesn’t know if it’s the first, the second or the third volume.
“Dad… are you alright?” His son asks him with those alight eyes that speak the language of the sun and the moon. He looks around again, maybe he hopes to see the brother he so is annoyed by. There is no annoyance in his eyes. “Where is Jason, dad? I didn’t see him go inside.”
There’s a shake in Bruce’s eyes, a tremor of the lips. M/n pushes himself forward on the crutch. It gets stuck in the grass for a second, but it does not stop the son from approaching the bat with no suit, no protection.
A shove closer, half a stumble backwards.
“… dad?” Bruce lets his son see his head fall down, down, down, looking at the grass next to his shoes. Bruce thinks he shook his head somewhere in between the burn of the sun on his neck and the thud of ‘The three musketeers’ by Alexandre Dumas, fallen to the earth. For a moment, Bruce imagines the volume as his own head, rolling on the too green grass, blood dried and burned by the sun.
“M/n… Why do you hate me?”
“…”
“Have I… done something that wrong? I know I can be annoying and loud and sometimes want attention, but I don’t mean what I say to you. I never do, not the bad stuff at least.”
“I… I don’t hate you, Jason. How could I? You’re everything I wish I was.”
“Why?”
“Aha… I think I say all I say and blame you all the time because, not so deep down, I’m envious of you.”
“Envious? How could you possibly be envious of me? You’re older and you’re smart… and you don’t get into trouble with the teachers.”
“Ha, well, I suppose I’m envious because dad is close to you, the way he isn’t with me. And… and because you are with him the way I could never manage.”
“But… it’s really not that hard. Just talk to dad, I’m sure it’s gonna be alright.”
“Aren’t you wise.”
“Ha ha. I’m serious, M/n. If you want something, just do it.”
“See? That’s why I’m envious of you.”
… or maybe I admire you for it. Is what M/n imagines late at night, a conversation that could have been between Jason and him, especially close after the funeral, when Dick drinks in his room and their dad drinks in his study and Alfred cleans up the dinner none of them really taste any more, but only eat as unfeeling corpses coveted in a quiet house.
Part 2:
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ideas-ideasideasideas · 2 months
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JayTim omegaverse AU where Tim presents as an omega when he’s stalking Batman and Jason-as-Robin. Jason finds him collapsed on a rooftop and tries to help him but the proximity triggers his own presentation as an alpha. From there things go to hell in a hand basket and they ride out their first heat/rut together. In the immediate aftermath, once they have both recovered enough presence of mind, they agree that this is no one’s fault but it doesn’t stop Jason from feeling guilty about taking advantage of Tim so he escorts Tim home (in the process finding out they’re neighbours) and asks if there’s anything that he can do for him to make up for whatever the hell just happened.
There’s a lot of trauma to unpack here for the both of them but Tim is barely a teenager and Jason has emotionally repressed Batman for a parental figure so they just mutually decide not to mention it ever again because if you pretend it never happened then it can’t hurt you right? (Wrong.) Anyway, Tim tells Jason that if he really wants to do something for him then maybe he can just not tell Batman that Tim was on a rooftop at night, pretty please? At which point Jason, horrified that a boy Tim’s age is running around on rooftops unsupervised in the most crime-ridden parts of Gotham at the most crime-infested time of the day, makes it his personal duty to figure out why Tim does this and also how he can convince him to NOT do this. What he did to Tim was wrong on so many levels but oh god, what if someone so much worse found Tim instead? He agrees to Tim’s request on the condition that Tim carries a beacon at all times during his nighttime extracurricular activities.
Jason brings the beacon over as soon as possible, which turns out to be the next day after school (as Robin of course), and the sight of Tim alone in a giant house compels him to stay for a while, and a while turns into the rest of the day. Tim shows off the photos he’s taken of Batman and the Robins, and Jason is reluctantly but appropriately impressed by Tim’s stealth.
A friendship grows between them.
And then Jason dies.
And Batman grows too reckless.
And Dick refuses to be Robin again.
And Tim becomes Robin—
Except he doesn’t. Not really. He wears Jason’s Robin suit for a very short time before random bouts of nausea take him off the field. But Batman is still beating the shit out of petty criminals and Tim is desperate to help, so he allows Alfred (bless him) to call him a discreet doctor to ensure that his illness is not due to anything he was exposed to while Batman-wrangling before he’s allowed back on the field. Tim just wants it over and done with quickly so he can get back out there and—
He’s not allowed to back on the field.
He’s holding a little black-and-white picture of a literal human growing inside him and he is absolutely benched until there is no longer a literal human growing inside him.
Doctor Thompkins lays out his options, is brutally honest about how his body (too young, too small) will handle a pregnancy (not well), and asks if there is anything he wants to tell her (if there’s anyone Batman needs to put in jail for touching him). Tim doesn’t have long to consider his options—he’s nearly too far along for most clinics to be comfortable performing an abortion (although, given his age, they might be sympathetic enough to bend the rules if Doctor Thompkins can’t perform the procedure for him).
He decides to keep it, a parting gift from his friend Robin to be cherished beyond his death. There is a difficult conversation with Bruce about the child’s father (no, you can’t arrest them, they’re already dead, no, I’m not defending a heinous rapist, it’s your goddamn son, Bruce, this is your grandchild). An unforeseen but extremely welcome consequence of this is that Batman starts pulling his punches, now that he has something to live for again. He looks only half-broken now and he offers Tim a room at the Wayne manor when he finally learns about Tim’s extremely absent parents.
(Tim worries about how to break the news to his parents until he no longer has to worry about it because his mother is dead and his father is in a coma and god he wanted to avoid having that conversation with them but this wasn’t how he wanted it to happen.)
Properly benched now for the foreseeable future, Tim picks up remote vigilante-wrangling instead (from Babs?) and makes headway in some cold cases. He pulls out of school to be homeschooled instead, keeps out of the public eye, and generally avoids leaving Wayne manor because a thirteen-year-old pregnant omega living alone with an adult alpha (and his butler) is a Very Bad Look even for Brucie Wayne and Tim would rather not be known as Bruce Wayne’s child bride thank you very much.
Life proceeds in this manner, the child is delivered by Caesarian with very little fanfare. It is, unfortunately, very difficult to hide the presence of a whole infant. The public settles on the theory that the child is Bruce’s illegitimate son from one of his many dalliances and Tim allows the misconception to propagate simply because no good can come out of him, all of fourteen, publicly claiming his child. But it still stings, just a little. He made this child, held him safe in his womb for eight months. He puts him to bed and nurses him and loves him so much but nobody outside the manor will see it.
Tim bursts back into society when he’s officially adopted by Bruce. He refused to register his son as Bruce’s (it takes some extremely deft work by Oracle to file the appropriate documents for Tim’s claim on his child to be legally valid without alerting the press) but he also understands that Bruce wants a legal connection to his grandchild, so he becomes his son’s dead father’s legally adopted brother. It’s a mess, but at least people who should be are allowed into hospital rooms. It’s not like it will matter, right? Jason’s dead, right?
Wrong.
Jason is very much not dead and very much bewildered by the presence of a baby Wayne that isn’t Damian and it completely derails his plans to exact revenge on Bruce for not killing the Joker. It fucking hurts to see that he’s been replaced by not one but TWO new children but at least they aren’t Robin. At least no one is Robin. At least one of them is Tim, his lonely friend who deserves a family. He returns to Gotham, heads to Crime Alley, becomes Red Hood, and buries himself in shooting out enough kneecaps to push Bruce and Batman from his mind. That was another life. He’s fucking furious at Bruce and his replacements but god the baby has the same curly hair that Jason did and Jason can’t help but think that Bruce might actually have missed him, at least a little.
But probably not enough to love Jason as he is now, full of anger and rage and impulse to hurt hurt hurt the people who hurt others. He channels it all into cleaning up the Alley, perhaps more aggressively than Batman would (should) have, but Batman doesn’t give enough of a shit about the Alley to know that what he’s doing isn’t enough and it’s up to Jason to get his hands downright filthy if he wants to make any changes around here.
Tim notices Red Hood, because of course he does. And it takes him no time at all to realise, oh, that’s Jason. That’s Jason.
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apocalypse-shuffle · 1 year
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BATMAN | BATFAMILY (assorted canon)
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“Long Overdue” (Bruce Wayne x Batmom!Reader)
| Reader was with Bruce in the past but grew distant after Jason’s death. No one tells her when he comes back from the dead until Bruce is forced to bring her in on an ambush when they’re overwhelmed.
-Jason and Batmom!Reader reunion.
| SFW, canon typical action, cursing, past death of a child, Reader & Bruce are divorced, -angry!reader
| This is like half fanon half UTRH/Batman:Hush. I’m really just fucking around with canon rn. Also the pictures used are just for aesthetics and have no contextual meaning to the story. (pic source: Batman - Three Jokers comic)
| 1k+ words
| parts: one, spurt, two, three, four, five, six/six point five, seven.
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Bruce clears his throat for the third time in ten minutes.
In contrast you roll your eyes for the third time in just as long before bending over to switch on the A/C. The Batmobile got stale whenever Bruce started binging. The vehicle not smelling like old blood and sweat stopped being important once your ex husband neglected his duties as Bruce Wayne.
Once upon a time that negligence would have worried you. Still does even if you vehemently tamp it down.
Another clearing of his throat.
“Spit it out already.” You hold your arm tighter to your chest at a bump in the road as you watch him, bullet wound treated rudimentarily enough to hold you over until you get to the cave but still adding to the scent of blood.
Bruce isn't a meta-human; he still emoted even if he did it in such small increments that the untrained eye wouldn’t catch on. You were far from untrained though; you’ve been speaking Bruce almost as long as Alfred has and so you see the twist of fearangersorrow that flashes across his face.
The same damn twist of fearangersorrow from the last days of you and Bruce’s relationship. This time around your stomach doesn’t drop and your body doesn’t flare, mirroring those same emotions. You don’t answer Bruce's natural pull at all in fact, only sigh as you do your best to keep your arm from jarring.
“I didn’t come here to fight. Say what you want.”
Not that you expected to get much leeway on that front. Asking Bruce to communicate without a million half truths was like asking a baby to scrape the paint off thirty feet walls. It could be done technically, it would just take a lot of patience and outside assistance.
His hands tighten on the steering wheel, gloves creaking, before he works through the motions of forcing himself to relax.
“You’re not going to like it.”
“Bruce, when's the last time I liked anything that came out your mouth?”
“You were on a video call with Dick and you laughed when I was complaining about that mite infestation in the cave.”
Of course he would remember that, living filing system that he was.
“Yeah, I was laughing at you,” you clarify with a tiny snort and Bruce gives you his faint smile.
“I know,” he says voice gone soft. You have to clench your eyes shut against the onslaught of emotions that tone elicits. How long has it been since you’ve heard it? “I'm…sorry.��
You don’t think he’s talking about the joke.
“Bruce-”
“I know,” he repeats before pausing. You recognize the active way he’s composing himself and something in you can’t help but to shrivel up. What could be so bad that he's acting nearly as off as when he had to explain how Joker killed your son to you?
Your heart pumps faster in your chest like it wants to run away from the impending news, and you have to open your mouth so that your breaths don’t begin to stutter. No more, not after Jason, you can’t take another death.
In an attempt to avoid the nearing collision of your anger and worry at Bruce gearing up to drop yet another bomb on you and straight up verbally expressing he’s sorry about it beforehand - which what the hell? - you run through what you know.
He could just be acting funny about a shared account you forgot to separate. That’s always a possibility. You focus on keeping your breathing level.
You’d seen Dick and heard from Babs tonight, talked to Dick on how to not burn down his house whilst cooking just three afternoons ago and he’d mentioned Alfred doing fine then. Hopefully that still rings true. The newest Robin that’d been dragged out of a collapsing building last week would still be recovering and no one had mentioned Timothy adding to his injuries so it likely wasn’t him that had Bruce like this, and you haven’t heard anything negative or otherwise about Batgirl.
Even this new Red Hood guy didn’t seem to be much of a problem outside of you not knowing who the hell he is and him being all up in your business earlier. You’d take a lot of shit over the dysfunctionality of you and Bruce’s relationship, but not from a stranger. Besides, you weren’t omniscient - that was more Alfred’s deal - so you weren’t exactly the best gauge on the greater intentions of the city’s newest crime boss. You made a habit of not looking too closely at Gotham’s vigilante scene if you could help it.
Joker did go by that once though, right before his metamorphic dip in a vat of acid green, but you knew it wasn’t the clown under that helmet. For one, Joker didn’t fight with Hood’s brute strength and honed finesse and secondly you knew for a fact the green haired bastard was in Arkham right now. Alive and well.
Your hands clench at the reminder.
“You let him live!”
“We are not executioners, Y/n!”
“Uh uh. Absolutely not, that’s where you’ve got me fucked up.” You take a deep breath before gesturing towards the expanse of Gotham. “When you choose over and over for this man to live you are explicitly signing everyone else’s death sentences, and how you don’t see that is beyond me.”
The way Bruce shakes his head is almost reflexive.
“We always stop him before he can do anything like that.”
“Oh really? Always? Because I got a son six feet under that says otherwise, and last time I checked so do you.”
Bruce twitches. “We don’t trade lives.”
You stare at him, your frustration a harsh nearly livable thing at that moment. The memory of him throwing you off the Joker, of the screaming match afterwards, makes your tongue taste like ash.
“Sure we do,” you murmur. “You just won’t see it that way.”
“We. Don’t. Stoop. To their level, Nightfall,” he accentuates gruffly and just as suddenly as it came your anger rushes away with the next gust of wind that lashes at your face.
An argument on methodology is not what you came here for. You're furious about The Joker, you have no doubt you always will be, but that fury isn’t what drove you to hunting Bruce down on a random rooftop. Joker isn’t what got you back in your suit on this night. Bruce is.
Bruce Batman who’s clearly getting ready to turn this into a thing again.
“Bruce. Bruce stop it.”
You look at him. Really look at him for the first time in weeks and something just…clicks. Bruce and you have been standing at a precipice this whole time. This was it. How Bruce handled Jay’s death was either going to make or break you. And if Dick going virtually no contact had been the trial run the continual state of your marriage wasn’t looking too good. No more kids to patch up the cracks. No more looking away from new cracks formed.
Your mask gets pulled off a second later.
“My baby is dead, Bruce. We had to bury our mangled son today and you want to go out and be Batman when Bruce Wayne is needed at home. I don’t want to argue philosophies, I want you to leave the cape at the door and be here for me as my husband.”
Problem was that Bruce hadn’t been able to do both, and by the end of that interaction you’d punched him for it. Punched him for your son too. One failed attempt and all of a sudden he couldn’t kill Jason’s killer or let you do it for the both of you. No, he’d cracked down instead. It would be inexcusable and he’d clash with you the whole way.
You can admit to yourself that you gave up because you didn’t want to be faced with the possibility of Bruce throwing you in jail over the Joker. He’d stopped you from wiping him from the earth three times at that point, who’s to say he wouldn’t have eventually caved and gotten you committed?
Bruce couldn’t balance being the husband to a grieving wife and being the grieving father of a murdered son. Couldn’t handle being Bruce Wayne when The Batman was so much simpler; easier to hide behind than confronting everything. So he retreated.
In a way you understood, the death of a child wasn’t something you walked away from at all in some cases and it certainly changed you in every situation, but you were supposed to have been able to deal with that blow together.
Bruce’s voice, tight and broad, less Bruce and more Bat once more, brings you out of your head.
“A few weeks ago the Red Hood made his presence known after an undisclosed amount of time hiding below the radar in Gotham with a duffel bag full of severed heads.”
You hum lightly having already known this. Dick got chatty when he was stressed.
“A few days after that Red Hood and I got in an altercation wherein he unmasked and gave me his blood and fingerprints. Both that I then tested…”
Behind your mask you squint, breath rushing out of you as another possibility you hadn’t dared to let yourself think comes to mind. Grief’s most dangerous wish. You start shaking your head. It's a useless attempt to not let the pieces come together.
“The results matched that of Jason Todd’s,” there’s a moment of brief wrenching stillness before he adds quieter, as if his veneer of control has suddenly been punched out of him. “Our Jason….”
…TBC
NOTES: Hope you enjoyed! Comments would be appreciated if you wanted to leave one! I read all of them, I only don’t respond cause this is a side blog.
P.S.: It’s gonna come off like I hate Bruce in the later chapters (only sometimes irl) so yeah. Apparently I’m just getting out some general Bruce frustrations with this, so fair warning. This is not a happy ending for his ass.
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msfcatlover · 5 months
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Shadow Damian (Reverse Robins)
Shadow starts with Damian, and I am drawing huge inspiration from his Infinite Frontier design. In particular, this absolutely gorgeous rendition by DuhDude.
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(I fucking love this look)
I'm also taking inspiration from @adoptedbybruciewayne's design, which just so happens to have a very similar silhouette.
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As I've said before, I'm aiming for "sleek while still somewhat disguising his body outline." The goal is to make him a harder target to pin down.
Black tunic-vest, the part below the (utility) belt shaped mostly like the green design. Keep the puffy sleeves, though they're now also black & ever so slightly translucent; the under-suit is actually very dark grey, so you still can't really see his arms, it just does weird things to the shadows.
The hood is NOT part of the tunic, it's a separate cowl like this (sized similarly to the green design), held on by a single snap so that it never chokes him or holds him back if it gets grabbed.
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No bandages, but the bottom half of his forearm does have a metal cuff for protection. Black gloves under dark red fingerless gloves, and the cuffs are the same red.
There is actually a single red stripe running down each arm like a ribbon between the cuffs/gloves & his shoulders, but I feel like if anyone drew it, those would be the first detail to go. In any case, those ribbon-lines sorta pour below the curve of his collarbones to merge into a red bat in front of a gold circle. (Referencing this chart, it's probably a combination of the "Batman: Dead End" & "Batman Beyond" designs.)
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(Quickly thrown together in GIMP, though the colors seem to have gotten messed up... it should be redder.)
No domino; he wears a black half-mask/mouth-guard on the lower half of his face (kinda like the "muzzle" mask Jason's been wearing in recent years), and paints the remaining visible skin with grease paint to disguise his features (think Battinson, but it's the entire upper half of his face.)
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The effect being Damian's mouth, jaw & nose covered, his face cast in shadow, his skin painted black, so there's no discernible features... just these two piercing green eyes staring at you from under the hood.
The pants are well-padded (same dark grey as the undersuit), and he has extra armor on his thighs, though a lot more in-line with modern sensibilities.
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(This, but black.)
I also love Damian's knee-high lace-up boots, especially how they're drawn in "Son of Batman" where they are all the way to the knee, with a very de-emphasized kneepad. Practical? Probably not, but I don't really like how the protective cap they usually put over his knees change the shape of the boots. So he gets those, but black instead of green.
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(It is weirdly hard to grab a good reference image for these; they never look as good on the covers, for some reason.)
So that's my... excruciatingly detailed explanation of Damian's Shadow costume. Look forward to future breakdowns of Damian's Nightwing costume, how future Shadows evolved the look, and basically every other costume in the family.
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anotherwritingblog12 · 5 months
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The minute before
Bruce took a calculated risk and this was the consequence. He had managed to get everybody out of the building before it inevitably collapsed under him. He would do it again in a second. Everyone was safe.
Everyone except him.
He was under an alarming amount of rubble, there was a fire somewhere and a burst pipe that kept screaming a few feet behind him. He was trapped under a fallen piece of wall, he could barely turn his head to see his surroundings.
Bruce was badly injured, he could tell because he couldn't quite feel anything. He could see the blood in his suit, in his gloves, he felt around his head and he was definitely bleeding. But he didn't exactly feel pain. Maybe he felt a tad lightheaded. He had pressed his distress signal on the way down, he would be fine.
That's when he saw Alfred.
Just standing there, next to Bruce, in a perfectly clean and pressed fitted suit. Looking at him.
Alfred had died 2 years prior, and his death still haunted the manor and everyone in it. Bruce wanted to think his death had brought the family together but it had only brought to light every problem they ever had tenfold.
If he was there, Bruce was definitely dying.
He wanted to talk to him, but he feared if Alfred answered back Bruce would be tempted to follow him all the way to the afterlife to be with him again.
Bruce knew this was a product of his imagination. Unless it wasn't. He wanted to tell Alfred everything he couldn't before. He wanted to apologize for everything Bruce had put him through, for his transgressions as Batman, as a father, as a son.
If he was dying why couldn't he feel it, goddamnit? Maybe he was already dead and Alfred was just here to get him to the other side.
He didn't want to die, he had so much to do still. This couldn't be the end-- The Batman beaten by a pile of rubble. No. Bruce tried to move but the wall simply wouldn't give and the more he struggled the more blood would pour out of him.
Bruce wouldn't be able to say goodbye. He had to tell Dick he didn't need to take up his mantle, none of them did. Bruce wanted to apologize to Damian for what he'd said after Alfred's death. Had he done it already? Probably, but one more time couldn't hurt.
Hurt. God he had hurt them all so much. He argued that they all hurt him back too, but he was the adult none of that mattered. They were all adults now, they would survive. He wanted to tell every one of his kids he was proud of them for everything, everything they had ever done had been a testament to their strength.
He felt tears running down his face. He looked at Alfred again and Alfred looked back with a questioning look in his face.
"My boy," Alfred said.
"I'm sorry--I'm sorry. I can't go." Bruce cried harder.
"I know," Alfred replied. Bruce stared at him wide eyed.
"I know," Alfred repeated. "but your body doesn't. Its holding out until you're rescued, and you won't feel anything until you're out there again."
Alfred moved closer to him. "There are instances in which a person will wait until they are safe to give into their injuries. Once the adrenaline rushes out of you, you will die, Master Bruce. You need to fight it."
Bruce shook his head. Alfred was right, of course he was.
"How?" Bruce asked.
"Feel. Feel how many things you still need to do here. Your kids need you, everyone needs you. You need them. You're getting out of here and you are going to live."
Bruce wanted everything to stop. He wanted everything to be over, the rubble gone, he wanted the fire to stop burning and the pipe behind him to run out of fucking water.
"I miss you so much." Bruce sobbed.
"I never left you." Alfred replied.
Bruce would live. He would see his kids again, he would love them and then they would fight. And Bruce would continue to put himself in dangerous situations that would get him killed, but he would be alive to do so. He hadn't even told Clark that he loved him, he couldn't die before seeing him again, he was going to wine and dine him so bad.
That's when he felt the ground above him shake. Then some of the rocks above him where moved and he could see a glimpse of light. Then more shuffling above him and that's where he saw Superman.
"Batman!" Clark said and dove straight into the building. He moved the wall from Bruce's chest, but Bruce still couldn't move.
"I'm getting you out of here okay?" That's when Clark noticed the bleeding in Bruce's head. "Just-- just hold on."
Clark grabbed him delicatley and with such gentleness, but the moment he started flying everything hit.
He was saved now, the adrenaline begins to dissipate, and everything comes back. His back hurt so much he started struggling to breathe, his right arm was definitely broken, and his head, his head was going to explode. His ears started ringing and his vision started to blur. He was drifting off.
"Bruce! Hey we're almost in the cave everyone is there we'll get you better."
Was that Alfred? Alfred's voice was so soothing, he could fall asleep to it again, just like he had done so many times in his childhood. Bruce had just seen him, hadn't he? Did Bruce even say hello? He would now. Bruce closed his eyes.
--
Bruce woke up freezing. He was in the cave, good. It must have been a rough patrol becuase he coulnd't remember falling asleep. He was laying in the medical cot plugged into a lot of a lot of machines.
He turned his head and found Clark sitting in a chair next to him, sleeping. He looked so uncomfortable, and he hadn't shaved. Bruce reached out to him and moved Clark's knee to wake him up.
"Christ, you look terrible. Please take a flight around orbit, you know Gotham doesn't get any sunlight."
Clark opened his eyes drowsily and then fully. He jumped when he saw Bruce.
"Bruce. Oh God. Let me tell the other's you're awake. How are you feeling?" Clark looked at Bruce with such softness and a hint of fear.
That's when everything came back to him. The building, the rubble, the fire, the pipe, Alfred.
Bruce was alive, he did it, he did it because of Alfred.
"How long was I out?" Bruce asked.
"Too long." Clark rubbed his temples, he was looking at him like Bruce had just handed him a million dollars.
"I'm sorry." Bruce said.
"No, no, everything is okay now. You're okay and everything is fine. The kids will be here in no time, don't worry." Clark looked so beaten up. Bruce grabbed his hand.
"Thank you." Bruce said.
"Of course." Clark whispered.
They looked at each other in silence. Bruce was rubbing circles in Clark's hand.
"I love you." Bruce finally admitted.
"I love you too." Clark answered.
There was a shriek in the cave.
"I can't it took Bruce almost dying for you to confess your feelings to each other? I owe Jason so much money." Dick Grayson was standing in the cave along with the rest of his kids.
Everything was perfect.
-
2:24AM
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