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disillusioneddanny · 1 year

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Love Me Like You

Absolutely wrote this instead of going to sleep. This is based off of the song Love Like You by Rebecca Sugar for steven universe.

Damian’s heart was racing violently in his chest. He was angry, no he was beyond angry. No one was listening to him! He was twenty years old now, he wasn’t some little Robin sidekick anymore either, he was Red Bird, he had taken a different name and become his own person as a vigilante yet it didn’t seem to matter to anyone in this blasted family. All they saw him as was the demon brat, the boy who had been raised to become an assassin who had been brainwashed his entire life.

But he wasn’t that boy any longer! He had been out of the League of Assassins for the same amount of time he had been in it. If not a little longer if one could count the fact that the ten years he was with his family he was fully cognizant and could make his own decisions, unlike the toddler he had been with the League.

Sure, he had been moulded to be the perfect weapon, the perfect heir to the Demon’s Head but he was more than that now, he was so, so, so much more than that.

He was a hero, he was someone that others could look upon and be inspired. He wasn’t some ruffian assassin any longer and his past shouldn’t matter in the slightest anymore. At least, it shouldn’t be thrown in his face by his own family every chance he got.

He stormed up the steps of the Brownstone he owned with his boyfriend and let out a huff, trying to calm his racing heart before he stepped into the home. It would be different once he was past these bricks, he would be in the company of someone who saw him completely and loved him anyways.

He stepped through the threshold and smiled as he found his beloved passed out on the couch, curled up with a blanket wrapped around him.

If I could begin to be, half of what you think of me. I could do about anything.

Damian smiled at his boyfriend before he stooped down, slipping one arm underneath Danny’s legs and the other under his neck as he lifted him in the air carefully, cradling him bridal style in his arms.

“Tried to stay up and wait for you,” the halfa mumbled, pressing his face against Damian’s chest. “Got too tired.”

“It is alright, Beloved,” Damian murmured before he pressed a kiss to Danny’s forehead. “Rest, I assume you had a busy day, my dear?”

“Justice League Dark are full of idiots who don’t know their ass from their head,” Danny mumbled as Damian opened the bedroom door.

He let out a soft chuckle at that. He would not be surprised if his beloved lost his mind even a little bit when having to work with both that dreadful Constantine and Doctor Fate at the same time.

“Who all were there?” Damian asked as he set Danny on the bed. The halfa whined at the loss of Damian’s warmth, making the vigilante’s heart flutter.

When I see the way you act, wondering when I’m coming back. I could do about anything.

“Give me just a moment to change into some sleepwear and I’ll join you,” he said, glancing over his shoulder at Danny who now laid with a pillow wrapped in his arms and a pout on his face. “Now, tell me about the meeting.”

“I originally went to the Watchtower to work on one of the main engines, Supes had been saying it sounded wrong,” he said, launching into his tale but Damian was taken back to a different time, three years before when he had first met his love.

I could even learn how to love like you.

Three years ago.

Damian trailed behind his father into the main room of the Watchtower when he had noticed something out of the ordinary. There seemed to be someone floating on the outside of the ship without a space suit of any kind.

“Batman,” he gasped out, stepping towards the man only for his steps to falter as the man-being waved at him with a wide smile. Bruce looked over curiously and smiled.

“Oh, that’s Phantom,” he said simply. “He’s the head engineer of the Watchtower maintenance crew. Although, I have been trying to convince him to join us as an actual member for well over a month now. He refuses.”

“He looks no older than I do, how could he be the head engineer?” Damian asked, looking mystified as the being, Phantom phased through the window and gave him a dopey smile.

“Would you believe me if I said I was just cool like that?” He asked, looking Damian up and down. “And who might you be?”

“Right, you’ve not seen him in his newest persona,” Batman said before, Damian’s eyes had to be deceiving him, his father was smiling at Phantom! “This is Red Bird.”

Damian held out a hand for Phantom. “It’s a pleasure,” he said, locking in on those eyes that reminded him of the Lazarus Pits he had grown up around.

“Oh, I think the pleasure is all mine,” Phantom had purred, his eyes a green fire that had sucked Damian in immediately. He had never been bested so easily by someone else in all his life.

I always thought I might be bad, now I’m sure that it’s true.

He never did learn how Danny had managed to become the head engineer, even after three years of dating the halfa.

“And then Detective Chimp had to but in! Which why the hell do we have a fucking monkey on the team anyway! His name is fucking Bobo, Dami, Bobo!” Danny said, now fully awake as he laid starfished in their bed, the pillow now resting on his chest as he glared up at the ceiling.

Damian chuckled and pulled his shirt over his head before he glanced at his boyfriend once more. “He is a detective, darling, quite a good one at that. I think he’s almost as good as,” Damian stopped and scowled. No, he was not going to go in that direction, he was not going to bring up his father, not when his mood was finally starting to lift and he had been distracted by his lover.

“Oh, I know that look,” Danny said before he floated off of the bed and gave Damian a look as he cupped his face in his calloused hands. Danny’s right thumb ran along the small scar just below Damian’s left eye. Almost miniscule, no one had ever noticed it before except for Danny. It had been from his first time knife fighting as a child, his oppent had managed to get a single nick in and Damian had been punished within an inch of his life for letting someone get past his defenses.

He had been five at the time.

Danny had been ready to destroy all of Nanda Parbat when he had first learned how Damian had gotten the scar. No one had ever been so angry on his behalf before. Sure, his family were angry about his upbringing but not once had they ever truly considered the emotional and mental damage it had done to Damian. How he had to work so hard to be good in their eyes even after all these years.

Cause I think you’re so good, and I’m nothing like you.

“What did he say to you this time?” Danny asked, his big blue eyes curious and so very full of love.

Damian sighed. “It doesn’t matter,” he said, stepping away to change into his pajama pants. Danny grabbed his wrist and frowned.

“What did we talk about, Polaris?” He asked, brows now furrowed in concern.

“My feelings matter,” Damian recited like a toddler back to his boyfriend.

Look at you go, I just adore you.

“Now, do you want to talk about it? Or do you want me to drop it?” Danny asked him, letting go of his wrist to instead wind their fingers together, interlocking them so that Damian could not escape his boyfriend’s grasp even if he wanted to.

Damian just smiled at him. “I do not wish to expand into the entire argument. But he told me that I will always be an assassin at heart and that I will never be more than that,” he said softly, his eyes sad as he tried his very best to not replay the argument in his head.

I wish that I knew, what makes you think I’m so special.

Danny’s face crumpled before he pulled Damian in for a tight hug, the shorter man pressed Damian’s face to his neck, forcing the vigilante to crouch slightly. “He’s wrong, you’re an amazing vigilante, Damian. You’ve done so much for people, for Gotham, ancients you’ve done so much for the world,” he said, combing his fingers through Damian’s hair. “You could have easily decided that this wasn’t the life for you when you left Talia, you could have decided to live as a normal kid and never get involved in any of this. But you became a vigilante anyway, and you’ve stayed a vigilante, a hero for the last ten years. Only a special kind of person could do that, Polaris,” Danny said softly, pressing a soft kiss to Damian’s damp cheek.

He absolutely rubbed at his face, not even realizing that he had been crying.

If I could, begging to do, something that does right by you. I would do about anything.

“Let’s get to bed,” Danny said, watching as Damian pulled away to slip his pajama bottoms on. Danny took his hand once more and led him to their large bed. He pulled the blankets back and slipped Damian in them.

Once Damian was secure underneath the blankets, Danny wrapped his arm around him and held him close. “You know, the first time I laid my eyes on you, Damian, I knew you were the one for me,” Danny whispered in his ear, his chin rested on Damian’s shoulder as the ghost spooned him, holding the vigilante close. “My core, it sung for you. It saw the good in you even then,” he whispered.

Damian smiled. It had taken him so long to work up the nerve to ask Danny on a date.

Three Years Earlier.

Damian stared at the head engineer as he declined Batman’s offer once again to join the Justice League Dark, stating once again that his passion was for engineering and nothing more. Damian had walked towards him just moments later, finally working up the nerve to talk to the ghost once again.

“Why do you need turning him down?” He asked, tilting his head to the side in curiosity. “Would you not like to use your powers to be a hero?”

Phantom had just smiled and shook his head. “Nope,” he said simply as he fasted the work belt to his waist. “Why would I do something that doesn’t make me happy?”

“For the safety of others? It is a duty, an obligation-”

“No, it isn’t,” Phantom told him. “It may be that for you, but it isn’t for me. I spent three long years trying to keep my hometown safe and I was very good at it until one day I realized it didn’t make me happy. There were others in the area who genuinely enjoyed being a hero so I let them take over. Then with all that extra time I graduated early, got my bachelor’s in engineering and now I’m working on the Watchtower as the head engineer while I get my masters. This is it for me, Redbird, it’s what makes me happy.”

Damian frowned. “But don’t you feel as though that is a waste?” He asked, trying to understand the man’s logic.

Phantom shook his head. “Not at all. I’ve got a lot on my plate, you know? I’m the Ghost King for one, which thankfully isn’t a whole lot of work now that I’ve got a council that pretty much runs everything. I’m mostly just a figure head nowadays. And I’m just plain old Danny Phantom, the head engineer of the Justice League’s homebase. If they need me to consult with their Dark team or need my help, I’ll offer it. But I won’t go out of my way for it,” he explained. “It doesn’t bring me joy, I don’t feel a sense of pride saving the world or helping others. I just feel tired. And that’s okay.”

“I do not think I understand,” Damian said slowly. This was not something he had ever thought of. His entire life had been planned for him. First he was the heir to the Demon’s Head and then he was the heir to Batman, the only blood son. Expected to take on the mantle of Robin and fight side by side with Batman to keep the forces of evil at bay.

And now Danny was telling him that he didn’t have to do that if it did not make him happy?

When I see the way you look, shaken by how long it took. I could do about anything.

“Danny,” Damian said softly, turning over to face his beloved. He searched those beautiful blue eyes and let out a breath. “I do not think being RedBird brings me joy anymore.”

Danny just gave him a small smile. “That’s okay,” he whispered. “You’ve been kicking ass for ten years, that’s a long time to devote yourself to others.”

“Will you help me?” Damian asked, twining their fingers together. “Will you help me find what sparks joy for me?”

The smile Danny gave him was dazzling. “Of course, Polaris. I would be honored to help you,” he whispered.

I could even learn how to love like you.

Love like you.

Love me like you.

I hope you all enjoyed! If you want to read more of my work check out my AO3

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#dp x dc #dc x dp #dp x dc crossover #dc x dp crossover #dis writes #dpxdc #dead serious #dead serious ship #Damian Wayne x Danny Fenton #fluff #this is literally so soft and sweet and im obsessed with it #song fic #song is Love Like You from Steven Universe

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avaritia-apotheosis · 4 months

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Nomen Nescio | chapter 1

Out of all of his names, he’s always felt the most comfortable with Danny Fenton. -- Nomen nescio - used to signify an anonymous or unnamed person. Translated from lating, it means "I do not know the name." 5th Installment of the Hey Brother AU

A DPxDC crossover // Read on [AO3]

MASERLIST // Next Chapter → Out of all of his names, he’s always felt the most comfortable with Danny Fenton. It was his identity, who he was and how he viewed himself for a good few centuries. Regardless of how much he’s changed, he’d always believe himself to be Danny Fenton at his core. That the Fentons don’t exist in this universe also means that it’s a handy pseudonym for whenever he wants to remain under radar. Jack Fenton, Mattie Fenton, Jasmin Fenton; all identities he’s assumed in one way or another. Sometimes he’d even parade around as Sam Manson or Tucker Foley.

(He contemplated going by Vlad Masters for a solid ten seconds before shuddering at the idea. He wanted to remain anonymous, not picked out for having such an obvious villain name.)

After Danny Fenton, he felt most at home with the name al Ghul. It was the name he was given in this life, lovingly chosen by his mother. If it were not for that single fact, he might have discarded himself of the name entirely.

Danyal al Ghul was everything Danny Fenton was not. The prodigal son. The Demon’s Heir. Pride of the League. An accomplished assassin, a proficient killer, the unseen shadow. The name alone cultivated a reputation of fear even without his interference (he blamed Ra’s for that). But it was a name that he’d grown up with. A name his mother chose. A name that gave him a brother. So even if he did not love the name, he still saw some part of himself in it. It was a version of himself he chose to be in this life, for better or for worse.

Wayne was the name that sat heavy and uncertain on his tongue. A name that he did not think of as his own, even when it was offered freely. The name evoked a legacy. Of pioneers, of architects, of doctors, of the forefathers of Gotham in all its smog and glory. Of hope, of justice, of the weak becoming strong to protect those who cannot do so themselves. It was the name of heroes.

And Danny—whether Fenton or al Ghul—was not a hero in this life. In the grand scheme of things, he was barely a hero in the last.

He could be a hero if he wanted to. He had the suit, the powers, and even the backstory. And he was certain worse people than him had turned over a new leaf and decided to pursue the path of righteousness. But the fact of the matter is that Danny didn’t want to.

He’s had that life already. And heroism just didn’t hold the same appeal it once did when he was fourteen and living in a different universe.

But just because he wasn’t a hero in this life, doesn’t mean he’d sit idly by when innocent people are in trouble in front of him.

Shades lowered, scarf firmly wrapped over his nose, and hood up, Danny ripped the emergency doors off the back of a school bus and ushered all the kids out. Just minutes later, a huge chunk of falling debris smashed onto the now empty bus.

Ah, Metropolis. Why did he wanna come here again?

Superman crashed onto the road, leaving a boulder-sized crater into the asphalt. He burst from the rubble unharmed, firing off his laser vision at the giant robot looming in the distance.

Right. It’s because he wanted to see aliens.

Danny helped the bus driver usher the kids into some nearby safe zone, mostly by making sure there were no stragglers. He kept watch over the battle at the corner of his eye, but paid no mind after Superman bounded into the air, probably leading the robot away from them.

One of the little kids—maybe a few years younger than Damian—tugged at his sweater. “You were so strong, mister! You just ripped the door right off!”

Danny couldn’t help the grin on his face. He ruffled the kid’s hair. “That’s cuz I eat all my vegetables.”

“Nuh uh! You’ve definitely got super powers or something. Ooh, or you’re an alien like Superman!”

“Cross my heart and hope to die, kid. I’m not an alien or anything.”

Danny scampers off before the rest of the kids start getting ideas.

He follows the fight as best he could in between aiding in civilian duty, and taking advantage of the chaos to switch up his disguises. It was rare for him to cross paths with a hero when he worked for the League of Shadows, so he was curious at how effective they were in a fight. He’d sifted through the League’s databases when he was younger so he had a basic idea of who the current big names were and their power sets, but it was nothing like watching them battle in real life.

Superman, surprisingly, kept his distance during the fight. He used his heat vision, cryo-breath, and even resorted to just chucking massive pieces of debris at the robot to keep his distance. Wonderwoman and Green Lantern seem to be doing a lot of the heavy hitting up close, and he thinks he’d seen the Flash zipping around somewhere.

The robot probably had a heavy stock of kryptonite on it, which means Lex Luthor.

Damn rich people.

The robot fired off two large shells of its weapon. The projectiles flew at high-speeds towards Superman— before suddenly changing course and homing towards…Danny?

Oh Lex Luthor that bitch.

Before Danny could even raise his own shields, Superman comes barreling in front of Danny and zipped him away as the shell impacted the earth. Superman let out a low whistle. “Well, that was a close one.”

The rounded shell suddenly popped open, releasing a cloud of green gas. Seconds later, more canisters lodged themselves in the ground around them, covering the intersection in a thick cloud of green smoke. And as if fate didn’t hate Danny enough, a strong wind blew the gas over towards them.

Superman toppled to the ground, doubled-over as he breathed in the gas. Aerosolized kryptonite? How fun.

A couple streets over, Danny starts seeing a bunch of smaller robots roaming around and causing chaos in the streets, further dividing the heroes’ attention.

Danny sighed. “You just had to jinx it, didn’t you?”

Superman looked at him like he just grew a second head— which hadn’t happened in centuries mind you. Learning how to clone yourself is hard no matter how easy Vlad makes it look. “You need to get out of here,” he shouted between coughs. “It’s dangerous!”

That he actually contemplates leaving Superman here as a hoard of giant spider-robots was enough of a reason to make Danny stay. Those thoughts were the devil talking. And by the devil, he meant Ra’s. “Trust me when I say that you’re probably at the safest place you can be.” Danny slams his palm onto the ground. “By the way, you don’t need air to breathe, right?

“I— well, no, but what are you—?”

A single purposeful tug at his ghostly energy creates a dome of bright green light around them. Those years of solitude gave him enough time to experiment the extent of his powers, both in his ghost form and outside it. One of the very cool things he learned with shields is that he could manipulate the energy and permeability of the ectoplasm in such a way that he could create his very own little vacuum chamber inside. Which meant that he could suck all of the airborne kryptonite out of Superman’s radius.

There would still be some kryptonite in his system, but at least he won’t be inhaling more of it.

The only downside of all of this is that Danny did have to fortify his own human lungs to be able to keep breathing. He was still technically walking around as a human right now.

“What in the—”

“Oh! Looks like back-up is coming.”

In the distance, the distinct shape of the batwing soars overhead, sending rounds and rounds of ammunition at Luthor’s robot. There’s an explosion at its front, sending off a chain reaction as both of the machine’s arms are blown off.

He takes his phone out of his pocket and dials a series of numbers right out of his head. (His phones had a tendency to break, so saving numbers just became too much of a hassle every time he had to get a new one.)

The call picks up on the second ring.

“Hey Bats! Your little superfriend over here got gassed with some kryptonite.” At the corner of his eye, Danny just sees Superman mouth what in the world under his breath. No swearing? Really? Huh, must be the boy scout in him. “He’s safe, but I’d rather you take him off my hand before he starts asking questions.”

(His sharp hearing picks up Superman’s mumbled “I don’t even know what questions to start asking.”)

There’s a brief moment of silence on the other line, before he eventually hears a strangled sigh and a raspy “Copy that, just stay there. Don’t move.”

Danny hangs up and pockets his phone. “Welp, better hang tight Supes, because your knight in shining…kevlar? (I think it’s kevlar) is coming to pick you up soon.” He steps out of the dome he’d created, picking up a fallen metal baseball bat from the ground.

“Wait— ok, putting aside the fact that you somehow have the Batman’s phone number, I am 100% sure he told you to stay put.”

“Yeah, well…” He twirls the bat in his hand, thinking back to that one mobile game he’s been enjoying. “Rules are made to be broken.”

He takes a swing at the nearest spider robot, hard enough to dent the titanium skull.

***

Ten minutes and thirty-something smashed robots later, Danny flagged down the Justice League to pick up their wayward companion.

Superman—who begrudgingly stayed put inside the ecto-shield because a) he couldn’t leave, b) even if he could the kryptonite gas just refused to disperse, and c) the League looked like they were wrapping things up soon anyway—breathed a sigh of relief as Flash created a vortex that cleared the air.

“Thanks, Flash.” And then turning to Danny, he flashed those pretty pearly whites and put out his hand to shake. “And thank you, too, for all your help. Though I don’t think I managed to catch your name there, son.”

Son, son, son. There was a time when Danny was newly born into this world where he flinched at the word, too unused to being called anyone’s son after his parents passed away.

(At the ripe old age of 92, passing within seconds of the other because Jack and Maddie had been attached at the hip ever since they fell in love. Much to Danny’s surprise, a whole symposium of scientists came to attend his parents’ funeral. He’d always pictured his parents as the weird and kooky scientists no one outside of Amity took seriously. Sure, they revolutionized the entire world’s view of science and the afterlife and essentially found a way to make interdimensional travel possible, but they were his parents.)

(Jack: his dad who drove recklessly but always somehow avoided getting his license revoked, who made a fudge so delicious it could be classified as a sin, and who never failed to be there for Danny whenever he was down.)

(Maddie: his mom who knew a thousand ways to break someone’s bones with just a paperclip, but couldn't cook a single unburned or irradiated meal to save her life, who nurtured Danny’s love of space and helped him build his first flight module.)

(He loves Talia, he really does. She’s his mother, but Maddie and Jack were his mom and dad. Like he was first and foremost Danny Fenton, he has, and always will be, their son.)

Danny doesn’t flinch at the word now.

It’s one word, and it’ll hold about as much meaning as he lets it.

He kicks the head of his bat off the ground and swings it to rest at his shoulder. “It’s no problem,” he says, completely ignoring Superman’s angling for his own name. “I was getting bored of sightseeing anyway.”

“Sightseeing?” Flash let out a laugh. “You must be fun at parties if your solution to getting bored is smashing robots into bits. Seriously, though, I don’t think I’ve seen you before. New meta?”

Danny tilted his head to the side and shrugged, letting them interpret that answer however they wanted to. It was always fun seeing what people came up with to explain, well, him.

“So this is your first time in Metropolis, then?” Superman asked, eyes narrowed. Not that Danny was thinking about it, wasn’t Superman’s day job a reporter or something? He could see the gears turning in the other’s mind, pulling out that proverbial red string on the corkboard to piece all his information together. “It’s…not exactly the best first impression of the city, but I’d like to welcome you anyway.”

Danny shook his hand firmly, but didn’t tap into his well of superhuman strength to make a point. “Well, might not be the best but it sure is the most exciting first impression I’ve had. It’s the first superhero fight I’ve seen this close, you know!” He didn’t know how much,if any, Superman already knew about him. And if he was being honest with himself, he didn’t really know whether he cared if Superman investigated him or not.

It could go either way. Dany wasn’t a threat to Superman, and there really isn’t anything that Superman has that Danny would go to great lengths to fight for. Bruce had already given his permission to see Damian whenever he wanted. And with Danny’s own…let’s say semi-calculated heart-to-heart, Bruce was unlikely to change his mind about Danny anytime soon.

He’s learned a lot about public personas since his debut days as Phantom. Bruce was a sentimental person to the core. The paradigm of Danny being some lost, wayward child that was hesitant, but willing, to someday join the family was a hope too alluring to discard so easily.

(Danny didn’t lie when he told Bruce he was bad at planning in advance. But just because Danny’s bad at long-term plans, it doesn’t mean that he can’t capitalize and build on an advantage when he sees one. Call it the al Ghul in him. The Wayne in him, even.)

“Really?” Superman pressed. “I would’ve thought you’d seen plenty in Gotham.” “A Gothamite?” Flash perked, face suddenly inches away from Danny’s to get a closer look. Danny barely resists the urge to pat his face to check if his disguise was still on. “So he’s one of B’s kids? Strange, I don’t recognize this one. Unless he got a new one— which, y’know, is kinda par for the course here. But really where does he keep finding all of these kids?”

“I don’t find them. They find me.”

Flash nearly jumps ten feet in the air at the sound of Batman’s voice coming from behind him. “Jesus christ, Bats! Where did you come from?”

Danny raised an eyebrow and pointed to the Batwing that’s been hovering above the skyline a little ways away from them. “You seriously didn’t see the giant fighter jet over there?”

“Well clearly not!”

Batman turns to Superman, business as usual. “Are you alright? Any lingering effects?”

“Oh just some weakness but it’ll be gone in a jiff. I got a lot of help from your…friend? Friend, over here.”

Batman grunts, looking Danny up and down for any injuries. There were none, of course. “I didn’t expect you to be here.”

Danny set the bat down on the ground, leaning his weight against it. “Got bored. Got curious. You know how I am when I’m curious.”

“Does your mother know that you’re here?”

Danny’s eyes widened. “She told you?”

Talia specifically requested that Danny not be sent on any missions in or near cities claimed by heroes. Specifically heroes with a strong connection to the Justice League. More than likely it was to deter Batman from finding out their connection to each other until the time was right, but when it comes to Talia, one could hardly say.

Batman raised a brow. “So does she?”

“Of course she does. She always knows where I am even when I don’t tell her. Probably had me microchipped or something, I don’t know.”

Superman and Flash sent very concerned looks towards them. Danny waved off their concerns with a laugh. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding. She doesn’t do that.”

At least, Danny hoped Talia didn’t do that. There was an unnervingly high likelihood that Talia would have placed a tracker on him at some point, but Danny would rather not think about the possibility. Ignorance is its own form of bliss after all.

Flash cups a hand to the side of his mouth and whispers to Superman. “I really feel like we’re missing out on something over here.”

Batman grunts again. He inclines his head at Danny. “Would you care to introduce yourself?”

Which brings Danny back to the dilemma he’s had since his rebirth: what name to go by. That’s the problem with having too many names; they can be attached to various distinct and overlapping identities that it’s difficult to choose which one is the best to go by.

It’s nice to know that Batman wouldn’t dispute him if Danny decided to give a fake name.

Wayne was an immediate no go. He could already see it now: the shock, the surprise, the curiosity, and next thing you know within twenty-four hours the whole Justice League is knocking at his door to learn more about Batman’s new kid. Even if the sound of Danny Wayne didn’t make him uneasy, he still wouldn’t go for it. Yeah, no thanks.

Al Ghul would probably be closer to the truth, but it was a dangerous option to make. The League of Shadows were still a formidable group with a lot of enemies from both sides of the moral spectrum, and Danyal al Ghul had a reputation that would mark him as an enemy on sight, Bat or no Bat.

Which left Fenton as the safest option. It was an unknown name with no added complications. Hell, he didn’t even have to go by Danny if he still wanted some anonymity.

But…

It was one thing to use the name with strangers he’d never see again. Giving that name to people that were connected to him to some degree felt…exposing. He’s never even shared that name with Damian, and he’s closest to Damian out of anyone.

Which left one option.

Just fucking with them.

Danny gives an exaggerated bow. “The name’s Nathaniel Edward Mortimer Olysseus, at your service.” He winks. “Well, not for much longer now, anyway.”

And then he drops a smoke bomb, leaving behind a confused Flash, and an equally amused Batman and Superman.

***

OMAKE:

It’s later on when The Flash is recounting the story to Wonder Woman—and by the small chuckle she gave at the name—did Flash realize the mystery man’s trick.

“Olysseus is one of the many variations of the Greek hero Odysseus,” Diana explained.

Nathaniel Edward Mortimer Olysseus.

N.E.M.O.

Nobody.

Flash buried his face in his hands. “Can’t believe I fell for that. Should’ve known he wouldn’t say his actual name.”

Superman shrugged. “What can you expect? He’s a Bat.”

#dpxdc #hey brother au

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eyesthecolorofarson · 1 year

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The batfam meet Danny Fenton and after weeks of research and one lucky blood test later there’s no doubt I’m anyone’s mind that he’s Damian’s long-lost twin brother.

But the day they go to his apartment to break the news someone else answers the door. Someone who looks identical to both Damian and Danny but is very obviously not them.

The new boy was albino and obviously a meta of some kind, his eyes a cherry red and his hair literally flaming white and styled a crowd braid. But his face shape was the same as Bruce’s, his eyes had the same curve as Talias, and his height the same as Danny’s.

“Oh, hi! You must be the Wayne’s. Danny’s told me about you. Sorry we haven’t been able to meet, I’ve been busy with classes.” He invites them in and the batfam take notes of his personality.

Danny was nearly entirely composed of snark and wit, able to run endless circles around not only rouges but their vigilante personas. He was wickedly intelligent, morally grey, and not afraid to resort to violence. He had a heart of silver; good intentions and beliefs but not afraid to get his hands dirty to achieve his goals.

As they talked with this boy, Daphne he said his name was, they learned he was just as sarcastic and witty but was also trying to stay on the positive side of things. He was intelligent like Danny, but had a chaotic lawful attitude similar to Danny’s chaotic neutral.

finally, Tim asked the question they’d all been wondering. “So, Danny’s never mentioned you before. Are you a new roommates or friend?” Daphne laughed, “Yeah, he’s really protective. He once got in a fist fight with someone for insulting me.”

Daphne smiled, and he was a carbon copy of both Danny and Damian. “I’m his twin brother.” There was a problem with that though. They knew for a fact that Daphne Fenton didn’t exist.

Everything was going great, Danny had though two weeks ago. He’d though that word for word and he knew it would come back to bite him in the ass. He just didn’t know when.

Dan–or Daphne, as he likes to be called now, said that the reason bad things happened after he said something hopeful was because he was ‘putting that energy out in the universe’. Daphne was always so positive, or trying to be, and it made it hard to remember that he used to be his future self hellbent on destroying the world.

Therapy had been a big help. They had Clockwork to thank for that, and for Daphnes new form. They couldn’t change his hair, no matter how hard he tried at first. It had made him incredibly upset and insecure, but nowadays he’d grown to accept his hair, saying ‘it’s a reminder of who I was and where I came from, and that everything’s ok now. I’m allowed to exist as the person I’d always wanted to be.’

Honestly, Danny couldn’t even begin to describe how proud he was. He’d come such a long way from the tyrannical King of the Infinite Realms to a scared, traumatized kid to the kind and gentle teen he was now. It’d been amazing watching Daphne grow not only out but in, growing as a person and a spirit.

And Daphne had helped him grow as well. It was nice, having someone so close to him and so aware of what he was thinking and how he acted because they were the same. So different but so similar. The first time they’d introduced each other as brothers, as twins, it’s felt right. Like that was exactly what they were supposed to be.

He got in a lot of fights after though. Not that any of them were Daphnes fault, who was holding him back most of the time, but there were just some assholes who, assuming Daphne was a meta, decided to insult him and even call him a few slurs. Of course, he knocked out one and broke the others nose.

There were a lot of people like this, people who felt it was ok to insult his baby brother–because no matter what Daphne said, he practically screamed ‘little brother’ vibes–felt it was ok to say hurtful things to his face because they didn’t consider him fully human.

So he got into fights a lot more often now, no matter how much Daphne begs him not to. But despite all those assholes things had been going great, despite it being, y’know, Gotham. He’d even made friend with a revenant and his family, who were weirdly nice and open about the whole ghost thing.

What a great surprise it was too when he got home and found that not only was Daphne back from school–he’d joined a lot of clubs and band–but that the Wayne’s were there and they seemed to be good friends already! Maybe Daphne was right; it was time he started projecting good vibes only.

#Danny Fenton is Damian Wayne’s twin #danny phantom #danny phantom au #damian wayne #batfamily #dan phantom #Dan phantom redemption

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sprnklersplashes · 5 years

Text

burning the memories

AO3

On a trip to visit her grandparents and Aunt Veronica in Ohio, Janis comes across her Aunt's high school memories and learns more about her than she thought she could. Veronica's past comes back to haunt her and she realises she can't outrun it unless she lets it go.

Words: 7k

(Set in a universe where Veronica is Janis’ aunt)

Janis is convinced her Aunt Veronica is the coolest person on the planet. From living on her own with her two cats in her New York apartment to being a kick ass social worker to somehow always knowing exactly what Janis wants every birthday and Christmas, there is no one like her. Her style still seems stuck in the 1980s; she’s almost always wearing a blue blazer and a skirt but she makes it work. She still turns heads and despite a few flings with men and women here and there, she doesn’t seem to want to commit to anyone. She just flies above it all, not caring about what anyone else has to say, stating simply that she ran out of fucks to give in 1989.

So of course, when her mom proposes that they go to his childhood home in Ohio during the summer to meet up with her and her grandparents, Janis has her suitcase half-packed. Aunt Veronica is the one thing that can make these reunion trips worth it. It’s worth the four hour drive in her dad’s car and people asking if she has a boyfriend yet and having that awkward conversation (how many times can people “forget” that she’s a lesbian?), casting eyes at the tips of her hair and her clothes and fake nails and heavy make-up, the rolling eyes and fake smiles when Janis tells them about her plans to study art. She has to fight the urge to flip them off until she can get home and vent everything to Veronica in private over coffee.

They get into her grandparents’ place first, with her grandma remarking how much she’s grown and asking about school and giving her cookies and her grandpa handing her a ten dollar bill and asking if she’s keeping her hair like that and mentioning how her outfit (graphic tee shirt, ripped black shorts, fishnet tights and an oversized blue shirt) is very creative.

“Creative is one word for it,” a voice says from behind the stairs. She turns and sees a thin, dark haired woman in a blue blazer and grey skinny jeans leaning on the banister, smirking.

“Aunt Veronica!” Janis laughs, running up for a hug.

“You got tall,” she remarks, throwing her arms around her and squeezing her tightly. “Though that might the boots.”

Within half an hour they’re all sitting around the kitchen table. It’s more cramped now than it probably was when her mom and Aunt Veronica were living there, but her grandpa insists on sitting on the armchair in the corner to make room.

“So Janis how’s school?” her grandma asks, pushing her pasta bake around on her plate.

“Fine,” she says. “I won a prize at this art expo.”

“Oh my god, Janis, that’s awesome!” Veronica says, nudging her with her elbow. “What was it?”

“It was this portrait I did of me and Damian and Cady,” she explains. “Cady’s new, she just joined this year.”

“She moved there from Kenya, right Jan?” her dad adds, refilling his glass of Coke. “Janis stepped in to help show her the ropes.”

“Well that was sweet of you,” her grandpa remarks from the chair.

“What brought her from Kenya to Illinois?” Veronica asks, snickering slightly.

“She said her parents were researcher zoologists until they lost their funding,” she explains. “But yeah, Cady’s pretty cool. I mean, she’s a little weird, but she’s awesome.”

“And… how is Damian?” her grandma asks, twirling her fork around, and Janis suppresses the urge to groan.

“Damian’s great, Grandma,” she says patiently. “He just started dating this boy from his drama club, so that’s great.” Beside her, she swears Veronica laughs before disguising it with a drink.

“And what about you, Janis? Any girls making your head turn?” she asks, looking over at her grandma.

Coolest. Woman. Alive.

“Not really,” she says, looking down at her plate. No girls had really caught her eye-except for the girl Damian took to calling ‘Danny DeVito girl’ after that one episode in the bathroom, but she knew her name was Gianna. Still, she barely sees her outside of history class.

“Oh, Ronnie, before I forget,” her grandma said. “We found a bunch of your old high school stuff in your old room. It was all boxed up, we didn’t know what you want done with it. It must have been left here when you moved out.”

“Oh, thanks,” Veronica says. “I’ll take a look at it tomorrow.” She stays quiet for the rest of the meal, making small, three word comments on whatever comes up in conversation, even about her own job, which is weird, as well as supremely disappointing. There’s few things Janis loves more than hearing about how she took another kid off shithole parents, and Veronica loves talking about it. Still, she shakes off whatever was bothering her when the apple pie is rolled out, sliding second helpings onto Janis’ plate when no-one’s looking.

“You know,” Veronica says in a low voice while the rest of the adults are stuck in conversation about the traffic on the way up. “If you don’t have any plans this summer… maybe you could come up to New York for a bit?”

“Are you serious?” Janis asks, feeling her heart begin to pound.

“Sure,” she says. “I know there’s art galleries around where I live that you’d love, and I’d get some quality time with my favourite niece.”

“Your only niece,” she reminds her, but she can’t supress the smile on her face. If she were Cady, she’d probably start squealing. “Thank you, Aunt Veronica!”

“Let me talk it over with your parents first,” she reminds her, placing her hand over hers and draining her glass.

“You’re the coolest person here,” Janis says, and Veronica blushes, laughing. “When and how did you get to be so cool?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” she says, her voice quiet.

Janis leans on the doorframe of her Aunt Veronica’s old room, having snuck away from the brunch discussions of what their neighbours were growing in their garden. She knocks on the wood, holding a plate of French toast, fried eggs and bacon in one hand. Veronica looks up from the box sitting on her bed. The bed is covered with all sorts; photos, books, clothes, all from her aunt’s high school years.

“I come with gifts,” Janis says, waving the plate in front of her. “You wouldn’t want to miss Grandma’s French toast, would you?”

“Of course not,” she says, taking the plate from her with a grateful smile.

“Is it cool if I hang here?” Janis asks, sitting on the bed like the question was already answered. “I’ll go insane if I spend any more time down there.”

“Sure, kid,” she says, placing the plate on her nightstand and taking a piece of bacon in her hand. There’s something in her face, how her smile doesn’t quite meet her eyes, how her eyes look kind of… well, scared. “Feel free to check out the Westerburg High memorabilia.”

Janis picks up a pile of polaroids and starts looking through them.

“You know these are back in fashion now,” she remarks, waving the photos. “This girl… my friend Karen, she loves them.” It’s odd, referring to the Plastics as “friends” now that they’ve disbanded. She’ll never in her life refer to Regina as one, but Gretchen’s not too bad and Karen is actually kind of fun, in a lost kitten kind of way that makes Janis want to protect her for the rest of her life. “Is this you?” The girl in the photo has to be Veronica, same cheekbones and wild dark hair and brown eyes and cheesy, wide smile (Janis kind of feels like she’s looking in a mirror), but she looks way different. She’s wearing a long red dress and denim jacket, a far cry from what she wears now. She looks like she didn’t even look in the mirror before leaving the house.

“Yeah, that’s me. March 1989,” she reads. “I was a junior.” She chuckles under her breath. “God you’re the spitting image of me at that age. I think that was my best friend Martha’s 17th birthday.” She points at the other girl in the photo, dark haired with glasses and a pink sweatshirt. “Yeah, she was my best friend from diapers.”

“What’s she doing now?”

“Kindergarten teacher up here,” she says with a soft smile. “Martha loves Sherwood so much she couldn’t leave if she tried. We’re still close though.” Janis hums and continues looking through them, finding more photos of Veronica and her friend Martha, sitting at school, in the park, in what she guesses is Martha’s room, all while Veronica keeps looking through the other stuff.

Suddenly, she finds one in which her aunt seems to have done a complete metamorphosis. Gone is the frumpy, slightly too big clothes of the ones before, in this one she’s in a fitted blue blazer and grey miniskirt, her eyelids blue and lips red, standing in someone’s backyard with a croquet mallet on her shoulder with three other girls; a tall, blonde girl in a red blazer and shoulder pads, a bright red scrunchie in her hair and a smirk that echoes Regina George on her face, a smaller blonde girl in yellow whose hair is in curls and an Asian girl in green with her hair pinned back. They’re all wearing the same style of all-American preppy blazers and miniskirts, and all have croquet mallets matching the colour of their clothes. While they all stand in a cluster, Veronica distances herself slightly from them, but still leaning in and still smiling at the camera. Along the bottom, someone wrote ‘Heather, Heather, Heather and Veronica-September 12th, 1989’.

“Woah, Aunt V,” she remarks. “What happened in September 1989?”

“What?” Veronica asks hastily. She comes over and looks at the photo in Janis’ hands and her face turns red.

“Aunt V?”

“It’s fine,” she says, not clarifying what ‘it’ is. “For a while… I was friends with some popular girls.”

“You were a plastic?” she asks in disbelief. No way. She refuses to believe that Veronica was ever a Regina George.

“Plastic?” she repeats, wrinkling her nose.

“It’s what we called this trio of megabitches in my school,” Janis explains. “Gretchen, Karen, and Regina George at the centre of it all.”

“Oh, that bitch Regina,” Veronica says. When her life fell apart after the “space dyke” incident, it was Veronica who had sped like crazy down the freeway to Illinois and took her out for ice cream and movies until she could smile again. She had even offered to pay for her to go to a private school in New York when her parents pulled her out. She could never be a Regina George. “We called them the Heathers. There was Heather Duke…” She points at the green one. “Heather MacNamara…” The yellow one. “And… Heather Chandler.” Her finger lands on the red one. She takes in a deep breath.

“I take it Chandler was your Regina,” she says. “Why were they all called Heather?”

“Universe is weird like that,” she answers off handedly. She’s staring at the photo so intensely she might burn a hole through it.

“Aunt V… you okay?” she asks.

“Fine,” she says, shaking her head. “We weren’t friends for that long anyway. We were at this homecoming party and they wanted to do this really bitchy thing to my friend. So….” She twirls a lock of hair around her finger. “I puked on Chandler and told her to lick it up.”

“Oh my God!” Janis laughs. “You’re such a badass, Aunt V!” Veronica chuckles and shakes her head. She looks around at the stuff around her, two cardboard boxes worth of high school memories.

“I’m going to get some trash bags. At least half of this stuff I want to throw out.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. It’s just junk now,” she says. “Be right back.” She runs out the door, her footsteps fading as she went down the hall. Janis keeps flicking through the photos, mainly ones of her and the Heathers.

The she finds another one. Veronica, still in the “popular girl” look, sitting on a wall, staring up at the sky, laughing. Then the next one, a dark-haired, brown-eyed boy is on the wall with her. The camera is so close that he must be holding it. The old school selfie. His arm is around her and the other holds the camera. She rests her chin on his shoulder, her smile easy and open, her eyes sparkling. The boy is smiling too. The writing on the bottom reads “September 30th, 1989, Our Love Is God”. The next one is them cuddling, him standing behind her with his arms wrapped around her, kissing the back of her head while she laughs. Someone else must have taken it for them or they set it on a timer. “October 3rd, 1989, You’re in my heart like a Madonna on a pedestal.” And another one of Veronica standing against a brick wall, her hands flat against the wall and one foot leaning against it “October 10th, 1989, We love the things we love for what they are”. And another of the boy, who clearly doesn’t know he’s having his photo taken, drinking a red slushie. “October 15th, 1989, JD doesn’t know I’m taking a picture and still looks good”.

“Holy shit, Aunt V,” Janis mutters. Who knew she had a thing for bad boys? She flicks through more photos, all of her and Mysterious Trench Coat Kid (JD, she assumes), until she finds herself back at the start. She puts the pile down and keeps sorting through stuff, finding a yearbook and older class notebooks and a small, black book with 1989 written on the spine in gold lettering.

Holy shit. Her diary.

She looks over at the door and back at the book. She knows it’s wrong. She knows she shouldn’t look through her aunt’s private stuff. But then again, it’s from 1989, what could she have done as a teenager that she’s so scared of people finding out? And… Okay, she really just wants to know who the mysterious JD was.

“September 1st, 1989, Dear Diary,

I believe I’m a good person, you know I think that there’s good in everyone, but here we are, first day of senior year. And I look around at these kids I’ve known all my life and ask myself…. What happened?....”

“September 22nd, 1989, Dear Diary

It’s been three weeks since I became friends with the Heathers. Well, friends isn’t exactly the right word. It’s like the Heathers are people who I work with and our job is being popular and shit.”

“Still September 22nd, 1989, Dear Diary,

Why when you see boys fight does it look so horrible, but feel so right? I shouldn’t watch this crap, that’s not who I am, but with Mr No Name Kid here… damn.”

“October 2nd, 1989, Dear Diary,

JD’s dad will not be speaking at our wedding.”

Holy shit, she thinks. Wedding? She was planning a wedding already? Calm down there, Aunt Veronica. So JD. It had to have been a nickname. It suits the boy she sees in the photo-the rebellious bad boy apparently sweeping her off her feet. She imagines some sort of Bonnie and Clyde style love affair, or a Romeo and Juliet whirlwind where Veronica’s dad had been desperate to keep his squeaky clean girl away from the troublemaker?

She hears her footsteps in the hall and quickly closes the book, dropping it back in the box. Aunt Veronica comes back in with two trash bags in one hand and a coffee mug in the other.

“Sorry, got sidetracked by coffee, although I did bring you a cookie,” she says, handing her over one.

“Thanks,” she says, taking a bite out of it while Veronica starts tossing bits and pieces into one of the bags. “So… who’s JD?”

Something changes in her. Janis expected her to blush or laugh off the bad boy she seemingly had a little affair with as a teenager; instead the bag falls from her hand, her eyes look up at her, wide and fearful, her breathing gets faster, her face paler. She looks so much younger now, like the seventeen year old she saw in the photos.

“JD?” she repeats weakly. “Where… how did you hear about JD?”

“I found some pictures of you and him.” She slides her hands into her back pockets, regret pounding in her chest. Veronica picks up the photos and Janis can see them shaking in her hands. She feels like she opened up Pandora’s Box, unleashing all the terrors inside. Another terror sits heavily in her chest, fighting its way up her throat and out of her mouth almost against her will. She could never keep stuff from Veronica. “And… I may have peaked in your old diary.”

“My diary?” she asks sharply. “My 1989 diary? You looked in there?” Her voice gets more frantic and Janis gets more scared and even more guilty. She can feel her ‘favourite niece’ status slipping away.

“I know, I’m sorry I shouldn’t have looked in there!” she apologises. “I’m sorry, Aunt V.”

“What did you read in it?” she asks. If Janis didn’t know better, she’d have sworn she was scared. No, she is beyond scared. Terrified is a more accurate term. Veronica looks like she’s struggling to catch her breath, her fists curling and uncurling. “Janis I need to know; what did you read in it?”

“Nothing important,” she says. “Just… like the stuff about the people in your senior year and the Heathers were people you worked with and how JD’s dad wasn’t going to be speaking at your wedding!” She feels her lip begin to tremble and she swears to herself she won’t cry. “I’m sorry, Aunt Veronica, I know I shouldn’t have look in it.”

Veronica sighs and lowers herself on to the bed, burying her face in her hands.

“It’s okay,” she says. “It’s okay, Janis. I’m sorry I got so worked up.” She pulls Janis’ hand and gets to her sit down next to her. She lets out a breath and laughs slightly, running a hand through her hair. “JD was my boyfriend in senior year.”

“That much I gathered,” she jokes. “I mean…Our Love Is God isn’t something you’d say to your friends.”

“He said all kinds of stuff like that,” she tells her. She pulls her jacket tighter around herself, her eyes filling with tears. Janis puts an arm around her.

“It ended badly?” she asks softly. Veronica stays quiet, looking at her hands.

“He killed himself,” she whispers after a while.

“Shit,” Janis says. “Aunt Veronica, I’m so sorry.” Veronica threads her fingers in Janis’.

“Kid, it was nearly 30 years ago,” she says. “I’m not… I’m not over it but, I guess I moved on.” She reaches over with her free hand and takes the pile of photos, looking at the one of him and her at the 7/11. “And yeah… it wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows when he was alive. His dad was an ass, for starters. He messed JD up pretty bad. And that’s…” She wipes tears away from her eyes and Janis’ heart breaks. She wishes she’d never looked at the damn photos. “I guess that’s why I try so hard now. Try to take kids off bad dads like that. Stop future JDs in their tracks.”

“Aunt V,” Janis protests. “You know it’s not your job to stop people, right? If people are bad, then they’re bad.”

“I know,” she says. “I just never stopped thinking what if his dad had been good? Or if someone had looked out for him.” Janis wants to shake her head and tell her that his problems don’t matter if he hurt her (and she can tell that he did) but she keeps her mouth shut. “I’m sorry for getting mad, Jan. And for unloading all of this on you.”

“It’s fine,” she says. “I’m sorry I read your diary.” Veronica shakes her head and pulls her into a hug.

“You know, you’re the only one in this family who knows he was my boyfriend?” she asks. “My mom and dad thought that we were just friends and your mom was away at college while it was all going down.” Janis smiles, feeling small sense of pride amongst all her guilt. Sharing a secret with her aunt, even if it’s about her bad boy former flame. Though she does wonder how her grandparents missed the fact that they were more than friends.

She knows there’s more she’s not telling, and she’s more than okay with that. First things first, she knows she doesn’t want to know exactly what went down between them. She’s not sure she can stomach the details. And she knows that it’s probably better if Aunt Veronica keeps them to herself.

By Veronica’s count, it’s been twenty one years since her last JD related nightmare. Her and her partner Anna had just started getting serious, and Anna was staying over at her house. That night, while curled up next to her, Veronica had dreamed about Anna pounding on her closet door while she barricaded herself inside, telling her about after and destiny and how they were meant to be together, the words “meant to be yours” being repeated over and over again until the voice turned into something different. Into him.

She had woken up screaming and she broke up with Anna the next week.

Still, after that episode, she went twenty one years nightmare free.

Until she bolted up in bed at 2:30 am, muffling her scream with her hands, an old trick she learned in college, feeling her heart in a frantic rhythm against her ribs.

She had dreamed about him blowing himself up again up again, except this time he was taking her down with him. She still feels her arms wrapped around him, the bomb digging into her chest, her fingers fisting in his coat as he tells her again “I worship you” and she just numbly nods, Heather Chandler pressing against her, whispering “see you in Hell, biotch” just before the bomb goes off and rips her to pieces.

After senior year, she had stashed everything into a box and hid it under a pile of other stuff in her room, hoping to never have to look at it again. She had almost forgotten about everything that was in there. It’s everything she wishes she could erase from her memory about her time in high school. Everything she regrets and misses the most.

She kicks the blankets off her, feeling suffocated by them, and looks at the bags of trash filled with all her high school memories. She had just wanted to get rid of all of it, clean the slate, to use JD’s turn of phrase, act like those months had never existed, but now she’s not so sure.

She gets up and opens one, looking at its contents from the lamp on her bedside table. She still can’t sleep in the dark, even now. Inside there’s her old notebooks and clothes that haven’t fit since she was a teenager and her old yearbook. She pulls out the yearbook, running her finger down the spine. She somehow opens it to the last page she wants to see; “In Memory Of Heather Chandler”. Heather’s photo beams out from the middle of the double page, all red lipstick and blonde curls. Words from students crowd around it “Always In Our Hearts”, “Rest In Power Heather”, “Drinking Rum and Coke With The Angels” (because there’s plenty of that in Heaven), “I’m Sorry I Didn’t Know” “You Deserved Better” (well maybe that’s not an unfair statement). And pride of place, close as possible to her picture “Best Friends Forever-Heather M” and “Miss You Forever-Heather D”.

She turns the page and finds Kurt and Ram’s memorial page, adorned with rainbows. She bites her lip as tears well in her eyes. More messages from the students are scattered around the page, promises to make the world a better place, to stamp out bigotry and prejudice. Apparently their dads did that until the day they died.

When she turns the page, there’s one more memorial page; Jason Dean. It’s blindingly different from the other two. One picture of him in the middle, God knows where they got it because it wasn’t taken at school. A little blurb explaining how he came into the school in September and died in November during the pep rally. The official explanation was that he had killed himself during the rally by blowing himself up in the football field.

Veronica had forged a pretty great note for it.

Hardly anyone had any words to say about him, though a couple of well-intentioned kids on the yearbook committee added some. “I Wish I’d Known Him” (trust me, she had thought when she first read it, you don’t), “Rest In Peace, Jason”, “Your Time With Us Was Short But Wonderful”. In the corner, there’s her handwriting, “I wish you’d stayed around a little longer”, then scribbled out so violently the page tore. She wishes a lot of things, but not that he had stayed around. Not in the way he was anyway.

She puts the yearbook aside and keeps looking through it, finding an old videotape. No title, except a white label with “Halloween, 1989” written in her handwriting. She wracks her brain for what happened then, and she draws a blank. Thankfully, her old TV and video player are still in her room, so she pulls them both onto the floor with her and slides it in, turning the volume low enough so that only she can hear it.

The picture comes into view and it’s her, wearing a long sleeved black minidress and tights and a pair of cat ears, raising her eyebrows and laughing, putting candy into a large orange bowl decorated with black cats and spiderwebs.

“Are you filming this right now?” the 1989 version of her asks.

“Yeah of course,” JD replies, taking a step closer. “Look at this folks, pure Halloween commitment right here.” The camera zooms in on her dress, on her cat ears, the whiskers drawn onto her unimpressed face with eyeliner.

Her heart stops at the sound of his voice. He sounds so different to what she remembers. His voice is higher, softer. He doesn’t sound like he does in her nightmares. He doesn’t sound like the kind of person who would storm into her room, tell her he wanted to kill her, tell her he was blowing up the school. He doesn’t sound broken or damaged. He sounds normal, happy, relaxed and it cuts her deep.

“Oh, okay,” the younger version of her says. “Now, look at this.” The picture shakes as the past version of her tries to take the camera off him while he makes tiny noises of protest. “No, give it, give me the camera.” Her voice is high pitched and nearly whiny, but she’s laughing, the same loud, dumb laugh she always used as a teenager. She used to complain to him about it and he assured her he loved the sound of her laugh.

“Or what?” he replies.

“Or you don’t get candy,” she teases.

A different fight plays out in the back of her mind, when they fought over something much more sinister. The two teenagers in the video didn’t deserve that. They didn’t know how it would all play out. The girl didn’t know the monster she was creating. The boy didn’t know just how broken he really was.

The younger Veronica wrestles the camera off JD with a triumphant laugh and turns it on him, snickering.

Her breath catches at the sight of him. He’s just like he is in the photos, except he’s moving. He’s more alive, laughing and twirling to show off his full costume. He’s even discarded his trench coat, she can see it sitting on the couch behind him, instead wearing a puffy white shirt and leather pants and an eye patch of all things.

“He’s a sexy pirate,” past her sings, zooming in on him. He leans against the wall dramatically and pouts at her, making her laugh.

“I’m a regular pirate,” he corrects her. “I just happen to always be sexy.” She laughs again, the camera tilting slightly like she’s leaning back.

“Yeah you are,” she agrees. The camera is place on the counter and she goes over to him, wrapping her arms around him and kissing him. He wraps his arms around her, tilting his head to deepen the kiss. She moans as he pulls her closer, getting rid of whatever space there was between them. Her hands get caught up in his hair while his trail on her legs, but never lifting her skirt.

It always got heated between them. Simple goodbye kisses turning into him letting her push him up against the wall and tongues and teeth clashing while hands were running along waistlines and through hair. He always let her take the lead, set her pace, be in control. It used to make her feel empowered. Having him underneath her, being willing to do anything she wanted, to obey her wishes. She never took it too far, asked if he was okay with it too, and he always was, looking at her with wide eyes and nodding enthusiastically.

She wonders now how much of it was real and how much was just him letting her get comfortable with him. Comfortable enough to be clay in his hands. It’s all so confusing to her know, love or infatuation, how much of her memories are viewed through the rose coloured lens she uses to make it hurt less, was he broken and damaged or just bad?

“Okay,” the younger Veronica breaks away, sounding breathless. “Movie time.” JD joins their hands as she lifts the bowl from the counter. Her eyes fall on the camera and realisation dawns on her. “Shit!”

“What?”

“We left the camera on,” she laughs, burying her face in the crook of his neck. “Oh we filmed that!”

“Oh my God,” he replies, laughing too. “Oh my God we filmed that. We filmed us making out.”

“Do not even talk about that,” she laughs.

“It’s your camera, right?” he asks as he wraps his arms around her. “So your parents will never see it?”

“They might!” she squeaks, wriggling out of his arms. “Okay, go get the popcorn started, I’m going to turn this off.”

Her face fills the camera as she lifts it, still laughing. Still young. Not too many scars.

“Sex tape!” JD whispers in the background, and she laughs harder.

“JD I swear to God-”

The picture changes and they’re in her living room. JD holds the camera, tilted at an angle so a sleeping Veronica is visible, curled up and using JD as a pillow. He’s smiling, open, earnest. His arm is around her and he kissed her forehead gently. She murmurs and snuggles closer to him. The way he looks at her can only really be described as reverence. Like she’s the Virgin Mary and he’s the most devout follower there is.

“Hello, person who is watching this tape,” he whispers. “Probably in the year 2127, when we’re all dead. You might notice this, but Veronica Sawyer is currently asleep on top of me. It is 1am here in Sherwood, Ohio and she fell asleep on my shoulder.” He runs his fingertips up and down her back, losing himself in thought for a moment. “If you’re in the future you probably never got to know her. Which is sad for you, really, because she’s the best damn thing humanity has to offer. And nothing that comes after her will really compare. And I am in love with her. I will love her until I die and even after that, I’m going to keep loving her.” Veronica shifts in her sleep and JD looks worried for a moment, but she just stretches her arm across his chest and settles down again. His face breaks out into a smile once more. “She’s the only thing that’s good in this world. I’m going to turn the camera off now so I don’t wake her up.”

The picture turns to black and he’s gone.

Veronica presses her hands to her mouth to muffle the sound of her crying.

This shouldn’t be happening. This was nearly 30 years ago. While she couldn’t get help with everything, she got counselling after JD’s death. She shouldn’t be sitting on the floor of her childhood bedroom, trying not to cry over a 29 year old video. She shouldn’t be falling back in love with a dead man, let alone a dead man who made her life hell for years and is the reason she flinches away from love even now, a man who was terrible and wanted to kill people and she shouldn’t even be thinking about because he’s been dead for nearly 30 years.

She’s reopened all her old wounds. All it took was one look from him and she’s back where she began.

Stupid heart. Holding onto someone who shouldn’t be allowed in there anymore. She used to think it would be better if she could just rip it out and stop herself from feeling anything again. But then she met people and made friends and reconnected with old ones and then Janis was born and took her heart in her tiny little baby hands. She would never stop herself from feeling all that. Even if it means she has to feel all of this too, the ugly and painful side of loving someone.

She keeps crying as she looks through the rest of the bag, Her fingers brush against something hard and she tenses. Her diary.

She kicks herself for keeping it. Putting aside every painful thing she put in here, it’s evidence. When Janis said that she’d gone through it, her heart had stopped and she had felt the world around her crumble. She only got as far as her first meeting with JD’s dad. But just one page later she wrote “Dear Diary…. Technically I didn’t kill Heather Chandler, I know that, but I still feel bad. But not as bad as I should. And that makes me feel even worse.” And then just two pages after that is the amazing line “Dear Diary, my teen angst bullshit has a body count”.

The most incriminating lines she could have written.

Janis thinks she’s the coolest person alive. Wonder how she’d feel about her after knowing that she’d murdered three people.

“Not you,” JD had told her. She supposes he’s right. But she doesn’t like saying that she was just an unwilling accomplice. She handed Heather Chandler the mug of drain cleaner, she shot at Kurt, she let JD shoot Ram. She fell for the “Ich Luge bullets” lie. Their blood is on her hands just as much as it was his. She doesn’t know if she believes in Heaven or Hell any more, but she knows that if there is a Hell, then she’ll burn for that.

And besides, in the mortal world, accomplices still do jail time.

She knows what she has to do. She’s just far too scared to do it.

It’s still pitch black outside when she sneaks out of the house, key in the pocket of the coat she wears over her pyjamas. She keeps the diary clutched to her chest as she makes her way down her old street to the one place she’s sure no one will suspect her of going.

Westerburg High stands just as imposing as it ever did before her, locked behind an iron fence. She started her senior year desperate to leave it then two months later she was risking everything to save it.

And where was her damn gratitude?

After the news broke about JD, things changed for her. People gave her sad eyes as they passed in the hallway, whispers of “I’m so sorry” and “if you need anything, I’m here” and teachers offering support and then the newspaper offering her an interview.

Still, she finally saw the hierarchy fall. Heather Mac started eating lunch with her and Martha and, seeing that she can’t exactly lead a clique of one person, so did Heather Duke, eventually. Heathers and Marthas sitting at a table together. Heaven on Earth. Checkmate, JD. MacNamara and Martha even dated until their second year of college. People stopped hating each other and it became beautiful.

Janis says that the same thing happened in her school. Her little jungle friend Cady broke the dance queen’s crown and shared it and told everyone they were beautiful. Now she’s braiding the former popular girl’s hair like it’s nothing. Everyone sits where they want and there’s no cliques or rumours or stupid bitchy girl fights. No one is afraid, all because one cute little mathlete made a speech. And yet for her school to get to that same kind of peace, she had to steal a scrunchie and four people had to die.

Outside the school fence, she finds an empty trash can, just like she hoped she would. She takes a look around the deserted street. No one’s around to see her. She’s completely alone and yet she still feels like all eyes are on her. Street lights glare down on her like an interrogation and she feels eyes on her back, even though she doesn’t see anyone when she turns around. She flips up the hood of her jacket, pulling it over her face.

She pulls the diary out of her pocket and drops it in the empty trash can, flinching at the sound it makes. It must be louder in her mind. Her shaking hand lifts out the matches. It takes longer than she would have liked to get them to light; her hands are trembling so badly she drops a few before she can get them to the matchbook, and others she can’t seem to strike hard enough.

The ground is littered with matches rolling in the light breeze when she finally gets one to work properly. The flame dances in front of her eyes, bright against the darkness of everything that surrounds her. She looks down at the diary, lying dead, almost invisible at the bottom of the trash can. It has every good memory of her time with JD, every time he made her laugh, every time he made her smile, details about what she felt when he kissed her. But it also has evidence and that’s a risk she can’t afford to take.

She lets the match fall from her hand and set the book ablaze.

“No!” she yells immediately after watching it start to burn. She presses her hands to her mouth because she knows that if she doesn’t do something she’ll reach in and try to grab it out.

She feels like she’s burning him. Like she’s seventeen again and back on the football field watching him explode, feeling her heart get torn apart while her soul and conscience are knitted back together. Simultaneously finding it hard to breathe and being able to for the first time in weeks. Saying goodbye to the worst and best thing to happen to her. She's burning every good memory she had of him and wonders if she'll forget if she doesn't have it to look back on. Does she even want to remember it now? Maybe she shouldn't, but she does. She wants to remember the good but also the bad. The bad reminds her why she keeps going and keeps fighting now.

She stays watching it, silently sobbing until the fire burns out and it’s nothing more but a pile of ash at the bottom.

Her clock reads 3:45am when she gets back into her room, climbing in through her window, nearly falling over the empty trash bag. As quietly as she can, she moves her TV back to where it was and takes the video out of it. She kneels next to the trashbag and fishes out the pack of photos. She had wanted to get rid of them, act like that year never happened. But she’s never going to forget him, no matter what she does. He’s burned into her mind whether she likes it or not.

She places the photos and videotape on her shelf and reties the bag. Maybe if that’s all she has of him, she can pretend he was something else.

After waking up at 11 the next morning and missing breakfast, Veronica decides to take Janis out for pancakes and coffee in town.

“Late night, Aunt V?” she asks, watching Veronica down another coffee.

“Yeah,” she admits, pushing her hair out of her eyes. She predicts she’ll crash out at 9pm at the latest tonight. “Just… looking through some old stuff. Kept me up.”

“Some old high school stuff?” Janis asks quietly, her shoulders hunching. She looks small and it doesn’t suit her. Ever since Janis could walk she’s been unapologetic about how loud she is and how much space she takes up. Even though the Regina incident knocked her down, all she did the next year was come back louder and bigger. She doesn’t look at Veronica, keeping her eyes on her half-constructed pancake house.

“Yeah,” she says. “I found some more stuff of when I was with JD.”

“Aunt Veronica, I’m really sorry,” she says. “That I brought him up. I know he can’t be easy to talk about.”

“Jan, it’s okay,” she assures her. “I’m actually, weirdly kind of glad you did. I just sort of needed that kind of release, I guess. I needed to remember him.” Janis nods, but the confusion is visible on her face. “It’s complicated.”

“Are you going to be okay?” she asks. Veronica smiles and takes her hand.

“I’ve been okay for the past 29 years, Jan,” she explains. “And besides, you don’t need to worry about me. It’s my job to worry about you. You’re the kid here.”

“I’m seventeen,” Janis corrects her. Veronica nods. Seventeen’s a fun age. She felt so grown up when it started and then everything happened and all she needed was someone to hold her.

“That’s not as old as you think it is,” she tells her. “Go be seventeen. Go do dumb stuff and don’t worry about me. Trust me, you’ll have plenty of time for all that later.”

“How do you know all that stuff?” she asks. “How do you know what to say?”

“Easy,” she answers, taking another sip of her coffee. “I just say what I wish adults had said to me at that age.”

#veronica sawyer #heathers the musical #janis sarkisian #mean girls broadway #not sure why im putting this here but its here now #fanfic #character study #i guess?#barrett made me do it #long post for ts

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learningrendezvous · 3 years

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Hospitality

HOSPITALITY: HEALTH, SAFETY AND HYGIENE

A versatile, affordable and comprehensive multimedia learning resource

The DVD contains six video clips: Kitchen hazards - hot, sharp, wet Hazards of heat Safe use and handling of knives Cleaning, sanitising, disinfecting Manual handling: the hierarchy of control Hands, bodies and food safety

This outstanding educational resource provides an essential introduction to workplace health and safety for anyone training for a career in hospitality, through a series of video clips and comprehensive learning activities.

DVD (With English Subtitles) / 2015

KITCHEN HAZARDS AND FOOD SAFETY

A commercial kitchen can be a fun and highly rewarding place to work, but also one full of potential hazards and dangers.

This video is filmed inside the industrial kitchen at Bendigo Health in regional Victoria where thousands of meals and other food requirements are prepared for hospital and associated health services every week.

Food Services Manager Damian Martin comprehensively covers a wide range of workplace health and safety areas, taking us through basic kitchen safety in working with hot, sharp and wet equipment and surfaces; and safe and hygienic practices in the storage and handling of food.

DVD (With English Subtitles) / 2015 / (Middle Secondary - Professional) / 19 minutes

SERVING ALCOHOL RESPONSIBLY

Anyone serving alcohol to customers must do so responsibly. This includes owners and licensees of premises, bar and drinks staff and security and other staff who might make judgments about patron behaviour. Alcohol affects people differently and it's important to recognise when someone is, or is becoming, alcohol-affected to the point where no more should be served. Even more critical is the ability to deal with a situation effectively and appropriately without disturbing other patrons. This video covers the skills required to ensure the responsible service of alcohol and includes interviews with hotel and live music venue owner Greg Dodds and wine bar operators Mark and Meredith Telfer. It is an ideal resource for learners in Hospitality and related courses.

DVD (With English Subtitles) / 2014 / (Middle Secondary - Professional) / 17 minutes

SME CASE STUDY: CREATIVE FORCE - TECHNOLOGY DRIVING CHANGE

Businesses constantly face change. Technology drives much of it and has drastically impacted every industry and sector in recent decades. Successful small businesses embrace change and use technology smartly. Often it means continual reinvention. This video profiles Creative Force, a small business in regional south-east Australia that started as a print media-based marketing company two decades ago. Today it specializes in web and multimedia development for clients ranging from universities and major health authorities to individuals. The program explores the impact of digital communications and the role that technology has played in completely transforming all aspects of the business over time. It is an ideal resource for upper-level learners in business, small business management, technology and related areas.

DVD (With English Subtitles) / 2014 / (Middle Secondary - Professional) / 16 minutes

SME CASE STUDY: UNWINED - INTRODUCING HOSPITALITY TO RETAIL

Mark and Meredith Telfer purchased what a franchised retail cleanskin wine outlet. Over the course of nine years they worked the business hard ultimately transforming it into a unique wine bar, complementing the now more up-market wine and boutique beer retail section of their business. Their slogan is 'Come for a glass, leave with a bottle'. This video explores the journey of a small business as it re-invents itself across a decade. It looks at making business decisions, opportunities for growth and sustainability, planning and implementing change to meet customer demands. It presents an excellent case study for learners in courses related to Business Studies, Small Business Management and Hospitality.

DVD (With English Subtitles) / 2014 / (Middle Secondary - Professional) / 15 minutes

LE CIRQUE: A TABLE IN HEAVEN

Director: Andrew Rossi

In this portrait of Le Cirque founder Sirio Maccioni and his three sons, director Andrew Rossi catches the family at a dramatic transition: the closing of the restaurant in 2004, its celebrated re-opening two years later followed by the nerve-wracking wait for restaurant critics to weigh in on their new incarnation. A must-see for anyone who is passionate about food and dining, this film shows us a family embroiled in the age-old struggle between father, sons, tradition and change.

DVD / 2011 / 74 minutes

THREE STARS

Directors: Lutz Hachmeister

Focusing on nine Michelin starred chefs from three continents, Three Stars depicts the everyday drama of life in gourmet restaurants and includes exclusive interviews and behind-the-scenes access to some of the world's most talented chefs as they work in their gastronomic laboratories, hunt for exquisite ingredients in local markets, and gather rare edible plants along rough coastlines. It reveals the business of cooking on the highest level and highlights the various kitchen routines and culinary philosophies of chefs like Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Yannick Alleno, and Olivier Roellinger.

DVD-R (Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Japanese & Spanish with English Subtitles) / 2011 / 94 minutes

RESTAURATEUR, THE

Director: Roger Sherman

This intimate film about Danny Meyer, one of America's preeminent restaurant owners, opens in the dining room of Eleven Madison Park in December, 2009. Meyer confides to the camera: "After Tabla and Eleven Madison Park opened, I was convinced I'd made one of the worst professional mistakes of my life." Fade to a vast, concrete space, January, 1998. A much younger-looking Meyer, with Tom Colicchio (chef of Gramercy Tavern), enters the site; Meyer gives him a tour of his hopes and dreams.

We follow the restaurateur and his team for a year as they experience gut-wrenching construction delays, miss deadlines, and fire a chef. We visit Tabla's chef Floyd Cardoz in his tiny home kitchen where he creates his now classic watermelon curry. We're there as chef Kerry Heffernan takes over EMP just weeks before opening.

Danny Meyer bares all in this portrait. Watching him and his inner circle, we witness first-hand how difficult it is to create a world-class restaurant. The Restaurateur is nothing like those reality shows. This is real.

DVD / 2010 / 57 minutes

INSIDE A HOTEL

The MacDonald chain of luxury hotels serves business and leisure customers across the UK. People are integral to their success. This film goes inside one of its hotels to discover what they do.

SERVICE IS EVERYTHING: There's premium on customer service. Guests have to be greeted with a smile. One of the first people you're like to meet is Neil, the concierge. He's virtually a "personal organiser" for everyone who visits the hotel, taking on everything from arranging trips to the airport to finding parts for a 1933 Ferrari! The receptionist is in the front line, too, checking people in, dealing with angry customers, but also the occasional celebrity.

STILL WAITING AFTER ALL THESE YEARS: Giuseppe, the head waiter, has been in the restaurant business for over 30 years. He prides himself on the confidence his customers have in him. But things aren't what they used to be, he reckons - and many guests fall below his standards. They don't know what to wear, what to order or even how to eat their food.

THE CONFERENCE BUSINESS: Long gone are the days when big hotels relied on selling people a bed for the night to make their money. Now the big market is the corporate market, hosting things like conferences.

Conference and banqueting manager James has to meet the whims of his business customers - and take it all with a smile.

TRAINING: Human resources manager Fiona says you can train someone to lay a table but not to be good at caring for customers - it's all a question of choosing the right people.

THE MYSTERY SHOPPERS: Colin and Wendy are mystery shoppers who visit hotels undercover to check they're keeping to their standards. A lack of nibbles in the bar or newspapers which they order but don't turn up and Colin and Wendy marks the hotel down.

HIGHS AND LOWS: Working in a hotel is a bit like being on stage. The highs come when you meet your goals, the lows when you fail to make a customer happy. For the receptionist, drunken guests are the biggest problem. Working in the hotel and catering industry takes lots of energy and the ability "to talk to anyone".

THE OTHER SIDE OF HOTEL WORK: By no means all hotel workers find their jobs satisfying. A foreign hotel worker describes experiences of outrageous sexual harassment and bullying. She says she would never let her child work in the industry.

DVD / 2008 / 30 minutes

HOTEL MANAGEMENT AT THE HOTEL MONACO

In the hotel business, there are many opportunities to provide service to customers, and in order to remain competitive; the service design must be excellent thought-out. The Hotel Monaco, owned by San Francisco's Kimpton Group, is a boutique hotel with 7 locations around the country. In Chicago, its property is in a prime location on the northern end of the business district. Its location between two shopping districts and in the heart of the reviving theater district which helps them have crossover appeal for both business and pleasure clients.

DVD / 2003 / (Grades 9-12, College, Adult)

HOTEL MONACO-MANAGING CUSTOMER SERVICE

The Hotel Monaco Chicago is one of seven boutique hotels owned by San Francisco's Kimpton Group. Kimpton's service concept is to offer the same services and comforts of a luxury chain hotel, but with the personality and individual attention of staying at a friend's home. In an extremely competitive market, the Hotel Monaco Chicago has successfully chosen to feature luxury accommodations in a small, friendly hotel with unconventional decor and unique service elements.

DVD / 2002 / (Grades 9-12, College, Adult) / Approx. 9 minutes

MARKETING A HOTEL: THE CROWN, SCARBOROUGH

Jhe Crown Hotel, Scarborough, used to cater for wealthy holiday makers, but with the decline of British seaside, the Crown fell on hard times. In 2000 it was up for sale and falling to pieces. Then came new hope.

Local businessman Richard Frank set about restoring it to its former glory. He brought in new features â€” a gym and a cafe-bar. A website now offers a "virtual tour" of the hotel. Celebrities are used to get the hotel publicity and prices are cut to make sure the rooms are filled. The marketing tactics are radical â€” but will they work?

DVD / 2001 / 25 minutes

SYSTEMS IN A HOTEL: TECHNOLOGY IN HOSPITALITY

This demonstrates the systems in a large hotel. The hotel's booking system shows the rooms available and helps maximise income from the rooms, discounting prices when things are quiet. For each guest the system records a guest history, with details of their likes and dislikes.

When a guest feels a room is too hot, staff use a building management system to turn down the temperature. A housekeeping system records details of a defective lamp to be reported for repair. But while all these different systems bring efficiency, do they really improve the quality of a guest's stay? Or is it all a bit too impersonal?

DVD / 2000 / 27 minutes

INSIDE THE HOTEL BUSINESS

Bill Marriott of Marriott Hotels, and John Coleman, of the Ritz-Carlton in New York and in Washington and Tremont and Whithall Hotels in Chicago, discuss what it costs to build a hotel, how to choose a site, how you staff it and run it so the guests are happy and the owner makes a profit. Bill Marriott has some surprising information about the responsibility he extends to workers at all levels.

DVD / 1983 / (College through Adult) / 30 minutes

FOOD SERVICE EXCELLENCE: CUSTOMER SERVICE SKILLS

Gives students specific information about work habits on the job: the importance of appearance, relating to customers and co-workers, dealing with complaints and interacting with management.

DVD / 60 minutes

FOOD SERVICE INDUSTRY: CAREER OPPORTUNITIES FOR YOU

Viewers will see how the increased number of food products and advanced technologies have helped national food and restaurant chains expand. They'll get a close-up view of careers, from packing and distributing to preparing, cooking and serving food. The program details the training and skills needed for a full range of food service careers.

DVD / 31 minutes

FOOD SERVICE PRE-PREPARATION: GETTING READY AHEAD OF TIME

how professional food workers work back from the menu to be sure all is ready for the rush. They'll follow the morning as bacon & eggs are prepared by the staff.

DVD / 52 minutes

HAZARD COMMUNICATION IN HOSPITALITY ENVIRONMENTS

"Hazard Communication in Hospitality Environments" courses discuss the requirements of the HAZCOM Standard, the hazards that can be associated with different types of HAZMATs, and what employees can do to avoid these hazards.

Topics covered in these products include: Sources of HAZMAT information. Exposure to hazardous materials. Different types of HAZMATs Personal protective equipment and safe storage. Responding to a HAZMAT spill.

DVD / 21 minutes

SHORT ORDER FOOD SERVICE: GRILL MANAGEMENT

Illustrates cleaning and maintaining equipment, cooking zones and techniques for cooking typical menus items such as eggs, pancakes, bacon, sausage, hamburgers and home fries. Explains the importance of "prepping" food, managing flow of orders while timing for doneness. Discusses interaction between cook and servers.

DVD / 45 minutes

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