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piedpiperart · 10 months

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Phantom in Gotham pt 2

Chapter one

The next week, Tim asked Dick for advice about Danny.

"And he's your age?" Dick frowned, leaning forward on the living room couch to rest his elbows on his knees. He had ha;f a cucumber sandwich in his hand, courtesy of Alfred. Meanwhile Tim was sipping his fourth coffee for the day.

"Yeah," Tim sighed,"I'm just worried about him. He doesn't look like he's eating or sleeping very much, and I don't know. I just want to make sure he's safe at home or something. He’s actually really smart and funny too, I think you’d like him. I just don’t want to freak him out in case Batman hears about this and decides ‘Bruce’ needs to get involved, you know?"

Dick hummed, ruffling Tim's hair. His little brother was so caring, he cooed in his head. "I'll check it out. You said he goes to the library after school a lot of the time?"

Tim nodded. "Steph and I may have followed him once or twice. I asked Barbara if she'd seen him, and apparently he goes to the library after school every day. He does his homework and then usually falls asleep until closing at seven."

Dick frowned at that. It was becoming more obvious that the kid was not in a good situation, or at the least was avoiding home. "I'll tail him when he leaves the library,"Dick reassured. "I know you're busy with the whole ghost stuff going on."

"Thanks,"Tim sighed. He also didn't want to have Danny recognize him somehow as Red Robin. It was unlikely, but not impossible. Plus, getting Dick to look into it would just give him more people on the 'Protect Danny' team. Tim was obviously president, with Steph as Co-president. With Dick on their side they’d be able to gang up on Bruce to get the kid adopted if everything turned out the way he thought it would. Of course, Tim knew it was probably unlikely, but he had to admit someone else in the family that was his age and didn’t want to kill him would be nice.

“You really care about him, huh?” Dick said suddenly.

“Uh, yeah?” Tim said, tilting his head to look at Dick. “He’s only been at school a month or so but he hangs out with Steph and I every day. He’s really into space, and super smart, like I’m pretty sure he’s a genius at physics and engineering.” Tim sut his rambling off, feeling his cheeks flush in embarrassment. Surely Dick didn’t need to know Danny’s hobbies.

“Just a friend?” Dick hummed. Tim narrowed his eyes at Dick’s suddenly mischievous attitude.

“Yeah?” Tim said hesitantly. “”Why?”

“Oh, nothing,”Dick smiled, getting up from the couch to bring his plate to the kitchen.

“Wait no- Dick what do you mean?” Tim stammered, putting his coffee down to follow. “Dick!”

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Dick had called Barbara about Tim's friend, and even the red haired vigilante was worried about the poor kid. Apparently he was there every night, and Babs was just about to contact him to do something about him. Dick didn't understand what she meant by the ‘new little brother’ joke she'd made until he laid eyes on the kid. He’d nearly laughed when he caught sight of the black hair and blue eyes. Maybe Tim wanted another sibling, one that wouldn't stab or shoot him, Dick mused.

Still, he followed the kid to a convenience store, frowning at the kid's yawn. If the apparent lack of sleep was worrying, the fact that the kid only got a bag of cheetos and a can of strawberry tea was even more concerning. Still, Dick hopped the roofs from afar, hoping the kid would at least have someone home to look out for him.

Dick's hopes were dashed when the kid made his way further towards Crime Alley.

Ignoring the fact that he was potentially infringing on Jason's territory, Nightwing perched on a building across from the old pizzeria, watching the kid skillfully climb the fence around the place with a sinking feeling. Dick sighed. So, apparently Danny was living in the abandoned pizzeria. Great. Jason would definitely want to know about this.

Dick's heart ached for the kid. He hoped Danny was finding ways to get food that wouldn't get him in trouble. Considering that he was still able to afford a spot at Gotham Academy, it seemed he had some sort of savings. Just, maybe not for things outside of school. Dick frowned. How that worked he wasn’t so sure. The school would have to know those things, right? If he was living like that, then how could he be going to such a rich school?

Dick sat back further on the roof, making a note to look into Danny’s spot at the school when he heard heavy footsteps land on the roof. However, Dick's eyes were still on the Pizzeria, hoping that Danny didn't actually live there despite the overwhelming amount of evidence pointing to the contrary. Maybe the kid was passing through. Or it was a clubhouse of sorts.

"Wing," Red Hood grumbled, coming to a stop a few feet away. "Whatcha doin' here?"

"Sorry,"Danny sighed, running a hand through his hair. If he had looked up he’d see Jaso towering over him with the iconic red helmet on. "I don't mean to trespass, I was just tailing one of Tim's friends."

"Timbo's friend? What'd the kid do to get Nightwing to follow him all the way to Crime Alley? He in some kind of trouble?" Hood huffed. Or the kid is trouble, Jason thought.

"Not exactly," Nightwing started, glancing back at the building Danny disappeared into. Still nothing. "Tim was worried about him. Kid didn't seem to be eating or sleeping well, and was hanging at Babs' library until close. We thought maybe he was a runaway, but he’s going to Gotham Prep so he has to have some sort of funds, except tonight I followed him until he went into the Pizzeria."

Hood whistled, crouching next to his brother. "Think he's living there? Not really a good place for a kid by himself."

"Yeah," Dick agreed. He paused before adding, "Danny's a good kid. If you could maybe look out for him when you can?"

Hood paused, looking towards the dilapidated building. "Yeah, alright. But you and Tim owe me," Dick huffed a laugh. "Can't be having a kid out here all alone, especially with winter coming up. I'll see if I can talk to him eventually."

"Please don't scare him too much," Dick grinned. If he knew one thing about Jason, it was that he had a soft spot for kids.

"So, what's the kid look like? Because if you say black hair and blue eyes I'm going to shoot you." Hood added. Dick simply smiled mischievously, causing Jason to let out a groan. "Seriously? Get out of here."

“I’m pretty sure Tim might just be looking for a new sibling. That or he has a crush.”Dick laughed, standing up and patting the dust off himself. "You'll still keep an eye out?"

Hood waved him off tiredly. "Yeah yeah, I'll look after the newest brother." He shook his head fondly at the cackle Dick let out as he grappled away.

Looking towards the shoddy Pizza place, Hood sighed. Obviously he wouldn't turn the kid in to CPS, but with winter coming up the kid might need someone looking out for him. There was no way the heating still worked in that place, and Jason was pretty sure one of the walls had a giant bat-sized hole in it. Maybe he’d check out the place while the kid was at school, just to see if he had everything he needed.

Though, Jason grinned, maybe he could have a little fun messing with his future baby brother before Bruce got his hands on him. Scaring the kid out of crime alley and into a shelter would be a good start.

It had been over a month since Danny'd stepped foot in Amity Park. It had just gotten too dangerous for him to stay after... that day. The GIW had been getting more intense, so Danny had already been on edge when the news broke.

His parents were partnering with the GIW. It meant extra funding, equipment, but it also meant Agent K and the others had more access to deadlier weapons- which made his job defending people from ghosts and ghosts from people even harder. Danny had obviously been upset at first, and had called Jazz to come home from college to help him persuade their parents against it.

Jack and Maddie were set on the partnership though, and Danny tried explaining to his parents why it would be a bad idea. Things escalated, and Danny had told them again about how ghosts aren't bad- they're not evil, they're sentient and they have feelings. Jack and Maddie had become eerily suspicious, and started thinking he was possessed. Like the only reason why he’d be advocating for ghosts was because he was one.

Things took a bad turn from there. They’d tried to trap him, which worked since he’d been Danny at the time. His transformation was an accident though, due to one of their crazy inventions activating his rings. Jack and Maddie were shocked, of course, when he'd accidentally revealed he was Phantom. He was terrified of their reactions- had been ever since he'd had the accident a year ago. Jack and Maddie had... not reacted well, to say the least. They hadn't immediately gone for their weapons, though, so Danny had stayed calm, hoping to talk things out. He thought maybe they just needed to hear his side of things. He hoped they'd accept him.

Danny had been wrong.

Waking up strapped to a table in the lab not long after being zapped by the net that had trapped him, he realized there was probably nothing he could do to convince them he was still their son. Danny had to finally admit he was scared of his parents. The realization hurt far worse than the wounds they gave him. Jazz was his only saving grace, and he thanked the Ancients he was able to call her to come home before it all went down.

Jazz hadn't heard from Danny at all after he’d called the first time, so when she'd come home it was to her parents sleeping soundlessly and her brother half-conscious and bleeding out in the basement, strapped to a table like some sort of lab experiment. She was horrified. Nearly crying her eyes out, she struggled to get Danny out of there and patch up his wounds. She did the best she could to stop the bleeding while keeping her eyes away from the various filled jars on the counter. Jazz knew that she and Danny were no longer safe with Jack and Maddie, so she started making plans.

First, she called Tucker and Sam to let them know of the situation, while she took Danny and the Specter Speeder into the Ghost Zone. She knew that was the only place her parents wouldn't be able to follow. Danny had also said before that the Far Frozen had people he could trust, as well as medical equipment that surpassed the human realm. The Yeti, who Jazz had forgotten the name of as soon as he'd said it, was horrified at what had happened, and reassured Jazz he would be well taken care of while she was making arrangements. She’d stayed a few moments to wash the greenish red blood off her hands before pulling herself together. She almost couldn’t bear to leave him alone again, but she knew there were things to get done in the human realm.

Jazz had some of the plans outlined in a worst-case scenario like this, but she'd never thought it would actually happen. Nevertheless, she was grateful that they’d made plans like this. Back in the house, she'd trashed the lab as much as she could, unfortunately, waking her parents in the process. Luckily, she’d destroyed the jars of suspicious green and red liquids before that, and she stormed out before they could say anything. Actually, they might’ve said a lot, but Jazz was not listening. Jazz no longer had anything to say to Jack and Maddie. In her mind, they were a hopeless case. They'd done something irreversible, and she no longer thought of them as her parents. Not after they had... dissected her little brother. The thought made her stomach turn, and she wiped away tears she didn't think she still had in her.

After her third short breakdown, she composed herself and kept going. Someone had to be the adult in this situation, and her little brother needed her. Jazz fought back the memories of Danny- so small, laying on that lab table, so much blood, her baby brother- and got to work. She'd had some of the paperwork filled out before, mostly regarding school records, applications, and personal information, then had contacted Tucker to help with the rest. Such as fake ID, birth certificate, etc.

Jazz knew her parents wouldn't rest until they had Danny back. Them and the GIW both. Thankfully, her parents were dumb enough to think that Phantom-Danny had been a ghost, and had kidnapped their real son, so the secret of Halfas was still safe. She knew Danny wasn't safe in Amity Park, and Danny's friends agreed. Jazz was glad Sam and Tucker hadn’t seen Danny strapped to the table, but judging by their faces, they could imagine. She made a note to talk to them afterwards as a therapist to make sure they were coping well. The three of them had met up at Tucker’s house, tears and blood- in Jazz's case- on all of their faces. After quick hugs and reassurances that Danny was alive and they'd get him when everything was ready, the three of them continued with their plans.

Sam was in charge of a go-bag. Danny would need clothes, food, medical supplies, ghost gear- just in case - and other supplies. Tucker dealt with funds- stealing from Vlad was like taking candy from a baby- fake ID, and other important forgeries. Meanwhile, Jazz got to work on paperwork. She figured schooling was most important, besides housing, and got everything set up from there. A few dozen calls and stolen funds, and Danny would be living in Gotham. Her brother would be renting a small apartment and attending a private school, with plenty of funds in his new bank account. It would be the least likely place for their parents to look for him. They kept Danny as his first name, but combined their own into a fake last name to throw off the trail. They didn't have many options with Manson and Foley, but they were too worried about their friend/brother to get too creative with it. The simpler the better.

Danny would now be Daniel Folson, resident of Gotham for a few months. The three of them figured it would be too difficult to remember a full name change, and the fact that Danny was a pretty common name would work in their favor. No one would look for him around Gotham anyway. Or so they hoped.

Unsure about the extent the GIW or the Fentons would go to to find Danny, they prepared for the worst. That is, if the police got involved, which was likely considering a day after Jazz had dumped Danny in the Ghost Zone, Maddie and Jack had filed a missing persons report on Danny. Since there were no guarantees that Vlad wouldn't get involved either, they had to be thorough. Jazz was not completely confident that Vlad could be convinced to their side, so she didn't bother with telling him anything. The only thing Jazz could trust Vlad to do was to be a fruitloop, and no one needed his smarmy help in anything this serious. Jazz was forever grateful that Tucker was as good with computers as he was, and she made a note to help him get into a good college when he graduated. Though she figured he could probably hack his way into any college he wanted.Either way, Vlad would be none the wiser to his missing funds, and wouldn’t be able to use Technus to track Danny down.

After they'd gotten all the supplies and paperwork ready to send Danny away- no one was happy about it but they knew things were about to spiral down from here- Tucker warned Dani of the situation, telling her not to come back anytime soon, and while she was worried and angry, she agreed. Dani had the task of leaving ecto-signatures in places far from Gotham in order to keep the trail off Danny while he healed. After a month or so of that, Dani would be okay to keep traveling around like usual. They'd keep in contact though, more than before. Jazz and Tucker were setting her and Danny up with weekly check-ins and emergency beacons and things like that. Tucker’s main job was keeping those two safe, and there was no way the two halfas were getting captured on his watch.

The Ghosts had heard what happened from Frostbite, and after a slight kidnapping of Ember, they made sure she warned the ghosts to stay in the zone for as long as possible. In a show of solidarity, Skulker had caused a distraction downtown for the GIW and Fentons while Jazz, Sam and Tucker went to get Danny and explain the plan to him.

Danny was... heartbroken. Traumatized. Weak and still healing. Jazz was surprised to see her brother had mutated even more in his ghost form, and now sported pointier ears, paler skin and sharp fangs. They'd eventually talked Danny into leaving for Gotham- not without many tears and arguments- with the help of Frostbite and a visit from Clockwork. All of them hoped it wouldn't be forever, but with the way things were in Amity, things were unlikely to be resolved so soon. Especially with the Fentons joining the GIW. They’d promise that once he was out and things settled, they’d start to form a plan. If it was possible, they’d try to get into contact with the Justice League again.

Flying alone to Gotham was the hardest thing Danny had ever done, and thought of turning back many times. He didn't. His friends and Jazz would be disappointed and worried out of their minds for him if he did. And he had to admit, they had a plan. He had to protect them and himself. The humming in his chest emanating from his core latched onto the fact that he was protecting everyone by leaving. The ghosts would be safe if they stayed in the zone, and Danny couldn’t stay in Amity or the Zone forever. He couldn’t be Danny Fenton or Phantom in Amity anymore. In Gotham, he could at least be Danny Fenton. Or Folson. He would be alone, but they'd find ways to check in on him when it was safe. He just had to deal with being alone for a while. No big deal. He could do this.

He couldn't.

The first few weeks were the hardest. Danny started school almost immediately, eager for some kind of distraction from the pain of leaving his friends and family behind. Because Jazz was his only family now that his parents were... hunting him. Had hurt him. Jazz was his only family now besides Ellie and he couldn’t even talk to them anymore. No one knew what Technus was up to so communication was only for emergencies and check-ins.

Moving to Gotham would have been fine. It would have been fine, if not for the shabby apartment Jazz had set up for him bursting into flames. Something about a villain from Gotham who liked to torch stuff. Firefly, maybe. Danny wasn't sure, but he'd been able to stake out a place to live in an old building. Danny thought it used to be an old pizza place. He'd been able to stash his stuff in the rickety old attic and set up a meager living space with his sleeping bag and other supplies that Sam packed him. His wounds were still aching a bit, but his advanced healing had helped him a lot. Since he woke up from…that, he’d been able to absorb a lot more ectoplasm than he usually did. It was odd, and since he found out he could absorb ectoplasm from anywhere in the human realm, he didn’t need to eat human food nearly as much as he had before. He was down to maybe one meal a day. He could still eat three if he wanted, but the ectoplasm was more than enough to sustain him. It felt weird to eat so much food he didn’t even need.

There was no way he could contact Jazz about the apartment though, and he knew to use the money in his account sparingly. Danny wasn't sure he'd tell Jazz about his living situation if she'd called anyway. There probably wouldn’t be anything anyone could do at this point. Hacking Vlad’s bank account had been fine the first time, but multiple times would tip the fruitloop off. Danny had rather not have to deal with the fruitloop on his trail too. If everything went to plan, Vlad would be chilling in Wisconsin and not even know about his disappearance until Jack or Maddie called him about it. Given how distracted they were, it should give them a few weeks or so.

The phone he had been given looked old, but it was Tucker approved safe from pretty much anything. Only to be used in case of emergencies for now, since everyone back home was looking into his friends and searching for him. Danny didn’t count being semi-homeless as an emergency. As a Halfa, he didn’t need to sleep as much as a human either, especially not since his strange new mutation, and that was pretty much all he needed a house for. It was weird to think that his second near-death experience caused him to become more like a ghost, and wondered if he’d just lose his human half over time. He really didn’t want to think about that though.

Living at the Pizzeria would be fine. The only thing he worried about was his friends and sisters, because at this point Ellie was more like his sister than anything else. Maybe after everything started to die down Danny would be able to contact them. He’d be able to hear their voices.

He could admit, he missed their voices. Hell, he even missed Dash. So far he'd made a few sort of friends at Gotham Academy; Tim, who drank enough coffee it probably replaced his blood at this point, Steph, who reminded him of if Sam and Star combined into the same person, and Conner, who might or might not be Tim's boyfriend, but he wasn't going to ask. He was pretty sure Conor might also be goth, but he wasn’t sure. It might be weird to ask. Danny thought they were nice, but he didn't want to get close to someone only for him to disappear one day. He didn't want to lose more friends. There was nothing they could do to help him anyways, no ghosts for them to help him catch, no all-meat or vegetarian lunches in the cafeteria to riot about, nothing out of the ordinary. Danny didn’t want to get more people involved in his problems. They might get hurt, and he didn’t want that.

Danny's new place was, for lack of a better word, not ideal. He showered at a nearby gym at night, which was easier because he could turn invisible, and slept in the attic of the abandoned pizzeria. He found it more comfortable to sleep during lunch at school, or at the library, though, so he used the pizzeria for storing his stuff. Since he'd found the library, he'd been going everyday after school to do homework until he fell asleep in one of their comfy bean bags. He was surprised to find he was actually doing well in school now without the constant ghost attacks, or mishaps with his powers. Who knew he was actually pretty smart. Definitely not him. Or Dash. Now that he thought about it, Danny was pretty sure Lancer knew he was wasting his potential. He wondered if his old teacher missed him in class. Probably not.

The Library closed around 7 though, and usually a nice librarian named Barbra would very politely wake him and kick him out. He'd then get a snack for dinner and then wander around in his ghost form invisibly. Danny didn't actually need to eat as much, considering his ghost form just leeched ectoplasm from his surroundings constantly now- something he learned from Frostbite’s lectures. Danny was just glad he wouldn’t have to make trips into the Zone to get the ectoplasm he needed.

Speaking of his ghost form, he wasn't stupid enough to use it in Gotham. Even though Dash would argue otherwise about his smarts, Danny knew having the Gotham vigilante's attention would be a bad thing. The Justice League and affiliates were government approved, so any heroes who were in contact with him would be obligated to turn him in to the GIW according to the Anti-Ecto Act. Anything with ectoplasm was no longer sentient and sadly that included Danny. So, he figured staying invisible as much as possible would work in his favor.

As a ghost, his core obsession to protect people determined his actions a lot more than he wanted it to. At first, he was fine with protecting himself, and staying out of the way. He'd caught glimpses of the vigilantes from afar and was not planning on introducing himself anytime soon. But his core urged him to help. The humming had only gotten stronger, and it made him extremely anxious to not help people every day. After a few days, he was wandering at night, unable to sleep in the dark attic of the Pizzeria- and also not needing as much sleep as a regular person. With no ghost attacks late at night or homework to catch up on, he was more than a little restless.

Danny had stuck to his goal of staying invisible on his nightly trips, but he'd do small things. Trip up a burglar, ice someone’s shoe to the ground, phase a gun out of someone's hand, the small stuff. Danny's core hummed with warmth whenever he managed to help a random citizen and keep the bad guys from doing any harm. He was so used to fighting ghosts, he wasn't sure how to go about fighting regular humans. Danny was very very afraid of going too far or using too much strength. Even on top of the fact that most of his weapons were only effective against ghosts. He couldn't stuff a robber into a thermos.... probably.

So he left actual crime fighting to the Bats. Danny had gotten curious a few times, and tried to follow them across rooftops. It was easier considering he could fly, but he was still in awe at how they effortlessly moved through the shadows and jumped roofs with ease. Danny found himself tagging along more than he planned to, but the way the vigilante's bantered back and forth reminded him of his friends back home. It was… nice. And he’d already learned a lot about crime fighting with actual humans just by watching them. It was interesting to see how different Ghosts were in comparison. Danny himself would stick to small stuff, and leave the rogues to the Bats, but he tailed them as much as possible to help lessen their load or keep an eye on them.

After one close call with a gun and an unaware Robin, Danny figured he could help out a bit and they wouldn’t mind. His core hummed louder around the Bats, and it felt…nice to feel like he was a part of things. He was invisible, and surely they wouldn't notice him knocking a gun astray, or a rock thrown at a random goon for a distraction. Danny was helping, but not getting involved in the big stuff, just like he’d promised. It wasn't like he was a vigilante, just… support from afar. It had taken a shorter amount of time than Danny thought it would for them to notice their apparent 'good luck'.

The Bats had started noticing the small hiccups their villains were having, but didn't know why or where it was coming from, or if it was simply a coincidence. It started with staring. A few times, Danny had to hold back laughter as Red Robin examined a broken flower pot a little too seriously after he'd pushed it off a ledge towards a guy with a gun aimed at the vigilante. He knew he should probably stop following the vigilantes, but he was worried about them. Robin was just so small, and his core hummed happily whenever he protected them in some small way.

Danny fully blamed his obsession for the bat-stalking he'd been doing. Sure, he helped people when the bats weren't around still, but it was less lonely with the group, and his core had latched onto the family. He wasn’t completely sure if it was because he was missing his own family, but Danny felt better around the Bats. He’d give them their secrecy though, and didn’t pursue them anytime they were on their way home. He didn’t care about their identities as long as they more or less let him tag along.

The initial suspicion dissipated after a few weeks, and Danny was amused and appreciative when they started to try to communicate with him. Robin mostly ignored him after telling the empty alleyway seriously that he would not tolerate threats, and if he hurt the other vigilante's in any way, Robin would dispose of him. It was funny, but Danny had no doubt the kid would find some way to do it if the ghost crossed the little kid.

Red Robin, when he was alone, would ask Danny questions. He figured out Danny was willing to communicate by moving objects, and asked questions to confirm some worries. It started with "Why are you helping us?" To which Danny had just kicked an empty can lightly towards the vigilante. From then, Red Robin had figured out a yes or no system that would help get him answers. Danny had fun answering the questions when there was time.

"Okay, uh, kick the can for yes, and the rock for no. Are you going to hurt us?" One kick to the rock.

"Are you... helping us?" Red Robin asked, raising an eyebrow behind the mask, and Danny cheered internally while kicking the can. He hoped the vigilantes would let him continue to help. “I mean, you have been helping us, but you really don’t need to. We’re professionals.”

Danny shrugged, floating a few feet in the air, but Red Robin couldn’t see that. Of course Danny knew they’d be fine without him, but he was, for lack of a better word, bored. And they reminded him of his family back home. Without his ‘nightly job’, he had no doubt that his core would reduce him to an anxious ball of goop.

"Are you…in trouble?" Red Robin said after, and Danny wasn't sure how to respond. He thought for a moment, but before he could do anything, Robin followed up with,"We can help you." to which Danny had kicked the rock in a burst of panic. No, no, no. He didn't want the bats in his business. For his own safety as well as theirs. No telling what the GIW would do.

Red Robin frowned at that, but took a seat in the alley. The vigilante seemed to be thinking of a question, but Danny stayed around, eager for some sort of conversation that wasn't from school. And a part of him felt that, if the vigilantes knew what was happening in Amity they’d help. Even if they had to go against the government. Well, he hoped. Tucker had mentioned trying to contact the Justice League about their issue before. "So you need help, but don't want ours." Danny kicked the can. The vigilante thought for a moment longer, then decided to stop pushing for the time being.

"Are you a ghost?" Danny kicked the can, laughing silently at the incredulous face Red Robin made in response. "What the fuck,"He'd muttered, then froze abruptly. "Are you haunting me?"

Just for laughs, Danny kicked the can. Red Robin paled, belatedly reaching for his comm or a weapon, but Danny kicked the rock after a second, making the kid let out a breath of air. The vigilante looked around the alleyway "That was a joke, right?"

Danny kicked the can, shoulders shaking from trying to contain his laughter. "Very funny, almost gave me a heart attack,"He mumbled. A second later, he stood up, brushing himself off. "You should hang out with Nightwing more, I'm sure he'd love to play pranks with you sometime. As long as they aren't on me,"Red Robin added.

"Are you... older than Eighteen?" Red Robin asked suddenly, and Danny kicked the rock nonchalantly.”Alright, younger then. And you’re a ghost.” After a pause, he asked. "Are you lonely?"

Danny left after kicking the can. He didn't want to talk about it, but figured it would be rude to not answer at least. And he was lonely. Danny missed Jazz, and Sam and Tucker and Ellie. At that point he'd been in Gotham a few weeks and it had been just as long since he'd seen any sign of the ghosts too. He hoped everyone was okay. Danny missed his family so much his core ached. And a part of him hoped Red Robin would talk to him more or let him patrol with them if Red knew he was lonely.

Nightwing was one of his favorite vigilantes to stalk. He'd been a little caught off guard the first few times, but after a while it seemed Nightwing was happy to have someone to chat with. After Danny had phased the gun out of someone's hand, Nightwing had continued fighting without pause, but after all the thugs were tied up he'd put his hands on his hips and looked around for where Danny might be. "Thanks for the assist Casper!" Nightwing had called out. "I don't know if you're still here, but-"

Danny knocked over a tupperware container on the ground, and Nightwing relaxed. "Oh, sweet you’re here. That’s mildly terrifying actually,” He rambled. “You know, I have a few more places to patrol, wanna race?"

And since that time, Nightwing somehow roped him into a bunch of activities to keep his mind off Amity Park. Usually, Danny would find some subtle way to let the vigilantes know he was with one of them for the night, like tap them, or toss a rock in their direction. Physical contact wasn't usually received well, so he didn't do it often. He could tell it really unnerved Batman, but he also didn't follow Batman as much as the others. Danny was a bit intimidated. Okay, he was a lot intimidated.

Same with Robin. He hung around him a lot since the kid was fun to annoy, and he was worried about him going off on his own sometimes. The kid had said on numerous occasions that he was more than capable and did not need assistance from a mere ghost. Danny thought Robin and Batman were pretty similar.

So, Danny avoided touching the vigilantes as much as possible. Except for that time when Nightwing asked him to phase through him. That had been pretty funny. He'd then convinced Danny to do it to Red Robin when they met up with him, and then Robin when the kid showed up asking why they were meeting without him. Nightwing had laughed his ass off, Robin had threatened to exorcize him, and it was hard for Danny to keep quiet. It was times like those he’d go back to the pizzeria with a smile on his face.

From there, they'd sometimes give Danny little tasks to complete, like pass notes back and forth, -or in Nightwing’s case he passed jokes- check in on one of them, or to scope out a building and tell them how many people were inside by using rocks or tapping. It made him feel useful, and it reminded him of his friends back home. Like he was part of a team. It was nice.

Danny was less lonely at night with the vigilantes. He hardly slept in his dingy little crawl space, opting to spend his nighttime with the heroes and get an hour or so of sleep at school or the library. He still didn't need to eat as much as before the lab accident, so the snacks he got in the morning from Tim, lunch at school, and the meal he ate after the library was fine to keep him going. Danny could tell he was worrying Tim a bit, but he figured the guy was just being polite. Even though Danny didn’t need to eat much, he still ate the snacks Tim brought him, to reassure the shorter kid that he wasn’t starving himself. He'd spent a few more hours sleeping before school to make up for it, hoping his eye bags weren't as prominent as they had been lately. As a newly mutated Halfa, he didn’t need to sleep more than four hours a night usually, and if he was avoiding sleep due to nightmares, well, that was for him to know.

A month of doing his not-vigilante but kind of vigilante thing, he was finally getting some sort of rhythm. He'd received a message from Tucker not too long ago detailing that he, Sam Ellie, and Jazz were fine. None of the ghosts had been caught by the GIW and they'd been setting some traps for the guys in white and Danny's parents. He could tell Sam was having a bit of vindictive pleasure with setting the traps to slow them down. Danny was pretty sure he heard something about a scoreboard. Meanwhile, Jazz was still being monitored by the Fentons.The GIW had been told of Danny's ghost-possessing, and the city's police force was still poking their nose around. Tucker had said Vlad had been seen talking to the Fentons, so it was likely the fruitloop- and by proxy Skulker or Technus- would get involved. Technus would be bad for Danny, so Tucker said it might be a while until the next check in and promised to delete anything remotely close to their correspondence. Danny had given a short message in response and a good luck text.

Danny felt his core hum in dismay, fingers twitching with the need to help, but he knew he couldn't go back. He still hated that the three of them had to solve his problems for him but… Part of him was glad he wouldn't have to go back there. Even the thought of the Fenton's basement sent shivers down his spine. So he tried to keep his mind off things, going to school and the library, then supporting the vigilantes at night. Danny sighed, knowing it could always get worse, and that his situation was temporary. He was lucky that his parents hadn't shipped him off to the GIW the moment he’d shown them Phantom. Danny wasn't sure he'd have been able to count on Jazz to get him out if that had happened.

Everything changed when Danny ran into the Red Hood one night.

He'd been following Nightwing, who was heading towards an area they usually stayed away from, when Red Hood showed up with his guns drawn. "I assume there's a reason you're in my territory?"

Danny didn't follow along with their conversation much, too busy trying to figure out why his ghost sense was acting up. He floated around the two, and the closer he got to Red Hood, the more his ghost sense flared. Was Red Hood like him? He passed in front of the red helmet, waving his arms. Danny's arms dropped to his side when he realized Hood couldn't see him like other ghosts could when he was invisible. Soon, when Nightwing jumped gracefully to another roof, Danny decided to follow Red Hood.

Watching him after a while, Danny could tell the Red Hood knew he was there. Or at least, could sense his presence. Danny wasn't sure if Red Hood was a halfa like him, or some kind of meta. It was interesting, because while he couldn’t feel any kind of core, he could still sense ectoplasm on the guy. What caused it? Did Red Hood generate ectoplasm himself? Danny wasn’t sure, no matter how long he stared at him. Either way, he could feel some type of ectoplasm coming off of Hood in small waves. It felt a lot like the ring of rage, and Danny shivered at the memory.

Suddenly, Red Hood drew a gun and pointed it to where Danny's head was. Caught up in his own thoughts, Danny was so startled he'd accidentally dropped his invisibility, letting out a small squeak. "A kid?" He heard Hood mutter, before the guy went into interrogation mode. "Who are you and why have you been following me?"

Danny stared wide eyed, willing himself to respond. "Uh- you, um," Danny stammered, trying to figure out how to explain that Danny was following him because he was possibly a halfa or contaminated with ectoplasm. "You um, you feel like a ghost."

Red Hood froze, and Danny scrambled to explain, floating away from the gun and waving his hands in a panicked way. He made sure to give Hood his space and not look threatening, but he felt like he needed to explain. One of the vigilantes was like him, meaning there was a possibility that they were hiding from the GIW too. Was Red Hood in hiding already? Did he know about the GIW? "I- I mean usually I can sense when another ghost is close by, and you feel like a ghost does. Sort of. I was curious, so I m-may have followed you, but I’m on your side. Obviously, you can sense me or something and I can um, sense you so I mean, I was wondering why you feel like a ghost. Sort of."

"What do you mean sort of?" Red Hood grunted, cutting off Danny’s panicked rambling and holstering his gun, but not relaxing. The glowing green eyes of the ghost kid did nothing to reassure Jason of anything good. "And what the fuck do you mean about ghosts?"

Danny floated closer, squinting at Hood, and getting a feel for the ectoplasm inside him. It felt... corrupted in a way. Like the Ring of Rage."Oh, um. Well, I'm a ghost," Danny said, straightening himself. He didn't offer to shake hands, because he knew the other vigilante's didn't like it. He was way colder in his ghost form and it unsettled a lot of people. Tucker in particular hated it when he shoved his cold ghost hands under the geek’s shirt. "You can call me Phantom."

"Red Hood," The guy grunted, still suspicious, but Danny couldn't blame him. Meeting a ghost for the first time was always kinda disorienting.

"Right, explanation. So, I was haunting Nightwing- which, okay that sounds bad but he uh, he knows about it. Um, I mean he knows about me, sort of," Danny clarified, glancing at the Hood’s stiff posture." We race sometimes. And I don’t haunt him all the time. Um. Only when I see him on the roofs and stuff."

Red Hood crossed his arms, willing the kid- Was he a kid? He looked younger than the Replacement- to get on with the story. He was curious and on edge about how the ghost kid could tell he was.. not fully alive. And the fact that he could escape "Uh, right. So when he met with you I sort of sensed you were sort of like me, so I followed you because I was confused and worried about how you-"

"What do you mean like you?" Red Hood said, stepping forward menacingly, which didn't seem to phase the kid who was floating several feet in the air. Right, he was a ghost. How the heck would he be able to fight a ghost, he wondered. Maybe he’d call up Constantine after this. If he survived.

"I mean it feels like you have ectoplasm in you, but it’s… different. All ghosts and Halfas have a core, but… I don't think you have one," He muttered, squinting at Jason's chest. When he floated closer Jason just took a step back. Danny held up his hands in surrender, backing off before the gun-toting vigilante decided to shoot him. It was just intriguing to meet a sort-of halfa.

"A core?" Jason asked, staring at the kids glowing white hair that moved like he was underwater. He'd started to realize this was just a kid, probably just curious about why Jason felt similar to him. But where did Phantom come from? What was a ghost kid doing haunting Gotham of all places? Actually, Jason could think of a lot of reasons why someone would haunt Gotham. He figured he might as well get some useful information out of the kid, but it was unlikely that the kid meant any harm. Just…a curious kid, Jason decided. Still. It was weird.

"Right,"The kid said, putting a hand to his chin. Jason wondered if he'd ever had to explain this to anyone else before. Did the kid know any other ghosts like him? It was a sad thought. Was this kid all alone in his afterlife? Jason thought maybe Bruce would be happy to adopt a lonely ghost kid to forever haunt the manor. "Um, so every ghost has a core, it’s like their heart. Halfas are like ghosts, because they have a core, but they also have a heart, and stuff like that cuz they're half human. Cores are sustained by ectoplasm. You though, you don't have a core, so you aren't a halfa or a ghost, but you have ectoplasm. I'm not sure why."

Red Hood was silent for a moment before answering,"I do."

“You- you know how you got all that ectoplasm? Cause it's not the good kind," Danny asked with wide eyes, then wrinkled his nose. "It smells angry." He squinted, making Jason snort.

"Yeah." Hood grunted. That’s an understatement. "I died, but was brought back using the Lazarus pits. Basically a pit of toxic green water."

"Huh." Danny shifted, coming closer to examine the angry ectoplasm a bit more. He was in awe of how close Red Hood allowed him to get. He could see a bit of a green tinge in the air around Hood, and poked at it gently, making the Hood stiffen, but the vigilante didn’t move away."The green water- sludge, whatevers, we call it ectoplasm. It um. It can be other things, not just water, but yeah. The stuff around you sounds, and feels, like some form of corrupted ectoplasm. Usually it's all in the Ghost zone- a sort of different dimension for ghosts, but sometimes there's thin spots in the barrier between worlds so some ghosts or ectoplasm can get through."The ghost explained, then added with a thoughtful expression,"I'll have to talk to the ancients about those pits, probably not safe for humans to be falling into it all the time."

The last comment made Jason hum in agreement, silently reeling about a different realm filled with ghosts and lazarus energy, but wondered if giving this kid info about the pits was really a good idea or not. Red Hood kept an eye on the ghost kid the whole time, fingers itching for his guns while the kid scrutinized him. His nerves almost got the best of him a few times with the kid staring at him so intently. Maybe this was a bad idea. He could feel the kid’s presence, and if he was telling the truth then that meant the kid was also a part of the Lazarus pits in some way. His hand went for his gun, when the kid suddenly straightened up. "Well, since you're not a Halfa or anything, want me to get rid of it for you?"

"What," Jason snapped, narrowing his eyes. Get rid of the Pit rage? Could it be that easy? Why now of all times did this tiny ghost kid come along and try to fix all his problems? Was it a trap? Jason thought, considering.

"I mean, I've never done it before, but all ghosts can kind of control ectoplasm to an extent," Phantom said, holding his hand out, which was now glowing with green, as an example. Jason stared at the collection of green in the kid’s hand, and he felt… strangely at ease with it. Unlike the green from the pits, this was lighter somehow. Not angry. And a lighter green. "Mine is not corrupted though, so it probably feels different."

And it did. Jason didn't get that same feeling he got when he encountered anything pit-related. He could tell they were similar, but not. Phantom's green was.. calmer. "I can try to draw out the grumpy ectoplasm-"

“We are not calling it that,"Jason cut in, and the kid smirked at him in a way that reminded him of his brothers. Jason felt taken aback at how easy it was to banter with the weird ghost kid. He shrugged off the weird feelings and went back to business. "No. We’re not. What would you do with it when you have it all?"

That question seemed to stump the kid. Jason squined, half convinced the kid was going to do something dangerous with it but instead of that, the kid just looked as confused as Jason as he started to ramble. "I dunno. It probably would taste pretty gross, but I don’t have a portal to the zone to toss it into either. I mean maybe I could find a natural portal. Maybe put it in a jar? It might get out though. I guess I could freeze it? Ghost ice doesn't melt. You could keep it around as a paperweight or something." Phantom shrugged, and the idea thrown out there that his constant rage could be filtered out of his body to be made into a paperweight was so damn strange that Jason knew there was probably no way this was a trap. Phantom was just a well meaning, too curious, kind of dumb kid.

“A paperweight,”Jason deadpanned.

“I-I mean I can try to make it into a sculpture?” Phantom winced,”I’m not great at making anything other than spheres. I can try though? If you want a.. Prettier paperweight?”

Jason stared at the kid a moment in exasperation. “No. A sphere is. Fine.” Jason huffed. “So you’re taking the pit rage-”

“Grumpy ectoplasm,”Phantom cut in helpfully. Jason ignored him.

“-and freezing it in a sphere of ice that will never melt in order to contain it forever, and giving it to me as a paperweight,”Jason finished, trying to wrap his head around the ridiculousness of everything.

“Yea,” Phantom finger-gunned. Jason sighed.

"Alright,"Jason shrugged, opening his arms a bit. "Do your worst." He said before he had time to regret it. This was probably way against Bat protocol, especially since he didn’t know where the kid came from or anything about him, but Jason was curious. Plus, if Nightwing spent time racing the kid in his freetime then he couldn’t be too bad. Probably. And he may be getting his hopes up a bit. No way would Batman let him exchange trauma for a paperweight in an alley with the ghost of a child. Batman never let him do anything fun.

"Nice! Okay hold still-"Phantom said, dropping to stand the ground, which surprised Jason because he could see the kid actually had legs now. Seeing legs instead of weird wisps of a tail was strange, but oddly made sense, and he noticed the kid was wearing some sort of hazmat suit with absolutely zero protection. He watched with suspicion as he held his palms out to Jason, but not touching, and closed his eyes. The kid took a breath- do ghosts breathe?- before Jason started to see this dark green mist start to waft off of him and collect vaguely in the kid's hands.

Jason startled, about to move away when he felt a weight lift off his shoulders. He felt... lighter. The green haze that seemed to always be at the edge of his vision receded, and Jason almost felt... relieved. He didn't realize how suffocating all that rage was until it was gone. It very nearly drove him to tears. For the first time in forever he just felt… calm. Like he was taking a breath of fresh air after a lifetime of pollution.

"Aaand done!" Phantom exclaimed,and Jason had a feeling that Phantom would be doing jazz hands if he wasn’t holding.. Something. The kid was holding a menacing swirling mist of green in between his hands like a giant marble. He focused again for a moment before Jason felt a chill to the air, and suddenly there was a blue sphere in the kids hands, the inside a swirly green color suspense within the sparkling ice.

"Here,"Phantom offered, giving him the sphere of Jason's pit rage before the vigilante could say anything. Jason looked at it a few moments with apprehension before shrugging. He'd have a breakdown about this later, he was sure, and pocketed the now paperweight in one of his pouches. The weight of it was not comforting in the least, and part of him wanted to throw it into the harbor as soon as he got a chance. He didn’t though. Yet. "I think I got all of it, but if you start feeling it again come find me. I’ll probably be around Nightwing or something. You feel okay, right?"

Pushing aside Jason's questions of how the hell was he supposed to find an invisible ghost kid in Gotham of all places, he nodded. "Y-yeah. Thanks."

"No problem," Phantom waved, once again floating into the air, only this time sitting criss-cross applesauce. Jason sort of thought he might be dreaming. Might as well try to get some answers though, he thought. “And it won’t melt or break. Unless, like, I get killed as a ghost or something but it might not melt at that either.”

"Why would you help me? Why would you tell me about any of this at all?" Jason asked, leaning against the wall. He felt exhausted all of a sudden, and elected to ignore Phantom’s comment about something possibly killing him as a ghost. Whether it be from the emotional whiplash or from having ecto-whatever pulled from his body, he didn't know. Still, he didn’t regret letting the kid turn his trauma into a paperweight. He had a passing thought about whether this meant he’d die without the ectoplasm, but honestly didn’t care over the relief of it being gone for good.

"’Cause you seemed like you needed help. And I didn't have any when I became,"Phantom trailed off, and Jason winced when he gestured to himself. "It can be scary,"He continued in a softer tone. "Having to get used to new powers and stuff."

Jason shivered, and felt a pang in his chest that the kid had probably died at that age. Phantom looked younger than Tim, who was fifteen. "You mentioned Halfas? Are they common?" Jason asked, suddenly aware of a possible new threat. People who were more half-dead than Jason and possibly had powers like the ghost in front of him. "How come I haven't heard of them or ghosts like you before?"

"Nah," Phantom said, still quiet. "There's only three Halfas that I know of. And you probably wouldn't know about any of us, since we're all usually in hiding." Especially right now, Danny thought.

"Why? Wouldn't halfas be like metas? They’d have protection." Jason asked, and Phantom could hear concern and confusion in his voice, despite the voice modifier.

Phantom shook his head, white hair swishing gently in the ghostly atmosphere, and Jason noticed pointy ears."Halfas fall under the Anti-ecto Acts according to your government. Anything with ectoplasm isn't classified as human, or sentient, and the Ghost Investigation Ward is able to hunt down and experiment on them,"The ghost shivered. "That's why I was confused about you. And worried, cause exposure to ectoplasm isn’t usually planned and can be difficult to get used to without help from a ghost.. I wasn't sure if you'd be at risk if the GIW found out about you. They have… sort of a way to track ectoplasm. If they knew about you they’d…" Phantom trailed off, but Jason got the picture.

"Oh,"Jason breathed. This went a hell of a lot deeper than he thought it did. And Jason could have just been taken and experimented on at any point before this and it would be legally allowed? Yikes. He needed to do more research on this for sure. "You mentioned a ghost zone?"

"Oh, yeah," Phantom waved nonchalantly. "It’s also called the Infinite Realms. Houses all the ghosts, ruled by the ghost king, blah, blah. It's been a while since I've been back, but the whole thing is made up of ectoplasm. Usually there’s weak spots that can act as a portal between the two worlds, but some ghosts have the ability to create portals. As far as I know only three ghosts in the Zone where I’m from can do that. There’s also man-made portals, where people from this realm sort of…poke holes? Into the Ghost Zone. It’s usually a pretty bad idea."Phantom added, rubbing the back of his neck. "Some ghosts can be kinda dangerous. Or ghosts who want to be left alone fall through and get trapped here. They all have their own obsessions to follow and sometimes humans can get hurt. Or the ghost hunters take the ghosts for experiments, try to kill them, stuff like that."

Jason thought for a moment, letting the info-dump process in his mind a bit before a thought came to mind. "Do you know where the Halfas are? How did they become half-ghosts?" He asked, to which Phantom inclined his head, but said nothing.

"If they're hiding from this shady government organization, I can help,"Jason argued, and Phantom shook his head stiffly. "Isn't there anything you can tell me about them?"

"If you go after the GIW, you might not come back,"Phantom warned. "They don't just exterminate ghosts, they use them to make weapons or power sources. It's dangerous, and they don't know halfas exist yet." Danny hoped so at least. His own parents thought he was just being possessed by Phantom, so there was a good chance they weren't aware of them yet. "I'd like to keep it that way. It’s safer for them if no one knows they exist. They know how to hide. They have protection. They’ll be fine."

Hood sighed, feeling the weight of his rage in his pocket. He was sure he’d have his gun out at this point if he’d still had all that rage inside him. Now he just felt kind of exhausted. He’d look into this shady organization no matter what the kid said though. Even if there were only three half-humans out there, they didn’t deserve to be hunted. Hell, even ghosts like this kid didn’t deserve to be hunted. Maybe if the Bats could get into contact with the ghost king then they can come up with some sort of truce between both realms.

”Alright. Fine,"Jason grumbled. "I'll look into it and see if I can't get it shut down.” Phantom froze up, so Jason quickly added,”Don't worry, I won't mention any of your secrets to anyone. I won't pry about the halfas either,"He sighed again, thinking of how this was probably a job for Batman. It's possible Tim already is semi-aware of it at least, Jason figured.

Jason wondered if Phantom in Gotham meant one or more of the halfas were hiding here, and he was just keeping an eye out for them. Was the kid protecting the halfa’s here? Were there other ghosts around doing the same? It seemed like something the kid might do. "Just, keep the halfas and ghosts safe, and stay out of trouble."

"Aye aye," Phantom saluted, before disappearing into the night. Jason paused, no longer able to feel the ghost's presence when he went invisible. Jason reached into his pocket, feeling the smooth cold surface of the pit rage.

What a weird night, he thought.

Chapter 3

#dpxdc #dcxdp #phantom in gotham #pog #Danny Phantom #tim drake #jason todd

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argentumcor · 3 months

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A flare-up of Arkham Trilogy fandom has been triggered, and so I spent entirely too much money on the Arkham Knight Genesis comic. Art is nice, writing is pretty good. I'm not a comic person, and find most comics to have ugly art these days, but this one (and Soulfinder from Iconic Comics) impressed me.

I always liked this version of Jason coming back best since I heard of the character. A plot device like a Lazarus Pit needs to be kept to a minimum because otherwise it just breaks everything and the Arkham version where the Pits are nearly exhausted and restricted to the Ra's plots is the best way to approach them. Jason being crazy because of torture and not mystical woo-woo side effects offers more interesting directions to go in to me, problems that can't be easily solved because they are choices he made while at least somewhat in possession of his faculties.

Man, I thought the backstory I cooked up for Arkham's Jason was dark but the canon one is darker. I had it where he never knew his dad and his mom was an addict who OD'd when he was young, but in the comic both parents are meth addicts who tried to sell him to the mob to pay their debts, which didn't work because that's nuts even in Gotham, and so abused him until he was thirteen, when Jason sold them out to the mob and watched them get killed in exchange for getting a small bit of turf where he was left alone to do small time crime.

I always liked the version of him meeting Batman by trying and semi-succeeding at stealing the wheels off the Batmobile, but the Arkham version where he saves Batman's life during a tussle with the Joker is a better fit for this universe.

There's conflict between the game City Stories version of how he got caught and the comic one. The game one is much darker, from what drove Jason after Joker (horrible murder and mutilation of children at a school in the game vs. pride I think in the comic) to the actual getting caught (Jason's hubris and sense of righteousness making him very stupid in the game vs. purely a trap the Joker laid in the comic). The game lore version of events is better, though harder to depict I think in the pages the comic had for various reasons.

One thing stands out about Arkham Jason: everyone in his life had given up on him from the moment he was born...except Bruce and the family. Bruce met him for only a few minutes at most and saw that Jason could be more than just another doomed rat in the dirty alleys of the city, wanted in some way to be more (Arkham Knight Jason disputes this in narration but it's clear from what happened that's the case). But a lifetime of being given up on doesn't just vanish in a year-ish of being really valued- and Joker brilliantly weaponized it against Jason and in doing so against Batman.

The comic is from Jason's bitter angry broken pre-Arkham Knight POV but there are hints that the darkness hasn't consumed him. I think Dick naming Tim as his brother in a fight hurt him- because I think they would have had that bond before Jason was taken and 'Tim as my replacement' is a big thing for Jason. He's ruthless, yes, and apathetic to the world around him but he sees that Bruce has a memorial to him in the Batcave and it triggers really intense emotions- anger because that's almost all he has anymore and then something else he can't and refuses to even try to process.

That's why, I think, Bruce extending a hand to Jason at the end of the boss fight destroyed the Arkham Knight. I also think that getting Gotham to evacuate civilians was Jason's idea. There's no logic to it from Scarecrow's POV; more people in the city would mean more fear to, uh, imbibe. It's not that Jason is worried about collateral damage, exactly, it's that he isn't totally gone. You can see that in the game audio logs. I wish we would have gotten an encounter with him and Dick, either as the Knight or as Red Hood. I think the rivalry there with Tim is built in as a matter of history and personality but with Dick there's a brotherhood that got broken through no fault of their own.

The Red Hood smart-assery is also present in the narration in the comic. I think it was there with the Arkham Knight, too, here and there, but he's on the furious hunt in most of what you hear from him so there isn't a lot of room for it.

#arkhamverse #arkham knight #jason todd

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mutable-manifestation · 2 years

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Part 2 of The Gotham Puddle Boy: Danny Fenton

Danny wasn't too concerned about getting in a car with a stranger in what may well be the crime capital of the world.

If he got weirdo - or Dash-like - vibes he could just slip out of sight and vanish into the wind. Being half ghost made a lot of human dangers less so.

Plus, perks of being a Fenton: riding in the car with a stranger wouldn't make him nervous about their driving. No one in the world was worse at it than his dad.

So a few minutes of trading jokes and a promise of video games was all it really took to get Danny to say "sure" to going back to Tim's house.

The car was nice, at least, and they bantered over music even as they left city limits, which Danny chose to ignore for the time being.

Around 10 minutes later they turned to approach the gates of a veritable mansion that unfortunately brought forth the memory of his first time approaching Vlad's house.

He was silent as Tim buzzed them in, and as they crawled slowly up the driveway he took the opportunity to ask.

"You live here?”

“Yep! Bruce Wayne is my adoptive father. Welcome to Wayne Manor!"

Not long after the building’s front door was opening before they could touch the handle, with an older man in a suit greeting them. "Master Tim, welcome home. I see you've brought a guest."

A hand clapped down on his shoulder as he was introduced, "Danny this is Alfred, Alfred this is Danny. We'll be in my room playing Damned."

"It is a pleasure to meet a friend of Tim, Mister Danny."

"Ah, you too. And just Danny is fine, Mister Alfred."

Alfred smiled and secured a promise that they'd be down to at least stretch their legs and eat something after an hour had passed before Tim was ushering them through the building to his room.

Sam was a good person, but also openly hated rich people despite technically being one. Her parents, however, were a nightmare hidden behind a thin facade of civility when in public. Vlad was also a nightmare. Axion labs had been run by some tycoon and they killed their innocent dogs. Lex Luthor openly hated Superman - which would be totally understandable if it were because he never so much as glanced at Amity Park’s issues instead of because of his incredibly Xenophobic stance on any and all non-humans. All told, Danny didn’t have a good track record with -illionaires - not the adults, at least.

'...Okay, maybe I should just avoid Bruce,' he thought, settling on the floor at the foot of the bed in the enormous room they'd entered to face the gloriously massive TV while Tim booted it up.

An hour later, Alfred was knocking on the door to herd them to the dining room where he'd prepared "refreshments." It was nice to enjoy homemade food that didn't fight back for once - he hadn't eaten at Sam or Tucker's house in a while and takeout wasn't quite the same. Even if they were unfortunately healthy snacks - the strange slices he'd learned were apricot were surprisingly good.

Alfred had them stretch their legs again two hours later - this time snackless - and Tim decided to give him a tour. The house was immaculate and the kitchen would have made the Lunch Lady greener than normal with envy.

It was also empty.

"Don't you have a bunch of siblings?" he asked on the way back to the room.

"Yeah, but they're all out doing their own things until lunch." He stopped just after closing the door behind him to grin at him. "Speaking of which. Can you stay for lunch?"

Danny blinked at the sudden manic energy starkly contrasting with the incredibly normal question.

"Uh, I don't have to be back at the hotel until like 5, so, sure?"

"How do you feel about playing a little prank?"

Danny grinned, "What did you have in mind?"

---------------------------------

POV Jason

Jason’s patience was running incredibly thin. He had been looking at tubes of water for hours while Bruce kept asking variations of the same question. His only consolation was that Duke took up half of the attention or he might have punched him by now.

The only reason he even showed up was that he’d been told there was potential Lazarus water in Gotham - or something similar. But after hours upon hours of tests by the computer and him and Duke staring at it he was certain; that was water. Bruce had lost it.

Just as he braced himself to try and knock some sense into Bruce, Alfred came to fetch them to lunch.

‘Finally,’ he thought, power-walking to the exit.

“I’ll be up in a minute, I want to set up one more scan to run while we’re eating,” Bruce threw after them.

“It had better only be a minute.” He paused to glower ominously over his shoulder, simmering with rage at all of the wasted time - and using that to smother the concern trying to bubble up.

“Finally,” Duke said once they were out of the batcave. “I thought we were going to be in there forever!”

Jason ignored him as he fished out his phone.

“Oh hey, group text from Tim; he has a guest that fits the family theme so he’s going to try and prank Bruce to see if he’s actually ‘lost the plot.’”

Jason grimaced, “Great, so instead of a productive lunch we’ll be playing house plus ‘guest that definitely isn’t the former Jason Todd, just a very similarly looking friend of the family’ for an hour.” He ran a hand down his face, sighing in frustration. “Count me ou-”

He froze in place, every muscle flinching to a stop.

“Uh, Jason?”

“Quiet.” He hissed, eyes darting to the stairs as voices began to drift their way.

Every hair stood on end as he stood there, something in his blood echoing dissonant signals of danger-run-hide-flee-don’t move-stay still-stop-stop-stop even as his conscious mind demanded he confront the problem head-on. But he couldn’t move - frozen as surely as if he’d been hit by one of Freeze’s ice rays.

As the stranger came into view his mind gave up on the danger signals, finally settling on don’t move don’t move don’t move even as near-unbearable levels of anxiety bubbled up in his gut. He barely registered Tim standing next to the guy as his head turned to stare him down, Jason’s eyes widening and shoulders hunching now that this… person’s full attention was on him.

The person hesitated a moment at the top of the stairs before smiling.

“Hi! I’m Danny, you must be Tim’s brothers?” he chirped, voice friendly enough that the anxiety uncurled just a bit. Just enough for Jason to register Tim staring at him oddly and Duke looking between the two of them.

Tim descended the stairs, done waiting for “Danny” to take the initiative, perhaps, while Duke took his silence as a cue to give the guy his cover story.

“Just me, actually,” he said. “The name’s Duke. J here is a friend of the family.”

“Oh, uh, nice to meet you both anyway. Sorry for crashing you guys’ lunch,” he rubbed a hand over the back of his neck sheepishly before following Tim down to their level, still smiling calmly. “My parents are in town for some engineering convention and Tim kind of rescued me from dying of boredom.”

Abruptly, Jason found himself completely calm - relaxed, even. Suspiciously so; all of the rage and frustration he’d felt ever since emerging from the Lazarus Pit was suddenly swapped out for a level of relaxation he could nearly call “Zen.”

He would nearly suspect a meta had broken Bruce’s rules, but he was the only one to react. Tim and Duke were clearly unaffected and the guy was either one hell of an actor or had genuinely only noticed him when he saw him.

Meaning this was potentially Lazarus related - and even that thought could not cut through the sheer tranquility he was feeling to cause panic. His thoughts, at least, were unaffected.

Also, he kind of just wanted to enjoy not being angry for the first time in ages. Sue him.

So he plastered on a Wayne-family PR smile and ended the second awkward silence of the day.

“Don’t worry about it; any friend of Tim’s is a friend of ours, at any rate. We have maybe two more minutes before Alfred actually manages to wrangle Bruce out of his study, why don’t you fill me in on this prank.”

#I guess there will be a part 3 too #Not me rapidly spiraling out of control #and writing way more than intended #oop #Also not me just stealing various headcannons I've seen other people post for the crossover for myself #Danny's one braincell is dedicated to suspecting rich people of doing something fishy #The Justice League doesn't know about Amity bc the first message got dismissed as a prank #And the GIW suppressed info after that #up until Amity tech upgraded in a weird & self-isolating manner bc of changes made to avoid being hacked by Technus #They don’t assume he’s a meta bc Batman tracks all the registered metas #or something #he has a system #and he has a no metas in Gotham rule and fought Superman once so people tend to respect that #Also they’re all incredibly sleep deprived at this point so #Jason is liminal not a halfa #but like if he were a halfa he’d only be strong enough to turn into a blob ghost #Yes I gave Jason blob ghost instincts #very small therefore very angry at everything ever #(I know the feeling)#also very scared of stronger ghosts (read: all of them)#until proven friendly #because then hey free friend/safety #ghosts eat other ghosts but only when hostilely territorial/power hunger not bc they actually need to eat au #but blob ghosts don't have lairs so they tend to wander/be more at risk until a ghost with a layer adopts them #at which point they're kind of like guard blobs #intruder alert system blob ghosts #anyway #dp x dc crossover #danny phantom au #dp x dc crossovers are my only source of knowledge on dcu characters outside of like

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demons2003 · 11 months

Text

My Boys (Chapter 54)

Series List

Eddie's pov

I place my stuff at the table while my group follows in behind me. I look around at the cafeteria and notice that almost everyone was in there for once. I look around, trying to find Y/n but didn't have any luck until the door swings open. I look to the door and watch as Y/n walks in and the whole basketball team starts to whistle and clap at her. She rolls her eyes at them and throws them a middle finger while walking away. I try to listen to the things they yell out but Gareth throws a magazine in my face. I glare at him while he puts his hands up and says, "Look at page 99. Read it out loud." I continue to glare at him but pick up the magazine anyway, quickly having a read and smiling at it.

"The Devil has come to America. Dungeons and Dragons, at first regarded as a harmless game of make-believe, now has both parents and psychologists concerned. Studies have linked violent behaviour to the game, saying it promotes satanic worship, ritual sacrifice, sodomy, suicide and even... murder, " I dramatically read out to the guys who are at my table, all of us breaking out in laughter. "Oh that's a good one," Jeff laughs while I cross my arms over my chest. We all nod and slowly stop laughing. "I mean, how is a game supposed to be responsible for all of that?" Gareth questions, looking at us all as if we have an answer. As Greg goes to answer, two of our little sheep slam their food trays down to sit. "Society has to blame something. We're an easy target," Greg says. "Exactly. We're the freaks because we like to play a fantasy game," I explain, before slamming my hands on the table, climbing on top and continuing very loudly. "But as long as you're into band, or science... or parties or a game where you toss balls into laundry baskets..." I yell at all the tables, ending with looking right at Jason. Someone in the background yells out loser while Jason stands up and yells, "You want something freak?" I laugh at him a little and do a little devil pose, poking my tongue out in the process and making a funny noise at him. The boys at my table laugh and I watch Jason turn around and whisper something.

I smirk and turn around, walking back along the table and explain, "It's forced conforming. That's what's... killing the kids!" I yell, and jump off the table, scaring the girls that are walking past. The guys continue to laugh at me while I let a few girls walk past me, stopping and bowing slightly. "That's the real monster," I finish, sitting back in my chair and looking at the magazine again. It is really weird that they think a game would be the reason people commit suicide. I mean, people like Jason are the real reason for that, why blame a bunch of nerds for the jock's crimes.

"So, uh, speaking of monster," Dustin says, causing me to look up at him and pop a pretzel in my mouth. "Uh, Lucas has to do his, uh, balls in laundry baskets game," Dustin explains to me but I just stare him down, wondering where he is going with this. "So...he's not gonna be able to make it to Hellfire tonight," Dustin explains to me, chuckling nervously and giving me weird looks. "And I know there's no way we can beat your sadistic campaign without him. So, me and Mike, we were talking, shooting the shit, and we were thinking that maybe we might..." Dustin tries to explain to me. I slowly get a little angry as he goes but really get angry when Mike finishes Dustin's sentence with, "Postpone." The other guys yell at the two of them. They all continue to yell at each other until I yell, "Shut up!" Everyone spots yelling and looks at me. "You saying Sinclair's been taken in by the dark side?" I ask the two younger boys. "Uh, something like that," Mike says. "Something like that?" I snap and through a pretzel at them. "Jesus Christ," Dustin squeaks. "And rather than find a sub for him, you want... you want to postpone 'The Cult of Vecna'?" I ask them both, confused by the whole thing.

"I...I don't want to postpone it. We don't want to postpone it. It's just that, you know, most of the subs will be at the championship game." Mike tries to defend while I slowly get up and walk a little to the window. "Oh, it's the championship game?" I turn and sarcastically ask. "Yeah," Mike says, not knowing if I'm being serious or not. "Can I level with you?" I ask them, trying to be a little less mean and moving slowly around the table. "Jeff graduates this year. Gareth's got, what? A year and a half? Me, I am army-crawling my way towards a D in Ms O'Donnell's. If I don't blow her final, I'm gonna walk that stage next month, I'm gonna look Principal Higgins dead in the eye, and I'm gonna flip him the bird, I'm gonna snatch that diploma. I'm gonna run like hell outta here." I tell them, looking over at them both, both of them laughing at me. I start walking a little away from the table but walk back when I hear voices talking to me. "Didn't you say that last year?" Gareth asks. "And the year before?" Jeff adds. "Yeah, yeah and I was full of shit. This year's different. This is my year. I can feel it. '86, baby." I look over at Y/n and give her a soft smile. She looks sadly at me and turns to Robin, whispering something and running off. Robin looks confused at her and starts to follow behind her after a few seconds.

"You know what that means?" I focus back on the boys, trying to get back on track. Before I can say anything more, a loud bang rings throughout the cafeteria. I look over to the nose and see that Jason has pulled Y/n close to him and they are whispering to each other. I roll my eyes at the display and Y/n punches Jason in the face. I laugh but Jason lunges at Y/n and pushes her against the wall. Her head bounces off the wall but she doesn't lose the sharp look in her eye. Jason leans into her and whispers something to her. I hear movement next to me and look over to see Mike holding Dustin back from walking over to them. "Dude, she said to stay away from her. Just ignore it," Mike whispers to him. Dustin shakes his head and sadly whispers, "But I have to protect her." I look confused at them while hearing, "Come on man, she's already said no, leave her alone," I turn back to find Sinclair moving towards the two of them. "Stay out of this little boy." Y/n snaps at him. Why is she being so rude to the boys? And why the hell is she keeping them away from her? And why is Dustin so protective of Y/n? She's way too old for him. Jason starts to push harder on Y/n shoulder but she just stares off into the distance, pain written all over her face.

As I go to step towards her, Robin comes up behind Jason and wacks him over the head, causing him to let Y/n go and falling over. Robin moves in front of Y/n and whispers to her before taking her out of the cafeteria. The basketball team all surround Jason and everyone looks away from the scene. "See? She's all good," I hear Mike whisper to Dustin, who finally calms down and sits back in his seat. I turn back to the two of them and ask again, "You know what us graduating means?"

They shake their heads and I explain, "It means you boys, are the future of Hellfire." I move to lean in between them both, putting a hand on each of their shoulders. "I knew it the moment I saw you. You sat on that table right over there, looking like... looking like two little lost sheep. You were wearing a Weird Al T-shirt, which I thought was brave." I tell Dusting, remembering the second time I saw the boys. "Thank you," Dustin whispers, looking away from me. "Mike, you were wearing whatever shit your mummy bought you from the goddamn Gap." Everyone laughs at my statement while I think of my next move.

Without another word, I grab onto the boy's shoulders and pull them up from their seats. I push them so they are facing the door to the cafeteria. "And we showed you that school didn't have to be the worst years of your lives, right?" I continue to ask the two boys. "No," They both whisper. "Okay, no, no. Well, I'm here to tell you that there are other little lost sheepies out there who need help. Who needs you." I tell them before spinning them to face me while saying, "And all you guys gotta do is get your Bo-Peeps on and go and find one." I snap and push the boys towards the cafeteria area.

They both run off and I sit down at the head of the table again. "You ok man?" Gareth asks me. I look up at him while shoving another pretzel in my mouth. "I'm fine. Why?" I slightly snap at him. He puts his hands up in defence and says, "You looked like you were gonna help that L/n chick. Making sure you were telling us everything." I laugh at him and look at the magazine while eating more pretzels. "Nah, just didn't think it should get out of control," I whisper, not looking up at the boys for the rest of the day.

#5 seasons #eddie munson #steve harrington #eddie x reader #steve x reader #eddie munson x reader #steve harrington x reader #robin x reader #steddie #stranger things #steve harrington x eddie munson #steve x eddie #steve x reader x eddie

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mischiefandspirits · 3 years

Text

Bernard Figures It Out

Was reading through all the comments on @frostbittenbucky's post and all I could think of was that it was Bernard talking to Tim. Then I got to thinking...

"I've connected the two dots."

"You didn't connect shit."

"I've connected them."

Bernard figures out Tim's a superhero... sort of.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tim fidgetted nervously as he waited on the front porch of his boyfriend’s house. Bernard had sounded so serious when he’d called during Tim’s lunch to ask him to come over after work so they could talk about something.

Which Tim had done, after spending an entire board meeting just going over the past week trying to figure out what he’d done.

The only thing he could think of was that he’d ducked out halfway through their lunch date on Wednesday to give Duke some backup, but Bernard had seemed understanding when Tim explained there was an emergency at GRC Labs. It couldn’t have been a tipping point, either, since Tim had managed to only flake on three other dates over the past few months they’d been dating. Kate had been happy to cover for him as often as she could “out of queer solidarity” when she found out Tim was dating a boy for the first time and Tim had managed to trick Bruce into covering a few actual Wayne Enterprises emergencies for him when they came up.

There had to be a reason Bernard was breaking up with him, though. Had he missed something? He definitely wasn’t forgetting an important day. He was good with days and Tam was even better, so she would have reminded him on the off chance that he had forgotten.

What was he missing?

Bernard was smiling when he opened the door, but there was a nervous energy to it that had Tim’s stomach sinking. “Hey, Tim.”

“Hey.” Tim gave his own nervous smile then slipped inside.

They went into the living room and sat down on the couch.

Tim frowned when Bernard grabbed a manila folder off the coffee table. Crud, had he screwed up enough that Bernard had had to make a list? He knew he was new to dating a guy, but he hadn’t thought he’d done that bad. He’d really been trying, especially with how his and Stephanie’s relationship had fallen apart at the end. “What -”

“Just let me speak, Tim,” Bernard said, waiting for Tim’s nod. “Okay, so you know Clark Kent, right?”

Tim blinked as Bernard opened the folder to show a picture of Clark. It looked like one of the employee pictures from the Planet’s website, with his dorky “I’m just a humble country boy” smile and the golden globe from their roof photoshopped in as the background. “Uh, yeah? I think so. He works for the Daily Planet, right? I think he’s worked at a few of Bruce’s events. Not a lot of outside reporters are willing to come to Gotham.”

“Exactly!” Bernard said, snapping his fingers and pointing at Tim.

“What?”

He pulled out the picture to show the next page was an article titled, “DAILY PLANET REPORTER… BATMAN!?”

A wave of relief washed over Tim and he placed his face in his hands. “Were you up all night on the hero conspiracy boards again?”

“No. I mean, I found this on a board and was up all night thinking about it, but I found it reasonably early.”

“One in the morning isn’t reasonable, Bernard.”

“Says the guy who’s always wide awake when I call to infodump.”

“Touché.” Tim leaned against Bernard and gave him a smile. “So tell me, why is some reporter from Metropolis from all places Batman.”

“First of all, living in Metropolis is the perfect cover. Everyone assumes Batman would live in Gotham, no one would consider he could be from anywhere else. Metropolis is outside the GMA, but close enough that the commute is still possible.”

“But it’s Metropolis.”

“And who would think Gotham’s Dark Knight lives in the sunshine capital? Plus, I hear he disappears a lot on the job. There’s gotta be a reason for it!”

Tim made a note to let Clark know he needs to cut back on the disappearing act some since people are catching on.

“And have you seen the guy? He is swol AF, babe.”

“Please don’t call me babe while you’re talking about how hot another guy is.” Especially Tim’s honorary uncle.

“You know I prefer twinks.”

“BERNARD!”

“I’m just saying,” he continued, ignoring Tim’s shout. “The guy is definitely hiding something! Besides, Kent is an investigative reporter. He’s gotta know a lot about cases and the underground and detective work.”

Not as much as he likes people to think, but more than he likes people to know Superman does, Tim mused. “But what about the other vigilantes?”

“Well, Kent has a cousin…” Bernard flipped through a folder and pulled out a picture of Kara. It looked like a screenshot of her interviewing Lena for CatCo. “She’s obviously the latest Batgirl. Look at her hair. And the first Batgirl and the current Batwoman were obviously Lois Lane, the red hair is just a wig. Did you see how she kicked butt at that last event she went to? She’s not as subtle as Kent. That means their son is the latest Robin. He’s exactly the right size.”

Oh, Damian better not hear about this, Tim cackled internally. His youngest brother hated being reminded that Jon was the same height as him despite their two years age difference. Damian definitely took after Talia when it came to body type, no matter what he said.

“And Kent also has a brother.” This time he pulled out a picture of Kon. The clone must have been caught by a reporter out shopping with Ma since he was carrying some paper bags and glaring at whoever was behind the camera. “At least, he’s supposedly Kent’s brother, but he was a teenager when he first showed up with the Kents. A lot of people think he’s actually Kent’s son, that Kent got a girl pregnant when they were teenagers and something happened to the mom so Kent had to take him in. Now the Kents are trying to hide it by saying the two are brothers.”

That was… scarily accurate actually. Especially given Luthor and Clark were close friends at the time that Kon would have theoretically been born.

“And that beef would explain why the younger Kent brother went all crime lord on Gotham for a while before reconnecting with the family.”

“Wait, what?”

“Yeah, Kent Jr.’s got the perfect build for Red Hood.”

Tim bit back a comment on how Kon was shorter than Jason by a good foot. Timothy Drake-Wayne should not know that. Add Jason to the list of people who can’t hear this theory.

“And then there’s this girl,” Bernard picked up a picture of Lois, Jon, and Natasha Irons walking down the street together. “No one’s sure exactly who she is, but she’s been spotted with the Kents a few times. I think the cover story is that she’s Jon’s babysitter.”

“And the actual story?”

“She’s Black Bat, obviously. That’s why she wears a mask that fully covers her face. She doesn’t want to stand out as the only African American Bat.”

“Isn’t Signal also Black?”

“Yeah, but he works in the daytime so he’s already a standout.”

“And who is Signal in this? And what about Nightwing and Red Robin?”

“Well, Nightwing’s just a Blüd who came to Gotham. He doesn’t count.”

Ouch. Sorry, Dick.

“And Red Robin is obviously an older Robin, the one who was Robin when we were kids. Kent wanted to keep him on, and I don’t blame him. As for Signal, he’s got the same backstory as all the other Robins Kent picked up, he just went the Signal route because he didn’t fit the usual Robin mold.”

“Because the female Robin fit the mold,” Tim snorted. Robin Mold, as if he and his brothers were even the same ethnicity. Or even had the same hair color. Jason dyes his hair, Dick’s is brown-black, Tim’s is pure black, and Damian’s is more a dark brown and it’s only getting lighter as he gets older.

“She didn’t, that’s the point. Kent tried to give breaking the Robin mold a chance by letting his cousin have a go at it, but he realized it just didn’t work so she went back to being Spoiler and he got a new Robin.”

Not touching that with a ten-foot pole. “Right, and where does he get the usual Robins? Please tell me you’re not back on the secret government orphanages theory.”

“No, no, no. Kent travels sometimes for his job, right? And a lot of the time he’s going to places that have been hit by disasters or major crimes. So he’ll take in some of the displaced children to train as his robins.”

Tim pressed his face back into his hands.

“You see it, right?”

Honestly, Tim was just wondering how his boyfriend could be so close, and yet so far off. “How would Kent even afford taking care of a bunch of secret -- possibly illegally acquired -- children without anyone noticing?”

“Simple. Bruce Wayne is funding him.”

“Bernard, I love you, but what the heck?” Tim blushed and looked up as he realized what he’d said, but Bernard didn’t seem to notice as he steamrolled ahead.

“It’d also explain how he can afford all the gear and how he’d be able to travel to Gotham or anywhere else Batman goes without anyone noticing. He probably has a secret Batplane or something.”

“Why would Bruce do that?”

“Because Wayne cares about Gotham, everyone knows that, and this way he can make sure someone’s taking care of the city without anyone putting two and two together.”

“And two plus two is?”

Bernard gave him a hard look. “I’m not stupid, Tim. Bruce Wayne is obviously Superman. His face is right there.”

Oh, the others are going to love this! Too bad I can’t tell Damian or Jason. Jason especially would have loved this. “Right. Bruce is Superman.”

“He is. Superman is known for being nice and Bruce Wayne’s basically all that’s keeping the city running at this point. That’s nice as hell.”

Oh my god.

“And Wayne does charity for the victims of cataclysms, doesn't he? I bet he first saves people from them as Superman and then builds them new homes for free.”

Oh my god! Why am I not recording this!?

“And the Wayne’s were rich enough to hide the fact they adopted an alien baby.”

Tim raised an eyebrow. “If you’re about to tell me this is why Bruce’s parents got killed, you might want to stop while you’re ahead.”

“It’d make sense. There’re all sorts of unanswered questions about their deaths,” Bernard muttered under his breath, flipping through the folder. He pulled out another picture of Kara. This time she was in full Supergirl attire with a bus held overhead. “So if Wayne is Superman, then that’d mean your ex-girlfriend could be Supergirl. They look a lot alike and it’d explain how she got involved with you all.”

“Bernard, she has a human dad. You know, Cluemaster. The supervillain.”

“Yeah, her dad. But we don’t know anything about her mom!”

“Let me guess…”

Bernard pulled out a picture of Karen. She and Helena were suited up and talking to a group of cops, two goons held over each of Karen’s shoulders. “Her mom could be Power Girl! Some makeup and a wig and she could look just like Crystal Brown! And Damian Wayne is obviously the new Superboy! That’s why his background is such a mystery, right? He had to stay a secret until he could control his alien superpowers. That’s why he’s always so mean. It’s a cover since everyone knows Superboy is super sweet!”

Sure, when he’s not helping Damian pull pranks or using his adorable powers to put the blame on Kon and I. “No, Bernard. Damian and Steph are just very human hellspawn. And Bruce and Crystal are human too. I can’t believe you called me over here just to tell me you think Superman is both Batman’s sugar daddy and my adoptive dad.”

“Well, that’s not exactly why I called you over,” Bernard admitted, the nervous energy coming back. He grabbed Tim’s hands. “Tim -”

Tim’s stomach sank. “You are breaking up with me!”

“What? No! I don’t want to break up!”

“Why are you acting all nervous and serious then!?” Tim asked, pulling his hands away to throw them up in the air.

Bernard shook the folder. “Because I’m trying to tell you I figured out you’re Superboy!”

Tim’s brain blue-screened and his hands slowly dropped. “I’m sorry, what?”

“I know you’re Superboy. The older one, obviously. By the way, you and Damian really need to figure out separate names.”

Forget Jason and Damian, Kon can never find out about this. He’d never let me live it down. “Bernard, you called me a twink five minutes ago. Su-” Shoot, I can not risk getting Kon’s attention! “The older one might not be as big as Superman, but he’s not a twink.”

“Well, yeah, that’s the shapeshifting at work.”

“The what?”

“Obviously you Kryptonians can shapeshift. Why else would you look so much like humans?”

… Why do Kryptonians look so much like humans? Was there some - Wait, no! Break into the Fortress of Solitude for research later! Reassure your boyfriend that you’re not an alien now! “Bernard -”

“And that explains why your step-mom was so hot.”

“Gross.”

“She and your dad were actors hired by Luthor so you could have a normal life! But now Bruce has custody so he adopted you.”

“No.”

“That’s why you and your dad were so weird with each other when I met him.”

“We were weird because he’d just gotten out of a coma not long before to find that his wife was dead so he decided to actually be a dad for once in his life, but overcompensated and became a helicopter parent to a kid who was mostly on his own for his entire life!” Tim blurted out. “I am not an alien, Bernard!”

“Well, not technically since you were cloned from Superman on Earth.”

“Oh my god! You were just talking about Steph being Supergirl! Why would I date my dad’s cousin?”

Bernard blinked. “Supergirl and Superman are cousins?”

Right, Timothy Drake-Wayne wasn’t supposed to know that. “I thought they’d said something like that before, yeah. Are people seriously saying I’m Superboy on the internet?”

“NO! No, I swear I would have led with that if I thought your identity was compromised. A few people have mentioned Wayne and Damian, but not you or Steph or Jason.”

“Wh-Jason!? You think Jason was an alien too!”

“No, not exactly, but a few times when I’ve visited I swear I’ve seen a guy in the manor who looks like Jason. It’s just been out of the corner of my eye and he’s gone whenever I look so I’ve always thought it was just Dick or Bruce or some picture of Jason that my mind was playing tricks with, but it makes sense now that I know Wayne is Superman. He must have been able to heal Jason with alien tech, but couldn’t say anything because that would give away that he’s Superman.”

Damn it Jason! And damn it Bernard! I’m dating the smartest moron in the world! “Bruce did not bring Jason back with alien technology and none of us are aliens!”

“It’s okay, Tim. I won’t tell anyone.”

Tim grabbed Bernard by the jacket and pulled him into a kiss. When he started to feel lightheaded, he pulled back, “Could someone whose skin is as solid as stone kiss like that?”

Bernard blinked dazedly at him for a moment. “How do you know what Superboy’s skin feels like?”

Tim screamed internally. “He’s saved me from a kidnapping before.”

“Really?”

“Yes. I can get you the police report if you want.”

“Huh… And the others?”

“Not Supers. I can stab Damian the next time we’re at the manor if that’ll prove none of us are aliens.” He’d rather stab Jason, but that would probably only confirm to Bernard that Bruce used alien technology to bring him back.

“You probably shouldn’t stab your brother if he isn’t an alien.”

Tim rolled his eyes. “I won’t stab him anywhere deadly.”

“That’s not the point,” Bernard said slowly.

“He’ll be fine.”

“If you say so.”

“So do you believe I’m not an alien now?” Tim huffed, letting go of Bernard’s jacket.

The blond’s eyes dipped down to Tim’s lips. “If I say no, will you kiss me like that again?”

“You’re ridiculous,” Tim said, but he kissed him anyway.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Okay, but I still say Clark Kent is definitely Batman.”

“Sure, Bernard.”

#Tim Drake #robin #red robin #bernard dowd #timber #fanfiction

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kyberphilosopher · 3 years

Text

Cerise

Those are people who died, died Those are people who died, died They were all my friends and just died.

Word Count: 5736 Warnings: Crime, Weapons, Mentioned Murder of a R/pist, Crude humor.

Jason’s friend and roommate, another Gotham villain, is ordered to return to Task Force X.

ce·rise/səˈrēs,səˈrēz/ [noun] a bright or deep red color.

.✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.★.*｡･ﾟ✫*.

Let’s open up our story on a colorful note: Fuck Amanda Waller.

Nobody likes her. You don’t like her. Jason doesn’t like her. None of the characters in this story like her. Arguably, none of the characters in your present universe like her, either. There’s a reason why people call her “The Wall”. It’s because that’s what it’s like talking to her. And that’s what it would be like trying to deny the request she’d passed on to you in her letter.

It weighed on your mind briefly as you walk up the stairs of your apartment building. By the third flight, the weight’s pretty much disappeared. Sure, there’s anger at Waller for violating your agreement, but it’s so useless being annoyed with her that it washes away fast. So by the fourth flight, the whole thing is settled in your head to completion. You’ll go back to your Suicide Squad- or a Suicide Squad, considering most people Waller selects are idiots. Then you’ll do the job, and walk away bing, bang, boom.

You tip your head politely as if in salute to the older woman, Mallorca, who occupies the apartment across from you. She returns a warm smile that raises her prominent and wrinkled jowls, igniting the fire in her warm brown eyes. “You need me to do your laundry again?”

Of course an angel such as Mallorca would make such an offer. It’s not a bad offer, either. Your dark, silver lined chest plate is splattered with blood all over the front. It’s nobodies blood that doesn’t deserve it, as per your agreement with Waller. Just some perverted little prick who thought with his dick instead of his brain with the wrong girl. She looked frightened, and you saved her, and since the prick had just hit 18 (a fact you learned after rummaging around his wallet after), you had permission to bash his brain in. Hence the blood splattered vigilante armor.

The first time Mallorca had seen such a sight, she had no reaction whatsoever. You weren’t sure what else you were expecting from an old woman living in a back alley apartment building, but it certainly wasn’t that. She offered no shock to your red masked, blood stained roommate either. Mallorca is simply an otherworldly being. And is that cocaine you see on the collar of her shirt?

“I got it,” you throw in return, rounding the corner so she’s at your back, and nearing the climb up the next and last flight of stairs. “Hey, is Jason home?” But when you turn around fully, Mallorca shows no intention of responding and has disappeared down your previous staircase. You clasp your hands against the sides of your thighs, “Oh, okay.”

You make your way up the final steps and stick a hand in a secret back pocket to fish around for your keys. You wince when you begin the rigorous task of tugging the lanyard free from the depths, which unfortunately fell near to your back hole. Then you slip the key into the lock and twist.

Inside your apartment is near emptiness. There’s a couch, a rug, some windows, a TV, and to your immediate right is a small kitchen beside a hallway that leads to a bathroom and two bedrooms. You see the large plant you’d stuck in the corner is wilted and tinged brown, and the TV is playing some movie with the sound muted. No sign of your roommate, however.

You toss your helmet and keys onto the couch. Then you make your way to the kitchen to search the fridge for a snack (that you know is not there) or perhaps some water. You bend down to peek an eye in, only to stand back up and close the thing. Then you pass over to the counter, and reach up to now peek an eye in the overhead cabinet.

“You’re home early.”

You let out a short-but cathartic- scream, jumping as you turn around. You relax quickly. It’s only Jason, and your face changes from shocked and panicked to simply annoyed.

The man at the other side of the room pulls his infamous red helmet from atop his face. Underneath is a classically masculine, handsome face with eyes that blend between green and blue. Black hair falls free in messy strands, accented by the one white tuft that you’ve claimed reminds you of a skunk. You tilt your head lazily in defeat. “How many times have I told you not to do that?”

Jason shrugs in his red hoodie and jeans, walking across the room to set the helmet on the coffee table. “Four. Any particular reason you’re home so early?” he flops himself onto the couch and kicks his feet up, crossing them tastefully next to the Red Hood helmet.

You turn back around to continue the task of grabbing a cup from the top cabinet. “It’s been five, and I apologize for assuming I could do what I wanted in my own home.”

“If you have to ask me to stop sneaking up on you five times, you’re probably a really bad vigilante.”

“Fuck,” you mutter as you fill the cup with tap water. “That’s true.”

You turn around to face Jason. His eyes are already on you, illuminated by the blue glow from the television. They linger purely on your form for a moment, then they dip down to narrow at your armor. “Were you the one who killed that guy on the back of main?”

You furrow your brows and look up with pursed lips in thought. “Are you talking about the main diner or the main records shop?”

“Main diner on main street.”

“No, that was Azrael. This was by the records shop.” You raise the glass to your lips.

Jason snaps his fingers. “Oh, that guy. The kid?”

You nod and take another sip of the water. “He just turned eighteen, so you know. Free game. So, what do you want for dinner? Pick something good. I’m going back to the squad so I won’t be here for a few weeks.”

Jason’s brows furrow for a split second, then he perks up attentively. “You’re going back to the task force?” he repeats, though it sounds defeated and disbelieving. Distraught- is that the word you’re looking for?

“Yeah,” you shrug. “I got the letter-” you set the cup of water down and reach a hand into your pocket. Then you pull the crumpled envelope free of its confines and toss it onto the counter, “-today.”

Jason’s eyebrows furrow again. This time the movement is quick and curved and almost offended. “So, that’s it then?”

“What’s wrong, Jason?” you smirk. “Did you finally fall in love with your roommate turned friend? I always knew this day would come.”

“Uh, no?”

“Suit yourself.”

You turn back around and begin rinsing the cup out. Jason watches your back, something in his chest sinking. You weren’t his best friend. Besides living together, you weren’t really all that close. You were living a life a lot like his, running around at night as some antihero vigilante. The only difference was that you’d crossed paths with Waller and had managed to make it out of her system alive. Most antihero vigilante’s weren’t so lucky. Most of them died. But now you’re telling Jason right to his face that you’re going back. That you think you’ll only be gone a few weeks when it could just be forever. Sprayed with dark blood all over... what if it was yours?

“Actually,” Jason leans forward. His legs drop from the table and spread open, elbows resting against his knees with a hunched back. “Why don’t you pick dinner tonight?”

The glass clinks against the metal of the sink as you set it inside. Jason almost always picks dinner. Most of the time he chooses burgers or Chinese. Your apartments stove isn’t working, so eating from home really just means a BLT sandwich for the both of you.

“Are you offering because you’re hoping I’ll choose that new steakhouse?” you smile.

“I’ll get you anything you want,” the man replies. “It’s on me.”

.✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.★.*｡･ﾟ✫*.

Jason meets you on the roof of the building about an hour and a half later. You wanted to go with him, since you’d say his behavior is different from usual, but he was very adamant about you staying in. Jason even encouraged you to go ahead and pick your favorite movie to watch while he’s gone.

When you told him you’d decided on the steakhouse option, you meant it ironically. Between the two of you, money could be described as ‘tight’. Going to a new place like that would mean saving for a while. Furthermore, you hadn’t even given him your order before Red Hood was gone.

To his credit, looking at him now, you wouldn’t change a thing. The first bite of the food is phenomenal. The second bite is just perfect. Jason must have mind reading powers to be so aware of your taste in food- you’d thought he never noticed.

He gets a steak, as predicted. Jason loves steak.

Gotham looks most like itself at night, a view shared between the two of you. Two sets of legs dangle over the side of your building, both of which are clad in heavy boots and armored knees. Jason had decided to go out as his alter ego- a fact he thought he could keep from you by putting his hoodie under his leather jacket.

“I saw you put your helmet by the door,” you tell him. “I know what’s under that sweatshirt.”

“No you didn’t,” is all he says back.

The wind tickles the back of your neck. It ripples through the air in lazy waves, making Jason’s hair ruffle. The white skunk streak disappears and reappears between the darker-than-midnight-sky strands. Behind Jason, the moon is full and lonely. Its only company is the two of you.

“Oh my god,” you stuff your mouth. “This is so good.”

“Hm,” Jason hums in agreement, stabbing his steak once again with a fork in his black to-go box. It’s the next movement of his shoulder that catches your eye.

“Jason, is that cocaine, or powder donut dust?”

Jason glances over at you.

Your eyes linger on the white splotch of something in the wrinkles of red fabric. “Because I asked you not to eat them since there’s only two left.”

Your face slowly falls to one of horror as Jason stays still. With a face of steel, he finally says, “It’s cocaine then.”

“Then?”

“Look what I got you.”

Jason sets his box to the ledge beside him and leans down.

“Worst subject change ever.” You take an angry bite of your meal in an attempt to both silence yourself and to make you feel better. Unfortunately as you pull away from the bite, crumbs attach themselves to your chest plate and stick to your fingers. “Crap. Jason, your dumb food is getting shit all over my stuff!”

When you look over, Jason’s orbs are already on you. His eyes pierce yours, almost unintentionally daring them to look away. The skunk strands glow this close. He holds two things in his hands. The first is a small, brown pot you could balance in the palm of your hand, filled with miniature yellow and red flowers. Scarlet tulips, golden sunflowers, and blonde alstroemerias. In the other hand is a Blu-ray copy of your favorite film.

“Oh,” is all you can muster out.

When was the last time the two of you had actually exchanged gifts? You weren’t lovers, or best friends. You were just friends. It had to have been last Christmas, when you had gotten him a TV subscription for South Park and a pair of socks. Jason had gifted you a new bedframe that he later helped you put together.

A big smile reaches your eyes and makes your cheeks sore. “I haven’t been able to find this anywhere,” you say, taking the movie from his fingers. Your voice comes out pure and genuine. “Thank you.” Your smile grows even larger when you cup the pot of flowers with both hands.

“All of the flower shops were closed,” Jason explains. “Those are plastic. They won’t die anytime soon.”

At that moment, you swear you could’ve kissed him. He’s looking at you like this is all nothing, like he didn’t just drop big money on dinner and flowers for you. Jason knew what food you wanted before you did. He knew your favorite movie when you can’t even remember saying a thing about it. When had any other man or woman been so thoughtful? So romantic? So caring?

You glance down to the film in your lap. “I didn’t think you payed attention this well.”

Jason’s brow quirks upwards. Something flashes in his eyes as he adjusts his position, seven stories up from the ground. “What kind of roomie would I be if I didn’t?” he asks. Something tells you there’s a shyness blooming in that broad chest of his. Jason’s eyes flit downward to the blood on you, before his head dips back upwards to lock a stare with you once more. “You smell nice,” he states.

You look up at him simply. You know your eyes are filled with pure adoration, and that it’s showing all over your face, but you don’t care. Your red hooded, drug pedaling, bat wrangling, gun toting equal roommate is your favorite person in all of Gotham at this exact moment.

Behind Jason, a small bird flits overhead with a flash of crimson. “Hey, look,” you pat Jason’s shoulder. His eyes follow yours until they land on the floor of the roof behind you. “I think it’s a robin.”

“I know that bird,” Jason scowls. “That’s the son of the bitch that keeps waking me up in the morning.”

“Hm?”

You watch as Jason swings his legs over the side and pushes himself from the ledge. One hand reaches into the back of his pants while the other searches his leather jacket pocket for something. After a few seconds, he produces both a clip of ammo and a gun, which connect with a click.

“Ah!” you yelp, placing both the flowers and movie on the brick before copying your friends actions and standing on the roof. Jason hasn’t shot yet, but the gun in his hand is aimed right at the little birdie. He’s got a clean shot. His face remains neutral and unmoving as you take your place beside him.

It’s a full minute, and the robin is still alive and intact. He nibbles on a little crumb of bread. “He looks happy,” you think out loud. The air of Gotham goes quiet up on that roof, despite the distant sirens, music, and people throughout the city. “Are you gonna shoot?”

Jason’s finger lingers over the trigger. Even the slightest of a squeeze would set the weapon off at this point. The balls of your feet move to and froe, anticipating the bang you’re so familiar with. But then Jason lowers the gun completely, and the robin flies away at the movement. “Nah. He’ll feel the pain I dish out in the morning.”

“Don’t be sad,” you nudge Jason. “He’ll be back at six AM tomorrow to wake you up.” You turn to return to your beckoning food on the ledge. “Thanks for all this, anyway.”

“You’re welcome,” you hear Jason respond. “Hey Y/N?”

Jason watches you spin until you’re completely facing him. He can see the blood again. How it’s completely standing out against the darkness of your outfit. You look powerful, yeah. And you look like the antihero you’re labeled as. But all Jason sees is a corpse of a... of a friend. “Yeah?”

“You’re sure about this Waller thing?”

“Yeah?” you reply, as if it were obvious. The stain on you is so haunting it’s easy to think otherwise. “It’s not like I have much of a choice. It’ll only be a few weeks. I’ll be back before you know it. Then I can show you this sick ass movie.”

Then you go back to walking towards the ledge to retake your seat. But Jason remains standing. He watches as you, the person he thinks of naked so often, get comfortable, your back facing him. And, despite your word, Jason has the sinking feeling that some Suicide Squad mission isn’t the only place Amanda Waller will send you to.

This time, Amanda Waller will send you to your grave.

.✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.★.*｡･ﾟ✫*.

This was supposed to be out on August 16th, for Jason’s birthday. But the concept came to me too late and I spent too long on it. Anyway, here’s some symbolism for ya.

Tulips symbolize unconditional love. Sunflowers symbolize adoration. Alstroemeria’s symbolize devotion. The reader describes the plant in their apartment as turning brown, suggesting it may share a similar fate as the reader as plants go brown when about to die. Robin’s symbolize optimism, a trait the reader displays towards the idea of returning to the Suicide Squad. Robin was also a former identity of Red Hood. Both of which could be why Jason decides to spare the bird.

I’ll go back and proof read this in the morning.

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marauderundercover · 3 years

Text

This Side of Normal Ch. 8

AO3

Marinette was seriously considering murder. She was pretty sure Jason would be able to help her hide the body, he was a lot stronger than her. But murder was seriously on the table. Why has she decided to break that one golden rule, you might ask? Lila Rossi. The bane of her existence. The very reason they were spending two fucking weeks in the crime capital of the world instead of their original destinations. But no, Lila just had to convince Mme. Bustier to take them to Gotham. And then, as if making Marinette plan a million things last minute wasn’t bad enough, Lila decided to talk. Nonstop. Throughout the entire first half of their tour of Wayne Enterprises. The only thing keeping her from strangling the girl right now was the promise of coffee in the cafeteria. She didn’t need food, she needed coffee. And then she’d go right back to plotting murder. Would anyone look in the river for her body?

“Whatever you’re thinking, I’m sure you shouldn’t do it.” Adrien says, pulling her out of her murder plot. She glares at him.

“I’m planning a murder, and I don’t appreciate you interrupting me.” She deadpans.

“Murder’s bad, Mari. We don’t murder people.” Adrien sighs, throwing an arm over her shoulders.

“Maybe you don’t murder people. I’m thinking about branching out.” She hums, getting in the line for coffee. Adrien huffs and grabs her arm, tugging her behind him. She immediately starts whining, reaching out towards the coffee booth.

“Mari, you need actual food. You can have coffee after you eat something. I know for a fact you didn’t eat breakfast.” He says, staring her down. She huffs, crossing her arms.

“You’re not my dad.” She mumbles, turning away from him.

“Why the hell are you all pouty?” Jason asks, walking up to the two. Marinette smiles briefly, then drops her face back into a scowl.

“Someone is keeping me from my coffee.” She says.

“Good job kid!” Jason says, high fiving Adrien. Marinette’s jaw drops at the betrayal.

“Honestly rude. Guess I’m not gonna ask you to help me anymore.” She says, sighing dramatically.

“Help with what?” He asks, frowning.

“Murder. She wants to commit a murder.” Adrien says, rolling his eyes.

“Who’re we killing?” Jason asks. This time it’s Adrien’s turn to drop his jaw, Marinette laughing loudly.

“Ha! I told you Jay would help me!” She cheers, shooting Adrien a smug smile.

“Marinette! Lila needs your help carrying her tray.” Mme. Bustier instructs, walking over to the trio. Marinette immediately frowns, looking over at Lila who was carrying a tray. Just fine.

“Uh, looks like she’s got it.” She says, nodding towards the liar.

“Well, she got it okay, but she needs someone to carry it to her table for her.” Mme. Bustier says, frowning.

“And one of her friends can do it. I’m not getting out of line for my own lunch just to carry Lila’s tray Mme. Bustier.” Marinette argues, crossing her arms.

“Marinette-” She starts, then stops when she realizes Jason isn’t one of the students. “Very well. But we’re going to talk about this later.” She adds before walking away. Marinette rolls her eyes.

“Is she the one we’re murdering?” Jason asks, leaning down a little so he could whisper.

“Nope. The one whose tray I was supposed to carry is the one on my list.” Mari says, nodding towards the girl who was now fake crying.

“Jesus. How does anyone put up with her?” He asks, face curling in disgust. Marinette shrugs.

“At first I thought she was Meta. Now I think my classmates are just idiots.” She says simply. Jason snorts.

“I believe that. I’m gonna go grab you a coffee. As much as I’d love to help you commit a murder, pretty sure the boss would be pissed.” He says, ruffling her hair before walking away. Marinette turns to Adrien and gives him a smug smile.

“Ha, bitch.” She says, snorting as he starts spluttering.

“You can’t just say that, Bug!” He whines, before turning to order his food. Marinette snorts.

“Sure I can.” She says in English, before quickly switching to Mandarin and lowering her voice. “I’m a seventeen year old ex-superhero, I’m allowed to say bitch.” Adrien just snorts, thanking the lady and grabbing his food so that Marinette can order. Once she has her food, she follows Adrien to an almost empty table in the corner farthest away from their classmates. She smiles at the person at the other end of the table, Dick Grayson. He was their tour guide and had dealt with their annoying ass class surprisingly well. She was tempted to make him a certificate if he lasted til the end of the day without losing his sanity. Plopping down in her seat, she starts eating her food slowly, watching Jason across the room at the coffee booth.

“Mari, he said he would get you coffee. He’s gonna get you coffee.” Adrien says, nudging her side to try and get her to actually eat.

“You don’t think he’d get me decaf, do you?” She asks, remembering the time he’d brought coffee to one of their late night training sessions. It was decaf then, he claimed that she needed to be able to sleep after training. She argued that she needed to stay awake and do homework and commissions and some lameass decaf coffee was not going to help her do that. She just hoped he would take pity on her and get her actual coffee this time.

“I think I’d get you decaf,” Adrien starts, dodging her attempt to whack him. “But, I think Jay’s a little nicer than me today. Probably since he hasn’t seen us in awhile.” He muses. Marinette stops trying to attack him, nodding in agreement. He’d be more likely to give her decaf tomorrow than today. So it was still safe to trust her coffee order to him. For now.

“I’m sorry, did you say Jay?” Mr. Grayson asks, catching her attention. She glances at Adrien who just shrugs. She knew the two had talked earlier, but she really didn’t want to accidentally get Jay in trouble.

“Uh, yes?” She says, wincing at the awkwardness.

“You know Jason.” He says, and she nods, frowning.

“Yeah, we got to know him last year when he was on a business trip in Paris.” She explains, dodging around the whole ‘he trained us as heroes and then found out our identities and helped us take down a supervillain’ part of it. “We ended up getting close and we’ve kept in contact over the last year.” Mari adds, confused as to why Mr. Grayson looks so lost.

“Really?” He finally asks.

“Yeah. He’s basically like our big brother.” Adrien adds, obviously sensing that Marinette was getting uncomfortable.

“Hey Dick, long time no see.” Jason snarks, putting Mari’s coffee in front of her and plopping down in the seat next to Adrien.

“Jason. So you have two new siblings?” He asks, gesturing to Mari and Adrien. Jason nods.

“Yup. And they’re loads better than you lot. Pixie Pop here even said I could help her with her first murder.” Jason teases. Marinette’s face instantly heats up, as she turns her glare to Jason.

“Jason!” She hisses. He’s lucky he’s on the other side of Adrien.

“Wait, you two are brothers?” Adrien asks, and Marinette blinks. Oh, yeah. Wait, what.

“You didn’t know?” Dick asks. Adrien looks at Mari who shrugs. She definitely hadn’t known. She’d assumed Dick was one of Jason’s bosses.

“Yeah, unfortunately this dipshit is my older brother. Adopted, of course.” Jason says.

“We also have two other brothers and a sister. And some unofficial siblings.” Dick adds, making Mari raise an eyebrow.

“All adopted?” She asks. Adoption was no joke. It was crazy expensive in the US.

“All but one. B kinda adopts every dark haired, blue eyed kid with trauma that he meets.” Jason says, smirking at Marinette’s face.

“I’m feeling attacked right now. Are you attacking me? If anyone has enough trauma to be adopted by a serial adopter, it’s Adrien. Not me.” She says with a pout.

“Hey!” Adrien objects. Marinette looks pointedly at his arm.

“Your arm was cut off by your supervillain father who was an emotional terrorist for over three years. That’s a shit ton of trauma.” She says as he pouts.

“Yeah, but if I get adopted in the US, I’d never see you anymore.” He points out.

“But you’d see me all the time.” Jason teases. Adrien grins.

“That’s right! Okay, sorry M, I’m gonna get adopted here.” He says with a wide grin.

“Traitors, the both of you. Mr. Grayson, how’d you like a new little sister? I’m officially disowning both of these losers.” Marinette says, ignoring the indignant squawks from Adrien. Dick snorts, a wide grin stretching across his face.

“Sure kid. And call me Dick. Do you happen to know any acrobatics?” He asks with a teasing grin. Mari smirks.

“As a matter of fact, I do.” She says. Dick freezes before a huge smile makes its way onto his face, his whole body shaking in excitement.

“Wait, really? You’re serious?” He asks. She nods. “That’s awesome! Sorry Jay, I’m stealing this one.” He says. Jason scowls.

“I don’t think so. I’ve known Pixie Pop longer, therefore, she’s my sister.” He says. Adrien clears his throat. “Our sister.” Jason amends, nodding to Adrien.

“But she’s an acrobat! You know I’ve been looking for someone to teach trapeze to!” Dick whines. Mari’s eyes light up and she starts bouncing in her seat.

“Wait, trapeze? Seriously? Where? Oh my god, that would be so much fun!” She squeals, suddenly actually excited about being in Gotham.

“We have one at our house, you guys have to come over! I could show you the basics.” Dick suggests, still grinning. Marinette turns to Jason, waiting to see what he’d say. If Dick didn’t know Jason, she’d never consider going over and learning trapeze. But since he’s Jason’s brother…..

“Ugh, fine. But if B ends up trying to adopt both of you, you can’t blame me. I wanted to keep you away from him. You’re the one who got suckered in by the damn trapeze.” Jason gripes, leaning back in his seat. Marinette just grins at him before turning back to Dick to figure out the specifics. Maybe this trip wouldn’t be that bad.

Tag list (open): @toodaloo-kangaroo @laurcad123 @kittenmywaythrulife @lost-in-the-world-of-maribat @queenz-z

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awhitehead17 · 3 years

Text

Batfam Alphabet: L - Language

Summary: Jason doesn’t hesitate to drag his brothers down with him when Bruce starts reprimanding him about the type of language he uses on a daily basis.

Enjoy! :D

“Well this is just a load of bullshit! Why do they have to intervene? We’re perfectly capable of handling this.” Jason huffs and crosses his arms over his chest as he leans back in his chair. He can’t believe what he's hearing.

On the opposite side of the table Bruce levels him with a hard look. “Watch your language Jason.”

Jason blinks before sitting up straight. “What, it’s not like the kid is currently around to overhear."

“Jason!”

Glaring at the man, Jason scowls. This seems to be a regular topic of conversation between them recently because according to Bruce Jason swears too much, especially when he’s around Damian. The man, for whatever reason, wants Jason to be a good role model for the kid and apparently that includes him not swearing.

So now anytime he swears, Bruce points it out with a matching scolding tone and expression.

It’s a ridiculous notion because Jason being who he is was brought up with swearing, living on the streets for so many years exposed him to all kinds of things, one of which being the language people use. Swearing is just part of his vocabulary, half of the time he isn’t even aware he is doing it. As long as he’s not swearing at someone, then surely there should be some leniency.

“Oh come on!” He exclaims with a wave of his hands. “He’s been raised as an assassin, he was already tainted before we even met. Me saying a few words isn’t doing any harm.”

Before Bruce could respond a new voice joins the conversation. “To be fair you do swear a lot. Maybe you should try and tone it down.”

Jason turns to his right to glare at his older brother who’s lounging comfortably next to him. “Oh fuck off, Dick, no one asked for your opinion.”

Dick stares back unimpressed, he raises both eyebrows as if to say, “really?”

Jason recalls what he said and grits his teeth.

He points menacingly at Dick. “That doesn’t prove anything. Quite frankly I grew up in Crime Alley, of course I’m gonna swear, you hear it every minute in that place and typically as a kid you’re gonna pick up the habit. You know what they say old habits die hard.”

“Just like you did?” A different voice retorts with a snort.

Jason switches his gaze to Tim, who is opposite him next to Bruce currently playing with his phone, and blinks at him in surprise. “Uh, excuse me? I don’t know whether to be insulted or proud by that.”

It’s usually only him who makes death jokes so it’s come as a surprise to find Tim making one, a well-timed one too. Jason shakes his head, he’ll deal with those emotions at another time.

“Anyway, if we’re talking about who swears too much then why aren’t you giving Tim a lecture? He swears like a bloody sailor. If anyone needs reprimanding on his language it’s him!”

Tim abruptly stops fiddling with his phone and looks up, he rolls his eyes and glowers at him. “Jesus Christ that’s so immature Jason. How old are you, 10? I’m no way near as bad as you.”

His response gets a gleeful chuckle out of Jason. He knows exactly how the next few minutes are about to play out and he can’t wait. While the focus of the conversation had been on him, he’s glad for the opportunity to move it onto someone else and Tim happens to be perfect for the new spotlight.

Without any hesitation Jason digs into his pocket and grabs his phone. Once he has the device in hand he starts searching for the video he has saved for this very purpose. Call him petty, but he knew it would be good blackmail material one day.

“Oh really?” He drawls out, finally finding the video he had been looking for, “then what do I have here…” Jason clicks play and puts it on speaker so everyone in the room would be able to hear the audio.

After a second the sound of Tim’s voice could be heard. The teenager was clearly angry about something and certainly wasn’t holding back from letting his anger be known through his choice of words.

“You bloody bastard, why won’t you work you piece of shit. By god this is pissing me off now, I’ve been at this all fucking day and you’re still not fucking working. I am going to kill…”

The recording lasts for about a minute and is filled with Tim swearing his head off, cursing at everything and everyone and making empty threats. Once it’s finished Jason turns his phone off, puts it back in his pocket and leans back in his chair feeling smug about the situation.

“I rest my case.”

His words are met with a stunned silence in the room. Tim is blushing hard with his head buried in his hands. Next to him Bruce looks concerned, probably for Tim’s mental health and wellbeing. Dick’s staring at Tim with shock spread across his features.

After a few beats Tim lifts his head from his hands but keeps his eyes down staring at the table so he could avoid everyone’s eyes. “Okay in my defence the technology was really piss–annoying me. It wouldn’t work and I couldn’t work out why so I got frustrated and that happened.”

His response makes Jason snort and causes Dick to shake his head in disbelief. He knew Tim could be feisty but until that moment he never realised how bad his temper could get. Jason’s honestly impressed. However that doesn’t mean he’s letting Tim get away with it, especially when he’s getting blamed for something Tim does just as much of as him.

If he's going down then he’s dragging Tim down with him. It’s just unfortunate that he doesn’t have anything on Dick.

Jason’s broken out of his thoughts on ways he could get blackmail material on Dick when Tim speaks up again. He’s finally looking up at everyone though his still flushed face shows his prior embarrassment.

“Let’s be honest, is swearing really all that bad? As long as we’re not swearing at people then I think it’s fine. We’re not harming anyone. Who cares if we swear a little too much. And anyway, doesn’t everyone swear at some point?”

“Clark doesn’t.” Dick pipes up next to him.

Jason snorts. “That’s because big blue is a boy scout, of course he isn’t going to swear. He doesn’t count. Plus we’re from Gotham after all, it’s not like this is the most impeccable place in the world.”

Dick becomes thoughtful, humming his response. “Yeah that’s true I guess.”

“Boys.”

The three brother’s all turn and look at Bruce who had called for their attention. Jason had forgotten the man was even there, he had surprisingly been quiet until now. Maybe it’s because Clark was brought into the conversation, it must have peaked his interest. Jason files that information away for later.

“It doesn’t matter how much any of you swear, you shouldn’t do it at all. Damian is still young, he doesn’t need to grow up listening to that sort of language despite his initial upbringing.” Bruce firmly says, looking at each of them in turn. “You all know better and have good manners, going forward I expect you to use them.”

As Bruce rattles on about proper manners and the importance of them, Jason finds himself resisting the urge to smile. With every second that passes, it threatens to break out on his face. What makes matters worse is that he knows he shouldn’t smile, this isn’t a smiling matter considering how serious Bruce is being but the man is making it difficult to concentrate and to take the topic seriously.

Jason glances to the right to find Dick staring at Bruce with a hand covering the lower part of his face and Jason can tell that his brother is in the exact same boat as he is.

Apparently all it takes for him to break is Dick to glance at him and for them to make eye contact.

After that Jason couldn’t help himself but to burst out laughing, next to him Dick also breaks out into a fit of giggles. They laugh for a good while until they’re able to start calming down, by that point Jason’s cheeks are hurting and he even had tears forming in his eyes. As he takes a deep breath to compose himself he makes the mistake of looking over at Dick again, Dick looks back at him too and just like that they fall into another uncontrollable laughing fit.

While laughing Jason gets a glimpse of a confused looking Tim and a disappointed Bruce, but it’s Bruce’s scowling expression that triggers off another wave of giggles.

It takes even longer for the two of them to calm down. As he sits there Jason repeatedly takes deep breaths in order to collect himself. Once he’s calmed down a little, now able to breathe somewhat normally, he could feel how his sides are aching, how his cheeks hurt from the wide smiling and the tears coming from his eyes. He can’t remember the last time he laughed so hard that it hurt, and over something so trivial nonetheless.

When it feels like he’s finally composed himself he risks a glance at Dick to find his brother also in the state of calming down though there’s still a wide grin on face. He then looks at Bruce who is still staring at the two of them with his disappointed look. That’s almost enough to set himself off again. Almost.

“If you’re both quite done, we have important business to discuss, may I remind you that being the reason we’re meeting to begin with.”

“Hey, you’re the one who started on the whole language topic that derailed us in the beginning.” Jason defends himself and his brother’s. All Bruce does is huff at that, knowing Jason is right and can’t defend himself against it otherwise. Jason smirks victoriously.

Opposite him, Tim sighs loudly and makes a show to sitting up straight and sorting out some of the paperwork between them all on table. “Enough already, can we just go over the details and the police reports again and get to the end of this. I have better things to do than hear everyone bicker about language and manners.”

Dick gives the youngest a side look. “What you got planned? Is that who you were messaging just now? Is it your boyfriend?”

“What? No. Just friends. I ain’t telling you.” Tim snaps glaring at Dick.

Jason whistles. “Timmy’s getting some tonight then eh? Make sure to stay safe and use protection.”

“Jason!”

“Well he’s not wrong Tim, but where are you going? We need to know so if something happens we know where to look first.” Dick’s looking more concerned by the minute and Jason could see the flip switch from carefree older brother to over-bearing mother hen.

Tim blinks at them before turning his gaze to Bruce. In a whining voice he pleads the man, “Bruce, get them to stop!”

To begin with all Bruce does is run a hand over his face like he’s regretting every life choice he’s made and how he would rather be anywhere else but here. After a moment he sends exasperated looks at his eldest sons.

“Not much more to go, then we should be all caught up and ready to proceed with the case further tomorrow. Is it too much to ask for your full attention for the remaining hour?”

Jason sighs and sits up straighter, knowing play time is over and it’s time to be serious. One more hour won’t hurt, then afterwards there’s nothing stopping him from having a little fun is there. He nods at Bruce and picks up the piece of paper closet to him to examine the page. Dick does the same and finally Bruce proceeds with their meeting.

#batfam alphabet #batfamily #Jason Todd #bruce wayne #dick grayson #Tim Drake #humour #lots of swearing #probably more than necessary #Brotherly Love #sibling relationship #annoying siblings #Petty Jason #this got away from me #i don't know what happened #tired dad bruce #fanfiction

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cdelphiki · 4 years

Text

“Fuck.”

Jason’s spoon clanked into his bowl, as he dropped it and fumbled for the remote. He’d been watching Jeopardy! with the volume low. Half the fun of the game was answering the questions himself, and really, the idiots on the show were often just distracting.

But Jeopardy! wasn’t on the screen anymore.

The Joker was.

The Joker and the current Robin.

“—play a game, shall we?” Joker said, and Jason just cursed louder as he tossed his cereal on the coffee table and jumped up.

“Hrnn,” Robin groaned, when the camera panned to him, “Who’d want to play with you?”

Fucking brat.

The poor kid looked in rough shape. His mask was slightly ripped, showing off a massive bruise right under one of his eyes. His fat lip and the blood trickling down his chin didn’t help much, either.

Oh, yeah. And the fact he was tied up and inside a tiny little cage.

How the hell had Joker got his hands on Robin?

Never mind, Jason thought, as he kicked around the shit on his floor, freeing the various pieces of his Red Hood uniform, he knew exactly how Robin got himself captured.

Batman was out of town.

And he’d left Robin in charge of Gotham.

Like a fucking moron.

“Uh, uh uh,” Joker said, “That’s no way to behave. Be a good little birdy.”

Robin groaned, when Joker stuck a stick inside Robin’s cage, and jabbed him in the side. He pressed a button, and Tim’s groan turned to a scream as he was electrocuted.

Jason grimaced.

“Now,” Joker continued, through a laugh, “The answer is ‘Topeka.’”

Joker’s stupid fucking laugh.

Jason should not be helping the bats.

He did not help the bats. The bats hated him. And, sure, they had good reason to, but it just meant Jason shouldn’t be helping them out of principle!

Why help people who hate your guts and wish you were still dead?

The bats are out of town, his mind helpfully reminded him, they can’t save Robin. And like hell was Jason going to let Joker kill another Robin.

“Shit,” he mumbled, as he grabbed his helmet and shoved it on his head. All he needed was his guns, now.

“Come now, Robin,” Joker said, “You’re disappointing the viewers at home.”

“No, you’re disappointing the viewers,” Jason snapped, as he placed three guns into his holsters, and grabbed his spare magazines, checking to make sure each was full. “No one wants to watch the fucking Joker fuck with a little kid.”

Even if that little kid was Tim Drake. And annoying as fuck.

The camera zoomed back on Robin’s face, and Robin finally mumbled out, “Capital of Kansas.”

Robin screamed, again, when Joker jabbed him with the shock stick, and Jason growled.

He grabbed his tablet and hacked into the batcomputer in record time. He wasn’t sure if Bruce knew he could still do that, but at the moment he was fucking glad he hadn’t been caught yet.

“You didn’t phrase your answer in the form of a question! Haven’t you ever watched Jeopardy!? That’s what the good folks want right now.”

“Fuck, kid,” Jason mumbled, as he triangulated a location on Robin’s tracker, “Where are you?”

Only Robin’s tracker was listed in Gotham, too. No one else was around. Not Alfred. Not Batgirl. No one.

Why the fuck did Bruce keep leaving Robin all alone?

Hadn’t he learned his lesson the first time?

Tim groaned on screen again, making Jason draw his gun and unload the full clip on the screen.

Shit.

His neighbors probably hated him.

“Where are you,” he growled at the tablet, just as Robin’s location finished loading.

Warehouse in Crime Alley.

Not even five blocks from Jason’s safe house.

Good.

- - -

The Joker had almost no henchmen guarding his warehouse.

Usually Joker’s operations were more thought through. Right?

This time it was just pathetic.

How in the ever-loving-fuck had he got his hands on Robin, anyway?

It took Jason not even ten minutes to reach the warehouse, break in, and incapacitate all ten of his thugs. It took only another fifteen seconds to climb up into the rafters, into the main area where Joker was ‘filming’ with Robin.

“Now, Robin,” Joker said, his his annoying high pitched drawl, “You are down in the negatives. You need to get this next answer correct or—”

Jason didn’t let him finish the thought.

Because he shot the Joker in the ass.

“Shut the fuck up,” Red Hood snarled, as he dropped down from the rafters, right on top of Joker, “No one cares as much as you think.”

“Hood,” Joker said, grinning wide, despite all the blood leaking out of him.

Or, well. Not much. Jason should shoot him again.

Robin would get all high and mighty, if Jason actually killed Joker.

Fucking hell.

“How nice of you to drop by!” Joker said, laughing, “We could use a second contestant.”

Yeah. Sure.

Jason brought his elbow down into Joker’s face. Hard. Breaking his nose and knocking him flat out.

“How disappointing,” Jason said, as he stood up and turned toward Robin, “That wasn’t nearly as satisfying as shooting him in the face would have been.”

Robin stayed laying there, where he was, curled up in his cage, clutching his stomach tight.

Whistling, Jason crossed the room and tried to get Tim’s attention. “Yo. Half-pint, you all right there?”

Tim didn’t react, other than to curl up tighter when Jason approached the cage and put a hand on one of the bars.

“Shit,” he mumbled, “Okay, kid. I’ll get you out.”

Ridiculously, it took longer to figure out a way to get Tim out of the cage.

He tried to pry the fucking lock open with a crowbar he found laying around…

Joker and his fucking crowbars.

But the lock wouldn’t budge, and the stupid replacement Robin kept flinching every time Jason got too near. Which, should have probably made Jason feel bad.

If he were, like, a good person.

Instead it just pissed him off enough that he grabbed the crowbar and started bashing it against the lock, until the damn thing fell off.

“Okay,” Jason said as he opened the cage door, “Tell me what the damage is, kid.”

Robin didn’t respond, so Jason reached in and placed one gloved hand on his shoulder. All he was going to do was shake it, a little. Just to make sure the kid was alive. And like, just out of it.

But apparently Robin was super out of it, because instead of growl at him or snap some dumbass quip, he jumped up and punched Jason right in the stomach.

“Fuck,” he huffed. The little sucker packed a mean one, but he was too damn out of it for it to do more than make Jason wince. “The fuck, kid? Knock it off.”

Tim jumped up, however, on top of the cage, then wobbled there as he tried to right his balance. The second Jason tried to reach out to him, to catch him before he toppled over, or some shit, Tim pulled out a couple of his stupid R shaped throwing stars and started throwing them.

“Shit,” Jason growled, as he dodged, “Kid, knock it off.”

“What do you want?” Robin asked, and with that, apparently reached the end of his spike of adrenaline.

Because the next thing Jason knew, Robin was falling off the cage bars he’d been perched on, and Jason had barely enough time to dive the few feet between them and catch the stupid runt before he landed on the concrete ground, head first.

“Get off me,” Robin demanded, thrashing about in Jason’s hold.

All it made Jason do was squeeze his arms around Tim tighter.

“Stop,” Tim said, his voice getting a little more desperate, “Get off.”

“Ow,” Jason complained, when Tim kicked him in the knee, “Would you knock it off. Am I hurting you?”

Tim stilled, for a second, and seemed to evaluate the situation. Jason was still holding onto him, but he loosed his arms a little.

“No?” Tim asked, like he wasn’t sure if that were the correct answer, or something.

Stupid brat. And they accused Jason of shooting first, asking questions later.

“Then why the fuck are you fighting me?” Jason demanded.

“You’re…” Tim said, then paused as he put a hand up to his head. Shit. Jason needed to get him back to a safe house and checked out.

Letting go of Tim completely, Jason set him down and maneuvered, so he was kneeling in front of the stupid runt. He put a hand on Tim’s head and forced his head back, a little, so Jason could get a good look at it. He could see one of Tim’s eyes, due to his mask having so much damage on it, and it looked like Tim was at least making eye contact.

Or, at least. As much eye contact as he could when Jason was wearing a helmet.

“You’re the Red Hood?” Tim finally answered.

Jason merely huffed. “Yeah. And you’re the boy hostage. Where are you hurt?”

“What?” Tim demanded, “Why do you care?” and Jason rolled his eyes.

“Like I’m gonna let Joker kill you. That’s my job.”

Okay.

Wrong thing to say.

Because Tim’s eye grew wide, and he shuffled backward, out of Jason’s reach, kicking his feet.

Jason tried to grab his feet, to make him stop, but Tim kept kicking, and got Jason right in the ribs.

“Ouch, stop it. I was kidding.” Tim got him on the chin, and Jason snapped, “Just stop. I’m trying to help you.”

“Why,” Tim demanded, as Jason finally caught one of his legs and held it up high enough that Tim lost his balance.

It was kind of amusing, how Tim landed on his back, and just groaned.

“Why’s there gotta be a reason?” he asked, “Maybe I don’t want to see another Robin die!”

“You beat me near to death like two minutes ago,” Tim shouted, pulling at his foot, and not succeeding in freeing himself.

Because Jason was standing, and Tim was short. It would be no trouble at all for Jason to just lift Tim right up off the ground entirely by his leg.

“It’s been four months, stop being dramatic.”

“You expect me to believe you’ve changed enough since then that it matters?” Tim demanded, just as he pulled another throwing star out and threw it at Jason.

Too bad for Tim, Jason saw it coming a mile away. And just caught it.

“Yep!” he cheered, “You done now? You’re, like, super out if it and your fight sucks. If you couldn’t tell.”

Robin mumbled something Jason didn’t catch, so Jason dropped his foot, and tried not to grin too wide when Tim groaned when his body hit the ground.

He didn’t fall too far.

And Jason was sure his head and upper back had been on the ground, already, before he let go.

“Can you walk on your own?” he asked.

Once Tim stopped being all dramatic about everything, he grumbled out a, “No,” so Jason knelt down next to him and offered a hand, to help Tim sit up.

Tim glared at him with so much derision, it risked making Jason laugh.

Instead, all he said was, “Then stop fucking fighting me and let me help.”

“Fine,” Tim snapped, lifting an arm up so Jason could wrap it around Jason’s shoulders, “But if you try anything, I’m calling for Superman.”

“Whatever,” Jason said, as he hefted Tim to his feet, and started making toward the warehouse exit, “Just shut up and let me get you out of here.”

Tim was in pretty rough shape.

Jason already knew that, of course, but it became even more obvious as they made their way back to Jason’s safe house.

Mostly because Jason did all the fucking work.

Tim’s left leg was obviously fucked up. Jason was a little glad he hadn’t held that leg up in the air, because then he’d feel guilty.

And that wasn’t it. He kept clutching at his stomach, and Jason was willing to bet there was at least some pretty bad burns there from all the zapping.

Dragging Tim’s ass up the side of Jason’s building was easy, of course. But annoying. Because Jason had to hold onto Tim tight, because the stupid brat’s grip kept loosening whenever Jason jostled him too much.

“Shit kid,” Jason mumbled, as he pushed Tim through the window to his safe house, “I can’t believe Bruce leaves his fucking kid all alone to protect Gotham when he’s out of town.”

Because, seriously.

This was ridiculous.

Tim was fucked up. And it was all Bruce’s fault.

“M’not his kid,” Tim mumbled, as he stumbled a few feet inside Jason’s safe house, over to the couch. He collapsed down with an oof.

Jason rolled his eyes and closed the window behind him, after he jumped inside. “You are too a kid,” he said, unsnapping his helmet and tossing it down on the ground, “You’re like, thirteen.”

Tim followed Jason with his eyes, even as he sank into the couch a little more, and said, “I’m fifteen. And I said I’m not his kid.”

“Fifteen!” Jason shouted, tossing his gloves on the ground. His safe house was pretty small, so his kitchen was his living room. And he, thankfully, had a pretty good first aid kit sitting in the cabinet under his sink. “That’s how old I was. And obviously I meant his son, you idiot.”

“I’m not his son either,” Tim said.

Jason paused, as he was pulling his kit out, and looked up over the counter at the little brat.

“He didn’t adopt you?”

Hadn’t Talia said….?

How the fuck was he even Robin?

“No,” Tim exclaimed, “I have a dad.”

Is that why Bruce was more lenient on Tim? Because he wasn’t his son?

Bruce never let Jason out of his fucking sight as Robin.

He’d thought that was because he didn’t trust Jason, and clearly he trusted Tim.

But was it maybe because he’d adopted….

Nope. Not thinking about this.

“And he lets you run around with the bats?” Jason asked, finally crossing back over to Tim and slamming the first aid kit down on the coffee table.

Tim jumped, but then scowled at Jason and said, “It’s not like he can stop me.”

“Seriously, kid?”

“Look. It’s none of your business. Are you gonna let me go?”

In that state? Not bloody likely.

But instead of say that, and get Robin all fighty again, Jason said, “I’m not keeping you prisoner, but let me look at your injuries.”

Tim rolled his eyes, but sank back down into the couch and mumbled, “I’m fine.”

“Uh huh,” Jason said, pointing toward the stomach Tim was still clutching, “lemme see.”

It took a second of Tim glaring, but he finally relented and lifted his shirt, and Jason could only wince in sympathy.

“Damn, Timbo,” he said, looking at the criss crossing scorch marks littering his abdomen, “Those look fun. I’ve got some burn cream that should help.”

Jason worked on Tim’s injuries in silence for a good ten minutes. He had so many burns, Jason kind of wanted to go back and shoot Joker in the ass again, just for inflicting them.

And maybe go find Bruce and shoot him in the ass, for leaving Tim all alone for this to happen in the first place.

“That one needs stitches,” Jason said, after he’d pulled Tim’s sleeves up, inspecting his arms for any more burns to treat. Instead, he found a jagged knife wound, that was still oozing a little. “Did you think you could hide it from me?”

Tim pulled his arm closer to himself, and mumbled, “S’not that bad.”

Jason rolled his eyes, and pulled out his suture kit. “You’re a terrible liar.”

Amazingly, Tim didn’t fight him at all, when he took his arm back and started cleaning the wound enough so he could apply the local anesthetic and start stitching it up.

Instead, all Tim did was stare at him, a little blankly.

It was actually unnerving.

“What?” he snapped.

“Why are you doing this?”

“I told you,” Jason scoffed, readjusting his hold on Tim’s arm so he could get the last few stitches in straight, “I’m not letting Joker kill another Robin.”

And, sure. Stitching the kid up and treating all his burns was going a little above and beyond.

But Jason would feel a little bad if he, like, bled to death or whatever.

“Yeah,” Tim said, blinking hard as he ran his free hand through his hair, “But like, you coulda just took him out and left. Why’re you— ow.”

“Whoops,” Jason said, bearing his teeth a little as he grinned at the accidental needle prick he gave Tim outside the numbed area, “Are you seriously complaining? Don’t you know better than to look a gift horse in the mouth?”

Tim was rich, wasn’t he? Weren’t they taught that shit, too?

Jason was pretty sure Bruce never let him be ungrateful about gifts. Not that Jason would, of course. But even Bruce Wayne taught his kids to be thankful for what they had…

Then again. Tim apparently wasn’t Bruce’s kid…

“When that gift horse tries to kill us every other week, no,” Tim said.

“Shut up,” Jason scoffed, “I haven’t messed with you idiots in months.”

Which was, absolutely, completely, 89% true.

He hadn’t attempted anything fatal on them in months. Fucked with their cases for the laughs? Maybe.

Mostly just Bruce’s. When it didn’t get anyone hurt, of course.

Just because it was fun to fuck with Bruce.

Because fuck Bruce.

“Yeah, but— ow.”

Jason might have stabbed him again.

“All done,” he said, before Tim could get out whatever it was he was going to protest, “Congratulations, you’ll survive. You can sleep here. I’m burning the safe house tomorrow, though.”

He’d shot the TV. So it was pretty useless now, anyway.

“Next time you get captured by the Joker, I’m shooting you in the ass, got it?”

“Yeah,” Tim said, rolling his eyes as he settled back on the couch a little more comfortably, “Whatever.”

Jason watched as Tim pulled his legs up and clearly just… collapsed there. To sleep. And rolled his eyes even harder.

Like that would be comfortable.

On his way to the window, after he’d put his helmet back on, Jason grabbed the blanket and pillow from under the coffee table and threw it right at Tim’s head.

Tim scowled, but did readjust himself so he looked at least slightly more comfortable.

Satisfied, Jason nodded and said, “Kay. Tell Bats I said fuck him. Later, squirt.”

“Thanks, Jason,” Tim mumbled, just as Jason was slipping out of the window.

Heh. The runt wasn’t so bad, after all.

Maybe.

But Jason was not going to make a habit of this. No way.

If he did, he’d have to go shoot Batman in the ass, for letting his stupid little Robin get hurt.

That would be fun, actually.

#whumptober2020 #no.4 #caged #batman #batfam #red hood #robin #tim drake #jason todd #c writes #fanfiction #injuries #hurt/comfort #batbros #cross posted to ao3

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forestlingincorporated · 3 years

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Teen Titans #29

So, one of my favorite types of fics to read is Different First Meeting fics between Jason and Tim. I looooove reading Enemies To Caretaker, of which I fed handsomely on fairly recently. Big Brother Jason fics give me warm fuzzies, and Tim Drake needs a hug, and I feel like if these two actually got to know each other and worked past their preconceptions, they’d get along surprisingly well. And Still A Jason!Robin Fanboy Tim Drake is just a fun concept.

Also, it just FEELS right for the middle siblings to band together after Damian comes along, lets get those abandonment issues in the party.

So, for mysterious and very secret TimKon Week 2021 reasons, I was rereading some Teen Titans, and I stumbled over the Original Tim+Jason First Meeting, and I just sort of wanted to talk about some interesting things I found in there rereading it after several years.

First thing right off the bat, when reading fics, normally it’s either the Core Four at the tower that Jason puts to sleep, or it’s Tim alone for the night. In the comic, none of Tim’s close friends are even at the tower, Jason waits for Bart and Cassie to leave, and Conner actually hasn’t come around for an in-universe month, because this is after the Superboy’s Birthright arc where Lex mind controls Conner.

The people Jason knocks out were his own teammates when he was a Titan. He specifically says he never got to work with Beast Boy or Cyborg directly, so he doesn’t feel bad electrocuting them, but he feels bad putting Raven under much more gently because she used to worry for him.

Tim has just gotten off the phone with Bruce when Jason shows up. It seems like Bruce might’ve been picking Tim up, but something’s come up with Martian Manhunter going missing, so Tim tells him he’ll catch a ride with Cyborg.

This is actually really interesting to me, because it’s a small moment of Bruce letting Tim down. It’s a conversation he’s probably had with his biological father many times when Jack’s canceled on him.

Gonna acknowledge this abomination real quick. This is So Stupid, and I’m glad as a fandom we just all agreed Jason didn’t do this. It makes me ask so many questions. Where did he get that oversized Robin costume? Why’d he tear off his perfectly good clothes? Why did he do this? Why the yellow tights? WHY?

A lot of things are actually happening here that are actually Really Interesting if you just look past the stupid fucking outfit. Because this comic actually flew really close to greatness, they just ended up dropping the ball by not continuing to do more with it.

First off, Jason doesn’t beat around the bush. He’s immediately like “yeah, yeah, yeah, Red Hood, whatever, I’m Jason Todd, bitch! Fight me.”

Secondly, Jason’s done his homework. He knows A LOT about Tim. He knows his name, he knows he has a dad, he knows he went to prep school, and he knows the story of how Tim became Robin. How he GOT that last bit of information, I’d honestly like to know. But even HAVING the information isn’t enough; he’s still letting his preconceived ideas get in the way. The surface level information about Tim’s life only served to fuel his jealousy and anger (thanks, Lazerus Pitt!). He’s so focused on Tim’s privilege that he’s looked past evidence of hardship; if he’s done this much research on Tim, he’s no doubt seen records of multiple boarding schools, lengthy travel records, news reports, a death certificate.... He can’t even bring himself to BELIEVE parts of Tim’s story that aren’t lining up with his world view, like HOW he became Robin.

Jason has convinced himself that what he’s discovered about Tim and the period of time when Jason was dead - the fact that Bruce was spiraling after his death, that his family mourned him, that Tim had to step up to the plate at a weird suicide prevention buddy system - is all a lie. Despite the fact that he’s beating Tim’s ass, he speaks to him with the assumption that Tim’s a child who’s been manipulated and lied to.

Meanwhile, it must be SO PAINFUL for Tim to hear Jason say these things: I bet he said the same thing to you he said to me, didn’t he? That you have the talent to make a difference in Gotham. That he needed someone he could trust in his war on crime. That you were one of a kind. The light in his darkness.

Bruce never said any of that to Tim. Bruce rejected Tim, he didn’t want Tim, and begrudgingly accepted Tim.

Going back to Jason waiting for Tim’s other young teen friends to leave the tower before going in, only drugging his own former teammates, is much of his anger seems directed at THEM, not just Bruce. To Jason, it looks like they didn’t mourn him either, he has no statue. I find it interesting that he smashes Donna Troy’s statue, who died after him, and I believe she came back before he did.

Unless he was keeping track of the news from the League of Assassins, to Jason, Donna never died.

And most importantly? Tim shuts Jason down. Tim “Bitch, Please” Drake out here like: you’re a fucking idiot, he loved you to death, he barely let me audition for the role.

Tim shows some deep resentment towards Jason in this scene. I mean... earned, Jason literally came into his house and starting hitting him, but Tim’s relationship towards the Idea Of Jason has gone through a few changes. At first Jason was ROBIN! THE BOY WONDER! And if maybe Tim thought Bruce wasn’t AS happy with Jason as he was with Dick, there was still SOME hero worship early on. But it only takes Bruce and Alfred and Dick using Jason’s death as a cautionary tale a few times to get Tim to see Jason AS a cautionary tale - the kind of Robin NOT to be. But the more Tim craved Bruce’s paternal attention and approval, and the more Bruce withheld it or made Tim work for it, knowing that Bruce did that, in part, because of his love and grief for his dead son (Tim having an actual living breathing father plays a part, too), and those feelings towards Jason have started to fester.

Jason can’t let it go, though, he thinks the concept of Robin was a mistake and had always been a mistake, and if he can hurt Tim, so can Scarecrow, Penguin, The Joker.

This is a good time to bring up that one thing I think Jason probably doesn’t know is Tim is injured. It is a little over a month since since Conner shattered Tim’s right arm. Tim is still healing from a comminuted fracture in his forearm. And looking at this picture that is - ah, yes, that is the injured arm Jason is swinging Tim by. Tim is probably healed by now, the cast IS off and he’s a child, but bones don’t fully return to full strength for 3-6 months.

Jason is conflicted. This is clearly, in part, a fucked up way of “protecting” what he sees as a manipulated child, to convince him to leave Bruce. But there’s also clearly some deep, deep jealousy thrown into the mix to complicate matters and cloud his judgement. Ultimately, Jason isn’t there to kill Tim. Tim would be dead if he was. He’s there to “beat some sense into him,” and he ultimately fails, and fails badly.

Tim is found by the older Titans, awake by now, though it seems Jason knocked him out to, uh, fuck with the memorial chamber, and Tim... does not beat around the bush. No secret identities here just “yeah, Jason Todd beat the shit out of me.”

And their reactions are HILARIOUS.

One more little sidebar, in the comic, Jason gets in with a D.N.A. check that never removed him from its permissions. Usually in fic this is a unique pass code. I’m not sure which version I like better, honestly. There’s something about Jason physically inputting a code that accepts him even though he’s supposedly dead that I really like, and just feels better than a dna scan. A dna scan sounds SAFER, sure, but there’s something about the Titans leaving in an honest SECURITY RISK out of sentiment that I like.

Lastly, I really like how it ends. Jason honestly thinks Tim IS a good Robin, and it seems like Jason’s done some research on the core four, mentioning Tim’s “real friends” again while the “camera” is on Conner and Cassie, suggesting that Jason KNOWS about them and possibly that targeting the tower while they were gone maybe wasn’t an accident or out of convenience, but fully intentional. And again, Jason’s real problem is highlighted: he feels alone, forgotten, unmemorable, no family, no friends.

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.

#Jason Todd #Tim Drake #Teen Titans #Teen Titans (2003-2011)

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capricorn-stark · 3 years

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Othello Pt 2

pairing: jason todd x reader, reader is a psych major because i think the concept of psych majors in Gotham is funny lmao

warning: i wrote this at 1 am again, kinda long, swearing

a/n: i mention Dana Harlowe and Annie B’s diner, they’re both from RHATO’s final two issues lol. still dedicated to @tadpole-san even though she hate crimed me

part 1

“I thought you said you wanted to get coffee,” you started when you noticed Jason veering away from where your regular coffee shop should’ve been, choosing to cut through the street and venture to a different path entirely. “Because you just-”

“Yeah, I know, I’m hungry,” he declared, slipping his hands into his pockets and tilting his head towards another row of stores illuminated with neon-lights and flickering street lamps. “This place has better stuff than overpriced coffee, promise.” You let out an exaggerated gasp of shock at that notion and he laughed, nudging your shoulder with his.

It was always strange to be walking around Gotham during the night, but with Jason by your side, it was far less worrying than it usually was. On your own, you couldn’t even imagine traveling around the dark streets littered with muggers, petty thieves, and the occasional evil clown prince or two - one minute, you’d be speed-walking down the streets, the next minute you could end up as the lucky winner of Scarecrow’s fear-gas testing special.

You actually knew someone who had been in that very situation. They were in Arkham now.

With Jason, it was almost ridiculous how much safer you felt. It didn’t take a whole lot of observational skills to notice how the men who usually leered at you and your friends when you passed shrank and slipped into the shadows when a man over 6 feet in height and built like a tank walked past them. Jason himself was in a good mood tonight, his shoulders relaxed and a slight smile playing at his lips while he told you about the local theatrical-adaptation of Othello that was currently under production near Gotham University.

You were getting used to seeing him like this - not so moody, smiling, present - but you had also noticed the expressions he had when no one was looking, when he wasn’t thinking about anything in particular, when his gaze had a certain intensity to them that you hadn’t ever quite seen before. He didn’t really like talking about himself or his life, preferring to keep conversations centered around school or you. The few times you had tried asking about his family and work had all led to him clamming up and quickly dropping the subject, his body language rigid and completely closed-off, the crease by his brows deepening as his expression transformed into a scowl. It was the first time you realized that Jason Todd could actually be genuinely scary - and the first time you realized there was a much, much darker side of him that you weren’t sure if you wanted to see.

You knew it wasn’t your place to pry, and you had never brought it up since - but you couldn’t help but wonder just what had happened to make someone like him so angry.

“...and I figured we could - did you just zone out on me?”

You snapped back into attention at his rather dramatic tone, flinching out of your character analysis to pay actual mind to the man in question himself.

“No, I just-”

“Yeah? What did I just say?” Jason challenged, grasping your arm to pull you away from the traffic lane you had nearly walked right into. His disbelieving expression made your face burn red - but much to your relief (and embarrassment), he was laughing.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t completely zoned out-”

“After you literally walked into traffic? Yeah, I can tell,” he deadpanned, tugging you towards him right as the cars slowed to a halt, the pedestrian signal blinking above you. The sudden action and the sudden closeness made your face heat up - something he apparently noticed when his bright green eyes flickered across your features and caused a smirk to tug at his lips. Instead of the teasing you had braced yourself for, you watched as he tilted his head towards the diner across the street, letting go of your arm. “It’s right over there, c’mon.”

He was already moving towards the crosswalk when you shook yourself out of your stupor, quickly moving to catch up with him and glancing up at the diner. The big glowing red letters on the sign beside it read “Annie B’s”.

“They got good food,” he explained at your questioning look, leaning forwards to swing the door open for you. “I used to hang around here a lot when I was a kid.”

“I don’t think I’ve actually seen this place before,” you commented, entering and hearing Jason close the door behind him, taking a quick glance around before you took a seat in one of the cherry-red and white leather booths. “Kinda wish I had.”

The entire diner had a vintage touch to it, from the luminescent pink and blue lights lining the ceilings to the multicolored tile floors, the cherry-red barstools, and even the jukebox in the corner cranking out old-timey tunes. There were only a few other people sitting at the bar and chilling in a booth a few down from your own, all too absorbed in their own worlds to pay much mind to the two of you. You could hear the sizzling of the food being made back in the kitchen, emitting a heavenly aroma that made your stomach growl not-so subtly. Jason laughed as he slid down across from you, sliding one delicate paper menu over as he scanned over the other.

“Pretty cool, huh? And like I said, they got great food.” He nodded at your stomach and you rolled your eyes, eliciting another laugh from him. “Knock yourself out, ‘cus dinner’s on me.” Before you could open your mouth to object, the kitchen doors flew open and a woman stepped out holding a heaping tray of food.

“One chicken fried steak with a side of mashed potatoes and rings,” she announced as she set down the trays in front of a man sitting a few booths down, already moving to refill his glass with a pitcher of water. “Enjoy your dinner, Phil.”

“Thanks, Dana,” the man told her as he picked up his fork and gave her a crooked-toothed grin, already digging into his food. “Always do.”

“I sure hope so,” the lady agreed, moving to walk back towards the kitchen before catching sight of them. She broke into a grin at the sight of Jason sending her a playful salute, changing course to head towards their booth instead. “Well, look who it is!” she exclaimed, securing her curly black hair out of her face with an orange-and-green bandana as she stopped in front of them. “Jason Todd decided to drop by for a little visit, did he? And he brought a friend.”

The sight of her beaming at you was too contagious for you to not smile back up at her in return.

“Hi, Dana,” Jason grinned, nodding at you as she looked between the two of you. “This is Y/N. Y/N, Dana Harlowe. Her dad runs this place.”

“It’s so nice to meet you,” Dana told you with another grin, leaning forwards to shake your hand in greeting. “When I decided to help out at the diner tonight, I wasn’t expecting a miracle. I definitely didn’t think this boy would ever walk in here with a date of all things-”

“Oh as if,” Jason scoffed loudly as the two of you laughed, face reddening beneath the bright colored lights. “Have you seen me? I was born a lady-killer.” He shot you a wink and you sent him another playful eye roll.

“Yeah, you sure killed me alright.” Dana burst out laughing again as Jason immediately let out a protest of betrayal at your words.

“I like you,” she decided when she finally managed to straighten, taking out her notepad and pen with another brilliant smile. “Did y’all decide what you wanted yet, or do you need another minute?” Jason glanced over at you and you nodded back up at her.

“Sure, I’m ready.”

Dana headed back into the kitchen for your food after you ordered, leaving the two of you to sit in a comfortable, familiar silence, the sound of forks scraping against porcelain plates and vintage beats being the only disruptors.

“I used to hear these songs on Gotham City Radio all the time,” Jason finally began after taking a sip of his water, fixating his gaze back on you as he crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back against the leather seat. “Growing up, I mean. I still do, sometimes.”

“Classic jazz?” You grinned, taking a small sip of your own water in turn. “You? I didn’t get that vibe from you.” He chuckled and rubbed the back of his neck with a slight shrug.

“At my old place, I had, uh, a butler. He wasn’t really a butler, honestly, he was more like a dad than anything. Or, like, a really cool grandpa. He had a whole rack of guns and shit he kept polished in this big cabinet thing-” You raised a brow, attempting to hide your amusement by taking another sip of water. You were a little surprised that he had actually started talking about his family at all - you weren’t about to ruin it, and boy, did you want to know more about the guy. “And he used to play that station all the time at home, GC Radio Classics. I guess I kinda missed hearing it.”

“He does sound pretty cool,” you admitted with a smile, setting the glass back down. “Do you still visit him?” Jason hesitated a few moments before attempting a nonchalant shrug. You noticed the tightness in his body language again, the same sort of tightness you saw when he was closing up around you.

“Not much anymore,” he finally said, letting his shoulders drop a little bit. “It’s been...a while. Just got some shit going on.” You watched him take another drink before you spoke again.

“If you ever want to talk about it with me - or talk about anything, really - you can, Jason.” It wasn’t just the products of your psych major showing through you - you meant your words, and the slight smile playing at his lips seemed to signal that he had understood that as well.

“Don’t worry about it, seriously. But thanks.” You nodded, looking up again when the kitchen doors flew open once again, Dana heading out towards your table with another two trays heaped with mouth-watering food.

“And here you go,” she smiled as she set your respective meals down before you, taking your glasses to refill them as well. “Enjoy your food, you two. Call me over if there’s anything else you need, yeah?” You both thanked Dana as she sashayed away again, letting the doors swing shut behind her once again after checking up on the rest of her customers.

Neither of you wasted any time digging into the food as soon as it appeared, finishing most of it in mere minutes like the starving university students you were, breaking the silence with the occasional offer at trying something the other had gotten. The aroma had been no false-alarm - it tasted even better than you had anticipated, and that was certainly saying something. Savory fries, buttery biscuits, and smoky burgers were better than anything else you had in a while.

“How did I not find this place sooner?” you sighed as you pressed a napkin to your lips, leaning back against your seat as you tried to process just how full you really felt. At this rate, you would have to roll your way out of the place. “I know you said it was gonna be good, but I didn’t expect it to be this good.”

“I told you,” Jason grinned as he finished up the last of his burger and fries, crumpling up his own napkins and setting them into the tray to throw away. “I know good food places! I grew up around these streets.”

“So did I!” you protested as he laughed and stood up to throw all the trash away, setting the trays back where they were supposed to go and pulling out his wallet just as Dana appeared by the kitchen’s window with two milkshakes.

“You can count these on the house,” she told him as she slid them over, ignoring his protests and sending you a wink as you stood up from the booth as well. “Enjoy your night - and it was real nice meeting you, Y/N. Todd, I better be seeing you around more often.”

“Yes ma’am,” he deadpanned, his smile warm as she waved them out anyways. “Thanks, Dana.”

You called out a thanks to her as well, tightening your jacket around you as you left the warmth of the diner and felt the chill of Gotham’s dreary night hit you once more. Jason handed you your milkshake, bringing his own straw to his lips and taking a sip.

“You guys seem close,” you noted with a smile as you took a sip yourself, relishing the cold, sweet taste of the shake in delight. Jason chuckled at that, shrugging as you walked along the illuminated sidewalks in no particular direction.

“She’s like an annoying sister to me. I’ve known her since I was a puny kid.” You watched as the corners of his mouth curled into a slight smile as he took another sip. “Dana, her sister, and her dad were good to me growing up. They’re great people.”

That, you had been able to tell just from meeting the woman herself.

“I liked meeting her. She was pretty cool.” He chuckled again and spared you another glance. “And thanks, by the way, for dinner tonight. It really was really good. And way better than just coffee.”

“I told you,” he grinned, flickering those brilliant green eyes across your face again. “I know where the good spots around Gotham are. We don’t have a lot of them, but when we do have them, they’re pretty damn good.” That elicited a laugh from you and Jason stopped beneath one of the streetlamps lining the sidewalk.

“You did better than I expected, Todd.” He made a big show of popping his collar and scoffing at your comment.

“What, you expected me to not impress you? Do you think that low of me?”

“That theatre minor of yours is really starting to make an entrance, you can put it away now-”

“Hey!” You burst out laughing and he couldn’t help but join. You felt pretty sure that he looked the happiest right then and there than you had ever really seen him - whatever that might’ve meant. Pretty soon, your laughter was residing and he had taken a slight step forwards, a cheeky grin still plastered on his face. “I’m glad you enjoyed yourself.”

You looked back up at him with a nonchalant shrug despite fighting back another smile yourself.

“Yeah, it was a pretty good night.” His gaze flickered towards your lips before settling back on your face.

“Yeah?” The sounds of honking cars and the murmurs of people walking past all around you felt like they were being drowned out somehow when you felt him get a little bit closer. The smile tugged at the corner of your mouth again.

“Yeah.” Another moment passed before Jason finally closed the distance between you, meeting your lips in a surprisingly gentle kiss for a man who looked like he could snap a baseball bat with his bare hands. You wrapped your arms around his neck after yet another moment, feeling him draw you even closer to him at the action.

Literally and figuratively, it was a sweet kiss. The milkshake truly had done wonders.

You were a little breathless when he finally pulled away, and you hoped the shitty streetlight would keep him from seeing just how red your face had gone. Jason was grinning at your reaction, rubbing the back of his neck.

“C’mon, that was better than pretty good.”

“Shut up,” you told him immediately, swatting his arm and moving to continue your walk again as he laughed and easily moved to catch up to you, slinging an arm around your shoulders.

“It was! You gotta admit it, that was pretty great-”

“Shut up, Jason.”

Just like that, once again, you had Othello of all things to thank for your night. Maybe, just maybe, it hadn’t been such a terrible book after all.

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sergeant-angels-trashcan · 2 years

Text

chaos cluster things none of you asked for but guess what i don’t care!

dean is literally so angry that kate and colin have codenames or whatever. he expects gert to back him up but she’s all, “i mean, arsenic.”

kate obviously high fives her after that

kate and gert are so so physically affectionate with one another they are constantly next to one another with their arms around each other

“are you SURE you don’t have a codename???”

Dean admits he’s been called the righteous man and kate and gert immediately veto this

Chaos’ suggestion of “muscle guy” is NOT HELPFUL

this cluster has so much drama for only four people. this means they were birthed by either Lito or Wolfgang

if it’s Wolfgang they all get together and sing 99 red balloons to him on his birthday. nomi hacks a camera somewhere so they can all watch it

NOMI AND CHAOS HACK OFF

if it’s Lito we all know Dean is a fanboy

they all visit dean when he’s working on the car and the rest of them become the greek chorus in hercules (honey you mean HUNKules)

they find out about Derek and people coming to kill the Hawkeyes and all three of them are like “do you want us to kill that guy for you? because we will totally kill that guy for you”

chaos: what the FUCK do you mean your ex boyfriend has a spaceship

chaos; WHAT the FUCK do you mean you know tony stark

kate: dean i just found out you’re a serial killer, would you like to explain that?

gert, very tired, just wants to sleep: he kills cereal?

dean: gert has a DINOSAUR how have we moved past that???

Kate: uh her dinosaur didn't film themself brutally murdering a bunch of people??? Sir????

Dean: it was a shapeshifter who just looked like me, okay? It happens a lot

Kate: oh okay that makes sense

Cha0s: that makes SENSE???

kate and gert get mad about dean’s music purist attitude and spend a full 24 hours making him listen to the best of boybands, mid 2010s pop, Taylor Swift and Carly Rae Jepson, Gay Music, and of course Britney.

a full 24 hours

he can’t even be that mad because Gert and Kate are having so much fun. there’s a lot of dancing

chaos requests that they take a break, he does not want them to be like those people who danced until they died in france

a story NONE of them have heard so then it becomes horrific history time with chaos

and like. you know that smile he gets in the last dam job where hardison is like “this must be how eliot feels all the time” its very smug he has that look the whole time. he pivots right into a story about the radium girls. the other three are sitting at his feet rapt, eating popcorn. dean wants to see if they haunt the watch factory but then?? how to deal with their radioactive remains????

i don’t know if chaos is with mr quinn, or if being in a cluster with dean provides the impetus for him getting with quinn i just know that there are a lot of bisexual awakenings happening

and some VERY genderqueer dean happening

i hmmm think chaos is slightly touch-averse, while dean is touch-starved,

kate and dean will wake each other up with nightmares and do a visit-cuddle to go back to sleep. sometimes gert wakes up and joins them. and if gert wakes up, chaos will wake up and grudgingly also get into the cluster cuddle. whoever is next to him will usually link pinkies with him

chaos is very good at painting nails

kate and/or dean will do a Thing and gert and chaos give each other looks like, they are so so dumb

“i’m not dumb!”

NO BUT YOU DO DUMB THINGS

They have zero impulse control

You know what I realized who is missing from this cluster

It's Jason Todd obviously

For some reason involving his helmet he is able to hide himself from the cluster

Like he's a weird shadowy figure and they can't figure out where or who he is

He reveals himself so reluctantly it's insulting

Chaos is mad because it's ANOTHER FUCKING MUSCLE GUY

Gert is mad because he's a crime lord or something???

Dean is mad because Jason is VERY attractive and also came back from the dead, which is Dean's thing thank you very much?????

And Kate is mad because she grew up with Jason, she went to his funeral, it was OPEN CASKET what the fucking fuck you fuckhole????????

Each guy, looking at the other two: holy shit am I into dudes?

Chaos makes memes of Kate in the style of Doge and then she starts talking in doge-speak

Such muscle. Very dinosaur. Amaze.

"Chaos help me steal music off the internet"

"What's a torrent is that like a current."

"Is Napster still a thing?"

Chaos: internal screaming

Jason: so can you help me hide thos money offshore or what

Jason: so are you going to help me steal from Elon Musk or what

For some reason they all go to visit Lito, probably related to Whispers

Jason, Chaos, and Kate argue over who is getting the plane tickets

Kate: Jason that is crime money we can't use it

Jason: oh sorry where did your money come from again? Stolen circus money or ill gotten heiress funds?

Chaos: why would we pay?????

Because Chaos has already hacked into 3 major airlines and gotten them staggered tickets because that's just being safe

Also this is funny because Sam Winchester now has four more overprotective sibling-parents

And Bruce Wayne now has four more mysterious children that nobody questions (in public)

#chaos cluster #kate bishop #dean winchester #chaos leverage #collin mason #gertrude yorkes #jason todd #feral cluster #goblin brain: dean and jason would get along really well with eliot #maybe eliot should be in this cluster #good brain: NO

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a-simple-gaywitch · 3 years

Text

Resident Geniuses

Summary: When the BAU is called to NYC for a case, they weren’t expecting to have to pair up with the local Interpol team. Spencer wasn’t expecting to meet his female counterpart

Word Count: 1496

Warnings: Implied Sexual Content, Talks of Murder Case and Crime

Requested: Yes/No

“The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.” -Albert Einstein

The BAU team was in New York working on a case. The city had yet another serial killer demanding their attention. The team was set up in the FBI field office, trying to lay down a profile. Unfortunately, this unsub would dump the bodies in New Jersey, making him harder to pinpoint. The team was getting closer until the next body showed up. Same MO and signature, but the victimology was completely different.

Then the local Interpol team arrived. Hotch and the woman in charge of the other team went head-to-head almost immediately.

“The man who was murdered is an international art thief. That makes this our jurisdiction, Agent Hotchner.”

“But he crossed the state line into Jersey. That makes this our jurisdiction, Agent Langley.”

“Um, Maura, Agent Hotchner?” a shy woman towards the back of the group spoke up. “You’re missing the obvious solution of us working together,” she said. “Wouldn’t collaboration help us both reach our goal?”

Agent Langley looked at the woman. “You’re right, Doc.” She sighed. “Agent Hotchner, we should pair up our teams to combine what we know and what you know.”

After a bit of discussion, Maura and Hotch returned to the two gathered teams.

“Morgan, Prentiss, you are going with Agent MacKenzie and Agent Leavitt to the crime scene,” Hotch said.

“Lorenzo, you’re staying here with Agent Jareau to keep the media at bay.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Reid, you’re staying here with Doctor (L/N).” Spencer’s head snapped up when he heard Hotch addressing him. Spencer looked over at you. You were sitting at a table, going through the FBI’s files. Spencer thought the way your brows furrowed in concentration was adorable. Just looking at you put butterflies in his stomach.

The two teams split up. Tanner MacKenzie, a man who was like your brother, patted your shoulder on his way out.

“Good luck, Doc.” He looked at Spencer. “I’m sorry man, she’s gonna drive you mad before the end of the day.”

You flipped him off as you took a seat and looked through the files. “Why don’t you bugger off and go catch up to Steph.” It was the first time Spencer was really noticing your accent.

After the other agents cleared out of the conference room, Spencer cleared his throat. “So, Dr. (L/N)-”

“Oh, (Y/N), please,” you interrupted him. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt you. I just don’t like the formality.”

He smiled at you. Spencer found you so endearing. “Call me Spencer.”

You and Spencer got along like a wildfire. While the two of you worked, Spencer learned that you were from a small town in Northern England but that you went to Oxford for your degrees. You just about matched him, with 3 PhDs and 4 Master’s degrees.

He learned that your nickname was Doc, but only your team could call you that. He learned about your family and how hard it was for you to be an ocean away from them.

You laughed at all Spencer’s jokes, and you actually understood them. Spencer had never met anyone he got along with as quickly or as easily. You were intelligent, funny, and beautiful. And when the team finally got back to the hotel for the night, you were the only thing on Spencer’s mind.

Spencer looked up at the hotel ceiling, realizing he was truly, completely, unequivocally, fucked.

When Spencer arrived at the office the next morning, the Interpol team was already there. They were rushing around the office, functioning as a well-oiled machine.

“What’s going on?” Hotch asked.

“There was a double murder last night,” Agent Langley informed him. “Both were women. One has ties to a crime ring my team has been investigating, the other doesn’t. Both fit your preliminary profile for victimology.”

“This changes our whole outlook. We need to sit down, all of us, and discuss this.”

Once everyone settled at a conference table, Hotch said, “So, start giving me theories. Why the seemingly random kill before reverting back to his original victimology?”

“Was he a victim of opportunity?” Morgan asked. “Or he got in the way and needed to be eliminated?”

You shook your head. “No. Marcel Delacroix is -was- a recluse. He only left his apartment for jobs.”

“A hit job?” Prentiss suggested. “Maybe the unsub was hired by someone to take the art thief out?”

“That could be possible,” Agent MacKenzie said with a nod. “The world of an art thief is competitive, much like the world of the one making the art. Jobs can be hard to come by, especially if people know someone is good, like Delacroix.”

“But that brings up another question- what is this unsub’s true motive?” Jason Gideon asked.

You were muttering under your breath, looking at the case file.

“What’s going on up there, Doc?” MacKenzie asked.

“Can I see the information on the previous victims again?” Hotch slid the files over to you. The BAU watched as you arranged the photos around the table.

“What is she doing?” Prentiss asked.

“It’s her process. It only makes sense to her, but her genius always pulls through,” Langley said.

“Sounds familiar.” Morgan nudged Spencer, who was just watching you work. “Reid?”

“What? Sorry, I was trying to see if I could figure out what connections she made.”

“I got it!” you said. “None of these are random. They’re all linked to the same crime family.” You went on a spiel about how they all connect, and who the unsub was. “The only problem is, we don’t know where to find him.”

“Leave that to us,” Hotch said.

The two teams worked together to bring the unsub into custody. Thankfully, he didn’t make things harder for everyone until he was put in restraints.

“Well, good work, Agent Hotchner,” Maura said, holding her hand out to shake the man’s.

“You too, Agent Langley. It was nice to work alongside your team.

“Likewise. Well, I guess we should be going back to our own office. We have a lot of paperwork to fill out.”

Before your team left, you walked over to Spencer. “You know, Dr. Reid, that cell phone in your hands can be used for more than just work,” you said in a low voice. You handed him a card, brushing your fingers against his. It sent a shock through Spencer. “Goodbye, everyone! It was nice working with you!” She waved to the BAU before following her team out of the FBI office.

Spencer smiled as he watched her leave. He looked down at the business card you gave him, your personal number scrawled on the bottom. In Roman Numerals. He tucked the card in his pocket before his team saw.

“Hey, has anyone seen Reid this morning?” Hotch asked the team as they waited for the jet to be ready at the airstrip.

“No, I thought he left for the hotel with Morgan last night,” JJ told him.

“He told me he was riding back with you,” Morgan said.

“I’m here, I’m here!” Spencer said, running over to the team. “Sorry I’m late.”

“That’s not usually like you. Are you okay?” JJ asked.

“What? Yeah, I’m fine. Just overslept.”

Gideon squinted at him. “You’re wearing the same clothes you had on yesterday.”

Spencer looked down at his rumpled clothes. “I, uh, I fell asleep reading last night and didn’t have time to change this morning.”

“Is that a hickey?” Emily asked him. Spencer’s hand flew up to cover the dark spot on his neck.

“No way, Pretty Boy has a hickey?”

Spencer’s face was bright red. “Shut up, Morgan.”

“So… Tell us about her!” JJ said.

“Yeah, who’s the lucky lady?” Morgan asked him.

“Um…”

“Guys. If Reid doesn’t want to tell us who he’s sleeping with, he doesn’t have to. As long as it isn’t interfering with his job.” Hotch gave Reid a pointed look.

He shook his head. “No, sir.”

“Good. And I don’t want to hear any of you pestering Reid about it.”

The team climbed onto the jet. After everyone got settled, most falling asleep, Gideon took a seat next to Reid.

“So, how was your night with Dr. (L/N)?” he asked.

“How did you-”

“You’re not that discrete, Spencer.” Gideon gave him a soft smile.

Spencer smiled back. “She’s amazing. She makes me feel… normal. I don’t feel like I’m weird or just a brain with her.”

“She sounds like a lovely girl. Why don’t you want to tell the others about her?”

Spencer sighed, looking out at the clouds. “I guess I just want something for myself for a bit. I really care for (Y/N) and I know how invasive the team can be. I don’t want them to scare her away.”

“I don’t think they could scare her away if they tried. She’s perfect for you.”

“Never give up on something you can’t go a day without.” -Winston Churchill

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #x reader #criminal minds #criminal minds x reader #em's fics

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olivia-anderson-fanfic · 3 years

Text

Stalker X Stalker, Part 12

First

Perma taglist: @nathleigh @peachmuses

Stalker x Stalker taglist: @aespades @jayjayspixiepop @blueslushgueen @fan-written @seraphichana @nerd-nowandforever @toodaloo-kangaroo @khneltea @raeuberprinzessin

Tim had exactly zero idea what was going on.

Marinette had disappeared into the shower so he’d figured that, hey, work was over and he was 90% sure it was the day she usually shaved (something he knew because every time she shaved she excitedly asked him to touch her leg because it was smooth) so he had time to kill…

He walked over to her jewelry box.

He’d already bugged all of the new jewelry he had bought her but her old stuff was perfectly intact and he kind of wanted more insurance. Sure, they lived together now so it was unlikely she would have much reason to leave without him, but he was known for his millions of plans and contingencies and he wasn’t about to mess up when it was someone he cared about.

So, he went to work on the first necklace he grabbed. It had a tiny cat with green emeralds for eyes.

He looked at the tiny black pupils that the cat had. He pulled a tiny pick out of his pocket and carefully started carving a circle in it for the bug.

And then a bug-shaped god came flying out of the door for something.

There were a few beats as Tim and Tikki stared at each other.

Tikki broke it with a loud groan.

He watched her float past him for the towel hung on Marinette’s bedpost and then go back inside.

Shit.

He darted towards the bathroom, only to pause at the door. He really didn’t want to burst in while Marinette was probably naked, that was a huge breach of privacy, but he also didn’t want Tikki to tell him about all the bugs he was planting! Shit! He bit his lip, considering.

“Here’s your towel, Marinette,” Tikki said with a sharp edge to her tone.

“... are you mad?”

“Not at you. Where are the cookies you baked last night?”

“Uh, the fridge --?”

“Thank you.”

Why hadn’t she told her? Tim wasn’t complaining, of course, but he was a little confused. She was clearly mad about it and he doubted that Marinette had made some rule that said ‘you can’t tell me about people bugging me’ because that was oddly specific and not a very good idea… so… what?

He didn’t know. He was just going to thank the god of luck -- he was pretty sure that was Tikki -- and continue what he was doing.

Marinette didn’t have to struggle to keep everyone inside the first night. She liked that. More time to plan.

But how did she get herself let out, you may ask?

Remember how Tim had said that all-hands-on-deck situations are the only exceptions to the Stay Inside While Injured Rule? Well, guess what had happened.

Arkham had had a huge breakout and Marinette wasn’t going to complain… even if her kwami might be a little disappointed in how happy she was about it.

She was even happier when she’d found out that one of the people that had broken out was Scarecrow. She’d been meaning to tell him about her guesses about his brownie recipe for a while and she hadn’t really had a chance to do it when she was talking to him through a phone with a thick glass between them.

Batman -- Bruce? -- didn’t need to know that they’d broken into a bakery for the night to test out their theories before she had taken him back to Arkham.

He’d thank them when he got the brownies (the missing ingredient was Mexican cinnamon!). Or, at least, she hoped he would.

Tim had to say… Marinette's plan to get everyone in her house was working.

He could warn his siblings but, honestly, he found it kind of funny.

He was surprised to see Jason show up first. He raised his eyebrows at his brother. “Didn’t know you were in town, Flamebird.”

Jason did an exaggerated eye roll that Tim swore he could see despite the domino. “Marinette said she had something she wanted to show me.”

And she did. She walked over and dropped the Harry Potter books onto the window ledge beside him. “This is terrible and I hate you for making me read them.”

“It gets better later on --.”

“I read two books. That’s six hundred pages. If you can’t get your shit together in six hundred fucking pages then you don’t deserve my time.”

He scoffed. “They’re not that bad.”

“Oh yeah? Read it. It’s been years for you, right? Get to book three and tell me it’s good.”

Jason scowled and grabbed the books, taking a seat in the armchair.

Tim grinned and rested an arm around his girlfriend. “You don’t actually hate Harry Potter, do you?”

“Only the book version.”

He frowned. “I think we need to break up.”

“Nope. Not allowed to break up with me.”

“Oh, well, if I’m not allowed then I guess I won’t,” he said, leaning down to press a tiny kiss to her lips.

There was a groan from the window and they both rolled their eyes, turning to look at Damian.

“Why must you sully my good mood so early on with your disgusting displays of affection?”

“It’s our apartment, you just so happen to be here,” said Tim, glaring at his brother. “We can do what we want.”

Marinette, bravely, stepped between the two of them with a bright smile. “Now, boys, it’s not the time.”

“It is not the time for your libido, and yet...” argued Damian.

“Please, that isn’t even close to libi --,” Tim started, only to get elbowed in the stomach.

She gave him a look that told him to let her handle it and, while he didn’t think that was a good idea, he held up his hands in surrender.

“Robin, it’s unbecoming of you to argue with everyone you meet,” she chided lightly.

… did she speak Damian or something? Because Damian actually looked a little reprimanded at that and Tim needed to learn her ways.

Then, she leaned down with a grin. He could see her hands start to rest on her knees but she thought better of it at the last second. “I got some new stuff from the pet store and I wanted to know if you wanted to help test them out on Vanelope.”

Damian narrowed his eyes slightly. “What kinds of new things?”

“A bunch of cat toys.”

“... I suppose I can test them out for you.”

“I mean, I said you could help --,” she started, but Damian was already heading towards Vanelope without her.

Tim looked over at his girlfriend. She didn’t seem all that put out by this.

“You really had something planned out for everyone?”

She smirked and took a seat on the windowsill. “Yep. It should take Flamebird about two days to finish the first two books -- assuming he can even get through them that quickly -- and Robin is sure to be very thorough in his testing of all the cat toys.”

“Oh? And what’s your plan for everyone else?”

She shrugged just slightly. “Guess you’ll have to wait and find out.”

When Dick appeared she set him up with Beat Saber, saying that she was curious about why the VR glasses gave her a headache and wanted to see if he had the same problem. Tim knew the problem was that they were made for men and therefore sometimes had negative side effects for women, but he bit his lip before he could offer to get a set custom-made for her in favor of watching Dick select the poppiest pop song in existence and instantly get addicted to the game.

Tim raised his eyebrows slightly when Steph appeared, textbook in hand.

“How did you know everyone would show up?” He asked once Marinette had set her up with a particularly long and difficult worksheet to make sure she got the lesson.

“Well, Spoiler shows up every Saturday night for tutoring, Robin comes by every other day or more and he didn’t stop by last night, Nightwing pops by most weekends, and I called Flamebird over myself… speaking of which…” She pulled out her phone and tapped a few buttons. “Right, Signal said he’ll be here in ten minutes seven minutes ago… so, he’s almost here.”

Tim grinned. “You forgot Cass.”

“She only ever really shows up to get away from all of you guys so, with everyone here, she’d have no reason to come over.” Her face split into a sheepish grin. “Also, she’d see through me pretty quickly.”

“Don’t you want B to have no help?”

She shrugged. “It should be a light night since almost everyone important is in Arkham right now but that doesn’t mean that the two of them can deal with all of Gotham’s petty crime on their own. I give them until three or four before they crack.”

“... you might be a little scary.”

“You don’t last long as a vigilante if you’re not at least a little smart,” she chirped. “I just choose to turn my brain off most of the time.”

He smiled. “Oh? And the exception is what? Making you stay inside?”

She waved him off. “Kind of. It’s more that I only put effort into making sure I’ll never be bored. What’s the point of thinking about anything else? All that does is make you sad.”

Well that didn’t sound healthy, now did it? Tim was pretty sure that was just repression but, honestly, he had no clue. His family famously did not use therapists.

Before he could figure out how to address that there was a knock on the door.

Marinette grinned and opened it to reveal Duke, who was holding a computer.

Duke looked around the apartment, raising his eyebrows at all the people there. “Uh… should I ask?”

“I’m spiting Bruce.”

“Wild. Whatever. Ready for GBBS?”

“Sure. Tim, you gonna watch it with us?”

He hesitated. Steph had been sending him pleading looks since she had gotten her worksheet and he felt kind of bad for her… but then Duke and Marinette sat on the couch and she rested her head on his shoulder lazily to get a better view of the computer and Tim figured that Steph was smart enough to do the worksheet on her own if she really tried.

He took a seat beside her and smiled a little when she switched to lean against him instead.

“So, who’s your favorite person for the season?” He asked.

She thought for a minute before shrugging. “The guy that always wins but keeps being anxious about his bakes. Forgot his name, though.”

“Rahul?!” said Duke.

“Sure.”

Duke frowned. “I’m not sure whether to be happy you like at least one contestant, be proud it’s Rahul, or be annoyed you didn’t remember his name.”

“Character development takes time,” said Tim wisely.

Marinette scoffed a little. “Just put on the damn show. I’m tired of listening to you assholes talk.”

Duke grinned. “Fine. Fine.”

Time passed as the three of them watched the show.

Other family members slowly made their way over one by one. Damian brought the cat with him. Jason came over to give his brain a break after all the reading he had done (and then, when Marinette pointed out that you never take breaks while reading good books, had gone straight back to Harry Potter). Steph decided she didn’t want to pass her class and came to lay across the top of the couch. Dick eventually got tired and rested his body after the intense game that is Beat Saber.

… B released her at almost exactly three thirty. They ignored their comms in favor of continuing to watch the season finale.

Marinette bit her lip anxiously as she preemptively turned off the notifications on her phone. Tim did the same.

They typed up matching tweets about how they were moving in with their partners, tagged each other...

Their fingers hovered over the tweet buttons.

“We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. I’m sure one of my siblings will do something stupid in a few days and the media will leave us alone,” said Tim.

She smiled awkwardly. “That isn’t what I’m worried about.”

He frowned just a little and slipped his arm around her. “Well, can I help with whatever it is?”

She hesitated. It would be better to warn him, she supposed. “Not really. You’re going to get the ‘shovel talk’ --.”

“My dad is Batman, Bean, I’ll live.”

“-- by the person who currently controls the embodiment of chaos and destruction.”

His face paled a little (which is dangerous, considering he was already pale enough). “Does Chat Noir not know we’re dating yet?”

“Nope.”

“... so he’s going to find out through the media?”

“Yep.”

“Shit.”

She nodded her agreement, curling into his side and glaring at the phone.

Adrien was going to be pissed. Especially since he was going to learn through the media. Sure, that was the intention, she was hoping that Tim would be left more or less alone because her friend would be too busy being hurt about not being told to focus on his anger at her boyfriend… but, yikes, she didn’t really want to deal with that just yet.

Also, she thought with a wince, Adrien was going to be even angrier when he figured out that she hadn’t exactly given up, as he called it, ‘stalking’ the people she was interested in. Marinette was pretty sure that Tim already knew about some of it but she wasn’t completely sure and, just in case, she wanted to keep it a secret for a while… a few years, at least, and she wanted to be the one to tell him because she was sure that Adrien would be a lot harsher about it than she would. He already called it ‘stalking’ when it was clearly different, she didn’t want to know what he would say if she let him talk about it in more depth.

Unfortunately, though, Adrien wasn’t stupid. He’d eventually catch on. The longer they dated without him knowing the guiltier he would assume she was.

She sighed and took his face in her hands. “I’m leaving it up to you. I’m not sure. I’m leaning towards being public but...”

He bit his lip as he considered it. She fought the urge to stretch his face until he let go.

He smiled hesitantly. “Well, I’ve lived long enough, I think.”

“Don’t worry, darling, I’ll summon a lucky charm for you,” she half-joked.

He gave a puff of laughter that wasn’t quite real and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Thanks, Bean, but I doubt that’ll be necessary. This is Gotham, no one dies here.”

“We don’t know how long that’ll take, though,” she said with a pout. “I’d prefer to have you back as soon as possible.”

He rolled his eyes. “You’ll always have my siblings.”

“But I want you,” she huffed. “You’re my favorite.”

She felt his cheeks warm beneath her hands.

“I’m your second favorite,” he reminded her. “Cass.”

She snickered. “True. You’re my favorite until Cass accepts my proposal.”

“Hm. I’ll have to enforce the bro code to make sure that never happens.”

“Oh no! I guess I’ll be stuck with you forever, then. What a shame!”

He smiled brightly. Sometimes she lamented the fact that he didn’t give a lot of genuine smiles. The grins and smirks were nice, of course, but she liked to watch the way he would duck his head slightly to try and cover his face with his bangs. Still, in the privacy of her own head, she had to admit that the fact she could get such a smile out of him when few others could made her heart rate spike. He smiled for her. Who wouldn’t be flattered by that?

She pulled the smile that she loved so much down for a kiss.

The first time they stepped out the door as an official couple they were hounded by reporters.

Tim wanted to ask how they knew where they lived. He settled for asking them to blur the area around them.

It was more than a little annoying to be harassed on your way to the grocery store. They had just wanted eggs, milk (Marinette kept leaving it out for some strange reason), some cat food, and enough miscellaneous snacks to keep Cass occupied. They did not want cameras shoved in their faces.

But years of being public figures had trained them to keep pleasant smiles on their faces and to answer questions with as little information as possible.

Finally, though, they made it inside and a manager kicked out the reporters.

Marinette let her shoulders slump a little beneath his arm and Tim flexed the muscles in his face before it could get stuck in that awkward half-smile forever.

He squeezed her a little. “You alright?”

She shrugged as much as she could without displacing his arm. “Yeah. Just… hate reporters.”

He nodded his understanding. He pressed a kiss to her temple.

“Want to buy some Oreos while we’re here?”

Her face lit up. “Can we?”

“I’m rich. Of course we can.”

And, so, they did. He made a mental note to start buying oreos in bulk. All the flavors, just in case she ever got sick of the normal version.

They glanced out the door and, though they couldn’t see the paparazzi waiting just outside, they were sure that they would be back soon. They ducked through back alleys to try and get away.

Only to stop in the middle of a dark alley at the high-pitched cry of: “Give me your money or else!”

Tim sighed and set down the cat food to hand over everything in his pockets. A glance back at Marinette confirmed she was doing the same --.

And then he stopped short. He turned more fully to look at their mugger and then started to laugh.

“I’ll… I’ll kill you!” Said the mugger, who was just a kid. They might not have even hit puberty yet.

“With a pocketknife?” Tim said.

Marinette turned around as well at that and a grin spread across her face. “Oh my gods, that’s so lame.”

“It’s Gotham, you gotta do better than that,” said Tim. He reached into his pockets and pulled out a butterfly knife. He handed it over. “Here, have this, at least. Christ, that’s terrible.”

The kid didn’t seem to know what to do about the fact that his would-be victims were laughing at her and apparently helping her mug people.

Marinette handed over everything except for the necklace Tim had given her. “Here, kid. And get a mask or something to hide your face, it’s not nearly dark enough in here for you to just go with a hood.”

“Oh, and here’s my address,” added Tim. He typed it into his phone -- damn, he should have brought more than a pager -- and then handed it over. “We always have a lot of extra food, so if you ever need it just knock on the window.”

“... thanks?” said their now adoptive kid (they didn’t make the rules, this kid was theirs now).

“Yeah, yeah, no problem. Can we go now? One of his siblings is coming over soon and he will start our show without us.”

“Uh… sure?”

Marinette sat on the kitchen island, squinting at the cast on her arm. Was it worth taking off for the sake of doing work? Maybe --.

Tim’s voice crackled through her ear and she perked up a little at the sound, smiling. He was talking, greeting guests it seemed. Right. He had a meeting today, Janet had mentioned it earlier that morning.

Marinette sighed a little at the reminder that, while she might not care about her broken arm, her boyfriend did. Yeah. Tim would probably be stressed if she took off her cast before the doctor said it was okay. She settled to lay back on the counter, head resting on her good arm, and stare at the ceiling as she listened to his voice...

Only to dart up when she felt a tap on her arm.

She looked over, eyes blown wide, and only relaxed slightly when she realized she recognized the person.

Adrien stood over her, arms crossed over his chest despite the glasses/miraculous he had hooked to the collar of his shirt, but he apparently wasn’t angry enough to not accept the usual kisses on both cheeks that Parisians did as greeting.

He said something that she couldn’t really understand with the part of her brain still concentrated on Tim explaining some sort of chart.

She sighed and reached a hand to her ear to turn off the bug. “Hey, can you repeat that?”

He didn’t. Instead he squinted at her ear suspiciously. “Does your ear hurt?”

“... no?” She said slowly, a little confused.

“Whatcha listening to?”

She paled. Shit. He was going to be pissed (or, at least, more pissed than he already was) if he found out that her supposed ‘stalking’ was getting worse. She needed an excuse.

“Uh, that one rapper, uh --.”

“BS. You don’t listen to rappers.”

He held a hand out and, reluctantly, she handed it over to him. She might as well get her murder over with.

He set it in his ear and, after a few attempts, turned it on. His face soured even more, somehow.

“This better not be who I think it is.”

She gave a tentative half-smile.

That was all the answer he needed. He grabbed her by the back of her shirt and started dragging her through the streets.

No one helped. Not that she expected them to, it was Gotham, but it was still a little hurtful.

Adrien stopped suddenly after a few minutes of walking.

“... wait… where’s his office?”

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