To be honest. DCxDP where the reason Danny meets the bats is Ace the Bat-hound
Like, just think about it for a second. Danny is in Gotham for college, or maybe he just moved out to find a city where having mad scientist parents isn’t actually that unusual.
He can see ghosts.
The ghosts know this.
Now he’s getting harassed left and right by spirits trying to get closure. Fine, whatever, most of them are a one-and-done type deal, and the amount of ghosts trying to get his help steadily decreases.
Except for this one very stubborn dog.
It just keeps showing up and leading him to crime scenes! He doesn’t know how many “anonymous tips” he can call in to the cops before they trace his phone! And this dog, this incredibly good boy, will not stop trying to help the city. He’s never met anyone with such a strong sense of justice, let alone a dog. Can dogs even have a moral compass?
And so Danny just accepts the fact that Ace isn’t going anywhere and becomes his reluctant sidekick/dedicated medium. He leans into the whole thing, dressing up in a mix of traditional magic-user attire and accessories that pay homage to the ghost dog.
He becomes somewhat well known. The psychopomp detective following around the shadowy figure of a German Shepard? That’s unusual! That’s weird! I mean, it’s not the weirdest thing in Gotham, sure, but he’s a new vigilante and he’s got a ghost dog that people can only see when it’s around him. Someone’s gonna notice.
Damian, as Robin, is the first to reach out to him.
Ace doesn’t know Damian but he does know a Robin, and while this isn’t his Robin, he’s still friendlier than usual. Danny’s panicking because oh god the bats are here and also is this kid gonna steal my ghost dog, Damian is absolutely delighted by Ace, and Ace is just happy to see a Robin again.
Damian decides that the psychopomp isn’t a danger to anyone, and there’s no reason to put this encounter into his reports, really, and perhaps Danny can help with some of his cases in the future.
Danny is sweating bullets because Damian basically tells him that he’ll keep him secret as long as he gets to play with Ace. Ace is happy that he’s finally getting some bat affiliated crime-fighting assistance.
And so, Danny is now both Ace AND Damian’s reluctant assistant. At least whenever he’s in trouble, he can always call a middle schooler to help him.
(Is Robin even in school? He’s out patrolling damn near every night, and he stays out late as hell. Does he have a bedtime? He should.)
Eventually it gets to the point where Damian is going over to Danny’s house. When he first sees it, he has a damn bitch you live like this moment, to which Danny responds that not everyone has the money to afford a nice place. Damian counters that he could at least take the time to clean up, and Danny replies that he’s working, going to school, and being a vigilante assistant to a ghost dog, something’s got to give.
Danny nearly has a heart attack when he checks his bank account the next day and sees that someone transferred him 10,000 dollars.
And so they get into a routine. Danny and Damian fight crime with Ace at night, and occasionally Damian stops by during the day to play with Ace and have Danny help with his homework.
(Damian is smart enough to do it on his own, but some of the instructions are written incredibly confusingly, and he would never admit to needing help to his family. Danny is just glad that the kid is in school and cares about his education, blissfully unaware that he’s basically emotionally adopted him.)
Damian is used to being in Danny’s company.
Eventually, when going over a case with the family, Damian absentmindedly remarks that he’ll have to ask Danny about some of the clues that they might be missing. Nightwing asks who he means and Damian makes a face like he just swallowed a lemon.
Cue shitstorm.
Who is “Danny?” Why is Damian willing to ask for help from anyone, much less someone outside of the family? Does he know who Damian is? Has Damian been compromised? What the hell is going on?
Damian now has to explain that Danny is the psychopomp with the ghost dog who he might have met hunted down while on patrol and conveniently not mentioned, but he’s not a bad person, really, and he lets him play with Ace, and he’s been quite helpful on certain cases due to his ability to talk to ghosts.
Bruce insists that the family meet Danny. Damian, hoping that he won’t just skip town the second he hears the news, relents.
Danny is surprisingly eager to meet the bats, considering his earlier fears.
Damian, blissfully unaware of what’s coming, sets a time and place to meet.
Once everyone is there, he gives Bruce the earful of a lifetime.
Robin is in middle school! Danny knows that there’s no way to stop the boy from going on patrol, but you could at least shift his schedule so he gets enough sleep on school nights! Does the Bat even know where he is half the time?! (No) And why isn’t he comfortable asking his family for help with both cases and homework? Did they ever even notice how much time he was spending at Danny’s house? If Danny was a bad person, he could have seriously hurt the poor boy! Shame on you!
Nightwing is mortified that Damian didn’t trust him enough to tell him about any of this. Red Hood is laughing his ass off, because yeah Danny is making good points but he’s also chewing out the literal Batman. Tim is recording the whole thing. Steph is delighted by the absolute gall of this Danger Twink™️, and already planning to add him to several groupchats. Damian is more embarrassed than he’s ever been in his entire life.
You, he points to Nightwing, did your academic life feel supported when you were a Robin? Nightwing is too stunned to speak. Red Hood, eternal shit-stirrer, says that oh, we all prioritized patrol over our education, that’s just how it is. Red Robin actually dropped out of high school to avoid distractions, did you know that?
Danny honest-to-god shrieks at this.
He finishes his angry rant and leaves, everyone too stunned to stop him.
And as it turns out, Tim wasn’t the only person recording the whole thing.
The entire internet is blowing up with Psychopomp The Danger Twink™️’s rant. People are taking sides. Things are getting messy. Red Hood literally admitting on-camera to previously being a Robin is somehow not the main focus here.
Eventually someone connects some dots from the video, as well as stories circling the internet about the psychopomp. A ghost dog named Ace, who is the literal only reason that the psychopomp is fighting crime at all, which seems incredibly fond of Nightwing and Robin.
A crime-fighting dog who wants constant attention from both the current and original Robin.
Oh my god, Ace the Bat-hound died and became a crime-fighting ghost.
And, somehow, that’s still not the strangest thing going on in Gotham.
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Conner Phantom, learning to live
It had been a few years since Vlad and Danny had stopped being enemies, years since Amity had been at peace with the ghosts. Danny spent his days teaching his children (he assumed they were his children) about well, everything.
Dan and Ellie had prefabricated knowledge, the halfa couldn't quite get it, but the point was that while they knew who was the creator of the chemistry, they had no idea how to do 2 + 2, so he made it his homework to fill in all the gaps.
No one at Amity blinked at the 30-year-boy-who-was-actually-12 and the 15-year-girl-who-was-actually-4, Danny guessed they had gotten used to the weirdness. One day, Vlad called and pointed out that someone had entered his database a few months ago (apparently he checked his digital security very little when he didn't make "evil" plans) and they had stolen the plans for the cloning capsule. Danny had a bad feeling.
Of course, it was after a month of searching that he found out about Lex Luthor's little "project." To say that he was angry was an understatement; he found the poor Superboy being mind controlled. He felt sad when he remembered Ellie's situation and well, he ended up stealing a clone child and destroying some laboratory. Like old times.
The world did not know of Phantom; Amity was suspicious, almost jealous that their protector could be taken away if they said a word, so they didn't say anything out of the city. It's not like the League did anything when they called. Danny didn't care, less tedious meetings and contingency plans for him. Besides, he wasn't excited about going back to the field if he didn't have to, as long as Amity was safe, the world could be destroyed for all he cared.
He wondered if spending too much time with Dan was affecting him, but in the end he dismissed the thought. Upon arriving home, Superboy had woken up and was being interrogated by the Phantoms. He chose his name to be Conner (sounds good apparently) and agreed to take classes to fill in the gaps of knowledge, just like Ellie, he seemed uncomfortable with the gaps.
The poor boy looked uncomfortable, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it never did. After finding out whose clone he was, he wondered if they would take him to Superman, but Danny just snorted. By the end of the week, Conner was a Phantom, and he was fine with that. Danny even told him that he could live normally if he wanted to, and the boy happily accepted the offer. Conner didn't want to be a hero, at least not that early, and Danny was happy with his decision.
Danny frowned thinking of all the heroes who would say that is "selfish" for someone with power to not to use it. But he believed that they were doubly selfish. Being a teenage hero wasn't fucking easy. He hugged Conner, welcoming him to the family and within days, the whole town already knew about him (they also knew whose clone he was, but they didn't really care, they weren't snitching).
Curiously, it was Tim Drake who noticed the strange family visiting Gotham (a 23-year-old seemed to be berating a 30-year-old for stealing tires, he snorted at the irony). However he froze when he saw Clark?, but much younger, speaking in Kryptonian and laughing. He called a meeting in the batcave and tried to call the family, but as soon as they saw the expression in his face they vanished from sight.
Hell, he needed to report it to Bruce.
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Uncertain if u know this but it's one of my favorite facts to share. Jason was 86 lbs and 4'6" when he died. I feel like the writers should have kept him as a short king bc can you imagine ppl going, "that's a child" to, "oh I'm going to die" upon seeing him.
Omg he was SMOL!!!!!
And yes I knew he was relatively short but I didn’t know he was THAT short. That’s—- okay, I’m not tearing up. My eyes are just sweating. (Pls sir that’s a BABY joker murdered a veritable BABY I’m not ok I’ll never be ok—)
But actually it isn’t even very surprising. From what we know of Jason’s childhood it’s safe to assume he rarely (if ever) had the amount of food children require to be healthy available to him. And I’m not sure if we have an exact time frame for the time he spent living on the streets, but food then must have been even scarcer, and most likely did not focus on nutritional intake. And we know he was 11/12 when Bruce found him, the time when boys that age usually go through growth spurts (10-15). Assuming he was on the streets for over a year at least, the lack of food may have very well stunted his growth permanently.
So basically what I’m trying to say is that it wouldn’t be far fetched to think that the Lazarus pit also cured him of the malnutrition he suffered during a critical stage of growth, and that the Jason we see now is what he could have grown into if he’d had a kinder childhood.
But honestly small people that look cute and shit but are able to absolutely DEMOLISH you are a special brand of badass and I love it. Jason could totally pull it off ✨
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none of this is proofread but here's my ideal modern au for the goth fam. wall of text incoming, sky is blue, etc.
mihawk: World's Most Reluctant College Professor. history/archaeology. reluctantly employed because his place of residence (half-wrecked castle) is owned by the university and one of the terms for him to live there for free is to teach classes. initially hired as a publicity stunt that petered out. actual respected swordsman in the modern age but the reality is "swordsman" is... not very lucrative. really important to me that he is forcibly employed while having gigantic unemployed energy.
his ass is not showing up to a lecture hall unless under extreme duress (shanks showing up to his place unannounced again🙄). fully aware his papers are only taken as a credit filler (robin lectures the papers that are more practically applicable). almost exclusively "teaches" by emailing out reading lists and assignments. actively trying to get his students to drop his paper so he can do fuck-all for the rest of the year.
zoro: phys ed major. he's so serious about his main courses as well as mihawk's stupidly niche paper. probably the first person the "Dracule Mihawk Teaches Here!" publicity stunt has worked on in years. has trouble with the heavy focus of book-smarts this paper requires but powers through it best he can until mihawk sets some indecipherable tome as part of a reading list and zoro is like. okay. you leave me no choice.
he fully shows up on mihawk's doorstep at 9:44PM on a tuesday night brandishing this tome. mihawk answers the door because he is two bottles into his wine.
zoro, furious that this piece of shit tome has no audiobook alternative: this. YOU. explain. NOW.
mihawk: a student. at my doorstep. did shanks blab to you.
zoro: your address is publicly listed as a minor tourist attraction.
mihawk (<- didn't know that): hm. come in.
zoro is treated to a full drunk history session and the supermarket gift wine mihawk has been avoiding but accidentally opened. he wakes up the next morning and zoro is still there in one of the guest rooms. he's like what are you doing here and zoro is like. i don't have a whole day to waste getting back to my dorm i need to do your assignment.
mihawk, fully aware the dorms should only be a max twenty minute walk away: interesting. get out.
safe to say, zoro thinks visiting mihawk's home is easier than emailing him. which is true in some ways since mihawk takes small joys in putting unread emails straight into trash.
perona: fashion major OBVIOUSLY. really interested finding vintage/archival sewing patterns/designs and modernising them. LOVES using essays as outlets for her rants. blase on everything else in life but takes her course so seriously. HATES zoro ever since he almost made her fail an assignment because he had checked out a book she needed and held it for fucking aaages.
similarly zoro hates perona bc she almost made him fail an assignment by hogging the only lightbox on this side of the campus that makes it possible to read some of the archival material mihawk puts on his impossible reading lists.
zoro gets lost in mihawk's castle and meets perona in-person for the first time outside of a name on a booking sheet and they have a huge stupid argument. zoro storms off and accidentally finds mihawk again this way and he's doubly mad because he can't believe mihawk has been chasing him away all this time while letting another student just live in the east wing.
mihawk (<- didn't know that): there's a what.
turns out perona just said "umm dorm fees? rent? in this economy? there's a wrecked castle 20mins away from campus it's free real estate". and she's right. she also finds out mihawk has staff access to archival materials not readily open to students and she immediately whips out a wishlist.
anyways i imagine perona graduates and becomes a fashion designer. zoro decides booksmarts is not for him and drops out to focus fully on a professional athlete career or make his way as a stuntman. models for perona on occasion. mihawk fully quits his job after those two leave bc they were the only ones in years that made it interesting. retires but robin recommends him as a consultant to the museum society and he does some work there. ALWAYS calls zoro or perona if he's restoring smthng cool he thinks they would love.
jfc are you still here. i kiss you on the lips
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hey real quick if youre a studyblr or even just a person in academia and
🌟 are neurodivergent and/or struggle with mental or physical health problems that impede on your academic performance
🌟 are a first gen student or otherwise feel a bit lost navigating this world compared to your peers who might have a bit more uh,, nepo baby energy
🌟 really hate the corrupt and elitist parts of academia but also love your studies and your dreams too much to give up on it
🌟 genuinely want to better the world with your education not just dangle it over people as part of a god complex or use it to help gatekeep knowledge
🌟 just generally kinda feel like academia wasnt really built for you but you are determined to make it so that it is, if not for yourself then for future generations at the very least
interact with this would you? you dont even need to follow if you arent a studyblr or dont want that on your dash, i just feel chronically alone out here sometimes and i could use the reminder that i am definitely not the only person feeling like this and not the only one fighting this fight. if this post only gets one note thats good enough for me lol
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Anomaly
Since the situation with Dan Phantom, Clockwork realized something very important: Danny was an anomaly, something that even he could not control. He lived outside the laws of time, suffered no consequence for his changes and was basically the representation of the butterfly effect.
That, of course, thrilled him. Since he began his "contract" with the Observants, his movements were restricted, he was forced to follow rules and could hardly act against them. That's why Danny was a blessing, his protégé was not tied to anyone, he could act freely.
Clockwork took advantage of this, he asked him for help frequently, for some things he could not change. This led him to discover another important factor: Danny was balance. He never acted for anything that was not fair. And the Realms followed his wishes.
That's why it didn't surprise him that Danny wanted to help Jon Kent. Clockwork knew how the "New Superman" would end up, he knew the boy would fall into a black hole and lose his childhood, he knew he would be trapped in a volcano for 7 years. The Observants told him it was "inevitable" of course, but as he had learned with young Daniel, nothing was.
Then he told him about the boy, the boy who laughed with joy in his parents' arms and had made a best friend his own age. The boy who had trouble controlling his powers but had a big heart. Just as he imagined, Danny frowned at his "inevitable fate," as a child whose childhood had been stolen, he didn't wish that for anyone else.
Then, the moment Jon fell down the black hole Danny decided to interfere. He changed the location he was headed to the clock tower, he needed the Observants to believe that the event had "happened" before taking Jon back home.
Jon Kent, who had been separated from his grandfather, panicked. Of course, since the Realms didn't have a red sun his powers didn't work, which made him feel worse. That was before he noticed the smiling boy offering him cookies and the old man-floating? looking at him curiously. Jon wondered what situation he had gotten himself into, he hoped Damian would believe his story when he got back.
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