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4015benson · 2 years

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Broken

@6313stabler

“Liv.”

Nothing.

“Liv.” His voice grows louder and this time it pulls Olivia from her thoughts. She takes her eyes off of the window and looks over at Fin whom is standing at the door, having been on his way out.

“Yeah?” She asks, her voice so weak - so dry and hoarse. A result of the past four days - of the severe dehydration and pain she’d been put through. Literal torture.

“You called him yet?” Fin questions and he knows Olivia doesn’t need him to clarify.

She shakes her head, her gaze falling to her lap - filled with shame, with guilt, with fear, with pain. So much pain.

“You want me to?” He offers and Olivia appreciates it. That much shows in the smile she manages, though it’s heavily strained, but it’s there.

“No.” She answers, the fingers of her non-broken wrist toying with the blanket covering her lap - a sign of her anxiety. “I will.” And she will... at some point.

Because more than anything, she wants to see him. More than anything she wants him here with her. The person that’s always made her feel safe, that’s always made her feel okay and strong and loved and just... safe. The man she thought of throughout the four days she was in the monster’s clutches. The man she screamed for, though not out loud. No, she couldn’t give the monster that satisfaction, but God, her heart cried for him. It ached for him and in this moment, it still was.

But he was on the other side of the world - practically unreachable what with his undercover assignment. It’s been almost two years now. One year in the states and instead of him coming home when that ended, he was flown to Rome where the criminal organization he’d been undercover in also operated in. They’d only been able to communicate through a few phone calls here and there with a few video calls thrown in. Most messaging was done via email or when he did have a chance, he’d send her a text but for the most part, communication was limited.

She hated it. She hated being unable to see her husband every day, she hated being unable to speak to him every day. It was vastly different to go from seeing him almost every single day for twelve years to barely even speaking to him for two. It was difficult and devastating and depressing. But to know he was alive was enough, to know that he would come home kept her strong. Because he would come home. At some point, he would come home...

He’d come home to her and their beautiful daughter that was walking and talking, that missed her father terribly. That was currently with her Auntie Amanda due to her mother having gone missing for four days... and as badly as she wanted to see Vera, she didn’t want Vera to see her in this condition... and that was one reason why she hadn’t called Elliot. Not only because she didn’t want to disrupt his work even though she knew he’d want to be contacted for something like this, but because he didn’t want him to see, or hear, her in such a broken state... barely able to talk, barely able to walk. Battered. Bruised. Bloodied. Scarred. Traumatized.

But fuck, she missed him. And she needed him. And eventually she’d have to tell him, eventually he’d find out... and she promised she’d contact him if anything ever went wrong and he was still out of town. Be it with her or Vera. She had the contact information of his case agent, but there had been a time or two when calling his phone that he answered, or that he got her messages and called her back. So maybe...

Better to do it now or else she’ll just keep putting it off. So, with a heavy sigh, Olivia reaches for the burner phone lent to her since her own phone would be taken in as evidence which was a problem because she didn’t have the Case Agent’s number memorized, but of course she knew Elliot’s by heart...

She looks over the numbers, hesitating for a few moments before she pushes the first number. Then the second. Then the third... pushing them all until it’s put through.

Ring. Let it go to voicemail...

Ring. Please pick up...

Ring. Don’t answer...

Ring. PLEASE answer, Elliot, please.

‘You’ve reached Elliot Stabler...’ His voice is enough to make Olivia choke out a soft sob, reveling in his voice and the easy comfort it brought her. Desperately wishing that he was standing in this room talking to her right now, wrapping his arms around her because they were the only hands she would let near her aside from her daughter’s. She felt dirty. Tainted. She felt full of sin even though she hadn’t done anything wrong, but the things she had to watch, the things she was forced to allow and do... she shuddered.

And she nearly vomited right then and there had it not been for the beep in the phone, reminding her of what she was supposed to be focusing on.

She pauses then takes a deep breath. “Hey, El...” God, she can’t even sound normal. She sounds weak and exhausted, pained, despite trying hard to cover it all. But maybe he’ll just think she’s exhausted, maybe had a bad case. It wasn’t uncommon for Olivia to leave him a message about her day, whether good or bad. It brought her comfort and made her feel less sad sometimes even if he wasn’t able to talk to her, but he was always willing to listen and that always meant the world to Olivia.

God, how does she even start? ‘I’m in the hospital because I was kidnapped and held hostage for four days? I was tortured during the whole time, too.’ How the hell does she even tell him all of that? Her heart starts to beat faster, her nerves becoming erratic, her breathing unsteady. She’s becoming stressed, anxious. She doesn’t know how to start or what to say...

She can’t do this. She needs to think of something quick.

“I just, um... I just... wanted to check on you... see how you were doing. Tell you, I...” God, she sounds like she’s about to cry. She needs to end this quick. “I miss you. I love you...” Another deep breath, tears now spilling from her eyes. “Bye.” She says that in a hurry and immediately hangs up the phone before tossing it aside out of frustration, hearing it hit the floor at the end of the bed. She lets out a cry of frustration, her head falling into her good hand as the tears spill through. She feels weak and sick and guilty and ashamed and every fucking negative emotion there is. Scared. Hurt. Desperate. Lost.

She wants Elliot. She wants their daughter. She wants all of this to have never happened. But it did and she feels disgusted and dirty. She feels his hands all over her, she smells his breath in her face, she hears his voice in her ear. The nausea is too powerful to push away so she leans over the side of the bed and empties her stomach until she can’t hold herself up any longer and she just collapses down onto the bed, her eyes falling closed.

She knows she won’t stay that way for long, not without seeing his face, but with how weak her body feels, she figures the exhaustion combined with the pain medication will make her fall into a forced, but much needed sleep...

#oops #felt inspired to do this sooooo here we are?#i have thoughts and ideas for this #like elliot maybe getting the message but when he calls back there's no answer so he calls fin immediately cause ue KNOWS something #is wrong with how she sounds #enjoy the pain!#tw; torture #( You and I. Always. | Season 8 / Married AU )#6313stabler

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the-gayest-sky-kid · 5 months

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god i love my friends. shout out to people who love their friends. this is a post for friend lovers

#sorry i thought too hard about everything and got weirdly emotional like hgoly shit #i talk to people here every day and we know stuff about each other and shit and we exchange ideas and waaa #we're like all basically penpals but better #im realizing how revolutionary this is. like had we all been born earlier we never would have met #and even if we did we'd have to talk through letters with weeks if not months in between responses #can you imagine that #every day instead i literally wake up and my friends are there #insane #i love having friends

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cemeterything · 5 months

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are we still doing this because i have a late submission

#🐉#this is less about fan content and more about that awful lazy one size fits all #'10 years later theyre happily married with a cute little nuclear family' trope #because ive read some genuinely incredible fics about characters who would Not fucking have kids #ending up with accidental pregnancy scares or child acquisitions that get treated with all the nuance #and thoughtful handling they deserve #but also. i reread one of my favourite fics yesterday and when one character jokingly brought up the idea of children #and the other reacted with genuine visceral disgust and said what hideously awful parents theyd be #i lit up like a fucking christmas tree

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uncanny-tranny · 3 months

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I think so many people are so deeply alienated from themselves that they have no clue how to exercise their free will and autonomy. For some, this alienation runs so deep that they are afraid of their own autonomy and humanity. It is completely understandable why one would have those feelings, but it can be worrisome.

I want to help others who feel this way, so here are small things I have done to exercise my free will:

Add "guilty pleasure" songs to playlists and actually listen to them (I have a ton of late 1990s-early 2000s music I listen to now proudly that I never listened to in the past out of shame)

Getting the décor item, bath set, bed spread, ect. in the patterns you like, even if it's "childish" (I got a dinosaur-themed wastebasket from the kids' décor section and I adore it)

Taking a new route to get to a place you go to often

Eat dessert first

Celebrate well, and often

Collect things that are "odd" or don't seem like an "acceptable" thing to collect (somebody on my "for you" page collects dandelion crayola crayons and it was so cool!!!!!!)

Incorporate one new piece in an outfit you wear frequently (e.g., a new chain, a necklace, ribbons, bracelets, ect.). Challenge yourself to add onto the outfits if you feel up for it.

Sing along to songs without worrying that you sound "good" or your intonation is completely accurate

Read a book from a genre you weren't allowed to read as a kid (comics, thrillers, mysteries, anything!)

Walk without having a specific destination or goal

Pick up a new craft without expecting yourself to master it or to ever be "good" enough. Get your hands messy.

I don't want to shame anybody for not feeling as though they have free will or that they are exempt from exercising it. However, I wanted to give ideas so that you might read this list and find your own ways to express your intrinsic autonomy and will. You deserve to be a person, to feel alive, not just living. That is what our lives are for.

#mental health #mental health support #positivity #if anybody has ideas of their own definitely include them!#i just think being stuck with this feeling that you don't have autonomy and that you ultimately aren't an equal person or a person at all..#...in comparison to other people can be a really troubling and dangerous place to be in...#...and that isn't the person's fault for feeling that way. they didn't pluck those thoughts out of thin air...#...like i have felt that exact way all my LIFE because i have been abused for. probably 2/3s of my life...#...only within these past few years have i even FELT alive. frankly it's going to take a while to repair what i have been left with...#...so i know the feeling and i want to help others feel even a LITTLE bit alive. you deserve it...#...you deserve to take in a deep breath before slowly realizing 'oh my gd this is what it feels like to be alive' and SMILE about it #i want that for you even if it is brief. even if it is small. even if it is a whisper. i want you to feel alive #unironically getting rid of the idea of 'guilty pleasures' has made my life SO much better

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arggghhhsstuff · 5 months

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forever obsessed with percy being weird. off-putting. strange even. a cryptid maybe. an urban legend if I may. my boy is the son of one of the oldest, most powerful gods, has been in FBI's records since the age of twelve, fought and won two wars against immortal beings, went to hell and back. I think he's allowed to be a little odd.

#percy jackson #cryptid percy jackson #<- there are only 3 fics under this tag on ao3 it's making me so sad #because i have THOUGHTS and HEADCANONS and IDEAS but i don't know how to write #demigods being less humans than they are in canon is a favorite headcanon of mine #they get to be WEIRD and SCARY and POWERFUL #!!!!#percy jackon and the olympians #heroes of olympus #pjo #pjo hoo toa #demigods #percy jackson fandom #percy jackson tv show #pjo show #yeah

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devsgames · 2 months

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Me: "hey game developers, especially AAA ones, are getting laid off en-mass and it's awful for our industry" Gamer: "well I only play INDIE games and the problem with AAA games is they are creatively bankrupt"

Me, slamming my fists on the table like a baby: "WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT THIS IS ABOUT A BUSINESS PROBLEM PERPETUATED BY CAPITALISM NOT A STATEMENT ON CREATIVE DECISION MAKING"

#look I think AAA should make weirder games also but I wish we stopped treating that like some kind of solution and not just a fun idea #the problem is capitalism. its always capitalim #its not like AAA studios would have less problems if they made weird indie games lol #also hey spoiler alert: indie studios need to organize their labour too #in fact I think the organizing movement would be stronger if more indies adopted it first #anyway im busy so imma mute some posts now #thoughts #blog

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quarklynx · 1 year

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here’s my cosplay of that old lady with a sword

#don't mess with her #sword #cosplay #old lady ad #i have no idea how to tag this i just thought it was funny i had the same sword so i pulled out my stage makeup and just did this lmao #this took me like two hours with cleanup. pls reblog to make my efforts for this shitpost worth it #i'm in my mid 20's i swear #1k #5k #10k #20k #owo;

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maskednerd · 6 months

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#happy late halloween!#enjoy these sleep deprived fnaf movie textpost memes #this will not be the last of them I assure you!#cus i have many ideas hehe... none of them well-thought out tho #fnaf #fnaf movie #fnaf movie spoilers #textpost memes #mike schmidt #steve raglan #vannessa fnaf

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glassrooibos · 3 months

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Everything stays right where you left it huh guys

#dimension 20 #fantasy high #adaine abernant #fantasy high junior year #I loved this parallel from Siobhan #none of these guys are getting a break huh #IM ABOUT TO LISTEN TO THE NEW EP TOO #Hope nothing upsetting or unsettling happens :0)#ps I have no idea what sauce you put with strudel #I would have thought custard #but the symbolism…#THE DRAMA of a red berry sauce #I dunno guys #should I do more freshman and junior year parallel pieces?#lmk #I love you bye

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fjordline · 8 days

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#transformers #megatron #tf g1 #maccadam #my art #Its over Prime! for I have depicted You as the seething soyjak and I as the gigachad!#optimus is like 'I have No idea what you are talking about Megatron.' then decks him right in the face #rumble and frenzy made this image for him #i was sleep deprived asf at work and thought of this #sloptimus prime vs kinotron

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joycrispy · 8 months

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One thing I love about Crowley --never stated, but consistently shown-- is that he is, at heart, an engineer.

I have a few different things to say about that. Let's unpack them.

As the Unnamed Angel, we see his designs for the Pillars of Creation are millions of pages long, comprised of cramped text, footnotes, diagrams, schematics, etc. It's very...Renaissance polymath, in the way it implies a particular intersection of artist and inventor.

Also: in the naked romanticism with which he views his stars.

We already knew he made stars, but in s2 we learn that he did NOT sculpt each of them by hand. He designed a nebula ("a star factory," he says) that will form several thousand young stars and proto-planets, and all --aside from getting the 'factory' running-- without him lifting a finger. We also learn that these young stars and proto-planets stand in contrast to those made by other angels, which are going to come 'pre-aged.'

...I'm reminded of Hastur and Ligur's approach to temptations. Damning one human soul at a time, devoting singular attention to it over the course of years or decades, and how that stands in contrast to Crowley's reliance on, quote, 'knock-on effects.'

Ligur: It's not exactly...craftsmanship. Crowley: Head office don't seem to mind. They love me down there.

Hm.

I'm also reminded of the M25.

The M25 may not be as grand as a nebula (sentences you only say in GOmens fandom...), but LIKE his nebula it's an intricate, self-sustaining engine that does Crowley's work for him, many times over. Again.

That's some pretty neat characterization --and so is the indication towards Crowley's disinterest in victimizing anyone tempting individual people. It takes a considerable amount of planning and effort (and creeping about in wellies), but in accordance with his design the M25 generates a constant stream of low-grade evil on a gigantic scale.

Cumulatively gigantic, that is. Individually? Negligible.

But no other demon understands human nature well enough to parse that one million ticked-off motorists are not, in any meaningful way, actually equivalent to one dictator, or one mass-murderer, or even one little influential regressive. That's the trick of it. Crowley gets Hell's approval (which he NEEDS to survive, and to maintain the degree of freedom he's eked out for himself), and at the same time ensures that any actual ~Evil Influence~ is spread nice and thin.

It's some clever machinery. And he knows it, too:

The Unnamed Angel and Crowley are both proud of their ideas.

(musings on professional pride, Leonardo da Vinci, the crank handle, and 'the point to which Crowley loves Aziraphale' under the cut)

In the 1970's Crowley gives a presentation on the M25, projector and all, to a room full of increasingly impatient demons. Maybe the presentation was work-ordered; the 'can I hear a WAHOO?' definitely wasn't.

Before the Beginning, the Unnamed Angel can barely contain his excitement about his nebula. Aziraphale manages a baffled-but-polite, "....That's nice... :)"

11 years ago, Hastur and Ligur want to 'tell the deeds of the day,' and Crowley smiles to himself because (according to the script-book) he knows he has 'the best one.'

(Naturally, his 'deed' has nothing to do with tempting anybody, and everything to do with setting up a human-powered Rube-Goldberg machine of petty annoyance. Oodles of 'Evil' generated; very little harm done.)

Hastur and Ligur don't get it, of course. That's also consistent.

Nobody ever knows what the hell he's talking about.

It didn't make it on-screen, but, in both the novel AND the script-book, Crowley was friends with Leonardo da Vinci. The quintessential Renaissance polymath. That's where he got his drawing of the Mona Lisa --they're getting very drunk together, and Crowley picks up the 'most beautiful' of the preliminary sketches. He wants to buy it. Leonardo agrees almost off-the-cuff, very casual, because they're friends, and because he has bigger fish to fry than haggling over a doodle:

He goes, "Now, explain this helicopter thingie again, will you?" Because he's an engineer, too.

(It is 1519 at the latest, in this scene. Why the FUCK would Crowley know about helicopters, and be able to explain them, comprehensively, to Leonardo da Vinci?

...Well. I choose to believe he got bored one day and worked it out. Look, if you know how to build a nebula, you can probably handle aerodynamics. And anyway, I think it's telling that this is his idea of shooting the shit. 'A drunken mind speaks a sober heart,' and all. He probably babbled about Aziraphale long enough to make poor Leo sick)

Apart from Aziraphale, Leonardo da Vinci is the only person Crowley has any keepsakes or mementos of.

Think about that, though. Aziraphale's bookshop is bursting with letters, paintings, busts, and personalized signatures memorializing all the humans he's known and befriended over 6000 years (indeed: Aziraphale has living human friends up and down Whickber Street. He's part of a community).

Crowley doesn't have any of that. It's just the stone albatross from the Church (for pining), the infamous gay sex statue (for spicy pining), the houseplants (for roleplaying his deepest trauma over and over, as one does), and this one piece of artwork, inscribed, "To my friend Anthony from your friend Leo da V."

To me, at least, that suggests a level of attachment that seems to be rare for Crowley.

...Maybe he liked having someone to talk shop with? Someone who was interested? Someone engaged enough to ask questions when they didn't immediately understand?

...Anyway.

There's also the matter of the crank handle.

This thing:

This is one of the subtler changes from the book. In the book, Crowley knows Satan is coming and, desperate, arms himself with a tire iron. It's the best he can do. He's not Aziraphale; he wasn't made to wield a flaming sword.

The show, IMO, improves on this considerably. Now he, like Aziraphale, gets to face annihilation with what he was made for in his hand. And it's not a weapon, not even an improvised one like the tire iron.

He made stars with it.

[both gifs by @fuckyeahgoodomens]

If you Google 'crank handle,' you'll get variations on this:

Crank handles have been around for centuries. Consisting of a mechanical arm that's connected to a perpendicular rotating shaft, they are designed to convert circular motion into rotary or reciprocating motion.

Which is to say they're one of the 'simple machines,' like a lever or a pulley; the bread and butter of engineering. You'll also get a list of uses for a crank handle, archaic and modern. Among them: cranking up the engine of an old-fashioned car... say, a 1933 Bentley. That's what Crowley has been using his for, lately. But he's had it since he was an angel and he's still, it seems, very capable of it's angelic applications.

Stopping time. For instance.

(This is conjecture on my part, but, I like to imagine that Crowley has the ability to stop time for the same reason I can --and should-- unplug my computer before I perform maintenance on it. Time and Space are a matched set, after all, and in his designs in particular, one feeds into the other.)

I know everyone has already said this, but: I REALLY LIKE that when he needs to channel the heights of his power, he does so not with a weapon but with a tool. Practically with a little handheld metaphor for ingenuity. One from long-lost days when he made beautiful things.

(And he loved it. Still loves it --he incorporated that metaphor into the Bentley, didn't he?)

Let Aziraphale rock up to the apocalypse with a weapon: he has his own compelling thematic reasons to do exactly that. Crowley's story is different, and fighting isn't the only way to express defiance. And if you've been condemned as a demon and assumed to be destructive by your very nature, what better way than this?

He made stars. They didn't manage to take that from him.

Neither Crowley nor Aziraphale are fighters, really --they have no intention of fighting in any war. They'll annoy everyone until there's no war to fight in, for a start. But between the two, if one must be, then that one is Aziraphale. Principality of the Earth, Guardian of the Eastern Gate, Wielder of the Flaming Sword... all that stuff. Even if he'd prefer not to, it's very clear that Aziraphale can rise to the occasion, if he must.

Crowley was never that kind of angel. He wasn't a Principality. He doesn't have a sword.

...And yet.

It's Crowley who protects. He's the one who paces, who stands guard, who circles Aziraphale and glares out at the world, just daring anyone else to come near.

In light of everything else I've said here, I think that's interesting.

Obviously part of it is that Aziraphale enjoys it and, you know, good for him. He's living his best life, no doubt no doubt no doubt. But what about Crowley? What's driving that behavior, really?

Have you heard the phrase, 'loved to the point of invention'? Well, what if 'the point of invention' was where you started? What if where you end up involves glaring out at the world, just daring anyone else to come near? What is that, in relation to the bright-eyed thing you used to be?

What do we name the point to which Crowley loves Aziraphale?

...Thinking about how an excitable angel with three million pages of star design he wants to tell you all about...becomes a guard dog. Is all.

#good omens #ineffable husbands #aziracrow #Crowley #Aziraphale #good omens 2 #good omens meta #unfortunately I do not have trains of thought #only long meandering strolls of thought #sorry about it #anyway tl;dr Crowley is a nerd #also I have a strange emotional attachment to the idea of 1500's Crowley...#...facedown in a pile of Mona Lisa sketches; drunkenly info-dumping about Aziraphale #and Da Vinci is just like. 'Ahhhh mio amico Antonio. You fucking simp.'

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hailsatanacab · 5 months

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Family Dinners - dpxdc

"Holy shit, you're Bruce Wayne!" Danny gaped, jabbing a finger at the man sitting at the head of the table.

The bustling dining room goes silent as everyone turns to look at him.

"Danny, who did you think was going to be here?" Tim asks, disbelief plain in his voice and Danny feels his face flush red.

"Sorry, I, uh, I guess I just never put it together. Tim Drake-Wayne. Wayne Manor. It, uh, makes sense now." He laughs sheepishly and scrubs at his neck before slumping back down into his chair.

"Well," Tim says with an indulgent sigh, "at least I know you're not just friends with me for my connections."

"Yeah, I'm really sorry, I just never thought about it, I guess."

Danny sinks lower as everyone around him laughs. Come to dinner, he said, the food is the best, he said, ignore the family, he said. Danny really wishes he'd listened to Tim and just ignored them—almost as much as he's regretting accepting the offer in the first place—but... he's having dinner with Batman.

Ancients, that's so weird!

The last time he saw Batman was in the future and, suffice it to say, it was not going well. There hadn't really been time for family dinners there.

Wait. Family dinners?

He peers around the table, openly gawking at everyone as it all clicks into place.

"Everything alright, Danny? Now realising who everyone else is?" Tim asks with a roll of his eyes.

"Uh... something like that..." Danny mumbles as everyone laughs again.

From further down the table, the smallest Wayne scoffs and clicks his tongue.

"I thought you said he was smart, Drake?"

"So, you all do it, too, then?" he asks, ignoring the jibe. Danny's only a little bit jealous as he thinks of how much easier they must have it, how much easier it'd be if his family had been on his side, too. "You all work together?"

"Nah," Dick says from across the table with a brilliant grin. "Tim's the only one that works with Bruce, we all have different jobs. I'm a police officer in Bludhaven."

"Disgusting." Danny blurts out without thinking—because seriously, what kind of self-respecting vigilante would also be a police officer?—before clapping a hand over his mouth. "Sorry."

The whole table laughs again, the loudest being the blonde girl a few spaces down from Dick. Look, Danny wasn't really paying attention to names when they were all paraded in front of him. Dick only gets remembered because his name is a joke.

Come on, Danny, recover!

"That's, uh, not what I meant, though."

"Oh?" Dick asks, cocking his head slightly to the side. Is it Danny's imagination or does his smile tense slightly?

"Yeah, I mean like, you know, in costume. It must make it so much easier to have everyone together like this."

"Costume? What do you mean?"

Yeah, Danny's not imagining it, everyone tenses up at that. It's really only now that he's realising that this probably isn't how he should bring up that he knows about their... night time activities. In fact, he probably shouldn't be bringing it up at all.

"Uuhhh..." Danny looks wildly around the table as he continues making his stupid noise. Think, think, think! There must be a way out of this!

"Danny?" Tim asks, looking concerned.

"Oh, Ancients, this isn't how I wanted it to go at all," he mutters, slipping even further into his chair. He's almost on the floor now and he so, so wishes it could just swallow him up.

His real first meeting with Batman was meant to be cool! He had planned to be Phantom, maybe save them from a tight spot, prove his worth as a mysterious and powerful ally as thanks for the help Batman gave him in the future.

"Danny, what are you talking about?" Tim starts tugging on his sleeve in an attempt to pull him back up from his pit of despair.

Eventually, Danny relents and sits up straighter, hiding his face in his hands and whining all the while.

"I'm sorry, I just didn't expect him to be here and it threw me off so now I look stupid and it's so embarrassing!" he wails, flailing his arms wide. "Why wouldn't you warn me that Batman was your adopted dad, Tim? Couldn't you have let me know?"

"I'm sorry, what? Danny are you alright? There's no way Bruce can be Batman, look at him!"

"Yeah," the blonde girl laughs from the bottom of the table, "look at him! That's a wet noodle of a man! Batman can actually do things, B is incapable of pretty much everything."

"Thank you, Stephanie," Bruce sighs, massaging his forehead.

It's... Those are the first words Danny's heard Batman say since everything went down and it's enough to knock him out of his embarrassment.

It's really good to hear his voice again. Especially now, when it's strong and healthy and full of personality—even if that personality is little more than a tired father right now—far better than how it had been, at the end.

Danny sits up, back straight, and grins. He's got this. He remembers it perfectly. Some people count sheep to fall asleep, Danny repeats his mantra to be certain that he'll never forget it.

"Gamma alpha upsilon tau iota mu epsilon, 42, 63, 28, 1 colon 65 dash 9."

Once again, the whole table falls into silence.

"Holy shit..." breathes the other D name (Duke? Danny's pretty sure he's Signal) from opposite Stephanie. "Isn't that...?"

"The time travelling code." The littlest Wayne says stiffly. "We have met in the future?"

"That's not just the time travelling code, Dami." Dick says, looking between Danny and Bruce. "That's the family time travelling code."

Danny's grin freezes in place.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"1 colon 65 dash 9." Dick explains, still flicking between him and Bruce. "It means you've been adopted into the family and we should all treat you as such, no questions asked."

"Tell you what, I'm about to ask a question." Danny says, dumbstruck. "You just told me it was a code to identify time travellers, not anything about being adopted! What the hell, B?"

Bruce looks about as shellshocked as Danny feels.

"We must have been close," he says finally, after opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water a few times.

"No! Not that close!" Danny reels back, taking a deep breath ready to refute it all, but... "Well, I mean, you found me when I first got stuck, and you helped me get better despite being... And then we fought together against the, uh, bad guy, before he, um, he... before you couldn't."

An uncomfortable beat passes while they all pick up on what Danny tried so hard not to say.

"So, you're not from the future, then, you travelled there and came back?" Tim asks, breaking the tension and leaning forward with a glint in his eye.

"Yeah, it was a whole end of the world thing, but don't worry about it," Danny says with a hand wave, "It's all kosher now, won't ever happen."

"What did happen?"

"Seriously, don't worry about it, we cool."

"How long in the future was it?"

"About ten years? You were pretty spry for an old man, B," Danny laughs, wishing they'd get off the topic of what happened and get back to the adoption bit.

Everyone shares degrees of a cautious smile as they relax out of the shock, and Dick—whose grin is the biggest—says, "No wonder you got the family code, you're already riffing on him like one of us. How long were you there for?"

"A week, before I managed to get back to my present and stop him then."

"A week? Jeez, B, that has to set some kind of record, seriously."

"Oh!" Danny says, sitting bolt upright and blinking in surprise before pointing at Dick and bouncing in his seat. "You're Nightwing!"

"What?"

"That's exactly what Nightwing said when Batman told me the code! Makes so much more sense now."

Dick laughs and claps his hands, delighted.

"You were not formally adopted?" The grumpy small one—Dami?—asks, his face pinched.

"I didn't even know I was informally adopted."

"And your parents? Are they alive or dead?"

"Damian, stop—"

"They were dead in the future, but they're alive now." Danny says, looking down. He fiddles with the tablecloth, twisting the fabric around his fingers as he fights down the pang of sadness that he always feels when he thinks of them now. He forces a bright smile on his face and hopes it doesn’t look too strained. "I just, uh, can't talk to them much, anymore."

"Damian," Dick warns, "1 colon 65 dash 9. Treat them as family, no questions asked."

"This is Damian treating him as family, the little turd has no manners." Tim scoffs, rolling his eyes, but he gently bumps shoulders with Danny to knock him out of his funk. Danny can't help but send him a watery smile.

"I have the most exemplary manners, Drake, unlike some people." Damian spits, crossing his arms with a pout. "I was merely ascertaining his status to see how he could possibly fit into the family."

"I know this is all a bit sudden, Danny," Bruce smiles, ignoring Damian and reaching out to lay a warm hand on his arm, "for all of us. But if I felt strongly enough to give you that code after spending a week with you in the future, then you are more than welcome in this family, if you so choose it. I think I can speak for all of us when I say we'd like to get to know you a bit more."

"I know a threat when I hear it, Bruce." Danny snorts. "But, yeah, I get it. I'm sorry this is all so weird, it really wasn't how I wanted to find you again, but... I'm glad I did."

"So are we, Danny." Dick says, with a warm smile. "And formally or not, 1 colon 65 dash 9 means you're family. Welcome to the fun house! No take backs or refunds, sorry. You're stuck with us."

#dpxdc #dcxdp #dc x dp #dp x dc crossover #batpham #hailsatanacrab🦀🦀writes #look. this has been in my mind for so long guys so long - and idk if its canon that the batfam have codes for time travel situations or what #but i feel like ive seen it before and if its not canon it should be #so here - how i think that would be funny to go down #i have so many thoughts about TUE and its place in a dpxdc crossover like holy shit there's so many ways it can go!!#i have another wip in the works thats kinda similar to this but with superman and i cannot wait to work on it again #there are so many ways i wanted this to go but i just couldnt get there - i wanted to keep it on the shorter side but like #perhaps ill have to expand #i just love the idea that like. theres a stranger at your table who knows you and knows you well. who knows the secret that youd die to keep #there's a stranger at your table and he says something and you know he's family. you know you're strangers but now...#now you have to be something more #oh man theres so many juicy ways it can go and I KNOW I DID NONE OF THEM #i want to write this whole plot again and make it angstier #(me with everything)#anyway! sorry love you all hope you enjoy it!!

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