#I could even write a dp crossover with it

[bluerosefox]

Another DPxDC idea cause I am still brain rotting in this fandom.

AND ONCE AGAIN, its a deaged Dani/Dan idea. And dad!Danny.

.........

Bruce stared for a long moment. Trying to make sure he wasn't going insane or was just very sleep deprived from three days of near no sleep because of a difficult case.

......

Nope he was still seeing them.

Two children, a toddler and a baby in a baby walker were in the Batcave.... One eating Alfred made cookies while the other was finishing up its bottle. The two seemed at home in the cave and were being watched over by Alfred who looked over at him with a raised eyebrow of 'More children sir?'

Bruce could hear nearly all of his children (one was not with them just yet still upstairs, they needed to take a private phone call it seems) who had come down to the cave for their annual weekly reports and updates all asking him when did he get more kids to bring into the family.

The toddler of the two, a little girl with messy black pigtails and blue eyes noticed him and smiled widely at him, eyes sparkling with toddler mischief as she finished her cookie off and then loudly said "Grandpa B!"

Then with the speed only a sugar upped toddler could do she ran over and crashed into his legs, her little arms wrapping around him as best as she could. The baby had finished his milk, and noticed him as well, making grunting sounds and coo's as he did his best to move his baby walker towards him as well.

Bruce blinked, his mind blanking at what he had been called, as he stared down at the toddler that looked up at him with smile.

Bruce could hear his children all freaking out and he questioned which one of them made him a grandfather and never told him about it!

Bruce got his answer when the one still upstairs in the manor came running down yelling out what had to be the children's names

"Ellie! Dan!"

"Hi Daddy!" came the response from the toddler and a tiny grunt from the baby.

[ducky-the-mucky]

I feel like the software department in the Watchtower is small, supper small. Like, so small that anyone who doesn't interact with them thinks the hiring process is extremely rigorous, and you have to be extremely professional and above Player-level skills to even think about getting in, let alone work with the Entire Justice League's software. And no one ever sees them, so one one ever asks about them.

But that's not it. At all.

You see, they get new employees every couple of months, all who barely ever last more than a week.

Why, you ask? Because Batman and the other heroes (but mostly Batman and his stupid batclan) don't communicate with the department when adding to and updating the software. Despite the fact there is a department to do and help with that.

So yeah, only a special kind of person can deal with having to make uncommenting code (with no clear purpose!!!) mesh with other code, having to go through and find unfinished code to either finish or get rid of (stupid batman coding off of 1 hour of sleep from the past two days), and still having to do collabs and stuff with the other departments.

All while waiting on HR to do something about it because they've all already given multiple complaints about it and HR is just sitting there, unsure what to do because not only is it their employers that are the problem but ITS SPECIFICALLY BATMAN.

The Software Department is the middle child of the Watchtower.

[kii0mi]

Ok so, hear me out, what if Danny thinks he and clockwork have a mentor and mentee relationship, almost like a family dynamic even. He gets to sleep on a couch on clockworks tower, hang around, and clockwork might sometimes even help him.

He’s happy, it’s everything he didn’t have with the Fentons, but, what if, clockwork only did it to avoid a bad timeline? He didn’t actually care about Danny, could care less what happened to him as long as it didn’t affect the timeline, and Danny discovers it for the first time when clockwork is very willing, and not at all affected, to end his life if he doesn’t complete a certain task for a “better timeline”

It’s not even a definite will, it’s just a slight chance of the timeline going wrong, and then Danny truly sees how little their relationship means to clockwork. It all crumbles around him as he realizes that the only “healthy” relationship he thought he had was build on straight up lies, he grieves for the mentor he apparently never even had on the first place.

Danny finishes the mission, and as clockwork goes to Pat him in the head for a good job so similar to a dog, a loyal pet to just follow orders in exchange for the bare minimum of affection and care, Danny avoids his hand and just flies away, core empty, void of any meaningful relationship, alone

He stops visiting clockwork altogether, and clockwork doesn’t visit either, barely keeping an eye on the boy to make sure he doesn’t step out of line, and if they capture and experiment on the kid? It’s not his problem as long as the timeline turns out alright

[omegasmileyface]

one of my favorite phenomena i see often is "dpxdc" fanfiction but its literally just a dc fanfiction where the author has an oc named danny. they can look entirely different, they can be a different gender, they can have zero relations to the dp universe or ghosts or any of his whole shebang, have a different last name and a different origin timeline, doesnt even have to be the main character, anything, but as long as the op is like "no dude trust me its technically danny fenton" its like. considered a dpxdc fic. im not saying this is a bad thing im saying its fucking hilarious

[noisilyscreechingsong]

Eyes

Dp x Dc Crossover Writing Idea

“Red Robin!”

When he backtracked to find the owner of the voice he was a bit surprised to find a young boy, maybe eight years old if he had to guess, dressed in a red sweatshirt that dwarfed him and a pair of gym shorts that had seen better days.

Not many Gothamites called out to the vigilantes, a silent agreement to stay out of their way and not to look too closely. This kid however stared up at him with bright blue eyes unafraid of getting the Red Robin’s attention.

A fan?

Before he even opens his mouth, the kid gives him a small, hopeful smile, eyes shining with something that reminds him of himself when he was that age and following Batman and Robin with his camera around his tiny neck.

“I brought you a gift,” the boy say with nervous excitement. He enthusiastically swings off the backpack he had on to dig through the contents, taking his eyes off the vigilante and showing his unwavering trust that nothing bad would happen to him while Red Robin was here.

The boy pulls out what appears to be a jar wrapped in newspaper, the worn page ripping in some spots to show the clear glass underneath. Small hands present it like it’s Red Robin’s birthday (which it wasn’t).

He takes it cautiously, the kid hasn’t been hostile but this was still weird, and pulls it closer with enough space so if it’s a bomb it doesn’t blow up in his face.

It’s got weight to it and the slight sloshing tells him it’s filled with liquid. He carefully unwraps the ‘gift’, keeping his eye on the boy who stands waiting anxiously.

Tim almost drops the jar as soon as he sees what’s inside. Only his reflexes from over the years held on and his expression turned neutral.

A pair of eyes sit at the bottom of the jar. The orbs were crudely extracted, tissue floating around them like a mane of hair around a head.

He turns the jar to see the irises and… he knew these eyes. The slimy green is filmed with death, but he recognized these eyes from the number of times the owner locked them onto him, the cruel possessiveness they possessed when they gazed at him. Never again apparently.

Tim doesn’t speak for a while, not knowing what to say, but also thoughts racing too fast to form any proper sentences.

“Do you like it?” The small, nervous voice interrupts those thoughts.

What an innocent question on an equally innocent looking face.

“How did you get Ra’s Al Ghul’s eyes?”

The teasing chatter over the comms immediately hushes into shocked silence.

“I took them from his body, so you knew he was dead. I burned the rest so you don’t have to worry about him coming back again. The Pit there is gone anyway,” the child explains easily, not fazed in the slightest from the words he speaks.

“Grandfather is dead?” He hears Damian whisper over the comm.

So many other questions were flying through Tim’s head. He looks the kid over again.

Black hair and blue eyes. In any other situation the kid might have been a possible Wayne adoptee. He’s not a clone from what he can see though. Despite the coloring he doesn’t really look like any of them. Pale skin like Tim, but has freckles. The same kind of nose as Damian, but wide, round eyes. Jaw kind of like Jason, but his body shape is too narrow. Bright, almost icy blue eyes like Dick, but eyebrow shape is flatter. Lip shape like Bruce, but from the kid’s anxious lip biting he could see the faintest trace of dimples.

“Who are you?” He asks instead of the other million and one questions.

The boy blinks almost like he wasn’t expecting the question. He’s cheeks color pink with blush as he grins widely.

“I’m Danny!” He introduces cheerfully like he didn’t just hand a vigilante a jar of eyes.

“Hi, Danny,” Tim greets almost dumbly. “Want to tell me why you gave me this?”

Danny scoffs his shoe against the pavement in what appears to be embarrassment.

“Well, I know when you ask someone for something, it’s nice to give a gift or something. Like I did something nice for you so maybe you’ll do something nice for me?”

He takes a moment to absorb that child-like reasoning.

“So you want me to do something for you and you thought I would like Ra’s Al Ghul’s eyes in exchange?”

Danny studies him and fidgets with the large sweatshirt sleeve.

“I just thought you would like proof. Like the whole ‘bring me the heart of my enemy’ kind of thing. Do you not like it? I couldn’t just take a picture ‘cuz I didn’t have a camera with me, I know you like photography. I can do something else for you if it’s not enough,” he offers worriedly.

Tim freezes.

“How do you know I like photography?” He demands.

Danny tilts his head curiously.

“Because Tim Drake likes photography,” he says like it’s obvious, “and you’re Tim Drake.”

Well. This is less than ideal.

“Red Robin, take him back to the Cave,” Batman instructs over the comms.

Yeah, he was getting there.

“Do you know the other’s’ identities?”

Danny nods and hums affirmatively. Tim waits.

“Oh! Yea. Batman is Bruce Wayne. Robin is Damian Wayne. Red Hood is Jason Todd. Nightwing is Richard Grey-“

“Okay. That’s enough.”

Tim glances around the empty alley they were standing in, checking to make sure no stray people heard. Luckily they were truly alone.

“Danny, do you want to come back with me?” He asks, but it’s not really a question. The kid was coming back regardless, it would just be better if he went willingly.

Unsurprisingly, the kid lights up like a little sun at the offer.

“Really?” He nearly shouts in excitement.

“Yeah, kid. I parked my bike a few blocks from here. You ever rode a motorcycle before?”

Danny shakes his head, nearly bounding on his toes.

“Not in this lifetime.” And wasn’t that odd wording? “Are we gonna grapple there?”

“Think you can hold on?”

“Yeah!”

He kneels down so the boy can climb onto his back and lock his arms around his neck and hook his feet together around his torso. Danny is worryingly light as he stands.

The kid is the picture of an excited and overeager child as they carefully fly over rooftops and then drive back to the Cave. Even when they park inside the safety of the Batcave, Danny’s eyes are filled with child-like awe and wonder, so curious and chattering with questions and wild imagination. It would be cute, endearing even, if the jar of eyes wasn’t sitting heavily in his pocket.

Alfred came down not too long after their arrival with a tray of healthy snacks and some waters. Danny happily munches on the apple slices as he wanders around where Tim can see him.

The rumble of the Batmobile can be heard almost an hour later after Tim has to tell Danny not to touch the weapons for the fourth time. The kid’s attention is drawn to the sleek black vehicle as it parks by Tim’s bike. He trots over with wide eyes as the doors open and Robin exits, then Batman.

Unfortunately, Dick is in Bludhaven and Jason is visiting Roy and Lian this week. Cass and Steph were gone as well and Duke was sleeping. It was just the three of them and this kid with Alfred as the only buffer.

Danny stares openly, curious, as the duo makes their way over to the computer where Tim has claimed his sit.

Tim turns the jar that he set on the table so the eyes are facing them and slowly leans back again, suddenly very tired. Damian flexes his hands into fists tightly while Batman is very still.

“Hi,” Danny chirps like nothing is wrong, oblivious to the tension in the air.

Batman takes a measured breath. Robin glares down at the child, but remains silent for now.

“Who killed Ra’s Al Ghul?”

Danny blinks blankly.

“Nobody.”

“You’re saying he just dropped dead?” Damian sneered in sarcasm.

“Death took him,” the child says simply as if that explained everything.

“How?” The word is demanded and emphasized.

“Like Death takes everyone. His expiration was overdue.”

Bruce frowns and Damian almost snarls.

“I demand you start making sense!”

Danny glares back in offense.

“I’m being very clear! Maybe you should ask better questions!”

The twelve year old growls at the smaller child and Batman has to place a firm hand on his shoulder to keep him from attacking.

“Danny?” Batman questions after a tense moment.

The boy’s arms are crossed in irritation, but he blinks out of his glare to stare up at the man.

“Yea?”

“How do you know our identities?”

“Oh, memories.”

Danny looked like everything he said made sense and it was driving Tim up a wall.

“Memories,” Bruce repeats.

“Uh-huh,” Danny nods confidently. “From the Lazarus Pit.”

A jolt goes through Tim as he recalls what the boy said earlier about the Pit.

“Didn’t you say the Pit was gone?” He asks before Bruce could continue his line of questioning.

Danny turns with a bright smile as if he was proud Tim remembered.

“Yea! Well, gone from this world anyway.” Tim was concerned. “I took the memories from it before sending it back where it belongs.”

“Okay. How did you know how to ‘take the memories’ and send it back? Back where?”

“I was born from it. Duh. It went back to the Realms or I guess you’d call it the Afterlife,” Danny actually rolls his eyes as if they should already know this.

“Born from it?” Damian asks with a wavering voice, hidden well from the child but not from them. “Nothing has ever been born from the Pits.”

“That you know of.”

And wasn’t that the kicker.

“So, to clarify, you come from the Pits. You know who we are because you took the memories from said Pits. Death took Ra’s because his time was up. And you took the eyes from his corpse to give to me because you thought I would like it as a gift so I would do something for you.”

Danny positively beams.

“This is why you’re my favorite!”

Damian grinds his teeth harshly.

“What is it you want Red Robin to do for you?” Batman asks in strangled hesitation.

“Oh!” Danny perks up like he remembered and hops over to Tim with pleading hands. “Can you please make me an identity? You’re really good at all that stuff and I was hoping you could find me a family. Someone to adopt me. A nice family, with a bed and family dinners and a dog. I always wanted a dog.”

Tim has the sudden urge to scream.

[kizzer55555]

How to Kidnap a Corpse

So here’s a DP x spn crossover idea I have. So basically, something happens and the Winchester brothers come across infinite realm ghosts. Vlad specifically (could be just him, could be others.) and they get separated. They try everything they can think of but none of their tricks work on Vlad. He treats the holy water like normal water, can cross salt lines, unbothered by the numerous chants they’ve tried or sigils they write, and any of their actual weapons such as guns, silver, iron, holy metal or other, even a good old fist to the face, just pass right through him. They have NEVER encountered a creature like this before. They don’t even know what it is. But whatever it is has a myriad of powers they’ve never seen before and is pretty much invincible. And then they get separated. (Maybe in the ghost zone, maybe in some random location. Maybe they were trapped in Walker’s ghost prison for being ‘illegal humans’ and Vlad is acting Warden or wants an object from them? Who knows?) So Sam is running from this…creature and Danny ends up seeing this happen and decides to help out when it appears Vlad might kill him. And Sam has no idea why a clearly supernatural creature is helping him, especially since he thinks they might be the same species?? But he keeps running. And then at some point Sam is cornered again and Danny takes a hit meant for the guy (maybe at first Danny was just tackling Vlad and Sam thought it was some kind of territorial thing and while it was supicious the second creature kept putting itself between Sam and the first creature, he chalked it up to a coincidence because there was no reason for it to help him) and a strike was about to hit Sam but Danny, after being thrown down in the opposite direction, very clearly throws himself between Sam and the hit, taking it himself. And tells Sam to run. This changes the tide of battle as before they were kinda even but now Danny is injured. So Sam runs while the second humanoid creature distracts the first (a little bitter because it appeared to be a kid) and then practically crashed into Dean. And they have the chance to get away but Sam stops him and explains about the other creature who saved him. Saying they couldn’t just leave him there. Besides, it looked like a kid. And Obviously Dean is ready to leave. (If they did have an object Vlad wanted, it was lost long ago in the fight and not worth their lives. But maybe they just interrupted his business and he didn’t want witnesses.) So Dean is convincing his brother to leave when they hear a noise and both immediately hide and then look out to see the first hostile creature dragging the unconscious form of the second creature away and the second creature is clearly injured. And looks like a kid. Maybe 15 years old.

And then a green portal opens up that gives off the most ominous presence, enough to make a shiver go down their spines, and the first creature is dragging the injured, young second creature through and so Dean says fine and gives in but makes it clear he’s only helping so they can figure out what the fudge those things are. So they get Danny away from Vlad. Maybe they shoot Vlad and it actually works because Vlad wasn’t expecting it and didn’t phase through it, or maybe they hit him right when the portal closed and it distracted him, maybe it’s just an outright smoke bomb kidnapping and they just bolt? But basically, they do something and now Vlad is gone and they have an unconscious, glowing, bleeding teenager. So they just kinda…manhandle the body into the Impala and really, they should not have as much experience manhandling unconscious, corpse like bodies into their car, but they do. So now they have an unconscious and injured unknown creature who is likely a child of the unknown species and Dean figures that at the very least, if they are helping him they‘ll figure a few things out so as they are trying to use medical supplies to fix up the scratches and burns and stop the oozing, glowing green substance flowing from the kids wounds that they think is his blood. Dean is also doing research on what the heck they just fought. As well as poking the unconscious teen with various things. Now that he isn’t phasing through them. Iron? No. Silver? No. Holy water? Nah, just passes right over the skin like normal water. Salt? Nah. What about fire? “Dean!”

“What?”

And so the experiments/impromptu surgery happens and it’s not like they can take the kid to a normal hospital so they go to see Bobby. And he just sees the two brothers awkwardly trying to drag a glowing body out of the Impala that is covered in amateur bandaging and leaking a green substance over everything. If this is a point in the series where Cas is present, he shows up later (likely was also separated from the brothers during the fight and then reunited with them at the car as they are running to it while carrying the unconscious Danny. Or maybe shows up at the car after the battle, sees them, and is like, what is that?) and Cas can’t even identify what Danny is. Not a demon. He doesn’t sense a malevolent presence from him. But not fully human either. Too strong. And a connection to death? (Did Vlad or anyone se mention they were ghosts and the Winchester’s just didn’t believe them/thought the creature was messing with him?) uuhhhh…I’m not sure if he’s breathing but the blood hasn’t stopped flowing. Ghost? Zombie?

“He’s too….alive to be a zombie.”

“He’s too alive to be a ghost!”

Cas says he’s closer to an angel than anything but something’s still off. And he doesn’t have any grace.

“Wouldn’t a graceless angel just be a human?”

So when Danny finally wakes up it’s going to be ✨interesting✨. But basically, Danny stays in Phantom form and the Winchesters have no idea he’s part human. Even if Danny does change to his human form, they just think it’s some kind of shapeshifting ability. (Does Danny tell them and they don’t believe him? Does he keep it secret? Does he think they already know/figure if they accept his ghost side there’s no need to hide the human part and just, not bother hiding it but they don’t pick up context clues?). So they now have a baby…thing…join them.

Is this a bad Fenton parents universe and Danny ran away? Nasty burger incident and Danny was running from Vlad? Is this Danny on ‘vacation’ with his Godafther and prefers spending time with the Winchesters Until he has to go home rather than the fruitloop? Does Danny just disappear because he was injured/saved and his parents just haven’t realised it yet? Is Danny jumping between the Winchesters and Amity? Who knows!

[neokamui414]

I really like crossover fanfics and fan art, I really do. However I sometimes feel like some of the most popular fandom crossovers are also ones that perpetually fall into boring and predictable patterns while simultaneously and consistently ignoring/forgetting the most obvious and easy ways two or more fictional properties could be combined or crossed over.

And I think this is nowhere more apparent than the absolute proliferation of Danny Phantom and DC comics content here on this site.

Because you know what, I think there are some really cool and interesting things you could do with placing Danny and company in the world of DC or vice versa. The problem is that overwhelmingly I don't see any of those interesting ideas being done.

It's all the same variation of like three different plot points, all of which are exacerbated in their boring unoriginality and fandom cringiness by the fact that they also almost entirely revolve around the same flanderizations of DC characters that originate from people whose understanding of these comic book characters is entirely based off of watching the Teen Titans and Young Justice cartoons.

I am so so so so tired of seeing the same premise of Danny getting involved with Batman because he's a dark-haired light colored eyed superhero "twink" just like the rest of the male Robins. I'm tired of him getting adopted by Bruce, I'm tired of him being secretly Dick Grayson's long lost relative.

What's even worse is this crossovers frequent demonstration of what I think is the inexcusable sin of unoriginally using John Constantine, a character that I by and large think the vast majority of this website and it's user base just doesn't understand and probably never will. (this is a whole separate rant but the website that at one point had the majority of its user-base obsessed with an imaginary queer interpretation of one of the most aggressively mediocre and dude bro heterosexual paranormal TV shows to have ever existed is one that I think is fundamentally incapable of actually understanding or appreciating a legitimately compelling queer paranormal/urban fantasy character. The website that thinks Cas and & Dean were anything, whether that be a compelling romance, compelling characters or even in a good or enjoyable show, I think are forever incapable of actually understanding John.)

Do I think you could write an interesting story with John Constantine interacting with Danny? Yeah sure but I think that that would be entirely predicated on one's ability to actually write John compellingly, which is a dubious ask in the first place AND regardless it's still the most uninspired and boring interpretation of what you could do with "Danny interacting with one of the supernatural characters of DC"

Here are some actual recommendations for interesting crossovers and universe fusions :

*The fact that people want to have Danny Fenton interact with DC characters and Deadman and Secret are not the characters that immediately come to mind for fic ideas shows I think either the fundamental lack of creativity on the part of people who like this crossover, or just that they really don't know shit about DC comics....... Danny and Boston Brand would play off each other so well both comedically and as potential mentor and mentee. Greta and Danny would be ADORABLE together whether it is just friends or in a shippy dynamic.

* We need stories where Danny is interacting with The Spector, and the lack of them is just plain criminal in my opinion. I really could see a bunch of really cool stories where GhostKing Danny is put into conflict with the Vengeance of God. Or make him team up with The Specter have and have him fight Eclipso.

*we know the DC afterlife is incredibly complicated and interconnected with other mystical realms such as The Dreaming and Hell, maybe explore how that would relate to DP's conception of the Ghost Zone. Danny, Zachary Zatara and Kid Devil's bizarre interdimensional odyssey would be a great fic!

* if one has to put Danny in Gotham for some reason or another have him fight against the Gentleman Ghost, play around with the relationship with the glowing green ectoplasm and the green glowing liquid of the Lazarus Pits, and if you do that you have an excuse to make him interact with Jason Todd if you absolutely can't resist bringing in a member of the Bat family. Remember, Jason has the ability to summon forth magical blades under certain circumstances and as a character who has repeatedly died and come back to life he's the only bat that I think would actually have interesting interactions with Danny.

* but above all if you have to have Danny Phantom and company goes to Gotham as your story premise, I cannot emphasize this enough, HAVE HIM TEAM UP WITH RAGMAN!!!!!! I swear to God, have the snarky Ghost Boy interact with the character whose costume is literally filled with ghosts!!!!!!

*going back to the ectoplasm and Lazarus Pit idea, make Danny an avatar of The Black/ Rot. I would absolutely love to see him have to contend with the likes of Anton Arcane or come into conflict with Swamp Thing and Animal Man. Also having Swamp Thing present in the story would give a far more organic reason as to why John Constantine would be interested in this teenager with ghost powers.

So yeah I would kindly ask the people who are so insistent on producing crossover content of these two fandoms to actually do some interesting ideas.

And incidentally while we're on the subject matter, the fact that so much of Danny Phantom is directly inspired by Spider-Man and yet there's not really a lot of crossover between DP and Marvel properties is really really bizarre to me, especially because this website's user base purports to be such huge appreciators of the Spider-Verse films........

[haleswallows]

coming at you live, with a news series.... Promises, Promises

Part 1: Cross My Heart (Hope to Die) Fandom: DC x DP Crossover Pairing: Dead Tired (Danny Fenton/Tim Drake) Rating: Teen

Teaser:

"Are you really doing the 'FBI, this is our case now' shtick? What are you, a cop?"

Phantom makes a retching sound. "Sorry, reflex. Any sort of implication I'm government adjacent, can't help it."

"You know being Justice League makes you government adjacent," Red Robin helpfully points out. He weighs a net-launcher in his hand. "If not affiliated with the UN, the League works with the organization often to be called an ally."

"Not me," Phantom says with cheer, pushing a narrow cylinder towards him. "That's essentially a light saber, by the way. Nah, they keep me pretty far from the UN shit. I'm not built for it. I'm there to hit things real hard and share tech."

A light saber? Hell yeah. Tim grabs it and wonders if he can keep it.

"Can I keep it?" he blurts out, because why not?

Shrugging, Phantom says, "Sure, I have like five more. This one is green, but I think I can change the color. Red would match your like —," he waves expansively at Red Robin, "Vibes and aesthetic. Very cool branding, by the way. The cape is dope."

Huh. Tim didn't expect the compliment. He chooses to ignore it, mostly because he just doesn't know what to say in response. 'Thanks, I like your cyber-gothic vibes too'?

"Green's fine, I always wanted to be a Jedi." A red light saber would infinitely more on brand, but Tim would never consider being a Sith. Wait, absolutes. Shit.

It fits perfectly next to his bo staff on his bandoleer. Which, sick and feels like a divine happenstance, as if Red Robin was meant to have the energy blade. He helps Phantom reload the bag, though the ghost keeps the thermos out before pushing the entire duffle back inside his chest.

God, that's even weirder up close. Tim examines Phantom's torso, mind spinning through possibilities on how it works.

"Alright," Phantom's voice breaks his concentration, Red Robin snapping to attention. A truly feral grin spreads across Phantom's face as he lifts into the air, hair swirling and catching the last dredges of sunlight. "Let's go ghost hunting."

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

They're wrapping up in one of Tim's more 'civilian' passing safe-houses. Mostly because it was the closest, and Phantom said something about 'ley lines' and 'easier to open a portal'. Cool, whatever. Tim wanted to burn this safe-house soon anyway.

Tim, as always, gets himself into trouble. Chronic Thinking Too Much Disease, they really ought to make a cure for it. He reflects, paused in the middle of writing the report and watching Phantom eat Cheerios right out of the box. Phantom perches on the counter, looking like he belongs there, shoveling cereal into his mouth with the relic sitting innocently at his hip.

When the fuck did Tim get Cheerios?

There's no denying it. Tim likes working with Phantom. The guy is good in a fight, doesn't rely on his powers too much, and kept up with Tim. Not just physically, but intellectually. And he's shockingly earnest when he isn't being a trash-talking little shit.

So. Tim gets an idea.

"Hey," he says before he's even thoroughly thought it out, "we should date."

Phantom pauses, gloved hand suspended in the middle of shoving another handful of cereal into his mouth, wide eyed and gaping. Attractive.

"Huh?" he says eloquently.

"Not for real," Tim scrambles to explain. "I mean fake dating. Just hang around some, be a bit performative, nothing out of masks. We can say we're taking things slow and break up amicably. Nightwing keeps trying to set me up with a date. This will get him off my case."

"Oooooh." Phantom resumes inhaling cereal. Why a ghost needs to eat, Tim would like to know, but it's probably rude to ask. Slowly chewing, Phantom seriously thinks it over. "You know, the council has been bugging me, too. About dating. This could work out for both of us."

Council? Tim would like to know why a council is interested in Phantom dating. So he asks.

Phantom sighs explosively. Finally, he sets the Cheerios down. "OK, so like, this is need to know basis only. I haven't even disclosed it to the League. And like, Nightwing only knows because he's my friend and the Observants crashed one of our missions and outed me. Hard to lie about why a floating eyeball showed up to demand I actually show up to the next council meeting, instead of blowing them all off again to play heroes with my living friend."

Pulling a face, Phantom waves an arm in an arc over his head. A crown appears, spinning and shooting off beams of light like an Aurora Borealis.

Tim doesn't gape, because Red Robin doesn't gape. But, you know, that's unexpected.

"I'm the Ghost King. It's a whole thing, no I am not taking questions on it at this time. Well, technically, I'm the Prince of the Infinite Realms because I'm too young to take the throne. So, there's a council and a regent. Whatever, not important!"

Phantom claps, getting himself back on track. "What that means is there's a council and Observants that are really interested in my personal shit. Including who I date. But like, I'm enjoying my brat girl summer and being single right now, not that they care."

Tim blinks. Then blinks again, slotting the new information in place alongside everything he knows about Phantom. That's... something.

"That sounds annoying," Tim says, instead of one of the approximately 23 questions in his head that are quickly spawning more by the second. "Fake dating would solve both of our problems."

Because Tim is a professional, they make a contract.

Phantom watches with great interest as Tim bustles around the apartment, setting up shop at the kitchen table. He doesn't think he's ever actually sat at this table. Mostly, he's used this apartment to sleep, a crash-out spot that has a nicer bed and isn't as sparse as the other Bat-affiliated safe houses.

As soon as Tim sits, stretching out his wrists, Phantom kicks off from the counter to hover around Tim's shoulders. The box of Cheerios balances precariously on the ghost's stomach. Tim eyes it briefly. Then sets to it.

"So, uh," Phantom starts, arms folded behind his head. "How casual is 'casual'?" Under the weight of Tim's judging eyebrows, Phantom defends himself. "I'm just asking! Like, how far are we both willing to go to sell it? Are we exclusive? Facebook official?"

"Facebook official," Tim echoes, typing. "Christ, is anyone Facebook official? Do ghosts have Facebook?"

"I don't know, I could get one. If, like, you think it'd help." Absurd, this entire thing is absurd. But they're here and committed to the bit. Or committing to the bit. There's 'selling it', and then there's…. whatever Phantom is saying. Facebook, what year is it?

"Red Robin doesn't have a Facebook, and I refuse to make one." Tim barely manages to keep from sounding snide.

"I won't mog on you referring to yourself in the person, even though I'm really tempted." How gracious. "Alright, so just. Seeing each other, feeling it out, not seeing other people."

[necrotic-nephilim]

@sasheneskywalker i love when you enable me to ramble about things because oh my god do i have thoughts.

so recently, i made a post discussing the phenomena of DC x DP and DC x MLB crossovers and why they exist and part of that post was discussing how largely speaking, at least half, if not more of the Batfamily fandom doesn't read the comics. if they interact with canon DC material, it's adaptations that are their own sequestered universes and oftentimes not remotely comic accurate or seeking to be. the most obvious example is the Young Justice cartoon. i'm adding a cut to this post because it just got so long i'm so sorry.

a lot of times, when people are discussing the "why" of this oversaturation of fanon-only fandom, they blame Wayne Family Adventures. and i think, to a point, i agree WFA is responsible for a boom in this fandom. but as someone who's been in the fandom long before we had WFA, to me it's the other way around. WFA was DC's way of meeting the demand for this easy-to-get-into, easy-to-consume content about the Batfamily that predicates itself on the comics just enough to be vaguely the same characters, but has a more sitcom, slice-of-life sort of vibe so DC could profit off of this section of the fanbase that otherwise wasn't consuming its primary material. and well, it's definitely worked. not only that, but i have a weird theory that the decline in the MCU also led to the rise in the Batfamily fandom. when you consider the fan content that made the MCU popular within fandom, it's that 2012 "they all live in Avengers Tower and Thor is eating poptarts and Clint is in the vents and there are movie nights every Friday" sort of vibe. those were the fics that were a hallmark of the fandom. and as the MCU has strayed from well... quality content in general, but specifically well-thought-out crossover content where characters can have their own arcs but also exist in a wider story where they clearly care about each other, that fandom was sort of homeless. so where do you go, if you like a superhero found family where you can have villains for angst but also stick them all in one big family-like home for silly crack and have a plethora of options for gay ships? well. you go to the Batfamily. if you write a crack/fluff Batfamily genfic with silly vibes and low stakes instead of say, a fic about a very specific comic issue even if it's a popular comic, you're *going* to get more traction for the former. because the fanbase largely just isn't reading the comics.

and i feel... complicated about this. because on one hand, Don't Like Don't Read has been a tenet of my fandom experience. i'm very pro-fandom and that includes fandom content i don't like. and to an extent, i do think this sort of should apply to Batfamily fanon. i enjoy having my moments with other comic purists, giggling over exceptionally painful OOC headcanons or even facepalming in pain over some content but it is on me to not interact with that content. you don't make fandom a better place by being hostile to fans who engage with canon in ways you don't approve of. and frankly? we as comic readers are not going to get non-comic fans to read the comics by being asshats to them. no one is going to want to pick up any comic if we get a superiority complex about it. and also, i feel like we're all lying to ourselves a little bit insisting comics are so, so easy to get into. they're not. we can just all agree, they're really not. i've been single-handedly helping my sister get into comics, specifically Wonder Woman and no matter how simple i make it, i watch her get frustrated trying to understand what pre-Crisis and post-Crisis and New-52 and Flashpoint and all these things mean and what a retcon vs a reboot is and what a Crisis Event is and what the hell Diana's current backstory even *is*. sure, you can give someone a beginner list of comics to start with and slowly dip their toes in the water but sooner or later, *something* is going to confuse them. comics as a medium straight up aren't going to be everyone's cup of tea. and if someone *just* wants to read silly fluffy fanfiction about the Batfamily, i can't entirely begrudge them for not wanting to take the hours and hours out of their day to understand this medium. it's not an accessible medium to get into. "read this and this, but this run is out of print and this run wasn't collected in trades at all but also make sure you read that event in order and this is a good comic but the backstory in it is retconned and you *have* to read this it's so important but it's also really bad because the author kind of sucks" sounds. ridiculous for someone who like. just wants to read some stuff about Nightwing. sometimes, we all make reading comics sort of sound like a chore, not a hobby.

so my point is, i do extend some grace to Batfamily fanon for existing. i think my biggest gripe is, as i said in my other post, misuse of tags (if you're not creating content about comics, maybe you don't need the comics fandom tag on Ao3, just the all media types umbrella tag) and my far bigger gripe: when panels are taken out of context to support fanon only headcanons. if i could impart *anything* onto the Batfamily fandom as a comic fan it'd be this: if you haven't *read* the comic, don't spread the panel. if you don't even know what comic it's *from*, don't spread the panel. it's fine to use comic panels to discuss your headcanons, but so often i see someone spreading a comic panel from a comic they haven't read, and when asked where it's from, they can't source it. a silly example that comes to mind is a post going around, taking a panel where Dick, in his internal monologue goes "here comes the sun. do do do do." and the post is claiming it's from him getting buried alive. when that panel comes from Nightwing (1996) #140, and he gets buried alive in Nightwing (1996) #127, two completely different moments frankensteined together. if you're going to not read the comics, that's completely fine, but unless you're sure of the source and the context, panels shouldn't be spread around. i'm sick of this specifically happening to Red Robin (2009), with ppl claiming Tim has totally killed people because he blew up some of Ra's' bases, when those panels within context, make it clear he gave everyone time to escape. and in a later arc in that very comic, Tim grapples with the idea of murdering Captain Boomerang, and *specifically chooses not to*, because he doesn't agree with murder, even against the person who has hurt him the most. if you'd like to write fanfiction where Tim is pro-murder and has done some sketch things, i'm totally on board and would probably like to read it. but there's no need to pretend it's canon from a few panels you saw out of context.

beyond that, i think it's not *entirely* correct to say that fanon is harmless. whenever i see very WFA-positive posts, they often default to the argument that WFA is fun and silly, and comic fans are killjoys for not liking it. which. i think is complicated because the issue is, WFA and fanon don't exist in a vacuum. if you like WFA power to you, i don't think it's the worst thing ever, but i do think it's degrading to these characters because honestly? they feel incompetent in the webtoon. it's one thing if WFA was solely a slice-of-life sort of deal, just having silly episodes where Bruce is taking on a PTA mom or they're all fighting for the last cookie. but when WFA attempts to take on more serious plots with these characters, it *fundamentally* falls flat in understanding them. i get it, Bruce comforting Jason having a panic attack because a noise reminded him of the crowbar felt cute in a microcosm, but i'm so serious when i say that storyline destroyed how like. half of this fandom understands Jason Todd's relationship to his trauma. it doesn't understand how he reacts when he's triggered, what coping mechanisms he seeks out, and how he would handle Bruce comforting him. even if i can believe for a brief moment Jason *would* be triggered by something like that, him running and trying to hide and then getting a hug from Bruce to make it okay is just. painful. WFA needs everything to be wrapped up in a nice, neat little bow. so even when it starts to tackle interesting concepts, it makes them fall flat with its need to be soft, low stakes, hurt/comfort. there was a two-parter episode that dealt with the complicated mutual hatred/jealousy between Tim and Damian that *almost* really interested me because for once, it felt like the webtoon wanted to explore canon messy dynamics. but of course, it had to be fixed with one conversation and a hug. you don't mend the *years* of issues these characters have like that. WFA isn't in character because these characters are hyperbole cartoonified versions of themselves to fit within the medium and be a cute happy family.

because that right there, is the crux of it. the Batfamily fanon seeks to simplify the Batfamily and force them into a nuclear family. there are so many fantastic posts on here discussing how the nuclear family-ification of the Batfam is eroding decades worth of complex histories so i won't go too far into that. but what i will say is that there's this need, in the Batfamily fandom, for the Batfamily to exist as a unit. they are a *family*. (honestly i think calling it the Batfamily is a misnomer and has been for years but we're in too deep now.) they exist to each other first, and any teams or friends they have come secondary to this family unit. you can *specifically* see this demonstrated in what headcanons are becoming popular these days. i have an entire lengthy meta in my drafts about how i *loathe* the "the Batfamily meets the Justice League" genre of fanfic because it makes no *sense*. in order to have this genre of fic exist, you must operate under the assumption that no one in the League, or adjacent to the League, knows the Batfamily exists and are thus utterly shocked to discover Batman has kids. and to make *that* work, you have to strip *every single Batfamily member* of such important dynamics and friendships so you can lock them all in Gotham for their whole lives. Dick can't have the Titans, Tim can't have Young Justice, Duke & Cass can't have the Outsiders, Jason can't have the Outlaws, Damian can't have the Supersons, Babs can't have the Birds of Prey, and so on. because if they had these relationships, they would be known to the League. the Batfamily fandom doesn't care about this, it's just "silly fanfiction", it's not trying to be serious. but how can you say you like Dick Grayson as a character if you don't understand the Titans *are* his family? at some points of his life, moreso than the Batfamily even is. it is constantly repeated to us in most comics with Dick how much the Titans mean to him. he *needs* them to be who he is. the same extends to every other Batfamily member, most of which have been full League members at this point. but in fanon, that doesn't matter. the Batfamily are a sequestered unit first, and all of those side relationships are secondary and easy to toss away, if it makes your fanfic work better.

and because they have to be a unit first, you have these forced relationships that dump years of actual canon material for the sake of making them get along. the Batfamily fandom has its favorites and well. it's no secret it's usually the boys. Jason and Tim by *far* stand out as fandom faves so, their dynamic is a heavily explored one. it does matter that in canon they don't tend to get along and especially don't see each other as family. what matters is that you can push dynamics onto them. and so fanon gets all twisted up about which Robin Tim actually idolized as a kid (Dick) and what member of the Batfamily is pro-murder but still an older sibling figure to him and looks out for him (Helena, or if you want the dynamic of once tried to harm Tim but they've reconciled, Jean-Paul) in favor of who's the most popular. Dick, Jason, Tim, and Damian are always going to be the standouts for popularity, but it's specifically Jason and Tim who are getting fanonized the most. and that's because really, we don't have much canon content of Tim that *isn't* the comics. for Dick you've got Young Justice (tv), for Damian you've got the DCAMU, for Jason you've sort of got the Under The Red Hood movie, but Tim sort of lingers in this limbo. (yes, he's in Young Justce (tv) and Titans (live action) but in neither is he the main character nor given much depth) so, he gets a *lot* projected onto him and has become fanonized. and even with Jason's animated movies, you don't see him interact with Tim, so people build it from the ground up how they want to see it, disregarding of canon comics. i think it's what makes him so popular in the first place- he's malleable into whatever you want or need him to be.

and of course, the fanon ignores other characters in the Batfamily it doesn't know about. i feel like you could create a tier list of Batfamily characters by their popularity, going from the fandom main characters: Tim, Jason, Bruce, Alfred, Dick, Damian. to the underrated: Steph, Duke, Babs, Cass. to the forgotten about unless they're convenient for a story: Kate, the Foxes, Helena Wayne, Carrie, Selina, Harper Row, Maps, Minhkhoa Khan. to the absolutely unknown: Helena Bertinelli, Jean-Paul Valley, Onyx Adams, the Clovers, Julia Pennyworth. it's not lost on me that the ignored characters tend to be women and people of color. which is both a canon and fanon problem, DC will continue adding interesting characters to the Batfamily, play with them for a few years, then drop them to default to the "Batboys" again. and it's a vicious cycle of the fandom only caring about the "Batboys", and thus people entering the fandom via fanon osmosis won't have content about the other characters, therefore, they won't be interested in those characters enough to create it, and it's just this ouroboros consuming itself, no matter how much canon content we have of these other characters. and it's ridiculous just how large the Batfamily is becoming because of this, which is why i'm a pre-Flashpoint fan, because then the Batfamily was contained enough to actually feel like a family with every character having nuances relationships with each other, but i digress because those thoughts could be their own post.

and the thing about fanon is it doesn't exist in a vacuum. DC has started turning the comics to accommodate for what fans are asking for, because fans will beg and beg for content they're not going to consume. Tim Drake: Robin had Tim as a coffee drinker because that's the fanon accepted headcanon. and the resolution of the recent Gotham War arc was for Bruce to buy this new manor for everyone to move in and call him. nevermind that most of these characters have their own homes and have zero reason to be moving in with Bruce. Tim had his marina in Tim Drake: Robin, Dick has Bludhaven, Cass and Steph have their little side of town in Batgirls (2022), and so on. these characters are being forced together as a unit, as one big happy family living together, to appease what non-comic fans want and it's damaging comic relationships. Robin: Knight Terrors saw Jason and Tim team up and working together, which i've seen varying opinions on but i personally despised. their interactions made zero sense for any of their canon history, but it appeases them being this close sibling relationship that fanon acts like they are. also the fears they faced in their respective knight terrors didn't make sense for either character and *only* worked as a moment of bringing them together so they could reassure each other and have this weird dreamscape bonding moment. the canon is bending itself to the will of fanon rather than building on the pre-existing complex relationships. Tim barely even gets along with his most important team in Dark Crisis: Young Justice because it seems the only important relationships the Batfamily can have is with each other. and when we do see them outside of the Batfamily, it only seems to be to relive the glory days like with World's Finest: Teen Titans, instead of developing them as they currently exist. this isn't recent in the comics, it feels like you can trace it back to the New-52, but it does feel a *lot* worse over the recent years. WFA is fine when it exists in its own bubble, but the simple truth is, DC content never exists on its own. the adaptations will reflect back onto the comics. (the damage the Young Justice cartoon has done to some characters should honestly be studied) and so it does frustrate me a bit when fanon-only or adaptation-only fans act like we're being nothing but killjoys for being frustrated with this. since they don't read the comics, they don't see how the comics are suffering as a result of this.

people argue about what's out of character for the comics they don't even read. i'm sorry, but "bad dad Bruce" is consistently canon. that man is just kind of shitty. when you take someone who has the drive he has, who has this need for the Mission first, who needs a teenager in spandex next to him to keep him off the ledge, that guy is sort of going to be a shitty father figure. he just is. not on purpose or with malice, but when you compare him to any other dad in a big DC family, he sure takes the cake. it's why characters like Oliver Queen tend to *really* fucking hate Bruce for how he treats his kids. Bruce loves fiercely, but he doesn't do well with putting that love first. and his love is a controlling one, he is very particular about controlling how others in the Batfamily are "allowed" to operate. it's what drives the wedge between him and Dick, it's why Steph is never a true daughter to him. (besides the reason of her needing to be a love interest to Tim first, anyway-) i've never understood the massive outcry of people reacting to Bruce kinda being shitty in comics they're not reading. there are some moments that get ridiculously OOC with how cartoonishly evil he is (the whole Gotham War arc and that... complicated mess with Jason) but largely if you want sitcom loving nuclear father Bruce, you have to accept that is a fanon thing, not a canon one. the Batfamily being a nuclear family in *general* is fanon. most of the "Batkids" don't actually see Bruce in a particularly fatherly light and begging for moments where he calls them his kids or they call him dad outside of incredibly specific circumstances is just OOC.

it's getting harder and harder to exist peacefully in this fandom it feels like, if you don't comply to the standard fanon has set. i'm happy people are having fun with their blorbos, even if in ways i dislike, but that "harmless fandom fun" does ripple it's way back to canon, eventually. so i end up pretty tangled with my feelings because are fans at fault for DC making these poor decisions? probably not, but it certainly feels like an unfortunate cause-and-effect situation whether at the end of the day, nobody is happy. and of course, i know some fanon-only fans are striving to be more canon accurate and care about canon dynamics more than others, but for them it's always going to be an uphill battle with the above-mentioned out-of-context panels thrown around and ever-pervasive fanon overtaking anything that's truly seeking to be canon compliant. so really, it sometimes feels like we're all losing.

[stars-obsession-pit]

Can do stories off art? If can't come up with fix prompt? Dp x dc could use more art.

Only do crossovers?

Try this prompt sounds interesting https://www.tumblr.com/wyvernsgale/777684760738873344/an-au-of-this-fantastic-au?source=share

So, firstly, the thing written for that prompt by @wyvernsgale:

Look, on some level, Tim gets it.

Bruce doesn’t owe him his parenthood. He had no part in the cloning process. He didn’t ask to have another kid dumped on him so suddenly after he lost his own. Passing Tim off to the foster system wasn’t an inherently unreasonable decision.

The rejection still stung, but Tim had been able to understand it. Bruce just didn’t want to take in another kid.

Except that evidently Bruce did want more kids. He recruited multiple other teenagers into his vigilante brood.

So why had Bruce rejected him?

He couldn’t get the question out of his head. Was his existence really that disgusting a thing? Was he doomed to always be alone, to never find anyone who cared about him?

Those fears had gradually worn away after he found a new family in Amity Park with the Grays. Not completely gone, but quieted down enough that he could manage them.

And then Amity Park went to hell. Well, not literally (unless that incident with the Ghost King counted), but the situation was bad. First the ghosts, then the Guys in White taking control.

Phantom was trying his best to maintain things, but it wasn’t enough. A whole team of allies was gradually coming together—beginning with Tim’s own sister Valerie after he convinced her to give the ghost boy a chance—but they were still losing ground. They needed help, badly.

So they sent requests to the Justice League.

But nobody came.

After the first few dozen, the lines actually blacklisted them for spam. Tim then reached out to Bruce directly, sending messages begging for aid.

Yet still, nobody came.

Could Batman be blocking their requests? Did Bruce really hate him that much?

Whatever the reason was, they were on their own. They closed ranks, built up their own systems of managing the issues. The GIW’s advances slowed to a stalemate. With time, maybe they’d even fully triumph over the white-suited bastards.

And then Batman had the nerve to show up and offer help. Like he hadn’t left them to rot.

Tim Gray sneered at his genetic template, not that the other “hero” wouldn’t be able to see it through Tim’e mask.

“Oh, so now you’re here. Ignoring our time of need and only showing up once we’re strong enough to potentially actually win and pose a threat to your image. How typical.”

Then, actually answering the questions from the ask: (beyond the readmore)

Stories based on art, maybe! Depends on what the art is I guess. Making actual art myself… yeah no I’m not likely to be satisfied enough with my skill level to willingly post my drawings.

As for if i would do non-crossovers: not no, but it heavily depends.

Like, I don’t feel confident enough in my depth/breadth of DC knowledge to be able to build off of many of their topics in proper detail. For instance, I know jack shit about the actual canon Flash or Green Lantern stuff, so I couldn’t see being able to write anything with a focus on them without first going through and consuming some of their source material.

Non-crossover stuff that’s purely Danny Phantom is easier for me than DC in that regard - there’s far less source material to comb through and my brain for whatever reason accepts its fanon more readily than with DC.

For other fandoms beyond those two… don’t get your hopes up high. There are a few other series I’ve posted about on this blog and would potentially be willing to write more with, but it’s a far smaller sample than my DPxDC interactions.

[roses-and-revolutions]

I have another idea for a story, but I once again don't know what to write, so I'm building a skeleton.

It's a DC x DP x ML crossover. Damien, Marinette, and Danny are triplets born into the LoA. From birth, they were taught to not see each other as siblings but as rivals for Ra's attention. When they were five, they were dipped (more like dropped) into the pits for the first time. Danny never comes back out. The second time was when they were six. Damien and Marinette came back from a mission gravely injured. Marinette doesn't come back out. Damien becomes the sole heir.

As one can imagine, Danny and Marinette aren't dead but simply taken to where they were needed at the time. That being said, things for these two characters go mostly according to their respective shows after they integrate into society. With the exception that the two of them are more competent and don't fight like rabid raccoons. But things take a dark turn when they turn sixteen.

Marinette

. After finding out that his father is Hawkmoth, Adrien is unable to carry the weight of being the holder of the cat Miraculous, as he doesn't want to fight his father and gives it to Ladybug. He promptly moves to the States to further his modeling career. Marinette, unable to find someone else worthy to be the holder of the cat Miraculous, stores it away and becomes the sole hero of Paris (with occasional helpers). But because of this, her two lives get more intertwined, and she is forced into a corner where she has to choose between being Ladybuy or Marinette.

. But she doesn't get a chance as Hawkmoth is dethroned and replaced by an even greater threat. She is forced to take on the persona of LadyNoir. Her life crumbles as she tries her hardest to balance her life as a hero and a person. She tries to save everyone but someone always ends up getting hurt. Whether it be her as Marinette, clinging to what little of her life is left. Or her as LadyNoir, with no choice but to watch innocent civilians die because she couldn't think of a better plan that could've saved everyone.

. It gets to the point where she makes an unforgivable wish. But every wish has a cost. She only finds out the price when she is forced to stand behind an invisible wall and watch as her life replays before her eyes, the film slowly burning away till there's nothing left. She cries as she falls into an ocean of familiar Lazarus green.

Danny

. Danny's life is also crumbling around him as he struggles to separate his human life from his ghost half. But after becoming the Ghost King, things only became more complicated and even more dangerous as more ghosts started coming through the portal to challenge him for the crown. And while he would really love to give it away, the guys that kept fighting him for it are very clearly evil. So he has to keep fighting, winning, and solidifying his position as the King of the Infinite Realms. But with every win comes a newfound power. Power he doesn't want. Power that scares him.

. It gets to the point when Danny has to drop out of school. He wasn't even scoring double digits anymore so what was the sense of keeping him? But Danny couldn't stay home either, it was too dangerous as his ghost and human halves were slowly becoming one. And his parents' obsession was slowly becoming a threat to him. He thought he had the solution. He was going to shut down the portal and leave Amity Park.

. It was perfect really, as no ghost portal meant no ghost. And he couldn't be vivisected if neither the GIW nor his parents could catch him. He talked the plan over with team phantom and they reluctantly agreed. The ghost portal is destroyed, and Danny leaves Amity and files over Elmerton and a few other towns. But after flying for a while, Danny gets to a sort of border where nothing meets... NOTHING. On the other side was just an infinite void. Nothing.

. Danny slowly realizes that in this world, all he knew was Amity Park. He never actually traveled or went on field trips. Never went to visit extended family nor did any visit. No one 'new' ever came to Amity Park because they were all just nearby. He learned no relevant history besides Amity Park because there was nothing outside of Amity Park. When the realization had finally set in the world began to crumble into the void and it became a race against him and the void.

. Danny knew that he was fast but the void was faster, and before he knew it he was back in Amity. He was going to warn them and try to save as many people as he could. But saw something in their eyes. They already knew. Danny watched how teary eyes and big smiles, everyone and everything he loved crumbled into the void, fading into nothingness.

Scientists across the galaxy, the universe even, often theorize about how everything came to be. Well, it didn't start with a bang, that's for sure. 'Well then how did it start?' you might ask.

Well..., it started with some tears and a scream.

[threewaysdivided]

compared to the other hero's in YJ how do you think Phantom stands up power wise. like Future Danny ripped the world apart and i know in some fanfiction that it is used as an indicator that he is high up there, but i'm interested in your thoughts.

This is an interesting question nonnie!

I generally agree with the idea that Phantom is in the upper-tier of crossover superhero powers, but I do have more specific thoughts so let’s break it down:

Danny’s power level

Just looking at the variety and strength of ghost-powers that Phantom displays in his show, I would put him in the higher rankings of most heroes when it comes to raw ability.  I alluded to this in my main DP x YJ Deathly Weapons fanfic, but to me Phantom shows signs of a pretty common power-scaling differential that happens when a solo-protagonist hero gets transplanted into an ensemble setting.  Within his own setting, Phantom had to be (or become) powerful enough to solve most problems/ fights all by himself – and some of those ghosts he ended up facing towards the end of his canon were impressively strong.  By comparison ensemble heroes are generally less-powerful because working as a collective means they don’t have the same need for aggressive self-sufficiency and also so that no one character upstages or outmodes the rest of the group from a writing perspective.

There’s also the nature of ghost powers.  Phantom needed to develop the raw strength to fill the role of solo combat heavy-hitter, but his base powers are versatile to the point of unsettling.  He has to physically fight against other ghosts because they have (and to some extent are immune to) the same abilities as him, but in a fight against other species he could potentially avoid, manipulate or exhaust an opponent with strategic use of invisibility/ intangibility/ overshadowing.

The back of Dinah’s neck prickled.  With flight to mask footsteps and intangibility rendering them undetectable by touch…  Nonthreatening as Phantom generally appeared, she was starting to understand why his kind had developed such an unsettling reputation.  The idea that a ghost could be present at any time - eavesdropping, spying, interfering - without any of them being the wiser was… disquieting to say the least. - Deathly Weapons, Chapter 17: Assessment

On top of that, he seems to be in a similar boat to Superman when it comes to physical weaknesses – he doesn’t have that many, and they’re often quite specific or hard-to-find.   The most easily-exploitable one is that Danny can run out of power, be slowly starved of ectoplasm or be knocked unconscious; all of which would forcibly revert him back to his weaker human state.  After that, he’s vulnerable to certain magics and ghostly-artefacts, which are more likely to be accessible to various DC/ Marvel heroes (although they might not know exactly which spells/items will be most effective or why).  Beyond those two, most of his weaknesses need to be specifically known about and actively sought out – anti-ecto-technology is obtainable but not mainstream, blood blossoms naturally repel/hurt ghosts but they seem to be rare in nature (or even extinct in the modern day) and then assuming you acknowledge Phantom Planet there’s ectoranium which is basically ghost-Kryptonite in rarity (and possibly even the same mineral in DP x DC settings depending on the crossover).  Much like with Superman, the most reliable ways to take down Phantom require actively knowing what he is and having prepared accordingly.

Based on those metrics, I want to place Phantom in the same power-band as Superman or the Martian Manhunter.  I’d consider their powers to be equivalent incomparibles – it’s hard to stack their abilities side-by-side and say one is objectively better than the others.  A no-holds-barred, knock-down drag-out fight between those three could get very nasty but it would be hard to confidently call a winner without knowing more about the external factors around them.

That said, I think the thing holding Danny back from being fully at that level is his experience: or rather his lack thereof.   Danny hasn’t had much formal training (except maybe some basic self-defence instruction from Maddie/Jack) and he doesn’t have a proper mentor either.  His personal experience mostly fits the narrow niche of direct open combat with other ghosts, mostly throughout Amity Park and surrounds (although occasionally in the Ghost Zone or further from town). 

Phantom has enough raw power and innate talent as a strategic lateral-thinker to get by, but I think that hyperspecialisation and lack of guidance would leave him with a lot of blind-spots.  His hand-to-hand is self-taught and probably missing a lot of best-practice basic techniques.  He’s also never had an experienced third party to observe him in the field and offer suggestions on alternative approaches to using his powers/ keep him from developing bad habits.  This is something Danny actually comments on in canon; he can take a long time to identify solutions (even obvious ones) that deviate too far from his default throw hands approach to fighting.  His powers could be more effectively deployed as a precision-instrument but a lack of coaching means he tends to falls back on using them as a blunt hammer because that was the pattern that came naturally when he was first starting out, and no-one was around to keep that habit from ingraining.

The place where you can see this lack of experience hurting him the most is in his lack of soft-skills.  Phantom didn’t have anyone to advise him on de-escalation, damage control, comforting civilians, interacting with authorities etc.  Add in the naturally-frightening nature of many ghosts and it was easy for him to fall into a public perception of being “the town menace”.  Danny is pretty decent at rallying both humans and ghosts (even erstwhile enemies) to his side in crisis situations but no-one has taught him how manage public relations outside of that.  He says it himself: he needs a PR agent.

On the other hand, Phantom’s heroics have inadvertently earned him a decent amount of potential political pull in the Ghost Zone.  He has enough positive rapport that some regular rogues will take his side or even actively seek him out for help in the right circumstances, and other more antagonistic ones have at least developed a degree of grudging respect.  There are several powerful ghosts that either have direct debts of gratitude to him/his team (Princess Dorothea, Pandora) or who hold him in high esteem for re-sealing Pariah Dark (The Far Frozen).  It’s possible that defeating Pariah might even have granted him a potential candidature/claim to an official position, and judging by the way the Observants and Clockwork pay attention to him, it seems that Phantom’s slow accumulation of power/influence isn’t going completely unnoticed.  However, again, Danny doesn’t have the awareness, experience or training needed to leverage that effectively – heck, he’s not even doing it on purpose.

With all that taken into account, I think Phantom would rank very highly in terms of overall potential, but at his current level he’d be in the lower ranks of the A-tier.  He could become a much more powerful figure with the right guidance but in his canonical state he’s underutilising or outright overlooking a lot of his most effective tools.

TUE Future/ “Dark Phantom”

The “Dark Phantom” presented in the TUE Bad-Future is interesting to me because while he’s a very powerful figure within that story, I don't think he’s a very good reflection of canon-Danny’s potential to do harm.

Gonna complain about The Ultimate Enemy for a bit: I’ve tag-muttered about this before but I’m one of the Phandom members who finds The Ultimate Enemy to be a frustratingly weak episode.  It has a potentially fascinating core premise (the “evil future/alternate self”) but the execution is so convoluted and driven by improbable contrivances that the whole ends up being far less than the sum of its parts.   

One of the biggest problems is that, rather than being a straight future/alternate version of Danny, “Dark Phantom” is actually a hybrid of Phantom and Plasmius’ worse sides.  He’s a distinct, separate entity which means he can’t work as an effective dark mirror to either of them.  (Compare and contrast the Justice League episode A Better World in which the Justice Lords acted as a dark mirror of what the actual Justice League members could become if they chose to abandon their morals and compassion in favour of seizing control and instating a totalitarian system of draconian crime prevention.)

The episode also tried to graft on a really mismatched moral of “don’t be a cheat”.  Rather than being a lesson on choices/ values/ power/ responsibility, Dark Phantom almost ends up being an offhand biproduct of Danny getting caught cheating on a freshman/sophomore-year career-aptitude test.  Instead of learning a lesson about himself/ his ideals/ his personal faults, Danny comes away from the episode with a cool new superpower after deciding not to cheat on the test after all.  Not exactly satisfying.

That mismatch and the convoluted levels of moon-logic required to make it fit severely undermine the idea that this version of Dark Phantom is “inevitable”.  There are too many steps that are too highly-specific and too easily-avoidable for the threat to feel real: Danny has to care enough about an early-highschool CAT to want to cheat, he has to somehow get the answers which he wasn’t intending to do in the canon timelineand only does as a result of Clockwork’s meddling, making it a self-fulfilling situation, he has to get caught using them, Mister Lancer has to hold the resulting parent-teacher meeting at Nasty Burger rather than a school office for some reason, the Nasty Burger Sauce has to 1. be dangerously explosive and 2. coincidentally explode while not only Danny’s parents but his friends and sister are inside, Danny has to be placed in Vlad’s custody rather than with his Aunt Alicia or closer family-friends, Danny has to ask Vlad to remove his Phantom-half and finally, Vlad himself has to agree to do it.  Take away any of those steps and this version of Dark Phantom doesn’t happen.  That’s not inevitable, it’s contrived.

But anyway, let’s look at Dark Phantom as his own entity:

One of the things that makes Dark Phantom much more potentially dangerous is that he combines Phantom’s raw power with Plasmius’ experience.  Like I was saying before, one of Danny’s biggest handicaps is that he lacks training/guidance and tends to underutilise his most effective abilities.  Vlad meanwhile has had years of relative freedom to practice and finesse a lower raw-power level; he’s much more skilled at advanced techniques like duplication and overshadowing (which he canonically used to force through his fortune-making business deals), as well as ecto-constructs.  Plasmius is also a lot more tactical and manipulative in how he applies their common powers.  Plus, the TUE version of Dark Phantom is a full-ghost, which means he doesn’t have a vulnerable mortal state that can be exploited as a weakness.

This is why I think it would be possible for TUE!Dark Phantom to successfully decimate other heroes in shared-universe crossover situations where ghosts aren’t common knowledge.  He’d be an unexpected, unknown enemy that the heroes have no effective way to fight (outside of a few magic users).  Combine that with many of the most powerful heroes being visible as public figures, and Dark Phantom having inherited Plasmius’ strategic/manipulative traits and it could be very easy for Dark Phantom to basically launch a premeditated paranormal blitzkrieg attack, using Plasmius’ skill with duplicates and overshadowing to subjugate any hero he couldn’t overwhelm with Phantom’s raw power level.  It would also make sense that Amity Park would become one of the remaining bastions in any TUE-style future, since having advanced knowledge of ghostly abilities and access to anti-ecto technology would tilt the balance more evenly and allow them to at least keep the danger out.

Mentally, it’s also worth noting that Dark Phantom is a lot more dangerous than either Phantom or Plasmius.  He’s basically the most toxic traits from both of them, removed from their more moderating/ compassionate instincts.  Based on the canonical explanation given, TUE!Danny had Phantom forcibly removed in attempt to remove the pain/ rage/ grief he was feeling over the death of his family.  This isn’t a model-hero-persona conceptualisation of Phantom a la Splitting Images; the TUE-version of his ghost half is a big ball of churning negative emotion.  And what are some of Danny’s toxic traits when it comes to negative emotions: he lashes out, falls into self-blame and self-destructs.  Then we add in Vlad’s toxic traits: he’s egocentric to the point of narcissism, he projects negative feelings/ blame onto others rather than accept responsibility for his own actions and he has a controlling/ sadistic streak.   

TUE’s Dark Phantom is the worst possible combination of an emotionally devastated teenager and an emotionally immature adult.  He’s a ball of pain and rage that blames the world for that pain, lashes out at it, feels worse for doing so and then blames the world for making him feel worse because he doesn’t have the emotional capacity to accept that he’s the one causing it.  Grief is love persevering but the feelings of love, connection and guilt that contextualise his pain were left in the human shells that remained of Danny and Vlad.  It’s possible that the Dark Phantom presented in TUE might not have the capacity to feel positive emotions or compassion.  He was never meant to exist as his own entity – he was an attempt to destroy Daniel Fenton’s negative emotions which went horribly wrong.  In some ways it seems like his reign of terror could be an angrier version of Dracula’s scheme from Netflix’s Castlevania or Haliax’s goal from the Kingkiller Chronicles – a drawn-out suicide note from an undead being who’s been dead inside for much longer, destroying whatever peace/happiness he encounters in revenge for being denied it himself, until such time as he either attains catharsis or finally ends the pain by destroying reality and himself along with it.  That’s the final thing that makes TUE’s Dark Phantom more dangerous than either Phantom or Plasmius – he has nothing to lose and no “better nature” or personal dreams that other heroes could try to appeal to.

So yeah, the TUE version of Dark Phantom could absolutely rip the world and other heroes apart, but I don’t think he’s a particularly good reflection of Danny’s capabilities in terms of either powers or personality.  There’s too much Vlad in the mix, and even then he represents such a narrow and extreme edge-case for each of their personalities that it’s barely representative at all.  At best he’s a warning for what these kinds of powers could be capable of in the wrong hands.

Meta-question: What is “power” in narrative?

Alright, now that I’ve (hopefully) answered the question, let’s finish with a self-indulgent thought exercise for extra credit.

There’s an anecdote which I’ve heard attributed to the Stan Lee, in which a fan apparently asked him “who would win in a fight between Superman and the Hulk?”  To which Stan apparently replied, “whoever the writer wants.”

While it can be fun to make tier-lists and try to rank how strong different heroes/villains/creatures are based on the rules of their respective universes, I think it can also be helpful to consider that– like all things in storytelling – power is a narrative device.  It’s a tool that the character(s) and storyteller(s) can use to create and solve problems.

A character can be extremely physically strong/ skilled/ knowledgeable/ influential in a specific area but how much narrative power they have depends on how well their abilities allow them to influence or resolve story problems.   And, as the omnipotent god(s) of the narrative, the storyteller(s) can choose whether to confront them with challenges that play to their existing strengths, or that force them to find other solutions.  What’s the best way to kill a vampire?

This is actually part of what makes Lex Luthor such an effective Superman villain.  Objectively most versions of Lex are just A Guy™ – on a physical level he doesn’t have anything close to Kal El’s Kryptonian strength or superpowers.  But he feels like a serious threat because he often comes after Superman in ways that Clark can’t easily steamroll with that brute strength.  Lex uses manipulation, money, influence, connections, politics, public opinion; Superman can’t physically fight him without playing into Luthor’s plans, and trying to face him in those other fields requires tools that Clark wasn’t handed as part of his Kryptonian heritage.  An invading alien army is objectively a bigger physical threat to Earth, but a competent Lex Luthor scheme feels more dangerous because – while we feel confident that Superman can beat down a legion of monsters – when it comes to the question of whether he can outwit Luthor, the outcome is a lot less certain.

Situational disempowerment is another of the ways a narrative can reign in an otherwise “overpowered” character: placing them in circumstances where they either aren’t given many opportunities to showcase their best strengths, or are kept from using them because the drawbacks/ risks/ consequences of using their abilities makes their power(s) a liability.  I’ve mentioned it before, but this is actually one of the tricks I’m personally using to keep Phantom’s massive powerset balanced against the other proteges in Deathly Weapons.  It’s also something I’ve been struggling with when it comes to Conner’s place in that story since the stealth-mission plot structure doesn’t allow as much room to highlight his core powers and personal strengths.   

Stories can create additional stakes for powerful characters by giving them emotional arcs which their powers can’t resolve.   For a published example, consider the series One Punch Man and Mob Psycho 100.  Despite how high-ranked Saitama and Mob are within the power-scaling of their respective stories, those powers don’t kill the emotional stakes because the things they actually want/ need can only be gained through self-improvement or making connections in ways separate from their powers (and in some regards their power level actively gets in the way of that).  This is also something I’m doing with Danny’s main grief arc in DW.   

Final Conclusion time

In terms of physical strength and range of abilities, I think Phantom would be pretty near the top of the power-scale in most superhero crossovers.  While the Dark Phantom presented in TUE might not be a particularly good reflection of Danny’s specific potential, a crossover version of the TUE timeline offers a pretty good litmus-test for how dangerous a strong ghost could be in a given universe: the combination of power level, ability range and highly-specific/ inaccessible weak-points poses a strong strategic threat.

On the other hand, physical strength isn’t the only strength.  Phantom has a decent level of potential political sway as well, but he also lacks a lot of the soft skills and experience needed to make use of his toolset to its full ability.

Stepping back further, the answer to how powerful Danny is in a narrative sense is really just “however much the writer wants”.  Phantom’s narrative power depends on the kind of story he’s in and the challenges placed around him – there are as many ways to situationally nerf our ghost-boy as make him OP, all without needing to alter his on-paper powers.

[ghostly-cabbage]

A friend recently brought to my attention that Something's Wrong With Danny Fenton is now on the first page of DP fics when sorted by kudos (excluding crossovers) on AO3.

I'm genuinely so floored and SO SO grateful to everyone that has read and left kudos on SWWDF!

When I started it that year for Invisobang I never would've guessed that it would do as well as it's done. I worked so hard and I wrote something that I'm tremendously proud of. I'm happy that it's resonated with so many people. It was a lot of work to write and don't even get me started on the editing.

I will be eternally grateful to @kkachis for her skill and dedication as an editor - not only did she tackle that fuckin' thing, but she did so while remaining subjective and unafraid to tell me when the style was working and when I needed to reign it in. We both learned so much over those 3 months, and we continue to learn from eachother to this day.

To celebrate, and in honor of SWWDF, I want to show a little hint of something I've started working on to share with everyone.

When I started SWWDF, the thing that terrified me the most is that I knew I wanted to swing for the fences stylistically. I wanted to write it the way I would something that I was going to submit to a literary journal for publishing. I did this full well knowing that it may be a style that turned people away at the door. It's not for everyone and that's okay! Little did I know how many people would love it 😅

I struggled a lot in the beginning to find a balance between narrative fiction and my voice as a literary fiction writer. I had a low level but near constant anxiety that the style was "trying too hard".

My struggle and fears in 2021 is what's inspiring me to write an essay of sorts on this topic. If I could help or inspire other writers to play with style when it comes to fanfiction then that would make me pretty happy!

Anyway! Thank you again for this achievement!

Also! Let me know/send me an ask if any of you have specific questions you'd like me to address in the guide/essay about how I use/d style in fanfiction. Any questions will give me a better idea of what to narrow down on and cover.

[brainmuncher]

So, in honor of trying to write DP x DC content that isn't focused mainly on Batman, I've been writing a new fic. It's one of those classic crossovers with the animated show Justice League from 2001. (It's super self-indulgent. I'm not gonna lie. Just under 14,000 words in, and I'm still on the first episode smh.)

I'm going to be honest with y'all, it has been really interesting trying to write it. The balance of trying to flesh out the bond between the two shows without making it feel like I've made the writing version of a collage board has been informative. But what's mostly been taking me aside is trying to balance out Danny's powers. It's honestly slowing me down because of how much I need to think about it.

While writing this I'm really trying my best to not let anyone shine over the others (Unless it's an episode or moment where a character or relationship is being fleshed out and learning some kind of lesson). I want this to be a story about a team coming together, and Danny finding a new place of belonging, not a spotlight on how much "better" any specific member is. (Considering it's all from Danny's perspective, it's been a tough balance.)

That being said, everyone has their own place in the team. So trying to fit Danny in there without overshadowing another member has been hard. I want him to be his own person, not an amalgamation of powers that take away the point of different heroes. Because at that point why do we need them? Danny can do it on his own!

Funny enough, the first time I encountered this issue was with his speed. In the episode Maternal Instinct Tucker mentions that Danny can fly at 112mph. Because I am writing this as Danny a few years older, I'd like to think that he's only gotten faster. This immediately made me pause because where I am currently in Wally West's comics, his top speed is a little over 200mph. (I already know that this ends up changing in future comics.) I know that that is in comics though, not the show, but it still made me realize just how careful I needed to go about representing Danny's speed. I do not want him to be too quick because that would nullify Flash's powers in the long run. With that in mind, I had to tamp down exactly what Danny could do with that speed without making it feel obvious that I was limiting him.

That's what set me off on a path of realizing just how much I needed to carefully represent Danny's strengths. Suddenly a lot of the usual canon and fanon tropes that I subscribe to became an obstacle.

I don't want him to be too proficient at making things with his ectoplasm because then that would start to entrench Green Lantern's territory.

I can't have him be too strong or pro of a fighter because then that would start to take away from Hawkgirl, Superman, and Wonder Woman. (I already feel guilty enough that the plotline had me basically replace Wonder Woman's place with Danny in the first two episodes. But unfortunately having four people on one team while there are just two in the others was just too unreasonable for me to excuse.)

That popular Fanon of Danny being good at building machines because of his parents now becomes too close to Batman's expertise for comfort.

The body manipulation powers that Danny showcases multiple times throughout the show start to feel a bit too much like Martian Manhunter. Danny already has intangibility, invisibility, and flight. It's hard enough already to not have him overpower J'onn.

And there's probably going to be even more things that I encounter while writing this fic. It was supposed to just be a fun side project that I could update every once in a while whenever I got the fancy. But now I'm sitting here with a pile of notes trying how to normalize him compared to the people in Justice League.

I dunno, just thought I'd share my thinking process I've had with this project. Until I have a solid ground, I most likely won't be posting it. It's super self-indulgent and clearly rips off from the show, though, so idk. Either way, I'm having fun writing it despite the troubles Danny is throwing my way. Was curious if anyone else has come into this issue as well.

[pokelolmc]

One of my new favourite Hazbin Hotel fic AUs is this weird crossover niche of "Alastor is/was a character from another fandom, before he snapped and became who he is today" AUs, eg. "Harry Potter becomes Alastor", and one random "Tim Drake becomes Alastor" fic I found on AO3. Because I find it interesting to try and figure out how to meld the other character's backstory, powers or personality with his.

And that inevitably led my traitorous brain to the idea of "Danny Fenton becomes Alastor" (because now DP and DC are forever associated in my lizard brain, curse you Phandom!).

Which is just...the weirdest thing ever, because they're just so different—like, how the fuck do you set up Danny to become Alastor, of all people?! It feels like the most unfitting character to do this with...

And that's exactly what my brain has decided to see it as a challenge.

Added caveat: this is an AU!Danny specifically from a generic angsty dissection fic scenario, where he's been traumatised by his parents and fucked over by the world (and he has no healthy way to cope)—then he's sent back in time, lost and completely alone

-Danny falls through a natural portal to 1900's Louisiana with no way back (something something, Clockwork's-out-of-the-picture, something something)

-Alastor being a mama's boy? Danny gets taken in by a loving mother figure after getting lost in time—a kind woman familiar with the supernatural who accepts his ghost half right off the bat. He sees her as his family. After a year or so, though, she dies. He spirals again. He dyes his hair brown and starts wearing glasses when he runs away to New Orleans to change himself and cover his tracks.

-Alastor feels like an interesting name for Danny to choose because it means "the avenger", and can also mean "defender of the people" (a meaning more apparent in the Scottish version "Alasdair/Alastair"), but could also have a negative connotation of "persecutor"; the character symbolism writes itself

-the normally tech-savvy Danny who finds old-timey stuff boring would be forced to find something to entertain himself in the 1900's. So he gravitates towards radio, with it being the closest thing he's got to modern tech. Give him several years or so to grow attached to it and enjoy the idea of working in it. He goes from fantasising of radio comms at NASA to a public radio host, playing with all the fancy knobs and dials.

-his ghost half is the reason Alastor's powers/magic in Hell is green

(also I heard someone say the typical human!Alastor design has the "Timmy Turner hairstyle", which I can't unsee now. And it's Danny's hairstyle too. Because we know how well Butch Hartman and originality mix. Male protagonist? There's only one hairstyle for that!)

-he becomes a serial killer because he's snapped over the years after all the shit that's happened to him; he's developed a bitter, cynical and self-aggrandised ego and thirst for justice and revenge, and he's all alone with no one to keep him out of the dark echo chamber leading to villainy

-a serial killer with ghost powers plays cat-and-mouse with cops, and never leaves a trace; before he starts killing, he's already made deals with and intimidated the ghosts that come to New Orleans through other natural portals (it's a portal hotspot) under a new ghostly persona. He has both sides of the city fearing or respecting his power. Every ghost who goes to New Orleans knows whose territory it is. They just never link the ghost and human together. He becomes like an even worse Plasmius. It sets him up for Overlord stuff in Hell from the getgo

-the cannibalism was a...happy accident. On a whim, he decided one guy's crime was too insufferable to die without torment, so he took the guy back and...tortured him the way his ol' folks knew best. He starts cutting people open as if trying to relive what his parents did to him, but from the other end—as the person with all the power. Taste-testing what he cut up came incidentally, but he decided he didn't mind it and made it a routine.

I can imagine a villain!Danny with more narcissistic tendencies, but my main trouble is where the overblown confidence and charming/manipulative skills come from. After all, Danny's pretty socially awkward. How exactly does he grow into that?

[4throbin4life]

I know there are a lot of various DP x DC crossover fics but I can never find one that I feel would suit both fandoms.

Like imagine a Jason adopting a kid Danny for whatever reason (preferably a "Danny is hurt and in a little kid body but remembers everything" trope) and Vlad bursting into the situation and challenging Danny for his crown (in front of everyone and on the watchtower but I'll also take other places as long a majority if not all of the bat-clan is there)

Like look:

Everyone on the watchtower for a JL meeting that requires the whole bat-clan for whatever reason and Danny being there bc he didn't want to leave Jason and Jason knew if he left Danny at the manor he would only follow. As Superman was in the middle of his drabble, about whatever reason their there, a cold burst of air comes from Danny's mouth.

Everyone in the room looking to him, not only to make sure he's ok but to also see if he needs help because the only explanation here is that the kid just unlocked a new ability, only to find the kid frantically looking around as if in search of something. Before Jason can get up from his seat to see if his son is ok a random man just appears in the middle of the room.

"well well little badger. I see you have a new look" the man that honestly looks dressed to go to a Halloween party said with his attention solely on Danny. Jason pulled out his gun and aimed it at the gut but before he could do anything a hand stopped him(dont care who or why but he was stopped). As he was going to call for his son the boy started talking back to the stranger.

"what do you want Vlad" Danny spit the mans name at him as if it were a curse word. The man, Vlad and Danny helpfully supplied, just scowled at the boy. "I see you have yet to learn any manners, little badger. Though it is ok once I take the crown from you and take you under my wing you will be the perfect son, yet." The comment on him making Danny his son made Jason see red but before he could react his son barked out a laugh that could serve no other purpose than to mock Vlad.

Danny's laughter died down a couple minutes later and every second that went past made Vlad's face contort in anger. Then as the laughter went away only came complete seriousness. "Vlad, the day I take you as my father will be the day after my core is shattered. I may be in a weakened state but you could never be anywhere close to my level. You will never be my father you discounted Dracula froot loop."

"How dare you, you insolent brat." Vlad spits as he attacks Danny. The heros in the room try to help but Constantine stops all of them mid step with a spell "I know all you goody two shoes want to help the kids but for whatever reason he has something of great power and even if it didn't sound it, that Vlad fella formally challenged him for it. If any of you intervene your soul will be shattered."

The end(well whoever writes it will need to continue but I won't be because it is 3:52 in the morning and I needed to post this before I went to bed)

If anyone has any recommendations, related to this or not, please put them in the comments🥺🤲🏽