I am loudly pushing the batdad agenda i am loudly pushing the— DPxDC Prompt
“Woah. You look like shit."
Granted, that’s probably not the first thing Danny should be saying to the guy that just bit the curb, but in his defense; he’s not running on 100% right now either.
The man -- tall, towering, and broader than Danny is tall -- whips around on his heel, black frayed cape flaring out impressively. Danny would've whistled in appreciation, but he takes the time instead to wipe the back of his hand across his mouth, smearing the blood running from his nose across his cheek.
"Sorry." He blinks widely, not even flinching as the man with the horns zeroes in on him. "That was rude of me. I have a really bad brain-to-mouth filter; Sam says its what always gets me into trouble."
And she's not wrong either, per say. His smart mouth is what landed him in this situation -- with blood blossom extract running through his veins and cannibalizing the ectoplasm in his bloodstream. Thanks Vlad.
The man grunts at him; a short, curt "hm" that shouldn't make Danny smile, but he does because he's somewhat delirious and probably concussed. The man keeps some kind of distance, sinking towards the shadows of Gotham's alleyway like he dares to melt right into it.
If it's supposed to scare Danny, it doesn't work. Danny's never been afraid of the dark; he's always been able to hide himself in it. He blinks slowly at the mass of shadows.
"You look hurt." The shadows says, blurring together around the edges. Danny squints, and licks his lips to get the blood dripping down his chin off. Ugh, he hates the taste of blood.
"I am." He says, "My godfather poisoned me. M'dying." The agony of the blood blossom eating him from the inside out looped back around to numbing a while ago, so all he feels is half-awake and dazed.
"Hey," Danny stumbles forward towards the man, a bloodied hand reaching out to him. "You-- you're a hero, right? You're not attacking me; which is more than I can say for most costumed people I've met." Maybe it's a poor bar to judge someone at, but he's already established that Danny's not in his right mind.
The man makes no change in expression, but Danny realizes blearily that it's hard to tell with the shadows on his face. He stays still long enough for Danny to latch onto the cape -- stretchy, but almost soft under his fingers.
He looks up blearily into the whites of the man's eyes. "Can you help me? I don't-- I don't wanna die." Again. He doesn't wanna die again. He blinks slow and lizard-like. "I mean- I'll probably get to see mom and dad again, but I told them I'd at least try and make it to adulthood."
There's a clatter down the street, and Danny's ghost sense chills up his spine and leaves a bitter, ashy taste in his mouth. He immediately knows who it belongs to even before the deceptively gentle; "Daniel?" echoes down the way.
"Daniel? Quit your games, badger, Gotham is dangerous for children."
Danny's mouth pulls back, and blood spills against his tongue. "Please." He rasps, and grabs onto the shadow's cape with both hands. "Please. He's going to kill me. Please--"
"Daniel? Is that you?"
His lips part, dragging in air to plead with the darkness again. He doesn't need to, the whites of his eyes narrow, and the cape whirls around him before Danny can blink. Soon swaddled in shadows, the Night lifts him up, and steals him away.
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it's just really funny to me to imagine Fabian actually being a great big brother honorable nemesis.
like, putting a nemesis ward on the nursery with aelwyn's help since "it won't do if they die before their eighteenth birthday, will it?" (aelwyn, deeply sarcastic: "well of course, that is exactly why I put the ward on adaine's room." fabian, too deep in denial for sarcasm: "see? you get it")
gifting them a battle sheet baby blanket since they should start preparing for their battle early on (and yes it's extra fluffy, it's for a baby stop laughing everybody)
generally trying to teach them everything he knows "so their battle to the death will be a fair one"
giving their adventuring party the same lecture on tactics that the bad kids got from his papa
hunting down chungledown bim and any other nemesis so his sibling is the only one who could get a piece of his fund (he just wants it to stay in the family, shut up)
just. fabian being an amazing big brother but also if you call him that to his face he will cut you
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To be honest. DCxDP where the reason Danny meets the bats is Ace the Bat-hound
Like, just think about it for a second. Danny is in Gotham for college, or maybe he just moved out to find a city where having mad scientist parents isn’t actually that unusual.
He can see ghosts.
The ghosts know this.
Now he’s getting harassed left and right by spirits trying to get closure. Fine, whatever, most of them are a one-and-done type deal, and the amount of ghosts trying to get his help steadily decreases.
Except for this one very stubborn dog.
It just keeps showing up and leading him to crime scenes! He doesn’t know how many “anonymous tips” he can call in to the cops before they trace his phone! And this dog, this incredibly good boy, will not stop trying to help the city. He’s never met anyone with such a strong sense of justice, let alone a dog. Can dogs even have a moral compass?
And so Danny just accepts the fact that Ace isn’t going anywhere and becomes his reluctant sidekick/dedicated medium. He leans into the whole thing, dressing up in a mix of traditional magic-user attire and accessories that pay homage to the ghost dog.
He becomes somewhat well known. The psychopomp detective following around the shadowy figure of a German Shepard? That’s unusual! That’s weird! I mean, it’s not the weirdest thing in Gotham, sure, but he’s a new vigilante and he’s got a ghost dog that people can only see when it’s around him. Someone’s gonna notice.
Damian, as Robin, is the first to reach out to him.
Ace doesn’t know Damian but he does know a Robin, and while this isn’t his Robin, he’s still friendlier than usual. Danny’s panicking because oh god the bats are here and also is this kid gonna steal my ghost dog, Damian is absolutely delighted by Ace, and Ace is just happy to see a Robin again.
Damian decides that the psychopomp isn’t a danger to anyone, and there’s no reason to put this encounter into his reports, really, and perhaps Danny can help with some of his cases in the future.
Danny is sweating bullets because Damian basically tells him that he’ll keep him secret as long as he gets to play with Ace. Ace is happy that he’s finally getting some bat affiliated crime-fighting assistance.
And so, Danny is now both Ace AND Damian’s reluctant assistant. At least whenever he’s in trouble, he can always call a middle schooler to help him.
(Is Robin even in school? He’s out patrolling damn near every night, and he stays out late as hell. Does he have a bedtime? He should.)
Eventually it gets to the point where Damian is going over to Danny’s house. When he first sees it, he has a damn bitch you live like this moment, to which Danny responds that not everyone has the money to afford a nice place. Damian counters that he could at least take the time to clean up, and Danny replies that he’s working, going to school, and being a vigilante assistant to a ghost dog, something’s got to give.
Danny nearly has a heart attack when he checks his bank account the next day and sees that someone transferred him 10,000 dollars.
And so they get into a routine. Danny and Damian fight crime with Ace at night, and occasionally Damian stops by during the day to play with Ace and have Danny help with his homework.
(Damian is smart enough to do it on his own, but some of the instructions are written incredibly confusingly, and he would never admit to needing help to his family. Danny is just glad that the kid is in school and cares about his education, blissfully unaware that he’s basically emotionally adopted him.)
Damian is used to being in Danny’s company.
Eventually, when going over a case with the family, Damian absentmindedly remarks that he’ll have to ask Danny about some of the clues that they might be missing. Nightwing asks who he means and Damian makes a face like he just swallowed a lemon.
Cue shitstorm.
Who is “Danny?” Why is Damian willing to ask for help from anyone, much less someone outside of the family? Does he know who Damian is? Has Damian been compromised? What the hell is going on?
Damian now has to explain that Danny is the psychopomp with the ghost dog who he might have met hunted down while on patrol and conveniently not mentioned, but he’s not a bad person, really, and he lets him play with Ace, and he’s been quite helpful on certain cases due to his ability to talk to ghosts.
Bruce insists that the family meet Danny. Damian, hoping that he won’t just skip town the second he hears the news, relents.
Danny is surprisingly eager to meet the bats, considering his earlier fears.
Damian, blissfully unaware of what’s coming, sets a time and place to meet.
Once everyone is there, he gives Bruce the earful of a lifetime.
Robin is in middle school! Danny knows that there’s no way to stop the boy from going on patrol, but you could at least shift his schedule so he gets enough sleep on school nights! Does the Bat even know where he is half the time?! (No) And why isn’t he comfortable asking his family for help with both cases and homework? Did they ever even notice how much time he was spending at Danny’s house? If Danny was a bad person, he could have seriously hurt the poor boy! Shame on you!
Nightwing is mortified that Damian didn’t trust him enough to tell him about any of this. Red Hood is laughing his ass off, because yeah Danny is making good points but he’s also chewing out the literal Batman. Tim is recording the whole thing. Steph is delighted by the absolute gall of this Danger Twink™️, and already planning to add him to several groupchats. Damian is more embarrassed than he’s ever been in his entire life.
You, he points to Nightwing, did your academic life feel supported when you were a Robin? Nightwing is too stunned to speak. Red Hood, eternal shit-stirrer, says that oh, we all prioritized patrol over our education, that’s just how it is. Red Robin actually dropped out of high school to avoid distractions, did you know that?
Danny honest-to-god shrieks at this.
He finishes his angry rant and leaves, everyone too stunned to stop him.
And as it turns out, Tim wasn’t the only person recording the whole thing.
The entire internet is blowing up with Psychopomp The Danger Twink™️’s rant. People are taking sides. Things are getting messy. Red Hood literally admitting on-camera to previously being a Robin is somehow not the main focus here.
Eventually someone connects some dots from the video, as well as stories circling the internet about the psychopomp. A ghost dog named Ace, who is the literal only reason that the psychopomp is fighting crime at all, which seems incredibly fond of Nightwing and Robin.
A crime-fighting dog who wants constant attention from both the current and original Robin.
Oh my god, Ace the Bat-hound died and became a crime-fighting ghost.
And, somehow, that’s still not the strangest thing going on in Gotham.
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