#Danny feels responsible for Amity Park

[flamingpudding]

Fictober23 Prompt: 28 - "I may not get another chance to say this."

Fandom: DPxDC

Rating: T

Warnings: -

A/N: Plays into the Forgotten Twin AU setting. Basically for this: Danny was sent to the Fentons as a mission when he was seven and Damian forgot about it until someone found an old mission report from Danny. Their first meeting didn't go well… But Damian has his reasons wanting Danny to come to Gotham with him that are not all completely selfish. I tried to make this little scene sort of funny with a bit of angst in it.

"So…" Danny floated next to a giant Cujo while 'sitting' cross legged in the air doing his best to suppress the growing grin on his face. "Are you convinced yet?"

He heard an inaudible grumble and laughed doing a little air flip before 'laying' in the air and resting his head in his hands. "I didn't catch that Dami, can you repeat that?"

"Get him off me!"

"Who? Cujo?" The dog licked Danny across his entire head before laying down on and making himself comfortable on his twin brother who grunted and Danny chuckled. "Didn't you say handling a ghost animal won't be any different than handling an actual animals?"

His twin grunted once more but did not say anything else. Danny grinned as he looked away from Damian and Cujo towards the rest his twin hand brought with him to Amity, he hadn't bothered learning their names when Damian had introduced them the first, second, third and fourth time. All in an attempt to convince him, he was surprised that his biological father didn't appear before him as often as Damian did after he told them no.

Red helmet guy, Danny believed his civilian name was something with J, was currently getting chased around the Main Street by Johnny on his motorcycle and Shadow trying to trip the poor guy up. He had heard the guy curse and complain very loudly that he was not happy about his bullets not working.

Another guy in blue who's hero name was something with Wing but his nickname was Dick, a fun fact that funnily enough made his name the easiest to remember, was currently doing a bunch of flips dodging Skulker. He wasn't entirely sure but with the way Skulker was glaring he was pretty sure that the other ghost was now hunting the guy out of annoyance for real instead of just as a favor to Danny.

The third guy Damian had brought with him to Amity, who's hero name was also that of a dinner, was locked in a weird tech battle with Technus. Danny was pretty sure he had heard that guy yell something about upgrading Wayne Tech to the point that Technus would never be able to take control of it. Good luck with that, Danny thought, so far his parents' and with his own ectoplasm infused tech were the only ones that could resist that ghost's control.

"Danyal, this is ridiculous!" Looking toward Cujo again, Danny found that Damian had managed to dig his way out from under him.

"Well you're the one that bet that you could handle some 'silly' ghosts, to convince me to go to Gotham with you. That there wouldn't be a problem if I left Amity Park behind." Danny moved to float before his brother spread his arms out. "Do you see now that I can't just leave? That I have a responsibility here? That I have a perfectly good life here? You didn't care for years that I lived here and now suddenly out of the blue you keep pestering me to come with you to Gotham."

Danny heard something muffled but he hadn't been able to make out what exactly his twin had said. Instead of asking he slowly floated down until his feet touched the ground and then proceeded to sit with his knees drawn in so that his head could rest on them on the ground. His head was slightly tilted as he watched his twin blankly, the same way grandfather had him do when he had been way younger.

Danny knew this was a habit left over from the League, something Jazz wouldn't have been able to help him get rid off without Damian around.

Damian was obviously struggling, trying to push that giant ghost dog off him so he could have a proper talk with his twin, muttering how a 'ghost' dog could be this heavy or solid. Yet even if Damian was late, there were things he needed to explain. Things he needed Danny to know, things he had only learned after he had started living with father, after he had left the League for good. Even if he didn't deserve his twin's forgiveness, he finally could be the brother his twin deserved. Besides he had made a promise to his twin's sister on his second visit, when Jasmine had been the one to sit him down and talk when Danyal refused. She tried to figure out why Damian had appeared so obsessed about taking Danny with him to Gotham and in the end she had made him promise something for Danyals health.

"I may not get another chance to say this. With you pinned under Cujo and your siblings distracted by my rogues this might be my only chance for now. I was convinced I hated you yet was loyal to a default until Jazz thought me I actually didn't hate you but cared in a messed up way." Danny started watching how his twin stilled. "It took Jazz exactly one year to mostly undo the mindset the league trained into me, she shouldn't have to but she wanted to for her new little brother and took all the steps needed to ensure my mental well being when she was nine and I seven. After that year I was sorta lost. A limbo between wanting a normal life and the duty that had been trained into me towards you. I didn't know what to do and then Tucker picked up the slack, showing me what 'normal' was. Well after I sort of went feral on Dash during my first day in grade school."

Damian looked up at his twin who wasn't even looking at him but sported a far away look. Seeing but unseeing at the same time as he remembered a childhood he knew nothing about. "I kept sending reports, not out of duty but hoping to protect the live Jazz had offered me. When they stopped responding, I also stopped reporting and grew wary."

Laughing humorlessly Danny returned his gaze back on Damian. "At first I believed grandfather gave up on me. That he would send you to kill me. After all, I was just a disposable spare. But no one ever came."

"Me appearing after years must have been shocking." Damian admitted, by now he had given up trying to get that giant dog to move off him, less he embarrassed himself like his elder brothers were currently doing. "That was why you attacked without waiting to hear me out once we were in a secluded area during our first meeting."

"Can't blame me. I thought you were still with the League and brainwashed into the perfect hire grandfather wanted." Damian huffed at that causing Danny to chuckle lightheartedly.

"Valid reasoning." His twin agreed. The half ghost signaled to Cujo, the dog only tilting his head before licking his tongue over the entirety of Danny's head once more, not moving an inch off of Damian. "I would most likely have done the same if the roles had been reversed."

"I got a family here now, Damian and you got yours with our bio-Dad and all the siblings you have been trying to introduce to me." Danny voiced after a moment of silence between them. In that moment Cujo finally changed size and moved to cuddle up to his twin, giving Damian a chance to sit up on his own.

"Danyal."

"No Damian. I will not go with you to Gotham. You tried to show me that others could take care of Amity. But look at those you took with you? They don't even have the equipment needed to handle ghosts." Danny was looking over his shoulder watching Damian's brothers. "Amity Park is my responsibility, the same way Gotham is Batmans."

"It is a responsibility you shouldn't shoulder alone. Father has us in Gotham but who do you have?" Damian watched his twin from the corner of his eyes. "It would be better and safer for you to come with us."

"Damian, I can't just-"

"Jasmine has made me aware of the danger to your physical as well as mental health here the longer you stay. She has inquired with us to see if we could help you to start thinking more about your safety than the safety of everyone around you but yourself."

"Of course Jazz would. Look I can handle my parents and the GIW, it's not like-"

"She has stressed the fact that you have been returning injured more often. Injuries not caused by your ghost rogues." Damian cut him off. "You are a lot more like father than I am but there is one fact we both clearly have inherited from him in the same way?"

"Oh, really now?"

"We are both quite stubborn and won't give up easily." Damian smirked as he stood up and dusted off his pants. He took a couple steps forward towards his elder siblings before turning to look back at his twin. "I believe the bet was that if we could prove to you that other hero's could also handle these ghosts that you would reconsider your stance on coming to Gotham with us?"

"Wha-?"

"IT WORKED! He's in my mini computer! I trapped him in my mini computer!"

"HA! Not so fun getting chased by your own bike, is it?"

"Oh come on dude, this isn't that much of a tied situation. I just roped your own weapon around you. No need to be so headless."

Danny blinked slightly unbelieving, Johnny and Shadow where now the once getting chased around, Technus was apparently stuck in one single little computer and Skulker was tied up with one of his own weapons, aktual Skulker not the hulk of his mech suit.

"Danyal. I… We want to make it up to you. For all the years of mistreatment during our childhood as well as forgetting about your existence for nearly half a decade. All I am asking is to give father and me a chance. According to your sister, your foster parents as well as this GIW organization are posing a threat to you. My siblings are just as capable as father and I, so allow us to help your situation… please."

Once again Danny was blinking in disbelief, this time though he was blinking at his twin he hadn't seen in years, he had sort of resented at first but came to sort of love and miss him through Jazz's constant help and deprogrammed in his childhood.

"Wow… you must have swallowed a lot of your pride to say that." Danny couldn't help but mutter. None of his twin's behavior matched what he remembers from his childhood with the League but maybe it was better this way. What did Jazz tell him a couple days ago? To give it a fresh and new start? To at least listen to them?

"Danyal, if you speak one word of what I told you to any of them, I will kill you."

"And there is the Dami, I remember."

Damian clicked his tongue and Danny laughed as he finally stood up with Cujo in his arms to stand next to his twin.

[long-live-astronerd-ghost-king]

DPXDC prompt: Spiritual Siblings

Bruce: My assassin kid can't be that normal!

Damian: Well, I’m completely emotionally stable by Amity Park standards. The problem is with you. Obviously.

~~~~~

Damian had long found peace and home in Amity, so he did not worry that the new family and Gotham might not accept him.

Sure, Al Ghul had lived without any contact with his biological father all these years but he could safely say that he had a happy childhood. First years were hard and he was raised more as a weapon than a human being. Even so, after that a ghost who decided to become his brother appeared and everything changed.

Damian still does not know what Ra's owes Phantom but Danny has a right to take him, without prior notification, to live with Fentons, to visit Aunt Alicia at her farm, and to make Vlad’s weekends much less calm and boring. Danny jokes that he just steals him as a hostage when Al Ghul does not pay taxes for using Lazarus Pits. Whatever the reason, he already has a family that loves him.

However, he still wanted to make an effort to fit in this one too. The model of conduct certainly was his older brother. No, not the oldest, of course. To be honest Dan wasn’t the kind of a man that could charm you from the first minute. But Danny, in Damian’s experience, had a calming effect on people. So he tried to act like him.

And, yeah, for lack of experience, he was more fun!Danny at home and super!Danny on patrol but he also really tried not to get any of his own assassin personality in his new-self and was tired of it. He couldn’t get a 100% match. Fine. Still doesn’t look like anyone in this house really likes him, so whatever.

Damian understood why Bruce didn't like his company. Jazz had long ago explained to him the importance of voluntary consent. His mother did a terrible thing. Al Ghul was not a child and therefore he was ready to admit it. However, he also understood that children were not responsible for the actions of their parents.

As a biosocial being, he wanted to be more than just a painful reminder of what had happened to Bruce. Wayne's ignoring of his existence was rude. But Damian wouldn't force this man to spend time with him just because he was legally obligated to take care of his well-being. He wasn't going to prove anything to Batman, and he definitely didn't need his attention. The care of his real family is enough.

But Damian really tried to get along with new potential siblings. He even shared Sam's and Danny’s special jokes with some of adopted kids 'cause he didn’t want them to feel like he put himself above them. He wasn't good at showing emotions but he was as open as the assassin could afford to be to strangers.

But they all obviously expected something from him. And it reminded him of the League in an unpleasant way. It was easier with Fentons. Almost everyone in Amity Park was saying what they thought, and Damian didn’t have to waste time decoding potential conspiracies.

Damian missed movie marathon nights with Sam, Tucker, and Danny. And he hoped Dani had time to bother Vlad in his absence.

It was so weird here. When Danny and Valerie were fighting, they would gather at the dinner table anyway. When Damian wanted to have combat training with Drake here, he was forced to stay in his room. A very strange punishment. And undeserved one too.

Al Ghul felt quite calm and fine sitting at his easel and painting the people he left behind. An unusual subject for his paintings. But, Ancients, he missed Amity.

He missed Jack's bone breaking hugs, Maddie's Ecto-Contaminated food, arguments of Sam and Tucker, cozy art class with Mr. Baxter and even Vlad's done look. He missed Danny telling him about the stars. He also missed sword practice with Dan's boyfriend Fright Knight and he missed Dan's stories about his other youth. He missed literary evenings with Mr. Lancer, Clockwork and Ghost Writer. He even missed the hours-long Jazz lectures. He missed the dance of death and life. He missed being looked at without expecting anything from him. He missed the crowd. In the league, he was never at one with himself and in Amity he was always surrounded by people who were not afraid of his fate as the heir to the said League. This Manor was full of people, but for the first time in his life he felt lonely. Damian has to admit that he felt left behind. Of course, he understood that people needed time to build relationships, but he could have sworn that even he didn't need that much time to connect with Fentons. Maybe this is one of the tricks of the Clockwork? Then this one is not funny at all.

~~~~~Phone call~~~~ Damian: Mom, I want to go home. Maddie: I'm so sorry to hear that, sweetheart. What happened? Damian: Just…Nobody likes me. Why was I sent here? I'm not weak. And my brothers are quite capable of protecting me from Raas. I don't need Batman for this. Maddie: We'll figure it out, champ. Moms love you, remember? I'll talk to Talia, okay? Your brothers and sisters are already on edge and ready to steal you right during the patrol. Damian: It would be nice, but it would put a bat on their tails. So lock them in thermoses if they bother you too much. Maddie: But that won't stop Jazz. Damian: I missed the part where that's my problem. Maddie: Well, it will be your problem if she comes to your doorstep with your childhood photos and moralizing.

~~~~~~~~

It's his birthday. And he was always excited about it. But now, looking at the pile of gifts, he realizes that these people don't know him at all.

And this is the family of the best detective in the world? Maybe yes, but none of them bothered to really find info about him or ask him about his likes. Damian's a stranger here, and that's obvious.

The lunch container, which he will obviously give to the Boxing Lunch when he's in the right time interval, tennis rackets that Youngblood might like, The Graveyard Book…

Valerie had already read it to him and Dani before it was published. Thanks to Clockwork for his little miracles. The book reminded him of home.

Obviously this one is from Jason. And well, Damian doesn't think it was a pun on his life in Amity, more like Hood's inside joke about death but Dami will definitely leave this thing in the room at the Manor and maybe take it with him to the GZ or Amity Park.

~~~~~~~

When they gather at the festive table, Damian realizes that he has to make some kind of speech. He tries to be as brief as possible in his report.

Damian: Todd, your gift is appreciated. And I found a potential use for items that were given by others, Bruce.

Damian never called Batman his father. With Maddie and Talia, calling both moms wasn't weird, especially when Jazz explained to his biological mom that he wasn't trying to replace her. But with Wayne, it was different. Both women took care of him, they deserved this title. Wayne provided for his needs, but his core heart didn't feel like they were close. Surely there's nothing wrong if they're just Bruce and Damian? Obviously, they both don't enjoy each other's company.

Jason: So, do you like books, little demon? Damian: Sometimes reading is quite relaxing, I should point out. I'm not indifferent to Stephen King and Lovecraft. Jason: Personal recommendations? Damian: Cujo is one of my favorites. Jason: Not a common opinion, huh. Damian: It reminds me of my family. Damian tries to smile like Danny does, but Jason's twitching eye clearly indicates that he screwed it up.

~~~~Dick and Jason synchronously drop their forks as an excuse for a conference under the table.~~~~ Dick*whispers*: How's the situation? Jason*whispers back*: If the boy asks for a dog, don't be fooled. He will be happy to dance on our graves.

~~~~Cass knocks over their heads, urging them to return to their seats.~~~~

Damian: So how good you are at fading and sliding,Todd? Jason: Why did you ask? I can't, of course. Damian: Because you're dead. It seemed to me that this was a completely understandable interest. Jason: Wow, what a jerk. Damian: I wonder why your own incompetence makes me a jerk? Even my sister could do this when she wasn't dead for even a month.

Jason, for some reason, looks awkward, although he has never been embarrassed before by the idea that a girl could be stronger than him.

Jason: Your sister? How old was she when... So it's all about age. Damian rolls his eyes.

Damian: We're the same age. It seems like it was four or five years ago. To be honest, I don't remember. I wasn't around then. I'll ask Danielle the next time I go to the cemetery to visit her. Dick: I'm so sorry, Dami. Where is she buried? We can take you. Damian: There's no need. She has no grave, as there was nothing to bury. Bruce sighs loudly and covers his eyes with his hands. Damian: It's just easier to contact the afterlife in places like this, you now? Duke: We are very sorry, dude. Damian: Don't be. People come and go, and then come back if they haven't finished annoying you. There's no point in regretting the past. Her creation was not the most ethical thing but everything is going as it should. At least that's what Grandpa says. Considering that the old man is older than time, I prefer to believe him. No one plays with fate without his permission unless they want to get hit by the clock. Tim now looks like he's going to throw up and Damian hurries to move his plate closer to him. Jason: Yes, Bruce, this is definitely your son. Damian: Did I say something wrong? Dick smiles faintly at him but still doesn't find anything to say. Damian shrugs and goes back to eating asparagus. People outside of Amity are so weird.

Signal looks at Damian suspiciously as he carefully rearranges the plate of soy sausages away from himself. Did he take him for an idiot? Everyone knows that even vegetarian sausage bite and fight no worse than those with meat when they come back to life. It's not Damian's fault that he doesn't have an ectoblast with him and wants to have extra distance from the opponent.

~~~At the same time, in the walls of Wayne Manor~~~ Dani: The operation codenamed "Get Haunted Idiot" is declared open. Danny and Dan *salute*.

~~~Several Days Later~~~

Damian: So, this is Dan. Danny says we keep him as a GIW repeller. Dick: And Danny and Dan are.. Jazz: His brothers. I'm Jazz by the way. Elle and I are his sisters. Damian: I feat the criteria to participate in their name cult, so they took me. Dan, Danny, Dani and Dami. Dan *ruffles Damian's hair* : I prefer to call this biting threat Damn, to be honest. Dami: Shut up, DaNtE, they almost wrote Dark in your passport, you idiot. I can't believe I thought I missed you. Danny: Wow. Rude. Your grandpa would be disappointed. Great job, lil one.

~~~Several years later~~~

[luxaofhesperides]

Dancing in the rain ; requested by @wandixx!

He hadn’t been expecting the Signal to chase after him. It is, after all, well after midnight, and he had seen the vigilante out earlier during the day. 

Maybe the Bats are understaffed tonight, he muses as he leaps over the rooftops, a wild grin on his face. Being on the other side of a chase is a lot of fun, he’s discovering. He can see why Selina enjoys it so much.

Though, it probably has to do more with who’s chasing her than it is the chase itself.

But Danny’s become a bit of an adrenaline junkie after a few years of being a hero, fighting ghosts and governments. He’s not a hero anymore, especially not in Gotham, but being Catwoman’s partner in crime is way more fun than being responsible for everyone’s safety.

It’s like he’s doing anything bad, either. Selina can steal whatever she wants; if they couldn’t protect things against her, then should they really have it? Danny doesn’t focus on jewelry or gems. No, he takes ghost artifacts or items contaminated with ectoplasm back to the realms where they won’t cause problems to any humans. There are enough ecto-contaminated people in this world, solely from Amity Park. Best not to let that number grow.

So here he is, leaping over rain-slicked rooftops and only using a little bit of flying to keep ahead, holding a cursed pocket watch that a ghost had requested he return to them, with the Signal chasing after him, disappearing into shadows and popping up unexpectedly. 

“Stray! Get back here!” Signal yells, and Danny takes a moment to spin on his heel to face the vigilante to stick his tongue out at him, then backflips away.

“I didn’t even steal anything important!” he returns, tossing the pocketwatch in the air ahead, then jumps up to catch it and scales his way up to the roof of the next building. 

“Seriously,” Signal says, suddenly in front of him. “Stop running and we can talk this out.”

“Woah!” Danny tries to get around him, trips over his own feet, and crashes into the Signal’s chest. 

“Careful, there.” He looks up to see the Signal’s smile, and he absolutely can not be blamed for having his half dead heart skip a beat. He’s in the arms of a hero who’s smiling at him so sweetly, what’s a guy to do? “Ready to talk now?”

Danny goes intangible for a moment, smoothly sliding out of the Signa’s grip. “Nope,” he grins, starting up the chase once again.

The rain isn’t very strong, and the drops feel cool against his face as he runs, getting a little more air with each jump as he uses more of his flight to keep ahead. He can hear the Signal chasing after him again, heavy footsteps that start and stop unpredictably as he travels between shadows. 

Just to be safe, Danny stashes the pocket watch inside his chest, leaving his hands free to grab onto the rough brick of the walls and scale them up, aiming to go higher and higher. Maybe if he finds a good building, he can dramatically fall off the edge and fly away invisibly. 

“Got you!” 

The Signal pops up out of the wall and grabs Danny, who yelps and tries to pull his arms away. The Signal is too strong, and his tight grip on Danny’s wrists is warm against the chill of the rain. 

They stand there for a moment, just staring at each other as they try to catch their breath. And then, “Is that any way to treat a guy?” Danny jokes, trying one last time to pull his wrists free.

“It is when it’s you,” the Signal replies. “Man, you sure know how to run.”

“I’ll be sure to put that on my resume for my next heist.”

“Seriously, can we talk?”

Danny eyes him curiously. The other Bats mostly tried to take back whatever it is he’d stolen that night, occasionally trying to get information from him. None of them had outright asked to have a chat with him. The Signal at least has some manners, compared to the rest of him. There’s no harm in sticking around for one conversation.

It helps that the Signal is cute, especially when he had saved Danny a few weeks ago. 

Sue him, he’s a bit soft on the Signal. Wouldn’t anyone be with their favorite hero?

“Alright,” Danny says, relaxing. “Go ahead. Talk.”

“Great! Okay, um.” The Signal bites his lip and Danny should really look away, but his eyes are fixed to his mouth. He doesn’t speak for a solid minute, during which Danny really begins to feel the chill of the rain. “Can I get less comments from the peanut gallery?” he says suddenly.

“What?” Danny laughs, confused.

The Signal sighs. “My comms are on. The others are being annoying. If they wanted to ask you questions, they should have caught you first.”

“Oh, protecting me from the big bad Bats? My hero,” Danny says sweetly, pretending to swoon. Except, the Signal follows his movements, releasing his wrists to catch him by the waist, holding him steady. Danny’s breath hitches, and from how close they are, he has no doubt that the Signal heard it. They freeze for a moment, then the Signal dips him like some fainting Victorian maiden.

“Well, I certainly wouldn’t mind sweeping you up in my arms.” The smirk on his face only lasts a moment before he grimace and says, “I shouldn’t have said that on open comms. Man, they’re annoying. It’s not my fault I know how to flirt.”

Danny…

Well. Danny short circuits for a moment, running the words over his mind again, then blushes so hard he’s sure there’s steam coming off his cheeks. “You’re flirting?” he squeaks. “With me?”

“Flirting,” a new voice confirms, making them both jump, stumbling against each other as Black Bat hops down onto their rooftop. “Both shy and silly. I’m better.”

“You can’t even ask out Spoiler,” the Signal retaliates.

“She can’t even WHAT?” Spoiler yells as she also vaults herself over the alley below to join them. “You want to ask me out?”

Though she doesn’t say anything, Danny can practically feel Black Bat’s glare through her mask. The Signal winces, then says, “Oops.”

“Man, you can keep yourself busy, clearly Sig doesn’t need backup,” Spoiler says. “I need to go on a date with Black Bat. The rest of you suckers are on your own!” And then she grabs Black Bat’s hand and grapples away.

There’s a beat of silence, then Danny and the Signal share a glance and start laughing. 

“Well,” Danny says, “Good for them! Good for them.”

“They’re probably just going to Bat Burger.”

“And are you going to be treating me to a burger any time soon? I should be compensated for this conversation, you know.”

“Please, if I was taking you out on a date, it wouldn’t be to Bat Burger. I’d take you out dancing.”

It sounds like a date his dad would take his mom on. It sounds nice. Danny smiles and leans in closer to the Signal, taking hold of one of his hands. With the other, he puts Signal’s hand on his waist, then brings his own up to the Signal’s shoulder. 

“Why not dance with me now?”

Danny leads them in a few clumsy turns of a waltz, silently thanking Sam for forcing him to take a few ballroom dance lessons with her. The Signal seems a little dazed, following his lead, and when he lightly squeezes Danny’s waist, he shivers. 

Catwoman should be done with Batman soon. They had agreed to meet up at the newly opened Vintage Boutique in Diamond District, and he intends to beat her there. 

Reluctantly, Danny pulls away from the Signal with one final spin, and hops up onto the edge of the roof. “If you can find me during the day,” he says, “Then I’ll dance with you again. See you around, Signal!”

And with that, Danny hops backwards off the roof, free-falling towards the ground before he lets gravity lose hold of him and slips into invisibility, flying up just as the Signal peers over the edge, searching for him.

Unable to help himself, Danny floats closer until he can give the Signal a quick kiss on the cheek, then flies off, grinning wildly. 

He certainly can’t wait to see the Signal again. 

Maybe if he hired a few guys to pretend to rough him up while Signal’s out patrolling…

Well, either way, this cat is already half dead so he can jump straight to satisfaction bringing him back. And, hopefully, back into Signal’s arms again when they won’t be interrupted by other Bats. 

He’s already looking forward to it.

. . .

[send me a ghostlights prompt!]

[dcxdpdabbles]

Dc x DP: Vague Threats

Danny Fenton gets a full ride to Gotham University, thanks to the Wayne Foundation. He won the scholarship after submitting his research on purple-back gorillas, seeing as the zoo incident had led to him wanting to study zoology after being a astronaut was out.

He was surprised that Gotham University had one of the best programs in zoology in the whole country, but that may be due to Bruce Wayne funding the whole department because his youngest loves animals.

In any case, he is expected to participate in specific requirements to keep his scholarship. Things like community service hours, GPA averages, and attendance to Wayne Galas.

Now community service isn't hard. He volunteers at an animal shelter. His GPA isnt hard, he has a 4.0 because when he cares, he is brilliant. No what's hard is the Galas.

He has to attend a total of 2. The scholarship fundraiser is unarguable, and another Gala of his choice. Danny has avoided the second one as best he can, and he knows it's to get rich people to donate so he can keep studying but the Galas are suffocating.

Mainly Danny stands in a corner invisible after the first 30 minutes, allowing himself to become visible when people start questioning where he is. He has to, otherwise he is acussed of not being there.

Danny is doing that when Bruce Wayne and his butler stop right before him and talk about the batcave.

Danny blinks, his eyebrow-raising higher and higher as they mutter details of a case. Then Bruce tells his butler to cover for him so he can go out. Danny follows and watches the man disappear down a clock, further investigation leads him to the Batcave.

So Bruce Wayne....is Batman. Huh. Welp that has nothing to do with Danny.

He returns to the party, appearing only four times, and heads home. The following morning he finds out Batman, along with Nightwing and Red Robin, had put a stop to a gang fight.

He thinks of how tired Bruce must be, and so as he's cleaning the dog cages gets an idea. He finishes his work for the day, goes to his house, and opens his miniature portal into the ghost zone to buy some teas and soap Baths.

The ghost zone products have an amazing effect on humans to help heal them faster thanks to the pure ectoplasm. He puts together a gift basket for everyone in the Wayne family- including the butler- and sends them to Wayne Manor through a ghost vulture.

He just wanted to thank them for all their hard work to keep him and the city safe. Mody Dick, knows he would have appreciated it when he was still acting as Phantom back in Amity Park.

He includes thank you letters each, including specific examples of how they have help the city both in and out of costume.

Danny then goes to his next lecture class with a pat on his shoulder. He feels so good about it, he decides to send them every other week.

Across the city, the Wayne are panicking that someone just sent them all a basket with a very vague threat of exposing their identities. They scramble to find the person who found out, but with no leads or evidence, they can only pray that whoever found them out wouldn't hurt their loved ones.

The personal threats only made them more uneasy. Are they being followed? How close have they gotten to have such details?

Tim Drake is determined to find the person responsible.

[letoasai]

dp x dc Chronos

An idea that’s probably been touched on before but well.. once more! 

~

It had begun with a meltdown. Being a fifteen year old was tough. High school was the time in your life where you were picking up life skills without even knowing it. Social skills, study habits, responsibilities stacked on responsibilities. It all seemed rather unfair when their brains weren’t done developing yet or… whatever Jazz had been telling him one afternoon. 

The point was, being a teenager wasn’t all making memories and messing around. It was hard. Add on dying to that work load and things got complicated. Add on a ghost portal that allowed ghosts to come and go as they pleased when you were the only one that could safely stop them and things got stressful. 

Parents that were trying to kill you…went without saying. 

Become a king of a realm by fifteen, and see how you handle the sudden workload. Danny had been holding up fine, until he wasn’t. Until a particularly loud boom in his parents lab from whatever their latest torture invention was cause a tremor of fear to shoot up his spine. In an instant, panic was sparked. He wanted to leave, he thought about it often, but how could he just leave Amity Park behind? Would it be better outside of his parents house? Could he live alone?

The fear latched onto his core, and not being able to relax in his own haunt was apparently counterproductive to a healthy, happy halfa. 

Before dying, Danny hadn’t been familiar with panic attacks, now, they weren’t entirely uncommon. One moment he would be overthinking in his bedroom, the next he’d be on his bed or the floor curled up in a ball. Tears flowing and throat clogged, he would sob under the weight of his responsibilities in silence. He doubted his parents would notice, but he hated to worry his sister. Being quiet was a must.

It was one of these episodes that had led to Clockwork appearing in his room, lifting Danny up into his arms like a child without even a weak protest. A post-it was left for Jazz so she wouldn’t worry and the king was returned to the Infinite Realm for a night. 

That was the start of Danny spending time in Clockwork’s citadel any time he was feeling overwhelmed. Being outside of time, he was given the time to relax, sleep, or study. It lessened the burdens of trying to be a normal high school student, hero, and king all at once, or at least gave him a safe place to crash. 

At least once a week, Danny made his way into Clockwork’s lair, long since allowed to enter on a whim unless expressly told otherwise for a day or two. For all Danny was king, he did his best not to interrupt Clockwork’s work and he knew beings from other dimensions popped in from time to time. 

If Clockwork didn’t want him meeting them, he was going to take his opinion to heart and make himself scarce. 

Danny wasn’t sure why he got the privilege to hide behind the ghost of time but he didn’t shun the offer. Any chance to get some sleep was a good one when he had ghosts like Skulker or Johnny waking him up at three in the morning with their bullshit. 

Danny floated over a sofa, backpack forgotten on the floor and books hovering around him. The crown that hovered above his head kept going back and forth between being covered by ice or green flame. It seemed to do what it wanted like a living creature. 

Danny had his own room in the citadel now but he was positive the sofa was put in Clockwork’s viewing room just for him. 

He slept there more often than not. 

“Hey Clockwork.” Danny called. He’d be ignored if Clockwork was deep into peering into the past for future, but would otherwise get an answer. “Can i ask you a question?” 

In the time it took Clockwork to turn to face Danny, his age had altered subtly, five or ten years younger than middle aged. 

Danny had always thought Clockwork had three ages he shifted between. His child form, middle aged adult, and old man. The longer Danny stayed in the citadel though, he learned that wasn’t the case. 

He’d seen Clockwork go from an old man, to a man about twenty. He’d slowly shift younger and younger through his teens until he stopped in his child form. Danny had seen the opposite too. Clockwork as a young preteen growing into an adult in the span of a breath. Dark circles would appear under his eyes and laugh lines etched into his face of a much older man but Danny wouldn’t have called that form elderly. 

It was fascinating. 

“What can i do for you, Majesty?” Clockwork asked, a hint of a smile already curing his lips. He likely already had the conversation they were about to have memorized. 

Danny groaned. “Can’t you just call me Danny? Majesty is so… so…” 

“Accurate?” 

“Bleh…” Danny muttered, slowly floating until he was upside, but his book turned with him so he could continue to look at it. 

Clockwork only laughed at him, that soft noise that said he was amused at Danny’s plight, but Danny was far from offended by it. 

“You’re the master of time, right, but were you the god of time too?” He pointed at his textbook, crown on top of his head doing slow flips. “Chronos?” 

“Ah,” Clockwork chuckled, arms crossing over his chest. His de-aging had abruptly stopped and he instead started growing older again. “Indeed. We are the same.” 

“Really?” Danny perked up and went back to skimming his book while rotating in the air. The edges of his wispy hair were looking like smoke. “So you were an ancient Greek god? That’s cool.” 

“Yes and no.” Clockwork said with a shrug. “Time is a funny thing. I was there, of course but more in the capacity of their stories. I predate the Greeks.” 

“Huh,” Danny hummed, growing quiet again as he read a little more but Clockwork didn’t return to his parade viewing. He instead waited for Danny to continue. “So wait, you were one of the first… titans.” he read. “Cool.” 

“Yes.” Clockwork agreed, “That was a very long time ago now.” 

Danny quirked a brow at a line in the book and glanced back at Clockwork. “‘Destructive and all-devouring’, huh?” 

“I was young.” Clockwork agreed, not bothering to deny it. “We all have that phase.” 

“Uh huh… How did this rule of yours coincide with Pariah Dark?” 

Clockwork grew older still, his beard starting to grow. He also relaxed into a floating/sitting position. “They didn’t really. Much of what you are reading is a mortal human interpretation. If you think stories in your high school become exaggerated, you should hear the true origin stories of the ancients sometime.” 

Danny was snickering. “I’d actually like that but none of them like talking about stuff like that. Did you really eat your kids?”

“Something to that effect. I’m afraid i was not a very good father. I was at a very different place in my life then.” Clockwork said. He didn’t sound particularly proud of it, but he didn’t look broken- hearted either. 

Danny didn’t quite get it. Clockwork had basically been his ghost guardian long before he’d even known that was a thing. He probably would have just assumed Clockwork would make a good dad. Then again, being a ‘present’ dad was probably tough for the god of ‘time’. 

“Hm,” Danny hummed and flipped the page while floating right side up again. He rubbed at his face, the constellation freckles across his cheeks twinkling. “Wait. Wait, wait, wait.” Danny muttered, clearly reading through a paragraph. 

Clockwork’s shoulders were shaking with quiet laughter. It wasn’t usually this easy to coax Danny into doing his homework. 

“You died. Zeus kills you. Did Zeus kill you? Your son?” 

“Yes.” 

There was a moment where Danny’s face warped into something like grief before it disappeared, suspicion forming in it’s place. “Did you know that was gonna happen? Did you let Zeus kill you to maintain a good time line? Did you know you’d just be the ghost master of time?” 

Clockwork just smiled and shrugged. 

“Ancients!” Danny cursed. “Are you serious? You were looking that far ahead already? Even then? That’s insane.” 

“I have not confirmed or denied anything. On the other hand, we all have our talents.” Clockwork mused. “Does this knowledge entertain you?” 

“I mean, it’s cool.” Danny muttered again. Clockwork wasn’t usually so chatty but he was more likely to tell him past things opposed to future things.

He went back to reading and Clockwork went back to his viewing clocks. It was only a few minutes before Danny spoke again. 

“The Elysian Islands. Are those in the Infinity Realm?” Danny asked, “They sound familiar.” 

“Yes.” Clockwork mused. “And before you ask, Zeus didn’t actually have anything to do with them and Pandora would get huffy at the mere mention of it.” 

“Are other gods in the infinite Realm?” 

“Some, but not many of the ones in your book there.” Clockwork said, twirling the staff in his hand. Danny could tell he was doing something along the time stream but Danny had no idea what and he didn’t ask. He was not looking to get sent on another timeline errand. “There are other places where they reside. Some even living. Those in the realm however, are your subjects.” 

“Oh.” Danny muttered, getting the same sour look he got when he was reminded he was king. 

Clockwork lowered his staff, done with his chore. He hovered closer to Danny now, ruffling his hair and dislodging his crown which spun around of its own accord on top of Danny’s head. The sentient accessory very much attached to its new wearer. “If there are any in the Infinite Realm who find you lacking, you need not pay them any mind. Pandora, Fright Knight, or Frostbite would be more than happy to deal with them. You have every right to be here.” 

Danny just grunted. Peer pressure was hard enough at school. It was worse in the Infinite Realm. “I’m not looking for fights.” 

“You do not need to prove yourself. You’ve done that enough. You must merely be you to succeed. You are balance, and balance in life will find you soon enough.” 

“Awe, you haven’t said anything cryptic to me all day. I was starting to get worried.” Danny muttered, a smile tugging. 

“I would never make you go without.” Clockwork said with a fond roll of his eyes. He was so old now that his beard nearly touched the floor. 

“Ancients forbid.” Danny muttered, snagging his book out of the air. “Wait, did you say there were some living? Wait.” His mind whirled to a previous school assignment. “Isn’t Wonder Woman’s dad supposed to be Zeus. Is Wonder Woman your granddaughter?” 

Clockwork just smiled and ruffled his hair again. “Don’t you have homework to finish?” 

“Oh Ancients! She is. Classic deflecting. Holy crap.” 

He let himself drop onto the sofa, over dramatic with his realization. “You have ties to the Justice League!” 

Clockwork did sigh that time. “A charming notion, i suppose.” 

“You’ve as good as admitted it!” Danny grinned, pleased to have learned something new. Had it been anyone else, he might have thought he learned something Clockwork didn’t want him to know. Clockwork knew everything though and only let slip what he wanted to. 

“You are a hero yourself, Danny. No need to be enamored with the League.” Clockwork turned to go back to work, eyes scanning screens before him. 

“Yeah but they’re real heroes.” Danny grumbled, opening his book again. Clockwork’s lack of response meant he wasn’t going to answer that line of thinking. “Fine…” 

The two of them were left in a comfortable silence for a few minutes more until Danny broke it himself. Even though Clockwork knew it was coming, he still jumped when Danny gasped harshly from excitement. 

“Saturn! You’re Saturn! Saturn is like, one of my top three favorite planets!” It was the pure joy on Danny’s face that had Clockwork laughing this time. 

“You would have a top three.” 

“Of course i do!” 

The door had been flung open for him to now talk about space and precisely why he had so many favorite planets specifically. Clockwork let him, happy to let one of his obsessions take its course. Talks about space banished all thoughts of the Justice League and ‘real heroes’. 

Danny knew he’d have to take his history books with a grain of salt. Eaten children or no...Clockwork had always been a good guardian to him. ~~ I might add on to this...  It’s almost like Danny was reading the same wiki page on Chronos that i was... lol 

Part 2  and Part 3 

[clockwayswrites]

Masked in Amity

CW: Sam doesn't come off great in this, but not Sam bashing. She just has a lot of growing up to do still and knee jerk reacts badly. (I also don't want to listen to any Sam bashing please and ty.)

Sam’s room still looked the same as always. Danny supposed that’s what happened when someone moved out for college but still came home again— especially to a home like Sam’s. There were only a few posters, a few photos, and a knickknack or two that had changed between high school and now. Danny sat on the edge of the bed like always.

“So how’s school doing?” Danny asked into the awkward silence. Silences never used to be awkward between them, or was that just looking back with rose colored glasses?

“Ugh,” Sam gripped and flopped back onto her bed next to Danny. “Why would you even ask me that? You know I hate it.”

“Because it’s what you’re doing right now? It’s a huge part of your life, you can’t just… avoid it.”

“Watch me,” Sam said, bitterly. Her snarled lips looked weird without the dark purple lipstick. “I’m going to get my stupid law degree my parents are paying for and work at some stupid corporate firm Dad has connections at and when my trust fund has made enough in interest I’m going to quite and go open a non-profit and sue all those fuckers I was forced to work for over how they’ve fucked up the environment.”

“Okay,” Danny said. He didn’t want to argue about this. He just hoped this plan worked better than the last three Sam had had before her privilege knocked her down a peg.

“Can I ask about, I don’t know, your time in Chicago at least?”

“Chicago is amazing,” Sam said, wistfully. “Being in Chicago, I mean, I’m sure you know how it is, it really makes it clear how backwater Amity Park is. The things people worry about here are so small compared to what’s out there!”

Danny just hummed in response. He didn’t exactly know what to say to that. It didn’t feel completely wrong, but it wasn’t right either. Worries weren’t a competition like that.

“And the bands!” Sam continued, thankfully changing the topic. “I have got to see so many amazing bands. The local scene alone is amazing and no one knows about them so you can be right up close and a lot of times even talk to the band after. You should come for a show sometime.”

“I can try to,” Danny said. Sam’s music wasn’t usually his thing, but something like that might be fun. It would be different at least. Danny gave her a little smile. “Maybe Tucker could make it out too.”

Sam rolled her eyes. “You know he won’t. When was the last time you talked to him not on the computer or the phone? He’s only here at Christmas when you aren’t.”

“You know how I feel about Christmas, Sam,” Danny said, holding back a sigh. Sure Tucker had been busy lately and that had made him more distant, but he was still one of their trio. “And if we plan something then Tucker can schedule for it. Don’t count him out just because he’s busy.”

“Alright, fine, we can plan something for a bigger show with Tucker,” Sam agreed, “but you still need to come out to something local. They’re really better anyways. We’ll go out to eat first and hit up a bar or three after. I know some really great places— places like you’ve never seen.”

Sam reached up and wrapped her hands around Danny’s neck, pulling him down a little. “It can be a date.”

Something in Danny balked at that. It was an innocent enough comment. Sam and him had dated and then not and then dated again or just had fun together. They’d known each other so long that it was easy to just ebb and flow out of the different levels of a relationship like that.

This time, though, Danny found himself resisting the tide. “Or we can just hang out.”

The almost dreamy smile Sam had crumpled into a frown. “What? I mean, sure, it can, but why? Are you seeing someone?”

“Yes? No? I mean, I’ve been… sleeping with someone, but we’re not dating or anything.”

“That’s okay,” Sam said easily. “I’m not going to make you be exclusive. I don’t want to be either right now; we’re not around each other enough for that and You know that I’ve been sleeping with my roommate sometimes and I’ve met a cute person in study group now too with amazing fingers.”

“No, I know, just…” Danny gave a frustrated noise. Nightwing and him weren’t even close to being exclusive. Someone like Nightwing could have anyone they wanted and with how much he liked sex, Danny was pretty sure Nightwing did have whoever he wanted. Danny was just… convenient for the hero side and Danny didn’t begrudge the other that. It was convenient for Danny too. It was just…

Danny didn’t want to keep living the same cycle with Sam where he was her world for a few weeks or months and then just back to an occasional phone call. He didn’t want to keep being pulled back to Amity Park. Maybe meeting her in Chicago would be different enough, but Sam was still so tied to Amity and always would be by her parent’s money.

“Maybe we shouldn’t do this again,” Danny said slowly, feeling the words out as he said them. “Maybe it’s time just to leave us dating in the past?”

Sam dropped her hands and sat up. “Excuse me?”

Danny rubbed at the back of his neck. “Just, we’ve tried being together in a lot of different ways and we always end up in the same place.”

“So you want to leave me in the past?”

“No!” Danny said quickly, trying to get ahead of this before Sam spiraled too badly from making assumptions. “I’d love to come to Chicago and see a band with you! Just… not as a date.”

“Because you want to leave that in the past,” Sam snapped and got up off the bed.

Danny scrambled off also.

“That’s not a bad thing. I enjoyed it and I know you did too. Just more, okay, maybe that wasn’t the best phrase? I mean maybe we shouldn’t go down that road again when we know where it’s going to end.”

Sam crossed her arms. That was never a good sign. “Right, because I’m always going to be a dead end, is that it? Not like you who’s off playing hero with the big names?”

“What? What does me being a Titan have to do with this?”

“Don’t play dumb, Danny, we both know you’re not. You left to go be a famous hero and hardly looked back at Amity Park or me or Tucker or your parents. What if the town needed you?”

Danny threw his hands up in the air. “Why would they need me? I destroyed the portal, came to an agreement with Vlad, made sure my parents couldn’t build another working one— it fixed everything!”

“And then left.”

“So I could help other people!”

“Sure it wasn’t so that you could be famous?”

Danny closed his mouth with a clack.

Sam winced at her own words. “Danny…”

“No.” Danny backed up a few steps from her. “No. You don’t get to— you of all people don’t get to come at me like that! I never wanted to be a hero, Sam! You’re the one who said I needed to protect Amity and you were right, sure, but it’s never what I wanted! You wanted it!”

“Danny, no—” Sam reached out for him and Danny stepped back again, hitting the wall.

“Yes you did, Sam! You did or I never would have had to die a second time after your wish! I lost everything again! I don’t have a future like you and Tucker, I just have being a hero. I just have being dead.”

“Come on Danny,” Sam tried. She moved close again, slowly, like Danny was some sort of feral animal.

Maybe he really was just a caged beast.

“I’m just— I better go. I’m just going to go,” Danny said. In a flash of light he was back to being Phantom. He let himself tip back and phase through the wall.

As he left Amity Park behind, he couldn’t help but think it really said something that he was far more comfortable being Phantom these day than Danny.

--

AN: Here's yous all voted on treat for the day! This comes before Danny showing up at Dick's door, quite upset.

[starry-bi-sky]

Childhood Friends Danny and Jason

(cw underage smoking / smoking as a form of bonding) (cw Jason thinking Danny killed himself but its only for a moment) (cw depictions of murderous intent? Danny wants to murder the Joker and he's a little descriptive about it)

Now on ao3 :) (and with a response and a third one)

AND ALSO A REMASTERED VERSION THAT YOU SHOULD TOTALLY GO CHECK OUT BECAUSE I WORKED VERY HARD ON IT.

This is… aha. Massive. Word count check: 9k+

this has probably been done before but hey, everyone loves a good trope and I wanted to share my take on this idea. 👏👏 So, Danny Fenton and Jason Todd being childhood friends. The Fentons lived in Crime Alley for a good long while during Danny's childhood. Nobody wanted to fund their research and Jack and Maddie struggled to keep any form of work for a multitude of reasons. Jack worked in construction due to his big build and Maddie had another job elsewhere.

Danny and Jason were friends during that time, really great friends. I'm not super solid on how they met yet but I do know it involves Danny committing petty crime and Jason deciding to jump in and help when he sees Danny struggling. Danny was distrustful (as all crime alley kids ought to be) but they eventually became thick as thieves, committing petty crime together.

While it's all too easy to make Danny the weaker one of the two with Jason protecting him, I actually really like the idea that they protected each other. Growing up (essentially) on the streets means Danny forcibly had to grow a backbone unless he wanted to get trampled all over. He is just as willing to scuffle with the bigger kids as Jason is, and he and Jason regularly fought each other whenever they needed to let off steam, or just because. They were a duo, having each other's backs in tough situations.

(Sometimes the pair of them would sneak out at night and try and get a glimpse of Batman and Robin while they soared through the air. It was like a game between the two of them to see who could spot the dynamic duo first. When they were a little older, Jason would steal his dad's cigarettes and share them with Danny while they searched for Batman and Robin)

So when Danny has to move away when they're eleven years old, it's pretty safe to say that Jason didn't speak to him for a week afterwards. Nothing Danny did could persuade him to otherwise, even when Danny insisted that it wasn't his fault and that he didn't want to move away either, but he didn't have a choice in the matter.

When the week was over, Jason climbed through Danny's window and sat in his room, dead silent and looking upset. he didn't speak until Danny fished out a stolen pack of cigarettes from his bed and handed one to Jason.

(It was a ritual they had where if one of them was upset about something but wasn't saying anything, the other one could then hand them a cigarette -- whether it be the one they were using or a new one -- and that would be an open invitation for the person to vent. The other one who handed him the cigarette wouldn't speak until the venter handed back the cigarette. Then back and forth it would go until the cigarette was gone.)

Jason ranted about how pissed he was about Danny moving, and they promised to try and stay in touch after he leaves. Neither of them had phones, but Danny was determined to send him a letters.

Danny moves to Amity Park and it's... an adjustment, that's for sure. He's angry, grumpy, upset, and every other negative feeling under the sun. He was going to a new middle school with new people he didn't know, away from all of the people he did know and away from his best friend.

(He does however keep his word about sending letters, and mails one out to Jason at the first opportunity.)

He refuses to get along with anyone, butts heads with the teachers, is combative, rude, and openly smokes in class -- which gets him plenty of detentions and a bad reputation. He speaks in a thick Gotham street accent and wears hand-me-down clothes that are too big and baggy on him. (His parents have yet to replace any of their wardrobes as they settle into their new life, and Danny is hesitant to spend the money to get new clothes.)

He only manages to befriend Sam and Tucker because one of the football kids was bullying Tucker and Danny stepped in. It was some blond jerk named Dash and when Dash threw the first punch, Danny broke his nose. Tucker found him later that day and reluctantly thanked him for his help.

Sam and Danny do not get along for the longest time. Sam questions Danny about his upbringing, his accent, his smoking. She judges him for talking back to the teachers despite doing it herself and for ruining his lungs with cigarettes. Danny tells her to fuck off, and when she tries to judge him and Tucker for not being vegetarian, he calls her a privileged brat.

Sam doesn't even look at him for two weeks after, and Danny refuses to apologize. Tucker is caught between a rock and a hard place as his old friend and new friend are feuding with each other.

They... sort it out eventually.

Danny and Jason send each other letters near religiously. Danny complains about Amity Park, and Jason complains about how Crime Alley isn't the same without him. Danny talks about the school and what he's learned, about Sam and Tucker, and how he's been getting into the astronomy books in the library. He steals Jason a book and sends it to him.

When Jason tells Danny that he was adopted by Bruce Wayne, Danny calls bullshit. There's no fucking way Bruce Wayne would even look at Crime Alley, regardless of his charity efforts towards it. But when he checks Gotham news later that week, he's hit in the face with every single news article announcing Bruce Wayne's newest ward; Jason Todd.

Cue freaking out. Jason talks all about living in Wayne Manor and what it's like there. He says that there's a monster library in a part of the house that Bruce says he has free reign over, and that Jason can have anything to eat as long as he asks Alfred to make it and it isn't a desert, and that he has his own monster-sized room that he got to pick out himself and decorate.

(When they both get phones, the first thing either of them do is add each other's numbers.)

When Sam complains about having to go to a Wayne Gala that her parents are dragging her to one weekend, the first thing Danny asks is if he can go with. It surprises Sam and Tucker; Danny was the last person they would have thought wanted to go with. HE hates the rich even more than Sam does. Danny stands firm in his decision, and refuses to elaborate.

"Besides." He says to Sam, with whom he's begun to get along with via 'the enemy of my enemy is a friend'. "Would you rather go alone or with someone you can tolerate?"

She brings him with and convinces her parents to allow Danny to come along, citing that she'll be on her best behavior if they do. They agree, and buy Danny a suit when he says that he doesn't have one of his own.

(He discovers that he hates wearing suit jackets and ties, but vests he doesn't mind. He doesn't like that he has to comb his hair back, but he does to make Sam's parents happy. They give him a crash course in etiquette that Danny's going to forget the next day, and soon enough off they go in a private jet to Gotham)

(he does not tell Jason he's coming.)

he feels mischievous and nervous as they touch down, his stomach swirling as Sam's parents usher them to a high-profile hotel that Danny's only ever dreamed about going into. He feels largely out of place as they walk through the lobby, and falls back on old habits: square shoulders, set jaw, make yourself look like the biggest person in the room.

They get ready in the hotel room, Sam's parents primp and preen for the night incoming, and Sam is dragged into it by her mother. Danny does only what's required of him, and fiddles with the sleeves of his fresh-ironed button-down that's been tailored to his body. He's itching for a cigarette, and didn't bring any with.

Sam's dad helps him with his tie, a bout of kindness that Danny doesn't think is one. Just obligation to prevent Danny from looking like a mess. Sam pesters him again about wanting to come, and his reasons for it, and Danny keeps mum.

He's stone-faced with anxiety as they get closer to the gala, and before they leave the limousine the Mansons rented Sam links arms with him. A form of solidarity that Danny needs as he squeezes their arms together and smiles weakly at her.

The paparazzi are loud, bright, and demanding, shouting questions over questions at them like overlapping tidal waves. Danny ignores them all and focuses on the front doors instead. Sam's parents whisper at the stairs that they are to greet the Waynes first, and Danny's heart leaps to his throat.

His heart is in his ears as they drift closer, Mister Wayne is preoccupied with another rich couple, smiling that charming billionaire smile that Danny saw on every billboard in Gotham, and then some in Amity Park. Getting so close to him feels unreal.

And there by his side is the one and only Jason Todd, who isn't even trying to hide the bored look on his face as he watches Bruce interact with the other adults. He's gotten taller in the year they've been away, and healthier. His hair looks like its been cut professionally and he doesn't look as street kid skinny.

Danny's arm, hooked with Sam's, tightens up, and he resists the urge to rush forward and hug Jason. He watches Jason's eyes sweep left, away from him, and then right, towards him. The air stills for a moment as their eyes lock.

Danny grins toothily at him, lopsided and playful in nature, and sees the moment Jason processes the sight before him. His arm starts slipping out of Sam's at the same time as an ecstatic smile stretches across Jason's face.

His lopsided grin fills out on the other end. "DANNY!" Jason yells, cutting off whatever Bruce Wayne and startling everyone within earshot. There's barely a moment for Bruce to look down when Jason shoves past him and runs at Danny.

Danny yanks his arm out of Sam's, "JASON!" He yells with just as much enthusiasm, and Jason nearly topples them right over when he collides with Danny. His arms wrap around Danny's shoulders, holding onto him tightly, and they're both laughing, spinning around like tops out of joy.

"You didn't tell me you were coming!" Jason cries, sounding accusing. Danny hugs him just as tightly, and laughs when Jason pulls away momentarily to punch his shoulder.

"I wanted it to be a surprise!" He defends, laughing between words as their spinning comes to a stop. They're both reluctant to pull apart, but they do and clutch the sleeves of their elbows tightly. "How could my best friend be adopted by the Bruce Wayne and have me not come confirm it with my own two eyes?"

"I sent you newspaper clippings!" Jason says, narrowing his eyes while his smile betrays his face. Danny quietly notices that his Gotham street accent is faded slightly.

"Oh that's what it was?" Danny's grin turns again, edging into a smirk. He feigns innocence, "I thought that was fire kindling." He has the newspaper clippings hung on the corkboard in his room, proud beyond words about his best friend.

Jason punches him in the shoulder again, hard enough to leave a bruise. "You jackass." He says, ignoring Danny's laughter even when he's holding back his own.

There's a soft, sharp clearing of someone's throat, breaking their attentions away from each other to the one that made the noise.

Bruce Wayne was a tall man, taller than Danny expected, and he looks exactly like his billboards. If less promiscuous than his perfume ads. Danny expects him to be upset with them both for disrupting his pretty rich gala, but instead he just looks gently amused, with an arched eyebrow. Overall though, he just looks fond.

Danny would be the first to admit that Bruce had taken in Jason as a charity case, something to fill the void after his other kid Dick Grayson finally moved out. But Danny’s a good judge of character — or he likes to assume he is — and those are not the eyes of a man who would take Jason in as a charity case. Those are the eyes of a man who actually, genuinely, cares about one Jason Todd.

The wriggly protective thing settles in his chest.

He doesn’t let go of Jason, but he does twist his smile into something a little more polite. Mister Wayne’s eyebrow arches higher, and he turns his blue-blue eyes onto Jason. “Who’s this, Jason?” He has that fancy Gotham Elite accent -- something that sounds like a mix between old transatlantic and faintly British -- that Danny's only heard in passing when he and Jason snuck up to the nicer parts of Gotham.

Jason stares at Mister Wayne, his grip on Danny tightens as his eyes flick to the other onlookers in the room. “This is Danny, B.” He says once his eyes turn back to Mister Wayne. “We grew up in Crime Alley together, he moved to Illinois last year."

Danny can see the uncomfortable expressions cross every rich person's face, murmurs sweeping across the room as soon their uncomfortable gazes turned judgmental and flinty. He's kept track of the tabloids after Jason's adoption, the ones calling him a charity case and looking down on him for being a street kid.

He inches a little closer to Jason, straightening up instinctively, as if they were back in Crime Alley and facing a pack of kids that didn't like them. He can see Sam's surprised expression from the corner of his eye -- he never told Tucker or Sam about where he grew up, although he's sure they had their suspicions.

He looks back to Mister Wayne and meets his blue-blue eyes, his smile has slowly begun to fade. Mister Wayne doesn't miss a beat however, and his smile stays plastered to his face. If anything, it gets a little softer, a little wider. "It's nice to meet you Danny -- Daniel? I'm so glad that Jason has a friend here." He holds out a hand.

Danny eyes him unsurely, and then takes his hand. "It's jus' Danny, Mister Wayne." He says, some of his old accent slipping through as he shook his hand firmly. He would have done it harder, but this was Jason's new guardian, and from Jason's letters he didn't sound too bad. "It's, uh, nice to meet you too. Jason's told me lots about you."

Mister Wayne's brows jump momentarily, he looks intrigued. He looks between Danny and Jason, and claps his hands together softly. "Well, Jay, how would you like to stay with Danny for a while, hm? I'm sure you too have a lot to catch up on."

Hope simmers in Danny's heart, and he glances to Jason to see that same hope on his face. "Really?" He asks, and Mister Wayne nods with a laugh.

"Of course! How could I keep two friends apart? Go on ahead, chum. I'll come get you when the gala ends."

And just like that, Bruce Wayne leaves Jason with Danny, diving back into a conversation with one of the rich gothamites and taking the attention with it as if he were the sun and everyone else a planet orbiting him.

Danny and Jason share grins, and throw their arms around each other with laughter. Danny is on cloud nine, pressing his nose into Jason's shoulder and breathing him in, fingers digging into the back of his suit hard enough to leave wrinkles in his jacket.

Sam demands answers when they finally, for real this time, pull apart. Why didn't he tell her that he was friends with Jason Todd!? Danny slings his arm around Jason's shoulders and keeps him close, and tells her that it was because he wanted it to be a surprise.

Sam's parents have unreadable expressions on their faces, part greed -- Danny is their in to the elusive Bruce Wayne -- and part disdain -- a Gotham street rat. Danny ignores them, they're unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

He introduces Sam to Jason, and Jason to Sam. And off they go to a corner of the room near the buffet table where they can eat and shit talk everyone else in the room in peace.

At some point in the night Sam is called back to her parents to meet some other fancy rich kids her parents want her to get along with, and Danny and Jason go off to the west end balcony to avoid anyone who may try and approach the new Gotham ward.

Danny hops up onto the balcony railing, kicking his feet as Jason pulls a cigarette pack out of his inner jacket pocket, and grins. "Don't tell Bruce," he says, handing the box to Danny first. "He's been trying to get me to quit."

"Hah!" Danny takes one just as Jason slips out a lighter. "That sounds like Jazz. She's been trying to get me to stop since we moved to Amity." Granted, she's been trying ever since she found out before they moved, but now she was even more insistent. "She hasn't found my stash yet."

At the end of the night when the Mansons are leaving and Danny has to leave with them, he walks back to Mister Wayne with Jason to tell him that he's leaving. Mister Wayne mourns his going, and tells him that he's always able to come visit.

"Any friend of Jason's is always welcome to the manor." He says with a blinding grin, pulling Jason close to his side and squeezing him tight. Jason's nose scrunches up, but he doesn't push away.

It becomes a new routine for them. The Mansons are all too happy to bring him with to the Wayne Galas (of which they start receiving more invites to due to their connection with Danny) and Danny is all too happy to spend the evening with Jason again. No matter what, they always end up on the balcony at some point in the night.

And, eventually, Danny is invited to stay at Wayne Manor either for a weekend or for a break. He jumps at the chance when winter break rolls around and his parents start their debate over Santa Claus again.

Danny and Jason stay up late into the night talking or playing video games during their sleepovers, and in the warmer nights they climb out and onto the roof to stargaze. Danny points out constellations - - things he can find in neither Gotham or Amity -- and rambles on and on about space.

There are plenty of times during the Wayne Galas that the event gets attacked by a rogue. More often than he'd like he loses Jason in the crowd, and has later stopped Robin or Batman in his panic to find him.

The first time it happened, he was in tears with terror. He grabbed onto Batman's cape, stopping the man from going back in as he babbled that his Jason Todd was still inside, that he disappeared during the chaos and he couldn't find him. Batman took his hands and calmly told him that he'd find Jason for him, and that he was sure he was okay, but he needed to calm down.

He found Jason later once everything had calmed down, and he screamed at him for disappearing during a rogue attack, if he ever did it again he'll kill him. Then he cried.

The second time it happened, Danny didn't even realize that Jason was gone until everything was already over. They'd been separated before the attack happened. He stopped Robin and Batman before they could leave, trying to keep his breathing under control as he asked again, if they had seen Jason Todd.

"That- that asshole keeps fucking ditching me when these things happen." His voice has an embarrassing wobble in it. "Please-- please tell me you've seen him, that he's alright."

Robin this time steps up to reassure him, that Jason Todd was out of the building. He got him out. "He's probably looking for you too, uhhh..."

"Danny" Danny says, and eyes him up and down. "You're the new Robin right?"

Robin stilled up, and Danny could understand it a little. He'd seen the thoughts on the new Robin online. He wasn't very popular at first. Robin nods curtly, and Batman was shuffled a little closer to him, almost protectively.

Danny grins at him. "Cool." He says, "Me and Jay used to sneak out onto the rooftops sometimes to try and spot Batman and the first Robin, we made it a game." He holds out a fistbump, "Thanks for doing what you do, man. I might not live in Gotham anymore, but I mean it. You're a living legend."

Robin looks like there's something stuck in his throat, and after a beat he returns the fistbump tentatively. "Th- uh, thanks." He stumbles out awkwardly, and then turns away, "Me and B- uh, better go."

Before Danny could even respond, Robin already had his grapple in hand and was grappling away. "You too, Batman." Danny says before Batman can follow.

When Danny sees Jason after that, and weight lifts off his chest and he hits him in the arm again. And then complains that he should have gotten Batman and Robin's autograph, it would have been epic.

By the fifth time it happens, Danny is cussing up a storm when Robin saves him, cursing out Jason and claiming that he needs to put that boy on a fucking leash. "We're a duo!" He scowls when Robin gets him outside, "I got his back, he has mine! I can't have his back when he's got no back to fucking have."

The eighth time it happens, Danny gets held hostage by one of the henchmen. He's become a recognizable friend of the Waynes, and when the Waynes are nowhere to be found, then the next best thing was up to offer. Danny isn't even mad this time around -- just relieved that Jason was fucking off somewhere where he couldn't get hurt.

Robin, however, seemed furious when he arrived, and broke the hostager's jaw with a single flying kick to the face. Jason found him rapidly quick soon after the situation had settled, and apologized over and over again.

Danny slings an arm around his shoulder and laughs that it was fine, Robin saved the day! His legs were shaking with the worn off adrenaline, something he tried to hide from Jason. "I'm just glad it was me instead of you, Jay." He grins. Jason looks like he swallowed a toad.

Jason stops disappearing as often after that, sticking close to Danny's side until the attack was over.

When Danny is fourteen, Jason dies, and his world unravels.

He calls the manor on a late night in April after Jason had stopped responding to his texts. Danny knew that Jason was just recently in a fight with Bruce, but he knows that Bruce loves Jason. He would know where he is, right?

When he calls, Bruce answers with a hoarse "hello?" as if he'd been crying all day, and Danny's blood turns to ice. The anxiety he'd been feeling beforehand doubles in size, and he feels himself stammering.

"Mister- uh- Mister Wayne? Um, I'm calling because Jason--" he hears Bruce inhale sharply on the other line, and his anxiety skyrockets into fear. "--hasn't been answering any of my texts and- and I'm gettin' real worried."

There's silence on the other end, and Danny feels a rock forming in his throat, gross and heavy like he was on the verge of throwing up. "Mister- Bruce? Mister B?"

There's a shaky breath, and then Bruce's voice crackles through the phone. "Um-- Jason, he, he's--" there's a sound like rustling, "he's been killed."

Danny's vision whites out with skyrocketing terror, his mind skidding to a stop. His body rapidly grows hot, and then chills, like a blacksmith striking a heated weapon. "What?"

When the phone call ends, Danny screams himself hoarse. Jazz and his parents come running into his room, his parents equipped with ghost weapons. Instead, they find Danny curled up in his bed, sobbing hoarsely.

Danny almost -- almost -- refuses to attend the funeral, nearly paralyzed with grief. Jazz coaxes him to go, to find closure if anything else, and he drags himself out of bed to go.

He feels numb the entire time. It's closed casket, so he can't even see him for one last time before Jason is buried in the ground. He's silent, and if he think he looks bad, then Bruce looks even worse, like he hadn't slept since Jason died and worse.

Danny grabs his sleeve before he leaves, and when Bruce turns to him with a dull look in his once vibrant eyes, he clings to him tightly. And cries. Bruce clings back just as tight, Danny feels tears drip into his hair.

"Who did it." Danny whispers, voice too hurt to speak any louder, when he pulls back. His fingers curl around Bruce's jacket tightly, desperately. His eyes hurt with tears. "You said he was murdered, B. Please, who did it."

Bruce looks down at him, and for the first time it really does feel like he's looking down at him. His face is blank, and his eyes close in grief. There is no answer, a silent no.

Danny's face twists up all ugly like, and he shakes Bruce's jacket. "Bruce, please. Tell me who did it."

Bruce refuses, his face full of grief.

Danny never returns to Gotham.

Prior to Jason's death and post their reunion, Danny had slowly begun to improve in school. He started caring more, he was putting in more effort, he was doing his homework and was actually enjoying class. There was the bullying from Dash and the A-Listers, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle, he was ignoring them for the most part.

Come Monday after the funeral, and Danny breaks Dash's nose when he starts up with his shit. He withdrew into himself, and it was like he was back to square one again, except this time it was much worse.

Everyone knew Danny was close friends with Jason Todd. So when news of his death finally reached the ears of Amity Park, the students of Casper High School kept their distance.

That following Friday, Danny dies in the portal and comes back. A month later he becomes Phantom, the ghost-fighting ghost. the ghost Phantom wears his hazmat suit partially undone, showing a tanktop he didn't wear in death under the initial suit while the sleeves are tied around his waist. Vicious, glowing lichtenburg scars travel up his arm and neck and torso, covering half of his face while a pair of scientist-like goggles covers his eyes. He's bitter and angry, showing off his death.

Look at me, Phantom's form says, I am a dead child. Look at me look at me look at me. Mourn me. I am a dead child. LOOK AT ME. MOURN ME.

A few weeks later he enters the ghost zone and realizes that he could find Jason. And he spends a weekend scouring the ghost zone for him. He finds Gotham in the zone, and rather than finding Jason, he finds Robin.

Danny didn't know he'd died. And he flies towards him, asks him if he's seen Jason, reveals that it's him, Danny Fenton. Robin stares at him, mouth agape, and peels off his mask to reveal Jason Todd.

They both cry, and when Danny tells him how he died, Jason looks pale in the face. "You didn't- you didn't kill yourself because of me, did you?"

Danny fervently denies it. No, no. He didn't, he didn't. It was an accident. Totally unrelated. But enough about that, what the hell happened? Bruce wouldn't tell him anything at the funeral.

Jason clams up, his ghostly face losing its color, and Danny curses himself. He tells Jason that he doesn't have to tell him, he doesn't have to say anything. They sit in silence.

"It was the Joker." Jason says.

That's all Danny needs to know. He nods quietly. 'I'll kill him.' He thinks to himself, a stubborn set in his jaw. "Okay."

It had always been a plan; a thought wriggling in the back of Danny's mind ever since Bruce told him that Jason had been killed.

Not died. Killed.

Danny wanted the fucker dead the moment he realized it. He just needed to know who did it. He thinks Bruce knew it too, could probably see it in his eyes the moment Danny asked him who did it. He isn't sure if he should hate Bruce more for keeping it from him now.

They spend hours together, just soaking in each other's presence. Danny tries to take him through the ghost portal, to bring him back to the land of the living. But much like Kitty, Jason's form is tied to the zone. Danny promises to visit every day.

And he does. Or he tries to. The grief doesn't go away, but with the comfort of knowing that Jason was on the other side, Danny feels a little better. He tells Jason about being Phantom, and Jason helps train him. It feels like they're kids again and are fighting just because they want to. Its a bout of familiarity in a place that feels unfamiliar. All they need are cigarettes.

And then six months later he loses him again. Danny scours the ghost zone for him for the second time, and this time he doesn't find him.

His haunt is still in the zone though. He didn't move on. He's still here, somewhere.

Danny is convinced that Jason was in the Elsewhereness, and looks for him in between ghost fights and his social life. He visits Jason's haunt every day, knowing that Jason should be able to feel when another ghost enters his home. He does not show up.

(He never thinks that Jason came back to life, and Jason doesn't remember his time in the ghost zone)

When Danny is nineteen, Vlad Masters blackmails him into going to another Wayne Gala. Begrudgingly, Danny goes. He's taller than he used to be, having inherited his dad's monstrous height and his mom's leanness. He has piercings, some of them he got after a lost bet from Sam and Tucker, and he's given himself an undercut.

He still prefers vests over suit jackets, and he still smokes. A little less than before, he sneaks a pack into his pocket before he leaves, along with a lighter. Vlad gives him a dirty look the whole time - he knows.

"Don't give me that look." "That stuff kills, you know" "I'm already dead."

It's like deja vu when he arrives; an awful bout of deja vu, that is. The paparazzi is still as bright and loud and annoying as it always was, and they don't recognize him at all. Something he thinks of as a soft mercy up until one of the reporters asks Vlad who he is.

Vlad smiles and tugs Danny into the camera frame, "Why, this is my godson!" He crows, and shoots Danny a look that is downright smug I'm sure many of you may know him as Daniel Fenton?"

If looks could kill, Vlad would be ash. Danny isn't quite sure why he still agreed to this -- blackmail or no. He felt itchy being in Gotham; jumpy. He's never forgotten his vow to kill the Joker, in fact it was something he still desperately wants.

But the threat of Rath, the name he chose for his evil future self, haunts him just as much as his murderous intent. If he kills the Joker, would he stop?

Danny's almost afraid of what he'll do if he ever lays eyes on the Joker in person. He doesn't think he'll be able to stop himself from wrapping his hands around that stupid clown's neck and watching the light leave his eyes.

He pushes the thoughts to the side, and smiles lopsidedly as cameras and microphones flood his face, reporters yelling over themselves as they clamor to get a shot of the old Wayne family friend.

Danny turns and walks inside without answering a single question, flexing his fingers in and out of fists. Vlad gracefully hurries after him, and Danny can hear his glare burning into his back.

"You told me to come," Danny hisses to him once he's beside him, meeting Vlad's gaze piercingly, "not that I should play nice."

"Don't embarrass me, Daniel." Vlad hisses back, trying to look the upmost calm as eyes turn onto them. "I'll make you regret it."

"You embarrass yourself, fruitloop." Danny shoots back, walking away before Vlad could get a retort in. He sees Bruce Wayne on the other side of the room.

His heart seizes with nostalgia. He hasn't seen Bruce since Jason's funeral, hasn't spoken to him either. He doesn't know how to feel about him, but he'd been keeping tabs on Bruce both as himself and as Batman.

Danny's feet carry him forwards before he can think about it, silently weaving between the throng of rich people vying for his attention. It's only when he gets closer does he see the little shadow clinging to his side: Damian Wayne.

The newest little bird, Danny realizes, and stifles a smile at the surly expression on Damian's face as two older women coo over him. He reminded him of Sam, who had long since stopped coming to these things the moment she was able to.

The feeling of eyes on him turns Danny's attention away from Damian, and instead finds them back on Bruce's, who stares at him with a little furrow between his brows. As if he recognized him, but he wasn't sure from there.

Danny grins crookedly the moment he's within earshot. "Mister B!" He exclaims, slipping into what remained of his Gotham street accent. Recognition flashed in Bruce's eyes, and the man smiled widely. "Long time no see, old man."

"Danny," Bruce says, his name breathing out like relief. He slips between the crowd surrounding him -- who are now watching Danny -- and pulls Danny into a close hug. "It's good to see you again."

Danny hesitates for a moment -- he wasn't expecting Bruce to hug him -- and returns the gesture. "It's good to see you too, Bruce." He admits. Bruce was still using the same cologne that he did when Danny was a kid. He blinks heavily.

He pulls away quickly, clapping Bruce lightly on the shoulder as Damian quickly latches onto his father's side again. Damian glares daggers at him, fingers digging into Bruce's pantlegs like a possessive little kid.

He made Danny's ghost sense tingle in the back of his throat, creeping up slowly like a spider before stopping suddenly before it reached his mouth. It hummed, and then disappeared.

Danny smothered a frown. Since when did Batman work with ectoplasm? “This must be Damian." He says to Bruce, and holds out a hand to Damian -- he doesn't crouch, he had a feeling that Damian would be less than appreciative if he did that. "You've really expanded the nest since the last time I saw you."

Damian's eyes narrow at him. Bruce laughs lightly, "Ah yes, Tim is around here somewhere. I'm sure you'll see him soon."

"Father," Damian says, his voice layered with an accent. He glares up at Danny with piercing green eyes. "How do you know this man?" He sounds distrustful, Danny respects that and drops his hand.

"This is Danny Fenton." Bruce says, and Danny lets him introduce him. "He was Jason's friend."

An expression similar to bewilderment flashes briefly over Damian's face, and he eyes Danny in disbelief. "Todd had friends?"

Oh. So that's how he wanted to be. Bruce had a little elitist on his hands. Danny's smile drops like a deadweight, and any lingering endearment he had hardens like ice in his chest, fury slowly taking its place like a flickering candlelight. "It's not polite to speak ill of the dead, Mister Wayne." He says coldly, his voice made of chips of ice.

Damian blinks, the disbelief disappearing from his face. The closest thing to a recoil Danny thinks he's going to get. He doesn't care. No one speaks about his best friend that way.

"I grew up with Jason, actually." He continues, breathing in slow and deep, trying to keep the ghostly possessive-protective-rage under control. "I was his best friend."

He turns, almost robotically, towards Bruce, and tries not to look so angry. "I'm going to go find Tim, Mister B." He says, and tries to offer up a weak smile for the man. It comes out as a grimace instead.

"And..." he pauses, flicks his eyes towards Damian, and then looks at Bruce. "I'll... try and keep in contact, B. Tell Dick I said hi, alright? I'll see you in a little bit."

Bruce nods, looking vaguely disappointed and sighing slow through his nose. Danny walks away as Bruce turns to address his youngest, and doesn't bother listening in on what he has to say.

He does, eventually, find Tim Drake. He spots him in a crowd instantly - it's hard not to, and he makes his way over to him. He's not sure Tim Drake would recognize him, Bruce didn't at first and Danny had been around him constantly.

Except Tim Drake does recognize him, much to Danny's surprise. They lock eyes and Tim immediately makes his way over to him. "Danny Fenton!" He says and stops in front of him, "What a surprise, we weren't expecting you tonight."

"Tim Drake," Danny replies, smiling a little as his earlier hurt begins to fade away. "I'm surprised you know me."

"There are pictures of you in the manor with Jason." Tim explains, stuffing his hands into his pockets with an easy-going smile. "It's hard not to know you."

"It’s hard not to know you too,” Danny retorts, a sly smile slowly spreading across his face. “Although you’re a lot taller than you used to be, when you were lurking around Bruce and Jason and I.”

Ohhh Danny recognizes him alright. One part due to all the news articles and tabloids on him after he was adopted by Bruce, and the other part because he remembers the little shadow lurking near plants pots and table legs that used to follow him and Jason around at galas just like these.

Knowing that Jason was Robin, he wonders if Jason knew he was there too.

The effect is immediate: Tim’s eyes grow comically large, and a red tint glows at the tip of his ears as he shrinks back like a turtle trying to hide into its shell. “You— you noticed that!?” He hisses.

“I did!” Danny grins, large and wide, stifling a laugh as the red tint spreads over Tim’s cheeks and nose. He looks mortified. Danny coos. “Aww, I thought it was adorable that Jason had a little shadow. I’m sure he would have loved you if you had just come over and said hi. He had a big soft spot for kids.”

Tim snorts and it— it almost sounds derisive? “Sure he would.” He looks sad, and the mirth in Danny’s chest shrivels up like a flower without light. The smile fades from his face, and all that’s left is a strange, staunch reminder that Danny and Bruce weren’t the only ones that probably mourned.

He touches Tim’s shoulder lightly, “Hey, I’m sorry.” He says, trying to look as apologetic as he feels. “I didn’t mean to make you feel bad. I’m sorry, I miss him too.” Like a fucking limb he missed him.

There’s something that flickers in Tim’s eyes, passing through too fast for Danny to realize what it is. He assumes its gratefulness, because Tim relaxes a little and offers him a weak little smile. “I wish I had talked to him.”

Danny sees an out and takes it, he forces out a short laugh, grinning widely. “I can tell you all about him if you’d like,” he offers, “I told Mister B I’d keep in touch anyways. I’ve missed him and Alfred quite a lot in the last few years.”

“Not Dick?”

“That dipstick wasn’t around often enough for me to form any sort of emotional attachment to him.” Danny says in a half-complaining tone, placing his hands on his hips. “Although I did like his puns.”

Tim snickers, “I’ll tell him you said that then. Nobody likes his puns.”

“Go on ahead,” Danny grins, laughter swirling in his chest and making his core thrum with warmth. Damn, he’s missed this family. “I stand by my decision. Puns are funny.”

“Let’s get a photo then.” Tim says with a hand already fishing in his pocket for his phone. “He’ll be devastated to know that you were here and he didn’t get to see you.”

“Sure.” And Danny sidles on next to Tim, throwing an arm around his shoulders — and making a noise of surprise when his arm was able to fit comfortably — as if he was just resting it on a counter.

He totally forgot how tall he was compared to Tim. Forgot that he’d been looking down the entire time they’d been talking. “Why’d I get my dad’s height.” He complains, and bends his knees as Tim raises the phone with the front-facing camera on.

Tim snickers under his breath, and takes the picture while they’re both smiling wide. Danny immediately stands up, and peers over Tim’s shoulders to look at the picture.

It’s a good one, with the fringe of Danny’s curls falling slightly over his left eye and making the dimple on his right cheek more prominent. He could see the barely-there smattering of freckles he had across his nose, the ones that became more prominent when the sun was out. His smile was lopsided, Danny’s favorite kind of smile.

He whistles lowly, “That’s a good one,” he says aloud, and smiles impishly at Tim when he looks at him. “You should send that one, I look hot in it.”

Tim snorts, his ears reddening as he looks down at his phone. “Yeah sure, no problem.” He says quickly, and Danny looks away when he pulls up the messenger app. He’s never felt comfortable looking over people’s shoulders when they were on their phone.

“I’m gonna go take a smoke break.” He shoves his hands into his pockets and curls his fingers around the box and lighter inside. “I’ll—“

“Be on the west-end balcony.” Tim finishes, the red in his ears darkening as he glances up from his phone to smile embarrassedly. “I know.”

Danny snorts, “Okay.” His voice is thick with amusement. “Let me know how Dipstick reacts, alright?” He backs up slowly, awaiting Tim’s response. Tim merely waves a hand at him, a weak gesture of “yeah yeah” that makes Danny grin before he flips around and marches towards his favorite smoking balcony.

———————

(Tim pulls up the family group chat and loads the selfie into the text bar. His face feels warm with embarrassment even as his thumbs fly across the screen.

Tim: look who i found at the latest charity gala :) [image]

Hee awaits eagerly a response, and finds he doesn’t have to wait long. Dick’s thought bubble appears on screen, then Cass’s — of which it only exists for a moment before disappearing.

Dick: holy shit, is that who i think it is?

Tim responds quickly, and his message sends.

Tim: yep. He wanted me to tell you that he thinks your jokes are funny.

Dick: they are funny

Tim rolls his eyes and thinks for a moment, really thinks. He weighs his pros and cons. And then his fingers fly across the screen again.

Tim: hey Jason are you not gonna say anything?

There’s no response for all of thirty seconds — of which it stretches on to an uncomfortably long minute — and then Jason’s thought bubble appears.

Jason: what do i have to say to a bunch of idiots blowing up my phone in the middle of patrol?

Tim: harsh. do you recognize the guy in the photo?

Jason’s response is instant. Too fast for him to have actually looked at the photo itself. He’s just trying to spite Tim then. Tim doesn’t care, he has the upper hand here

Jason: no and I don’t care, i have patrol

Tim knows he didn’t look at the photo, and yet he can’t help stifle a shit-eating smile and feign innocence

Tim: really? You and Danny used to be so close, color me surprised

His teeth dig into his lower lip, he doesn’t need to in order to hide a smile. But it gives him something to do. Jason is worryingly silent for a long, long time, and Tim can almost imagine him staring long and hard at the selfie. Tim knows he will be later.

Finally, Jason’s text bubble shows up. It exists for a long time, before finally Tim’s phone buzzes with his message alert.

Jason: that’s danny?

Tim feels all too gleeful. Smugness swirling in his chest like kicked up sand as he types his response: yep! Apparently he showed up today, although I’m not sure with who since I don’t see Miss Manson around here.

Damian: Father says to get off your phone, Drake. We are at a Gala and your behavior is most unbecoming

Tim: can it demon spawn, I was just telling Jason that his friend Danny is here

Damian: He can’t be too important if he doesn’t even know Todd is alive

Tim: how would you know that?

Damian: When Father introduced him as Todd’s friend, I expressed my surprise that Todd even had friends, considering how unpleasant he can be. Fenton became quite cross with me after that and quickly excused himself thereafter

Dick: you said what!? Damian that’s not okay

Damian: Father made that quite clear after Fenton left in a huff. My mistake for thinking that Todd had told his ‘supposed best friend’ that he was alive.

Dick: he didn’t even tell us we were alive at first

Damian: He did eventually, didn’t he? Clearly Todd doesn’t seem to care too much about Fenton if he hasn’t even informed him of his being alive at this point.

Jason’s thought bubble quickly pops up, and then dissipates, then pops up again. Tim quickly pockets his phone before he can see Jason’s response. He doesn’t feel smug anymore, just uncomfortable.)

———————

Stepping out onto the west-end balcony feels like a blast from the past. A painful one at that. Danny’s fingers dig into his cigarette pack, and he pulls it out with a sense of bittersweet familiarity.

It feels like a lifetime ago that he once stood here with Jason. The package clunks dully as his fingers scrape against the side, and he fishes a cigarette out of the box before stuffing it back into his pocket.

“Quite the night isn’t it.” He says to nothing, to ghosts of the past, to himself. He turns and sits on the railing, sticking his legs out like a tripping hazard while Gotham’s hot city wind blows through the air.

He looks up and only sees the ugly pollution yellow sky looking down at him. It’s an unfamiliar feeling to him. He loves the stars and yet when faced with a smog that covers it, he feels more at home.

Danny’s fingers find the lighter, and with a few clicks a small open flame appears in existence. There’s a poem here, he can feel it. But he feels too tired to find it.

The cigarette lights, and the lighter dies in response. Returning back to his coffin-like pocket until he needs to use it again. He pulls a leg up, resting his chin on his knee with a heavy, tired sigh.

He soaks in the sounds around him. The ugly city warmth nips at his jaw. The music inside is muffled by the force of two glass doors and walls on all four sides, and Danny can hear late night traffic coming by on the road nearby. It’s a special kind of ambience you can only find on the west end balcony.

Half a decade ago, Danny had played a part with that ambience with Jason. Now it was just him, and Jason was nowhere to be found. It left a hopeless kind of feeling in his chest. An all-suffocating kind of fear that filled him head to toe with an intensity only ghosts could have.

His body winds up like a spring, and Danny holds his breath. When he exhales two minutes later, the spring stutters and jolts, and his body relaxes with a tremble.

He misses Jason. He misses Jason.

Ghosts are emotional creatures. They feel it from their crown to their soles. And emotional wounds never really heal. They scab over and fester, waiting to be picked at again and again so it can bleed as fresh as it did when it first opened.

Danny’s grief is never going to go away, he thinks. It’s clung to him like a parasite; shaped him and molded him. The wound was too close to him when he died, and now it will stay with him forever.

He opens his eyes when his ghost sense tingles, a heavy feeling in his throat that is neither nicotine nor grief. It’s just like Damian’s, but stronger. Potent. Older. It reaches the top of Danny’s throat and sits at the base of his tongue, like a hand about to suffocate him.

He looks up, cigarette hanging off his lips, and the Red Hood drops down beside him. He stands in the same spot Jason once did, and that alone makes the ghostly core in Danny seize possessively.

Don’t you dare stand where he stood, it hisses, coiling around his lungs like smog. Danny grits his teeth and feels his ghost sense evaporate. He pulls the cigarette out of his mouth, and nicotine smoke pours out like a cheap version of his ghost sense.

“Red Hood.” He says plainly, his free hand coiling and uncoiling like cat’s claws against the railing. “A surprise to see you here.”

Danny knows through process of elimination who most of the Gotham vigilantes are: Dick is Nightwing, Bruce is Batman, Tim is Red Robin, Damian is Robin, and Cass is Orphan. There are a few who he doesn’t know, however. Like Batgirl and Red Hood.

It’s fine, he doesn’t need to know. Danny of all people understands the importance of a secret identity.

Red Hood doesn’t say anything, just stares at him as if he’s a deer in headlights. His body all tensed up like he isn’t sure what to do now that he’s here in front of Danny. Like he wasn’t expecting Danny to be here at all.

Danny’s brows furrow. “Sorry, am I in your spot?” He asks, and begins to push off the railing. “I didn’t think vigilantes used the Wayne Hall west-end balcony, I can leave if you want.”

He’s already begun to move towards the door.

The Red Hood lurches in his spot, “No!” He yells, and Danny stops in place with raising eyebrows. Red Hood’s fingers cringe, and he straightens up.

He’s shorter than Danny, he notes. Which isn’t much of revelation. Everyone is shorter than Danny.

“No,” Red Hood repeats, sounding sturdier than before, “No. You’re fine. I’m just stopping here for a quick rest before resuming patrol.”

…Danny doesn’t question it. It’s none of his business about other vigilantes and their practices. He shrugs and breathes out more smoke, “Alright.” He says, and walks back over to the railing to sit on it. “I’m Danny, by the way.”

The Red Hood nods, and a silence falls over them. Danny doesn’t care enough to make it feel uncomfortable, but the Red Hood seems unsettled by something. Lost in thought. He leans his back against the railing similar to Danny, and then switches a few seconds later to a new pose.

He does it again, and again, and again. Until finally he flips over and leans his stomach against the railing, arms resting against it. It is starkly like what Jason used to do, and Danny stares at him long and hard.

He frowns. And says nothing.

When Danny’s cigarette is nothing more than a butt of nicotine, he crushes it in his hand and watches the ash flutter down to the ground. The heat stings his hand, but its nothing his ghostly healing can’t fix.

The Red Hood is already holding out another one when Danny’s hand drifts to his pocket for the box.

Danny stares at him, sudden wariness opening up like floodgates that sit at the bottom of his stomach.

His frown deepens, his eyes flicker up and down at Red Hood. His hands hover over his pocket. “I have my own.” He says, and watches subtly as the Red Hood hides a wilt. As if he’d been expecting Danny to take it.

“Alright.” The Red Hood says, trying to sound unbothered. He retracts the cigarette away from Danny, quiet all the way. He’s looking away.

Danny plucks the cigarette out of his hand, startling the Hood enough that Red snaps back to look at him. Danny yanks his lighter from his pocket. “I won’t say no to a free cigarette.” He says, slightly muffled with the stick between his teeth. It lights.

Silence falls over them again, and when one minute stretches into five, whatever hope that had been digging into the shoulders of Red Hood finally pulls away and leaves him slumping subtly.

‘A ciggie for your thoughts?’ Nine year old Jason Todd whispers one night with an impish grin, holding up a cigarette pinched between his two fingers. ‘I stole it from my old man. He won’t even notice its gone.’

Danny is halfway through it when he speaks. “The Joker killed my best friend.” He says, and watches from the corner of his eye as the Red Hood flinches. Is he startled by Danny speaking, or startled by the bluntness of him starting?

“He beat him to death.” Danny continues, staring stone-faced away from Red Hood. His grief claws up his lungs and burrows into his heart again. His fingers dig into the railing. “He beat my best friend to death.”

The Red Hood is silent, his body as still as the grave. Silence stretches out between them both, and like he’d been thinking, the Hood finally speaks: “How do you know?”

He’s not holding the cigarette, he broke his and Jason’s rule. Danny bounces the stick between his fingers. “His ghost told me.” He says, taking a trembling breath. “His ghost told me so, before he disappeared.”

The Red Hood says nothing, and Danny gathers his thoughts. The ones that had been buried deep next to his core, shoved down ever since Danny learned of Rath and a terrible future where a world is destroyed by one ghost’s hands.

Danny has never said it out loud before. His face scrunches up briefly, and then smooths out when his eyes squeeze shut. “I’m going to kill him, Red Hood.” He murmurs when he opens his eyes, turning his face toward the vigilante. The sound is sucked out of the air.

The Red Hood stares at him, but he doesn’t say a word. Danny pushes on, teeth grinding into teeth as he flips his silvery scarred hand back and forth. Palm up, palm down. “It’s why I haven’t been back to Gotham in a while.” He admits, voice still quiet. “If I see the Joker I will kill him, and I won’t feel bad for it.”

“Not today though,” he says, and closes his hand, “today I’m here on a favor to Vlad Masters. Then after this I’ll go visit my friend. I need to apologize for not seeing his grave in a while. I’ll have to stop by a florist to see if they have any zinnias. Jay likes those.”

He takes out the cigarette in his mouth and breathes out one last cloud of smoke. And then he crushes the cigarette stick under his foot and walks back inside.

[radiance1]

An off-shoot to an off-shoot!

Danny left the human world for the Ghost Zone, as the Crown Prince he has quite a lot of responsibilities, much more than he would like in all honesty.

He barely even knew there was a high society of the Ghost Zone, some of which he has met and others he's just questioning the existence of.

He was already tired of the amount of marriage proposals he was sent and had to sort through, and there was still 3 more mountains to go!

He was honestly looking forward to the calls from his two best friends when he was finally able to get a break from his duties as prince. Never has the sound of his friends' voices felt oh so sweet.

Sometimes he visits Sam when he managed to convince Pariah, or when there just wasn't any work to be done. He tried to visit Tucker too but, when he tried to leave Amity Park he just... couldn't???

There was something just, stopping him. He couldn't leave, like some kind of barrier that prevented from moving even smidge past the line.

He just left it be.

He heard about Tucker being a villain and decided he wanted in. But since he couldn't leave the boundary of Amity Park for whatever reason, he needed Tucker to plant a series of tidbits of knowledge that'll allow people to summon him.

Tucker very obviously agreed.

But they decided to have a bit of fun here. Tucker- who now goes by Daedalus as his villain name- has history with the Ghost Prince, who is the 'hero' to Daedalus' villain.

Daedalus does not like Phantom and constantly tries to neutralize him, which is a far cry from his usual non-lethal tactics. While Phantom, on the other hand, considers Daedalus to be his best friend and closest consort and often ignores said attempts of neutralization or plays it off.

So Tucker left behind bits and pieces of the knowledge to summon the Ghost Prince in random parts of the city, which are discreetly yet highly guarded. Then overtime certain people began to find those bits and pieces and Daedalus, in regard to such an event has notably gotten more panicky and worried.

With each and every sighting he's in he seemed to be searching for something and used the chaos he brought to search for it. To which the heroes have been taking notice of.

They think that he was searching for something to use for his next plan or something.

Then the Justice League got word of a group of cultists looking to summon the Ghost Prince to take over the mortal world, which they obviously couldn't let happen. So then they locate and find the group of cultists (and as usual in these ideas) they fail to stop the summoning in time.

But as the summoning circle was shinning and the room got colder, someone unexpected showed up.

Daedalus. (Imagen he's in the floaty chair thing that Eggman uses constantly)

Who, surprisingly. Is just a 16 year old. (This takes place in the second year of Sam's little isolation thing.)

Who then proceeded to get irritated and screamed at the cultists about how they managed to find the necessary components to summon that he specifically split into pieces to avoid this situation happening!

Then the Ghost Prince pops into existence, who then calmly looked around the room and then into the sky, his indifferent, cold expression faded away into a bright beaming expression and then went:

"Daedalus! My best buddy!"

And then had to dodge a blast from said villain. Then they proceeded to have a battle, quite- no, very lethal on Daedalus' part and not so much on the Ghost Prince's part.

It was... reminiscent of a dog and cat, really.

Until in the midst of said fight Phantom exclaimed his woes about the Ghost responsibilities and then Daedalus just kinda, stopped trying to kill him and then made Danny explain what problem he has and then gave him the solution to said problem and goes back to fighting.

The Justice League feels like they should intervene here, but they also don't know if they should.

Said problem was solved by Daedalus getting hungry and proposing to stop the fight to go and eat at a food place he knows that's very good. Phantom agrees, claiming that he hasn't had human food in ages and then they go and eat and forget about the Justice League.

Who then questioned why the Prince of Ghosts and the villain that a few of them has been fighting are literal children.

[bet-on-me-13]

Dp X Injustice AU's

So, we have seen the frankly insane about of Dp x Dc AU's that have been spawned over the years. But I never really see any Injustice AU's

And then I thought, which Dp x Dc AU would you actually use for an Injustice AU?

Let me give some examples:

Justice League Member Danny: Danny is a part of the Justice League by the time Superman goes insane. He decides to step in when Shazam is nearly killed by Superman, but gets hurt himself in the process and is thrown in jail. This causes some of Superman's supporters to doubt him, since Danny is just a 16 yr old kid and Clark nearly killed him.

Danny is sill a Solo Hero: Danny is still just a Solo Hero from Amity Park in this. When Superman takes over the world, he goes to Amity to try and recruit Phantom. Danny refuses, and they butt heads. Danny eventually promises that he will continue to just act as a small time Vigilante in return for not joining Batman's side. This changes years later, when Superman is responsible for the death of Jazz Fenton.

Danny is a "Villain": Danny is seen as a Villain because he is a Ghost. At least, that's what the outside world thinks, but the situation in Amity is different. Danny has been seen as a Hero for years now, it's just the rest of the world that doesn't want to accept that fact. So when Superman takes over the world, and tries to execute every Villain, he goes after Phantom. Only for the Entire Town to try and stop him.

@little-pondhead Everlasting Trio Villain AU: So, take Little Pondhead's Villain AU and put it in the Injustice Universe. Danny can be the insane megalomaniac Villain he always wanted to be and not feel guilty because this is a Dictatorship. (Although it does remind him of Dan before his parole). He just has fun, messing with Superman, building insane crazy inventions, messing with Superman, enacting fun Villain plots, messing with Superman, and of course messing with Superman. Meanwhile Superman is just having a horrible time because there is just this random Villain, doesn't even seem to have powers, and he Just. Can't. Catch Him! Batman is looking for Fenton to recruit, meanwhile Fenton is literally here to Not be a Hero. It gets even worse when he brings in his Friends and Ellie.

Danny is the Ghost King: Danny is the Ghost King by now, and Batman's side try to Summon Him to deal with Superman during the whole "Super Pills" event. He shows up just in time to save Green Arrow, but isn't trong enough to kill Superman. He himself gets extremely injured in the process and gets forcibly summoned back to the Ghost Zone to be healed. Now the entire Dimension is gearing up to attack the Living World as revenge for their King being so hurt.

Old Man Danny AU: My own AU. Danny is still an Old Man just living in Gotham when Superman takes over. At one of his rally's to try and garner support and stop the rebellions, Danny stands up in the middle of the crowd and calls him out on all his Bullshit. This causes the whole crowd to start yelling at Superman, which in turn causes Superman to have a Homelander Moment. He kills Danny, who just laughs as he falls to the floor, and causes a riot. What Superman doesn't know, is that Danny was slated to ascend to Godhood at the moment of his Death, so now he has a God of Death chasing him to fulfill his "need to be avenged" urges (its like hunger pangs for ghosts)

Danny as a Medium: Danny is a Traveling Ghost Speaker, like the guy you pay $5 to pretend to speak to your dead loved ones, but he can actually speak to them. Superman is patrolling the world, just making the rounds now that he had conquered the Earth, and comes across Danny's Tent. He stops by in curiosity and asks to speak to his dead Wife. Danny asks if he really wants to put himself through that, but Superman insists. So Danny, instead of just speaking for the Ghost like normal, actually Summons Lois Lanes Ghost to talk to Superman. They have a heartfelt conversation about how it wasn't his fault, and how he shouldn't blame himself, but eventually they get to the topic of Clark talking over the world. She isn't proud, but understands if this is what it takes for him to be happy. She leaves, and Superman is left finally second-guessing himself for the first time in years. Because it doesn't make him happy. (*ahem* Danny still wants to be payed, soooo......)

[charcoalhawk]

Common knowledge

Summary: sometimes, Jazz forgets that things that were common knowledge in Amity park may not be all that common elsewhere.

Warnings: Phantom Planet is canon

“This class will be focused on argumentative and persuasive essays. The first two weeks will be developing your argument to-“

Jazz doesn’t mean to zone out, but after a rather frantic festive season she’s sorely behind on sleep. Besides she had read the syllabus front to back multiple times since it had been released the other day.

Jazz doesn’t know quite how to feel about this ‘persuasive writing class’ yet, but it’s required for her degree, so at the very least she can suck it up and keep chugging.

At least her other classes look fun so far, and both Deja and Louis are in Psych 102 with her, so they can compare notes.

So far, one whole semester completed and Jazz is pretty confident she has college down. Yes it was hard being so far from Danny and her parents, and the family otherworldliness of Amity, but Jazz needed this change.

A glance at the clock on the lecture room wall jolts Jazz back into paying attention to what the professor is saying. How had she zoned out for almost fifteen minutes? She definitely needed to get some better sleep tonight. Which unfortunately meant she couldn’t finish reading the Psychology textbook they had all been given yesterday.

“- and now, for the remainder of class we are going to discuss some possible essay topics. Now normally I would ask that we limit it to one topic per student, both to avoid copping and to allow for a wide range of topics. However, given the, ah, unexpected event that happened earlier this year, I am going to allow for multiple people to write about the same overarching topic. I would however ask that we think of some unique sub-categories so we can explore most of this topic.”

Jazz sits there stumped for a second. What could have possibly happened in the last year that multiple people would want to talk about it to this extent? Maybe a new game came out? She’ll have to ask Danny, he’d always kept up to date on that kind of stuff.

Or maybe it’s a new study somewhere? She knows she read something fascinating about brain waves in response to-

“Ghosts aren’t real!” Someone shouts from the far side of the classroom, bringing an abrupt halt to the quiet murmuring that had previously engulfed the classroom.“this all has to be some kind of super secret spy-ops thing that got leaked-“

“-Ghosts are totally real!” Another classmate retorts, “When I was six I saw my grandma’s ghost on the day of her funeral-”

“No way! That would me hundreds of years of research are now-“

“All right! All right.” The room quiets at the Professor’s slightly raised voice. “I know you all know how to behave in a classroom, so let’s all settle down and treat this as a discussion and not a shouting match. Now, Deja, would you like to go first?”

“Yes, thank you Professor. Now as I was saying, it’s chemically impossible for ghosts to exist-“

Oh.

Oh.

Jazz had forgotten that most people hadn’t known ghosts were real.

Danny was going to laugh so hard when she told him about this. If she told him about this.

Maybe this time it could stay because just her and Bearbert.

[spooky-fm]

DP x DC fic: Delivery Ghost

This has been consuming my brain for weeks. Based on this post by @gummybearstastelikesadness:

Danny wakes up in the new world and, not feeling responsible for its villains (unlike the ghost attacks where he is the one who turned on the portal) decides to take a break and have a vacation. As a pizza delivery person, he brings orders to the recipients within the specified timeframe, no matter what. Certain citizens of this world are suspicious when the app lets them order to a town 2 hours away from the location ... and the delivery boy is there in under 10 minutes.

If only Danny cared about their feelings.

Part 1.

Waking up sore and confused in the middle of a random field with only vague memories of last night's events wasn't that weird for Danny Fenton. He had been Amity Park's resident hero for several years and had lived through much stranger awakenings. His list started with Vlad Plasmius's spooky basement inside a cloning tube and his parents' lab strapped to the vivisection table, and ended with places like the middle of nowhere in the Ghost Zone after an ecto-storm or a hundered-year-old abandoned maze of secret tunnels under the Masons' house after a particularly exciting date with Sam. Next to those, an ordinary-looking meadow was a welcome change. Despite that, something felt not quite right, but Danny couldn't quite focus on the feeling in his drowsy state.

Careful inspection of his body revealed that he had all of his limbs attached where they should be attached and functioning as normal. Aside from mild discomfort after lying on the cold ground for a significant amount of time he was perfectly healthy, despite splotches of dried ectoplasm and blood indicating recent injuries.

Deciding that he did not care enough to remember what those splotches were from just yet, Danny shrugged and continued his inspection. He looked around the field, trying to find any clues, tracks, or signs of civilization, and, failing to locate any, he transformed into his ghost form.

The transformation was enough of a jolt to wake him up from his morning sleepiness, forcing Danny to remember the fight with an unfamilliar ghost that appeared just as he finished fixing reindeer antlers to the top of the head of his freshly-made one-foot-tall snowman made from the first snow in the season. He had been so concerned with taking the fight away from his new porch guardian that he hadn't taken it seriously enough. Between exchanging blows and trying to find out the name of the intruder into his neighbourhood, he ended up too distracted to notice that they were not alone and got blasted with a dark-purple beam from behind.

As much as he would have liked to know more, the memory tastefully faded to black and refused to provide any further details.

'Never mind the why's and how's then,' - Danny thought, unconcerned. 'Time to consider the where's and the when's.'

Having thought that, he suddenly realised what had been bothering him from the moment he woke up. He was so busy taking stock of his physical state that he forgot to question the gentle warmth of the ground he had slept on and the decidedly non-December greenery around him.

Wide-eyed, Danny quickly flew up, searching for anything that could point him towards Amity or any other nearby town.

The vegetation did not seem too different from what he was used to, so he concluded that he probably wasn't anywhere Southern enough to be this warm in December. That suggested Clockwork shenanigans, which did not fill Danny with too much confidence.

He turned invisible, picked a random direction, and flew at a leisurely speed fully intending to enjoy the idyllic weather.

A couple of hours later, he finally came across a large enough town where he decided he would not be instantly noticed in the morning crowd. He easily found the local library and got permission to use a computer from the librarian that barely glanced at him in the dimly lit lobby. He made his way towards the two ancient computers ready to learn the local date and hopefully figure out how he ended up in this situation.

Danny wasn't truly surprised when the calendar showed a date a couple months in the past according to his personal timeline. He had spent enough time (ha!) with Clockwork to not be put off by a bit of minor time-travel. What surprised him, however, was his inability to find even a single mention of Amity Park on the internet.

Familiar forums, social media account of his friends, Amity news sources, even his personal blog that he posted blurry pictures of blob ghosts to were missing. Maps, both regular and satellite, showed a familiar but slightly different landscape where his home town should have been with a completely different name written over it.

Danny stared at the monitor with unfocused eyes. If he really had travelled in time, he would have been able to find some trace of Amity, or his friends. Searching for their names gave unhelpful results, and trying to look up ghosts and ghost attacks only led him down the rabbit hole of superheroes and something called 'The Justice League' that just gave him a headache. This led to the natural conclusion that instead of a minor instance of short time-travel he got tangled in a major instance of timeline-hopping.

He shuddered a little, remembering Dan. At least it seemed that Danny didn't exist at all in this timeline, in any shape. That turned out to be a slightly disturbing thought and Danny decided to ignore it with the practiced ease of someone who was used to rolling with the punches for the sake of his mental stability.

He wondered briefly when this world and his started to differ, but his limited knowledge of human history was not enough to give him much of a hint. He figured it was at least a couple hundred years in the past, but that was the extent of his detective abilities.

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

It was a relief to finally exit the stuffy library building and let the rays of sunshine fall on his face after several hours of researching the new world he found himself in. Despite failing to get any closer to the mystery of his appearance there, he didn't feel that upset at the change of scenery.

While walking leisurely along the tidy street, Danny contemplated the heroes and villains of this timeline. It seemed that the Justice League was the top dog when it came to the forces of good. He wasn't sure how to approach them without raising suspicion that a person suddenly coming into existence would certainly cause.

Suddenly, he was struck by a thought so alien to him that he stopped in his tracks and stared blankly ahead.

He didn't have to do anything!

There were no ghost attacks in the news, and thus probably no portal to the Ghost Zone. He hadn't opened a doorway between the Infinite Realms and Earth, and there was nobody who needed help that couldn't be given by any of the local heroes.

Danny realised that didn't feel any pressing need to protect this world. That little part of his core that was always anxious about Amity, about Sam and Tucker, and about the rest of the world was now blissfully quiet. Danny smiled at that, shaking his head and continuing his walk towards what seemed to be a small river.

He also began to notice the stares people around were directing at him and tried to get lost in the crowd - with little luck. It almost seemed that having drawn the attention of the locals, he was standing out as an obvious outsider.

He was starting to get annoyed at the constant attention, when he noticed his ragged sleeve and recalled that he was in fact still covered in suspiciously blood-looking greenish blots. He considered the fact that it was actually blood from his already-healed small scratches was irrelevant. 

Cursing quietly, Danny quickly turned into a shady-looking alleyway and made his escape from the public eye by going invisible.

He decided to continue on his course towards the riverside in this way, while mulling over the earlier revelation. The more he thought about it, the more he became convinced that it was a great idea to take a break and get some rest from ghostly affairs. And if he really wanted to go back, he could always find a way to open a portal into the Ghost Zone and find Clockwork. His sort-of mentor, sort-of father figure wouldn't mind helping him with a little nudge towards the right timeline, would he? Besides, the guy probably knew all about Danny's little jaunt across realities. Since there was no sign of him or his cryptic advice, it was entirely reasonable that he approved of the whole thing.

So it was decided: Danny Fenton was going on vacation.

He flipped in the air in excitement and started flying away from the town. Giggling a little at the fact that he still didn't know the name of the first town he visited in this timeline, he froze in place as something occured to him: He had no money, no possessions and didn't know where to go.

Despite not technically needing food or shelter as a ghost, he didn't want to spend his vacation hiding away under his invisibility. And what sort of vacation would it be if he had no money to spend on fun things like videogames and hot dogs?

He figured the solution was simple: He'll just have to find a job.

[rainybyday]

I want Batman to visit Amity Park. Whether it’s because of Vlad Masters or the supernatural energy there, as long as it’s not the Fenton’s I want him to visit

I want Bruce to go out during the night for his investigation only to see Danny sitting near the trees, lazy as he threw a ball for a glowing green dog over and over.

I want Bruce to stop, to hold, cease and just pause. Not because of the glowing dog that may or may not be a part of his investigation but because of how Danny looks to him.

He looks like the child he brought to the manor who experienced depression at an early age from the murder of his parents. He looks like his kind-hearted child who would look longing at certain times, longing when he still believed in the magic of his name. He looks like his daughter who was talented and strong but would hold the weight of the world if a life was taken under her protection. He looks like his tired son who would always take on the burden of working hard to gain the approval that he already has. He looks like his son who would stare out in space thinking of the parents that have yet to heal. He looks like his son who seems lost with the world around him at times because of how different he was raised from the rest.

He looks like a child that needs saving.

Despite how his children would tease him, how Alfred would probably drawl “another one sir?”, or how the dog was connected to his investigation in some way (that green glow was not natural) he did not leave.

Instead, he walked towards the boy, footsteps loud as to announce his presence.

That was the start of their nightly meetings. 

(I want a slow story of Batman meeting Danny. I don’t want Danny to be in trouble or be in danger in beginning or for Batman to suspect him in any way. I want a natural meeting of the two that slowly progress from there, from Danny seeking comfort from this man cloaked in shadows and Bruce slowly thinking of Danny as his. 

I want Bruce to be stressed out by the fact about the supernatural things that happen in Amity, how Master’s has a secret lab basement below his house, and the ghost that haunts Amity on a daily. I want him to feel the annoyance and massive headache it is to deal with the supernatural of all things, but the moment he sees Danny sitting in the shadows of the trees waiting for him all of his worries just, disappear. 

I want Danny to feel the weight of being the new Ghost King and the responsibilities that it holds. He would love the perk of fewer attacks from Amity but he still has to deal with the responsibilities of being a King, the adding factor of many of the ghosts he meets all seem to fear him like Pariah Dark, and how his parents were becoming more unbearable by the day. I need him to feel the weight of his identity catching up to him every day, but the moment the moon is up and he sees a man with a bat suit he can’t help but relax a little, his core letting out a happy hum.  

I want the two to become family on their own terms before everything goes to shit. 

I want a bond before the danger.

I don’t want a hero protecting a victim or a young hero looking for help. I want a single father and a struggling boy to find each other and meet halfway.)

[luxaofhesperides]

Post-Apocalypse + Soulmate AU ; requested by @burr-burr!

When Danny was a kid, he used to imagine how the world would end. It was never a zombie apocalypse or the fallout of a nuclear war, but the death of the sun, the expansion of their star in death that would swallow their planet whole, leaving no survivors.

It would have been nicer than the post-apocalyptic world he stands in now, knowing that it’s his fault the world has ended. 

He’s still struggling to wrap his head around it. To understand that all of this is his fault because he cheated on one test, desperate to pass after being unable to study for it with how exhausting and time consuming fighting ghosts is. Everywhere he looks, there’s more destruction. His own home is rubble, with only the partially untouched Ops Center remaining to let him know that this is where he once lived.

The rest of Amity Park is in worse shape. Buildings are hollowed out, the skeletons of their foundations visible, if they still remain standing. Most homes have been burned to the ground, leaving blackened corners of walls and nothing else. The roads are cracked and difficult to walk through, as if an earthquake tore through the city. Cars are scattered along the road, overturned or left abandoned, doors still open.

Danny has yet to find any bodies. He doesn’t know if that’s a good sign or not. 

He’s only caught a few glimpses of his future self, the cause of all this, and can’t bring himself to chase after that monster. He feels sick to his stomach knowing what he’ll become. 

That monster has to be stopped. The world has already ended, but that doesn’t mean his future self can be allowed to go on like this. If there are any survivors, they need protection. They need to know they’ll be safe to try to start rebuilding, and that can only happen if his future self is dead.

Danny knows what he has to do; he has a responsibility to protect what little remains of Amity Park, and to do that, he needs to kill himself. 

But his head it spinning from the horror of the situation and his throat is tightening up the way it only does when he’s about to have a panic attack.

He needs to stop his future self, but he also can’t stay another second in the ruins of Amity Park without destroying himself.

The guilt sits heavy in his chest as he goes ghost and takes to the sky, flying blindly towards the setting sun. Danny doesn’t know where he’s going, and he doesn’t really care. He just needs to get away for a bit, until he can calm down and put together a plan of attack so he can take out his future self in one go.

He just…

He never thought he’d be a monster. But here they are.

Flying away from Amity Park reveals the truly harrowing extent to which this world has suffered under his future self’s hands. There are no intact cities or towns. Roads are broken beyond repair, highways littered with empty cars, most bridges crumbling into the rivers below them, and everything is covered in overgrowth. All signs of humanity’s careful cultivation of the world has been erased. The earth takes back what humans took from it, covering everything in green. 

There is no movement. No people. Barely any birds flying beneath him. 

What remains of the world is silence.

Danny is terrified that there’s no one left. That his future self has so thoroughly destroyed the earth that no human survivors remain. 

That gives his guidance, some idea of where to go: a big city. Any big city, really. 

He flies lower, searching for some sort of landmark, or a sign that will tell him where he’s going. A rusted over green sign farther down the road tells him that he’s 50 miles from Gotham.

Oh, Danny thinks, Maybe Batman can help me.

If anyone could survive the end of the world, it would be the superheroes, right? If anyone stands a chance at defeating his future self, it would be a superhero. Superman might have been a better choice, but Metropolis is the opposite direction and multiple states away; Danny’s not sure he can make it before his future self catches wind of him and hunts him down. 

Danny has no doubt about what would happen to him if he’s caught; there’s a reason he hasn’t seen any ghosts around, after all.

Gotham is a city of secrets and rumors. What little he’s heard of it is baffling and, frankly, insane. There’s no city in the country like it and Gothamites prefer it that way, stubbornly loving the home that will kill them. For all the manmade horrors they survive on the daily, they would be more prepared for the end of the world than anyone else. 

Gotham may be another casualty of his future self’s destruction, but it also offers him hope.

Danny follows the broken road towards Gotham, pushing himself to fly faster than he ever has before. What should have been a half hour flight is completed in fifteen minutes. 

As soon as the towering buildings of Gotham, dark and semi destroyed, come into view, Danny drops from the sky and returns to human form. The strain from pushing himself has exhausted him and he feels it like an ache in his chest, his heart twisting and trying to burst from how hard it’s beating. 

He collapses to his hands and knees and gasps for breath on the outskirts of Gotham. 

It takes a good few minutes to calm down and breathe normally, then another to gather his strength to stand up and begin walking. 

The world is eerily quiet as he enters the city, feeling the chill fall upon him as he is consumed by the shadows of tall buildings. It’s much more intact that Amity Park, but there’s no denying the destruction that still surrounds him. Buildings are empty and worn down, decaying and slowly being consumed by new growth. Burnt out husks of overturned cars fill the street, leaving Danny to carefully pick his way around them, unable to walk in a straight line. 

He feels like the only person in the world. He feels like he’s being watched by a hungry eyes. 

Danny shivers and walks faster. 

The deeper he goes into the city, the more he starts to hope that he’s not alone in this world. There’s small signs of life: the smell of smoke, recently burned, certain streets cleaned up, makeshift walls constructed from rubble to block access to certain areas of each block.

He swears he can see people move above his head, but anytime he looks up, the windows of every building are empty. 

“Batman,” he whispers to himself, “I just need to find Batman.”

He turns a corner and continues walking. Apartment buildings give way to stores and businesses, all with their windows broken and nothing on the shelves. Then the buildings end abruptly and he’s left staring at an overgrown park that resembles a jungle more than it does a part of the city.

The scent of something sweet lingers in the air. Fruit, perhaps, or flowers. 

If he was left in the aftermath of an apocalypse, he would go to where he could find growing food. If there’s anyone left in Gotham, he’s willing to bet they’re in here, surviving off of what food can be grown in the confines of the park. 

Danny crosses the road and takes three steps onto the grass before someone appears beside him and points an electrified baton at him.

“Who are you?” they demand, eyes hidden behind a cracked helmet, but the bottom half of their face is visible, revealing scars crossing on dark skin. 

Danny takes a step back, eyeing the electric baton warily, and lifts his hands to show he means no harm. “Danny. I came from out of town. I was hoping to find people here.”

“You don’t look like you’ve been traveling.”

His clothes are clean and intact and he has none of the world-weariness that weighs down this Gothamite. Danny winces, and says, “My situation is kinda complicated. But I did just get here. I’m looking for help, actually. Do you know where I could find Batman?”

There’s a long moment of tense silence, then he hears a quiet sigh and the helmet comes off. An exhausted looking man looks at him with one blind eye, turned a milky white, and his voice is low and stricken as he says, “Batman’s dead. But maybe I can help you.”

“Batman’s dead?!” Danny repeats, shocked.

“Yeah. Sacrificed himself in one of the last times Phantom attacked Gotham. Got me and Nightwing out of that encounter alive. We’re really the only heroes left in Gotham, not that there’s much need anymore with everyone trying to survive.”

Phantom killed Batman. His future self killed Batman. 

Danny feels sick to his stomach.

“Oh,” he manages to say. 

The man’s expression softens. “Don’t worry, we’ll help you as much as we can. Why don’t you come on in? Ivy can get you some food if you’re hungry.”

Danny nods numbly as he follows the man deeper into the park. He walks with ease, taking paths that only become visible when he walks them, leaving Danny to follow close behind. It takes some time before he realizes that the plants are moving out of their way just enough that they don’t trip, and when he looks back, the path is covered again, hidden from sight.

He’s taken to the heart of the forest, where the trees shift to the side to reveal a large encampment of survivors all living together. Beds are strung up as hammocks between trees and rope ladders dangle from branches to help people move up and down. The ground is full of small fire pits, a few in use to make make food, and sections in the back full of vegetable and herb patches, separated by berry bushes. 

The people here all look tired and worn down, but they still smile and speak in light voices, adjusted to a new life after surviving so much horror and destruction. He even spots a few people using powers, or just looking different, including one large man who looks like a crocodile. 

“Pick up another stray?” a raspy voice asks, humor lighting the tone. They both turn to see a woman with long red hair and a green tint to her skin be lowered to the ground by a vine. She’s also heavily scarred and her right arm is completely gone, replaced by a wooden limb covered in moss that moves as if it’s always been a part of her body.

“Hey Ivy,” the man greets, “I don’t think this one is staying. He came to Gotham looking for Batman.”

The words make Ivy’s gaze sharpen, and Danny feels a trickle of dread go down his spine. She’s dangerous and standing before her feels as if he’s in the mouth of a hungry beast.

“Is that so,” she says, voice flat. “How interesting. I’ll let you two talk somewhere more private.” Her gaze flicks to the side, and when Danny turns to look, he can see some of the people in the encampment observing them warily, bodies tense and poised to either flee or attack.

Ivy turns and the plants part for her. Danny waits for the man to begin walking before he follows, trying not to feel trapped as the plants close the path behind him. She takes them to a small pond full of water lilies, gives the man a careful look, then leaves, swallowed up by the plants.

“Is everything okay?” Danny asks hesitantly. “I didn’t mean to cause any trouble.”

“Nah, you’re good,” the man replies, “It’s just that people don’t trust me much.”

“Why? You’ve been really nice.”

The man shrugs. “My soulmate is Phantom. He’s the one responsible for doing all this and killing almost everyone we love. I didn’t know until the first time I fought him, but they hate anything to do with Phantom, including me.”

Danny’s heart stutters in his chest. This is his soulmate.

Most people don’t subscribe to the belief that they’re meant to be with their soulmate. Meeting your soulmate is rare enough that most people don’t try, and plenty of people have spoken of how important it is to have a variety of relationships, to not close yourself off for the slightest chance of meeting your soulmate. 

Danny never looked for his; he didn’t want to subject them to his parents, and then he became a halfa and gave up on all dreams of having a normal life or any relationship with someone who didn’t know he was Phantom.

And now he’s here, in a ruined future, standing before his soulmate who understandably hates him for destroying the world. 

“You’re Phantom’s soulmate,” Danny breathes. His hands are shaking. He wants to cry.

The man sighs. “Yeah. I am. Not that it’s stopped him from trying to kill me. Don’t worry, kid, I’m not working with him. I swear.”

“He’s your soulmate and he hurt you.”

“He hurt everyone,” he says, then gestures at his blind eye. “This is barely a thing compared to what he did to other heroes.”

Danny can’t find the words to expression his horror at seeing the damage he did to his own soulmate. His future self is heartless and cruel and bloodthirsty. He has to be stopped.

He doesn’t want to kill his soulmate. 

“I came here for Batman,” Danny says, “Because I thought he could help me stop Phantom.”

“That’s rough, kid. Batman couldn’t beat Phantom. I don’t think anyone can. We’ve tried, but most heroes are dead and we can’t just go out there and risk the lives of everyone here. We gotta focus on survival, not revenge.”

“I have to stop Phantom.”

“Sorry kid, but that’s a terrible idea. Don’t go out there trying to be a hero. You can stay here, alright? Ivy will get you set up and the others will help you settle in.”

Danny takes a step back and shakes his head. “No. I have to stop him. It has to be me.”

“And why is that?”

“Because I’m Phantom,” Danny whispers. 

The man immediately reaches for his electric batons again, taking a step back. “Not funny, kid,” he says with a tense voice. 

“I’m not joking. I am Phantom, just from the past. I’m not supposed to be here.”

“You’re Phantom?” the man repeats. “You. You’re just a kid, and you’re going to destroy the world one day?”

“I don’t want this to happen! That’s why I need to go back, so I can stop the event that will set me down this path. And to go back, I need to defeat the Phantom that exists here.”

“He’ll kill you, kid.”

“That still solves the problem, doesn’t it? If I die here, then he’ll never live long enough to destroy the world. He’ll die too.”

The man stares at him with cold eyes, then turns away, dropping his hands away from the batons. “Don’t turn this into a suicide mission, kid,” he says. “The Phantom who’s here isn’t you. You don’t have to pay for his crimes. Just… stay here and I’ll go fight Phantom.”

“He already hurt you,” Danny says. 

“What’s a little more hurt? I can handle it.”

“No,” Danny says firmly. He shoves away the fear and hurt in his heart and finds his strength in determination. No more running away. No more hiding. 

The timeline should not exist. He can’t hesitate at the thought of erasing this version of his soulmate from existence; he’s tired and injured and an outcast in the only community that still exists in Gotham. He deserves better. Everyone here does.

And to give them a better life, Danny needs to stop this one from ever happening.

“This is my future. It’s my responsibility. I’ll stop it and make sure this never happens. And… I’m sorry for everything I did.”

“It’s not your fault, Danny. You’re not this version of Phantom.”

That’s not at all true, since Danny’s actions lead to the end of the world, but he’s not going to argue when he’s preparing to fight a stronger, more ruthless version of himself. He takes a deep breath, then goes ghost and floats into the air. 

“Before I go,” he begins, hesitantly, “What’s your name? Since you’re apparently my soulmate.”

The man smiles sadly and answers, “Duke. If we ever meet in your time, tell that version of me to look for my mom’s favorite book.”

It’s an odd request, but if it’s important enough to be asked for, then Danny will do it. “Your mom’s favorite book,” he repeats, “Got it.”

“Take care, Danny. Good luck out there.”

Danny nods and takes one last look at his soulmate, older and worn down, stubbornly getting through each long day, and swears to make things better.

Then he flies off, ready to fight his future self and make things right again. 

. . .

He thinks of his soulmate for years after he’s back in the present. The timeline where his future self exists is gone and the world is safe, but he still remembers the pain he caused Duke. 

When the time comes to apply to universities, Danny sets his sights on Gotham. His parents take him on a trip during spring break to tour the campus, and it’s after the tour, as he wanders around on his own, that he bumps into a student walking out of a building.

“Sorry,” they both say at the same time, reaching for each other to help each other keep their balance. 

As soon as their hands meet, it’s as if lightning runs through him. From the look on the other guy’s face, he felt it to. 

This is his soulmate.

“Duke,” Danny says, amazed and disbelieving all at once. And the request crosses his mind, something he wondered about almost every night since he returned to his time. “Look for your mom’s favorite book.”

“How—?”

“I met you in the future. You asked me to take back a message for the you that’s here. So: look for your mom’s favorite book. What does that mean, by the way? I never asked.”

Duke blinks, then slowly retracts his hands from Danny’s. “My mom’s favorite book was a hand bound journal from my dad. They were soulmates and he wrote about their first year in a relationship together. It’s full of pictures, and she loved it more than anything. That message is to remind me to have faith in soulmates, to believe that something good can happen to me.”

“Oh! That’s… wow, sorry, I didn’t mean to pry into something so personal.”

Duke shrugs. “It’s fine. I needed the reminder. I would have already run away by now if you didn’t say that. You already know my name, but I think now’s a good time to introduce ourselves.”

“Right!” Danny says, flustered. He sticks his hand out, which Duke shakes with an amused smile. “I’m Danny. Fenton. I’m coming here next semester.”

“Duke Thomas. I’m a freshman here and I’d really love to get your number.”

He’s not hitting on Danny, not really, but it still makes him blush. The way Duke looks at him is full of light and laughter, so different from the exhausted and wary way he looked in the future now rewritten. 

This is what the future version of himself tried to kill. He doesn’t understand how anyone could ever hurt Duke when he’s so full of life. 

But he’s safe now. Everyone is; Danny changed the future and what lies ahead is wholly unknown to him.

The world is safe and full of promise. 

No matter what comes, Danny is sure he and Duke are going to be just fine.

[samgirl98]

Wail of the Silent 2/?

Prev | Next

TW: this chapter mentions suicide and thoughts of self-harm. Proceed with caution. Do not read if this triggers you

Danny Fenton, aka Phantom, flew over the smog-ridden city. It was cloudy, the sky threatening to release rain. He couldn’t see the stars.

(Not that it was possible to see them in the crime-ridden city.)

He had finally reached Gotham City.

“Of all the places Spectra could’ve run off to, it just had to be Gotham.”

Of course, considering all the city's misery, it made sense that Penelope Spectra would find her way there.

“Now I have to dodge the stupid Bats while looking for her.”

Still, as much as he grumbled, he was responsible for protecting people from ghosts. Ever since he told his parents the truth two years ago, they more or less accepted him (even while they kicked him out of the house.), and he had had more time to capture ghosts.

They gave him gadgets and access to the portal (as long as they supervised.) and paid for his apartment while giving him some money. And, bonus, they no longer shot at him and didn’t want to dissect him.

(Did they love him, though? They had kicked him out of his only home when he was eighteen…)

Thankfully, Danny had been able to make his patented inventions that focused on protection from ghosts instead of offensive weapons, so he was getting some income from that. After all, the people of Amity Park would rather have something that protected them than fight ghosts.

He had been able to graduate high school, but he couldn’t go to college. Jazz was encouraging him to take some courses in community college. She argued that since his parents were helping with capturing ghosts (and releasing them instead of experimenting on them.), he should at least think about doing more than ghost hunting.

He couldn’t. Danny had a responsibility to Amity Park. Besides, he had powers; he couldn’t not use them to protect his town. It was his fault the ghosts were coming through in the first place.

 If I hadn’t opened the portal…if I hadn’t been a stupid teenager…

The portal was mainly closed now, but natural portals spawned almost weekly in Amity Park, allowing any ghost to get through. This time, Spectra had come through again. She had caused havoc in Amity Park. Three had died, two by their own hands by the time he had figured out that Spectra had had a hand in it. When she figured out Danny was after her, Spectra fled Amity Park.

So, he followed her.

At the moment, he had left Amity Park in the hands of the Red Huntress and his little more capable parents. Spectra was not a ghost that should be allowed in the mortal plane. He’s seen what happens when she feeds on someone too long.

(He could still see the shadow of a hanging body…)

Danny made it invisibly to the top of the tallest building he could find. Wayne Tower was in the middle of an island Danny had found out was called Old Gotham. (Thank you, Google Maps.) He could see the city sprawl in front of him. Danny decided to remain invisible in case any Bats were around. He knew he wasn’t a meta (he was dead, it was a medical condition), but he was sure Batman wouldn’t see it that way.

Looking at the city before him, Danny had no idea where to start. There were so many angry shades and ghosts hanging around that he couldn’t pinpoint Spectra’s unique ectosignature with the Ecto-finder he had with him. And Danny’s ghost sense was useless as it kept going off every other street.

Danny sighed. He decided to go in a random direction when he heard it—no, he felt it.

A ghost was wailing in pain. It was broadcasting its agony and torment to every ghost, shade, and Danny. The wail turned into a roar before suddenly cutting off. The silence that followed left Danny feeling disoriented.

Danny went in the direction that the ghost had projected its pain. He had to help. No one should have to deal with that suffering alone. Besides, if he could feel it, Danny knew Spectra would pinpoint the misery still coating the air.

Danny flew into the night, determined to help.

____

Jason got up, knowing he couldn’t sleep any longer that night.

His shoulders curved inward from the heavy feeling he felt on his back.

(Spectra smiled as her shadowy hands held onto Jason’s shoulders.)

He started making a cup of tea when his feelings reached a crescendo. The cup Jason was holding on to hit the floor and broke. Jason stared at the shattered pieces and felt the sudden urge to use one to stop the crawling under his skin.

(Spectra amplified the need to hurt himself. She smiled as the boy’s emotions fed her powers.)

It was only Jason’s stubbornness that stopped him from doing it. He ignored the broken pieces of glass and sat on the couch. Silent tears left tracks on his cheeks. He wanted his dad, his family—anyone to stop what he was feeling.

He felt he was going insane!

(Spectra smiled and inwardly hoped the boy would last longer than her other victims. His misery made her youthful quicker than any other victim, and more powerful.)

Just as Jason felt his mind was going to break, the feelings went away suddenly, leaving Jason panting hard.

(Spectra felt when Phantom got close and left.)

Jason pulled his hair, wanting, needing the physical pain to ground him to the present.

What was happening to him?

(Spectra smiled as she stared at her reflection at a random window. Her skin was glowing, and her face was free of wrinkles. Spectra’s hair was shining and luxurious. Yes, she hoped the boy would last a while.  

Her smile grew as the ghost boy flew overhead, completely missing her.)

____

Though the city of Gotham seemed like a cruel, cold mistress, she cared for her people in her way.

Every vile villain, hero, anti-hero, and citizen was welcomed into her dark and shadowy bosom. The shades and ghosts who had lived and died in her dark alleys and streets knew their mistress would take care of them.

So, when a new ghost showed up and started targeting one of her knights (not just any knight but the one who had been born in her old buildings, the one who had been raised and shaped in her streets. The one she could not save as he had died so far from her soil.), she felt a visceral anger deep in her being.

How dare this spirit come and target her favored knight? She would not let the ghost get away from it. Lady Gotham let her consciousness spread throughout the city, trying, needing to find a way to help…There! A young half-ghost, looking, searching, wanting to help.

She guided the young ghost to her knight—the one who had suffered at the hands of the Joker and his father. (Even now, she doesn’t protect Bruce Wayne as much as she used to, only if it was necessary. The shadows of the city no longer covered him as tightly as they used to.)

She would do whatever she could to help Jason Todd.

The last part was a surprise to me. I hadn't intended to make Gotham a sentient city, but she decided to come screaming out in full force. Yes, Lady Gotham is holding a grudge against Bruce for hurting Jason.

[greentrickster]

(walks up to the microphone and leans in): Okay, so, I’ve seen a lot of Ghost King Danny (which, let’s be fair, is a fun concept, I totally get it), but I’ll see you that and raise you this: Fright Knight Vlad. The current Fright Knight himself is the Spirit of Halloween, but what if it’s like how, while Pariah Dark was the Ghost King, certain circumstances being met can make someone else the Ghost King. And this applies to members of the Ghost King’s court as well, including the Fright Knight.

And let’s say that the Fright Knight, the Ghost King’s right-hand spook, isn’t a battle-based position, but one based on what the current Ghost King most needs from a right-hand spook upon their ascension to the throne. Pariah Dark was a conqueror, so his Fright Knight was a powerful ghost skilled in battle, the Spirit of Halloween. But Danny’s not a conqueror, he doesn’t even typically seek out fights unless there’s a reason he has to. What he’d likely need most is someone who’s really good at politics, has the respect/fear of a decent amount of the Ghost Zone, and who could maybe give him some pointers on how to go about all this. Maybe teach him how to handle his powers better or something while they’re at it.

Which leads to Vlad waking up one morning and the Fright Knight’s sword (the Soul Shredder) is just… hovering over him. He doesn’t know why, his research into ghosts tends to be in regards to ways to gain power, not culture and traditions. Not to mention, he has no idea that Danny finally cracked and accepted his status as Ghost King the night before. He’s got no way (that he’s actually bothered to look at) of knowing that taking the sword is a binding agreement to accept the position and a declaration of fealty to the new monarch until such a time as he’s released from this oath.

Cue the Ghost Zone getting to watch in a combination of amusement and deep concern as their new king and what’s supposed to be his staunchest ally proceed to try and beat the stuffing out of each other in a swathe of chaos spanning Amity Park, Wisconsin, and a good chunk of the Ghost Zone. This is an unprecedented occurrence, no one’s ever accepted the position of Fright Knight without at least a vague idea of what they’re doing, and it’s certainly never been someone who’s enemies with the new monarch. The Fright Knight physically can’t try and overthrow the King, it’s part of the binding agreement accepting the sword entails, so no one who’s planning to attempt just that has ever been dumb enough to try it. Especially because it’s a job you’re stuck with either until there’s a new monarch, or the current monarch’s needs change so drastically that you’re no longer qualified for the job.

Congratulations, Vlad, you’re going to go down in history for this one.

Also, just worth noting, I do not see this going in a shippy way or anything like that. This would be a set-up for enemies-to-friends, with maybe a culmination of some good Badger Cereal (ie, platonic Danny and Vlad bonding, friendship/mentory stuff, maybe some found family if you’re feeling wild). No mental compulsions or anything going on with Vlad for this, either, it’s more along the lines of getting whacked with the Spector Deflector if he tries to use his new position against his king, and possibly it forces him to pull his punches somewhat if he gets into a physical brawl with Danny unless Danny specifically tells him to go all-out. I dunno, I don’t have all the details, I just think it would be funny as heck for Vlad to get himself stuck in a position like this and also that he’d look good in armor.

Also also, I’m a sucker for forced bonding leading to friendships and found family and stuff. And enemies-to-friends. And Badger Cereal and mentor!Vlad and Vlad being forced to be a responsible adult and domestication arcs for villains. And Vlad gaining the power he wants but in a way with all these strings attached and also he’s not actually in charge. I want this horrible man looking fine as hell as he’s dragged kicking and screaming into becoming a better person.

Oh wait, no! It’s not so much a physical compulsion or shock collar or anything like that that’s keeping Vlad in line, it’s learning that, while the Fright Knight technically could betray the Ghost King, it’s one of those actions that generally gets you hunted down by the majority of the Ghost Zone unless they really hate the monarch you’re betraying. And the denizens of the Ghost Zone may not be the biggest fans of Danny, but they like him so, so much better than Pariah Dark, and the twerp’s somehow got Clockwork backing him, so it’s probably worth keeping him around for a bit, at least for a century or two, see how things work out. So Vlad’s landed himself in a position that he can’t relinquish, it can only be taken from him in a few certain circumstances, and if he tries to overthrow or betray Danny, it’s good odds the majority of the Ghost Zone will unify to hunt him down.

Getting strong-armed into being Danny’s staunch ally on pain of ectoplasmic retribution was not how he saw this Thursday going, but b’golly if it hasn’t happened anyway. Maybe- maybe he’ll just call off work today, go grab a bottle of wine to drink while cuddling Maddie-the-Cat, staring into the distance, and asking what he, an angel, ever did to deserve this.

[clockwayswrites]

Like Betta Fish Do - Part 10

Masterpost of ao3 link and all parts. wc: 3324

“Baby Pop!” Ember cried as she swooped Danny up into a crushing hug.

Right then, he was really glad that he didn’t have to breath in his ghost form. Not even five minutes in the zone and he was already being crushed to re-death. He managed to get a hand up to pat awkwardly at her arm. “Heya Ember… everything okay?”

“Is everything okay?! Is every— what are you asking me that for?” Ember wailed. She held Danny out suddenly at arm’s length and shook him around a little.

Danny gripped her arms to stop the shaking. “Seriously confused here, Ember.”

“Pandora talked to us—” 

Oh no.

“—and told how you didn’t know we where just having fun! Danny, Baby Pop, little melody, we didn’t know, I swear!”

“Ember—”

“If we had, okay, like yeah I want my music to be heard and shit!”

“Ember!”

“But not if it hurt you. You have to believe that.”

Danny smacked his hand over Ember’s mouth to keep her from interrupting him again. She huffed at him with a glare but didn’t try to move away.

“Ember,” Danny said, trying his best to muster up a reassuring smile for her. “Pandora explained. I know it was just a big misunderstanding.”

Ember pulled Danny’s hand away from her mouth, gripping it tightly. “Just because it was a ‘big misunderstanding’ doesn’t mean it was okay, Baby Pop. We hurt you. It doesn’t make it right just cause we didn’t know.”

“I— okay, no, maybe not entirely? But also I could have talked to someone, like one of the Ancients, before this. Jazz is always reminding me communication takes both parties, so some of it’s on me too.” From the way her face scrunched up, Danny wasn’t sure Ember believed him. “Look, after I move I’m going to get some of you together and we’ll plan a brawling schedule or something, alright? I think it will be nice to have a way to blow off stress from college.”

“You’re moving? Away from Amity Park?”

“Yep. And I’m shutting down the portal there. Amity Park is going to be off limits. I can’t keep you all safe from the hunters anymore. Can you help spread the word to the usual suspects about that? That would help me out a lot.”

“Can do Baby Pop! You can count on me,” Ember said, flying up with a twirl. Danny waved to her as she sped off, glad that the encounter at least ended on a good note.

He really wasn’t looking forward to having that conversations with any of the other ghosts, but he had the unfortunate feeling it would happen again and again and again. Well, he might as well get it over with Technus first. Danny wanted the other ghost’s advice to make sure that the portal would be well and good destroyed. Between Technus, Tucker, and his own skills, he’d make sure that the Fentons could never get into the Infinite Realms again.

And then he could finally move on.

Not in that way. Just, like, to college.

-

The explosion of the portal shook half the city. Car alarms screamed, windows shattered, the ops center tilted perilously on top of the half collapsed wall.

Amity Park was the safest it had been in nearly eight years.

-

Danny had debated moving like a normal human. He really had. He’d sat down and planned everything out from the trip route to the van to cost. He could do it; he was pretty sure. A small moving truck wasn’t any bigger than the Fenton Tactical Response Vehicle. Also, he didn’t need as much sleep as a normal human so could make the trip pretty quickly.

He almost did it just for the chance of doing something normal for once— to have the real college experience.

And then he thought about having to sit still in one seat for that long and immediately abandoned the idea pretty quickly.

Instead, he opened a portal from his apartment in Amity Park to the Infinite Realms and chucked all of his (mostly) boxed stuff into the zone. He technically had a whole castle, what did it matter if he had his junk in it for a few hours? Then he flew to Gotham, wanting to make sure to get the portal precisely where he needed it, and ripped open a new portal.

Sure, he had to stop Boxy a few times from taking off with a box, but otherwise the plan went pretty well.

Just now he was standing in his new, cramped studio apartment surrounded by boxes and furniture and maybe not quite enough room to move and arrange it all. He possibly should have taken a little more time moving in. His new place was tiny. He didn’t think it was possible, but he was already missing his Amity apartment a little. At least that place had more than one room.

But as tiny as this shoe box was, it was all his. He couldn’t imagine having to live with other people any more— not normal people at least. He would have had to hide his ghostly side constantly and he knows he would just mess up and out himself. That wasn’t the sort of attention he needed.

He was really, really trying to have a normal college experience here.

Speaking of…

Danny climbed over a pile of boxes to find his backpack. He’d tried to stick all the most important things (and a change of underwear) in there so it was all in one place. Now he just had to find the damn thing…

Aha! There it was. He leaned over a box, legs flailing to keep his balance, as he grabbed the patched covered purple bag. One of these days the strap was going to give out so badly that there was no saving it. Maybe it was time to get a new backpack. Maybe even before classes started…

Danny twisted around to sit on the box that he had been crawling over and fished around in the front pocket of the backpack to pull out his ear buds. He flicked open the app on his phone and and started a voice call. He was so glad he listened to Tucker and had set up the internet before he moved in.

A few minutes into trying to figure out the Tetris like puzzle of rearranging his space, he heard the ding of someone joining the channel.

“Are you in Gotham? Did you get moved in?”

Danny grinned and rolled his eyes. “Yes, mom.”

“Don’t you dare call me that Daniel John Nightingale.”

“You’re the one who’s full naming me, Sam,” Danny pointed out.

“Would you rather me call you Invis-o-bill?”

“I hate you.”

“No you don’t,” Sam said, completely unbothered by his words. “So how’s the new place.”

“Like a closet. If I trip in the kitchen I’m going to land in the bed.”

Sam snorted. “I doubt it’s that bad.”

“Maybe not, but let’s just say I’m glad I didn’t have money when I left ho— the house to get a bigger bed. I seriously don’t think I could fit anything bigger than a twin in here and still have room for my couch.”

“It’s your couch just a love seat?”

“Exactly my point Sam, this place is tiny.” Fuck it, time to approach this place like an engineer. He snagged the notebook he kept in his backpack, flipped it open to a blank enough page, and sketched out the floor plan.

“Okay, I get it, Princess,” she teased. “But aside from tiny, how is it?”

“Pretty basic but it looks clean and, I don’t know, well kept? I think a lot of people in the building are students too since we’re sorta close to campus and stuff.”

“Are you close enough to walk?”

“I think so, at least when it’s not too cold. But I’m close to a subway and it’s only two stops so once I get used to riding the subways, that will be nice,” Danny said, unable to hide the nerves in his voice.

“Don’t worry about it, you’ll be used to the city in no time,” Sam assured him breezily. “Just get your pass and set it to auto refill. Make sure to check if you get a discount for being a student.”

Danny smiled, just a little somberly. Sam was so much further ahead of him in all these life experiences. He shook his head as if that could shake the thought free with it. He was here now. “Thanks for the advice, I’ll do that. I’ve got a few weeks before classes start to handle all that shit.”

“It will go quicker than you think.”

“Don’t make me ‘mom’ you again,” Danny threatened with a laugh.

A loud knock cut off whatever ever Sam was going to say (probably telling him to fuck off).

“What was that?” She asked instead.

“I think someone is at my door?” Danny scrambled over boxes to make it to the door, which he basically tripped into. That last box he stepped on might of not been as solid as he thought.

“Don’t break yourself, fish.” A muffled voice called from the other side.

“Jason?”

“Who’s Jason?” Sam asked. Suspiciously. Fuck.

Danny fumbled with the locks before yanking his door open. It banged into a tower of boxes with a crunching noise that makes made Danny wince. He rubbed at the back of his neck as he looked up at his smirking guest.

“Jason, hi. I— um, one moment?” Danny asked, pointing towards his ears and the (on brand) bright green and black ear buds that were in them. He turned his back slightly to Jason as if that provided any privacy. “I’ll talk to you later, okay Sam?”

“Who’s Jason?”

“Bye Sam!”

“Danny! You better call me ba—”

Danny hung up on her with no regret and a bashful smile towards Jason. He had to mute the app a moment later as messages pinged in. “Hi, hey, what are you doing here?”

“Moving day always sucks, so I thought I would bring you some food.” Jason held up the bag of deliciousness.

Danny had forgotten he’d even told Jason about what day he was moving in the sporadic back and forth texting, but his stomach rumbled gratefully. “Dude, you saved my half-life. I spent so much energy portaling today.”

“Is that how you trapped yourself in your own apartment? Did you forget about this thing called doors?”

Yeah, Jason was far too smug at this.

“Look, it’s fine! I just have to—” Danny pushed against the door. It smacked into the pile of boxes again. “—shift a few things—” He pushed harder, his socked feet slipping on the linoleum. “—and then—” the cardboard finally gave and the whole tower crumpled slightly. “—see!”

Jason snorted and squeezed through the open door. His bulk barely fit and once he was inside, it left him standing pressed against Danny in the narrow space.

Danny felt himself blushing red as he tried really, really hard to pull his eyes up from the broad chest to Jason’s smirking face. Nope, that wasn’t any better. Those wonderfully quirked lips were way too close. He really needed to stop thinking things like that.

“So what’s your grand plan now?” Jason asked, looking around their box prison.

“That’s, um—” Fuck, even the guy’s neck was hot. It was like a damn tree trunk. Was that weird to think? That was probably weird. “—I’ve just been playing mountain goat and climbing over it? I have a clear spot over there.”

“Alright then Capircorn, lead on.”

“What?”

“Capricorn? The horoscope sign and mythological animal? It’s a like a mermaid but with goat top half. Since you’re a fish goat.”

Danny snorted, once, before he just dissolved into a fit laughter. It was maybe more a sign of how long Danny had been stressing over everything than how funny the joke was, but it still left him leaning against Jason as his peels of laughter died out.

Damn did Danny want to just stay right there though. Jason’s chest was really way too comfortable to have his face pressed into. The large hand spread over his lower back to help him keep his balance was grounding. It made his core want to curl up happily like a content cat.

He really had been alone for too long, hadn’t he?

Danny made himself pull away and start scaling the box. “Follow the goat fish’s lead then.”

“Hey, I think I said fish goat,” Jason said, handing over the bag of takeout once Danny had crossed the proverbial mountain.

“Okay, but if the top half is goat, goat should totally come first.”

“No, the fish tail is the weird part. You’re just looking at it going ‘this is normal’ and then you get to the fish half and realize it’s fucked up,” Jason said as he eyed the pile of boxes and then vaulted over them like it was nothing. He straightened up from his landing to smirk down at Danny again (and man could Danny get used to that). “So the defining feature is fish and hence fish comes first.”

“Ancients, why am I arguing with an English nerd about words?” Danny said, making himself step back even as his core screamed at him to do the opposite. He set the food down and dug around in one of the nearby boxes (he had labeled this one, go him) for a blanket to spread out on the floor. “And I totally know what Capricorn is. It’s a constellation, after all.”

“Oh my god. You’re a space nerd,” Jason said, gleefully.

Danny flicked him off over his shoulder.

It only took a little bit of digging before Danny found a blanket and soon they were seated on the small bit of open floor with the take out containers spread out between them. One of Jason’s long legs was stretched out all the way across the space. Danny was trying to ignore how where his thigh pressed against Jason’s leg felt so warm.

Jason, unconcerned, munched on a spring roll thoughtfully. “How did I surprise you anyways?”

Danny swallowed his mouthful of honey chicken before answering so not to be disgusting. “What do you mean?”

“Just whenever you’re anywhere near my place I get the whole someone walked on my grave feel,” Jason said with a little wave of his chopsticks. “So how did I show up at your door without you noticing?”

“Oh, well, this isn’t my haunt? At least not yet? I don’t know if it will become mine. This sorta thing is all really unusual, changing haunts, but you know, halfa and all.”

Danny deflated a little at the utterly done expression that Jason was giving him.

“That explained nothing. What’s a haunt? I assume you mean like a haunting?”

“Oh! Oh, yeah, sorry. I guess that would be confusing.” Danny rubbed at the back of his neck. “Okay, so the area where you live, Park Row—”

“Crime Alley.”

“Pardon?”

“Crime Alley,” Jason repeated. “Only the rich assholes call it Park Row.”

“Right, gotcha, sorry, all of Crime Alley is basically your haunt. Think of a haunt as your territory. It’s an area you protect or control, depending on your vibes as a ghost. For you, I’d say it’s definitely protection.”

“So I can feel you when you’re around because you’re, what, basically trespassing?”

“Yep. So, like, ghosts that are ‘yours’ in some way can exist in your haunt without much of any notice. Take, like, Frostbite. He’s the chief of the Yetis—”

‘Yetis?’ Jason mouthed silently but didn’t interrupt.

“— so most of the other Yeti’s live in what’s his haunt, but their presence doesn’t bother him any because they’re his tribe. He gets a bit of a sense of them being there, but he explains it as basically just a really faint feeling unless anything goes wrong. Families work the same way. Friend’s or allies never go away completely but it mellows.”

“So not getting that scream of static and chills anymore when you show up…?”

“Totally means you don’t want to disembowel me,” Danny joked before he sombered. “But shit, that sounds overwhelming. I didn’t know it was so bad for you. We’re going to be more sensitive to each other because we’re both halfas. Like, once your core develops other ghosts will sense you too and you’ll sense them, but right now you just feel like a minor shade to them and I guess my presence covered up anything you might have felt of the other ghosts. You said it’s better now?”

Jason stuck his chopsticks in the takeout box and leaned back against the pile of boxes behind him. “Yeah. The first time it happened it almost knocked me out. There was just this overwhelming level of static. I crushed a glass in my hand and I didn’t even notice. All I knew is I needed to get home.”

“To protect your haunt,” Danny said with a grimace. “Shit, I’m sorry. If I had noticed in time I would have stayed out. I was chasing this pain in the ass ghost and then suddenly I was in your haunt which was, well, not great?”

“Because you were trespassing?”

“Yep. And because your haunt felt… there was a lot of rage there.”

“The haunt feels like things?” Jason asked with a scowl.

Danny gave a little nod. “It’s based on both the area and the ghost. So you know, Crime Alley plus Pit rage…”

Jason looked away, glaring at the ground. “Which explains the ‘please don’t disembowel me’ message.”

“It seemed better safe than sorry,” Danny said, quietly.

“Is it horrible for you? Being in my haunt?”

Danny glanced up to meet worried, ice blue eyes. “No. It’s fine, really Jason. We’re getting used to each other, right? I’m not as bad on you when I go into your haunt and your haunt isn’t as pressing on me. Besides, the center of your haunt was always just… well, a little sad? Aching?”

“Right, sure, aching,” Jason said, snatching back up the box of take out to stab at it with the chopsticks.

Danny fiddled awkwardly with his own, not knowing what to say.

“So, well,” Jason started eventually, clearing his throat. “Why won’t this become your haunt?”

“I don’t know if I’ll get attached enough. Or if it will end up being the college campus or something else or maybe even nothing. Ghosts don’t really change their haunts unless something traumatic happens, and a trauma of that level they might not survive. But because we’re halfa’s and still living life and changing, it’s not as big of a deal for us.

“At least that’s what Frostbite thinks. Honestly we’re not really sure how exactly this will all work out for me. But I was already… detaching from my old haunt after my friends and sister left so might as well try, you know?”

That didn’t exactly seem to have the reassuring effect he wanted. Jason was gripping the takeout box a little too tightly. “But it won’t hurt you?”

“Frostbite is keeping a close eye on me, I promise. I’m going back for so many doctor visits right now. Which, by the way, when you’re healthy enough to travel between realms you will be too. But for right now I’m being looked after and I’ll do what I can to make Gotham my home and settle in. The sooner I do the sooner we’ll know more.”

Jason took a deep breath, shoulders losing some of their tension, and nodded. “Well, you better finish eating so we can get this place livable then. I’m not sure if the fish goat life is sustainable.”

“Goat fish.”

“Fish goat.”

Jason ducked with a laugh as Danny chucked a spring roll at him.

Yeah, maybe this place could at least be a home.

-----

AN: AH! I found an easier way to get this from Scrivener to share with all of you. Sweet. Chapter 4 rewrite is ready to go up on ao3 on schedule too~

The first part of this chapter really fought me (I started a whole new fic to avoid it lol) but parsing it down to just having Ember there really helped. I’m not sure if we’ll see Danny talk with the other ghosts much, that’s not really the focus of this fic, but I’m sure one or two will find a way to show back up. In the second half my poor ace self struggled with Danny’s “oh no he’s still hot” POV but hopefully it came out well! This may be a rougher chapter though (wee endless migraine) but that’s what the rewrite is for! (Seriously, for a better version of this fic visit ao3 lol link in pinned post.)

My darlings, my dears, the tag list may be supremely broken. I’m going to try to reset it here, but I make no promises. I’m sorry if it doesn’t tag you! No matter what though, stay delightful!

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