#and nobody calls them out on it

[confessedlyfannish]

Writing Prompt #12

Bruce is reading the paper when the pour of Tim's coffee goes abruptly quiet. It would be hard to pinpoint why this is disturbing if it wasn't for the way the soft, tinny sound the vent system in the manor makes cuts out for the first time since being updated in the 90s. The pour, Bruce realizes, has not slowed to a trickle before stopping. It has simply stopped. And there is no overeager clack of a the mug against the marble counter or the uncouth first slurp (nor muttered apology at Alfred's scolding look) immediately following the end of the pour.

Bruce fights the instinct to use all of his senses to investigate, and instead keeps his eyes on the byline of the article detailing the latest set of microearthquakes to hit the midwest in the last week. Microearthquakes aren't an unusual occurrence and aren't noticeable by human standards, which is why this article is regulated to page seven, but from several hundred a day worldwide to several hundred a day solely in the East North Central States, seismologists are baffled.

Bruce had been considering sending Superman to investigate under the guise of a Daily Planet article requested by Bruce Wayne (Wayne Industries does have an offshoot factory in the area) when everything had stopped twenty seconds ago. That is what he assumes has happened (having not moved a muscle to confirm) in the amount of time he assumes has passed. His million dollar Rolex does not quite audibly tick but in the absolute silence it should be heard, which confirms the silence to be exactly that—absolute.

While Bruce can hold his breath with the best of the Olympian swimmers, he has never accounted for a need to remain without blinking without being able to move one's eyes. Rotating the eyeballs will maintain lubrication such that one could go without blinking for up to ten minutes. But staring at the byline fixedly, he estimates another twenty seconds before tears start to form.

These are the thoughts Bruce distracts himself with, because he doesn't dare consider how Tim and Alfred haven't made a (living) sound in the past forty-five seconds. About Damian, packing his bag upstairs for school after a morning walk with Titus that was "just pushing it, Master Damian".

There is a knife to his right, if memory serves (it does). In the next five seconds—

"Your wards and guardian are fine, Mr. Wayne," the deepest voice Bruce has ever heard intones. For a dizzying moment, it is hard to pinpoint the location of the voice, for it comes from everywhere—like the chiming of a clocktower whilst inside the tower, so overpowering he is cocooned in its volume.

But it is not spoken loudly, just calmly, and when he puts the paper down, folds it, and looks to his right, a blue man sits in Dick's chair.

He wears a three piece suit made entirely of hues of violet, tie included. He has a black brooch in the shape of a cogwheel pinned to his chest pocket, a simple chain clipped to his lapel. Black leather gloves delicately thumb Bruce's watch (no longer on his wrist, somewhere between second 45 and 46 it has stopped being on his wrist), admiring it.

"You'll forgive me," the man says with surety. "Clocks are rather my thing, and this is an impressive piece." He turns it over and reveals the 'M. Brando' roughly scratched into the silver back. He frowns.

"What a shame," he says, placing it face side up on the table.

"Most would consider that the watch's most valuable characteristic." Bruce says, voice steady, hands neatly folded before him. Two inches from the knife. To his left, there is an open doorway to the kitchen. If he turns his head, he might be able to get a glance of Tim or Alfred.

He doesn't look away from the man.

"It is the arrogance of man," the man says, raising red eyes (sclera and all) to Bruce, "to think they can make their mark on time."

"...Is that supposed to be considered so literally?" Bruce asks, with a light smile he does not mean.

The man smiles lightly back, eyes crinkling at the corners. He looks to be in his mid thirties, clean-shaven. His skin is a dull blue, his hair a shock of white, and a jagged scar runs through one eye and curving down the side of his cheek, an even darker, rawer shade of blue-purple.

The man turns the watch back over and taps at the engraving. "Let me ask you this," he says. "When we deface a work of art, does it become part of the art? Does it add to its intrinsic meaning?"

Bruce forces his shoulders to shrug. "It's arbitrary," he says. "A teenager inscribes his name on the wall of an Ancient Egyptian temple and his parents are forced to publicly apologize. But runic inscriptions are found on the Hagia Sophia that equate to an errant Viking guard having inscribed 'Halfdan was here' and we consider it an artifact of a time in which the Byzantine Empire had established an alliance with the Norse and converted vikings to Christianity."

"The vikings were as errant as the teenager," the man says, "in my experience." He leans back in his chair. "I suppose you could say the difference is time. When time passes, we start to think of things as artistic, or historical. We find the beauty in even the rubble, or at least we find necessity in the destruction..."

He offers Bruce the watch. After a moment, Bruce takes it.

"The problem, Mr. Wayne, is that time does not pass for me. I see it all as it was, as it is, as it ever will be, at all times. There is no refuge from the horror or comfort in that one day..." he closes his hand, the leather squeaking. And then his face smooths out, the brief severity gone. He regards Bruce calmly.

"You can look left, Mr. Wayne."

Bruce looks left. Framed by the doorway, Tim looks like a photograph caught in time. A stream of coffee escapes the spout of the stainless steel pot he prefers over the Breville in the name of expediency, frozen as it makes its way to the thermos proclaiming BITCH I MIGHTWING. Tim regards his task with a face of mindless concentration, mouth slack, lashes in dark relief against his pale skin as he looks down at the mug. Behind him, Bruce can see Alfred's hand outstretched towards the refrigerator handle, equally and terrifyingly still.

"My name is Clockwork," the man says. "I have other names, ones you undoubtedly know, but this one will be bestowed upon me from the mouth of a child I cherish, and so I favor it above all else. I am the Keeper of Time."

"What do you want from me?" Bruce asks, shedding Wayne for Batman in the time it takes to meet Clockwork's eyes. The man acknowledges the change with a greeting nod.

"In a few days time, you will send Superman to the Midwest to investigate the unusual seismic activity. By then, it will be too late, the activity will be gone. They will have already muzzled him."

"Him."

"There is a boy with the power to rule the realm I come from. Your government has been watching him. The day he turned 18, they took him from his family and hid him away. I want you to retrieve him. I want you to do it today."

"Why me?"

"His parents do not have the resources you do, both as Batman and Bruce Wayne. You will dismantle the organization that is keen on keeping him imprisoned, and you will offer him a scholarship to the local University. You and yours will keep him safe within Gotham until he is able to take his place as my King."

This is a lot of information to take in, even for Bruce. The idea that there could be a boy powerful enough to rule over this (god, his mind whispers) entity and that somehow, he has slipped under all of their radars is as frustrating as it is overwhelming. But although Clockwork has seemed willing to converse, he doesn't know how many more questions he will get.

"You have the power to stop time," he decides on, "why don't you rescue him? Would he not be better suited with you and your people?"

"Within every monarchy, there is a court," Clockwork. "Mine will be unhappy with the choice I have made," he looks at Bruce's watch, head cocked. "In different worlds, they call you the Dark Knight. This will be your chance to serve before a True King."

Bruce bristles. "I bow to no one."

"You'll all serve him, one day," Clockwork says, patiently. "He is the ruler of realms where all souls go, new and old. When you finally take refuge, he will be your sanctuary." He frowns. "But your government rejects the idea of gods. All they know is he is other. Not human. Not meta. A weapon."

"A weapon you want me to bring to my city."

"I believe you call one of your weapons 'Clark', do you not?" Clockwork asks idly. "But you misunderstand me. They seek to weaponize him. He is not restrained for your safety, but for their gain."

"And if I don't take him?" Bruce asks, because a) Clockwork has implied he will be at the very least impeded, at worst destroyed over this, and b) he never did quite learn not to poke the bear. "You won't be around if I decide he's better off with the government."

"You will," Clockwork says, with the same certainty he's wielded this entire conversation. "Not because he is a child, though he is, nor because you are good, though you are, nor even because it is better power be close at hand than afar.

"I have told you my court will be unhappy with me. In truth, there are others who also defend the King. Together we will destroy the access to our world not long after this conversation. The court will be unable to touch him, but neither will we as we face the repercussions for our actions. I am telling you this, because in a timeline where I do not, you think I will be there to protect him. And so when he is in danger, even subconsciously, you choose to save him last, or not at all. And that is the wrong choice.

"So cement it in your head, Bruce Wayne," the man says, "You will go to him because I tell you to. And you will keep him safe until he is ready to return to us. He will find no safety net in me. So you will make the right choice, no matter the cost."

"Or, when our worlds connect again, and they will," his voice now echoes in triplicate with the voices of the many, the young, the old, Tim, Bruce's mother, Barry Allen, Bruce's own voice, "I will not be the only one who comes for you."

"Now," he says, producing a Wayne Industries branded BIC pen. "I will tell you the location the boy is being kept, and then I would like my medallion back, please. In that order."

Bruce glances down and sees a golden talisman, attached to a black ribbon that is draped haphazardly around the neck of his bathrobe, so light (too light, he still should have—) he has not felt its weight until this moment.

Bruce flips the paper over, takes the pen, and jots down the coordinates the being rattles off over the face of a senator. By his calculation, they do correspond with a location in the midwest.

"You will find him on B6. Take a left down the hallway and he will be in the third room down, the one with a reinforced steel door. Take Mr. Kent and Mr. Grayson with you, and when you leave take the staircase at the end of the hallway, not the elevator."

The man gets up, dusts off his impeccably clean pants, and offers him a hand to shake.

"We will not meet again for some time, Mr. Wayne."

Bruce looks at the creature, stands, and shakes his hand. It feels like nothing. The Keeper of Time sighs, although nothing has been said.

"Ask your question, Mr. Wayne."

"I have more than one."

"You do," Clockwork says. "But I have heard them all, and so they are one. Please ask, or I will not be inclined to answer it."

"What does this boy mean for the future, that you are willing to sacrifice yourself for him?"

There is a pause.

"So that is the one," Clockwork says, after a time. "Yes. I see. I should resolve this, I suppose."

"Resolve what?"

"It is not his future I mean to protect," the man says. "It is his present."

"You want to keep him safe now..." Bruce says, but he's not sure what the being is trying to say.

"I am not inclined," Clockwork repeats, stops. His expression turns solemn, red eyes widening. In their reflection, Bruce can see something. A rush of movement too quick to make heads or tails of, like playing fast forward on a videotape. "Superman reports no signs of unusual seismic activity. With nothing further to look into, you let it go in favor of other investigative pursuits. You do not find him, as you are not meant to. He stays there. His family, his friends, they cannot find him. His captors tell him they have moved on. He does not believe them, until he does. He stays there. He stays there until he is strong enough to save himself."

Clockwork speaks stiffly, rattling off the chain of events as if reading a Justice League debrief. "He is King. He will always be King. He is strong, and good, and compassionate, and he is great for my people because yours have betrayed his trust beyond repair. He throws himself into being the best to ever Be, because there is nothing Left for him otherwise. We love him. We love him. We love him. My King. Forevermore."

The red film in his eyes stall out, and Bruce is forced to look away from how bright the image is, barely making out a silhouette before they dull back to their regular red.

"I am not inclined," Clockwork says slowly, "To this future."

"Because of what it means in the present," Bruce finishes for him. "They're not just imprisoning him, are they."

"They will have already muzzled him."

Clockworks is right in front of him faster than he can process, fist gripping the medallion at his neck so tight he now feels the ribbon digging into his skin.

"Unlike you, Mr. Wayne," and for the first time, the god is angry, and the image of it will haunt Bruce for the rest of his life, "I do not believe in building a better future on the back of a broken child."

"Find him," the deity orders, and yanks the necklace so hard the ribbon rips—

Clack!

"sluuuuurp!"

"Master Timothy, honestly!"

"Sorry Alfred!"

[chaoticace2005]

Inspired by this fic: Something New (For Good Luck) - Chapter 1 - False_Fantasy - Hazbin Hotel (Web Series) [Archive of Our Own]

@falsefantasy

Lucifer, talking to Husk and Angel: I’d take a page out of your boyfriend’s book and-

Angel: *spits out drink*

Husk: My what?

Lucifer:

Lucifer: Oh, sorry, are you two married? Okay, husband’s book-

Angel and Husk, both blushing: NO!

[kelluinox]

Egypt has sent 40 tanks to shoot at civilians trying to flee an active war zone. Shoot civilians. That are trying to flee an active war zone. But yes, let's waste our time with outrage against Israel, and not the country that has closed its border, has done everything to prevent evacuation of civilians, and has now sent tanks to shoot at them

When Ukrainians needed to flee a war zone, Europe opened its doors to them immediately. When Palestinians need to escape a war their terrorist government started, Egypt and other Arab countries close their doors, lock them, and send soldiers to shoot those trying to flee.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Peeped the horrors

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[starry-bi-sky]

Childhood Friends Au: Danny's in Gotham Again

when the wool is off your eyes you'll stop counting sheep at night cause you'll eat your fill of them during the daytime

A few weeks after Danny’s visit to Gotham, he buys an apartment in the city. It’s this little thing, a studio apartment on the same street he grew up in. In Crime Alley. When he tells his parents, they protest heavily. They don’t think it's safe. They think he should reconsider. There were plenty of apartments and places to live somewhere else. And what about college? 

Danny doesn’t think he’ll go to college. He isn’t sure what he wants to do, now that being an astronaut is off the table. It’d be a waste of money to go without a goal in mind, he thinks. He says he’ll take a gap year and apply at one of the community colleges funded by the Wayne Corporation, possibly. It just wasn’t in the cards right now. 

“If things get tough,” He says at dinner that night, “then I can talk to the Waynes. I’m friends with the family, remember?” He ended up getting Bruce’s number in his phone again before he left, and in the process got Tim’s as well. They don’t talk much, Danny isn’t sure what to say. But he sends Tim memes whenever he comes across one and thinks he’ll like. Tim sends memes back in return.   

His parents do remember. They remember. They also remember the horrified shriek that echoed through the house when Danny learned of Jason’s passing. They remember running up the stairs and bursting into their son’s room and finding him sobbing into his bed, curled up like a little kid, like he was in pain. He lost his voice that day, stuck between screaming out his grief and sobbing it. 

They’re still not sure if they should let him go. 

In the end, Danny wins them out, and he lets them help him search for an apartment. They take a break from their lab work to help search for cheap furniture to buy. They may have more money than when they were in Gotham, but that frugal part of you never fully goes away. They all agree that they don’t want Danny to be seen carrying in nice-looking furniture when he moves in. 

He ends up with a basic furniture set, all mismatched, and in the warm summer of June, his parents rent out a u-haul and drive him down to Gotham to move in. They meet the landlord when they arrive, a skinny and frail old man with wispy white hair and a wrinkled face. He gives Danny the keys and tells him what apartment number he is, and then he leaves. 

His parents help him move in. They help him carry his heavy furniture up to the second floor, where his apartment is. Danny isn’t sure if he wants them to help. His mom and dad are strong, but they are getting old, closer to their fifties now that their children are grown. His dad’s hair is slowly beginning to thin, and rather than the white eating at the sides of his head, it now streaks through his hair like salt-and-pepper. His mom’s hair is graying out too, and there are more lines in their faces than he remembers there being. 

When he voices his concerns, his mom laughs spiritedly and says that they may be getting old, but they are still as spry as when they were in their twenties. Danny isn’t sure if he believes them or not. He can see his dad struggle a bit when they return to get his bed frame, and they have to take a break before they go back down for the rest of their things. 

Five years ago, his dad could do this without breaking a sweat. It forces a heavy thing in the back of Danny’s throat. (He is less afraid of his own death than he is of his loved ones, and while he has always felt rocky with his parents, he still loves them more than anything else.) 

Danny’s apartment is exactly as he would have expected it to be: shabby and worn through. The entire room smells like stale cigarette smoke and weed, nicotine stains the wall with poorly covered bullet holes, and stains in the carpet that are a color he can’t discern. The fridge has a broken light and when he tries to turn on the gas stove, it click-click-clicks before lighting, fire fwooshing out while the smell of gas fills the air. There’s rat droppings in the cupboards and the closet-like bathroom is just as bad. 

The ghostly part of him can sense the heavy stench of death in the room; people have died in this room. People have died in every room of this building, he thinks. They have died on the streets outside and in the alleys squeezed between them. He can feel it like a heavy fog in the air. 

It is painfully nostalgic, a bittersweet feeling in his chest that he grimaces to. 

When the last box is placed in his apartment, his parents offer to help unpack. They are hesitant to leave and Danny knows it, although he doesn’t know if it’s from empty nest syndrome or because it's Gotham. He thinks it might be both. He is their youngest child finally leaving home to a city known for its danger. 

“Are you sure you don’t want us to stay behind, sweetie?” His mother asks, a frown she tries to hide settled in the creases of her face. She fiddles with her hands, a nervous habit Danny has since noticed when she feels truly unsure and doesn’t need to hide it. Hesitancy looms over her like a heavy cloud. 

His dad jumps in hastily, splaying his hands and smiling painfully wide to hide the glistening in his eyes. “You’re mother’s right! We can help you get everything set up, champ. I could probably do something with that stove of yours to make it faster!” He says, his voice still booming like it always does even if there’s a stumble in his words. 

It makes his heart squeeze, knowing just how much they care. It was hard last summer, telling him that he was the Phantom. Terrifying, actually. They couldn’t comprehend it. He hadn’t felt his heart beat that fast in years when he stood in front of them at the kitchen table and told them he was a halfa, begging them to believe that ghosts weren’t inherently evil. 

His parents were people of science, however, and after much, much shock, they slowly came to terms with it. How could they not? The evidence was right in front of them. Their son was dead-alive, alive-dead. Somewhere stuck in the between. The tears they shed that night could fill a river, moving from the kitchen to the living room as Danny explains how he died. 

(When Danny tells them that he died after a week Jason did, his mom and dad look horrified. His mom covers her mouth when he adds that it was his idea to go inside it, his dad looks ashy pale, gripping his pant legs so tight that his knuckles turn white. There is a conclusion coming to their minds that he can tell they don’t like.) 

(“You’ve always hated our inventions, Danny.” Mom says in a hushed voice, and Danny winces at the wording, sinking into the back of the cushions in shame. He never thought that his parents noticed. Mom quickly grabs his arm, “No, no, there’s nothing to be ashamed of Danny. We were… perhaps too careless with our inventions, too enthusiastic. You had every right to hate the things we made when they had a tendency to… to malfunction.”) 

(Malfunction is a delicate way of putting it, when Danny remembers every time they had to evacuate their old apartment complex because whatever half-baked creation his parents made inevitably blew up into ash and smoke. There were soot marks permanently stained into the ceiling.) 

(Her hand slides down and grabs his, and she cups it in both of her hands, squeezing tightly. He forces himself to look up, and there is a look like her heart breaking when he looks into his mother’s eyes. “You’ve always avoided the lab after we moved, Danny. And you had every right to, so why on Earth did you ever think about going into the portal?”)

(Danny struggles to come up with an adequate answer, a way to verbalize what came over him that day five years ago. The answer is there, hanging in the air like a knot in a noose. He opens his mouth, and then closes it.)

(Finally, with a tongue made of lead, he shrugs lamely and looks away. “I didn’t know there was an on button inside it.” He mumbles, and despite being the truth it feels like a lie. But that is the truth. He didn’t know there was an on button inside it. So he didn’t care what happened.)

(Something dulls in mom’s eyes, like she thought of something else that Danny hadn’t said. Her eyes shimmer, and she squeezes them shut, breathing in so deep that it shakes. And then she pulls him into a hug, a hand burying into his hair and pressing him close. “It must have hurt so much, sweetheart. I’m so sorry.”)

(It is something that Danny doesn’t expect her to say, like missing the last step of the stairs. It startles him so much he laughs this short, bark of a thing. He feels his dad press against his back and wrap his big arms around them, his nose pushed into his hair.) 

(Because yeah. Yeah, it did hurt. It hurt more than anything else he’s ever felt before. It had torn him apart and sewn him back together again, only to rinse and repeat. The pain was nothing he ever spoke to Sam or Tucker about, and it was something they never brought up. No, that’s not true. If they ever brought it up, Tucker would call it a zap. As if Danny only experienced a mild static shock. Like it was painless. It’s a pretty lie that Danny lets him and Sam believe.)

(His eyes sting and water immediately wobbles into his vision, coming up with such a force that he doesn’t even need to blink before it spills over. “Yeah.” He forces out, voice unexpectedly rough and cracking. “Yeah, it- it hurt. A lot.”)

He tells them about fighting the Lunch Lady a month later. He tells them about finding Jason. It comes spilling out like a waterfall. “I found him, mom.” He says, holding onto her tight while she keeps him tucked under his chin like a little kid. The secret of Jason being Robin stays hidden under his tongue, it is not his secret to tell. Not his identity to expose. He grips her tighter. “I found him, mom. Right there in the Ghost Zone, and he was my Jason. He wasn’t an echo or a— an imprint of him.”

Mom is silent; quiet and attentive, and so is dad, who rubs his large hands up and down Danny’s spine in an attempt to soothe him. It only works a little. Danny breathes in like a gasp as the urge to cry overcomes him again. He always avoids talking about Jason, his grief is like a never-healing scab that can be picked off at any time. It is ingrained into his core. 

“And then I lost him.” He forces out, a sob layering under his words that he chokes on and swallows. The hand on his back stills, and he can feel mom and dad breathe in like a question. He turns his head and pushes it into mom’s shoulder. “He disappeared, mom. Just— just gone.”

“And he didn’t move on.” He says, voice snarling like teeth biting before his mom can ask, because he knows that’s what she was going to ask. It’s what Sam and Tucker asked when he came to them in tears hours after he found Jason gone. It’s what Jazz said when he finally told her about it. It’s what every one of his ghosts asked when he told them about it and begged for their help. 

Danny grits his teeth and tries not to dig his nails into mom’s clothes as a fresh wave of tears run down his face. “His haunt is still there. If Jason really moved on it would have disappeared with him. That’s how it works. But it’s still in the zone, so Jason’s out there I just don’t know where.” 

(Sam once asks him why Danny didn’t just move on from it a year after Jason’s disappearance. She asked him why he didn’t give it up. Danny nearly saw red, and nearly bit her head off for it. It was incomprehensible to him to just stop looking for Jason, to give up. Not when he was out in the zone somewhere. Because he had to be in the zone.)

(Danny once tried to take Jason through the portal with him, and much like what happened to Kitty, it didn’t work. Jason was too tied to the ghost zone to leave.) 

(Some bonds are just unbreakable, he thinks. Bonds forged through blood and time and trust, and when you’re on the streets of Gotham, you hoard what little trust you have in someone like a dragon with its gold. It is scarcely given and fiercely kept.) 

“I’ve been looking for him.” Danny whispers when talking becomes too hard for him, when it runs the risk of him crying. “When- when I’m not fighting ghosts or, or in school or with my friends, I’ve been looking for him.” He has explored the Ghost Zone in every reach he can. He has met so many people. He’s met the ghosts of aliens from planets in every corner of the galaxy. He has met gods or god-like beings and their disciples. 

He’s met famous scholars and writers (he’s gotten the autographs of all of Jason’s favorite writers). He has found entire cities that have so much life in it that it's been permanently etched into the ghost zone, like a mirror version of itself. 

He’s visited the ghostly vision of Gotham so many times, and he avoids the imprint of Wayne Manor like the plague. There are ghostly newspapers that he reads. There are the ghosts of Martha and Thomas Wayne in many of them. 

Jason’s haunt connects to Wayne Manor, but it is also the street they grew up in. It is a small brick building with a door that leads to Jason’s room. A ghost knows when someone enters their haunt, it alerts them like a doorbell in the back of their mind. A foreign ecto-signature in a place drenched in your own. 

Danny visits it every time he goes into the Ghost Zone. It’s always his first stop. 

He tells his parents all of it. He tells them of the ghosts he’s met, of the places he’s seen. And when he feels brave, he tells them about Rath and the terror that his future self brings him. He keeps some details hidden, the ones that he can afford to keep without muddling up the story. 

(Rath is a tall, spindly thing, like a funhouse mirror version of Danny himself. He has arms that are much too long and legs that are much too tall, with skinny fingers that extend into claws.He wears his suit the same as Danny does, with it partially undone and the sleeves wrapped around his waist.)

(There is a black hole in his chest that is much bigger than Danny’s own. It takes up his chest cavity and drips the same, viscous black liquid as the tears falling from his eyes. Danny never forgets his voice; a scraping, quiet thing like he’s screamed himself hoarse. Rath has a voice like goosebumps, and it haunts Danny like a bump in the night.) 

Danny speaks and speaks and speaks until he can’t think of anything else to speak of. He is tired and sad, and it feels like his heart has been ripped out and rubbed raw again. And yet, he also feels so much better. Like a long heavy weight has been taken off his chest. 

Yeah, last summer was hard. His parents walked on eggshells around him, and they forced themselves to unlearn their bias of ghosts. It was more than Danny could have ever dreamed of, and when they felt ready for it, they asked him more about the ghost zone.

He smiles sadly at his dad, “I think fixing the stove can be a priority another time, dad.” He says, watching him wilt and his smile fall. Jack Fenton was always so good at making himself look like a kicked puppy. “I can handle unpacking by myself, I promise.” 

His parents still look so unsure, like they want to argue. Danny watches his mom purse her lips tightly, confliction running across her face like a datastream. She takes dad’s hand, squeezing their fingers together despite the droop in her shoulders. 

“Oh, alright then, I suppose.” She relents, her hand placing on Jack’s arm. “I guess we could go, we’re just going to miss you so much, Danny.” 

Tears seem to have won over his dad, and Jack Fenton sniffs back before he can cry properly. “Our little boy, all grown up.” He says, voice wobbling. It makes Danny laugh, and it makes his heart pang. His smile grows impossibly wider and so much fonder. “You’ve become such a kind, wonderful young man, Danno. We’re so proud of you.” 

Danny laughs again, and it cracks. “You’re gonna make me cry, dad.” (He feels a welling of guilt in his gut that he ignores — he doesn’t feel like a kind man. He doesn’t feel like a good one either. Not with what he plans to do.) 

His father holds out his arms in hopefulness, “One last hug for your old man before we head out?” He asks, mustering up a smile on his face. 

Danny barrels into him, nearly knocking his dad over with an oomph. He’s as tall as him now, but he still feels little in his bear hugs. With arms wrapping around his middle, Danny hugs his father tight and breathes him in one last time. 

“Careful there, Danno.” He laughs, patting Danny’s back roughly. “You’ll break my ribs with that ghostly strength of yours!” But he holds on just as tight.

Out of spite, Danny bends back and lifts him off his feet, laughing when Jack tenses up and nearly scrambles out of surprise. His mom laughs with him, stepping back to give them room for the few seconds that dad is in the air. 

When it’s his mom’s turn, Danny has to hunch to hug her. Something bittersweet to him as she plants a kiss on his forehead and says that he’ll always be her baby. “Even if you do have that horrid smoking habit.” She adds on with a disapproving eyebrow raise. 

Danny turns red in embarrassment, and walks them back to the GAV. Gothamites of all kinds slow to stop and boggle at the monstrous, road-illegal thing that is parallel-parked next to the curbside. In the past, Danny would have died with mortification to be seen with it. Now it just makes him laugh. Before he goes back into the apartment building, he buys a newspaper from a nearby convenience store.  

The first thing he does when he gets back up to his room is one: make a mental note to buy a bicycle chain lock for the door. The locks jiggle and there are splinters along the side that show signs of it being broken into in the past. The second thing he does is pull his cigarettes out of his pocket and light one. 

Danny starts to unpack with a cigarette hanging from his mouth, placing the newspaper he bought onto the counter. He has a cheap loveseat that he pushes off to the side, and he moves the boxes into the kitchen. It’s a matter of organization that Danny has to think about before he does anything. 

It’s as he’s pushing the sofa up against the wall facing the windows that his phone rings a familiar tune: Sam. The phone is fished out before he can think about it and when he stares down at the screen, he realizes it's a facetime call. 

He presses answer and walks over to prop his phone up onto the counter. The smiling faces of Sam and Tucker greet him, rather than just Sam. Immediately, Danny grins. “Hey Danny.” Sam greets, smiling a dark-painted lazy thing. From the background it looks like they’re in Tucker’s room. Sam is in Tucker’s desk chair, and Tucker is behind her, leaning against it. “Have you moved in yet?” 

Danny pulls the cigarette from his mouth and huffs, a cloud of smoke following his breath. “Yeah! It’s a shithole.” He grins lopsidedly, and his feet carry him off to the side to allow Sam and Tucker view of his apartment. He lets thirty seconds pass, allowing the both of them to really see the rest of the room. And then he steps back into frame. 

Sam and Tucker both look like they’re trying not to look judgemental, like they’re trying to hide a grimace that Danny sees anyway with the small turns at the corner of their mouths. He grins wider, mirth filling his lungs. “I know, it looks awful doesn’t it?”

“It’s— it’s not so bad.” Sam says with a strain in her voice, a forced smile on her face that tries to be reassuring. Tucker nods along readily, and he looks just as unsure as Sam does. Danny stifles laughter behind his teeth. 

“No, no, it looks bad,” He takes a drag of his cigarette, shaking his head. “You can say it, I won’t get offended. It’s a fucking apartment in crime alley. Of course it looks bad.” 

Sam remains silent, a rearing of her stubbornness showing itself. Tucker takes a different approach, and heaves a dramatic sigh of relief, slumping like a weight. “Okay, you’re right. It looks bad.” He frowns, “Sorry, man.” 

While Danny snorts, Sam sighs. “Yeah, it looks bad. What even are those stains?” She asks, and both she and Tucker lean closer in tandem to the screen, eyes squinting at the floor behind him. Danny glances at the floor, and shrugs. 

“Blood, probably.” He says, and while years in Amity Park have accustomed him to a clean environment, the desensitization of Gotham still remains. Tucker and Sam both make faces and lean away, as if the stain itself was capable of passing through to them. “Yeah, there are bullet holes in the walls.” 

“Are you sure it’s safe to be there?” Tucker asks, a furrow appearing between his brows. He adjusts his glasses and leans against the chair. Sam is frowning heavily, and Danny can already see her thinking up of a new way to fix the problem. 

“Oh, I never said this place was safe.” Danny tells him cheerily, taking a last hit of his cigarette before placing the dead stick onto the counter. He itches for another one. Instead he walks over to the shelf his parents brought in and starts moving it. “It’s Crime Alley, Tuck. Safe isn’t even in its vocabulary.” 

Tucker and Sam look like they’ve both swallowed a lemon.

“But it’s where I want to be right now.” He says, grunting quietly when the shelf is against the wall he wants it to be, near the short hallway leading to the front door. He can push it in front of it if someone tries to break in. “And Crime Alley’s apartments are the only ones I can really afford right now without mooching off my parents, and I’d rather not depend on them.” 

He can hear the disapproving hesitance from where he stands. And he ignores it. 

Danny walks back into frame, lifting up a box onto the counter. He hums lightly, fingers run over the tape keeping it shut. “Why do you even want to be in Gotham, Danny?” Sam asks, and she sounds genuinely perplexed. Danny stills. “I thought this place only had bad memories for you.” 

His blood turns cold, and like a dime being flipped his slow heartbeat fills his ears. “It does.” He replies automatically, before he can think. Shit, shit. He knows that Sam or Tucker would ask that question, and yet he still feels unprepared for it. His heart pulses quickly against his ribcage, knocking, asking him what he’s going to tell them that isn’t the truth. 

Danny stammers, “I mean— I just— I guess I felt nostalgic.” He says, and it sounds like a weak defense. He looks away, finding himself instinctively scratching his jaw. A new tick of his when he’s nervous. From the corner of his eye, he sees Sam and Tucker both narrow their eyes at him. 

He cannot tell them the real reason why he’s moved back to Gotham. He can’t tell them of the little secret and vow he told himself five years ago, the one that’s been left to fester and burn like an open wound close to his core. The one that, if he thinks too much about it, sends a searing hot electricity through him, filling him from crown to toe top-full of direst wrath.  

(Danny was always the angrier one in the duo of Jason and Danny. He was always the one with glass in his mouth, cutting his teeth and tongue so that he could spit blood at the world around them. His knuckles had more blood and bruises on it than skin, once upon a time. All because he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. He has grown from it, that fury has turned to a small simmering candle.) (But sometimes, sometimes it rears its head, and electricity will buzz under Danny’s skin. There is lightning before the thunder, the second before a fist pulled to punch lands, the spark before it becomes a blaze.) 

He stumbles over his words, and then sighs long and low, drooping his head. “I… was thinking that I can’t avoid this place forever.” He says, and the best lies always have the truth in it. Because it’s not a lie, not completely. But it’s not close enough to the truth either. “And that maybe if I came back, I’d be able to do something about those bad memories. Make them better or make it hurt less.” 

Like wool over their eyes, it fools Sam and Tucker. Their narrowed eyes soften, and Danny feels like a snake is in his lungs as they both adopt their own versions of gentleness on their faces. “Oh, Danny.” Sam breathes out, and the snake squeezes, “Of course, we understand.”

Tucker nods, smiling at him. “Yeah, bro, that’s really brave of you. I know it can’t be easy coming back.” He says, “Maybe you can reconnect with the Waynes again, you always thought well of Mister Wayne whenever you came back from visiting.”

Danny smiles weakly, the gesture cutting into his cheeks like a knife. Perhaps he could. He was still upset with Bruce for hiding Jason’s killer from him. But he doesn’t hate him. Maybe five years ago, he did, when the death of Jason was still fresh in his mind and freshly bleeding in his heart. Now he just doesn’t know what to think of him. He was Batman. Jason was Robin, and the Joker killed Robin. 

It would need to be something he’d have to speak to Bruce about in person, he thinks, in order to resolve it. To hear his judgment on it and make an opinion from there. Danny has learned in the last five years, much to Jazz’s smug delight, that talking to people about something he was upset about did make him feel better. 

The conversation slips on from there into something more light, more breathable. And while they talk, Danny unpacks. He sets up his bed in the corner of the room, adjacent to the windows, and unpacks his cheap TV and table stand. It’s directly across from the couch, in front of the windows. He puts up knicks and knacks he’s collected over the years on the shelves.

When he puts up the curtains, he notices that more than one frame jiggles loosely. Sam makes a comment on the musty stains permanently dyed into the glass, and Danny talks about getting something to fix the cracks. Gotham winters can get brutal, and even if he can withstand the cold, doesn’t mean everything else in his apartment can. 

“Oh, watch this.” He says halfway through unpacking, and pulls out a stick of thick white chalk from a box. “This is something I learned from Clockwork a while back; I think he knew I was going to move to Gotham.” He grins sillily, popping into the camera frame to show them. “I wonder how?” 

Sam rolls her eyes, smiling while Tucker huffs. “It’s not like he’s the Master of Time and can see all past, present, and future.” Tucker snarks. 

Danny hums lightly, curt like he isn’t sure he believes Tucker, and walks to a piece of bare wall not yet blocked by furniture. He starts to draw on it. The chalk shimmers with faint ectoplasm on the wall. 

“Uhh…” Tucker’s voice cuts through, “Are you sure you should be doing that? Won’t you get in trouble for that?”

“There are bullet holes in the plaster, Tucker.” Danny retorts dryly, arching his hand to make a big circle. “I don’t think the landlord is gonna care if I get washable chalk on his walls.” Inside the circle, he inscribes the symbols of the Infinite Realms. “I don’t think he’d be able to see it anyways, he was really old.” 

When he is done, Danny steps back to admire his work. It’s not bad, he thinks, for a lack of practice. He tosses the chalk off to the side, it lands on the couch and rolls back into the cushions. Ectoplasm heats under his hand, slowly glowing from his fingertips before stretching down the rest of his palm. 

Danny’s fingers press against the wall, into the center of the circle. The result is immediate, ectoplasm is siphoned off his hand and into the circle. It glows, and then swirls. He steps off to the side for Sam and Tucker to watch its transformation. The circle fills with a swirling pool of ectoplasm, like a smaller version of the basement portal, and then it warps and stretches. 

It fills out a rectangular shape, shifting like taffy being pulled this way and that, before settling into a solid shape. It solidifies, and instead of a wall there is a glowing purple door, warped in nature and seemingly shifting like a trick of the eyes. He can hear the gentle hum of the zone standing next to it, and can see the carving of the circle in the wood. 

He gestures dramatically, grinning from ear to ear. “Ta-da~” He sings, “A door to my haunt! For whenever I feel like visiting it.” He pats the wood, making a strange thunk-thunk sound. “And then watch this.” 

Danny touches the circle again, and the door twists and recedes like water going down a drain. The circle flashes bright green, and then fades into nothing on the wall, invisible to the naked eye. “I can hide it whenever I want! So if I ever invite someone over—” which he doubts, “—I won’t have to worry about them asking, ‘Hey Danny? Why is there a creepy fucking door in your studio apartment?’”

He gets a pair of laughs for his efforts, and Danny grins wider. 

Sam and Tucker have to end the call when Danny is nearly done unpacking, leaving him alone with only his thoughts and the Gotham ambience outside. There were only a few boxes left, and they promise to call him tomorrow. He tells them that they better keep that promise. 

The silence that follows after they leave feels somberly, as if the reality of moving in has finally set in and filled the air with its loneliness. With its change. Finally, Danny lets the strangeness of moving back to Gotham hit him when he reaches the last box, and he stops to take another smoke break to let it settle. 

It feels so strange to be back in Gotham, he thinks. He’s all grown up, or almost grown up. He can vote and pay taxes, but he doesn’t feel much older than he was at fourteen. There’s a disconnect that makes him feel sad. 

There are cars running outside, driving by. He can only catch glimpses of them, his apartment faces an alleyway. There are dogs barking in the distance, strays he bets. It’s already dark out, and he wonders if he looks out the window he would see the bat-signal shining through the night and staining the permanent cloud that hangs over Gotham. 

Bruce would be so disappointed if he learned the reason for Danny’s return to Gotham. But Danny’s not here for him. He’s here for someone far more important. And like that, the simmering anger that has tucked itself into the furthest corners of his heart starts slipping through. His heart has teeth, ready to strike and snarl and bite. 

He crushes the cigarette in his hand and throws it away. When he opens the last box, it is with hands that tremble and with a face of stone. With a delicateness he does not feel, he reaches in and pulls a corkboard from the box. On the corner frame is a small, near inconspicuous carving of another ghost rune. 

Danny hangs it up on an empty space on the wall, out of sight from the window. It’s plain, and he has nothing to pin to it. He presses the small rune on the corner, pushing ectoplasm into it. Unlike the door, it does not twist and warp and shape itself into something new. Instead it bursts into green flame, eating away at the board and revealing the same thing underneath it, just in dark blue-black-purple. 

Now this board, this board Danny has something to pin to it. The newspaper he bought earlier sits abandoned on the counter, and Danny unrolls it with something like viciousness in his chest. On the front page is an image of a damaged street, and above it is titled: “JOKER STRIKES AGAIN, 3 DEAD AND 27 INJURED”

Danny rips out the first page, he rips out every mention of him. His hands shake and threaten to crumple the paper as he turns back to the board, there is hot blood pounding in his ears. There is an impending sense of finally in his chest, like a setting sun giving the stage to a starless night. There is a stern set in his jaw, five years of festering rage rushing forth like a tidal wave, threatening to make his vision swim. 

It would be so easy, he thinks, to go out as Phantom right now and hunt the clown down. It would only take a night. All it would take is a night, and then he could sink his hands into the Joker’s chest and rip out his heart where he stood. It would be so easy. 

The thought alone forces Danny to stop as he is hit with another rush of fury, really making his head and vision swim. Thorny vines wrap around his throat, making it hard to breathe. He stares at a spot on the wall until the shaking passes. 

If he wants to be discreet about this, then he can’t do it now. Even if he wants to. He doesn’t want witnesses. He doesn’t want an audience. He made a mistake, telling Red Hood about his plan. He wasn’t sure what he was thinking. Perhaps he wasn’t thinking at all. But he can only hope that the Hood hasn’t mentioned it to Bruce. He knows it hasn’t been long since they started working together. He hopes that the Hood has already forgotten about it. 

He pins the newspaper clippings onto the black-blue-board, and stands back. It’s bare now, but it won’t be forever. 

He presses the circle again, and the pinboard reverts back to its original blank state. 

-----

Was I expecting to make a third part?? No. No I was not. I was also not expecting to make an entire google doc filled with summaries for short story ideas about this au that all tie into each other so that way if i DO continue this i have a skeleton pathway to follow rather than making everything up from scratch and potentially cornering myself

you can find this on ao3 or on tumblr 1 2 :)

[rosesapphire2323]

do y'all ever think about how xie lian got propositioned enough times to not only figure out a fool-proof rejection at hand, but to have used it often enough to not even feel anything while saying it. Like. Eight hundred years is a Long Time, can you imagine just how many times women tried hanging from the arms of The Beauty Prince of Xianle? Like? He's the Casanova™ of centuries confirmed???

[fluffypotatey]

no, your honor, you don’t understand. i need this specific scene to breathe. your honor, listen, listen, please, they’re everything to me, please, you have to understand—

[autisticaradiamegido]

day 178

sometimes a polycule is just four goth girlfriends who are also supernatural entities

[butwhatifidothis]

It really is strange how Edelstans simultaneously dig hard into people that don't agree with their specific interpretation of 3H to the point of being happy they manage to drive those people away... and be so upset and baffled that people become generally disinterested/actively hostile towards 3H content.

If folks get repeatedly driven out of a fandom, and that group of people repeatedly calls anyone who disagrees with their specific interpretation of 3H stupid/illiterate/"acting in bad faith"/sexist/racist/homophobic/etc., and it is repeatedly done by a group of people who insist that 3H's fandom problem is a "both sides" thing, with all of this being dragged into spaces that have nothing to do with 3H, well... obviously people are then going to start to dislike interacting with either 3H in general or its fandom in particular?

Edelstans are the ones spreading the idea that 3H's fandom in totality is shit. They keep trying to make their hands look cleaner than they are by claiming that everyone else's hands are just dirty as/even dirtier than theirs. Of course people who are unaware of everything are going to then assume that everyone's hands are dirty, thus making people not exactly want to shake hands with anyone.

Like, really now. What did they think was going to happen when they directly go after fanartists/fanfic writers who create/say things that go against the Approved Edelstan Status Quo, to the point that a non-zero amount of these creators just up and leave social media entirely? Or after they nitpick every single Disapproved Post and then lie about the post's OP? Or after it becomes a consistent pattern that people who even remotely disagree with Edelstans' opinions are always, without fail, buried with insulting and harassing anons? Or after they're shown time and time again to defend their worst actors with "well their/our victims deserved it because they said a 3H opinion we didn't agree with"? Or when they say that everyone does this shit in 3H's fandom except for them (which is either not believed because it's demonstrably untrue or is actually believed and now those people think the overwhelming majority of 3H's fandom is filled with shit)? Or when they drag 3H discourse into literally actually everything no matter how unrelated?

That with less fandom creators within the fandom space they'd get more content? That harassing and insulting people and accusing them of being this-and-that bigot is going to magically "correct" their minds into seeing The One Truth about 3H? That people are going to just look over all the shit they did just because they allocate the blame of their action on all of 3H's fandom? That people would like 3H more if they constantly remind people of the inarguable worst thing to come from 3H? That this would help 3H's general perception?

Fuckin' no, of course that's just going to make everyone fuck off from 3H. And would you look at that, a shit ton of people have fucked off from 3H since everything has been swept under a "well it'sth a bolth thides ithue tho what can ya do?" rug. And it's been swept under that rug by pretty much the only people who are pulling this shit, who then get shocked - utterly gobsmacked! - that that made them look bad too. That crying "both sides!" included themselves too and not just the people they've been harassing. That saying that the entire fandom is bad everywhere made the entire fandom look bad everywhere.

If Edelstans are really so upset that no one talks about 3H positively anymore, then maybe they should stop being the reason no one likes 3H anymore. Just a thought

[dialovers-translations]

All of the people out there who judge Yui and call her ‘weak’ based solely on her anime portrayal...GO PLAY KINO’S LOST EDEN ROUTE.

Yui is a real girl boss in that route who takes ZERO shits from anyone. Kino’s over there thinking he can force her into submission by threatening her but she pulls a reverse Uno on his sad ass and straight up tells him ‘Haha no. YOU are wrong, mister.’

#YuiSupremacy

[oceanwithouthermoon]

unpopular opinion for this area of tumblr, beware+also abuse talk warning

admittedly, all the super casual bashing of saikis dad makes me really uncomfortable, like i dont totally disagree but i wish we didnt just all do it in the middle of other completely innocent headcanoning 😭 its never tagged or warned..

my personal opinions on kuniharu are not as extreme as some are on here, like i think he sucks but i dont think hes a genuinely bad person, he was just thrown into a situation he didnt know how to handle.. he reminds me of those parents who prepare to have a baby and get pregnant on purpose, but then the baby has a disability and suddenly, everything changes.. because they didnt prepare for this unlikely scenario, but it happened anyway, and now they have to figure out where to go from here.. kurumi and kuniharu BOTH made mistakes and didnt handle their genius/psychic kids in ways they shouldve, but its because they werent prepared for it

[kittysawat]

as much as i love the visual of a big fancy wedding (or even a private lowkey one), i dont even think kinnporsche would get a wedding ceremony or marry formally or something . i think one day they would just call each other husband and that would be it. rings have been exchange, promises of being together for better or worse have been made, thats it.

[chrollohearttags]

that ‘convos black ppl aren’t ready to have’ thread on tiktok is like my fav thing ever bc the girls been eating them all up 😭 the church, the nasty aunties, the raggedy sons, and def the pe*o uncles and I’m here for it!

[purple--queen]

Kate going to Clint saying "I'm in love with a Black Widow"

Yelena going to Nat saying "I'm in love with a Hawkeye"

Clint & Nat thinking 'yeah i know how that feels'

[itsafternoonpast5]

thinking about their friendship so hard

[somegrumpynerd]

They're watching Birdemic: Shock and Terror

I really love the idea that once they get to the surface Sans and Alphys have movie nights just to watch the most hilariously bad movies they can find