Tim Drake had a lot of free time.
In between the time little Timmy was deemed old enough to not need a nanny and his ninth birthday when he got his first film camera, Tim Drake had so much time after school to explore his big, empty house. And so he did, hours upon hours were spent exploring his house.
Mansion, Tim corrects himself. His house isn’t a house. It’s an abandoned mausoleum disguised as a mansion. He intimately knows every creak of the floorboards in the out of the way galleries, every heavy weight curtain shut closed so what little sun that makes it way through Gotham’s gloom is reflected in order to protect the artifacts stored within the walls. Tim probably knows the exact amount of fleur-de-lys on the fourth sitting room’s wall paper- by extrapolation from preexisting data and personal data collection. Basically, he laid on the floor and counted.
Tim had a lot of time. He also had a lot of artifacts to pore over, making stories as he goes and double checking the actual history of the object.
Tim thinks he’s an artifact, almost. To his parents, at least. A child, a thing, they collected at one point in their lives and put on display at the galas they deem worthy to return to Gotham for. Perhaps he’s worth even less, had his parents bothered to look at him more than the lesser art pieces in their storage-mansion. The story everyone knows about him is prerecorded by people who weren’t really there.
Regardless, Tim Drake knows every single corner of his prison mansion. He’s catalogued everything, after all, on a nice spreadsheet. 
And that’s why, as he entered the fifth- and least used- guest bedroom, Tim’s attention immediately cut to the wrong bit of detail. Eyes flickering between the indent on the bed, the mussed- but not terribly dirty- state of the sheets, Tim slowly backed towards the door. His eyes fixed on the spot on the bed, he called out a soft “hello?”
He immediately cringed. He’s not an amateur, and that little “hello” was a mistake that might get him killed.
Tim trembled as the panic set in, tears pooling at his eyes. He wished Batman and Robin were here, they’d know how to-
There’s something appearing on the bed. Tim Drake stares as a glowing figure with white, wispy hair and a black hazmat suit appeared sitting cross crossed on the guest bed. His gloved hands were held out in the universal I-mean-no-harm gesture.
“Don’t- don’t panic!” The thing said, looking rather panicked itself. “I’m, uh, Phantom.”
Tim Drake’s curiosity and mystery-solving mindset slammed down on the toddler’s mind, quickly banishing the fear and panick in favor of interrogating this new, exciting thing.
“I’m Tim. Are you…” Tim frowns, wishing he had Batman’s intimidating growl. “A ghost?”
“Got it in one, kiddo. I’m, uh, not here to harm you. Or steal anything! I just wanted to rest.”
Tim blinked. He decided right then and there that he likes this person. This… Phantom. If his trust was based on the fact that the loneliness was worse than a dead person, no, it wasn’t.
“I thought you sleep when you’re dead..?”
——
Danny stared at the child in front of him, watching the kid- Tim- pout at something. Danny is distracted from the staples holding his ghostly guts from falling out of his non-consensual vivisection when the kid asks him if he’s a ghost.
“Got it in one, kiddo!” Oo, he should tone down the energy. Danny’s too tired right now to maintain that level when speaking to Tim. Now, gotta reassure the kid he means no harm before he reports Danny’s presence to whatever authorities around.
His parents, at best. The cops, at worst.
“I’m, uh, not here to harm you. Or steal anything!” He could tell he landed in some richie rich mansion by the opulent decorations in a seemingly impersonal room alone. “I just wanted to rest.”
Ancients, that had been more honest than he’d wanted. He really was out of it.
“I thought you sleep when you’re dead?”
Danny snorted.
“Yeah, but you can almost never have enough sleep, you know?”
The toddler looks unsure but nods anyways.
“Listen, would you… not tell anyone that I’m here? I’ll be out of your hair soon, promise.
Tim looks like a smart kid. There’s no way he’d fall for-
“Okay.” He fell for it. Danny blinked, stupefied. “My parents won’t be home for a while.”
“What.”
Tim shrugged. “You can stay. The housekeeper is only around a couple of days.”
“You… are you supposed to tell me that?”
Tim sent him a derisive look, clearly bolder now that Danny made no moves to hurt him.
On his cherubic but skinny face, the effect is both adorable and absolutely devastating.
“You’re hurt.” Tim fidgeted with his hands. “I can… I can get you water…?”
His core purred.
“Please. Thanks… Tim?”
The kid beamed at him and left.
Crap. New fraid member it is.
——
Danny, naive: “Surely him trusting strangers is just a one time thing, he’s so well behaved”
Tim, staring Danny in the eyes as he jumps out of the window to go stalk his vigilantes: “I’m gonna go take a walk in Crime Alley”
——
Tim gets Danny water, but it’s tap water from Gotham and is infected with both an ungodly amount of toxins (that doesn’t affect either of them bc one’s dead and the other had been chugging it since they were a baby- Gothamites get bottled water or from Wayne Foundation’s Clean Water Stations) and also like trace amounts of ectoplasm.
Danny: woah this is so healthy water!
Tim, pleased because Danny ruffled his hair: yes, I’m perfect
The rest of Gotham, if they knew: making warding sigils against these two eldritch gods
——
Basically, Danny gets attached and stays mostly because of said attachment but also Danny could see Tim’s budding world dictator tendencies and went yeah gotta curb that
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In terms of “canon-compliant” zutara, I think often about how Zuko’s development is both his redemption and his doom.
Because how come the obsessive go-getter of the show does not fight harder against fate (bryke’s annoying ass) to save his beloved from putting herself into a rewardless martyr-like situation in the form of a marriage that serves as repopulation program? (Which I always thought was ridiculous).
He learns bit by bit to acknowledge and make up for his mistakes. He respects Katara above all else. He fights fair. He does not guilt-trip her nor treat her like a reward. He loves her. He gave his life for her. He would not have survived had she not been the exceptional person she is. He supports her decisions no matter what. He listens to her.
So when she tells him about her ridiculously good and selfish intentions of pandering (once again) to a non-celibate Monk who wishes to have her mother his children for the sake of airbending and his supposed affection that was born out of the self-insert of narrators who give way too much importance to childhood crushes for one’s babysitter, he might argue but he can’t help but love her and respect her decision, both horrified by the cruelty of fate (aka bryke) and filled with admiration for the person she has always been.
If Orpheus loved Eurydice too much not to turn back when she tripped behind him, then Zuko loved Katara way too much not to validate and support her terribly selfless decisions. Because how dare him be selfish and want her for himself. And how dare him tell her what to do after years of war.
It is terribly tragic because on the other side, a part of her wishes he had fought harder.
A “villain” turned “hero” sometimes can mean the upholding of ideals made by two men who enjoy shaming young girls for their choice of love interest. Sometimes, the lack of a “villain” to whisk away the princess from the “hero’s” hands means said princess will remain unacknowledged and forgotten in a narrative that turns it into something of her own volition, a narrative that ignores everything a beloved female character represented for the people she was made to represent (by their own words, must I say). It leaves the realm of picking the love interest (which honestly could simply not ever happened in any form and would still be better than this) and enters the realm of once again giving a poor treatment to a female main character who quite literally Drives the story from its beginning.
And just like Orpheus and Eurydice are doomed by fate, Katara and Zuko are doomed by Bryke. And surprisingly, Katara gets the worse of it.
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I think some people forget that peppino can be kind of a jerk. He's not your perfect awkward nervous guy who can do no wrong, he is not perfect, but that doesn't make him a bad guy. He has flaws, because thats a normal human thing to have.
Sometimes he gets angry and a bit mean, sometimes he takes joy in beating the shit out of the tower residents, sometimes he gets selfish or says something mean to someone. His anxiety is not his only flaw, please don't forget that. He is not a perfect sunshine boy who can do no wrong. He is not nice and friendly 100% of the time. He is a human person, he is a complex being who cannot be easily defined as completely good or completely bad.
Sometimes good people do shitty things. Sometimes a person will not act in the kindest way possible. Sometimes someone will do something not realising (or caring) how it makes others feel. Sometimes people have bad days. Sometimes people make mistakes. Sometimes people are wrong.
Peppino is a human, he is not immune to being a jerk sometimes. Again, this doesn't make him a bad person, it just makes him human, and I don't want people to forget that and misinterpret him as being someone whos only flaw is his anxiety. Yes it is a key part of his character, but theres more to this guy than that, thats not his only flaw or imperfection or whatever you want to call it. He's not 'kind perfect guy who also has anxiety', theres more detail to who he is than that.
Peppino can be a bit mean, Peppino can be hotheaded, and you know what? Thats okay because thats what a person is like sometimes, and that is a sign of a complex and realisticly written character (even if he is a cartoon guy, his personality still feels realistic). He's not the same guy all of the time, he doesnt respond to every situation in the same way, he's not a one note character. Sometimes he sucks as a person, but its okay because despite all that, he's a loveable and endearing character, and he isn't a horrible terrible person, he just is human, and thats okay.
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