Dp x dc AU - If the Internation Space Station orbits the Earth 16 times a day, then so does the Watchtower.
Danny’s on track to move out of his parent’s house and move to Gotham for college (He swears that Sam bribed the board to let him in- and she wasn’t even going to that university!) but the dorms don’t open for another three days and he cannot wait to escape. Seeing his parents try to perfect yet another weapon to use against him while he changed out the ecto filters on the portal was too much. He’s completely over the idea of staying when he already has everything packed and ready to go.
The solution? Take all his boxes into his haunt in the Ghost Zone, leave them there and then spend some time in camping in space. He’s already explored the Infinite Realms enough to be bored of it for a minute (not to mention he wants to avoid getting more ‘favors’ to do from Clockwork) and hell, he just wants to see some stars.
He grabs his tent, a sleeping bag and all the food and things he could need and brings it into the atmosphere with him. Keeping it all tethered to him, Danny stays in a fixed position above Gotham (Cause that’s where he’s going next, duh) and treats himself to some quality Me-time.
Only problem is that several times a day he has to make himself intangible while he lets satellites and things pass through. Easy enough and honestly pretty interesting to observe as a wannabe engineering student.
He doesn’t know when exactly it happened the first time- but it turns out the Heroes of Earth all congregated in a satelite office building? It was bigger than the ISS! What the heck!?
Going intangible but not invisible, the JL spot Danny and are incredibly confused how an ‘Alien’ teen just happens to appear in their meeting rooms disappearing at the rate (slowly but surely) of the Watchtower moving through space. Was that camping gear? How was he roasting a marshmallow? Did propane camping stoves even work in space??
16 times a day they get the opportunity to ask Danny a few questions. He mostly ignores them or gives them joke answers. Eventually Martian Manhunter phases through the Watchtower to join him.
They talk about how hard transition periods in life can be and having strained relationships with family. J’ohn returns to the watchtower on its next cycle and reports that the kid is just fine, being an adult is just a hard thing to do.
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you're grabbing lunch with a nice man and he gives you that strange grimace-smile that's popular right now; an almost sardonic "twist" of his mouth while he looks literally down on you. it looks like he practiced the move as he leans back, arms folded. he just finished reciting the details of NFTs to you and explaining Oppenheimer even though he only watched a youtube about it and hasn't actually seen it. you are at the bottom of your wine glass.
you ask the man across from you if he has siblings, desperately looking for a topic. literally anything else.
he says i don't like small talk. and then he smiles again, watching you.
a few years ago, you probably would have said you're above celebrity gossip, but honestly, you've been kind of enjoying the dumb shit of it these days. with the rest of the earth burning, there's something familiar and banal about dragging ariana grande through the mud. you think about jeanette mccurdy, who has often times gently warned the world she's not as nice as she appears. you liked i'm glad my mom died but it made you cry a lot.
he doesn't like small talk, figure out something to say.
you want to talk about responsibility, and how ariana grande is only like 6 days older than you are - which means she just turned 30 and still dresses and acts like a 13 year old, but like sexy. there's something in there about the whole thing - about insecurity, and never growing up, and being sexualized from a young age.
people have been saying that gay people are groomers. like, that's something that's come back into the public. you have even said yourself that it's just ... easier to date men sometimes. you would identify as whatever the opposite of "heteroflexible" is, but here you are again, across from a man. you like every woman, and 3 people on tv. and not this guy. but you're trying. your mother is worried about you. she thinks it's not okay you're single. and honestly this guy was better before you met, back when you were just texting.
wait, shit. are you doing the same thing as ariana grande? are you looking for male validation in order to appease some internalized promise of heteronormativity? do you conform to the idea that your happiness must result in heterosexuality? do you believe that you can resolve your internal loneliness by being accepted into the patriarchy? is there a reason dating men is easier? why are you so scared of fucking it up with women? why don't you reach out to more of them? you have a good sense of humor and a big ol' brain, you could have done a better job at online dating.
also. jesus christ. why can't you just get a drink with somebody without your internal feminism meter pinging. although - in your favor (and judgement aside) in the case of your ariana grande deposition: you have been in enough therapy you probably wouldn't date anyone who had just broken up with their wife of many years (and who has a young child). you'd be like - maybe take some personal time before you begin this journey. like, grande has been on broadway, you'd think she would have heard of the plot of hamlet.
he leans forward and taps two fingers to the table. "i'm not, like an andrew tate guy," he's saying, "but i do think partnership is about two people knowing their place. i like order."
you knew it was going to be hard. being non-straight in any particular way is like, always hard. these days you kind of like answering the question what's your sexuality? with a shrug and a smile - it's fine - is your most common response. like they asked you how your life is going and not to reveal your identity. you like not being straight. you like kissing girls. some days you know you're into men, and sometimes you're sitting across from a man, and you're thinking about the power of compulsory heterosexuality. are you into men, or are you just into the safety that comes from being seen with them? after all, everyone knows you're failing in life unless you have a husband. it almost feels like a gradebook - people see "straight married" as being "all A's", and anything else even vaguely noncompliant as being ... like you dropped out of the school system. you cannot just ignore years of that kind of conditioning, of course you like attention from men.
"so let's talk boundaries." he orders more wine for you, gesturing with one hand like he's rousing an orchestra. sir, this is a fucking chain restaurant. "I am not gonna date someone who still has male friends. also, i don't care about your little friends, i care about me. whatever stupid girls night things - those are lower priority. if i want you there, you're there."
he wasn't like this over text, right? you wouldn't have been even in the building if he was like this. you squint at him. in another version of yourself, you'd be running. you'd just get up and go. that's what happens on the internet - people get annoyed, and they just leave. you are locked in place, almost frozen. you need to go to the bathroom and text someone to call you so you have an excuse, like it's rude to just-leave. like he already kind of owns you. rudeness implies a power paradigm, though. see, even your social anxiety allows the patriarchy to get to you.
you take a sip of the new glass of wine. maybe this will be a funny story. maybe you can write about it on your blog. maybe you can meet ariana grande and ask her if she just maybe needs to take some time to sit and think about her happiness and how she measures her own success.
is this settling down? is this all that's left in your dating pool? just accepting that someone will eventually love you, and you have to stop being picky about who "makes" you a wife?
you look down to your hand, clutching the knife.
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realizing thistle never actually reached the maturation point for an elf is so. eye opening. especially bc he actually witnessed both delgal's birth and the birth of delgal's son (AND HIS GRANDSON!!). as a human reader it's so easy to be lulled into thinking he's so old and marcille's remark of him being a child came so fast it's so easily forgotten
like i definitely think the golden kingdom and delgal himself never knew let alone be able to perceive thistle as an immature person. bc in their years he's just so old. and i think growing up surrounded with all tallmen also gave thistle false perceptions of how mature he was and it played a part in him taking on the responsibility of rejecting death for the whole kingdom. it's a brilliant and raw display of what age discrepancy actually means in the world of dungeon meshi
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