DPxDC: Jarro Adopts an Alien
Ok, so Danny has a space obsession and a protection obsession (I headcanon that as a halfa, Danny has two obsessions like all Halfas do which makes them unique to other ghosts.) and so while he can get his fill protecting people in Amity, he struggles with his space obsession. Sure, he can look up everything he can about space and the stars on the internet. He can stay up until 2 am looking at the stars (who needs sleep? He’s a ghost, he can go days, or even weeks without sleep if he wants, same with a lack of air or food.) but it’s just not enough. He craves to learn more, see more. Just as Dani gets that itch to travel, Danny wonders. What would it be like to see the stars up close? Are they really as hot as a dragons fire breath? Hotter!? Or maybe they are so hot they are cold. What does it look like to see plasma dancing across the surface, or touch the gasses of Jupiter? Does Pluto have ice caves like the far frozen? How many planets are actually out there? What about Mars. There’s a whole species living there with a language and culture Danny can’t even fathom! Oh what he wouldn’t give to talk with martian manhunter or Superman.
And what’s stopping him from exploring this? He can fly. He doesn’t need air. He can go intangible if it gets too hot and he’s practically immune to the cold. He wants to touch a space rock! See if they are smooth because there is no wind or earth to rub against them and erode the surface. He wants to see what planets they come from. What minerals they might have. He wants to know if there are currents in space. All of these things are right there just above the atmosphere. Surely it couldn’t hurt to take a quick peek. So he does. During a particularly bad day Danny flies as fast as he can until the earth’s gravity looses its effects. Until his hair is floating as of it’s in water even more than normal. Until he can feel when breathing no longer became a choice (still not necessary though). And it…was beautiful. To be surrounded by space. To see the earth like this. Pictures just didn’t do it Justice. He flew across the solar system and as he passed planets, he longed to fly through them. To search every crevice and learn their secrets. But he had a bigger prize in mind at the moment. The crown jewel of their universe. The closest star he could find. The sun.
Danny was mesmerized. The plasma really did dance across the surface. Like a never ending performance of science and beauty. There were sparks that few in arcs. Danny flew down and played in them, making a game to see how many he could fly under. His ghost core purred in delight. His obsession had never been more satisfied. He spent hours out there. Just exploring what his solar system had to offer. So when he returned? He couldn’t just forget. Pictures and online science theories had nothing on the real thing. He wanted to explore some more. So he did. Every night he would go out and explore the cosmos. Flying from planet to planet. (Either the Martians were still around and Danny made friends with them, even learning their language, or he just looks at their ruins to learn as much as he can). And with both obsessions now being filled, Danny is more settled. More confident. And he can focus better. Everyone notices the change, even his teachers. They just think that he’s paying more attention to his education now. He’s even better during his ghost fights.
But Danny can fly awfully fast. And he soaks up information even faster. Soon his trips take longer and longer as he flies further out. Sometimes he can barely make it back in time for school. And he can't go every night. Sometimes the ghosts won’t wait for daytime so he has to make sure the town will be safe in his absence. Although he’s been able to take more trips ever since Valerie joined the vigilante ranks. But still, he’s getting farther and farther from earth each night. Until one day he’s visited every planet, every star, every comet or debris in their solar system. Which would be fine. He could deal with that if that was all there was. But it wasn’t. Danny saw the stars just out of reach. He saw places the Milky Way was leaning towards. He saw just the barest hints of new solar systems with new planets and stars. And he knew of legends from lanterns that they had posted online. Heard tales from some scientists that have made better telescopes. And his core itches. It aches to know more. See more. Yet he can't go further. And this puts him in a sort of depression. Suddenly he’s back to his old self. Lagging behind. Distracted. Zoning out. Crashing into a few more buildings during ghost attacks. Yet he tries so hard to be satisfied with what he has. He can still fulfill his obsession…it’s just more like chewing on a granola bar rather than eating a decent meal. He’s almost becoming lethargic.
So one day he goes to Frostbite to see if there’s anything he can do to lessen the effects. But the yeti just takes one look at him and gives him the infimap. And suddenly Danny is in a whole new universe in seconds. The planets are purple. The stars are blue. He’s pretty sure there are furry blob-like creatures living on one of those planets. And suddenly he gets that itch, but holding the infimap, he knows he had time, so he lets himself go.
And for a while it’s good. great even. Since he can’t keep asking the yetis for the infimap, he goes over to Wulf to see if he’s up for an adventure. Most of the time he is and they go exploring the galaxies together. And then Wulf had the genius idea of teaching Danny how to make portals. It took a long time but soon, he could concentrate the surrounding ectoplasm enough to weaken it and pull. It took a while since Danny didn’t have ecto claws and would have to use his pure will. But this would allow him to follow his obsession anytime, anywhere. So it was only a matter of time. And once he figured it out? It was like something was unlocked. Danny had never before understood how Ellie could travel so much. But now he did. That feeling when you discover something new. When you add to your reservoir of knowledge. When the patterns in the universe just click. There is nothing Danny could compare it to. And to explore that whenever he wanted? It was so freeing. While Wulf sometimes still joined Danny’s adventures, Danny did most of his explorations by himself.
He meets various planets and aliens. So many different cultures. He learns thousands of languages. Tries all kinds of foods (and it’s a good thing his ghost self has an iron stomach and he’s basically poison resistant.) even found a whole comet where blood blossoms grew. (Which he most definitely avoided). And wasn’t that fascinating? To find out they were from space.
And then during his travels one day he met a space alien starfish.
It was actually a funny story. A meteor shower was about to attack a planet of talking blue monkey creatures with 4 arms. Danny immediately started diverting them and was soon joined by some lantern corps (which his inner fanboy wanted to talk to so bad.). And a tiny starfish in a…Robin uniform? Oh and the starfish could apparently do martial arts which was interesting to watch him karate chop a meteor. He could also talk directly into Danny’s head which the halfa found more interesting. So they got to talking and apparently his name was Jarro. He seemed to be helping the lantern corps as a ‘proxy from earth’ to make better use of his skills.
Danny would run into Jarro a few more times. Sometimes he was with Lanterns and sometimes he would just be exploring the galaxies. They started forming a pretty strong friendship and Danny would start seeking out the starfish alien to travel with him. He knew all kinds of space facts. Apparently he had an eidetic memory. When they explored, sometimes Jarro would just stick to part of Danny. Wrapped around his arm, his waist, sometimes just sticking to his back like a strange backpack. But they always had fun.
So Danny was happy. He could fulfill both obsessions and got a space pal. Everything was great!
Until the GIW caught him.
It would probably be the worst day of his life. There was an explosion in the lab. Something set up by them after they realized Danny frequented that place often. So they set a trap and blew it up. Thankfully, Jazz was at college during this but both his parents were home. When the explosion went off, Danny had tried putting a Barrier around them all. It took everything he had to maintain it. That’s how they found out he was phantom. Danny had a few moments where his parents said they accepted him but he couldn’t hold the barrier for long. His parents said that they loved him and then everything went green. He woke up in a lab, tired and injured. His only saving grace being that he remained in phantom form. And he was determined to remain so.
Danny’s time at the GIW was a haze but eventually, he managed to escape. Bleeding, and tired, and still recovering from the burns in the explosion, Danny made a portal straight to Amity. Only when he got there, it was a ghost town. Streets were empty, buildings were boarded up. Even the Nasty Burger was deserted. As for his house, there was nothing but a crater left and some scattered debris. Danny looked everywhere but there was no one. No Jazz. No Sam. No Tucker. No one. and he was tired. And everything hurt, and he needed a friend. Someone he could trust. So in a daze he made a portal and tried to just project safe. Safe safe safe. Somewhere he knew he would be protected. And so Jarro got a surprise when his space buddy suddenly popped out of a green portal, bleeding green and clearly passed out. He didn't know what to do. He didn’t know how to help him. But Jarro knew someone who would.
So with a speed never before seen from a tiny starfish, he flew to earth. Bringing his friend straight to his father. Because surely batman could help!
And with his appearance, the green blood, the knowledge of space facts. The lack of wanting to talk about where he came from (and the nightmares crying out for his parents). This is how the bats became convinced that Jarro brought them an injured alien.
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tales of the passerine - danny fenton being bruce wayne's first kid
okay okay. so this is like a continuation/elaboration of my oneshot/prompt i wrote about the idea that Danny was the first batkid. We have a lot of aus where he joins the family after the rest of the bats do, right? So hey! Lets shake things up a bit. Danny is the first to be adopted by Bruce Wayne.
Danny's parents and unfortunately Jazz die shortly after the events of TUE -- how so? I was gonna say an ecto-filter explosion, that would call back to the TUE explosion and trauma behind that. But lets do something new! Carbon-monoxide poisoning.
It's not too unexpected for something to break in the Fenton house, especially with the Fenton parents' questionable understanding of proper weapon handling and lab safety. The water heater broke from a stray shot by one of the weapons, and was promptly MacGyver'd incorrectly. Danny went to stay with Tucker for a guys' night, and came back to a dead silent house.
(Danny's neighbors got a very unfortunate shock when he ran to the next house over in hysterics.)
There was a lot of shuffling around with CPS, the police. People had to be called in to handle the equipment in the lab, and the GIW was rumoring to show up in aid to clearing the scene. When Danny heard of that, he immediately went and dismantled the ghost portal to the best of his abilities. He burned the physical blueprints of all his parents' inventions, their blueprints on the ghost portal, and their most dangerous weapons were destroyed beyond recognition. Anything to prevent the GIW from getting their hands on his parents' tech.
It opened up another investigation, but he was not under the list of suspects. He was placed in the care of Vlad Masters, where they then went back to the rebuilt castle mansion in Wisconsin. Danny, terrified of the future that has once passed and may do so again, shuts down in his grief. Inadvertently, he ends up somewhat repressing his ghost half. Something Vlad, who is grieving Madeline but relishing in Jack's demise and his custody of Daniel, is not very happy with.
Vlad's... gone into a bit of a mental health spiral. He's becoming increasingly possessive over Daniel, the final remnants of his friends and a liminal being like him. He doesn't like that Danny's repressing his ghost half -- both out of genuine concern as a ghost, but also because of his desire to control Danny and groom him into the perfect son. If you ever had a phase where you read Dark SBI found family fics, first off; me too bro, and second off; those are the vibes I'm thinking of.
Danny's mentally shut down from grief! And fear. He's dropped into a bad depressive state -- paralyzed with grief and the terror of the inevitable. Clockwork saved his parents because he believes in second chances, but what's the point of that when his family ended up dead anyways? Danny doesn't wanna believe that he's destined to become evil, and he's holding out onto that hope, but it's a thin line, and he feels utterly hopeless and trapped. He hasn't used his powers or ghost form since he trashed the lab, and Vlad has alarms set up to prevent him from trying to escape.
He's also unintentionally cut off Sam and Tucker -- both of whom are so scared and concerned for Danny too, and are trying their damndest to reach out to him. He keeps ignoring their texts. Danny basically haunts Vlad's manor. He goes out to eat if he has to, attends parties Vlad drags him to, and stays in his room all day if he can.
At parties, Vlad doesn't allow Danny to leave his side, or really talk to anyone -- not that Danny wants to. A product of Vlad's increasing possessiveness. Well, he almost doesn't let Danny leave his side. Danny has a habit of slipping off to hide somewhere for the parties whenever he can, and Vlad reluctantly allows it so long as he stays alone.
This becomes an advantage when eventually, Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham after missing for years, and holds a bright charity ball to celebrate the return. Vlad has been chomping at the bits to get his hands on Wayne Industries, and with the return of its owner there is no better opportunity to wipe out his rival. He goes, and he as normal, brings Daniel with him.
Vlad thinks Wayne will bleed his little heart out for Daniel's poor orphan sob story -- he's a fellow orphan himself, after all. He's not wrong; Wayne's little heart will bleed, just not in the way that benefits him.
Bruce sees Vlad and Danny approaching before they're even close enough to introduce themselves - and like with many of the children he will soon come to care for, it's like someone set a mirror into the past right in front of him.
Danny Fenton's suit is tailor-made for him, and despite the fact that it's his perfect size, the sag in his shoulders, the ducked down head, and the way he hunches into himself all pictures the image of a child in shoes too big for him. There's a far away, glazed over look in his eyes and grief marble-cut into the lines of his face. There's not enough makeup in the world that will hide the dark circles under his eyes.
("My nephew, Daniel Fenton." Vlad's hands are possessive on Danny's shoulders. Bruce immediately notices the way the boy tenses under his touch. "His parents passed recently, and as his godfather I was designated his guardian.")
("I'm so sorry, the loss must've been terrible.")
("Yes, carbon-monoxide poisoning caused it. Daniel was out with friends, when he came home... they had already passed.")
(Bruce immediately dislikes that Vlad shared the details of their death unprompted -- he likes it even less when Danny flinches at the reminder and hunches into himself.)
Danny runs off at some point earlier into the charity. At this point, parties are still being held at Wayne Manor (because iirc google search mentioned that was a thing at first before it was changed), so he disappears and hides in one of the empty rooms nearby. It just so happens to be the same room Bruce Wayne hides in when he needs a break from all of the socialization.
Thus begins a long, long process of trust. Bruce can't reveal his hand as being smarter than he looks, but he can be compassionate. Kindness needs no measure of intelligence. He keeps Danny company for as long as he can before he runs the risk of being found.
Rinse and repeat. Vlad insistently wants Wayne Industries, and he'll go to as many Wayne parties as he can to get his hooks into the man. The problem is that Bruce Wayne is never alone, and getting him alone is impossible. Finding him too. It's like the man never stops moving. Always talking to someone, always circling somewhere. He orbits around the room as if he isn't the sun of the Gotham Elite's solar system.
Danny's had such repetitive behavior that Vlad never thinks to believe that Bruce Wayne is disappearing to go talk to him. That "Vlad's" son is even interacting with him at all. Danny never gives him a reason to think so, and neither does Bruce.
Danny doesn't actually acknowledge Bruce until a handful of parties in, where he hands Bruce a small slip of paper he smuggled in that says; "don't trust Vlad". Danny's face stays carefully blank, but he's so tense that his hands are trembling, and he's purposely looking away from him. Bruce plasters a smile onto his face, slips the paper into his pocket, and tells him "okay".
(he's been busy with his own goals with the mafia, but he sets aside time to investigate Vlad Masters. He was holding off. Until now.)
Danny does eventually start speaking to Bruce, he's starting to really like the guy. He's starting to see a little hope, even as Vlad is starting to get more and more agitated with him the more he refuses to use his powers.
He reaches out to Sam and Tucker again, and starts trying to reconnect with them. Vlad has spyware on his phone, and he limits the amount of times he can talk to them. A weird parental control lock of some sort that leaves a time limit on how long he can talk to them for. 30 minutes. Danny doesn't tell them anything about Mr. Wayne.
Danny, slowly, wants out of here, and he's slowly gathering the motivation to do it. Vlad is genuinely scaring him -- and Danny wonders just how truthful the past-future Vlad was when he told him that Danny wanted his ghost half separate. He starts trying to come up with an escape plan.
Vlad has anti-ghost wards everywhere around the mansion, and while they're always on, they boost to full power at sunset. The doors and windows are always locked, all main exits have alarms set on them. The only reason it's not super extensive is because Danny hasn't tried leaving at all yet, so Vlad hasn't had to tighten anything.
At night, Vlad locks the door to his room and puts up an anti-ghost ward around the room. The mansion is on the outside westward side of Madison, more entrenched in rural Wisconsin. The closest town is a four-way stop sign with one house on three corners, and an open bar on the fourth. Not much to go.
He refuses to go to Sam and Tucker; Vlad would look there first. It's too dangerous. Vlad would sound alarm bells and have a manhunt looking for him, Danny can't risk going just anywhere. Too much risk of being found, sold out, or caught. There's really nowhere for him to hide.
Until there is. Bruce is telling Danny about the history of Wayne Manor, and says, as casually as saying the weather; "The manor has dozens of empty rooms, I'm sure Alfred wouldn't mind filling another one if he could." And quietly, hesitantly, Bruce places a careful hand on Danny's shoulder, unrestrictive and gentle; "He wouldn't mind getting one ready for you if you need one."
And there it is. There's his out.
Danny, just as quietly, replies; "I'll keep that in mind."
The ball starts rolling.
Now I've been trying to summarize this au as much as possible for length convenience, but Vlad has been steadily growing more and more controlling. More emotionally manipulative. More agitated at Danny for not using his powers.
He wants Wayne Industries under his thumb but he's been steadily growing more and more concerned with Danny. He's started grabbing him, yanking him around, shaking him; trying to goad him into using his powers. He gets angry when Danny doesn't react, or tells him he doesn't want to use his powers. He hasn't outright attacked him, but he's getting there. This has been happening over the time it takes for Bruce to indirectly offer Danny sanctuary at his home.
It all comes to a head when Vlad stops going to parties at all -- something Danny has to pretend he isn't upset about -- because Vlad doesn't want him around other people anymore. Vlad rarely goes now without him, and only leaves to go to a Wayne function or to handle something at VladCo.
Danny can't wait for Vlad to leave long enough to escape. So he leaves during the night of a big storm. Vlad's locked him in his room, but Danny doesn't bother trying to go for it; he goes to the alarmed window instead. Danny's been repressing his ghost half so long that he can't access his powers immediately anymore -- he can feel it, he knows its there, but he can't quite reach it.
He breaks the lock by hand.
Immediately the alarm goes off through the entire castle, filling the room with red, and he scrambles for the rope the Wisconsin Ghost left for him a few months back. Danny's already out and climbing down the side of the castle before Vlad even reaches his door -- the only good thing about the entire room being ghost-proof is that Vlad can't get in that way.
The rope ends before it reaches the bottom, and he's still twenty feet in the air. It won't kill him if he lands it right. Danny takes his chances, and drops. He breaks his ankle, but he survives.
And he fucking books it to the back garden. He hears Vlad shrieking over the thunder and rain.
I'll save the full experience for a future oneshot, but Danny makes it out into the nearby woods and forcibly experiences what it's like to be in a horror game, trying to hide from the thing that's hunting you. There's only one thing going through his mind; "i'm going to die"
I have this mental image for this scene. Very stereotypical horror imo. Where Danny is hiding behind a tree, with a hand over his mouth, and Vlad is a few feet away from him, glowing ominously red through the trees, trying to search for him.
Danny doesn't get away from this unscathed, but he does get away alive. That's all he could ask for. He gets away by getting his ghost half awakened long enough to transform into Phantom and fly to Gotham.
But he gets to Wayne Manor, he gets to Bruce. Or, at least, Alfred answers the door from his insistent pounding. Danny's just in tears and Alfred gets him in the living room, wrapped in a towel, with ice on his swollen leg before he has to step out and alert Bruce.
Bruce already breaks multiple traffic laws on a nightly basis. And that's just with the sheer existence of the batmobile itself, not including the speeding and military artillery attached. He breaks double the amount trying to speed back to the cave and get out of the suit.
Right off the bat: Bruce will know, at least before Dick enters the picture, about danny's powers. He'll figure out something considering the fact that Danny traveled from Wisconsin to New York in a single night. That'll be a bit of complicated affair, but I've already got something in mind.
Actually it'll probably be very soon after Danny joins the family, because Bruce tries to offer to fight for custody for Danny - the state Danny was in at arrival is clear enough evidence for a trial. But Danny immediately shuts it down, says it's not going to work and then Vlad will know Danny's with him and he won't be safe. He tells him that Vlad cannot know Danny was with Bruce.
Danny's biggest regret was not telling his parents he was a halfa, and while he doesn't want to tell mister wayne (yet), he does tell him about Vlad being one. He needs to know why Danny can't be seen with Bruce. So he tells him, and Danny's current plan is to just hide out from Vlad until he turns 18. That way, he has no more legal jurisdiction over him. After that? He's not sure.
And to wrap this up, since this has already gotten very long and I can make more posts about this au later; I've thought about it, and I'm going to say that Danny does become a vigilante before Dick enters the scene. He goes by, as you probably guessed; Nightingale. "Gale" for short.
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