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liquid-luck-00 · 3 years

Text

Seven Stages of Being thrown into Teenage Superherodom

Stage 1: Panic

@marijon-week Day 1: Blue Eyes / Identity Reveal

@t1dwarrior-of-earth

Here *** Second

~~~~~~~~~~

Ever since Fu made her Guardian she left Paris. The Kwamii convinced her that the stress of being ladybug and the mental, and now physical, abuse of her classmates has become too much. Her parents also noticed her shift and they supported her leaving.

This was how she found herself in Blüdhaven. She was a student at Gotham Academy, but with Gotham's high crime rate they wanted somewhere safer for her. Sure she could have also chosen Metropolis, but the commute from Blüdhaven was shorter.

She will be the first to admit that it wasn't ideal, but for her mental health it was great. And with complete honesty and sincerity she wouldn't change a thing.

You see one thing that apparently gets overlooked is that Nightwing is the resident vigilante of Blüdhaven. Even more is the fact that he happens to be her neighbor.

OK so maybe a little bit backtracking here. Marinette may have figured out that her next-door neighbor, Detective Richard Grayson, happens to moonlight as Nightwing at night.

So the building they had chosen for her was extremely safe, however they didn’t take an account Marinette's extremely packed and late work schedule. With how Marinette would still be awake in the early morning hours, and if she heard a thump of boots on the balcony next to hers regularly, she is going to look out the window eventually.

When she does, she sees Nightwing at her neighbor's apartment. Which could be one of two possible reasons why Nightwing could be there. One, his significant other lived in that apartment and he just came regularly. Or two, he lived there and assumed every sane person was asleep.

Her question was eventually answered one night when she was at the desk next to her balcony door, she heard boots like normal, but this time they were closer than normal, this time they were on her balcony.

The door moved, causing her to turn and focus on the door. That was when a male voice muttered, I thought I left it unlocked like always.

So most people would have quietly left, but she wasn't most she opened the blinds. She is pretty sure she had a stare down with him but its difficult to say because at the mask.

However after countless akuma attacks, you tend to figure out who the target is, which is what she did. Same height, same rough build, same hit and skin tone, combined with her ability to recognize figures for fashion, that gives you Richard Grayson. Without breaking eye contact she got up, stepped to the door, opened it and pulled him in, shutting it and the blinds, turning to face him. Then is when she noticed the blood near his hair line and down his neck.

“There better be an extremely good reason why this happened Mr. Grayson.” She looked innocently at him, “because I don’t know how to explain.” She gestured to him now seated at her desk. She pulled out her first aid kit and started checking him.

“How did you find out?”

“Night owl,” she shrugged. “I hear you come in every night and well um, well...”

“Curiosity got the best of you.” She nodded.

Of course this was when her phone would go off, she grabbed it, opened it, and groaned, because of course she was being called a Paris in the middle of the night, morning over there.

“You know what you're still alive, just a superficial head injury, but I have to go.” She said moving towards her bedroom when Mr. Grayson finally reacted.

“I’m supposed to… you said you were 14 right?” She nodded. “I’m supposed to let a 14 year-old leave in the middle of the night?”

“I am, I can explain in the morning.” She tried to justify, but he wouldn't let go of her wrist. So in a leap of faith, she gave him a quick rundown of the Paris situation and why she had to leave. If after this Blüdhaven had another vigilante well no one else knew why, Trixx loved it though. And she had someone who not only knew who she was but knew how to help and train her. Even if he acted more like a brother to her.

After all the eyes are the windows to the soul, and as a true guardian and a pure soul of creation, she knows that she can trust Richard ‘Dick’ Grayson’s.

- - -

It’s almost humorous that the next pair of eyes she would this come to trust were a blue so electric that they seemed to hold Lightning itself. Those eyes belong to one Jonathan Samuel Kent.

She had actually met John while in class at Gotham Academy, but nothing much more than their initial meeting and a good morning in the halls. This was pretty much because he seemed to stick with Damian Wayne, the ice Prince of Gotham. And green eyes always hurt her in the past, so she mostly stayed away from them.

However the fates had another plan for them. A group project, yay was sarcastically running through her head because of course, the two people she was partnered with happened to be two pairs of eyes that made an impression on her originally.

“So, should we go to your place, or should we go to the library, oh maybe we should go to Damien’s, or maybe mine to work on this.” Jon rapid fired at her and Damian, as they well she moved in order to talk about the project.

“I um... I’m not exactly...” she couldn’t even finish the sentence before Damian butt in.

“Tt figure this out and inform me later.” With that he go up and walked away. And go figure her assumption that everyone with green eyes were complete and total dicks is just reinforced. Because if you’ve never had a good experience with anything or anyone who shares the same traits why would it be any different now.

“Maybe we should just meet at the café or at the library just get this over with.” She got up with the bell, turned on her heel, leaving Jon sitting at the desk she just vacated.

She heard of a soft, “oh ok” as she walked away.

But of course nothing ever was easy in her life. Because the next thing she knows she hears foot falls behind her, they were actually picking up speed, and then stomps as if they were trying to stop right behind her. That was when I hand wrapped itself around her wrist making her spin and face the person who grabbed her.

In that moment she didn’t think, she reacted, she reacted like every other time one of her classmates decided to hurt her. It was a motion that came as naturally as breathing while in her civilian form, so much so that she would bet her heartbeat wouldn’t have changed. She dropped the books and book bag from her arms and shoulder lifting her arms defensively to protect her head and she pushed her shoulders forward , defend her head, in an attempt to stop a blow. But the swing never came, no weight, no pressure, no kick, no pain, just silence.

She tentatively opened her previously shut eyes eyes and looked forward, towards where the hand had originally pulled her, to the person who pulled her, she saw Jon, shocked at her reaction and then that turned to fear almost, it seemed to her, as if he was wondering if he did something wrong, if he hurt her, quickly she tugged her arm away from him and dropped to the ground and tried to pick up her items. However what shocked her was that he also dropped down and tried to help her pick up her things.

She looked up as he handed her a stack, “I forgot to ask you for your number so we can do a group chat. Are you OK?”

“Oh yeah yeah I’m fine.” She pulled a pen quickly from her bag and a sticky note, she usually uses to annotate her sketches and class notes come on, “here.” She handed him the piece of paper, Marinette got up and started to walk away again, as to not miss her next class.

By the end of the day, she found out that Jon can can text her head off. She always tries to respond to text quickly but this boy spammed the chat trying to get to know her better. If she was Damian, and she figured he did, she would’ve silenced the conversation, but it would be rude of her not answer.

Eventually they did figure out a an arrangement, Damian was going to go meet a brother after school so he wouldn’t be available meaning that she and Jon would start the project. So they decided to open a chat just between the two of them and figured it out from there.

Seeing as both of them lived outside of Gotham they decided it would be a little bit safer to meet at Marinette’s and John would leave from her apartment. And that is what they did, together the two of them left Gotham Academy after school, took the train to Blüdhaven and got into study mode. They worked in relative peace, researching and writing down ideas until there was a knock on the door. Marinette made her way up to the door, looked through and there stood Dick. So she opened the door, yet what got her attention was not just her pseudo Brother but the person who is with him. This person just happened to be the missing member of their project group, Damian.

“Hey Mari, I thought I would introduce you to my baby brother!” He beamed then noticing the other person in the room. “Hey Jon.” He greater and then took a double take “Jon!!!”

“Hey Dick, Damian.” He smiled.

“Tt. Anyone care to explain this.” Damian glared between her and his brother.

“Wow something the boy wonder doesn’t know.” She muttered under her breath, apparently it wasn’t quite quiet enough as some reacted.

“She knows?!?” Jon directed towards Dick and Damian.

“Know what?” She bit the bullet.

“Boy Wonder!?!” He seemed to shout just loud enough to get their attention. This did cause a reaction, Dick almost looked proud but Damian seemed ready to attack her.

“Okay I knew you were clever but seriously?!”

“Not the time Dick!” She moved so the kitchen island was between her and Damian. That was when something clicked Boy Wonder, Robin, Damian is Robin. Dick is Nightwing, both work with Batman. Jon heard her the others didn’t, Robin is close with… oh sweet honey iced tea. “ Dick please please tell me that I’m wrong!”

“I’m going with no your right.” Thump went her head as it fell onto the counter unrestrained.

“Why can’t my life be normal?” She asked no one in particular.

“You are a magical girl who can use the power of mini sized gods who you also protect.” Dick supplied ever so helpfully.

“Not helping!” She glared at him.

“Your life wasn’t normal long before we met.”

“Still.” She grumbled. Damian and Jon were now watching her and Dick interact as if trying to figure something out. Ping. Her phone went off. “Oh come on.” She fell back on the counter.

“Who is it this time?” Dick asked.

She tossed the phone to him. “I hate elementals.” A livestream of Stormy Weather ravaged the city of Paris.

“Cookies?”

“Cookies, I’ll be back.” He tossed her a box from her pantry. Special macaroons for the kwamii.

“Wait! Let me come with you.”

“And how many times have I told you that would be a bad idea.”

“But…”

“No, don’t make me call Honey Bee to venom you again.”

He slowly backed up and sat on the couch dragging Damian with him. “I’ll um… I’ll hold down the fort. Don’t call Goldie.”

“I won’t.” She turned to go to her room. “Oh there is fresh cookies in the jar.”

She silently transformed and portaled away. Luckily her team was already there and they made quick work of the Akuma. Meaning she was back near instantly.

“That was quick.”

“Viperion was there.”

“How many times?”

“Dunno.”

“Liar.”

“Am not.”

“You are.” Jon interjected into their bickering.

“Who’s side are you on anyways?” She asked out.

“I have no idea.”

“Great we broke Superboy.” She plopped down on the couch next to a stunned Jon. “If only… Fluff.”she smiled, and knowing that smile Dick panicked. “Fluff. Hey Fluff.”

“Oh no time travel is what got you into this time travel will not get you out.” Dick jumped landing on her keeping her seated.

“What it’s going fine?!“ Jon screamed at them, looking pretty close to a mental break down, she should know.

“You didn’t explain anything did you.” She looked on up from her position under a pile of a Dick and pillows.

“I was meaning to come up with the cookies were good and kind of had my mouthful.”

“OK great so here’s the rundown. Hello my name is Marinette Dupain-Cheng and I was chosen at the age of 13 to wield the Miraculous of the Ladybug which grants me the power of creation and healing. I moved Blüdhaven and enrolled into Gotham Academy because of my utterly deteriorating mental health as a result of bullying in my previous school. Not to mention the magical terrorist who prays on sad or negative emotions, who happens to be using the Miraculous Butterfly or the miraculous of transmission. My partner uses the miraculous of the black cat which grants them the power of destruction, but he’s a total and complete asshole, but that’s not surprising. I was then given full guardianship of every single miraculous in the Chinese zodiac box, the most powerful of all of them the tender age of 14. I figured out that Dick was Nightwing about a month after I moved in and afterwards I have been going out into with him as he’s in as the vigilante Vulpes. And I literally just figured out you are Robin,” she pointed at Damian. “And you are Super Boy,” she pointed at Jon, “because of you’re a little outburst. I would not have figured it out otherwise! And I’m totally not I am going crazy because now there is a total of three people who know my identity in another country, no less, and I’m sure I can figure out the rest of the Bat family from here but I so I don’t want to.“ She was able to breathe now, after having explained this in just under a minute.

She looked between both Damian and Jon noticed they both looked as if she was either crazy or that certainly made a lot of sense, or a mixture of both she really can’t tell.

“You were bullied.“ Jon seemed to only take away. “That actually explains earlier.” He said just load enough for her to hear, as they were still next to each other.

“I’m not going over this again.“ She huffed, causing Dick to roll off of her laughing onto the ground and she followed suit. “You know there’s a reason I’ve always trusted blue eyes.” That was the beginning of and inseparable friendship between her and Damian, and something more between her and Jon.

None of them quite knew that at the time.

~~~~~~~~~~

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sohotthateveryonedied · 3 years

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Hiii!! I really love your tumblr posts and I'm pretty new to the Batfam (meaning I have only read fics and textposts about them, no comics) and I wanted to ask about the year Bruce/Batman gets "lost in time". I know general things of what the kids have been doing–Dick became batman and fired Tim from robin, giving it to Damian, everyone thinking Tim was crazy for believing Bruce was alive, (don't really know what Jason was up to though, was he still murderous towards Tim? Does the pit still affect him? Also I have no idea about Cass and Duke, were they introduced at this point??) Anyways, my real question was why was Bruce lost in time, what villain put him there? And how did he get out? And how long was he "dead"? Was Bruce in another reality or like just asleep the whole time? Oh! And how soon did this happen after Damian got introduced to the family–a couple months?

I'm so sorry this is so long, but I hope you answer and thank you!!

(I’m going to try and cover all my bases here by going into how exactly Bruce “died,” what went down during the Battle For the Cowl, what the Batkids did while Bruce was gone, and how Bruce came back. Hopefully it all makes sense?? We’ll see how it goes lmao.)

Part 1 - What Happened to Bruce:

So there was this event called Final Crisis (which I won’t go completely into since it would make this post a million times longer than it already is), but the bottom line is that Darkseid wants to overthrow reality and release his Anti-Life Equation, which would overthrow the whole planet and turn everyone into slaves. (If you’re interested in knowing more about the storyline, here’s a Reddit thread that explains it WAY better than I could.)

What I CAN tell you is that during his final confrontation with Darkseid, Bruce is hit by an Omega Beam and turned into a burnt chicken nugget killed. Poor guy.

Final Crisis #6

Clark and Diana bring the body back to the Batcave and break the news to the Batfamily. Batman #687 covers a good portion of the aftermath such as Bruce’s funeral, the Batfamily grieving, and Dick coming to terms with his new responsibility of becoming Batman.

Batman #687

Part 2 - Battle For the Cowl:

Musical chairs time, fellas! After word gets out that Batman is gone, Gotham erupts into chaos. Dick doesn’t want to take over the mantle, Tim needs Dick to take over the mantle, and Jason says “fuck it” and takes over the mantle himself because somebody around here has to. He becomes this murderous psychopathic Batman and starts taking out criminals with deadly force because someone’s gotta do the job, so it might as well be him.

Batman: Battle For the Cowl #1

(Okay honestly, this series had some pretty bad characterization overall, which sucks since it’s such an important storyline. Jason is portrayed as this violent psychopath, which...okay, he was kind of insane after the Pit and all, but not to this degree. Personally, I choose to owe the bad characterization to Bruce’s death because as much as Jason resents Bruce for all he’s done, he does still love him and losing him would be devastating, which would exacerbate his already fragile mental health. As for Damian, this happens roughly three years after his first appearance, so we can assume it’s been a few months since he first joined the family. He’s still relatively new at this point, so nobody knows how to write him yet. He ends up being depicted as if his main two personality traits are Bratty and Assassin-Child and that’s it. It’s all just a mess.)

Anyway, Tim tells Dick to become Batman and stop Jason’s reign of terror. Dick says no, so Tim follows Jason’s lead by saying “fuck it” and putting on the cowl himself. He goes to confront Jason, which ends in Jason beating the crap out of him (again) and leaving him for dead after Tim declines his offer to become Jason’s Robin. Dick goes to save Tim and ends up fighting Jason.

Battle For the Cowl #3

Dick wins, Jason disappears, Tim is fine, and Dick finally gets his head out of his ass and becomes Batman.

Part 3 - What Happens to Each Batkid While Bruce is “Dead”?:

Dick:

As I said, Dick becomes the new Batman a month after Bruce’s death. He’s got big shoes to fill, and it takes some time for him to get used to his new role. He and Damian end up flipping around the classic Batman and Robin dynamic, with Batman now as the fun counterpart to Robin’s edginess. Dick, Damian, and Alfred relocate to the penthouse above the Wayne Foundation building, operating out of a secret Bat-Bunker in the basement.

Batman #688

Jason:

After Battle For the Cowl, Jason is still batshit insane and determined to make Dick’s already stressful life even harder by becoming a supervillain with an ugly costume and an even uglier hairstyle. (I know it’s just because the artist sucked, but still. Jason is horrifying to look at during this time.) He mostly just gets on Dick’s nerves by running around Gotham with his new sidekick Scarlet and killing criminals as Batman and Robin wannabes. Eventually, Dick has Jason committed to Arkham Asylum and he hangs out there until Bruce returns.

Batman and Robin (2009) #5

Tim:

Tim...doesn’t do great after Bruce’s death, mentally. Dick makes Damian Robin, his reasoning being that Robin is more of a sidekick and he sees Tim as his equal. By making Damian Robin, Dick hopes that it will give him the stability he needs to keep him from straying back toward the “bad” side. (It’s the right move ultimately, although his execution was pretty messed up since he didn’t discuss it with Tim beforehand, but he’s allowed to make mistakes. Dick’s father just died and now he’s in charge of picking up the pieces of their broken family. It’s a lot to handle.)

Long story short, Tim has a breakdown, realizes that Bruce is alive, dons the Red Robin identity, and cuts ties with his family to travel the world in search of proof. It’s a rough time.

Red Robin #1

Damian:

Our little guy becomes Robin! So proud of him! As I explained earlier, Dick makes Damian his Robin with the assumption that it will keep him out of trouble, and he’s right on that account. He mentors Damian, teaching him how to channel his violent instincts into something productive, and it works! Slowly but surely, Damian makes the transition from bratty assassin to actual hero!

Batman and Robin (2009) #22

Cass:

Duke sadly was not introduced at this point in time, so he missed out on all the pandemonium. Cass, however, has been Batgirl for years by now, but she got kind of pushed aside by the writers after Bruce’s death. Bruce disappears shortly after adopting Cass, but once he was “dead,” the writers sort of moved Cass around for a while, not quite knowing what to do with her. First she was with the Outsiders. Then they got disbanded and Cass tried forming a new network of heroes to take over for Batman if needed. Then she helped out in said network during Battle for the Cowl, taking care of a newly ravaged Gotham. Then Cass gave the Batgirl mantle to Stephanie Brown after she became disillusioned with the role, thanks to the loss of her father and mentor. Then Cass picked up and moved to Hong Kong to “follow Bruce’s plans” by continuing whatever work he had set up for her there. It was all very vague and confusing, and Cass more or less got swept under the rug during this time. Thanks, writers.

Batgirl (2009) #1

Part 4 - How Bruce Came Back:

When the Blackest Night storyline happens, the Justice League realizes that the corpse buried under Bruce’s grave is apparently not the real one and that he’s actually alive out there somewhere! How wild is that! This is further proven by Dick after he places Bruce’s body in a Lazarus Pit to revive, which has the same result because it’s very clearly Not Bruce and they should have listened to Tim from the start.

Batman and Robin (2009) #9

Anyway, what actually happened is that the Omega Beams that Darkseid shot at Bruce didn’t kill him, but rather blasted him back through time to the prehistoric era with his memories wiped. The Omega Energy inside of Bruce ends up catapulting him through various time periods, which is all part of Darkseid’s plan. With each time-hop, Bruce builds up more Omega Energy in his body which, when he gets back to his original time period, will be unleashed and destroy everything.

Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne #5

It’s been a little under two years since Final Crisis, though in-universe it’s uncertain exactly how long Bruce has been “dead.” We can assume it’s been a year, give or take. The way he comes back is too scientific and complicated for me to understand, so uhhhh the bottom line is that Tim and a few Leaguers save Bruce at the Vanishing Point and the day is saved! Hooray!

Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne #6

(If you want to read about how it actually goes down, then I seriously recommend reading Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne. It’s only six issues, so it’s a quick read and it explains the situation far better than I ever could.)

Bruce eventually reunites with his family after spying on them for a period of time as Insider to see what has changed in his absence:

Bruce Wayne: The Road Home

After that, things quickly settle back into their new normal. Dick and Damian stay on as Batman and Robin. Bruce goes back to being Batman as well, with him handling Batman Incorporated business and Dick continuing as Gotham’s defender. Tim keeps the Red Robin outfit, Steph stays on as Batgirl, and Cass becomes Black Bat. Jason stays in Arkham for a while before filing an appeal to be moved to a regular prison. He kills 82 inmates in less than a week and gets transferred back to Arkham, which he promptly escapes from. It’s a ride, I tell ya.

Aaaaand that’s about it! I hope this answered all of your questions!

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ectonurites · 4 years

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do u have any thoughts on the whole “tim is zapped to time prison” storyline? bc i feel like it could have been pretty interesting and a good way to bring back young justice/tim’s memories more immediately if it hadn’t been such a blatant attempt to just get tim out of storylines bc they had no ideas for his character

sorry lol u don’t have to respond i just kind of wish people talked about this storyline more? and the fact that tim lowkey became one of the only people in dc with knowledge of the other timelines (i think so at least) and nobody really addressed it?? like going into the next phase where people learn about other timelines after death metal.... tim should already know some of this stuff right?

YES YES YES OKAY LETS TALK ABOUT THIS this got incredibly long because I just have a lot to say (and i included screenshots) and i prob got a little off topic but. but lets get started anyways:

i haven’t read that particular storyline in a few months so i might be missing/misremembering some details here, but that whole ‘time prison + future tim’ thing was like. a really really interesting concept and the implications/impacts it has are a big part of why i liked tynion’s detective comics run as much as i did even with it’s flaws in characterization (such as treating tim like he was jimmy neutron boy genius and making steph..... be all ready to quit/breakaway from the team like that. the steph quitting characterization really started i think in batgirl convergence and unfortunately has haunted her since, even though pre reboot never giving up was like...... one of her defining traits. dc i hate you sometimes)

i think that one of the biggest things that bothers me about the situation is how little we saw most of the other characters in the batfamily grieve (aside from steph and some with bruce, but again the way steph was portrayed just... hhhhhh. it very much reduced her to ‘tims girlfriend’ more than i’d have preferred) but otherwise like...as far as I can remember there was maybe one line in that monsters crossover thing where dick mentioned tim was gone, jason had a single line about avoiding the funeral in rhato, i dont think they showed any reaction from babs at all until after he was back, and the most for damian I recall is at the end of the 2014 teen titans run (#24) where he looks at... a case with the old red robin uniform Tim wasn’t even wearing anymore when he died? and that just bugs me. Instead of getting to see the actual funeral we get one flashback to it way after the fact once Bruce already knows Tim’s not actually dead

But at the time when they all DID think he was dead? the closest thing we see was in that same teen titans issue (#24) there’s a memorial-type ‘sharing stories’ thing after the funeral with tim’s titans friends but.... we don’t see something like that with his family. tim is a major presence in these peoples’ lives, they are his family, when he gets sent into time prison its even SAID how loved he apparently is

its just... idk. they all thought he was dead, and if they had put more emphasis on showing not just telling how that effected EVERYONE (not just steph) in the batfam, it might have felt a lot less like they were just putting tim away until there was a story idea for him. (like obviously I know they can’t make everyone’s stories revolve around Tim, but I’d have way preferred a detective comics issue of the funeral/memorial with the family than having there only be a teen titans one, I think it would have... held more relevance & meaning... but instead they just went right into that monster crossover story instead of lingering on this)

but then the Tim story itself once it does pick up way later, with titans tomorrow/future tim coming along having that whole “tell conner you’re sorry” “who’s conner?” exchange with current tim... that opens up A LOT of things to think about, and I think was pretty interestingly done if i’m remembering correctly. future tim recognizes the timelines are different, and ya know goes off to try to change things further ("whaddaya got there?” “a gun to kill batwoman” “NO!!!!”), theres lots of fighting etc etc the good guys win as we expect, but once that’s all settled tim’s left there with this whole. thought process

which ya know is the big indicator there’s weird timeline/reality fuckery going on (or also the read here can be that tim and kon are so connected across all space and time that their bond can transcend anything even timelines and realities and reboots... “and they were soulmates” “oh my god they were soulmates”)

ANYWAYS lets not forget that tim isnt the only one who learns about this other timeline stuff during this whole situation!

Brother Eye has records of future tim’s timeline, and cass & steph see who they used to be! and as soon as steph finds out ‘holy shit i was ROBIN and BATGIRL?’ she also desperately wants to know more! which then a bit later leads into young justice 2019 where instead of going off to college like they told Bruce they were gonna, Steph and Tim go get the help of Zatanna to see what might be going on in their brains with these timelines and weird feelings (as we see in flashback form in yj 2019 #5)

and HOO BOY DOES SHE FIND THINGS! she gets in there and finds out that oh yeah, their brains had very much so been tampered with, and with her magic she undoes some of it, by unlocking memories, and Tim finally remembers Conner! (also in case u were wondering, that panel is specifically a callback to this one from yj 1998 #17 when Cissie quit the team)

one thing that I think is weird/interesting/idk if it gets... properly addressed even, was that Zatanna also poked around Steph’s brain too and she didn’t remember everything? Might have something to do even with how Tim had been in time prison, might have taken less work from Z to open things up because of that? Who knows

additionally i wanna call attention to how he said “That entire chapter of my life” which... leading into my next point a bit... strongly leads me to believe even though he’s remembering some things he definitely does not have ALL of his memories back (because theres a lot more than just the young justice ‘chapter’ of tim’s life that was drastically changed by the new 52 & rebirth)

BUT moving on, i wanna bring up this part from later on (after they figured out that there was a crisis that caused things in the world to change, which is why their memories/brains were messed with) in issue #16

so yeah, I think it’s indicated even though Zatanna brought back some memories and opened up his brain a bit, there’s still many holes, and some things seem more like dreams rather than memories and he’s probably unable to tell which are which on his own to some extent. (also for reference the real thing that Tim thought was just a dream is... likely yj 1998 issue #1)

So based on the things i’ve brought up here (which are the things I remember off the top of my head, I could easily be accidentally leaving shit out LMAO i haven’t fully read through any of these books in at least 3 or more months now) I think it’s safe to assume that Tim definitely has a head start on getting back his memories before Death Metal happens, but that it was by no means a complete thing. So the after effects of Death Metal are probably just gonna... be a little less drastic for him vs most other people because it was already happening, but it’ll be kinda filling in the remaining gaps?

And like you said he is absolutely one of the few people that already knew about about the timelines/the fact that these crises have happened and changed things, but pretty much all the other young justice characters are also aware that there was meddling in the timeline/that multiple timelines and alternate universes like this exist since they were all together as a group when it got explained (in like. yj 2019 #15 i believe is where most of the explaining happens) (and cass as well is aware of things to some extent because of her and steph’s interaction with Brother Eye) but the difference is that Zatanna didn’t go into everyone’s brains, so they aren’t dealing with the same memory things as Tim (and possibly Steph? because again Z DID go in her brain, she just wasn’t able to unlock all the same things as she did with Tim)

but yeah in general i SO wish this was explored more, both in canon and in fanworks (fanworks tho... that can still happen >:3c). Memories hazily coming in for Tim while Kon and Bart are able to confirm or deny things, him dealing with conflicting memories and feelings about his past as they trickle in... like I think we’ll start to see these types of things moving forward across a lot of titles with Infinite Frontier (i BELIEVE dont quote me on this but I BELIEVE the person writing Damian’s upcoming solo had mentioned in an interview that the memories coming back of the other timeline aren’t going to be an all at once thing but will be more gradual for most characters) but the fact that it theoretically had already been happening for Tim for MONTHS and we only got that one crumb indicating it in #16 of it instead of any actual exploration makes me SAAAAAAD

#Anonymous #tim drake #dc comics #meta #sam talks about tim too much #if anyone has diff thoughts interpretations im always down to discuss!#this sent me down a rabbit hole thats why i didnt answer last night it was Suddenly 1am djsjsjs #also sorry no issue numbers on the detective comics stuff but those r screenshots i already had #from my readthrough a while back or google images. so i didnt go check

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mischiefandspirits · 4 years

Text

Colony of Gotham (1/7)

Special thanks to @starlightandsunshine for helping me with this <3

The Colony of Gotham is an urban legend that is whispered about in the dangerous city. It's said the Colony is a family of demons and spirits that stalk the night, hunting for the souls of the guilty.

When Bruce became Batman, he'd never intended to be mistaken for a demon. He was happy to lean into it, though, and as he gained his partners -- as his family grew -- they all followed suit.

Next Part

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Bruce Wayne was born a vampire, one from the long-standing Kane family of vampires through his mother. This nature granted him a few abilities. He was more durable than a human and could heal faster. He was stronger and faster than a human and had better sight and hearing, though not to anywhere near the degree that some metas boasted. He could take on the form of an animal and could influence bats, corvids, canines, and felines to a certain extent. Finally, he would stop aging once he reached his thirties, a trait of those who were born or turned young instead of those like Alfred who were turned at an older age and therefore would always be that age.

However, when he set off on his path to becoming Batman, he swore to himself that he would not rely on any of this to fight the criminals that plagued Gotham. He would not be like those heroes past who relied on their powers, then were left defenseless when those abilities faltered or were ripped away. After all, only a vampire’s healing and longevity remained during the day and some spells and devices could similarly strip his nature away.

Batman stuck to his wits, tech, and martial arts training.

Even still, the criminals of Gotham could tell something was off about the Bat. Rumors flew about a demon haunting Gotham’s night, which Bruce leaned into. He hadn’t chosen a bat just because of the family significance. He wanted to strike fear. As such, he stuck to the shadows and allowed his fangs to bare. He used makeup to make himself appear paler and contortionist tricks to make his movements uncanny. He allowed Batman to become an urban legend that sent shivers down the spines of Gotham’s infamous.

When Barbara Gordon became Batgirl, she quickly realized his tricks were just that and leaned into them as well. She became a ghost following in the Bat’s footsteps. She disappeared into a mist made from special smoke pellets and spun across the ground and air in a weightless way that came from years of ballet and gymnastics training. She wore shadows like Batman’s, but violet and gold peeked through the darkness to make her stand apart.

Bruce initially didn’t want her in the field, but she eventually proved herself both competent and stubborn. In a bid to help protect her, he outfitted her with proper gear and let her in on the secret of his nature. She considered it, then a week later she asked him to turn her so she could always watch his back.

Then Dick Grayson was taken in by the billionaire and became the Bloody Robin. They called him a demon child, the son of the Bat who flew on bird’s wings. His cheerful laughs and giggles echoed and hissed eerily thanks to a voice filter. His clothes were bright colors, but were covered by the wing-like shadows that wrapped over his shoulders. Fake blood dripped from his hair and eyes and coated the tips of his gloves and cape. He chirped like a bird as he flipped and flew through the air. His mask made his eyes glow white and his body almost appeared boneless when he moved around on the ground thanks to the contortionist who’d babysat him at the circus.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The three heard the tales when teams of heroes began to form, but they didn’t reach out. Gotham’s Colony was a myth, an urban legend. Those outside of Gotham had never heard of them and those within only spoke in whispers.

That was how the Colony preferred it.

Besides, the rest of the world wasn’t as dark as Gotham.

Their tricks and games worked fine in the shadow-filled gothic architecture that made up Gotham, the near-perpetual overcast days, and the deep darkness of Gotham’s nights, but cities like Jump, Metropolis, or Central were far brighter. They could do without, they’d proven that plenty of times against the bigger villains that were either too crazy or brave to fear the Bat, but why should they? The tricks and games had become a part of them over the years and discarding a piece of themselves just so they could work outside of Gotham with strangers felt wrong.

So the Colony stuck to their own.

On the job, at least.

Dick met Wally West at a two-week-long Jr. Forensics Summer Camp when they were eleven and thirteen respectively. Bruce had sent him to brush up on his skills while Wally’s mentor, Barry Allen, thought it would be good training. Neither boy knew about each other's secret lives, but became close friends all the same and kept in contact when they returned home. Dick didn’t reveal it to Wally when he discovered the other boy was Kid Flash, but kept a close eye on Central City just in case.

A similar situation happened two years later when the Colony discovered Green Arrow’s latest protégé, a girl named Artemis Crock, lived in Gotham and had been helped into Gotham Academy by the other billionaire. Dick decided to keep an eye on her, but his pseudo-stalking quickly turned into a genuine friendship.

He may have taken a bit too much joy in introducing Wally and Artemis to one another. Wally got back at him a few years later by introducing him to the model Kory Anders, the secret identity of his celebrity crush Starfire. Dick had to admit to having a crush on Kory as well to explain his nerves.

It turned out to be a net gain in the end, though, since he came out of it with her phone number.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As time passed, Dick started to get too old to be the demon child. He decided to create a new story for himself. One that would let him step out from under the shadow of the bat, using a name from an alien myth in Bruce’s files that he’d loved reading growing up. He and Bruce argued, and Dick spent some time sleeping on Barbara’s couch, but with nowhere to run they were forced to come to a compromise. There was still tension, but it was smoothed over with time and a bite.

Nightwing was a nocturnal bird that had taken human shape after being taken in by Batgirl’s elegance. It chased after and raced the ghost, nothing but shadows and a blue streak flying through the air. Those who got close enough to see his face would say that his skin was like porcelain while black wings covered his eyes completely and his lips were painted with darkness.

Nightwing wasn’t the only change to the Colony, though, because as Dick was finishing up his designs for the story, a little boy was stealing the tires off the Batmobile.

Dick was furious when the kid climbed out of the car into the cave, thinking Bruce had brought the kid in as a new Robin without even consulting him, but anger’s quickly replaced by confusion.

Because Batman wasn’t with the kid.

Jason Todd had gotten grabbed by the Bat after having already nicked three tires off the batmobile. Batman caught him before he could run then replaced the tires. He’d made a mistake in leaving the boy in the car when he went to call for someone to pick him up, however. Jason, who some might generously call impulsive, proceeded to use the opportunity presented to him to hotwire the vehicle and take it for a joyride that ended when he accidentally had the autopilot bring him to the cave.

Dick was immediately taken with the small spitfire’s story, as well as his stubbornness and intellect. Meanwhile, Jason was amused by the fact that Gotham’s demon was, in his eyes, nothing more than a spectacular conman and wanted in. They teamed up to force Bruce to adopt the younger boy through underhanded -- and perhaps slightly illegal -- tactics.

As Dick started using his new story more and Robin less, Jason got his own turn under Batman’s cape.

People started to say Robin was more vicious. He’d climb walls, the claws on his feet and hands easily cutting into brick and metal. He’d give a fang-filled smirk as he hung from the ceiling like he’d forgotten he was a bird instead of a bat, only to drop down on unsuspecting shoulders. If he wasn’t clawing at opponents, he was beating them with his fists.

As one of his first acts as Robin, Jason saved a young boy who had been kidnapped for ransom. The kid had acted out of it during the rescue, but Jason put it down to trauma. He’d had no reason to realize the young detective-to-be had noticed the edge of Jason’s fake fangs through the shadows and fake blood. No one could have predicted the rabbit hole young Tim Drake had just fallen down nor that it would lead him to massive discoveries in the near future.

When Jason discovered Catherine Todd wasn’t his birth mother, he considered going alone to look for the mystery woman who’d given birth to him. He and Bruce had just had a fight about his temper that had left him benched and he wanted to prove himself, but something Dick had told him months before echoed in his mind.

“No matter how much we argue, we’re always going to be there for each other. Us birds and bats, we’re a family. We have to stick together.”

In the end, he asked Dick and Barbara for help. It was something he was thankful for when his mother sold him out to the Joker. At least he could hold out against the torment with the knowledge his true family would soon come for him.

When Batgirl and Nightwing arrived, Joker fled. Barbara got Jason out while Dick, after seeing the state of his brother, tracked down the clown. Bruce got to him just in time to stop him from beating Joker to death, but when he saw Jason’s condition he couldn’t bring himself to scold his elder son for his loss of control.

Jason was barely hanging on and Bruce, knowing there was no other choice, turned him.

The boy lived, but his injuries were too severe and he fell into a coma.

Three weeks later, Bruce and Dick came into Bruce’s study to find Tim Drake waiting for them. Both were a little more focused on “My parents are never home” than “so I’m in a perfect position to cover for Jason as Robin while he’s sleeping,” to Tim’s confusion, but he ended up in the suit all the same.

The whispers that had come after Joker’s latest incarceration had him crowing about clipping bird wings tapered off as Robin sightings flared up throughout the city. People saw him flying next to the Bat and they heard him tap-tap-tapping his claws. He tapped them against the walls as he hunted through warehouses and against the floors as he crouched in front of technology that seemed to unlock under his gaze thanks to the computer that’d been built into his gloves, the interface of which could only be seen through the lenses in the Colony’s masks and cowls.

Tim didn’t really know how to feel about being adopted by Bruce, aside from the guilt he knew was mixed in there somewhere. It felt wrong to be slipping into the family like that while Jason was right there and Dick had to talk him down when the anxiety attack eventually hit.

Tim was Tim. He wasn’t Jason and they didn’t want him to be Jason.

Dick understood though. He explained how Dick and Jason had both had similar feelings regarding Barbara and Dick respectively, though Dick could admit he’d gotten off easier all things considered. He told Tim that the Colony was a family, and adoption or not, Tim was a part of that now. Jason wasn’t going anywhere and neither was Tim.

When Jason woke, Dick had a similar conversation with him after Jay saw a news broadcast about Tim while waiting for the others to arrive. It soothed him some, and Tim soothed him more when he assured Jason he wasn’t taking Robin from him.

“There can’t be two Robins.”

“Why can’t there?”

As Jason went through physical training to get back in shape, the two worked together to develop a strategy for acting as Robin together. One part of this was Trillic.

Tim, with help from Dick and Jason, invented a secret language made up of chirps, whistles, and clicks. It started as a way for the Robins to communicate with each other without giving away there was more than one, but over time the rest of the Colony picked it up and the vocabulary expanded until it became the family’s own personal language that they’d use whenever they didn’t feel like using words.

A few days after Jason was released from the hospital, Dick found Jason down in the cave and grew worried his little brother was pushing himself too soon after his accident. Then he saw the young woman on the screen. She looked a year or two older than Jason with long red hair, olive skin, and bright green eyes.

They’d met in Ethiopia, Jason told him, while saving a woman from some men. Jason had wanted to try to track her down now that he was awake. He’d succeeded, but it turned out she was an Amazonian hero.

Combined with the fact her name was Artemis, Dick couldn’t help but laugh and make a joke about Jason following in his footsteps. Jason smacked him and told him she was really more of an anti-hero so it wasn’t the same as Dick making friends with Kid Flash and Tigress, but Dick ignored him.

Jason did end up contacting her, and even got her to take a visit to Gotham. Dick took the opportunity to introduce her to Wally and his own Artemis, who Wally began to refer to as Stripes to not get confused. When questioned, he claimed it was because of some outfit of hers that stuck in his mind. Dick and Jason, knowing it was actually based on her identity as Tigress, nodded along and picked up using the name, to her annoyance.

Surprisingly, the two women didn’t get along despite their similar attitudes. This led to them taking great offense whenever people couldn’t tell which Artemis was being talked about, something only Jason, Dick, and Alfred never managed to do.

While the teens were laughing over this, whispers were going around about how the Bloody Robin seemed to be everywhere. If you fled from a room you knew he was in, you’d find him standing right in front of you in the new room. There was no escape. And he trilled more than ever, though his voice almost seemed to echo back at him as if he was having a conversation.

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Not long after the Justice League had formed, Barbara had hacked into their security system and planted a little bug she named Mockingbird. It was designed to alert her whenever someone mentioned the Colony’s civilian or vigilante identities and copy any footage during the time. More often than not all it gave her was Wally and Bow-Artemis (as most of the family thought of her, to contrast with Axe-Artemis) discussing Dick. Every so often though, there’d be someone pining after Dick or Bruce, which could be good for a laugh depending on who it was.

On a day not long after the Robins had been set loose together, Mockingbird gave her something that was sort of new, yet at the same time not.

The video started with Wally discussing some prank he and Dick had pulled on Bruce and slowly devolved into him just bragging about how awesome Dick was. Suddenly he froze, staring off into the air.

Artemis took one look at him and asked, “Did you finally realize you’ve got a crush on your best friend?”

He immediately went to reassure his girlfriend, but she said got it and even shared his feelings.

Barbara settled in to watch the show.

Unfortunately, it took longer than she’d anticipated for Dick to catch on that the two actually wanted to date him and not just spend more time with him. He was usually pretty good at picking up on people’s feelings, yet Artemis ended up having to pull him into her lap during a movie night and kiss him flat on the lips before it sunk in.

When Barbara approached him about it, he pouted over her spying. Then he admitted that he’d known for years they all had feelings for each other, he just hadn’t wanted to risk getting in the middle of the two’s relationship since they seemed so happy together. When he’d realized how they’d started flirting with him, he’d been worried they were just after a quick thing and he couldn’t do that to himself. So he’d put on his media mask of naive ditz Dickie who wouldn’t recognize flirting if it hit him in the face.

Thankfully the two had reassured him and after talking it through, the three settled happily into their throuple.

To congratulate his brother, Jason gave him a solid week before making jokes about Dick following in Bruce’s footsteps by dating someone with a feline-themed suit.

The next hurdle was deciding how to deal with the media. Dick was Richard “Dickie” Grayson, eldest son of Bruce Wayne. The media loved to go on about him. Pretty much every second of his relationship with Kory had been recorded by the press. Neither of them had minded. He was still a performer at heart, always would be, and she was a warrior princess who had been in the spotlight all her life.

But Dick knew Wally and Artemis weren’t Kory so he talked to them about how they wanted to handle things.

In the end, they agreed only friends and family would know about Artemis, but Wally and Dick would go public. They all had practice keeping much bigger secrets so it wasn’t hard on Artemis to hide their relationship. Meanwhile, Wally didn’t mind playing around for the cameras. Plus, he knew how people treated Dick when they thought he was single and a small possessive part of him didn’t want them trying anything, even if he knew Dick would never cheat.

Things didn’t actually turn out too bad. Of course, there were always the conservatives that came around when Dick got a boyfriend, but they never stuck around long. Bruce had made his support of Dick’s sexuality very clear from the beginning and no one wanted to risk really ticking someone as rich and connected as him off by attacking his son like that.

The real problem came when their agreement to tell their families accidentally didn’t reach everyone.

Dick had been alone at the manor when it happened.

Bruce had gone on a weekend business trip, bringing Tim with him. Alfred was on a trip to England. Jason had taken the opportunity to spend the weekend hopefully not blowing things up with Artemis Grace, who had ended up getting a small flat in Gotham to act as her home base so she could visit with Jason and Dick during the rare occasions she wasn’t running across the world causing trouble with the Outlaws. Dick had been planning to spend the weekend with his partners at Stripe’s apartment, but they’d both been caught up by something (Dick assumed a mission had unexpectedly run long) so he had the night to himself.

He was watching a movie in the theater room when he felt a shift in the air. He immediately dropped to the floor, barely avoiding the sai that had been coming for his throat. Then he was over the back of the couch and engaging the assassin. He quickly realized she was with the League of Assassins as he recognized moves Bruce had picked up from them. She was good, too, but she had clearly come to the fight unprepared to face a Gotham myth. He didn’t take too many hits before pinning her and binding her hands and feet with the obijime from her dress. He then disarmed her of all her hidden weapons just in case.

When he questioned her, she declared that she was Artemis’s sister and had come to avenge her honor after Wally had betrayed her for Dick. She was not going to sit back and let the fool cheat on or dump her sister for the likes of a man she had believed was nothing more than an airheaded socialite.

Then, with narrowed eyes, she added that she had clearly been mistaken as not many airheaded socialites had been trained by assassins. Nor did they use moves only known by those trained by Ra’s al Ghul.

Dick ignored that and explained the trio’s situation as he untied her, having recognized her as Cheshire aka Jade Nguyen aka his girlfriend’s -- apparently protective -- assassin sister.

He took pride in the fact that he was dating someone who was only related to criminals instead of actually dating a criminal, unlike a certain father of his.

She thankfully believed him, though she did warn that should he be lying or should he hurt Artemis, she wouldn’t underestimate him a second time. She made a few more thinly veiled digs at his assassin-based fighting style as he showed her out that he cleanly sidestepped with comments about self-defense training. They both knew she didn’t believe a word of it, but she left it alone as she slipped away into the night.

So long as her sister remained unharmed, she had no desire to get involved in whatever was going on between the Wayne’s and al Ghul’s.

Before she left Gotham, though, she met Artemis and Wally on their way in and informed her sister that she approved of her new boyfriend. Both to be sure Dick was telling the truth and to mess with the speedster. The two predictably freaked out and she used their panic to slip away.

Dick answered Artemis’s call with, “Oh hey, Stripes! Your sister came by earlier to give me the shovel talk over tea. It was pretty gory, but I think the one Jason gave Wally was still probably worse so I’m not going to complain. Are we still on for tomorrow?” to their relief.

Artemis had not wanted to try to explain her assassin sister to her civilian boyfriend.

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I decided to use Stephanie's Batgirl suit for Babs because most of Babs' suits are either bright or look just like Batman's. Steph will get other suits of hers when she appears.

The Robin suit looks just like Dick's from The Batman (2004), just bloodier.

Nightwing's suit looks like the typical V one, just with the eyes of the mask being blacked out. Also, black lipstick because yes.

Vampires’ animal forms:

Bruce: Gray bat

Alfred: Common raven

Selina: Oriental shorthair cat

Barbara: Little red flying fox

Dick: Black-billed magpie

Jason: Malayan flying fox

#batman #batfam #colony of gotham #fanfiction

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currentfandomkick · 4 years

Text

Marinette did Not sign up for this part 5

so, this happened. i would feel bad, but the characters hijacked this story after chapter 1 and i’m just along for the ride and checking that words makes sense.

First part here Previous Here ao3 Here

“Hey Alya, you haven’t been getting more hits on your blog from Gotham lately, have you?” Marinette asked.

Alya rolled her eyes as honestly, could her bestie be any less obvious? She could see the “new” necklace. The one that only shows up when Multimouse is on call. Honestly—why is it everyone keeps thinking she doesn’t know who’s who? She’s the Fox—Illusions and Truth are her bread and butter.

“Now that you mention it,” Alya pulled up her latest stats. “Yes. The whole site—jeez these guys must have just found out and want the scoop from the best source in Paris,” Alya preened.

Marinette acted… different after she got that answer. Moved in on herself. Alya could feel the attempt at a cover-up before she even asked.

“Hey, is something up?”

“Nothing! Nothing is up, why would something be up! Ha, that’s a good one Alya!”

Ah, the miraculous-related tic was in full swing then. Marinette isn’t exactly the most in-the-know miraculous user, and the Mouse is always taken back after its been used. She could be forgiven for assuming Alya, the expert in all things Miraculous second only to the Original duo and their boss, would not know that something was going on in a certain spotted heroine’s life, and it was all hands on deck.

“Okay,” Alya switched to her theory notes, “Any new names to add to the ‘would not be surprised if they were Hawkmoth’ list?” Marinette is a goldmine on this topic, and while miraculous adjacent, definitely able to ease the whole ‘not in control’ and helpless feelings this situation was probably stirring in her girl. She knew it was for herself atleast.

Marinette perked up with a familiar ‘I know what you will say, but lets do this anyway’ type of sly smile. “Okay, so we do agree that it has to be someone that knows Gabriel’s schedule and doesn’t want to interfere with it for the most part, right?”

“Well,” Alya wasn’t letting this hunch go anytime soon, no matter what LB and Chat said about evidence against. She knew she was onto something with it, and for all she knew, some miraculous magic could be interfering. “I still say it could be him and Natalie taking turns, but that doesn’t rule them both out.”

Marinette shot Alya a look, of the ‘I strongly disagree, but feel it is futile to remind you why’ variety.

“I’m kidding, your boss isn’t Hawkmoth, I know… He’d totally have better designs for akumas if he was.”

Marinette leaned forward conspiratorially. “You should have seen him tear into the Bubbler one when I brought it up as an example of horrible design. His face was perfect!”

Alya would love to imagine the many, many ways to torment Gabriel after what she and Nino have come to understand about the man from their friends. Ranging from negligent and uninvolved control freak at best to manipulative, victim-blaming, and abusive POS. If Adrien and Marinette were a little less attached (re: not pedestalling the man so much), then she could get them to see the truth and they could go over the pair’s options to get them both away from his BS and make the man pay for the all the crap he put Adrien through, and was starting to put Marinette through. Why else would the girl be running herself ragged—especially the past week—if the man wasn’t a demanding asshole boss?

“That’s great, next time, get a pic or vid and share the love.”

“I will, so I met another one of his suppliers and…” Alya began to take vicious notes, glad for Marinette’s attention to detail on these things. It made looking for possible Hawkmoths much easier on her and Max—yes she knows who Pegasus and Cowboy are, Markov in a hat is still Markov in a hat. It was a wonder that no one else noticed.

Alya grinned when she saw Trixx peek out of her hiding place, a wide smile that reminded her exactly why Alya could catch everyone’s identity while her friends still hadn’t put together she’s Rena; a Fox casts illusions. To do that well, you have to learn to seek and see the truth, and get your evidence. And Alya? Is a damn good fox.

----------

Tim hates his stupid insane list of designers. He managed to knock of half by using his own damn filters, thank you very much for dominant genes from the Wayne side that could be seen visually. It knocked out a good chunk (about two thousand out of five thousand) on hair alone. He decided he would let it keep running for those that linked their socials to their psueds and aliases.

The problem was the handful (about ten) that didn’t. He’d have to meet them in person, used his glasses to get pictures, and run those against social media posts in Paris to find out who these more private designers were—all to find out if they really are in the right age range, and if their natural features do put them in the ‘likely a Wayne’ category for Wayne dominant traits (and those possible given Bruce’s own DNA makeup, which he doesn’t know Tim has. Hey, he’s the Robin that Gets Shit Done, never said he was the polite one. That’s Dick’s job, not his.)

---------

Adrien hates not having Plagg with him. Not that Tikki isn’t great and all! Really! Just… he misses him and his stinky cheese, okay?

“Adrien,” Natalie knocked on the door.

“Come in.”

Natalie entered the doorway, but no further. “When is Marinette free for consultations next? we have a high end client who would like to commission her as soon as possible.”

“Give me a minute…” Adrien checked his ‘overseeing Marinette’ schedule on his phone. “Uh, she has walk-ins around four until five tomorrow.”

“Excellent. Will she be at her home or the studio Gabriel has provided for consultations?” By her tone, he could tell which Natalie and Father would prefer.

“Let me check with her.”

“See that you do.”

Adrien sent a lipstick, X arm lady, and house emoji to Marinette.

In a minute she sent back a thumbs up and apartment building emoji.

“Studio it is.”

Natalie nodded. “Excellent choice. I will let them know to be there at four ten, given Marinette’s… difficulty arriving on time.”

Adrien grimaced a bit on that as yeah… no longer having a Danger sense meant her punctuality was… not very good. “Are they speaking to Marinette or MDC?”

He’d need to know if he should just pick her up or not. MDC didn’t have to get picked up—designers to celebrities are allowed to be late and can blame it on getting caught up in a few details on a commission design for a walk-in consultation. Marinette was tied to the Gabriel Brand and needed to reflect that, therefore, be there on time and ready.

“Marinette for now, though they expressed an interest in MDC as a budding designer, and they are well within the MDC price range,” Natalie hinted.

Adrien kept the hiss growing in the back of throat quiet. Marinette chooses who MDC works with, not his Father.

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Stephanie is both delighted and upset when she sees Cass. As its Cass—she probably figured it out already damn it!—but its Cass and she missed her since she left a few months back for a mission and got caught up in the Chinese crime scene again.

“Hey Cass!”

Cass grinned when she saw Steph and made her way over.

“Found her!”

Stephanie was gutted. She really wanted to win, just this once, at a detective thing. You know, be the normal one that managed to out-do the prodigies and geniuses. Not to be again. “Oh, that’s great. Where is the baby bat?”

Cass shook her head. “Not her, Soup Girl.”

Stephanie opened and shut her mouth. Then lit up as she still has a chance! “Oh, right—right! You said you wanted to meet her a while back.”

Cass nodded. “Her family is nice.”

“Did you talk to her or…”

Cass shook her head. “Busy.”

“Ah.” That made sense. “Well, uh, still competing?”

Cass raised an eyebrow. That was a yes.

“Maybe we should work on helping her on the hero side of things together, you know, so we don’t freak her out when we all swarm her place. Make the whole thing a bit less…”

“Dramatic.”

Stephanie nodded. It would help ease the girl into the family, and keep Cass on that case instead of finding Baby Bat for a bit. Win-Win for Stephanie and Baby Bat.

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Chatte Noire really, really hates dealing with akumas. She's built for strategy, to see tricky parts and work out how to make them safer for the team and minimize risk. She is not made to be Chatte Noire. Yet here she is, in an akuma attack, trying to play the role of a Black Cat—identify and destroy threats to the team. Problem is, she lacks Chat Noir's heightened ability to sense danger. In fact, she lacks it completely--and she knows the team isn't happy.

The attack is taking longer than it would if she was Ladybug. This would be over if she had just managed to keep her big mouth shut and not talked to Aquaman. Then the Justice League wouldn’t be involved. Then the whole promise to Murder Robin would not be broken and Paris would already be saved for the day instead of dealing with another Sandboy attack going on well into the night, with a cure that won’t be able to handle fatigue, energy renewal or relax the body for sleep post ‘I’m scared out of my mind’ fear.

She made sure to avoid this Sandboy’s attacks and she would save whoever got caught. Her Cataclysms may not be as strong as Chat’s (his do make the whole thing go away) but she is just as quick on her feet and just as good at getting civilians out of danger.

“Chatte!”

“On it Buggaboy! And not yet!”

It was too off for the Lucky Charm. They’d need Viperion, and he was stuck underwater with Aquaman trying to get him out at the moment. Until then, she just had to minimize damage, keep civilians away from their nightmares hunting them down, and keep moving and planning and work everything out while playing bodyguard for the team at Cha—At Mr. Bug’s call.

She hopes things turn out okay.

Then she sees a bat symbol and the world vanishes.

----------

Red Hood blinked when he saw some girl running around on rooftops in… Isn’t Chat Noir supposed to be the cat one? Where the hell is Ladybug—and why is some guy in her place? Shit, did the baby bat lose her miraculous or was it stolen? Damnit, now he has to steal it back for her!

“Okay, how did LB get hit when she isn’t even here?” The fox girl groaned as she dodged another attack. “Aren’t these guys supposed to go after who’s scared of them?”

The bee girl rolled her eyes. “More than just Ladybug can be terrified of the bats. They’re the Ghosts, remember?”

“Hey, can we argue about fears and who has rights to them some other time?” fake ladybug asked, flinching and moving closer to the Turtle guy. “Uh, Chatte, that way!”

Cat girl—Chatte— said something he didn’t catch and grabbed a kid stuck in a mob and bounce out.

“I—” the boy threw his hands up. “We’re screwed. She really, really isn’t getting the whole Cat thing.”

Red Hood pulled out his guns, checking that the darts were loaded and aiming for Spots.

“Chatte---guy with a gun!”

This time cat girl managed to look over and froze. She started… hyperventilating? Shit—kid’s having an attack.

Red Hood lowered his gun and made sure to get closer to her---seeing as the other heroes—Dragon girl, Monkey boy and Snake Guy were busy with the bee and fox girls trying to circle some kid on a pillow. No clue where the other kid in black was, but the cat girl losing it? that was his current focus.

“Kid, come on, breathe.”

“Oh my—” the kid looked at him like he was the threat. “Fuck, no—I shouldn’t have talked back to---shit. Shit, now I’m gonna—”

“VOYAGE!”

Just like that, Red Hood was dropped into Gotham harbor. Jason didn’t even get to look around to see what happened. He did manage to tread water and work out which was to go to get to shore.

“Oracle!”

“Jesus Hood—sending Robin to your location. What happened?”

“Some kids stole baby bats’ jewels, some akuma attack, the actual cat thief was hyperventilating and then I end up here.”

“Oh, B is not going to like this.”

“I already don’t like it.” Batman growled out over comms. “Did someone say voyage?”

Red Hood wracked his somewhat waterlogged brain. “In French, yes.”

“One of the local heroes.” Jason could feel Bruce’s annoyance. “Why were you in Paris.”

“Well,” Red Hood kept swimming to shore. “When you find out a long lost bat is in life threatening danger, one must locate and meet this possible winner of the ‘avoided having crappy parents raise me’ lottery to give a well-earned ‘congrats, you’re a well-adjusted person in a family of crimefighter! Mazel tav.”

“Hood.” Robin began on a private channel. “We need to talk.”

“Gotta go B, life to live, baby bat to find.”

“Red Hood!”

“Bye!” Red Hood climbed out of the harbor, finding his baby brother on his motorcycle that was definitely not Bruce-Approved.

“What’s up buttercup, didja miss me?”

Robin scowled at him. “Of course not, the world is more peaceful without the drivel that falls out of your mouth.”

Red Hood snorted. “Yeah, and that’s why you hide in my room all the time.”

Robin refused to make eye contact, shoving Red Hood onto his bike. “Is it true, did my sister lose her miraculous?”

“Unless she’s B and Catwoman’s lovechild and she decided to embrace it.”

Robin was quiet on the way to the cave. “…how long would it take to get the pilot to return and take me to Paris?”

“…you’d make it there around their in time for dessert.”

Robin frowned. “that’s not soon enough.”

“Closest you’ll get. And don’t’ think you’re going alone.”

Robin frowned. “I am not exposing my sister to you.”

“She’s our sister first of all,” Red Hood corrected. “and second of all, I have a bet to win, and I’m behind thanks to this portal guy. So I’m coming.”

Robin rolled his eyes. “Only if you get past Father and Alfred.”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

Robin smirked as they pulled into the Batcave.

“Father, I believe Red Hood needs your full attention given he was in the harbor for so long, and we all know how cold they are this time of year.”

Jason decided Damian was by and far his least favorite sibling in that moment. “Wait, B, no, look—no signs of hypothermia, no shaking, just need to change and—”

“I will check and ensure you don’t develop it with Alfred on standby.”

Jason glared at Damian, already stripping from his Robin gear with that self-satisfied smirk. “Traitor!”

“I simply want what is best for my siblings, how is that wrong?”

----------

I hope this gave you all a good idea of what’s going to happen next… I do love the Batfam and all, but some of their approaches here… no good and need to have that hit over their head.

And if I’m screwing up ladybats characterization, feel free to let me know so I can fix it---going off what I could find from DC fans and lore but I also do not know these characters inside and out, and want to do them justice.

OH and for anytime i refrence princess Justice, got a refrence for you now! picture the one made by @tinymelonbug right here with the only (maybe?) change being that below the cut it is cut off as a romper: Here

TAGS:

@heldtogetherbysafetypins @laurcad123 @raisuke06 @chaosace @jeminiikrystal @toodaloo-kangaroo @kris-pines04

#maribat #bio!dad bruce #marinette did not sign up for this #part 5 #long post #ml au #my writing #how do i tag?

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rhub4rb · 5 years

Text

Home is Where the Heart is

AO3

[First chapter] [Previous chapter] [Next chapter]

-_-_-_-

Damian didn't try to hide his disdain for Marinette one bit. He knew his father wanted him to accept that Marinette was now part of the family, but he simply couldn't. He had no reason to trust her, no matter what Alfred said.

It felt like a leech had been let into his home and no one was doing anything to get rid of it.

To be completely honest, he was still half-convinced that she was League of Assassins member that was there to get him.

So, he made his disdain for her obvious. He wanted her gone. Bruce, however, was having none of it for some reason, trust that the butler told his father something.

And what was even going on with Alfred and Marinette? There was no way that the girl's story of her grandfather and Alfred being true, so what was their actual relation? Was Alfred betraying them?

Damian told all of this to Jon as they entered the Manor. Everyone in the household knew he didn't like the girl, so there was no point in hiding it.

"I mean really, why let her stay? I don't know what that girl has led Alfred to believe about her, but I for one don't believe a single word."

"Jon?" Marinette's voice cuts through their conversation, and Damian could hardly believe his eyes and ears for a moment because Jon knows Marinette? "Jon!"

"Marinette!" Jon exclaims with a smile, hugging the girl tightly, and for a moment, Damian was sure he was going to throw up. "I see you found the manor?"

"Yeah! Thank you for the address again, I would probably still be looking for Alfred if it weren't for you," For a moment, the two just stared into each others eyes and smiled and Damian had never wanted to gouge his eyes out more than in that moment.

And then what Marinette said processed in his head.

"You were the one to bring this menace into my life?" Damian asked in disbelief, his eyes wide as he looked between the two. Marinette winced.

"I bumped into her when I was running late for our study session a couple of days ago," Jon told Damian, and Damian felt like jumping out of a window because he remembered how late Jon had been and it was because of her. "We met again the day after that and kind of went on a date?" It was said in hesitance, Jon looking at Marinette with a clear question in his eyes, to which Marinette nodded before perking up.

"Oh yeah! I got a phone now!" She dug said phone out of her back pocket, and Damian reminded himself to have a very long talk with Drake later. "I can finally get your number."

Damian could hardly believe it. It was as if the two were in their own little world! Once Jon had handed back the phone to Marinette, Damian was quick to snatch his wrist and drag Jon away, but not fast enough for Jon to not dopily grin as he waved at the girl.

Jon: want to go out for coffee again sometime?

Marinette had to hold back the squeal that threatened to spill from her lips. She and Jon had been texting and calling each other frequently since she finally got her phone, but they hadn't gone out on another date.

That was about to change she supposed.

She had been slightly hesitant to keep what she had with Jon going after Damian found out. She knew the youngest Wayne wasn't too fond of her, and she didn't exactly want to fuel the fire by continuing to date his best friend.

However, Marinette was practicing the act of being selfish, and Jon was cute. Plus, Tikki had chewed her out thoroughly when Marinette had voiced these thoughts.

"I'll be damned if I let you give another thing up just because Damian has some issues."

Still, Marinette had the sinking feeling that Damian was plotting something. Not that she blamed him, but having to constantly look over her shoulder, feeling that she was being watched, increased her paranoia to a point where she could hardly even sleep at night.

When Marinette had accepted being adopted by Bruce Wayne, she knew things between her and the brothers would be tense. Things with Tim were fine, he was the one she was the closest with so far, then came Dick, but she had a feeling he was just more accepting and outgoing than the others.

Jason... Marinette wasn't quite sure what Jason thought of her. He looked at her like a mystery mixed with a ticking time bomb. He didn't try to reach out, and most of the time, he wasn't even at the manor. Then again, Jason didn't even seem fond of Bruce most of the time either, so she assumed it wasn't just her he had a problem with.

Damian was the one who was most clear with his disdain. He had no problem loudly proclaiming that he disliked her, didn't try to make things go smoother between the two of them, which... Marinette could accept it, but it was frustrating. She wanted to be able to make things better between the two of them. She was, technically, his sister now.

Rome wasn't built in a day, but Marinette was now nearing the end of her first month in the manor, and the constant animosity was draining.

Marinette: I'd love to!

She supposed it would take more than just time to get closer to Damian, to understand him properly, but patience was a trait Marinette had learned, and sometimes she wanted to forget those lessons she was taught.

Jon: I'll pick you up at 3 tomorrow?

Marinette smiled at the screen, pushing thoughts of Damian aside for later.

Marinette: It's a date!

Marinette was positively buzzing when Jon picked her up the next day. She ignored the death glare shot her way by Damian, just beamed at Jon and pretended she didn't notice.

Jon noticed the glare his friend sent her way, but didn't comment. Even he knew that it wouldn't be the most tactful thing to do.

Despite Marinette's protests that they would be fine, Alfred still drove them to the main city, and while she did know that it was faster, she also knew that Alfred was enjoying "chaperoning" on her date.

It wasn't even like he didn't know Jon! From what Marinette had been told by Jon himself, he had met Damian when he was twelve and Damian was fourteen. The two had become friends despite Damian's best attempts at denying it and pushing Jon away. Maybe Marinette could ask Jon for advice...

When they arrived at the coffee shop, ordered and got seated, there was an awkward moment of silence as neither knew what to say. Marinette fidgeted in her seat, picking at her cuticles as Jon's eyes darted around the place, both of them searching for words to say.

For a moment, their eyes meet, and they both cracked. Their shared laughter caused other patrons to glare their way, but for just a second, things felt like they were exactly where they were supposed to be for Marinette.

When the two of them calmed down, they went into silence again, but this time there was a certain level of comfort to it.

"So you fell victim to the serial adopter," Jon commented suddenly.

Marinette blinked, eyebrows raised. "I uh, yeah... Not what I expected to happen when I arrived in Gotham but..." she shrugged. "I don't know how to feel about it all yet. And you don't think it's weird now that I'm technically your best friend's sister? You know Damian isn't particularly fond of me."

Jon shrugged, "Damian isn't fond of a lot of people."

Marinette let out a snort, though her expression fell quickly again. "Yeah..." She looked down, face in a frown as she turned her cup in her hands.

"Hey," Jon reached across the table, placing his hands over hers, stopping the turning of the teacup. "Just give him some time, yeah? It took me almost a year to get on his good side, you've only been part of the family for a couple of weeks."

She sighed, nodding, before looking up at him and smiled a small smile of appreciation.

"Thanks."

Jon smiled brighter than the sun, and for a moment, she was so sure her heart was going to melt.

"Nothing to thank me for," he squeezed her hands, cheeks tinted red, before he let them go again. "Now, 20 questions, I want to know more about the mysterious Marinette Wang."

Marinette was happy to oblige.

Damian felt his irritation growing as Marinette's giggles entered the manor, accompanied by his best friend's full-hearted laughter.

Todd had been on his back all day the moment Marinette left on her date with Jon, teasing him about the fact that his "sister" was dating his best friend. It was pissing him off, both Todd, as well as Wang and Jon spending time with one another. He wasn't jealous, far from it, he had no romantic interest in either of them, but Jon was his friend first, Jon should be spending time with him.

Of all the people Jon could have ended up being interested in, it just had to be her. Jon didn't even decide to stop seeing her after he found out she was the girl who beat his brothers!

Damian refused to feel impressed by the fact she could do that, instead focusing on the fact that she was a threat, she should be neutralized, and not be living in the manor where the Batcave was right under her feet.

At least his father had the sense to not tell her about the vigilante work. It did surprise him, especially seeing as Damian himself was starting to grow out of the Robin name. He wanted something for himself now, create his own legacy. Perhaps the old Bat was finally considering retiring.

Damian leaned against the wall as Marinette stretched herself up to the tip of her toes, kissing Jon on his cheek before scurrying away, Damian glaring at her for a moment when she looked his way.

"I don't get what you see in her."

"And I don't get what you have against her."

It was quiet for a moment before Jon sighed.

"If it bothers you so much-"

"No, no, keep seeing her, just don't say I didn't warn you when she suddenly attacks you," Damian said, raising his hands in a placating manner.

"She's not like that," Jon said, trying to defend, despite knowing it would probably lead to nothing.

"That's easy for you to say, you don't live with her."

"And yet I've talked more to her than you have."

They fell into silence again, Damian's face carefully blank while Jon's was furrowed with worry. Suddenly, Jon walked forward and grabbed Damian's wrist, then started to drag the boy up to his room.

"What are you doing?" Damian asked indignantly, clearly not enjoying being pulled around.

"We're hanging out, no talk about girls, just playing video games." It looked like Jon wanted to say something for a moment but decided against it. Damian didn't comment.

They walked in silence until,

"I still don't get what you see in her though."

-_-_-_-

@constancetruggle @mojos-biggest-fan @lysslovesanime @heredmaquam @luciferge @scribblinggraveyard @thatfandomsgirl @eliza-bich @ki77h3dr4g0n @crazylittlemunchkin @worlds-tiniest-spook-pastry @skyel0ve @serenacross200 @valeks-princess @thebananathatwrites @aurordraws @nothernbluetongue @bluerosette23 @xxmadamjinxx @graduatedmelon @tritaledkitsune @tinybrie @shamefullove @screechingflapbiscuitpeach @danielslilangel @vivilakitty @kurogaya913 @elspethshadow @theatreandcomicfreak @naoryllis @lordsmeldingtonthethird

#marijon #joninette #jonette #maribat #home is where the heart is #marinette x jon

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bigskydreaming · 5 years

Text

The Ric Grayson AND Talon storylines both end at the same time, and in the same way:

Great Grandpa Creeper Cobb successfully manipulates Ric into position to be brainwashed and become the Talon that Willie the Weenie has always wanted him to be.....this happens for like, two issues.

Then Grandpa Get Ye To A Graveyard Already fucks up....he accidentally brings Talon Ric within sighting distance of the Court’s latest crop of prospective Talon recruits, including a wee baby ten year old orphan being trained to be a future Talon.

And the essential corn kernel of Dick Grayson’s essence, deep down in his psyche, just fucking POPS like its Orville Redenbacher and someone just nuked it in the microwave.

And the real Dick Grayson comes SHRIEKING to the forefront of Talon!Ric’s brain, nothing subtle about it, and the next thing his Rancid Relative knows, he’s being fucking impaled by his great grandson’s blades as said great grandson, who is SUPPOSED to be docilely brainwashed, wtf, is already halfway across the room, diving into the mass of other Talons like they’re a collection of bowling pins and he’s a wrecking ball straight out of a Miley Cyrus music video, but instead of the caterwauling lyrics “I never hit so haaaaaaaard in love,” Dick’s accompanied by a soundtrack of him screaming:

“I WILL PROTECT YOU SMOL CHILD!!!”

As said smol child is just standing there, staring, like....dude, wut?

And then Dick finishes absolutely DESTROYING everything undead and nefarious in sight like he’s the Tasmanian Devil on meth, and he turns to said smol child and begins the process of Smothering, as his hands flutter all up and down checking for injuries but not touching, like:

“Did they hurt you are you alright you’re safe now cough once for I’m all good or punch me in the no-no’s if I’m making you feel unsafe, I will make sure you are totally safe from here on out, you are my baby now, I have decided, but like, only if you want to be.”

And smol child is decidedly overwhelmed but Man-Who-Speaks-Like-He-Has-Pixie-Sticks-In-Place-Of-Blood-Vessels seems harmless, if weird, and is definitely preferable to the weird Bird Men who kidnapped him off the streets and tried to teach him how to kill people and make death threats out of nursery rhymes. And he doesn’t have a lot of experience in OTHER subterranean lairs to compare this one too, but he’s decidedly not a fan, so when Dick asks if he would like him to take him to see Batman and Batgirl and Robin and other superheroes who can also reassure him there will be no more homework on How To Torture People Good, he’s like....”yeah I guess. If you want.”

And so Dick scoops him up with glee and takes off through the tunnels, yelling back over his shoulder: “Bye Greatly-Gross-Grandpa, hate you lots, don’t call, don’t write, you’re officially off my Christmas card list, hasta la neeeeeeeeeever.”

Thereupon swiftly grappling across the Bludhaven rooftops, yelling PARKOUR! just because he can and its fun, and its weirdly relaxing for his wee passenger, because look, this dude may be weird as fuck, but he’s clearly got the moves to protect him from the Undead Legions of Ornithologists and he seems too....fun to be evil, like not in the Joker kinda way like he’s seen on TV in previous foster homes where its like, jeez dude, try hard much, but more like an adult who just quit a soul-crushing cubicle-dwelling corporate-craphole job and has suddenly been reminded that the sky is blue, flowers smell good, and there IS a Santa Claus, Virginia.

Thus by the time they arrive at Wayne Manor, with no attempt made to hide where they’re going from his wee passenger’s eyes - Dick has already decided he’s keeping the kid, pending said kid’s approval but look, kids like him and he’s determined to bring his A game to the pitch meeting, so he likes his chances - said wee passenger disembarks in the Batcave but stays close by, clinging to Dick’s side in an ever so slight way that allows for plausible deniability later, once he gets his bearings and also his bravado back.

“Dick?!” Comes the chorus of voices from the rest of the family, who are all there already, by great coincidence and in great defiance of the crapfests in their own individual titles, but also who the fuck cares. And Dick puffs out his chest, cuz he’s putting on a good show for his new kiddo, first impressions are important...

“Tis I, fam! The one true Dick Grayson has returned! Huzzah!”

Look, being completely oblivious to his Greatest Dork Energy coinciding with his Times He Most Attempts To Be Impressive, is like, Peak Dick Grayson characterization, you can trust me, I’m a doctor.

And Tim’s like, “Why are you dressed like a Talon?”

And Dick’s like, “Isn’t the better question why AREN’T you dressed like a Talon?”

Which makes no sense but shhh, I’m running out of steam here, don’t question the atmosphere, just let it be.

And Bruce is like, “Who’s your friend?”

With like...designs and agendas already in mind, because said wee Talon-to-be is cute and adorable and bravely trying to act like he is not at all intimidated by his surroundings and is in total control of what’s going on like, he meant to be here, this is all according to plan, yes, excellent, everything is progressing nicely....

Which as everyone knows, are the three key essential traits Bruce looks for in prospective adoptees....

So Dick snarls and later blames it on residual Talon-ness, they’re very territorial bird...assassin....people....anyway, the adrenaline is still high and also he has swiftly become attached because whether kiddo knows it or not, Dick 100% credits him with the brainwash-breaking and thus when factored in with the cuteness quotient, what we have here is an instant recipe for Protectiveness slash Possessiveness that would be creepy and inappropriate if this wasn’t pure crack.

But crack it is, and thus Dick curls a protective arm around the kiddo like the lap-bar on a particularly turbulent roller coaster and applies G-Force sufficient to keep even Superman from prying him out of his hands - but in a gentle, non- ’crushing kinda way that might hurt the kiddo,’ even though physics doesn’t work like that, except look, these are CRACK PHYSICS, they can and they do work like that.

And he’s all, “I already adopted him, so back off, Bruce, I’ll cut you. But also hi dad, I missed you. In spirit I mean, like I had amnesia and then I was brainwashed so technically its probably a reach to say I missed anyone but just roll with it. Also I can haz hugs now, please?”

And then Damian apparates in front of Dick amid a cloud of Disapproval that’s really just a cover for OMG-I-Was-Without-You-And-It-Was-Terrible-And-I’m-So-Glad-You’re-Back-But-Also-Who-Is-This-Interloper-And-Why-Is-He-Stealing-My-Hug.

“Tt. Grayson. Your absence was...less than desirable. See to it that this doesn’t happen again. Also what is that and why is it here.”

“Aww, Dami, I’m sorry. I promise to install a “please have the nearest available psychic reboot my brain in case of future brain damage slash amnesia” clause in my living will, and soon as I get a free second, I’ll break the fourth wall and blackmail the DC editorial staff into declaring me off-limits for all death, brainwashing and/or kidnapping plots for at least the next four major crossover events. I have naughty pictures. They’ll cave.”

“Hmph,” Dami says. He resumes staring pointedly at the kiddo, who juts his chin defiantly and stares back while clinging more tightly to Dick, because he may have very little clue what’s going on, but he’s a quick one and has at least picked up on the fact that Dick wants him and this other kid wants Dick. Which combined with the rescuing and the kicking of bad guy ass means Dick is probably Quality and In Demand and Of Value, and thus he might as well stake a claim now and worry about whether or not to act on that or skedaddle later, once he’s got more intel. He’s a natural Bat, this one, but then, that’s probably why he was in Toddler Talon Boot Camp, he scored high on whatever weird aptitude tests they used to scope out talent, and by talent we mean murder-skills.

“Dami,” Dick admonishes then, “This isn’t an it, he’s a person, and he was recently traumatized so promise me you’ll be on your best behavior or at least your ‘engaging in shenanigans with Jon’ behavior. And he’s not competition, you’re my Dames and my little bro, and he’s potentially your nephew, which is a whole separate category and no threat to you and your baby bro status at all, so retract the claws. If anything, the real danger is Pops adopting him and thus supplanting you as the official Baby Bird of our generation, so make like an ally and help me get that dangerous “I’m gonna adopt this kid so hard” gleam out of Bruce’s eye before it gets any gleamier. We’re still only halfway through my tearful reunion and having to cut Dad before we even get to cake would be a major mood-killer, but I’ll do it, I swear. Also, get your Baby Bird behind over here and hug me already, I have two arms.”

Damian rolled his eyes but obediently disappeared and reappeared nestled against Dick’s other side in the blink of an eye. The proper application of ninja skills has always been the pursuance of hugs and cuddles. Thus sayeth the crack.

“Hey, I do get cake, right?” Dick asked suddenly, looking around dangerously. “I was amnesiac and also brainwashed, I deserve cake, TELL me there’s gonna be cake.”

“Well that answers whether or not we should be worried about this being an attempted infiltration or not,” Jason says, strolling over casually. “No impostor or brainwashing script-writer could ever duplicate the Essence de Dick so perfectly. Hey squirt. Welcome to the madhouse. I’m Jason, what’s your name?”

“Oh right,” Dick realized, cocking his head. “Hey, what is your name?”

“Really, Dick?” Tim sighed, fondly exasperated. “I realize you like to jump from A straight to Z whenever possible, but steps B through Y aren’t usually just mere suggestions.”

“It hadn’t come up yet,” Dick defended himself.

“Yes, why would it have,” Duke mused from where he was leaning over and snapping his fingers in front of Bruce’s eyes, in a futile attempt at tearing his gaze away from the viable adoption candidate within 20 meters from him. It was probably best that they get this adoption thing inked out and signed off on as soon as possible - it was the only thing that was definitively going to get that “Argh, I’ve spotted treasure ahoy” look out of Bruce’s eyes. And Alfred had been very clear :Bruce was forbidden to adopt any more kids himself until he got a better handle on juggling the six he already had. Which. The past year had...probably not met Alfred’s standards on, so it didn’t seem likely he’d be waiving that requirement any time soon.

(And nobody wanted to get in between the Unstoppable Force that was Bruce’s ‘must adopt all the orphans’ and the Immovable Object that was Alfred’s ‘must maintain at least a reasonable fascimile of order in this household, even if it is a total sham, appearances matter.’)

“Hey!” Dick protested. “I’ve been busy, okay? There was fighting and then there was parkouring and now we’re reunifying, and it wasn’t like I was just calling him ‘that kid’ in my head, I was calling him ‘my kiddo’ which is a perfectly reasonable identifier and thus more specific detail just....hadn’t been relevant yet!”

“So uh, bee tee dubs, what is your name, buddy?” Dick asked, looking down. His kiddo looked back up at him for a long, measuring moment, and then he shrugged.

“I’ll tell you in exchange for some cake. You said something about there being cake, but I don’t see any.”

Dick got misty-eyed at that. “See? He already prioritizes like me. This was destiny! Also, you heard my kiddo, do we not deserve cake? It has been a very long day, there was murder and mayhem and more. Also, my creeper great grandpa was there being icksome, and you know how much that weirds me out.”

“Come along, Master Dick,” Alfred said then, appearing out of nowhere thanks to his Bat-Butler Magic. “And your young charge as well. I already have your favorite baking in the oven and it should be done shortly. Lemon meringue with raspberry layers.”

“That’s disgusting and I will not participate in any ceremony that treats that as part of a celebration instead of just a weird kind of laxative,” Jason said loftily, though it escaped no one’s notice that he was the first to the stairs.

“Shut your facehole, its delicious and amazing and you will like it or I will kick your ass,” Dick said, equally loftily.

“Boys,” Bruce said with a long-suffering sigh, as the threat of brotherly bloodshed was enough to finally shake him out of his orphan-induced stupor.

“At MARIO KART. I will kick his ass at MARIO KART, ugh, jeez, B, why do you always assume the worst of us?”

“Precedent,” Tim said dryly.

“Who the hell asked the Oompa Loompa Brigade to weigh in with all ninety of his pounds?” Jason called back from the top of the stairs.

Cass came up on Dick’s left, where the kiddo was one half of the sandwich made by him and Damian on Dick’s other side. She smiled down at him when he directed his still very wide-eyed gaze at her, landing on her after his latest sweep of the cavern and all its contained chaos, as if trying to take it all in - most likely in the hopes that if he could manage that, somehow the last 72 hours of his life might suddenly make sense. He really was adorable.

“Don’t worry,” she beamed at him, reaching out to pat him comfortingly on his shoulder, right above where Dick’s arm was still curled around it like a warm blanket - albeit one with the tensile hold of a python. “They’re all crazy, but only in the good ways.”

Duke scoffed as he slipped ahead of them and started taking the stairs two at a time. “It’s funny how you say that like you’re some kind of exception to the rule.”

“Bold words, little brother,” Cass called after him. He only shouted back from the top in a booming voice, his words echoing down the narrow stone stairway dramatically.

“Am I not Batclan?”

“Oooh, is that a new thing we’re doing?” Dick asked excitedly. “Somebody catch me up, I demand context. I smell a story there.”

“It was Jason’s fault,” Tim said automatically. Dick nodded.

“Sure, that tracks. Continue.”

Bruce trailed after his brood of batlings and birdlets, sidling over to where Barbara was waiting for the elevator. The latter having hung back to watch the commotion with the air of one taking notes for repurposing in the form of future blackmail material. Her ever extending network of spies and informants made so much more sense, suddenly.

He cleared his throat while they listened to the hum of the elevator’s machinery as it descended to their level.

“I wasn’t really thinking of adopting the boy,” he said. Not at all sullenly, nor with a trace of defensiveness to be found.

“Of course you weren’t, Bruce,” Barbara said. She patted his arm fondly, with all the conviction of a kindergarten teacher whose student was attempting to claim innocence on the matter of a paint disaster perfectly matching the paint stains on his hands.

“I wasn’t,” Bruce muttered as she preceded him into the elevator.

Why did nobody ever believe him?

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sebeth · 6 years

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Young Justice: Independence Day, Fireworks, and Stopover

Warning, Spoilers Ahead…

My goal is to re-watch the Young Justice series and re-read the comics before the January 4th launch of Young Justice: Outsiders. Let’s begin.

Episode 1: “Independence Day”

July 4th: We begin, appropriately enough, on the United States’ Independence Day. The title will have multiple meanings by the end of the first two episodes: the kids’ semi-independence from their mentors and Superboy’s freedom from the Cadmus Project.

Do cold villains hate the Fourth of July?

Dick is the only Robin who would have laughter as a trademark.

“Juniors doing this for attention?” – One of my favorite parts of this series is the depth of knowledge for the characters of the DC Universe – even the obscure ones. The current Icicle is a “junior” – his father was the original Icicle of the Golden Age era. As a huge fan of the B through D list characters, I have a huge appreciation for anyone who remembers the small details.

Kaldur was an interesting choice as he was a new but fairly obscure character when Young Justice debuted. Garth would have been the more logical choice as he was a founding member of the Titans along with Dick, Roy, and Wally.

I admit I wondered why the series was called Young Justice because all I was seeing were the founding members of the Titans at this point (minus Garth and Donna).

“You’ll chat it up with the cops, the bystanders, with Cold even.” – One sentence reveals so much of Barry’s personality.

“I knew we’d be the last ones here.” – Again, a Barry trait.

“Speedy is Green Arrow’s sidekick.” “Well, that makes no sense.” – Accurate.

“Why isn’t anyone just whelmed?” – Dick’s mangling of the English language begins.

“02” – The assigned numbers correspond with the members joining the team. The way to my heart is the small details.

Roy has a huge hissy even by his impatient, hot-headed nature. We discover the reason later in the series.

“We could make an exception.” – Really, the Justice League wouldn’t allow their proteges on the Watchtower? Why?

Zatara and Wotan! Yay, obscure characters for the win!

“Glad you didn’t bring you know who?” Foreshadowing!

The boys invade Cadmus in all its glory: Guardian, G-Nomes, Genomorphs, Dubbilex, and, of course, Superboy.

“Dr. Desmond” is a hint for his upcoming transformation. The “Blockbuster” label confirms it.

Wally is a science nerd. Makes sense with Barry as a mentor.

“File KR” – another hint.

“Sub-level 52”. – DC does love its 52.

Superboy! Looking more like the Teen Titans-era version than the early, scrawny, fresh out of the pod version.

Hack! – Tim is typically the Robin most associated with computers. To be fair, the Internet was pretty much non-existent when Dick and Jason were Robin.

Superboy, unsurprisingly, curb-stomps the team.

Episode 2: “Fireworks”

First appearance of the Light aka the Cadmus Board of Directors.

“Clone them.” – We later discover that one sidekick has already been cloned.

Dubbilex, the sneaky traitor, awakens the boys.

“Project: Sidekick” – Desmond is so imaginative when it comes to naming projects.

“He can talk.”

“Yes, he can.”

“Not like I said it.

Wally, listen to Dick and Kaldur and keep your mouth shut.

Kaldur is clearly the wisest of the original group.

“Batcave’s crowded enough.” – Well, it’s been said three is a crowd.

“What would Superman do?” – Everyone should apply this standard to their decisions.

“Don’t you give me orders either.” – I can see why it would be a sensitive issue – his whole life (all 16 weeks) has been controlled by others.

“You can leap tall buildings in a single bound. Still cool.” – Sweet Wally being supportive.

“Don’t apologize. This is perfect.” – That’s how you know Dick was raised by the Batman.

“I finally have room to move.” – Yeah, speed is more useful when you have to space to run.

“Grab something from Project Blockbuster.” – If you were familiar with the villain, you knew what was about to happen.

“The Genomorph hero.” – Unfortunately, this bit wasn’t followed up on.

“Everyone back.” – Protective Guardian for the win. Sadly, he’s outmatched by Blockbuster.

“Got your nose.” – Gross!

“You incredible bulk.” – Shout out to the competition.

Oh, look at protective Superboy and Aqualad covering their more delicate teammates.

The League arrives with Superman taking point.

Not loving Hawkgirl/woman’s costume.

Poor Kal breaks Superboy’s heart. Bad Kal! I understand Clark’s upset and confusion but don’t take it out on the newborn child.

“All 52 levels.” – Again, DC loves the 52.

“Why let them tell us what to do. It’s simple. Get on board or get out of the way.” – Superboy declares the true mission statement of Young Justice.

Red Tornado as team supervisor is a nod to the comic book version of Young Justice.

I did like the addition of Black Canary as team trainer. It’s a nice nod to Dinah’s combat skills which Gail Simone spent most of the 2000s building up.

“This is the Martian Manhunter’s niece.” – Another surprise choice as Miss Martian wasn’t very well known in the comics. Never will a character start out so cute and then devolve into creepiness.

M’gann’s obsession with Superboy begins immediately. We’ll discover why later in the season.

Young Justice #1: Stopover

The issue begins immediately after Superboy declares “Get on board or get out of the way.”

“Give me three days” Batman responds.

The group then realizes Superboy has nowhere to go in the meantime.

Kid Flash brings Superboy to Central City. Wally explains the situation to his parents. There is a cute moment when Mrs. West corrects Wally’s grammar: “Robin, Aqualad, and I…”

Superboy interjects with a “You weren’t there.”

Cadmus clearly didn’t instruct Superboy in conversation nuances.

Mrs. West informs Wally that he “leads a very strange life. But we’re use to it. Largely.”

Wally’s parents are way more understanding and supportive than they are in the main DC Universe.

Wally’s parents ask Superboy’s name. Wally responds “I call him Supey. I think he likes it.” Conner doesn’t look like he likes it.

We stop in on Kaldur and Arthur’s return journey to Atlantis.

Kaldur: “We meant no disrespect.”

Arthur: “I would not be much of a king if I did not allow my subjects freedom of expression. Especially when their words carry such wisdom.”

Somewhere, Garth is wondering why he never had this type of relationship with Arthur.

Conner wonders “Think Superman knows I’m here?”

Wally awkwardly reassures Conner that Superman knows he’s in Central City.

Wally awakens the next day to find Conner sleeping upright in his closet. Conner informs Wally that he is not “used to sleeping in a bed. Your closet reminded me of my Cadmus pod. Except for the funny smells.”

Poor Conner. A bed shouldn’t be a foreign concept.

The boys spend the day vegging in front of the tv. Conner is very bored. Each panel has Wally eating something different: a bag of chips, pizza, and a bucket of fried chicken.

Nice nod to Wally’s metabolism.

Late in the day a card arrives with a credit cart addressed to Wally “for expenses.”

Superboy wonders if it’s from Superman.

Wally vaguely confirms it’s from Superman with a “who else could it be from” even though he’s clearly aware it was sent by Batman.

Wally is so sweet – he keeps trying to reassure that, of course, Superman would care about Conner’s location and well-being.

Batman is also a very sweet Bat-Dad this issue. Bruce would deny it but he was consistently sweet and supportive to Conner in the first season. None of the other Leaguers thought Conner would need money to buy basic essentials like clothes. Or that the middle-class Wests would need financial support to care for Superboy. Wally’s appetite alone has to put a serious dent in their income.

If Wally hadn’t offered, I’m positive Bruce would have taken Conner back to the Batcave. If for no other reason than Alfred wouldn’t have been thrilled with the idea of an underage child being left alone. Batman would have also thought of the risks of leaving Conner on his own – Cadmus operatives could have tried to regain custody of a lone Superboy.

The boys head to the mall to shop for clothes. A nice easter egg is the name of the store the boys enter: “Forever Sixteen”. Conner was genetically locked in that age for some time in the comics.

Conner buys multiple copies of the same black shirt. Not someone who’s big on fashion.

We bop over to Gotham where Dick is impatiently wondering what Bruce is doing in the Batcave – it’s been almost two and a half days!

Alfred patiently reminds Dick that when one says three days, one means three days.

Poor Alfred has the patience of a saint. Imagine what the poor man endures on a daily basis: Bruce in all his glory; hyper, energetic Dick, Jason’s explosiveness, Damian’s demanding arrogance, and Stephanie’s boisterousness. Tim, Cassie, and Duke are the quieter children. They don’t cause Alfred as much fuss.

Back to the mall where Wally and Conner encounter Tommy and Tuppence, the Terror Twins – the same twins that Conner and M’gann impersonate at Belle Reve.

Flash and Superman arrive on the scene of the fight. Conner mutters a single “Superman” before Clark flees from the scene. To be fair, he was pursuing the Terror Twins but he couldn’t even offer a “hi” before he left?

Flash tells the boys to go home. Barry will pick the boys up in the morning because “Batman has made his decision”.

Honestly, Batman made his decision as soon as he told the kids “three days”. Bruce simply needed the three days to implement his plan.

Conner asks Wally if “Superman will be there tomorrow”. Wall responds “Uh, sure, you know…if there’s no emergency somewhere.”

Conner’s downcast face shows he doesn’t believe Wally’s statement.

Conner asks Wally “Why’d you invite me to stay with you?”

“Well, un, Aqualad lives underwater. And the Batcaves’s kind of a big secret. So I figured it’d be cool for us to hang.”

Conner smiles after Wally’s statement.

Wally is so sweet and supportive in this issue. It also shows that Wally is very trusting. He is inviting Superboy into his home with his civilian parents – and he knows how easily Conner curbstomped the entire team. But Wally knows Conner is one of the good guys and doesn’t even hesitate to bring him to Central City.

The issue ends with the final moments of the second episode.

#Young Justice #Superboy #Kid Flash #Robin #Aqualad

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differentjokes4differentfolks · 7 years

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WTFIT Chap 8

Chapter 8, you guys! Who knew I’d actually go through with writing this?? This is one of the fics I’ve had the most fun writing, I gotta say. Anyways, enjoy!

AO3 Chap 1

It’s all Joker can do not to burst out in laughter. It’s also all he can do not to strangle the man under him either, staring down at the Red Hood. Jason Todd. Suddenly this seems familiar. A run-in a while ago hadn’t been so pleasant between them, he remembers that clearly. A rooftop, a scuffle, himself tied to a chair as Todd and Bats fought it out. An interesting show, but he doesn’t really enjoy being tossed about by Batman’s kids. While he wouldn’t ever kill Batman, he never set Robin off limits as well.

As it is, he won’t be killing anyone just yet.

“What in God’s name is the Red Hood doing in the sewers?” he asks casually, holding a knife to the man’s neck. The Robin to his side watches warily, ready to leap at moments notice. “You get tired of messing with people up on the surface?”

“What’s it to you, you sack of shit?” Jason growls from underneath him. Joker shakes his head, tutting in mock-disappointment. “Well, that was rude.” Todd growls. This is just too easy.

“What do you want, Joker?” Robin says, a steely edge to his voice. “Why are you here?”

Joker does let out a slight giggle at that. “Well, isn’t this just the craziest thing? I’m looking for Bats, and I found his Bat-babies instead. You wouldn’t happen to have misplaced him, would you?”

Todd writhes underneath him, trying to knock the clown off balance. Joker rolls his eyes, setting down the knife and adjusting himself so that he pins the anti-hero’s arms down as well. “Why the hell are you looking for him?”

“We’re partners at the moment, solving crimes like Sherlock and Watson, didn’t you know?” Joker says with a wide grin, savoring Todd’s obvious confusion. His mask might hide his face, but there are some emotions you can just feel radiating off people. “Well, no, you wouldn’t. Batsy probably thought you’d react like this. Anywho...” He stands up, springing away from Todd as the man swings at him viciously.

“There’s no way he’d actually team up with you. He knows better…”

“I thought he was just giving Batman tips,” Robin says in confusion. Todd turns to him.

“You knew?”

“Well, he knows the locations…” Robin’s voice drops off as he points to Joker, who dusts off his suit. It might be time to get a new one soon, the purple is starting to fade...

“That’s right, I do. Though where exactly Bats is I have no idea. I’m about as lost as you are at this point, and I hate sewers.” Joker shudders. He looks around, picking up the flashlight on the ground and shining it around, curling his lip when he sees rats scurrying around. “Well, nothing we can do, I guess. Are we all looking for the same man here?”

Todd snorts in disgust. “You don’t actually think we’re going to work with you.”

Joker frowns slightly. Damn, one awful run-in and Todd hates you forever. What is it with this bat-family and holding grudges? “Well, cupcake, you can go down the way I just came from, see if I missed something.”

“Well-”

“-Which I didn’t,” Joker finishes, crossing his arms and sticking his tongue out at Todd. The way Todd’s fists clench shows just how much restraint it takes not to strangle him. He loves it. Smiling again, he looks over at Robin, who takes in this whole exchange with perplexion etched on his face. “What do you think? You’re so quiet, not at all like his past Robins. No cheesy one-liners? No insults?”

“I… how did you know Batman would be down here?” He asks warily.

That's a good question, Joker has to admit. But he doesn't just want to go out and say he cajoled Harley into telling him after she’d received the call from Black Mask, who hides down here somewhere with Jonny. It wouldn’t be fair to them. All these villains…and for just one night of terror. It’d seem a little overkill, if not for the fact they’re up against Batman. And himself too, as it happens. “I heard it through the grapevine. And I'm sure if he’d gone to the docks I'd have been there.”

“Why's that?” Todd mutters.

“I know my way around there. He doesn’t, not like me. It’d take him ages.” Joker cocks a hip to shift his weight, wishing he could lean against the wall without ruining his suit more. “Besides, why do the easy jobs when you could finish off the hard tasks first, am I right? Now are we doing this together or not?”

Robin seems a bit easier to convince, but there’s a length of silence before Todd sullenly says, “Fine.”

Joker sticks out his hand, mouth slipping into a smirk. “Shake on it?”

Todd gets closer to Robin, stance defiant. “We don’t shake hands with clowns.”

Joker sighs, putting away his joy-buzzer. “Fair enough. Now let’s go find our Dark Knight. Shall we?” He gestures for the boys to go first. When it's clear that they won't move, he rolls his eyes. “Fine, scaredy cats. I'll go first.” The first tunnel they come across is a dead end, setting the example for a few others they come across. Todd stands between Joker and Robin as a barrier, which he finds hilarious. He isn’t going to do anything right now, not when there’s a task at hand. Maybe he’ll play with them a bit later on in the week. It’d give Bats something to do after this fiasco, that’s for sure. It makes him wonder where Grayson is. Joker hasn’t heard from him in a long while...

“Bruce?”

“Hnggh…”

“Bruce!”

A shaking sensation makes Bruce open his eyes, though they turn to slits at the change in lighting. His head pounds as he pushes himself up from the floor, stumbling, his legs heavy. Dick helps steady him as his eyes adjust. Slowly he looks around, remembering what happened. He tries to block out what he saw, focusing on the now. He’s had enough of terrifying hallucinations for now, there’ll be time to reflect later.

“Are you okay?” He asks Dick. Dick blinks, though his mouth forms a relieved smile.

“You’re asking me that? Goddamn, Crane must’ve dosed you with twice what I got! You wouldn’t move for a half hour. I would know, I tried waking you. Were you trying to fight it?”

Bruce meets Dick’s eyes. “It was awful, I couldn’t control anything. If this is how it affects me, how do you think it’ll affect the city?”

“We won’t let it.” Dick’s cool blue eyes are reassuring, though Bruce knows it’s a front. Just one of the many coping mechanisms of a hardened vigilante, alongside witticisms and time spent thinking on the tops of buildings. “Now help me find a way out of this, Crane closed the entrance. It’s locked, but I don’t know how. The wall’s too solid to break through.” He leaves Bruce to stand on his own, running his hands along the door.

“Maybe it only opens from the outside,” Bruce says, moving a bit to get his blood flowing again.

“Well isn’t that sadistic...” Dick mutters, looking back at Bruce. The latter shrugs.

“We both just got poisoned,” Bruce points out. “I don’t think he locked us in here to be nice.” Glancing around, he realises there aren’t any vents in the small space. Meaning they’ll run out of air if they stay here longer than they’re supposed to. There are cracks in the walls, but nothing solid enough to get out of with his gadgets. “Nightwing, maybe we should save our air.”

After pounding at the wall a couple more times Dick nears Bruce. “Do you think Crane is coming back for us?”

“That’s my guess. Why go for a quiet death when it comes to your enemies?” Bruce asks dryly. “It’s just a matter of when.”

“I can’t believe this.” Dick laughs shakily, trying to maintain some of his cheerfulness. Heights are more his thing, Bruce knows he can get rather claustrophobic in rooms like these, but the younger man remains calm all the same. “...does anyone know we’re here?”

“Barbara and Tim know I went looking for you, maybe they’ve figured out we’re in the sewers, but even so, there’s nothing to do but wait it out.” Bruce sits, taking a deep breath and trying to slow his intake of air. After a moment Dick joins him, both calming themselves down enough to slow their breathing patterns as they wait. Bruce doesn’t know what’s going to happen, but he needs to be ready regardless. If it is Crane, they’ll need to be fast and clever, avoiding those awful needles of his. He thinks back to all the canisters in that one shallow room he’d come across, wondering if his lock still holds. It should, but even so it’s something to think about. That’s one of the top priorities he has before he leaves the sewers.

He looks over at Dick, whose eyes are closed, fists clenching and unclenching slowly as he breathes in and out, in and out. It’s one of his talents, being able to stay calm even in trying times. He’s been that way since before he met Bruce, but working as Robin only strengthened that trait over time. He smiles, pride filling his heart. No matter how many times they’ve disagreed over the years, he couldn’t be happier to have Dick Grayson at his side. His first Robin, his first son. He’s proud of Tim and Jason too, knowing Tim is probably headed this way now, and that while Jason has his own version of justice, he’s capable and making the city better in ways only he can. He wonders if he’ll ever say this out loud. Saying it now would waste what short supply of air they have at the moment. For now, at least, he’ll keep it to himself facing forwards again and closing his eyes.

The sewers seem never ending the longer Tim walks. He knew they spanned the entire city, but no one had ever told him that they made up a labyrinth of tunnels. Jason never really breaks a sweat, and while Joker grumbles to himself on occasion, he walks at a comfortable pace as well.

Why would Joker team up with Bruce? It doesn’t seem like him to ally himself with his closest enemy, even though he’s been known to throw wrenches into other people’s schemes. It’s not likely that Joker is in it for the rush, he gets that just by blowing up buildings. There’s something niggling at the back of his mind, something out of reach that he just can’t pinpoint. The clown is clearly out of place here, occasionally he’ll say something like, “Why sewers? Why couldn’t it have been a collapsing highrise?” or “These were new shoes,” and “He could’ve called to tell me he was going to be getting himself lost in a sewer.” It’s amusing to listen to, but it leaves Tim confused all the same. How would Bruce call him anyway?

“How you holding up?” Jason asks Tim quietly, slowing down to walk with him. Tim gives a one-shouldered shrug.

“Alright, I guess. We’ve got to be getting a least a little closer, right?”

“I hope so. Nightwing’s with him?”

“I’m not sure.” He barely hears Jason’s sigh.

“I knew something was going on in Gotham, but I didn’t think it’d be this big. How many baddies are out and about?”

Tim counts on his fingers. “Not including Joker, seven. But we captured Dent and Bane already, so five then.”

“Is this your first night out?”

“For this ordeal? Yeah. I’d say I jumped into the the thick of it.” Jason laughs.

“What are you two doing back there?” They both look up to see Joker waving the beam at them, eyebrow raised. “You’re being awfully loud for heroics, aren’t you?”

“Says the dude who’s been mumbling to himself,” Jason retorts. Joker grins, clearly wanting to answer back, or maybe laugh, but he smothers it with a hand. It’d bounce all around, giving them away in seconds.

“Wait, do you hear that?” Joker turns to face the dark end of the passage, where Tim starts to hear a dull thumping noise. It ends abruptly, but now he knows they’re going the right way.

“Nobody would do that except them,” Tim says. Jason nods, but Joker’s already gone ahead of them, the light fading with him into the gloom. “What’s he so rushed about? It’s like he’s more worried than we are.”

Jason starts to run. “I don’t know, but I don’t like it. I don’t trust him.”

“I don’t think anyone does,” Tim responds, matching his strides. His heart starts to beat faster, he knows they’re close to finding Bruce and Dick, he just has to be super observant in these dark halls. His eyes roam, searching for any doors, any flaws in the walls, any sign of the men. He almost runs into Joker, who pauses, pulling out his knife. In front of them stand two thugs guarding a heavy metal door that he instinctively knows holds the men they’re looking for. Joker doesn’t hesitate, running at them before they can shout, Tim and Jason right behind. Tim knows Jason and Joker have no restraint, killing if they have to, but Tim stops himself at knocking one of the men unconscious. He looks over the door, knocking. Jason takes the lock in his hand, cursing.

“Who uses these anymore?” He pulls out a lockpick, making quick work of the contraption, but the door itself is heavier than it looks. It takes all three of them to open it, the door sliding open inch by inch. On the other side stand Bruce and Dick, both looking a little worse for wear but generally okay. They both stand defensively, apparently not expecting them. Then Dick relaxes and waves, and Tim smiles widely. Bruce steps forward to meet them eyes landing on each one. There’s relief in his eyes, but Tim notices his eyes linger longest on Jason. His eyes are wide.

“What are you doing here?”

“Oracle. She didn’t want this guy looking for you alone,” he claps a hand on Tim’s shoulder. “Gotham’s stuck in a mess, isn’t she?”

Bruce only says, “We’re taking care of it. You’d be a welcome help-”

“Are you actually working with the Joker?” Jason’s voice is frigid, the area drops a couple degrees just with his question. “You’re working with him and you want my help. You’re insane.”

Joker smirks, but Bruce frowns. “That’s not the point here, Jason. There’s too much going on right now. We need your help.”

There’s a long silence before Jason shakes his head. “No. I’m sorry, but I won’t do this. You’re asking me to team up with the man who almost killed me. How do you expect me to brush that aside?”

Tim catches Bruce sending the Joker a glance. Joker frowns, eyes dark. Then Bruce steps forward.

“Jason, can we talk? After we dispose of the toxin, I mean. I need to go back to this one room, it contains most if not all of Crane’s toxins. I have it tracked.”

Jason gives a curt nod before he says, “Are you just going to blow it up? You aren’t going to just drag it through the sewers, are you? That sounds like a stupid idea.” Bruce sighs.

“I don’t have a better idea besides blowing it up, unless you want to carry it. If it’s contained in the room there shouldn’t be a problem, it won’t go into the water,” he explains. “Crane won’t be able to open it easily either.”

“Just how many canisters are there?”

“About fifty in a crate, but it’s strong. Strong enough to send everyone spiraling into fear-induced insanity.” Dick says. Joker raises an eyebrow curiously. Tim narrows his eyes, Joker smirking and shrugging as if to say: I can't help it, I'm a villain at heart, really.

Some of the tension in the chamber fades away after that, but Tim still thinks if he tried hard enough he could cut right through it. Dick has stayed silent all throughout, tapping his foot uncomfortably. A family reunion and no one is particularly happy to see each other. Kind of like a normal family’s Thanksgiving, Tim supposes. Bruce starts heading down the passage to where he’s left the tracker, and the rest follow.

Bruce doesn't exactly know how to interact with anyone as he walks down the tunnels, so he doesn't. He gets to the room with the toxins, making sure the lock hasn't been tampered with. The rest file in behind him, all stuck in that same tension he feels. The guilt that he’d pushed away earlier slams into him tenfold, especially now that both Jason and Joker are here. He feels sick, feeling like he’s betrayed Jason with his feeling, with teaming up with the clown. The only thing is, as much as he hates it, he can’t change any of it. Can’t, or doesn’t want to. He knows it’s selfish, but his mind keeps fighting against what’s wrong and right, and how he feels. He doesn’t want to push Joker away, bad as that might sound. But there’s the fact that he doesn’t want Jason to hate him, to carry any animosity.

It’s a crossroads, one where he doesn’t want to move in either direction. And that’s the real problem.

In truth, he doesn’t really need Jason, Tim, and Dick here anymore. He doesn't know where Scarecrow is, but the longer they spend here, in a group, the easier it’ll be to capture all of them. It’s such an enclosed area, easy to get trapped in. Luckily the canisters are close. They come upon them relatively fast, the room glowing a faint green.

“That crate?” Jason looks at it. “Maybe me and Nightwing could carry it out, it doesn’t look that heavy.”

“True.” Dick circles around it, the box coming up mid-thigh on him. “Let’s try and lift it.” He and Jason do a count, lifting on three. It’s heavy, but they’re sure they can carry it. Bruce suggests they trade off if they get too tired, everyone agreeing. Tim leads as they lead the room, pointing out where to turn and when to stop. Bruce stays in back to make sure no one follows, Joker falling in step with him.

“You think you’ll stop this before Friday?” Joker says quietly. “There’s still plenty of stuff going on.”

“We will stop it, we have to.” There’s no getting around it, if Bruce can’t stop this scheme in its tracks Gotham will be destroyed. He should be over at the docks at the moment, if Scarecrow hadn’t set them back. Speaking of Scarecrow… he could still be in the sewers, just waiting. He should do something about that. “Guys. I’m going after Scarecrow.”

“Alone?” Dick’s voice drips with disbelief. “You know what he can do.”

“I have to take him in,” Bruce says, refusing to be swayed. “I’ll be fine. You just need to focus on getting that toxin somewhere safe. Promise me you’ll do that.”

Dick frowns, matching with Tim and Jason. “...an hour. I’ll give you an hour, then I’m coming to get you.”

Bruce agrees, looking over at Joker. “Are you going to stay with them?”

Joker laughs, pointing at the trio. “I’m not too popular with your kids, if you haven't noticed. I’ll tag along with you, in case I need to save you again.” Bruce wants to argue that point, but Joker is technically right, and there’s no time for banter anyway.

“Let’s go then.”

“Wait. Oracle and I noticed we haven’t seen Sionis anywhere. We thought that he might be in there with Crane,” Tim says.

“I’ll make sure to check that out. Be back soon, head for the entrance.” Turning back, Bruce runs back into the tunnel, the deep gloom an unwelcome but inescapable sight. He turns on his infrared, Joker’s quick steps follow.

“You know, I have a feeling Black Mask is around here somewhere,” Joker muses, his voice quiet enough to barely echo off the surrounding walls. Bruce knows that’s a tip, that he won’t get an elaboration and that he’ll have to take it for the truth. “Bats, I know this is important to you, but even if you get these two, you’ll still have to deal with three more. And it’s already after midnight. You sure you don’t wanna just blow up the sewers and call it a night?” He huffs out a short laugh. “We could go club hopping, stir up trouble with the authorities. Much more my style, wouldn’t you say?”

Bruce slows down, starting to edge around closer to the walls. He knows Joker wants to say more, voicing it as more of a jest than actual concern. He knows that there’s more at the tip of the clown’s tongue, but he’s so tired of people worrying about him, concealed or otherwise. He knew the risks that would come with being a vigilante, knows that any day really could be his last. Sometimes he just wishes he didn’t have so many people making sure he isn’t about to have a breakdown or something. There isn’t time for that.

“Can you not worry about me?”

“I’m not, I’m just-”

“Please.” He doesn’t turn to see Joker’s expression behind him, can’t imagine it being anything other than confused or annoyed at the moment.

“Batsy.” Joker’s voice is measured and even, different from what Bruce expects as he turns to face him. He expects a punch even less, but that’s what he receives, a sharp blow to his face that puts him off guard. It’s surprisingly accurate for it being pitch-black.

“What was that for?” He asks in shock and anger, his cheek stinging. He sees Jokers sharp grin, practically glowing through his vision.

“Stop acting like the world revolves around you. I’m making fun of you, not crying over how tired you look. I realise you aren’t a kid that needs taking care of, so stop acting like one. You’re with me, not your nanny.”

Oh. Oh. He’s right. Joker might care for him, in his own weird way, but he’s not going to baby him if he can help it. And Bruce doesn’t really know why he thinks he would. Fuck, this lack of sleep is getting to him. Or maybe it’s the toxin, still making its way out of Bruce's system. “I don’t have a nanny,” he mutters under his breath.

“Then stop acting like it,” Joker says, patting him on the cheek where he hit him. He walks up ahead, Bruce staring at his back like he’s an indecipherable puzzle.

He’ll be happy when he finds Crane and Sionis. It’ll give him something to beat up.

The closer Dick, Tim, and Jason get to the entrance on the outskirts of the East End the happier Dick gets. There’s no thrill to be had below ground, nothing but mud and sludge to step into. He’s sure it must be because of his beginnings in the circus, performing on the trapeze with ease, throwing himself without worrying about what’s there to catch him. He feels uncomfortable whenever he’s not in the air, funnily enough. Or at least, not aboveground.

He’s been carrying this crate the whole time, not letting Tim take his side of the box, though Jason readily hands it over. He hasn’t been much help tonight, might as well do this one thing.

He can almost see the lights of the city when Tim says, “Guys, did you notice Joker’s kinda...different? Around Bruce, I mean.”

Dick had noticed that, the clown was a bit more subdued, not as raring to get into a fight. Even on the rare occasions they did team up Joker was full of commentary and snark. At least, when he was around to witness the occasions.

“Maybe he’s getting tired of being a homicidal maniac and he’s chilling out?” Dick suggests, though he doesn’t believe that himself.

Jason shakes his head. “Are you crazy? The monster thrives off hurting people, no way he’s mellowing out. He’s faking it.”

“Maybe…” Tim’s voice drops off. The sound of wind whistling through the tunnels replaces the conversation, the sound of water nearby. They’re nearly at the shoreline the sewer lets out of, the dark sky a welcome sight. Dick clicks at his comm.

“Barbara?”

The reply is almost instantaneous. “Dick? Are you alright? What happened? Is the Bruce there? Are Jason and Tim there? Are they okay--”

“Barb, they’re fine. I’m safe.” The corner of his mouth tilts up as he waits for Barbara’s reply.

“Good. What happened? Were you in the sewers?”

“Yeah. There must’ve been a jamming system too. We were in a bit of trouble, Bruce is back in the sewers to take out Scarecrow and maybe Sionis.”

Barbara takes a few seconds to answer back. “You’re not with him?”

“No. I’m with Tim and Jason. By the way, can you have Alfred send over something to pick up a crate we have? It’s kind of heavy.”

“Yeah. You’re coming to back to the apartment, right?”

“As soon as Bruce comes back, yes.”

Barbara hums. “Bruce didn’t go back in alone, did he?”

Dick glances at Tim and Jason, neither obviously listening in but both focused on the conversation. “...No? I mean, he’s with Joker.” Boy is his hand getting tired, carrying the crate with one hand and he keeps one on the comm. Barbara doesn’t answer, silence coming through the device. At the end of the tunnel they set the crate down, Dick shaking his hand out to get the feeling back in. “Barbara?”

“Sorry, I’m just thinking. Why did he take Joker instead of one of you?”

Dick honestly doesn’t have an answer to that. Barbara seems to sense his uncertainty.

“I’ll be right back, I’ll tell Alfred you’re all alright and to send a vehicle.”

“Thanks, Babs.”

There’s audible relief in Dick’s voice, to which the woman replies, “You owe me, Grayson.”

He knows it, and he plans on replaying in full. He can’t help but ask, “Were you worried about me?”

“...” He knows Barbara is doing that pout only she can pull off, a small one that makes you feel like you fucked up and should do anything you can to fix it. Funny he can get that specific about it. “Just come back soon, alright?”

“You know I will.” He ends the call, knowing any longer and he’ll say three words into that phone that will spiral him into a mess of excuses. There’s too much going on for a snowball into a massive confession. It’s just one he’s not sure Barbara wants to hear. He looks up to see Tim smirking in his general direction, not quite meeting his eyes.

“I’m surprised you didn’t confess to her right then and there.”

Dick lifts a shoulder, looking up at the stars. “There’s too much stuff going on. And besides, she’s over me.”

“Obviously,” Jason drawls, resting on the crate. “You should’ve heard her when she called me. ‘I need you to go with Tim, you need to find Dick and Bruce, it’s serious, he’s been gone for twenty minutes and I can’t find him, Bruce went after and I’m worried sick--’” Dick frowns at him and he winks.

“Give her more credit, she didn’t sound like that, and your conversation was a lot shorter, she said something like, ‘Dick’s gotten himself captured like the idiot he is and Tim shouldn’t go alone to rescue him’,” Tim says through a snicker. Dick glares at him, and the younger man raises his hands to placate him, “But he’s right. She still cares about you. I’m sure you’ll be back together again in no time.”

Dick runs a hand through his hair. “You guys don’t know anything.”

#batjokes #wtfit #batman #joker #dc comics #my writing #as always comments appreciated :)#upload to ao3 later

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dylan-hague · 8 years

Text

Chapter 18

Sheldon Park, Gotham City. January 12th, 2018. 2:31 AM.

Bruce crouched down on a ledge overlooking the park, looking through his binoculars at the gathering of thugs below. Normally he would leave these lot to the likes of Jim and his men– he didn’t tolerate their crimes, but they cropped up so often that even he couldn’t handle all of them. But something was off about this group; people were going missing all across the Bowery, and each time it happened, this group gained another member. It seemed obvious that these people were likely running off to join this gang, but none of the missing persons had any sort of police record, nor did they demonstrate any sort of violent behaviors or personality traits common in people involved with gang activity. These people were all, for lack of a better word, passive people. Gentle folks, just trying to get by in Gotham. At first Bruce considered the possibility of mind-control, but the only one capable of control this extensive was Ivy. And he knew for a fact that she wasn’t causing any trouble; thanks to a generous donation from Wayne Enterprises, Ivy’s specialized holding cell in Arkham Asylum had been considerably improved. Ivy wouldn’t be going anywhere. And besides that, Ivy’s control was limited to men. Three of the missing people were women.

“So whaddya think, boss?” Carrie whispered from behind the Dark Knight. “Y'think these are your runaways?”

“Maybe…” Bruce growled quietly under his cowl. He was confident that Carrie was ready to join him on patrol; she was a gifted fighter, and she was just as bright as Dick was at her age. But still, he wanted to start small with her, just in case she turned out to need more time. Disappearances or not, street toughs were street toughs. Easy pickings. Kelley would be able to handle them. (Especially now that she’d finally taken his advice and wore a full costume.) “Either way, we’re going to have to get our hands dirty tonight. Remember, you’re going for knockouts, not injuries. We don’t want any of these people in the hospital tonight, understand?”

“You got it, big guy,” Robin grinned as she took hold of her cape, ready to launch into her glide.

With that, the duo leapt off their ledge, gliding toward the thugs below at considerable speeds. Just as one of them turned to shout out a warning, Bruce came down upon him, grabbing the man’s shoulders and flipping them into the air before slamming them to the ground. A brief moment of hesitation gave Bruce time to turn on his heel and rocket towards the nearest thug.

“Batman!” Another punk shouted as she reached for a pistol. This one was silenced by a pair of legs scissoring around her neck, as Robin brought her crashing to the grass. The Girl Wonder shoved off into the rest of the crooks, delivering a fierce kick to the back of one’s head. He crumpled, and Batman and Robin pressed forward, dropping each thug as quickly and gently as they could. Four seconds later, there was only one thug left. Batman was on him almost instantly, tearing his face mask away to reveal the frenzied face of one of the missing persons.

“Why are you all here?” Batman growled, hoisting the thug up off his feet. “Who are you working for?”

“B-b… b… Batman…” the man stammered, looking into the burning gaze of the masked man before him. “A… ah, a-ah… D-d-d… d…”

Bruce’s grip tightened. “Give me a name… now.”

“D… duhuhh…” slowly, quietly, the man began to giggle. “Duheh… heheh heh heh… d, d...”

Batman’ eyes widened.

“Darrrrling.”

Bruce tossed the man forward as fast as he could, just he began to emit a cloud of gas. The crook’s giggle grew, becoming a cackle, then further into a loud, piercing laugh that sounded throughout the park. Bruce and Carrie quickly equipped their gas-masks as all the missing people around them began to fill the air around them with the same green gas. The two masked figures quickly grappled out of the cloud, perching on the same ledge from which they had jumped off before.

“Of course…” Bruce groaned. “He always comes back around at some point…”

Carrie paused for a moment, the realization slowly dawning on here. “… Joker is back, isn’t he?”

Batman nodded. “You did good tonight, Robin. Head back to the Cave, I’ll be there soon. I need to let the Commissioner know who’s behind these disappearances.”

“You…” The young Robin furrowed her brow as she looked up at her teacher. “… you seem a little freaked.”

Bruce sighed. “Every time he comes around, Joker always tries something bigger than his last stunt. The last time we fought, I had to nearly destroy the Cave to stop him. I hate doing this, but… We’re gonna need backup.”

Titans Tower, Jump City. January 13th, 2018. 11:34 AM.

Damian looked across the counter at Raven, whose eyes intently scanned the pages of the book she had propped up against the countertop. He smiled as he watched her eyes sparkle as they danced back and forth across the page. He glanced at the cover to see what exactly it was she was reading, and smiled when he read the words A Tolkien Miscellany on the cover. Raven was quite fond of Tolkien’s works, her favorite being Return of the King. He’d been looking for something he could give her for their… “anniversary” in the coming months, and believed he’d finally found the perfect gift: the brooch worn by Cate Blanchett in the 2001 film adaptation of The Fellowship of the Ring. It had taken some serious doing, but he had it. He had never been fond of exchanging gifts, but for her… well, Damian found himself doing a lot of things for Raven that he’d never imagined himself doing.

Raven looked up from her book to see Damian smiling at her. Her pale grey cheeks turned the faintest shade of red as she smiled back at him, closing her book and gently sliding it to the side before bringing her hands together on the countertop. “How are you feeling, Damian?”

Damian gazed into her eyes, a familiar flutter in his heart. “In love. How are you feeling?”

Raven’s smile spread wider, and she walked around the counter to wrap her arms around her Damian. He did the same, his arms sliding into place around her neck. Just about that time, Kori walked into the kitchen.

“Raven, Damian, team meeting. C'mon.” The Tamaranean spoke quickly. The two followed their teacher into the livingroom, where Tara and Jaime were already waiting. Soon enough, Jon and Garfield emerged from their training and joined their friends gathered to hear what what Kori had to say.

“This morning, I recieved a message from Damian’s father,” Kori began. “There’s a threat coming to Gotham and he needs our help.”

“Why didn’t he just call the Justice League?” Jaime asked. “They’d prob'ly be better help than we are.”

“Most of the Justice League are off-world right now helping resolve an issue on Thanagar,” Kori explained. “Batman has informed me that, including him, there are only two Leaguers on the planet, and they’ll both be waiting for us in Gotham.”

“Any word on what we’re up against?” Jon wiped his face with his sweat-rag and leaning against the couch.

“No…” Kori crossed her arms, furrowing her brow as she looked around. “But we have to help. And if Batman is calling on us for aid, that means he has confidence that we’re strong enough to overcome whatever it that’s waiting for us.”

Damian nodded. “Alright, then. Everyone pack your bags, we’re wheels-up in thirty.”

As everyone rushed off to gather what they needed for the trip, Kori took Damian aside. “Damian, I need to know what we’re up against,” she whispered. “Do you have any idea?”

“That depends…” Damian crossed his arms as he thought, bringing a hand up to his chin. “Is it just one person causing the threat?”

“That’s what he made it sound like,” Kori said. Damian sighed.

“There have only been three villains in Gotham that could work up enough trouble on their own for Father to need outside reinforcements,” the young Titan spoke grimly, “one of them is locked away in Santa Prisca, and one of them was my grandfather.”

A single bead of sweat ran down Starfire’s face as she looked down worriedly at the boy. “And the third…?”

Damian looked up at his teacher. “The clown is back.”

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