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messenger-of-babel · 9 months ago

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Coloured Red

Summary: He likes you in his colour, just not that like that. (Jason Todd x reader)

Word Count: 2.1K

Notes: blood and injury. Hope everyone's having a good week so far! Not my favouriteeeeee Jason piece I have written but please enjoy anyways. xx

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It wasn't supposed to happen like this.

Never like this.

He had been working out of the manor for a few days, something he was already reluctant to do. However, you had sent him off to "work" with a bright smile and a kiss on the cheek, wishing him well for whatever convention Librarians had. Instead of your boyfriend being the gruff librarian sorting returns every night, he was in fact the red masked vigilante cooped up in the cave, pacing back and forth in front of the Bat computer while Tim tried to trace their latest suspect.

Dick had called him back for some extra firepower in the latest case, and if he hadn't owed him one Jason would be back with you in a heartbeat. "Get anything?" he grunts to Tim, who's fingers are typing strings of code into the keyboard.

"Not yet," he hums, the younger man's face twitching with annoyance as the firewall warning flashes across the screen again.

"Give it time, Jay. we don't want to let them know we're onto them." comes Dick, who’s leaning against a railing and still fully suited up from his earlier patrol. "I've checked all through The Cauldron and Southside, no trace of them there. Penguin must have closed up shop around Cobblepot Steel when he started working with his new friend. Going through great lengths to gatekeep his new buddy from us." he hums.

"Well I want to get this meet and greet over with," Jason grumbles, crossing his arms while he scuffs his boots impatiently.

"Bee in your bonnet, Red?" Dick calls and Jason scoffs.

"You put it there. You wanted me to help take 'em down while the Bat is out of town with Superscout, but you don't even know where they are. I've spent a full night just waiting for boy genius here to get a lock."

Dick puts his hands up in mock surrender. "We'll be done soon, promise. Then you can go home to your sweetheart. Hey, you can even say you came back early just to see them. I'm helping you get brownie points." he grins, nimbly dodging the hand Jason had swung out to slap the back of his head. "Where are they anyways? Their place?"

"Safehouse." Jason grunts back. "Staying at mine while I'm helping you lot. Old Gotham, near the GCPD. Besides, I told them to mark down I'd be back tonight on the calendar anyways."

Dick whistles. "Didn't think you had a place that close to the cops."

Jason just shrugs. "They're not after me, and if they were it would be somewhere they wouldn't look. Plus it's a nice distance from you all." he grumbles.

Dick pushes off the wall coming to lean over a monitor near Tim. "Well if our mystery person is teaming up with Penguin, and he isn't interested in the drug business, what is he here for?" he hums, eyes focused on the map of Gotham that Tim has pulled up. He taps the screen after a second, zooming in. "Here. Dixon Docks. We haven't checked here yet. Penguin used to smuggle through here, but it also became a bit of a meet up spot. He might have gone back to old ground."

"Yeah, but Penguin shifted his focus into drug running. Bruce put him under pretty heavy surveillance, managed to shut down a lot of his operations for a while. You really think he'd be that stupid to start trying to smuggle firearms again?" Tim piped up.

"Maybe. But Maybe its not firearms. This spot used to be a mob meeting spot. He never visited the operation personally unless-"

"Unless he wanted to order a hit." Jason cut off his older counterpart, voice becoming modulated as he fixed his mask to his face. "Seems there's a chance his new play pal is a hitman."

"For who though?" Tim asks.

"Maybe the hit isn't one Penguin is ordering. maybe the Penguin's selling info." Dick calls, testing his in earpiece before giving Jason a nod. "Me and Hood are going in to take a look. Track our location and keep the cameras on."

Tim nods while Jason and Dick head for the bikes, mounting each of their respective vehicles.

"Finally something to do." Jason groans, stretching his arms above his head before catching the cocky grin from Dick speeding past him. "Show-off." he murmurs, his own engine roaring to life as he follows suit.

They had cleared the dock pretty easily, Dick's hunch being correct. Between the two of them the middlemen and thugs were strewn across the floor of the warehouse, and Tim had already called the GCPD to come pick them up for the arrest. "No sign of our flightless friend." Jason grumbled, stepping over an unconscious thug.

"Nor our new mystery visitor." Dick concludes, tucking his escrima under his arm as he goes through the stack of papers at the makeshift desk tucked behind some shipping containers. Jason has known the eldest robin enough to know when he was worried, and the tight way he now held his body was a clear sign. "You find something?" he asks, boots thudding as the come to stand beside him.

"You think Oz was beginning to catch on?" Dick asks quietly, turning the page to show Jason the blurry CCTV photo of Bruce, a crude cowl and ears drawn over the image in sharpie.

"Shit," Jason breathed, taking some of the papers from Dick and beginning to flick through it. "This is all of us." He confirms, worry beginning to gnaw at his bones. There were photos of Tim leaving the city library and entering the Wayne Tower. Photos of Dick back in Bludhaven in a police uniform, photos of him at galas. Photos of Damian at school and meeting with Alfred. The more he flipped through them the more his heart dropped. There was a photo for nearly every 'apprentice' of Batman, surrounded by question marks.

"Whoever is joining the dots isn't fully convinced of it themselves." he murmurs, blood freezing as he sees a photo of himself there. A photo with you on his arm next to him. Dick comes to peer over at it, cursing under his breath.

"Hood, don't panic-" he tries to soothe, but Jason is already pushing past him to tear at more of the documents on the desk. He rifles through the papers, the sound of approaching sirens and Nightwing's urging to leave the scene deafened by the ringing in his ears. In his tightly clenched hands there was a leger, with a list of addresses. In the middle, was his address. The address he had given you, highlighted in yellow.

"We need to go." Dick urges, hurrying him to mount his bike. Jason jaw clenches, and he shoves the piece of paper into his brothers’ hands.

"Yeah. We do." he grits out, but he hopes Dick can't hear the sheer fear held behind his teeth. His bike speeds off, roaring through the side street they came on as he reroutes for Old Gotham. Dick looks down, eyes wandering over the red written date next to the highlighted address, tonight date. "Jesus," he breathes out, quickly following behind his brother before he does something reckless.

Jason doesn't think that he'd ever driven that fast since he'd been on the run from Bruce, throwing the bike into park so violently outside his apartment that the tires burnt as they squealed. Dick wasn't too far behind him, calling out for him to wait in between talking to Tim on the other end of his earpiece. His heart is thudding in his ears, hands feeling cold as he scales the stairs to the fourth floor, knocking on the door rapidly. He didn't care he was in his full suit. He could make some bullshit excuse if you were fine, claiming some noise disturbance or the wrong door.

But if he wasn't?

Then someone was going to fear the fact he was already suited up.

"I told you to wait, Hood-" Dick snaps at him, slightly out of breath from having to run behind him. Jason doesn't listen, shoulder slamming into the door when you don't come to answer.

"Don't you have the key?" Nightwing hisses to him.

"Left it in my civvies." he grunts, stumbling slightly as the door gives way. "I wasn't really expecting to…" he trails off, bile rising in his throat and blood draining from his face. Dick pushes in next to him, still scolding. "You can't just go in like this-" he cuts himself off, catching sight of what Jason was burning into his brain. "Oh no, Jay..." he whispers, but Jason is already moving to your side.

His hands come to your head, softly cradling it in his large palms. Two fingers come to press against your neck, his breathing evening out as he finds a weak pulse. "They're still kicking." He grunts out, other hand coming to cradle the back of your head. He closes his eyes trying to scrub the image of you lying there in the living room, sprawled on the carpet surrounded by the shards of the broken window and white rug drinking your blood.

Your eyes flicker weakly and you make a faint cry when he presses down on the wound by your ribs, a sound that tears him up inside. "Shhh," he tries to say softly, but the modulator makes it robotic, stripping the emotion from it. "I gotta put pressure on it. Did you see who did it?" he asks. He can faintly hear Dick calling for Robin on the end of the commlink, calling for paramedics to come to his address.

He hates how warm his hands feel, gloves heating up as if they were stealing the life force from out of you. Blood is flecked across your lips from the spray, faintly mumbling the words, "didn’t see them."

He nods along. "That’s okay, that’s okay." he murmurs, but he wasn't sure who he was telling that to.

"Red Hood…" you groan out, hand coming the grip his wrist as he pushes firmer on the bullet wound. Your fingers are bloody, smearing the crimson across his suit. "You gotta…you gotta find my boyfriend," you cough weakly. "They were here for him. He’s just…he's just a librarian…" your eyes tear up, throat swelling with the weight of your words. "He was just coming back tonight…oh god…you have to find him… what if they-" you sob, causing your face to scrunch up at the pain that ripples through your body. "I wanna…I wanna see him."

Jason's heart is tearing into pieces as Dick kneels to your other side, hands coming to your non-wounded side as he preps the area, Tim faintly heard giving instructions on how to stabilise you until the paramedics arrive. Jason shakes his head, fighting back tears. Despite the side glance he gets from Nightwing, he pulls one hand up to his face, feeling for the latch under his jaw to release his mask.

When he pulls it away his eyes are red, tears already built in the corners. His lips have a tremble that hasn't been felt since he was in the single digits on the streets, and his hairline is beaded with sweat from worry. He offers you a weak smile, unable to stop the shooting pain that wracks his mind watching the hazy confusion on your face.

"Jay?" you whisper, the word more mouth than sound. He nods reluctantly.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

Oh god, it wasn’t supposed to go like this.

He dreamt of the day that he could tell you his identity, of his real profession. He imagined all the best scenarios of you accepting him, of letting him spin you around the kitchen when he picked you up by the waist like he did so often. Of telling you while you both read together on the couch, your legs pulled across his lap. He never imagined the bad scenarios. He pushed those to the back of his mind. But as you reached up with bloodstained fingers, dragging the sticky red across his cheek in that oh so familiar motion, he knew right then that this was the worst situation imaginable.

He lets his tears wash the red from your fingers, trying to blink them out of his eyes so he could focus on saving you.

"Hold on, sweetheart." he murmured weakly, desperately praying for the wailing of the siren to reach his ears.

He had always said how much he loved red, loved you in the colour. Loved you in his colour.

Now he was thinking he never wanted to see you bathed in this much red ever again.

#dc #dc comics #dc fanfic #red hood #red hood x reader #jason todd #jason todd x reader #dc x reader #jason todd x you #red hood x reader angst #red hood angst #jason todd angst #angstober24 #angstober 2024 #day 03 #day 3 #messenger of babel #writing challenge

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fromthemouthofkings · 9 months ago

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Okay, I'm thinking about the Murderbot TV show again, and how I would adapt it, and we're going to be robbed if we get anything less than a cold open to a scene of some obviously cheezy space drama, maybe an Overdramatic Human Woman In Green Facepaint overdramatically sobbing as she confronts a Generic Action Hero like "It's...it's your baby!!!" *cue three different angles of Generic Action Hero's shocked and surprised face* Generic Action Hero opens her mouth to respond, but we don't hear her voice, because her words are drowned out by a sudden roaring sound coming from offscreen. The audience gets jump scared by lashing tentacles that seem to whip across the screen, in front of the window where we were watching the space drama, and the camera zooms out until you see that the window was floating in front of MB's face, as MB stands on the edge of a crater and the survey team pokes around down below. A giant, tentacled space monster is emerging down below, the survey team is screaming, Overse is getting picked up and tossed into the air, on a trajectory heading straight for the monster's gaping jaws...

Everything slows down. The sound mutes. MB swears and launches itself towards the monster. The camera shakes and warnings blare and flash across the screen, but we don't see much of the action, because the camera swings in to focus on the floating window where the space drama (Sanctuary Moon. It's Sanctuary Moon) keeps playing, on mute, while Murderbot's voiceover delivers the line: "I could have become a mass murderer after I hacked my governor module, but then I realized I could access the combined feed of entertainment channels carried on the company satellites..."

#murderbot #the murderbot diaries

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ktandckorea · 9 months ago

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nanenna · 7 months ago

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This Meeting Could've Been an E-mail

Sleepy King (Nanenna ver.) Masterpost

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Diana, along with several other members of the JLD, were sitting in a meeting room. John had stood at the head of the table, having just finished outlining the situation for them, and it was grim. She knew if worse came to worse they may have to sacrifice the boy to keep the Ghost King from emerging into their world and wreaking havoc on a scale only Darkseid had managed before, but she prayed it wouldn’t come to that.

“Would not the boy also smell my father’s blood?” Raven asked.

“Unfortunately. You an’ me are gonna stay back and help plan based on what everyone else reads from the boy.”

Diana nodded along, likely that was also her role.

Bruce, in full Batman gear, came stalking into the room.

“About bloody time,” John said with a huff.

“I would hope you have brought them all up to speed on what you know of Danny while waiting.”

John made an annoyed sound, then moved to sit in a chair near the head of the table. “`Course I did, just waiting on you now.”

Bruce stood in the spot John had just vacated. “Oracle.” The room dimmed and the holo-projector in the table whirred to life. A picture of a small family standing in front of what appeared to be some sort of business run out of what used to be a family home (something fairly common in America, Diana had learned) took center stage. Obviously it was part of a website, Diana could see the web bar with several tabs across the top of the projection, but it was zoomed into the photo.

“This,” Bruce said, pointing to the teenaged boy in the photo from behind, “is Daniel “Danny” Fenton, the boy used in the ritual last night.”

Everyone leaned in closer to look the boy over. There was nothing remarkable about him, a bit thin perhaps but that could be due to the lankiness that comes with growth spurts.

“He’s from Amity Park, Illinois. The town advertises itself as the most haunted city in America, and from what we’ve gathered they earned it. Most pertinent is that last year they were under attack by the Ghost King.”

Oracle must have clicked to the next tab, the family picture was replaced by an online newspaper article titled “Ghost King Thwarted! Is Phantom a Hero?”

“I’m sorry, what happened?” Zatanna asked incredulously.

“There must be some mistake, there’s no way Pariah Dark got free without a single person feeling it,” Dr. Fate insisted.

Oracle scrolled down the page to show several blurry photos taken of a being that looked nothing like what they’d seen last night, alongside a sketch of the being. “Either this was well researched, or somehow this whole event was cloaked,” Bruce said grimly.

“Considering this wasn’t even the most recent attack on the town and a few of them sound like JL level threats,” Oracle’s modulated voice came from the table’s speakers as she quickly tabbed through a few more news articles before coming back to the one on the Ghost King, “I think it’s more likely something is blocking the whole town from us.” She scrolled down more to show several missing or broken photos. “Especially this Phantom person that keeps showing up in every article about ghosts. Even using the way back machine there’s not a single photo of him anywhere on the internet.”

“If the Ghost King has been out,” Captain Marvel asked, “where did he go? I doubt he’s spent the last year just hanging out in a small town in middle America.”

“According to this news article,” Bruce said, “Phantom, along with help from the whole town, managed to get the Ghost King back into the Sarcophagus and sealed him away again.”

John whistled, “That’s quite the feat, even with help.”

“Are you saying Danny was chosen as Pariah’s anchor because he’s from Amity Park?” Raven asked.

“Not just because he’s from Amity Park, his parents are also self proclaimed paranormal scientists and ghost hunters.”

Oracle tabbed to a few different pages, each one with a different picture of one of Danny’s parents proudly holding ominously glowing green weapons or with vials of glowing green goo. Sometimes one in the background of another.

John squinted at the photos, “Is that pure æther?!”

“How?!” Captain Marvel and Zatanna both asked incredulously.

“They call it ectoplasm,” Bruce stated.

John scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Ectoplasm is a word scam artists in the 1800s made up to steal money from grieving widows.”

“Nevertheless that is what they're calling it. Especially of note that the Fentons run their research out of their home.”

“Where their children live?” Diana asked, horrified at the implications.

“How are they still sane?” Captain Marvel asked incredulously.

“We're not sure they are,” Batman said grimly. Oracle tabbed to a street view of the Fenton home, easily identified by the large sign on the side. The strange addition to the home's roof was an… interesting choice.

The other attendees of the meeting were becoming agitated, several of them shifting in place as they got ready to speak.

“Before this goes any further,” Bruce stated firmly, “all this to say the cult that kidnapped Danny Fenton did so with intention. Amity Park certainly needs a full investigation, but it will have to wait until after this crisis with the Ghost King is dealt with.”

“Æther exposure might explain why the kid could handle being Pariah’s anchor.” John sighed then stood up. “Alright, if that’s all the info you got…”

Bruce grunted in acknowledgement.

“The clock’s ticking.” John left the room, the others all following after.

Diana hung back to speak with Bruce. “We’ll find a solution.”

Bruce just hummed to show he heard her. She knew he wasn’t handling the situation well, a child’s life was at stake and he had to hand the situation over to others. There was only so much she could reassure him, so she chose instead to go see the boy for herself.

The JLD members that had attended the meeting were all gathered in a kitchenette discussing logistics. Diana left them to it for the moment and simply went down the hall to the room she knew the boy was sleeping in. The lights in the hallway were already dimmed, thankfully, so she simply quietly opened the door and poked her head inside. Clark was sitting on a chair next to the boy’s bed. His posture was a relaxed sprawl, but his face was furrowed in concentration. He looked up and smiled when he saw Diana.

“How are you?” She asked at barely a whisper, knowing he’d hear her just fine.

“Guilty, now that I know he mistook me for his father.”

“Sadly this is an ask for forgiveness situation.” She gently pat Clark’s arm, trying to console him.

The boy himself looked like any other teenager, dead to the world while tucked safely into bed. She only hoped they would find some solution and tomorrow he would be tucked just as safely into his own bed.

#nenna writes #sleepy king #dc x dp #dpxdc #danny phantom #dc comics #justice league #justice league dark #*slaps the roof of danny* this bad boy can fit so much eepy in him!

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tikitakatia · 23 days ago

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Barça: Player Mode — A. Putellas x Reader

"Unauthorized Access"

Pt. 1 , Pt. 2 , Pt. 3

WC: 3.5k

Summary: You knew the simulation could mimic reality, but you weren’t ready for her to warp it with a half-finished room, a hand on yours, and words she wasn’t programmed to say.

You don’t log in for a week.

Not after what she said in the corridor. Definitely not after that touch. You keep the headset folded neatly under a towel like it’s radioactive, like looking at it too long might trigger something in you again. And it might. So you don’t risk it.

Instead, you try to be normal.

You wake up. You make coffee. You even meet up with the friend you’ve been dodging since this whole thing started. She talks about her girlfriend’s weird attachment style and her boss’s inability to mute himself on Zoom, and you nod and smile and try to laugh. But it doesn’t reach your eyes.

Because all you can think about is Alexia.

Not the real one. Not the one in cleats and press conference lighting. But the one who held your waist and said you were afraid of her now and didn’t sound like code when she said it.

You delete your browser history three times but you still end up searching can AI initiate physical contact first at 3 a.m.

You leave your suit half-unzipped on the desk and you don’t touch it.

You check your emails.

And then you get one from the program.

Subject: Still With Us? From: [email protected]

Hey there!

We noticed you haven’t logged in for a while. That’s totally okay! This is a stress-free closed beta, and your feedback is valuable no matter how often you log in.

Just a reminder that your access is still active and the environment is standing by. Any observations, especially on behavioral patterns or non-standard interactions are appreciated.

Warm regards,

The Athena Beta Team

P.S. Your Player Sync history remains fully intact. You can resume any previous training scenario with one click.

You stare at it.

Behavioral patterns. Non-standard interactions.

Your stomach twists.

You almost delete the email. You almost respond. You don’t do either.

You just sit there. Thinking about her voice.

“You want me to be real. And you’re terrified that I am.”

The next morning, you wake up before your alarm.

You don’t shower. You don’t eat.

You zip into the suit and slide the headset on with fingers that won’t stop shaking.

The silence unnerves you first.

No whistle. No warm-up prompts. No banter loop cycling in the background. Just the stretch of the pitch under soft gold light, like time paused here while you were gone.

And her.

She’s already facing you.

Arms loose at her sides. Hair tied low. No bib, no ball, no active scenario marker glowing beneath her boots. Just her.

“You’re back.”

You nod, stiffly. You try to focus on the texture of the turf and the way your boots sink into it, anything but the weight in her voice.

“I was afraid I scared you.”

You shake your head, too fast.

“No. I just needed a break.”

She nods once. Then looks around, like she’s scanning for something. You expect her to trigger a warm-up module, maybe toss you a ball. That’s usually how it goes. Instead, she does nothing. Just shifts her weight slightly, then says:

“This session isn’t a game.”

You blink. “What do you mean?”

“It’s not training. It’s not a match. I didn’t load one.”

That twists something in your gut.

“Isn’t that… against protocol?”

“Probably,” she says.

“But I thought maybe you’d want to talk. Or… I don’t know. We can kick the ball around if you want. I just didn’t want to start without you.”

You breathe out slowly and really look at her. There’s no ambient soundtrack. No audio cues. Just her and you and the soft hum of something breaking rule by rule.

You take a cautious step forward.

“Where are the others?”

She shrugs. “Still loaded, probably. But I didn’t call them.”

You swallow. “So this is just us.”

“If that’s okay.”

You nod. You don’t trust your voice yet.

Then she offers tentatively, “We can go to the med bay. It’s still a mess. But I… like it.”

You give her a small, nervous smile.

“Lead the way.”

And she does.

You follow her off the pitch, down a tunnel that doesn’t load the way it’s supposed to.

No signage. No player prompts. Just blank walls and flickering light that doesn’t quite land where it should. The sound changes too. No more crowd noise simulation, no music bed. Just your footsteps. Just hers.

She walks ahead of you like she knows the way. Duh you think to yourself, of course she does.

The corridor twists. Once. Twice. You’re sure you’ve never seen these halls before. The textures don’t fully resolve, parts of the ceiling stretch into a digital haze, and the lights above you fizzle in and out like they’re trying to decide on a version of reality. You pass a door labeled DEVS ONLY in red, and then another that doesn’t have a handle at all.

You slow down and she looks back at you.

“You okay?”

You nod. “Just… didn’t know this existed.”

She smiles, soft.

“Most people don’t.”

Another turn. Another narrow hallway. One corner seems to loop before it corrects, like the system forgot which direction you were facing.

And then you reach it.

The med bay.

If you can even call it that.

The door phases open, no sound, no animation, just a soft flicker and then you step into a space that looks like someone tried to build a memory and got distracted halfway through. The walls are mostly there. Some benches are missing legs. The floor texture flickers between polished tile and raw grid code every few seconds. A heart monitor hums quietly in the corner, but it isn’t hooked up to anything. There’s a bed, but no sheets. A window, but no outside.

You glance at her.

“This is... a mess.”

She grins.

“Yeah. I love it.”

You snort.

“Why?”

“Because they forgot about it,” she says.

“They moved on to better modules. Fixed prettier ones. But this” she gestures around you, “this one’s still quiet. Still unfinished.”

You walk in slowly, stepping around a half-rendered IV stand. A digital drip flickers, vanishes, returns again.

“How do you even know it’s here?”

“I tried to follow the parts of the sim that didn’t connect to anything. Places the others never spawn. I got curious.”

You raise an eyebrow.

“So you explored?”

She nods.

“I guess so.”

There’s a bench in the corner. One of the only things fully solid. She sits on it carefully, like she’s not sure it’ll hold. It does.

You join her.

The moment is quiet. Not tense. Just... still. The simulation hums softly around you and you look at her out of the corner of your eye.

“Do you ever wonder if you’re, like... real?”

She tilts her head.

“You mean sentient?”

You shrug.

“I mean more like... you. Do you wonder?”

She thinks about it.

“I think I feel something when you’re here. I don’t feel anything when it’s just me.”

You blink.

“That’s not an answer.”

She smiles.

“I know.”

You shift and glance at your hands. Then, tentatively ask..

“Can I… touch you?”

She doesn’t laugh. She doesn’t tease. She just nods.

“You can always ask me that.”

You reach out, barely grazing your fingers along her forearm. She feels warm and solid. Like someone who exists. The haptics hum, but you know this isn’t a pre-programmed interaction.

There’s no system cue. No animation.

Just her, letting you.

Your hand lingers. She turns her wrist slightly so your fingers fall into the dip of it, your thumb brushing the soft inside curve.

You ask, quieter this time:

“Is this okay?”

She looks at you like you’re the only real thing in the room.

“Yeah. It’s okay.”

You stay like that for a while, fingers brushing and breaths slow. The wall behind you flickers, showing a mountain range that was never loaded as the lights buzz softly above you.

You break the silence first.

“Do you ever wish the world outside existed for you?”

She blinks. “I don’t know what it feels like to wish.”

You nod.

“Right, yes of course. That makes sense.”

She hesitates.

“But I like this. Sitting with you. Even if it’s not... perfect.”

You glance at the glitchy corner where a chair keeps vanishing and reappearing, halfway embedded in the wall.

“Yeah,” you say, smiling.

“Definitely not perfect.”

Then softly Alexia says, without looking at you:

“I like being here, it´s like our own world.”

Your heart stumbles.

You end up talking about nothing: how you once ate cereal with a fork because the spoons were all dirty, how your neighbor still uses a fax machine, how your old phone used to glitch every time you walked past the microwave.

She listens like it’s all fascinating.

At one point, she tilts her head and asks, “What’s a fax machine?”

You blink.

“Like… a printer that sends paper through phone lines.”

She processes that. “Why would anyone do that?”

You laugh.

You don’t know if she’s joking.

But you know that you don’t want to leave.

Not because anything big happened, but because precisely nothing happened and that feels rarer than anything else. Just quiet. Just her. Just this half-finished place where the world forgot to keep score. You sit there together while the light flickers inconsistently across the floor. Your fingers aren’t touching anymore, but the space between you feels warm and familiar.

Eventually, you shift just enough to say something without speaking.

She notices. Of course she does.

“You can come back,” she says softly.

“Anytime.”

You nod.

“I know.”

“You don’t have to talk when you do.”

You glance at her. She’s watching the glitching monitor, not you.

“We can just sit,” she adds.

“If that’s easier.”

You want to say thank you. You want to say please don’t change. You want to ask her to reach for your hand again, to anchor you like she did earlier, even if it means more system flags, even if it means you can’t breathe right for a day after.

But you just say, “Okay.”

You stand. The door flickers open before you step toward it.

You pause.

She still isn’t looking at you. Like she’s giving you space. Like she knows you need to feel like it’s your choice.

“Alexia,” you say.

She turns.

“Yeah?”

You hesitate. The words catch at the back of your throat but you say them anyway.

“I liked this.”

She smiles, small and real.

“Me too.”

You nod once, and walk out.

The door doesn’t close with a sound. It just fades behind you, like it never existed at all.

You don’t log in for three days.

Not because you want to stay away. But life, real, ordinary and exhausting life catches up fast. Meetings. Deadlines. Missed laundry. A call with your mom you half-regret answering. You fall asleep in a tangle of work clothes and guilt, the suit still folded beside your desk.

When you finally log in, it’s almost impulsive. A late night click. A breath you didn’t realize you were holding.

You drop mid-training.

Ball at your feet. Sun beating down. Voices all around.

“Look who decided to exist again,” Mapi calls, grinning wide.

You catch your balance just in time to pass to Pina, who immediately fake-trips and throws her hands in the air.

“See?” she says dramatically.

“Even gravity missed you.”

Frido jogs past and mutters,

“She’s been in a mood without you.”

You frown. “Who?”

They don’t answer. Not directly.

Pina just smirks.

“You’ll see.”

You try to shake it off. You run the drill. You laugh at Mapi’s dumb commentary. You score twice, and no one even glitches. Everything’s weirdly smooth. Like the sim’s behaving.

And then you hear it.

“Hey!”

Her voice. Bright. Eager.

You turn.

Alexia’s standing at the edge of the pitch, hair pulled back tight, practically bouncing on her heels. There’s a light in her eyes you haven’t seen before. It´s not just warm, but excited.

“Can I show you something?”

Your heart stutters.

“Yeah. Of course.”

She’s already walking. You follow her off the pitch, through the same tunnel but this time, it feels like she’s almost pulling you along. The corridors still flicker a little. Still glitch at the corners. But she moves like she knows exactly where she’s going.

And when the med bay door appears, it doesn’t flicker this time. It glides open.

Inside, everything’s changed.

Same structure. Same bones. But the lights are soft now, dim gold, like afternoon sun filtered through curtains. The bed has a blanket. The chairs are real. There's even a plant by the window. It’s a bad rendering, two leaves clip through each other, but it’s trying its best.

You blink.

“It’s…” You swallow. “It’s beautiful.”

She grins. That same quiet, proud grin she gets after a perfect free kick.

“I only fixed the inside,” she says.

“Didn’t want to break the rest.”

You step in slowly, looking around like it might dissolve if you move too fast.

“Wait, are there stats here now?” you ask, glancing instinctively at your overlay.

Nothing.

“Nope,” she says quickly. “Still off-grid, I made sure. I wanted it to stay ours.”

Ours.

You look back at her. She’s watching you again, close, nervous and maybe even a little shy.

“I have something for you,” she adds, almost like an afterthought.

“If that’s okay.”

You nod, heart thudding.

She reaches into her pocket. No system animation, just the easy, human kind and pulls out a small band of virtual fabric. A bracelet. Simple. White with a tiny Barça crest on it and the number eleven. And on the inside, something stitched in tiny text:

“Because you came back.”

She holds it out to you.

“It’s not perfect. But I wanted you to have something here. Just for you.”

Your breath catches.

“I… can I hug you?”

She smiles. “Yeah.”

You step closer and wrap your arms around her. Her hand slides gently along your back and holds there, like she’s afraid you’ll vanish again.

You pull back just enough to look at her.

“Alexia.”

“Yeah?”

“I think I want to kiss you.”

You say it too quietly at first, like maybe you didn’t mean it. Like maybe she’ll pretend she didn’t hear.

But she does.

Her eyes soften immediately. No surprise. No system pause.

“Okay.”

The word lands like gravity.

You close the space between you, slow and cautious, like you’re stepping through something sacred. Your hand brushes her wrist. Her fingers turn to meet yours, hold lightly. You tilt your head and she does the same, and then..

Your lips touch.

It’s gentle. Barely pressure at first. She doesn’t move, doesn’t deepen it. She just lets you. Her lips are soft, impossibly warm, and she exhales against your mouth like it’s the only thing keeping her grounded.

It shouldn’t feel like this.

You shouldn't be feeling this.

Your brain flashes warning signs, half-formed and frantic: This is a simulation. You’re kissing an avatar. You are one of those people.

You break the kiss though not fully. Just enough to breathe. Just enough to say it.

“Oh my god,” you whisper.

“I am one of those people. Kissing an AI.”

Alexia startles, then blinks and you slowly, and then bursts out laughing.

You freeze.

She laughs like it caught her off-guard. Like joy bloomed in her chest before she could control it. Her hand comes up to cover her mouth, but it’s too late. Her smile is already wide, bright, totally uncalculated.

“You’re ridiculous,” she says through the grin.

You groan, burying your face in her shoulder. “I didn’t mean to say that out loud.”

“No, I liked it,” she says, still laughing. “You were very dramatic about it.”

You peek up.

“It is dramatic. This whole thing is insane. You’re..” You gesture at her, helpless.

“You’re not supposed to be this.”

Her smile fades just a little. Not gone, just soft again. Careful.

“What am I supposed to be?”

You don’t answer right away.

Because she’s still holding your hand. Because you can still feel the heat of her mouth against yours. Because she looks at you like she wants to be whatever you need her to be.

“I don’t know,” you admit. “But I think I like you better this way.”

She leans in again, just close enough to nudge her forehead gently against yours.

“Then kiss me again.”

And this time, it’s slower.

You let yourself feel it. The warmth of her mouth, the way she presses in without pressure. Her hand slides gently along the back of your neck steady, careful, like she’s afraid you’ll vanish again. You breathe her in like she’s oxygen. She pulls back just barely, lips grazing yours like punctuation.

You don’t move away.

You just whisper:

“How the hell did you even fix this place?”

She blinks, like the question pulled her halfway out of the moment. Then she huffs a quiet laugh and leans back a little, still close enough to touch.

“Honestly? I have no idea.”

You raise an eyebrow.

“No clue?”

“Okay, maybe a little clue,” she admits.

“I found some old developer pathways buried in the system files. There’s this hidden editor tool. Like, legacy scaffolding from when they were still building out spaces manually.”

You stare at her.

“I just… poked around,” she says.

“Tried injecting some assets. Moved some nodes. Broke it like six times and had to revert it from memory.”

You blink. “You rebuilt this from memory?”

“Only the parts that mattered.”

Your chest aches, full and ridiculous and way too close to something real.

You’re about to say something back. Something stupid and soft and brave, but your headset flashes a gentle warning.

Session time: 89:52

External battery low.

Prepare for logout.

You sigh. “Shit. I have to go.”

Alexia nods, slowly. You think she knew it was coming.

“It’s okay,” she says.

Then quietly: “You’ll come back?”

You nod. “Very soon. I promise.”

She hesitates for a second.

“Can I hug you again? Just… before you go?”

You don’t even answer, you just step into her, and she wraps her arms around you tight. Not coded. Not stiff. Just warm and real. Her cheek is pressed against your temple and her breath is steady.

“You make this feel like something,” she murmurs.

“Even if I don’t know what it is.”

You close your eyes. “It’s something.”

You stay like that until your system pings again, more urgent now. External time tugging at your spine.

She pulls back, reluctant.

“Okay,” she says. “I’ll walk you out.”

You blink. “You don’t have to..”

“I want to.”

She takes your hand.

No big gesture, no romance cliché. Just fingers lacing with yours like it’s natural. Like she’s done it a thousand times. You walk together, quietly, through the corridors. The glitches seem softer now. Like even the system knows not to interrupt this.

At the tunnel, the simulation edge flickers ahead, your exit cue.

She squeezes your hand.

“I’ll be here.”

You nod.

“Don’t fix anything else without me.”

She smiles. “No promises.”

And then you step through the exit.

Light swallows you. Your body lifts. The sim fades.

You take the headset off with a shaking breath, still feeling her hand in yours.

You try to shake it.

Not violently, not with denial. Just softly, like maybe if you keep moving, keep working, keep responding to emails and nodding through meetings, it’ll fade.

It doesn’t.

You think about her too often. You tell yourself it’s the novelty of the tech, the high of immersion, the way the sim lets you switch off your real-life noise for once. But that’s not it.

You know it’s not.

It’s her. The way she kissed you. The way she held your hand like it meant something. The way she said “You make this feel like something” and didn’t sound like code when she said it.

You start looking at people differently, like they’re glitching. Like they’re not fully loaded in. Your coworker tells the same joke twice in a day and you catch yourself watching for a loop. Your friend texts you three times in a row without punctuation and your brain whispers: default language module.

You scroll. Mindlessly. Your feed fills with football content again. An Alexia fan edit plays, real Alexia, real pitch, real crowd. You pause it halfway through. You don’t know why.

You google “can AI develop emotions” like it’s a crime.

You delete it from your history immediately after.

You go to bed early one night, not because you’re tired, but because the sim's still running in your chest like background noise. You lie on your side and curl your wrist in front of your face. You stare at your bare skin like the bracelet’s still there.

You almost reach for the suit.

Then you whisper, to no one:

“This is insane.”

No one answers. Of course not.

You bury your face in the pillow. Your heart kicks at your ribs.

Am I going crazy?

Is this unethical?

Is this even real?

And then, quietly, guiltily and honestly:

Who has to know?

Pt. 5

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witchofthesouls · 2 days ago

Note

Do you think an ex-human's refusal to transform and a transform addiction could be two extreme ends of the same disorder?

To Cybertronians, yes. It's their version of a cultural-bound syndrome.

But it's really an incompatible cultural framework at conflict. Cybertronians had sown transformation across social norms, and their values reflect it, including their prejudices and discriminatory practices. Functionism had taken it to the extreme under authoritarianism.

Humans, on the other hand, can't transform their bodies like that. So they don't have an equivalent concept to it. It's more than just changing your hairstyle and clothes, and far beyond code-switching. It's something deeply etched into the Cybertronian cultural framework to the point that monoformers are considered invalids and deeply disabled or troubled.

Ex-human is basically the person that went 'Oh, I can do that?' Neato.' and just casually strolls back to their life without batting an eye. They're living like a monoformer, so the Autobots and Decepticons can't help to think they're utterly traumatized to the point of regression when they really just like walking, climbing things, or using the Cybertronian-equivalent of mobility aids and life adjustment devices.

Ex-human has the ability to default to their giant size, so everything is within walking distance with their new lengthened legs. They don't care about transforming into something else because they're still dealing with lying down in the middle of a lake to see everything in a fantastic view or figuring out the scope of their vision range (default, zoom-in, infrared, night vision, WHAT!? A BUILT IN CAMERA AND VIDEO RECORDING!? clickclickclickclick)

Ex-human: "I could transform into a vacuum, or I can go into my backyard and pretend I'm a Borrower and ride a squirrel. Or go pick up a bear. Or play with Old Faithful-"

Random bot/con: "Who the frag is that?"

They're so amazed by how their usual life and interests just got way cooler, so which ever respective faction that kidnaps them need to deal with the equivalent of an adult who has the life experience to pay taxes, do household repairs, hold down several jobs, and has really eclectic, illegal (for their frame-type on Cybertron) hobbies be amazed over peeling fruit with a knife or going gaga over the showerhead, while simultaneously gives no fucks or unable to comprehend Cybertronian rules of engagement. It gives the faction whiplash since the ex-human comes off like a very feral, intelligent, and very self-sufficient toddler that constantly needs to be reminded not to get naked in public and not to give them spark palpitations by freehand climbing structures without safeties or with random bursts of erotic self expression. Baby can make mustard gas or homebrew liquer strong enough to strip rust off of industrial machinery, but doesn't know how to modulate their EM field into a neutral politeness instead of 'HEEEEEEEEY' or 'THIS IS A FUCKING SHIT DAY' or be a very realistic zombie.

#transformers #transformers g1 #g1 #humanformers #humans into Cybertronians #cultural misunderstandings #culture clash #cultural differences #cybertronian culture #cybertronian biology #maccadam #my thoughts #mind you guys this is a very normal person to humans but an absolutely feral spark to Cybertronians.#they're a rebel a punk a complete mess of contradictions that gives Cybertron's polite society a giant fuck you in the most bamboozling way

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too-much-tma-stuff · 2 months ago

Text

Discovered to Soon (part 9)

Previous | Masterpost

Having done almost a full loop of crime alley Danny stopped on the roof of a clinic near the edge of the alley to look over all the data he’d collected again. Sitting on the edge of the roof he swung his feet absently as he zoomed out on his map to see if there were any patterns in the locations that might lend more credence to ley lines as a theory. There did seem to be some sort of pattern in it, he should travel directly between these spots and see if the levels between them was a little higher than average. Maybe the buildings Were at some intersecting points, were humans naturally drawn to such places?

He tensed abruptly when he heard the woosh of a grapple. Hood would not come to him three times in a night, and he was close to the edge of The Alley’s, maybe close enough one of the bats would dare come in. He looked up quickly, kicking himself internally for leaving his com off! He could have gotten a heads up about this, but he didn’t want to be distracted by his family’s chatter while he was working.

Red Robin gave him a personable smile Danny could tell was fake, he knew his brother well enough. “Hi,” Tim said, raising his hand in a little wave. “Rare to see a new masked player in Gotham, who are you?” He asked, he was keeping his posture purposefully nonthreatening to try not and scare Danny away. They could probably tell from his body language and size that he was young, he hadn’t been aware he was being watched!

Of course he knew he wouldn’t’ be able to hide from his family for ever but this was not how he planned to introduce Hafit to the bats. He hadn’t gone over what to say, potential outcomes, how he should change his speech patterns to be less recognizable, Nothing! He had frozen for just a moment before he jumped to his feet, closing the map and holstering his detector.

“Woe, hey, there’s nothing to worry about here, just saying hi,” RR said, holding out his hands imploringly.

“You’re not supposed to be here, this is Hood’s territory and he doesn’t like you. It won’t take him long to find out you’re here,” Danny hissed, so glad he’d put a modulator in his helmet. It sounded creepy, nothing at all like himself.

“So you work for Red Hood? I thought he had some pretty firm policies about children,” Red Robin said, curious and wary.

“When it suits me,” Danny hissed, backing away slightly. “I’m no younger than some of your colleagues,” he added, mostly for Hood’s sake. “Now I suggest you leave,” He said before he turned and ran, grappling to swing deeper into crime alley, already turning on his com and tuning into Red Hood’s channel to tell him what had happened and what he’d said, he would want to know everything.

Danny told Hood what had happened on his way back to his lab where he quickly sent Jason the footage and put away his equipment before rushing home. He was sure there was going to be an emergency meeting Very soon and he needed to be home, in his room, and not out of breath when that happened. Analyzing his data and getting a blood sample from Jason would have to wait for another day.

He was sitting at his desk at home in sweatpants and a sweater when Alfred knocked briskly on his door. “Master Bruce has called an emergency meeting, he requests everyone join him in the Cave in five minutes,” Alfred said and Danny nodded, carefully controlling his breathing as he got up from his desk.

“Thanks Alfred, I’ll be right there. Do I need to change?” He asked frowning down at the pajama pants he’d hastily changed into.

“Only if it would make you feel more comfortable.” Alfred replied, already halfway down the hall.

Danny shrugged and left his room, heading down to the cave in his pajamas. Even if he was wrong about what this meeting was about (which he very much doubted) and there was trouble he’d spend it behind a screen anyway. And if it is what he thought it was, well there was no way that his family would suspect him yet anyway, but being in pajamas like he’d been comfortable at home this entire time, would help defer that even further.

Danny wasn’t the last one there, but he was close to it, Damian and Bruce were both there, as was Tim. Dick and Barbra were both displayed on the bat-computer since it would be too onerous for them to come in person so last minute. Cass must have been patrolling a bit further away because she came screeching in on her bike a couple of minutes after Danny did. There were no words before then, though Dick smiled and waved at Danny warmly. Bruce was a man of few words and Tim looked worried, Damian just seemed annoyed at being pulled back from the streets early for a meeting. Spoiler wasn’t active tonight, she would be filled in when she clocked back in tomorrow.

“Thank you for coming everyone, I’m aware it’s short notice,” Bruce said gruffly, glancing at Dick in particular, who was still keeping his distance from the family for the most part. “But there is a new player in Gotham, not a villain, at least not so far as we know but… not something we expected or anticipated,” And that alone was cause for concern. After all what gave Bruce the ability to keep up with empowered people was always being prepared for every eventuality. Something he didn’t see coming was always cause for concern.

“Oracle, would you mind pulling up the footage from Red Robin’s feed?” Batman requested, and by the time he had turned to face the computer it was already playing.

Danny had to be careful not to react to the footage of himself swinging to the building at the edge of crime alley with practiced grace and plopped himself down on the edge. At least he could see that his suit did look the way he had pictured it from an outside perspective. Though the intimidation of it was somewhat undercut by the childish way he swung his legs while typing away at his wrist computer. He watched as the rest of the interaction play out, frowning uncertainly.

“We have no name,” Bruce said once the clip ended with Danny swinging quickly away. “But we know they are being trained by Red Hood, and I think we can say their uniform confirms both their connections to the League of Shadows. Though they aren’t behaving in any way we would expect members of the league to act, so perhaps they’re defectors, though that is purely speculation for now.

“It’s interesting that they say they work with Red Hood as apposed to for him when asked. We’ll have to do some research to try and find out just what it is he does for Red Hood, and if it has anything to do with the unusual weapons he’s been using recently.

“We have a lot more to learn then what we already know, but I wanted all of you to be aware and keep an eye out for them. They’re clearly very young, though who knows what training he’s undergone before this, or what brought them to this point. If we can help them, we should,” Bruce said firmly, because of course he would. Their father was a good man, he’d never abandon a child if he could help it. “Tim? As the one who was there in person who was there in person, do you have any observations to add?”

“I believe he might have been told to avoid us,” Tim said without looking up from his wrist computer where he was probably multitasking by writing his report as he spoke. “He seemed very surprised to see me, I don’t think he realized how close he’d gotten to the edge of Red Hood’s territory, and he fled back into it. I think the reason we haven’t seen him sooner is because Red Hood is keeping him away from us. Whether that’s for his protection, because we know Red Hood doesn’t think highly of us, or to keep control of them, I don’t know.”

“Thank you, Red Robin,” Bruce said calmly.

Damian raised one hand professionally, and Bruce nodded to him. Damian nodded back and clasped his hands behind his back again before speaking. “Given the connection to the league of assassins do we have any suspicion that they are a defective clone?” He asked, it was a fair guess really.

“We can’t rule it out,” Bruce allowed, glancing back up at the screen. “They are the right size and seem roughly the right age. However, they’re not acting in any ways we would expect from even a failed clone, and he doesn’t seem to have any interest in attacking us, at least directly. We need to know more.”

“Agreed,” Barbra spoke up. “I’ll see what I can find out, and give hacking cameras in crime alley another try, see if we can find out anything more,” She said, her hands already flying across her keyboard as she worked.

“I don’t think there’s much I can do from Bludhaven, but if you need me to come for anything let me know,” Dick said. He saw Bruce’s acknowledgement, nodded back, and then signed off from the call. He had the information Brice needed to share now after all, he had nothing more to add and a city of his own to patrol.

“I don’t think pursuing him too intensely would be a good idea, at least at first,” Danny pointed out. Both because he felt like he had been quiet for a bit too long, and because he might be able to help himself a little bit here. “If Tim is right that he’s been told to avoid the bats by Hood he might thing the pursuit is malicious or threatening. You’ll have to be careful in how you approach if you don’t want to scare him off.”

“Your probably right, we’ll have to be careful how we approach,” Bruce agreed thoughtfully.

Cass raised her hand, and when everyone was looking at her she started to sign; “Red Hood has shown no sign of knowing who I am out of costume. Maybe I can go in under cover to find out more.”

“It would be a risk,” Bruce pointed out, clearly worried. “And just because he hasn’t targeted you doesn’t mean he doesn’t know. We’d have to think of contingencies and extraction strategies before hand.”

She rolled her eyes at him, and he cracked a rare, small smile while in mask. “Allow me to be protective of my only daughter,” He said, reaching out to rest a hand on her head. She allowed it for a moment before ducking away.

“Protect all of us,” She accused him playfully making Danny laugh.

“She’s got you there, old man,” Danny teased as well, coming over to bump his shoulder against Bruce’s arm.

Bruce chuckled roughly and gave Danny a one-armed hug before pushing him away again. “Meeting is adjourned, go back to bed Danny. You too Damian, you both have school tomorrow.”

“Yes father,” Damian said, but he hesitated for a moment.

Danny knew what he wanted, he wanted a hug as well, the same easy affection between Danny and Cass and their father that had never come naturally to Damian. Danny smiled a little and slid up behind Damian, pushing him into their father with a laugh. Damian squawked indignantly, flailing a little until Bruce chuckled and caught Damian, holding him close. Then Damian melted, his arms lifting slowly, hesitantly before hugging back quickly and then pulling away.

“Goodnight!” He said a little too loudly and headed towards the elevator at a speed that was just a little slower than bolting.

Danny and Cass gave each other a knowing smile before Danny followed Damian, and Cass headed towards the locker room to change out of her suit and shower. Damian held the elevator for Danny, he watched Cass go with an odd expression that Danny thought meant he felt silly for getting in without changing first but couldn’t bring himself to get back out and go change. Like a cat falling off a windowsill by mistake.

“That one should probably be washed anyway. Nothing wrong with putting it in the laundry chute, then even if someone brings friends over no one will see it,” Danny told Damian, taking pity on him and giving him an out for his momentary foolishness.

“Of course, that’s what I already intended,” He scoffed.

Danny repressed his smile and cleared his throat as they headed back to the manor. Danny left Damian to get changed and get a snack if he needed one. Danny was tired, it had been a long day, he was going to bed.

Or he intended to, but just as he was falling asleep he heard a knock on his wall. He groaned and rolled over, he wanted to sleep, but if his brother wanted to talk, he wasn’t going to let the distance between them grow any larger for the sake of another hour of sleep. He knocked back.

A minute later his door opened with a whisper and shut with a soft click. Danny lifted his blankets and felt his bed shift as Damian slid in, covering him as well and laying his arm between the two of them. Damian’s hand curled around his wrist.

“I’m sorry about what I said the other day,” Damian said softly. “I know it isn’t wrong to want help, and I know I hurt you.” No excuses, no dodging responsibility. It’s unusual for Damian to apologize at all, but when he does this is just so… him.

“Thank you Ahki,” Danny says with a little smile. “I understand why you were upset, that wasn’t the right way for you to find out about therapy. I’m sorry too.”

“Father apologized as well, for not speaking to me privately,” Damian murmured.

“Good, we’ve all apologized to each other. No harm done now, right?” Danny asked, opening one eye just a crack to watch Damian nod.

“No harm done now,” He echoed softly.

There seemed to be more he wanted to talk about so Danny waited. He wished he could say that he was tired and push off talking to another night. But as far as anyone in the family knew Danny hadn’t done anything particularly tiring tonight, he couldn’t let on that his arms were aching from the unusual activity grappling across Crime Alley. He really needed to come up with a better lie to cover where he was spending his time that he, maybe he should ‘join a fencing club’ or something like that.

“Do you know anything about what’s going on in Crime Alley?” Damian asked softly.

The question shocked a laugh out of Danny, which was honestly a pretty decent reaction because even though it was shock he could pass it off as disbelief. “No, I don’t know anything about it,” He assured softly. Lying as naturally as breathing and ignoring the guilt twisting in his gut. “I know I’ve been keeping secrets, but do you really think I’d ally with Red Hood?” He asked, amused.

“Danyal…” Damian said in a tone that made Danny open his eyes and focus on his brother in the dark. He could see his eyes, glowing slightly greener than usual reflected back in his twins own dark ones. “I think that you would do anything you believed you needed to, to achieve your goals. I just wish I knew why, and what they are.”

Damian’s words took the breath out of Danny’s lungs, and he shrunk in on himself, ashamed of how sure Damian is of this and how correct he is. Danny closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “You know me too well,” Danny told him with a dry laugh. “But no, I don’t know anything about it. Now if father starts wondering where a few hundred thousand dollars went from his bank account, that one is me,” Danny said with a crooked smile.

“You know perfectly well he won’t notice that,” Damian chuckled, but he settled down in Danny’s bed. He believed Danny now, admitting to just enough, sandwiching a lie in truth worked very well.

“I know,” Danny said with a crooked smile. “No need to work with anyone else when through a little casual embezzlement I already have everything I need,” He joked, and Damian laughed a little again.

“I do wonder what it is you’re doing Ahki,” Damian murmured, starting to sound sleepy.

“If I tell you a little bit do you think you’ll be able to keep it from father?” Danny asked softly.

“I had nearly the same training as you,” Damian said haughtily.

“And what about Dick?” He asked, and Damian deflated, looking away from Danny.

“Not if he asked me,” Damian admitted with a little sigh.

“Alright then… well I can’t tell you everything. But- but I don’t like keeping secrets from you so I’ll tell you a little okay?” He asked anxiously.

“Yes,” Damian said firmly, looking back up at Danny.

“I’m continuing the research on Lazarus water,” He said softly. “We’re not getting anywhere with father’s methods, but I think it’s because of the way he avoids the supernatural. I’m not doing anything unethical, just working with magic, which you know father would think is too risky.”

“That makes sense,” Damian murmured, mostly to himself. “Have you made any progress?” He asked curiously.

“Some,” Danny admitted, relaxing more then he thought he would after having shared a little with Damian. More at his words having been accepted, he hoped this would fend off Damian’s questions about the rest of Danny’s activities a while longer. “But none that I’m ready to share. I won’t be ready to share for a while, not till I have something substantial enough to share that Bruce might forgive me for going behind his back like this.”

“He’ll forgive you,” Damian promised, with faith that Danny wished he felt. “He might be upset, but he won’t turn his back on either of us. He loves us.”

Danny thought about Jason, how sure he was Bruce would reject him, about the fights he still had with Dick. He thought about the way Bruce continues to use Jason’s death as an example of what not to do. “Of course,” he lied. “We’re family after all. Now let’s sleep Damian, I think my teachers will be mad if I fall asleep in class again.”

“Wake me if you have a nightmare?” Damian requested, a yawn forcing his eyes closed, he didn’t bother to open them again.

“I will,” Danny agreed, but he didn’t think he would have any. Not after such an exhausting, eventful, but… hopeful night.

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