what-is-merlin-so-gay-for

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

conversations overheard through the batkid com lines pt 2

*Damian and Jason, four hours into a stakeout*

Damian: Jay, hand me the mango pieces.

Jason: *plastic crinkling* ayyy, I’m Jason again!

Damian: *snorts*

Jason: what was with that, by the way? I just showed up in Gotham and found you referring to everyone like they’re your professor. Like, that’s not a ‘you’ thing, I don’t know why you started doing that.

*audible chewing noises*

Damian: do you want the genuine honest answer?

Jason: please god do tell

Damian: so- and you aren’t allowed to laugh. but when I first came to Gotham and I showed up at the manor, father obviously had to give me a tour of the place, right?

Jason: yeah.

Damian: and they wanted to do a DNA test to check that my mother wasn’t pulling a fast one by claiming my birthright, so the first place he showed me was the cave, which was also where Tim was.

Jason: *hums*

Damian: and you know that place- the first time you went to the cave, it was wild, right?

Jason: oh, like walking into the tardis for the first time. insane.

Damian: exactly. all high-tech and shit, and I’d just come from the desert compound I’d spent my entire life in- like, my first time going into the kitchen at the manor I saw Alfred loading the dishwasher and my first thought was ‘oh my god what the fuck kind of machine is that-‘

Jason: *abrupt cackle*

Damian: -so the fucking cave for the first time? as a little desert-boy ten year old? I was a little distracted,

Jason, chuckling slightly: ok, fair,

Damian: and so I’m zoned the fuck out, looking around this cave and not paying attention to anything father’s saying, and then I finally tune back in just to hear the words ‘-ackson drake’ while he like, tries to introduce me to Tim.

Jason: *slowly starts laughing again*

Damian, raising his voice to be heard over Jason’s increasing beats of laughter: -and so I’m fucking standing there, ten years old, no clue what this kid’s first name is, and everybody’s looking at me like I’m supposed to be the one fucking talking right now, and ALL I can think of is my mother, who before she shipped me off to Gotham completely alone kept fucking telling me ‘Damian you have to be strong and show that you deserve to be the Batman’s blood son. show no weakness and take the mantle you were born to have; show no fucking hesitance.’, so I’M panicking,

Jason, still cackling: *a clap* NO I DO- I DO REMEMBER, LIKE, BACK IN THE LEAGUE-, holy shit back in the league when your only coping mechanism for not knowing the fuck was going on around you, was literally just to pretend you knew what the fuck was going on around you and bullshit till you make it,

Damian: WELL IT WAS LIKE THE ONLY FUCKING THING MY MOTHER TAUGHT ME-

Jason, through tears: -that’s why I didn’t say shit when I came back to Gotham and found you fucking, doing all this blood son bullshit! You started calling me Todd and speaking in old english and I was just like ‘bless him he’s terrified, just leave him be’

Damian: *cackles* and I did- I did appreciate you going along with it, because back when this happened I panicked and just started calling Tim ‘Drake’ because I was too embarrassed to ask him for his first name, and then by the time I heard somebody else call him Tim in passing, everybody had just assumed this was a thing I did. and I was too socially awkward to clear it up and switch back, so I just had to stick to Drake.

Jason: *wheeze* a-and Grayson?

Damian: well at first I just went along with the surname thing out of awkwardness, but then I’d gone too deep and I had no way out- AND THEN- and then Batman fucking died-

Jason: *wheeze*

Damian: -and I went from being parented by the gymnastics version of the dark lord to being gentle-parented by fucking Nightwing-

Jason, choking: holy- holy shit-

Damian: do you know what it’s like to go from *gruff voice* ‘Damian we don’t fucking kill, give me the katana or I’ll put you in Arkham’ to *high pitched, sweet voice* ‘oh hey Dames, obviously I can’t stop you from killing but I really would appreciate it if we discussed all our options and came to a mature decision together on what’s best in this scenario-‘

Jason: *crying, silent wheezes*

Damian: so DURING all this I’m trying to subtly switch back to using peoples actual names, except it fucking backfired because people just assumed I was calling Richard Richard because we had that special parental mentor bond, and Tim had pissed off to- whatever he was doing in the desert for six months- getting a hysterectomy or whatever the fuck happened-

Jason, amused: hysterectomy- he lost a spleen, Dames

Damian: well whatever happened he wasn’t AROUND for me to shift to calling him Tim! and when father was back I’d made no progress and was back to square one, except this time I was stuck calling one brother Richard and the other Drake!

Jason, still laughing: and this is where I came in?

Damian: I felt BAD! I’d already taken Robin from the guy, I didn’t want him to feel like he was lesser of a brother to me than Richard. So I demoted you to Todd so he wouldn’t feel alone.

Jason: very thoughtful.

Jason: we should probably get you a therapist, dude. I think everybody forgets that when you showed up you were literally just a very confused immigrant child with no experience of normal social interaction apart from me at the league.

Damian: oh I was like, 60% into an anxiety attack consistently for the first two years I was in the city.

Jason: *snorts*

Damian: the first time I was left alone with Tim we were in the kitchen and he said ‘do you want wifi?’ and, y’no, coming from the league, barely any tech and the only normality was the concept of fighting to the death over everything, MY instinctual ten-year-old thought was ‘oh shit, wifi must be slang for brawl here, we’re about to fight’-

Jason: *laughter* you’re fucking kidding

Damian: -so I’m like, so be it, and I say ‘come on then’ and get ready to start punching, only for him to turn around and grab a piece of card stuck to the fridge and hold it out to me,

Jason: *cackles*

Damian: and he goes ‘here’s the password so you can connect, I’m assuming you have a phone or something’-which I fucking didn’t by the way, my mother gave me a shitty flip-phone to call her in emergencies but it didn’t use wifi-, and he’s holding it out to me and I had to like, subtly shift my posture out of the defensive position I’d been in-,

Jason, delirious from laughter: this is the fucking best. thing.

Damian: -and I take it from him, and he gives me this weird look like he has no idea how to communicate with me, and I was just like ‘shit I might have to kill this one, it’s the only way to get out of this interaction’.

Jason: *wheeze* if we go through the timeline, every murder attempt on Tim’s life has just been an occasion where you’ve felt socially awkward and didn’t see any other way out of conversation,

Damian: pretty much, yeah. I should have been on xanax for those first few years.

Jason: stories from your first years in Gotham are my favourite thing in the world.

*a few silent beats*

Tim: are you telling me I’ve been stuck as Drake for YEARS all because Damian’s fucking scared of social interaction?!

*crashing sound*

Jason: HOLY FUCK-

Damian: OH MY GOD I FORGOT WE WERE CONNECTED TO THE MAIN LINE-

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

conversations overheard through the batkid com lines pt 3

*wind whooshing* *grunting* *the sound of scraping against stone*

Dick: you have to be cheating somehow, you could never do that jump before!

Jason: how the fuck do you cheat at parkour?

Dick: *pause*

Dick: secret.... winches.

Jason, incredulous: secret winches?

Dick: secret winches. you got like- i dunno. stuff to help you up here.

Jason: *snorts* you're a fucking idiot. i can do the jump because i got steroided by the lazarus pit and pokemon evolved three times the size of myself, dipshit.

Dick, humming: yeah, that must have been a culture shock.

Jason: well it was fucking something that's for sure.

Dick: did you ever get like-, like when you woke up and you were just over six feet tall. did it fuck with your head?

Jason: like did i forget and run into doorframes a fuck ton-?

Dick: -yeah, like what was it like?

Jason: *hums consideringly*

Jason: kinda like. what i imagine the hulk had to go through. like i was just suddenly real big and real strong.

Dick: was it cool?

Jason: parts of it were cool, parts of it- *wheeze* parts of it were fucking fantastic.

Dick, very amused: ok now- wait hold on- don't you give me that fucking look-

Jason: *laughing*

Dick: -alright. brother to brother, i feel like we're close enough with each other to discuss this as mature adults. but i have to ask,

Jason, audibly grinning: -oh, i'm proportionate.

Dick: *bursts out laughing* that- that must have been fucking wild-

Jason: IT WAS- it was- *breathy laugh* it sure was something-!

Dick: how long after you came out the pit did you notice?

Jason: how long- dude, instantly!

Dick: *laughing*

Jason: i was out that pit like that fuckin' tiktok audio, just 'woah woah, wait, where my dick at?!'

Dick: *laughing louder*

Jason: just climbing out, barely conscious, in the back of my mind like 'did they tie a weight between my legs or something because this shit ain't normal, why's it heavy'

Dick, crying: why's it heavy-!

Jason: i will say in all honesty i kinda forgot about it for a while.

Dick: how do you forget?

Jason: i dunno, just kinda doing my thing. mentally i was still like, fifteen, so as much as my cock did interest me, once Talia gave me a shiny sword i was like 'ooooh' and instantly stopped thinking about it.

Dick: was there not any like, mechanical issues?

Jason: mechanical- like, did it work? yes, dude, it fuckin' worked?

Dick: well i don't know i just feel like- it's probably like getting a new phone, right? like they're all pretty similar but when you transfer over to a new model there's an adjustment period?

Jason: OH- ok yeah, no, i get you. no there was definitely an- *slight wheeze* there was an adjustment period.

Dick: *starting to laugh* i don't even know if i want to ask,

Jason: *wheeze* well it was- like i said i forgot for a while, right? so the first time i slept with somebody,

Dick: *cackling* no, littlewing what did you do?

Jason: no i think i just ruined the mood a little bit in the beginning, because like- like it was just as much a surprise to me as it was to her, right?

Dick: *cackling even louder*

Jason: so she was- *wheeze* she was fuckin'- *high pitched, breathy* she was below me as i got it out, and she went 'oh wow, it's so big', and my fuckin' stupid ass was just- wide-eyed looking at it like 'jesus fucking christ it is isn't it?!'

Dick, choking: i can't- i'm fucking crying-

Jason: *half-silent wheezes*

Dick, slightly delirious: but didn't you ever, like, try it out alone beforehand?!

Jason: WELL I-

Damian: OH MY FUCKING GOD. S T O P.

Jason and Dick: *cut off chokes*

Damian: MAY I FUCKING REMIND YOU, that BOTH i AND Batman are on this line tonight!

Jason, slightly muffled: *shocked laugh* oh my god, B-?

Damian: he's been staring blankly into a gutter since Nightwing first mentioned genitalia.

Dick, high pitched through hitched breaths as Jason starts cackling in the background: yeah that's- that's our bad, B. Sorry about that.

Damian: i feel like i also deserve an apology.

Jason: *cackling louder*

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

conversations overheard through the batkid com lines pt 7

Dick: oh yeah i see you guys, hold on coming in hot-

*grunt*

Dick: hey, who are we waiting for?

Damian: Hood is working on the other side of Gotham tonight, but we're still supposed to wait for father while he talks to Catwoman

Dick: *a groan* god, he always takes forever when he's talking to her, and i'm already bored!

Tim: yeah we've been waiting for twenty minutes.

Jasons, whispering: sucks to suck for you guys- oh SHIT-

*distant gunshots*

Dick, casual: did you just give away your position to insult us Jay?

Jason, strained: *gunshot* NO,

*more gunshots, a yelp*

*silence*

Dick: anyway i'm still bored.

Tim: wanna play a game me and Damian made up?

Dick: you two made up a game?

Tim: yeah after Damian messed up and accidentally revealed he was fun on the main line.

Damian: i don't know what you're talking about, i've never had fun in my life.

Tim: -we're calling it 'league days: yay or nay?'

Dick, amused: ok, what are the rules.

Tim: ok, so, the aim of the game is to find out stuff from Damian's league days, because he got up to a lot of insane shit over there. he wrote down any interesting experiences he could remember onto a bunch of cards and then got Jason to digitalize them into a randomizer,

Tim: and then we got Jason to come up with a bunch of fake experiences and mix them in with the real ones. Damian doesn't know what the fake ones are so he has no way to come up with stories beforehand. the rules are Damian has to use the app Jason made to shuffle a random card, read it out loud to us, and then we have to guess if it's real or fake. we can ask him questions about what the card says and he has to answer, and then we have to figure out if he's bullshitting or not.

Tim: Jason isn't allowed to play because obviously he was there for like, 90% of the truths.

Jason: but i am allowed to listen and laugh! fuck you guys by the way, i almost died and nobody checked up on me.

Damian: sucks to suck, Todd. are you playing, Grayson?

Dick, giggling: holy shit, yes, i'm in. read a card.

Damian: ok, hold on.

*a beat*

Damian: oh- *a strangled sigh*

Tim: you have to read it out loud!

Damian: i am!

Damian: 'when i was a child, Todd introduced me to pokemon games, and then convinced me that pokemon were real by painting a snail and telling me it was a very small magcargo. years later, this lie was then used to convince me that i should move to Gotham.'

Jason: *bursts out wheezing* OH MY GOD-

*continuous cackles*

Damian: we may have to mute him.

*more distant laughter*

Tim: please god, let this be true.

Dick, smothering giggles: and- oh my god- and we get to ask questions?

Damian, resigned: ask away.

Tim: so- hmm.

Dick: *wheeze*

Tim: the reason you came to Gotham...?

Dick, wetly: yeah that's- that's what i think we need clarification on. Jason... Jason told you pokemon were real, and then...?

Damian: so i was around five years old, and had never played a video game before, and Todd came back from a mission with one of those handheld consoles and an old pokemon game loaded in.

Tim: what, and he told you it was real?

Damian: he told me it was based on reality and that it was just very rare to see pokemon in real life, especially in the area that the compound was in. to be fair i'd never left, so i had no way to confirm that or not.

Dick: still though, painting a snail got you to believe it?

Damian: it was- i-

*a sigh*

Damian: it was a fairly competent art project.

Jason: *starts laughing again*

Tim: see this is a hard one, because i don't know if he's laughing because of how proud he is that he did it, or because of how funny he finds his own lie. he makes shit up all the time.

Dick: this is genuinely a tough game, what the fuck. ok. how did this correlate with you coming to Gotham? i thought Talia sent you?

Damian: my mother gave me the option of going to Gotham to train with Batman, or to go into hiding with her and help during the league uprisings. i was unsure at the time because i had never met father before and didn't know what it would entail, but Todd obviously knew i would be safer coming to Gotham with him when he returned, so he took it upon himself to convince me to choose Batman.

Jason: *high pitched weeping*

Tim: see- SEE DAMIAN'S SMILING, i feel like he wouldn't find it funny if it was true, he'd just be angry that he'd ever fallen for it.

Damian: not necessarily. Todd has a very infectious laugh, i could just find his odd squeaking entertaining. you cannot base your answer on that.

Dick: so did you come to Gotham because he told you that there would be pokemon to see or something?

Damian: he told me that team rocket was active in Gotham, and that they were abusing pokemon. i have a fondness for animals, so obviously this angered me and i wanted to intercept.

Tim: it- *wheeze* it angered you-,

Jason: *silent gasps of laughter*

Dick: and what happened when- like, how did you find out he'd lied to you?

Damian: i figured it out on the boat to Gotham, about a day's journey away, and i was so infuriated that i pushed his motorcycle off the boat and sunk it. we were actually- it made us late, we were a day later than expected coming into Gotham because i sunk our ride from the boat to the city and we had to take public transport.

Dick: see but thats- like you told me before that the journey from the compound took two weeks, i can't imagine you being outside the compound for two whole weeks and not clocking that pokemon didn't exist in the real world.

Damian: i was busy with other things

Tim: bullshit, you literally said it was the reason you went!

*ping*

Bruce: apologies for the delay, i am three minutes out from your location. does anybody have any info on Red Hood? i've received reports that he may have been dosed with laughing gas. does he need backup?

Tim: he's fine, he's just an ass.

Jason, still struggling to breathe: ok- ok B's gonna ruin it now so i'm calling it. you have to choose, yay or nay?

Dick: THIS IS SO HARD!

Bruce: what's going on?

Tim: *groaning* god i so want it to be true... but i just don't buy the two week thing. i think you would have figured it out sooner.

Dick: i'm with Tim. i gotta go with nay. it's a lie.

Jason: *laughs slightly* *high pitched* alright, Damian. yay or nay, did this happen?

*silence*

Damian: *deep sigh* as much as i really wish it hadn't, this one was true. i did indeed, for a solid half a decade, believe that pokemon were real.

Dick: WHA-

Tim: ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS-?!

Jason: *bursts out laughing again* *cheering*

Damian: i should have never agreed to play this game again.

Bruce: what on earth did i just come in on...?

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

It's interesting to think about orv as this like, world governed by a child. Like, of course, hsy wrote the actual world of twsa into existence, but she did so as a gift to a young kim dokja i.e. oldest dream. Everything was designed to his liking, and the very fabric of the world relies on od actually liking the story lest he like, blow up himself and the world with him. And od gets this eldritch horror component to him from this, because he's like, really not doing anything, right? Like od is effectively just a child enjoying a story, just kind of existing, but in the logic of orv having your story watched is not...that good. This is of course *the* thesis of orv, that stories keep us alive and that you're not evil for wanting to stay alive, etc, etc. but it's also interesting to think about the system of probability within this world governed by a child reading a story. Because nobody really sits down to explain probability, at least not off the top of my head, but it can be pretty easily inferred that probability is. Well. How probable something is to happen, but specifically how likely it is for a certain event to happen, under the constraints of a story from a particular genre. So it's not about what's physically possible, it's about maintaining suspension of disbelief. And, despite what it says on the tin, od is not actually omniscient, he can overlook things, he can be distracted, his attention can be purposefully called to things. So really it's about what you can get away with in this cosmic-level game of make-believe. And of course this is a system made for a reader, for kim dokja, where knowledge of tropes will make surviving through the apocalypse way easier. So how come kdj, with such a big advantage, has so much trouble getting by? A big part of this I think is because od, being od, cannot actually imagine an older version of himself. Od can't think of a world where he gets to be 28 years old, much less be even remotely happy or stable at that age. And this is also why kdj's face has to be blurred, because to od, kdj is both a self insert (like he is to us, the readers of orv) and an impossibility. Because kim dokja does not allow himself happiness, not even when he's little

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

I’ll never not be amused by the fact that I can drop the words “crucifix nail nipples” into a conversation and some of you who have been with me since the livejournal days will join me in the flashbacks, screaming and crying all the way.

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

distressing things to say to your friends

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

Red Hood Au

Red Hood before he reveals himself, decides to fuck with the bats one day when he comes upon Batman and Spoiler arguing and she yells “your not my dad, you can’t tell me what to do!”

Red Hood gleefully throws out “His my dad and he can’t even tell me what to do.”

Batman/Spoiler: What

Red Hood: did mom not warn you about me?

Spoiler: WHOSE YOUR MOM!? (She is delighted to have all the gossip first)

Red Hood: Talia

ex.Batman.has stopped working

Spoiler: who???

Red Hood: *points finger* I like you

Later

Dick: TALIA AL’GHUL, ARE YOU CRAZY!?

Bruce: *tiny whisper* she said she had a miscarriage

Tim: wait how old does this make him!?

Bruce: He shouldn’t be as old as he is now

Tim: is he like Kon? Made older in a lab?

Bruce: Talia wouldn’t do that

Dick: Talia would 100% do that.

(Also yes Jason 100% called Talia to warn her about what he did. Shes ignoring Bruce’s calls.)

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

the writer, the reader, and the protagonist

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

i was in the middle of reading THE MOST INSANE FANFIC

AO3 WHYYYYY PLS COME BACK TO ME

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

no you know what you guys are right. reverse league son reveal. Jason comes back to Gotham and does his crime lord thing before tentatively starting a truce and returning to the batfam and one day Dick asks who Bruce’s favourite child is.

Bruce: i love all three of my sons equally.

Jason, without thinking: three? what about Damian?

Bruce:

Tim: who the fuck is Damian

Jason, freezing:

Jason:

Jason:

Bruce: *carefully* Jay, who is Damian?

Jason: I have to leave.

-

Jason, on the phone with Damian: so i ALMOST blew it-

Damian: ?! BUT I AM NOT READY FOR FATHER TO KNOW ABOUT ME YET-

Jason: shut the fuck up i’m older than you- and i said ALMOST. i told them that Damian was the name of my imaginary twin back when i was a kid and that i’d just gotten muddled up after the resurrection.

Jason: so you’re in the clear but when we finally do introduce you, we’re gonna have to say that Talia let me name you and i named you after my imaginary twin.

Damian:

Damian: Ahki please do not tell them that.

Jason: no im gonna. you called me a twat last week. so im gonna.

Damian: god forbid a boy try to expand his vocabulary

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

baby dragons whose scales are much more shiny and iridescent in order to hide in their parents' hoards

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

i cannot move on from this

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

I think it'd be funny if Damian kept up his formal speech patterns for the sole purpose of appearance. Originally, he would've learned to speak that way in the League, but I feel like Jason's informality and unseriousness would rub off on him eventually.

Alfred is gone for the week and Bruce is cooking for the bats

Bruce: "Alright guys, it's a little burnt, but it still might be good."

Tim, squinting his eyes at the plate: "B, it looks radioactive.."

Damian: "Father, I will not be consuming this horrible dish. It seems itself to be inedible, and I will not be poisoned by your lack of skill in the food department."

Later

Damian, on the phone with Jason: "It looked like shit! He served us all mystery meat, Todd. Bring me some decent food right now or I'm killing myself."

Jason: "Jeez, kid, take a chill pill or something. I'm on my way."

Damian: "There is no pill chill enough for me to take, Todd! I can't keep starving myself whenever Dad is put in charge. He's going to kill us all on accident!"

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

oh yeah i won’t be watching next week. i was buried with bobby nash

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

oh angela bassett the woman you are

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TOMMY VEGA WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE???

didn’t expect to see margaret buckley during my criminal minds rewatch but here we are

[what-is-merlin-so-gay-for]

didn’t expect to see margaret buckley during my criminal minds rewatch but here we are