TW. Thar be (less than I expected) gratuitous violence and cussin' below~
Red Hood was pissed.
His return to Gotham had been perfectly planned. Years in the making, he took Crime Alley over in just under a week. He still had some loose ends to tie up, and Black Mask was bein' a little bitch about it, but it was only a matter of time until everyone got used to the change in management.
His psychological warfare on the bats as he prepped for the big reveal was playing out exactly how he had expected it to, getting the big bat all in a tizzy.
Though, instead of the pretender escaping to Titans Tower, the little shit just fuckin' vanished. Jason couldn't find him anywhere, as if he just fell off the planet. Except Jason was a goddamn professional, so he had checked departing spacecraft, and the pipsqueak wasn't on any of those either!
So, fine, he couldn't warn off the bird and mess with the bat that way. He could rearrange things, he's adaptable. He decided to move onto the Joker. Who, he might add, he found in minimum-fucking-security in goddamn Blackgate. Like, what the hell, Bruce?! It doesn't matter that he couldn't find evidence of the Joker escaping in the last two years. It was the principle of the matter.
He didn't save him. Wasn't there when he crawled out of his fuckin' grave. Couldn't kill the piece of shit who beat him to death and blew him up. And couldn't even be respectable and keep the asshat in Arkham or even maximum-security!
But Hood kept his cool. He kept his shit together... Okay, he may have killed a few people a bit more brutally than he had intended, but it was still the right people to further his aims, even if they got offed ahead of schedule.
Whatever. Joker in minimum just meant it'd be easier to access him. And lo and behold, his deathiversary was comin' right up. Perfect time to grab the fucker. They could make a whole reunion out of it! Make confetti of the Jokers splattered blood or some shit.
Except someone. Got. Him. Out. FIRST.
So, Red Hood was pissed.
Luckily, he had already built the rapport with his people. It didn't take long for the Alley to go out of their way to help sniff the piece of shit out, and the odd movement on the east side of Crime Alley was quickly reported to him.
Hood finally tracked him down to the stereotypical abandoned warehouse just as the clock struck midnight. He'd give himself a Happy Deathiversary gift of punching the Joker in the mouth as soon as he had 'im.
As Hood surreptitiously entered the building, he had to fight off a shiver and sense of unease at how similar this warehouse was to the one in Ethiopia. Even the boxes and pallets were ominously reminiscent of that place. It was eerie and creepy and was the only reason he nearly jumped out of his skin when he heard the clang of metal.
Jason froze and listened. Low voices reached him and by the cadence someone was monologuing. He grinned under the mask and quickly made his way to where he knew the Joker must be.
The warehouse didn't have rafters or an upper level to do the bat patented death from above routine, but the layout of all the boxes created enough cover for him to climb up to get a better view of the situation.
It took him longer than he cares to admit for his brain to compute what exactly he was looking at.
He had expected the Joker pacing back and forth. Doing his wild gestures and trademark grin as he abused his unlucky followers that were in reach during his monologue. Instead...
Instead.
The Joker was in a strait jacket. Which was chained to a chair. Which was bolted to the floor. And he was sobbing. Silently. Jason could see his whole body jerk with the effort not to give into the heaving sobs he wanted to make. He was biting his lip to help make sure he didn't make a sound, and his eyes were vacantly staring at the being standing over him.
Jason's mind tried to focus on them, but it kept skittering away in refusal to comprehend. When he tried to force it, all his brain allowed was a vaguely humanoid shadow. They stood perfectly still as they stared down at the Joker, until they finally tilted their head to the side.
"Come now, Jack. The day has only just begun! You can't check out this early." The being leaned into the Joker. "I haven't even done anything yet~"
Their voice was a multitude. It reached inside Jason and scraped across his soul. Beneath, around and through each word echoed the sound of electricity and screaming. Jason's heartrate began pounding and he had to focus to keep his breathing even. The emotion that swept through him was a mix of terror and excitement.
Jason wasn't going to be looking into that any time soon. Instead, he took a moment to compose himself before he tuned back in. He realized the Joker was saying something over and over again.
"What was that?" The being leaned in and cupped a shadow dipped hand to where their ear would be. "You're sorry?" The being leaned back and the laugh it barked out felt like falling through thin ice. "Oh, well then, if you're sorry." Before Jason could even register what was happening the being cracked the Joker across the face with a crowbar. "Everything is better since you're sorry." They snapped the crowbar across the other side of his face then crouched down before him.
"What's wrong, my little Jack-in-the-Box? Are you upset that I haven't taken you out of the toybox to play with in a while?"
The Joker started shaking his head as fast as he could. The shadow scoffed then slammed the crowbar against the Joker's knee, the resounding crack of the broken patella only being overshadowed by the Joker's scream.
The being stood up and walked away from him, their hand still gripping the crowbar tightly. Even if they were only shadow, Jason could see the tremors in their hands and the tensing of their shoulders in barely restrained control.
They stopped a few steps away and turned back leaning on the crowbar in front of them like it was a cane.
"It's okay to be sad I left you in Blackgate, in your little box, Jack." They tilted their head unnaturally to the side. "You can always try to leave, again. Maybe you'll be lucky, and I won't notice. You might even be able to cross the shore this time!" They chuckled as a neon green grin cracked its way across their face. Their teeth were too many and too sharp with green and black oozing from them. "I can promise not to bite next time. It took too long for it to grow all back anyway. No? Hmm." They tilted their head back and forth as if they were thinking.
"Maybe it's because I'm the only one playing with you. Don't worry! I can hear a new friend just over there. Maybe we should go see if they're going to be your friend or mine~"
Jason barely registered what the being was implying when the hair on the back of his neck stood on end.
"Hi." Jason couldn't even turn around before a hand grabbed him by the throat and lifted him into the air. "Did you come to play?"
Red Hood grabbed the arm that held him up and futilely tried to get out of the hold. Whoever and whatever this was, they were strong. And had some sort of density shifting as the only thing he could make contact with was the arm that held him aloft.
All of a sudden, rage swept through him overriding all fear, caution or incredulity at whatever the fuck was happening. The rage was familiar, comforting. He wrapped it around himself like an old coat.
"Let me the fuck down!" He demanded.
"Tsk tsk. That's not very nice. Tell me why I should."
Hood snarled. "That motherfucker is MINE. You stole him, and I need him. Put me down and give me the clown."
Laughter like packed snow echoed around them. "Love the rhyme, there! Just for that, I'll give you a chance." The shadow brought them off the crates and down to the warehouse floor where they released him. Hood automatically glanced over at the Joker who was trying his best to remain as small and unnoticeable as a grown man in a strait jacket tied to the middle of the floor could be.
"Now, now. It's rude to look away while we are conversing. Ignore the Jack-in-the-Box. Well," The being tilted their head almost contemplatively as they looked at the Joker. "I suppose he's out of his box right now. The Jack-in-the-Jacket is probably more apt at this point. Either way..." They made a gesture with their hand and shadows wrapped themselves around the Joker. Jason could only see his eyes widen in terror before his whole body was smothered in darkness.
"There. Now we won't be interrupted and he cannot hear, see, or sense us in any way, which is always fun. So," they clapped their hands, "what can I call you, Mr. Tall, Wide, and Snarly?" The being had started floating, moving as if gravity was a suggestion as they looked Hood up and down.
"Doesn't matter. I just need the clown." Jason stated even as he felt the being's displeasure.
"Jack Napier has a debt to pay. He will be going nowhere except where I say. In fact," The thing started to circle him. "Today is a special day. I should really punish you for interrupting. Explain why I shouldn't."
Jason scoffed. "That fucker has a debt to pay to me. He's going to die by the end of this. So, give him back!" The shadow stopped moving. They were so still. If Jason hadn't seen them move before he would almost be able to convince himself they weren't even there.
For a moment he wondered if he had pushed too far with this unknown. He could feel their eyes staring at him, into him, like everything he ever is, was or would-be was laid bare.
Then the thing was directly in front of him. One blink and the next. No air movement, no flinch. The thing was inches from his face. They seemed to be breathing in deep. They tilted their head as if they were scenting him until a thin blue mist escaped from their jagged maw.
"Tell me your name."
"No." Came Jason's immediate reply. The thing snickered. This time it felt like slipping and falling into a mound of snow.
"I wasn't asking. I core-swear that if you give to me your name this once, I will not keep it. Now. Your name."
Something in their tone, in the cadence and the rumble between icebergs and snowflakes, Jason found he couldn't resist. He tried to keep his mouth shut. Tried to keep his name locked behind his teeth. But it was dragged out regardless.
"Jason"
Once again, the being froze. Jason found that he was holding his breath as the being reached a hand out oh so slowly towards him. He couldn't move. Couldn't shift. He tried to do anything but could only watch as the hand finally touched his chest.
A wave of ice swept through him followed by a blanket of warmth that seemed so achingly familiar that it shook him enough to draw in a breath.
"Jason? Jason Todd?" The being whispered. It's once echoing reverb was now just a singular, masculine voice. Jason could only nod in response.
The being gasped and brought both hands to where their mouth should be. As they touched their face, light erupted and burned its way across the form. Like fire to a scrap of paper, the light ate away at the shadows leaving behind a person with floating white hair, a scattering of glowing freckles, and brilliant green eyes that were tearing up.
"Jason, is that really you?"
"Do I know you?" Jason couldn't remember ever meeting a glowing, floating, ethereal guy before. Their body was wrapped in a black jumpsuit that could be a hero suit, but the emblem wasn't anything he recognized.
"It's me! Danny. Danny Fenton?"
Danny? Danny from when they were kids, Danny? Danny whose shitty mad scientist parents kept losing him on the streets before they moved them out of Gotham, Danny? It wasn't long after that when Jason got picked up by Batman. They had tried to keep in touch, but things had obviously gone sideways since the last time Jason had seen Danny, he wasn't a glowstick.
"What the fuck."
"Oh." Danny looked down at himself and seemed embarrassed. "Let me just..." There was another flash and Danny was no longer glowing. Or floating. He looked just like he had all those years ago with the unkempt black hair, piercing blue eyes, and that grin that always meant they were about to get into trouble.
"Jason, you absolute walnut! Where the fuck have you been? I have been looking for you everywhere!" Danny leapt at him and pulled him into a tight hug. "You piece of shit. I searched all the Infinite Realms. I called in favors. I looked for you as often as I could get away with. I even snagged the Infi-map in the hopes it would lead to you. What the fuck. How are you alive?? I'm so fuckin' glad yer alive!!"
Jason held onto Danny for a moment, lost in the confusion of everything that was happening before pulling away.
"It's, uh, complicated. Besides that, what the hell are you doing with the Joker?"
"Oh!" A blush spread across Danny's face as he kicked the ground before grinning wide up at Jason. "Found out that piece of shit is who killed you. So, when he broke out the first time after you died, I picked him up. Held him for about 3 months. It would've been longer, but summer break was ending." Danny looked ashamed by that. "By that point I had discovered everything that happened to you, so I let him experience it for himself over and over again." Jason felt his chest seize.
"You did what?"
"Yeah!" Danny looked so proud of himself. "Some of it he was actually beaten with a crowbar, then we'd set up a fake bomb. Those ones obviously didn't end in him being blown apart. I didn't think that was fair, so sometimes I would send him into the nightmare realm using Frighty's sword! That way he got to be blown up over and over again. Sometimes the nightmare would make it seem like the cops or Batman saved him and took him to Blackgate or Arkham just to find himself being walked right back into the warehouse." Danny clutched his chest as he cackled. "His face! It was so good. He gets so paranoid even when he's being a good Jack-in-the-Box. Wonders if it's real and when the next swing will come. Oh! We saved pictures if you want to see!"
Jason....Jason didn't know how he felt about all this, what little he could actually understand anyway.
"We?"
"Oh, sure! Tim, ya know, tiny Tim who lived next door to you? We worked together setting it all up. He's been working with Batman as Robin since Batman sort of went aggression level 9000 when you died. He was hurting all the wrong people. N wouldn't come back, seeing how pissed he was that B didn't tell him you died until after his mission ended, and T couldn't just let him hurt your city like that, so he basically walked in and refused to leave.
I've been trying to keep tabs with them since Tim shouldn't be responsible for a grown ass man's emotional stability, but getting any of them into therapy has been a pain in the ass." Danny shrugged. "Tim actually would've been here tonight for the party, but B got all weird and wanted him out of Gotham. I set him up with some friends of mine and a supernatural scooby-doo mystery to keep him busy while he was banished. I was gonna bring the bastard out to Tim before I put him back in his box so he could get some swings in."
"Some swings?"
"Hell yeah! Tim's a vicious little gremlin and you were his Robin. Means he takes extra special care of Jack. Especially today."
Jason's understanding of everything that had gone on was being rewritten. Everything he had assumed was actually slightly to the left. He couldn't deal with all of that. Not yet, not now. All he could focus on was -
"You avenged me."
Danny gave him a soft smile. "Of course I did, Jay. You're my best friend. You're the only reason I survived Gotham. And that piece of shit," Danny's face twisted in fury and hate with a manic glint in his eye, "He took you away. He snuffed out your light." Danny snarled before pausing and taking a purposeful breath before continuing.
"Batman and his rules meant that even though they came close, they would never do what needed to be done. Besides, I didn't want him to just die. Death was too good for him. No, he needed to pay his debt."
A grin reminiscent of the jagged crack of his shadow form stretched across Danny's human face.
"I am the Balance. As such I can feel the tipped scales of life and death, and Jack," Danny looked over at him, "has been a very bad boy, constantly ending lives before their time. He won't be rid of his punishment well beyond his life and into his afterlife." Danny reached out and softly took Jason's hand. "And now that you're here, that you're actually back, you can join in!"
Jason suddenly laughed. All this time he thought no one had cared, that he had never been avenged. He was still angry. Angry at Bruce, angry at the world for letting him die and then moving on without him. But for the first time since he crawled out of his grave, something actually felt right.
Danny handed over the crowbar with a grin as he turned back into his shadow form and released his hold on the darkness enveloping the whimpering clown.
Looks like he'd be able to give himself that deathiversary gift after all. Bloody confetti included.
I'm tryna write a multi-chapter fic outline, and I'm out here writing lore like I'm a DM for d&d with players who've never followed the plotline hooks in their life.
Tim was having lunch in the dining room when he heard the door ping from the garage entrance. Everyone else was either out and about or down in the batcave and shouldn't be back for at least an hour. He quick checks the hall cams and sees that it's the new guy, Danny, walking down the hallway.
He was supposed to be at the mall getting new clothes to fill his wardrobe since he had only arrived with a single duffle bag, except all he had in hand was a single small bag.
Tim watches as he walks past the stairs and looks up from his tablet as Danny walks into the dining room.
"Hey! Didn't think you'd get back so fast. Have fun at the mall?" Danny all but ignores him as he sits down across from him, dropping his bag beside him. He leans forward, placing his elbows on the table and clasping his hands in front of his mouth. Tim takes a bite and waits for a response but only gets a vacant stare. "Dude, you good?"
Danny takes a deep breath. "I was stopped no more than 17 times."
Tim frowned. "In the car? While you were walking around?"
"In the mall." Danny's voice was still distant, but he finally made eye contact with Tim. "I was stopped. 17. Times. They wanted pictures, Tim. Pictures! Why?"
Tim covered his mouth as he tried to smother his smile. "Oh?"
"They asked me for autographs. I dropped the pen and then kicked it when I tried to pick it back up. Why do they want my autograph, Tim?"
"You're part of the Wayne's now, my guy. You're going to be getting more than that." The horror on Danny's face finally made Tim crack and he started laughing.
"This isn't funny, Tim! How do they even recognize me? The article only posted 4 hours ago! The photo is blurry and barely has the side of my face!"
"We told you to wear a disguise."
"I wasn't even with any of you! How did they put that all together?" His eyes widen. "Oh, no. I'm going to have to have PR training. I'm going to have to practice my signature. Make it iconic or some shit. I'm going to have to figure out how to pose so I don't look weird in photos. Tim." He looks at him with panic. "Tim. I'm going to have to have an actual rich person wardrobe. And, like, look like I have my shit together!"
"I can get you in touch with the right people."
Danny nodded absently. "Good. That's good. Have to like, figure out how to people in public now. This didn't matter before. I could be as fuckin' weird as I wanted and no one batted an eye. Now they'll post me all over the internet forever. Thank the Ancients this wasn't when I first got my powers. They'd post me losing my pants and that's all anyone would know about me. I'd be the pant-less Wayne."
Tim chuckled as Danny continued to spiral while sending texts off to the right people. He then began making copies of this conversation for future reference, before quickly hacking into the mall's database to try and get copies of each of Danny's interactions. For posterity's sake. Obviously.
Constantine said that, right in the middle of a crisis, and then all but ran to the zeta-tube before anyone could have stopped him. Which, right, nobody gave a damn about because aliens and cosmic death rays are not up a magician's alley anyway.
Still, it was kind of disappointing. He could have at least tried, you know?
So, understandably, everyone up on the Watchtower was plenty surprised when the arrival announcement went off.
"D-4, John Constantine," and then, like that wasn't enough, it is followed with, "Unauthorized guests, G-01, G-02, G-03, G-04, G-05, G-06. Welcome to Watchtower."
The announcement system doesn't welcome anyone. Much less does it let in 'unauthorized guests' of any kind; anyone and everyone has to go through a registry process. Which naturally meant that everyone and their mother scrambled to meet whoever the magician brought with him.
What greeted them was a gaggle of teenagers following Constantine; the whole group looked a lot like mother duck with her ducklings. Only the duck in question seemed utterly resigned, and the ducklings were in the midst of a heated argument, never bothering to even look around.
"This is, like, fight fire with fire thing, you can't do that!" A tall, redhead girl throws her arms up, looking fed up with the conversation.
"Oh, I dunno, Jazz, it worked for me," the oldest of the teens offers with a smug grin, "Several times."
"That's different, though," the youngest girl catches up to him, wiggling her eyebrows, "You weren't fighting, really. You were burning down a pack of matches with a flamethrower."
The oldest one barks a laugh at that, and the redhead's — Jazz's — face sours.
"Can we please not compare the Justice League with a pack of matches?" Another boy, one that looks a lot like the other two (they could be triplets, if it wasn't for their very obviously different ages), cringes, rolling his eyes. "I feel like it's bad manners."
"Rich, coming from you," another girl in an alt-goth outfit deadpans, her eyes firmly down on her sketchbook, where she is furiously drawing something.
There's only one of them who doesn't actively partake in the argument — a black boy that is completely engrossed in whatever he is doing on his tablet as he follows Constantine on autopilot. The man himself doesn't speak up either, just leads them all through the corridors and towards the main control room.
It's only when they are a few feet away from the entrance that someone finally comes back to their senses, and Batman stands in their way, making the group halt. The youngest girl collides into the redhead's back, which sparks another wave of arguments.
"Constantine," the man says, and it's not really a polite greeting, but it's not much displeased either. If anything, Batman sounds a bit confused.
"Hi," the magician deadpans back. "I'm about to stop your monthly apocalypse event, so do you mind?" He waves his hand, like asking Batman to scoot over.
"You are about to stop the apocalypse?" The middle 'triplet' lifts an eyebrow pointedly. John rolls his eyes.
"Fine, the tiny terrors team are about to stop it. Semantics," he amends. The goth girl grimaces, making a so-so gesture, but none of them voice any other complaints, instead going back to arguing.
"Remind me, why did we even let you out of the thermos, Dan?"
"Because I'm inevitable, my darling sister. Also, I'm a charm."
"Was that a fucking Thanos reference?"
"You're so not allowed to make it, considering that you're the only one who's never dealt with the Reality Gauntlet."
"What's a Reality Gauntlet?"
"Oh, right, Dani hasn't seen it either."
"Wait, you're telling me the Infinity Stones are real? I want them."
"Great job, Tucker, you've revived the evil in him!"
"Technically, you can't revive shit about Dan. Or you, for that matter. Physically impossible."
"Considering our whole deal with 'impossible', I wouldn't be taking any chances. And, no, the Infinity Stones are not real-"
"Anymore."
"-you can't have any in any case. It's forbidden candy for you."
Constantine takes a deep breath in, tapping his fingers over the pocket where he keeps his cigarettes, but otherwise stays calm and completely, utterly done with the lot behind his back.
"Who are they?" Batman asks after a long pause. Somehow, that makes the argument stop, and all the kids and teens turn to stare at the man, unblinking. Constantine sighs, loud and clearly aching for something alcoholic and strong.
"In the order of descension," he points his finger, "Dan, the evil overlord from another timeline, but don't worry, he's fine, Jazz, the totally human older sibling who we keep around because she's the only one with braincells, Danny, the- you know, I'm not even sure where to start with you."
"My parents are chaotic good mad scientists, and I turned out to be a true neutral local hero," said Danny shrugs, which causes the others to snicker and hide their laughter with coughing.
"I'd say Jazz is the true neutral, and you're chaotic stupid, but alright," the black boy says quietly, and the goth girl elbows him with a huff.
"You've never even played DnD. I did, though, and I can expertly say that Jazz is lawful neutral."
"She's broken three laws — that I know of — this week," the boy argues, but his friend just shrugs.
"The fact that you don't know what law she follows doesn't mean she isn't following it."
Constantine doesn't seem to pay attention to it — and it looks like he does it on purpose — and keeps going, "Okay, then, Danny is the small town hero with a taste for drinking acid, Sam over there is an angry and rather vocal Wednesday Addams, Tucker is short for tech-fucker-"
"Hey!"
"Language!" Jazz makes an offended gasp, but John doesn't bat an eye.
"-and Dani is what happens when you give human form to a baking soda volcano." Then, the magician turns to look at Batman again. The man doesn't seem satisfied, though, so John grimaces, looks up to the ceiling, muttering something that sounds way too much like a prayer, and adds:
"They are my nephews. And nieces, I suppose. Can you step aside now so they can save the day and I can put them back home before their mad scientist parents notice?"
Yo. Anyone know if there's a dp x dc x Addams family ish out there? Cuz that sounds like a good time. Give me 1990s Addams Family Values boppin' into Gotham, befriending all the things, half adopting the bats, and then suddenly Danny and co. just wilin' out there causing confusion and chaos. Danny, Gomez and Damian could start a dueling club. Morticia, Sam and Ivy could do gardening, poisoning, or witchy stuff. Tim, Tuck and Pugsley could build crazy traps.
Bonding over bombs, friendship over fires, love over larceny. Someone please. Just. Crack that out and have so much chaos.
Tim entered the bathroom and locked the door before bracing himself against the sink. Everything hurt like he was one giant bruise. God, how he hated magic. The magician they fought had been trying to bring something through, though the place burnt down before Tim had enough time to investigate.
Thanks Jason.
The only reason nothing was summoned was because Tim had accidentally grabbed the crystal focus that was powering the spell when the magician had tossed him across the warehouse. When he stood up the focus had been shattered below him.
Not that he's complaining! He's glad something potentially world ending hadn't been brought to their world. It's just, beneath the magician's look of horror at the broken remains of his artifact, there was an odd level of relief. Then the smug smile he had sent Tim's way, well... needless to say Tim wasn't feeling like tonight was a win.
Tim looked at himself in the mirror. He hadn't even taken the time to change yet. He looked like he got tossed around a warehouse like a ragdoll, which is accurate, but still rude. He shifted to grab the spirit gum solvent and froze.
He looked at his reflection. Nothing was amiss at first glance. He couldn't be sure all the scuff marks were accurate, but he looked how he felt.
He moved again.
A cold feeling crept its way up his back as his hair stood on end. His heart started pounding in his chest.
His reflection was moving a beat too slow.
Maybe it was an illusion. Maybe it was all in his head.
It followed his swallow and him licking his lips.
Maybe it was a prank of some kind.
He reached out to touch the mirror.
The reflection followed him exactly. Fingertips rested against fingertips. The glass felt solid, and his reflection stayed the same.
He let himself breathe a sigh of relief. He probably just needed to sleep.
The reflection smiled.
Tim tried to pull away but mirror-him reached through with reflective hands faster than he could blink. It grabbed him tight and pulled. He tried to call out, but his face was quickly pressed to the glass. He dropped a bug as he tried to brace himself or kick out, anything, but each movement shoved him further into the mirror until, in just a few moments, it pulled him through.
Cold. Piercing through his skin like blades. His entire body buzzed with static like an asleep limb. Pressure surrounded him crushing him so he couldn't breathe, couldn't move. Then nausea. The whole world spinning and tilting until he couldn't tell which way was up. Panic, confusion, until, suddenly, relief as he broke through the mirror into a void of darkness.
He managed to look back as he fell, only to see his reflection smiling at him, grin stretched wide with malice.
He whipped a batarang and tracker at the window he just came through. Though the batarang clinked harmlessly against it, the tracker stuck fast. He cursed while mirror-Tim's laugh followed him into the darkness.
Tim turned and tried to see what was below him. His mask was able to see structures coming towards him quickly. With a small gesture he activated his cape glider and caught his free fall. He located an area that looked clear enough for a landing, but still protected from whatever might be down there, and easily shifted into a slow, spiral descent.
He landed soft as a whisper even as the ground beneath him was no more than rubble and glass. The ground glowed a faint red and pulsed like a heartbeat. Its ominous glow threw shadows across the decimated landscape, outlining the broken skeletons of buildings towered above, and the debris of their remains scattered around him.
Tim swiftly hid amongst the shadows and tried to activate the bug he had left behind. The response was only static. He cursed and activated the tracker. It pinged a mile above him.
Tim closed his eyes and tried to breathe. The air was warm and dry. It grated against his throat and irritated his skin.
This was fine. It was going to be fine. Mirror-Tim probably didn't know the checks and balances they used with each other to determine imposters. His family would figure out what happened and help get him out of this place. Until then, he needed to survive.
Tim quickly cased the area to see if there were any living beings or any threats around. When he found nothing, he began taking debris and shaping it into the bat symbol that would only be obvious if you knew what you were looking for or if you looked at it from several stories above.
"So, whatchya doin'?"
Tim froze at the voice. He was moving one of the last rocks into place for the marker showing what direction he was going to go to try to find resources. He turned slowly and looked up. He was greeted with a young face around his age peering down at him from a broken wall.
The person was leaning with their head in their hands. Their pure white hair floated above them and their bright, glowing green eyes stared into Tim's soul. A feeling of calm washed over him. He hadn't even realized how wound up he had gotten as his jaw unclenched, and his shoulders lowered.
What were they? Alien? Supernatural? Human? Were they friend or foe? Were they going to run on some fae rules where he wasn't supposed to answer or else get his words stolen from him?
It didn't matter. Silence wouldn't get him any information, and the being didn't feel like a threat just yet. Better to move cautiously, though.
"...Redecorating." Tim replied.
The stranger giggled before they stood up from the wall and jumped down. Instead of falling they floated effortlessly towards him. Tim tried not to let his concern for what this being's ease of power use could mean for the other dangers he might find here overwhelm him.
"I like you. You can call me Phantom, he/him. What can I call you?"
Tim hesitated for a moment. Phantom seemed nice, but he couldn't take anything for granted in this place. Simple. As little as possible. "Red Robin. He/him."
"Nice to meetchya, Red Robin." Phantom started slowly floating around him. "You don't seem like a namuratu and you don't look like you belong in the Musalara."
"I have literally no idea what you're talking about." Or don't say as little as possible and just blurt things out.
Phantom laughed. The joy lit his face, literally, as his freckles glowed like stars. "It's been a while since I've been allowed to give explanations. I think I'll do a good job this time!
Bullet points, this land is the Musalara. Its people are the namuratu. And you are astulatu, a top-sider. I also saw your landing, very sleek." Phantom seemed to be thinking hard as he stared at Tim before he clapped his hands. "That settles it. I'm goin' with you. I'll help you get to the mundane world."
Tim felt a wave of relief flow through him even as Phantom's topic change threw him. He wanted to believe in this guy. Wanted to lean onto someone that might be able to help him in this strange place. But the strong desire to depend on this stranger also made him suspicious.
"How can you help me? How can I trust you? What will it cost?"
Phantom chuckled. "You're awesome. Perfect questions. 10 outa 10. Also, we're gonna have so much fun. To answer, I'm strong, we can do an oath about it, and only some cookies."
"Cookies?"
"Yeah. You seem like a guy who can get some delicious cookies topside." Tim hesitated and Phantom leaned in. "Or you could do it alone if you know how to get out of the bone forest; how to avoid the namuratu soul scribes; where to go to talk to the sphinx who will give you a ridiculous journey all to get to a place where you'll probably find out the answer was with you all along."
Tim chuckled, losing the battle of wanting to depend on this stranger. "Fine, let's do an oath about it."
Phantom leaned back in the air and kicked his feet. "You won't regret it, Red!"
Danny frowns at the headstone for a while as he feels his bones slowly knit back together. He is very happy to feel his accelerated healing, even if it was down to about 10% of what it used to be.
Jason Peter Todd
He looks at the headstone and then down at the disturbed earth where he had climbed out then down at his own body. He's really hoping it's not what he thinks it is, but he knows his own luck.
He pulls back his left sleeve and doesn't see any of the faint branches that remained of his time in the portal. He looks at his hands and there's different calluses, different scars, and a freckle just below the knuckle of his left ring finger.
These were not his hands.
Which means this was not his body.
Which means....
Realization has fire burning in his chest like acid that bubbles beneath his skin as nausea sweeps through him. His vision starts to fade and pulse as he can't look away from his differently marred skin.
He was in someone else's body.
Danny tries to get out. Tries to do a reverse overshadowing, tries to go intangible, and even tries to do a summoning of himself. Nothing works. He's locked in.
He's stuck in someone else's corpse.
He's hijacked someone else's body.
He's desecrating the dead like this, right? Ancients, what if this guy's family sees him?! What if they think he's actually come back?! Danny is going to be able to leave at some point, right? Then they'd just have to relive this Jason's death all over again!
Nope! Nuh uh. Not doing it. He's getting the hell out of here.
Danny comes back to himself covered in mud, frantically returning the earth to look more like the ground was just heavily rained on instead of having someone climb out of their grave.
It's terrible work. Awful, really. There's a big divot from all the dirt that is now inside the casket, but that doesn't matter because Danny is leaving this city as fast as his uncomfortable shoes can take him.
Oh! He still has his shoes! That's nice. They must have been tied on quite tight. He was a little worried about losing them in his climb out of the grave, so he's very lucky to have them still. Yep. Super happy to have shoes. And his makeshift mask that he carefully put into his pocket before putting his lucky belt back on.
Look at all these great things he's got going for him! He can absolutely ignore the screaming agony of his ribs and all the other broken bones. He can ignore that nothing looks familiar outside the cemetery. Each step definitely doesn't feel like glass grinding together. Steps in a body that belongs to someone else. Nope. He's fine. He can do this. He's totally okay. He can definitely see just fine and everything isn't just a bunch of blurry blobs and smears of light and cold and wet and dirty and exhausting and painful...
He's fine.
He's also... airborn?
Ah.
He's back on the ground.
Welp. Pretty sure that last bright light was a car that definitely hit him.
Real nice, Fenton. Successfully dug himself out of a grave to probably die immediately by walking into traffic. He tries to get up. His hands keep slipping and he can't lift up his head. Eventually he lets himself lie there in the rain and grime. He thinks he maybe hears sirens, but they're distant and don't really seem to matter at the moment.
He sends apologies to Jason for not taking care of his body as the darkness takes him.
~(- -)~
When he comes to, it's instantly and all at once. There was no groggy awakening, or slow transition to awareness. He was unconscious and then he was wide awake, taking in more information about his situation than he ever had before.
Medical smell. Beeps of familiar machines. Lying on a table, but comfortable. No restraints, but there's a needle embedded in his hand. There is no rustling of fabric or presence in the room. His heart rate has not changed between asleep and wakefulness.
All of his observations happen faster than he can comprehend. He was asleep, he was awake, and he knew he was in a hospital in a room by himself and somehow his body has automatically controlled his heartrate.
This cataloging of information felt ingrained, something that was almost innate to his body. It felt very strange to Danny, but also amazing. Jason must have been a badass. Or involved in unsavory shit. Or both! Who's he to judge? Not body-snatching Danny, that's who.
His pain isn't any worse than it was before, so he thinks he got pretty lucky with that car. Or he's been here for long enough that his healing has fixed him back up. Which means he should probably gtfo before someone starts asking too many questions and gets the wrong people interested in him.
He tries to keep the heart within him beating slow and steady as he lets himself have a pity party. All he wanted was to visit that ghost. He didn't know where he was or when. He didn't know if he was back in his home realm or in another. How long has he been gone? Has anyone noticed yet?
The full understanding that he just crawled out of a grave engulfed him. He crawled out of a grave. He was hit by a car. He's stuck in someone else's body. He's lost. He's alone. He's the weakest he's ever been.
Horror, loss and fear rippled through him. His vision seemed to waver as his mind tried to protect him from the onslaught of his emotions. He ignored the increased beeping of the machines as his breath came faster and faster.
He wanted to throw up.
He wanted to scream.
He...Wait. That's not just his panic attack causing his vision to do that. The air is actually wavering. Like a heat mirage but made of shadows.
What the actual fuck.
That.
That is a lot of darkness. Just. Shadows pouring from the corner like smoke. It pools and flows into the room before starting to climb until it begins to take form, coalescing higher and higher. It arcs into the air until it bends over towards him. The shadows bubble and ripple until they solidify into a humanoid form.
Their thin, skeletal frame is encased in skin made of grey concrete with cracks like sidewalk and draped in tattered and stained black fabric accented by streaks of dirty yellows, blues, reds and greens. Shadows drip like oil from their head like strangled locks, barely hiding their angular face of too tight skin and black veined yellow eyes. Their legs have too many joints and end in sharpened points. Their arms are too long and wrapped in caution tape splattered with something that was too dark to identify.
"King." They rumble, their voice a multitude. All the voices of the city's dead in one harmony.
He swallows thickly and is about to greet this great city spirit before the words die in his throat. The city's smile stretches too far, with too many teeth shaped from jagged, bloodied pearls. The spirits bones click together as they reach for him.
He tries not to flinch. The chittering of carrion beetle's echo in his head as they laugh at him.
Danny is barely able to take a single breath of acceptance as the city spirit crashes over him, ice filling his veins as she steals him away from the hospital room.
Danny is having a great day! The skies are green, the clouds are green, okay almost everything is green 'cause he's floating through the Infinite Realms, but that didn't change the fact that it is a lovely day!
He had heard of this badass city spirit that, according to Ember, was "absolutely metal". Apparently, she had this whole insane goth aesthetic that he just had to see and since he's on summer vacation he figured he would take the time to check her out! Maybe make a new battle buddy and maybe, if she's chill like that, he could bring Sam and Tuck to meet her!
He starts to slow as he gets closer to where her lair is supposed to be. There's something funky in the air. A vibe, if you would. A weird vibe. It's not a bad vibe or a good vibe, just A Vibe™. Also, he's now thought vibe too many times that it's starting to sound weird.
Not the point! The point is, there is a vibe. And this vibe is coming from somewhere nearby.
Danny starts to turn to try to find the source when what feels like a supersonic, interdimensional punch just socks him right in the gut. It sends him flying and twisting through the air disorienting him before the trajectory suddenly reverses as if he's being pulled into a vacuum (or a thermos).
He tries to gather himself. He doesn't know which way is what, he just knows that being yanked towards whatever is going on is gonna be a big ol' nope from him. A no thank you. A not today, satan! He very much does not volunteer as tribute. He, in fact, volunteers to be let the fuck go, thank you very much.
He pulls and pushes and tries to fly as hard as he can, but the suction is too strong. He finally looks behind himself and sees the tear in reality. The other side looks like a void of nothingness.
Oh. This is gonna suck, isn't it?
He has only a moment where he allows the panic to overtake him. Only a moment for fear to fully rock through him, for him to question if this was it, before he is pulled into the darkness.
It feels like when you're in a chair and you think you're going to fall backwards. Like when you miss a step going downstairs. Danny thinks he should be screaming, but he's in the space between heartbeats. He is everywhere and nowhere and is traveling too fast and not going anywhere at all. He thinks it lasts forever, but it also never was.
He feels gravity slam into him all at once. He feels too big and too small, and everything is too loud and too quiet, and it's pitch black wherever he landed. He tries to keep his panic at bay, but he still feels all twisted around and his whole sense of self feels wrong.
He tries to sit up and hits his head. He reaches out around him and feels that panic bubble up. He's in some sort of box that's just big enough for him and is lined in some sort of soft fabric. Satin or silk, maybe? He's also got a small pillow that whoever trapped him in here was nice enough to give him.
Well, this is fine. This is no worries at all! He's Danny Phantom! The OP Ghost King! He just needs to phase through... aaand... he... He can't access his powers.
Okay.
Okay.
No need to panic.
No need to freak out.
No need to worry about his heart beating faster than it has in two years. Or to worry about how he's hyperventilating, and he can't seem to stop even though he hasn't really needed to breathe in that long either.
He closes his eyes (even though he couldn't see anything before anyway) and tries to calm himself. He goes through some exercises and grabs onto his handy dandy unhealthy coping mechanisms in order to shove everything into a box, and put that box in another box, and shove that box so far down inside himself that he won't even be able to send it to himself to smash it with a hammer. What he can do is smash himself out of whatever box he is actually in.
First, he has to take stock. He has on a jacket, what feels like trousers, and really uncomfortable shoes. Is he in a suit? Why is he in a box in a suit. Never mind. Don't answer that. It's not important right now. What IS important is he is also wearing a belt with a belt buckle that feels sturdy af and has some sharp edges.
Danny quickly takes off the belt and wraps it around his hand, tying the buckle so it was easy to hold. He starts slashing at all the fabric around him. Once it's out of the way he starts blindly feeling the top of his box. It has a weird curvature and there's what feels like a seam halfway through it.
So, that's a bit of a bummer. It might be stronger with that extra seam there. He was hoping to punch his way through, but it might be thicker than he thought.
He's going to ignore exactly why there's a seam in the center of the box. A box with a curved lid. A box with a person in it. A box with fancy silk lining and a more comfortable than he expected pillow under his head and the fact that he was wearing a suit. He is going to ignore all that. Because if he doesn't.
If he doesn't.
Then he's going to have to consider what this all actually means. And he is NOT buried alive. He just simply isn't. That isn't something that he's going to be dealing with right now inside this box with too little air and absolutely no powers.
What he IS going to do is wrap some of the extra fabric around his nose and mouth. Then he's going to shove all the rest of everything in his way as far down below his feet as possible before he tries to punch his way out of the problem as usual.
The first punch using the belt buckle as an impact point is surprising in how loudly the lid cracks. So, he may not have all his abilities, but it looks like strength is still in play. Nice.
It only takes a few hits before the first trickle of dirt lands on him. Don'tThinkDon'tThinkDon'tThink. He brushes it aside and starts hitting a different point in order to try to expand his exit area. The dirt coats him in little bursts with each impact, and he brushes it off his chest while decidedly not thinking about why there's dirt.
No thoughts, only punching.
Soon he has enough of a weak area where he doesn't think it'll hurt him too much if he forces himself through. He takes a slow, deep breath and punches as hard as he can, fully cracking the lid. The dirt pours in. He shoves it down to his feet as he tries to make the hole bigger and wider until it finds an equilibrium and stops flooding in on him.
He takes one last slow, deep breath and holds it before trying to move as quickly as possible. He grabs the edge of the hole and pulls. The edges bend inward, and dirt comes cascading down. He shoves as much as possible down and around him before heaving himself upward.
Dirt is everywhere. It's in everything. He pulls himself above the casket box and feels everything shift and fall. He quickly finds the box with his feet and does his best to shove off and essentially swim through it.
At first it was all dry. At first, he felt confidence and knew he was going to get out of this.
But now the dirt is wet.
Now the dirt is heavy.
He keeps his panicking thinking down and only focuses on what he has to do. He doesn't think about how far down he could be. Or how far he's already gone already. Or how much pressure the ground was squeezing against him.
Danny just keeps moving and pushing and practically climbing through the dirt. Keep pushing the dirt beneath him. Push it around him. Keep going. He's going to be fine. He's going to be fine. He's going to be fine. He'sGoingToBeFineHe'sGoingToBeFineHe'sGoingToBeFine.
Just when the breath in his lungs starts to burn, his hand breaches and reaches nothing but air. He'd have sobbed in relief if his head wasn't still buried.
He grips the edge of surface and pulls while pushing the dirt beneath him with his feet as much as possible until his head finally breaks the surface. He gives himself one more shove until he is mostly out of that accursed hole and just lays down in the rain and cherishes the lungfuls of air he breathes in.
It's night, and the rainclouds are above, but Danny can still see the moon just beyond them. He tears off the makeshift facemask that managed to make it all the way to the surface with him. The water feels so refreshing even if it almost doomed him to a dirty death.
He feels the rain splatter against his filthy skin and starts giggling, before he starts laughing so hard he has to curl around his screaming ribs. And if he's also sobbing that's nobody else's business but his.
Danny is exhausted. Everything hurts. Though, it hurts more in a "lost a fight with a bus" than a "dug yourself out of a grave" kinda way. He can tell one of his eyes is swollen, and he thinks he might have a broken rib or two. Maybe a fracture in his arm?
What the hell even happened? One minute he's in the realms, getting all the vibes, then getting sucked into the abyss and, then what? The abyss decided since he had died, he deserved a dirt nap? He also lived, thank you very much, though he wouldn't say no to a memorial or something. Or a grave he could get in and out of without powers might actually be nice. But this buried and having to get out the human way was the absolute worst. -1000000000/10 do not recommend.
He finally sits up and looks around. Definitely a cemetery. He takes a moment and takes a deep, calming breath before looking back at the grave he crawled out of... and is instantly confused.
Danny was doing some cleanup work for Clockwork when the magician he was trying to get under control flubbed a spell. He now finds himself stuck inside a glow-in-the-dark rubber duck with a cowboy hat that he decides to name Jeff.
It takes him longer than he cares to admit to become aware of the world outside of Jeff. It's even longer that he can push himself out long enough to interact with the outside world.
Ooh! Looks like he's in the house of a family of heroes! Now he just needs to get their attention to help him get unstuck from inside Jeff! Luckily he's got enough strength to project himself to other objects, even if he snaps back to Jeff every now and again.
Cue the batfam having an increasingly more chaotic haunting as Danny, unknowingly stuck in a semi-eldritch form with a semi-eldritch mind, keeps trying to get their attention and help by being the shadow out of the corner of their eye, manipulating reflections in mirrors, spelling unfortunately ominous phrases in ketchup and that one time he turns all the shampoo and conditioner in the house into slime and glitter glue.
They'll probably figure it out eventually... maybe.
Dead on MAYN Day 5:
Danny is there when Jason resurrects in his coffin.
The thermos rolls back and forth between Danny’s palms. It’s only faintly warm to the touch, though Danny knows that the tea inside is still plenty hot. Tea, chocolate, protein bars, sour candies, oatmeal cookies, apple slices—Danny brought a variety of things, not sure what the other might want. At this point, it’s basically a whole picnic.
A picnic in a graveyard.
It’s just one of those things that leaves Danny befuddled about how his life is going. Other teens are at the lake for the break. Danny is sitting around in a graveyard because a god of time told him too.
Just undead boi things.
(Like girl dinner, but way worse.)
The warm hoodie, wet wipes, and plushie are less about the weird picnic vibes and more about trying to offer some comfort. Danny can’t imagine waking up in a grave, so if he can offer any comfort he wants to. Though sure, the plushie is a little awkward looking; Danny sowed it in home economics class. The project probably would have gone better if Danny had chosen something more standard, like a teddy bear, but the opossum design had been too cute. Besides, Danny thinks that the flaws sort of add to the character.
Besides, someone crawling out of their own grave won’t be too picky, right?
The headstone catches Danny’s attention again and he glances over at it. Jason Todd. A beloved son. Dead at fifteen.
Would he have a grave stone like that, if he hadn’t come back from the accident? Or would his parents have gone for cremation? Would there even have been anything of him left?
Or would his parents have just studied what was left of him?
Don’t think like that.
Danny rests his head against the top of the thermos. He can’t think like that. His parents love him. He knows that his parents love him.
He just doesn’t know if they can love Phantom.
He doesn’t want to find out.
Slowly, Danny takes a deep breath and lets it out. He counts; in two three four, hold, out two three four. The earth is cold through the blanket that he’s sitting on. The air smells like the city, so different from Amity Park. It’s the difference that helps ground Danny.
He checks the time on his cellphone again. Four minutes. At least Clockwork gave a very precise time.
10:42
What an insignificant time to come back to life.
For the last four minutes, Danny fusses. He straightens the blanket, sets the snacks up in a neat row, and spreads the hoodie out.
10:39
10:40
10:41
10:42
Well, that’s an anticlimactic stillness. Isn’t something supposed to happen? A halfa rising from the grave?
Danny leans over and presses his ear to the dew damp earth.
Does he hear something?
Maybe…
Screaming.
Not stopping to think, Danny plunges his hand through the earth then his shoulder then torso…. down, down down he reaches until he’s deep enough for his fingers to brush against the enameled wood of a casket. Then he reaches through it.
A cold, trembling hand grasps his.
Danny pulls.
It feels like dragging up a million tons to pull Jason Todd up and out of his grave. It feels like the very earth and soil of Gotham is resisting letting go of its son.
Danny only pulls harder.
“He doesn’t belong here yet! Please! He’s not dead! You have to let him live again. You have to let him go!”
The resistance vanishes so suddenly that it feels like the earth basically spits them out. For a moment Danny feels like he’s flying—not Phantom, but him. It’s a whirl of motion and and earth and then Danny is doing his best to turn and take the blunt of the landing. They land hard on the blanket, knocking the thermos over and squashing at least one snack. Danny holds on for dear life.
Well, dear half-life.
The guy—Jason, his name is Jason—is large in Danny’s arms, all broad shoulders and firm chest. Danny feels slightly smothered under the other, but in a good way. Like being under Tucker’s weighted blanket. His fingers slide easily through Jason’s hair.
“Jason?”
Jason just clings tighter. His nose is pressed against Danny’s neck like he’s trying to hide from the world there against Danny. Danny breaths in and out, trying to focus.
“It’s okay, Jason. I know how much it hurts. I know how much it hurts and how everything feels different. Nothing feels right, and it’s not. But it will shift. It will be right again. I’m here and I—um, I have snacks and tea and a hoodie. Because you’re cold! Which makes sense, you’ve been underground for, like, months and that would make anyone cold. Oh! And a plushie, which is stupid maybe, but you can hold on to it,” Danny rambles. Jason manages to get an arm around Danny and holds him close. Their legs tangle together. Danny swallows thickly. “Or you can hold onto me, I guess, that works too. But really. It will be okay. With some time, it will be okay.”
“It—I… I’m… I’m…” Jason’s lips were surprisingly soft again Danny’s neck.
“Yeah, you are. You’re alive,” Danny said. “Come on, can we get sitting up? You don’t need to let go of me, but I want to get a little bit of food and drink into you. It will help you feel better.”
With some effort and coxing, Danny gets them sitting up. Jason does not let go.
He does take the opossum though.
And he sips slowly at the tea and eats a few apple slices.
It’s something at least.
“Okay, Jason,” Danny says as he gropes blindly for where his cellphone ended up. “No clue how I’m going to explain this, but let’s see about getting you back to your family. Don’t suppose you remember anyone’s phone number? I know, who even remembers phone numbers these days. Or can you at least give me some names?”
“That—I… Dad. I want Dad,” Jason chokes out.
“Dad, okay.” Danny lets out a sigh as he lays fingers on his phone. “Let’s see if modern technology can help us find ‘dad’.”
It’s a bit of one handed fumbling to type in Jason’s name. Danny doesn’t even expect to find much, not until he can get around to hunting through funeral home obituaries at least, so he’s shocked when Jason’s name pulls up article after article. ‘Son of Billionaire Bruce Wayne Murdered’, ‘The Mysterious Murder of Jason Todd’, ‘The Prince of Gotham’s Son Dead at Fifteen’—on and on.
“Well, okay, ‘dad’ has been found,” Danny said. “Because getting a hold of Bruce Wayne is going to be easy. Like I can just call up a billion—Sam! Right, duh. She might not have his personal number or anything, but she’ll know how to get a hold of someone who can get a hold of him.”
“Sam?” Jason mumbles around a half attended to slice of apple.
“Friend. Well, ex-girlfriend actually,” Danny says as he pulls up the trio’s group chat. “So just friend again! Which is good? Fine, it’s fine. We had too much history with each other, it just wasn’t working. There was too much between us, including, you know, murder.”
For a moment, Jason stills before the faint trembling that seems to have settled into Jason’s bones resumes. “M-murder?”
“Oh! No, it’s not as bad as it sounds. It was my murder, and it kinda needed to happen. But hey, you know, you don’t have a monopoly on coming back to life you know,” Danny babbles absently as he types.
Dtom:
Sam Sam Sam Sam ASAP need Bruce Wayne’s # or close a you have
While Danny waits for a response, he rubs his hands idly up and down Jason’s back. He’s surprised that Jason isn’t in a suit. He thinks that’s what people are normally buried in. Instead, Jason is dressed in sweats and a well worn Wonder Woman t-shirt. Danny has to wonder if it’s the scars that Danny can feel under the thin cotton of the shirt that has something to do with the strange outfit. Maybe open casket wasn’t an option.
“Come on, let’s get this hoodie on, okay?” Danny manages to worm his was free of Jason’s tight hold enough to grab the hoodie.
It takes some fumbling, and by the time that the hoodie is on Danny’s phone has chimed a few times. At least the hoodie fits—more than fits. Danny had brought one of Jack’s. It was big.
SpAM:
wtf Danny
WTF!!!!!
DANNY PICK UP YOUR PHONE RIGHT NOW
Dtom:
The person that came back to death? Jason Todd. Wayne’s son
SpAM:
G-d. FINE
Danny helps Jason drink a little more tea while they wait.
SpAM:
Here. But you better send me the full story as soon as you can!!
Danny sends a thumbs up and then clicks on the ID card Sam sent. He puts the phone on speaker and holds it between them. It rings exactly three times.
“Wayne residence. Who may I ask is calling?” A prim British voice asks.
“Um, hi. I’m Danny Fenton, not that means anything to you. I’m here… I don’t really know how to say this but to just say it. I’m here at the cemetery with Jason Todd.”
“Pardon?”
“Ah… Al…fie.” Jason struggles to speak, but pushes on. “Alfie, ish me.”
“Oh heavens…,” the Brit gasps cross the line. “My dear boy.”
I need you to understand I have enjoyed absolutely everything they've written. Sharing this one cuz it's currently living rent free and I can't get it outa my head. Master post is here.
Robin looked over at Red Hood from where he was hunkered down on the rooftop. He sat unmoving with his helmeted head resting on the top of the raised roof edge. Robin couldn't tell if he was actually focusing on anything or just zoning out.
They had been on this stake out for over 2 hours, and he was starting to get bored. He double-checked the camera feeds set up around the supposed meeting place at the docks. No movement. All clear. He just wanted something to happen before he gave in to his urge to lay starfished on the dirty roof.
As if granting his wish, a bright green light flashed and crackled in an alley next to their building. An electric hum mixed with the cheery tinkle of silver bells followed by the scent of plastic burning had both Robin and Red Hood looking at each other before moving to investigate.
What they saw didn't make sense at first. A man with bright, nearly glowing white hair, Lazarus green eyes, and dressed in black overalls was drawing sigils in the air while facing the alley wall. Bolts of green and purple light danced across him as if he were a living Tesla coil.
He didn't look in danger. In fact, he was writing the sigils almost carelessly with loose posture as he hummed a song to himself, bobbing his head and tapping his foot.
It took Robin a moment to realize the song he was humming was followed by the Tesla bolts giving the same pitch. It was oddly enchanting.
The others were a few minutes out when the man finished his sigils. They spun and twisted, taking the electric bolts from the man, before warping into a floating circle that revealed multiple beams of light flowing quickly beyond the window. They felt chaotic and unstable, clashing against each other and sending sparks into the alleyway.
Hood signaled that he had alerted the rest of the team, and O had responded that she was picking up heavily corrupted video and slightly static audio from them, but nothing she broadcasted to them over comms was being received.
They waited for backup.
The man grinned and shoved his hands directly into the anomaly of electricity without a second thought. Hood and Robin had no more time. They made their move.
Robin leapt down into the mouth of the alley, blocking the strangers' escape into the streets while Hood blocked his way further into the alleys. The man made a high-pitched scream and pulled light out from the window, which sparked, stuttered, and promptly burst into a shower of glitter that dusted across the stranger.
"Aw, man. What did ya go and have to do that for? Can't you see I'm busy?" He moved to stick his arms back into the window before he paused and whipped his head to look at both of them with wide eyes. "Oh, fudgesicles. You're alive."
Robin raised an eyebrow. "Astute observation."
"No, I mean, I thought you were -" he paused before rubbing his hands down his face. "Nevermind. How can I help you... people?"
"What are you doing here?" Hoods mechanical voice demanded.
"Uh..." The man looked between his window and back at them before standing in front of it as if he could block it. "Nothing. Not me. Not doing a thing. Nope." The vigilantes just stared at him for a moment before he broke. "Working. What's it to ya, any way? Who are you people?"
"You do not know of us? You're in Gotham. How can you not know of Robin and Red Hood?"
"I only know one Robin Hood, and he steals from the rich. Ya'll thieves?" Robin bristles before Hood interrupted.
"We're vigilantes. This is our city. Now, what are you doing?"
"Vigilantes?" His scoff quickly turned into dismay. "Oh, fiddlesticks. You're the Lady's cauldron." He groaned and looked up at the smog filled sky as if praying for strength. "This is my fault. I should have verified your signatures, but you're some of the most liminal I've met in years. How was I to know?"
Hood and Robin just looked at him while he seemed to have a mini-breakdown before he started patting himself down and going through his pockets.
"Hello, local vigilantes." He read, "You may call me Phantom. I am the assigned mechanic to your universe, 3969-XDM." He gave a little wave. "I am currently running diagnostics and correcting a broken loop caused by an unauthorized temporal readjustment. Please allow me to complete my task before further corruption and failures develop. Feel free to ask questions after my mission is complete." He gave another smile at them before tucking the card away and turning back to the anomaly. His arms were already back inside as both Robin and Red Hood drew their weapons.
"Okay. This is fine. Totally okay." He began emptying his pockets at his feet. A hammer, a rubber duck, an Allen wrench, fake vampire teeth, a few batteries... was that an avocado? "Breaks every rule I was supposed to maintain, but c'est la demi-vie."
He exclaimed triumphantly as he pulled out a stack of index cards. He went through each one, "No, no, nope, definitely not. Aha!" He put the other cards back in his pocket before he took a deep breath, straightened his spine, and put on a smile that Robin might have seen Tim use as he went into a WE boardroom.
"Hey! Back away from the magical window."
Phantom frowned at them. "No. I told you I gotta fix this loop. The corruption is starting to cause issues." He narrowed his eyes at Hood as if sizing him up before nodding and going back to his task. "You of all people should want this fixed. That feedback can not be good for you."
Hood switched off his safety. "What are you talking about?"
Robin was just about to move forward when Batman landed beside him.
"Unknown, alias Phantom. Step back and stand against the opposite wall." Phantom gave him an unimpressed eye and raised a single eyebrow. Robin knew what his response would be.
"No." He retorted before he snapped his arms within the anomaly. The window gave a bright flash of light with a shower of sparks. The electricity hummed and danced across Phantoms form before settling into a soft lullaby. The energy within the window calmed and flowed gently. Phantom stood back, then clapped his hands, causing the anomaly to vanish in another shower of glitter.
As it vanished, Robin realized Hood had staggered and stumbled into the wall with his hand on his head.
"Hood!" Red Robin jumped down beside Hood hands hovering over him, unsure if Hood would accept any physical assistance.
"I.. I'm fine. I. I'm actually fine. What was that? What did you do?" Even with the distortion, Hoods voice was filled with awe.
Phantom had moved to lean against the opposite wall from where his anomaly had been. All his pocket hodgepodge was no longer visible. "I told you, fixing the loop. You were ridiculously affected. Mass amounts of feedback. Feeling better? Not so angy?"
Robin expected Hood to bite Phantoms head off and was thrown when, instead, he laughed. Hood stood up with the help of Red Robin. He took off his helmet, disregarding his brother and father's protests despite the domino he still had on, and grinned at Phantom.
"You have no idea. I was murderous all the time. I can finally breathe." As if to prove the point, he took a deep breath before laughing joyfully. Robin saw how this new laugh visibly shocked both Red Robin and Batman. "He cured the pit rage. Holy shit. C'mere." Hood quickly strode over and wrapped Phantom in a hug. "Thank you so fucking much." Phantom awkwardly patted his back.
"Eh, no problem, big guy. Glad I could help!" As they stepped apart, Phantom rocked forward on the balls of his feet. "So.... I'm gonna just go, now."
Batman took a step forward. "No. We have questions."
Phantom slumped and sighed. "Yeah, I figured. Ok, tall, dark, and brooding. Where ya taking me? I respectfully request to keep my purpose here limited to a small few as the knowledge can create another loop, and it's a pain in the ass to locate."
Batman nodded before gesturing to the batmobile that was rolling to a stop by the alley. Phantom looked mildly apprehensive before Hood moved up beside him and knocked shoulders.
"Don't worry, Phantom. What you did for me, I'll shoot pretty much anyone who'd wanna do ya harm. The old man included." Phantom laughed and let Hood guide him into the rear seat of the batmobile with Hood sliding in beside him.
Robin shook his head. He left Red Robin at the scene calling JLD to investigate. He had to race to his bike if he wanted to be there when this Phantom was interrogated.
Danny's been on this planet for ... okay, all his time shenanigans, along with natural time blindness, have kind of ruined his ability to tell. He's pretty sure it has been a while, though.
He's getting kind of bored, tbh. I mean, this underground alien fighting pit was pretty amusing for the first hundred or so fights, but they're starting to get monotonous. And he's pretty miffed at the fact that everyone fighting is kidnapped. And enslaved! Rude, honestly.
He hears the din above raise to an obscene level. Danny looks up as the new contender gets thrown into the pit. His eyes widen, and a feral grin spreads across his face.
The new fighter looks human. It's been so long since he's seen another human-esque person. Ooh, they even smell like earthling! And! Better yet! Simmering below their anger is ectoplasm.
Well, butter biscuits. He wants to fight the human. (Ghost rough house ftw!) But now he also just wants to bust outa this joint and take the human with him. Maybe get a drink. Have a latte, sip some chai tea. No time for a bubble bath, though.
His hand is to his chin, and he's rocking his head side to side in contemplation when the decision is made for him by a right hook to the jaw.
"So rude! I was making a decision!" He starts to duck and weave around the other fighter's fists.
"Sucks to be you. I'm not waitin' for ya to decide how yer gonna kick my ass."
Danny scoffs. "I was," he dodges a kick and the follow up fist it tried to hide, "deciding whether to fight or leave and we could," duck, duck, boop the nose, "go get a drink. I'm sure this planet has a bar or something."
The fighter makes an affronted noise at the boop. "What the fuck? Don't fuckin' lie. You killed all the other fighters you went up against!"
Danny smiles, "Did I?"
"Yes!"
"According to whom?" Danny was king. THE king. Of everything. He was OP af. Like he was going to kill his fight buddies! That's just bad manners! He got all his opponents free with liberal amounts of ectoplasm and creative use of portals.
Block, block, swipe kick. Ooooh, they've got moves. What was that flippy thing???
"OhMyAncients, you're so fun!!" Danny dodges another onslaught before dancing away to put distance between them. "Call me Barghest, he/him. What can I call you? Your pronouns? I need something more than 'new fighter' for my inner dialogue."
The other fighter pauses, looking thoroughly confused. "... Red Hood. He/him?? What is happening right now?"
"Now? I'm gonna tear this fuckin' place to the ground and you and I are getting a drink."
Hood scoffs. "I've seen you fight. You don't have the ability to tear this place down."
Danny glances at the alien ring. There are inhibitors and reinforced containments everywhere. The entire place is built to keep some of the most dangerous beings in the universe inside the pit to fight to the death.
This place was formidable, but it was meant for the living.
Danny shrugs. "I'm here on vacation."
"On vacation." Hood deadpans.
"Yup. I was bored. Thought only using my enhancement powers in a fighting pit would be a blast! And I was absolutely correct." He grins, letting his power flash his eyes green, then blue. "This was fun, but I'd rather chill with you now." He lets his power flash freeze all the containment contingencies around the pit, then lets his power shatter it all into dust accompanied by the lovely screams of the crowd. "I do have a few people I actually have to deal with first, but would you like to get outa here?"
Hood stares at his offered hand for a moment before giving a casual shrug. "Fuck it." Hood walks forward and reaches his hand out before pausing, "I gotta kill some people before we bounce, too."
Danny threw his head back and laughed. "Oh, I don't need to kill them. But I can respect the grind." He takes Hood's hand, and in the next breath, they're behind the owner of the underground ring, most of his upper lieutenants and about 30 alien goons.
Red Hood and Danny move in tandem, each taking a side and weaving their way through the group. They dodge, turn, disarm, and maneuver opponents into each others attacks in some of the most coordinated movement Danny has ever experienced. As if he knew exactly where Hood was going to be, going to strike, going to dip. It's amazing. His thoughts are static except for internal screaming. He stans this human so fucking hard.
As the leader finally fell to Hood's blade (where did those come from???) Danny turns to him with barely contained excitement. "Are we best friends? I think we just became best friends!"
"Uh..."
"Nope. Time's up. You're mine now. Besties forever." Danny opens his armory pocket dimension and pulls out some light body armor, a few blades, a couple of handguns, and an RPG. "New bestie, I bequeath unto thee protection! Let's go blow some shit up!"
Red Hoods smile finally matches his own. "I could be down for that."
“So what made me different from all your other opponents that you may or may not have killed?” Jason asked once they finally had their drink. “Enough to bust outta the underground alien colosseum you were “vacationing” in?”
“Oh the smell.”
“Excuse me?”
Danny leaned over and took a deep sniff, sighing contentedly. “Oh yeah. That’s nostalgic you know? You smell like my childhood.”
Jason leaned back to get out of sniffing range. “And what exactly did your childhood smell like?”
“Death magic mostly. Reanimated meat products come a close second, but that was just when I still lived with my parents.”
Danny chuckled. “That was back when I still lived! Gosh it’s been a hot minute. I’m mostly dead now. And you’re human, right? Or at least you were. You’re definitely an earthling. Call it sentimental but ghosts like us tend to have soft spots for our species of origin.”
Before Jason could process any of that Danny threw a friendly punch at his arm, adding, “Plus you fight like a dream! That was the most fun I’ve had in ages! We’ve gotta schedule more play dates like that.”
Danny's been on this planet for ... okay, all his time shenanigans, along with natural time blindness, have kind of ruined his ability to tell. He's pretty sure it has been a while, though.
He's getting kind of bored, tbh. I mean, this underground alien fighting pit was pretty amusing for the first hundred or so fights, but they're starting to get monotonous. And he's pretty miffed at the fact that everyone fighting is kidnapped. And enslaved! Rude, honestly.
He hears the din above raise to an obscene level. Danny looks up as the new contender gets thrown into the pit. His eyes widen, and a feral grin spreads across his face.
The new fighter looks human. It's been so long since he's seen another human-esque person. Ooh, they even smell like earthling! And! Better yet! Simmering below their anger is ectoplasm.
Well, butter biscuits. He wants to fight the human. (Ghost rough house ftw!) But now he also just wants to bust outa this joint and take the human with him. Maybe get a drink. Have a latte, sip some chai tea. No time for a bubble bath, though.
His hand is to his chin, and he's rocking his head side to side in contemplation when the decision is made for him by a right hook to the jaw.
"So rude! I was making a decision!" He starts to duck and weave around the other fighter's fists.
"Sucks to be you. I'm not waitin' for ya to decide how yer gonna kick my ass."
Danny scoffs. "I was," he dodges a kick and the follow up fist it tried to hide, "deciding whether to fight or leave and we could," duck, duck, boop the nose, "go get a drink. I'm sure this planet has a bar or something."
The fighter makes an affronted noise at the boop. "What the fuck? Don't fuckin' lie. You killed all the other fighters you went up against!"
Danny smiles, "Did I?"
"Yes!"
"According to whom?" Danny was king. THE king. Of everything. He was OP af. Like he was going to kill his fight buddies! That's just bad manners! He got all his opponents free with liberal amounts of ectoplasm and creative use of portals.
Block, block, swipe kick. Ooooh, they've got moves. What was that flippy thing???
"OhMyAncients, you're so fun!!" Danny dodges another onslaught before dancing away to put distance between them. "Call me Barghest, he/him. What can I call you? Your pronouns? I need something more than 'new fighter' for my inner dialogue."
The other fighter pauses, looking thoroughly confused. "... Red Hood. He/him?? What is happening right now?"
"Now? I'm gonna tear this fuckin' place to the ground and you and I are getting a drink."
Hood scoffs. "I've seen you fight. You don't have the ability to tear this place down."
Danny glances at the alien ring. There are inhibitors and reinforced containments everywhere. The entire place is built to keep some of the most dangerous beings in the universe inside the pit to fight to the death.
This place was formidable, but it was meant for the living.
Danny shrugs. "I'm here on vacation."
"On vacation." Hood deadpans.
"Yup. I was bored. Thought only using my enhancement powers in a fighting pit would be a blast! And I was absolutely correct." He grins, letting his power flash his eyes green, then blue. "This was fun, but I'd rather chill with you now." He lets his power flash freeze all the containment contingencies around the pit, then lets his power shatter it all into dust accompanied by the lovely screams of the crowd. "I do have a few people I actually have to deal with first, but would you like to get outa here?"
Hood stares at his offered hand for a moment before giving a casual shrug. "Fuck it." Hood walks forward and reaches his hand out before pausing, "I gotta kill some people before we bounce, too."
Danny threw his head back and laughed. "Oh, I don't need to kill them. But I can respect the grind." He takes Hood's hand, and in the next breath, they're behind the owner of the underground ring, most of his upper lieutenants and about 30 alien goons.
Red Hood and Danny move in tandem, each taking a side and weaving their way through the group. They dodge, turn, disarm, and maneuver opponents into each others attacks in some of the most coordinated movement Danny has ever experienced. As if he knew exactly where Hood was going to be, going to strike, going to dip. It's amazing. His thoughts are static except for internal screaming. He stans this human so fucking hard.
As the leader finally fell to Hood's blade (where did those come from???) Danny turns to him with barely contained excitement. "Are we best friends? I think we just became best friends!"
"Uh..."
"Nope. Time's up. You're mine now. Besties forever." Danny opens his armory pocket dimension and pulls out some light body armor, a few blades, a couple of handguns, and an RPG. "New bestie, I bequeath unto thee protection! Let's go blow some shit up!"
Red Hoods smile finally matches his own. "I could be down for that."
Jazz: Hey, little brother. I thought you'd still be out with Tim?
Danny: Heeeeey, Jazzypants! Yeah, we're *explosion in background* we're still out and about.
Jazz: Danny...
Danny: Say, you wouldn't - *groaning of metal collapsing* *Tim: DP go right! You're other right!* - happen to know where my purple pouch is, wouldya?
Jazz: *bites back a sigh* Which purple pouch?"
Danny: The one - *more explosions.* *Ha ha! Take that you calamari rejects!* -that I won off of Bacchus that one time?
Jazz: Danny, is this like Sydney?
*silence quickly interrupted by triumphant cackles from Tim*
Danny: Yeah... it's like Sydney."
Jazz: 3rd bedroom, 4th drawer on the right side of the desk behind the collapsible star in a jar and Constantines right toe bone.
Danny: Perfect! You're the best - *a scream like an irate giraffe echoes* best sister ever! I'll let you know when we're back! See you next Sunday for dinner!
Danny: Okay! I can portal it! Bout to throw a rock at these squid games!
