We've all seen the 'we have your son' trope done with both Bruce and Batman, but I've been thinking about it, and, hear me out, let's give it more flavor.
Bruce gets a call, and it's the usual 'we have your son, follow out orders or he dies', but the orders are not money. It's 'find us this other kid, and we'll trade your child for him'.
While that is an unusual demand, there's another thing: the child on the picture that the kidnappers sent Bruce looks exactly like Damian, sans the eye color. And he's smiling, but that's irrelevant right now. A clone? A decoy? A fake?
Oracle runs a face recognition and finds out that the kid's name is Daniel Fenton, and the record says he's been dead for two months now, buried in the local cemetery of Amity Park, Illinois. Have the kidnappers gone mad with grief? But, wait, there are several 'missing' reports that have been filed after the boy's death, submitted by Jasmine Fenton — the kid's sister — and Vlad Masters, the town's mayor? What does he have to do with the kid?
Meanwhile, Tim is sitting tied up in some warehouse, surrounded by Vlad and a dozen of his carbon copies. Is this man some kind of a meta with duplicating abilities? Why did he even decide to use such a weird scheme when contacting police, FBI, or hell, even the Justice League, would have been so much more effective?
It's just confusing all around.
But Vlad has good reasons! He really does, he swears!
The thing is, it's all his fault. If he didn't fund the GIW in the first place, none of this would have happened. The agents in white wouldn't have outed Danny for being Phantom and wouldn't have taken him away. Maddie and Jack wouldn't have rejected their still alive, just different, son, and wouldn't have put an empty casket in a grave with Daniel's name.
Police won't be searching for a person when they know they are already dead and buried. Justice League, who stands for all that's good and fair, won't go against a government agency that stands for the very same thing.
Which leaves Vlad to find other solutions. Like stealing a rich kid and making his even richer daddy do all the work.
If only said rich kid would stop talking.
Wait, what do you fucking mean 'that picture looks like my brother'?
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