I got sucked into the DC/DP brain rot even though I’ve never read any DC comics and I haven’t watched DP. I wanted a place to reblog things sooooo here we are!
@keepsdrifting
Danny & Flashpham, Magenta, “Mist and Shadow, to the edge of night”
There’s someone running with them.
Someone else in the Speed Force.
It’s Bart who notices them first. He’s always been more sensitive to the Speed Force than Wally or Barry. Barry knows he’s the worst about it, what with constantly fighting against the idea of the supernatural, and even he notices this other being that’s running through time along side of them.
It’s hard not to once the fighting starts.
They’re a blur of black and white set against the vibrancy of the Speedsters. Set against the sea of agent white. Against red and green blood. Whoever they are, whatever they are, they aren’t afraid to draw blood, or to bleed. It’s a messy fight.
And then it’s over.
Everything ends so suddenly that Barry finds himself not only skidding to a stop but helping to stop the person that’s been running with them. They’re small; the size of Bart but frail in a way that Bart isn’t. And they’re thrashing in Barry’s arms.
“It’s okay,” Barry soothes. His words are soft, just between him and this kid—because it’s just a kid. A kid who’s splattered in red and green blood. “It’s okay. They’re down. They’re down and we’re going to hunt down all the others.”
The kid screams, though it’s an almost soundless noise, and then collapses like their strings are cut. Barry fumbles for a moment before he’s got the kid supported all the way. They’re sobbing now, their shoulders hiccuping with each one. It’s soundless too. Barry brushes fingers through the kid’s hair, even as he looks up in panic. In worry.
@nagarajas
Dany/Bruce, Magenta, “To Tooms at last to Tooms at last We climb the Upward Way. And young Rhody Mccordy goes to die on the Brridge at Tooms today”
!!CONTENT WARNING, GUN VIOLENCE, OPEN ENDED (but come on, it's Danny)
“The hostage is still with Two-Face,” the police radio hummed.
Hostage.
As if Harvey’s attention was on some anonymous stranger and not Bruce’s lover. Somewhere in Bruce’s shed tux the weight of a ring in the breast pocket sat heavy. Would Bruce even have the chance to ask the question he had been so afraid of?
“Oracle,” Bruce barked.
He was too sharp, too harsh, but he hoped they understood. They knew too.
It was Danny.
They cared.
“Danny is taking all the attention. SWAT almost has the all the other hostages out, the ones we know of. Some cars they can’t get close to check,” Oracle answered.
The bridge was mess of smashed and overturned cars. There was no way that there weren’t fatalities. They just hoped to avoid more. But with Harvey.
The coin glinted against the search lights as it flipped again. How many flips had spared Danny now? Each one a promise that Two-Face would stay focused on Danny and let another batch of people go.
Bruce was still too far to stop the flip.
One more. Danny just needed one more toss to go his way.
Harvey caught the coin, smiled, and then shot Danny in the head.
@hi-hi-cakey
Danny & JL, Cyan, "windshield is bigger than the rear view"
The room was quiet. It was quiet and ever person at the large, round table was looking at him. Quietly. Danny wouldn’t know what to say even if he could open his mouth to speak. The muzzle bit into him as he struggled with the… muchness of it all.
Slowly, Batman rose from the table. His oil slick black cape fell around him. Danny clutched tighter at his own borrowed purple cape. He didn’t want them to see the ruin of him under it. That wasn’t it—it didn’t—he was here for everyone else. As king. He held the cape tightly closed and raised his chin higher. His haloed crown of aura light shuddered. The light of it glinted off of the stark metal of the muzzle.
Batman came closer. Danny kept his chin held high, trembling. He clutched at the cape. The aura shuddered. A few feet of him, Batman took a knee. It was like all the air went out of the room at once, but in a good way. Danny swayed on his feet as his knees threatened to give out.
“Hello. This is the Justice League Watchtower. I am Batman,” Batman said, hands moving with his words, though Danny couldn’t understand any of the motions. “Is this where you intended to come?”
Danny nodded. His fingers hurt from holding the cape close.
He couldn’t see Batman’s eyes, but he knew that he was being looked at. Being seen.
Batman raised his hands again. Danny flinched. Batman paused and then moved more slowly. “Are you here for help?”
Danny nodded so quickly that the room started to spin. His hands ached. The light shuddered.
“Alright. To start, I would like to call a medic—”
@wisteriavines
Danny/Bart, Yellow, “We’re going up up up something something together we’re glowing gonna be golden”
Danny’s new boyfriend didn’t exactly live in town. Danny really only knew that because they hadn’t seen him around before. Danny had asked once, at the urging of Jazz, about schooling, and Bart just explained he was home schooled, it worked better with his ADHD. It made sense to Danny. (He wished that he could be home schooled.)
(Maybe he could pass English that way.)
Sam was convinced that Bart was a ghost and had Jazz and Tucker mostly on board with the idea. Danny got the feeling that Tucker was only holding out because he felt beholden to be on Danny’s side. But Sam… Sam wanted Danny to ask Bart all of these questions to try and catch him out on being a ghost who was masquerading as human like Spectra. Danny didn’t want to. He didn’t want to dig into every little thing about Bart. Was it so bad to want to get to know his boyfriend like a normal person?
“Danny!”
Danny looked up from studying his shoelaces. He couldn’t have helped the grin that split his face if he had tried.
Bart was there.
He had been willing to come out to the stupid fall festival with Danny just because Danny needed every bit of extra credit he could get and so had to go. But Bart was there to help make it bearable. He was there, and he was adorable. Bart was almost always in bright colors, whites and reds and yellows. Today was no exception; his yellow shirt was splashed with stylized hangul characters. The white jean shorts were a braze choice for a county fair.
“Hey,” Danny greeted with a little duck of his head.
Bart, shorter than even Danny, just used it as an excuse to duck in and kiss Danny. The kisses had never been more than pecks, but each one felt electric in the best way.
“Hey to you,” Bart said back. “This place looks amazing!”
“Yeah? There are butter sculptures.”
“Butter sculptures?”
“As big as you,” Danny said as he took Bart’s hand.
Bart bounced on his toes. “Oh-meh-gee, that’s totally crash.”
Danny started to lead them to the entrance. He had already bought tickets for them, this date was his treat. He’d saved up allowance and everything. “And we can do the corn maze.”
“Absolutely.”
“And then we’ll see what fried food there is. The fried Oreos are great.”
@void-of-unparalleled-chaos
Danny/Tim, Cyan, "Nail your child to your gospel"
Tim’s fingers pause over his keys. Every second matters, he knows that. He knows that through blood and death. Through a history of failures and saves. He knows that but he can’t—he tosses the call to Oracle, flagging it as the highest priority even as his fingers fumble to do what they need him to do right then. “GeeGee.”
“Hey, Birdie.” GeeGee’s voice is shredded. The broken parts of it catch on the letters.
It still makes Tim go boneless in relief. “GeeGee, where the fuck have you been? Where are you—”
“Just, can I come to you?” GeeGee asks, cutting through Tim’s questions. “You… you’ve offered for me to visit. Can I still…”
“Of course, yeah. I can text you my address, is this a good number—”
“Nah, itsa payphone,” GeeGee says, their words slurring. “Actually found one of those, can you believe it? I got a pen here, it sorta works.”
Tim frowns. His fingers start finally working. “Can you get to a bus or train station?”
“At one, managed to… I don’t have much money on me—”
“That’s fine, what station?” Tim asks, even as he glances at Oracle’s incoming message that the call is coming from Chicago.
“Chicago Union Station.”
That lines up. “Okay. There will be a ticket for you at will call for GeeGee Shepard, confirmation number 76XD89C. It doesn’t leave for a few hours, but it will get you all the way to Gotham. I’ll meet you at the station.”
GeeGee gives a breathless laugh. “I still don’t know what you look like, just that we both have black hair and blue eyes.”
“I’ll wear a bright blue hat and a leather jacket. I’ll be near the clock at the center of the station, you can’t miss it.”
“Okay. I—shaved head. Got a darker blue puffy jacket,” GeeGee says.
masterpost there will be man mixed up words, brain fog is real, please no edits <3
It was 6:55 and Jason was standing at Danny’s door, bottle of wine in hand and dressed down as much as Red Hood could be.
It felt wrong.
Danny swung open the door before Jason could dwell too deeply on it. His crop top rose high as he leaned on the door, showing a sliver of tan skin that Jason wanted to run his fingers along. “Hey there.”
“Hey,” Jason said and then floundered for a moment before he just held out the bottle of wine. “Not sure if this goes with what you’re cooking tonight, but if not, you can have it another time.”
“That’s sweet, thank you,” Danny said as he took the bottle with a little smile. “Come on in. Dinner still needs a little bit, but we can get this open to enjoy.”
Jason nodded even though Danny was already turned away. He was so quick to show Jason his back. Only after making sure the door was secured did Jason move on. His fingers twitched, wanting to check over the rest of the security of Danny’s apartment. He took a breath and let it out slowly.
“All the windows and stuff are covered if you want to take off your mask,” Danny called from the kitchen. “Not even a laptop open.”
It’s easier to listen to Danny and remove his mask than it should be.
Easier to want to be Jason than it should be.
“Will you be going out after this?” Danny asked from the kitchen.
“Maybe. Probably,” Jason said. He hadn’t really thought about it. Going out as Red Hood was just who he was.
“Maybe that depends on how long I keep your enchanting company around?”
“Maybe. The night is young, though,” Jason said. He accepted the glass from Danny and gave the wine a little swirl. He hadn’t seen Danny pour it. He knew the bottle was safe, as he brought it, but he hadn’t seen Danny pour it. He should have gone to the kitchen to watch.
“To the young night then,” Danny said. He clinked their glasses in toast before taking a sip of his own. He held out his glass with raised brows. “This is good.”
Jason gave an offended noise. “You think I’d bring bad wine?”
Danny just shrugs, unconcerned. He moved to sit down, folding elegantly onto his couch. “I just didn’t expect it to be the kind of thing you paid attention to.”
“I… maybe had some help,” Jason admits. He glances from Danny to his wineglass.
“Oh, shit. Shit. I’m sorry, Hood,” Danny said. He got up, more speed than elegance now, and left his glass on the coffee table. “Here, I’ll take your glass for dinner. Or I can pour it back in the bottle and then drink from a fresh glass to show it’s safe? I shouldn’t have just poured it in the kitchen like that.”
Jason… he doesn’t know what to say to that. To Danny’s concerned offer.
Danny smiled, sadly, and reached out. One hand took the glass of wine. The other reached out and brushed over Jason’s brow. “You’re so expressive like this, without your mask and your hood.”
“I, um,” Jason cleared his throat. “Just you thought of that so quickly…”
“Comes with the job,” Danny says, short words ending that line of questioning quickly. “What would make you feel safe enough to drink the wine?”
“I trust you,” Jason answers with a frown.
“You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t, but that doesn’t mean that your brain feels safe. What would make you feel safe?”
Jason actually thought about that. Danny gave Jason the time to think about that. “I… pouring it back into the bottle would work, I think.”
“Okay. Come on, come to the kitchen with me.” Danny hooked his fingers in Jason’s and moved them forward with a little tug.
With them both in the kitchen, Danny carefully poured the wine back into the bottle. He gave it a good swirl before pouring a fresh glass, which he toasted Jason with before taking a sip. Jason huffed out a little, half laugh at Danny’s dramatic flair about it all. But it did help. Jason took the glass from Danny’s graceful fingers and drank.
“Next time, I’ll remember,” Danny said.
“Next time?” Jason asked instead of dwelling on the hangups of his own brain any longer.
“Of course next time. This could be a thing, if you want it to be. I mean, with our schedules it will have to be a flexible sort of thing, but it could still be a thing.”
Jason tilted his head. “I… yeah, I’d like that, this being a thing.”
Danny’s smile was a luminous thing. (It made Jason feel a little heady.)
masterpost please no editing or concrit, I still cannot focus to edit with this headache, but I can write!
Danny’s resting his chin on the blob ghost that’s cradled in his folded arms, and listening to the others tell stories, mostly at the expense of their teammates. Robin is busy at his laptop. He’s been working for ages trying to save Technus. Danny’s grateful. All of these people trying to help save ghosts.
Save dead people.
Danny rubs his nose against the hoodie he wore. He refuses to wear any sort of super suit, even the domino feels like too much. He isn’t a hero anymore. How can he be? He doesn't know how dead he is anymore. Somethings that…
Things that should be easy…
He flexes his hands. His still healing skin pulls taut. The skin is startling pink, and Danny wonders if it will fade out to white like the rest of his scars.
“Are you okay?” Superboy asks. His words are quiet, but everyone zeros in anyways.
Danny shrugs. “It hurts. Being here hurts.”
“It hurts?! What do you mean it hurts? Why didn’t you—” Bart’s babble is cut off by Superboy shoving Bart back by a hand on his cheek.
“Are you okay?” Superboy asks again, calmly, but with a serious sort of pinch between his brows. He’s been different today, still distant but more… attentive, somehow.
Danny lets out a slow breath and nods. “Yeah. It’s like an old bruise or something. I think it’s because… I think it’s close. My core, I mean, I think that it’s close. The hallow of it aches.”
Superboy scowls, but it’s Super Girl who says, “That… doesn’t sound good.”
Danny gives a little snort at the understatement of it. The problem is, he doesn’t know what to do about it. Even if they find what’s left of his core it could be too broken to put back in. Maybe he can’t even put it back in. No one has said that’s even how it works. No one has said he could be whole again.
Half again.
A whole half and a half.
A half and a half to be a whole whole whole—
“Hey!”
Danny gasps in a startled breath. Superboy’s hands are pressed against Danny’s cheeks and there’s warmth suddenly, so much warmth. His exhale is as shaky as he feels.
“Okay, yeah, like that, keep breathing,” Superboy says. He’s close enough for Danny to see the little flakes of brown in the otherwise perfectly blue eyes.
Danny does his best to listen, but he doesn’t really feel that in control of what his body is doing right then. He’s pretty sure that he just had another panic attack. He tries to turn and look at the blob he’s holding, wanting to make sure he didn’t hurt the little thing, but wavers when Superboy moves his hands away. It leaves him cradling the blob and slumped against Superboy’s chest.
If he had the energy, he would’ve been painfully embarrassed.
As it is, Danny can only manage a weak smile for Barry and Wally as they suddenly appear in the room. “I’m okay.”
Superboy makes a derisive noise that says what he thinks of that claim.
“I—okay, I mean… I didn’t hurt myself, not like that last time,” Danny says. He makes an aborted move to try and sit up, but just ends up surprised by the fact that one of Superboy’s arms is around him. Danny blinks down at the ring covered fingers. But Superboy doesn’t even like him?
“What? No? I don’t… it’s not like I dislike you,” Superboy protests.
Oh. He maybe said that part out loud.
“Yeah, you’re sort of out of it,” Bart says from between the Flashes.
Barry reaches out and brushes a chunk of sweaty hair from Danny’s forehead. Danny closes his eyes at the touch. “Can you tell us what set you off? And if not that’s okay! But we don’t want whatever it is to keep eating at you.”
“My core. I was thinking about my core and… and I don’t know if it’s here and what you all found and—” Superboy’s arm tightens across Danny’s chest, and he sucks in a breath. “Sorry. It’s just…”
“No, you’re allowed to be upset,” Barry says, as patience as ever with him. “We do have something to show you, but we needed to secure and clear the area first. It should be almost done. Can you drink some water and have a few bites of a bar first?”
“Yeah, I can try,” Danny agrees because of course he does. He doesn’t want to be trouble for Barry and Iris. They’ve been so kind to him, opening up their house, taking him to doctors, never getting mad at him… he just needs things to calm down, just for a little bit.
Danny sips at more of the water than he eats the bar. The slightly off peanut butter taste wrapped in dubious chocolate turns his stomach a little, but he manages a few bites by the time he’s finished most of the water.
Barry has zipped back and forth a few times, and he’s back now, smiling tensely. “Okay, we’ve got the clear to go into the room. Flash and I are going to take you, but do you want Impulse to come too?”
“Yes, please,” Danny says quickly. He sits up and this time Superboy lets him. He makes sure to sand firmly and not waver, but Bart is by his side just in case. It’s nice, to know that he can break and people will be there to catch the pieces.
They go through the halls at normal speed. Danny keeps his eyes at their feet, following Barry, flanked by Bart, and with Wally behind them. Danny doesn’t need to see these halls again. He doesn’t need to be back here other than getting his core.
His core, they were taking him there now.
There was enough of it left to show him.
That was something.
It would be enough.
It had to be.
It was…
Except it was…
“Phantom,” Danny whispers, pressed up against the tube.
Phantom’s eyes snap open. That bright green gaze finds Danny’s instantly. A pale hand lifts, moving slowly through the ecto mixture in the tube. It presses against Danny’s, that damn glass in between. The glass fogs up where Danny breathes against it.
Some random art of Danny, Dani and Dan hiding under Johns coat. Idk why I made it, just the AU of the three ghosts getting taken by Constantine was so cool for me that I decided to make some art.
The drawing isn't in full color or very detailed bc Im too lazy for which you need to forgive me </3
masterpost please no editing, I know this has issues, I tried to read over most of it but I've had a migraine for days now and today learned I didn't get the jobs so--yeah not in the mood. But I hope you all enjoy this. I hammered it out in bits and spurts.
Danny doesn’t rust Gotham on its word alone. He has no doubt that what Gotham feels is real, but Gotham wouldn’t be the first parent to understand the situation with their children wrong. Wouldn’t be the first parents to go to war only to destroy their own.
While Gotham does rile against Danny’s insistence that he needs to check matters out himself, it still gives him permission to explore its streets. That permission is important. Danny could certainly hold his own, he was no mere ghost or specter, but the fight was unwanted. It iiis much easier to let Gotham open up a little tear in the fabrics of its reality and simply step through it.
He stumbles right into wall.
He clutches at his chest.
It hurts.
It all hurts.
In the caves with Dami, it doesn’t hurt so much. The pain was still there, of course it was, it was something that he could never let go of, but in the caves it was muted by the rough stone and the pool of green. Here there is none of that. Here Danny is truly alive. Or as alive as he has ever been since the…
Danny shakes his head. It feels like his brain is sloshing against the inside of his skull. Bones, they were overrated, really. At least he (or Gotham) had the forethought to make sure that Danny came out clothed. He smooths his hands over the lapels of the coat and the vest under it. Definitely Gotham’s doing. Danny didn’t think he had ever worn anything so fancy in his life.
Well, half-life.
The alleyway that he steps out of may have been next to a theater, but by the boarded up windows and smell of piss, it has obviously seen better days. He stands under the unlit marquee, looking up at the graffiti and fallen letters. There’s something beautiful about the decay of it, as much as the space is steeped in tragedy.
Danny tucks his hands in his pockets and starts off. Where? He isn’t sure, really. Danny trusts that Gotham will keep him moving in the right direction as long as he listens to it. And Gotham hums with information. Stepping onto its streets is like stepping into a bee hive. Danny follows the energy as it ebbs and flows, leads and warns. He trusts it.
Which is why it’s extra insulting for Danny to end up with a knife pointed at his throat and his hands raised.
“I told you, I really don’t have anything on me,” Danny says calmly.
“Bullshit! Who the fuck doesn’t carry at least their phone anymore?” The knife waves with the words. “Hand it the fuck over!”
“Cursing won’t make something magically appear,” Danny says. He probably should get an identity again. What year was it?
“Or I say what I fucking want to and fucking gut you so I can loot your body!”
“This body really isn’t worth that much effort,” Danny says, with as much of a shrug as he can do with his hands raised.
“Fuck y—”
Before the thug an even lunge, a mass of shadow drops between them and Danny. Fora moment, Danny is convinced that it’s Gotham, for all that Gotham is the one who led him there. It feels like Gotham, with the same deep love for the city and the same chasm where the little bird once was but… this one is alive.
Danny takes in the caped figure with no small amount of wounder. They feel like the honored dead, but they clearly live and breathe and ache. Their fist pulls back, ready to strike the cowering thug. Danny rests his hand on the arm. “I think making them piss themselves with fear is enough.”
Both the thug and whatever this creature is turn to incredulously look at Danny. He just offers a smile and a shrug. He plucks the knife delicately from the thug’s hand and flips it closed. “Now, maybe you should promise not to do this again since you’ve gotten to keep your face intact.”
“Y-yeah! S-s-shur! I, um, I’m s-sorry mister Batman, sir! I just… things have been really tight and my brother is still sick from the last fear gas—yeah. I, um, will just be going!” The thug says, jutting a thumb behind themselves. When neither Danny nor ‘Batman’ move, they turn tail and run.
After watching them disappear behind a corner, Danny turned and smiled at the looming specter. (He tucks the knife into his pocket.) “Thank you, Batman, for your gallant rescue.”
“Hn,” the Batman utters. He pauses a long time before saying, “You shouldn’t be out here this late.”
“Absolutely not. I believe I will be heading right home,” Danny says. The Batman looks at Danny’s hand, pale and slender against the dark, still on his arm. Danny holds up his hands and steps back. As the Batman aims some sort of gadget at the grungy architecture, Danny adds, “and I am sorry for your loss.”
There’s another long look before the Batman flees like the hounds of hell are on their heels, rather than just standing on a random street corner in Gotham. Danny watches until they vanish and then slip into the shadows himself.
He has a great deal to talk with Gotham about. He hadn’t understood that this about a little specterling. That changed things. Complicated them. Made them clearer.
@amaralie, @crystalshard
Key, a room that holds the smell of smoke in the curtains, and the warmth of long evenings spent in good company.
Yellow, the smell of rosemary
cw for basic dirty talk and fade to black at the endt. It is Constantine, atfer all. (I am very, very migrained today. Please no editing or concrit, I know there are issues <3)
John wakes up in that room again. It’s been enough times now that he doesn’t panic about it. Hell, he even lets himself linger in the bed for awhile. The sheets are that over washed sort of starchy, but the pillow is soft enough. The curtains are still drawn. Light peaks around the edges of the heavy fabric enough though John knows that there’s nothing but endless void behind them.
He had made the mistake of looking the first time that he had ended up in this place.
John throws the sheets off and sits up. His long limbs feel endless for a moment as he stretches before he snaps back into his aching, (mostly) mortal body. The smell of the room, of endless visitors and days, has him craving a cigarette. Sometimes he’s lucky enough that there’s a pack on the bedside table. Today is one of them. He peels the seal open and taps out a fag from the pack. The first inhale makes him wistful; this brand went out of business twenty years ago.
He sits there long enough that he has to tap a solid bit of ash into the soot stained ashtray. He wants to stay longer. Schrodinger’s cat and all that.
Maybe he should just go look.
He grabs the pack and the room key from the bedside. The key has a battered plastic tag that feels right in his hand. He thinks the room is number twenty-one, but it hurts to look too long at it. The key itself is different with each glance.
The cigarette is just balanced between John’s lips, stuck there so that he can toss on the robe over the boxer briefs that he has on. He wears it mostly to have a pocket to stash things in. It also helps stave off the chill of the halls.
Every door looks exactly the same—yellowed oak wood set into even more yellow wallpaper. There’s no decoration other than the hall sconces. The way the light pours out of them is fragmented and shifting. Every so often a door is cracked open, held tight by the chain. There’s something there behind those doors. Other ones too, sometimes, when John knows he’s being watched from behind a peephole. John’s careful to never look back.
He just smokes his cigarette, lighting the next off the old butt of the last, and keeps walking down the hall. He’ll get to where he’s going eventually, wherever that may be.
There’s one place he’s hoping for more than the other.
He just keeps walking.
Finally, suddenly, he’s come to a set of brass and glass doors. The thick fog of condensataion on the doors make it impossible to see through. It doesn’t matter, John knows what will greet him as he pushed both doors open. A smile plays on his lips and in his voice. “Hello, handsome, how’s the water?”
“Just about the same as always. Too fucking green and weirdly warm.”
John eyes the pool as he walks around the outside of it. His steps sound sacrilegiously loud against the tiles, but what is his whole fucking life but being sacrilegiously loud?
“It is very green,” John settles for saying.
The other makes a noise that manages to sound sarcastic as he sets his book aside. “Green is sorta its most defining trait.”
“Hum… nah, mate,” John says. He braces his arms on either side of the plastic pool chair as he leans down. “I would go with other worldly first.”
“Everything is other worldly here, Hellblazer.” Those sea-glass green eyes meet John’s steadily. “Including you and me.”
“Yet you won’t tell me your secrets,” John points out. The words are a whisper and nearly cut off by the kiss that follows. It’s as much a kiss John starts as one that John meets in the middle. He lets himself enjoy the taste of it before he pulls back just enough to get a look. “What are your secrets, Dan?”
Dan rolls his eyes, but it’s mostly an excuse to look away. “I’ve told you, you really don’t want to know.”
“Oh but I do, lovely. I’m curious,” John cajoles as he straddles the chair and Dan. Dan is likewise in a robe, but only with swim trunks on underneath.
Tiny, yellow swim trunks.
Dan runs his hands up under John’s robes. He has the calloused hands of of a craftsman, and his thumbs are rough where they rub against John’s hip bones.
“Curiosity killed the cat,” Dan says.
“But boredom killed it quicker,” John sings back.
“Oh, well, if boredom is what you wanted to avoid…” Dan purrs. His grip tightens, keeping John held down as he arches up.
John hums happily. He would rather understand what Dan is, but ever visit he learns a little more. What’s so wrong about having some fun at the same time? “I’ll learn your secrets.”
“Not if you want me to keep fucking you.”
John laughs. His cigarette is tossed somewhere over his back in the direction of the pool and his robe to the side after. Just some fun, first. Other worldly messes after.
She swoops down, claw like hands extending forward. There’s something about the missing head that makes it all the more threatening, but her attack is easy to doge. She’s clever though, and her head swings around separately. Bruce has to duck into a roll to avoid it. At least he can act on instinct, there’s no one but the dead to watch him be acrobatic. It’s a macabre sort of dance between him and her, but one he can keep up for awhile. He can tell that ever every time he dodges another attack that she grows angrier, and with her anger the glow around the ring grows too.
Bruce has enough time to mutter a “well, fuck” before he’s dodging a blast of red energy from the ring. And he dodged. He knows that he did, but he still finds the red energy wrapping around him. It squeezes him like a constricting snake, tighter and tighter. His teeth grinds as he struggles to hold back a scream of pain.
“Hey! Come on now, don’t lose your head over this,” a voice calls out, seconds before a green beam hits the ghost.
The colors split and warp before Bruce’s eyes as he’s squeezed tighter and tighter and tighter—
He drops to the ground. His elbows clank hard against the cold floor before he instinctively curls up to protect himself against the fall. He sucks in desperate breaths.
“Shit, hey, are you okay? Sorry I got delayed, you’re really fast and I got caught up in panicking museum goers.” The words are said over the sharp step of dress shoes.
A moment later, calloused and slightly chilled hands are helping Bruce up. The thief. He looks concerned.
Bruce does his best to offer a reassuring smile. “Just winded. She was quicker than I expected.”
The thief shakes his hands. “Ghosts, they have a way of moving like that. I think it’s because they’re not really part of our reality, you know?”
“Not really,” Bruce says. His smile feels a little more settled now. More real. “That’s the first ghost I’ve ever seen.”
“Oh, right.” The thief steps back and rubs at the back of his neck. “Well, um, they do—”
“Bruce! Are you okay?” Bruce turns to see Vicki Vale head his way. She’s not running, but for the height of her heels, her speed is impress.
“I’m alright Vicki,” Bruce says. “You know me! I always come out of these things alright. Besides, I had help…”
Help who is gone.
For someone who supposedly didn’t move quickly, the thief was sure speedy in his get away. Which… reflexively, Bruce pats his pockets.
The necklace is missing.
“Bruce?” Vicki asks.
“Nothing,” Bruce says with a chuckle. He turns back to her and takes her arm, leading her back towards the crowd. “That was sure something, wasn’t it? Do we think it’s a new Scarecrow gas?”
“Well, I mean, it almost has to be doesn’t it?” Vicki asks back. “And just them stop me from writing about it! I’ll show them that I’m more than the society section if it kills me!”
“Watch out what you wish for, Vicki, we did just have a ghost attack,” Bruce says with a chuckle.
Vicki laughs and leans against Bruce as they walk. There’s motion out of the corner of his eye and Bruce glances over. The thief spins the necklace around his finger. He grins, wide and bright, and than disappears into the shadows like he was never there.
There are more than ghost stories there that night.
Stories that Bruce is determined to blow wide open.
masterpost no editing or concrit please. I am tired and broken. wooohoo It is back! My baby!
The glass was cold against its hand, but it kept it there just be it could. Being half tucked away in the heavy curtain that would normally shroud the window was warming despite the cold. The outside was right there. So close that it felt like it was touching the flowers that brushed against the glass. That was good enough.
It had to be good enough.
It shouldn’t even be out right then. The other’s had dropped back, exhausted after a high of nerves, but they were not in danger. Here was safe, it had decided. There was a father, but not Father. There were brothers and a sister. There was no mother (or Mother), but there was a caretaker. There was no reason for it to be there.
But it was.
Drops of water splashed suddenly against the window, and it jerked back with soft noise of surprise.
“It’s just rain.”
Now it really jolted. It spun, crouched now on the window seat and ready to run. Or not. Sometimes running made it all worse. Sometimes Father wanted him to run run run—
“We’ve spoken before, haven’t we?” They had come closer and were squatted now. Trying to make themselves small. Why?
It shook it’s head to clear it. It had talked with them before. They had been kind. It nodded, a small, barely there move. “Jason.”
They smile like it had done something good. “That’s right, I’m Jason. And I’m pretty sure you aren’t Tim, Alvin, or Caroline.”
It pressed further back against the cool window.
It shouldn’t be out.
“Hey,” Jason said, voice low and gentle. “That’s okay. I just was hoping to know your name.”
It shook its head slowly, not taking its eyes off Jason.
“No? That’s okay, maybe you’ll feel okay telling me later.”
“No,” it whispered. It didn’t want Jason to have it wrong. It didn’t… it wanted Jason to like it maybe. “No name.”
Jason’s brow scrunched up. “You don’t have a name?”
It nodded, please that Jason had understood.
Jason rubbed a hand over his face and sighed. “Right. Yeah, I guess that tracks. Tim didn’t mention you when he talked about the others. He doesn’t know about you, does he?”
It flinched back. The glass rattled, making it jump in surprise. It stumbled, feet cold against the floor. Always cold. Cold cold cold—
The breath it sucked in burned at its lungs. It took another shaky breath, following the gentle press of the large hand on its chest.
“There you go,” Jason rumbled. Their voice vibrated through its bones like it was the only thing holding it together.
Oh.
It was behind held by them. Somehow now it was on the couch, with a blanket, wrapped up in their arms. Jason’s large hand pressed a rhythm for it to breath.
It had messed up.
It had lost time.
It couldn’t—
“Hey, no, don’t,” Jason ordered. “I just got you back. Just keep breathing, okay baby bird?”
It tried to listen. It breathed. It got easier.
“There you go. You’re okay. You haven’t done anything wrong.”
It shook its head. “Need to be… aware. To protect.”
“…not here,” Jason said. Their voice sounded odd. “You don’t have to worry about that here, okay? We’ll all protect you. All of you.”
It wanted to argue. Jason was wrong. But Jason was safe. Here was safe.
Once again grateful for having actual treads on his dress shoes, Bruce makes it swiftly to the contemporary wing. He feels a little bad about risking the paintings, but considering he had donated much of them himself, the guilt wasn’t enough to make him change plans. Getting this ghost away from people was the important part.
And Bruce is pretty sure that it’s working.
There’s a sense of creeping dread crawling up Bruce’s spine. It’s the feeling of being watched but with ice poured into it. It’s every instinct telling him to get away. It’s a feeling that Bruce has only felt once before when he had walked down into pool of toxic green as a mater of life and death.
Though was this any different? The living verses a ghost.
Bruce really hoped that perfume bottle actually did something.
And that cute thief wasn’t only a thief.
(Dick was right, Bruce did have a type.)
He manages to make it through the doors before he has to finally listens to his instincts. He throws himself to the floor in a roll, coming up in a crouch and facing the way he had come.
Even knowing that he had been kiting a ghost, it is still a shock to come face to face with one. She’s nothing like Bruce expected. For one, she is far more solid. Well, her neck is. She fades a bit from there with her dress becoming transparent before it finishes. The severed head floats about on its own, a trail of green following it for a time. It is all rather macabre.
“C'est vous!” the head hisses at the same as the body raises an acquiescing arm. The pointing finger glitters with a ring. It seems that this isn’t the first museum she’s robbed.
“Madame!” Bruce says enthusiastically and with a sweeping bow. “M'accorderez-vous cette danse?”
Bruce was pretty sure that the answering wail meant ‘no’.
Sinking into the green is a relief. Something in Danny loosens the further that he submerges himself. Something calls like home.
It would be easy to lose himself in it.
He had, before.
How long had it been?
Focus.
Dami.
Damian needs him to focus.
Damian is waiting for him to come… not home. Danny doesn’t have a home anymore, not since— but Damian is important to Danny and he needs Danny to protect him. He needs Danny’s help. He needs Danny’s care.
Danny blinks into the green. It swirls into focus around him, or as in focus as the green ever gets. The blur between the ever shifting shades never truly settles, but it’s easier to pick out the objects floating in the void. The stones. The doors. The bones.
It’s too much. Danny isn’t sure if he can navigate it anymore. That part of him that was meant to be a normal ghost… never mind. The present mattered more than the past. Damian mattered more than the past. The broken bird too. Apparently his name was Robin.
A Robin from Gotham.
Danny had never been to Gotham. He had heard of it, of course he had, who hadn’t? But he never traveled much while he was alive. As a half ghost it had been easier, but never just because he wanted to. His world had been Amity Park, Aunt Alicia’s homestead, Vlad’s mansion, and the haunted places in between.
It is fortunate for Danny that Gotham has quite a presence in the green, as certain cities do. After taking a deep breath that does nothing for him here, Danny lets his senses extend into the green. The pool he came from swirls just above his senses. Further there is Paris with its mound of carefully stacked bones. London and its tunnels. Stonehenge. The vast, deep sea, still so out of reach by humans.
Gotham.
The city sits heavily in the green. Chunks of gothic architecture pierce through the veil like ribs through skin. After the blood red of Paris and the kaleidoscope of Barcelona, Gotham’s aura is startling dark. It hangs like a heavy shadow, the sort that that gently wraps one up as night settles. Jagged lines of cures cut though the dark like lightning.
He’ll have to take care not to get struck by one.
Danny sinks into the dark. His eyes hang around him, keeping careful watch on as Danny digs claws into footholds. The dark shifts around him, defensive and resistant like a dog with its fangs bared. Danny tries to say he means no harm, but oh how Gotham wails!
A son lost.
A protector untethered.
Oh how Gotham tried!
Oh how Gotham gave so that the son could live!
But it moved the pieces too early. The son, so vibrant with new life, moved too early. Gotham hadn’t the time to make him whole. To give him back his spark!
And then the son had been taken.
Gotham roiled, the darkness frothing around Danny. No!, he soothed, The son yet lives. He is without his spark but he lives! Danny has seen him, touched him, felt where the soul is missing like a weeping wound. But Danny needs to understand what happened to know what he should do.
Gotham’s moods shift swiftly between anguish and hope, pain and joy, anger. Gotham bristles. The dark becomes different—menacing shadows that stretch across a midnight street. The shadows close in, oppressively tight.
Danny lets his powers flair. Not fully, no, never, but just enough. Just enough to let Gotham know he is no pup to be threatened like that. He is Phantom! He has been broken and remade by the green itself time and time again! He has been fused with it! Saved by it! Doomed by it.
He is not to be threatened.
Gotham flairs. Its grip eases. Its wary now, but still stays on the aggressive despite what it must feel now from Danny. Danny can appreciate how dictated to its people Gotham is.
Explain it to me, Danny asks gently. Explain him to me. Your son. Your prince of a prince.
Gotham ripples: doubt, pain, acceptance. The desire to see its son safe and whole wins, and so it begins to explain to Danny about its Prince and those he made his sons. Gotham’s sons.
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