... divided by ship and then in chronological order from older to more recent.
No ship
What doesn't kill you makes you a monster - 6165 words; rated M; HEED THE TAGS!; body horror and angst as Steve turns into a half-demobat after all those demobat bites.
Harringrove (Billy/Steve)
Amok - 1927 words; rated T; modern AU where Billy and HoH!Steve stumble upon Billy's mom years later, by chance, in a mall. Angst and messy feelings galore.
Come close - 2965 words; rated T; a meet ugly (you'll see) in a cyberpunk AU.
I just came to say... - 3807 words; rated T; modern AU with hard of hearing Steve's meet cute with Billy in the club!
What doesn't kill you might become your friend - 29005 words; rated E; angst and monsterfucking in the woods. AKA "the one in which werewolf!Billy catches one glimpse of demobat!Steve and goes ABSOLUTELY WOULD!" Starts where 'What doesn't kill you makes you a monster' ends.
In all the worst way - 3443 words; rated G; secret romantic Billy's meet cute with his new hot neighbor.
An affinity for dead things - 67605 words; rated E; necromancer!Steve steals Billy's body from his tomb after Starcourt to resurrect his crush, as one does. Try graverobbing today! It's fun for all the family!
Birthday Boy - 1972 words; rated T; Frat boys Harringrove? Frat boys Harringrove!
A Pirate's Life For Me - 848 words; rated G; a quick prelude to a Princess Bride AU.
Time travel is real - 38738 words; rated E (for blood, not smut); an AU about time travel, pining, and the constant fear of screwing up. Aka: the fix-it fic in which I make everything worse before it gets better.
Flesh for Fantasy - 32474 words; rated E; angsty AU full of pining in which if you Fantasize about someone, that person feels it on their skin. Someone has been Fantasizing about Steve, but they're not sexual Fantasies, just the softest, most restrained touches ever.
As You Wish - 28677 words; rated M; my Princess Bride AU.
The paths of winter - ONGOING; rated E (for some violence); a D&D-esque AU where prince Billy is on a mission for his father and there's an annoying paladin named Steve escorting him to his destination.
Mantras for Maladjusted Mammals - 3395 words; rated G; soulmates, fratboys, and waking up after some bad decisions the night before.
I'm hungry like a wolf - 4141 words; rated T; werewolf AU!
Birthday wishes - 1422 words; rated T; weird angsty-but-also-happy (?) thing all in the future tense.
(somewhere in the dark) we are together again - 2883 words; not rated; weird sad thing where Steve is haunted.
The Chloe Hotel - 55472 words; rated E; the "The Broken Hearts Gallery" AU I needed to read.
Mungrove (Billy/Eddie)
In plain sight - 4782 words: rated T; Billy vows he won't have fun during the school trip at some science museum. He's not even supposed to be here today!
Free fall - 9250 words: rated M; Mungrove! In space!
Every chance of joy that you can find - 7471 words; rated E; whump Billy and Eddie taking care of him in his own way.
Metalsandwich (Billy/Eddie/Steve)
Of soulmates and colors - 78235 words; rated E; very angsty soulmates AU where the world goes into color thanks to your soulmate, but it's more complicated than that, and Upside Down shit abounds. Also, Munson twins!
The hawk, the wolf, and the mouse - 7246 words; rated T; Ladyhawke, but make it gay and with a polycule as the endgame.
Munver/Tigerfreak (Eddie/Jason)
Unscripted - 22889 words; rated E; a no Upside Down AU in which Jason broke his arm and Eddie is helping him with stuff. Enemies to fuckbuddies to lovers with a lot of internalized homophobia.
Wish I Had An Angel - 4473 words; rated E; HEED THE TAGS!; PWP and monsterfucking and a lot of blasphemy all rolled into one weird burrito of altar sex.
Spellcasting & Spitroasting - 21567 words; rated E; a D&D-esque AU. A spell gone wrong, one Jason, five Eddies, a lot of porn. HEED THE TAGS!
i dont consider myself a 'fashion guru' by any means but one thing i will say is guys you dont need to know the specific brand an item you like is - you need to know what the item is called. very rarely does a brand matter, but knowing that pair of pants is called 'cargo' vs 'boot cut' or the names of dress styles is going to help you find clothes you like WAAAYYYY faster than brand shopping
this also goes for aesthetic or -core titles. 'y2k tank top' is going to get you resellers and fast fashion brands advertising to people looking to meet a current trend. 'thin strap crop tank top' is going to get you a diverse group of results and not upcharge you to hell and back
additionally, shop second hand when you can, second hand and thrift sites typically organize clothes by the cut and color. theyll be more affordable than a depop seller curating you a style to sell you
Had the idea of ER nurse Danny and ER doc Damian working in the same ER.
Like their the same age but Danny was working there first (bc it takes less time to become a nurse than a Dr) and everyone in the ER loves him. He is the most component nurse they’ve ever had and is always cool, calm and collected even in the most stressful of times. Drs know that if shit hits the fan they can pass any patient that’s not dying right this second over to Danny and he’ll get them sorted all by himself, cracking jokes the whole time to keep everyone else from freaking out.
Then Damian starts working there and he’s basically a no nonsense Danny. Nothing fazes the guy. On his second day there he handled a gun shoot wound, spinal injury, rib fracture and stabbing all within an hour of starting his shift, all on different patients. He gets in, gets shit done and moves on as if he was dealing with a minor problem not 3rd degree burns.
Now these two, despite working at the same hospital, have never met. Bc Danny works the night shift and Damian works the day and every person that works there is so fucking glad that’s the case bc non of them expect them to get alone. Like Danny’s all wise cracks and jokes and Damian is all ‘stop wasting time’ so even tho they’re both efficient as fuck, no one expects them to tolerate each other.
Then on the first Halloween Damian works there, every member of staff is on shift bc it’s fucking Gotham and all the staff r just bracing for the inevitable fall out of two unstoppable objects colliding. Only it never happens bc these two get alone like a house on fire. Like yeah normally Damian gets up people goofing off but that’s bc their not doing work and just wasting time, he sees nothing wrong with Danny’s jokes bc he’s getting work done while he jokes. It’s like working with Dick, he honestly finds it a bit reassuring bc if Danny is cracking jokes it can’t be that bad. Danny on the other hand is just so glad to have someone else that can keep pace with him. Normally by this time of night he’s juggling 8 to 18 patients on his own with only minimal help from the on shift doctors but now Damian is right there with him and the two r basically tag teaming the hoard of mass casualties that just came in.
Needless to say that night Gotham general was the most efficient hospital on the planet and every doctor and nurse on staff have the horrible realisation that while they had mentally prepared for these two fighting, they hadn’t prepared for the fucking hurricane these two form when they get alone. 
@codename-alias Thanks to this beautiful person I've started a new story. It's going to be covering harsh topics such as torture, PTSD, and whatever else I come up with in the future. So, if this isn't for you then just rest assured I'll soon get back to posting about Danny and the Batfam.
Chapter 1- You with those sad eyes
Tensions are still high between Tony and the Rogues after the incident in Siberia. Once Steve had gotten far enough away, he’d given Pepper a call to send someone for Tony, feeling guilty about leaving him stranded in the cold as injured as he was. It’s a couple of months before Tony is healed both physically and mentally from the pain that Steve had wrought upon him, but he does eventually use the phone that Steve had left behind.
Steve had apologized for what had happened in Siberia but doubles down when anyone says anything bad about Bucky. Tony had realized that both of them had acted in the heat of the moment but ultimately still feels betrayed at the secrets that should have been aired long before that moment, and can’t quite trust Steve to have his back.
Bucky holds such phenomenal guilt at the anguish he had caused that he hides in Steve’s room back at the tower most of the time. Anytime Tony and he are in the same room together, Bucky immediately disappears in the hopes that Tony won’t hate him any more than he does. It helps to soothe some things in Tony, but until they talk it out everyone walks around on eggshells.
While the two teams try to figure out a way to balance this fragile truth, Steve brings to light the Hydra cells that still seem to be in play even after the mass info dump. They’re so well hidden that Steve and Natasha can’t figure out where to go even with her amazing hacking skills. So, they think that maybe Tony might have better luck, and luck he has in spades.
Tony creates a program that searches for key files by infiltrating the entire net, no matter how deep it has to dig. Anything that had to do with Hydra, the Winter Soldier Program, or the Super Soldier Serum is viciously dug into and scrutinized. They manage to find several active Hydra cells in this way, although, by the time the teams get there, the entire place is always emptied of everything but the office furniture.
It isn’t until they come across a small piece of information about something called The Phantom Soldier that Tony decides that they need to use a different tactic since they are obviously not getting anywhere. When Tony asks Bucky if he’d heard of or seen this “Phantom Soldier Project”, Bucky pales.
“Well, that’s not a good sign. Come on, out with it. What’s got you looking so scared?” Tony asks as he leans up against the kitchen counter.
“The Phantom Soldier was something I was supposed to train,” Bucky says. “My handlers liked to talk about Phantom, and from what I could piece together when I broke free, it was a kid. Or…something that looked like a kid. Hydra made a deal with some government agency called GIW. They believed that ghosts are real and have the ability to mimic human form while only having a more animalistic mind. The GIW captured one who looked like a kid but had more power than the gods.” Bucky looks apprehensive as he continues, his expression darkening. “I don’t know what Hydra gave them in return for this kid but one of the few things I do remember is them hooking up a teenager to the chair. The one that wipes minds. That wiped my mind.” He sits down in one of the chairs at the island, avoiding Tony’s gaze..
“That sounds both insane and horrible. How come you didn’t bring this up before?” Tony asks, crossing his arms.
With his head in his hands, Bucky groans, “Because I thought it was just more nightmares. I can only remember bits and pieces of Phantom and I really thought it was just one of the many things that I’d made up. I mean, who actually believes ghosts exist?”
“I would say no one does but I would be lying. The things we’ve seen make me believe in a lot nowadays.” Tony starts messing with his phone. “Friday, add all this information to the search parameters and see if we can’t find something. Make this a high priority.”
“Sir, it would appear that someone has tried to do a media blackout for anything related to Phantom,” Friday replies. “I’ve started the process of deciphering all information and tracing back to whoever might be placing these orders,” she informs Tony as large files of information are dumped into his phone. It’s going to take him hours to go through everything.
“I don’t care where it leads back to,” Tony says. “Find out what’s going on and who’s doing it. Quietly, if possible. If not, well, they can try and do something about it. See where it gets them.”
~~~
It takes almost a year before Friday can track down a Hydra cell that still seems to be active. More pieces of information are found about The Phantom Soldier the deeper Friday digs. Like how they acquired the subject when it appeared to be 16. The different ways they tortured the creature. How it seemed to have a weakness to electricity. A few pictures are even found to go along with some of these reports.
The more information Tony goes through, the more sickened he feels.
Tony has to find this kid.
Thankfully, Friday is able to narrow down the location of the cell and finds it outside a small town in Missouri. The population of the town is only in the hundreds and seems to be isolated enough that the nearest city is two hours away. A perfect place for Hydra to hide.
Tony has both teams meet him in one of the meeting rooms for a debrief.
Natasha, Steve, Bucky, and Sam all sit next to each other while Vision, Wanda, and Pietro sit at the end. Tony stands at the front of the table where a large TV sits on the wall. Rhodey, Bruce, Clint, and Peter sit on the other side. Tony had tried to get Peter to stay behind but the teen had heard about the torture that the Phantom Soldier had gone through and wouldn’t take no for an answer. So, rather than argue with him, Tony let him in on the meeting. Besides, the kid might be able to help in the long run.
“Friday found the base for an active Hydra cell near a small town in Missouri. From the heat signatures, the base is extremely large.” Tony activates a hologram that sits in the middle of the table. It spreads across the table showing off the building and the surrounding areas, including the entire town.
“From the thermal images Friday has been able to get, there are a large number of Hydra inside. There’s a particularly large cold spot that I think might be where they’re holding Phantom,” Tony says, glancing around the table at everyone. “The security in this place is some of the most high-quality shit. Obviously, it’s still not as good as mine, but some of it is better than what the army has. Friday will be able to hack into it, but someone needs to get her into the system first.”
Natasha clears her throat. “I’ll sneak in to activate her. What kind of security are we looking at?”
Tony flicks his wrist and the hologram changes to show a bunch of different devices. “Their security cameras have both thermal and night vision with very few blind spots. I should be able to give you a jammer that will loop the feed for a few minutes,” he says. “There’s something in the walls that I haven’t figured out what they’re for, but they do have an off switch. They aren’t supposed to inflict harm, that much I do know. I think it’s some kind of shield, but with an amount of power usage that I’ve never seen.”
He zooms in on a couple of the devices, rotating them so the holograms can be seen from all angles. “Some traps are embedded into the ceiling in case of any subjects escaping, although they only come down if an alarm is sounded. I’ll cook up something that will help you out just in case. You’ve got the typical guards patrolling the place.” Tony zooms back out and surveys his former teammates. “That was all I could find so far. The notes mention something about ‘ectoplasm’, but I haven’t been able to find anything out about it, so I’d just watch out for anything suspicious.”
Natasha nods. “Maybe Bruce can find something out about it from his peers? If it has anything to do with ghosts, then there has to be some kind of information floating about in the scientific field?”
Bruce quickly adjusts his glasses as he speaks up. “I asked around if anyone had heard of anything like ectoplasm and when I mentioned ghosts they laughed at me,” he says. “If it is connected, then the information is so well hidden that the rest of the community has never heard of it.”
Peter raises his hand as he looks around at the group nervously.
Tony sighs and rolls his eyes. “Kid, this isn’t school. You don’t have to raise your hand.”
“Oh, uh, ok.” Peter looks at Tony before pressing on. “When I was starting middle school, there was this thing going around on Facebook. Some kid from a town called Amity Park was talking about how haunted their town was. The posts continued for a few weeks before it just stopped. When I tried looking into it, all I could find was a deleted account.”
“So, besides talking about how haunted it was, was there other information?” Steve asks.
Peter nods. “Yeah. This kid would talk about whatever ghost seemed to be attacking the town. After a while, they started talking about this ghost called Phantom that would fight the other ghosts. The kids seemed to like him alright but none of the adults could stand him. The kid even posted a video of one of the attacks but the quality was really bad and it was hard to see what was going on. Something about some ghost called Skuller or Scaller or something. It was like something was interfering with the video.” He shrugs and relaxes back in his seat.
“Huh. I'm surprised the media didn't pick up on that. Sounds like something that would definitely grab the news attention,” Sam says, leaning forward slightly.
Wanda stops looking at the hologram to stare down Tony. “It doesn't surprise me that someone shut down any way for this kind of thing to get out. In the world we live in now, it wouldn't surprise us to find out ghosts are out there, but back then? It would cause panic and fear. Not to mention the army trying to figure out how to turn them into weapons if they can.”
“Except Hydra found out about it first and it looks like they turned this ghost kid into a weapon. How much you wanna bet they're the ones behind the blackout?” Sam says.
Nat scoffs and shakes her head. “That's not a bet I'm willing to take. I'm surprised this wasn't part of the info dump that went out. Otherwise, this news would have been everywhere.”
“Maybe a completely cut-off section of Hydra? One that wasn't part of the rest of the system, but how that’s possible I don't know.” Steve says with a shrug, while the rest of them wonder how something so monumental could have been kept hidden for so long.
“When are we heading out?” Rhodey asks. “And who's going? A facility this large means you're going to need a lot of backup.”
Pietro scoffs at the assessment and everyone turns to look at him. He shrugs. “I could take out the entire place in seconds. I could do that before your computer even hacks the place.”
“Is that so?” Tony says, crossing his arms. “What are you going to do if you come across this ectoplasm stuff and you can't get past it? Or it hurts you, or it negates your speed? We don't have enough information about this place for you to go in unprepared. Maybe after we get the defenses taken down you could, but it's still dangerous with that Phantom character around.”
Wanda hits her brother's arm lightly. “Think before you speak, brother. Not all problems can be solved with your abilities.”
“Most can,” Pietro mumbles quietly enough that no one comments on it.
“As for everyone going,” Tony says as he claps his hands together, drawing the attention back to him, “We need Nat to sneak in and get Friday into Hydra’s system. Everyone else hangs back until security is down and their alarms are useless. Then Cap and his bestie can break down the front door while the twins go in the back. I want Vision to hang back until we find out just where and how to help this kid.”
He shifts his attention to Rhodey and Bruce, who are sitting next to each other. “Sam and I will be air support while Rhodey makes sure the army comes running to sweep up the mess we are definitely going to be making. We don't know what state this kid is gonna be in if we even find him, so I'm going to have Cho stay on the plane with Bruce as her assistant. I don't think we'll need mean and green, but I'd feel better if Cho had someone with her, just to be on the safe side.”
“Mr. Stark, what do you want me to do?” Peter says, looking excited about the prospect of getting to go on an Avengers mission. He’s never gotten to go with the team on these sorts of things, but he really wants to go and help the poor soul that's been tortured.
“Yeah, no. You are gonna stay here and man the helm. Your aunt would kill me if I let you go,” Tony says as he waggles a finger at the kid. It may be childish but nobody ever said he was mature.
Peter sputters his protest as he stands up, gesturing wildly as he talks. “I can help! I swear I won't get in anybody's way or get hurt. I can even be backup like Mr. Banner! Mr. Stark, please, please, let me go with you.”
Peter pulls out his ultimate weapon and gives him the puppy eyes. The others look away except for Clint, who has kids and has become immune to that look no matter what his wife says.
“No. Nu-uh. Nope. Not happening. Absolutely not.” Tony completely avoids the look by staring down at his phone. “There's no telling what this kid can do and I'm not going to be the one to tell May that you got hurt because you wanted to tag along on a mission way above your pay grade. You can monitor the progress from the safety of the tower and that's final.”
With a sigh, Peter drops back into his chair the way only a teenager can. “Fine but I get to meet him once you get him back here and patched up.”
The genius stares at his apprentice for a moment, just long enough to make the teenager squirm in his seat. “We'll see.”
“How long before we're ready to go?” Steve asks as he watches Peter slump in his seat, defeated.
“I'll leave now and let the higher-ups know to be ready. Let me know when we can move in.” Rhodey says as he stands up and hugs Tony before leaving the room.
“Be prepared to go by midday tomorrow,” Tony replies “Hopefully, Friday will have even more detailed information for us.”
The groups leave after that, all going their separate ways to get ready for the mission. All except Peter who glumly goes back to Queens to do his evening patrol.
~~~
“Okay, people! We land in 10. Everyone knows their part, so do your last-minute checks now.” Natasha says from the pilot seat of the Quinjet.
Everyone adds the last bit of necessary items to their persons as the jet lands.
Natasha leaves the jet first, quickly and quietly easing herself into the building unseen. Tony had been able to get better pictures of the guards and had made her a matching outfit to go over her Widow outfit. Between that and the face cloaking device she wears, she’s unrecognizable.
It doesn’t take long for her to find an empty office with a usable computer. After powering up the device, she sticks the flash drive holding Friday in. It only takes five minutes before Tony is on the comm telling her the security system is down and all parties are go for entry.
It doesn't take long for the Hydra agents and staff to start rushing around in a panic. Pietro finds Natasha almost instantly knocking out any guards that come around.
“Hold your breath. Tony wants me to take you to the lab where the scientists are,” Pietro says, grabbing Natasha’s arm with one hand and bracing her neck and head with the other.
This isn't the first time he's done this to one of the team members. They've all practiced this maneuver during training so that the motion doesn't catch anyone unaware. So, she does what he says without question.
It barely takes a second as they zip through halls faster than the eye can see. Thankfully, Natasha’d had the foresight to put her hair up so that the flowing red locks wouldn’t tangle into a horrid mess. The sudden stop unbalances her for a second.
The entire room of scientists are in shock as Natasha and Pietro suddenly appear. The scientists startle as their brains finally kick into gear but before they have the chance to react, Pietro already has them tied up with tape around their mouths.
“Well, that was easy,” Natasha says amusedly. “What’s in here that he wants…” She trails off as she looks around. On one wall are large screens showing off a lot of information on one subject. Hurrying over to them, Natasha takes pictures of each screen so they can be inspected much closer later.
Going through a computer, she finds a file on The Phantom Soldier Project. Not only does it include information about the various ways they tortured the subject, but it also has information on how they’re controlling it. The file also tells her exactly where the kid is now.
“If anyone can hear me, Phantom is in a cell on the Northwest side,” Natasha says into her comm. “His room has those weird shields in the wall preventing him from getting out, so you might have to break down the door. There should also be a collar around his neck that prevents him from using his abilities. Someone try to get to him before Hydra activates him!” As she speaks, Nat pulls out another flash drive and starts downloading all the files she can get her hands on.
“We’re on it,” Steve replies into the comms.
Natasha pulls the flash drive out of the computer and places it in a nearly invisible pocket in her suit. “The lab is secure and I’ve got the flash drive. Anyone need help?”
“I could use-” Clint’s sentence is cut off by a grunt as a Hydra agent manages to kick him in the knee. He’s at a disadvantage as the number of agents overwhelms him.
Natasha doesn’t have to say anything to Pietro before he’s rushing her to Clint’s side.
There are small burns all over Clint from the guns that Hydra has, something the two Shield agents have never seen before. The gun barrel glows a bright neon green with the same colored smoke coming off it. Clint grits his teeth from the sharp pain.
Natasha and Pietro make quick work of the agents, taking a few of the guns in the process.
“What in the hell is this powered with?” Clint grunts as he stands up, grabs a dropped gun, and looks it over. “Is this that ectoplasm that Tony was talking about? It hurts like a bitch.”
Suddenly, a large explosion shakes the entire building and several alarms go off, bathing the hallways in red. A high-pitched scream echoes through the comms along with static and sharp crackling.
“What was that?” Tony shouts, sounding slightly distracted.
“Wasn’t from my end,” Natasha and Wanda say at the exact same time.
Clint and Natasha look at each other with concern on their faces. “Steve.”
~~~
“We’re on it,” Steve says, grunting as he takes a gut punch from an agent.
Bucky appears suddenly and picks the agent up. As if the guy weighs nothing, Bucky throws him at a wall, swings around, and punches another agent in the face with a harsh crunching noise. With a practiced elegance, the two super soldiers dance around each other with ease, each fending off a blow that was aimed at the other. They’d spent so much time together that they knew each other's movements without having to communicate it.
By the time they’ve gotten the agents taken care of, the floor is littered with bodies. Most are unconscious but there are a few who met the wrong end of Bucky’s guns. There are scorch marks mixed in amongst the blood splatters along the walls from these new weapons, but Steve and Bucky’s bodies are already healing, leaving behind red welts instead of burns.
“We need to hurry, Steve,” Bucky says. “If Hydra has done to this kid even half of what they did to me, then we’re going to be in for a rough time. We have to hope that they haven’t been able to activate him.” Bucky continues in the direction they were headed before they got ambushed.
“What do you remember about this kid, Bucky?” Steve asks as he takes off after him.
“He wasn’t human. They made him wear this thing that prevented him from using his powers. It was a collar but it would inject him with this poison so that he was too weak to escape. They made me train him to fight without any of his abilities so I don’t know what he can actually do.” Bucky grimaces slightly as he continues. “They were still trying to turn him into an obedient little soldier when I left. Something about his physiology prevented the chair from being completely effective.” He sounds regretful. His role in this made him ashamed even if it wasn’t his fault.
“Did they try and add any…accessories to him like they did with you?” Steve asks.
“I don’t know. Well, I don’t remember,” Bucky replies.
They slow down as they come to a section of the building on the northwest side. It’s glowing slightly with the same neon green that came from the Hydra weapons. Steve’s pretty sure that this is the correct area, but he doesn’t want to be wrong and come across another new weapon that Hydra has made.
The hallway they’re in is filled with steel doors. There must be about fifty doors lining both sides of the hallway with no markings on most of them. Bucky and Steve each cautiously open a door and find that the room inside is an empty cell.
The rooms are dark, with only the light from the hallway shining in letting them see just how barren it was. The only things in the rooms were a simple toilet, sink, and bed. Leaving the door open, Bucky and Steve move on to the next room.
They check room after room, only to find them all empty. When Bucky gets to a door marked with a number, he whistles to get Steve’s attention.
The room is locked and they don’t have the time to find the keys, so they try to bust down the door. With both of them kicking down the door at the same time, it finally dents inward enough to peel away from the walls. Both of them grab a side and pull, using the entirety of their strength until they’ve ripped the door off the hinges.
Inside is a kid who looks like they’re on their deathbed. They’re lying on the bed with their back to Bucky and Steve. Neither Bucky nor Steve can hear a heartbeat, but the kid doesn’t stop them from coming into the room.
This room is brighter than the others, a soft green light bathing everything in a sickly glow.
“Hello?” Steve walks forward cautiously.
The kid doesn’t move and they still can’t hear a heartbeat. When Steve finally gets over to the kid, he puts two fingers on their neck to check the pulse. There’s no heartbeat and the kid’s skin is cold to the touch. With a sad sigh, Steve leaves the kid where they are and turns to Bucky. Bucky looks upset when Steve shakes his head, but there’s nothing either of them can do, so they move on.
They quickly realize that the doors with no markings are all empty, so they only go after the doors with markings. With each unmoving kid that they find inside, the super soldiers become more and more hopeless. It isn’t until they get to the end of the hallway that they realize that they only have one door left, and with it, all their hope that the person inside is alive.
Steve and Bucky rip the door off its hinges, but before Steve can walk inside, Bucky puts a hand on his chest to stop him.
Inside the center of the room is a glowing boy, kneeling and chained to the floor. He can’t be more than 17 or 18. His hair is pure white and floats as if gravity has no hold on it. His eyes are clenched shut and he looks absolutely terrified. There’s a thick metal collar around his neck that hangs around his neck tightly. Chains hang from his wrists and ankles, leading to several metal loops in the floor, all tightly drawn so that he’s forced to kneel.
The kid has no shirt on and looks malnourished, his ribs practically poking through his skin. Wounds and bruises cover every inch of exposed skin, making it hard to tell if the slight green from his skin is natural or if all the injuries cause it. The poor boy is hunching over as much as he can with the chains attached.
Bucky takes a step forward into the room, but it’s Steve that calls out gently. “Phantom?”
A sharp intake of breath comes from the kid and he flinches. He opens his eyes and his gaze immediately locks on to Bucky. Panic and terror flood through his glowing emerald eyes as Phantom starts jerking viciously on his chains.
“Nononononono.” Phantom cries over and over again, desperately trying to get away from the person in front of him. “I’ll be good. I swear. I’ll do better this time. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. Please don’t hurt me. I swear. I’ll be good. I’ll do it right. Whatever you want.”
Anguish twists Bucky’s expression as he listens to the teen’s frantic pleading. He’s frozen to the spot watching the tortured soul trying to break free of his prison. What did they do to this kid? he thinks. Fuck. What did I do to him?
Steve slowly walks past Bucky, towards the struggling boy. With all his strength, he crushes the collar and rips it off Phantom’s neck. It takes Phantom only a few seconds to realize he no longer has the steel wrapped around his neck, but when he does, it’s like his whole demeanor shifts.
There’s a cunning gleam in his eyes and with a deep breath, Phantom screams loud and clear. The sound is deafening, forcing both Bucky and Steve to cover their ears. Phantom stops and takes an even deeper breath and the scream becomes something more.
It’s a banshee scream that sends Bucky and Steve flying back through the doorway they’d walked through. They’re sent flying all the way out of the room into the opposite side of the hallway with such force that they dent the wall. The longer the wail goes on, the more the walls start to shake, until the walls are shaking so much that debris rains down onto Bucky and Steve. They’ve just managed to get themselves up when a loud explosion suddenly erupts in front of him, knocking them back into the same wall with such force that they’re knocked unconscious. Their bodies slowly slide down to the floor, and the last thing they hear is someone screaming their names.
Dick paused almost mid-jump, having apparently turned to the wrong channel but also changed to the perfect one too. At least, perfect in the fact that he had just overheard an interesting thing from Jason, apparently forgetting that his comm was in fact on still.
Damian must have answered, because Jason snorted a laugh. “You can try getting him to leave, he’s taken over my bathtub and keeps eating all my food.”
Hold up, was- Dick had thought Jason was talking about a plush or something, but was he talking about a literal living animal seal??
“I’ll have you know I’m not going to make a poor little baby seal leave, and I’m not putting him in a zoo, brat.”
Oh Gotham, it was a real living animal seal. Dick about faced, rushing towards Jason’s safehouse. How did he get a seal? Why was it in his bathtub?? Why hadn’t he called the proper people for this sort of thing?! He had to get to the safehouse now to see this shit.
Jason's Goons absolutely set up a proper enclosure for their boss' new seal son. Do they understand why Hood refers to the seal as his kid? No. But they love the little guy- he's adorable. It takes a lot of research and work, but the little guy is thrilled with his new habitat and Hood gave them all a bonus for setting it up.
Jason bringing him to the manor to meet his new family. Just, drops a baby seal in Bruce's lap. "Meet my son. Danny, this is your Grand Bat.". Which I believe we all agree? Would lead to chaos. Did Jason actually adopt a fucking seal?!?! Jason, what the fuck! It's not until Alfred walks in and raises the eyebrow™ and Danny resumes human form. Suddenly it makes a lot more sense.
Not sure how it's a mystery why Alfred knows about Selkie.
He is British.
A lot of us know about the Fae, sure, not everyone, but a lot of us. We might not know that the legends qualify as fae, but we know of them.
It may not be as common in main cities, but the British isles are filled with stories about the Fae. Especially in the countryside or the seaside, and other places the Fae were believed to gather.
And the older a brit is, the more likely they are to have heard of the Fae.
Alfred would likely be no stranger to the legends, and he would know Danny holds no ill intent (only a desire for mischief, but that's normal for benevolent Fae)
Alfred, well versed in the old wives tales of ghost dogs who guide the dead to the afterlife and protect cemeteries (church Grimm's), of spirits who wail in morning for deaths they can predict but not prevent (banshees), of mischievous childlike sprites who dance and wrestle through the night (pixies) and of people who can shift between the forms of a human and a seal (of course, selkies), would accept the newest charge just like any other.
If a fae child is gifted to a human? That human is their family now. This is a known habit of the fae. Master Danny may be a selkie. But he is also Master Jason's son. Nothing can change this. So Alfred will simply welcome him as he would any child Master Bruce has dragged home over the years. Besides, Master Jason knows better than to play such pranks on him. Alfred was invited to dinner to meet Master Danny last week.
Danny is delighting in the mischief he got to make. The chaos and shock and amusement are great! He loves it! Papa Jay has a great family to prank! So much fun reactions! He's a happy lil snuggle bug. Happily being squished by most of his new family members. His Grand Bat seems awkward, which is funny! He runs around in a batsuit and punched bad guys! But given a child he doesn't seem to know quite what to do! Hilarious! Danny will just have to teach him. It's fine.
Jason and Damian are busy in the corner designing a sea water play room for him. Tim is helping by looking up ways to source what they need for it. Cass has stolen her nephew, and they are chatting seriously in her chair. Jason snaps a quick photo. Danny looks so serious as he nods to whatever Cass just said. Adorable.
I just want to add something that I forgot to put. Danny's skin (seal skin) takes the form of a space seal hoodie. And I just think that is needed to be known, especially when he's sitting with his aunt or following his grand-bat and great grandpa around.
And holding up his hands demanding his dad pick him up for snuggles after dinner.
Danny, who knows how much this is going to Fuck with his new family. Turns to Tim with the saddest baby seal eyes. He looks like you just told him puppies were made for eating. Saddest baby boi™. Jason is trying so hard to keep his shit together and not crack up. Timmers looks so awkward. He loves his kid so much.
Combine this AU with that one Selkie!Jason AU and actually the Bats aren't entirely certain that Danny isn't Jason's biological kid who was somehow shenaniganized into teenagerdom and/or the past. It doesn't help that DNA tests always tend to spit weird or inconclusive results when more magical elements are involved.
Omg yes! Now everyone is side eyeing Jason like “who did you sleep with that it made a baby seal??”
And Jason is like “honestly the whole night kinda a blur I slept with a lottttt of people that night”
The family starts pressing for details and Jason comes up with this whole elaborate story- I mean this boy put those romance books he read to WORK- and now everyone is scrambling to work find the mystery mother that doesn’t exist.
Except Cass and Alfred. They know bullshit when they hear it.
The Observants finally tell Danny that's he's a baby Ancient.
And he needs to decide what he's going to be the Ancient of.
Danny does not like this. Does not want this. Absolutely hates it.
He can't say the Ancient of the Living, because that'd apparently make him a God of Life, with the ability to command all things living. He'd never know if asking his friends to hang out with him would be of their own volition if he does that.
He can't say Ancient of Space, because that'd be way too powerful and he'd be scared shitless of fucking it up. What if he sneezes and moves the Milky Way five hundred thousand lightyears to the left?
But if he doesn't chose an aspect, then his core is just gonna choose one at random.
(Clockwork confided that it's very likely to choose space)
It's Sam who gives him an idea, as she's reading Odysseus. She's on the part with the cyclops, when Odysseus tells him that his name is "Nobody", so when he cried out in pain and said Nobody was attacking him, no one thought to do anything.
Somehow, this thought led to another though, and Danny finally figured out how to get out of the whole "Ancient" thing.
"Nothing."
"...Excuse us?"
"I'm the Ancient of Nothing."
Problem solved! Can't get OP powers and become a demigod if there's nothing to rule over!
Danny did not anticipate his "easy" solution leading to being interpreted as the Ancient of the Void, Guardian to the Eternal and Eldritch, Keeper of the Hungry Emptiness That Circles the Universe.
Sam won't take responsibility for his actions.
Life (and death) are so fucking unfair.
(He manages to coax the Hungry Emptiness into a much smaller and more manageable size. It took the shape of a Ferret with too many legs, and it likes eating deodorant.)
Danny at the tender age of 23, has had a bad month. He had just lost his job as an interpreter with his company due to rejecting the advances of one of the older female bosses and his landlord was trying to screw him over on rent.
It honestly surprised him when he woke up one day with his wrists bound in front of him and trapped in a tube. He had been out of the hero game since the portals closed up years ago and Vlad lost his powers, so it had been a while since the whole "kidnapping" thing had happened to him.
He looked out through the glass of the tube as he turned intangible to let the IV needles fall out of his arms. There luckly wasn't any glowing green goo in the tube with him, but he doubts it will stay that way long as the scientists outside his containment chatted happily about "the discovery of the decade!" Ick.
He waits till they're gone before turning intangible slipping out of his tube and heading straight for the computer. He knew how to hack, but he was low on time and needed to know exactly what was going on, so some ghostly meddling with electronics were necessary. Sorry Tuck.
It was at this moment he found out several things.
1. Danny had apparently been here for several months instead of the few days he had initially assumed
2. He was found somewhere in his own thermos, asleep. Luckily they haven't been able to replicate any technology from it.
3. Superheros were a very real thing now. How long had he been asleep?
4. He had been cloned. Again. But this time he had someone else's DNA mixed in with the clones to make them more stable and intelligent. Some guy named Red Robin. Huh. Was that his real name or...?
Danny took a deep breath before locating his new clone kids. Ellie would be thrilled...if she was still around that is. He could think about that later, right now he had to grab his babies-and oh ancients- they were babies! The oldest of the three looked four years old at most and the youngest looked only a few hours. He was still all pink and alien looking.
Luckily his children didn't fight him when he picked them up and flew through the walls with them. He made a mental note to teach them stranger danger when he came across a large red button.
You won't believe what it was labeled as. Yep. A self destruct button. How cliché. Whatever. He pushed it and sirens immediately started to go off and he continued flying them through walls before exited into a dark gothic city he knew Sam would immediately love.
Somehow he managed to immediately land a job as a linguist for Wayne tech. Probably thanks to the three small kids he had and the panicked look on his face. Bruce was a really chill dude.
Batman however, was a prick. He met the guy weeks after his run in with Bruce and he kept popping up after he found out the clone babies were partially from one of his birds and trying to take custody away from him or convince him to give them up. Danny retaliated by spreading the rumor/truth that his kids where Red Robins from creepy cloning scientists that kidnapped him before immediately moving out of Gotham and into Fawcett City to work for a competitors company. This way Red couldn't legally go after him for custody without revealing his identity :)
This is how Red Robin, at the tender age of 25, learned he had kids with a man named Daniel Nightengale. Not only that, Bruce knew about them and didn't tell him.
Danny made it clear that if any of the Gotham Rouges tried to follow him and harm his kids they would come back missing a hand. Joker found out the hard way that he wasn't bluffing.
Shazams old guy mentor almost has an aneurysm when he senses the freaking GHOST KING living in Fawcett. Danny is also much more powerful then ever before and accidentally made the power go out in half the city when he got truly angry with Batman.
Please stop giving me more hyper fixations relating to Danny Phantom and Batman crossovers I keep needing more to the point where I need to write it to satisfy my needs.
Danny had left a mark on Gotham when he left with his kids in tow, trying to avoid a freaking custody battle with BATMAN. Literally a man dressed like a bat that ran around in the night and beat up criminals. If the fact that superheroes were now a common thing wasn’t enough, imagine having a custody battle with one for three clones of yourself. It’s weird.
The bigger mark may have been the fact that Danny may or may not have mangled one of the most dangerous criminals of the city, the Joker. A stupid idiot of a man who thought it was a good idea to steal his kids to taunt Batman with. Since apparently the truth about their other clone dad happening to be Red Robin, one of Batman’s birds, had circled to him and he thought killing kids would be fun. Now he was in an actual hospital because he terrified Danny’s kids, left one too many bruises (which was a single small bruise on his oldest cheek after being smack for biting, Danny was proud but also livid that anyone would ever lay a hand on his daughter). Did he go overboard in tearing apart the facility and they literally tearing off the maniacs arm? Maybe. But he did warn everyone that if they hurt any of his kids, he was coming for blood.
They were just lucky he didn’t kill anyone.
So he had three kids with him, was now working for a competitors company of Bruce Wayne’s in Faucett City, and building up a new life. He felt a little bad for ditching Wayne Corps for LexCorp, the Wayne company had some amazing benefits and holidays, not to mention it was a very chill environment. But he could not handle dealing with Batman every goddamn night.
LexCorp had some pretty decent benefits as well, not as amazing as the Wayne Company but it was way better than other jobs had to offer. And again. Three kids to feed. Three kids that may or may not be half ghost as well. He never got that far on the files at that creepy kidnapper place, too focused on leaving. All he knew was that they had half of his DNA, and half of this Red Robin’s DNA (of which he had yet to meet this dude.) The oldest was his daughter, who he named Asterope (Aster for short), named after a member of the Pleiades open star cluster, as well as one of the Pleiades sisters from Greek mythology. She was smart in a way that reminded Danny of Jazz, and she had a fierce fire in her heart like Danny himself. She was the one who bit one of the Joker’s henchmen when they threatened her younger siblings. She was only four, which broke Danny’s heart to see such a serious look on her face from time to time, and he was determined to make sure she didn’t have to raise the younger siblings like Jazz had to raise Danny. He wanted to see her serious face when she argued why she needed an extra scoop of ice cream, not why she could stay home alone and watch the younger two. The middle child, about 2 years old from what Danny read, was a shy boy. Danny named him Kapteyn (he seemed to enjoy the nickname, Teynny) after the Red Dwarf star that had so much proper motion it would move from its recorded position and go missing, as well as Danny picked a red dwarf star as a relation to the ‘Red’ Robin. Like his sister, he had an intelligence to him in his owlish eyes. He rarely spoke, and wasn’t as brash as Aster, but he had a knack for well timed distractions. More than once had Aster snuck extra snacks from behind Danny’s back while Tyenny knocked over a glass or made a new noise. Little troublemakers and Danny was quite proud of the pair. And his youngest, only a couple of months old, he named Vela. The smallest recorded star. She was going to be the death of Danny, she was so small and he constantly feared the worst happening to her. All three children had black hair and blue eyes, though Vela and Aster had paler blue eyes while Tyenny had richer blue eyes. Yet Tyenny and Vela had signs of freckles while Aster lacked them. It gave Danny a small idea of what this Red Robin could look like but it wouldn’t be enough. He wasn’t even sure if he wanted to meet the guy.
Only because Batman was so aggressive about custody, what would he expect from the guy who was trained by him and the actual other father?
Danny didn’t want to know.
He had been doing fine without being a hero every second of his life, and he would do fine now. He wasn’t sure if he still held his title as Ghost King after his disappearance, he still didn’t know if his friends and family were still alive based on the time he seemed to lose, and he couldn’t really check on it because he couldn’t drag his kids across the planet looking for them OR leave them for a day.
So his plan? Get settled. Use a nice cushy job for money, and dig up information the human way. Through the Internet and normal human transportation. (Yet Aster was showing signs of being half ghost, and he would be more surprised if the other two were fully human, so traveling through the ghost zone wasn’t an impossible idea.)
The idea of his kids being half ghosts also put a fear into him related to his other clone, Dani. Dani had been unstable when he first discovered her, and he had watched other clones of himself destabilize into green goo. And his fear was that one day he would wake up to find those piles of goo and his kids gone. None of them showed any signs of destabilizing, but that didn’t ease his fears any. He even debated bringing them to a hospital for a check up, just to see if everything was okay. Maybe even bring them to Frostbite one day to confirm or deny any ghostliness being passed down.
He flopped onto the couch of his new apartment in Fawcett city, warm bottle in hand for Vela, his youngest gently cradled in the other, and Aster playing some sort of chase game with Tyenny. He’d need to make dinner soon, mac and cheese (he needed to learn more recipes, his single life meals were not the most nutritious things his kids should be eating on a daily basis). Being Ghost King? Easy! You wave a hand and ghosts leave, you punch Skulker in the face to back off, strength determined everything. Being a Dad?
Oh. Oh boy that was more difficult.
He had to feed his kids at regular times instead of his usually eat when he hungry. He had to tuck them into bed. Tyenny and Aster were potty trained but Vela was a baby and therefore needed regular changes. She needed to be fed more. She woke up in the middle of the night crying either for food, a diaper change, or comfort. Tyenny and Aster had horrible night terrors that Danny also had to comfort. Sleep was almost non-existent.
Then he also had to work.
He needed babysitters or just take his kids with him. The manager above him at LexCorp said it was fine to bring his kids with him, but that they also had a daycare he could leave them at. He couldn’t leave them anymore though. Last time he did that they got kidnapped.
He wasn’t dealing with that again.
He leaned back slightly, watching his kids laugh as they tripped over each other.
He wouldn’t trade anything in the world for them though.
-
-
-
“What do you mean that I have kids?!” Tim fumed, glaring at Bruce with a burning gaze.
Bruce, still wearing his cowl, let out a small ‘hrmph’. It wasn’t an answer.
Tim hissed and brought up the papers he printed, papers containing information he came across by ACCIDENT. Information that should have been shared with him the moment Bruce got ahold of it. “Batman is trying to steal my kids, Red Robin is the father?! Gothams custody battle of the century?!?” Tim shook the paper, “were you planning on telling me AFTER bringing back three kids that apparently have my DNA?”
“They’re clones, Tim. It was a sensitive matter. And Daniel Nightingale has made this more difficult than it needed to be. I would have told you-,”
“You SHOULD have told me the moment you found out! Now this man has left Gotham with all three kids! My clones! I should be the one dealing with this!” Tim scowled, “why did they even clone me? How did they get my DNA?”
“They got it when you leave it all over the streets.”
Bruce and Tim turned to see Jason standing near one of his bikes, lazily looking at his hands like he was uninterested in their conversation. If it wasn’t for his helmet, Tim would have sworn he had the smuggest look on his face.
“This conversation has nothing to do with you,” Tim hissed.
“Whoa, Red got teeth tonight,” Jason hummed.
“Shut up. I’m going to find them myself and get to the bottom of this,” Tim shoved past Bruce, anger clear on his face.
“Do you even know where to look?”
Tim whipped his head to Jason, “like you would know.”
“I do know. A couple of days ago the Joker was admitted into emergency care, he doesn’t have a left arm anymore. Some of my sources say he took your little clone babies and something else came after them madder than a mother hen. I made a point to keep track of the kids after that.”
“Why the hell would you do that?”
“Because whatever mangled the Joker is a best friend my books. Never had I ever seen that bastard so terrified of shadows in my entire life. If I find the kids, I find the person who saved them, and then I can personally thank them for giving the clown what he deserves.”
“Show me the way.”
-
-
-
Danny. Was fucking. Exhausted.
One week into his job.
One weeks.
Ancients.
He has had 2 hours of sleep.
LexCorp was a bad idea.
He should go back to Gotham.
At least Batman is somewhat civil.
This entire thing is a mess.
Here Danny stood, Vela in one arm, Tyenny in the other, and Aster clinging to his leg.
Some sort of… flying magic man in a red skin suit with a big lightning bolt on it was throwing some sort of robot through the wall. Danny was just doing his job when this all started. He didn’t know how it all started. He just wanted to leave. He was pretty sure this was getting into hallucination territory.
He managed to make it to the ground floor without much trouble (thanks to intangibility and his kids super chill with his ghost power use.) He then walked right through a wall, existing the building, and coming face to face with Lex Luthor himself. The boss of bosses. Head of LexCorp.
They stared at each other, then Danny scowled as he noticed a glint in the man’s eye that he knew all too well. It’s easy to spot when your arch-nemesis had the same look. “I don’t think I’m a great fit here.” He huffed and pushed past the billionaire, only for him to chuckle and turn around.
“Those are the alleged Red Robin clones, aren’t they?” Neither we’re paying much mind to the building being destroying by flying man in red and his robot enemy.
“And you are an evil rich white man. I should have known. At least Wayne didn’t have any active brain cells to be evil. No thoughts run though that man’s head.”
“I can protect them-.”
Danny held up a hand to stop him, “no. Nope. No. Fuck off.” He was not dealing with this, walking away and whispering to his kids, “don’t say fuck unless someone REALLY deserves it.”
Danny heard a click behind him, and he blamed his lack of sleep on being to slow to turn intangible as the bullet went through his head.
-
-
-
Tim screamed as he leapt at the bald man, anger shooting through him as he saw Daniel Nightingale fall and the three small children with him begin to wail in distress.
Tim saw the bullet go through the mans head, and he was too slow to prevent another death. If Bruce had just told him sooner, this may have never happened!
Tim brought down his staff, but a henchmen got in his way and took the hit. More began to circle around him, just as Jason came to a halt behind him and bearing dual pistols. He took a step towards Daniel’s figure when the kids hissed at him, only the small baby still cradled in Daniels arms crying while the other two put on brave faces with tears in their eyes. Jason turned his gaze to the surrounding henchmen when movement caught everyone’s eyes.
From the man who was supposed to be dead.
Daniel Nightingale shifted, slowly dragging a free hand in a position to push himself up, baby still in his arms and slowly calming down as he whispered to them. He turned his head and everyone froze, toxic green eyes blazing. He gently handed the baby to the four year old, gently getting her to sit to make it easier to hold the baby. Once the three children are gathered and sitting is when he turns, shadows along his face making it seem unnatural, terrifying as he steps towards Luthor.
“You scared my children. Surely you heard what happens to the people who do such horrible things?”
Tim didn’t see what happened next, it was like the entire area was dipped into shadows, all he heard was screaming and cracking.
When it was all over, broken men lay on the ground around the vigilantes, and Daniel was crouched over the three kids, checking them for injuries. He glanced back at the two, eyes lingering on Jason for much longer than Tim. “I’m assuming one of you is Red Robin?”
Tim slowly raised a hand.
“I need a fucking nap. And it’s time for you to pay child support.”
Tim isn't entirely sure why he allowed Daniel to practically drag him by the hand to the other guys apartment, but he was glad he did. The place seemed homey, comfortable and tidy despite it being obviously lived in.
Mr. Nightengale had locked the door before smiling at them. A heavyness filled the air making it hard to breath and sending a shiver up Tim's spine, and by the way Jason stiffened next to him he knew he felt it too. "Here's whats going to happen." The ravenette began, "You're going to watch your kids for a few hours while I take a shower and a nap."
Red Robin gave him a confused look, "Whats stopping us from taking the kids and leaving?"
The smirk on Daniels face told him enough. "You saw what I did to those guys in just three seconds. Imagine what I could do to you if you were to actually kidnap them." And with that, he walked into a the master bedroom and presumably the attached bathroom because Tim heard the shower start a few minutes later.
Jason took a look around before turning towards the kids, "So what do you guys do for fun around here?"
----
Danny stirred in his bed sometime in the evening, the siren song of a fresh cooked meal rousing him from his slumber. Oh ancients. When was the last time he had something that smelled that good?
Shuffling out of his bedroom and down the hall to the living room and kitchen he saw Red Hood standing in front of the stove cooking a rather large meal. Danny had to keep himself from salivating as he saw it, chicken fried rice, cheese enchiladas with a side of chips and salsa. Danny could kiss this man!
"Hello sleeping beauty!" Hood greeted through the voice modulator in his helmet. Realizing he had been staring he blushed and rubbed the back of his neck, "Morning Hood. Thank you for cooking dinner. I slept longer than I thought I would."
Red Robin smiled up at him from the couch where the kids were sitting on either side of him while the Pokemon Movie 3 played on the TV. Again. Ancients, he was getting sick of that movie but Aster just couldn't get enough of it.
Moving to sit next to Teynny on the couch, "How were the kids? Did they give you any trouble?"
"Not really. We've watched movies and colored most of the day. You should have seen Hood with the Dora coloring book!"
"The Dora the explorer one?" Danny asked, trying and failing to imagine the big buff guy sitting at his kids play table coloring with them.
"The very same."
"Hey!" Hood called from the kitchen, "If we're talking about ridiculous things then why don't you tell your boyfriend about your first ever diaper change?"
That caught Dannys attention, "What happened?" He asked at the same time Red Robin groaned and sunk into the couch.
Luckily Teynny chose that time to intervene on his fathers behalf and shoved his Fletchinder plushie into Red Robins hands. Danny had somehow fostered a deep love for pokemon and animals into his kids without meaning to and now the kids were obsessed with them. So much so that he had to learn how to make stuffed animals himself just because he could never find the ones his kids wanted at the stores or online. He had noticed before that Fletchinder probably reminded the kids of Red Robin -which was probably why he was forced to make an antire basket of the birds.
Danny was taken aback when Red flung the bird in a way that made it look like it was flying into the other room. He understood a moment later when his son grabbed his stuffed pokeball and ran after it, giggling the entire while. At this very moment Asters favorite pokemon, Fluffy appeared on the screen and she hopped off the couch and ran over to it and shoved her own stuffed Flaffy (made with sparkly pink fabrics at his daughter's request) into the screen.
"Uh, what is she doing?" Red asked as thier son returned with the bird and made him throw another one.
Danny huffed out a laugh, "She's making sure Sparkles gets to see her friend."
"Ah."
Vela, thier baby girl, began to get fussy from where she was laying in Tim's arm, the horn of her unicorn onesie smooshed against the red of the robins chest armor. "Mm. Its her dinner time. She hates when its late."
Red didn't even ask questions, he just got up and went to feed her. Danny followed behind him to the kitchen where Red Hood was finishing up. "So." Danny began somewhat awkwardly as he watched the bird make a bottle with his one free hand, "What days do you want?"
Both of the men froze, "What do you mean?" Hood asked, as he plated some of the rice.
"For visitation. What days do you want to swing by?"
-------
Danny had learned that the safest place for his kids to be right now was in the spotlight. The more people who knew about them the harder it would be to for someone to run off with them and hide them, *cough* batman *cough* so he made sure everyone in thier mother knew about his kids and thier -annoyingly famous- Father. How? Social media.
Let's just say his followers got lots of pictures of Red Hood and Red Robin playing with pokemon toys and coloring books alongside his kids. If his social media was soon flooded with the drawings his kids drew of them and a mysterious figure in a black and white jumpsuit then that was no ones business but hisown.
Not that it stopped people from speculating and coming up with wild (and admittedly entertaining) theories
@im-totally-not-an-alien-2 here’s some world building and i added my favourite phantom elf au cause it works amazingly in this context
Here’s the thing.
Danny did extensive research into whether Amity Park was still around. Answer is: Maybe.
He looked into the possibility of this being a different universe kind of situation. That came back negative even though nothing really comes up about Amity Park on the internet other then a single news article about the Mayor election that Danny remembers vividly because Plasmius. Ugh.
He looked into the possibility of a time jump and actually did confirm that it has been 200 years which sucks but he was expecting it and he will grieve AFTER he searches the Ghost Zone for his family and friends.
He has opened small portals into the Ghost Zone and yes it is still exactly the way he left it before this whole situation and yes he is still The King. Skulker was ecstatic that he “has come out of hiding” and has gone back to picking fights with him. Not that Danny really minds since he knows it’s because of his obsession and Skulker knows his people are off limits if he wants to continue fulfilling said obsession, which means his kids are actually safer when Skulker is there cause he is watching to make sure they aren’t in danger too (even if it’s only so Danny will continue to allow him to hunt him since he has the power to order him to stop… and although he won’t admit it, being called Uncle Skulky has him just a little moved).
Danny may have, however, forgot to take several things into account.
One is the long term affect on Amity Park and it’s inhabitants in terms of extending their lifespan due to the ectoplasm exposure which he accidentally made worse when he claimed the city as his haunt and thus drenched everything again in more pure ectoplasm.
Two is the fact that Danny had ASKED Tucker to make Amity Park pretty much unsearchable via internet due to stupid self-proclaimed Ghost Hunters just showing up and making a mess of things even AFTER the anti-ecto acts were abolished. Which means Amity Park got news on the World’s situation if they want it but not vice-versa.
Three is that when he became King and let only the people of Amity Park in on the fact that Fenton is Phantom. The ENTIRE city helped hide his status and brutally beat the shit out of government agents (and anyone else for that matter) that came poking around, which created a “Amity Protects Their Own” mindset. This lead to practically no one moving into or out of the city. You still could move of course but honestly why would anyone move INTO a “natural disaster zone” with “paranoid people who side eye you and stop talking when you come within hearing range” and why would Amity Parkers leave with how cheap and affordable living costs were since the government just started to ignore them, not to even mention the job opportunities and the zero human crime rate in the city because of THIER hero.
Finally, Danny MAY have forgotten about how much Amity Park half flickers into and out of the Ghost Zone. A place OUTSIDE OF TIME. Of course these flickers made life a pain but some side effects had to occur after Pariah Dark and flickering wasn’t the worst outcome, just an annoying one.
When Amity does flicker, the people currently in Amity can’t leave the boundaries of the city even if they can see Elmerton right there, and the people in Elmerton might be able to vaguely see Amity Park and her people but not actually interact with anything even when they manage to overcome the feeling of “you shouldn’t be here” that the flicker gives off, creating a holographic city of sorts.
So yes he may have forgotten a few things that would have solved so many situations for him and spared him some grief but it’s fine.
More then fine actually.
And he was notified of that fact when Jazz, Dani, Tucker, Sam, and Valerie bulldozed into his apartment decked out in Futuristic Fenton Ghost Trapping Gear, two hours before the Gotham Vigilantes were supposed to show up.
“WHAT THE FUCK!!!” Danny, who had been in the middle of a brain killing marathon of Pokemon, swore and fell off the coach. He managed to avoid knocking Aster and Teynny on his way down and luckily had already put Vela to bed but with the shout both kids were up and alert and Danny could hear the mumbled awakening of his baby a room over.
“DANNY!!!!” With that as their battle cry, Danny was tackle hugged onto the ground after he had just managed to stand up.
They found him since Tucker monitored/monitors the internet religiously and his social media account was practically the equivalent to “walking up to my door while wearing a sign with an eye-bleeding neon colour that says I’M THE GHOST YOU’RE LOOKING FOR!”
Now, Danny had questions.
Aster and Teynny wanted snacks.
Vela wanted to be held.
Luckily, they had answers, treats and everyone wanted a chance to hold Vela.
Turns out ectoplasm exposure slows aging to an insane degree. They only look 2 years older then they did when Danny last saw them which means Dani looks exactly like Danny’s twin.
Jazz even confirmed that mentally they’re only about 2 years older as well. Which is similar to how the Neverborn in the ghost zone mature.
The lack of aging was also aided by the constant flickering into the Ghost Zone where time is optional at best and none existent at worst, which means that for them it’s been 40 years rather then 200. Not really surprising with how adaptable Amity Parkers are, everyone in Amity just kind of accepted that they are the equivalent to Elves and carried on so practically no fuss was made about it. The people who didn’t like it simply left after the discovery (approximately 10 years after Danny disappeared) and, in turn, lived relatively long lives but not out of the realm of possibility for a normal human.
The Fentons stepped up to be the main Ghost Control protectors and the only reason they aren’t present is due to the need to watch over the city.
Therefore, Amity Park was relatively the same in terms of people and most importantly, his kids get to have excitable grandparents and a TON of cool aunties and uncles which they seem to be very content with.
Dani in particular has claimed godmom position and threatened to bite off the hands of anyone who tries to take it from her.
She’s very serious. She will bite.
Unfortunately, although Danny’s social media has brought a lot of benefits, like protecting his kids from attacks, notifying Amity Park that he is still around, and stopping Batman and others from kidnapping them, it has one important downside. Danny can’t live in Amity without it drawing too much attention to the city and ghosts.
So just lots of moving around and a lot of weekly Amity visits via Ghost Zone express.
He can and will do that.
Everyone had settled amongst the various chairs in the living room near the end of discussions. Danny with Vela curled into his chest while squished between Dani and Jazz on the couch. Tucker. Sam and Valerie on the foot rest, armchair and kitchen stool respectively all pulled close enough that they could rest their feet on Danny’s lap if they so chose. Finally, Aster and Teynny switching between laps pretty much every five minutes.
All of them had been crying for the past 2 hours and it shows in red eyes, tear tracks down their faces, and red noses. It was a relief to confirm that their relationships haven’t changed in any way that matters.
They’d only just moved on to lighter topics when Danny heard the tell tail sign of feet on his fire escape.
Red Hood and Red Robin were here.
Danny had no time to warn anyone.
———————
“We brought dinner!” Red Robin called as he flipped in through the window. Red Hood following not even a second later.
“And new colouring bo….” Red Hood trailed off as he took in the room. Four people decked out in what could only be considered sci-fi level tech and another that is obviously Danny’s sister, if not twin, all in fighting stances. All three sci-fi females had every inch of skin covered in a nano tech metal and two matching wrist blasters with the only difference being the colour of the metal (red, green, and black) and the F logo on the shoulders of the green and black nano tech. The sci-fi dude stood behind the three females but instead of weapons various circuits of glowing green led to arm and hand held devices that looked even more futuristic and fantasy then anything else in the room.
Jason didn’t need to look over to tell that Tim was probably drooling at a chance to get his hands on some (if not all) of it.
Finally, Danny’s sister stood in front of everyone else holding Dual Dao swords that look like they came straight out of Avatar. The swords were also glowing due to the GREEN FIRE covering them. They looked as if they were made via nano tech as well.
Everything and everyone was painstakingly still.
Then Danny’s sister laughed and dropped her swords. The others followed by dropping their arms and deactivating wrist blasters and the weird tech. They also were laughing.
Danny, who had been shoved to the back with his kids groaned. Pressing his face into hands, “please don’t do this.”
All five of them continued to laugh and turned their backs to him, therefore facing him and Tim once again, “Nope,” they stated in unison. Danny buried his face deeper into his hands and sighed with pure resignation.
Danny’s sister stepped forward with a smile that was much too sharp to be fully human. Jason and Tim flinched, “buckle up bird men. You’re getting the shovel talk.”
Amity park is an elf city, but it’s because of ghosts and undeath and all that. Amity Parkers aren’t just elves, they’re dark elves.
Bruce and the JL are having an aneurism, because now they have to deal with another secret city of elf people, and they seem to have some connection to the lazarus waters.
Wonder Woman and Aquaman are delighted to meet another secret kingdom with a new species of people. Even more so to meet their king and royal family.
Also, someone in Amity decided that Elf stand for Ectoliminal Life Formes. That along with their ectocontamination making their ears just a little pointer and teeth just a little sharper….well, the Amity Parkers found it hilarious and decided to commit to the bit. Now they’re trying to see how many people they can convince that they were the inspiration for all elves in history and media like how Atlanteans were the inspiration for mermaids. And they’ve been doing this for hundreds of years. (Also, it might be a thing in Amity to be insulted if they are ‘insulted’ for being called one of Santa’s Elves. In honor of Danny not liking Christmas. Or even better. They have factions of those that support Santa clause and those that don’t so Santa’s elves are the pro Santa faction. And the Fentons get the whole town into it every year.)
Constantine already knows of the Elves. They are known for being mysterious and having all forms of knowledge and magic (due to access to the ghost zone). He’s been trying to make a deal with one for years but has never made it into the city.
You can't not convince me that Amity "city of Commit to the Bit Gremlins" Park won't also Commit to the Bit.
They would have elven names too! Maybe it's LotR inspired. Warcraft! Witcher! Or actual Norse-inspired names, which can't be hard due to Infinite Realms and dead ppl and whatnot.
So legal identities of Sam and Tucker while OUTSIDE Amity can be Sylvanas and Turgon. (Sue me, those two are the first names I can think of). Jazz, Dani and Val can be Luthien, Elurin, and Varda or something 😂😂 (I unapologetically love Tolkien ok)
What's to say that they would also be gaslighting everyone that the modern iteration of elves also came from them?
(Fun fact, Danalakshmi is an elven name I found on the web that looks like Dhana lakshmi which is a Hindu goddess known as the avatar of the divine mother and is the goddess of prosperity, abundance and unlimited potential. And Drápastúfr is a Norse name meaning bad poet which I translate into pad puns. So Danny is basically saying his name means either he is the mother of all bad puns or that he has unlimited potential for bad puns.)
So I'm actually obsessed with the idea that the "on" button Danny hit going into the portal wasn't actually an on button like one you get in a computer.
In basically any legally compliant workspace where I am (and I think in the western world broadly) you get these big red EMERGENCY STOP buttons that tend to be every few feet and on every machine so if something goes wrong people don't have to run far to make what ever's going wrong stop going wrong
Now to me that thing looks pretty much exactly like this thing
With a different layout, but the big red button is the subject of interest
Jack and Maddie seem to have cartoon consistency in their lab safety protocols, which checks out honestly given that's what they are, but It makes sense to me that they didn't so much put the ON button on the inside of the portal as that they flipped the power off to finish the final checks on the portal and then
Forgot About The Emergency Stop
(Incase people dont know, emergency stop buttons stop all the machinery it's attatched to. This can be anything from Only One Machine to literally an entire floor or building depending on the levels of "oh shit everything needs to stop RIGHT NOW." They're usually 'released' at a seperate point which can be anything from the keys in the panel above to a seperate button/keypad. Or, like the ones we had in our high school, the original red button that was pushed but you had to twist it to get it to pop back up. Kind of like a weird child lock)
So I'm proposing that the Fenton Parents, instead of being idiots in their planning and putting the on switch somewhere insane when they were drawing the schematics, actually built in a safety feature they forgot they tripped
Essentially, the Fenton parents were EXTRA safe in their lab and it half killed Danny
I just had an idea. A wonderful, awful idea. Lex Luthor went to the same university that Jack, Maddie, and Vlad did. He, of course, shared a couple of classes with Jack. And Lex develops an unrequited crush on Jack. Jack is oblivious, and Lex knows that it couldn't go anywhere. It would get in the way of his plans. So he locked that possibility away to not be revisited until he meets Dr. Jack Fenton at a science conference where Jack is a keynote speaker...
I dont want to break up Maddie and Jack, but I think it'd be funny to have two evil billionaires trying to woo either Fenton and getting in each other's way.
I mean, she's an obvious genius, so he'd be more interested in her.
But unlike Vlad, he has some lovely family trauma that makes him pay at least a little bit of attention to Danny.... As in, he still spoils him.
He's trying to bribe the kid with space themed things. Says that if he married Jack, Fanny would have. Half alien step-brother.
Vlad comes in and Lex is like "shit, damn" when witnessing a kidnapping.
I bet it's a whole rivals thing going on before they have a reluctant truce.
And from there, it could be rivals to allies to lovers with slow burn (as another reblog desired).
And, if Danny never reveals anything or it hasnt happened yet, then Naughty Scienc (Lex/Vlad) steals the kids. It's not safe in that house I their own food attacks them.
I want Lex to more or less redeem himself. Sometimes, he'll bully Superman, but doesn't do much else. He's supporting Danny more after finding out from Vlad that he's a hands-on type of genius and an everything genius with space themed things.
By then, the kids accept the polycule solution.
But then it's getting through their parents' thick heads. The dense pricks- why are they idiots when it comes to romance?!
So then it becomes comedic, a whole crazy adventure with insane plans.
The Supers and ghosts are just watching it all go down. Is hilarious
It's Mercy, Lex's right hand woman, to be the one to get them on the same page and just leave like the girl boss she is
Danny was living his best life, his parents accepted him as a Halfa, the GIW was disbanded and their remnants couldn't do anything to him or other Ghosts, Vlad was being less of a jerk and he found love with someone. But then Pariah returned, and the Sarcophagus of Forever Sleep was in pieces, Danny did his best to fight the Tyrant King, but the King has a new power, a type of Ectoplasmic Venom in the new claws on his gauntlets, Danny was poisoned by the venom and turned on those he held close to his core, his entire home dimension, gone in a single day, with Danny, Vlad and Dani being the only surviving ones there. Vlad was slightly poisoned by the Venom, but escaped before he could be poisoned more, Dani fled with Vlad to the Far Frozen, where Frostbite began to see if he and the other Yeti's can make a cure for Danny
As for what Danny has been doing? He's been helping Pariah in his conquest, Clockwork was sealed by the Tyrant King, but not before the Time Ghost freed Dan from the Thermos he was trapped in, Dan did his best to battle the King and his new Prince, but ultimately he too had to flee. As for the other Ghosts fate? Pandora? Seeking aid from a dimension with her Amazonian sisters, Ember? Barely got away because Skulker gave her time to flee. At the cost of his own afterlife, the musician ghost mourned her on and off boyfriend, Walker? Fought to the very end when his rules didn't align with Pariah's, Ghost Writer? MIA, Johnny, Kitty and Shadow? They are still being chased by Pariah's army, Undergrowth, and Nocturne? Still battling Pariah's army to buy Pandora time, The Observants? Mostly gone, with the few remaining ones in hiding with other Ghosts in the Far Frozen.
Dani was trying to be quick, getting something for Frostbite to help with the cure for Danny, of course it went horribly wrong, with her being chased by both King and Prince and them slowly gaining on her. When she spotted a natural portal nearby, she took the chance and dove in the portal, which had begun quickly closing behind her. She landed in the middle of a meeting with the Justice League and Pandora, both her and the Ancient of Hope can feel that Pariah and Danny are getting closer to the dimension they are in, so they both need to get these people ready to fight the Tyrant King and his Prince, with the plan to End the King amd free his unwilling Prince from the King's Venomous control
I bet Vlad was cured first while Frostbite was making the antidote. Lab rat or whatever, you know?
But I can see this happening afterward.
Young Justice were the ones who strayed from the plan. They're crazy enough to do it, and its not like they haven't strayed from plans before. It was a really bad idea that could horrendously backfire, but it was worth a shot.
Ghosts were nothing but emotion. It's what made the ectoplasm keep them together, keep them going.
So Tim suggested using a mixture of Joker Venom and Fear Gas. With only a bit of explanation, everyone was in. Bart went with it from the start, getting the right ratio and amount by the end of the conversation.
It wasn't hard to make. The hard thing was pulling it off.
(Somehow, they did.)
It was a close call, but they managed it.
And once the new concoction started running through the prince, he regained partial clarity.
"Can't hurt... th-them...."
And they see him struggling for control, everyone one does before he turns away with a manic laugh. He goes after Pariah.
It's an intense fight between them. The army can't do anything, this was a fight between royalty. They couldn't pick sides.
With both distracted and the army with much less power, as Pariah needed all he could get against Danny (who leveled up big time because of the venom and all the tyrant stuff), they went to free Clockwork.
That was the true game changer.
Instantly, Clockwork pulled off the most OP move and used his time powers to heal everyone and trap the most of the army into in a bubble, freezing them.
It was hard for him to do, as the seals effects still lingered, but he managed it.
Dan and Vlad were the ones to go after Pariah and Danny, both with multiple antidotes for Danny so either could give it to him whenever. They also decided that it must be done multiple times due to Danny's strength level. They had to quicken the progress no matter what.
So Dan and Vlad join the battle, the heroes are playing support (mostly magic users) and clean up as the mess left in the wake of the battle was crazy big. There restrained the remaining soldiers and rescued and helped people who couldn't evacuate in time.
And when Danny was given the cure, he had stalled. He was both fighting with and fighting back the antidote. He was pulled away from battle and restrained by Captain Marvel and Raven as he was given more of the antidote by Dani, who also helped hold Danny down through using his weakness to electricity.
With only Pariah left as a threat, all attacks centered on him. Heroes remained at a distance of were quick with their distractive attacks. The Acients helped out to fight Pariah back, enhancing the current blessings they gave their favorites. So you bet that some rogues/redeemed rogues had been there, like Poison Ivy.
And once Pariah was defeated, Dan and Vlad didn't hesitate to finish him off.
The last thing they had to do was give Danny the antidote to the venom Young Justice made and the remnants of the battle.
Oh, and the legal side to things. Because now, all the Dans and Vlad were royalty. Dan and Vlad won by right of conquest, both dealing the final blow. Dani had technically tied with Danny in a fight during the restraining process, so she was officially a princess. But because Pariah was Ended after the mini Dans' "fight", Danny and Dani ascended to the throne.
It was a whole thing.
Something that confused them to no end and they hated it. Vlad was exhausted, Dan was confused on what exactly he wanted to do but it for sure wasnt that, Danny was struggling to not have his core shatter from guilt and mourning his family and dimension, Dani was fully against it with the responsibility it held that would trap her.
So Vlad disappeared, deciding to sleep it all off. Dani ran away. And weirdly enough, Dan stayed with Danny to help him, distracting himself from everything else.
The Justice League were given compensation by the Ancients and they held off any political talk until the 4 ghosts could sort things out.
Tim: *dies*
Stephanie: Timer starts now! When do you think he’ll be back? I say two months
Damian: Bullshit. One month
Dick: nah, half a month
Bruce, sobbing: WHAT ARE YOU DOING? TIM JUST DIED!
Jason, scratching his chin in thought: One week
Ok so ive had this idea stuck in my head for WEEKS at this point and i need to tell someone about it so im invading your asks
(ages for this au, id imagine Damians around like- 12 or 13 and Tim/JJ's like- 17)
What if a version of Damian (like from ine of the good happy batfam universes) was sent to to a universe with Joker Junior where the rest of the bats were killed by the Joker and JJ was never reacued and brought back to being Tim?
And Damian is like- terrified because he doesnt know where he is or how to get back home and then hes found by JJ.
And like- at first JJ would probably try to leave Damian but once he gets a good look at this kid baby brother, thats his baby brother- he would realize that he recognizes this kid. So he keeps him!
The only problem with that is the Joker. Now the bats are all dead (or theres circumstances preventing them from doing anything) in this universe so theres nobody around to stop the Jokers shit. And we all know that the Joker isnt above murdering or tourturing kids. (Id imagine the JJ of this universe has done stuff like that once or twice, but he doesnt like to. He's a smaller equally manical yet WAY less bloodthirsty version of the joker)
So JJ keeps Damian hidden from his "Papa" until the bats of Damians universe are able to find a way to bring him back home. In the meantime tho, Damians under JJ's care, and its terrifying, but at least he tries!
Now in my mind Joker Jr. is kinda like Jinx from Arcane with mood swings, visual and audio halucinations, so so smart but so so crazy and confused and SCARED and oh so close to finally snapping until he actually does.
And this boy that he kiddnaped rescued confuses the fuck out of him. Because Junior recognizes him from somewhere and he doesnt know why.
(I hope this all makes sense its kinda just like a word vomit lmao my lizard brain just want crazy older brother Joker Jr. [Also there isnt enough JJ content out there and that is a crime])
(Older brother JJ content??? Fuck yeah)
TW: JJ, torture, child abuse
JJ... Recognizes those glaring emerald eyes and scowling face. He doesn't know why, but it causes reality around him to pulse with uncertainty as it teters between JJ's world and someone else's. Someone Papa doesn't like.
JJ won't talk to them. He knows he's not supposed to. Papa will become angry. So Junior tears his eyes from the bird kid baby bat and turns to leave. A tsk stops him.
Another wave of familiarity crashes over JJ, but he doesn't know that child. He doesn't. He really really doesn't know him.
So, Junior should move. Papa won't he happy if JJ can't move.
Well, unless Papa is teaching JJ a lesson.
His nerves light up at the memory of cold metal tables, electric probes, and buzzing.
JJ needs to go, but that kid. He can't leave him. He also can't take him with either. He knows what happens to the kids Joker meets.
Junior would never disobey his papa, but the ever-present buzzing noise isn't a deterrent for bad behavior. With how often he's punished, it hardly matters whether JJ is being a good child or not. He's always in trouble. Instead, that buzz is a reminder that he can't be caught.
JJ is smart. He's clever and sneaky. He's also great at lying, even to bats. While he may not know why lying to the nocturnal creatures is important, he knows it's an accomplishment he's proud of.
He can hide the child from Papa! It'll be a fun game! Junior's little surprise.
Junior isn't sure what he's winning, but he knows what will happen when he loses.
Death to the bird and punishment to JJ! A great joke!
Though Junior doesn't know why the kid is a bird.
Oh well! JJ will take great care of the little bird. All he has to do is feed him and keep him hidden! It will be like all the other things JJ hides from Papa. He'll never admit it, but Junior thinks Papa is a little dumb. As long as JJ plays pretend with the older man, he'll remain unsupervised.
Anyways, JJ has more of a demented, childish voice while Tim is more analytical and serious.
Damian, to start with, doesn't recognize Tim. JJ has green hair, bleached skin, cut cheeks, and way less muscle mass. The behavior is drastically different as well (also, we're not gonna speculate any specific mental disorders for these AUs. JJ and Tim are considered different due to their characterizstions, but I don't want to put harmful connotations out there [especially since I don't have any relevant conditions to insert accurate and mindful interpretations]).
In this AU, the Bats are all dead. JJ did kill some of them, which drastically reduced his ability to recover and remember that he's Tim.
He didn't kill Damian, though. Tim also feels extremely protective of his younger siblings (Duke included). Unfortunately, they're dead in this AU :/
JJ oscillates between being terrified, peppy, silent, crying, and content at rapid rates. It takes several days for Damian to feel out some of the triggers.
The Bats from Damian's universe are trying their damned best to get there as soon as possible. Sadly, Joker finds out about Damian before then.
JJ, by this point, has bonded with the kid. That kid is HIS. He may have some slightly fucked up notions on how to show care, but he will not let anyone harm the bird (not even Papa).
So, JJ does his best joke yet. He kills Joker.
Only after killing the Joker do the other Bats show up. They offer to take JJ with them (particularly because that's Tim!!!), but he refuses. He doesn't want to go with his family. He doesn't remember them and he killed some of them.
Just like JJ bonded with Damian, Damian has bobded with him. Damian was not only protected but also taken care of. JJ stole parenting books and thought about Harley (who im making into a villain to sort of proper mother. Maybe it's like split custody sorta with Ivy and Harley kidnapping him every so often and Joker just going along with it because he doesn't want to be responsible for a kid).
JJ was a genuinely good parent aside from the times Joker would hurt him and he'd end up having an episode that Damian helped him through. JJ was hesitant to give affection, feeling buzzing on his skin and remembering the nails digging into his arms or shoulders, but he dealt with it because he needed to be a good mama bird to the baby bat.
It started like a bit.
Joker had made up little background stages to act like they were on a picnic or fishing or enjoying a nice sunny day as a family.
Junior tried to do something similar, but more genuine and without all the horror and pain he had gone through.
Being a parent who came from a bad family taught you to be better. So he was better. Plenty of times, better meant not having a kid at all. He didn't have that option, so he had to do better in taking care of the kid.
So they went outside, Junior gave Damian proper affection and not too much of it.
Damian had gotten used to it. He got used to hearing words of affirmation, the clear cut "I love you", and the "I'd do anything for you, baby bat."
He tried to use the last one to get Junior away from Joker. He tried to remind him that he was Tim Drake. But Junior only smiled sadly at him.
"I'm not Tim anymore, Baby Bat. I don't want to be. Think of me like your Harley. Never like before, but reformed with a little crazy."
And Damian did. He did because he couldn't recognize Tim in him at all. And thinking of it, he probably shouldn't try to get him back. The way he'd act would be devastating. He killed bats; he killed the people he tried to restrain and save.
So Damian focused on reforming him. And Junior had really stopped thinking it was some kind of game a long time ago. They both knew it. And when it was time to prove it, Junior delivered.
"No, he's not going to be like me or the fun little bird! He's mine, and I'm not letting you take him from me!"
BANG
That wasn't it. There were plenty more gunshots that went off. But Damian could only focus on being held by Junior soon afterwards. Held tightly as Junior moved them to a bathroom to clean off the blood Damian hadn't noticed.
Junior hummed all while long. A little nursery rhyme or maybe an actual song of some kind that Damian didn't recognize. It was an episode, but it was different. He acted like everything was normal and treated Damian like a toddler. Damian recognized this as Harley's influence on him. That he was acting like this world's version of her by using her coping mechanism.
Then the batfam came. Damian's family. His real one. And Junior tried to let go of the kid. How could he join a family when he killed them? How could he not do it again? He could relapse, he could have some episode that ended badly. Because while he was insane, he still kept a good amount of intelligence from before. He had even gained some from the Joker, who was much smarter than he was given credit for.
Damian wasn't happy about that.
Damian had built a life with Junior and had seen him as a guardian figure. He got so used to Juniors unconditional love that was similar to Dick's, just not as over the top but also definitely more so.
Junior had killed his vile father figure for Damian. Junior had looked into parenting books and taught him about who Damian was allowed to take down without major consequences for enrichment. Junior had taken them outside and taught him "better" versions of childish games (playing freeze tag with ice bombs that froze people was fun, especially when Junior was kind enough to give a target list full of really bad criminals).
So Damian refused to part ways with him in that dystopia. And he convinced Junior the only way he knew how.
By committing to the bit as a baby bat.
"NO!"
Everyone one jumped and turned to him. Damian, in which, forced tears to come forward, but not letting them fall.
He threw himself forward and onto Junior, grabbing onto his stupid tail coat that was once used to comfort him during a small anxiety attack. Junior staggered backward but kept standing.
"I'm not leaving without papa! I'm not going anywhere!"
And the batfam was in complete shock. Did they have the right dimension??? Did another Damian get kidnapped?? Was that their Damian?
And Junior had froze up, eyes wide as he owlishly blinked, completely confused.
Cause wtf?
Papa?
When the fuck did that start up?
Junior placed his hands on the back of Damian's head and his back, rubbing his back awkwardly before looking up at the flock.
"Well? Do something!"
And they're still hung up about it all.
Dick and Bruce were shattered by the fact they were his parents (Dick raised the kid more than Bruce, I will die on that grave), and yet he called Junior Papa? Choosing to give him that title?
Jason and Duker were concerned. Very concerned. What happened that Damian had attached himself to the makeshift son of a much worse version of a clown that looked like a mini him? But also, they felt like this was more like a Harley situation with Junior, so they wanted to help the kid out, take him under their wings. Encourage the adoption habit.
Cass and Tim knew that act was fake instantly. Steph took a bit to realize that and then sat back, ready to use it as blackmail. Babs had to take a moment to confirm that this was fake. All 4 were more than ready to keep the charade up. Tim felt weird that this was him (I'm making it so that he didn't deal with this, sort of leaning towards canon), but he also wasn't. They knew that Junior wasn't coming back unscathed, that he'd be more like Harley. And that was more than fine. What's wrong with having another morally gray family member? Jason passed that point, Dick got there but it was reversed, Tim hid that, Damian pulled away but he was one bad unsupervised incident away from getting rid of their Joker. What's wrong with another?
So yeah. Tim was the one who took the reign and moved that along quicker. He made direct eye contact with a panicking Junior and shrugged.
"You honestly should've expected this. I mean..." Tim looked over to the conveniently placed stack of parenting books and DIY storybooks Junior and Damian had fun making.
Junior glared at him, only to jump at another fake cry from Damian and focus his attention on the teen.
"Hey, it's ok. They'll take great care of you-"
"Y-you're going to abandon m-me?!"
"No! No, of course not." He looked up with a pleading look that only Dick responded to.
"Dami... If he doesn't want to come with us, then we shouldn't force him."
"If papa isn't coming with me, then I'm not leaving! I won't leave papa! I won't!"
Cass went up to Junior and Damian, offering a small smile, one that gave him a small apology. He wasn't going to get out of this easily. Not without hurting Damian. Junior knew that too and hung his head forward in defeat.
"Well, we can't have that." Junior forced a small giggle. "I hope you guys are ok with a plus one?"
Junior looked up for any sign of outright denial, but he saw the fist pump Steph made and the fist bump that Tim and Cass shared. The traitors. Bruce stiffly nodded his head and Dick and Duke sighed in relief.
Damian looked up "hesitantly" with his teary eyes. And that sealed the deal instantly.
"You're coming with us? Really?"
Junior only smiled gently with a nod.
"Great, then lets hit the road." Jason interrupted. "Alfred's been stress cooking lately, so let's not let him stress any longer. It's not good for his age."
