Andulka
Not today Justin
KIROKAZE
#extradirty
Today's Document
Mike Driver
"I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas"
Sade Olutola
titsay
ojovivo
PR's Tumblrdome
JVL
Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her
shark vs the universe
bliss lane
Love Begins
I'd rather be in outer space 🛸
Noah Kahan
Claire Keane
taylor price
seen from United States
seen from Germany
seen from Türkiye
seen from United States
seen from China
seen from United States
seen from Türkiye
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from France
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from United States
seen from Türkiye
seen from Finland
seen from Belgium
seen from Türkiye
seen from Türkiye
seen from United Kingdom
seen from United States
@merormerlin
Hey, everyone! I'm Mer. This is my only AO3 account.
I have blanket permissions for anything and everything I make— you can do anything to it, just don't claim it as your own.
(Minus anything AI related.)
Prompt asks are allowed and appreciated! (but are made by joy and whimsy, not obligation!)
FIC LIST:
BloodyMary DC x DP Prompt
"Bad bad bad," Rocky declared emphatically, rolling around in his glorified snow globe of anarchism at a speed akin to a gerbil stuck in a ball.
"Bad." Danny agreed with a grimace, thick leather gloves hesitating over the prone body. "I don't know what this is— is this acid?" He grimaced, finally pulling down his rebreather enough to catch a whiff of what must've been sulfurous battery acid.
"Oh yuck, that is definitely not for humans." The teacher almost immediately snapped back on the filtered mask, shaking his head like a wet dog to try to unclog his sinuses.
"Put in airlock, question?"
"Rocky!" Danny said, aghast at his friend's suggestion. "Why would we kill him? I know we've broke Ancients know how many laws up here, but I draw the line at murder—"
Rocky shook his balled claw in what Danny associated with irritation at their (somewhat often) translation and cultural barriers. "No. You stupid, statement." Ouch. Friendly fire here.
"Put Other Human in airlock for decontaminating."
Danny had to stop himself from cupping his chin in thought. He'd already touched his mask with his cursed Mountain Dew acid fingers, and he'd rather not smear it on his face. He gave a nod, before awkwardly hauling the man (?) limply towards the airlock by his armpits.
He preferred to keep most of the equipment and space as sterile as possible, partially due to Rocky harping on him like space's pickiest impromptu roommate, and partially because of general lab cleanliness standards (at least ones he hadn't discarded yet).
But. About the, you know, big, goo-covered person at the center of all of their issues currently.
He was mostly unresponsive, minus some occasional grunts and light thrashes, eyes moving underneath their eyelids. Armando had declared that, minus some heightened brain functions, some bones that needed to be reset and gnarly burns, he was... okay, stable, for the moment.
The biggest thing would be infections and Ye Unknown Somewhat Gelatinous Substance he was coated in. He'd already taken samples (obviously), but he'd best describe it as a toxic, danger-green colored snot mixed with sparkling water. It dripped and kind of sizzled, but was still somewhat slimy.
"This is going to be such a pain to clean off my Ecto-Suit." Danny mumbled, having grabbed the meager basin of water and the most disinfectant or "gentler" cleaning supplies he could find.
"Yes yes," Rocky modulated, "Save Other Human first, complain later."
"Thanks for your aid as always, Rocky." Danny replied, dryly, beginning to wash off the substance and wipe away any residue with towels and his supplies. It was grimy and pretty intimate work for a stranger, Rocky observing and fiddling with something in the corner of the airlock.
"I dunno, it's just nice to see a human after so long. Even they're, y'know."
"Half-dead, question?"
The teacher worried his bottom lip with his slightly pointed teeth, protected hand coming to try to remove Ye Unknown Substance that had crusted in their scalp. Danny felt another pang of sympathy— he'd probably claw off his skin if it was anywhere near his hair.
"I'm not so bothered by their injuries rather than his floating-in-the-middle-of-space situation."
Danny wondered, in this moment, what Val and Tucker would be doing differently. The emptiness of pilot and Captain Gray and mechanic Foley would and had haunted this mission.
Lost in his musings and the almost monotonous task, he didn't notice their eyes fluttering and hands moving until it was too late.
He let out a girlish shriek as he was shoved into the airlock wall, Ecto-Suit digging in hard enough where he yelped at the impact and the hands shoving him and gripping his face.
Rocky, predictably, had launched himself in his xenonite ball, ready to body-slam the human off of Danny. Main issue is that xenonite was hard and Rocky was almost 400 freakin' pounds and could easily hurt this human more.
"Whoa there, cowboy! You're okay. We're safe here." Danny tried to shift his shock and alarm into a tone that was supposed to be soothing but probably came off much different.
There was almost a subvocal growl as he felt their calloused fingers dig into his un-helmeted cheek and jaw, a not-so-subtle threat. "Are you apart of the LOA?"
His— Danny would call them a he for now— voice was raspy with disuse, but somewhat deep, glowering and sultry.
"I swear on my left kidney, I'm a teacher and biochemist. I don't even like librarians, their glasses and glares put the fear of God into me." Danny assured, and babbled a bit, hands still raised in surrender from where he was getting partially straddled by (Less) Goo Covered Burn Man.
"What— what the fuck are you talking about?"
"Wait, what are you talking about?"
Danny can see their teeth and features, now that they're practically pressed together in something cosy if it wasn't for, you know, everything else. He's... undeniably handsome, built like a fucking wall, with what must be black hair and unearthly green eyes. Even with the burns and general crazed animal look, he has this dark tug of danger that surrounds him. Danny's mouth went dry, and not just with fear.
"The... Librarians of American?"
"The League of Assassins." The man hissed, fingers pressing harder. Danny leaned further into the wall, ignoring the zings of pain up his spine. He was, unwisely, going to comment on how comically evil that named sounded, but Rocky saved him finally.
Rolling forward a bit, he tilted his carapace up towards Human Goo Man. "What is League of Assassin, question?"
His head jerked towards Rocky, eyes widening and a strangled shout, shoving Danny away and scrambling to a corner. It seemed he had finally realized that there was... a rock alien in a ball behind him.
"What the fuck is that?"
Danny used this opening to fumble to his feet, pushing his nigh indestructible glasses back up his nose. "It's okay! It's Rocky. He's Rocky, what we call an Eridian."
There were some shuddering breaths and tense silence in the airlock as he let the A-L-I-E-N idea set in. Which... was a bit strange, because this guy was closer to Erid than Earth, but. Who knows.
All his years as a biochemical engineer and subsequently a teacher had never prepared to play referee to an rock alien Eridian and a somewhat crazed space man in Jabba the Hutt's acid reflux.
"Rocky is more likely to insult your mathematic prowess than eat your organs. I swear." He reassured, stepping to the side slightly to allow Goo Human to see Rocky but be able to prevent either of them charging at each other.
All I need is my red blanket and the confidence to start yelling toro, toro!, Danny thought sardonically.
"Yes yes yes. Human organs too soft and water-filled."
He let out a long-suffering sigh. Rocky would be no help in calming this guy down. Probably still too bristly at the idea of him being tackled and gripped like a fish. "Thank you again for that, Rock. Very helpful."
"Welcome." He answered, and Danny stopped himself from kicking his xenonite ball at the smugness he could detect in the Eridian's voice.
Danny still held his hands out like he was comforting a feral animal, and he saw the man glaring at him from underneath his lashes and caked hair. "Who are you?" He finally grit out.
No biggie. Just an intimidating, huge, probable-bite-risk, handsome maybe-human. Danny tugged down his rebreather, ignored the smell, and extended a Ecto-Suit hand to shake.
"I'm Danny. Danny Fenton."
Hesitation was thick in the air. He didn't take his hand, but he did step further out of the corner of the airlock. "Jason."
Jason. Very human name. A genuine smile spread across his lips. "It's nice to meet you, Jason."
He hit the button to open the airlock so they could explore the actual ship, and hopefully lessen Jason's paranoia. "Welcome aboard the spaceship Phantom. We hope you enjoy your stay."
Hihi! So your Janitor Danny! Prompt is literally living in my skull so I did a little doodle of it!
For you <3
OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD.
HE HAS THE RED HOOD JACKET ON?? AND THE BLEACH AND RUBBING ALCOHOL? he even has PHANTOM EARRINGS. HKJDSKJHSDKJ??
BLESSINGS UPON YOUR BLOODLINE FOR GENERATIONS OP ITS SO DELICIOUS IM SHAKING IT IN MY MOUTH LIKE A RABID DOG <3333333
DC x DP Prompt — The Janitor
"Cheryl, I just locked Joker in the deep freezer, what do I do?" The words came out in a rush as he leaned against the hallway, nervously looking at the door as if the clown demon would somehow punch through six inches of metal and survive subzero temperatures.
"Are you fucking with me, Fenton? You know I'm in the middle of a shitshow right now."
He breathed out a little hysterically. "No, I'm not fucking with you. There's a bunch of Joker goons in the base on 7th street. I lured them into the deep freezer—"
"The one without exits?"
"Yeah, uh-huh, the one with no exits. And then I barricaded the door."
There was an audible muffle of words and a few shouts and what sounded like gunshots. Danny was worried his closest coworker got shot until she came back on the line, out of breath.
"Let me get this straight— your first thought when the Joker invaded our headquarters was to lock him in a freezer?"
"No, I had time to think about it." Danny answered absently as he wandered down to the utility room after he turned on the fans to full blast. He wasn't the designated handyman, but a Fenton with a screwdriver could do anything, really.
Just because he was the janitor didn't mean he somehow lost the ability to fix a washer, oil a door, or wire a ghost electric chair. (Yes, that was a real thing, and yes, he did destroy it when he moved out of Amity Park.)
Speaking of moving, he supposes it's important on A. why he was in a Red Hood base (and more broadly, Gotham), B. Why he was a janitor in a Red Hood base, C. why he knew a lieutenant of Red Hood and D. why he had just committed what most would call felony murder.
(Danny would call it self defense, but potato pahtato when you're working for a gang.)
It all came down to one thing. He was good at cleaning. How, Danny "The Slob" Fenton, do such a thing when his room was sometimes more of a bio risk than the literal lab?
It's that Jazz was constantly stressed with school and taking care of him, so a lot of chores often fell to him.
Which meant cleaning up the lab.
Sure, he was no where near happy about this arrangement, but it wasn't like he could tell his sister "Hey! Stop giving me non-contaminated food and clean, woman!"
He was a lazy, deeply sarcastic, a borderline delinquent and a vigilante, but he drew the line at misogyny And, you know, his hotdogs trying to murk him in his stomach.
Ergo, Danny the bitter cleaner of all things radioactive and probably illegal.
The thing with the Fenton lab? There was always something staining the floor. Whether it be blood, ectoplasm, oil, lubrication for bolts, coffee, or an ungodly mix of all of it.
He had to get creative and fast.
Ectoplasm is a bit corrosive and stains like you wouldn't believe, even on metal floor. So he learned to put a bit of his own ectoplasm and mini ice particles so it would actually be able to be scrubbed out of the floor.
Coffee? Oil? Yeah. Cleaning supplies were mixed together like a potion master, toeing the line between dangerous and genius. He was always careful enough not to make chlorine gas or chloroform.
It became an uncanny skill, along with other things. He knew how to get spots out of clothing, how to make homemade detergent and how to get any stain or blemish out of almost any material.
So, when he moved to Gotham to complete his bachelors in chemical engineering at G.C.U., he knew he had to get a job somewhere.
And there was a lot of benefits for custodial staff in his position. Good hours, mostly at night or afternoons when he'd be free. And he knew a lot about cleaning, so why not?
...He hadn't really planned to be scouted as a crime cleaner, though.
Especially for a gang.
But hey! They even gave dental. Red Hood didn't even seem all that bad, drug peddling and murder aside. (Unsurprisingly, he could put a lot of things aside. His parents and well, Phantom, etc.)
If he kept his mouth shut, head down and hands working, he could get a good wage and even better benefits.
Danny, much to his dismay and minor shock, became known as 'the guy who can get stains out of literally everything.' Goons would literally stop and watch him like he was preforming black magic on a crime scenes walls. Even more surprisingly, he got clients and friends from this arrangement.
(Ignoring that one time of the jackets he was randomly given looks like Red Hood's.
No pressure. Just a crime lord who (allegedly) put heads into a duffel bag and mailed it to another crime boss.
He does it anyway, because he has a reputation (and monetary gain) to keep.)
So! Back to the present.
"What the fuck. What the fuck!" Cheryl hissed, whether at him or what he assumed was a gunfight in the background, "Jesus effin' Christ Danny, get out of there."
The halfa swung open the maintenance/janitorial supply room, trying to be nonchalant as his brain spirals and calculates. "I don't think Jesus can fuck Christ. They seem almost identical, y'know?"
Hydrogen sulfide would be the quickest killer, but chloroform could also do it if they didn't have enough acids and sulfur cleaning products.
Decisions, decisions.
Eh. Fuck it.
Danny grabbed some plywood, a box full of tools, his handy dandy cleaning supplies and a big plastic bucket. He would call his shaky hands adrenaline instead of being absolutely terrified that the most notorious mass-murderer in America was a few rooms down.
"Danny, I'm not fuckin' joking. You need to get the hell out of there. That's an order, you brilliant, stupid piece of shit."
He began trotting back to the deep freezer, inhaling through his teeth and scrubbing his face. "Kinky," he said, with levity he sure as hell didn't feel, "Hey, so, I'm gonna have to call you back. Tell me once you get out of your Nerf gun battle."
"Dann—!"
Danny snapped on a respirator, tucked his phone away, and quickly dumped a mixture of chemicals he knew would kill, well, a lot of things.
He'd heard the screaming and gunshots even through the thickest 1950s subzero room known to man. Kind of hard to muffle even that.
But alas. He went partially intangible, hauling his bucket of unicorn love and sparkles, floating up towards the air ducts. With no pizzaz, he dumped the entire thing in the vent system for the room.
The screams immediately rose in volume, and so did the ping of gunshots. Not wasting the time to poke his intangible head in and see how they were doing, he reappeared back in the hallway.
To be a safeguard even for an empty base, he quickly hammered in some plywood to any vents, duct taping the edges.
And for the coup de grâce, he sealed the door with his ectoplasm ice, cranked up the fan and turned the temperature to the lowest it could reasonably go.
"Have fun in there kiddos," he rapped the door, and then got the fuck out of the base. So really, he was following Cheryl's order. So it wasn't insubordination, no siree. Just insurance.
— — —
Danny found himself grabbing a cup of coffee. It wouldn't help his nerves, absolutely not, but at least it gave him something to do with his hands as he called up Cheryl.
"Danny!" She immediately snapped, and he winced.
"Hi, Cheryl," He demurred, hoping to project the most charming air that she could definitely see through. "How're you doing?"
"Don't change the subject, pretty boy."
He held his tongue at a sarcastic comment to that. "Mmmm yeah, so. About that. Would you mind like, not telling the Big Guy about what I did? Keep it like, anonymous act of charity?"
"Why." The word was sharp, almost unquestioning. Danny kept from squeezing his plastic ice coffee cup so hard that it would explode.
Okay. Okay. He had to do this. "I'm a Meta." He explained. "I really— Like, I left something definitely a Meta could do to keep the Joker in the deep freezer room." He really didn't want to become some super soldier or enforcer. He would quite literally rather kill someone before he did that.
It wasn't like there wasn't Metas in Gotham or, hell, some gangs. But he wasn't just Danny the Throw Him At Any Problem Because He Has Powers guy, and he never wanted to be. He just wanted to get his degree, get paid, and get out.
"Too late. I'd already told him that you'd locked Joker in there."
Danny smacked his head against the cafe table, wishing he inhaled more of the chemical weapon in the plastic Home Depot bucket.
"Cheryl," He said, with thinly veiled horror and dread.
Her voice audibly softened. "Danny. It's fine. You know he wouldn't throw you off the Harbor or anything. Hell, he's probably going to be grateful, however uncharacteristic. Everyone 's gonna be. It's the Joker."
Danny gave a truly pathetic groan as the now murderer of the Joker, and wondered if being fed to the fishes was truly a worse fate.
— — —
Jason was smoking on one of the balcony of his many safe houses, holding a picture of the man in front of him.
It'd been a long night and a long morning. Once he had gotten the intel that the Joker was locked in a deep freezer, in one of his goddamn bases, you bet your lucky fucking stars he had gotten there faster than Bruce had gotten to him.
It had taken hours to get into the room from whatever the hell was coated over the door, and dear fuck was it worth the effort.
The Joker was dead. So were many of his closest lieutenants and underlings. Some had died from GSWs, other from chemical burns or inhalation, and the Joker? The best of all.
He'd died slowly and painfully from hypothermia and the chemicals.
It had been a mixture of vindictive, vengeful glee and deep exhaustion as he carefully monitored the cremation process of all of the bodies.
It was over. It was fucking over. His syndicate would be in pieces that Jason would euphorically grind his heel into.
Now all that remained of the infamous, homicidal Joker was a plastic bag of grey ashes.
Jason wasn't sure what he was going to do with it now. Maybe he could flush it down his toilet. It'd clog, but he wouldn't give two shits.
Maybe he could even sent it to Bruce. The thought brought a huff from his lips as he blew out the smoke from his cig, eyes examining the picture from the file.
Cheryl had referred to this Danny as 'pretty boy' on many occasions, and Jason was inclined to agree. A mischievous, almost boyish face of a 22-year-old. The famed Red Hood Janitor, jack-of-trades.
The killer of the most prominent killer of all time.
He couldn't summon as much jealousy of it should have been me, twisting the knife in his gut rather than the feeling of relief. Red Hood had struggled even getting close, whether it was his obscene amount of gang members or it was fucking Batman or one of his little soldiers preventing him from putting a bullet in his head.
No, it wasn't as much anger but interest that he twisted around in is mind, thumb hovering over the face of Danny Fenton.
He'd like to meet this man. Jason was sure that it would be a conversation he wouldn't want to miss.
Red Hood, covered in blood and flicking a cigarette butt off his balcony, smirked and picked up his burner phone.
fandom etiquette come home the kids miss you. AO3 manners stop leaving for milk the omegas make enough
DC x DP — The Boss, The Bat (Mafia AU) PT1
"So... let me get this straight—"
"You're not straight." Sam pointed out, mock confused, but her amused lift of her brows and lips made it obvious
"Let me get this gay, then, Miss Manson," he retorted as he shifted uncomfortably in a suit, "we are walking into the house party of a mafia don. The biggest mister mafia man of Gotham, to be specific."
"This feels like a rhetorical question, Danny."
"No, it's a valid one! Why did you not tell me this until we were five minutes away?!"
"I don't know! I didn't want you to freak out!"
"Well, now I'm freaking out! What if I say something wrong and get myself fed to the fishes?! I'm not ready to be mutant Gotham fish chow, Sam!"
"Look, they're ethical criminals."
"That feels like an oxymoron, Sam." He mimicked, and ducked from the swing of her black purse automatically.
"It's like when I threw seed bombs on golf courses and Vlad's lawn. I broke the law, but in style."
"There is a very thick line between minor acts of eco-terrorism and actual terrorism or murder or human trafficking." Danny was about three inches away from flipping his shit. He was walking into the home of a crime lord. An entire family of criminals.
I'm going to die again, Danny thought, sardonically.
"Bruce Wayne has sworn off hurting kids since he started." Samantha placated, but now Danny knew why she had been pacing in their hotel room and why she looked so pale without her usual goth makeup on.
"Oh, gee, he doesn't traffic or give drugs to kids. It's only adults," He replied dryly.
"He's actually banned human trafficking in his territory. And the drugs, I've heard, are made to be as safe as they can with the threat of passing around tampered-with ones with consequences."
Phantom dragged the heels of his palms down his eyes. "Consequences meaning getting shot in the head."
"Eeeeehhh..." Sam grimaced, seesawing her hand. "Look, do you really think I would put both of us in that much of danger?"
"Well seeing as you didn't tell me that fact that Bruce Wayne was a part of the mafia, yes!"
"Okay, okay, I get it. But all I need to do is quickly rub a few elbows and give some money to Tim Wayne."
"Why are we giving them... Sam. Sam, please, for the love of Ancients don't tell me that your parents told you to go pay off the mafia. In Gotham. By ourselves."
A beat of silence.
"I won't tell you then."
The halfa cast a glance around the limousine cab, already taking off his dress jacket.
"Daniel fucking Fenton, roll back up that window right now, you are not leaping out of a moving vehicle—"
There was a thunk, flailing as limbs as the goth wrestled him to the floor in a fancy dress, and a whole lot of cursing.
- - -
"Really, Danny, it's not that bad." Sam growled as she half-dragged the boy by his suit jacket to where the entrance of the Wayne gala was beginning.
The goth had been almost obsessively smoothing out the wrinkles from the whole trying-to-escape thing. It had been a lot of fussing and a lot of cusses in Hebrew he shouldn't repeat for his safety.
"You're supposed to be the brave one," She pointed out mulishly as she glanced up at the oppressive height of the infamous Wayne family manor.
"Yeah, I'm also not supposed to be the smart one but look how the tables have turned."
"Forget tables," Sam hissed as they drew an adequate (thankfully) amount of attention, "if you don't act at least a little normal, I'm going to hit you with one of the chairs."
"How barbaric of you, Miss Manson." He mocked, and was then subtly cuffed in the back of his head. He rubbed what would probably be a light bruise tomorrow and sent her a scowl.
"Behave."
"What next? Do you want me to go arf?"
She turned and started looking to the sky, beginning to murmur a prayer as they walked away with clicking of their stilettos.
"Wait, stop, don't leave me here. Everyone is old and white and looks like they're going to buy my organs on eBay for their purebred toy poodle—"
"Don't be silly," Sam called back as she continued to get further and further to the ballroom door, "Everyone knows you can't buy human remains or organs on eBay. People have tried."
And then she's in, and Danny knows what is good for his survival and shuts up.
He hasn't seen Sam like this before. I mean, at all of the mini galas and parties in Amity, she, Tucker and him were messing with the snobbiest people's cars. (Sam's grandma had caught them once, and simply cackled and given them tips on wiring the break light to the horn so whenever they break, it would blare the horn until they stopped. Fucking legendary.) Sam would not be polite, or even present. Sometimes she'd hijack the classical music and put on screamo.
But no. Now she's giving this fake little smiles and hiding her clenched fists behind her back. Danny was pretty sure if he focused and got close enough, he could see her eye twitching.
"Frrreaky," Danny muttered to himself. Well, contexts were different. Fuck him, he had almost forgotten he was in the heart of the mafia family of Gotham.
No biggie. Nooooo big deal. He had this. He's dealt with Vlad, and he was practically ah... Just as violent.
Well. Half of his... goons (he can't say that without snickering, but it's not like he can say manservants or butlers with a straight face either) were human, and the other half were ghosts. Vlad and his Kronk's were shitty at the whole "mafia" thing in Amity, but he supposes you could call them that.
Danny didn't want to follow Sam around like the dog he joked about earlier, so he decided the best bet was food. Food and staying in the bathroom for most of the time.
The food choices were grim. Well, grim for him as an average fifteen-year-old who ate pizza or his sister's cooking all the time. There was some sort of charcuterie ("Shark coochie," Tucker had proclaimed at a Amity gala to see how much sparkling water Sam could accidentally snort up her nose) cup arranged fancily, something with those fish eggs, and a vast amount of other things that looked needlessly expensive and modern.
Danny plucked up the least offensive looking item, some sort of mini fruit tart, sniffed it, and tossed it down the hatch. It was really rich, a bit too sweet and dry like something he'd get out of an army MRE. Money can't buy tastebuds.
He tried swallowing it down, but the crumbs and its congealed little fruit paste got stuck in his throat. Yuck, yuck, fucking yuck. He decides to make a tactical retreat to the bathroom sooner than he'd anticipated his Fucks To Give to run out.
Slipping into the, of course, opulent crapper, he sticks his head underneath one of the golden faucet to drink some water. God, if Sam knew what he was doing, he would get his ass reemed and probably get called Danny the Dachshund or something equally terrible.
He was mid-drink when a boy, probably a few years older than him, opened and shut the door, leaning against it with a drained sigh.
They made eye contact.
Danny, with a slightly wrinkled and suit too large, lapping water out of a marble-counter gold sink. The boy in comparison had twists (like Tucker had once, but it looked to be a lot more maintained and professionally done), a clean cut suit, and the farthest thing from disheveled. Tired, though.
It was really long, awkward eye contact and Danny got water all over his cheeks because he's an idiot. He stood straight, wiped his face with his sleeve and remembered that in polite company, that was really unhygienic and let his arm drop to his side.
"Hi?" Danny offered.
"Hi," The boy seemed to drag out the short word, just staring at Danny like he was looking right through his flesh and into his core. He scratched the back of his head.
"Um. Am I in your way or...?" Ignoring that it was an empty fucking bathroom, maybe Mr. Perfect Black Tux With Accents of Yellow was deeply connected with this specific sink he was drinking out of.
"No. No," He waved his hand a little bit, stepping away from the door and just standing there. Staring at Danny like he was a bug in one of those children bug collectors.
Awwwwkwarrrrd.
"Those fruit tarts are horrific," Danny starts, emphatically. Danny hopes he's seeing a kindred spirit in this guy and not that Sam gave him a concussion earlier.
Unknown Teenager gives a look of confused incredulity, probably at his passion of hate for expensive desserts, before nodding slowly. "They're not the best. The spread is terrible, even for 'high society.'"
"Yeah, someone was definitely high when they chose it," Danny snipes unapologetically, and it unexpectedly brought a grin to the boy's face.
Danny learns that his name is Duke Thomas, no, he does not need to go to the bathroom, and he thinks that Bruce Wayne is going to add a chandelier to one of the bathrooms soon just to win the high and mighty measuring contest that rich pricks (ha) do.
They get along well, so Danny offers Duke half of his off-brand Nature Valley granola bar he shoved in his GoodWill suit jacket. It is crushed to about bits from wrestling with Sam on the floor of the limo.
Duke hesitates, pressing his lips together and analyzing Danny again. To ignore his skin crawling, he jokes, "Dude, if I was going to poison you, I'd just give you one of those fruit tarts."
Duke laughed in that kind of hesitant laugh where he didn't know if Danny was joking or not.
Everyone here was so weird. He should've leapt out of the car window, self preservation be damned.
The kid had been thrown to the wolves too, as he had said with a weary sigh, like it was more predictable than upsetting. For complete strangers who met inside a bathroom at a mafia party and getting crumbs everywhere on the (also marble, what the fuck) floors, they got along surprisingly well.
Duke was more suave than Tucker and less inclined to anger than Sam. Nice guy, if a little strange and stared a bit too much when Danny thought he couldn't see him doing so.
Danny was about to suggest they maybe leave the shitter to have a better conversation when his senses prickled.
Conversation had stopped outside, and he could see Duke twitch slightly as well.
A blood-curdling scream cut through the air, even through the thick doors of the bathroom, and then a singular gunshot.
Oh man, I'm so fucked, Danny thought, before running out with Duke hot on his heels, and so, so stupid.
why I have been inactive:
I present to you Mr. Spock. he was nicknamed the Don’t Kill Yourself Dog but my shrink disagreed. he eats my ankles and rocks sometimes
"I'm pregnant!" Phantom yells inside a crowded, Justice League meeting.
Now, objectively, Danny is a teenage, biological male and ghost. While he might— emphasis on might— be able to manipulate his ghost form to create a few appearance changes, he can't make an entire organ.
Also, that would mean ghost periods and whatever. He's going to save that for human health class because he would rather die (again) than go to Frostbite about this hypothetical ovary.
So, theres no logical way for him to pop out a McDonalds toy from his Happy Meal. Or however people allude to childbirth.
"I don't know how to drive!"
"What? How do you not know how to drive?!"
"I died at fourteen!" He yelped out, hitting the gas despite Spoiler gripping the handles from the roof. "You can't get the license in my ghost world!"
"I'm going to die. This is the stupidest way of dying, oh my god—"
"Focus, you two! We have bigger issues than how legal this is!" Harper snapped, holding down the bandages to Duke's shoulder.
"Do I need to sing the Dumb Ways to Die song to make you understand—!"
Danny made a sharp turn, the wheels of a Honda Civic squealing against the rain slicked Gotham pavement. Spoiler screamed. Signal groaned.
"Stephanie! Shut up!"
"Your name is Stephanie? What are you, a 2000s mean girl?"
"Thanks, Bluebird, now Little Freshman Boy knows my name!"
"Hey!" Danny squawked, trying to keep his eyes on the road and not run into anything on the empty streets. The bullets had stopped spraying a couple boulevards before, but he still drove like a madman.
"If he doesn't crash us on a power line, Batman will string your organs on one for that!"
"What the fuck?!" Phantom cried out at that, horrified. When he had come to Gotham to stop the Guys in White from expanding, he hadn't really planned to get involved with the Bats.
Or a gang war, for that matter.
"Great, now you're fear mongering the child! The one who's driving, if I may add!"
"I'm not a chil—"
"Yes, you are," came the chorus from all of them, even from Signal's clenched teeth.
"Where do I turn?" Danny asked instead, weaving through side streets and ignoring signs he wasn't even trying to read.
"Next stop sign, Shortstuff." Bluebird replied, trying to reposition herself to continue giving first aid to a semi-conscious Duke.
"I'm going to crash us on purpose for that—"
"The hell you are! I will toss your scrawny ass out the window, so help me god." Steph shrieked, blonde hair frizzy and nose bloody. Danny was 67% sure she had gotten a concussion earlier.
"Calm it, Britney Spears—"
"It's Stephanie!"
"Same thing!" Danny hit the breaks as they came skidding up to an average, squat apartment complex with billboards shining down. The whole car rocked with momentum. "Sorry," the ghost said, mildly apologetic.
"I," Bluebird said, exhaling heavily and shakily after a moment of still silence, "am never going on a patrol with you guys again."
Duke gave a pained groan of agreement from where he had fallen in between the seats.
Phantom's grip was white-knuckled on the steering wheel as he slowly turned his head towards Spoiler. "So, uhm, did I pass my driving test, teach?"
"I'm going to be sick," was all Stephanie moaned as she fumbled out of the beaten-up car door and onto the wet ground below.
"Don't lay on the concrete, you're going to get stabbed by a used needle." Bluebird called out from the shot-through window, swinging her door open as well and hauling out Signal.
"I'm a Gothamite, my mortal coil can't be harmed by that."
"Can your 'mortal coil' help me with this mortal injury?"
Stephanie and Harper both linked their arms underneath Duke's armpits, helping him into the apartment complex. Danny locked up their (stolen) car, only one light blinking when he did.
The two of them were still bickering as he hurried inside, wiping his palms of the blood that came from various scratches all over his hands. "Look, your unresolved romantic tension is cute, but can we focus on getting making sure the Traffic Cone of Justice doesn't die?"
"Oh, Dick is going to love this one," Stephanie grumbled as they pushed the button for the 3rd and final floor.
"Steph." Bluebird hissed, trying to punch her while still supporting Signal.
"I'm a minor! I don't want dick! And I'm straight!"
"No, not like— Oh ew. No! We have a friend named Dick."
Bluebird only gave him a raised eyebrow at the straight comment, and a once-over to his costume. "You sure 'bout that?"
"You guys are insane," Was all Danny could manage as the elevator gave a cheerful ding.
"Oh yes, and you're mister Psychologically Stable over here."
He was then unable to say much more as Spoiler dropped half of Signal onto him and ran towards one of the doors, banging on it with her fist.
Danny was about to ask, half-hysterically, about if this wasn't their apartment but the door swung open. A scarred man with a rumpled t-shirt and sweatpants loomed over the four teens.
"What," the dead man growled, "the fuck are you doing here. And who the hell is he?"
Phantom's brain, malfunctioning from the adrenaline rush and in genuine shock of another sorta halfa, blurted, "You're dead?"
All eyes slowly turned onto him like a horror movie.
"Oops."
Sam is firm in her belief that hating popular things doesn't make you any more cool.
And she? She is cool.
Well. She hates most mainstream stuff since it's shallow and overrated, but she'll let this be an exception.
Never mind that Danny and Tucker didn't believe she cool then, and certainly don't now when she's dragging them to Chicago.
Besides. She wants to cosplay as a goth teenager with absolutely no background in pseudo-vigilantism and somewhat ethical ghost hunting.
If only her two idiots would stop ruining her delusion.
"Wee are Lex Luthorrr, we caaaarry the flaaame!"
"I'm going to kill you," Sam stated, matter-of-factly.
Tucker saw the honesty in that statement and yelped, ducking behind Danny like a 5'5" skinny kid was a shield.
Researching Captain Marvel villains is such a strange experience.
Like, oh, haha! There's just a dude named just "Crime Man", or a guy named Ice King who tried to take over some small town in Alaska—
Oh, that's a racist depiction of a POC or culture—
Wait, is that Benito Mussolini????
It's okay (to let Sam Manson punch Nazis)
Although I've seen many environmentalist, witchy and chaotic Sam Manson, I feel the alternative Sam interpretations are a bit lacking.
As seen by many episodes, she openly cares a lot about activism and her own opinions. She seems to be against conformity and pro individualism and self-expression (albeit, in a bit of a flawed way, but I contribute that to the weird writing of teenage girls and the teenage girl part).
So... It's absolutely not a stretch for her to be heavily anti-facist, anti-consumerist and mega-corps while also being heavy on protecting the ecosystem and marginalized groups.
I know, it might be scary to point out issues in literature— it can be an escape from the world, or you might fear that others will disagree with you.
But if you want to write a realistic, Jewish, goth teenage girl?
Give her a little bit of rage and character.
So, send her to protests! She's going to hate Vlad and his company and shit on him online! Have her be apart of the community! Have her get a cool piercing, cut her hair weird, wear trad goth makeup! Have her go to concerts, have band t-shirts and merch, make patches!
No, you will not be smote by the goth gods if you can't name a niche goth band or can't get everything right about characterization. Perfection is not the expectation, nor even the encouragement.
And if you're against everything that she stands for? Well, firstly, fuck you. And secondly, you shouldn't be contributing to a fandom where a they hate on a corrupt government agency which hurts and terrorizes citizens with guns because there's entities they deem "other."
Do a bit of research on Ecosia. Find a goth/riot grrl/punk band she might like.
Just give it a shot.
It's the name of the game to get injured being Phantom. Late nights or early mornings in different friends houses or in his own bathtub, patching up injuries with hissed exhales and clenched teeth.
Tucker has seen him missing a good chunk of his shoulder. Sam's stitched up his wounds; jutting slashes of his stomach before finals. Jazz has seen the worst— the wounds inflicted by their parents— and her fingers only shook minorly while applying ecto-burn cream.
No one outside of their friend group really notices. Long-sleeved shirts are shields and his reputation is his wielded weapon.
He just... kinda assumes it's the same everywhere as it is in Amity Park.
When Danny is forced into a Wayne gala as a begrudging plus-one to Vlad, and Sam weasels into joining them through pure spite and manipulation.
It's downright miserable, especially since he and Vlad had duked it out barely minutes before they stepped through the extravagant doors. Their usual spat made him feel weak and his hands and arms were stinging like crazy, even in human form.
Sam drags him into an empty room the moment she sees him, and only then did Danny notice that he's bleeding. His clenched fists had hid it initially, but now there's red and green tinged blood spreading and smearing on his hands.
"Where am I bleeding now?" Danny questions, almost sounding like he's whining. It's deeply resigned, exasperated, and definitely frustrated.
It's not the first time where he has millions of cuts or injuries and he doesn't know where he's bleeding from.
He instinctually removes his scratchy dress shirt to see if there's more damage on his arms. Scars criss-cross around his entire upper body, and there's more serious burns and cuts than he'd assumed from the fight with Vlad, but neither of the fifteen-year-olds are disturbed.
Why would they be? He's Phantom, and they've done patch-ups everywhere, dozens of times.
It's at this moment that Bruce Wayne stepped into a distant side room to take a call and comes across one Daniel Fenton and Samantha Manson.
Bruce Wayne stares at them, his phone pressed to his ear.
Danny and Sam stare at Bruce Wayne.
There is a tiny stream of blood that Danny can feel running down his arm like a raindrop on a car window, and Sam's hands pressed against a burn scar on his rib. Guess he hadn't dodged one of Vlad's shots faster than he thought he did.
His stupid dress shirt is tossed over to the side, wrinkled on the floor and very noticeably bloodstained in the places he had been injured. The only reason nobody else had noticed was because he'd been saved by the stupid jacket he'd been forced to wear.
None of that really fuckin' matters though because Bruce freakin' Wayne is right there, staring at the two of them with a gobsmacked expression. Danny really wants to disappear right about now.
"Shit," he breathes, and bites back a wince at the way it lances a sting of pain up his lungs, "I thought you locked the door."
"So did I." Sam says, equally as faint as he. He bets they're wearing the same dumbstruck looks on their faces.
Crap. Crap. Crap. Think fast, Fenton! What can he do to get out of this?
"Do you take bribes?" He blurts out.
Bruce does not ask follow-up questions out loud.
He files information away the way a knife slides into a sheath—quiet, precise, already planning what comes next.
• Fifteen-year-old boy
• Covered in old scars and fresh wounds
• Casual familiarity with being patched up in bathrooms
• Another adult—Vlad Masters—named repeatedly
• “Obsessed with me,” said with bitter resignation
• Vlad present minutes before injuries worsen
• The kid immediately defaults to bribery and cover-ups
Bruce’s stomach turns.
Not with shock.
With recognition.
Because he has seen this exact constellation of behavior before—too many times—and it never means anything good.
Danny just doesn't know what to say.
Wow, he wants to think, the unbeatable tongue of Daniel Fenton has been defeated.
All he can grasp is fear at the moment, short and blinding, his inhales becoming sharper and more increased. It tugs at the injury— he should've dodged better, this was his fault now— and he presses a hand to it despite Sam's increasingly loud noises of disagreement.
"He's— Vlad. He just."
He waved his free hand wildly. It's not like he wants to defend the fruitloop, but what can he do right now?
DC x DP Prompt — Adult, On Occasion (Part 4)
TW: Implied child death, minor and implied suicide attempts, injuries.
"What am I doing with my life," Danny grumbled, slumping over on the couches of the Fenton household.
"Maybe if you hadn't chugged ectoplasm like we're in a drinking game you wouldn't be debating your mortality, Danny."
"Sam, be nice." Jazz sighed, laying on the cold hardwood floors and sipping intermittently at a crinkled plastic water bottle.
"For real." Tucker agreed, hooking up a camera with one hand while the other shoved beef jerky into his mouth.
"Sorry."
DC x DP Prompt — Adult, On Occasion (Part 3)
TW: Discussions and descriptions of child & infant death, implied trafficking, implied war and injuries.
There’s another fire.
To Danny, at this point, it shouldn’t be all that surprising. Some kids didn’t know the burner was left on. Apartment complexes, especially in places like Poland, were big.
He just really wishes there weren’t so many.
DC x DP x Polar Express
Danny had long gotten used to not being able to sleep on Christmas Eve. It wasn't because the excitement, not because of ghosts.
It was his parents.
They were fighting again. This time, louder than usual. Nothing had been thrown yet, but their voices rose and fell, arguing about Santa, about how a sleigh couldn’t possibly go that fast, about everything and nothing in between.
He hadn't even been able to go out as Phantom today with their hatred of him from last year's fiasco. He already tried this week and lost a lot of ectoplasm from a shoulder wound because of it.
The fifteen-year-old groaned, rolling to stuff a pillow on top of his head to stop the fighting.
Santa's probably not even real, he grouched, just shut up and go to bed.
Maybe a minute later, their voices cut off abruptly. Before he could bask in the relief of silence, he noticed his clock had stopped, too.
DC X DP Prompt — The Monster Motel (PT2)
Duke peeked past the corner of the hallways, trying to get a glimpse of an entity.
A fireball shot straight towards his head and he jerked back behind the yellowed motel wallpaper.
"Danny!" He hissed.
"Gimme a sec."
There was a clang, a sound of a foam fire extinguisher, and a inhuman scream that rattled his teeth.
He waited a moment, because he didn't want his head to turn into a grey matter piñata, before rounding the corner.
It seems his mop and makeshift shield weren't needed, as a husk of something gnarled and demon-like was already dead as the hell it came from.
"Eugh. Do they always look like a gargoyle that went through Chernobyl blender, or is this one just a heartthrob?"
Danny shrugged, wiping off the foam from his stained jeans. "Dunno, never really examined them for a pageant."
Said creature's body began to almost... crumble. Duke hesitantly gave a tap to its head, and yelped when it turn into an ashy sort of dust.
"Where the fuck do these things keep coming from?"
"My best guess is the basement or we have an angry tenant who likes summoning them."
The basement. Duke would rather kiss a mutated cockroach than go down there. If he thought the motel was scary then the underground was even worse. He wouldn't be surprised if Evil Cults Anonymous had weekly meetings there; it fit the vibe.
"I am not going to the basement."
"Cmoon. Have I ever let you get hurt?"
"Yes! Multiple times! And you laughed for like, all of them!"
"Look, I didn't know you were like, a glorified lamp to Mothman. Besides, they only tried to throw you into the air." Danny, despite being 5'5" and a solid thirty pounds lighter, began to steer him towards the door to the basement.
"I hate you. I hate you so much."
"Remember, my young intern, workplace etiquette."
"You literally told a customer to 'shove his long balloon up his ass if he wanted to be a dick so much.'"
"He was a Joker goon. I didn't want you trying to kill him."
"I hate you."
"Now you're only saying that because I wouldn't teach you how to hide a body."
-
“Are you sure this is safe?”
“Oh, absolutely not.” Danny replied, almost cheerfully, stopping in front of a door had a suspiciously rusty colored brown splatter all across it.
There was one buzzing, yellowed light above the way, and Duke gripped his beat up metal flashlight for dear life. It swung open with an ominous creak, and something in his gut was telling him to get out.
So of course, Danny started to hum a Lady Gaga song that had been playing on the buzzy radio in the break room earlier.
“Danny. Why are they staring at me.”
The pull-string bulb wouldn’t turn on, predictably, and he kept the beam of light over what looked to be a Victorian-esq painting. Whose eyes were literally following him.
I’m going to die here, Duke thought, for the fifth time this shift.
It stank of mildew and ozone down here. They hadn’t even gotten past the storage room into the unfinished part of the basement and he wanted to run for his life.
Sounded about right for this place.
“Hey, hey. Staring is rude.” The boy wagged his finger at the painting, who blinked and mimed the gesture.
“Hooly shit. That is creepy as fuck.”
“Don’t be rude either, Dukey.”
The African American’s face pinched. “Never, ever call me that again.”
“Fine. Regardless, they’re probably just a shade stuck in an inanimate object. We can probably do an exorcism.”
“We? Who is we?”
"Mm. You know. Trench coat man."
Duke mutters something unkind and very unprofessional. Danny, predictably, ignores him and swings open the next door.
It smells like blood.
"Damn it all, Danny, I better not have walked into a fuckin' murder scene—"
"Hey man," his pseudo-mentor says, and he freezes at the tone. Danny is nonchalant to his core, and the almost tense, forced casual of it is more horrifying than the demons they'd faced this week. "Don't take any steps closer. Let's just turn around and go back upstairs, yeah?"
He doesn't trust his vocal cords, so he slowly nods and carefully turns, grabbing onto the corpse cold arm of his friends as they walk past the door and up the poorly nailed stairs.
"Danny, and I mean this with my entire fucking heart: what the fuck just happened."
"So!" The boy said, with forced enthusiasm. "Good news: we're not cursed to eternal damnation! Bad news, to put it simply, there's a portal to hell in our basement and a big, evil demon who knows its open."
We're cooked, Duke thought, blankly. He'll compartmentalize and scream about it later.
"Oh. And you get to meet trench coat man."
"Is that good news or bad news?"
"Errr. Ambiguous."
Duke buried his face in his hands. How did he decide that this was more safe that drug running for Red Hood. "Joy and happiness."
At some point in the future, Constantine is called by Batman to Gotham and runs into Signal in the Batcave.
Constantine: Bloody hell- fuck no!
Duke: Don't worry, Bruce only.
Constantine: Oh, thank fuck.
Bruce: Duke?
Duke: No.
Bruce: No?
Constantine: No. If you don't already know, mate, you do. Not. Want. To. Know.
Later when it's just Duke and Constantine with no Bats or Birds to hear them, not even Oracle, they catch up a little.
Duke: You know, looking back, it wasn't all bad.
Constantine: ... you're fucking insane. You willingly go back even though you don't need the money anymore.
Duke: What can I say? It grows on you. Besides, Danny's a friend.
Constantine: Yeah... a friend... I remember, with vivid detail and clarity, you cursing out that "friend" and calling him crazy.
Duke: So there were some rough patches, we're cool now. Oh, and I told him you're here, so you should come visit. Or at least expect him to make you visit.
Constantine: ... you vindictive little shit-
