living bomb steph
or, a reverse robins fic in which Red Hood Steph takes Bruce's place getting lost in the time stream... except that instead of being thrown through time, she's thrown through the multiverse
ao3 link (full chapter 1 with workskin formatting): https://archiveofourown.org/works/43764253
no hearts in my hands but i've got diamonds up my sleeves
prompt fill: rejected soulmates Tim Drake & Danny Fenton + thief Danny pulling Tim's pigtails
tumblr links: original prompt; part 1; part 2; part 3; wip wed ch 4 snippet; ch 1 fanart by 1princessbeast
ao3 link (chapters 1-3 + omake): https://archiveofourown.org/works/44164414
Obligatory Clone!Danny
prompt fill: clone!danny greets his template with a "hi dad" and then dips, only to have the template follow him home
Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov was a lieutenant colonel of the Soviet Air Defence Forces who became known as “the man who single-handedly saved the world from nuclear war” for his role in the 1983 Soviet nuclear false alarm incident. The incident was unknown to the public until it was revealed shortly before the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.
On 26 September 1983, during the Cold War, the satellite-based early-warning system of the Soviet Union reported the launch of multiple intercontinental ballistic missiles from the United States. At the time, tensions with the U.S. were on edge, and high officials of the Soviet Union, including General Secretary Yuri Andropov, were thought to be highly suspicious of a U.S. attack.
Petrov checked ground-based radars which had not detected a launch, noted that the warning system had detected only 1-5 missiles instead of the hundreds that would have been expected in the event of a first strike, and chose to mark the system alert as a false alarm. This decision is seen as having prevented a retaliatory nuclear attack, which would have probably resulted in immediate escalation of the Cold War stalemate to a full-scale nuclear war and the deaths of hundreds of millions of people. Investigation of the satellite warning system later confirmed that the system had indeed malfunctioned.
While it is highly probable that if Petrov had reported this incident to his superiors they would have come to the same conclusion, it was a point in time when many people feared that the Cold War might become hot. Andropov, the new Soviet leader, was considered weak by the US president Ronald Reagan, and the Western countries were deploying new missile installation in Europe to counter existing missiles in the Eastern Bloc. This fear of nuclear war meant that at this time the peace movement in most western countries reached one of its highest levels.
i think the thing about batman's no kill rule is that its essentially bruce saying "guilty people don't deserve to be murdered on the street either, actually." and he's not wrong.
Saying this with no vitriol, just a complete lack of understanding of this viewpoint:
Killing is wrong. Beatings are wrong. Violating privacy is wrong. Torture is wrong. Except for that first one, these are all tactics Batman uses. He's not Superman. He wasn't made to fight the same types of threats as Superman.
"Killing is wrong" is a child's level of understanding of morality. Reducing the response to criticisms of Batman's "no-killing" rule to that level of simplicity ignores the context of those criticisms to a level that I genuinely am baffled by.
It's not the regard for life that gets criticism, it's the absolutism. The complete disregard for context or scale, and the willingness to do literally anything besides killing, as though killing is the worst thing one can do and the only line that can't be crossed.
A compassionate Batman is heroic.
An extremist authoritarian Batman is a villain.
Batman refuses to kill. No one has the right to make him do so. He might have saved more lives if he'd chosen to do so at times, but he has no obligation to. That's fine.
Batman resorts to extreme, shockingly lethal and abusive measures to prevent his children from killing, even in self-defense or the defense of others. That's insanity.
I have now read All Systems Red from The Murderbot Diaries, and I think the main charm of it is I went in fully expecting a "Humans treat robots like appliances then some of them slowly learn not to because of This One Special Example" but instead the crew immediately goes "No, Murderbot is a person. Look at it, it's got anxiety."
Meanwhile, Murderbot itself is like "Why was I cursed with a face. Please treat me like an appliance so I don't have to make eye contact with any of you. I've got anxiety."
oh hey, yeah, I'm alive. here, have some Red Hood Steph, now featuring: Jason (as Robin) from Arkham Knight
content warnings for canon-typical violence, body horror, and non-consensual body modifications
Steph hated being conscious when she world-hopped. The problem with being restored to exactly as she had been when she’d gotten hit by that energy beam was that she was exactly as she had been back then.
As in, she always started out without any of the memories she’d made beyond that point.
She had a moment of disorientation before the electrum kicked in. The restoration of her mind was accompanied by brain zaps, as well as the uncomfortable knowledge that she was trusting the veracity of memories given to her by evil magic metal forcefully implanted in her jaw by a cult.
Still, she’d been trusting it since the first time it had restored her mind. She’d had a stroke back when she was being mind-controlled by the Court and two rogues simultaneously. When her healing had kicked in, the regeneration seemed to consider “healed” to mean restoring her mind to its vanilla, autonomous state. Madame Xanadu had later told her she’d been lucky it considered her memory part of her healed state at all, never mind its accuracy.
Sometimes you just had to accept reality as it appeared and let Arkham sort out the results.
Steph wasn’t sure how her evil magic tooth actually stored the memories it returned to her. She sure couldn’t save data on her USBs or helmet storage. She presumed it has something to do with being evil and magic. Prooobably unrelated to it being her tooth, but what did she know?
...Whatever the tooth told her she knew, apparently.
Before Steph had gotten here, she’d been in a cave below Arkham Asylum, lit by the glowing waters of a Lazarus Pit. She’d been following up on her murder of that universe’s Joker by preventing Harley Quinn from throwing his corpse into the pit. Would the waters revive him in that universe? Would they absorb him and add some purple to their garish green light? That world would never know.
She was now in a dimly-lit facility with no windows, so she was presumably still underground. A quick mental prodding at her helmet got it connected to local satellite GPS data, which she pulled up on her HUD to confirm she was still beneath the asylum. Apparently, it had a basement in this world.
The filth accumulated on the walls and floor indicated that it was not maintained by staff, however. Best to move cautiously as she explored—
Deranged laughter echoed through the rusted metal hallways. Steph closed her eyes and huffed an exasperated breath.
That was absolutely the Joker. Again.
“What am I, Sisyphus? Stephisus? ...Sisanie? Wow, the portmanteaus are not vibing there,” she murmured.
Her hands moved instinctively to check her gear, despite knowing exactly what she entered each world with as she wandered toward the room the laughter originated from.
As she got closer, distressed sobs became audible, which was only to be expected when the Joker was enjoying himself. She wondered idly whether it was medical staff or a security guard. If she were making bets, she’d put money on a nurse. Joker had some weird thing for them.
She came to a closed door and switched her helmet view to pick up heat signatures.
Only two people inside, the Joker and someone on their tiptoes with their arms pressed together over their head. Probably hanging by their wrists, then, just high enough that they couldn’t keep their weight on their feet.
‘Check the doorknob… there’s the joy buzzer trap. Disconnect that… Key left on the table by the door will be a fakeout for sure. Prod this bit… Aaaand open!’
Fully armored and fearing neither god nor man, Red Hood pushed open the rusty metal door with a suitably ominous creak and sauntered into the room.
Before her, Joker tapped one finger against the considerable length of his chin, tilting his head at her as he stood partially obscured by the body of some poor kid hanging by his wrists.
“Someone call for an Uber?” she asked through the distortion of her vocoder. Oooh. She regretted that instantly. Stupid multiverse; can’t even quip without worrying about where they were in their timeline. If they still used taxi cabs in this Gotham she was going to be devastated.
At least the solution was simple! The hostage wasn’t likely to remember this, so all she had to do was kill the other witness. Easy peasy.
Joker stood facing her with his arms opening wide and chest puffed out in a showman’s stance. His mouth was opening, obviously to make a dramatic statement of some kind. The victim was suspended between the Joker and Hood, obstructing the path to the Joker in a way that was definitely intentional on the villain’s part.
His body language was just as purposeful. It invited any projectiles toward center-mass, where he was almost certainly wearing protection. She didn’t bother letting him return her greeting; hand flicking to her knives and back outward faster than the eye could track.
The Joker’s throat opened in a spray of blood that blanketed the poor guy in front of him, who, now that she was looking—
Aw, maaan… That was definitely Noonie. Not even the big, alternate Red Hood version, just the barely-there “High Noon Shadow” teen version. …Or whatever the Robin equivalent of that was, anyway, based on what was left of his costume.
Joker’s hands whipped inward in a futile attempt to staunch the blood flow as he staggered, making a noise of inarticulate rage and terror.
“Yeah, rude, I know,” Steph agreed. “My bad! It’s just that your voice is really annoying.”
As his eyes flickered around in a wild panic, they paused on the dangling, blood-covered Robin. Then his mouth pulled open into a wide, hideous grin and blood spurted as he wheezed out laughter. Chest, convulsing, he let himself fall back, making absolutely revolting noises as he tried to cackle with his dying breaths.
Ominous.
“Could you die already?” she snapped. She chucked one more dagger at him, this one entering through his eye at an angle. He spasmed, then finally quieted.
“Great!” she chirped. “Now let’s get you down from there, buddy.” She moved to cut Robin down, the kid coughing as his sobs reacted poorly with his recent decision to hyperventilate. She helped him keep his footing as he hit the floor, then supported him awkwardly as he got his breath back and then went boneless.
He stared emptily at Joker’s body, and Steph had no idea what to do here. Her Jason was four and a half feet of murderous rage. He’d never once been vulnerable in front of her, and quite frankly she’d rather have her version drop from the ceiling to try beheading her again than deal with this one’s shattered emotional state.
She tried to think of what her Jason would like. Hmm. Well, she didn’t have his trick marbles, but she did have some small explosives on her. She dug through the pouch at her left hip and pulled out a detonator, waggling it in the teen’s face so he’d blink.
“Wanna blow up the corpse?” The robotic voice of her helmet managed to sound hopeful.
A moment passed, and Steph thought she might have missed the mark. But then he blinked again, and a bit of life returned to his eyes. Gingerly, he reached out and grasped the offered end of the detonator, wiping his nose with his other arm.
“Yeah,” he said wetly.
Hell yeah; who said you needed a soul to be great at the whole compassion thing? Steph had nailed this.
Tim, internally: I need to make sure my family doesn't start the shovel talk the moment we appear, I can do this, I just need to introduce him the right way
Tim, walking into the dining room, hand in hand with Danny: Bad news, Damian's grandfather stole my spleen four years ago. Good news, my boyfriend of six months returned it to me yesterday and even installed it back!
Danny, the picture perfect image of innocence: Hi!
The Batfam, who knew nothing about the missing spleen or the mere existence of a boyfriend in Tim's life: wh-
Dick: Wait, what do you mean that was your anniversary gift? It's been six months!
Danny: Yeah, I set the bar a little high. I'm already good for the one year mark though!
Bruce: ...What exactly are you planning to give him for the one year anniversary?
Danny: The Sword of Sin! It's this magic sword he got stabbed with to pass some morality test. Then the wielder decided he knew better than the magic sword and failed him anyway or something? Obviously, that guy didn't deserve to keep it, so if it liked Tim, he might as well have it, right?
Bruce: ...
Danny, pouting: Your face says you don't agree. Whatever, I'm not dating you, you don't have to like it.
Why do you think the fandom latched on the idea that Jason is super cultured despite his rough demeanor? The amusing contrast? Or was their something in the comics that showed him and Alfred bonding differently than the others?
Jason over all acts very sophisticated, speaks in a very elaborate manner, frequently uses undertones and coded language to distract or leave clues, and is over all prone to holding his helmet like Yorick’s sull.
But more than that, it’s that there are clues throughout his time as Red Hood. He sends a first edition copy of a book to Wayne Manor to let Alfred know it’s the real him back and not an imposter, leading to the revelation that they used to collect first editions together with Bruce. Then there’s also the sequences of him in the prison yard reading Pride and Prejudice.
Fans have taken it to their own ends. I personally see Jason as a theatrical person in general and have developed a persona for him around that. But it’s not coming out of thin air.
Jason Todd is a fuckin nerd ok, he was a straight-A student as Robin and perpetually concerned with keeping his grades up, even though he had one of, if not THE top GPA in his class:
94.8 94.8 are you kidding me
He was the kind of kid who cared enough to do extra credit assignments and went to MUSEUMS to do research for homework and he was apparently really REALLY skilled at writing… like ok, when Alfred says your essay about European cultural history is outstanding, you know that shit is amazing.
Which is really incredible given that Jason was a fucking fifth grade drop out what the fuck… excuse me while I just. implode on myself for a second ok
This kiddo would pour over newspapers in the high school cafeteria while the other kids at school made fun of him, and everyone at school called him a square and shit all the time LMAO.
I tried to find this one panel but I can’t locate it, but one of his classmates once said something along the lines of “that Jason Todd thinks he’s SO mature, ugh, gag me with a FORK” jfc……
And he speaks like a zillion languages, and he views himself as a modern day Lizzy Bennett, and he wears a mask under his hood SOLELY FOR DRAMATIC EFFECT good lord this child. This sweet, book loving child. He is an embarrassment and I love him.
That’s the tragedy of Jason Todd though. He was this pure, scholarly kid where Robin gave him magic. He was denied school when he was younger and when given the chance to attend school went at it with gusto.
That didn’t change with his death. He loves learning, he’s shown to care about looking after the disadvantaged. The tragedy is that his outlook on his time with Bruce is marred by his death and Bruce’s seeming inability to off one madman to save countless. Jason may be alive now, but Jason the wide eyed child who saw wonder in everything died. Now all Jason can see are the dark edges and the tarnishing behind the glamour.
God I love Jason. He’s such a deep character when he’s written by someone who loves and gets him.
Also, you can’t badmouth Jason for being dramatic when his adopted Dad is a billionaire Furry who chose vigilantism over therapy.
Hey, is it just me, or is everything but the display weaponry in his safehouse set up so that you can reach it if you're like... crawling. What a pessimistic precaution.
Danny is attending Gotham U and gets caught up in a Joker escapade and realizes the clown is, in fact, a ghost.
Suddenly everything makes an insane amount of sense: the fact that no one has killed a psycho with seemingly human-normal abilities yet, that Arkham can’t keep him for more than a week, the obsessive behavior, the appearance.
Honestly, Danny should have clocked this before he even met the spook.
And Danny doesn’t want to step on any toes, really. The Bat and the Joker have A Thing going on. But, the Batman just isn’t equipped to really put a ghost away. No wonder there’s a breakout from Arkham every couple of months. How many other Gotham rogues are obsessive ghosts haunting the city?
Joker doesn’t display any of the usual ghost powers he associates with his own “rogues”—who’ve really become more like unwanted relatives over the years what with their dropping in uninvited, making a mess, and then ditching before they had to help clean.
It strikes Danny, as he’s being tied up by the clown-costumed goons, that maybe the Joker doesn’t know.
Huh.
How does he broach the topic in a sensitive way?
“Hey, uh. Not to be rude but… You know you’re dead, right?”
Danny winces. Not like that, probably.
The Clown Prince of Crime stops in front of him, the crazed light in his eyes dimmed slightly by confusion. He glances back and forth between Danny and the students around him who are shying away from their insane classmate. (Which is. Fair.)
A menacing giggle warbles from the specter’s throat. He leans into Danny’s bubble, that eerie grin stretching somehow wider.
“Ohhhh really?” The clown draws it out and Danny can hear the crackle of static in the high notes. Honestly. How did no one figure this out before? “And are you gonna kill me, hmm? Have I got a widdle hero in my bait tank?”
“No, no, I mean, it’s not… you’re not… like? You’re not alive,” Danny rambles, trying to clarify and failing utterly. “You’re already dead.”
The Joker tilts his head, eyes dilating and glowing toxic green. He considers what Danny said, then throws his head back and cackles like a hyena.
The ghost doubles over, even, laughing so hard it sounds like he’s gonna bust something. He puts a white-gloved hand on Danny’s shoulder for support and squeezes, just shy of hurting.
After an uncomfortably long moment, the ghost wipes imaginary tears out of his eyes and pats Danny on the back so hard he stumbles and falls to his knee.
“You’re a riot, kid! If I didn’t have a date already planned…”
He trails off and ambles away, still chuckling and muttering to himself. “And they say I’m crazy! Wait til Bats hears about this!”
Danny sighs. “Hey, clown. Want to see a magic trick?”
Joker turns back around. “A magic trick?”
“It only works on the dead, y’know. So I can prove it to you. I have the supplies I need for the magic trick in my bag! Have one of your goons go to my bag - it’s the black and green one over there - and grab the thermos. It’s a silver and green cylinder.”
Joker leans forward. “I would love to see where you’re going with this, kid. Batsy and I will get a huge laugh out of it!”
“I bet you will,” Danny replied as the goon handed over the thermos. He unscrewed the cap, pointing it at the Joker.
“And now, for my next trick,” Danny announced dramatically. “I shall make the ghost in front of me disappear!”
He clicked the button, sucking the Joker into the thermos.
Everyone in the room froze. His classmates were likely thinking “Oh my god, he attacked the Joker, his goons will kill us all!”
But the goons were just staring at him. “That proves nothing, kid,” one of the said.
“Okay, well it doesn’t work on the living.” He pointed it at the goon and clicked again. Nothing happened. “See?”
“What the hell?” Red Hood’s voice came from across the room. “So Joker is actually a dead guy and has been the whole time?”
“Yup!” Danny announced. “Here. You can keep him in the thermos as long as you want. It’ll keep him sustained and contained. It looks cramped but I’ve fit 20 ghosts in here at once before, so he’ll be fine.”
Red Hood cackled. “I like you, kid. Thanks for my favorite new paperweight! I’ll come grab it from you in a sec. But first.” He turned to the goons. “Let’s deal with the living before we handle the dead.”
per anon’s request, i present to you THE best version of beatrice’s monologue in much ado about nothing. i thought about cropping this but decided this scene must be watched in its full glory
What’s really cool about this is this is the first version of this scene that I’ve seen where the tone doesnt whiplash wildly which is so hard to do!!! Bc it’s a scene that comes directly after some rough public shaming and it is both a love confession scene and a scene where a woman asks someone to kill someone and the love confession IS funny but Beatrice’s monologue is not. A lot of the other versions- even well beloved ones like the 2011 version with David Tennant and Catherine Tate- do this scene and there is emotional whiplash, audiences often laughing when Beatrice begs Benedict to kill Claudio. To see it done this way??? Oh my god the line read on “if a were a man, I would eat his heart in the marketplace” DESERVED that cheet
just for @msfcatlover, here's more from that scene in the Red Hood Steph fic:
While he had his little fit, Steph walked away, rolling her eyes beneath her helmet. Against the opposite wall was a niche she used as a storage locker. She sent the code to open it and, once it was open, she rifled through its contents. It wasn’t long before she’d found what she was looking for.
With one of her gloved hands, she snagged a heavy visor with a single opaque lens. With the other, she put her flat palm against the side of her helmet, head tilted, as though she could just cover her ears to block him out.
In reality, her audio filter evened out sound levels, letting her pick up quiet noises without being deafened by gunshots and explosions. She hadn’t prioritized more customizable volume control in the design. Hm. Is there an audio version of the “hindsight is 20/20” saying? She could come up with one; she was great at biology.
Casually, she spun the high-tech gadgetry around her forefinger as she swung the marble facade back against the wall, hearing it lock back into place.
Let’s see, ‘Hindsound is—’ Wait, no… That was dead on arrival. What the heck was hindsound?
See, this was what happened when you got home-schooled. And also brutally murdered mid-education.
Turning back, she gripped the visor, stilling its movement. She took a moment to check the power source, then activated it. When the lens lit up, she strode back to Tetch. His face was as red and wrinkled as a squalling infant’s, but without the excuse of actually being one. She didn’t wait for him to acknowledge her, just reached out and gripped his jaw to keep his head still. She shoved the visor over his face.
The sudden glare of the screen in the lens right up against his eyes startled him into a momentary silence as he tried to shrink back, squeezing his eyelids closed.
“I’m sending you schematics for the chip I’m working on. I need the subject to act naturally while carrying out my instructions, but they keep giving off that ‘drone’ vibe when they do something out of character that always tips someone off.” The Big Bat Guy had already caught the pattern, and now the courts were well on their way to establishing precedent for contesting financial decisions under mind control. Fuck her for holiday charity donations, right? Sheesh.
Tetch’s attention had been snagged by the schemetics, she could tell, but she could also tell he didn’t see why it mattered.
There was an elongated wet nasal sound, and then: “Just liquidate whatever assets you can manage until it’s spotted, my dear,” he advised. Through his wrecked throat and stuffed-up nose, it came out completely garbled: “Dusth ligvidayde bwadeba…”
Irritating translation work aside, he just zoomed straight from sobbing to lecturing with nary a pause, huh?
A mood swing like that would be suspicious from anyone, much less a rogue, but Tetch was imprisoned by his own obsession even more than he was by the fake mausoleum. He’d cooperate, just so he’d be able to go back to the dream world induced by his own technology.
“They can’t reverse withdrawals when you’ve taken it out of virtual space. Why worry about authenticity for a bit of funding?” He continued on, tone prim as though he was oblivious to his own state.
As if the point was to fund some flashy showdown. As-if. The point was to shake these assholes down to the last dime in their pockets.
And also help people. With redistribution of wealth or whatever. Sure.
“You know, you could have just said you had nothing.” Steph rolled her eyes beneath the helmet and palmed one of her knives.
“Wait!” Tetch rasped, sensing her intent. “Wait, give me just a moment, I’m looking, I promise!”
Steph let her hand drop, her thin throwing knife dropping back in its pouch. For a deranged sicko, Tetch was surprisingly good at reading the room. At least, he was when it came to saving his own sorry skin.
