DP AU - Timeless Journey
What if the Infini-Map episode was more like individual, full-scale journeys. Like, the map deactivates for a period of time after each leap, so Vlad & Team Phantom have to survive in each time until then. Because of this, they are essentially stuck for months at a time. Like, depending on how far into the future/past it sends someone, the more it drains the map & the longer it takes for it to recharge. Sending people to other places in the same time is small beans, but sending people through time is difficult.
So, they literally have to dress & act the part while becoming part of the legends there.
Like, there was this one Danny Phantom x Teen Titans fic that did this with the Ancient Asia time & it was super cool!
Like, in these times, they have other things to contend with besides Vlad. In fact, Vlad is about the only Hereafter Ghost that they have to fight & as such, they have to adjust how they fight.
In Rome, they have to fight monsters. In Salem, they are hunted regularly by Supernatural hunters, legit human-sacrificing, devil-worshiping witches, zealous Puritans, monsters, & angry Natives. In Asia, they have to go against Yaoguai & Youkai, as well as Yuurei.
In Salem, it becomes apparent that it's far more complicated than just black & white. For one, there are legit witches & then there are people who just wanna live their lives in a way that might not be entirely endorced by the general public. There are also true Children of God Christians who want to live a good life in His honor, then there are religious zealots that go way too far, & then there are those who use their religion to manipulate others & as a ticket to further their own agendas or to spread hate. Not to mention how there were places where there was conflict between settlers & Natives where in some places it was the settlers who attack, while in others, it was the Natives.
They were especially surprised to see how the 2 sides delt with the other's dead. Generally, settlers just killed & buried, & sometimes so did the Natives. However, there were also tribes that actually did scalp people or even ate the losers in order to 'gain their power.' At the same time, there were also plenty of places where the 2 sides actually got along very well.
Sam is especially shocked to learn that it actually wasn't a genocide as genocides imply an intent & concerted effort by a people to cause an entire population to go extinct. Yes, there were dickwads that mistreated them, but there are assholes like that everywhere, you can't get rid of 'em. It wasn't the norm, nor the goal. In fact, what killed most of the Natives were diseases accidentally brought over by the English. That isn't genocide. That's an accident.
As for the reason behind Lincoln's execution of 38 indigenous individuals. From what I'm seeing, the Dakota killed hundreds of settlers & took many hostages, hundreds infact; most of said hostages being women & children. Not just white people either, but "mixed-blood" as well. True, their land was taken, they were asked to stop their traditional hunting practices, forced to farm (after which there was crop failure, a harsh winter, & depletion of wild game due to poor hunting practices; none of which besides the poor hunting was something that could've possibly been predicted at the time by either the Dakota or the settlers), they were promised provisions & annuity which, just before the war they didn't get, & they weren't able to trade because of the Civil War.
All these things were obviously wrong & unfair, & I can definitely understand their anger, but the Dakota also shouldn't have attacked & killed so many people in retaliation. Protest should always be your first option in these situations.
At the end of the war, 2,000 Dakota either surrendered or were taken into custody. This included 1,658 non-combatants, as well as those who opposed the war & tried to free the hostages. In actuality, out of all those people, only a little more than 300 Dakota men were initially sentenced to death. Then, Lincoln came in, reviewed the cases, & reduced that number even further until it was only 39. Even then, one later got a reprieve, so the total was reduced to 38!
Only 38 out of 2,000!
The likelihood that even one of those 38 Dakota were innocent is very low. And the fact that it was so few meant that Lincoln was trying his damnedest to salvage the situation!
If it were a true genocide, each & every one of those 2,000 Dakota, including the 1,658 non-combatants & indigenous who didn't agree with the war & tried to free the hostages & the "mixed-bloods," would've also been killed, but they weren't!
Also keep in mind that what we know of today as Native Americans weren't even the original occupants of America. Most Natives can trace their lineage back to Asia because the Natives migrated to America from across the Baring Straight. Those migrants then either fought with the original inhabitants of America or mixed with them exactly like how the English did, so Natives have no more claim over American land than modern Americans.
Back then, land was obtained via right of conquest because, whether you like it or not, back then the general belief was might makes right.
The same could be said of the Natives. They waged wars between each other all the time. Not just with the white man. And when one tribe won, what do you think happened? The winner took the losers, either their belongings, people, or land. Sometimes all 3. Life was just cruel back then. So, why is it okay when the Native Americans did it, but when the white man did it, it was wrong?
That's what we in the business call a double standard.
It is very much not just black & white.
While briefly in Japan, specifically, Danny is called a Hanyuu, or 'Half-Spirit' & is often targeted by Youkai, Buddhist monks, Taijiya, as well as Shinto Miko & Kanushi. He has a similar journey there to what was described in the Teen Titans Crossover fic I mentioned.
Like, I'd like to see character growth in the trio especially. Especially in Sam who, as a very modern, vegan, & obviously left-leaning, feminist individual, has to learn that women actually have it super good back home. That she is not oppressed &, in fact, even has a couple of freedoms that men don't. Also that if she doesn't eat meat in these times, it's actually possible that she might not eat for long periods of time & might even die. At least, she definitely wouldn't be able to eat enough to keep her healthy. It's not like they made supplements back then.
Not to mention how up-in-arms she gets with a lot of the Puritans in Salem. There is this belief that she has that all of them were wicked & evil & were genocidal maniac zealots & barbaric slavers, but she's very quickly confronted with the fact that most of them were actually just people.
Let's not forget how much Tucker actually learns about actual slavery & racism. Yeah, the Emancipation Proclaimation was passed at least a decade before the time that they arrive there, but prejudices still ran very high. Like, he never really knew that there were black plantation owners & while he knew, conceptually, that slavery was a world-wide issue, it never really clicked inside his head what that meant. Such as the fact that there were white slaves such as the Irish or that 99% of the black slaves in America had not been stolen from Africa by white colonists, but rather sold by other African natives such as the Dahomey. Let alone the fact that the Barbary Pirates had more white slaves in Africa than there ever were black slaves in America.
It's only here in this journey to different times & countries that he realizes that slavery was legitimately a world-wide pandemic. That it had existed since the foundation of human history & had a handhold in practically every country. That people didn't simply imprison other cultures or races because of racism. Rather, the strong enslaved the weak. To the victor went the spoils & that included the people of the same race. If you lost, you were likely enslaved.
Hell, slavery was even worse in Rome than it ever was in America. Tucker never knew that in Rome it was entirely legal if a slave killed their master, for every slave in that household to then be executed to dissuade rebellion. THAT'S NUTS!!
Then, to connect the fact that the very word "Slave" was derived from Slavs who were white themselves & were often enslaved in the Ottoman Empire. It was mind-boggling.
As such, in modern times, there was likely not a single human alive that wasn't descended from at least one slave. No one group had more right to being angry about it than anyone else. If anything, white people should be proud because they can truthfully say that their ancestors ended slavery. Or, at least made it illegal in most of the free world. No other race has done more to end slavery than those demonized most today. If not for this, it's highly likely that slavery never would've ended. In fact, no other country has ever had slavery as part of their institution for such a short amount of time as America. No other country has abolished it so quickly after their inception.
Hell, Sam is Jewish! They'd been enslaved multiple times! They'd been culled in Egypt & had a genocide waged upon them! Sure, the genocide failed, but only due to American intervention.
So, the entire idea of reparations is sheer lunacy because if one group that'd suffered from slavery got reparations, then shouldn't every other group that suffered through it too? Including those of European descent? Realistically, if everyone got reparations for their ancestors' suffering in slavery, then how would you even keep track of the exchange of money because, again, literally every person on the planet probably has a slave ancestor.
And if you say that only those who suffered the most should get reparations, then how do you even measure that?? You can only know this sort of thing through deep, deep research. Do you have any idea the amount of money it would take to figure all that out? It'd probably take more money to sus all this out than to actually pay reparations! Then there's the reparations on top of that?? Entire countries would go bankrupt all to soothe a phantom hurt that no one still alive actually experienced for themselves! A hurt that isn't even secondhand!
You don't heal generational trauma with freaking money!
And just like with Natives, African tribes waged war against each other & took the spoils including people & land from the losers all the time! So, why was it perfectly fine for the black man to do this, but not for the white man? Why does everyone hold the white man to such a high standard??
But I digress.
Either way, Tucker & Danny become the designated hunters of the group, while Sam forages. With how naturally archery came to him in Beauty Marked, I see Tucker getting very good & seemed to be oddly suited to the life of a hunter, to Sam's growing anger.
However, she is quickly forced to either eat meat or die because, without her supplements or access to a wide enough variety of vegetables, she becomes very sick.
Then, one night she was attacked by a bear who would've killed her if not for Tucker's shooting. Sam's automatic response was to go ballistic on him for killing an animal, until he told her that it would've killed her. Period.
It wasn't playing games, it would've killed her & she expected him, her best friend, to do nothing? To what? Choose the bear's life over hers? Hard pass.
That already was humbling, but then Tucker later taught her a hard lesson in the natural order; you kill it, you eat it.
She'd been attacked again, but neither Tucker nor Danny had been near & so she was forced to defend herself.
The cougar that had attacked her, went down with a lucky shot to the head.
The thing was, when Tucker, Danny, & an old, grisled hunter who lived nearby found her crying over it, the old man told her that they had to use its parts or it'd rot & it'd have died for nothing. That she needed to take responsibility for the life she took.
It was a hard lesson for Sam to learn. She sobbed as she ate the cougar's meat. As much as she hated to admit it, it was the most delicious thing she'd tasted in a long time. Due to her stubborn adherence to veganism, she'd been slowly starving herself.
It was here that she finally realized that not everyone had the luxury of veganism. That it was only possible because of modern convenience & if society were to collapse, the stubborn vegans would be the first ones to die.