Danny was just minding his business retrieving something for clockwork in some gothic city in another dimension. He could admit opening the Infi-map and showing off the wierd purple doors inside it as he tried to make heads or tails of Clockworks newest riddle looked kinda sus from an outside perspective.
That didn't mean he expected getting jumped by colorful masked vigilantes.
Or for them to fight with eachother over turf.
Nor did he expect the map to get shot by one of them and the map to freak out and teleport all of them to a new unknown location. The biggest surprise was him and "Red Robin" he couldn't resist adding "Yum" after he introduced himself, much to the two vigilantes confusion recognizing one of Kakashis ninja dogs just staring at them tiredly before asking them why they were so close to the leaf village.
Then he asked what Phantom was. Crap. Crap. Crap. Danny decided it was a great idea to saybhe was a Yokai. For some reason.
He and Red Robin were freaking out for similar reasons and both wanted to gtfo of this dimension as quick as possible while Red Hood was just curious. Danny heard the oh so familiar sound of ninjas jumping through trees in the distance and grabbed both of the older guys before booking it with them, flying as far and fast as he could while maintaining intangibility.
If Danny disappears from thier camp and comes back a few hours later with a small blond boy and a teary eyed red haired boy then who could blame him?
Bringing this back cause it would be so freaking funny for Naruto and Gaara to be adopted by the Fentons. Can you imagine Jason and Tim checking up on the kids and seeing the Fenton Parents and immediately filing for emergency custody across interdimantional lines?
What if the ninjas find a way to follow them after a few years, and the kids are traumatized by the way they had treated them and are terrified of being forced to go back? The JL is going to get involved, and the Fentons are going to go feral protecting thier kids from all these weirdos who keep suddenly appearing.
not my tweet or my fic (and there’s a good chance of this comment being a bot) but yeah, don’t do this. sure, some writers wouldn’t mind having fanfics (or direct continuation) of their fanfics written by someone else. some may even be thrilled and happy. but the fandom etiquette is that if you want to write a fanfic or a continuation of someone’s fanfic, YOU POLITELY ASK THE WRITER FOR THEIR PERMISSION. not their readers.
also 5 months isn’t long at all. 5 months is 5 minutes when it comes to fanfics. I’ve waited years for my favorite fics to get updated (one of my favorite fanfics was updated by the author after 13 years) and I’ve never said anything to them about “it’s been ___ years, I don’t think it will get updated anymore”. because another fandom / fanfic etiquette is that fanfic writers write for free in their free time, they don’t owe you anything. maybe they will update one day. maybe they won’t. if you want your favorite fic to get updated, you comment something like “this is good!! I’m excited for what happens next” and maybe your positive comment will motivate the author to update. but you don’t say “it’s been ___ months or years”. fanfics writers write for themselves and their own enjoyment. they’re just kind enough to let you read their works for free. stop being rude and entitled to fanfic writers.
Nightwing: Good news! They didn't summon whatever they were after! Bad news! They still summoned someone! Good news again! They aren't freaking-
Danny: Oh my god Ive been Isekaid! Noooooo!
Nightwing: Scratch that- they're freaking out!
Danny: ohancientsohancientsohancients truck-kun why have you forsaken me! Ohkay Danny, you can do this- You just need to remember that last thing you played or read! This place looks modern so definitely not my history book-thank ancients-but ugh please don't be COD, im too pretty for war! Maybe its Pokemon? I could deal with Pokemon! Find a-a Phantump, we could be besties-
Robin: Will someone get down there and shut him up?
Spoiler: If we can't send him back home, can we keep him? He's funny.
Red Robin: He sounds like hes going to have a panic attack!
Batman: Just go down there and help him.
Bat & Birds: *slowly approaching*
Danny: *looks them all up and down* Wait, I'm in the DCU? That means I'm in the same Universe Martian Manhunter! *starts squealing and hopping up and down* Best birthday ever!
That's the first thought that registers in Dick's mind once they reach the warehouse. The summoning circle is already glowing brightly, the flames in the lit candles brightening and elongating themselves far past what is normal. The occultists that have gathered obviously seem pleased with themselves at least until something seems to start going wrong.
The flames flicker and the circle takes on a sickly glow, the celebratory grins and cheering die off, and then everything goes dark.
A scream cuts through the air, inhuman and yet unlike any animal that Dick knows of. One by one the candles relight themselves with green flames and the circle is gone entirely now, replaced by a swirling green vortex. Dick can hear Jason almost choke across the comms, and knows that they're both thinking the same look. "Ok uh- Good news? They didn't summon the thing they wanted to summon." He ignores the scoff from Damian and the 'no duh captain obvious' from Spoiler because they have much much bigger problems to focus on.
Like the fact that something is clearly pulling itself out of the vortex in the ground. Something with massive radiation green hands that grip the edge where concrete meets apparent portal, a long seemingly never ending body made of nothing but writhing black mass, and a head the same green as the hands with two eyes like deadlights staring out at the occultists. The occultists who have shrunk back in terror from what they've managed to summon.
"Who- Where- What have you done?"
The being's voice is distorted, crackles as if coming through an old radio. One of the occultists, a leader perhaps, attempts to speak to the being but they don't get far.
"We- We... I apologize spirit! We were attempting to commune with-"
The being slams a hand down on the ground hard enough to shake the entire building. "How annoying. Begone." It waves his hand and the warehouse is empty. That's... not good.
"Bad news! Clearly they have summoned something they can't control." Dick really doesn't like how quickly this whole situation has gone belly up. "Should we call Constantine? Zatanna maybe?"
He doesn't get a response from the others before the being starts to shrink down, shape warping and changing until a relatively normal looking man stands in the middle of the warehouse. Average height and build, white hair that defies gravity to float around his head, pointed ears and a blue tinge to his skin. "Jeez this is bad... I don't even think I know where I am- UGH! This blows!" The man- spirit- being? kicks at the ground and leaves a dent in the concrete next to the scratch marks left behind from his claws. "What am I gonna do? I can't get back on my own and I don't know where I am and-"
Oh boy. "Uh more bad news, he looks like he's freaking out." Dick doesn't really know what to do here. Is it standard victim protocol? Containment? "Any advice on next steps?"
"Don't let him freak out maybe?" Sound advice from Oracle, amazing really. "I haven't been able to see anything since the summoning started so you're on your own."
Shit.
"Nightwing, get down there and assist the civilian."
Civilian? Ok, guess they're treating this like the usual victim protocol. Wait- "Why do I have to go down and assist? Shouldn't we send Hood, he's got the All Blades!"
Not his finest moment, arguing over who helps a person clearly on their way to a full blown panic attack but he also still remembers that with just a word the thing disappeared a bunch of occultists. "Yeah well you're more civilian friendly than me so..."
Dick sighed and leaped down from one of the windows to land not far from the person, that's what he's settling on, hoping to get his attention from afar. Of course, he's still rambling on in a panic so it takes a minute. "I can't believe Clockwork would let me get isekaid without telling me! I don't even remember what I was reading or doing last, this is so unfair and I just wanna go home!"
"Maybe we can help with that?"
The person stops suddenly in his ranting and looks up at Nightwing, yes up because apparently he's taller than him, and his jaw just kinda....drops. "Nightwing?" He squeaks out and oh is that like actual stars in his eyes? "I'm in the DCU? Oh nevermind. Best birthday present ever. Thank you Clockwork!"
Dick officially doesn't know what's going on anymore.
The Justice League, Danny, and Constantine are too late to stop a summoning from a cult that has recently appeared. But the being that comes out of the summoning circle isn't the eldritch being they were expecting, but a punk rock-looking ghost who gives them one look before laughing.
"Damn, didn't expect to see my ex here!" The ghost laughed, and everyone looked at Constantine, who shrugged because he's never seen this chick in his life.
"No, she's uh...she's my ex..." Phantom, their newest recruit, gingerly raised his hand.
The day started like any other in the Ghost Zone: tense, glowing, and humming with the promise of disaster. Danny had only popped by Clockwork’s tower to ask a simple question—something about paradox prevention or whatever—and definitely didn’t mean to touch the ancient, glowing relic perched delicately atop a cursed pedestal of time-forgotten sorrow and screaming. But he did. He touched it. And then everything exploded in green light and dramatic violin music (which might have been in his head).
And just like that, Danny Fenton was five years old again. Five. Chubby-cheeked, wide-eyed, pint-sized kindergarten-age with all the raw ghost powers of his seventeen-year-old self packed into a body no taller than three feet of chaos. Worse, he remembered everything—every awkward high school moment, every near-death experience, every ghost fight, every existential meltdown.
“Clockwork!” Danny shrieked, his voice now horrifyingly high-pitched and squeaky. “What the actual hell?!”
“Language, Daniel,” Clockwork said in the maddeningly serene way only a time god could manage, waving his staff with an infuriating smirk. “Consider this a learning experience.”
“I hate learning! Learning’s for school and people who don’t get turned into toddlers by rogue hourglasses!”
But Clockwork only chuckled like this was all going according to some elaborate cosmic lesson plan. Probably because it was. He vanished mid-scolding, leaving Danny alone in the tower, stomping around in his little sneakers and throwing ghost-powered tantrums that cracked the marble tiles.
Which is when the floor opened.
To be clear, Danny did not jump into the swirling blue portal. He fell. He fell dramatically with limbs flailing and an undignified scream that would later be blamed on the wind. The portal spit him out in the middle of what could only be described as a cathedral on steroids: tall golden columns, floating runes, and people in robes glaring like he’d farted during a funeral.
He crash-landed on a silk-draped table in front of the actual gods.
“…Ow,” Danny groaned, blinking up at a very tall, very unimpressed man with a horned crown and cheekbones so sharp they could cut reality.
The man frowned. “Why is there a child in the royal seidr sanctum?”
“I didn’t mean to be here! I touched a stupid relic and now I’m five and I fell through a portal and—wait, are you Loki?”
There was a pause. “Yes.”
“Cool. Love your work. Big fan. Please don’t murder me.”
Loki blinked. “…What?”
Then the child burst into blue flames and hovered six inches off the table, sparking with ghost energy like an angry firecracker. Everyone screamed. A robed man passed out. Someone wet themselves. Loki, to his credit, looked intrigued.
“Fascinating,” he murmured, circling the small floating menace. “You’re not of Midgard, are you?”
“I’m Danny from Earth, actually! I’m from Illinois! I’m just—also—kind of a half-ghost and currently five and possibly stuck like this forever!”
Loki raised an eyebrow. “You’re an abomination of magic.”
“Thank you?”
“I like you.”
“No thanks?”
But Loki had already scooped him up like some cursed kitten that wandered into his life. Danny screamed the whole way down the palace corridors, zapping walls, guards, and an unfortunate tapestry depicting Odin’s triumphs. Loki just looked delighted. Like this was the best pet he’d ever found. Like this was revenge against Thor just by existing.
“You are now Dánjal Lokison,” Loki declared.
“I AM NOT—STOP—PUT ME DOWN—”
“I shall raise you in my image.”
“I already have a dad and he’s stupid but he’s mine—put me down or I will scream and explode and possess your furniture!”
“You’ll fit in perfectly.”
Thus began the unholy saga of Danny Fenton, age five, accidentally adopted by the God of Mischief and forced into Asgardian nobility under duress. It was, somehow, not even the weirdest thing to happen that month.
Loki dressed him in child-sized black leather and tiny green cloaks. He taught him how to chant spells in Elder Seidr, how to bend illusions with his hands, and how to summon fire with a thought. Danny, in retaliation, taught Loki about Earth cartoons, fart jokes, and TikTok dances. It was a two-way cultural exchange of chaos and regret.
“I’m telling you,” Danny said one day while floating upside down and eating apples he stole from the royal garden, “if you say ‘We’re going ghost’ and then transform, it’s at least thirty percent more dramatic.”
“That’s idiotic,” Loki replied, watching as Danny exploded into white light and ghost form, now slightly glowing with new magic enhancements.
“You’re just jealous I sparkle when I fight.”
“I do not sparkle.”
“You sparkle on the inside.”
“Stop talking.”
“Dánjal Lokison, feared child warlock of the Nine Realms,” Thor once declared when he saw the tiny menace casually phasing through walls and summoning frost giants to play tag.
“DON’T NAME ME THAT,” Danny screeched, blasting Thor into a wall. Loki applauded from the doorway.
“Good aim, my son.”
“I’M NOT—STOP CALLING ME THAT!”
But Danny was starting to enjoy the magic lessons. Seidr wasn’t like ghost powers. It was older, wilder, sometimes alive. Loki was a surprisingly good teacher—equal parts unhinged chaos and genuine brilliance. He explained the threads of fate like they were spider webs and taught Danny how to pull on them without being noticed. He spoke about illusion like it was poetry and destruction like it was art.
Danny, in turn, taught Loki to prank Thor using invisible slime bombs and existentially disturbing hand puppets that whispered secrets in Old Norse.
They became a problem.
Every time the Avengers tried to contact Asgard, they were met with grainy magical holograms of a tiny child in a green cape flipping them off while floating upside down on a summoned ghost-storm cloud.
“Tony Stark looks like a soggy crouton!” Danny shouted once.
“And smells like cheap cologne,” Loki added.
“High five, evil dad!”
“High five, tiny curse.”
Eventually, Odin tried to intervene.
“This child is not of Asgard,” the All-Father declared.
“I’m not trying to be!” Danny yelled. “Please take me back to Earth! I miss McNuggets and not wearing robes!”
“He’s mine now,” Loki said, summoning a massive magical contract written in fire and Loki’s own blood. “Legally and spiritually bound. I did the adoption ritual and everything. It involved a screaming goat.”
“I HATE THAT GOAT,” Danny screamed.
“I love that goat,” Loki sighed.
“You’re both mentally unstable,” Odin muttered, rubbing his temples.
Danny was eventually granted limited “portal privileges,” which meant he could sneak back to Earth and terrorize his friends while still technically being a Lokison. Sam and Tucker didn’t even question the fact that he was a child again. Jazz just nodded like this was expected and handed him a juice box.
“Have you emotionally bonded with your captor yet?” she asked.
“I am not bonding with Loki!” Danny snapped.
“You call him ‘evil dad’ and wear his colors.”
“THAT’S NOT A BOND, IT’S A THREAT DISPLAY!”
Back in Asgard, Danny practiced summoning tiny void rifts, which Loki encouraged.
“Good,” he said, sipping wine as the rifts swallowed another fruit bowl. “Let the darkness consume you.”
“I just wanted an orange.”
“Even better.”
Eventually, Danny grew attached. It was subtle. A twitch of the lip when Loki conjured birthday cupcakes with green fire. A soft “thanks” when Loki wordlessly cleaned his scraped knees with glowing runes. A quiet night where Danny fell asleep reading next to Loki and didn’t wake up until morning curled in a pile of fur cloaks and dark magic.
“Do you miss being big?” Loki asked one night, watching the child version of his adopted problem-child sketch battle plans in crayon.
“Sometimes,” Danny said. “But…this isn’t bad. Just weird. You’re weird.”
“Thank you.”
“That wasn’t a compliment.”
“Take what I can get.”
Loki never asked too much. He didn’t push Danny to call him ‘Dad’ or act like anything other than the feral little ghost-child he was. But he was there—smirking through tantrums, snarking through training, protecting Danny like a dragon hoards gold.
So when some ambitious frost giant tried to kidnap “the ghostling Lokison,” they were met with a five-year-old banshee of death wielding seidr, ghost rays, and an unholy screech that shattered icebergs.
And behind him, Loki arrived in a storm of green fire and fury.
“Touch my son again,” he said, “and I will erase your ancestors from the time stream.”
“I’M STILL NOT YOUR—wait, okay yeah, get him.”
They were a nightmare pair. A chaos duo. A tiny tornado of destruction and his too-proud magic tutor/father/roommate/menace.
Eventually, Danny stood in front of a new portal, Clockwork hovering beside him with his usual smug patience.
“You’re ready to go back,” Clockwork said. “To your age. To your world.”
Danny glanced over his shoulder. Loki stood there with his arms folded, expression unreadable but eyes a little too bright.
“I’ll come visit,” Danny said, voice small but steady.
“You’d better,” Loki replied, voice quiet and sharp as always.
There was a long pause.
“Bye… evil dad.”
“Goodbye, Dánjal.”
Danny turned. The portal shimmered. His small form stepped through, glowing with ghost light and seidr and something else—something new.
Back home, he hit the ground as a seventeen-year-old again. Taller. Older. But he still wore green.
did i tell u guys i got into an argument on twitter bc i said foxes are dogs and someone tried to bring up their actual fuckin. classification or whatever and i just said “foxes are dogs cause they are fluffye” and they kept arguing with me. the entire time i was like “you will not survive the immigration to tumblr you are lucky we are not there right now”
AKA "Homeless-Danny-in-Gotham trope but he doesn't realize the Gotham Public Library is not as secure as Tucker's network. The Batfam are... concerned about Danny's search history." DPxDC prompt idea.
Okay, so I keep seeing tropes where Danny gets stuck in Gotham for whatever reason - Clockwork shenanigans, portal accidents, dimensional travel, etc - and immediately finds the Gotham Public Library. Which is great. But I give you this: Danny's best friend has an internet network more private than the Fortress of Solitude. Danny, Sam, and Tucker have practically admitted to war crimes via Tucker's secure line. So, it doesn't really cross Danny's mind that using the public internet at the library would be traceable.
Thus Barbara Gordon, otherwise known as Oracle, comes across several strange inquires during her periodical browser history checks.
Guest user: where is got ham
Guest user: where is gottham city
Guest user: gotham city nj to amity park il
Guest user: amity park il
Guest user: Link selected: r/AskReddit/missing-cities-in-america
Guest user: Link selected: r/AskReddit/What-To-Do-When-Flash-Changes-The-Timeline-And-My-City-No-Longer-Exists
Guest user: who is flash superhero
Guest user: Link selected: Wikipedia/Justice-League
Guest user: how to contact justice league about possible dimensional travel??
Guest user: how to undo dimensional travel diy wiki how
So... that's kind of suspicious. Barbara checks the cameras to find a black-haired and blue-eyed kid sitting at the computer that matches the IP address for the Google search history. Then rewinds the cameras, from the time the kid sat at the computer to the time to when he came in the library entrance; she picks through city surveillance footage until she sees the kid falling face-first through a Lazarus-green portal into an alley.
Welp.
(Cue the batkids frantically paging through Batman's thick binder of "What-If" scenarios, trying to find the "Dimensional Travelling" section before Bruce's adoption senses start tingling.)
I've seen some people say that what if Danny was a diffrent dimensions Jason and I raise you, Jack Fenton is a diffrent dimension Jason Tood (yes this thought keeps floating in my head cause Jack used to have a white streak in his hair) or Jack Fenton is this dimensions version of Jason Todd's older brother who died (cause Jason had an older brother who joined a gang and died in one of the comics) (also also Jason km Danny's dimensions died at the same age as this dimensions Jason but unlike this Jason that one stayed dead).
Before leaving the library Danny Google some more stuff that he thinks Sam or Jazz would ask.
Search bar: Where to get food free?
What ends up coming up: bunch of articles about food scams, black mask food for hire, odd "jobs" for food no questions allowed.
Search bar: free food legal not sketchy
What ends up coming up: articles about avoiding getting pulled in to gangs for food
Search bar: please where free food safe no crime teen
What comes up: articles and articles of teens being trafficked for going to a free food handout
Search bar: please safe place for homeless teen to get free food no crim no scam in gotham reddit?
What comes up: posts about red hood giving some kids in crime alley food, another about red hood buying a kid from crime alley a buger from batbuger, another about red hood giving out winter supplies to homeless youth in crime alley
Search bar: Gotham public library to crime alleh
What comes up: map to park row also known as crime alley
Dany quickly scribbles down the directions because the library is about to close.
Danny walking around what he hopes is crime alley and sees a behemoth of a man that kind of looks like- "Dad?!?!?" He exclaims in surprise.
The man glances over with a raised eyebrow, and shit yeah thats Dad in his Skunk hair phase Danny subconsciously wrinkles his nose in disgust.
Jason Todd, confused and offended did that kid just call him Dad and why is he making that face at him.
Jason having that uh-oh realization when the kid starts wondering out loud if he went backwards in time.
"Am I in the past? No, the technology here is ahead on a wider scale than in my Timeline. So is the whole Timeline here shifted forwards? So everything that happened in my world is lagging behind? If dad's a college kid now, will I have to wait twenty years for him to make another Portal? Or maybe he's already making the prototype and I can use that to get back home? If home still exists. No. Don't think of that. Okay, skunk streak means he's in his band of misfits. Mom should also be with him. That means my 'uncle' is also here. They're probably already trying to date Dad? Let's just hope I don't mess up too bad and erase myself."
Only for the clearly tired and distressed kid to groan with how exhausted he was and faceplant into the desk.
Fun Fact: Jean Shepherd, best known for the 1983 holiday classic, A Christmas Story, had an earlier career as a late-night talk radio host where he told stories, talked about current events, and occasionally invited his listeners to help him play harmless pranks on "the day people."
His most famous hoax was born of being fed up with arbitrary "lists" which determined the existence and approval level of media pieces, particularly the NY Times Bestseller List. In 1956, he asked his listeners to go into their local bookstore and ask for a non-existent book called "I, Libertine" by Frederick R. Ewing.
It went 1950s viral. So many of his listeners asked after the book, published alleged excerpts, discussed it in literary circles, and planted references to it so widely that people actually believed it existed. There were even rumors that somebody tried to get it on the NY Times Bestseller List based on word-of-mouth demand.
Plot Twist: SOMEBODY WROTE THE BOOK. Based on Shepherd's basic plot outline and a compilation of the various bits and bobs provided by the public, contemporary author Theodore Sturgeon wrote a full-length novel version of "I, Libertine" and published it under the previously-established pseudonym Frederick R. Ewing.
All this to say, I think Goncharov should be nominated for an Oscar.
Can you please write something about Jason x Danny? Maybe something about Jason having a crush on this new guy (maybe Danny works in a library or helping people as a nurse) and just falling cause Danny is sincerely nice and isn't afraid of his Lazarus's rage
Jason first notices the new face volunteering at the soup kitchen when the guy hand-makes flour tortillas for the beans. Just like his mom used to make, alongside Mrs. Huerea before she got into drugs.
It's been years since he last had some, not because Alfred refuses to make it but because the butler never has the time.
It's usually a treat for Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, or his birthday. Sometimes if Jason is lucky, there is another important holiday for the many members of Wayne Manor, and there is time for Alfred to get them done. He can have them more.
But mostly, Alfred had them store-bought.
That's why he wanders to the other man's line, mouth already watering as the volunteer piles smashed beans with cheese and tortillas onto plates. A name tag has a simple "Danny" on top of a white NASA shirt coupled with slightly baggy pants is the whole outfit of the stranger - odd in Gotham's winter time.
He offers Jason a smile, then, with a wink, places two more fresh tortillas on his plate.
Before he can say anything, Danny pushes the plate toward him. "I can tell you're a man who appreciates fine food. Take them. I can always make more. "
He jerks a thumb to the back, where a press awaits use. It looks just like Mrs. Huerea's iron-clad tool that, for a second, he's six again, early happy the women preparing for Christmas.
When his mother was sober, the Huereas had always opened their home to them. The elderly couple had always felt like grandparents to him.
"Thanks," He says around a forming grin. It matches Danny's.
Jason accepts the food with an excited thrill; for once, the memories of his mother are not so bitter and ruined. He moves out of the way for the next person, making a mental note to tell his men to ensure Danny gets home safely after his shift. It would be in his employee's way.
He does this often, assigning some Red Hood boys to make sure no one bothers any of the volunteers. Jason knows he can't get rid of all crime, not like Bruce believes, but he can at least protect those trying to make this place less of a shit hole.
He sits, savoring the flavor with great appreciation. He's got time to relax a little.
One of his Lieutenant is in the back, speaking to the director of the Soup Kitchen. This is one of Jason's protected areas, but to make sure people know it's not to be taken lightly, the Red Hood gang does require protection money.
He doesn't ask a lot but Jason knows that any place that doesn't have protection money is a bigger target. Of course he also here pretending to be hungry just to make sure the place is actually doing what they promised to do and feed people.
When Jason first took over, this particular place had been known to only give out half of the money they donated in food. The rest was going into the old director's pocket. When he caught wind of the senior director often refusing kids just to save money to steal, Jason quickly fed him to the fish.
His Lieutenant, Rogers, would not be able to recognize him. Jason was eating without a mask. What better disguise than his own dead face? Much less the other people in the soup kitchen.
Although he was meant to observe his surroundings for any funny business, Jason glued his eyes on Danny the entire time. It seemed the man had an easy smile for everyone and a calming personality that seemed to put even the most hostile at ease.
Snow. Jason thinks while watching Danny make more tortillas while chatting with a street kid until the young girl feels she could make one. He lets her round the table easily, showing her how to press down on the metal lever with the same soft ease. He's like pure white snow.
He would not last long in Crime Alley. Nothing pure ever does.
Jason fishes his food, unable to look away from what he knows would be a broken man in only a few weeks.
He leaves just as Rogers returns to the front clutching a brown bag. It looks like he didn't need to worry about the upkeeping of this place. He needs to check on the other kitchens in his territory before the day is out.
After three other Kitchens, Jason is satisfied that he's secured two. He must send Rogers to the last one because a few girls seemed uncomfortable with the leering crew. He'll have the creeps removed by this Friday.
He's swinging around as Red Hood on his normal patrol when he catches sight of Danny again. It's close to two in the morning, so he's surprised to see the other man cheerfully strolling about without any signs of exhaust.
He's also not wearing warm clothing despite the snow slowly falling around them. The only difference between what he was wearing earlier is the large black backpack. Jason half wonders if Danny only has nothing else to wear until the man pauses at an alley entry.
He crouches down, unzipping his bag, before pulling out a plastic-wrapped package. Jason watches him cautiously walk into the alley, following on the roofs out of curiosity.
His eyes widen when he spots a young boy hiding behind a trash bin, squishing himself against the wall as Danny carefully approaches him.
Jason hadn't seen the kid when he had passed by earlier, likely due to the boy knowing how to hide himself in the shadows. How had Danny seen him?
"Go away!" The boy yells when Danny gets too close for comfort. Jason's hackles rise, pulling out his gun in case he needs to intervene. He remembers the days when the sound of approaching footsteps to his hiding places in the streets meant.
Danny stops just on the other side of the trash bin. He places the package on top of it and backs away quickly. "I don't mean to bother you. But I thought you could use these. Stay warm, and if you need to escape the snowstorm, go to the address in the right pocket."
The boy doesn't answer, and Danny doesn't seem to wait for one. He leaves with quick strides. Jason watches him from the roof, noticing he returns to a slow stroll once he's back on the main street.
Below, the street kid carefully pulls the plastic bag towards him once he knows Danny is gone. He unwraps the bag only to gasp in delight at the jacket, gloves, hat, scarf, and socks inside. He quickly slips them on, burying himself in the small amounts of warmth they offer him.
Jason watches the boy for a few minutes before jumping down. The kid scrambles away until he realizes it's Rood Hood. Everyone knows that he won't harm street kids.
"Hey," He says, noting that the boy's new clothes seem to be made from expensive material, all in black and neon green. "Do you have somewhere warm to sleep tonight? Snowstorm is coming."
"I can handle it." The boy scoffs despite the shivers that wrack his body.
"I know you can. But it's not safe out here" He kneels at the boy's eye level. He seems about twelve, likely new to the streets since he has yet to find proper shelter. Dirty blond hair and dark, weary brown eyes stare back at him as Jason offers. "Let me get you somewhere safe."
"I won't go back to the stupid system."
"Nah, that shit's broken. I got a safe house for you to crash in."
The boy thinks it over. "Just us?"
Jason isn't a mind reader to know what the kid fears. "No. It's full of other people."
It takes a few more minutes, but eventually, he convinces Max to follow him. They travel across Crime Alley to one of the empty warehouses he had turned into an illegal shelter. Inside are various Red Hood gangsters passing out blankets and setting up cots for people from the streets to sleep.
The heaters are on, but a few still refuse to remove their warm clothing- likely in fear of theft or that it proves an extra layer of comfort- as they settle down.
Max thanks him as the boy rushes to a corner that seems to be taken over by children. He doesn't approach the others to speak to, but he looks more comfortable picking a cot close to them. Jason's eyes widen slightly when he realizes that all seven children are wearing some form of the Black and Neon Green outfits Danny had given Max.
Rogers strolls up next to him, nodding his chin at the children. "Some street kids have been saying a man is offering them free supplies. He doesn't ask for anything in return and leaves them alone with they tell him to. His calling card is the little neon green ghost he places on each item. Want me to take a few of our boys and check him out?"
Jason grunts. "No need. I already know who it is. He seems like a non-threat."
Rogers appears flabbergasted for only a few seconds before pulling himself together. "If you say so, boss."
Jason turns to stare at the man, and Rogers raises his hands. "All I'm saying is that it's a little odd how good the guy is at spotting street kids."
"How good is he?"
"It's like he can see in the dark. He might be a meta."
Jason thinks back to Danny walking around in his light clothes like it's the middle of summer instead of winter and finds some weight in the meta-theory. "I'll pay him a visit soon."
Rogers lets the matter drop, even if he is confused by Jason's involvement. Usually, he has some of the newest members of the youngest ones who reckon a personable target- or new recruits.
But something about Danny called out to Jason. He couldn't say it, but the man's snow-like personality eased the Pit Rage in him. Strangely it felt like Danny was the calm winter promising rest to the wounded parts of Jason's soul.
He didn't want to see Danny's pure heart ruined by this city.
Jason wonders if he could keep it safe and if Danny will even give him the chance to try.
*Spidey and the Sinister Six having their usual fight*
Doc Ock, landing a hit: You’re getting slow Spider-Man! Age finally catching up to you?
Spider-Man: You wish! I haven’t even hit my 30s! From those costumes I can already tell I failed to save you guys from those midlife crises! Sorry by the way.
Vulture: Watch it wallcr- wait… Did you just say your not in your thirties yet?
Spider-Man: Surprised that this spiders so young and spry? Well-
Electro: Dude I’ve been fighting you for at least 5 fucking years! How old even are you?
Shocker, joking cause he’s the only one who picked up no grown adult acts likes Spidey: Don’t swear in-front of the boy you don’t want him to pick it up.
Rhino: Christ! You’re tellin me I almost crushed some 12-year-olds skull all those years ago?
Spider-Man, regretting his quipping: I was not that young! Like just starting freshman year but-
Sandman, horrified as he’s the only one with a kid and dad instincts(as of my iteration): I could’ve killed a kid…
Shocker, genuinely curious: Are you even old enough to drink? Cruel to kill a man who ain’t had his first drink yet.
Electro: Please tell us you’re at least over 25 as of this fight. Hell, I’ll take over 21!
Spider-Man:….
Sandman, realizing just how young he really is: Oh my god.
Spider-Man: My birthday’s coming up soon so I guess it counts?
Doc Ock, exacerbated: It. Does. Not!
Vulture: What would your mother think if she knew her son was out here risking his life telling poorly constructed jokes?
Spider-Man, offended cause it quips slap: 1. My jokes are great 2. She and my dad are dead so-
Sandman, hysterical cause holy shit he almost killed a kid orphan: OH MY GOD!
...thinking about it, if Peter makes just one particular slip in the ensuing conversation, Doc Ock will be the one to realize who he is and it's going to hit him like a sack full of anvils.
Doc Ock: ...your uncle. Was murdered.
Spidey: oh fuck can we pretend I didn't -
Doc Ock, furious and flabbergasted: I unmasked you. I literally unmasked you and I didn't believe my own eyes why the hell were you so weak, you were not faking -
Spidey: ...I had a real bad case of the flu...
Doc Ock, realizing that he dated and proposed marriage to Spider-Man's charming widowed aunt and has almost murdered her nephew on multiple occasions: (bluescreens)
If you take requests can you do a dc x dp with dead tired ship?
I love requests~! I really hope I got dead tired, ship, right. I need to find out the ship names. It's Tim/Danny, right? If not, let me know, and I'll fix you another one.
Tim really wasn't looking forward to meeting the new heir to Vladco. Usually, his parents didn't want anything to do with new money, as they thought that new money was too close to no money, but Vlad Masters was different.
The difference? He bought out almost all of Drake Industries' shares, and now Tim honestly thinks he owns more of the family company than his parents. Jack and Janet hoped to make good connections with the man and slowly but surely trick him into selling the shares back to the Drakes.
Tim thought if he was smart enough to get the people that bought shares of his family company generations ago, not just once but at least eight times, then Vlad Masters wouldn't be as easy to trick as they thought.
Then again, his parents aren't the best businessmen around. If they were, they wouldn't be flying through the family wealth, leading them to bankruptcy.
Tim would know.
One day, he looked at their books when he was bored a few months after discovering Batman's identity. He tried to tell his mom about it, but she told him that he didn't understand the business well enough to tell.
So he signed himself into college-level business courses online to learn it. She didn't appreciate his initiative.
"Remember, Tim, Daniel Masters is who you must befriend," Janet says for the third time as they climb out of their car. " Friendships are the ladders to climbing up in the world."
"Yes, Mom." He tries to smile at her, but all Tim wants to do is go back to the roofs of Gotham and watch the Bats.
Jason is supposed to start his solo patrols tonight, which is a big deal, and he's missing it. His parents weren't supposed to be back for another month. However, their latest job was canceled due to locals complaining.
His dad grumbled about people getting in the way of history, but Tim thinks it has more to do with his parents wanting to dig up an old cemetery......apparently the locals like their grandparent's resting place to be left alone.
Tim also thinks it's not lovely to dig there just because the locals are poor, so he may have hacked into the country's files and flooded the internet with the disrespectful attempt that his parents were trying to make. It received the right amount of backlash to stop the whole operation.
He then sent the community an anonymous donation so they could fix it up, get the gravestones washed, and the stories of the buried people turned into a book. It's the least he could do.
Tim's parents didn't realize the loss of funds only because he carefully hid his tracks with shell companies.
They are greeted at the door by Vlad Masters. He gives his father a handshake, compliments his mother's dress, and even offers Tim a gentle hello. Masters is known for being a bit of a humble hermit, soft-spoken but with sharp, intelligent eyes.
Everything he expects new money to be, down to his mannerism and even the way he stands. Tim would have been able to clock him miles away without even knowing his name.
"This is my son, Daniel," Masters says, patting the head of a frowning boy Tim's age. He stands just a bit away from Masters as if he does not want to be near him. Tim notes the way he shies away from Master's hand.
Interesting.
"It's Danny." The boy hisses. Mom's face tightens at his manners. She never liked children being heard instead of seen. Danny takes a small breath before smiling at the Drakes with a friendlier composure.
The hostility was only toward his father?
"Please call me Danny. It's my real name, not a nickname," He says, offering his hand for a shake. Tim fights a wince. As the son of a wealthy family and not the head, Danny is not supposed to initiate a greeting with Tim's dad.
He just told the Drakes he needs to be aware of high society rules, making him easy pickings. His parents jump onto that weakness like a lion on a trap gazelle.
"Daniel. It's lovely to meet you. " Mom's articulation is just a shade away from being mocking. Danny's smile falls off his face closing down into a near-emotionless mask. "How old are you, deary?"
"I'm old enough to still hear correctly, unlike you. That's not my name. It's Danny." He says much to mom's surprise. Tim guesses she's not used to people challenging her so directly. He learned that, too, while he was running Gotham.
The elites always made passive-aggressive backhanded comments to insult each other. The poor told you to fuck off to your face.
"You do not speak that way to my wife, Daniel-" His Dad starts, but Danny holds up his hand.
"You either call me Danny or don't talk to me." He says. "I don't need to waste my breath repeating myself."
Wow. Tim thinks, watching the red growing on Dad's face. He's cool.
"Are you going to let him talk to me like that?" Dad demands, turning to an amuse-looking Masters. The other man raises a brow, his gentle smile still on his face, but somehow it looks more....dismissive now. As if he was looking at a child demanding the impossible.
"Why ever do you mean?" Masters asks, "Your tone implies you were insulted, but that would mean you are upset with a child asking to be spoken to with respect. Surely, a man of your standing knows children deserve respect?"
"They need to respect their elders." Mom cuts in her voice like ice.
"He is my son, so I am his elder. Not you." Master counters, "But not to worry, I will remedy this issue. Danny will no longer be speaking to you disrespectfully, as I will not allow him to be near you."
His parents had a few seconds of looking smug until Masters waved his hand back towards the driveway. "Have a lovely night, Mr. and Mrs. Drake."
"Excuse me?" Mom cries, and Tim can't believe his eyes. The rest of the wealthy guests have caught on to the issue and have gathered near the windows and doorway to watch.
"That's Fruitloop for You can leave now." Danny chirps starting to look more like his father by the amusement on his face. "Except for him. He's cool."
He points to Tim, who flushes at the attention. He had been staring at Danny, taking in every detail of his expression and body language, fascinated by the fact he did not once seem intimidated. He didn't even look bored.
He seemed comfortable in his slightly slouched posture and confident in his skin and abilities. But his earlier behavior implied that just as he is confident in himself, he also doesn't think very highly of himself.
Tim's never seen anyone like that. It's strange. New. Exciting.
Heck, it was exhilarating.
Tim wanted to break Danny Masters' head open and figure everything about him out. It felt like a new case just begging him to uncover.
"I am?" He asks in a slight daze, and the other boy offers him a dazzling smile.
"Yeah, you respect the dead. The spirits adore you."
What?
"Oh, this is the young boy who protected that cemetery in Guatemala?" Masters asks with genuine warmth this time. "A fine job, Timithoy."
"It's Tim." He hears himself say, and Masters nods.
"A fine job Tim."
Danny offers him a wink, and Tim thinks his stomach just fell out of his body. What is this-?
"Timothy, we are leaving!" His mother screeches, tugging on his arm and yanking him away. The rest of the guests laugh as the Drakes are driven away. Tim knows he will never be allowed near Danny after this, so he turns his head around to give the boy one last look.
He meets the glowing green eyes of the Masters, who wave their fingers at him.
Tim starts following Danny around after that.
(Danny and Vlad know he's there and think it's cute. That's how ghost courts, so they don't see it as a problem. What is problem is getting along long enough for them to figure out a way back to their home dimension. Danny allowed Vlad to overshadow people just so they could have the means to eat, but he's getting really sick of Gotham. At least the soft clicking sound of a camera lures him to sleep at night.
Tim approaches Robin before his hero can go to Ethiopia. He doesn't understand what he is experiencing as his first crush and concludes that the Masters are aliens planning on luring small children by making them fall under a spell through their glowing eyes. Jason takes this very seriously and agrees to wait on his mission overseas. He realizes early on what's actually happening but, by that point, thinks Tim is hilarious and just edges him on.
He, too, thinks the Masters are aliens, but he's not about to tell Bruce.)
Bruce prides himself in keeping all of his networks secured. If he didn't make it himself, he had the funds and connections to get him the best working on his systems.
He had backup plans in case the systems were ever hacked, of course, but he had yet to encounter a cyber attack that wasn't beaten away by his firewalls or his team.
Babs and Tim were far more feral when booting out unwanted guests. The level of protection was also transferred to his other systems that weren't Batman-related, just to make sure the connection between Bruce and Batman was never made.
That's why he never really checks his personal phone's caller ID, not the one he gave out as Brucie Wayne, but the one Bruce used for his real life without any masks- civilian or vigilante. The only ones who had the number- and the access- were his children and Alfred.
Not even the Justice League- those who were aware of his identity- knew of this number.
Bruce is in the middle of typing up a report for the next Wayne Board meeting when his personal phone rings. He figures it's Dick giving him a call to update him on his drive home or maybe Jason, as his son was planning on going to college.
"Go for Papa Bruce," He says, knowing his kids hate his phone greeting and doing it deliberately to spite them.
There is a long pause where he can't help but smirk thinking his child is either rolling their eyes or cringing too hard to properly speak. Eventually, a voice cracks over the speaker.
"Hello. I'm selling cookies to raise money for my own star. Would like to buy a box from me?" says a boy, not one he has taken in. The voice is young maybe not even double digits yet. Bruce is alarmed.
"Who are you?! How did you get this number?" He demands, yanking his phone to his face and seeing, with a chill, a phone number out of state.
His system had been compromised. By a child. By accident.
"My name is Danny!" The boy chirps. "I sell cookies. Like the Girl Scouts, but I'm a boy, and I don't scout."
"That's rather fantastic, lad. What kind of cookies are you selling?" Bruce asks to keep the boy on the line while sending an email blast to the others. It's a string of numbers that are code for compromise so they all know to close any communication channel until it's safe to get back on.
"Chocolate chip. Mint Slim. Oatmeal and peanut butter. I made them myself!"
Right. Bruce hooks up his phone, tracing the call. The signal bounces off the call, swinging up to a salute and falling back down to earth. In seconds he has the boy's location. It pings in a small town right outside of Star City.
He sends Barry a private message. His friend is already on the way to the location. He'll get the boy in a few seconds.
"How much for a box of chocolate chips? Those are my favorite." Bruce tells the boy, voice whimsical as his Brucie persona demands.
In an unsure tone, the boy pauses, then whispers, "I don't know. No one ever let me get this far."
"How about twenty for a box of dozen? I'll buy five boxes for each of my kids that live at him," Bruce tells him, and the boy gasps.
"That could buy me one whole night in a hotel!"
Bruce's insides freeze. What did he mean-
"Hey! No! Let go!" Danny suddenly screams. Bruce's heart launches- he hates it when kids get hurt, especially those that sound like Danny- until Barry's voice comes over the speaker.
"I got him, Mr. Wayne. Thank you for alerting the Justice League Hotline." That's code for This is not a threat to you Batman and Bruce allows himself to relax just a little.
"Narc!" The boy shouts, outraged, before the call drops. Barry is likely taking over the situation, which means Bruce can leave it in his capable hands.
After reassuring his kids that he is fine and that they are all safe, he suits up and meets the Flash in the Watch Tower. There, he learns that Danny is only seven years old and has been living on the streets for a while.
The boy had been surviving by baking some cookies to sell on the side of the street- where did he bake them? The boy would not say- until he got the bright idea to try to sell through phone calls like he had seen on TV.
He punched in random numbers at the community center phone and gave his pitch about a star, thinking people would be more willing to buy from him if he had an excellent reason.
Barry had left him with CPS, but he looked devastated about that. It turned out that Danny was a meta and had likely been kicked out of his home once it was found out based on what he said of his parents.
Bruce felt he should assure Barry that Danny was fine and look into his placement to help settle his more sensitive teammate's nerves.
He was unhappy that Danny was not in a good placement; there were far too many reports from a concerned neighbor to make him think it was a safe place. Given the fact that placement had a lot of meta kids that "fell through the cracks," Bruce worried he had just stumbled across a trafficking ring.
He would sick Barry and Jason on them. Just to ensure they wouldn't see the light of day again.
Still, that did not fix his mistake with Danny, the little cookie seller.
Bruce hacked into the system to move Danny. He thought about where he would move the young child but ultimately had him in Wayne Manor.
Just until he could confirm that he would be safe. He certainly didn't think about the adorable little boy who called him with his heart in his hand and got sent to a terrible place for three weeks because of Bruce.
Danny arrived at Wayne Manor with a happy little bounce and a chipper outlook on life than Bruce was expecting. "If it isn't Mr. Narc!"
God, he going to adopt the boy, isn't he?
(Danny has been thrown into a different universe, aged down to a child. He survived by overshadowing people into letting him spend the night baking cookies.
He was thrown into a somewhat typical home, but the nosy neighbor down the street took far too much notice of his overshadowing, and now he was being moved again.
One of the batkids laughs. "What are you? A criminal?"
"According to the government I was!" Danny chirps, completely ignoring any concerning implications this statement may have on any listeners.
All activity halts. "What?"
"Mhmm. Well, not this one. This one is a lot nicer! You guys actually have like, laws 'n stuff!" Danny exclaimed, thrilled both with the reactions he was getting, because he's a little troll, and with the number of Alfred's rolls he was able to grab since no one else was moving.
Danny gets confused for Tim Drake when he stop for gas in Gotham on his way to visit Dan. His clone had set up shop- a literary comic book shop- in Metropolis.
Danny was going for the weekend to help him run the red dot sale and also spend time with his Clone turned older brother.
Dan after being released from his prison and getting a Core Cleanse in the FarFrozen ectoplasm iced pools, had mellowed out greatly.
It turns out Dan had gone mad after suffering a dip in contaminated ectoplasm. He called it "Pit Madness" and Clockwork assured him it was a real medical condition
Much like getting bitten by a rabies-infected animal, Dan's condition was not his fault despite turning him violent.
After the Big Reveal with his parents - who took the news surprisingly well- Team Phantom introduced Elle and Dan to them.
The two clones had been quickly made official Fentons and now Danny had an older brother and a young sister.
Elle lived at home with Danny and his parents, but Jazz and Dan moved out after high school graduation. Danny was thinking of moving in with Dan to go to college.
He wasn't sure, but he still had a whole year to decide.
Danny found a gas station within his GPS map and stopped at the closest one. There weren't a lot of people around, so he assumed that was a slow day.
He was not aware the locals avoided the area due to the danger of feuding gangs. He was also unaware that while pumping the gas, a Scarecrow goon was watching him.
That goon knew his boss had been getting a bit bored with his experiments, and he knew it wouldn't be long before his boss turned on his employees to relieve his boredom.
He was just starting to sweat, thinking he would be the new genuine pig until Tim Drake himself rolled out of a beat up car in the bad part of town.
He practically gift-wrapped himself for Scarecrow! The goon grins, creeping up behind the distracted young man.
One of the employees' inside the gas station had clocked Tim Drake too and had been staring at him - how could he not when Tim was a Bi icon?- and sees the moment the goon covers the boy's mouth with a clotch and yank him into a van that speeds away.
For a moment, the employee only gawked after the speeding vehicle, too shook to do anything as it disappears around a corner.
He scrambles for his phone to call 911. He prays that his slow reaction does not cost Drake's life.
(His call's transcript pings on Oracle's program designed to pick up the civilian names of the Bats if ever used in the emergency hotlines)
Sadly it is hours before the Bats have even an idea of where Tim (actually Danny) was taken to.
Danny wakes up in a warehouse, strapped to a table. He only had a brief moment of thinking his worst fear was coming true ,his parents, were going to rip him apart molecular by molecular, despite it being two years since they learn.
Thankfully a man dressed in a ridiculous Halloween costume steps into the light and he knows it's not his parents.
"Lovely expression Mr. Drake. Let's see how lovely that fear truly is," the man says in a raspy voice, holding up a needle. He stabs Danny with it and the boy blanches as the hot liquid enters his blood stream.
A minute goes by.
Two.
Three.
"Ugh was that supposed to do something?" He questioned, moving around his restraints to check his chances of escape without outing himself as Phantom.
The camera pointing at him limits his options.
The man dressed as Scarecrow lets out a gleeful cackle. He doesn't answer Danny, instead turning to the door- from where Danny can lift his head, it looks like he's in a basement of some kind- and shouts, "Bring me experiment six two six!"
A bulky man comes in carrying a tray of tubes. Danny watches as Scarecrow carefully selects a tube and pours it into another needle. "Lets see how you handle this"
The answer is Danny handles it very well. In fact he takes all seven tubes without a single reaction. Honestly it's the needle that's a real bother.
Scarecrow is both impressed and slightly insulted by the end of it. "How did a simpleton chloroform work on you but not my brilliant science!?"
Danny squints at him. "I would call this many things but never science, let alone brilliant, you fruitloop."
He gets knocked out again for his cheek with a new chloroform rag.
He wakes to the same made leaning over him again, but this time, there is also a clown in purple. Danny can only stare as the clown cackles.
"I think you're losing your special touch if Tim Drake is immune to your Fear Gas." The clown says, and Danny wonders if a costume convention exists in town.
Danny is happy to see that besides being knocked out and tied him down they haven't really done anything to him. "Who are you supposed to be?"
The clown face spams before a wide, mad grin breaks across his face. If Danny were to look of the definition of madness in a dictionary he knows this guy would be the example for it.
"I'm just a simple chum who wants to see the world laugh," The clown tells him, holding a squirt flower in Danny's face. "Let's see that smile!"
Danny squeaks as the liquid splashes in his face, some going up his nose. He coughs while the two men stare intensely at him.
After a moment Danny gets himself under control. "Ugh what was that? Is smell nasty"
The clown face freezes, rage bleeding into his eyes as the scarecrow one scoffs "seem you are also losing your touch, chum"
"No no no. Our little friend just needs a higher dosage! I'll have him laughing in no time!"
He doesn't. After a gas tank full of that nasty-smelling stuff is forced onto his face, and five different needles stabbed into his arm the clown is forced to admit Danny is immune.
They still call him "Mr. Drake" even though Danny tells them between needles that's not his name.
After hours of attempting to get a reaction out of him- both by clown and scarecrow- , Danny is knocked out again by the little rag.
When he comes two three people stand over him. The two from before, though clown now looks murderous and scarecrow politely interested, and a women in green with leaves splat across her outfit.
So Danny got kidnapped by a Scarecrow, a clown, and a nymph? Sounds like the beginning of a bad joke.
The gas mask is forced back onto his face and another Danny struggles he can do nothing as he is forced to breath in a new gas.
The woman watches his reaction with a keen eye before nodding "He should be pretty far gone now"
Scarecrow shakes his head. "There isn't a single reaction. He isn't affected by your pheromones."
The woman scoffs, leaning over Danny and fluttering her eyelashes "You're going to kill dear old dad for me"
Danny glares at her. "Like hell, I will."
His voice is muffled by the mask but they hear him and the woman actually looks shocked "He might need a higher dosage "
"By all means, give it a try. Neither Joker or I saw a difference in Mr.Drake even after adjusting his intake."
"How is that possible?"
"Maybe because you all suck!"
The clown slams his hands on the table. "I am one of the best chemists in the world, brat!"
"And the ugliest!"
Danny doesn't see the knife until it's pressed repeatedly into his left leg. He screams around his mask as the Clown spits and swears at him.
The other two only watch, neither seemingly bothered by the man stabbing a teenager.
Then the knife is plunged into his stomach, and he screams as the world almost whites out in agony.
Danny, blinks the white hot pain, and is just barely thinking of going ghost when the door bursts open and a group of people wearing more costumes pour in.
A man dressed as a Bat flings the clown away with an outraged cry. Danny can't see where the clown lands, but he hears fighting all around him.
A boy in a hood and mask appears in his line of sight. There is a worried frown on his face as he quickly picks at the locks keeping Danny down "Do not worry, Drake, we are here."
Danny finally gives in to the pain, running to blissful darkness as a man in a red helmet lifts him off the bed and makes a run for the door.
I choose to believe Tim was kidnapped by Danny’s rogues in a double case of mistaken identity. The GIW nab him as he rolls into Amity and the ecto-chloroform they used to capture worked just fine but none the ecto-phasers or ecto-lasers they planned to use work at all.
Dan gets worried when Danny doesn’t arrive, and he phones the family. Tucker listens in to GIW comm chatter and hears they caught something big. There’s a big heroic rescue. And Tim’s in a bad way by now because the ecto-weapons had no effect on him at first, but repeated high strength beams of ectolasers are gradually building up ectoplasm in him and now he’s come down with acute ectoplasm poisoning. (The GIW see this as evidence that they are finally breaking down the ghost’s resistance, not understanding that they are the ones turning him ghostly.)
Danny and his fraid of course clock this guy as not Danny as soon as they see him. The aura is all wrong, for a start. But whoever this is is in real trouble and is going to die of ectoplasm sickness unless he’s treated. So Elle takes him off to the Far Frozen to be treated and sits with him to wait for him to wake up, while the rest of them start again to look for Danny.
Meanwhile, the Bats clock their guy as not Tim as soon as they get him out of there. The scarring is all wrong, for a start. But he’s still very stabbed, and possibly poisoned with rogue toxins. They take him to a hospital, because he’s presumably a civilian, but he looks enough like Tim they are wondering about a clone, so Cass changes her clothes and goes back to sit with him to get answers when he wakes up while the rest of them start again to look for Tim.
Based off of @saphushia art found here. . I just loved the idea of Tucker not knowing his skill level because he grew up in the boonies
Tucker gets scouted by Wayne Enterprises after he fixes a kid's computer game while in Gotham visiting Danny.
See, Tucker always known he is passable at tech- one has to be when a technology theme ghost is consistently harassing one's best friend- but to be good at something in a small town like Amity Park didn't mean much .
It's a big fish in a small pound sort of deal. That's why he's never put much thought into it. If Tucker were ever to rank himself in terms of school grades, he would say his computer skills were about a C-.
B+ if it was just coding.
His parents also don't think much of his obsession with his PDA or phones. They thought he waste too many hours on them like the rest of his generation.
It didn't matter that Tucker's technology was about five or more years behind his classmates.
The Foley were hard-working people who barely scraped enough for bills. They were never below the property line, but they danced on it often enough that Tucker knew never to ask for unnecessary purchases.
For as long as he could remember, his parents have always worked long and hard hours. He never blamed them for missing so much of his childhood, in fact he was grateful that they worked so hard to keep the roof over his head, but he did miss them.
That's why Danny's house became a haven for him. He was always at the Fenton's place because the loud, wacky family was much better company than the home silence.
Tucker knew that his family's financial situation didn't change how Danny or Sam viewed him. They had his back through tick and thin just as he did for them, but as they got closer to graduation the difference between them became jarring.
Sam had easy picking of what she wanted to do and where she wanted to go. Her parents were so overjoyed that she wanted to go to a university that they didn't even argue about her wishing to major in botanical biochemistry.
She had started house hunting in Star City midway through senior year. Her parents would gift it to her as a graduation present. Sam would live there for the next eight years to finish her degree.
Danny's parents, while somewhat eccentric, were also certified geniuses. Between the two of them, they had five PHDs and were often freelancing for companies when not doing ghost research. They too could send their two kids to college States away with housing not being a issue.
Jazz went to Metropolis to study Physiology. She lived in a small apartment but was doing well off her scholarships and parent's funding. Last he heard, she had a part-time job at the Daily Planet as a research assistant to gain some independence.
Danny wanted to go to Gotham for their engineering program. He, too, had an apartment of his own, with scholarships and equal funding from his parents. He also worked at Wayne Enterprises, but he was a receptionist. He hoped that once he graduated, he could apply for their engineering program
Not Tucker. His family could only help him get into Community College near Amity. He also couldn't afford to move out so he stayed with them, picking up a part time job to help out when he could.
Tucker is a first-generation college student so even though it wasn't much, he loved to see how his parents glowed when telling others their boy was futhering his education. He wanted to do something that paid well- and after years of patching up Danny- he figured nursing would do the trick.
Tucker would do all his basics in the community College, take a break to save up some money and then move on to the bigger schools.
The day of the graduation felt bittersweet. Team Phantom was finally adults, finally starting out in the real world, but while Danny and Sam moved on to bigger and better things, Tucker knew he would be left behind in little no-where Amity Park.
He never brought it up, but he felt a small dosage of envy the last day of summer before his friends finished packing and left.
Despite both being gone, Tucker had little to no social life even though they called, texted, and emailed often. His days blurred between class, work, and home. Even then, classes were long and tedious, work often ending with one or more customers screaming in his face to try and get free food.
His parents quickly started to nag that he should find a wife as they had married young. They couldn't figure out why he didn't want the same, even though he had no social life again.
Life became dull.
Tucker's only sparks of joy were playing online with Danny and Sam - when they found the time to log in or re-coding his old tech to try and salvage it whenever it broke down.
Soon, it became apparent that Tucker was slowly lacking motivation when he started skipping classes to sleep in and started feeling anxious when he needed to clock in for shifts.
It leads to him barely getting out of bed.
He felt horrible about it, thinking his parents sacrificed so much for him only to have him throw away the opportunities they gave him, and the cycle of not being able to get out of bed would start all over again.
It was Danny who caught on, and all but begged Tucker to come to Gotham for a weekend. He even sent money over for the plane ticket.
Tucker couldn't have gotten on that plane fast enough. He arrived early on Friday since the tickets were cheaper- and Uber over to WE headquarters to pick up Danny's keys as they agreed.
That way, Tucker could sleep and rest in the apartment while Danny worked.
Danny would finish his shift and have the weekend plus Monday and Tuesday off to spend with Tucker. When he arrived, Danny was helping a school check in for a field trip, so Tucker sat down to wait.
Next to him, a kid was growling at his laptop, frankly typing and moving his fingers over the computer's touch mouse. Tucker accidentally glimpsed his screen when the kid started swearing in a different language.
It looked like a shooting game but his lag was bad. By the time the boy pressed the buttons to have his little drone move the other flying things he was chasing were flipping though the air and out of his shooting rage.
It sucked when that happened, and since he was using WE free wifi for guests, it was probably the game. The graphics were badass, though. Seemed almost real.
"Hey try updating the system" He tells the kid after seeing the boy once again lag so bad he missed his shot.
Green eyes swing to him drenched in rage. Which yeah, Tucker knows how frustrating that could be.
"Did I ask for your help!?" The boy snaps, his words lined with an upper-class accent. Made sense since he was wearing a Gotham Academy uniform like the rest of the large school group. "Why are you even looking this way, peasant?"
"No, sorry. I just noticed the lag." Tucker raised his hand, slightly amused at the peasant insult. "I thought I could fix it for you."
The boy's face spams, "You believe you have the ability?"
"Ugh sure? I can try?"
"Here. Be quick. The fate of this city's air defenses depend on it" the boy turns his lap top to him and Tucker blinks.
Okay. So fix the game. He can do that.
And he does, quickly opening the code, analyzing the control and commands , he gets it running properly in less then twenty minutes. The boy seems utterly shock but he quickly takes control of the game and shoots down all the escaping ninjas from the sky.
"Thank you." The boy says with no more tense in his shoulders. Then he closes his laptop and dissappears with the crowd of students.
Tucker thought the kid was a cute.
Danny hands him the keys not long after and he leaves.
Never was he aware of the Boy being Damian Wayne and that the game was not a game but a actual defensive drone system that was fighting off the League of Assassins.
He only finds out how important those two facts are when Danny gets a call from Tim Drake asking if he could pass along Tucker's information because the CEO wanted him on staff as soon as possible..
Both nineteen-year-olds lost their minds after getting the call, screaming at each other in ghost shrieks of glee. They called Sam to let her know- and have her lawyers look over the contact Tim Drake sent just to make sure it wasn't a big-time company trying to screw him over.
He went to an interview three days later. He faced Tim Drake, the current seventeen-year-old CEO, Leo Noir, the current head of HR, and Jessica War, the current head of computer services. They asked him many questions about himself- some of which he felt he had answered terribly- then had him take a computer test.
Tucker thought it was busy work, so he quickly breezed through it. He fixed the problem in many of the coding for various programs, adding his flare to the final product, and after thanking them for their time, went out into the lobby.
He hadn't even reached the door before Jesssica ran after him, offering him the job. Apparently, the first two problems they had him do was the busy work. Tucker had thought they were the ones to let him get comfortable with the coding program.
Like a tutorial in video games.
The other seven were actual issues; many of their latest cellphone products failed. Tucker had solved them in an hour, which had taken the actual team of coders about a month.
"Nitey one dollar and thirty-five cents an hour," Tim tells him tapping the hiring contact. "It would be eighty hours every paycheck. You can work here or at home. Full Benefits. What do you say?"
Tucker's jaw drops. "When do I start!?"
He calls his parents to tell them he will be staying in Gotham with Danny. He tries to explain what had happened but it was all so fast that he can only babble about certain parts.
They tell him not to worry about explaining because they understand how much this means to him.
His parents help pack everything for him and when he flies back for it they, offer him hugs and support. Tucker is so glad they aren't mad.
"I sort of knew it was coming," His dad laughs. "You and that Fenton boy have always been inseparable."
"I did the same thing, you know," His mom says, wiping tears from her eyes but smiling all the same. "I moved with your father states away with little to no plan when I turned twenty too. Drove your grandfather mad."
He loves them both so much. He promises to send money- disregarding their denials- and flies back to Gotham, where Danny has opened his apartment until he gets enough for his own place.
He plans on renting a house with three bedrooms, one for him, one for his office, and another for Danny, as soon as he can. He wants to pay his friend back for everything he did and Danny deserves a bigger living space.
And for once, he'll not have to worry about money!
For once, life is looking up!
(What Tucker is unaware of, is that his parents think he moved to the big city to be with his childhood best friend turned recent lover. They don't know that the money he is sending home is from his own payroll and not Danny's. They think he's a stay-at-home husband.
Tucker is also unaware that the Bats are closely watching him in case he goes rogue. They have been slowly "causally" running into him in the city and breaking into his place to check for supervillain activity.)
Once Tucker passes all of their background checks. Runs through the paranoia gauntlet? Which is going to take a few months. Of Tucker genuinely just having a good time at work. Not causing any trouble. You can get Tim or Babs are going to instigate a non Bat hack war. Just to see how good he actually is. And see what he does with the carefully curated information they left as a prize on the computers they are using.
Meanwhile Tucker finally explains how his new job is going to his parents. Who have no idea what he's on about. Who then promptly ring Danny. Because, Danny what job has Tucker taken up? We thought he was just moving in with his boyfriend?
Cue incoherent sputtering. Danny is in a panic he had nO IDEA THEY WERE DATING HE'S A TERRIBLE BOYFRIEND 😭
and Kool-Aid-Mans through the nearest wall to go buy his boyfriend a decorative kebab arrangement. Like the cut fruit arrangements, but all meat. Hopefully Tucker would forgive him for this.
This is going to give the currently watching Bat the best sitcom nonsense moment.
Danny rushing into their place with fancy meat arrangement. Shoving it at a visibly confused Tucker. "I'm sorry for being a bad boyfriend!". Followed by an even more confused Tucker. "Why do you think you're a bad boyfriend? Wait, when did we start dating?!?".
The two very smart bois then slowly figuring it out. And realising Tucker didn't manage to convey his news to his parents. They thought he moved in cause they were dating.... Shit, how do they break the news to them?!
Danny:... I am 100% willing to marry you so we don't upset your Mom and Dad.
Tucker: Oh thank fuck! Ok! Ring shopping next week?
Danny: Sounds good to me. Should we try to make it a real deal?
Tucker:.... I mean? We do love each other? May as well slip the 'no homo'.
Danny: Dork! Ok. We got this. Now we never, ever admit to this.
Tucker: What's one more secret?
Bat watching them plot to get married so they don't disappoint the Foley seniors. Welp, now we got blackmail. You watched that O? Good good!
Sure they all love each other, it's just that the limits between the type of love between each other got super blurry and they don't really care about giving it a name at that point, is it romantic? Is it platonic? Is it both? Is it some secret third thing?
THEY DON'T KNOW AND THEY DON'T CARE WHAT IT IS.
They're each others' idiots and that's all that matters to them.
Tucker: If I'm in a dress? It better be gold. Or at least with gold details. You know white makes me look sickly.
Sam: Oh I know.
Danny:... Why is mine a mini dress with sheer lace over the top?
Tucker: It is? Actually, you would look great in that.
Danny: My sister's are going to be there. It better reach at least mid thigh!
Sam:.... Only if you agree to *super sexy nightwear* for the honeymoon!
Danny: Deal. Oh sweet, you chose full Morticia for your on outfit!
Sam: Of course!
Steph: Guys! We got another one to check!
Babs:... She's in college elsewhere right now. But will likely move to her boys after she finishes. Heavy into activism. Minor charges for uh, disrupting the peace.
Tim: So, a genius hacker, a genius of inventor, and an eco activist?
