Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Daniel Fenton, king of the ghost realm and one of the strongest ghosts in existence? Scared? Ha! Daniel was not even the slightest bit nervous as he rested back on a church steeple, looking over the gloomiest city he’d ever seen (and he was from the ghost zone!)

Daniel Fenton was sixteen years old. It had been two (very) long years since he had accidentally killed himself (and isn’t that an awkward statement out of context). It had been a year since his parents had discovered his alter ego and he had moved to the ghost zone to begin his training to be the next ghost king.

And now Danny was in Gotham, on some strange mission that Clockwork had sent him on, being annoyingly vague about Danny’s purpose in the city.

The ghost boy had heard of Batman. Everyone had. Well, everyone who didn’t live under a rock. But there was one piece of information that Danny and those with abilities like his own paid attention to.

Batman hated metas.

Ok, maybe that was an over exaggeration. He seemed to work well enough with the rest of the justice league, and all together they had more genetic miracles than Danny had friends.

But he still had that ironclad rule of no metas in Gotham.

Now Danny wasn’t technically a meta, but he didn’t really think Batman sit around to let him explain the technicalities of being half dead.

So Danny’s plan went like this:

Step 1- Get clockwork to tell him just what he was doing in possibly the most ominous city on earth.

Step 2- Get whatever he needs to do done as fast as (in-)humanly possible.

Step 3- Run for the hills like Pariah Dark himself is chasing you.

Now Danny just had to wait for someone to hurry up and help him kickstart Step 1.

Lost in his thought, he would have missed clockworks near-silent arrival if not for the pale blue fog that floated out of his mouth.

“So you want to tell me what I’m doing here?” Danny asked, peering at his mentor from the corner of his eye.

“No.” Clockwork smiled before flying away leaving a grumbling Danny to follow him.

As they weaved through the buildings of Gotham, Danny called out to his technical subject “I’m pretty sure this is insubordination!”

When Clockwork finally came to a stop in a dark alley, Danny floated down next to him, scanning the alleyway for any hints as to just what Clockwork brought him here for.

Scanning the surrounding area, the halfa came to a solid conclusion.

“Clockwork, this is a completely average alleyway.”

“That is true Daniel.” Clockwork still had that stupid smile on his face, before it turned somewhat sadder. “I suppose I should prematurely apologize.”

Now Danny was even more confused as clockwork patted his shoulder sympathetically “Apologize? What’s going on-“

A flash of green light lit up the near abandoned alleyway, consuming it in light.

When the light finally faded, Clockwork was nowhere to be seen.

Danny Fentons head was pounding. He reached up to clutch his head, to see if he could somehow manage to shove it back together even though it felt like it would split in two-

- his hands were too small and his body felt too soft and his head hurt and he didn’t know where he was and he didn’t know who he was because all that was left was pain-

And the Ghost Boy’s body fell to the floor, rings glowing around him changing pale white hair to a soft looking black and pale blue eyes sliding shut.

Danny laid prone in the filthy alleyway, consciousness completely lost from the boy who had been so much larger not even a minute ago.

Daniel Fenton was sixteen years old until he wasn’t, and Clockwork couldn’t help but feel a tinge of sympathy for the now prepubescent boy.

Daniel Fenton was a child again, and Clockworks pieces were falling into place.

Chapter Text

When Danny woke up, he couldn’t remember how old he was.

He knew he was sixteen, a high school drop out and ghost royalty and having lived a life so full of action and growing with so many great and horrible times he could never forget-

But at the same time he had just had his seventh birthday and he was just a boy who knew nothing about the world and didn’t believe in ghosts and was so dependent on his sister and friends-

Danny lifted his too small body off of the ground, trying to open his eyes without disturbing his pounding head. He saw what seemed like a wall in front of him, so he turned his body and pushed his back up against it, not standing but happy to be off the floor.

Once he got over the slowly receding headache, Danny became more aware of his body, and kinda wanted the headache back.

He felt like he had been stretched like taffy and then squished into a small box. It reminded him a bit of being stuck in the Fenton thermos, and the memory of that terrible day sent a shiver down his spine.

He held his unusually small hands up to his face and came to a conclusion.

Clockwork had fucking de-aged him.

The bastard.

Danny flung his fist into the wall that was supporting him in anger, then immediately flinched away when he heard a metallic crunching sound.

Childlike panic filled his small body as he looked at the bowling ball size dent he had made in what he could now tell was a dumpster.

Danny quickly realized that clockwork definitely did not just plain de-age him, as he could feel the ectoplasm racing through his body and he still had his memories somewhat intact.

Danny shoved his head into his hands and groaned. He knew clockwork would never do anything truly malicious to him, but ancients he wished the ghost was more transparent (heh, ghost pun) with him.

Danny stewed in his thoughts until his ghost sense started bubbling in the back of his throat. He quickly looked around himself, but the alleyway was dark and still.

It took Danny a moment to realize that while he could definitely feel the blue smog in the back of his throat, it wasn’t leaving his mouth. Deciding that whatever this anomaly was, it was probably what Clockwork wanted him to investigate, Danny set off.

—

Jason Todd was annoyed. He hadn’t been annoyed all day, in fact up until about a few hours ago his day had been pretty decent. Then the scarecrow decided to make a mess a bit too close to crime alley and Jason had to work together with the replacement to beat him down.

Now at this point, Jason didn’t have too much of a problem with Tim. Yeah he had tried to kill the kid (and he had apologized for that), but most of his murderous impulses towards his pseudo-brother were do to the Lazarus water, which Jason had under control now. Kinda.

Despite apologizing for his attempted fratricide, things were still tense between him and the bats. Which was fine. He didn’t need them. He didn’t need anyone.

Unfortunately for him, his helmet had cracked during the fight with the straw-headed-bitch, and he had to walk home in his civvies because his spare had gone missing.

So Jason was pissed off, walking home at 1 am in the morning, and now he was being followed.

He had only noticed his pursuer a few blocks back, a tingle on the back of his neck tipping him off to the strange feeling of being watched.

And whoever was watching him was good.

He had only managed to catch glimpses of small shadows out of the corner of his eye, those always disappearing a split second.

Maybe if he’d been in a better mood, Jason would’ve called someone for safety, or tried to give his follower the slip.

But Jason could feel Lazarus water and rage dancing in his veins so he took a sharp turn into an alley he knew was a dead end, adrenaline beginning to pound.

Halfway in he stopped and turned around, surveying the corner he figured his stalker was hiding behind.

“Are you gonna come out and fight me or keep on following me like a coward!” Jason said loudly, hoping they didn’t choose the second option.

He sat and waited for a moment, long enough to make him wonder if he actually had a follower or if he was imagining it. (God that would be embarrassing if it was just paranoia. That sounds like something Bruce would do.)

Eventually a small movement by the corner caught his eye, and he finally got a solid look at the person who’d been following him for the last 15 minutes.

And it was a kid.

Because of course it was.

The kid was short, he couldn’t be more than ten. Fluffy black hair framed his head, floating in a way that seemed only half-bound by gravity. The kids eyebrows were furrowed over round icy blue eyes.

He was just Bruce’s type and for a moment Jason wondered if he had another brother. But then Jason took into account the boys skinny frame, looking not like a child completely without food but like a kid who definitely didn’t get as much as he needed.

The clothes he wore were baggy on him, looking like they were for a kid a foot or two taller than the one currently staring him down.

Jason blinked before realizing that he should probably retract his offer to fight the literal child in front of him.

He coughed into his fist before making eye contact with the kid, watching the boy stiffen up under his gaze. “So you wanna tell me why you were following me kid?”

The boy looked like a deer caught in the headlights, and in another situation Jason probably would have found it funny.

“… no” The kid finally said, frowning at the older man.

“Well alright then.” Jason said, as he started walking towards both the boy and the exit of the alleyway.

The kid stiffened up as Jason got closer, stiff as a boulder when Jason put his hand on his shoulder.

“If you’re gonna follow me, might as well walk with me then. Kids shouldn’t hang out alone at night.” Jason said, not really sure what he was doing but doing it all the same.

The younger of the two’s face soured. “I’m not a kid.” The kid said petulantly.

“Sure you aren’t.” Jason kept on walking, and after a moments hesitation, the kid followed. “The names Jason by the way.” He looked to the kid, hoping he would offer up some sort of name so he could stop mentally calling him ‘the kid’.

The kid stared at him for three beats before responding. “It’s Danny.” The kid- Danny paused again, before seemingly making a decision. “Danny Fenton.”

Chapter Text

Danny was an idiot.

I mean that was kind of a a fact of life (he literally went inside an unstable piece of machinery and got himself killed), but now he was feeling like even more of an idiot than he usually was.

He was following a stranger home as thousands of Jazzes lectures and school presentations about the dangers of being kidnapped flew through his mind.

Jason seemed perfectly content with this situation, which only added to Danny’s confusion. This man was just going to let a little kid follow him home? Was this kidnapping? Was he going to try and sell his organs?

Danny side eyed the man next to him, who had pulled out his phone and was seemingly texting someone.

Jason was definitely more intimidating up close, a near six-foot frame towering over Danny’s now even shorter than usual figure. He had short black hair, with a white streak in the center of his head that reminded Danny of his own hair when he went ghost. The man had bluebell eyes, the soft color offset by the sharp way he seemed to look at the world around him.

He looked strong, broad shoulders and thick arms and legs giving the illusion of someone not to fuck with.

Danny really hoped he wasn’t supposed to fight this guy, because there was no chance of winning unless he used his powers, and he really did not want to reveal himself in this situation.

Despite his intimidating appearance, the man gave off a certain sort of air that had Danny’s core glowing with a warm sort of recognition. It was strange, but Danny had definitely dealt with stranger.

So lost in observing the man as the walked side by side, he was startled out of his thoughts as Jason stopped in front of an apartment building.

“This is my stop kid, you can go home now.” Jason said, placing his hand on the door to his complex.

Except Danny couldn’t go. Because this man made his ghost sense go all weird and he couldn’t chance losing the opportunity to get back to his normal body as fast as he could. Plus, he was also very homeless.

“I’m homeless.” Danny said without thinking, watching as Jason grimaced. “So I actually can’t.”

Jason stared at Danny for a second and Danny felt the impulsive need to share more to fill the awkward silence, which in retrospect probably wasn’t a good instinct to act on, but oh well.

“I mean I do have a place where I live but my…” What should he refer to clockwork as? He couldn’t exactly say Mentor or Lord of Time. “… uncle left me passed out in an alleyway and I can’t really go home yet so-“

“Passed out in an alley?” Jason asked, his voice strained. Daniel promptly realized that maybe that wasn’t the best thing to say in this situation.

“I mean the me passing out thing wasn’t completely his fault, and he knows I can handle myself…” Danny trailed off, realizing he wasn’t really helping his case as the taller man started frown.

They stared at each other for a few moments more before Jason sighed. “Well come on in kid, we can see if my brothers clothes fit you better than those.”

Jason held open the door for Danny as he gaped at him. Sure he was playing up the ‘pitiful homeless boy’ bit, but he didn’t expect the taller man to cave so easily.

“You aren’t going to try and steal my organs are you?” Danny said without thinking, and then realizing that maybe being in a kids body was a blow to his impulse control (not that it was particularly steadfast before).

The man snorted before giving him a grin, the first that Danny had seen from him all night. It was a bit crooked, but it was warm. “I don’t plan on it two-bit.” Danny pouted at the man for the nickname, only causing him to smile wider.

Going into a strangers apartment in the body of a child probably wasn’t the best idea Danny had ever had, and it definitely sounded like something that his friends and Jazz would yell at him for.

Oh well. He was Danny Phantom. If things went wrong he could handle it. He wasn’t dead yet!

Well, not completely anyways.

—

Jason was turning into his father.

Not the first one, he wasn’t that much of an asshole. Ok he was an asshole, but not in that way.

He was turning into the dad he never called his dad, the dad who felt so close at times but so untouchable, standing tall and sturdy on a podium while Jason could barely move through the thick mud that Bruce was so high above.

He never understood why his dad Bruce had so many random orphan kids he picked up off the streets, but he thought he might get it looking at the tiny boy in the slightly too big shirt (he was immensely grateful that Damian and the rest of his brothers had decided to keep some clothes at his house in case of emergencies) who was swinging his tiny legs on Jason’s couch, watching intently as Jason dug through his kitchen looking for something edible that he could feed a kid.

He managed to find some packs of ramen in a cabinet, and he promptly realized he definitely needed more food in his house.

“You good with ramen kid?” Jason asked, really hoping Danny liked ramen because he was pretty sure that was the only edible thing in his apartment.

“Ramen’s fine.” Danny said, before pouting in a way that Jason did not find cute at all shut up “and I told you, ‘m not a kid.”

“How old are you again?”

“… seven.”

“Okay kid.” Jason was smiling. He could totally see Danny’s lips quirk up before the boy schooled his expression. He was glad to know his humor was appreciated.

Jason cooked in a comfortable silence, losing himself to his thoughts.

He’d need to pick up more kid-friendly food next time he went to the store, maybe Danny could point out the stuff he liked and-

Oh.

Shit.

He was totally turning into his dad.

He’d already mentally adopted Danny.

Did he even know how to take care of a kid? ‘You’ll figure it out,’ his mind whispered back ‘you already know what not to do.’

Which, okay, that was fair.

Plus, how hard could raising a kid be?

He poured the ramen he was cooking, carrying it towards the kid.

Passing him the bowl and a fork, he sat down next to the kid who was holding the ramen like it was a holy grail.

Shit, he’d probably need a table too.

Jason decided to wait until the kid had finished his ramen and set the bowl down before talking again.

“Hey Danny.” Jason looked at the boy next to him, who turned his head to face him.

“You wanna move in with me?” Jason asked and Danny choked.

After thumping the kid a few times on the back until he stopped coughing, Danny turned to him with the most incredulous look he had ever seen on a child so young.

“Are you fucking with me?” The kids voice squeaked a bit at the end of his sentence, confusion bleeding into his tone.

“Nope! Also, language.” Alfred always scolded him for cussing, so it probably wasn’t a good idea to let a kid a kid cuss. Alfred knew what he was doing.

The kid was unimpressed at his cheery disposition, sending a flat glare that rolled straight off Jason’s back.

“You’ve known me for what? Two hours? How do you know I’m not going to rob you?” Danny asked, searching Jason’s face for answers.

“You find anything decent to rob in this house, feel free to take it.” Danny frowned even harder at the man.

“Why?”

Ah, that was the million dollar question wasn’t it. Why did he want this kid to stick around?

Maybe it was the boys small frame, the way he had wolfed down his food like he had been starving for weeks.

Maybe it was the intelligent blue eyes, too distrustful and wary to look so young.

Maybe it was the way that being around the boy felt like a cool breeze in summer, like someone was rubbing aloe on his broken soul.

Maybe it was the way the kid reminded him far too much of another kid with messy black hair and clear blue eyes that had ran through the streets stealing car parts and hadn’t had a single other person to rely on- the kid who had died bruised and bloody and waiting for a hero who never came-

“I’m not gonna leave some kid who knows nothing about Gotham out on the streets.” It wasn’t a lie, not technically. That was definitely one of Jason’s reasons.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” The kid’s shoulders rose.

“You’re obviously not from around here. You followed a stranger through Crime Alley, no kid would pull that unless they had some sort of death wish.”

Danny looked like he was trying to come up with an excuse until “Is it seriously called Crime Alley?” Jason had to fight to keep a smile off his face.

“Technically it’s called Park Row, but no one who isn’t a rich prick calls it that.” Jason responded to the boy’s question. “Where are you from?”

“Amity Park, Illinois.” Danny answered automatically.

“Never heard of it.”

“That’s cause it’s in the middle of nowhere.” Danny stated. “So you’re just some Good Samaritan who wants to take care of a pitiful kid?” He was obviously suspicious. Which was fair.

“I like to think so.” Jason responded. He then stood up, grabbing both empty bowls. “Think it over. You can take my bed it’s the door on the right, I’ll stay on the couch.”

Danny looked conflicted for a moment, but the tiredness was apparent in his eyes. He stood up and walked over to Jason’s bedroom, making eye contact with him for a moment.

“Thanks.” The kid said, avoiding Jason’s eyes as he stood in the doorway. “Night.” And he shut the door behind him, Jason hearing the soft click of a lock.

He took off his jacket and laid it on the counter, before turning off the lights and laying on his couch.

He’d probably have to take the kid shopping tomorrow.

He had a kid now.

Fuck. 

Chapter Text

Damian Wayne hated school. This wasn’t a very new development of course, but as Damian picked up a liter of coke and put it in his shopping cart for an inane school project his hatred of the American education system was only reinforced.

They were making soda volcanoes like in one of the horrible made for T.V. movies Dick made him watch, and it took all of Damian’s self restraint not to smash his group mates heads into their desks anytime he needed to interact with them.

Damian was pushing his shopping cart through the store and trying to decode Drake’s horrible handwriting on the shopping list the older boy had given him when he heard he was headed to the store.

He couldn’t tell if Drake wanted 5 or 3 boxes of Keurig coffee, but either number was concerning for both his physical and mental health.

Might as well get five.

Damian was turning the corner to go find the vegetarian section when his cart nearly slammed into someone else’s. Looking up to scold the other person for almost running into him, Damian’s brain short circuited when he saw the man he nearly crashed in to.

“Todd?” Damian said his name like a question. It was strange to think his brother Todd would do something so domestic as shopping, not when the concept of Todd that lived in his head was constantly being angsty or shooting people and making witty remarks.

“What’re you doing here pint-size?” Jason asks, looking into Damian’s cart as he bristles at the childish nickname.

“I needed to collect supplies for a school assignment, and Drake decided he wanted me to pick up items for him while I was out.”

“Ah, got it. Chore boy then.” Jason grinned.

“I am not a chore boy to that incompetent fool you-“ Damian starts, knowing that Jason was always like this, teasing remarks thrown at others just to see their flustered reactions, but Damian doesn’t care he’s being played cause Jason is good at what he does but if he thinks he can get away with implying Damian is subservient to that no-good self-sacrificial-

“So are you just an ass to every random kid you meet?” Damian startles at the new voice behind him, realizing that he was far too distracted by Todd being ornery to have not noticed someone sneaking up on him.

“Hey!” Jason pouted in fake offense. “I actually know this one!” Damian turned to look at the boy Jason was so casually bantering with.

He was shorter than Damian, and probably a few years younger. His coloration was similar to the rest of Damian’s family, but he lacked the muscle and confidence that came so naturally to each of Bruce Wayne’s wards. He was wearing clothes that were a few sizes too big on him and- was that Damian’s hoodie?

“Danny, this is my brother.” Jason said, gesturing at Damian. “Damian, this is Danny. He lives with me now.”

Damian turned to Todd’s grocery cart, noticing both frozen meals and cooking ingredients, coming to a horrific realization.

“Todd, you’re turning into father.” Damian says as Jason’s face immediately drops and he starts sputtering.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Danny asks, causing Damian to turn his head back towards him.

“Our father also has problems with picking up pathetic looking orphans and taking them in.” Danny looked insulted at that.

“Well first of all, I’m like 97% sure my parents are still alive, if they died their ghosts would totally haunt me,” Danny started, holding up a finger before lifting a second one “second of all, I’m pretty sure you just called yourself pathetic there too.”

“I am not pathetic.” Damian stated “I am my fathers blood child.”

“I dunno, I think you’re pretty pathetic shorty.” Jason’s was grinning again, over his indignation at being compared to father.

“Jason has a point, I think all of your dad’s kids are pathetic, adopted or otherwise.” Danny was grinning too, and Damian promptly decided that Danny was one of the most annoying people he had ever met.

Todd gasped and lightly grabbed Damian to pull the younger boy in front of him like some comically small shield. “Danny is so mean to us! Can you believe it Dami?”

“I can not believe you are acting like such an imbecile.” Damian grit out, not wanting any part of whatever childish plan Todd and Danny had formulated. (Damian had long since left his own childhood behind. It only served to make him soft.)

“Big word for such a short kid.” Danny snarked and Damian shot him an unimpressed look.

“You do realize you’re shorter than me, right?”

Danny looked confused for a second before smiling again. “Oh yeah, I forgot about that.” Jason snickered at the younger boys words.

“You’re just such a garden gnome it’s hard for people to imagine they can be shorter than you!” Todd played off Danny as both of their faces lit up in grins.

Damian shoved Todd’s hands off his shoulders, watching him stumble around in mock hurt. “You’re both insufferable.”

He grabbed his cart and speed walked away from the cackling thing one and two.

There was still stuff on Drake’s list, but Drake could get it himself.

“BYE DAMIAN! IT WAS NICE MEETING YOU!” Danny yells as Damian turns the corner, his voice far too sunny to not know what he was doing.

God, his new nephew was almost as bad as his father.

—

Dick wasn’t expecting Dami to be so pissed off when he came home from the store, but after his little brother hurled a bag of coffee at an unsuspecting Tim’s face and then stormed back up the stairs, Dick figured he should probably check on him.

Damian was found in the gym, attacking a dummy with such force that Dick was pretty sure his little brother was attempting to murder the inanimate object.

“Jeez-“ Dick started, smiling at his little brother as their eyes met and Damian slowed his assault. “What did the dummy ever do to you?”

“Went shopping today.” Damian said around small pants of breath. “Ran into Todd-“

Dicks breath froze in his lungs.

Ok, that wasn’t really what he was expecting.

Jason had always been strange to talk about, a bit of a taboo in the Wayne manor.

Bruce ignored him, or he tried to. Jason was the son B had never given up on, but Jason had given up on B. Bruce had let Jason die, and now Jason stood as a testament to Bruce’s failings.

Jason had tried to kill Tim. Sure he’d been out of his mind at the time, but Tim got hurt. Shit like that leaves scars. Tim still stiffened up whenever Jason stood too close, avoiding the man whenever he could.

Damian had known Jason before, but neither of them had talked about their time together in the league. Now Damian saw Jason as the disappointment of the family, the black sheep.

To Dick, thinking about Jason made regret lay bitter and heavy against his tongue. At night when he couldn’t sleep his brain was plagued by what-if’s. If he had been a better predecessor, a better Robin, a better brother- would Jason have died?

What if Jason’s death and pain could be attributed to the fact that Dick had been a jealous kid who felt like he was being replaced and didn’t care enough for his little brother.

Did he even have the right to call him brother anymore?

“Jason, really?” Dicks smile didn’t falter. It rarely ever did anymore.

“Yes. He and his ward are absolutely intolerable.” Damian said as Dick’s brain blue-screened.

“I’m sorry his what?!?” Dick shook his head a bit, wondering if he misheard.

“The boy he took in, his new ward.” Damian responded as if he was reading the weather.

Jason Todd took in a kid.

What the fuck?!

Chapter Text

Timothy Drake wanted to go home. It was midnight and Dick had pulled him out the window while he was working on how to get more funding to the R&D department without passing of the assholes on the board of directors.

“So why are we breaking into Jason’s place as civilians again?” Tim asked as Dick dragged him through another dirty alleyway.

“According to Damian, he’s taking after B and picking kids up off the street.” Dick said without breaking stride.

Tim nearly face planted, as he turned his wide eyes towards his eldest brother. “Jason? With a kid? Was Damian pranking you?”

Dick stopped to stare at him for a moment.

“Ok fine, that was dumb.” They both set off again, Tim now jogging side by side with Dick. “But why would Jason take in a kid?”

“That’s why we’re here.” Dick said, as he grabbed onto the bottom rung of the ladder of a fire escape, pulling himself up.

“Is Jason even home?” Tim asks as he follows Dick towards Jason’s third floor apartment.

“We’ll find out, won’t we?” Dick grinned like an idiot. Not just like an idiot, he was an idiot. He turned to the window and began picking the lock.

They crawled their way inside the window, looking around at the dark apartment.

While Tim waited by the window for his eyes to adjust, Dick immediately charged forward, blind as a bat.

Tim could hear dick sliding his feet along the floor until-

“FUCK MY KNEE-“ a repetitive thumping sound  filled the room around the sound of Dick stumbling and tripping.

When Tim finally found and flipped on a light switch the thumping noises stopped, and he was greeted with the sight of his oldest brother on the floor, a short child straddling him holding a slightly bloody-

“Is that a thermos?!”

—

A few minutes before…

Danny was pretty sure Jason didn’t have an actual job.

Or he was a prostitute.

He was pretty sure it was the second one.

He got all dodgy whenever Danny asked him about his job, apparently he only worked during the night, and when they were shopping he never seemed to worry about money.

Really, all the signs pointed towards his new guardian being a sex worker.

Not that Danny was judging sex workers. It was a completely valid job and it was old fashioned and pretentious to shame someone for it.

Danny was startled out of his musings on Jason’s prostitution by the soft noise of a window opening in the main room.

He slowly crawled out of his room, one that Jason had previously been using for storage, grabbing the Fenton thermos he always keeps nearby on his way out.

At times like those he’s grateful for his ghost physiology, as he could easily see the two people in the apartment, even through the pitch darkness of the night.

One stayed by the window as the other slowly shuffled across the dark room.

Danny decided to go for the second one first.

He snuck up on the tall man, using intangibility to make his steps silent, and then slammed his thermos into the back of the tall man’s kneecap as hard as he can.

“FUCK MY KNEE-“ He fell to the floor and Danny is hitting him with his thermos over and over, not giving the man a chance to collect himself before going at it again.

He only stops once the lights flicker on, and then he looks up to meet the eyes of the teen staring at him in shock by the light switch.

“Is that a thermos?!”

“Yup.” Danny answered, lowering his arm and turning to look at the man he had been wailing on.

He looked pretty strong, lean muscle as far as the eye could see. He had shiny black hair that had probably been neatly done, but was now floating around his head in a frazzled mess. His eyes were a sky blue, though one of them was starting to swell up due to thermos-induced blunt force trauma. His nose was rigid and tall and sluggishly dripping blood.

“You wanna stop hitting me with a thermos?” The man under him asks, almost hesitantly.

“Depends? You wanna tell me why you broke into my apartment?” Danny shoots back.

“We’re looking for our brother, Jason. I’m Tim and that’s Dick” the newly-dubbed Tim says,

“He’s working.” Danny got off of Dick, watching as the man scrambled to his feet. “Don’t move.” Danny told them as he walked towards his room where he kept the burner phone Jason had given him.

He walked back out while the phone rang in his hands, and when Jason picked up Danny could tell he was trying to get his breathing under control (another piece of data for the “Jason is a prostitute” folder.)

“Hey Danny, shouldn’t you be asleep?” Jason asked as Danny turns on the speaker.

“Two weirdos climbed in through the window and say they’re your brothers.” Jason choked on the other end of the line.

“Hey Jayce!” Dick- was his name seriously Dick?- said and Danny heard an audible sigh through the phone.

“They’re my brothers. I’ll be there in ten minutes tops.” Jason said, and then hung up.

Danny turned to look at the men in his living room, focusing on Dick’s battered face.

“Sorry about that I guess.” Danny said, not really feeling sorry. ”You want some band-aids or something?”

Chapter Text

This was not how Jason was expecting his night to go. He was gonna go out as Red Hood, sticking close to his house, he wasn’t being a helicopter parent, he just wanted to stay close by his the kid.

And then Danny had called him and told him that his idiot brothers were in his apartment, Dick and… he didn’t actually know who the other one was. One of them. They were all annoying either way.

So Jason shoved his mask and bloody clothes in a duffel bag and started walking up the stairs of his apartment building, tired and ticked off.

Jason pushed open his door, not sure what he was expecting to see but definitely not whatever this was.

Danny was perched on the counter across from the couch intently staring at Jason’s brothers.

Dick tried to keep his eyes on Danny as well, but he kept on getting distracted by Tim who was performing first-aid on his severely damaged face.

They all turned their heads towards Jason as he entered the room, Danny giving him a cheery wave while his brothers both nodded at him, acknowledging his presence before returning to their half finished patch up job.

“What happened to you?” Jason asked Dick. It wasn’t every day someone managed to get the drop on his eldest brother, and he looked pretty shitty.

Dick blushed and averted his eyes from Jason while Tim snickered.

“Danny beat him up with a thermos.” Tim grinned wider as Dick pouted.

Jason turned to Danny, who shrugged at him.

“They came in through the window at midnight. Don’t act like a robber if you don’t want to be treated like one.” Danny said as Jason tried to tamp down his grin.

“Next time there’s a robber, call me instead.” Jason says. As much as he wished he saw Danny wailing on his eldest brother with a thermos, he didn’t want to think about what would’ve happened if it had been a real robber.

He then observed Dick again. His right eye was swelling up, his nose bleeding and his lip split. His body was painted with angry red welts that would probably turn out to be interesting looking bruises. Jason felt a swell of pride in his heart at the damage the kid had done.

“But really? A thermos? Why that?” Jason asked the kid. The weapon choice was funny as hell, but it didn’t really make a lot of sense. Did Jason even own a thermos?

“I always keep a thermos on me.” Danny said, which Jason thought was weird, but he’d seen people with weirder habits. “It’s basically my go-to at this point.”

“Why would you pick a thermos as your go-to weapon?” Confusion was laced in Dick’s voice.

“Ghost terrorists.” Danny answered, which only raised more questions.

There was a beat of silence before Tim spoke up, his voice tentative.

“Where are you from again?” He asked, obviously as confused as the rest of them.

“Amity Park, Illinois.” Danny responded without missing a beat.

“So why did you guys decide it was a good idea to break into my apartment?” Jason questioned the men on his couch, trying to change the subject.

Despite the question being meant to divert from whatever Danny had been talking about, Jason figured it was a pretty valid question.

His brothers avoided him when they could, and most conversations were stiff and awkward when they happened. Them showing up in his apartment was a bit unprecedented, and he really hoped he wasn’t going to be dragged into another family emergency.

“Damian told us you were following B’s example and picking kids up off the street. We wanted to check it out.” Dick responded, glancing at Danny. “Glad to know he’s got the same temperament you did.” Dick grinned before wincing, hand going up to cradle his hurt lip.

“Same temperament?” Danny asked, looking intrigued.

“Please shut up Dick.” Jason said. He didn’t want to be a bad example for impressionable young children.

“Please don’t shut up Dick.” Impressionable young children obviously didn’t appreciate Jason’s efforts to keep them uncorrupted. Or, considering Danny, less corrupted.

“Jason first met B trying to steal the wheels off his car. When B caught him, Jason attacked him with a tire iron.” Danny looked overjoyed with this new information.

“So what was Jason like as-“ Danny started off, obviously interested in what Jason’s past was like.

“Well you’ve seen I have a kid now.” Jason interrupted Danny. He definitely did not want the kid to be privy to all the secrets of his childhood. “And it’s midnight so I’m putting the kid to bed.” He walked over to the couch, pulling his brothers into standing positions before steering them towards the door. He opened the door and shoved his brothers outside despite their protests.

“Don’t break into my house anymore bye!” Jason slammed the door on his brothers faces, immediately turning the lock and walking away.

“So… a tire iron, huh?” A shit eating grin had made a home on Danny’s face.

God Jason hated his brothers.

—

Tim Drake had come to a conclusion.

Amity Park?

Fucking wild.

Tim didn’t really mean to pry into his new nephews life. (That’s a lie he totally did.)

But he figured he’d at least look him up. Their family wasn’t exactly the most normal, so he just wanted to double check the kids origins because he knew Jason wouldn’t. (His brother respected privacy. It was admirable, at least until it bit you in the ass.)

So he searched up Amity Park, finding it a bit funny when the claim of “worlds most haunted town” was the first thing to come up.

And then he checked the news.

And it stopped being funny.

Ghost terrorists, property damages, kidnappings, robberies, inter-dimensional travel (how had no one noticed that?), mind-control, sentient plants, an evil ghost-therapist(?), and so much more.

There were newscasts and videos and photos of the evil ghosts and spirits that terrorized the small town.

Tim now understood what Danny had mean when he said ghost terrorists.

Tim then froze with realization. Danny had grown up around this stuff. He wondered just how many ghost attacks Danny had been caught up in, just how many times his nephews life was put in danger, how many times he nearly joined the undead that haunted their town

The only excuse Tim had for never hearing of this before was that the ghosts never left Amity Park.

There were three separate groups dedicated to stopping the ghosts and containing them, and they were pretty damn good at their jobs.

There was Red Huntress, a vigilante a lot like the bats, only fighting ghosts instead of criminals. (Tim wondered if putting “red” before a noun was a vigilante thing. Red Huntress, Red Hood, Red Robin…)

Then there was the Fentons. They were ghost hunters and had been long before the ghost attacks on Amity Park even began. Tim wondered if they had any relation to his new nephew.

The final Ghost Hunter was definitely the most interesting. Phantom, the most popular, and a ghost himself. He had showed up when the ghosts started attacking, fighting them and protecting the humans around him.

The town seemed to be torn on their opinion of their ghostly defender. He had been shown doing good and saving people, but at the same he didn’t exactly have a spotless record. Robbery and harassment of the mayor were the two biggest marks against him, and Tim couldn’t help but feel he was a major wild card.

His sightings were strong in the first year, but they slowly began tapering off as time went on.

Still, it was a pleasant reassurance to know that not all ghosts had world domination on their minds.

Tim wasn’t really expecting much to come up when he searched up Danny’s name, and he clicked on the first link that popped up while taking a sip of his coffee.

When he looked up at his screen again, he froze, the cup slipping from his hand and crashing against the floor.

Why the fuck did Danny have an obituary?

Chapter Text

Dick was having a decent day so far. Well, a sort of decent day. As he moved his hand to grab more cereal, he could feel his fresh bruise twinge against his upper arm. An average day.

Tim threw the door open startling Dick into dropping his spoon onto the floor.

You know what, it was a terrible day.

Tim obviously didn’t share Dick’s grief, not pausing as he shoved his phone in Dick’s face.

“Ok so I was doing some basic research last night on Danny, not because I was suspicious or anything- I mean I was suspicious but not the point-“ Tim passed his phone to Dick and leaned back, barely pausing for air. “And apparently ghosts are a thing now, and I have no clue how I’d never heard of this before-“

Dick looked down at the phone in his hand, confused. Then he read the title and it felt like the world froze.

‘Daniel Fenton, Died at 15, Funeral on…’

“What the fuck is this?” Dick questioned the boy across from him. Tim froze, before frantically starting to speak again.

“That’s our biggest problem. Daniel Jack Fenton died one year ago on April 15th in a lab accident, at age 15. Now usually I would think oh wow wild coincidence, but not only has there been no other Daniel Fentons in Amity Parks recorded history, look at this picture!”

Tim scrolled down on the phone still in Dicks hand, and on the obituary site there was a picture of someone who looked just like Danny, only older.

He was flashing the camera a peace sign and grinning wide, wearing a baggy nasa hoodie and standing by two other teens.

One had Dark skin and glasses and a red beanie on his head, and he was shooting the camera a peace sign as well.

On Danny’s other side was a pale girl with short dark hair and a gothic aesthetic, sending the camera an almost bored look.

Dick couldn’t tear his eyes away from the boy in the center though, looking like some funhouse reflection of the kid he was talking with not even ten hours ago.

“So what the hell does this mean?” Dick said, after processing the news and turning to Tim, who was practically vibrating.

“That’s what I was confused about, but there’s more.” Tim quickly took the phone from Dick, opening up what looked like a news article.

‘Modern Day Grave-robbers or Ghostly Phenomenon? The Mystery of Daniel Fentons missing corpse.’

“His corpse went missing?!” Dick’s voice raised as confusion and anxiety swirled around inside his chest. Just what the fuck was up with that kid?

“Apparently the police caught his parents trying to dig up his grave, they refused to admit why. When the police checked inside to see if anything was tampered with, the body was gone.” Tim summarized for Dick, who had found a photo of the Fentons, Daniels parents. He had to admit, he could see the similarities between the boy and the people who raised him.

“The Fentons claimed that they didn’t take it, and no one was able to find the body.” Tim continued on. “This was a little more than a month after his death. There was no dirt overturned anytime beforehand, and the outside of the coffin was the same as when they had first put it in the ground.”

Dick handed the phone back to Tim, running a hand through his hair. “So how does a kid die, go missing in his grave in the next month, and show up across the country a year later and eight years younger?”

“I’ve got three theories.” Tim said, walking around the table to take a seat next to Dick.

He held up a finger. “Theory one. Someone stole the corpse, put everything back exactly the way it was, and the Danny we have now is a clone made from the other Daniel’s DNA.”

“That doesn’t sound very probable.” Dick comments, and Tim scowls at him. “Plus, who would make a clone out of Danny?”

“Yeah, that’s why it’s my least likely theory.” Tim says, before holding up a second finger. “Theory two, he’s a ghost.”

“He doesn’t look very ghostlike to me.” Dick said. Not that Dick knew what ghosts looked like. They probably didn’t look like seven year olds with impulsivity issues. At least, Dick thought so.

“I’m not done.” Tim snapped as Dick raised his hands in surrender. “There are a whole lotta ghosts around that area, so Daniel becoming a ghost after he died doesn’t seem like too much of a stretch. There are a few holes though. According to the Fentons research papers, they were ghost hunters by the way, ghosts have no use for their physical body, so I don’t know why Danny would take his back. They can also disguise themselves as humans, but they need a steady flow of either ectoplasm or other peoples vitality to sustain it.”

“What exactly is ectoplasm?”

“It’s what ghosts are made of. They’re basically souls that shape ectoplasm around them as bodies.”

“You think Jason could have some of this ectoplasm stuff in him?” Dick asked, not knowing if Tim had considered their brothers undead state in his ghost theory.

“He probably does, but chances of it being enough to sustain Danny in the long term are low.” Tim frowned.

“So what’s the third theory?”

“Time travel. For whatever reason, someone shot Danny’s corpse eight years back in time, or dragged Danny’s past body eight years into the future. And he somehow ended up in Gotham.” Tim groaned in frustration and Dick couldn’t help but sympathize.

“I don’t know how or why, but if someone brought him to Gotham, him running into Jason probably wasn’t a coincidence.” Dick hoped that wasn’t the case. Even though the kid humiliated him, he was a charismatic little fucker.

“What do you think Jason will do if we tell him that we think the kid’s a threat?” Tim asked and Dick stilled. The kid had already made a positive impression on Dick, and they’d spent less than half an hour together. He then weighed that against the constant tenseness and fights that came between not only Jason and the rest of the family but interwoven into the family itself. They loved each other yes, but when you’re in a family like theirs, any spark starts an inferno.

“Let’s keep an eye on the kid. Jason will probably cut us out of his life if we try to question the kid.” Dick decided, and Tim nodded.

Damn that annoying brats charisma. Likable little shit.

—

Danny was pretty sure teaching a seven year old how to use a gun wasn’t an advisable bonding activity.

Yet here he was, gun in his hand as he learned how to shoot a weapon at an unreasonably young age for the second time in his life.

Real guns had a pretty similar base and shape to the ghost guns his parents had designed when Danny was young, but the similarities stopped there.

The closest thing Danny had ever gotten to holding a gun like he was now was when he had stolen one of Skulkers guns during an attack.

Jason was walking him through the safety features of a gun with a cool ease and familiarity, his voice strong and collected in Danny’s ears.

The man had taken it as a personal insult when Danny had told him he’d never shot a gun over breakfast that day, dragging him to his motorcycle as soon as they finished eating.

They showed up at an old warehouse in the middle of a seemingly abandoned area, Jason pushing open two big doors as Danny followed him inside.

It was mostly empty except for what seemed like some targets on a wall, a small table and a wardrobe on the other end of the building.

When Danny asked why Jason knew about this place, he had seemed uncomfortable a moment before answering that the warehouse was commonly used by a business partner of his.

Danny was concerned about just what type of people Jason was selling his body to, but he was quickly distracted by Jason beginning to teach him how to use a gun.

So now here Danny was, preparing to shoot a gun with his new prostitute guardian cheering him on.

Danny aimed, before taking a deep breath to calm himself.

3

2

1

BANG

The shot fired off and Danny’s body exploded back, tripping onto his back at the strong recoil and surprise.

Jason snickered a bit as Danny pouted on the ground.

“Guess I should have told you about the recoil, huh?” Jason squatted down next to Danny.

Danny frowned at him “That would have been helpful, yeah.”

“Watch out for recoil.”

“Thanks” Danny deadpanned.

“Can I double check you didn’t hit anything?” Jason asked, gesturing to Danny’s shirt.

“No problem.” Danny said, before turning his back to Jason and lifting his shirt over his head.

He had barely got it off when he heard a sharp intake of breath from behind him.

He could practically feel the waves of rage rolling off the man behind him but when Jason reached for his back his touch was soft as a butterfly.

Danny felt calloused fingers run across the lichtenberg scars that danced across his back, surrounding his heart, and his breath caught in his chest. He could feel his ghost sense thickening up in his throat, shifting and roiling.

“Hey Danny” Jason’s voice was filled with barely suppressed rage. “Where the fuck did these come from?”

Chapter Text

Jason was going to murder someone.

Jason was going to fucking kill someone.

His thoughts were too loud and too few all at once as Lazarus green began clouding his vision.

Kill

protect

KILL

Protect

KI-

PROTECT

PROTECT

PROTECT.

Jason didn’t wait for the kid to answer his question.

With hands far gentler than he should be capable of with his veins boiling, he slowly turned Danny around, taking the boys shirt from his hands and pulling it back over the kids head.

He then stood up and hoisted the boy right off his feet, cradling the kid in his arms and walking straight towards the door.

“Ah? Jason, I can walk.” Danny said from inside Jason’s arms.

“Nope.” Jason responded, shifting Danny in his arms as he pushed the door open, proceeding to head straight towards his motorcycle like a man on a mission.

Jason placed the kid in front of him this time around, the kid was small enough to drive around.

-he was too small and fragile and easy to break-

It seemed like an eternity happened in an instant but somehow Jason was in front of his apartment building again.

He lifted his kid into his arms again, and this time Danny had no complaints, only looking at him with unreadable crystalline eyes.

He only put Danny down when he got into the apartment, setting him gently on the couch.

Jason stood up, his hands twitching with the need to do something-

-to hold his son and tear people apart and ruffle his kids hair and rip out throats and cherish and hurt and protect and kill-

He didn’t do any of that.

He walked over to the kitchen, vaguely reminded of doing this just a few days ago, and what it really that short of a time since?

It was hard to imagine a life without Danny and he’d barely known the kid for a few days.

Jason was beginning to think that maybe he had abandonment issues.

Yeah, that probably wasn’t a maybe situation.

Before Jason knew it, he had two steaming mugs of hot chocolate in his hands and was sitting back down next to the kid.

He passed one of the mugs to the kid, who took it with cold hands.

“I’m not going to make you tell me anything.” Jason stated, feeling the kid stiffen up at his side.

“You aren’t curious?” Danny’s voice was smaller than he’d ever heard it, so shy for such a usually excited kid.

“Of course I am.” Jason said, taking a sip of his hot chocolate. “You’re a real mystery kid. But you don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.”

Jason shot a look at Danny, who was staring at him in confused shock.

Jason just kept drinking his hot chocolate but after about five minutes, the kid spoke up.

“My parents are scientists. They study ghosts.” Danny’s words were hesitant, but Jason simply watched the boy, so he continued.

“Their biggest project was a ghost portal in the basement. It was supposed to open a door to another dimension, one where ghosts lived. They worked on it for ten years. And when they turned it on, nothing happened.”

“They were out of town, and I had some of my friends over. They dared me to go inside the portal, cause it was creepy and all that.”

Jason really didn’t like the way this story was going, but he couldn’t stop the kid now.

“The ghost portal worked, my parents just messed up some wiring. The way they designed it, there was an on switch on the inside.” Danny gulped.

“I accidentally hit it. The portal.” Danny’s eyebrows furrowed as he drew in on himself. “The portal turned on with me inside.”

“I should have died” 

Everything around Jason turned green.

Danny could have died.

His kid could have died.

“I’m lucky.” No he wasn’t. Lucky would’ve been his kid being born to parents that didn’t leave kids alone with unstable experiments.

-Lucky would have kept the fragile boy next to him far away from the dumpster fire Jason called his life-

“I’m still alive-” Danny’s breath shook, raw emotion making his throat stutter “-I’m still alive so I’m fine.”

Shit. His kid didn’t deserve that. His kid didn’t deserve any of this bullshit.

Jason set his hot chocolate down on the armrest, before hesitantly circling his arms around his kid, ready to pull away at the first sign of discomfort.

Danny teared up, but before Jason could make his retreat the kid put down his own mug before latching onto Jason like he was a life preserver.

Jason paused before gripping Danny tightly in return.

It was in that moment, Jason made a decision.

He was gonna protect his kid.

No matter what.

Chapter Text

Damian Wayne wasn’t expecting to run into his nephew at the dog park.

Damian Wayne hadn’t even expected to go to the dog park that day, as he didn’t even have a dog with him.

But Drake had been non-stop muttering about ghosts and pacing aimlessly since yesterday morning, and when Damian had seen him doing the same that morning, he realized he needed to get out of the house.

He had been quietly observing the dogs when he spied a familiar head of black fluffy hair through the crowd.

Damians nephew was running around like a headless chicken, seemingly searching for something among the throng of playing dogs.

Damian approached the panicking boy, placing a hand on his shoulder.

He wasn’t expecting the boy to immediately grab his hand and sweep his legs out from under him.

“Oh shit, Damian!” Danny exclaimed, immediately leaning over to help the startled Damian back to his feet.

Damian was torn between being proud of his new nephews reaction time or embarrassed he had fallen so easily.

Oh well, Richard had already been bested by Daniel, and in a much more embarrassing way.

“I am so sorry about that you just scared me and I was already tense cause of-“

Damian cut off the younger boys rambling by placing a hand on his shoulder.

“You have good reaction time.” Damian said simply, and Danny smiled at him in a way Damian did not find cute at all shut your mouth Todd.

A bolt of realization hit the younger boys face, and Danny was back to frantic. “Damian have you seen a dog?”

Damian looked at Danny, unimpressed, before gesturing to the dog park around him.

“Ok yeah, I’m looking for a specific dog.” Danny stated. “He’s a ghost dog so he’s green which should make him easy to find but he can also turn invisible which makes him decidedly less easy to find.”

“A ghost dog.” Damian stated, skeptical. Was this why Drake had been muttering about ghosts all throughout the manor this past day?

“Yeah, his name is Cujo.” Danny said.

Damian wasn’t really sure what was going on, but the frantic look on Danny’s face worried him.

“I will help you search.” Damian amended, and Danny perked up.

“Great! I wasn’t really expecting Cujo to show up in Gotham. I mean, I probably should have been, he’s kinda got separation issues.” Danny rambled on before Damian’s stare shocked him back to himself.

“Right, sorry. Cujo is pretty small most of the time, he’s bright green with red eyes. I don’t know what type of dog he was when he was alive, but I’ve been thinking along the lines of bulldog.” Danny quickly informed Damian of the dog they were looking for.

“Most of the time?” Damian questioned the boy next to him.

“Oh trust me, if he wasn’t small we’d definitely know where he was.”

The boys then spread out, searching high and low throughout the dog park.

It wasn’t too long before Damian spotted a flash of neon green, instantly rushing towards it.

He found what he assumed was Cujo (unless there were two bright green ghost dogs running around Gotham) playing with two other dogs, rolling and tumbling and occasionally going straight through the other dogs bodies.

Damian was about to look around for the younger boy when Danny suddenly appeared by his side.

“Cujo!” Danny exclaimed, running to the dog and grabbing him by his collar.

“You can’t just run off like that!” Danny scolded his dog, before lifting Cujo into his arms.

The dog pouted at Danny and the boy sighed, before turning to Damian.

“Damian, this is Cujo. Cujo, meet Damian.” Danny introduced them as Cujo barked happily.

“Can I pet him?” Damian asked, as he wondered what the green dogs soft looking fur would feel like.

Danny looked surprised at Damians question, before smiling warmly. “Sure!”

Damian slowly laid his hand on the dogs head, marveling at the strange texture underneath his hands.

It was smooth, his hand seeming to pass through the texture of the fur and straight on to the cool slightly squishy skin. The dog preened under Damian’s careful attention, pushing his head against Damian’s hand.

Damian decided he might have to reevaluate his opinion on his new nephew.

He was tolerable.

And his dog was quite cute.

—

Danny let Damian hold Cujo as they walked back towards Jason’s apartment, a comfortable silence falling over the two of them as Damian seemed completely entranced with the ghost dog.

Danny had been a bit surprised by Damian’s soft behavior towards the dog, but watching the tough kid turn mushy for a puppy reminded him that mentally, Damian was younger than him.

Mentally Danny felt about 50 with all the stress the other ghosts placed on him. 

Could ghosts get gray hairs? 

Danny had been woken up at about eight that morning by his ghost sense going off, and he immediately panicked thinking that he would have to fight off some malevolent ghost and reveal himself to Batman.

He had been relieved when he found Cujo sitting in Jason’s living room, then had promptly panicked again when Cujo ran off, trying to start one of the games of tag that he and Danny would usually play.

Danny barely had time to scrawl out a note for Jason and run through the door before he lost track of Cujo, and he had spent about forty five minutes chasing him around before ending up at the busiest dog park Danny had ever seen.

He was lucky Damian had found him when he did, he had been considering going ghost to find his dumb dog.

Danny pushed open the door, absentmindedly wondering how he was going to get Cujo back to the ghost zone when-

“Danny!” Jason immediately leapt over to the ghost boy and Danny barely had time to react before Jason lifted him into his arms, his eyes looking Danny over with concern.

“Hey Jason.” Danny said, squirming a bit inside Jason’s hold. Yeah it was nice, but it was probably temporary and Jason would think he was weird if he just melted into the soft touch like he wished he could.

“You can’t just disappear on me like that without saying anything!” Jason’s voice was scolding, though to Danny it sounded more like panic than actual anger.

“I left you a note.” Danny was confused. The note should have let Jason know that he was going out, so why was the man so worried.

Jason scowled before picking up the sticky note Danny had left his message on. “‘Gotta go, ghost emergency, be back soon’ is definitely not a good note.”

Damian apparently decided that Danny wasn’t suffering enough and decided to pitch in himself. “That does seem annoyingly vague.”

“I find it more worrying than just annoying.” Jason said, which was weird. People don’t worry about Danny, that’s not how it works.

“Well not all of us are mother hens Todd.” Damian snapped back. It looked like it was going to devolve into an argument when-

“Why would you be worried about me?” Danny asked, and Jason turned to him with a look of concern on his face.

“You’re a kid who disappeared into Crime Alley without telling me where you were going, of course I’m gonna be worried about you.” Jason frowned at the kid in his arms.

Realization hit Danny like a truck.

Of course the man was worried about him, Jason thought he was seven years old!

No sane person would let such a tiny kid walk around in such a dangerous place on their own. (Certain Fentons excluded, but they never were the sanest.)

Danny nodded sagely. “That makes sense. Sorry about that.”

“Somehow I feel like we are on completely different pages here.” Jason grimaced. “Where did you even go for this ‘Ghost emergency’ anyways?”

“I had to hunt down Cujo.” Danny stated, gesturing to the ghost dog in Damian’s arms, watching in slight amusement as Jason finally registered his younger brother and the fluorescent green dog in his arms.

“I ran into Danny while he was looking in the dog park.” Damian added. “We found Cujo shortly after.”

Jason blinked twice. “Why is there a ghost dog?”

“There was a ghost portal in our basement. I’ve always wanted a dog, so when Cujo came through I ended up sort of adopting him. He usually stays in the ghost zone, but he comes to find me when he’s lonely.” Danny told Jason “He likes playing tag, so he ran off once I saw him this morning.”

Jason sighed. “Just don’t do it again kid. Or at least leave me a better note next time.”

“I will.” Danny said. The last thing he wanted to do was cause grief to the man who had been so kind to him, Danny couldn’t stand it if Jason turned on him too-

“Sorry to interrupt,” Damian interjected “but what do you mean there was a Ghost Portal in your basement?”

Chapter Text

Dick learned from his mistakes.

While many people would say otherwise, Dick liked to think he was in fact very good at learning from his mistakes.

That was why, this time, he was going to break into Jason’s apartment through the front door.

And he had Cass with him!

Cass would totally protect him!

Not that he needed protection, he was Nightwing, and he had defeated people way scarier than some kid with a thermos.

The kid had just caught him by surprise. He wouldn’t be able to do it again.

But Cass was good to have. Just in case.

It was also mid-day, and if things got awkward Dick could leave claiming he was hungry for lunch.

Alfred would tell Dick he was running away from his problems.

Dick preferred the term ‘tactical retreat’.

Alfred was probably right.

Dick was surprised when the door knob turned easily under his grasp, and he was able to push open the door without any resistance.

He was even more surprised to see Damian sitting with Danny on the floor, playing with a green(?) dog as Jason watched them with a fond look on his face.

Damian, looked up at Dick as he walked in, nodded in recognition, and then refocused on the excited puppy he was playing tug-of-war with.

“Hi Dick!” Danny grinned warmly, and Dick couldn’t help but smile back. “How’s your face?” He asked, and Dick could feel his smile grow a bit more strained.

“It’s cool, there weren’t any hits that were too bad.” Dick waved his hand nonchalantly, deliberately ignoring the twinging bruise on his forearm.

“Don’t you guys have a mansion to hang out in? One that’s like, bigger than my apartment?” Jason asked as Dick let himself in, willfully ignoring his brothers words to bend down and pet the excitable puppy.

“Cass wanted to meet Danny.” Dick says, gesturing behind him to where Cass was standing by the door.

“Cass?” Danny asked, before looking over to the woman at the door.

‘You didn’t tell him about me? I thought I was your favorite sister.’ Cass signed, her face torn between a grin and mock offense.

“How many siblings do you have?” Danny turned to Jason, who looked startled.

“You know sign language?” Jason asked, surprise apparent on his face.

“Yeah. A pretty decent chunk of the ghost community is mute, so I got Sam to teach me.” Danny responded, as if having nonverbal conversations with the spirits of the dead was a normal thing.

‘Ghost community?’ Cass signed, and Dick realized that no one had told her about the ghost thing.

“Again, I had a portal to the ghost realm in my basement. Ghosts were flying in and out of my house like, all the time. Ignoring them would be kind of a jerk move.” Danny shrugged. “Are there any more surprise siblings I need to look out for?”

“You’ve met all the ones that were legally adopted.” Jason said, before pausing and turning to Dick. “B hasn’t adopted any new kids I don’t know about, right?”

“Saying all the legally adopted ones makes me think that there are some who aren’t legally adopted.” Danny frowned as Jason gave him a grin and a shrug.

Danny turned to look at Cass again before furrowing his eyebrows. “So is the Black-hair Blue-eyes thing something he does on purpose? There’s like 4 of you and this feels purposeful.”

Cass grinned at Danny. ‘You’re included.’

“So you inherited your Dads adopting problems and his preferred adopting type? How unoriginal.” Danny teased Jason.

“Do you have any siblings Daniel?” Damian asked the boy sitting next to him.

“Yeah, I have two sisters! Jazz is older than me and she’s really smart. Dani isn’t technically my sister, but I just kind of call her that anyways.” Danny talked about his sisters in such a happy way, and Dick felt a flash of envy at the boy’s good relationship with his sisters. Maybe he could ask the kid for some tips.

“Was she adopted by your parents or something?” Dick asked. Jason scowled at the notion, and Dick wondered what Jason knew that made him react that way.

“No, my parents don’t know about her. She’s my clone.”

Huh.

So Tim’s clone theory had some merit.

“What!?”

—

Bruce’s children were hiding something from him.

Tim had been lost in his thoughts for the past five days, muttering something about amity and ghosts.

Damian had been complaining about school, which wasn’t unusual, but he hadn’t been spending as much time in the manor as he usually did. When Bruce asked him, Damian told him he was taking Titus to the dog-park, but Bruce had driven by the park and seen no sign of Damian or Titus.

Dick had been patrolling at seemingly random patterns, being seen in Crime Alley two times, and he somehow hadn’t even been shot at yet.

Cass was in town, and every time Bruce saw her she had a mysterious smile on her face, obviously happy with whatever secretive thing that was effecting her siblings lives.

Bruce hadn’t seen Jason since the last time Scarecrow had attacked, and according to the people in crime alley, Red Hood had been patrolling for shorter periods of time, and in a more concentrated area.

Alfred probably knew what was going on too, but he wasn’t offering up any information, so Bruce needed to figure it out on his own.

Bruce’s children were hiding something from him, and Bruce was going to figure it out.

After all, he wasn’t called The Worlds Greatest Detective for nothing.

Chapter Text

Jason Todd liked to think he was pretty smart.

He had always been good at school, understanding books and learning equations faster than the other kids.

And because Jason was smart, he was good at recognizing patterns.

People did the same things over and over, subconsciously repeating past actions.

People like the Joker would hurt people, again and again, like it was all they knew how to do.

People like B would sacrifice themselves, again and again, because it’s all they can do.

And Jason had noticed a pattern in his own life.

Every time Jason loved someone, every time he was able to start to build a family and be happy, he fucked it up.

Again.

And again.

Jason’s hand clenched around the shitty note-

Didn’t he tell Danny to stop disappearing and leaving only stupidly vague notes behind?

-and he could feel the Lazarus water around the pain in his heart, wanting to lash out and stop the hurt-

-but there was no one to lash out at, because this was all Jason’s fault.

His The kid’s hurt face flashed into Jason’s mind, shock and fear and pain-

And Jason had left before more of his harsh words could hurt the kid but it was the wrong thing to do because of course it was

Because when he had calmed down enough to know he needed to apologize to the kid and he had walked into his room

He was gone.

And all that was left was a shitty note.

‘I’m sorry I wasn’t that I was a burden. Don’t worry, you won’t have to see me again. -Danny’

Jason had fucked it up.

Again.

—

A few hours earlier;

Jason Todd wasn’t having a good night.

He had started his patrol at nine, trying to get back in the swing of covering all of Crime Alley.

He was clearing up a drug deal when the kid they were selling to panicked, pulling out a gun.

He was so focused on taking down the sellers, he didn’t even notice the new weapon till it clipped the side of his ribcage, making Jason hiss.

Before Jason could take the weapon, the girl took off.

Jason was about to follow her but his side stung at the movement, and looking down at the gash on his torso, he realized that maybe first-aid was a better plan.

Jason made it to the top of his apartment building without bleeding out all over Crime Alley, and he tossed his helmet into a small hole he had made when he first moved in, before climbing onto the fire escape and starting to head down to his own window.

Jason climbed through, grabbing his first aid kit and pulling off his bloody shirt before sitting  himself on the couch.

“Jason?” Danny’s voice was soft and sleep addled as Jason heard the door creak open.

Internally cursing, Jason reached for his shirt, but he was too slow.

“Jesus fuck Jason!” Instead of flinching away like Jason had expected him to, Danny rushed towards Jason’s side, concern creasing his brows.

“Language kid.” Jason reprimanded automatically.

“How the hell did you even-?” Danny’s voice was shaking slightly, and a pang of guilt squeezed Jason’s heart. He shouldn’t be worrying the poor kid like this.

“Mugging incident, accidentally got shot.” Jason definitely did not like the way Danny sympathetically winced.

“No hospital?” Danny questioned, and Jason was surprised the kid picked up on it that quickly.

“Nope. I’ll be fine, just go back to bed.” Jason waved his hand a bit, trying not to wince at the sudden movement.

“How the hell am I supposed to sleep! Let me help.” Danny reached towards the medical kit, worried eyes flickering between it and Jason’s wounded side.

“I’ll be fine.” Jason grit his teeth as he felt annoyance building inside him. Why wouldn’t the kid just listen?

“You got shot!” Danny practically snarled at him, and it was the first time Jason had seen the usually laid back kid so defiant.

“Do you even know what you’re doing” Jason snapped. “Don’t try to help if you’re only gonna make it worse!”

Danny flinched away, nearly dropping the first-aid kit in his arms.

“I just wanted to help-“ he choked out, naked hurt on his face. “I-I need to help-“

Jason rose from his seat, his vision warping with green.

Why wouldn’t the kid fucking listen?

The kids hand were too small and fragile to be tainted with Jason’s blood-

-Danny was so bright and clean and Jason would ruin him-

- and he should stay far away from Jason, because Jason was shattered like glass and he’d only hurt anyone who tried to touch him-

Jason snatched the first aid kit from the kids shaking arms, the same venom dancing through his blood pooling in the back of his throat.

“You can’t fucking help, so just stay away and go back to fucking sleep!” Jason yelled at the boy, before swiftly going into his room and locking the door behind him, leaving the kid lost behind him.

The kid was better off far away from him.

Everyone was.

—

Daniel Fenton’s knuckles hurt.

So did his core.

It ached with the failure of his obsession, mixing in with the pain in his heart as Jason’s words rang in his head.

The words twisted in his head, getting louder and warping as they repeated on loop.

Danny knew Jason hadn’t been in his right mind when he had snapped at him, Danny had seen the luminescent green shine in Jason’s eyes that reminded Danny of his own when his emotions became too much for his body to handle.

But all the same, the words had carved themselves deep into Danny’s heart, and now the ghost boy bled.

His core demanded he keep Jason safe, but what could he do if Jason was already hurt?

Danny knew how to fight and conquer.

He didn’t know how to heal, how to take care of another person.

He didn’t even know how to take care of himself.

So Danny had left Jason’s apartment before his instincts took over and he broke down Jason’s door, invisibly weaving through the dark roads of Gotham.

Then he saw the fight, two grown men kicking a curled up body, the smell of booze potent in the air.

So Danny did the only thing he was good for.

He fought.

He didn’t even need to go ghost, easily able to throw one of the mens body’s against the wall, as he punched the other square in the chest, making him double over in pain.

-Humans really were far too fragile-

And his core hurt a bit less as the bleeding man raised his head in shock, eyes widening as Danny slipped from his vision with nothing more than a thought.

And Danny could protect people.

Danny could fight.

So he kept wandering the dark alleys, breaking up fights and then disappearing, hurting those who hurt others until his knuckles bled and the pain in his core had dulled to a weak throb.

Danny paused for a moment to catch his breath, his shoulders heaving as he loomed over some idiot who had decided it would be fun to put his cigarettes out on a stray dog.

When a hand landed on Danny’s shoulder, Danny didn’t hesitate a moment before turning and punching whoever had touched him square in the chest, sending them flying back into a dumpster.

Adrenaline rushing through his body, Danny blinked a few times to clear his vision before observing the person he’d impulse slammed away, and Danny could practically feel his body freeze with dread.

Slowly looking up at him from where he sat against the dumpster, Danny could barely breathe as his eyes met the gaze of the one person he had been wanting to avoid in Gotham.

Batman stared right back at the young ghost king, the lower half of his face impassive, a contrast to the panic Danny could feel twisting his face.

Danny was fucked.

Chapter Text

Bruce Wayne’s feelings were torn.

Embarrassment or concern, that was the debate.

Embarrassment over the fact that some random kid had hit him so hard he was sent flying into a dumpster, or concern over the stiffness of the boys body, and the way his eyes were wide in fear.

As none of his sons were around to see what had just occurred to the Bat, he settled on concern.

He slowly pushed himself up, watching the kid take two quick steps back.

“Why did you hurt that man?” Bruce asked.

The kid looked confused for a second, before his eyes landed on the man on the floor and his mouth made a small o of realization.

“I wasn’t just going buck-wild on him for no reason, I might have gone like a bit overboard but he was hurting a literal puppy so I think I was mostly justified and-“

“If you have a good reason for what you are doing, why are you so scared of me?” The boy flinched.

“I’m not scared.” The boy scowled at him, and Bruce was vaguely reminded of another boy with black hair and blue eyes who had attacked him in Crime Alley.

Bruce took a step forward, and the kid hopped two steps back, before pausing and blinking at him.

“Ok maybe I’m a bit scared.” The kid stated. “But I’m completely justified here! You’re a part of the Justice league, and y’all are like, super strong! Plus you’re like super anti-meta about Gotham and I-“ The kids stopped suddenly, before redirecting. “Um. That’s not very nice to metas and stuff. Not that I’m one. Or anything.”

So the kid was a meta. Not that punching a grown man so hard his feet left the ground gave that away or anything.

“Why is a meta like you fighting crime if you’re scared of me?” Bruce asked.

“I’m not a meta. And I can’t fight dead people right now, so I’m fighting not-dead people.” The kid shrugged.

“Why do you need to fight people?” Bruce was ignoring the dead-people thing for now. He was good at staying on task like that.

“Isn’t that question a big hypocritical Mr. Justice League?”

“I’m an adult. You can’t be more than ten.”

“Regardless of age, I’m sure our reasons are similar enough.”

Bruce didn’t respond to that, staring at the kid until he sighed.

“My da- My guardian is mad at me. I was being stupid and pushy and I couldn’t do anything to help him because I’m useless with stuff like that.” The kids looked away from Bruce’s eyes and down at his hands, and Bruce watched a few drops of blood fall from his knuckles. “I needed to help, and this is all I’m good for.”

Bruce watched the boy for a second more, before slowly approaching the kid again.

“I’ll take you home.” Bruce finally said, and the kid stared at him with a blank expression.

“You’re not gonna try to kick me out?” The boy asked him.

“I’ve been more… lax on my meta restriction lately.” Signal was a testament to that. “Some kid with a bit of extra strength won’t do too much harm.”

The kid let out a nervous laugh. “Thanks Bat.”

Bruce absentmindedly pondered how horrible Damian would be about having a new brother.

Just in case Danny’s guardian didn’t turn out to be a good parent.

Just in case.

—

Jason’s side hurt like a bitch.

So did his heart, but it was easier to complain about his side.

Jason wasn’t going to let a stupid decision ruin his family for him, not again.

So Jason was searching Crime Alley, which was oddly quiet, despite him turning in early.

He was methodically moving through the streets, scanning for any sign of his kid.

Countless ways to apologize ran through his head, and Jason tried to focus on those to ignore the small voice in the back of his brain saying his kid was long gone.

Jason wasn’t just going to let the little shit disappear on him, not when he had already wormed his way into Jason’s heart so effortlessly.

But what if he was-

“Jason?”

Jason immediately whipped his head towards the call of his name, relief filling his body as he recognized his sons voice.

“Danny.”

Danny was standing just a few yards away, and Jason immediately took a few steps towards his son-

- and then his steps faltered.

With the way he’d blown up at the boy, the way he made his sons face filled with hurt, did he even have any right to hold him like he desperately wanted to?

Jason didn’t deserve Danny, and he wasn’t worthy to hold-

Jason’s thoughts were immediately stalled as Danny rushed towards him and wrapped his arms around Jason’s hips, holding so tight that if Jason was a lesser man he probably would have winced.

But Jason wasn’t, so he pried his sons hands off for a second, before immediately dropping to his knees and clutching Danny as tightly as he could.

Danny was in Jason’s arms and he was safe.

Jason could feel the kid shaking in his arms, and he pointedly ignored the slightly uncomfortable dampness at the shoulder Danny was shoving his face in.

After a few moments of simply basking in relief and the feeling of rightness that came with Danny being in his arms, Jason lifted his hands up, and slightly pulled the boy away from his body-

- even though everything in him protested, wanted to clutch Danny tight and never let go-

- and he looked at his kids tear-stained face and felt his heart clenched because this was his fault.

But he could try to fix it.

“Shit kid, Danny I’m so sorry, I was being an ass and I didn’t mean anything I said, and it was super irresponsible of me to lash out at you and I promise-“ words spilled from Jason’s mouth in a desperate attempt to justify himself to the young boy in his arms, trying to find a way to stop the tears falling from his eyes.

“You shouldn’t be apologizing!” Danny said, which in Jason’s opinion was bullshit. “I’m the one who pushed at you even when you told me not to, and I wasn’t listening to you even though you were right-“

“Hey.” Jason cut Danny off. He softly grabbed the sides of Danny’s head and directed the boys eyes towards his own. (Were they always this green?) “Never apologize for trying to help. I was at fault because I took out my emotions on you, which is something I shouldn’t do, and you were doing the right thing.”

“I overreacted too.” Danny said, with surprising maturity, and Jason absentmindedly wondered how such a young kid got so wise. “I ran away from my problems because I saw you hurt and-“ the kid blinked twice, before his voice raised “Your injury!”

“Don’t worry squirt, I patched myself up at home. I’m pretty good at this stuff, so I’m fine now.” Jason said, which apparently wasn’t the right thing to say as Danny started sputtering.

“You’re fine now? You were shot! You should be resting, not walking around looking for me!” Danny scolded him, but unlike earlier that night, Jason could only see concern from the younger boy.

“I promise I’ll rest and you can play nurse once we get home, ok kid?” Jason patted Danny’s head, enjoying the way the kids worry warmed his heart.

“Damn right I’ll be playing nurse!”

Jason laughed at that, and then winced at the twinge in his side, but the smile never fell from his face.

Really, Jason loved his kid.

Jason and Danny’s nice moment was interrupted by a small cough from the alley beside them, and Jason turned his head, really hoping he wouldn’t have to deal with some asshole mugger-

Jason Todd made eye contact with Batman and felt his mind go blank for a moment, before a flood of thoughts raced through Jason’s head.

When the fuck did B get there?

“Oh yeah, I ran into Batman!” Danny said, not at all bothered by the awkward tension building between Jason and Bruce.

“Jason.” Bruce nodded at him, obviously uncomfortable with the situation.

“Bitch.” Jason nodded back, trying not to smile at the way Bruce’s mouth tightened.

“You know Batman?” Danny asked him, and Jason realized that despite meeting most of Jason’s siblings, Danny knew absolutely nothing about the family business.

“Sadly. I was adopted by a rich bastard, so I got kidnapped a few times as a kid.” Jason felt Danny stiffen slightly in his arms. “Batsy here helped me out of a few tough spots.”

“The more I learn about your life, the more concerned I am for your health.” Danny deadpanned at Jason.

“Oh, like you’re one to talk Mr. Ghost Hunter.” The kid was a damn hypocrite. (He definitely had that in common with his father)

“My parents were ghost hunters. I’m more like a ghost wrangler.” Danny specified, before turning to look at Batman, who still seemed very confused with how the situation.

“Help me get Jason home?” Danny asked the vigilante.

“I’ll be fin-“

“He’s a dumbass who got shot-“ Danny said, ignoring Jason’s words. “-and I don’t want him to irritate his wounds even more than he probably already has.”

“… I’ll help.” Bruce agreed, walking to where Jason was still resting on his knees and offering him a hand.

Jason really wanted to slap the hand away, to leave Bruce and go home with his kid-

- But Danny was looking at him with stupid Puppy dog eyes even more intense than Cujos-

So Jason sighed and took the hand of the man who had once been his own father, letting himself be pulled to his feet.

“I’ll be fine on my own you know.” Jason complained as they started walking, him leaning against Bruce’s side.

“Just because you can survive on your own doesn’t mean you have to.” Danny said, and it was strange how such a simple phrase hit Jason straight through the heart.

“If you insist kid.” Jason grinned at the kid who was walking a few steps ahead of him.

Three generations of Black-Haired Blue-eyed boys walked side by side, a slightly broken family of slightly broken men.

“Let’s head home.”

Chapter Text

Tucker Foley totally wasn’t freaking out.

Sure he was a bit stressed, but he was well within his rights to be.

Danny had been missing for like two and a half weeks, and Clockwork had been telling everyone Danny was taking a sabbatical for his mental health, which Tucker knew was bullshit, cause Danny was a damn workaholic and he and Sam had wrestled him away from his paperwork to sleep multiple times so there was no way in hell Danny was willingly taking a break-

And there was going to be a two-week long school trip in a few weeks and if Danny wasn’t back by then, the only ghost hunters in town would be the Fentons and the GIW and that wouldn’t be good for anybody.

And with Danny on “sabbatical”, Tucker had almost three times the executive tasks to do. (curse being a ghost duke, Tucker should have never agreed to this.)

Tucker wondered how Danny kept up with all his work without dying. Again.

Danny’s only saving grace was probably dropping out of school, though he didn’t know if it was considered dropping out if the school assumed you were dead.

Tucker shivered involuntarily, memories of what he considered the worst month of his life running through his brain.

The image of his best friend lying still in a casket would probably haunt his nightmares forever, no matter how lively Danny was in the months that followed.

An alarm rang from Tuckers phone, startling him out of his reverie.

Quickly grabbing his backpack and heading out the door, Tucker sighed.

Why was his life so hard?

The answer was probably Danny.

Or his terrible luck.

Or both.

—

Tim didn’t know whether he wanted to laugh or cry.

Watching Bruce and Jason trying to hold a civil conversation while he quietly watched from the couch was way funnier than it should be.

It was early in the morning, and Bruce had dragged Tim out of bed to come meet Danny with him, not even considering the fact that the sun hade barely risen and most seven year olds aren’t fond of getting up at dawn.

So now Tim was sipping his coffee from a thermos and watching an uncomfortable Bruce try to make conversation with a stone-faced Jason.

It probably shouldn’t have been as funny as Tim found it, but sleep deprivation let’s you see the humor in any situation, and Tim was pretty sure he hadn’t slept in three days.

Maybe four.

Oh, the wonders of caffeine.

Both Bruce and Jason turned their heads as they heard a door opening, and they all watched Danny step out of his room with a yawn, before looking at the three men staring at him.

“Morning Jason, morning Tim.” Danny nodded at both of them, and Tim nodded back without thinking. “Morning random stranger.” Tim snorted at that, and he saw Jason smirk a bit.

“My name is Bruce Wayne, it’s a pleasure to meet you Danny.” Both Jason and Tim winced at the formality as Bruce approached Danny. “I am Jason’s adoptive father.”

“Aren’t you like, rich and famous or something?” Danny asked bluntly.

“I am. I’m the CEO of Wayne Enterprises.” Bruce responded stiffly.

“Hmm. Good for you.” And then Danny walked past a befuddled Bruce, over to Jason, who looked like he was trying not to laugh.

“Do we have any food for breakfast?” Danny asked, looking up at Jason.

“Not yet, I was just about to make something.” Jason responded, turning towards his kitchen.

“Not fucking likely.” Danny immediately grabbed Jason by the hand and started pulling him towards Tim on the couch.

“Danny I can cook-“ Jason started.

“So can I, sit down.” Danny ordered, and Jason plopped down on the couch.

“What’s with the hostility?” Tim asked, looking between Danny in the kitchen and a pouting Jason.

“The idiot got shot.” Danny scowled at them before pulling some bread out of a pantry.

Tim snorted, Danny reminding him of Alfred for half a second. Lord knows how many lectures the Bat-boys had received about proper self care while the butler angrily cooked.

It was always funny to watch his brothers get lectured, but it was definitely more uncomfortable to be the one lectured.

Tim might be a bit of a hypocrite.

“I’m letting the kid play nurse until I’m better. He insisted.” Jason shrugged.

“I didn’t insist.” Danny corrected. “I told you I was, as you obviously have terrible self preservation instincts.”

“What else is new?” Tim smirked at Jason, who probably would have tackled him by now if not for Danny.

“Even I know to take it easy when I get shot, and I don’t even get hit by real bullets!” Danny waved a small butter knife in his hand as he stood in front of a toaster.

“When you get what?” Jason asked, looking torn between anger and confusion.

“Don’t get your panties in a twist, it wasn’t on purpose.” Danny turned to them with an exasperated look on his face, a yawn splitting his sentence. “The whole ghost portal gave me a higher ecto-signature than your average bear, so a lot of my parents automatic weapons thought I was a ghost and shot at me. Most of them were made for ghosts, so there was rarely anything that hurt humans too badly.” The kid explained, and Tim was now even more confused.

What portal incident? He knew that the Fentons had built a ghost portal, he had seen the schematics and information for it online, but the Fentons (horribly designed) website mentioned nothing on any accident involved with the portal. Was that the reason for his obituary? But that didn’t make sense-

“A ghost portal?” Bruce questioned, and Tim was drawn from his thoughts.

Danny blinked at them, before sighing. “I’ve explained this like three times already. Does no one in your family communicate with one another?”

Which was fair, if not a little insulting.

They knew how to communicate.

Sorta.

“No, they suck at it.” Jason responded. “Your parents just let you get attacked by ghost weapons and didn’t do anything?” Jason’s voice was tight, and Tim subconsciously shuffled away and tensed up himself.

He wasn’t scared of his brother, Jason was a dork and the farthest this from scary, but sometimes he couldn’t help but get a little nervous.

“I mean I got sprayed in the face with Fenton foam to make sure I wasn’t overshadowed whenever I set something off.” Danny shrugged, and Tim was vaguely reminded of a younger version of himself, a kid who didn’t know that parents were supposed to protect-

Jason shoved his head into his hands and groaned.

“What does overshadowed mean?” Bruce asked, which surprised Tim. The Fenton website listed that as an ability almost every ghost possessed, and he was beginning to wonder if B had even done his homework.

“Possessed, mind-controlled, made into a flesh-puppet, whatever definition floats your boat. I use overshadowed cause it’s the term that the ghosts do.” Danny turned around as the toast popped out of the toaster, opening up the butter and beginning to put it on.

“And this was a repeated problem?” Jason asked.

“Yeah, I’d trigger anything set to automatically fire, and a lot of my parents auto-aim weapons would end up beaning me if they were fired around me.” Danny was blissfully unaware of Jason’s growing anger as he brought four pieces of toast on paper plates over to the couch, where Tim and Bruce were watching the exchange in confused silence.

“Your parents. Allowed you to be attacked and shot at. In your own home. By the weapons they created.” Jason grit out.

“Well it sounds bad when you put it like that.”

“That’s because it is bad!” Jason said, almost spilling his toast with the way he exploded.

Which, to be fair to Jason, Tim wanted to do as well.

Tim knew what it was like to have neglectful parents, and he knew what it was like to put himself and his needs as an afterthought.

And like hell he was letting his new nephew go through the same bullshit he did.

Jason seemed to have a similar mindset to Tim, because after his explosion he sat up straight and sighed.

“Sorry for yelling at you kid.” Jason said to Danny, before turning to look at Tim. “Replacement, I’m pulling a Bruce. Help me legally adopt the kid, I probably can’t do a worse job than his old parents and I want to officially be his dad.”

Ah. Tim had been wondering how long it would take Jason to try and make it official. Figures that an assurance that Jason would be a better parental figure than Danny’s birth parents would be the tipping point.

“Alright, sure.” Tim nodded, wondering if he’d need to make Danny a new identity.

“You’re doing what?”

Chapter Text

Despite what the majority of people who met him might say, Jason was not impulsive.

Well he was kind of impulsive, but most of the time people confused him being hot headed with him being impulsive.

Which was stupid.

Jason was a had been a Robin, and if there’s one thing he got from Bruce besides Trauma and Muscles, it was plans.

And Jason had a lot of plans.

Probably too many plans, but that’s debatable.

He had been planning to adopt Danny since he pulled the kid into his arms the night before, wanting to make sure the kid knew he was his, and Jason wasn’t ever going to think of him as a burden.

Yeah, maybe he didn’t have the best timing on announcing it, but it seemed like a good idea when he had said it, and Tim had gotten on board pretty easy.

Now to convince Danny.

“I mean, I’ve been wanting to adopt you officially for a bit now.” Jason said.

“You have?” Danny’s voice jumped up a few octaves.

“Well, yeah. I kinda thought it was obvious.”

“Why would you- people don’t- how long-“ Danny shoved his head into his hands and groaned. “Why?” He finally asked, looking at Jason with pure confusion in his eyes.

“Because I like you and I can.” Jason stated simply.

“That doesn’t seem like a very good reason for adopting someone.” Bruce said, but he looked even more confused than Danny at the situation. Jason totally wasn’t reveling in the fact that he had caught “The worlds greatest detective.” by surprise.

Okay, maybe he was reveling a bit.

“You have no room to talk Mr. I’m-going-to-adopt-the-random-kid-who-stole-my-tires.” Jason frowned at him, and Bruce frowned back.

“This isn’t a smart decision Jason, I’m just looking out for your best interests. I had the resources to raise a child. You live in an apartment in Park Row, not to mention your job-“ Bruce started, and Jason could feel himself grit his teeth.

“You were right Jason, it is only rich pricks that call it Park Row.” Danny interrupted Bruce, and Jason could hear Tim trying to hold back laughter just as much as he was.

“I-“

“You’re opinion is nice and all old man, but we’ve literally just met today so I don’t really care about it.” Danny snapped at Bruce, who looked surprised at the boys sudden iciness. “And Jason obviously doesn’t give a fuck either, so either stop making dumb arguments about matters that don’t concern you or leave.” Jason restrained himself from shivering, Danny’s voice almost seeming like it was physically cooling the room. Jason could feel green seep into the edges of his vision, responding to his sons rage.

“Jason is my son and I-“ Bruce put his hands up in a placating gesture, which did not help him at all.

“Jason is an adult, and you don’t get to say shit about what’s in his best interests. You may be his dad, but parents don’t always know what’s best for their children, and thinking that you do without listening only leads to shitty situations.” Danny was full on ranting at him now, and as fun as it was to watch B get brutally destroyed by a scrawny midget, Jason leaned forward to put a hand on Danny’s shoulder, stopping him in his tracks.

“Yeah he’s a dumb rich prick, but he’s my dumb rich prick. At this point I just ignore his opinion like ninety percent of the time.” It seemed like Jason’s words calmed Danny down a bit, so score.

“Literally all of his kids do that you aren’t special.” Tim said, because he was a sassy little brat.

“Shut your mouth replacement, I was talking to my kid.” Jason said, and he felt Danny slightly stiffen under his hand.

Shit, he hadn’t even adopted the kid yet he couldn’t just-

“So we’ll just ignore the wrong opinions of Mr. Hypocrite over there. Got it.” Danny relaxed and leaned into Jason’s touch, and Jason smiled subconsciously at the soothing feeling that ran up his arms.

Bruce was sulking, but as they had already established, no one really gave a fuck about his feelings.

“So you’re just adopting me,” Danny paused, going back to the topic from earlier “because you want to? Because you like me?”

“Yeah, basically. You could use an actual guardian and I want you to be my son.” Jason watched as his kids eyes filled with barely restrained hope.

“So, can I adopt you?” Jason asked, looking Danny in his eyes.

“Yeah.” Jason’s heart swelled as Danny sent a shaky smile his way. “I think I’d like that.”

—

Daniel Fenton-Todd was confused and unsure about a lot of things in his life.

Most of them had to do with the fucking insanity that his life had become in the past month.

Danny wasn’t really used to having a big family. Both of his parents had been disowned (which was fair) and it had really just been Danny and Jazz his whole life with how distant his parents were.

So Danny wasn’t really sure what was normal for big families, but he was pretty sure crafting your nephew a fake identity and then enrolling him in a rich kid school didn’t really fall under the category of “normal.”

But really, who was he to question the existence of gift horses. Or however the phrase went. Danny never really got that idiom.

It had been three days since Danny had taken the placement test for Gotham Academy, and apparently the school had not expected the tiny seven year old to have a sophomore level of education.

There had been a bit of confusion over where to place him, not wanting to leave him under stimulated with kids his age, but not wanting to shove a literal child into high-school.

Bruce had suggested putting Danny in sixth grade, the same year as Damian.

Danny had no clue if Damian knew about Danny joining him in school, but as Jason drove him on his motorcycle towards the school, Danny figured Damian would realize soon if he hadn’t already.

Jason pulled to a stop in front of the school, letting Danny get off before turning to meet his eyes.

“I know this is probably stressful-“ Jason started.

“Not really!” Danny replied, cutting off Jason and grinning a bit at his bewildered look.

“Going to a new school. Isn’t stressful?” Jason asked.

“Can’t be worse than my old school, and back there I had to deal with two staff members trying to murder and-or maim me.” Danny rocked back and forth on his shoes, adjusting the straps of his backpack on his shoulders.

“Two staff members trying to what?” Jason’s voice was strained, and Danny wondered how many more casual trauma-drops he could get away with before Jason permanently damaged his voice.

“Kill and-or maim me. To be fair they were ghosts, not psychopaths.” Danny responded nonchalantly.

“Okay yeah, that excuse shouldn’t make as much sense as it does.” Jason sighed at Danny before lifting a hand to further ruin Danny’s already messy hair. “I’d say don’t get in trouble, but I feel like that’s a bit hypocritical of me.”

“Yeah, probably.” Danny stated cheerily.

“That’s the part where you’re supposed to defend me you know.” Jason frowned at him, but it hold any heat.

“I’ll defend you when it’s actually a lie.” Danny argued back, and Jason chuckled a bit.

Jason used his hand to push Danny towards the doors of the school, before grabbing his helmet to get ready take off again.

“Tell the demon brat I said hi.” Jason said as he slipped the helmet on his head.

“Bye Jason!” Danny said, as he walked away from his Dad and towards his first day of a new school.

Chapter Text

Damian Wayne liked very few things.

Growing up as a child, he had never been allowed to have opinions of his own, so the list of things he liked had only really been formed in the past few years.

Swords were one of those things.

So were animals.

Richard was on that list as well, but Damian would never admit that within earshot of the man, or any other people.

At school, Damian Wayne had very few things he liked.

(Really, it was just Jon. But that was another part of his list he refused to admit.)

So Damian had decided it was safe to say that overall, he disliked school.

Unfortunately, simply disliking something wasn’t enough to get him out of going to school on a regular basis, something his father and Richard decided to insist on.

So Damian was sitting in his homeroom class, half-listening to Jon as he talked about the newest update in a comic series he read.

The bell rang, and Damian’s eyes fell on his teacher as she came into the classroom, before quickly falling on the short boy behind her and lighting up with recognition.

The teacher cleared her throat twice as the classes small talk slowed to a halt, before addressing the class.

“This is Daniel Fenton-Todd, and he’ll be joining our class.” Damian observed his classmates grow confused at the teachers words, and he really couldn’t blame them. Danny was a baby faced little boy, and his bright and cheery grin didn’t make him look more mature.

“Nice to meet y’all!” Danny was smiling, completely unaffected by the judging eyes on him.

Damian was only a little bit jealous of his happy nonchalance.

“Feel free to sit in any empty seat.” Danny’s eyes came to rest on the empty desk in front of Damian, and the older boy watched as Danny walked over and plopped down right in front of him, shooting Damian a peace sign before sitting straight forward.

Damian pointedly ignored the eyes of Jon and the rest of his class darting between the unanimously dubbed “Ice Prince” and the new sunshiney child.

Damian wasn’t sure if Danny’s ignorance was willful or if he was just that oblivious.

Jon leaned over to whisper in Damian’s ear when the teacher turned to the board to elaborate on the daily announcements that no one was paying attention to.

“Damian how-“ Jon started, but he was immediately cut off by Damian shushing him.

Damian felt a small flash of amusement at Jon’s over exaggerated pout, but he automatically tamped it down to pretend to pay attention to whatever useless drivel the school system decided he needed to know today.

When the teacher finally stopped talking, Jon immediately turned back towards Damian, ready to interrogate him.

Before he could however, another student loudly questioned Danny, drawing the attention of the entire class.

How a normal student had asked a question faster than Jon, who had actual super speed, Damian couldn’t guess.

“My name is Walter Rivers, how do you know Damian Wayne?” Rivers asked, leaning forward on Danny’s desk.

“He’s my uncle!” Danny responded brightly, and Damian felt himself balk at the boys pure honesty. Did his nephew know nothing about keeping secrets?

Jon had started gaping, looking between Danny and Damian, his eyes going back and forth like he was watching a ping pong match.

“Your uncle? I hadn’t heard anything about that?” Rivers looked hesitantly to Damian, probably expecting him to tell the kid off for lying. Damian just raised an eyebrow in response and watched as Rivers gulped.

“Well that’s probably because it’s none of your business.” Danny was still smiling like an angel, but Damian noticed a mischievous look in his eyes, slightly more green than they had been a moment before.

Rivers gaped for a second, looking affronted, before scowling and leaning into Danny’s personal space. “Watch your tone you little brat, do you even know who I am?”

Damian was unimpressed with Rivers. At the beginning of the year, Rivers had tried the same song and dance with Damian, and he had been coldly rebuked at every attempt to prove superiority. And now he was trying it with Damian’s nephew, right in front of Damian. It was astounding how someone who had grown up surrounded by expert tutors could lack so much common sense.

“I know you’re a little brat with entitlement issues who throws a fit every time you get mildly inconvenienced. As for who you are in specifics, I’ve kinda already forgotten your name, but I think it started with a L.” Danny was still grinning, but River’s face was turning red.

“Mister Rivers, please return to your seat.” The teacher said, looking up from the book she was reading for a moment before turning her head back down.

Rivers gritted his teeth his voice lowering in a pathetic attempt to seem intimidating “This isn’t over you brat.”

“It was nice to meet you!”

Rivers groaned before sulking back to his seat.

Danny turned around in his seat to face Damian, mischief still dancing in his eyes.

“Hey uncle Dami!”

“Daniel.” Damian responded, trying not to show any reaction to the nickname.

-No he definitely did not find it cute lies and slander-

“Hi, my name is Jon, I’m Damian’s best friend!” Jon stuck his hand out towards the kid, and Damian mourned his eyesight for a moment. He would soon become blind sitting directly next to the two boys with such bright smiles.

“Danny, I didn’t expect Damian to actually have friends.” Danny said, as if he wasn’t ten times meaner than Damian could ever hope to be.

“It definitely took a lot of determination, but I grew on him.”

“Like a tumor.” Damian commented, and Danny snickered.

“I’m pretty sure Damian only tolerates me because of my dog.” Danny let his head rest on his hand, propped up by his elbow on the back of his chair.

“That sounds about right.” Jon nodded. “By the way, how old are you?”

“I’m seven, but I’m at about a sophomore learning level. I ended up in this grade cause they didn’t want me too out of my element.”  Danny said simply, not noticing the impressed look on Jon’s face.

“Wow, you must be smart then!” Jon said, and Damian watched Danny lose his composure for a moment, a light red blush dusting his face.

“Oh- um I guess.” Danny stuttered a bit. Damian found it amusing that a kid who so smoothly dealt with insults got flustered by a small compliment.

Danny coughed into his hand for a moment, before turning to Damian. “By the way, Jason says hi. Well, he said to say hi to Demon Brat, but I’m assuming that’s you.”

“Tell Todd he can go fuck himself.” Damian answered automatically.

“Ok!” Danny’s bright smile never left his face.

Damian considered investing in sunglasses.

Chapter Text

Jason Todd was not anxious.

He knew Danny could handle himself fine, the kids sharp wit and iron resolve wasn’t gonna dull by being in a new place.

Jason probably should be worried more for the school than his son, Danny was a scarily competent seven year old and Jason knew the kid could hold a grudge.

(Jason was honestly surprised he was getting away with going out so soon after getting shot. Thank god for the kids weirdly skewed perspective of recovery time.)

But Jason hadn’t gotten any calls about Danny burning down the school yet, so either he was laying low, or he was being sneaky about the takeover.

Jason figured it was the second.

Or maybe the school lost their phones in the blaze.

Pulling his motorcycle to a stop in front of one of his safe houses, Jason pulled out his phone to check and make sure Danny hadn’t texted him.

He wasn’t being clingy, he was just being a good aware dad to his kid.

Okay maybe he was being a bit clingy.

Jason pulled his key out of his pocket and unlocked the door, flipping a small switch under the doorknob to disable his security system.

He pushed open the door, pausing in the doorway when he heard noises coming from his kitchen.

He automatically adjusted his stance, silently easing the door shut and creeping down his hallway, hand resting on the small gun he kept on the inside of his jacket.

He peeked through the doorway of the kitchen before his shoulders abruptly relaxed, and he let himself turn the corner and rest himself against the doorway.

“Hello, people who do not live here.” He watched as three heads turned to look at him, a wry smile on his face.

“Hey there Jay!” Roy grinned, and Jason couldn’t help but feel a bit at peace among his friends.

—

Jon had decided he liked Danny.

Yeah he was kinda weird, but Jon was half-alien so he really wasn’t in a place to judge.

Yeah, the younger kid had an unhealthily slow heartbeat, and sometimes his eyes were an unnatural green, and his body temperature was so low he could’ve been mistaken for a corpse, but it wasn’t exactly Jon’s place to pry.

At least, that’s what he’d been telling himself.

Besides having all the symptoms of a dead body without actually being dead, Jon thought Danny was pretty cool.

He was tiny, even for a seven year old, and Jon had no clue how that much snark fit into his body.

He was smart too, easily able to keep up with kids four to five years older than him.

But what Jon had found most endearing about his new friend was his honesty. As far as Jon could tell, he held nothing back, and Jon respect that about Danny.

He knew in his bones if he asked Danny a question, he’d get an honest answer.

So hypothetically, Jon could just ask him why he was seemingly dead, and Danny most likely tell him the truth.

But Danny was a part of the Wayne family now, and they were all scarily smart and competent.

Jon’s dad had told him multiple times not to meddle too much in the Bat’s problems, they were all too cunning and underhanded compared to the straight-forwardness of the Supers.

So really, there was no reason for him to question the new kid, and it’d probably cause him more problems than it was worth.

Jon was waiting next to the doors of the gym with Danny, waiting for the bell to ring and release them to lunch while Damian got his weekly ‘Stop using unnecessary force during friendly sports’ lecture from their gym teacher.

Danny was playing with the straps of his backpack, staring intently at the clock.

“So why’s your heartbeat so slow?” Jon asked, after finally deciding to ignore his common sense (it wasn’t an unusual development.)

Danny looked at Jon with a confused expression for a moment, cocking his head in confusion a bit like a dog.

“How’re you able to tell?” He asked.

“I can hear it.” Jon answered, wondering if none of the Bat’s had told Danny he was Superboy.

“Ah, makes sense.” Danny said, and Jon’s worries were assuaged. “It’s because I technically don’t need to breathe more than about once an hour or so, so I don’t breathe as much as a normal person, and my heartbeats slower cause it gets less oxygen.” Danny moved his hands while he talked, and while Jon didn’t know much about biology, the cause and effects seemed to line up.

“Why don’t you need to breathe again?” Jon asked. Most humans definitely needed to breathe more than once an hour.

“Ectoplasm poisoning.” Danny shrugged. “It’s the stuff ghosts are made of. My parents were ghost scientists, and I basically had a bunch of electrified ectoplasm explode on me, which was definitely not fun. Now about half of my bodies systems rely on ectoplasm, so I don’t really need as much stuff as normal people do.” He clarified, and Jon was kinda interested.

Ghosts weren’t really that big of a surprise to Jon with all the weird stuff there was in the world, and he knew Costantine dealt with weird magic stuff that his dad liked to complain about.

“How do you get ectoplasm then? I don’t think I’ve seen any before.” Jon really didn’t know what ectoplasm looked like, but he was pretty sure he’d know if he’d seen it.

“The biggest source of ectoplasm is obviously the ghost zone, but some ghosts have the ability to turn humans emotions into ectoplasm. It works better on negative emotions like fear, but any emotions could technically work. Another good way to get ectoplasm is to fulfill your obsession.” Danny was fully lecturing now, obviously excited to share his thoughts.

“Obsessions vary between ghosts, but they’re basically the ghosts entire reason for- well, not living but close enough. Following your obsession allows your core to produce more ectoplasm, and it’s mentally satisfying for the ghost. Obsessions are weird and kind of personal though, so I don’t have a very big data pool for studying them.”

“Gotham has a lot of latent fear floating around, so being here is a pretty nice energy boost, and most weaker ghosts could probably thrive on the ectoplasm here without going back to the ghost zone or making moves on their obsession-“

Danny paused and grimaced, before turning his head up at Jon with an apologetic look on his face. “Sorry. I start to act like my dad when I get excited and rant, I know it’s kind of annoying.” He wrung his hands together, looking away from Jon as soon as he had apologized.

“Why are you apologizing? Ghosts sound so cool! I mean I didn’t get some of what you said but it’s definitely super interesting!” Jon was confused. Why would Danny apologize for being so passionate about something?

“What’s interesting?” Damian asked, having finally been released from the gym teachers lecture.

“Danny was telling me about ghosts!” Jon replied, and Damian nodded his head in understanding.

“Like Cujo.” Damian said, as if Jon had any clue what that meant.

“Who’s Cujo?” Jon asked, tilting his head. Did that mean Damian had met a ghost before him? No fair!

“My ghost dog!” Danny exclaimed, grinning wildly.

“You have a ghost dog!” Jon responded with similar enthusiasm towards his new friend.

Yeah, Jon liked Danny.

Even if he was kind of weird.

It was a good weird.

Chapter Text

Danny had decided Jon and Damian were his new friends.

Danny had always been quick to decide if he was going to be friends with people or not, and he had instantly clicked with both Jon and Damian, in a way that almost reminded him of when he had first met Sam and Tucker.

Jon was bright and friendly, a good parallel to Damian’s cool and aloof demeanor.

Also Danny was pretty sure he was a meta, but he had no plans on asking his new friend any questions he might be uncomfortable with.

So now Danny was walking out of his new school, waving goodbye to Jon and Damian before scanning his surroundings for a glimpse of familiar black and white hair or leather jacket-

“Yo shorty-“

All of a sudden there’s a pale hand on Danny’s shoulder, lightly pulling at him, and it barely takes a second for him to realize he does not recognize the hand-

-and that the strangers hand needs to be off of him fast before he tries to hurt-

Danny was quick, warning signals immediately flying through his head as there was an enemy behind him and he needed to move.

Danny widened his foot stance and moved let his center of gravity rest on the balls of his feet as he reached to grasp the hand on his shoulder, feeling it stiffen under his own.

“Um kid-“ a voice Danny had never heard before sounded from behind him, but the man was cut off by Danny promptly using the man’s arm as an anchor to spin around and nail a kick right to his side, before quickly letting go and hopping away.

Danny could sense the people looking between him and the man he had just attacked, but he kept his eyes on his new opponent.

The man was bent over clutching his stomach, but Danny could tell he was tall. He had red hair that had probably been covered by the baseball cap at his feet, and it was easier than Danny thought it would be to fight back the instinct telling him to relax because red hair meant Jazz, and Jazz meant home and safety because home was red hair and purple eyes and soft scolding and the smell of cheap perfume that only half hid the smell of chemicals-

-but now home was also black hair with a splash of white and teal eyes and snide comments with laughter hidden underneath and the smell of leather and gunpowder and dried blood-

But this really wasn’t the time to think about that cause the red headed man had l straightened up again and Danny knew that the man’s green eyes had met his own which were a few shades more toxic.

The man lifted his hands in what seemed to be a placating gesture, a bit of a grimace showing through this grin.

“Jeez, if I had any doubts before, now I definitely know you’re Jason’s kid.” The man laughed a bit, before groaning and grabbing his side again. “Damn that’s a mean kick.”

“Maybe don’t sneak up on people then dipshit.” Danny saw Jason strolling up and stopping by Roy’s side, and he felt himself relax a bit.

“You know him?” Danny asked Jason, who turned to him and started waking towards him.

“Sadly.” Jason placed himself by Danny’s side, and Danny took that as an invitation to lean into him as Roy scoffed. “Danny meet Roy, my friend. Roy meet Danny, my kid.”

“Oh! Sorry about that.” Danny apologized. “Are you okay?”

“Don’t worry about it, I’ve taken way heavier hits when-“ Roy froze, looking at Jason. Danny turned his head up to meet Jason’s eyes, but Jason only smiled back down at him. “When um- during work. And stuff.”

“Do you work with Jason?” Danny asked, his mind already running through possible explanations.

“Yes.” Roy answered, at the same time Jason said “No.”

Danny tilted his head, confused.

“Roy works a similar job to me, but we don’t work for the same people.” Jason clarified, and it clicked for Danny.

Roy was a prostitute too, but he just probably did kinky shit or something.

Jason began lightly steering Danny’s body towards the sidewalk and beginning to walk along it, and Danny really hoped Jason hadn’t ridden his motorcycle to pick him up. Fitting all three of them on would be awkward.

“Makes sense. Even if you’ve had worse before, I’m still sorry.” Danny amended, before turning contemplative. “Maybe I should stop attacking everyone who sneaks up on me. This is like the third time this month.” He paused and frowned at his hands. “Fourth if you count when I thought Dick and Tim were robbers.”

“When you though Dick and Tim were what?” Roy asked, adjusting his hat as he put it back on his head.

“They came in through the window, in the middle of the night. No one expects siblings to get into the house like that. I mean Dani likes to sneak in my window too, but she usually does it during normal business hours.”

“… I thought your name was Danny?” Roy looked thoroughly confused, and Danny was probably more amused than he should have been.

“Her name’s Dani with an I, it’s short for Danielle.”

“What sane people would give their kids almost the exact same name?”

“Well one, my parents are like the farthest thing from sane, and two, they weren’t the ones to name her. Our names are so similar because the bastard who keeps on trying to get with my mom decided to clone me and fucked up, and he sucks at coming up with names.”

Roy blinked at Danny twice, his mouth moving open and closed but no sound coming out.

He stopped in his tracks and took a deep breath, before meeting eyes with a smirking Jason.

“Jason. What the fuck.” Roy said, his voice sounding completely done.

“I told you the kid is interesting.” Jason grinned at his friend, before turning to look down at Danny. “Wait. There was Dick, Roy, and you told me about Damian, but who was the other one?”

“Oh did I not tell you? I ended up accidentally punching Batman.” Danny said, and he felt a little bit of his pride slipping into his voice. Yeah, he was scared shitless, but he had punched the Batman. That was like, objectively cool.

With the way Roy was grinning, he definitely seemed to think that way too. His shoulders started shaking, and a few snickers left his mouth.

“Yeah that’s definitely your kid Jay.” He said around giggles.

“Damn straight he is.” Jason smiled, crooked and proud, and Danny couldn’t help but smile right alongside his dad.

—

Tim Drake was looking over the Fenton’s ghost research in the Batcave, thoroughly confused.

The Ghost-technology was revolutionary for their field, albeit strangely named and designed. There were so many inventions though, from an odd dream catcher looking contraption that separated ectoplasm from living beings, to a thermos that apparently imprisoned ghosts (Tim had remembered that one, and from the small shiver Dick had gave when he peered over Tim’s shoulder, he did too), to a painted green bat that had no special functions besides being a baseball bat that ghosts couldn’t pass through.

Their research on actual ghosts on the other hand, was severely lacking. Most of their observations on ghostly psychology weren’t actual observations, they were just biases with a bunch of fluffy scientific terminology to hide the fact they had no sources.

A lot of their concepts on how ghosts work were obviously influenced by their bias as well, as they made a bunch of wild claims with zero evidence to back it up.

They were brilliant inventors, Tim would give them that. But they were fucking terrible scientists.

Tim is drawn out of his indignity at the Fentons complete disregard of the scientific process by Jason speeding in to the cave on his motorcycle, lifting up his helmet to reveal a wide grin as he quickly walked over to Bruce, who looked confused.

“Jason-“ Bruce started, but he didn’t have an opportunity to continue.

“You got punched by a seven year old!” Jason crowed, full of joy and a bit breathless.

By now everyone in the cave was watching them, all in varying states of amusement.

“So Danny told you.” Bruce said, and the round-about admittance was all his kids needed to start swarming him.

“When was this?”

“Danny got Bruce too!”

“Oh how the mighty have fallen-“

“How was Daniel able to land a blow-“

“That’s three of us now, we should make a club-“

“Four, he got Roy earlier today-“

“I am not joining a stupid club-“

“Are we sure Danny isn’t a secret vigilante or something?”

“He’s seven Drake, and while Todd is oblivious I’m sure he would have-“

“Oh you don’t have any room to talk about obliviousness if a seven year old got the drop on you-“

Tim grinned as he saw Bruce sigh, not missing the obvious affection in his eyes.

The family bickered together, and for the first time in a while, Tim really felt like they were brothers.

Chapter Text

Watching his best friend make breakfast for five, Roy grew a bit jealous at how fast Jason was taking to the whole fathering thing.

As a father, Roy felt like he was constantly grasping at straws, and he was constantly paralyzed by the fear of fucking up and hurting his kid.

But Jason was so assured of himself, interacting with his kid with a soft smile on his face, and Danny obviously adored Jason just as much as Jason adored him.

Kori and Bizzaro were still passed out on the living room floor, Roy had won the (very intense) game of rock-paper-scissors and got couch-sleeping-privileges.

Jason hasn’t let any of them share his bed with him like he usually did, something about setting a good example which Roy figured was just an excuse to be a stick in the mud.

Now he was sitting at the table and watching Jason calmly cook eggs, obviously lost in his thoughts.

“You know, I’m kinda jealous.” Roy said, and Jason turned to look at him.

“Of what? My dashing good looks?” Jason smirked, and yeah okay maybe Roy was also a bit jealous of that too. Or he was just attracted to it.

Sounded like a problem for future Roy to stay up at night about.

Now it was time to banter with his best friend and ignore his feelings.

“If I was jealous of anyone’s good looks it would be Kori’s, but nice try pretty boy.” Roy said, trying to imitate Jason’s roguish grin and probably failing horribly.

“Ok you have a point there, but you admitted you think I’m pretty, so I think I win here.” Jason used the spatula in his hand to gesture at Roy, and his heart was kinda melting at the domesticity in front of him.

“If you say so sweetheart.”

“So what are you jealous of then?”

Roy paused for a moment, and Jason stilled a bit too.

“I guess I’m a bit jealous of how good you are at this whole parenting thing.” Roy said, his eyes never leaving Jason. “You haven’t even been at it for more than a few months, and you already seem more levelheaded than I am with Lian.”

What he really wasn’t expecting was for Jason to snort, before softly smiling at him. “Well for one, it’s probably easier to parent a creepily mature seven year old than a literal toddler, and for two, it’s pretty bold of you to assume I have any idea what I’m doing.”

“But Danny is so comfortable around you!” Roy exclaimed, confused.

“That’s because I try to respect him. I know he’s a kid, but treating kids like invalids only breeds resentment. I’m not gonna be the bastard who dismisses what my kid is saying just because I’m the adult in the situation. I don’t really know what I’m doing, but I figured treating Danny like I wish Bruce had treated me is a good start. It’s honestly kind of scary, but I’ve gotta try my best, you know?”

Roy smiled at his fellow dad, taking in the softness in his best friends eyes as he talked about Danny.

“We can work together. Neither of us know what we’re doing, so we’ll just give each other dad advice. And hopefully don’t fuck up in the process.”

Jason smiled back at Roy, and really this new soft dad side of Jason was not going to be good for Roy’s heart, and his eyes were warm and crystal blue.

“Yeah, let’s dad together then.” Jason amended with a grin, and he nodded before turning back to his eggs, scooping them out of the frying pan.

And Roy couldn’t help the smile on his face or the fondness in his heart, watching the his best friend with affection that may have been a bit more than friendly.

Ok it was definitely more than friendly.

But no one but Roy knew about the fact that Roy was absolutely pining after his best friend, so until he finally broke from watching Jason for too long and letting his feelings completely overwhelm him, his secret was safe.

—

Roy Harper was absolutely, annoyingly, and pathetically in love with one Jason Todd, and Daniel Fenton-Todd was suffering for it.

Danny had first picked up on it the day before, noticing the adoring way Roy had gazed at Jason in the car on their drive from Danny’s school to Jason and Danny’s apartment. Jason’s eyes had been mostly focused on the road, and Roy had expertly schooled his expression into an easygoing smile anytime Jason turned his attention to him.

That was the point where Danny realized that Roy held more than platonic affections for his dad, and the wonderfully obtuse Jason was probably unaware of this fact.

Danny was soon distracted by the fact that he definitely didn’t remember Jason having a car before that point in time.

They had arrived at Jason’s apartment and Danny was introduced to Kori and Biz, both of whom were delighted to meet Danny.

They had eaten Dinner together, and while they definitely weren’t the most normal of people, Danny found himself growing to like Jason’s friends.

They had spent the night, and now that the morning had come Danny could hear indistinguishable voices coming from the kitchen, the smell of eggs making Danny aware of the way his stomach was growling.

But Danny was ignoring the sensory input, stuck in his own thoughts as he was.

Danny was having a conflict, and it was entirely Roy Harpers fault.

He chewed on the inside of his cheek softly, trying to figure out just how he was supposed to go around solving this problem.

How the hell did he, a prepubescent looking kid with little to no muscle mass and a very low intimidation factor, scare the tall and buff golden retriever that was Roy Harper enough to make for a decent shovel talk.

Hell, Roy had probably been pining after Jason longer than Danny and Jason had known each other, so was it even his place to give a shovel talk?

Maybe he could bribe Dick into doing it for him.  No, Dick was too nice. Now Damian and Cass, those were two people who would probably give a mean shovel talk.

But Danny was Jason’s son. And he already had experience threatening people who wanted to seduce one of his parents, so Danny figured he was allowed to be the one to give the shovel talk.

He could probably try to add some ghost fuckery to make himself seem scarier too. Nothing put people on edge like an unnatural chill or a haunting reverb to his voice.

The next problem would be getting Roy alone, which Danny didn’t know how to achieve without looking suspicious.

Both Kori and Biz seemed pretty emotionally dense too, so chances were that no one else had picked up on Roy’s annoyingly obvious crush.

Danny was startled from his musings by two sharp knocks on his door, followed by Jason’s voice.

“You awake kid?” Jason asked from outside Danny’s door.

“Sadly.” Danny responded, hearing a small huff of laughter from his dad before groaning and rolling himself off of his bed. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

“Alright, I’m serving up breakfast.” Jason said, and Danny heard his footsteps heading back down the hall.

Danny got dressed quickly, adjusting his tie while he walked down the hallway and towards where he could hear Jason and his friends eating.

Danny grabbed a plate of eggs and sat himself next to Jason, looking at Roy who sat a bit closer than he probably should have been on Jason’s other side.

“Hey Danny.” Jason turned to meet Danny’s eyes, and Danny swallowed the bit of egg in his mouth before nodding at Jason to continue. “Me, Kori and Biz have to talk about work stuff, so do you mind if Roy takes you to school?”

Danny quickly nodded, a bit amazed at his luck. “Yeah, I don’t mind.”

Now he had a perfect window to threaten Roy in, and he didn’t have to cast any suspicion upon himself. Maybe Clockwork had decided to finally be merciful on Danny and give him a good day!

“That’s good. You can head out as soon as you and Roy finish.” Jason laid his hand on top of Danny’s head and ruffled his hair, and Danny let himself preen a bit at the contact.

It wasn’t long before Roy and Danny were walking out the door and to the car, and Danny was mentally preparing to give Roy the scariest shovel talk of his life.

Danny had decided to wait until they were about ten minutes into their drive and stalled at a stop sign before turning to look at Roy.

“You have a crush on Jason, don’t you.” Danny said in a monotone, watching as Roy stiffened up and clutched the wheel.

“What are you talking about kid, of course-“

“I’m not dense. Ok well I am kind of dense, but I’m not that dense.” Danny said, steamrolling over Roy’s fruitless protests.

Roy looked at him for a few seconds, before sighing.

“Yeah, I have feelings. For Jason. Romantic feelings.” Roy grit out, turning his face towards the road and away from Danny’s imploring gaze.

“That seemed painful.” Danny remarked, before turning his face serious and letting a chill seep off of his core, noticing goosebumps rise on the back of Roy’s neck. “Listen Roy-“

But Danny never got to finish his threat, as he was cut off by a loud thump and a body crashing onto the roof of their car.

Roy slammed the breaks and swerved, cursing under his breath as Danny felt his heartbeat pick up.

Danny gaped as Red Robin groaned and pushed himself off the roof of the car, scowling and rubbing his head.

Danny felt his hand on the car door and he was climbing out before he could even think about it.

Before Danny could offer any assistance to the vigilante though, he froze at the sound of a very familiar voice.

“WHERE IS THE GHOST WHELP!” Skulkers loud voice rang out and Danny bit back a groan.

“Son of a-”

Chapter Text

Timothy Drake decided he hated ghosts.

They were annoying and went intangible and bantered like villains from bad cartoons and were so arrogant and if the damn bastard would shut up for like three seconds Tim would finally be able to hear himself think-

And then he got thrown on the roof of a car.

Which was Ow.

His ears were ringing from the impact, but it wasn’t enough to block out the annoying bastards (Skunk-something?) voice, and he groaned.

He turned to look at the car and make sure the civilians inside weren’t panicking, and then blinked twice at the familiar face staring back at him.

What the hell was Roy doing in Gotham?

Tim didn’t have the time to question Roy though, because the stupid robot ghost came into view and pointed a giant ghost gun directly at Tim.

And consequently, the car he was sitting on top of.

The car Roy was in.

God, Tim hated ghosts.

Annoying ass dead people.

But before Skunk-dude could shoot at them though, a young sounding voice reverberated through the air from somewhere behind Tim, vaguely echoey in a way that sent chills up Tim’s spine.

“Looking for me Skulker?” The echoey voice taunted, and Tim turned his head to see… another ghost?

This one looked far younger, probably around Damian’s age. He had white hair that contrasted with a black jumpsuit, and he was floating a bit above their car.

“Ghost twerp!” Skulker (that was his name) responded. “I’m here to take your pelt!” He then leveled his gun towards the floating kid, and Tim let himself relax a bit as the gun was pointed away from him.

Tim then started panicking again, because the weird cyborg ghost man was pointing his gun at a kid.

Albeit a dead kid, but the point still stood.

“Can this wait? I was kind of in the middle of something.”

“No puny excuses will be able to stop me!”

The smaller of the ghosts sighed, obviously annoyed.

But then a small smirk played softly on the Phantoms face, and his hands began glowing green.

“Guess I’ve got to kick your ass then.”

—

Jason Todd was going to kill a ghost.

He didn’t know if it was possible, but he would totally figure it out. If he could come back from the dead, he could find a way to make ghosts double-dead.

Of course, the one day he trusts Danny with someone else, he gets caught up in a ghost attack.

And of course, instead of keeping an eye on the literal child he was with, Roy got distracted by the ghosts and then Danny fucking vanished.

And now Jason was watching two ghosts brawl, one large and robotic and vaguely evil looking, the other a kid in a hazmat suit and somehow kicking the robots spectral ass.

When Roy had texted him about the villain attack, it hadn’t taken Jason more than seven minutes to suit up and get Kori to carry him to where Roy’s tracker was flashing at him on his gps.

But apparently it was seven minutes too late because Danny was nowhere in sight.

As much as Jason wanted to rush off and find his kid, it looked like he’d have to kick some undead ass first.

Jason unholstered his guns, watching the kid and the robot grapple in the air as he drew closer to the fight.

Once he got close enough to the fight, he fired off a single shot, watching as the fighting ghosts stilled. The robot had the smaller ghost in a choke hold, and the smaller ghost paused from where he was chewing on the robots arm with indignant fury.

“So what the hell are you two chucklefucks supposed to be?” Jason asked, mechanical voice easily heard in the sudden silence that had come over the two ghosts.

“I am Skulker, greatest hunter to-“

“Oh my god you’re Red Hood!” The kid interrupted, his face lighting up as the robot scowled at being interrupted.

“Be quiet tiny ghost whelp, for you are interrupting-“

“Yeah yeah, best hunter in the history of ever, blah blah, tries to skin a child for bragging rights, the whole speech gets tiring after the first twenty seven times.” The kid interrupted the robot, Skulker, again, who was growing madder by the second.

“Insolent Brat!” Skulker said, releasing the child from the chokehold he was being held in, only to hurl him straight at a mildly confused Jason.

“Shit!” Jason cursed, scrambling back but unable to get out of the way before the tiny ghosts body slammed into his own.

Dazed, it took Jason a second before he could sit up and check on the cold-feeling kid sprawled across his lap.

“You alright kid?” Jason said, ignoring the small protest his mostly-healed side gave at the movement.

The kid popped his head up, not a single sign of hurt on his face and green eyes alight with excitement.

“I’m great! My name’s Phantom, it’s nice to meet you mister Red Hood!”

“It’s nice to meet you too?”

“I was super worried that Batman was going to show up because he’s like scary and I’ve already met him once and it felt like my heart was going to explode but you showed up which is like thirteen times better because you’re Red Hood and you’re really cool-“

“Hey, Phantom right?” Tim interrupted the ghost kids rambling, a little out of breath. “As funny as it is to watch Hood be confused at a fanboy, maybe save the hero worship for after we beat skunk-dudes ass?”

“Don’t worry, I just need to slow him down enough to shove him in my thermos!” Phantom said, pulling a uncannily familiar thermos out of… somewhere. The kids suit was almost skin tight, and Jason couldn’t see any visible pockets on him.

“Isn’t that a Fenton thermos?” Tim asked, looking fairly wary of the tool that he had watched Danny use to beat Dick into submission.

“Yeah!”

“Don’t the Fentons hate all ghosts?”

“Yeah. They make good tools and it pisses them off that I’m able to steal them so really it’s a win-win for me. Except the part where they try and shoot me, but you can’t win everything.” Phantom shrugged, and Jason was left wondering if this kid was connected to Danny in some way.

With Jason’s luck, probably.

“Less chatty more fighty midgets, you can talk about things I don’t know about later.” Jason said, standing up and watching as Phantom floated a bit off the ground, dusting himself off.

“I thought we established I would be fanboying later?” Phantom asked, and Jason felt himself grin a bit under his mask. It was always more fun to fight when your teammates knew how to banter.

(No matter how hard he tried to deny it, Jason had loved being Robin, but the lack of reciprocating banter from Bruce had been absolutely stifling.)

“Learn how to multitask then pipsqueak.” Jason said, before turning and charging the robot ghost.

“I’m not a little kid you know!” The ghost kid said, letting himself flank Jason’s right and Tim took his left.

“How old are you then?” Tim asked.

“Chronologically, sixteen. Physically… maybe twelve? Time magic and not having a true physical body make it hard to tell.”

“You pathetic whelps!” Robot-face interrupted their banter, and Jason watched as a comically oversized gun was leveled towards his head. “Stop ignoring me!”

“Well shit.”

Chapter Text

Danny decided that despite the ghost attack (or maybe because of it), he was having one of the best days of his life.

He got to fight at the side of The Red Hood(!!!!) and Red Robin(!!) which was like the awesomest superhero team up he’d ever taken part in.

It was also the only superhero team up he’d ever taken part in, but that was beside the point.

With the help of the other two vigilantes, it barely took five minutes for the three of them to incapacitate skulker and shove him in the thermos.

Danny twisted the lid of the thermos on with a smile, before turning to the other vigilantes, who were looking at him expectantly.

“So am I allowed to fanboy now?” Danny grinned, watching as Red Robin snorted.

Red hood huffed a bit too, before his body language turned more serious.

“When you got here at the beginning of the fight, did you happen to see a small kid? He’s got black hair, pretty short, and he was wearing a blue school uniform.”

Danny paused for a minute, trying to remember any civilians that he saw that looked like that when he first arrived-

Oh.

The kid was Danny.

Red Hood was looking for Danny.

Why was Red Hood looking for Danny?

“Why do you want to know?” Danny probed. Danny had met a lot of people since coming to Gotham, but he was pretty sure he hadn’t ran into Red Hood yet.

Unless he met Hood’s civilian identity?

“He’s my-“ Hood paused, obviously rethinking his words. “He’s my friends kid.”

“Well if he’s a kid, why wasn’t he with his dad?” Danny played dumb, which wasn’t very hard for him.

“He was with another friend of his dads.”

“Then where’s his dad’s friend?” Red Hood was starting to look twitchy at Danny’s constant questioning, but Danny really couldn’t help himself.

Curiosity may have killed the cat but Danny was already dead so he could ask as many questions as he wanted.

“Well right now, he’s trying to find the kid. Do you know where he is or not?” Red Hood asked, obviously anxious to find the kid.

“Yeah! He was in the line of fire when the fight started so I dropped him off on a rooftop. Anyways I’ve gotta run, see ya later Mr. Red Hood, Mr. Red Robin.” Danny waved at them before disappearing, rushing to a nearby rooftop to transform back.

Danny slipped the thermos into his backpack, sitting down on the rooftop and preparing to act like he’d been there the whole time.

It only took a few minutes before Danny heard the sound of a grapple line, watching as Red Robin pulled himself over the ledge, feeling a slight shock at the sight of Roy clinging onto him like some sort of overgrown koala.

“Danny!” Roy said, quickly rushing to Danny’s side and grabbing his shoulders with strong arms.

“Hey Roy! Hi Mister Red Robin! I saw the fight! It was super cool!” Danny said, still bouncing with adrenaline from the fight. “Where did Red Hood go?” Danny asked, looking between the two of them.

It was weird. Red Hood had definitely been more invested in finding Danny than Red Robin had, but he was nowhere to be seen.

“Red Hood had… things to do.” Roy said, almost hesitantly, avoiding Danny’s eyes.

But why-

And then everything clicked.

Roy’s avoidance of talking about Red Hood, his  abnormal strength, the way he knew Jason, why Red Hood had been so hesitant to call Jason his friend and his desperation to find Danny, it all came together to form one big picture.

Red Hood… was Roy Harper.

It all made sense!

Red Hood was known for being close with prostitutes, so that was probably how he met Jason.

Roy wasn’t anywhere to be found during the fight because he was fighting, right alongside Danny.

Roy was so obviously a vigilante, Danny could kick himself for taking so long to figure out.

Danny froze with realization.

Roy Harper had a crush on his dad.

Roy Harper was Red Hood.

Red Hood had a crush on his dad.

How the hell was Danny going to give a good shovel talk to the god damned Red Hood?

Chapter Text

Jon was worried about Danny.

Damian was too, and Jon could tell, but Damian probably wouldn’t admit it oh loud.

But it was already one hour into the school day, and Danny was late, and both Jon and Damian hadn’t heard anything from their new and tiny friend.

But when Danny sauntered into class, handing a tardy slip to their teacher with a bright grin on his face, Jon could tell that both he and Damian let some tension melt away from their bodies.

“What happened?” Damian asked, passing the worksheets to Danny as he sat down at their table.

“Ghost attack, which is bullshit because there aren’t even any convenient ghost portals near Gotham. Shitty Skulker flew all the way here just out of spite, and then lost in less than fifteen minutes.” Danny ranted, before looking down at his worksheet and sighing.

“Skulker?” Jon probed. He liked to think he knew his supervillains pretty well, but ghost supervillains were still a pretty new concept to him.

“Yep. He’s super annoying. His whole shtick is being the greatest hunter in existence but he’s been trying to skin Phantom for like at least two years now and he gets beat every single time.” Danny said, twirling a pencil in his fingers before absent-mindedly answering the questions on his worksheet.

“Phantom?” Damian questioned.

“He’s the town’s ghost wrangler. He’s also a ghost, but not as much of a bastard as most of the others.” Danny said, not looking up from where he was filling out the work sheet with far too much ease.

“Why was Phantom in Gotham? You said there were no ghost portals.” Damian probed some more.

Jon sort of understood. He was only allowed in Gotham for school after he swore not to interfere with villains as Superboy. And even then, he was sure Mr. Batman had him under some kind of supervision.

A new hero popping up in Gotham was definitely going to be met with resistance, especially when his motives were unknown and he was drawing enemies.

“I… have no clue.” Danny’s brows furrowed and he paused his writing. “Probably ghost king bullshit or something.” He shrugged.

“Hearing a lot of chatter and not a lot of working!” The teacher said, and Jon immediately turned his head towards the worksheet he’d barely started on the hide the flush in his face.

“I’ll tell you more later.” Danny whispered, and Jon grinned.

Ghosts were cool.

Confusing, but cool.

—

Duke Thomas decided he was never going out of town again.

With a family like his, it was the equivalent to missing a day of school only to come back to learn that you missed a fire alarm, free ice cream, and an arrest.

But since it has to do with Gothams local family of mentally ill crime-fighters, it’s ten times worse than it normally is.

Duke left for one month on a school trip, and he comes back to ghosts, ghost villains, and a new ghost vigilante.

And also Jason having a kid.

Admittedly, the ghost thing wasn’t that new. He’d already had his “ghosts exist” mental breakdown at the beginning of his schools one-month trip to Amity Park, most haunted place on earth.

It was a weird exchange program that had him end up in Amity Park.

The students of Gotham Academy would spend one month there, and the kids of Casper high would spend one month in Gotham.

Apparently it was supposed to teach them something about culture swapping.

All Duke learned was that ghosts were bastards and most of the ghost hunters weren’t much better.

So ghosts weren’t too much of a shock when he came back home. Ghosts in Gotham, admittedly a bit wild, but Gotham already had its own personal zombie vigilante so not too wild.

But the Jason having a kid was definitely something else.

Duke had always figured if anyone would inherit Bruce’s adopting issues, it’d be Dick or Damian, maybe Cass if you were gonna push it.

Sure, Damian didn’t like people, but the rate he took in animals was alarming and Duke figured it might translate to orphans once they got older.

And Dick was the most friendly, so Duke wouldn’t be surprised if one day a kid just decided to keep him as their dad.

Jason with a kid was definitely unexpected, but not exactly unwelcome. From what he’d heard when Bruce was telling him about their newest family member, the kid was a meta like Duke, which was super cool.

He hadn’t asked about the kids powers, but he could probably just ask the kid himself.

He’d wanted to meet the kid earlier that day, but Jason was being stupidly overprotective after the ghost attack the kid had been involved in earlier. Duke was a bit surprised he let the kid go to school, but being in the same class as Superboy and Robin must have soothed his worries somewhat.

Now he was on patrol with Jason, leaping over roofs side by side as Signal tried to get back into the swing of vigilante things.

It was supposed to be a normal patrol to help Duke get back on his feet.

The glowing kid who flew through the floor of the building they were standing on to cheerfully greet them was definitely not normal.

He was supposed to be done with ghost bullshit after his month in the hellscape that was Amity Park.

At least this one seemed nice. And he probably wouldn’t stick around. In fact, he was probably here right now to tell them that he just came for the idiot robot ghost and would be leaving soon never to bother them again.

“Y’all are the local vigilantes right?” The little ghost kid asked.

“We are.” Jason said shortly, voice modulator giving his voice a mechanical edge that sent a chill down Duke’s spine.

“Great! I live here now, so I look forward to working together with you!”

Mother Fuck-

Chapter Text

Jason Todd had met a lot of superheroes and vigilantes in his time.

Young ones, old ones, living ones, not-quite living ones, the whole shebang.

Jason also knew that there were some other ghost vigilantes. At least one. He had never interacted with the dude but he knew he was dead which had interested him at the time and Jason formed a sense of one-sided kinship with the ghost. Of course that was back when Jason thought ghosts were a one time thing.

Now he had a kid who used to have a ghost portal in his basement, partial ownership of a ghost dog, and a new ghost vigilante who apparently lived in crime alley now.

Duke had looked so very pained at the kids abrupt introduction before rushing off, and he had ranted to Jason for a solid hour about all the ghostly bullshit he had experienced in Amity Park.

(Jason hadn’t even noticed he was gone. To be fair, he had been in the process of adopting a snarky little flight risk. Maybe he should pay more attention to the rest of his family.)

Now Jason was crawling back in through his window, yawning as he grabbed a banana from his counter and quickly peeled it.

(Jason had a fucking fruit bowl now. Was this what domestic life did to a person?)

Jason took two bites of the banana before he heard a creaking noise from behind him, and he quickly turned, vigilante instincts on alert.

He relaxed slightly when he realized it was only his son, who was tiredly staring at him and rubbing his eyes.

“You’re awake?” Danny tiredly slurred, his sentence interrupted by a yawn.

”Just got back from work. What are you doing up?” Jason asked, walking over to his son.

“Dumbass nightmares.” Danny said pulling on Jason’s sleeve. Jason was thankful no lights were turned on, leaving Danny unable to see the blood spatter on the sleeve of his Red Hood Jacket. When Jason leaned down Danny climbed into his arms, and Jason stood back up holding his son against his chest.

“Want to talk about them?” Jason asked, not really sure what proper nightmare procedure was. When Jason had nightmares as a kid he had always ignored them, not wanting to cause anyone any problems.

Looking back, that definitely was not healthy.

“Nah. It’s stupid.” Jason made a small noise of protest at that but didn’t interrupt. “I’m stronger now, strong enough to fight anyone. I punched Batman for ancients sake. I would punch god too if given the chance. Actually, I think I did fight god once. Does the lord of time count as god? I mean I didn’t win but I definitely fought him.”

Jason shrugged, slightly moving Danny’s head where it was leaned against his shoulder. “I can’t say I’ve ever fought god, but I did hit Batman with a tire iron once.” Jason bragged to the half asleep kid, who chuckled.

“Oh hey, you did that to your dad too, right?” Jason stiffened. He had forgotten that Dick had shared that particular tidbit of information with Danny. “Do you just go around hitting people with tire irons or…” Danny trailed off, his eyebrows furrowing.

“Okay, back to bed we go.” Jason said as he started speed walking towards Danny’s room.

“Holy Fuck! Your dad is Batman!” Danny looks up at Jason, eyes filled with shock as Jason groaned.

Shit.

—

Fuck.

Fuck.

Fuck.

Bruce Wayne was Batman.

Batman was Bruce Wayne.

Batman was Jason’s dad.

Jason had been raised by Batman.

Danny had punched his Grandpa?

Jason was saying something, but all Danny could hear was the blood rushing in his ears.

“-it, shit, Danny, you with me?” Jason was kneeling in front of Danny, who was now sitting on the couch. When had that happened?

Danny’s mouth tried to move, but no noise came out, so Danny settled for a small hum of acknowledgement.

“Fuck, yeah, B is Batman. Shit, I wanted to tell you in an actual proper way, god this is definitely not going well-“

Danny let out a small, almost hysterical chuckle and Jason’s shoulders tensed just a bit.

“You cuss worse than me.” Danny said, watching as Jason’s eyes and posture softened.

“Oh excuse me for worrying when my kids gone catatonic.” Jason rolled his eyes, but he obviously found the banter as comforting as Danny did, letting it dull his nerves as the feeling of safety wrapped around him like a soft blanket.

“Danny.” Jason’s voice turned serious again far too quick for Danny’s comfort. “We can talk about this now, or we can go back to sleep and talk about this tomorrow morning, and I plan on calling you out of school either way. Balls in your court kid, and I want you to be comfortable.”

Danny looked into his dads eyes, finding nothing but honesty and concern and overwhelming love.

“Tomorrow.” Danny answered, leaning forward against his dad.

Jason picked Danny up, letting Danny’s head rest in the crook of his neck as Danny basked in the scent of safety and warmth and home- (and also a bit of blood but Danny had been desensitized to that for at least a year.)

It was barely any time at all before Danny was laid in his bed, a soft hand brushing his hair back.

“Sweet dreams short stack. Don’t let the bedbugs bite.” Jason said as Danny let sleep slip back into his tired mind.

“Mmm. Night dad.” Danny responded, whining softly as he felt the hand carding through his hand pause.

There were two sharp pats on the top of his head before a suspiciously wet “Night kid.” was whispered.

Danny rested for a few minutes, dozing but not quite asleep.

Then suddenly an idea struck his tired mind, and his eyes flew wide.

The reason Batman doesn’t like Red Hood is cause Red Hood wants to date his son!

Chapter Text

Alfred Pennyworth was a very well put together  man, if he did say so himself.

He wasn’t perfect in the slightest, he had too much blood on his hands and too heavy a conscious to even come close to being perfect.

But compared to the insanity of the Wayne family, Alfred practically looked like a saint.

Coping methods that weren’t fighting criminals in dark alleys did wonders for a person.

But since Alfred held the title of most mentally stable in the family, his son and grandchildren often came to him for advice, calling the home phone as while Alfred did have a cell phone, he very rarely carried it around with him.

The only problem with calling the home phone was that sometimes it wasn’t Alfred who answered.

It was about three in the morning when Alfred walked down the stairs, listening to Richards cheery voice hold a one sided conversation as he sat in the chair by their home phone, twisting the cord between his fingers like a teenage girl.

“Oh come on little wing, I’m great at advice!” Richard said, before pausing for a moment, listening to the person on the other end of the line, who Alfred now knew was Jason. “Ok I’m not great at following my own advice but it’s not like hypocrisy is a new thing for this family.”

“Master Jason is calling?” Alfred prompted, watching as Richard turned to him, a natural smile on his face.

“Oh yeah, it’s for you!” Richard said as took the phone away from his ear and pressed the speaker button before offering to Alfred, lifting a finger to his lips which were curled into a mischievous smirk.

Alfred took the phone with a small sigh, before lifting it towards his head. “Master Jason, Master Richard is still listening in. Are you alright with him hearing this conversation?” Alfred asked, ignoring Richards pout.

Alfred heard Jason’s exasperated sigh through the receiver. “Yeah sure, he’ll probably hear about it later anyways.” His voice was tired, and a bit hoarse and Alfred felt a twinge of concern for his grandson.

“I’ve got good news and bad news.” Jason continued speaking. “The good news is that Danny called me dad earlier tonight.”

Richard gasped at this, a look of pure joy lighting up his face. It had taken both Richard and Jason at least a year in the Wayne manor before they felt comfortable enough to call Bruce dad, and even then it was rare for them when they were young.

Now Richard only called him that on very rare occasions, and the only time Jason had called him that since his death he had been shaking and crying after a particularly potent dose of fear gas. He still referred to Bruce as his father, but to his face it was B when he was feeling civil, and a rotating string of expletives and titles that would make a sailor blush when he wasn’t.

“Oh jeez Jason I’m so proud of you! That’s amazing!” Richard cheered, his grin threatening to split his face.

“Congratulations Master Jason.” Alfred said, a soft smile on his own face.

“Thanks.” Jason said, and Alfred could hear a rare softness in his voice.

Alfred hadn’t met his great-grandson yet, but he already loved the boy, of just for the joy he brought his most wayward grandson.

“The bad news is he figured out B is Batman and then went completely unresponsive for like ten minutes.” Jason said, and the smile on Dicks face froze. “I managed to calm him down and now he’s in bed and we’re talking about it tomorrow morning.”

“Oh. That’s definitely less good.” Richard finally said. “How did he find out?”

“Told him I hit Batman with a tire iron, forgot you told him I got adopted after I attacked B with a tire iron.”

“Oops. Sorry!” Richard said, not really sounding apologetic at all.

“I wanted to tell him in a different way, and now I’ve got no fucking clue what I’m doing.” Jason said with a sigh, and Alfred could see Jason running a hand through his hair, a nervous tick that he never managed to kick as a kid.

“Master Jason, from what I’ve heard you parent very differently than Master Bruce.” Alfred said, interrupted by Jason’s scoff.

“Well I would hope so.” Jason snarked on instinct.

Alfred paused, letting the silence show his dissatisfaction at being interrupted.

“Ok, yeah sorry, I’m listening.”

“Neither you or Master Bruce have had a stable father figure in your lives, so you both became your idea of what a father should be. Master Bruce became someone commanding and able to take charge, but you became someone who is honest and safe for your son. The most important thing is for you to be honest with him, and let him come to his own conclusions.”

Jason sighed.

“Yeah, thanks Alfie. The pep talk helped.”

“I’m glad it did Master Jason. Though I have to suggest bringing Master Daniel to the manor soon. I’m afraid I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting him yet.”

“You got it.” Jason said, and Alfred could practically see the tired smile on his face, before hanging up.

Alfred smiled at his phone for a moment, so proud of the man that the tiny street kid who had the guts to steal Batman’s tires had become, and even prouder to call him a grandson.

Richard looked pensive as well, staring at the phone with an indescribable expression on his face.

However, the illusion was ruined when he opened his mouth.

“So who do you think Danny’s favorite hero is?”

—

Valerie Gray didn’t like Gotham.

It was damp and dark and wherever she went, there was an underlying smell of rot and death.

Their hotel was pretty nice, definitely something Valerie couldn’t afford staying at on her own.

The joys of making deals with rich kid schools with too much money to burn.

It was three students to a room, and Valerie had ended up bunking with Sam, which was nice, and Paulina, which was a bit less nice.

Paulina had mellowed out since her freshman year though, still full of herself but less likely to lash out at other people.

Valerie was calmly unpacking when Tucker slammed the door of their dorm open, panting a bit and red in the face.

Valerie loved Tucker, but he was not built for cardio.

Sam came into the room, because of course the pretentious hotel gave them both a living space and two separate bedrooms.

(Paulina had thrown a fit about sleeping in the master bedroom, so Sam and Valerie were staying in the second room.)

“What’s up Tuck?” Sam asked.

Tucker didn’t respond, instead pulling out his phone and rushing over to shove it in Sam’s face.

Valerie walked over to where they were, peeking over Sam’s shoulder and promptly freezing at the story that was showing on Gothams local news channel.

“Why the hell is Phantom in Gotham?” Valerie questioned, almost rhetorically.

And why the hell was he so tiny?

Chapter Text

Jason Todd, the infamous Red Hood, the man who died and came back swinging, scared? Ha! Jason wasn’t even the slightest bit nervous, no way no how, and anyone who would tell you otherwise was a lying liar who lied.

Ok, maybe he was a bit nervous. But only a bit.

Really, being a little nervous was completely reasonable in this situation.

Jason had barely gotten any sleep, tossing and turning in a haze when he had tried to lay in his bed, plagued by half-baked nightmares

Jason had gone over what he planned to say dozens upon dozens of time, but nothing ever sounded right in his head.

And now he was watching his kid sleep.

Like a creep.

He had spent half the night in his bed, a fourth pacing his apartment, and the final fourth watching Danny’s face as he rested and praying to any listening deity that he wouldn’t completely fuck things up.

The talk with Alfred had helped calm Jason’s nerves some, and Jason knew deep in his heart that Danny was hopelessly good and trusting and wouldn’t judge Jason, not for protecting people.

Jason had seen Danny’s face when Red Hood and the other Gotham vigilantes had come up on the news, awe and respect and something deeper that Jason couldn’t quite identify lighting up his eyes.

Jason could never help the swell of pride at knowing his son admired him, even if he didn’t know the vigilante that fought against the darkness of the night was his father.

At the same time, maybe an ex-crime lord vigilante who frequently used murder as a problem solving method wasn’t the best role model for a seven year old.

Because Danny was eerily similar to the way he had been as a kid, and Jason would do everything in his power to keep Danny from turning out like him.

He may have been too late to stop the potentially fatal explosion part of their shared backstories, but Danny was still pure and clean and ever so good.

Jason would dirty his hands a thousand times over before he let anything happen that would change that.

Logically, Danny would be safer somewhere far away from Jason, far from the blood and gun powder and toxic green that stained his soul.

But Jason was already in too deep, and unlike his son, he was selfish.

So Jason would keep Danny by his side, shielding him the best he could from the darkness of the world.

And now that his son had brought him and his secrets into the light, and Jason would protect his son still, no matter what.

“Jason?” A tired and familiar voice probed, and Jason startled, watching as his son met his eyes, sitting up in bed.

“Morning Danny.” Jason felt a soft smile grow on his face, every single bone in his body overtaken with pure love for his son.

“What’re you doing?” He asked tiredly.

“I was just waiting for you to get up.” Jason said, walking over to where Danny was pushing himself to the edge of his bed.

Jason held his arms out in a question, and Danny nodded and held own arms out. Jason chuckled a bit as he scooped his son into his arms, feeling his son relax against him sleepily.

“Does waiting for me to get up include watching me like a weirdo stalker?” Danny asked into Jason’s neck.

“I wasn’t watching you for that long.” Jason protested.

“And just how much did you sleep last night?” Danny asked, and Jason could feel his smirk.

“Remind me again who is whose parent here?” Jason said, avoiding the question.

Danny laughed a bit, and as Jason made his way into the living room he set Danny down on the couch, kneeling to meet his sons eyes.

“So, do you want to talk or have breakfast first?” Jason asked, watching as his son weighed his options.

“Let’s talk. I’m not too hungry.” Danny said, and Jason rose to sit next to his son on their couch, turning his body so they faced each other, despite being side-by-side.

“All right.” Jason sighed, leaning against the couch. “As you figured out last night, Bruce is Batman.”

Jason paused as Danny nodded.

“The rest of my family is made up of vigilantes too, and it’s a family tradition I’d definitely prefer you not follow. Dick was the first Robin, and now he’s Nightwing, Tim is Red Robin, Cass is Black Bat, and Damian is Robin. And I’m Red Hood.” Jason finished, watching as Danny’s brows furrowed in confusion.

“You’re Red Hood?” He asked incredulously.

“Yes?” Jason’s voice was questioning as well. Danny hadn’t seemed too surprised at any of his siblings, so why was he so shocked for him?

“But I thought Roy was Red Hood!” Danny exclaimed, half to himself and half to Jason.

Jason’s brain blue-screened.

Whatever Jason had been expecting when he decided to come clean to Danny, it was definitely not… whatever this was.

“Out of all the- why is Roy Red Hood? Why not me?” Jason asked, trying not to let his voice crack.

“Because you’re a prostitute!” Danny responded.

“Because I’m a what?!”

Chapter Text

Danny wasn’t wrong very often.

He was smart, wise, and had experienced a lot of things in his short life, and that experience usually let him see straight to the heart of any matter.

This time though-

This time Danny was very wrong.

Jason spluttered across from him, obviously as lost as Danny was.

“What- how- Why!?” Jason’s eyes met Danny’s. “How do you even know what a prostitute is? Do you even know what a prostitute is?”

“What do you think I am, stupid?” Danny asked, raising an indignant eyebrow.

“You’re seven!” Jason threw his hands in the air.

“Oh yeah, I keep forgetting that.”

Jason ran a hand through his hair, pushing it back.

“Why did you think I was a prostitute?” He asked, his confusion obvious in his voice.

“You’re super secretive about your job, you work super odd hours, you never worry about money, and you’re pretty good looking. It was definitely more obvious than vigilante.” Danny laid out all his evidence, and Jason looked a bit stunned at it.

“That… actually makes a lot of sense. Maybe I should start using prostitute as a cover job.”

“But you aren’t a prostitute.” Danny said, just to make sure.

“No I am not.”

“You’re the Red Hood.”

“Yes I am.” Jason affirmed.

“How did that happen?” Danny asked, curious about his dad’s origin story.

“We’ll first, I was Robin. I took the mantle from Dick, who was the first.”

“So you’re the Red Hood and you were the best Robin too?  You never told me you were secretly cool.”

“Oh please, I’ve always been cool- wait, the best Robin?” Jason redirected halfway through the sentence.

“Oh yeah totally! Well at least in my opinion. Tucker really liked the third Robin cause he was smart, Sam liked the second Robin-you-too, and Valerie liked the fifth Robin cause he has a sword. You were my favorite cause you felt the realest.” Danny explained, remembering the unnecessarily passionate debates in his friend group on the best Robin.

“… right. I kind of forget people like Robin me sometimes. Anyways, I was Robin from ages eleven to fifteen-“

“You were eleven!?” Danny was shocked.

Yeah he’d only been three years older than Jason had been when he’d started being a vigilante, but Danny had powers and was already mostly dead. Jason would have just been a normal kid.

“Yeah, I’ve now realized that slapping a mask on a child and sending them off to fight for justice is not a method I’m on board with.”

“What was Batman thinking! You were practically a baby!” Danny exclaimed.

“… from the mouth of babes I guess.” Jason teased, a shaky smirk finding its home on his face.

“Oh shut up, I’m defending your honor or innocence or whatever.” Danny playfully snapped back.

Jason grinned at him before his face fell again, his eyes turning a shade more green. “And then when I was fifteen I ended up being forcibly retired.”

“Forcibly retired?” Danny probed.

“I died.” Jason said casually.

“You what!” Danny practically screeched. He suddenly felt a flash of sympathy for his dad. Was this what Jason felt like everytime Danny dropped a completely unprompted and unexplained traumatic fact?

Maybe Danny should drop less truth bombs.

Nah, probably not.

“When I was 15. A lot of shi- stuff. A lot of stuff went down.” Jason’s eyes were turned downward, his hands figeting. “It started with my mom- and then the Joker- and then-“

“You don’t have to tell me.” Danny said, watching as Jason looked up, a strange shock on his face.

“I thought you wanted to-“

“I didn’t have to say anything I didn’t want to. You don’t either.” Danny nodded to himself, and Jason grinned at him, wide and genuine and a bit tired.

“Thanks Danny. So after I died, I came back to life. I’ve honestly got zero clue about how that happened, but B’s assassin cult-lady ex dipped me in some evil Mountain Dew to bring me back fully, and then I trained there and came back to Gotham and took up the mantle of Red Hood.”

“Assassin Cult? Like the League of Assassins?” Danny asked.

“Yeah those guys- forget prostitution how do you know about the League of Assassins!”Jason’s voice rose a few octaves.

“Huh. I guess Wes was right about that one too.”

“Wes???”

“Yeah, he was a conspiracy theorist. No one actually believes him, but I’m beginning to realize he was on point more often than not. Anyways, what do you mean evil Mountain Dew?”

“Lazarus Pits. They’re glowing green pools of evil, and they make for terrible mental health. Don’t touch one with a ten foot pole if you can help it.” Jason said, and Danny nodded in compliance. “Well, I think that’s about all of my story. Any questions?”

Danny paused for a bit, pondering. “Yeah. Can we have ice cream for breakfast?”

“No way.” Jason sighed, his eyes becoming warm.

Danny shrugged. “Worth a shot.”

Chapter Text

Duke knew something was up with the Amity Park kids.

Well, something was always “up” with them.

They were weird as fuck.

But they were acting weirder than normal, which while hard to achieve, they had proved it possible.

Sam and Tucker had been whispering to each other non-stop since class has started, and since they were sitting at the same table as Duke he was absolutely bored out of his mind.

It was English and they were discussing To kill a mockingbird, which Duke already knew basically everything about due to Jason’s Book DebatesTM, which came up whenever there was a particularly slow night of patrol.

So Duke almost sighed in relief when he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket, pulling it out and seeing a text in the family chat.

It was from Damian, which was surprising enough as it was during school hours.

And then Duke felt a flash of concern when he realized it was Damian asking about Danny’s whereabouts, because apparently he hadn’t shown up for school.

Dicks response was almost instantaneous.

Don’t worry, Jason’s just keeping him home today to have the talk with him :)

Isn’t it a bit early for the sex talk?

Nono, it’s the “guess what your entire family is secretly comprised of a bunch of crime fighting furries” talk

Do birds count as furries? Wouldn’t they be like featheries?

DANNY KNOWS OUR SECRET IDENTITIES!?

Well it took him long enough

Does this mean Red Hoods getting a new sidekick?

Fuck no.

Jason! How’d he take it :D

He thought Roy was Red Hood.

????what?? ??Why not you?????

Because I’m obviously a prostitute, duh.

According to Danny at least.

Duke choked on air, quickly shoving his phone into his pocket as his teacher sent him a sharp glare.

It was only a few seconds after the teacher looked away that Tucker leaned forward across the table.

“What’s up?” Tucker whispered.

“My new nephew, Danny. I haven’t met him yet but he’s my new favorite family member.” Sam and Tucker blanched at the name, and Duke raised his eyebrow.

“Danny?” Sam asked tentatively.

“Yeah. I’m probably meeting him tomorrow. He’s in the middle school and it’s not too far from here. I could introduce you to him and some of my brothers.” Duke offered, and Sam and Tucker untensed.

“At the middle school? Sure, why not.” Sam grinned, something unidentifiable hidden behind her apathy.

“Great, we’ll head there tomorrow after school.” Duke smiled softly at his out-of-town friends.

—

Danny wasn’t woken up by any movement or light, instead he was woken by a noise, a noise he’d hoped never to hear again.

Falling salt

His eyes flashed open and he was there again.

He quickly tried to rise to his feet, but his weak and sleep addled body quickly fell to the floor as he tripped over his restraints.

Helpless eyes watched as his father as Jack completed the circle of glowing green salt, and then Danny’s eyes landed on his mom on Maddie, smiling that sickly sweet smile that made Danny’s very soul feel slimy.

“Don’t worry darling, all this will be over soon, and then both of you will be normal again! That’s all we want for you.” Her voice sounded wrong and scary and- both of them?

Danny’s head turned and

no

No

NO

“Dad?” Danny’s voice was hoarse and choked up as Danny rushed towards Jasons prone figure.

He shook his father once, twice, and Maddie kept droning on in his ear, meaningless noises that turned to chanting as the salt around them began glowing greener.

“Dad please-“ Danny’s voice choked off as a sharp pain struck his core.

This would kill Danny. He knew it.

Just like it did last time.

But Danny had come back.

And Jason wouldn’t.

Jason wasn’t a ghost. He couldn’t heal from a disconnect between his soul and his body.

Jason was going to die.

It’s

All

His

Fault

Tears streamed down the ghost boys face as he clutched his dad closer, an endless stream of pleas spilling from his mouth as the pain built in his chest.

Danny’s pleas finally stopped as the climax of his exorcism hit, ripping the air from his lungs-

And then he woke up.

Tears streaming down his face, he climbed out of his bed, quietly moving towards Jason’s room, pushing his door open with a small squeak.

“Danny?” Jason’s tired voice asked into the darkness, and Danny hummed a response.

He made his way to Jason’s bed, crawling up and fitting himself into his dads arms as Jason pulled him tight in his arms, surrounding Danny in warmth and safe and home.

“Hey dad?” Danny asked tentatively.

“Yeah?”

“You aren’t gonna die, right?” Danny’s voice was soft in the darkness.

“I’ll try my best not to.” Jason responded, a reassuring hand running through Danny’s hair.

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

Chapter Text

Jon was deciding whether the joy or relief in his heart was stronger when he walked in to home room and saw Danny with his back to the door, sitting in his chair the wrong way and while he couldn’t see Danny’s face, he could see the small and soft smile, and Jon knew that things were perfect.

“Danny!” Jon exclaimed, dashing over to his best friends as fast as humanly possible (or as fast as he could go while still appearing human.) “Where have you been?”

“Damian didn’t tell you?” Danny asked, tilting his head in a way that kind of reminded Jon of Krypto.

“You knew?” Jon turned to his other best friend, absolutely scandalized.

And Damian, the absolute Jerk, shrugged.

“I only learned in math, we don’t have that class together.” Damian said, like they didn’t have a class together right after math.

“I have been betrayed. This is a tragedy and I will never recover.” Jon flopped across Damian’s desk, a hand over his head like a fainting maiden to emphasize the depths of his broken heart.

Damian, because he was cold-hearted and cared nothing for the deep and profound bond shared between the two of them, pushed Jon off his desk and onto the floor.

“Ow,” Jon said, his heart and back aching with the same pain. (No pain at all, to be specific.)

“Yesterday Danny was busy getting an introduction to the family business,” Damian said, and Jon lit up with realization, before pausing.

“Wait. Danny didn’t know before?” He asked, picking himself up off the floor.

“No, why?”

“I thought you knew! I told you I had superhearing!” Jon strained to keep his voice at a whisper level, looking around the classroom to make sure no one was listening in.

“You told him you had what?” Damian asked incredulously before Danny had the chance to answer.

“I thought he knew!”

“What does me knowing have to do with superhearing?” Danny asked, tilting his head like a puppy.

“I’m Superboy!” Jon flung his hands into the air, as a dumbfounded look came across Danny’s face.

“Oh… that makes a lot of sense.” Danny said after a beat of silence.

“What did you think it was?” Damian asked, his frantic energy much better hidden than Jon’s.

“I don’t know? Metas don’t have to be heroes! He could have just been a dude with superhearing!“ Danny protested.

“How are your deductive skills so horrendous?” Damian asked, and Jon really didn’t think he was expecting an answer.

“Hey! This isn’t as bad as it could be! I thought Roy was Red Hood!” Danny said, like that was a good defense at all.

“Why would Roy be Red Hood? Your father is Red Hood.” Damian said, appalled.

“To be fair, at that point I was pretty dead set on the idea of Jason being a prostitute.”

“Why would Jason be a prostitute!” Damian exclaimed.

“What’s a prostitute?” Jon asked, watching as his friends faces blanched.

“Ask your mom.” Danny said, not meeting Jon’s eyes.

”Yeah, do that.”

Chapter Text

Tim Drake was frustrated.

Which to be fair, wasn’t that uncommon, but still.

He had met Duke’s friends from Amity Park earlier, and he knew them from somewhere, but he had zero fucking clue where.

He had already ran their faces through multiple supervillain databases and pulled up absolutely nothing, so at least they probably weren’t evil.

Probably.

Even if they were evil Damian would probably sniff them out like the little bloodhound bastard he was and then stab them.

Or maybe he’d set Danny on them, the amount of damage he could do with a thermos was not to be underestimated. (Dick could attest.)

He was walking with both Duke and his friends, half tuning in to their conversation as he told Damian about how they’d be picking him up from school.

The walk was short, and it felt like no time at all before Tim was in front of Gotham Academy Middle, scanning through the throngs of children for his brother, nephew, and the Kryptonian latched onto the both of them.

Damian came forward first, all prim and proper and sizing Sam and Tucker up, probably figuring out how many times he’d have to bite their ankles until they ran away screaming.

“Drake. Thomas. Who are these?” He said, and Tim probably shouldn’t have found Sam and Tuckers dumbfounded blinks as funny as he did.

“This is Sam and Tucker, Duke’s friends from the Amity student exchange.” Tim introduced them by pointing, the asshole in him not telling Damian their last names grinning at Damian’s pointed glare.

“Nice to meet you little dude!” Tucker said, extending his hand, obviously expecting Damian to act like a normally socialized child and extend his own.

Damian, the heathen, only raised an eyebrow, and Tim was kind of jealous of how much judgement and pretentiousness the shrimp could fit into one single motion. “I’m sure it is.”

“So Damian, where’s Danny?” Duke asked, deflecting as Sam (and Tim) snickered at the dejected look on Tuckers face.

“Daniel is over there meeting Kent. He came to pick up Jon today.” Damian said, pointing to where Danny was excitedly shaking Superman’s hand and Clark was staring at him with a look somewhere between awe and confusion on his face.

Tim turned to look at his companions and see Duke’s first impression of Danny, when he stopped dead in his tracks at the identical looks of horror on Tucker and Sam’s faces.

“Hey, are you two okay?” Tim asked, looking between the horrorshocksurprise on the faces of his brother’s friends.

“We… we need to go.” Tucker said, still half in his trance and grabbing onto Sam’s arm like it was a lifeline.

“What?” Duke looked sad, because Duke is a nice person like that (Tim was suspicious, cause Tim is a paranoid bastard) . “Is everything okay?”

“We need to- uh- water our mayor. Hamster!” Tucker said, his mind obviously scrambling to catch up with the situation. “We’re watching another kids hamster and we need to water him right now so we’ve got to go bye!” Tucker spat out, before turning around and speed-walking away, pulling Sam after him.

“You have weird friends.” Tim said to Duke, watching the two out of towners scuttle away.

“I have weird family too.” Duke looked at Damian, who huffed and looked away.

“Poor normal Duke, the unwitting weirdo magnet.” Tim said, patting a totally sympathetic hand on Duke’s shoulder.

“Are you guys calling me weird?” Danny asked, doing that annoying little appearing out of nowhere to scare the soul out of you thing he did.

“Yes.” Damian said, without missing a beat, and Tim almost choked on his laughter.

“… yeah, that’s fair.” Danny nodded.

—

“Holy fucking ancients.” Tucker said, his mind racing as fast as his heart.

“That was Danny.” Sam said, her voice empty. “But it was tiny Danny.”

“Tiny Danny who is also a member of the fucking Wayne’s and- oh no.” Tucker said, puzzle pieces in his head coming forward to snap into a horrifying picture. “Oh no.”

“What is it?” Sam asked, and Tucker had to give himself a breath to make the panicked words running through his head make sense.

“Okay so you know how Bruce Wayne funds the JL?” Tucker asked.

“Because he’s dating Batman? Yeah.” Sam responded, confused at to what point Tucker was trying to make.

“Who do we know that’s evil and rich and would probably love to have access to facts and finances involving the Justice League?” Tucker said, trying to goad Sam into getting the answer herself.

“Lex Luthor?” Sam asked hesitantly.

“No! Well, probably, but no. Vlad!” Tucker said, throwing his arms wide as a hint of recognition dawned on Sam’s face.

“Okay, so how does that relate to a smaller Danny-“ Sam paused. “Oh my god Danielle. Holy fucking Ancients there’s Another Clone!”

“And Vlad probably placed him among the Wayne’s to get info on the Justice League!” Tucker said, and by this point they were both probably a bit hysterical.

“Vlad’s going to try to make a move against the Justice League.” Sam’s voice was as shellshocked as her face.

“Yep.”

“And we have zero clue where our Danny is.”

“Yep.”

“So it’s up to us to do something about Danny’s clone, who is currently a part of the Wayne family, AKA one of the most prolific families in Gotham.”

“Yep.”

“Fuck, we’re so screwed.” Sam’s face hit her hands with a soft slapping noise.

“Oh we’re far past screwed. We’re super screwed.” Tucker said, cursing every god he could think of.

Sam groaned in response.

Chapter Text

Vlad Masters, CEO of DALV. Co., figured himself a pretty positive man. He hated very little, as hate impeded his rationality. 

Really, there were only two things Vlad thought he truly hated. Jack Fenton and everything associated with the man was one. The other was Bruce Fucking Wayne’s stupid galas. 

His first problem with them was that they were held in Gotham, and for the past three years or so every time Vlad had set foot in that accursed city he felt his core screaming at him to evacuate. 

His second problem was the frequency of inane crime in that hellscape of a city. Bruce could barely hold a gala without at least one villain attack, and Vlad rather deal with the box ghost than that obnoxious Harley Quinn any day of the week. And despite none of them being criminals (overt criminals at least, Bruces youngest was always followed by the unsettling scent of steel and blood), the Wayne children could be classified as menaces withing their own right. 

Richard (he would not call the man something as vulgar as Dick) would always manage to find some new and extraordinary way to violate the social rules of proper society, from the time with the frogs (age 14), to the time with the pizza duels (age 17), to the time with the swirly straw (age 23). 

When Jason was younger he had always been unsettlingly quiet, only deigning to say anything when literature was discussed, and then getting so passionate that at one point he had called Prince Prospero “a dipshit who only lost his virginity thanks to his money, as his dick was probably as small as his bank account was large.” Vlad hadn’t appreciated the boy’s glare in his direction when he had said this, and the boy was mistaken anyways, as Vlad was saving himself for marriage. Not that it was that impudent brats business. 

Timothy had always been a polite presence in his youth, but as soon as he became Wayne’s ward it seemed as if a switch had flipped. He was still nice of course, but Vlad had spotted him passed out in a broom closet three times, in a nook under the stairs four times, and on one occasion, under a table. Half the time he spotted Wayne’s sleeping ward there was also a madly grinning blonde girl at his side, scribbling all over his face with a dry erase marker. 

Cassandra never talked much, which Vlad could appreciate, but she did stare into his eyes as if she was weighing his soul, and it really shouldn’t have been that unnerving for a man who fought the king of the damned on the regular. Vlad figured it was probably because he was surrounded by people who wouldn’t stop running their mouths, so the silence of the young girl was unsettling. Yes, blaming Jack and Danny for his problems was always easier. 

Damian was the one Vlad found simultaneously the worst and the best. Sure, he had to deal with the boys obvious desire for bloodshed, and the scent of blood that followed him around like it was his natural scent, and pretend to ignore the fact that the boy hid more knives on his person than years he had lived, but at least the youngest Wayne never cared about him enough to threaten him with any of said knives. Dangerous, yes, but at least he was easily ignorable.

And Vlad’s final problem was the man of the hour, Gotham’s favorite scandal himself, the accursed Brucie Wayne. He was probably the most idiotic man Vlad had ever seen, and he had spent extensive periods of time with Jack Fenton. But despite his idiocy, (or maybe because of it) people loved the mans jovial personality. Yet there were times during conversation with the man, times that only Vlad and his heightened awareness picked upon, where the man didn’t seem like an idiot at all. His eyes would sharpen into something cold and metallic that Vlad felt could carve his core open, his body would go rigid in a way that reminded Vlad of a predator hunting his prey, and something unsettling made the hairs on the back of his neck stand at attention. 

All in all, it was easy to say Vlad hated Brucie Waynes parties.

Unfortunately, Vlad thought, looking at the invitation in his hand, he still had to go to the damn things. Especially when Brucie invited him personally. For some unknown and god-forsaken reason. 

— 

“No.” 

“But Jason-”

“N. O. I know you have trouble spelling sometimes, but that spells no.”

“Jason.” Bruce sighed tiredly, and Jason could feel the exasperation through the phone speaker. Not that he particularly cared.

“Nope, you're shutting up and listening to me,” Jason said, picking up a plate and sending Danny a light glare, watching his son go from blatantly eavesdropping to scribbling down answers on his homework, still eavesdropping, but at least less obviously. “Those parties suck hard. I hated them back then, I hate them now, I’m not forcing my kid to go through that.” The plates were tossed in the sink, and Jason leaned himself against the counter and shot a quick glance at the clock on his microwave. “So now that you’ve been brutally shot down, I’ve got things to do, people to shoot, and a kid to put to bed.”

“Jason, wait.” Bruce demanded, and because fatherhood was making Jason soft or whatever, he didn’t immediately hang up on the man and toss his phone out the window. Setting a good example for obviously eavesdropping and impressionable young minds or whatever. (Jason quickly tamped down the idea of Danny doing that to him eventually, because thoughts like that only led to very very bad things.)

“There’s a highschool class from Amity, Danny’s hometown, that will be invited to the gala. I thought he might recognize somebody there, and I figured a link to his past would be good for him.” Jasons fists clenched around his phone at that. With the nightmares that followed Danny like a shadow, he doubted any reminder of his past would be all that productive. Still-

“You’re just gonna keep bugging me about this, aren’t you?” Jason accused. Bruce stayed silent, which was basically an answer itself. Jason groaned. “Fine. We’re showing up for ten minutes to steal all of your rich people food, seeing if Danny recognizes anyone that he wants to talk to, and then hightailing it out of there. And you’re going to be the one paying for the clothes.”

“Thank you Jason.” Bruce said, and it was so warm and genuine and weird that it sent chills down Jasons spine. 

“Yeah, yeah, you just better be serving good appetizers.” Jason said as he hung up the phone, before turning to check the clock again. 

“Alright Danny, two things.” Jason said, leaning against the back of the couch right next to Danny. “One, we’re going to one of Bruce’s fancy parties this weekend.”

“Ew.” Danny stuck his tongue out, and Jason wondered if they were actually secretly related or something. Knowing the chaos of his family tree, it actually wouldn’t be that surprising. 

“Two,” Jason barrelled on, “It’s bedtime.”

“Double ew.” Danny said, but setting his homework down on the table before heading to the bathroom to get ready for bed anyways. 

Jason looked over Danny’s homework while the kid did his nighttime routine, grinning at the messy handwriting and the small complaints scribbled in the margins about showing his work. 

“I guess you’re gonna head out and do vigilante stuff?” Danny asked from the doorway, looking tiny in his oversized pajamas (NASA themed, with little rockets and saucers on the pants) and obviously waiting for Jason. 

Jason walked over, scooping his kid up in his arms as Danny let out a sleepy giggle. “That’s the plan kiddo,” he said, before depositing Danny onto his bed. 

“Punch some jerks for me, ‘kay?” Danny requested, his eyes on Jason as he flipped off the lightswitch. 

“You got it boss.” Jason grinned into the darkness of his kids room, doing one last scan for any suspicious looking shadows before he left. 

“Hey dad?” Danny said, just as Jason was turning to leave the room. “Love you.” It was almost whispered, and impossibly soft. Or maybe that was just Jasons heart melting and his ears not getting as much circulation. 

“Love-” Jason paused, his voice kind of choking up. “Love you too kiddo.”

Chapter Text

Hi. I haven’t updated since February. And I will update eventually. But the ao3 curse hit me like a truck, and I figured y’all were owed an explanation.

And I’ve had two deaths in my immediate family

Thank you to everyone showing their support, I will be back eventually, but I can’t bring myself to find inspiration right now. I’m really glad that everyone enjoys my writing, and I’m not giving up, I promise. As always, thank you for reading.

Chapter Text

Jason Todd was annoyed. His suit was too tight on his body, practically choking him, and he had to talk and smile and pretend he didn’t want to bite people.

And he also had to keep Danny from biting people, which was a monumental task in and of itself. Especially when people kept pinching his cheeks. So Jason had to keep both Danny and Himself under control.

They had been at the party for a half hour already, and they were still only halfway to the food table that Jason had planned to raid. Jason had grown rusty at navigating parties, and making sure to keep an eye on Danny had made things doubly as hard.

But Jason had been doing pretty well, and he grinned softly as he cast a cursory glance back at his son, and-

Fuck damn it. He had lost Danny.

And before he even had the chance to run off and find his son, there was an unnaturally cold and clammy hand on his arm, and he turned his head, trying not to snarl in frustration.

“Yes?” Jason gritted out, his gaze looking down at a vaguely familiar old guy. “Ah- Van, right?” He asked, grasping at straws for the man’s name.

It took him a moment to respond, and his face made Jason wonder just how strong the champagne they were handing out was.

The knock-off Dracula-looking man definitely didn’t look normal. Dilated pupils, a manic look in his eyes, his shoulders tensed. “It’s Vlad- that boy- the one you were with- what’s his name?” He sounded… strangely eager. Jason didn’t like it.

“… Daniel Fenton-Todd.” Jason said, weighing the pros and cons of punching the man’s lights out. Pro- he’d get to leave. Con- He wouldn’t get to try the fancy food he promised Danny.

He’d also get Bruce’s Disappointed Dad Look(not very effective), Dick’s Sad Older Brother Look(slightly more effective), and Danny’s Why Would You Lie To Me Like That I’ve Been Betrayed Look(Extremely effective. Jason was weak to Danny, and the kid knew it. Sort of. Sometimes, he still acted surprised that Jason cared so much, and Jason had to remind himself not to hunt down and put the fear of the Red Hood into his parents.)

Vlad sucked in a deep breath, and grinned. “Thank you- I’ve got to go now- I’ve got a son to collect.”

And then he walked away, and before Jason could consider chasing after the man, a chilling laugh rang throughout the ballroom, and it was like ice had been poured down Jason’s spine.

He was here.

“Welcome to the party everyone!” His voice was shrill- grating in Jason’s ears like nails on a chalkboard- racketing his heartbeat up to eleven.

And there he was, sitting on the chandelier with a mad grin, and Jason hated how pure fear filled his heart.

“I think it’s time to give our newest Wayne a proper Gotham welcome, hm?” The madman asked, clicking a button as a fog started to fill the room, and a spotlight was turned towards a separate chandelier (because this was Wayne Manor, and only broke bitches had ballrooms with less than four chandeliers). And hanging from it-

A silver oversized birdcage, with Danny (His son-his baby-his life-his-his-his) sitting inside, looking slightly irked.

The Joker had Jason’s son.

Suddenly, all the fear clouding Jason’s mind vanished.

All that was left was a cold, green, rage.

——

Regrets? Danny had a few. Going invisible and darting outside once he spotted Fucking Vlad at Wayne’s Gala instead of telling his dad? That’s one.

Being so caught up in watching Vlad and his father interact that he missed the Jokers goons sneaking up on him? Another.

Being suspended in front of thousands of people, making it impossible for him to go ghost and run away? Technically not his fault, but he still hated it.

Danny managed to catch sight of Jason in the crowd, his eyes glowing a toxic green.

And then Danny remembered.

The Joker- he’d been the one to kill Jason last time.

So, with a bone to pick, and vague memories of his sister trying to psychoanalize supervillains for a psychology project, Danny decided to do what he did best.

“Hey! You! Joker!” The room went still as everyone looked at him. “You do realize lashing out for attention because your parents never loved you enough as a child makes you look seem a badly written bully in a live action Disney film, right?”

Banter.

Chapter Text

Harley Quinn wanted to do many things. She wanted to kiss her girlfriend, for one. She wanted to watch that new romcom twilight parody this weekend, but she knew she'd probably need to bribe Ivy for it. She wanted to see the Joker get eviscerated.

Watching the Gotham news channel while eating a Batburger, Harley realized she could check one of those things off her bucket list, and it wasn't the shitty romcom.

“I mean seriously, just because you’re bad at being a clown doesn’t mean you should take it out on everyone else. I mean, aren’t you embarrassed?” Harley’s new favorite Wayne asked, sighing dramatically, more akin to a customer service representative tired of dealing with entitled customers than a child being held hostage by a supervillain.

The Joker sputtered. “A bad- a bad clown! I am not a bad clown!”

“Uh, yeah, you are.” The kid said matter of factly. “You’ve broken like... all eight of the clown commandments.”

“The clown commandments?” The Joker repeated, and Harley snickered at the dumbfounded look on his dumb face. 

“He doesn’t even know what the clown commandments are.” The tiny Wayne muttered, his forehead slumping into the bars of his cage in faux-disappointment. “I’ve seen con artists put in more research than you! You’re a shame to all clown kind!”

The Joker growled, waving his gun around. “Oh shut it! I’m the ultimate clown, world-renowned for my ability to make people laugh!” He yelled, before giggling madly.

“Cheat people into laughing, more like.” The kid looked severely unimpressed, shooting the camera an unamused frown. “Listen, I almost joined an evil circus once. I didn’t, but I’m sure I would’ve been a better evil clown than you!”

“An evil circus?” The Joker repeated, blinking. “Why’ve I never- No matter! I’m the clown prince of crime, you really think you could best me?”

“Yeah.” The kid said. “Unlike you, I’m actually funny.”

And for the first time in a long time, when Harley laughed, it didn’t feel like hysteria, or mania, or because He made her. She was laughing because she was happy.

How freeing.

And then, Harley saw something in the corner of her screen that sent her reeling into confusion.

“Is that a fucking Vampire?”

------

If Tucker hadn’t known that the tiny Wayne was a Danny clone beforehand, he sure as hell knew now. Only someone with Danny’s genes could talk so much shit with so little prep time. (Tucker refuses to comment on if he’s ever fallen victim to the Fenton’s sharp words.)

But now Plasimus was on third chandelier, and Tucker was pretty sure a lesser man would struggle with keeping track of all the key players on the chandeliers. Luckily, Tucker was pretty cool. 

“Hello Daniel.” Plasimus said, in that greasy slimy voice of his, flying over to Mini Danny’s suspended cage. Mini Danny looked properly affronted. 

“Wait- Who are you?” The Joker asked, still not recovered from Mini Danny’s verbal slaughtering. 

Vlad sneered. “Why, I’m the boy’s father of course.” He took ahold of Mini Danny, who flailed like an angry cat, trying and failing to bite and scratch Vlad as he was hoisted through the bars of his cage. 

Tucker heard something snap to his left, and when he averted his eyes from the spectacle above, he saw Jason Todd-Wayne, holding a small gun in his hands. Tonight was not shaping up to be the night of highbrow entertainment it was advertised as. 

“No you aren’t, you mother non-fucker!” Mini Danny screeched, before pushing out of Vlad’s grip, tumbling through the air and landing on a chandelier.

The same one the Joker was on. Because of course it was. 

The chandelier shook with the force, and Mini Danny scrambling away from Vlad, who was flying towards them, didn’t help at all.

One misstep sent the chandelier vertical, as both Danny and the Joker began plummeting downward, Vlad gaping in surprise. 

“Danny!”

Crunch.

Chapter Text

Vlad had him!

Finally, after all this time, Vlad had him! Daniel Fenton, in his hold- and all it took was a dead clown. 

Well, an undead clown apparently- the latent ectoplasm he and Danny were letting off was circling around the villain’s body. 

If he wasn’t already a ghost he would be soon- but Vlad had more pressing ectoplasmic concerns to deal with— For instance, the revenant who looked seconds away from jumping him and tearing his throat out with his teeth. 

“Put. Down. My. Fucking. Son.” The revenant growled. Vlad would be honest— he wasn’t expecting Brucie Wayne’s son of all people to be a such a creature, but considering the man’s track record, it wasn’t too much of a surprise.

Vlad scoffed. “As if a brute like you could be Daniel’s father. You are nothing but a miscreant- you truly think you could raise Daniel?” The child in question was trying to squirm away- Vlad loosened his arms obligingly. “You think they’ll still accept you? No human child would survive this fall.” Vlad whispered.

Apparently seeing the child’s eyes blown wide in fear was a bit of a sensitive spot for the Revenant, as the dormant ectoplasm in its body became active and he aimed a gun at the floating pair.

Plasimus laughed. “See? So quick to anger- you’ll kill Daniel at this rate. Who would trust such a beast with a child?” 

“No-“ Daniel started, before Vlad let him slip, dangling the small boy by his ankle as helplessness dawned on the revenants face.

“Really. You never deserved Daniel. This was inevitable after all.” Plasimus turned invisible and flew off, watching people begin to evacuate as the ghost of the clown stirred.

He didn’t need to stick around anymore.

Daniel was his.

———

Jason was green. Or maybe the green was Jason. Whatever he was, he was angry.

He needed to rip and tear and bite and kill because his son was gone, gone like the wind, gone because of Jason- Another family lost.

His fault.

And the Jokers fault too, who was standing up again, somehow. Jason couldn’t tell if he was greener than usual, or if it was just the green clouding Jason’s eyes.

Either way, Jason was never one to turn down an easy target- hello misplaced aggression.

The first swing missed, weirdly enough. Well not missed- it went right through. The Joker laughed, which made Jason more green- or the Green less jason. He punched again.

It was kind of like punching ooblek- there wasn’t the satisfying crunch of bones, but there was the Jokers confused and terrified screech, so that was something. 

“How are you doing this?!” The Joker screamed.

“You put my son in a bird cage.” Jason responded, as he proceeded to do what should technically be impossible and beat the shit out of a ghost.

It was a good long while before the Joker vanished, getting swooped into a thermos similar to Danny’s (Jason’s chest ached), by a vaguely familiar goth girl.

“… You okay bro?” She asked tentatively.

Jason was Not Okay. His son had just been kidnapped. If she hadn’t seen that.

“Yes.” He lied, because he was a very good liar.

“… Sure.” A nerdy looking kid responded.

“THATS THE SAME FUCKING THERMOS DANNY BEAT DICK UP WITH!” 

Chapter Text

“THATS THE SAME FUCKING THERMOS DANNY BEAT DICK UP WITH!” Tim shouted- when did Tim get here- darting forward to grab at the girls wrist. He was suited up- and distantly Jason realized that he wasn’t- he was normal. And yet. 

And yet even when he wasn’t a bat, he still couldn’t escape the Joker. Except, now, apparently he could, because the clown was dead.

A small, forgotten, spiteful part of Jason began to crow with laughter. The Joker was dead. The Joker was dead. Danny killed the Joker. Danny who was his. His son. His light. 

Danny who was *gone*.

“Where-“ Jason turned on the teenagers, trying to blink both the tears and the Lazarus from his eyes.

“Danny. Where’s Danny?” 

The kids looked up at him, before looking between each other, a silent conversation passing between the two.

“… Listen. We. Well. Um.” The kid in the glasses started.

“We’re pretty sure your son is our friend and Plasimus somehow shrunk him.” The girl chimed in.

“Or a clone.” The boy shrugged.

“But didn’t Danny say he had been cloned? Not to like. Clone-shame or anything, but cloning a clone doesn’t make sense.” Dick popped in, materializing from… wherever he had been. Distantly, Jason registered that most people had been evacuated from the ballroom. “Note that Red Robin is an exception to this hypothetical.” He added on.

Tim flipped him off, before blinking in surprise. “Danny’s been cloned?” 

Jason blinked. “Yeah yeah, we all know Danny’s been cloned before. What do you mean *shrunk*?”

“Well if he’s our Danny, he should be sixteen right now- we have no clue why he’s so small!” 

“So he is the original Danny? The one from the obituary?” Tim asks, and Jason has to fight not to scream because.

“Obituary? What do you mean- obituary!” Jason tried not to scream.

“Yeah, Danny died when we were fourteen, it happened-“ the boy shrugged. 

“Is that how he got his Meta abilities?” B asked, once again appearing from nothing- and maybe Jason’s just in shock cause he should not be missing all this shit.

“… Daniel has meta abilities?” Damien blinked, his nose wrinkling a little. 

“Hnm. He punched me through a dumpster. That’s meta.” B shrugged. 

The boy in the glasses looked delighted. “Wait- Danny punched Batman?” 

The girl groaned, slapping Tucker upside the head. “Summary: Danny died at fourteen but he stayed alive and was half ghost and had superpowers, Vlad’s a freak who cloned Danny and is also half a ghost, and Danny also died at fifteen when his parents tried to exorcise him but only for like a month so he faked his death. Any other questions, comments or revelations?”

Jason froze, his mind buffering like a laggy computer, because what the-

“I KNEW IT!” And all of a sudden a ginger teenage boy was popping out from behind a pillar, his eyes manic and a grin on his face. “I FUCKING KNEW IT!”

“Shut up Wes!” The teenagers screeched in unison, as Jason felt his mind slipping further away.

Danny was a teenager.

Danny was a hero.

Danny had died twice.

Danny had… lied.

… Was Danny still his son?

Jason felt himself crack- just a little. Enough to let a tear loose from his eyes- dripping down his cheek and his chin and-

—

Splat.

Danny watched the ectoplasm dribble from the hole in his chest with an almost detached panic, splattering across black marble floor.

Splat. 

His eyes moved slowly from Vlad, slumped against the floor, sluggishly bleeding, to Clockwork, standing before him, his eyes sad like the gaze of a man watching his least favorite movie- the type of movie where you know how it’s going to end, but each time you press play, you hope that just maybe this time you can change it. In Clockworks hand was Danny’s core- glowing with a cool light, sticky with ectoplasm.

Splat.

“… Daniel. I’m sorry.” 

Danny could only manage one whimpered word as his eyes began to roll back, blackness tugging at his mind.

“… Dad…” 

Chapter Text

When Danny opened his eyes, he was in pain.

A sea of white snow surrounded him, and he could feel the chill crawling up his spine like a soldiers march.

He hadn’t felt cold like this in a long time.

Not since he’d died-

No.

No.

Danny was alive. 

He could feel it in the way his breath steamed in the air, the way the coldness seemed to splinter his lungs. His heart beat like a toy drum, pounding away inside his chest.

He was still a kid. Maybe he always had been. He wasn’t sure.

He was just cold.

“Fuck, you look like death.” A familiar voice rang out above him, and Danny opened his eyes. 

There was a ghost boy before him- achingly familiar, even though Danny had never seen him before. 

“You shouldn’t though. You were never supposed to die. I don’t even know if you can.” The ghost boy sighed as he sat down, unearthing Danny’s body from the snow, sitting across from him as his fingers swept through Danny’s hair. 

The ghost boys touch was as cold as the snow all around them.

“… I want my dad.” Danny whined, trying not to sound pathetic. 

The ghost boy frowned. “Aren’t we supposed to be a king? It’s a little bit pathetic for a king to be crying for his Daddy.”

“I don’t wanna be king.” Danny huffed. “I don’t- I don’t want to be dead either.” The ghost boy hummed. “I… I don’t like my parents.” 

The ghost boy laughed. “What- it only took like thirty murder attempts to realize that?”

“Shut up!” Danny yelled, charging forward to shove snow into the ghost boys face. Instead of being afraid, like a normal victim, the ghost boy only laughed, and tackled Danny in turn.

The boys began rolling through the snow, fighting in the way that only two people who truly know each other can.

“They were bad parents!” Danny yelled, yanking the ghost boys hair.

“The worst!” The Ghost boy laughed in agreement.

“Seriously! They were so fucked up! Who the hell feeds their kids ectoplasm!” Danny cried righteously, before being tossed into a snowbank.

“Oh most definitely. Never even took us to a doctor afterwards!” The Ghost boy was still smiling- a fond look in his eyes, like he was remembering something nostalgic.

“They ignored lab safety!”

“Remember that time we almost blew up on our ninth birthday?” 

“They never showed up for us!” 

“Dad once tried to ask me how basketball club was going! I’ve never touched one in my life!”

Danny was panting for air, finally exhausted when he plopped down into a snow bank, fighting to catch his breath. The ghost boy sat down beside him. Still smiling.

“They let us die.” Danny whispered. “They killed us.”

“… Yeah. They did.” The ghost boys eyes softened.

Danny hiccuped.

“You still love them.” His voice was soft, but it rang with truth. The cold wind howled around them.

The ghost boy was quiet for a while, his breath making small puffs of steam in the air, even though he didn’t really need to breathe.

“Yeah. I do.” The ghost boy said. “The moment Daniel Fenton was born, fate looked down on us- she chose us. This was always our destiny.” He let out a sad sigh, his eyes distant. 

“That’s not fair.” Danny mumbled, trying not to cry as he thought of crooked grins and warm blue eyes and calloused hands that he knew would never hold him again. “It’s not fair. I want to be normal. I want to be loved.”

“Clockwork was really trying to help, I think.” The Ghost boy hummed. “He really does love us. He wanted to give us a taste of childhood. He just didn’t realize that Daniel Fenton can never escape his fate- not the fate of a hero.”

“He loves Phantom. I’m just here too.” Danny laughed wetly. “I don’t want to be a hero. Not like this.”

The Ghost boy paused, before smiling sadly. “Daniel Fenton may never be able to live a normal life- but maybe Danny Todd can.” He murmured softly. The wind quieted around them, as something dangerously hope-shaped began to take root in Danny’s heart. 

“But- but how-“ Danny gasped out, before realization dawned on him like a flood. “Oh. You’re Daniel Fenton. I’m not. We’re… different. I’m. I’m alive.” 

The Ghost Boy smiled. “Yeah. How about- when you’re all grown up, I’ll give you some of my powers. As a treat. You know- if you earn it.” He winked cheekily. Danny laughed.

“Okay. Can you take me home?” 

—

When a glowing green portal appeared in the center of the Batcave, Jason had to try hard not to scream. It’d been about an hour since the vampire bastard had scooped up his son and dipped, and since then Jason had switches between pacing around, methodically loading his guns, and reading Daniel Fentons obituary.

Good son. Friend to all. Loved.

Loved. 

Jason wanted to break something.

He tried to reconcile it- looking through pictures of the ghostly hero Phantom and at Daniel’s photos, trying to see the man his son was- or the man he’d grow up to be. 

He felt like throwing up.

Was it real? Why didn’t Danny tell him? Did he think he wouldn’t love him? Why? Why why why why-

And then the portal showed up.

Sam and Tucker- the teenagers- Daniel’s friends, lit up. 

And then Daniel walked through. 

And Danny followed after him.

And the room froze.

It was a study in similarities- almost. Daniel- obviously a ghost, and a teen too, looking just like the photos of Phantom from the newspapers. He grinned at Sam and Tucker, his eyes warm. 

And Danny right next to him- looking smaller than ever before, a new streak of white in his hair, shivering a little-

The second Danny saw Jason, he lit up, his eyes wide. “Dad!” He screamed, darting forward and pressing himself into Jason’s hold. 

And just like that- every doubt that Jason had about whether Danny was truly his melted away- as Jason cradled his son in his arms, holding him tight, his hands stroking the boys hair.

“Danny- Danny- oh Danny-“ Jason bit back his sobs, burying his face in Danny’s hair.

“Wait- was little Danny not Danny?” Tucker asked, looking thoroughly confused.

Phantom shrugged. “He was- I was- I mean- yeah, fuck it. I’m not explaining it all. Let’s go home.” Phantom smiled at his friends, offering them his hand. 

Sam and Tucker looked at each other, before grinning as they joined Phantom.

“By the way, if you disappear like that again, I am double killing you.”

Phantom's laughter was the last thing Jason heard before the portal closed.

“… I’m sorry Dad.” Danny mumbled, holding Jason tight. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth. I love you. I’m sorry.” 

“Danny-“ there were so many things Jason should have said. So many questions he should’ve asked. He should’ve made Danny swear on both their graves never to lie to him again, cause holy shit- “… You’re alive. That’s all that matters.”

And Danny laughed, warm and wet as he held Jason tighter. “Yeah. I’m alive.”

Danny Todd, former Ghost King and the first grandson of the Wayne family wasn’t scared. Not of Gotham, or of anything else. Not when his family was by his side.