Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Now, Tim couldn't really tell you what exactly led him to this ... situation, but he's currently tied to an uncomfortable metal chair that is connected to a odd machine he Does NOT like the look of. Tim would say fuck it and get the hell out of here, but he wasn't the only one kidnapped and he's dressed as a civilian. Sat 2 feet away, in his own equally awful, possibly deadly chair is prime adoption bait, which is probably why the poor kid was snatched with Tim. Seriously, the kid could be a secret Drake relative with how well his build and complexion matches Tim's. He's been as snarky as a Robin the entire time he's been conscious too.

"- And for every hour you don't send the money, I'll hurt them." The no name criminal threatens, waving some cheap smartphone. Tim only really knows WE phones or the newest shit from his competitors, the out of date and shitty phones get deleted from his memory, so he has no idea what he's looking at.

"Can't I just wire you the ransom? I have the money And have plans for tonight that didn't involve this bullshit." Tim says as bratty as possible.

"I don't have either of those things, but I wanted to nap before going to my second job." The kid adds his 2 cents. Tim whips his head around to look at the kid.

"Wait! Second job? How old are you? Shouldn't you be in school?"

"High school doesn't pay the bills and I rather live in my shady apartment than the streets." The kid simply shrugs in a 'what can you do?' way.

"Dude-" Tim tries to voice his concern, but is cut off by McDouchebag.

"Enough!" The asshole jabs a button turning on a machine. A short, but powerful electric shock is sent through both the hostages. They have very different, but similarly intense reactions. Tim yelps before breaking into Joker-like unhinged laughter while the kid screams bloody murder for the entire time of the shock and becoming catatonic once it stops. The villain is completely spooked by their responses, but figures it's a good ending for his ransom video and sends it off to Bruce's "public number". It's a number that only takes text messages that are fed through a program on the batcomputer that divides them into different categories, and hostage/ransom messages are flagged and an alert is sent out. It takes less than fifteen minutes for Bruce and Damian to break into the building. Bruce beats the dingleberry unconscious while a freaked out Robin disables the machine and unties Tim and the teen.

"Dr-Drake?"

Tim fumbles for the emergency medications he keeps on his person in case something like this happens. He manages to speak while choking on his laughter. ": It's- HA It's fine- HA HA HA It happens some- HA HA- Sometimes when-when-HA HA- I'm Sh-shocked-HA HA HA- How's the-HA-the kid?"

"I-I don't know. He's unresponsive and I'm not sure if I should touch him..." Damian fidgets when Tim shoots a look at him. "His eyes are glowing green.."

Tim shakily moves to see and the kid's eyes are glowing similar to how Jason's eyes do during a pit rage episode, just slightly more neon. "Oh! HA HA Guess he-HA- he's coming with us-HA HA HA- he's coming with us now- HA!"

Tim leans closer when he realizes the kid is mumbling, trying to hear him over his own involuntary noise. "I'm not dead. I'm not dead. I'm alive. I'm not dead. I'm not dead. I'm not a monster. I'm alive. I'm still Danny. I'm not dead. I'm still Danny. I'm not dead.-"

"That's HA concerning Hehe!"

"Indeed. I shall inform the others to expect a guest." Damian says, eyeing Tim warily before walking a short distance away. Clearly trusting Tim to get through to "Danny", and luckily, his meds are starting to kick in and his laughter is winding down.

"Danny-hehehe- Danny can you hear me? Hehe!" Tim calls out and winces when the kid's teeth click from how hard his mouth snaps shut. Awareness starts bleeding into him.

"W-what?"

"We're hehe electric shock buddies hehe!" Tim lightly jokes as Danny's bright glowing eyes lock onto Tim's still painfully smiling face, "I hate hehehe electrocution."

Danny tugs up his left sleeve to show off slightly glowing Lichtenberg scarring with a soul deep exhaustion. "Electrocution sucks. Have some major ptsd dealing with it..."

"God, me too. Heh Electroshock therapy with the Joker is a zero out of ten, would not recommend heh!" Tim chortles.

Danny makes a face. "Ew, clowns."

"HA! MOOD!"

Batman approaches them with louder than normal steps and from an angle that both Tim and the teen can see him coming from, "Do you have any family I can drop you with?"

"Eeeh... no? I got disowned by my parents last year and my sister hasn't moved out and started college just yet, but it's fine, I'll be fine, I was just telling..." Danny blinks and looks towards Tim. "I just realized I don't know your name?"

"Tim- heh Tim Drake."

"Oh! You're that teen CEO! No wonder they kidnapped you. I'm guessing my shitty luck is why I got snatched too." Danny guffaws. Damian follows Bruce's example as he comes back from talking to the rest of the Batfam, visible and loud.

"That, and you look like you could be one of my adopted siblings." Tim informs him, before fishing for the rest of Danny's name. "What's your name by the way?"

"Danny..." Danny looks like he's debating on if he's going to give his last name or not before frowning at no one in particular. "Just Danny."

Tim stares Bruce down while clearly addressing Danny. "How would you like to be a Drake or Wayne or both? We're trauma buddies now."

Danny looking between Tim and Bruce, confusion rolling off him in waves. "Uuh? What?"

Tim starts grinning as soon as Bruce looks defeated, and absolutely beaming at Danny. "B adopts every sad orphan with blue eyes or black hair, do you happen to be a vigilante? He speed runs the adoption process with the vigilante types."

Danny stares with wide bewildered eyes, "Uuuuh, I mean, I used to be something like that in my hometown??? I'm technically retired so I can keep a roof over my head???"

Tim's grin is even wider at that knowledge. "Cool, I'm Red Robin."

"TIM!" Bruce scolds and is ignored.

"How old are you?"

Danny looks like he's mentally flailing as he answers, "I- I turn 17 next month?"

Tim nods and turns to Bruce. "I'm pulling a you. He's mine now. Danny, you're a Drake now. Clown hating, electricity trauma bonded vigilantes who really need a nap got to stick together."

Damian frowns in concern. "Father, I believe Drake is having a manic episode."

Tim blows a raspberry at Damian. "Shut your mouth, demon brat. I forcefully adopted Bruce and Jason, I can forcefully adopt a little brother if I want."

Danny looking intrigued, but also so done with the day. "Do I get a say?"

Tim beams, "No. Now, do you have any food restrictions?"

Tim manically babbles to Danny, pulling more and more of the kid's shitty life out of him. Bruce shepherds them to the batmobile with tired dad energy and drops them off in front of the Manor. The man knows better than to try to change Tim's mind on this because he wasn't lying about the forced adoption, but no one believes Bruce when he brings it up. Tim thinks it's funny.

Chapter Text

As far as kidnappings go, this one was pretty cushy in Danny's opinion. He was fed delicious food, given a room, with a lock on the door and things he can easily use to barricade the room if need be, and a change of clothes, they're Tim's since he's the closest to Danny's size. He had the best sleep of his life since the bed feels like it was made of clouds and no one wants to kill him, yet, in Wayne Manor. So yeah, he gives them a 10/10 would allow again so far.

"Danny? You awake?" Tim's voice sounds much mellower than last night. "I have another change of clothes for you."

Danny scrambles over and pulls the door open, revealing a much less unhinged looking Tim holding an bundle of clothes. "Good Morning!"

"Morning." He hands over the clothes, "I'll wait out here while you change. Breakfast will be served soon."

"Okie dokie!" Danny smiles, probably a little awkwardly, before closing the door. The clothes are nothing special (other than probably costing more than his shitty apartment), just plain jeans, t-shirt, socks, and a belt. All of it is black and soft as hell. The malnutrition he's suffered in recent years make the clothes hang off him more than they should, the belt is a godsend.

Tim looks up from his phone when Danny exits the room, pale blue-gray eyes taking in how the clothes fit, "We'll be ordering some clothes that actually fit you after breakfast. If you give us your apartment's address we can get your things."

"You're serious?" Danny elaborates when Tim shoots him a confused look. "About adopting me? You don't got ta. I'm perfectly fine doing what I'm doing. I won't tell no one y'all's identities or nuthing. I get keepin' that shit a secret."

"I've staked my claim, you're a Drake now." Tim states as if saying the sky is blue. "Just because I was manic doesn't mean I don't remember what you said."

"What?" It's Danny's turn to be confused.

"You said enough about your life story for me to know your life has been as shit as anyone of the insane people in this fucked family." Tim starts walking down the hall forcing Danny to follow him. "Shit parents, dropping out of school to survive, you WERE a vigilante, you mumbled something about dying-"

Danny's breath involuntarily hitches, making Tim glance back in concern "Wha-When-?"

"After you got shocked, you kept promising you weren't dead." Tim pauses at the stairway that leads to the main entrance hall. "Just about every single one person in this family has died and come back. I think you should meet Jason though. Your eyes were glowing green during your flashback, leading me to believe it's tied to your emotions, you don't got to tell me the details, but Jason's eyes glow too when his emotions run high due to how he was revived."

"I'll... I'll keep that in mind." Danny feels a bit dazed by the information. Tim nods and continues leading his down the stairs and to the dining room.

"Holy Shit! Why Are You So Bright?" An African-American guy about the same age as Tim shouts and slaps his hands over his eyes. "My eyes! My poor, poor eyes!"

"Duke?" Tim asks in alarm.

"Sorry!" Danny blurts, in a panic "I didn't know anyone could see that! And I can't control it unfortunately!"

"You glow?" Tim blinks at him.

"No problem, man." Duke does not sound genuine due to how much pain Danny accidentally put him in. "Tim? Can you get my sunglasses?"

"Yeah. I got them." Tim says and books it out of the room.

"May-maybe I should go?" Danny feels like he's glitching out as he steps unsteadily towards the door. "I don't belong here any-"

"Dude." Duke cuts him off, turning to face toward him with his eyes still covered. "Sit down. Tim will make me wish he killed if you run off because of me. The fucking stalker is possessive when he claims someone. I've seen his revenge plans for Superman, I ain't dealing with that petty shit."

"He has revenge plans against Superman?" Danny is frozen in confusion.

"Yeah, beca-" Duke is cut off by Tim bursting back into the room.

"I got them!" Tim drops the darkest pair of sunglasses Danny has ever seen into Duke's outstretched hand.

"Thanks." Duke shoves the eye protection on instantly. "Now lets get a look at you, fresh meat."

"Er.. Hi?" Danny waves awkwardly when Duke clearly looks him up and down.

"Pfft. Dude, are you related to the Drakes? Because you look like you could almost be a clone of Tim." Duke is cracking up.

"Not as far as I'm aware? It's not like I can ask my parents about it since it'd be a dead give away to were I am and I really don't what them or their new government buddies tracking me down." Danny is not studying all the odd similarities between him and Tim. "I could have asked my sister to ask, but the electric shock fried my phone yesterday."

They both pale as a corpse white skin, purple eyebags, black hair, blue eyes, similar wiry build, and etc., but there's differences too. Tim's hair is darker with a blue undertone, straighter, and longer, than Danny's, which is browner, wavier, and cut into an undercut by his own hand. Tim's eyes are more grey than blue while Danny's are almost electric blue. Tim's skin is blemish free with a pink undertone while Danny has pale freckles and a slight almost unnoticeable green undertone. Tim's face is sharper, more bird like, while Danny's is rounder and cat like. Tim is a healthy weight and stands with perfect posture, Danny is unhealthy and hunched over. Tim is also taller by an inch or two. Danny's growth seems to have been stunted, so he doesn't see himself ever being able to reach Dan or Jack's height.

So yeah, definitely not identical, but could pass as siblings. It could be a good cover story if Danny chooses to stay, but Tim would have to be willing to shit talk his parents for "putting his brother up for adoption", since there's no way the rich shits couldn't have provided for 2 kids.

"I can grab you a replacement on my way home tomorrow." Tim says easily.

"Good morning, young masters." A very british older gentleman greets wheeling in a breakfast cart. He starts moving the food to the table. "Please take a seat to eat."

"Yes, Alfred." Tim takes a seat and gestures for Danny to sit by him before smiling at the old man when he sets a bowl of eggs near him. "Thank you!"

"Thanks, Alfred!" Duke says and reaches for the hashbrowns near him.

"Uh, thanks?" Danny is just going to roll with it today. Free food is free food. Plus he's probably fired from his second job for not showing up to work last night. He might agree to be adopted by these rich people just so he doesn't have to job hunt again... and he misses being able to go to school without hero work fucking up his grades.

Topics are kept light while they eat, just what's happening in the Waynes' college classes, Duke is going to school for film creation, or day job, Tim mostly complaining about board members. They end up talking about some hero stuff too, which reveals Danny to be the space nerd he is and how much he knows about engineering when Tim makes an offhanded about the Titan's spacecraft needing repairs. Danny starts mentally calculating how to convince them to hire him as a mechanic. He figures they'd pay him well and he won't need to have 2 jobs to keep his apartment.

As much as Tim seems like he's fully serious about adopting him, Danny isn't holding his breath that this is going to last. Nothing ever does. Plus he's almost 17, there's no way they'd want some random kid about to age out of the system anyways.

"Hey, Danny?" Tim gets his attention while they're ferrying their dirty dishes to the kitchen. "Do you plan to become a vigilante again? We can get you new gear if you want."

"Eh?" Danny blinks at him and shrugs. "I'm willing to be on call, but I didn't become a vigilante because I wanted to. I was just the only one who could take care of all the bullshit happening around my hometown without anyone getting too hurt."

Tim frowns in concern. "Will your town be fine without you?"

"Yeah." Danny starts washing the dishes, "I destroyed the portal and all it's blueprints before I ran."

"Portal?" Duke asks.

"Don't worry about -" Danny frowns as he thinks about it. "Actually, y'all should dig up all you can on the Ghost Investigation Ward. Y'all died so you probably have some ecto-contamination and they'll take that as an excuse to capture you and experiment on you."

"The what?" Duke's voice is a higher pitch.

"The Anti-Ecto Control Acts give them the legal right... and it's my parents' fault.." Danny admits with a scowl, "They're obsessed with the Infinite Realms and "ghosts"... I'm legally not a person because of them."

"Because you're.. ecto-contaminated?" Tim asks, typing rapidly on his phone.

"Technically yes." Danny sets the last dish into the drying rack and continues bitterly. "I'm not fully human anymore because of a lab accident involving the portal I mentioned. I'm more than just contaminated. It's why I glow. I got powers and a magical girl transformation that I never asked for... I wanted to be a fucking astronaut, not a vigilante, but I never get what I want."

"Oh, big mood." Duke says, breaking the tension. "My sperm donor wasn't human so I'm only half human, which is why I got some sick ass powers."

"Human or not, you're one of us now." Tim declares. "Speaking of, what name should I put on your new identity? My parents didn't even want me, so it wouldn't be shocking for them to have given up any kid not their "heir"."

Danny was kind of shocked by Tim's willingness to toss his own parents under the bus for this. "Er? Can I just have it be Danny Drake? I .. I chose my name myself and hate it when old dudes elongate it to "Daniel" of all things."

Danny looks disgusted from even mentioning the cursed name Vlad assigned him and so other adults rolled with it.

"Oh, cool." A tired blonde says while dragging herself into the kitchen towards the coffee maker. "It'll be nice to have a fellow trans person to bitch with."

"Do you have everything you need? Testosterone? Binders? That type of shit?" Tim asks before jolting "Were you binding all night?? You'll break a rib and damage the chest tissue! It'll make top surgery an impossibility!"

Danny raises his hands in surrender. "I did not sleep in my binder. And I haven't had access to hrt ever. My inhuman half is more emotion based than anything else and influences my human half enough to look more masculine."

"I'd call you a lucky bitch, but I'm pretty sure I missed some big emotional bombshell that would make that insensitive." The blonde blinks sleepily at him.

"Only that I'm not really human anymore because I died in a lab accident." Danny's voice is joking, but his knows his face is too tight to be read as that. "Could say my power were to die for?"

"Oh, god. Another one!" Damian(?) complains as he enters the kitchen and places a dirty dish in the sink.

"Lighten up, Demon Brat." Tim teases before grabbing Danny's wrist. "Come on. We're getting you clothes of your own."

"What? Don't like sharing?" Danny teases.

"Everyone who lives here is a clothing thief." Tim drags him to a sitting room that has his(?) laptop in it. He pulls up several expensive clothing websites. "I figured you'd want your own clothes though."

"I guess so.." Danny cringes at the prices.

"Ignore those. The Waynes have a curse that no matter how much money we spend or give away, we somehow get more. I've spent several billion on non-profit community services without using them for tax reduction and somehow gained twice as much back." Tim explains. "Pick whatever you want. It won't do shit to our funds."

"...What a weird curse? It sounds like a blessing."

"Meh. It is what it is. It's why I had no problem just giving our kidnapper the money if he let me." Tim huffs.

Danny stares at him for a full minute, unblinking, before shaking his head. "Y'all are fruitloops, but I'll give ya a chance. I'm gone if I can't stand being here."

"Fair."

Chapter Text

Tim is so self satisfied. It took 2 whole weeks, but he's positive he's convinced Danny to stay. Or at least convinced the teen that living in the Manor is an upgrade and that there's plenty to do to "earn" his keep plus pocket money. Danny is a little too much like Tim in that way, it took Tim years to not believe that the only reason he's around is because he provides something for each of the Bats. He's still not convinced that wasn't why he was kept around at first, but nowadays he feels like a full member of the family. So he can't blame Danny for having the same mentality, kid's been through it because of his own set of abusive parents.

Tim figures that he'll be able to help break that mentality using his own experiences to make a plan. Danny is freakishly similar to Tim in his mannerisms and coping skills, it's to the point Tim and Bruce AND Damian each ran separate DNA tests on him just to make sure he really isn't actually Tim's bio brother or something, and the results say the same thing each time, he's not even slightly related. But it's why step one is to provide him with things to be helpful with.

Which is why Danny is currently being a mad scientist is the Batcave. At first they were just letting him repair things down there because he had a real talent for it, but that rapidly turned into him upgrading things and just straight up inventing things with the broken scraps of whatever was laying around. So now he has lab space down there and anything he requests for projects. It's terrifying to watch him work because he never uses tools for proper measurements, but he can literally eyeball chemicals within a nanoliter and freehand the correct length of wires or plating or- You get the point. Tim would think it was one of his superpowers, if not for all the horror stories he heard of the Fenton Lab. Tim's OCD ass feels like tearing out his hair just thinking about all the contamination that surely covers the entire nightmare of a place.

Tim pushes the doorbell on the outside of the lab, it flashes blue lights in all corners of the room instead of making a noise that might startle Danny into an accident, before entering the lab space. "Hey, Danny, I have a question. Well, a couple actually."

Danny looks up from his current project, pulling his goggles up, making his hair stick up chaotically. He's wearing gloves and a protective apron over his normal everyday wear because he might as well as taken a lung full of fear toxin the way he reacted the one time he tried to put on a hazmat suit. No one can blame him for that since they found pictures of his hero identity and he's all but stated how he died in his parent's lab. "What up?"

"So first off, do you want to go back to school? I finished setting up your new paper trail so we can go forward with that if you want." Tim shrugs. "I dropped out and ended up getting my GED after the board members kept whining for 3 years about it, so I don't care either way."

"Dude! I would love to go back to school!" Danny grins. "I used to be an A/B student before I died! Sure, the bullying sucked, but I still loved learning."

"Concerning, but I'll ignore it for now. I'll get you enrolled tomorrow when I pick up Demon Brat and have you start going next week." Tim informs him before turning his tablet toward Danny with a picture of Vlad Masters in both his forms. "This is one of your Rouges, right? What information can you give us to arrest him and keep him there? I found an impressive trail of crimes from even before he started throwing hands with a minor."

"Ew, Vlad." Danny makes a face. "I'll draft up blueprints and make you guys deflectors, weapons, and stuff to contain him. If it was anyone else I usually fight, I'd argue against going in guns blazing, but Vlad isn't a full ghost and is a special type of awful by choice. I bet Val and Ellie would love to help you fuck him over too. I'll contact them when it's a reasonable hour for them."

"Who're Val and Ellie?" Tim thinks he's heard Danny say something about Val being Amity Park's main protector with Danny out of town. The GIW and Dr.s Fenton don't count as protectors by a long shot, both cause more harm than good anytime they show up on scene before the TEENAGE protectors finish taking care of whatever situation.

"Val is the Red Huntress, a ghost hunter that got her tech from Vlad. We had a whole enemies to friends arch that was embarrassing and hilarious. Just a bunch of misunderstandings that I should tell you about later." Danny looks amused just thinking about his friend before melting to a fond expression. "And Ellie is my little sister. When Vlad realized I wasn't going to "join him" and play family, he tried to clone me. But dipshit didn't know I was trans... Ellie's the only survivor and even she almost didn't make it. Vlad was going to let her die, so we had to scramble to figure out how to save her... She travels a lot now to taste the freedom she never knew with Vlad and explore, but she'd totally be down to go back to Amity to throw hands with him."

"How old is Ellie? Physically?" Tim is very concerned about a kid, especially one related to Danny, just wondering around without support of any kind. "And is Ellie short anything?"

"She about 14." Danny grimaces as he continues. "And technically it's short for Danielle because Vlad thinks my name is Daniel. I've talked her about changing it since we both feel weird about it, but we haven't found a substitute she likes yet."

"Oof." Tim says sympathetically, "If she ever needs a place to stay or wants to settle down somewhere, she's always welcome here. It's not like we're hurting for room."

Danny looks touched, "I'll... I'll pass it along. I'm always worried about her, but I couldn't take her in nor would she have let me when she first started out."

"We've dealt with many clones before, sometimes they need that space. She at least knows you care, right?" Tim asks, thinking about Kon.

"I should fucking hope so." Danny frowns. "Why? What happened with the other clones?"

"It depends on the situation." Tim admits, wary of the murderous intent radiating from Danny. "We've had 2 types of clones pop up. There's mindless killing machines that groups like the League of Assassins send out that can only be put down, it's a mercy for both parties to do it. Or there's the fully sentient ones that need help or guidance. It's been hit or miss if the donor of the sentient clones accept their new family member."

"Bitches." Danny growls. "If a 14 year old can accept and love their clone, why can't everyone else?"

"I don't know." Tim concedes, adding with a scowl. "My best friend is the clone of Superman and he was NOT accepted by the superass. At least not at first.... Kon was technically created to kill and replace Superman, but escaped and never even made a single attempt."

"Was Supes tortured for the DNA used?" Danny asks.

"Not that I'm aware." Tim is confused by the question.

"Then the man officially sucks." Danny declares. "I was a kid, I got tortured, AND Ellie tried to kill me, and I still claimed her as my precious gremlin of a baby sister!"

"Everything out of your mouth is admirable or/and concerning at all times." Tim tells him. "Invite her over, I'll write her into the Drake family too the moment she wants."

"I... I'll tell her." Danny says softly, eyes a bit misty. "Thanks.."

"Of course." Tim idly wonders if Damian and Ellie will love or hate each other if Tim can convince the girl to stay. Traumatized 14 year olds are hard to predict accurately, especially when he hasn't met one of them. "But back to Masters. Tell me everything."

Danny snickers. "It'll be my pleasure."