#Cielle's writing

[noir-renard]

From chapter 8 of "If You Give a Bat a Burger"

[starseungs]

does anyone want skater!hyunsung perhaps... 👁️👁️

[hyunverse]

write something (what is it that u want to write? 👁️)

hi cielle thank u 😵‍💫 i've been talking abt loser nerd!hyunjin lately and i have this Specific vision in my head but i haven't gotten around to planning the plot properly 😿gonna do it tonight though!!!! i will!!!!!!

[noir-renard]

If the ask game is still running - chapter 13 beta please?

sure, the game is still running!

Chapter 13 Beta is the next chapter of IYGABAB. That's how I always title the chapters in gdocs, mostly because it makes it easy to remember which version of the chapter is the most recent. (I have at least four versions of ch 13 floating around so it's easier to change old version to Ch 13 OLD or ch 13 PREV because I have a bad but sometimes useful habit of not deleting anything)

The working title of this chapter is You've been hit by--you've been struck by--a smooth liminal! but it's a bit long, so I might change it to something else, we'll see. Mostly, the titles are for my own amusement.

If I remember the rules of the game correctly, I can post a little snippet if I so choose, and since it's almost finished...I'll post a snippet ^w^

(under the cut for those who don't want to see anything until it's finished)

“I distinctly remember you saying you tried this already and it didn't work,” Bruce noted.

“Well. Last time, I didn’t have this.” He pulled out the shard of ice Bruce was regretting giving him more and more by the hour, placing it at the apex of the sigil legs. “Also, last time, I didn’t have a name to use for the ritual.”

Experience had taught Bruce how important a name was. Even in mundane matters.

“Why does the ice shard make a difference?”

“Look, before, I was just thinking of it as a piece of ghost-essence. But then I saw Red Hood’s ice duck—I don't suppose you managed to borrow that, by any chance?"

Bruce had, in fact, asked.

Jason's response had been a rude emoji, followed by the directive to 'go duck yourself'. 

Bruce still wasn't sure whether that was a pun or an autocorrect mishap.

[noir-renard]

It was one of those things people said all the time: “Hate is such a strong word.”

People liked to bandy about it like it was footy or something equally trite—but very few actually stopped to think about what that meant (strong word, that is), in the context of hate.

Hate was like love; it was an active thing. Alive. No one who truly hated could go about it passively. Hate was something you had to put your back into–your soul. 

Very few things earned that kind of soulful commitment, in John’s experience. Save for maybe himself, but that was a can of maggots he was happy leaving sealed, ta ever so.

So. John did not hate anyone, really.

However.

John Constantine very strongly disliked every single member of the Fenton Family, et al. All for very different but no less compelling reasons.

He wasn’t quite prepared to dedicate himself to hating any of them just yet—hate was such a strong word, after all; one he wasn't sure any of the Fentons deserved.

Besides all that, John was too tired and too old to hate any of the Fentons with that kind of passion and dedication.

But he didn't know that yet. He didn't know a lot of things, like where the fuck he was, how the fuck he got here, and who the fuck these fuckers were.

There were four of them, all too young to be summoning occult beings. Or John, for that matter.

He'd just been minding his own, as usual, when a sharp pain stabbed in the spleen region and yanked, hard. Like he was a goddamn fish or something. The sensation that dragged him here was not unlike a teleportation spell, except he hadn't cast it. As such, he’d been helpless but to go with the metaphorical flow, and here he was.

Stuck. Trapped, more like.

By the look of it, he was in a basement somewhere—it was dark, smelled of dust and rot and seawater and a particular shade of magic he almost recognized.

John looked around at all the candles, half-burned. Duck shaped, for some reason. 

He squinted at the symbols drawn on the floor in what he hoped was paint. Red and green paint.

He inventoried the strange…collection of items placed inside the appropriate places inside the summoning circle exactly like you would if you were trying to summon a—

Fuck. He’d been summoned. Somehow. Fuck. He wasn’t supposed to be summonable. Summoning was what he did, not something that happened to him. Certainly not by a bunch of clear amateurs.

He reached for his magic, considering his options. It was still there, just blocked. No harm allowed. He also seemed to be bound here until whoever summoned him deemed their deal concluded.

Fuck.

So. John Constantine had some regrets. Many regrets. Loads, really. Still, he wasn’t quite ready to admit that this might, on any level, be his fault. Whatever the hell this was.

“Right. Who the fuck are you lot and why the fuck did you summon me to Gotham?"

None of them answered immediately. Watching to see what he would do.

Maybe they were smarter than they looked.

"Is it money?" John pressed. "‘Cause I’ve got fuck all in the money department—”

“John Constantine.” 

One of them stepped forward; he almost looked familiar in that ‘eight of out ten people I know have black hair and blue eyes’ way. Also in the ‘I could snap you in half if I wanted to’ kind of way. And in the ‘I haven’t slept well in years’ way.

Point was, he looked like a cape. Not any one of them specifically, but enough for John to know this was going to be an even worse experience than he’d thought.

Black and Blue pulled out a scroll. A very familiar looking scroll. One that haunted him.

John was going to use up his daily allotment of fucks, at this rate.

“In accordance with the deal you made in exchange for services rendered,” Scroll Bearer continued, “you, John Constantine, are obligated to perform one equitable service in return.”

The language was a little off, to be fair, but clearly they’d done their research. They meant to do this proper-like.

But there was one problem. 

“If that scroll is what I think it is, then I didn’t make said deal with you. Unless the Ghost King underwent some kind of…downgraded metamorphosis.”

John had expected that to get a reaction—insults and anger were the best way to make sure the other party was too upset to properly negotiate.

But Mr. Hero Expy just smiled. Small, dangerous. 

“The deal you made was with whoever holds the scroll and calls upon you while doing so. And as you can see” —he waved the scroll to underscore his point— “that’s me.”

“So you’re not the Ghost King?” John clarified.

Black-and-Blue scoffed.

“No, and I’d like to keep it that way.” He crossed his arms and leveled his gaze at John. His eyes flashed green—pit green.

Christ. He was a pit fiend, wasn’t he? The worst kind of ghost.

At least now John understood how they’d managed to make all this happen. Denizens of the Infinite Realms could do whatever they wanted if it made sense to them and bugger all who took issue with things like ‘logic’ and ‘rules of magic’.

“In short, you need my help,” he replied, playing it cool.

“Look, Mr. Constantine,” said the Pit Fiend, “technically we could force you to help, seeing as how we have a piece of your soul right here, but I don’t think we’ll need to force you. Just hear us out.”

John looked over the rest of the group, wondering who else here was a Pit Fiend or Pit-Aligned. There was: a pale goth girl who looked like she ate preps for breakfast; a black kid wearing a red beret and carrying more tech than Batman; and a redhead who looked like the PTA Board personified.

None of them stood out as anything other than ‘too young for this rubbish.’

Right. Looked like it was the old fashioned way, then. 

He pointed to Pit Fiend(confirmation pending). 

“You, maybe, have a case, through force or through favor, but the rest of you…” John trailed off. “It might take some convincing.”

“We’re not gonna hurt you—” said the Pit Fiend, eyes flashing green.

“I might,” said goth girl. “Depending on how helpful you are.”

John closed his eyes. This was why he refused to deal with children.

“Look, what do you need me for anyway? Clearly you're a clever, determined lot. You got me, trapped in here like a bug under a glass—”

“You trapped yourself by swearing allegiance to Pariah,” said Pit Fiend. “But if you help us, your contract will be complete. Honestly, I think it’s something you’d want to do anyway. Really, we did you a favor by bringing you here.”

“Is that right?” John itched for a cigarette. “Okay, I’ll bite. Tell me how you summoned me so I can make sure this never happens again, and I’ll happily listen to whatever little problem you have that you decided to involve me in the most annoying way possible.”

“Technically we don’t have to negotiate with you,” said Tech Kid.

“We stole a bunch of stuff from Gotham,” said Goth Girl at the exact same time.

The other three glared at her. “What? We did. We’re an officially recognized Gotham Gang and everything. Penguin even shot at us.”

“We didn’t steal anything,” said PTA Redhead. “We borrowed a bunch of stuff from Gotham.”

“Try telling that to Batman and Robin,” said Goth Girl. 

“Or the museum, hospital, bank, zoo, and Mob-Back Night Club we broke into,” said Pit Fiend.

Was this in-fighting? God, John hoped so. He could use that.

“You know, I’m pretty close with the Bat, if he’s giving you trouble, I could–”

“You really couldn’t,” said Tech Kid, unimpressed.

Interestingly enough, PTA Redhead looked guilty. 

“We might have made it look like you were somewhat involved with the, um. Illegal borrowing?”

“He is involved,” said Goth Girl. “We did it all to summon him.”

“Batsy knows me better than to think I’d intentionally piss him off in his city just to steal a few items of interest,” John lied.

“Not according to his files on you he keeps on his super secret server,” said Tech Kid.

They’d hacked the Bat? Well. This just got interesting.

John started to laugh. “You know what? I misjudged you lot. You’re competent and stupid, somehow. Bravo, hats off to you all. Still haven’t heard why you need me, though.”

The Pit Fiend focused his attention back on John.

“What we need from you is help getting the crown of flames back from a ghost and locking it in a special box without any of us having to touch it.” he paused. “Also if you have any ideas on where to find a box with no key that ghosts can’t phase through, that’d be great.”

John stopped laughing. “Well. That’s one hell of an ask.”

“The real question, John Constantine,” the Pit Fiend began, “is how much is your soul worth to you?” 

Hate was a very strong word, but in a word? Yeah. John hated everything about this.

+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+

Stephanie didn’t want to say she’d expected better of Batman before becoming Robin and that she had been, thus far, unimpressed. But she wasn’t not saying that either.

Sure, it had all started off a bit rough, but what hadn’t in Stephanie’s life?

And yeah, maybe there were reasons why Alfred didn’t want her to become Robin.

Why Bruce didn’t want her to become Robin.

Maybe even why Tim was so being so, well. Tim about the whole thing. (Even though when Tim had showed up in the Batcave wearing a Robin costume saying ‘well someone’s gotta do it and it might as well be me’, everything was just fine and you’re the best Robin ever Tim thank you for your service, but when Stephanie did it everyone was all ‘now hold the phone, who let you in here’. Was it the hair? Should Stephanie dye her hair black? Surely not.)

Anyway, the point was, maybe they had reasons for not wanting Stephanie to be Robin, but she was pretty sure that if Dick or Jason or Tim or even Barbara had done what she did, it would have been a disapproving look and nothing more.

Apparently, laughing at rich people who'd lost like, a small handful of gems from their 'super safe vault' (that contained hundreds of identical gems) was 'unprofessional', and her follow-up statement when they said they felt 'unsafe' thar  'Maybe you should go ask geologists for some thematically appropriate safe words so no one gets the rest of your remaining rocks off without your approval' was a bridge too far.

So Robin could pun, but only at the eighth grade reading level, and only if it wasn’t Stephanie. As a result, she was ‘grounded ("on probation") for til college (“a week”)’.

On the other hand, no one even incrementally bat-aligned was remotely emotionally well-adjusted, and Stephanie was a big enough person to admit that, just maybe, Tim was worried. Maybe Alfred was worried. Maybe Bruce was worried. Stephanie didn’t plan on being the most emotionally well-adjusted bat-aligned person though, so she wasn’t gonna read into it.

A-n-y-w-a-y. Patrolling the streets as Robin was way different than roaming as Spoiler. Because Spoiler mostly just existed when Cluemaster was around for the pure filial sentiment of “fucking up Cluemaster’s shit”. Spoiler didn’t have to be perfect, or show up all the time, or represent hope and all that bullshit.

Robin, on the other hand, did.

Because Gotham’s hope couldn’t say ‘get fucked, asshole’ to Goon of the Week when they aimed an uzi at you. Robin had to say things like ‘Holy Guacamole! It’s Taco Time for you to see the dock-tor’ before punting them off the pier and into the Gotham River.

Stephanie had thought it would be easier to fight with Batman on her side. But having Batman on her side (and for all that he’d hesitated to bring her along, when they were out here as Batman and Robin he was on her side) meant going into the kind of situations that Batman and Robin got into.

Scrapes and muggings, sure.

But also the less fun part, which was this: sitting in front of the computer. Watching video footage. No punching in sight, except for punching the keys.

Bruce was insisting that this wasn’t punishment, but Stephanie had been in public school all her life and this? This was saturday morning detention for Robins. Had to be.

“Shouldn’t you be patrolling or something?” she asked. Not for the first time. Just because she was grounded didn’t mean the rest of GC could be left to its own devices.

“I told you we weren’t patrolling tonight,” Bruce said, which was a lot of words for him to say at once. 

“What, you don’t trust me down here all by my lonesome with access to the best information tool in the whole world?”

She smiled at him. She hoped it was a winning smile.

Apparently it wasn’t; Bruce said nothing and returned to scrubbing through security footage.

Stephanie pouted and ate the sandwich Alfred had brought her. He didn’t approve of this, but he took care of her still. Great guy, Alfie.

“What are we even looking for here, anyway? We’ve already looked through this stuff, like, a billion times. And you probably wrote a program to scan it for like, stuff the human eye can’t detect.”

Bruce didn’t sigh–not even the patented Bruce Sigh™(which was really more of a slightly-louder-than normal exhale).

“We’re watching it again. We must have missed something.”

Stephanie was preeeetty sure they hadn’t, but part of being Robin was knowing that Big Bat was the Boss. 

It had started off innocuous enough. A break-in and theft at the Gotham Fine Art Museum. Typical Batman and Robin stuff. 

Stephanie had almost thought Bruce was playing softball with her. Dick had been doing cases like this when he was just a baby still, basically. And she might have been offended and voiced it had Bruce not made it explicitly clear how thin the ice was when it came to her being Robin.

So she’d sucked it up and gone to the stupid art theft with B.

They’d looked at the security tapes. They’d poured over the scene. There was nothing. No cut power lines, no hacking into the mainframe, no fingerprints, no broken glass. It was like the picture just got up and walked away. Except that if it had done that, they would have known, because the pressure plates on the floor would have set an alarm off.

According to the docent, the only reason they knew it had been stolen was because they got to work in the morning and it wasn’t there.

“That Roscoe piece was on loan to us from the Walker Gallery, you know! They will not be pleased about this!”

(Stephanie had a lot of maybe not-so-nice things to say about those observation skills, but Robin was supposed to be nice, so she kept it to herself.)

She and Bruce had been about a week into the investigation when another top-security location go broke into. This time it was a vault or something, some rich person lost their ‘ademite, citrine, and garnet’ collection, and that was when Stephanie stopped caring. Bruce, too, but the bank also had several million in Government bonds, so it was kind of bad that someone could break into it.

Even Bruce hadn’t immediately put together that the jewel break-in was related to the art theft. But the M.O. was the same in that it was flawless. No security lines breached, no pressure plates depressed, nothing on video, no fingerprints, no dust disturbed.

By the third time a similar break-in happened—a dinosaur egg from the Natural Science Museum—Bruce was starting to get into a little Bat Tantrum about it. A new but very skilled crew was taking things of high value, but not to sell—he’d looked at all the markets, black and otherwise.

The Gotham Gazette has also caught on, and was calling them the Ghost Gang, on account of they were like ghosts. Not the Gazette’s best work, in Steph’s opinion. It was almost October though (August TOTALLY counted as almost October; they had all the Halloween decorations up in the store so it COUNTED), and seasonal shit like that always made the papers sell like hot cakes, or however the saying went.

Stephanie had jokingly said ‘maybe it is a bunch of ghosts’, to which the expected reply had been ‘ghosts aren’t real, Robin’.

Unfortunately, what Bruce said was that it was ‘unlikely’ because ‘ghosts are exceedingly rare and don’t have much use for physical property’.

So much for Stephanie’s comfort, right?

Anyway, it had been three weeks of this Ghost Gang Bologna now. Stephanie had only gotten in trouble when they’d returned to ask the jewels' former owners if there was anything special about the minerals they’d lost, to which the reply had been ‘no, but we did get them all from the same seller. English fellow’.

They’d apparently thought Batman and Robin were there to comfort them or offer them some kind of financial compensation, which was why Stephanie had laughed at them. But really, how stupid did money make people?

It wasn’t that Stephanie didn’t like looking for clues; her dad was Cluemaster. She ate clues for breakfast, sometimes literally.

But in this case, she was pretty sure there were no clues to find. This new gang, whoever they were, was good. Maybe they’d slip up eventually, if they kept this up, but so far they hadn’t.

“There,” said Bruce, freezing on a frame. “Analysis, Stephanie. What do you see?”

“An empty display case.”

“Look more closely.”

Stephanie sighed internally and looked closer. She didn’t like this part of the job, but it was—quite literally—what she’d signed up for. 

She squinted. She scrunched her nose. She leaned in close. “Is that a disembodied hand?”

“A gloved hand.”

“So it is a ghost.”

“It’s too soon to say what it is definitively. Some sort of phase shifter.” He pressed a few buttons on his fancy keyboard and a different screen popped up.

It was a list of everything that had been stolen. When put up like this, it had kind of a theme, actually—

Ah. That was the point. “You think they’re stealing these things for a reason.”

“It’s not to make money,” said Bruce, which was Bat-Speak for ‘Yes’. “They aren’t ransoming it off. They aren’t advertising themselves as a new gang. So why?”

Stephanie narrowed her eyes. What linked all these things together? “Have you cross referenced these with any of the JL Dark team?”

Bruce turned to her slowly and didn’t say anything.

Right. She wasn’t supposed to know about JLD. The super confidential occult team that really was not-so-secret when you had access to a database like the Bat Computer.

“Don’t look at me like that. You’ve had me down here for like, a week, looking through files. Don’t put a mouse in the cheesebox then get mad when you don’t have any Jarlsberg left.”

The silent staring only continued for thirty more seconds before Bruce cracked. 

Stephanie decided to take that as a win.

“I did contact them, yes. Zatanna said she’d ask Constantine about it, but she hasn’t been able to find him.”

“Isn’t he like, super hard to get in contact with?”

Everything she knew about Constantine was that he was very much not a team player, dealt with demons, and didn’t believe in cell phones. Also, he was British or something.

“Not for Z. Which means he’s avoiding her.”

“Or maybe the Ghost Gang got him, too,” she joked.

But Bruce wasn’t laughing.

“Hn,” he said. He tapped a few buttons, making different things light up on the screen. Facts from testimony, provenance charts from the various stolen items, suspicious activity prior to the thefts.

‘Blonde man’, ‘English guy’, ‘borrowed from famed Liverpool art gallery’. ‘Lingering scent of cigarette smoke and sulfur.’

“Huh,” said Stephanie. “Well. Either Constantine’s sloppier than I thought, or someone is trying very hard to frame him. He got any resentful exes we can track down?”

Bruce sighed for real this time. “Countless.”

“Well. This should be fun.”

“One of them is a shark.”

“Like a loan shark or…a real shark?”

Bruce grimaced.

“Well alright then. I’ll got get my bat-flippers.”

Being Robin was nothing like being Spoiler. But half of being a hero was answering the question of ‘why isn’t someone doing something about this?’ with ‘well, I’m someone. I can do something’.

Including talking to a shark with the capacity for dating and fostering resentment.

But someone had to do it, and it might as well be her.

DPxDC Prompt

Summoning is an imperfect art, mispronouncing a name or having an incorrect symbol can lead to unexpected, and sometimes explosive results. Summoning can open unexpected doors. No one's prepared for what--or who--steps through when a rising gang tries to summon backup.

My little ficlet for this is below the cut:

Smoke. The acrid slam of it in the nose, brought on by the screaming wind. Chanting. A chorus of voices, steady and thrumming. Pain. Everything is hazy, and it’s equal odds on it being from the smoke or the potential head injury. 

Bruce stumbles to his feet, body throbbing. 

This was not how he’d planned this night. 

Of course, he hadn’t planned for Gotham to suddenly be overrun with a new…gang? They claimed to be a government organization, but Bruce has his doubts. He hadn’t had a chance to go through the GIW’s information, but according to Barbara, their claims were sketchy at best.

The shouting about ghosts and waving around sci-fi weapons with no trigger discipline certainly didn’t help their claims. 

Government organization or not, they had no right to raid homes, to drag people out onto the street, or overall threaten his city.

His ears ring, and the chanting rises in volume, impossibly. His chest reverbes with the sound. It’s steady enough to feel like a second heart. His blurry vision locks onto the center of the summoning circle. Because this night couldn’t get any worse, of course. 

First the GIW had rocketed up his list of threats with one simple move. 

They’d gone after Jason.

Jason, who even now was laid out in the middle of the summoning circle, eyes bright, bright, bright green through the haze. 

First they’d taken his son. 

Then they’d used him as a sacrifice. 

Bruce bared his teeth, locking eyes with the closest GIW agent. The man held up his weapon, a glowing baton. His form is weak. 

The baton gord flying, Bruce’s armored elbow slamming the man to the ground. The agent curls up, groaning. Nightwing’s escrima sing electric in the background, followed by the whip of Tim’s bow staff. Damian’s sword glints through the haze, and purple flashes through the crowd of white, white, white. 

He can’t see Cass, but he doesn’t expect too. 

The ground rocks under his feet, and it takes several precious seconds to regain his balance. There seems to be an almost endless flood of agents, with more and more meeting his fists as he tries to make it through the gauntlet. 

Suddenly, the air shifts, the scream of it heading for the circle instead of out. 

The circle glows toxic green, and Jason’s at the center, frozen in the light. 

“No!” Bruce shouts, the sound ripping from his soul. 

It’s echoed by Dick, who stands just outside the circle’s boundaries. His hands are pressed against the light, his blue eyes a shock against the green. 

It’s a confusion of people - GIW white and the summoner’s black. The GIW is here to end whatever it is they need Jason to summon to them. The summoners themselves seem to have broken away from the “agency” and want power from the being they’re calling. It’s a fight on multiple fronts, with the GIW fighting the summoners and Bruce and his family fighting them all. 

The temperature drops. 

“HOOD!” Dick screams, as Jason is swallowed by the green. 

The chant is all he can hear, even as he shoves towards the circle, even as he slams against the same wall Dick’s against. 

The world goes bright and he can’t keep his eyes on Jason. On his son. 

When the light fades, Jason’s not alone. 

A being sits six feet in the air, Jason collapsed over his lap, somehow hovering with the - what is he? He looks human, but there’s something wrong. Off. Bruce can’t quite pinpoint his age. A crown glows on his head, an ever shifting cape spills down his back, dragging close to the floor. His eyes are green as Lazarus, and just as deep. Jason is breathing, Bruce notes. The being’s hands curl in Jason’s hair, playing with it idly. 

The air is *rigid, and everyone’s stopped fighting. No one can draw their eyes away from the being. 

“You dare to summon me with one of my own?” The being speaks, and it’s like crackling glaciers. Someone whimpers. 

“We - wanted to give you a gift,” One of the men in black says, his voice chattering. 

It’s like breathing in ice. 

“A gift?” The being says and the sound is fury, banked in a waiting avalanche. “What kind of gift is this? A denizen of my Realms, trapped and tortured? Used to summon his king, against his will? This is no gift.” 

“B-but we didn’t know,” another speaks, and then obviously realizes he shouldn’t have. 

“Ignorance will not save you,” the being says, and it - he’s? - still holding Jason like he’s something precious. “And I am not the only one you have infuriated. 

“I am not the only one you have awoken.” 

To a man, the GIW agents cry out in panic. Bruce turns, looking for the threat but - the agents are buried to various depths in the cracked concrete floor. The ground is decidedly solid beneath Bruce’s feet but the agents would obviously not agree. They flounder, like the concrete is quicksand. The summoners are next, but it’s ice that gets them, crawling up their bodies until they’re locked into place. 

“My lord!” One cries and promptly finds himself gagged. 

Bruce can’t stay silent any longer. “Hood was used against his will to summon you,” he starts. The being’s eyes meet Bruce’s. “He didn’t want this. Is he alright?” 

“Your son is fine,” the voice is rough, but feminine, and obviously not from the being. It’s around him, dancing through the steel beams and pushing through concrete. “You are mine, my knight. You and yours are mine. The little king will not harm him, nor you.” A figure forms off to his right. 

“Holy shit,” Dick whispers. Bruce has to agree. 

She’s made of concrete, of broken brick and dust, of bone and police tape, of twisted metal and more. 

“Gotham,” Bruce breathes, and he doesn’t know how he knows but he does.

“Hello, my knight,” she says, her form shifting. She turns slightly, and there’s something sharp in her movement. “Hello, little king.” 

“Lady Gotham,” The being - the king? - returns. “You look well,” 

Lady Gotham laughs, a ringing sound - it’s bells and gravel, fresh air on a summer day and rising wind. “How you flatter me, little king. Do you fear me?” 

The being grins, mischief dancing around him, white hair floating high. “I respect you. It’s good to see you awake, Milady.”

“What is happening?” Tim asks no one in particular. Dick shrugs and Steph just leans harder on Tim. Cass holds Damian’s shoulder firmly, watching carefully. 

Bruce wishes he had an answer. 

“It is good to be awake,” Lady Gotham says, and she shifts closer to the circle, fingers skimming against the barrier of light. “How long do you intend to keep my reaper from me?” 

Reaper. Bruce thinks, and it’s a gut punch. 

It makes sense, to describe Jason. Jason can go where Bruce cannot, do what Bruce cannot. 

The king laughs lightly. “The summoning harmed him, Milady. I’m just keeping him safe. I’m not here to undermine you,” the king’s eyes glow. “But remember who is king.”

Lady Gotham smiles. “I’m aware of hierarchy little king.” 

“My son,” Bruce says, because there’s no point in pretending Jason is anything less. He’s talking to - the embodiment of gotham and a king of - something. “He’ll be okay?” 

Lady Gotham sighs. “He will be fine, my knight. The little king cares for his own.” 

“What - what are you the king of?” Tim asks, bold. 

The being smiles. 

“I am Phantom,” he says. “I am the Ghost King.” 

Jason stirs in his lap, and the implications crash over Bruce. Maybe Reaper has more meaning than he’d thought.

[cielles-random-vault]

im usually not a fan of sommophilia (dont even know how you write it) but

(nsfw under the cut, fem reader in mind, its not a joke when i say i NEED mike injected in my veins)

content:height difference slight size kink, unprotected penetrative sex, sub mike, aftercare included bc im fucking sick of smut finishing when they cum

also if this does better than my full works im offing myself /hj

dt: @unabashedcroissanttreefan 😵‍💫

imagine getting woken up by mike's muffled moans as he slowly grinds his cock on your ass, little/big spoon style while youre asleep because he doesn't want to wake you up

pretty boy being just so needy and fighting the urge to fill your pretty face all over again with his cum, but he's so shy he cant seem to wake you up so he contents himself to just grind on you

"is my handsome boy getting all needy?" you ask softly, amused and surprisingly aroused as he nods slowly.

you then sat down on your bed, softly lifting his chin up with one hand, and slowly teased his already hard cock, already full of precum dripping.

"aww." you mumbled on a pitying tone. "already so flustered for my touch, arent you?"

he nodded slowly, with pleading eyes full of nothing but lust and love, practically begging you to fill you with his warm and soft release.

and who would you be to refuse him? he looks so cute as a flustered whimpering mess you turned him into, it would be unfair for him to just leave him like this :((

you then got on top of him, eyes still full of sleep, wearing one of his shirts you borrowed from yesterday, and it just made him so hard.

you looking so small in his shirt was such a sight to him,

and he sure was turned on.

as you got on his lap, he hastily drew his hands to your waist, in a soft yet possessive way.

you then kissed him all over his body, from his neck to his lower stomach. when you reached his cock, you adjusted yourself in his lap so that he could penetrate you, as you were as needy for him as he his for you.

you let out a muffled moan, not expecting his cock to be this hard, but especially to feel this good inside of you.

"mmm.... you feel... so good... and... so warm...." he panted.

a few moments pass as he kept on thrusting in you, and with each move you both felt yourselves come closer to reaching your climaxes.

as you both did, he took a moment to admire you, a soft smile on his face, his warm release all over your stomach.

"you did good, you know that?" he whispered softly as you put your head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat.

"thank you" you sigh softly, "you too"

and then you both fall alseep little/big spoon style because thats what id do

ok this ends v abruptly now watch me RUN to horny jail

hope you enjoyed and pls reblog ily wmah

-@cielles-miscellaneous-vault

[dpxdc-worldscollide]

Contributor Spotlight: SummerSixEcho

Meet @summerssixecho! One of our talented writers for the World's Collide Zine!

What are you most excited for with this Zine?

SummerSixEcho: See the convergence of so many amazing ideas and styles in a unique edition that celebrates the love we have for this crossover.

What is your favorite DPxDC Headcanon?

SSE: Amity Park being disconnected from the world due to a distortion the portal creates with all sort of communications.

What is your favorite DPxDC Fanfic?

SSE: If You Give a Bat a Burger by Cielle

Check out an excerpt of SummerSixEcho's writing:

The weight of the past 24 hours rushed back in a swirl of emotions he was not prepared to process. Not with the threat of new enemies worming their way into Danny’s ever-growing DNI list. It occurred to him that Gotham was no longer a sanctuary if he couldn’t even trust its vigilantes.

To read more of SummerSixEcho's work check it out here

[noir-renard]

Dick had just wanted Damian to have one normal, safe, fun childhood experience. Trick-or-treating, he'd thought, would be just the thing. Not in Gotham of course—Halloween was anything but a normal, safe, fun childhood experience in good ol' GC. Even in the suburbs, Damian would be too recognizable as Bruce Wayne's son.

There was also the problem of convincing Damian to leave patrol for one night. Damian didn't want normal, safe, and fun. 

Dick had thought he'd found the perfect solution in Amity Park. It had enough high tech labs and shady government facilities that it looked suspicious, but he'd done enough investigating to see that it was just a normal city with an impressive commitment to the "most haunted place in America" bit. Damian didn't know that though, and could be convinced that his expertise was needed.

'We need to get a good look at everyone who lives here without raising suspicion' and  'you're the only one young enough to be a believable trick-or-treater' hadn't convinced Damian, but when Dick mentioned it would be "good corporate espionage training", suddenly Damian changed his tune.

Whatever got him out the door, honestly.

"Why are we investigating in these costumes?" Damian asked, tugging on the pirate hat Dick had given him.

"There's nothing more corporate than American Halloween," Dick said through a smile that was far more strained than he'd like. "Anyway, we can't go as Nightwing and Robin, obviously. So we're going as local legends, Youngblood and Ember."

Damian clicked his tongue. "You just want to wear a crop top."

"And a blue wig."

This night would go perfectly, Dick was sure. He smiled, hanging back as Damian walked up to the brownstone with the huge neon sign. Surely the local "Ghost catchers" would love their costumes. Damian deserved to be praised for his creativity. Lots of people seemed to be dressed up as ghosts, though they were all avoiding this street for some reason—perhaps they'd caught it earlier in the night?

Damian approached the door, looking back at Dick once more with a look on his face that said he thought this was foolish. It had been effective the first ten times, but Dick was starting to think it was just for show.

One day, he'd look back at this night fondly.

With one last put upon sigh, Damian rang the doorbell.

feat. Dick dressed as Ember

DP and/or DC prompt:

It's a well-known fact by everyone in Amity that you don't trick-or-treat at the Fentons' house. …Unfortunately, out-of-towners missed the memo. OR

It's a well-known fact by everyone in Gotham that you don't trick-or-treat in Crime Alley. …Unfortunately, out-of-towners missed the memo.

[starlostseungmin]

NEW THEME HELLO????? i always love your themes 😩🫶 also hi ate keisy just checking in >< how's your start of the week been so far?

i love my theme like i love my man hsksksks thank you cielle!! my theme will stay like that for a while (not until someone would slay a photoshoot) i’m doing good, just resting and everything. i’m trying to write something to be posted tomorrow soooo... how about you? congratulations in advance for your graduation btw <33

[hwangism143]

hi via just checking in cause ive been a bit inactive lol ;;; how are you doing? hope you're well !! i saw that you sprained your ankles tho, get well soon :((( make sure not to put too much stress on it

i also saw ur post about first impressions, and personally i thought you were really nice >< i kept seeing you on the dash and really wanted to become ur friend but i was too shy ... so glad we've gone over that already tho im really happy to interact with you like this ur so sweet and fun !!

also hope battleground is coming along nicely, but no pressure ok? you can always come to me if you need help with it hehe

hi bby i'm good, hbu? yeahh spraining my ankles sucks but it's also really funny tbh.

STOP i literally used to love ur writing sm and i'm so happy i can call you my moot <3 ilysm cielle! i hope ur summer break goes well, you deserve it!

currently at 18k words in battleground (writing the prom scene write now MWAHAHAHAHAHA)

[noir-renard]

Daniel J. "Call Me Danny" Fenton was. Odd. An excellent employee. Incredibly bright. But Odd.

That he stood out as Odd in a place like Gotham was notable.

He’d joined Wayne Enterprises last fall, during the time Bruce was “dead” and Tim was “CEO”. Tim had been a bit too preoccupied with not getting assassinated or letting Hush take over WE to worry about all the new hires, so he didn’t officially get around to meeting Danny until months after the fact.

Now Bruce wasn’t dead, Tim wasn’t CEO, and Danny was still here.

“Tim, Bruce, meet Danny. He’s the new lead on the experimental engineering sector of R&D,” Lucius had said, introducing what was to become the subject of Tim’s newest obsession.

Tim hadn’t known it at the time; at the time, Danny had just been another black haired tech in a lab coat and goggles. Someone Tim would have to learn to work with and around, now that Tim was going to be the assistant head of R&D under Lucius.

The first thing Danny had ever said to Bruce (and Tim, who was standing right next to Bruce at the time), was “I always knew you’d come back some day.”

Which was support that would have been nice for Tim to have had months ago. But, no matter. 

Tim did nearly have a minor conniption when Danny continued with, “You got back just in time,” but maybe it was just a turn of phrase. He couldn’t possibly know Bruce had been lost in time and almost died for real in the process of getting him back.

But it was the first of many strange…encounters.

—

The first incident that Tim Actively Noticed as Odd was about a month after Tim had first met Danny.

"Hey Mr.Fox, Mr. Wayne. Mr. Drake-Wayne,” Danny had said, breezing into the very private meeting they were having in the third office on the fifth floor that only existed to give Lucius, Bruce, and Tim a place to meet while at work.

It was nowhere near the R&D department, where Danny apparently “lived”. Metaphorically. Maybe.

How he found them there, Tim wasn’t sure.

“Did you want that moonlander prototype ready for the board meeting this afternoon or are we pushing to next week?"

"Moonlander Prototype?" Said Bruce.

"Board meeting?" Said Lucius.

Danny blinked, squinted, and scrunched his nose, in that order.

"Oh. Have we not had that conversation yet?"

"I think we can assume no."

“Right. Different time-line.” Danny backed out of the room without turning around. “Um. Let's pretend this didn't happen, okay?" 

There had been some kind of crisis they were dealing with at the time, but Tim had noted in a passive way that it was. Well. Odd.

—

The next Odd Thing had been some time later.

Danny had walked up to Tim so silently that Tim hadn't heard him at all until he spoke.

"Ahh, so that's how you do it," he'd said.

Tim had whipped around, wondering what Danny had seen. He'd technically been working on stuff for his Night Job, but it wasn’t something that was apparently obvious…unless you knew every project inside and out. Like Danny.

Still, Tim had played dumb. Which didn't come easy.

"How I do what?"

"Well, I've been wondering how, legally, you get away with designing things for. You know." Here, he put his fingers up on top of his head, as if to imply bat ears. "I've seen tons of stuff on the servers that the locals don't use, but unless they work here I wasn't sure how they got the designs. But it's enrichment and plausible deniability all wrapped up into one, right?"

"What?" Said Tim.

"Like, they can have access to any designs they can hack into. So you can design things for them without actually designing things for them. I've been wondering how to send my stuff over. I have ideas, you know."

"Huh?"

Danny clicked his tongue and shot him a finger gun. 

"Exactly. But hey, if you wouldn't mind looking over my stuff, I'd love your input. I don't usually have to worry about people dying or falling to their death, so I might have overlooked something."

Tim had gone to look at Danny’s stuff, because he was curious.

It was good. And he wanted it. 

Technically, he could just access it directly from the WE server, but Danny was expecting someone to hack into his account to get it and he said 'he'd know' if it happened. 

Tim, by this point, had every reason to believe him.

He'd thought he could hack it no problem. As it turned out…it was a challenge. More importantly, it was fun. It'd been a while since Tim had had fun, he realized, which made it all the sadder that hacking into his co-worker's account to justify making use of the designs made for him probably said a lot about Tim.

Nothing he was prepared to admit though.

—

There were other things, too. Easily explained away but which had accumulated into a Pile of Things Tim Couldn’t Ignore.

Like the overheard ("overheard") FaceTime between Danny and two other people.

"For the last time, Sam, I know you wanted to come to Gotham, but according to Clockwork the timelines where you become Ivy's protégé all begin with you living here! Besides, you secretly love undermining Lex, don't pretend otherwise."

“You just say that because Evil Me is so much hotter than Evil You,” said Apparently Sam.

"I thought we decided Danny can't work at LexCorp because Lexy would definitely want to study him like a bug?” said Voice Number Three.

"As if we’d let that happen, Tucker,” said Sam. “Anyway, Mercy is incredible, she could do so much better than Lex. I’m gonna flip her and/or marry her."

“Well I get to work with the Stones, DILF and RILF” said Tucker, “so who’s really winning here?”

“Me, obviously,” said Danny. “But we’re all breaking rule number two.”

The other two people, based on context clues alone (as well as Tim’s totally justified research into Danny’s background), were Sam Manson, the Ethics Board Lead at LexCorp; and Tucker Foley, Head Programer at S.T.A.R. Labs Detroit.

Tim had investigated Danny for weeks after that, convinced of either corporate espionage or an evil plot.

All he found was a private group chat with a pinned set of rules: 1. We don't talk about work 2. We don't talk about or fall in love with our co-workers 3. We don’t talk about NB1-7 4. Vladposting hours are always

There was the incident where Danny, somehow, single-handedly prevented DalvCo from buying 50% stock in WE. Literally. All it took was a handshake and the deal was off. Which was good, because although Tim was sure the buyout was somehow illegal, he couldn't find evidence.

There was the time he walked up to Jerry from the mail center—one of the criminals Bruce had recruited off the street as Batman—and told him right in the middle of the break room, "your brother is proud of you for stepping up and changing your ways for his kids, and he's sorry about the tooth incident."

Jerry burst into tears and hugged Danny. Danny somehow left the situation with the broken break room microwave in his custody and thirty unreformed Gotham Goons on speed-dial “in case he needed literally anything ever, no questions asked, just say Jerry the Salamander sent you”.

Tim had watched the security footage from that day thirty times. He still wasn’t sure when the microwave even broke, much less how Danny ended up with it. There was some kind of glitch in the video.

It wasn’t obviously Danny’s fault, but by this point Tim was starting to suspect any strangeness in the building had something to do with Danny.

—

It all came to a head on what should have been a normal Tuesday, for what counted as normal in Gotham.

The whole WE building was on lockdown because of a ‘mysterious pathogen’ making employees exhibit odd symptoms, like floating, duplication, and general peevishness. Because of the unknown nature of the pathogen, the floors had been sealed off from each other and the outside.

Tim, much to his chagrin, was stuck in R&D, which was to say: The Basement. 

Where Danny just so happened to be as well.

The only good thing about being stuck in the basement with Danny aws that Tim, hopefully, might have a chance to Study Him Without Interruption.

Somehow, Danny seemed more mildly inconvenienced than worried.

“She always does this,” he grumbled, pulling up a program on his computer that was definitely not part of WE’s IP.

“Who always does what?” Tim pressed, desperate for answers.

“Spectra,” said Danny, green matrix-like text scrolling across the screen. “Good thing Technus owes me a favor.”

With an ominous click, a cube on Danny’s desk that Tim had incorrectly assumed to be raw material started to move, slowly unfolding itself to a nine foot tall behemoth not unlike what one might see at a mecha convention.

“I AM TECHNUS,” said the Robot, arms charging with some kind of green…vacuum power? In his hands? “MASTER OF WORKPLACE SAFETY AND CLEANLINESS.”

“What?” said Tim.

"He doesn't normally say that," Danny mumbled, sounding disappointed.

It wasn’t until after the whole thing was sorted out—the source of the virus having been some sort of interdimensional being? Apparently? —that Tim had the chance to ask : “Where did the robot come from?”

“From the broken microwave, obviously.”

“Why did you make a mech from a microwave?”

Danny had looked at Tim like he was the unreasonable one.

“Everyone knows you send a robot to fight a pathogen. They come preloaded with antivirus software.”

Unintentionally Mysterious Danny

No one in the Justice League/Wayne Industries seems to know much about their colleague Danny Fenton. Every time he opens his mouth, he tends to leave everyone in the vicinity with more questions than answers. That is, until they were put on lockdown.

[melandrops]

Hi there! Not a question, I just wanted to rant about how AMAZING your fic is! I found "Golden" through the illustrations of cielle-b because I love their art and I thought "damn, a doorkeay fic? Looks promising" and then I got the best Gerry/Michael fic I've ever read, frankly amazing, you have an unmatched talent

I left a comment too, but I wanted to rant a bit here too, I hope it's not a bother, I just loved it so much that I had to

you are not a bother to me i love you deeply 🫶🫶🫶🫶🫶

i'm so glad you enjoyed it!!! i love them so so much and i had so much fun writing that little fic

cielle is so amazing i owe him my life for making such beautiful beautiful art of those two (cielle if youre reading this i love you)

thank you for the comment and the ask it means so much to me!!!

[starseungs]

just came out of a car crash with an eight wheeler truck and suddenly maybe my week isnt so bad after all if im still alive and unharmed somehow

[hyunverse]

now what if i actually write a haikyuu au for skz ... plot wise i have no idea what to do tho 😓 but imagination wise i have a vision for volleyball!skz (aka my attempts at getting a self-indulgent pretty setter seungmin)

CIELLE. if u do it best believe i am EATING it up!!! also omg same i've always thought of seungmin as a setter... 💭 while we're at it let me tell u what i think the boys wud be 😋 (the new movie dragged me back to haikyuu brainrot i fear)

hyunjin wud be a middle blocker not bcs he likes it but bcs he's the tallest so it was js kinda pushed onto him. he grew to enjoy it though!!!

lowkey i think changbin would be a pretty cool spiker Likeeee... he puts his force onto those spikes. in my head he's like bokuto. he's the ace best believe

chan is also middle blocker energy 2 me IDK he feels like it!!!! good at reading people. also i think he would have killer serves

han libero energy... 💭 i think. i can't elaborate it's js in my head!!!!!!!!!

jeongin's also a middle blocker 2 me i have no idea why. i feel like he gets fired up if he doesn't get to predict the opposite's moves 🥴 he cud be a spiker too. he reminds me a little of suna

minho pinch server!!!!!!!!!!! if i speak!!!!! he gives that energy off U GET MEEE.?

spiker felix. IMAGINE IT. he can jump rlly high hes like hinata

i agree with the seungmin pretty setter agenda btw 🤝 canon! also if they were a team they'd b like nekoma lowkey yeah

thank u for listening to my ramble love U

[noir-renard]

I’m enjoying the few DC Danny Fenton crossovers of yours I’ve found. Do you post on AO3 so I can binge them without fighting Tumblrs awful search system?

you know, I really should put them on AO3, given a) how terrible tumblr's search system is and b) the recent announcement that tumblr's future is somewhat uncertain.

I do have an AO3, but I mostly put my longfic on there, including If You Give A Bat a Burger and What's a Spleen Between Friends, but I frequently participate in writing games and produce shorter DPxDC fic.

For now, the best way to find my writing that's not on AO3 (yet) is though my tag, cielle's writing. I really should put it all on AO3, though 😅

I'm glad you've been enjoying my writing! Thanks for stopping by! ^w^

[dpxdc-worldscollide]

Contributor Spotlight: Cielle

Meet @noir-renard! One of our talented writers for the World's Collide Zine!

What are you most excited for with this Zine?

Cielle: how can I pick one thing? I'm excited to see all the art, read all the stories, see all the merch

What is your favorite DPxDC Headcanon?

C: the reason Jason came back to life when Superboy Prime punched reality is thanks to Clockwork's interference

What is your favorite DPxDC Fanfic?

C: Picking just one is really hard >.< I have countless favorites, but I'm picking two to highlight here: We're Longing for Daylight by AKela_Nakamura and A Part of Me That'll Never Be Mine by Halfagone

Check out an excerpt of Cielle's writing:

Danny wouldn't exactly call himself an optimist, but in the year since he'd become what he was—halfa, hero, public enemy number one—he'd learned that if he didn't mine those silver linings for all they were worth, the rain clouds of reality would drag him six feet under. So, he wasn’t an optimist, but he could be grateful for this at least: the Justice League showing up gave him the distraction he needed to get away from Val. Fact: the Justice League was finally taking the ghost threat seriously. Good. Fact: the Justice League was giving Valerie external support that wasn’t Vlad. Good. Fact: the Justice League training Val was likely to reduce the number of buildings that she destroyed while chasing him. Good. Fact: the Justice League considered Danny to be the biggest threat of all and would now be hunting him down with everything in their arsenal. Not good. Silver linings, as it turned out, weren't very buoyant.

To read more of Cielle's work check it out here