#I will never let go of them | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

aerodaltonimperial · 1 year ago

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bestie prompt: One bestie plays matchmaker for the other bestie, gritting their teeth the entire time. (I'd love to see this from either perspective, but go with whatever clicks for you first!)

((((and I am so sorry for all the feelings today i didn't mean to break us pls forgive me ))))

(SO FIRST OF ALL she did mean to break us SECOND OF ALL I was trying to find the family feud episode on youtube and youtube instead asked me if I wanted to watch Hook first saving Jack in December and SO I WATCHED IT and then I was crying like what the fuck I miss them so much ESSENTIALLY I HAVE BEEN ATTACKED TONIGHT so here is some bestie fic because i am too emotionally attached at this point to be pried loose)

Jack doesn't really get it at first. One minute, he was getting his ass kicked by Moriarty and Big Bill, and the next, Hook has shoved his hand out in front of Jack's face for a handshake. Jack doesn't know what it means. Jack doesn't know why Hook is here, when Hook is...never anywhere, really. But he takes Hook's hand, because that's just what you do when someone saves you from broken bones and severe internal bruising.

He doesn't get it when Hook shows up at his hotel room door a few hours later, either; he's holding a bucket of ice in one hand, still got that perpetual scowl on his face. Jack's already been checked by medical, already iced the worst of things. But this is the second gesture Hook has made in less than 24 hours, and Jack was raised to be polite.

"Do you want to come in and watch a movie?" he asks, and honestly, he doesn't know if it's an offer that won't be immediately laughed down the hallway.

Hook's expression goes softer. One corner of his mouth quirks up. He nods, and Jack lets him in.

Hook doesn't even end up using the ice. They let it melt until the wooden desk it's sitting on is wet with all the condensation while they sit up against the headboard and watch the second Die Hard.

Towards the end, Hook pulls his phone out, opens up his contact list, and creates a new one. It's labeled simply Jack. Then he holds the phone out sideways, waiting.

Jack takes it and types his number in. Finally, he gets it. Hook is absolutely, painfully, desperately in need of a friend.

And you know what? Jack feels the same god damn way.

He hands the phone back. Smiles. "See you next week?"

Hook smiles back.

The Firm targets them together now. They throw Jack in a dumpster just to piss Hook off. Hook digs Jack out with his face wrinkled in disgust, and Jack wants to punch Stokely right in his fat mouth. But Hook came after him. That's more than Jack would have believed two weeks ago.

Jack peels something sticky and nauseating off his arm, and shakes his head. "How do you feel about the old, original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movies?"

Hook looks confused, but he answers, "Favorably."

"Alright." Jack nods. "They're On Demand in the hotel streaming system. I'm gonna go back and take a really hot shower, and then what do you think about marathoning them with pizza?"

Hook smiles. "Cool."

They actually don't make it through them all—they actually both fall asleep halfway through Secret of the Ooze, heads tilted back at uncomfortable angles against the pillows. Jack wakes up when the credits start to roll unsure of what year he's in. When he looks over at Hook, the man is...vulnerable. Curled back against the headboard with his mouth slightly open.

Jack turns the TV off, and then the lights. He shifts his pillow down into a normal position and waits. It takes about ten minutes for Hook to do the same, but he doesn't leave. They sleep like the dead until Jack's phone alarm blares bright and early the next morning.

Turns out, they're a really good tag team. It's easy to fight with Hook, probably just because Jack feels so comfortable around him. Hook has slipped into his life with a strange familiarity that should be weird and somehow isn't, like Jack has known him forever, the sort of old friend that's always got his back.

They make their way through whatever the hotels have available on the Smart TVs in their rooms, and night by night, movie by movie, Hook opens up. Starts talking more. Instead of single syllables, Jack gets sentences of things he notices in the filming. How the angles were shot. The bits that they get wrong about various things: athletic training, New York City, photography.

When they aren't in the same place, they text. And most nights they are, they end up sleeping in the same bed, just because it's easier than returning back. Jack takes to packing an extra toothbrush every time, for Hook to use. It's not romantic, this thing between them; he thinks it probably could be, if they were in different places, different head spaces, but it doesn't really matter. Jack's not lonely anymore.

It's been quite a while since he could say that.

He starts figuring out Hook's little tells, all the signs that he's had a rough day. Jack's good enough at it to be able to always have the right sort of movie queued up. Hook is mercurial like that: he bottles everything up, and Jack thinks what he ends up seeing is all the implosions when it fails to be enough, the tendrils of emotional turmoil Hook tries so hard to swallow down. On the hard days, Hook will end up curled up against Jack's side as they sit on the bed, and Jack will loop his arm around Hook's shoulders. They don't talk about it, but Hook will smash his face into Jack's collarbone and exhale so deep his whole body shudders with the force.

They don't talk about it, until one day, abruptly, they do.

"I really miss him," Hook whispers, as the clock ticks over to 2 AM and they're laying side by side in the too-starched sheets of the king sized bed.

Jack freezes for a second, only because he's afraid he'll say the wrong thing and scare Hook into clamming up all over again. "Miss who?"

"Danhausen."

"Oh," Jack says, tone light: still a whisper. It feels safer. "Have you said that to him?"

"He doesn't talk to me anymore," Hook replies.

"Maybe he's just waiting for you to reach out first."

"Or," Hook mumbles, bitter and thin, "he's happier without me. With them. And he doesn't care anymore."

Jack winces in the darkness of the room. "I don't think that's true. You guys were...really close."

There's a long stretch of nothing, but Jack knows Hook hasn't fallen asleep. Finally, Hook sucks in a ragged-sounding breath. "Jack."

"Yeah?"

"I think I was in love with him."

"Yeah," Jack agrees, because that's probably correct. They lay in quiet for a very long time, though Hook's breathing never evens out, so Jack knows he isn't asleep. Eventually, Jack rolls over. Presses his hands against Hook's shoulder—light enough to be a suggestion he can ignore if he wants.

Hook, it seems, doesn't want to. He rolls to the same side and lets Jack curve behind him. Jack loops his arm over Hook's waist. And then he settles in, his cheek against Hook's shoulder blade, and waits while Hook shakes, shakes, shakes against the mattress.

A week later, he's on a website full of black and red. Bright colors, weird graphics. He clicks around, trying to figure out what would work. His phone dings with a text from Hook. It's completely unrelated, superbly casual; a reply to Jack's earlier message complaining about gas prices in California.

Jack stares at it, and thinks You're my best friend. I'm going to fix this for you.

It takes another few weeks for the dates to line up, but Jack finds himself in Wisconsin at a convention. He's got his hair thrown back under a cap so he won't be recognized, but ends up taking it off at the back door so the volunteer will let him in. She even gives him one of those staff lanyards.

It doesn't take him long to find the person he's looking for. Danhausen appears very surprised when Jack grabs his elbow and hauls him over to the wall. "What are—"

"I need to talk to you," Jack says. "What did he do?"

Danhausen blinks. "What?"

"What did he do that was so bad? What was it?"

"You...you're talking about Hook," Danhausen says, slowly. He's got the face paint on, so his tongue looks very pink when it darts out to wet his lip.

"Of course I'm talking about Hook. Why are you still mad at him?"

Danhausen frowns. "Danhausen doesn't know what you're talking about. Hook is the one who is mad at Danhausen."

"What..." Jack stares at him, boggled. "He's miserable. What are you talking about? He thinks you hate him."

"Hook told Danhausen that he didn't need him."

That one takes awhile for Jack to place. He searches back in his memories; that was a weird time. He wasn't in the best place, mentally. But he's pretty sure he remembers that interview. "He...no. He was only talking about that match."

"He..." Danhausen's expression has twisted. His eyes dart to the side. "But Danhausen thought Hook was pushing him away."

"Dude," Jack says. "He wasn't. It was just about that one thing. And you just disappeared afterwards."

From Danhausen's expression, Jack has just handed him very new information. And then Jack laughs, because he can't help it; it sucks, of course it sucks, and Hook's been in this twisted agony circle for months, but of all things? This?

"Are you telling me," he starts, "that this entire thing was a misunderstanding?" He waits, watching; Danhausen looks upset. "Do you miss him, too?"

When Danhausen nods, Jack gives him an awkward pat on the shoulder. "Right, so. I'm being very serious right now. You need to call him. Like, immediately. Because he really, really misses you."

"And Hook is not angry at Danhausen? He might be, when Danhausen calls. It's been a very long time, and...well."

"I can confidently tell you that he will not be mad at you," Jack tells him. "Call him. Please."

He turns to leave, but Danhausen's voice stops him. "Danhausen misjudged Ju—Jack."

Jack stops, swivels back. Danhausen's hands are clasped in front of him, fingers tangled. He's managing a lopsided black smile. "Sorry for that. But Danhausen will find a way to thank you."

"Just call him," Jack says. "That's all I need."

Danhausen has his phone out, tapping something, when Jack glances back near the exit. It looks more like a chat thread than a phone call, but he's pretty sure he won't have to wait long.

He's right: Hook texts him that night.

You went to find him? In Wisconsin? You flew to Wisconsin?

Jack grimaces, replies: Don't be mad. I'm sorry I did it behind your back. Did he call?

Yeah, comes the reply. And then, You know I'm gonna fucking love you forever for this, right?

Jack smiles at his phone. Sap.

Seriously, though, Hook's message says. Thank you.

I'm glad I could help.

#tag so you don't lose this shit #IT'S MISSING MY BESTIES HOUR UP IN THIS HOOOOUUUUSSSEEEEEE #i will never let go of them #when i die put them on my tombstone

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confessedlyfannish · 8 months ago

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Writing Prompt #12

Bruce is reading the paper when the pour of Tim's coffee goes abruptly quiet. It would be hard to pinpoint why this is disturbing if it wasn't for the way the soft, tinny sound the vent system in the manor makes cuts out for the first time since being updated in the 90s. The pour, Bruce realizes, has not slowed to a trickle before stopping. It has simply stopped. And there is no overeager clack of a the mug against the marble counter or the uncouth first slurp (nor muttered apology at Alfred's scolding look) immediately following the end of the pour.

Bruce fights the instinct to use all of his senses to investigate, and instead keeps his eyes on the byline of the article detailing the latest set of microearthquakes to hit the midwest in the last week. Microearthquakes aren't an unusual occurrence and aren't noticeable by human standards, which is why this article is regulated to page seven, but from several hundred a day worldwide to several hundred a day solely in the East North Central States, seismologists are baffled.

Bruce had been considering sending Superman to investigate under the guise of a Daily Planet article requested by Bruce Wayne (Wayne Industries does have an offshoot factory in the area) when everything had stopped twenty seconds ago. That is what he assumes has happened (having not moved a muscle to confirm) in the amount of time he assumes has passed. His million dollar Rolex does not quite audibly tick but in the absolute silence it should be heard, which confirms the silence to be exactly that—absolute.

While Bruce can hold his breath with the best of the Olympian swimmers, he has never accounted for a need to remain without blinking without being able to move one's eyes. Rotating the eyeballs will maintain lubrication such that one could go without blinking for up to ten minutes. But staring at the byline fixedly, he estimates another twenty seconds before tears start to form.

These are the thoughts Bruce distracts himself with, because he doesn't dare consider how Tim and Alfred haven't made a (living) sound in the past forty-five seconds. About Damian, packing his bag upstairs for school after a morning walk with Titus that was "just pushing it, Master Damian".

There is a knife to his right, if memory serves (it does). In the next five seconds—

"Your wards and guardian are fine, Mr. Wayne," the deepest voice Bruce has ever heard intones. For a dizzying moment, it is hard to pinpoint the location of the voice, for it comes from everywhere—like the chiming of a clocktower whilst inside the tower, so overpowering he is cocooned in its volume.

But it is not spoken loudly, just calmly, and when he puts the paper down, folds it, and looks to his right, a blue man sits in Dick's chair.

He wears a three piece suit made entirely of hues of violet, tie included. He has a black brooch in the shape of a cogwheel pinned to his chest pocket, a simple chain clipped to his lapel. Black leather gloves delicately thumb Bruce's watch (no longer on his wrist, somewhere between second 45 and 46 it has stopped being on his wrist), admiring it.

"You'll forgive me," the man says with surety. "Clocks are rather my thing, and this is an impressive piece." He turns it over and reveals the 'M. Brando' roughly scratched into the silver back. He frowns.

"What a shame," he says, placing it face side up on the table.

"Most would consider that the watch's most valuable characteristic." Bruce says, voice steady, hands neatly folded before him. Two inches from the knife. To his left, there is an open doorway to the kitchen. If he turns his head, he might be able to get a glance of Tim or Alfred.

He doesn't look away from the man.

"It is the arrogance of man," the man says, raising red eyes (sclera and all) to Bruce, "to think they can make their mark on time."

"...Is that supposed to be considered so literally?" Bruce asks, with a light smile he does not mean.

The man smiles lightly back, eyes crinkling at the corners. He looks to be in his mid thirties, clean-shaven. His skin is a dull blue, his hair a shock of white, and a jagged scar runs through one eye and curving down the side of his cheek, an even darker, rawer shade of blue-purple.

The man turns the watch back over and taps at the engraving. "Let me ask you this," he says. "When we deface a work of art, does it become part of the art? Does it add to its intrinsic meaning?"

Bruce forces his shoulders to shrug. "It's arbitrary," he says. "A teenager inscribes his name on the wall of an Ancient Egyptian temple and his parents are forced to publicly apologize. But runic inscriptions are found on the Hagia Sophia that equate to an errant Viking guard having inscribed 'Halfdan was here' and we consider it an artifact of a time in which the Byzantine Empire had established an alliance with the Norse and converted vikings to Christianity."

"The vikings were as errant as the teenager," the man says, "in my experience." He leans back in his chair. "I suppose you could say the difference is time. When time passes, we start to think of things as artistic, or historical. We find the beauty in even the rubble, or at least we find necessity in the destruction..."

He offers Bruce the watch. After a moment, Bruce takes it.

"The problem, Mr. Wayne, is that time does not pass for me. I see it all as it was, as it is, as it ever will be, at all times. There is no refuge from the horror or comfort in that one day..." he closes his hand, the leather squeaking. And then his face smooths out, the brief severity gone. He regards Bruce calmly.

"You can look left, Mr. Wayne."

Bruce looks left. Framed by the doorway, Tim looks like a photograph caught in time. A stream of coffee escapes the spout of the stainless steel pot he prefers over the Breville in the name of expediency, frozen as it makes its way to the thermos proclaiming BITCH I MIGHTWING. Tim regards his task with a face of mindless concentration, mouth slack, lashes in dark relief against his pale skin as he looks down at the mug. Behind him, Bruce can see Alfred's hand outstretched towards the refrigerator handle, equally and terrifyingly still.

"My name is Clockwork," the man says. "I have other names, ones you undoubtedly know, but this one will be bestowed upon me from the mouth of a child I cherish, and so I favor it above all else. I am the Keeper of Time."

"What do you want from me?" Bruce asks, shedding Wayne for Batman in the time it takes to meet Clockwork's eyes. The man acknowledges the change with a greeting nod.

"In a few days time, you will send Superman to the Midwest to investigate the unusual seismic activity. By then, it will be too late, the activity will be gone. They will have already muzzled him."

"Him."

"There is a boy with the power to rule the realm I come from. Your government has been watching him. The day he turned 18, they took him from his family and hid him away. I want you to retrieve him. I want you to do it today."

"Why me?"

"His parents do not have the resources you do, both as Batman and Bruce Wayne. You will dismantle the organization that is keen on keeping him imprisoned, and you will offer him a scholarship to the local University. You and yours will keep him safe within Gotham until he is able to take his place as my King."

This is a lot of information to take in, even for Bruce. The idea that there could be a boy powerful enough to rule over this (god, his mind whispers) entity and that somehow, he has slipped under all of their radars is as frustrating as it is overwhelming. But although Clockwork has seemed willing to converse, he doesn't know how many more questions he will get.

"You have the power to stop time," he decides on, "why don't you rescue him? Would he not be better suited with you and your people?"

"Within every monarchy, there is a court," Clockwork. "Mine will be unhappy with the choice I have made," he looks at Bruce's watch, head cocked. "In different worlds, they call you the Dark Knight. This will be your chance to serve before a True King."

Bruce bristles. "I bow to no one."

"You'll all serve him, one day," Clockwork says, patiently. "He is the ruler of realms where all souls go, new and old. When you finally take refuge, he will be your sanctuary." He frowns. "But your government rejects the idea of gods. All they know is he is other. Not human. Not meta. A weapon."

"A weapon you want me to bring to my city."

"I believe you call one of your weapons 'Clark', do you not?" Clockwork asks idly. "But you misunderstand me. They seek to weaponize him. He is not restrained for your safety, but for their gain."

"And if I don't take him?" Bruce asks, because a) Clockwork has implied he will be at the very least impeded, at worst destroyed over this, and b) he never did quite learn not to poke the bear. "You won't be around if I decide he's better off with the government."

"You will," Clockwork says, with the same certainty he's wielded this entire conversation. "Not because he is a child, though he is, nor because you are good, though you are, nor even because it is better power be close at hand than afar.

"I have told you my court will be unhappy with me. In truth, there are others who also defend the King. Together we will destroy the access to our world not long after this conversation. The court will be unable to touch him, but neither will we as we face the repercussions for our actions. I am telling you this, because in a timeline where I do not, you think I will be there to protect him. And so when he is in danger, even subconsciously, you choose to save him last, or not at all. And that is the wrong choice.

"So cement it in your head, Bruce Wayne," the man says, "You will go to him because I tell you to. And you will keep him safe until he is ready to return to us. He will find no safety net in me. So you will make the right choice, no matter the cost."

"Or, when our worlds connect again, and they will," his voice now echoes in triplicate with the voices of the many, the young, the old, Tim, Bruce's mother, Barry Allen, Bruce's own voice, "I will not be the only one who comes for you."

"Now," he says, producing a Wayne Industries branded BIC pen. "I will tell you the location the boy is being kept, and then I would like my medallion back, please. In that order."

Bruce glances down and sees a golden talisman, attached to a black ribbon that is draped haphazardly around the neck of his bathrobe, so light (too light, he still should have—) he has not felt its weight until this moment.

Bruce flips the paper over, takes the pen, and jots down the coordinates the being rattles off over the face of a senator. By his calculation, they do correspond with a location in the midwest.

"You will find him on B6. Take a left down the hallway and he will be in the third room down, the one with a reinforced steel door. Take Mr. Kent and Mr. Grayson with you, and when you leave take the staircase at the end of the hallway, not the elevator."

The man gets up, dusts off his impeccably clean pants, and offers him a hand to shake.

"We will not meet again for some time, Mr. Wayne."

Bruce looks at the creature, stands, and shakes his hand. It feels like nothing. The Keeper of Time sighs, although nothing has been said.

"Ask your question, Mr. Wayne."

"I have more than one."

"You do," Clockwork says. "But I have heard them all, and so they are one. Please ask, or I will not be inclined to answer it."

"What does this boy mean for the future, that you are willing to sacrifice yourself for him?"

There is a pause.

"So that is the one," Clockwork says, after a time. "Yes. I see. I should resolve this, I suppose."

"Resolve what?"

"It is not his future I mean to protect," the man says. "It is his present."

"You want to keep him safe now..." Bruce says, but he's not sure what the being is trying to say.

"I am not inclined," Clockwork repeats, stops. His expression turns solemn, red eyes widening. In their reflection, Bruce can see something. A rush of movement too quick to make heads or tails of, like playing fast forward on a videotape. "Superman reports no signs of unusual seismic activity. With nothing further to look into, you let it go in favor of other investigative pursuits. You do not find him, as you are not meant to. He stays there. His family, his friends, they cannot find him. His captors tell him they have moved on. He does not believe them, until he does. He stays there. He stays there until he is strong enough to save himself."

Clockwork speaks stiffly, rattling off the chain of events as if reading a Justice League debrief. "He is King. He will always be King. He is strong, and good, and compassionate, and he is great for my people because yours have betrayed his trust beyond repair. He throws himself into being the best to ever Be, because there is nothing Left for him otherwise. We love him. We love him. We love him. My King. Forevermore."

The red film in his eyes stall out, and Bruce is forced to look away from how bright the image is, barely making out a silhouette before they dull back to their regular red.

"I am not inclined," Clockwork says slowly, "To this future."

"Because of what it means in the present," Bruce finishes for him. "They're not just imprisoning him, are they."

"They will have already muzzled him."

Clockworks is right in front of him faster than he can process, fist gripping the medallion at his neck so tight he now feels the ribbon digging into his skin.

"Unlike you, Mr. Wayne," and for the first time, the god is angry, and the image of it will haunt Bruce for the rest of his life, "I do not believe in building a better future on the back of a broken child."

"Find him," the deity orders, and yanks the necklace so hard the ribbon rips—

Clack!

"sluuuuurp!"

"Master Timothy, honestly!"

"Sorry Alfred!"

#i feel like I'm going to reread this and want to add other stuff #but I also just want to post it and get it out there #fun fact i scribbled a bunch of lines down at 2am bc i didn't want to forget them #im bad at multiple drafts #my writing #dp x dc #dp x dc au #dp x dc prompt #dp x dc crossover #danny phantom #batman #i live to make everybody dramatic #but also i subscribe to a world where clockwork doesn't know how NOT to be dramatic #lol he's a ghost from all of time he doesn't know how to speak to humans and tailor it to the century let alone the decade #and his favorite little girl who calls him clocky loves how he speaks so #he doesn't need to change for nobody #nor feels inclined to #also I feel like as god he's way more inclined to threaten to get what he wants than like...be vulnerable #jazz: let's unpack that #clockwork: we never do #jazz: are you saying that because it's true or because that's what you want to be true?#clockwork: ...#also I cannot take credit for BITCH I MIGHTWING #wish i could #that is cash money right there #shoutout to 11thsense

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