#Infelix supposedly means something like unfortunated

[hoarderfan]

The city hadn’t really changed since they left. Yeah, there were obviously some new shops, and the different buildings had some modernization done. But the essence of the city? Absolutely the same.

For a moment Kitty just stood there. Taking it all in. The noise, the people, the smog filling the air.

She hadn’t realized how much she missed this shithole.

She felt Johnny intertwine their fingers, and she looked to her side where he stood with Shadow wrapped around his neck like a scarf. She gave his hand a squeeze and a tight smile, which he reciprocated. They could do this. They still had each other. No matter how hard that man had tried to separate them.

-----

They had planned their trip before they left. It would have been almost impossible to know where to start otherwise. Fortunately, the Realms has plenty of resources to help those looking for closure. It wasn’t always possible for ghosts to find the kind of closure needed, but those of the Realms would (almost) never try to deprive death-originating ghosts of ways to come to terms with their demise. Which meant Kitty and Johnny easily got access to the archives of homicide records.

And there among rows and rows of filling cabinets, they found it.

Records of the murder of:

Johnny I.N. Felix

and

Kristy Ivgene - Kitty

Killer: Leroy Ivgene

Status: Avenged – Leroy Ivgene has been removed from all realms of existence.

Avenger: Jason Peter Todd – Jason Todd Wayne – Red Hood.

-Residency: Crime Ally […] (Park Row), Gotham.

--Other known locations: Gotham City, NJ […].

Kitty stared at the paper and then reread it. The status update was something she never anticipated seeing. But the thing that stuck out to her the most was the name of their avenger.

“… the kid… it’s Jay Jay! It’s gotta be him!”

“Hah, knew that little shit would be alright”

Even though he said that Kitty could see how relieved he was at seeing the kid’s name. They had wondered sometimes what had happened to Jay after their deaths, but they hadn’t been able to check on him. And later, they hadn’t dared.

“Wait. Since when was he a Wayne?”

-----

So… they knew where to start looking at least. But finding someone in a big city like Gotham was going to take a while. They should have some sort of resonance with Jay given that he avenged them, but ghost fuckery weren’t always that simple and straightforward.

They both agreed that the best place to start looking was Crime Alley. Which came with a big helping of death trauma. Yay…

But the thought of seeing their little Jay again was enough to fight past the slight hesitation.

Their little tour of the city had them seeing both familiar and foreign sights. The drug deals happing down small alleys? Familiar. People skulking down the street? Familiar. Street kids laughing while playing? Sadly, a bit foreign to them. It’s not that it never happened before, but it had been rare.  Something had clearly changed in Crime alley. Something good.

A young man taking a cigarette break while leaning against the wall. Familiar.

It was so familiar that they almost floated right past him without a thought, when they felt a light tug at their cores. They both whipped their heads back around so fast that a regular human would have snapped their own neck.

The man was broad and muscular, and even though he seemed casual his demeanor showed sense of confident resilience that showed he weren’t to be messed with. He had blue eyes and black hair with a white streak at the front. Scars marred his face, with one of them forming a ‘J’.

“It’s him” she whispered.

Johnny didn’t say anything. But he was starring at the kid, the man, with the same intensity as her.

What were they supposed to do now? They hadn’t planned this far ahead. Somehow it didn’t feel like enough to just see him. This man had avenged them!

She looked over towards Johnny, and when he averted his eyes from Jay and met hers, she knew he agreed. They had to talk to him, to thank him, to tell him they were doing okay for a couple of dead people, and then they were going to hug the living daylight out of him.

Now they just had to figure out how to do that without freaking him out too much.

When Jay finished his cigarette and started walking away, they just followed him from a distance.

Did they have to do that while invisible, intangible and unable to be heard? No. But they did it anyway.

Although from the way Jay seemed to tense slightly, it might not have been enough.

Jay headed towards a small alley, and as soon as they followed, they heard Jay rumble out “I know you’re there. Come out while I’m feeling nice.”

She didn’t even think as she let the invisibility drop. The hand Jay had hovering near his gun twitched, but he didn’t make any move to grab it. His eyes widened and she knew he had recognized her. She didn’t know if Johnny had made himself visible, too focused on Jay to check, but she assumed he had.

Jay didn’t move. He just stared at them for a while.

“If this is some kind of trick,” Jay managed to get out through gritted teeth, “I will personally make your lives a living hell”.

Kitty snorted.

Johnny seemed to find it equally amusing since he replied with, “Good luck kid. There ain’t much living about us anymore”.

Jay didn’t laugh. The only indication that he heard Johnny was the slight pursing of his lips.

Ancients, she wanted to know what ran through his head as he went back to staring at them. She took the time to stare right back. She was running her eyes over him, taking the sight of him in. He had grown, that’s for sure, but looking at him like this, all the small bits that made up their Jay shone through. She weren’t a mushy feely type, otherwise she wouldn’t have survived the streets and her family as long as she had, but just seeing him alive made her tear up.

Crying ecto felt different than regular tears. The tears somehow felt heavy on her skin, and it made her emotions run wild in her core.

“Can I hug you Jay Jay?”

He still seemed off-kilter, but he gave a slow and hesitant nod.

She zoomed towards him and threw her arms around him. Jay made a small sound at the impact, but after letting her cling to him for a bit, he wrapped his arms around her in a gentle but firm hug. She heard herself thank him again and again, and at some point, Johnny seemed to have joined the hug. Even Shadow ended up curled around them. She babbled on about how happy she was to see him, and about how proud she was of him and anything else that crossed her mind.

But then she noticed something.

She pulled back from the hug without removing her hands from Jay’s sides, which meant she accidentally broke the hold Johnny had on them. She ignored his tiny protests.

Something was wrong.

Jay looked fine. But now that she had gotten close to him and touched him, she could feel something emanating from him. She had been so focused on the feeling seeing him again had brought, that she hadn’t thought about it at first. Now she couldn’t ignore it any longer. Because it wasn’t a feeling she was meant to sense in a human. It was ghostly in nature. And it was rotten.

She raised her hands to cradle his face. Her concern must have shown on her face, because Jay scrunched his eyebrows in confusion.

…Shit. They had to get their kid to Phantom.

Gothamites Never Really Rest

Small warning in this: very light swearing, light mentions of deaths, and tw light touching on the subject of abuse, like very light. But still an fyi.

Danny was used to his main Rogues (Boxy, Ember, Skulker, etc etc, you know those guys) showing up randomly and at odd hours, causing some chaos around town due to their own boredom or just wanting some fun (the more deadly ones were rare to show up and his main Rogues do at least respect him enough to give him the rest of the day off when they sense a ‘big bad’ fight), he fights them, wins, before he send them back to the portal. Then they rinse and repeat this for the next day.

So as he really wasn’t expecting, especially since he had just sent his ghostly quota for the day back to the portal a few hours ago (Boxy of course, and Youngblood (dressed as a Firefighter this time, though the ending for their fight actually ended on a good note. YB had been asking Danny about space, Danny kinda hoped YB will be an Astronaut next time cause that would be fun)), Johnny 13 (and Shadow) to phase into his room as he was heading to bed.

Honestly (he groaned when he realized who it was, dealing with Johnny, Kitty (and Shadow) during a ‘break up’ or ‘lovers spat’ always was a pain) he was expecting Johnny to just start attacking but before Danny could demanded to know what he was doing in his room Johnny hesitatingly asked if they could talk.

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