#Tim and Jon freaked out when they became friends

[friendlyneighborhoodplebeian]

I need an au were Damian and Kon’s relationships with their parents mirror each other. We have the villainous parent that engineered your existence (Talia and Lex) and the distant, not-knowing-how-to-reach-out super-parent (Bruce and Clark). And when Damian and Kon first meet they both already have these preconceived notions with each other and instantly take a disliking to the other, but while hanging out with at each other’s houses with Jon and Tim, respectively, they realize how much they have in common and they learn to help and understand each other.

[kleenex-tissues]

Yours Truly (7)

AO3 Version here

Ch. 7: Must We Confine to Expectations?

Damian Wayne was a man of few words, but each one was carefully crafted. His mother and tutors taught him the importance of efficiency above all. To get the kill, you must find the path of least resistance. To catch the criminal, you must beat them at their own game before they can even formulate their plans. And to interact with those around you, few words should be needed to convey a point. Time is of the essence. Slow men do not win races, and Damian liked to do things on his terms.

Which is why he had become frustrated at the very thought of responding to Marinette. She somehow defied reason, her words and actions throwing his entire life’s motto out the window. The longer they spoke, the harder it became to speak to her as he normally did his peers. Damian, for the first time, was at a loss for words.

After his first initial reply just weeks ago, it was easy to talk to her. She asked exactly what she wanted to know and even persuaded him to send pictures of Titus and Alfred the cat, which was received with much enthusiasm. He expected it to continue to be so effortless, but she was an enigma. Her brain seemed to jump from thought to thought, her fingers barely being able to relay the information onto the computer screen. This wasn’t just small talk he could analyze and answer quickly. She spoke to him with ease and openness, something he had only ever seen in his brother, Dick.

Marinette spoke to him about her daily life, from schoolwork to her online shop and helping in her parents bakery. Her life seemed normal, but somehow she found herself in increasingly odder situations.

Like the time she tried skateboarding by the Seine and fell into the water. Or when she managed to show up to her school award ceremony with her dress on completely backwards after staying up all night watching a new show. Or when she sent him a selfie of her with Jagged Stone, world-famous celebrity, in one of her own designs, followed by a picture of Jagged’s pet alligator, dressed to the nines in a ball gown also of her design.

On top of this, she happened to be best friends with a boy she failed to mention was a celebrity model, was friends with the daughter of his father’s recently reformed personal stylist, Audrey Bourgeois (not that she knew that), and had many celebrity acquaintances that she talked about like they were nothing more than regular people that anyone could get to know.

Her words sent him for a loop, and he found himself intrigued by it. Normally, anything that did not make sense to Damian was thrown to the side, deeming it unworthy of his precious time, but even that reaction had been curved by the girl. She took everything he had ever known and turned it upside down. Something about her made him act in a way he never had before, and it was beginning to freak him out.

Surely, she was using magic. Across the ocean. Through a computer. On a person that was a mystery to her in all manners of physicality. Yes, that must be it. There is no other reason Damian Wayne could ever be so enthralled with another person. Not even Jon received this much attention from him, despite him being as close to a best friend as Damian could get.

Which is exactly why his brothers could never know about this.

Damian went through painstaking actions to make sure the email password was changed, two-factor authentication guaranteed, and impossible for anyone save for a very determined Barbara to break through. However, if she were to break through, he would automatically receive a notification, allowing him enough time to delete the evidence. No one could know how easily he had been entranced by Marinette’s magic.

He looked into the research Tim had compiled on the girl’s life. Not because he was interested, obviously. He just needed to see what kind of person he was dealing with. It was better to know your enemies, after all, especially if he wanted to find a way to be one step ahead of her.

Marinette seemed to be incredibly normal, yet extraordinary at the same time. Her list of achievements stood steady with his own, something not easily obtainable. He just didn’t understand how. She was just an average-looking girl, albeit a little prettier than most he knew, from a middle-class background and an average school. Nothing particularly stood out about her, but as a whole, she seemed to shine. No matter how many times he scoured through everything there was to know, it did not add up. How could someone so normal stand out so strongly?

He was distracted by this, he knew, but he couldn’t help it. She invaded his thoughts, driving him insane. While on patrol, she hovered in the back of his mind. He scribbled theories regarding her potential magic on the margins of his notebook when he should’ve been paying attention in class. Even his dreams were plagued by visions of her. This was maddening.

Perhaps this madness was what was causing him to lose his edge, and allowed Duke to suddenly appear behind him in the confines of his bedroom, asking why Damian was emailing a girl named Marinette.

Damian leapt from his chair with the agility of a cat, managing to close his browser and push Duke to the ground in seconds. He held his arm to Duke’s neck, pinning him with his body weight.

“How did you get in here,” Damian demanded, pushing his arm further down.

Duke choked, obviously in a panic. He sputtered, “I knocked on your door for like 10 minutes and you never responded, so I came in to get you! Alfred said it’s time to eat!”

Damian was not satisfied with his answer. No one could know he was caught in this moment of weakness. He briefly considered eliminating Duke, but knew his father would disapprove of that. He settled for intimidation instead.

“You speak of this to no one, Thomas, or I will ensure you may never speak again.” He accompanied his threat with a dark look in his eyes and a quiet tone. He knew exactly how to scare his brother, being no stranger to forcing him to keep quiet regarding embarrassing activities. Duke had a bad habit of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Duke threw his hands up, as well as he could with Damian’s body weight holding him down, stammering, “Okay, okay! I promise I won’t. Please just let me go.”

“I will hold you to that, at the cost of your tongue.”

Damian finally released Duke, gracefully removing himself from overtop the man and dusting off his pants. Duke nearly cried with relief that he wouldn’t be on the receiving end of Damian’s embarrassment, so long as he kept this quiet. Which he definitely would. Not even Bruce could save him from Damian’s rage.

Damian stepped over his brother to reach the door, decidedly ignoring his place still on the ground. He hovered in the doorway, turning to his brother and in a deeply unsettling way, smiled. “Shall we go to dinner now? Alfred appreciates punctuality.”

With that, he left. Duke pulled himself up from the floor before following after him, face pale with the terror from just minutes ago. No matter how many villains he faced, none would ever be as scary as his younger brother.

–

To: maridesigns@xxxxx.net From: d.w.redbird@xxxxx.net Subject: Re: A New Challenger Approaches?

Hello Marinette,

I seem to have been signed up for this program without my knowledge. I was merely proving a point to my brothers that they need not meddle in my private affairs, however, I felt as though I should at least deign to give you a response. It is not your fault that you fell victim to their mindless schemes.

Attached are photos of my dog, Titus, and my cat, Alfred. I could not send you a picture of Batcow at this time, as viewing her is a privilege granted to very few. Not even my closest confidant, Jon, is allowed to visit her, as she is rather special to me. Perhaps some other time.

In return, I hope to see some of the designs you have raved about, so that I may determine your true capabilities as a designer. While I lack the knowledge on accredited fashion design programs, I am quite familiar with a well-made suit. I would be an excellent judge of your craftsmanship.

And do not worry about your secrets being shared. I find little enjoyment in gossip. It is best saved for those who have nothing better to discuss.

Sincerely, Damian

[redrobbingabank]

Damijon au yeah you heard me

Ok so quick before i say this i know very little about damian and jon i’ve only read the adventures of super sons comics and outside that i just know that jon somehow became an adult while damian’s still a kid so if i get anything wrong feel free to correct me but please be nice about it lol

So there’s a mission and Jon gets de-aged. Poof and all of a sudden he’s back at the age he would have been if time had happened normally. Everyone’s doing the natural freak out when someone’s been magically fucked with and starts working on something to fix the spell.

Except...for Damian. He’s realized at this point that he’s ace, but that doesn’t mean he’s blind, and Jon is really cute ok. Plus, all those tiny little baby feelings that he crushed when Jon got yeeted forward in life are all starting to spring up, and he’s furiously wrestling them back because Jon is obviously going to become an adult again as soon as there’s a solution to this. 

But Jon doesn’t realize this. In fact, he’s practically euphoric because fuck yes he finally gets to be a teenager and he wants to spend time with his best friend doing the stuff they never really got to do!! But Damian’s avoiding him, and people keep talking to Jon about ‘fixing him’ and ‘returning him to his age’, and Jon doesn’t really want to think about that, and Damian’s cold shoulder is making him sad. 

Cue a chat with big brother Kon, who is actually his big brother rn and very happy to fill the role. He tells him(because obviously he halfway lives at Wayne Manor because of Tim, and vice versa) how Damian’s been moping and Jon should maybe try what he always used to do and just sort of show up and be himself. 

It was the way he and Damian always used to operate. Damian would pretend not to care, and Jon would show up and smile and be the happiest ball of sunshine he could until Damian finally warmed up. Since he’d turned older, that had kind of disappeared. 

So he does. He shows up at Damian’s hosue--flying outside his window, no less, with ice cream and demands they hang out. Damian, force of habit kicking in, agrees.

Insert them relearning their relationship, growing closer than ever before, realizing that they maybe have more similar wants than they thought they did, and Jon having a decision when a solution is finally ready. 

(obviously they’d be around sixteen/seventeen in this btw)

[the-witches-you-couldnt-burn]

It started with a whisper

I originally wrote ‘Like I did with you’ as a one-shot but people wanted a sequel. This turned out to be waaaaay longer than expected (4.7k word count). Inspired by Everybody Talks by Neon Trees. I hope you lot enjoy!

Ao3

(Also this is Mari’s new outfit, all credits go to the original artist)

————

Two teens stood upon the balcony of a large banquet hall, exposed to the midsummer night air. The sky was a lilac blanket that hung over the Parisian buildings, speckled with glowing stars. The moon, with it’s crescent smile, beamed down of the young couple.

Hey, baby, won't you look my way?

Marinette’s eyes were closed as she rested her head upon his shoulder, relaxing after the night’s rapid escalation. Tonight she had arrived at the ball with the intent to be there for her friends, but somehow she found herself within the arms of Gotham’s (and probably Paris’) Ice Prince. She had overheard his nickname from the Gotham students, one of which being Jon, who was in the middle of mocking the young Wayne. She had never considered that nickname as suitable; sure he was temperamental & had a tendency to snap, but icey to the core? No.

I can be your new addiction

Damian was calm. For the first time in his life he felt like he could take a breath. His exhale was carried off by a small gust of wind, the bush over hanging the stone railing rustled. With his inhale, the scent of Marinette’s perfume became present once more. Mixed with the crisp night’s air, her usual scent of pastries was mixed with what could only be described as ambrosia. His phone vibrated within his pocket, it was never on volume due to the potential risk it caused during his heroic activities.

“Shit.” Notifications covered his screen, multiple tweets, Instagrams and Tiktoks in which he had been tagged in. But the alert came from his family’s private messaging chat. The whole thread was a shit storm, Grayson and Todd’s messages were completely capitalised (he learnt years ago this meant ‘to yell’ in writing form) and both had multiple ‘keyboard spasms’. Drake, like the thorough detective he is, had combed through the images and videos, investigating their validity. His honorary sisters had replied with ‘awwwww’(s) and ‘Omg we MUST meet this girl! I need to know how she tamed the demon!’. He could practically hear Brown’s shrill voice from across the ocean.

Hey, baby, what you gotta say?

No reply from his father or Alfred. The two of them were the only semblance of ‘normal’ paternal figures he had within his life, after the sham of a relationship he had previously held with his grandfather. Their silence unnerved him.

Marinette had noticed his attention had shifted to his phone, her own mobile was buzzing away within her baby pink purse. Messages, notifications of account tagging and comments galore. A sigh left her lips when she saw her parents seemed to be none the wiser. Good, she didn’t need to deal with future adoration for ‘The boy who swept our daughter off of her feet’ (or something along those lines).

Her cheeks regained some of the warmth they held before as she thought of her parent’s reaction. Scrolling through her Twitter she saw her friends had posted multiple images of the night’s events, majority being her shared dance.

Chloé Bourgeois @TheBestBourgeois

what kind of Disney shit is this? (Insert video of two teens dancing around an mostly empty dance floor.)

Alix Kubdel @Sk8trGirl

Replying to @TheBestBourgeois

I KNOW RIGHT?! THEY WERE FUCKING FLOATING!!!

All you're giving me is fiction

She was thankful that they hadn’t tagged her but she hadn’t been spared by others in attendance. Her post thread had blown up, thousands had commented and even more had viewed the evidence. There was no way she would come out of this unscathed.

“Has anyone been on Twitter today?” The blonde of the family asked as she walked into the dining room. Her eyes focused on her scrolling screen, brows furrowed in confusion. “Actually has anyone seen what’s happening on any of our socials?”

It was early in the afternoon and the family had recently returned home after a straining stakeout. The Joker had broken out of Arkham and the Batfam had to deal with his minions. Dick’s arm was in a sling (sprained from a grapple gone wrong), Jason was icing his hand, Alfred was stitching Bruce’s chest wounds while Tim and the girls escaped without severe injuries. All were still recuperating and finally able to recharge.

Alfred always enforced a strict ‘no devices at the dinner table’ rule; no matter how urgent it was, it could wait until after sustenance was consumed. Tim strongly opposed this, but there was no arguing with Agent A. This all surmises that probably no one had seen the crap storm on social media.

I'm a sorry sucker and this happens all the time

Bruce sighed, bringing his free arm up to rub his eyes. Tilting his head back to look at Steph, “Who was it this time?” Barbara quickly took out her phone to see what Stephanie was talking about, all the while glancing accusingly at Dick and Jason. Both of whom held up their arms (or in Dick’s case arm), declaring their innocence.

“It wasn’t fucking me!”

“Jason! Language!” Dick shot a glare at Jason and was met with one in return. “It wasn’t me either.”

“Then who-“ Bruce started before being cut off by his most rambunctious daughter.

I found out that everybody talks

Stephanie with a squeal, exclaimed that it was Damian. Visions of what the Wayne brat could have done flashed through the heads of everyone in the room. He had been sent overseas before the quarantines and lockdowns hit. During Damian’s first month in France he had been forced into online schooling and then finally when he got to go to in-person classes he hated it. Described the class as a kindergarten with petty and vindictive toddlers.

Had he broken someone’s arm? Was that person of such importance that it had spread over multiple social media platforms? France’s government had announced on June 15th, that teens were now being inoculated so him having COVID-19 was doubtful. Had he insulted the wrong person? Had he taken over the government? He certainly had the potential.

Everybody talks, everybody talks

What they saw stunned them, even Steph as she watched it for the 7th time. Damian Wayne was dancing. But not only that, he was dancing with a girl.

It started with a whisper

“What is this shit?”

No one verbally objected to Jason’s outburst but he was sent a harsh glare from Alfred, Dick and Bruce. Their focus soon returned to the images and videos before them. Babs’ and Steph’s phones were returned to them as the others ran to grab their own devices. They all met back at the table, comparing the posts and comparing their notes.

I can hear the chitchat

“There’s no way this can be real.”

“Jesus Tim,” Barbara rolls her eyes, “have you seen the amount of posts there are? You’d be an idiot to think otherwise.”

Take me to your love shack

“I’m with Tim, how do we know this isn’t some skit. I mean, Demon Spawn almost looks normal. That’s a matter of concern.” He almost dry heaved when he agreed with Tim. Damian couldn’t be capable of naturally exuding that amount of humanity unless there was something in it for him.

Mamas always gotta backtrack

“I was just saying Babs, that we should check the credibility of these images. For all we know they could be gorilla glued together and trying to get unstuck.” Tim cringed at his own reasoning, he really needed to either sleep (probably not going to happen anytime soon) or find his favourite coffee brand (which had been one of the first to vanish after the covid hoarders appeared).

When everybody talks back

Dick was too busy freaking out and spam messaging the youngest Wayne, to defend Damian’s humanity. The family saw this and followed suit, wanting to get information from the source.

Chat name: Alfred supremacy

BigBird: AHHHHHH DAMIAN!

BigBird: YOU LOOK SO CUTE!!!

BigBird: HAIFJDNDNFI

LittleWing: WTF HAPPENED DEMON SPAWN YOU LOOK ALMOST HUMAN

Babs: who knew the city of love would influence the brat

Blondie: they are so cuteeeeeee!

Blondie: We HAVE to meet her!

Silent-but-deadly: agreed.

Timbo: YO DEMON

Timbo: Apparently the videos are legit

Timbo: are you being blackmailed?

And it just devolved into more chaos from there, fueled by the fact that they saw Damian’s ‘Blood Son’ account appear online before vanishing once more. Dick shrieked, “I FOUND HER ACCOUNT!”

The family gathered around the eldest son, peering over his shoulder to view his iPhone 12max screen. They saw a young girl’s Instagram account. It was locked but they could see her profile pic, the girl had black hair and looked to be if Asian decent. They compared it to the videos but it was hard to see due to the hall’s lighting and the minimised facial features of the pfp. Alfred suggested that they search up her username and see who has tagged her, some might have other photos of her.

After research for awhile, the family began to get frustrated with lack of results.

Hey honey you could be my drug

You could be my new prescription

“Come on!” Jason complained, “What kind of teenage girl doesn’t post her life online?” He ignored the girls glares and went back to researching. How had the account by the name of ‘mariiiiinette’ to managed to prevent the entire Wayne clan from accessing it? Damn Instagram privacy settings. He groaned, dragging a hand down his face, “We are fucking stupid. Why don’t we just use the Bat-computer? It would be so much fucking easier.”

“It shouldn’t be used for civilian issues-“

Too much could be an overdose

“The girl could be a meta for all we know! We aren’t safe until we know who she is.” Jason points a finger at Tim, his paranoia flared up and even though he would never admit it, Jason would do anything to protect each member of his family (although Bruce is still debatable).

All this trash talk make me itching

Barbara and Tim took their usual positions as Oracle and Red Robin (who had been banned from patrol due to lack of sleep). The rest of the Batfam stood behind them either with arms crossed or still failing at researching.

Oh my my shit

“The account is owned by a girl called Marinette Dupian-Cheng. She is French-Chinese and her parents own a popular bakery. Also if it wasn’t already obvious, she goes to Collège Françoise Dupont, aka Damian’s French school.” Tim begun informing his nosy family, “But this account has been inactive for the past 6 months, which is strange due to her frequent posting schedule before hand. It seems she probably has a second account and this is her old one.”

Everybody talks, everybody talks

“Not only that,” Barbara interrupted. “There are unopened messages from other accounts that accuse her of being a bully. There is a whole Facebook page about this girl and how she has been hurting her old friends, but neither side seems reliable. The so called victims seem to be twisting the truth but there is barely any information about Marinette so we can’t disprove it either.”

“Read out some of the messages.” Bruce took a cup of coffee from Alfred and sipped it.

The main screen of the bat computer displayed a Facebook group with the banner picture being a photo of Marinette. “They are mostly complaints expected of teen girls when there is a girl they don’t like; ‘Marinette is such a know-it-all’, ‘She is constantly insulting Lila’s intelligence’. They go on to talk about how Marinette was briefly expelled from the Collège before being reinstated by the principle for a reason unknown to them.”

Everybody talks too much

“Her school reports up until this year were good. The newest one states, ‘While Marinette is a wonderful and bright student, I encourage her to settle her disagreements outside of class. This seems to only be a recent occurrence and I implore her to go to the guidance council if she is in need of help.’” A beat of silence echoes through the cave, Tim sighed. “Jason’s meta theory could be correct. She could have just recently started exhibiting her abilities and using them to get what she wants.”

“Bruce what do you want to do?”

“We’re going to Paris.”

She opened her eyes to the blaring morning light that streamed through the blinds. Her lashes still painted with mascara that refused to leave. She felt a pang of sorrow when she was removing her makeup and dress last night, she never wanted the night to end. She shuffled down the stairs to the kitchen, covering her mouth when she yawned. She greeted her mother as she entered the kitchen to get breakfast.

She glanced at her phone and there was the chaos that was started hours ago and it was still occurring. It was the weekend, she wouldn’t need to deal with her classmates until Monday. But she would still have to survive her parent’s interrogation. Out of the corner of her eye she caught her mother smirking at her.

Everybody talks

“Nadja told me some interesting news about last night.” Marinette held her breath, glaring at the toaster, willing it to hurry up so she could escape. “Well,” Sabine patted her shoulder before rubbing Mari’s back. “I know you didn’t want to go but I hope you had fun.”

With that she exited the kitchen, probably going to help her father in the bakery. The ravenette stared after her, eye widened in shock, jumping when the toaster went off. Buttering her toast she went over the conversation, her brows furrowed in confusion. She had expected a ‘When do I get to meet the oh so famous prince?’ or ‘Should I be expecting a new guest sometime in the near future?’ or at least a ‘Who was that young man, Bǎozàng (宝藏 it means treasure)?’ But she said nothing.

A small smile was plastered upon her face as she changed and went down to help her parents in the bakery. Her father didn’t say anything either, he gave her a knowing smile before continuing to kneed the dough. She sat at the the store front as the cashier whilst her parents were busy making ‘Paris’s Finest Pastries’.

Her musings slowly faded as she was brought back to reality by badly hushed whispers. Two young preteens were by the bread roll casing near the door. She had seen them come in before with their parents, the girls went to the prestigious international school over in the 16th arrondissement. The one with purple hair kept whispering to the brunette, both ‘subtly’ glancing towards her. Using her enhanced hearing she listened in on their conversation.

“That’s her, I swear that’s her in the video.”

The blonde’s face soured likes she sucked on a lemon. “No, it wasn’t good lighting there is no way he would dance with someone like her.”

Everybody talks

Marinette had tough skin but their words had an impact, only a small one due to her defence mechanism of repressing emotions. She stopped listening and went back to drawing in her sketchpad, she was in desperate need of a new school outfit.

The two girls eventually came up to the counter, goods in hand. Marinette rung up and bagged their items (paper because save the turtles sksksk) in a tired daze. A phone was shoved into her face, her eyes barely adjusted to view the screen before the blonde spoke.

“Is this your instagram?” She asked in a tone so snobbish that it should be illegal from a person her age. Marinette finally was able to view the screen that was barely an inch from her face. Her old Instagram ‘mariiiiinette’ was displayed on screen, she hesitantly nodded, gaze flicking back to the two in front of her.

The blonde’s nose scrunched up and the purple goth girl squealed in delight. They soon after left the store, their conversation had devolved into ‘See! I told you’ and ‘Yeah, yeah. You were right.’

Walking to school on Monday, she had finally come down from cloud nine. She still rode the tail end of her high as she rushed along her path to her campus, she wasn’t going to be late but she sure wasn’t going to be early. She had spent the better part of the weekend designing and sewing a brand new outfit. Her new look was composed of a black cropped singlet (L'amour gagne hemmed into it and it’s straps), paired matching peach plaid cropped overshirt and a-line miniskirt. Her hair was down, ballet flats were worn and her makeup was the usual with the added edition of a rose gold eyeshadow.

Even though her face was covered in a black and gold mask, she looked hot.

She reached the campus and the whispers started again, people were still buzzing from Friday night. Her classmates, the majority of her grade and the younger years seemed to gossiping before class about the formal’s events. She couldn’t spot any of her friends or the two Gotham transfers, so she was stuck listening the the chitchat. Why couldn’t she have been late like usual?

Damian had a fowl disposition and it showed in multiple icey glares (and that was before he even reached the collège). His family had made their appearance known in Paris at 1am Sunday morning. He could have used his dorm to escape but his family didn’t have the word ‘privacy’ within their vocabulary. He didn’t want to have to pay for a lock replacement due to his brothers’ (most likely Todd with Drake & Grayson laughing at him) lock picking habit.

The Ice Prince was back with full force. He had just been... influenced by all the other couples. Yes he did respect Dupain-Cheng and he appreciated her company & pleasant conversations. He would struggle to hide a small smile at the memory of the dance, even if he denied himself the happiness of normality, he felt content when reminiscing.

“Ooo the Ice Prince is here, did he have a fight with his princess or something?” The voice seemed to mock him.

“The Disney Magic is gone. The demon is back.”

Everybody talks

At the second jeer he shot a glare at the perpetrator. Jon held his hands up in an ‘I surrender manner’, laughing as he joined Damian at his side. The two entered the school’s large foyer and looked to see if any of the classes were open yet. Sadly they weren’t, before he was wrong and the his class was plain torture but this was truely hell.

He saw Dupain-Cheng sitting alone on the stairs, drawing within her sketchpad. He wondered how a girl like her, who always seemed to be involved in other’s lives (for the better) was ignoring all of the comments about her. She felt his focus centre on her, eyes flicking up to meet his, she provided him with a small wave before continuing to draw.

Jon nudged him with an elbow to his ribs and dragged him off to the side, into the boy’s locker rooms. Jon scowled at the door, “It’s a mad house out there. You’ve heard what some people are saying right?”

“Why would I care about these imbeciles?”

Jon jabbed Damian in the chest, causing the demon to stumble. Green eyes darted from blue eyes to the tan finger. “You care when lies hurt people you care about.”

The day began to rapidly decline once the two dance partners took their seats, next to each other. They had both been placed up the back of the class and them sitting together hadn’t been a problem until now apparently. She wasn’t even safe when the teacher started their lecture, whispers and glances were cast towards them. Once the two got to biology it was better, Ms Mendeleiev was a strict teacher and was able to control the class.

Everybody talks

But the recess came. When the bell rang she slowly started packing up her equipment, Alix and Max (who she shared biology with) waited for her; she watched as the Ice Prince left through the door. She knew she didn’t need to be concerned about her friends joining in with the gossiping, if anything they would dispel people and tell them to ‘Mind their own fucking business’ because this whole situations is ridiculous, utterly ridiculous.

She did receive some slight teasing from Alix about being a Disney princess, but Marinette quipped back about the skater’s fairytale story being ‘Pinknette, the Geek and the Beast’. The three met up with the other two of their group, they had just come from geography. Kim was complaining that Argentina was a state in America.

“That’s Arkansas you idiot!” Chloe shrieked, lightly hitting his arm with her white handbag. Max held his head in his hand as he approached, how had his tutoring sessions failed so badly?

Chloe turned to Marinette, a smile forming from her glare. The blonde examined the designer’s clothing, nodding. “You look like you are about to have a hot girl summer.”

Marinette’s face burned, the tips of her ears coated in red. Alix chuckled and nudged her shoulder.

Everybody talks

“Look at her, she is so desperate for his attention that she probably copied those designs.”

“Why do you think he danced with her anyways? Maybe she has something on him? I mean, she forces him to sit next to her in class, who knows what else she has done.”

What. The. Fuck.

Chloe glowered towards Lila’s posy. “We have a fucking seating plan, those cretins-“ She made a motion to storm over but was caught by the ravenette, looking back to Mari, her rage decreased from a boil to a simmer.

“No Chlo. It’s fine, it’s not worth it.”

Everybody talks... back

The group walked out to the school’s front steps, it was a mad house... a mad courtyard? Students sitting on the stairs, on the grass and standing around mingling, all of them now were staring at her. She held her backpack close to her chest (she had swapped her signature coin-bag purse for the pastel pink bag), pretending its a shield. Her friends circled around her becoming an obstacle to prevent their stares. If people were afraid of a scowling Kim then they don’t know the scorn of Chloe or Alix’s bite. And Max, sweet quiet Max.... you better hope he doesn’t have blackmail on you (he probably does), he can dismantle your life with a single anonymous post.

Rushed footsteps approached them. The group was broken apart by a rude Wayne boy, he swept Mari away from the school and the gossip crowds within. Her four friends shouted at him and he kept walking, shooting a glare at them in response. He kept pushing Marinette forward with a hand placed on the small of her back, her backpack was now swung over his other shoulder.

They ended up in her favourite alcove. She had brought him here with the other Gotham transfers for a native’s tour of Paris. It had always been her safe place to be creative.

It started with a whisper (everybody talks, everybody talks)

“My apologises for our rushed departure but you seemed to want to get out of their anyhow.” His gruff tone danced through the silence, his head still peaking around the corner; watching for any unwelcome guests.

“Thank you.” She whispered, her voice almost being carried off by the gentle wind. A genuine smile illustrated upon her face.

“We weren’t able to converse after the events of the other night. I would like to formally apologise once more for my actions causing this adverse reaction. If I had kn-“

“You don’t need to apologise!” She squeaked, hiding her eyes behind her fisted hand. Her shoulders curled inwards as she tried to make herself seem as small as possible, a side effect of her common use of her secondary miraculous form: Multimouse.

“I chose to dance with you, you don’t need to apologise for my own actions.” He stared at her with confusion. He had taken the blame so she wouldn’t need to do so herself; but she had taken it anyways. He had given her an out. Why does she always take the blame, even for things out of her control?

“But if I hadn’t danced with you then you wouldn’t have been the focus of the entire school.”

Marinette stepped forward, her eyes hardened and blazing. “Damian Friday night I went there out of obligation to my friends, I didn’t want to be there. But dancing with you? That was the highlight of my week, probably my month too. I enjoyed our time together.” Her face softened, lips twitched downwards ever so slightly. “I don’t regret anything about that night, but do you?”

He was bad at comfort. Everyone in his family avoided him when they were in need, he plainly didn’t know what to do. She wasn’t visibly upset but he sensed that she is disappointed that he apparently didn’t share the same opinion of the night. The only thing he regretted about that night was letting Jon call him a coward, but then again if he didn’t he never would have danced with Dupa- Marinette.

He picked up her clenched hand, the tension in her body alleviated at his embrace. He remembered how Grayson would apologise to Kor’i or how his father interacted with Ms Kyle. He brought their hands up and placed a kiss upon her knuckles.

And that was when I kissed her (everybody talks, everybody talks)

“I do not regret anything either—“ he cleared his throat, “In fact, I’d appreciate if we would be able to interact more, especially outside of that cesspit.”

Was he...?

It didn’t matter.

She smiled the same dazzling smile she gave him at the dance. She nodded while laughing, “I’d love that.”

Everybody talks

The two stay talking, hidden within their secret alcove for the rest of the day. She texted her parents to say she was with a friend and would be back later that night. Damian didn’t bother texting his family, Marinette knew he had to be back soon due to his dorm’s curfew.

The sun was setting at they walked back together, he did the gentlemanly thing and dropped her off at her bakery door. She could see her mother behind the register inconspicuously looking over at the two of them. Damian’s lips quirked upwards, she was satisfied with his kinda-smile.

He walked back, hands in pockets and a neutral expression upon his face instead of a scowl. He reached his door and took his keys, he found that it was already open. Damn.

His family was splayed out within his two roomed dorm. Todd and Drake were fighting over a place to sit on his bed, whilst his father sat at his desk, watching the commotion. The three of them turned to him as he enter the room, they were the only family members able to attend on short notice; Cain had a ballet audition, Gordon & Brown had concert tickets for tomorrow, Grayson had to take care of Mar’i while Kor’i was on Tamaran and Alfred stayed to ensure no one died during their night time activities.

“We need to talk Damian.” His father stood, leaning onto the desk chair. “The school called and said you had an unexcused absence for half the day. Where were you Damian?”

Damian stared into his father’s eyes. He was fifteen, almost an adult, but was treated like he was ten again.

“I was with a friend.”

“Probably the girl from the dance. Marinette, right?” Todd mocked him. Damian snapped his head in the direction of his bed, glaring at both his brothers.

“That’s what I want to talk about with you Damian. Now I don’t know her personally but from what we’ve discovered through our investigation we have some concerns. What’s happened Damian?”

The youngest Wayne’s glare shifted off of his brothers to the floor, and then finally to his father; his family sitting in wait for his answer. Straightening his posture, his shoulders clicked as he rolled then back. His statement’s tone was sure and steady, “Everybody talks father.”

Everybody talks... back

[rosileeduckie]

Itinerary

Statement of Jonathan Sims, regarding a statement.

You know the feeling when you get way too into reading something? Like, when you feel so involved that you start to feel like the story’s happening to you? Poor Jon feels this sometimes. Hopefully no one nefarious finds out about this... Starting Tickletober with Day 2: anticipation! Thanks @gigglymonster for posting this sfw list for this month :)

SFW. Potential warnings: swearing. The Magnus Archives tickle fic.

Word count: 3,567

~*~

Much as he appreciated having his own space to work without interruptions, sometimes Jon really did miss the old researching days when Tim would roll his chair over to Jon’s cupboard-sized working space for company or a chat, or when Sasha would lean on the door frame, pointedly in the way and watching until Jon finished the tea she’d brought and actually took a break from his work. When his current office, cobwebs in the corners and statement stacks growing ever higher, seemed too big or quiet, he could always find relief in leaving it and walking past the open door of the assistant workroom, where there was nearly always a conversation being held over the sound of clacking keyboard keys and flipping book pages. He wasn’t the kind of boss to pop in for a check-in or a friendly hello, so Jon rarely went through the ever-open door, but he found comfort in hearing voices other than his own, even if just for a little while. Maybe he’d even go so far as to wander into the break lounge, pretending to look for something that wasn’t the human interaction of anyone he happened to meet there. These days, he didn’t have to do so much sneaking seeking someone to talk to. Throughout the day, he’d often have coworkers dropping by his office to drop off statements or inquire about information from previous cases or ask if Jon wanted tea. He appreciated that, too—the time Melanie, Daisy, Basira, Sasha, Tim, and Martin would all take out of their days to come see him. The introvert in him was glad for some time to work alone, but the sentimental part of him wished the stretches of time between visits weren’t so long.

Jon had finished reading the statement nearly a quarter hour ago. But it still lay on his desk next to a tape recorder that collected only dead air. Some statements, the ones he could rationalize or that didn’t hit too close to home, didn’t rattle Jon so much. He was the head archivist of a library of reported paranormal experiences, after all; he should have been able to read through things without feeling actually scared. Some, though, needled their way into his brain and stuck there, haunted him. Left him with an empty, hollow feeling like the downswing after a high. If he was alone to dwell on them for too long, it started to really freak him out.

Blessedly, a knock came from the office door. Pulled from the perturbed state, Jon cleared his throat and turned off the recorder, which he hadn’t realized he’d left run. “Come in.” He swiveled his chair around and brightened considerably when he saw who opened the door. “Hello, Martin.”

“S-sorry if I’m interrupting,” Martin said as he entered, seeing the usual recording supplies on Jon’s desk. “Just, um, found this and thought you’d— hi.”

Jon couldn’t help the twitch in his lips at Martin’s rambling cutting off with so timid a greeting. Even after having been in a relationship for nearly two years now, there was still a giddiness underlying the professionalism they maintained in the office. Not that anyone else did. When Jon and Martin had told their coworkers about their new romance, they became quite the targets of teasing from their friends, who were happy to see them “finally” get together. Jon could put up with teasing at work, especially when it made Martin go so adorably red, but mostly because, he knew, at the end of the day, it would be him and Martin, happy.

Martin returned the small smile with a rosier one of his own, then cleared his throat and held out his hand, drawing Jon’s eyes to the clipped-together bunch of papers Martin had brought with him. “Just found this statement I’d thought you’d want to see.”

“Oh?” said Jon, taking the pile and glancing at the information filled out at the top—the usual stuff, the statement giver’s name, address, and succinct summary of their experience to categorize the pages they’d written out—and then looking back to Martin. “Pertaining to a more imminent cosmic horror, or just interesting?” he asked, trying to guess why it required his immediate attention more than any other statement. “Funny?”

“You might get a chuckle from it,” Martin nodded.

“Ah. Okay. Thank you, Martin. I’ll—” Jon reached to set aside the earlier statement to be refiled and placed the newly delivered one before him, “I’ll add it to the queue.”

Martin nodded again, quickly adding, “If you don’t get to it today, you know, or— it’s fine.”

Jon’s eyebrows furrowed, and he quietly enjoyed the flush he could see coloring Martin’s ears. “You didn’t slip me some poetry hoping for a review or something, did you?”

“What?” Martin said with a startled chuckle. “No. It’s just the statement.”

“Right. Well, thank you,” Jon said, amusement coloring his tone. “Was there anything else?”

Pursing his lips thoughtfully, Martin shook his head. “I’ll let you get back to it. See you for lunch.”

“Alright.” Jon turned his chair back toward his desk, waiting to hear the sound of an exeunt. Instead, he heard footsteps approaching, and, when he turned his head to ask if there actually was something Martin had forgotten, he was met with a quick kiss to the forehead. Jon had seen the flash of Martin’s smile, heard it in his farewell as he left the office, and that smile and the tenderness of that kiss hung in the forefront of Jon’s mind more stubbornly than any statement could. It was moments like that when he was actually glad to have his own office, as he could practically hear Tim cooing about how adorable a pair they were and how he needed a camera to capture the cryptid that was Jon smiling, especially so shyly. In solitude, Jon could hide his smile as poorly behind his hand as he liked.

He did take a breath and try to scrub the smile from his face with his hand so he could start the statement, not wanting to sound like a lovestruck gay schoolboy when reading about horror, no matter how absurd and funny the horror was that awaited him. He was a serious archivist, after all.

“Right then,” Jon said, grabbing a new replacement tape and starting the recorder wheels spinning.

~*~

Statement of Jason Thisman, regarding his partner, and the thing that took over his partner’s body. Audio recording by Jonathan Sims, the archivist.

“Recently, I’ve come to really worry about my partner. Not the kind of worry that would prompt me to seek help from a hospital or couple’s counselor, but… well. You can probably infer what kind of worry, just from the fact that the place I chose to come for help was here. Not that I’m sure you guys here can help, if that’s the thing you do here. I heard of the archives from a friend, and I guess I just want to get what happened off my chest without being looked at like I’ve lost my marbles. Even if there’s no help for me, at least it will be there to help someone else. Warn them, or whatever.

My partner and I have been together for almost two years now and living together for a year of that. We have a dog and a cat, we work day jobs neither of us want, we get takeaway too often, and we go for drinks with friends on weekends. All things considered, our home life has been pretty normal. Domestic, certainly. Maybe even boring. But I don’t mind. It’s nice, to have something to come back to that you can be certain will always be there, will always make you feel a special kind of safe. At least, I was naïve enough to believe it would always be.

Don’t misunderstand me—it’s like I said, my partner and I don’t need the kind of help a couple’s counselor could provide; and I know that, because we both have individual and couple’s therapy—the ‘always’ didn’t start to show cracks because of discontent or infidelity. In fact, there weren’t any cracks. It was sudden. Like the floor under me had given way with a splintering crack like thunder, and I suddenly had no idea who I was committed to.

When it happened, when the rug was pulled, it was a normal night, just last Thursday. We’d taken the tram home, and I started making dinner while my partner took the dog for a walk. I remember he was humming…

I remember he was humming when he left, because, when he got back, I had just put dinner in the oven when I heard the front door open, then close, then… nothing. Looking back, maybe I could say something profound, that it was in that silence that I could hear when everything changed. But that wouldn’t be true. Really, I couldn’t hear anything at all.

And then the dog ran in, all happy barking and nails clattering on the floor. I bent down to pet her, and, when I looked up, my partner was standing in the kitchen doorway. For a moment, I was relieved. I’d overreacted, I was tired from a long day, I was stressed from work, whatever—but everything was fine, everything was normal. I smiled, told him, “I hope you’re not too hungry, because we’ve got a bit of a wait for dinner.”

And he said, “Suppose I’ll have to find something to snack on in the meantime.” Normally, I would have scolded him for spoiling his appetite, but the way he said it, it didn’t sound like him. There was gravel in his voice I’d never heard, and, when I looked at him, his eyes had this bright, hungry light in them. All at once, I didn’t recognize the man who stood in front of me. His fingers had grown sharp and his hands shook, and it was like his aura was bursting out of him, drenching the kitchen tile in sinister energy.

I was scared. I didn’t know what else to do. I’d thought he was joking, but I’d never seen him look that way. So I— I ran. Deeper into the flat, as fast as I could, and faster when I heard him chasing after me. He slammed into the door seconds after I’d ducked into the bedroom and locked myself inside. I knew I had precious few moments to try and escape while he got the key from atop the door frame and unlocked the door, and I was frustratingly frozen. I hadn’t made a dash for the front exit, and now I was cornered. I could have tried hiding in the closet or under the bed, but I had no hope of going undiscovered. Maybe the window. I was far from athletically inclined, but perhaps I could have shimmied down to the ground using a tree or drainpipe, anything that could offer enough hand- and footholds to keep me from sprain my ankles in a rough descent.

My planning brain betrayed me in eating up all my head start time, and I was stuck even further as arms captured me around the waist, growling breath hot against my ear. I was free for a moment as I sailed through the air, only to be pinned on my back as I fell onto the bed. The thing that wore my partner’s face had rendered my legs and arms trapped and useless with how he straddled my thighs and pinned my wrists in one hand above my head. Nothing made me feel so helpless, though, as the ravenous gaze he fixed upon my face. I could feel my blood pounding, from my heart under the clawed hand he held suspended above my ribs, through my neck and quickening my pulse when his eyes flicked to that vulnerable space, into my cheeks where heat bloomed as he pressed a suddenly tender kiss to my forehead before rearing back. He lunged, dug in with teeth and claws, and I screamed.

The shaking of my head deterred neither his nibbling mouth nor bearded chin from the sensitive skin beneath my jaw, and his fingers dug mercilessly between my ribs on the left side. And the right side, when his other hand joined the fray. I had thought he’d meant to kill me swiftly by going for such vital spots so fast, but he evidently intended to use our supper’s lengthy cook time to the fullest. He pushed my shirt up and over my heaving chest, exposing my stomach and still tingling ribcage to his hungry gaze. I hadn’t caught my breath before he’d pounced again, gnawing delicately along my lowest ribs and scribbling his claws, unbearably featherlight, over my hips. The sensations tore through my body as though his jaws and talons were ripping me to shreds, making me howl and writhe and fight until I had no strength to do anything but laugh. I’d been skin and bones before he’d begun his meal, and, afterward, I was all nerves and residual giggles. More than residual when I threatened to enjoy supper on my own, since he’d already stuffed himself, and he’d so eloquently rebutted by introducing his teeth to my hips. That final attack had left me too hoarse and happy to argue any further, so I’d given in with a nod.

After that, the night carried on. The days since have been normal again, with. I worry for my partner, though. Will this monster overtake his body once again? When? And I worry for me. I can feel this isn’t over. Whatever overtook him has had a taste of me, and I don’t think it will be satisfied with just one course of a meal.”

~*~

Jon was happy he had his own office. If he’d had to have people looking over his shoulder as he recorded what was clearly a prank statement, waiting for him to realize as much and ready to tease him about it afterward, he probably would have sunk through his chair and through the floor in embarrassment. Well. He already sort of was sunk into his chair in mortification, but the fact that no one was around to witness it was a relief.

With statements actually dealing with the possible paranormal, Jon often got wrapped up, invested, like he was experiencing the statement firsthand. That wasn’t the case here. He didn’t feel claws on his torso or fangs on his neck. He did feel his ribs tingling in anticipation of such sensations. Part of him was glad that he hadn’t felt those things the way statements usually made him feel things, since he knew the noise he’d make would only garner more teasing. The other part was irritated knowing that he soon would feel all those sensations, but that he’d have to wait for them. Damn, Martin.

It took nearly a quarter of an hour for Jon to convince his face to cool down, flustered beyond belief had the unorthodox love note his partner had tricked him into reading. He couldn’t bear the thought of leaving his office to confront him about it, knowing that Martin would be all pleased hums and sunny grins about it. But then, the thought of not seeing that grin for the rest of the day, if he could even manage to hunker down away from anyone else for that long, was also sort of killing him. Maybe he could be quick, have a chat with Martin and be back before anyone saw the state the statement had left Jon in, indignant and stupidly eager for the emergence of a tickle monster after dinner.

Holding the affronting statement gingerly between his fingers as though it could bite him, Jon ducked his head and hastened from the office and down the hall. The workroom’s door was open, and, when he stepped through, Jon was met with expectant gazes and stifled smiles, the most prominent one upon the freckled cheeks of his villainous partner.

“Alright, boss?” said Tim, elbowing Sasha in the side when she started snickering beside him.

Jon shot both of them a glare in answer and beelined toward Martin, holding the statement out to him. Calmly, he inquired, “What the fuck is the meaning of this?” He remained calm even as his ears went hot at the sound of poorly hidden laughter from different desks.

“Sounds like he didn’t like it, then,” said Basira, shaking her head with a stage whisper. “Poor taste; I thought it was good.”

“At least, it couldn’t have been technically bad,” Daisy replied. “It did have four editors.”

Tim agreed, “Very good editors, at that.”

During the little sidebar, Jon took slower breaths. It had just been a joke, and only Martin—who was still smiling at him with a mischievous sparkle in his eyes—could tease him for the contents of the fake statement, where the others were surely only going to tease him for having believed it was real at all. His heart took a brief sprint at the thought of his friends and coworkers teasing him the way Martin would, by prodding, figuratively and literally, at the soft spots in his armor to prompt a smile or win an argument, and to take note of how, flustered as it made him, Jon didn’t mind it. “Yes, well,” said the archivist, snatching his hand back the moment Martin relieved him of the statement. “A very good prank.” He cleared his throat in what he hoped sounded like a scoff. “Might have slipped by that you wasted my time with a fake statement if you hadn’t used an anagram of my name in the header.”

Melanie looked up from her laptop, eyebrows raised and mouth elevated into a smirk. “If you caught it at the header, why’d you read the whole thing?”

Jon whipped his head to glare at her and reply, but he found his mouth open uselessly with no good answer. He’d read it because he hadn’t noticed that the statement was addressed to him until he’d already finished it, and, by the time he caught on, he’d wanted to finish it. Not compelled, just wanted. “It was very unprofessional. Don’t do it again,” said Jon with a sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose in an excuse to not meet anyone else’s eyes. “I think I’ll make some tea.”

The glimmer of hope that was an escape was snatched away—by Martin, no less—when he stood. “I’ll do it, Jon. As an apology for—” He sidled past Jon, brushing a hand casually but precariously along the back of his ribs along the way. “—wasting your time.” Jon tried not to stiffen or melt when Martin touched him, crossing his arms because he had no idea what else to do with them as Martin left the workroom, glancing over his shoulder with a smile. Jon was about to follow, only to be stopped by yet another question.

“Boss? Did Martin have it right in the statement?” Tim asked, grinning crookedly as he leaned back in his seat, fingers steepled. “Ribs is the worst spot? Thought it was always your armpits that got you to ‘screaming’ territory.”

Melanie shook her head. “And Sasha told me stomach.”

Jon wished he had enough eyes to glare at everyone in the room.

“Perhaps,” suggested Sasha brightly, “we need to record a collaborative statement to get our information straight.”

“You should feel lucky!” Daisy called as Jon power-walked out of the room fast enough to leave a cartoon dust cloud in his wake. “We agreed a statement tickling you stupid wasn’t too mean. They shot down my idea of trapping you in a haunted dunk tank!”

Martin already had the kettle on by the time Jon cornered him in the lounge, wrapping his arms around Martin’s waist and burying his face in the taller man’s shirt. He felt the soft rumble of Martin’s chuckle through his back.

“What kind of tea, darling?” Martin asked.

Jon lifted his head and stood on his toes to hook his chin over Martin’s shoulder. “I’m going to end you.”

“Mm-hm,” replied Martin, unperturbed as he selected a box at random from the communal tea/drinks cupboard and setting it by the stove.

“Seriously,” Jon said, remarkably amiable to Martin turning around and returning the squeeze. Even as Martin leaned in to brush the tip of his nose against Jon’s affectionately, Jon threatened, “Pin you to the bed and feather your ears until your head is spinning.”

Martin only smiled, pressing a kiss to Jon’s forehead. “Sounds lovely. After the plans we already have for tonight, though, alright?”

“We?”

“You read the itinerary,” Martin grinned. “Any notes?”

Feeling his face catch fire again and a stubborn smile begin to grow in the wake of Martin continuing to plant kissing on his forehead, Jon let his head fall, burying it in Martin’s chest this time. He shook his head.

“Perfect. Then, if you still feel the need for revenge after that, if you feel anything but happy and content, my ears are all yours.”

“Good,” Jon replied, tempted to spend the rest of the afternoon right there against Martin’s chest until evening could come and he could be pinned beneath Martin’s hands and monstrously beautiful smile.

[yellowocaballero]

Opening Line Tag Game

Rules: List the first lines of your last 20 stories (if you have less than 20, just list them all!). See if there are any patterns. Choose your favorite opening line. Then tag 10 of your favorite authors!

Tagged by @actualbird, who did not mean to bait me with the opportunity of director’s cut, but he absolutely did. I’ll just go through my last 15, which are all  for The Magnus Archives. 

Opening Lines: 

1. Most people who were unlucky enough to meet Jonathan Sims assumed he had no friends. This was true, up to a point two months after Jon became a researcher at the Magnus Institute: afterwards Jon had no friends, except for Sasha James. (Fahrenheit 101)

2. Jon had one final dream, then. (Hope, Etc. (Dickenson et al.))

3. It was a perfect day for his wife’s funeral. (Sucker’s Bet)

4. Monday morning, two hours into their brainstorming session into how to rescue Daisy from administrative labor, the Archives received a package. (Solitaire, part 3 of Roleswap AU)

5. The act of object reacquisition was a subtle and refined technique. (The Crow’s Funeral)

6. Jon was reasonably sure that his History teacher was a time traveller. (The Monster at the End of This Book)

7. “I don’t care what Elias says,” Melanie said, watching Basira uncap her dry erase marker with a vengeance, “we aren’t letting that pig Stoker into the polycule.” (Minesweeper, part 2 of the Roleswap AU)

8. In Melanie’s defense, she wouldn’t have had to do it if working at the Magnus Institute wasn’t so freaking boring. (Space Cadet, part 1 of Roleswap AU)

9. “Our boss is an immortal psychic vampire and I can prove it,” Tim told Sasha two weeks after the worm incident, barging inside her office after hours. (Human Relations)

10. If asked, Martin would say that he became the shadow director of the Magnus Institute by accident. (Feste)

11.  Martin dreamed that night of opening the door to the Archives and walking down slimy cement steps, stopping in front of a wood oak door. (Martin and the Dream Boy)

12. [My Chemical Romance lyric but I’m not counting that] Ah, Jon thought, unlocking the door to his house. Just what any thirty three year old man loves to hear upon returning home from a long day at work: the sweet, dulcet sounds of My Chemical Romance peeling the paint off the walls. (No Sin But Ignorance)

13. Jon was reading out sections of Georgie’s battered copy of Encyclopedia on Ghosts out loud just to bask in the sound of his own voice when he heard a knock on the door, quickly followed by a choked scream, and a thump. (Bell, Book, and Candle)

14. Daisy woke up to Jon standing over her with a knife.  (Attempted Assasinations)

15.  Jon woke up at 5:45 AM Monday morning with what, at the time, he assumed to be a head splitting hangover, despite the fact that he was not a known heavy drinker and could not recall partaking last night. (theatre of the absurd)

Thoughts: 

If you want advice on writing opening lines, Zak “Actual Writing Major” Bird gave good advice. I find writing opening lines to be really similar to writing summaries, and you kind of have to play the same game with all of them.

I’m going to agree with basically everything he said, as I do the same thing - especially with the orientation, and then the cliffhanger. As Zak said, opening lines especially have to play many different roles. I tend to apply that ‘triple time’ rule to scenes, because I want every scene to play a plot/thematic/suspenseful/character-building role, but if you’re a better writer you can get it down to the lines. Here’s what I was typically trying to do with my opening lines:

1. Orient you in space and time. Where in the canon am I? Who is the point of view character? What’s going to be the problem we’re facing? This is doubly important because I tend to pretty much exclusively write AUs, so the first thing I want to establish is that it’s an AU. The BBC line establishes that Jon’s living at Georgie’s place pre-S3, and that something exciting’s about to happen that didn’t happen in canon. The NSBI opening line establishes that Jon is...living a happy domestic life, presumably with a teenager?. In Space Cadet, you get that this is when Melanie’s working at the Institute but...it’s boring? What’s going on?

(For a non-fanfic story, this kind of orientation would establish setting and character.  I also tend to do that, but it’s more important in fic that you’re grounded in where we are)

2. Establish that SOMETHING WEIRD IS HAPPENING??? My stories have a lot of ‘weird’ factor, or so I’m told, and I want the opening line to establish that. I often pull that ‘what the fuck is going on’ further into the story into the entire first scene, so I’m always hitting the ground running and waiting for the reader to catch up. Why is Jon standing over Daisy with a knife? What do you mean Martin’s the shadow director of the Institute? What does arson have to do with anything?! It’s a cliffhanger, and you’re already presented with this ‘question’ in the first line of the story. Evilcon’s a good example of a line that does 1 + 2: you understand immediately that this story is about Jon, who is probably a child in school, and that he’s having a very canon non-typical encounter with the supernatural. Same with Sucker’s Bet - the opening line brings up so many questions: we understand that we’re at a graveyard and probably not in canon, but Jon has a wife? His wife is dead? Why would it be a perfect day for a funeral?

3. Set tone. You can pretty much tell instantly from these lines which are comedy and which are not. The (relatively) serious ones start out with some kind of action or engagement - Martin’s walking down stairs, Jon’s waking up with a hangover, Jon’s standing over Daisy with a knife. In contrast, the more comedic ones kick off with a joke, some dialogue, or a relatively whacky moment. Crow’s Funeral is more thoughtful and atmospheric. My style of comedy is very machine gun and incessant, so when the story starts off with a joke and just doesn’t stop, then you know what you’re getting into. 

4. Just punchy. Don’t get too long, or too fancy, but make it sound good. I do typically try to get them to stand on their own in an interesting way. Maybe only half of them have particularly snazzy opening lines (which tend to get used in the synopsis), but typically I either open up the document with a snazzy line or a snazzy scene in my head. A lot of the time that’s all I got. 

Actually, I’d say that it’s super similar to writing synopses. A lot of these rules also apply to first scenes. I do remember a writing teacher when I was 20 telling me about a bunch of rules for opening lines but I don’t remember them. As usual I’m vibe based. Anyway, uh...Hannah get your butt over here I know you like talking about this too @lazuliquetzal.

[artxyra]

What if Damian and the miraculous class are friends and they have movie nights, but since Damian is in Gotham he sneaks out of the manor and portal via Max & Kalki to participate. The Fam get suspicious and try to figure out where Damian is going every week. When they find out he goes to Paris they try to follow him but the portal closes and they use the tubes instead. They end up crashing in on them watching a horror movie which freaks the class out. Insert yelling and things being thrown.

To: Demon From: Angel

Are we still on for movie night?

To: Angel From: Demon

Yes. Just need to get away from the family.

To: Demon From: Angel

😀

Marinette looks over smiling from her phone. Today is a good day. There were no akuma that needed Ladybug’s attention, nor had she broken up a fight between Max and Kim about the latest game. So yes, she was ecstatic to know this is how her day is going.

“Hey Mars, is Damian coming tonight?” Adrien asks seating next to her playing with a strand of his hair. Ever since he came out to her, their relationship has blossomed beyond a crush to a blooming brother-sister relationship. That and Luka were more than willing to take on the blonde without a second thought. She kind of feels bad for Juleka having to see Adrien on a near-daily basis and with her brother no doubt.

“Yup,” Marinette continues to smile, “I just received word that he’s good to go. All we need is for Kaalki and Max to open up a portal at the designated time.”

“Sweet, I hear that Kim was the one picking out this week’s movie. I hope it’s nothing horror-related.” Adrien pouts causing Marinette to laugh that the poor kitty’s face.

“I’m sure it’s nothing too crazy.” Marinette hopes that it was something simple to follow and an action pack rather than horror. She may love horror games but kwami be damn if she watches a horror movie in the dark that wasn’t comedic.

“It looks like break is almost over, we’ll continue you this later.” Adrien sends Marinette a comforting smile before jumping down into his assigned seat next to Nino. Alya and Nino just walked in holding hands.

“Hey, lovebirds, who’s ready for a night full of fun?” Alya greets the two causing them to roll their eyes at the nickname that no longer pertains to them.

“Hey Als, I should be asking you that instead.” Marinette lifts an eyebrow that accompanies her smirk. Nino and Alya’s faces turn red and they side glance each other. Marinette and Adrien laugh at the couple.

“After class, I’ll be giving a quick speech regarding tonight’s plans,” Marinette states pulling out her classwork and books for class. They all nod in understanding. Just then the rest of the class filed in with matching smiles and asking pertaining to tonight’s activities.

To: Angel From: Demon

Save me from the idiots that I call my brothers?

To: Demon From: Angel

Can’t love, I’m sure it not that bad.

To: Angel From: Demon

For some idiotic reason, they are watching me like a hawk today. I’m currently in the bathroom with the doors locked listening to them bicker outside.

To: Demon From: Angel

Yikes 😬. I’m sure it will die down before you’re required to leave.

To: Angel From: Demon

I doubt that.

To: Demon From: Angel

About that, why did we move our weekly movie night from Saturday to Friday?

To: Angel From: Demon

It’s a half-day at school.

Shit. Talk to you later.

Marinette places her phone down and slowly turns her attention to Mme. Bustier. The red-haired teacher tried to keep her students engaged with the content, but she was losing them faster than on average. Marinette turns to her classmates. Alix and Kim were trying to out strength each other, Juleka and Rose was trying to pay attention but the drooping in Rose’s eyes say otherwise, Sabrina and Chloe—well doing what they usually do—living in their own bubble, Nathaniel was sketching something down in his notebook while Max was pretending to take notes as Markov does it for him. Finally, Mylene and Ivan were also in their own world.

Hours seemed to past in Marinette’s mind before Mme. Bustier concluded today’s lesson. She was so caught up in watching the time that she didn’t realize that was sketching an outfit in her own notebook. Whoops.

“Marinette is there something you would like to add?” Mme. Bustier prompts sending the class’s designated designer a smile.

“Yes,” Marinette gets up from her seat and walks down to the podium. “Tonight is our weekly movie night instead of tomorrow. Do you remember what to bring? If not, please message me before the event. Remember that we are having this event at Chloe’s family’s hotel as it a makeshift theatre room.”

“Daddy says we can have the popcorn maker also.” Chloe interrupts. The class cheers at the thought of the infamous popcorn maker that was usually locked behind the hotel kitchen doors.

“Thank you, Bee, for that tidbit. Now, Max, you are to arrive at the bakery no later than six o’clock. The demon is having a half-day today and I’m ninety-nine percent sure that he’ll want to be here no later than that. Everyone else, you are free to do.” With that and a pretend gavel, Marinette dismisses the class to their next class for the day. 

For Damian, being at school felt like a blessing even if it was a half-day. His brothers have been hounding him all morning. It’s like they are looking for something that isn’t there. Damian’s emotions? Yeah right, they all know he only shows emotions to his beloved animals or animals in general. Damian had to double, triple check the security on his phones because who knows what Drake would find if he had access inside it.

For over six months, he had been going to Paris for movie nights with his beloved and her classmates. At first, he had done it through the zeta tubes but after gaining their trust just enough to be in on the Miraculous Team of Paris, his trips became a lot more frequent. He would make up an excuse about going to a classmate, or Jon’s, house for the night, or to work on a school project. He had gotten away with it for a while, but Tim was the first to notice the lie.

Tim and Conner were having their usually meet up when the Damian had told his family that he was spending time at Jon’s, something that was no unusual. All was fine and dandy until Jon came home with a Damian Wayne. Tim, well it was mainly Dick, had grilled into the young hero about Damian’s whereabouts. Jon either lied or literally had no idea. Which prompted the Batbros to start the search on Damian's weekly disappearance.

Everyone took the day off to “spend time” with Damian. They wanted to trap the teen inside the manor and watch his every movement. Like that isn’t an invasion of privacy or trust.

Alfred brought Damian to the manor around noon. This gives them enough time to hide any open-source of weaponry they could find or items that Damian could use against them in battle. That was a lot of items on the list. Dick inquired for Bruce to hold off on the tracking device as a last resort. He wanted to start everything out with a discussion, but Jason laughs that idea out the window as he cleans his guns.

“The young master is residing in his bedroom,” Alfred speaks walking down into the Batcave.

The Wayne family knew this was it.

To: Angel From: Demon

I’m ready.

To: Demon From: Angel

ETA in 5

Damian smirks at his phone. He loves his girlfriend and how quickly she can manage an entire group of classmates and plan a weekly movie night event.

He had packed his belonging that he usually brings with him when he does to Paris. Which isn’t much.

Four minutes.

Damian thought his ears were playing tricks on him, but they weren’t. He could hear the stampede of footsteps that were no doubt from his family members aside from Alfred. Alfred’s footsteps are like a ghost, you never hear them.

Three minutes.

“Hey little D, since you had a half-day today, why don’t you spend it with us,” Grayson asks the second his bedroom door swings open. Alfred the cat sends a glare to his owner’s family.

“Yeah, Demon spawn, we all took the day off to spend time with you,” Jason adds gas to the fire that was already burning intensely.

“Damian…” Not his father too.

Two minutes.

Damian doesn’t say a word. His eyes bounce from one person to the next and repeat. He didn’t know who to answer them. “Tt.” Was the only word? Sound? That had escaped his lips.

“You need to leave like now.” Damian refuses to have his family find out the very secret he had kept hidden for so long. His quick need for them leaving only pushes them to stay. Worried about various reasons from teen problems to joining the League of Assassins again. They didn’t want to take any chances.

One minute.

Damian could sense the user of the horse kwami becoming active. Soon a blue swirling portal opens up behind Damian. Damian looks at his family and side glances at the portal. The portal wins. The family of vigilantes runs to the portal only for it to close.

“Am I hallucinating or did that just happen?” Tim asks wiping the sleep away from his eyes.

“No, replacement, that really just happened.” Jason states. Tim nods in understanding.

“I’ll do track him down.” Dick sulks at the thought that Bruce was right.

It didn’t take long for the results to come in.

“Uh…so how the hell is the Demon in Paris, France of all places?” Jason shouts from behind his older brother and Bruce.

“The swirling portal thingy?” Tim states the obvious, but it sounded more like a question as he sits down and drinks a cup of coffee.

“Boys we’re going to Paris.”  Bruce states over his sons. From afar, Alfred sighs and goes to prepare the zeta tubes with the destination in mind.

“Uh, civvies or uniform?” Dick asks as they all start to make their way to the zeta tube. This was one of those questions that they linger on for a hot minute.

Before they knew it, Damian had gained an hour over his family.

“It doesn’t matter, we need to know where the little demon has been hiding all this time.” Jason screeches talking over to the zeta tube and teleporting to the location.

Bruce turns to the remainder of his sons who shrugged and follow suit.

Entering Paris, they were further from Damian’s location than anticipated. They follow the tracker with some interruptions. Dick wanted to buy something for Kori, Jason wanted food and Tim needed for coffee. After all that was done, they officially made it to the supposed location of Damian’s whereabouts.

“Why would the little demon at a hotel?”

“Hum, this coffee is really good,” Tim says before taking another sip.

“Boys, focus on the mission.”

“I am focus, Bruce.”

“I didn’t say you were, Dick.”

“Touché.” Dick rubs the back of his arm.  

They enter Le Grand Paris with tensions high and were surprised by how calm and relax the employees were. Jason swears this was just a hoax and they were torturing Damian behind one of these doors. An employee asks them if they are in need of anything. Bruce states that they were looking for his son.

“Is he friends with Chloe and her classmates?” The employee asks.

“Who?” Dick and Bruce ask simultaneously. Jason had dragged Tim off somewhere to look at some things.

The employee eyes the family skeptically.

“Well if he’s not friends with Mlle. Bourgeois, then I suggest heading to the police department and report a missing child.” The employee states before walking away. Bruce sighs and pulls out the tracking device. Damian is so close to them.

“We’re going to find him, right?”

“And drag the brat back to Gotham?”

Bruce in the direction that would be location, he gestures for his children to follow.

Damian was having a blast. In his arms, Marinette sat on his arm clinging to his shirt cursing Kim’s name throughout the film. Kim had chosen a horror movie for tonight’s showing and by kwami it was fantastic. There was no comedic relief, actual horror storytelling leaving the class on the edge of their seats.

Adrien was curled next to Marinette in Luka’s arms. He was also clinging to a body, a certain musician as if he was a frightened kitten.

Just as the MC was about to open the door to the attic, a series of figures jump from the ceiling. Screams in real-life match those within the movie. Popcorn, empty cartons of candy, soda drinks are thrown at the figures. A string of curses follows not long after that.

“Damian, tell your friends to stop.” He knows that voice from anywhere, it was Grayson’s voice. Marinette slides herself off himself.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” He screeches in English. Most of the class didn’t have a clue what was being said.

“We wanted to see where you were?”

“We thought you were kidnapped?”

“I just came for the scenery.”

Damian’s eyes twitch.

“That’s nice and all, but can you move? We’re trying to watch a movie here and you’re ruining it.” Chloe stands up demanding the bat-family to move. They all look to one another before subtly moving away from the screen.

Damian places a quick kiss on Marinette’s cheek and guides his family out of the room. He was not happy that they came in ruining his night with Marinette. Now he has to make up for it with something romantic, not that he’ll do it anyway.

“What made you believe that I was kidnapped?” He asks, the second they were out of the room.

“The portal thingy.”

“You not answering any of our questions.”

Damian breathes through his nose. “You’re all idiots.”

“Well movie night is a bust, but we all agree to stay here to continue rather than going home.” Marinette walks into the hall after a moment of them talking—well it was more of a screaming match between Bruce and Damian with some input from Dick. “Will your family be fine without you for a couple more hours?”

“Habibti, these dunces are my family,” Damian states gesturing to his family,

Marinette nods, “Well then, hello, and can we keep Damian for the night?”

Damian walks over to Marinette and wraps his arms around her. “I’ll return from before it’s nightfall in Gotham, father.”

“Uh, sure. Boys lets go.” Bruce accepts the came and walks down the hall. Before either of the brothers could pester Damian about this newfound relationship, Bruce gave them all the bat-glare and demanded that they follow.

“You know you’re going to get pestered, right.” Marinette laughs.

“Don’t remind me.”

“Come on, we have a movie to finish.”

With that, Damian takes Marinette’s hand and walks back into the room.  

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[peppersonironi]

Pepperrrr give me all you've got on Talia al Ghul for headcanons 👀 p pls

Oh YES! YES YES YES! Talia is awesome! I'd love to give you some headcanons!

Note: Talia is a great mom. It's canon in the only canon that matters: DCeased.

First Off: I headcanon her as Bisexual. Do I have a reason? No, not really.

That being said! I once saw a post about Talia and Selina hooking up once, and then give each other looks every time they already other afterwards much to Bruce's confusion, which I love!

I also adore the idea of those two flirting up a storm whenever Bruce is nearby. Mostly to mess with him. (Kind of like how I headcanon Kate and Selina doing the same thing, if you've ever read my fic All Hands On Deck)

I also just think those two would be great friends with benefits

She'll sometimes randomly show up at the Manor and kidnap Damian for a day of mother-son bonding! The first time it happened, the bats freaked out so much until they saw Damian arriving at home safely with take out containers from a middle eastern restaurant and the smallest smile on his face.

She also likes to send gifts. They appear in random places, but everyone always knows it's from Talia. They started off for just Damian, but then she left something for Jason. And that became normal. Then she started to leave jewels for the the girls because "Bruce give them enough shiny things, honestly." Then one time there was an arrangement of specialty read for Alfred.

When Damian was younger, Talia would sneak into his room and sing lullabies to him. To sooth his wounds that he'd received that day, or comfort him after nightmares. It just to spend a few minutes alone with him. Minutes just between them. For no one else.

She's also the reason Damian got sent to his father so young. She came up with a believable reason for Ra's, then subtly worked to get her son there.

She gives literally anyone who gets remotely close to Damian a shovel talk. She recognises how his upbringing - much to her dismay - as made him emotionally vulnerable. This ranges from Bruce and Dick in the beginning when she made sure they’d keep them safe, to Damian’s other siblings when they began to warm up to him. She told Tim that Damian was worth it if he truly wanted to repair their relationship (this was later on, when Tim really wanted to). Then you have Damian’s friends. Jon was confused, but assured her that he wouldn’t hurt Damian. Maps thought it was so freaking cool she was meeting a genuine assassin (Talia was so close to adopting her).

Because of her similar, and close upbringing with Damian, Talia sees Mara as her own daughter. 

She can’t be as outward showing in her affection than with Damian (If her restraining herself for Ra’s can count as showing affection), but she helps the girl in small ways. Little gifts of extra food, salves and bandages. 

And she eventually finds a way to get Mara out of the League as well. (Is this linked to a fic I may or may not be writing? Who knows.) 

[unmaskedagain]

Five boys the Batfamily scared off (And the one boy who helped Marinette get revenge on them all)

This is actually based off a prompt/ask I got by #vixen-Uchiha

Okay, believe it or not, I’ve in history of all my days writing fanfiction (I just turned 27 and have been writing since I was sixteen); I started when Twilight was still at the height of its popularity. (All that work has been deleted, burned, and doused with holy water; don’t ask questions) But even with almost a decade of writing fanfiction, I never even considered approaching this fanfiction classic.

Until now.

Wish me luck. And don’t judge me too harshly.

Note this was also inspired by a poem I loved called To the Boys Who May One Day Date My Daughter by Jesse Parent

 Marinette always knew Tom was her step-father. Sabine and he married when she was three after all. And while she considered the great cuddly bear to be her dad, she still had a great relationship with her actual father: Bruce Wayne. And all her brothers and Sister.  She spent every summer with them and every other Christmas in Gotham. She loved her family. She just wished they take a chill pill.

And stop scaring away her freaking boyfriends.

Lê Chiến Kim: The Boy who swears Marinette’s related to the Boogieman

           If anyone asked Marinette now if she would ever date Kim, she’d have died of laughter. Kim was like a goofy cousin. They were great friends. Their moms were best friends. She just didn’t see him like that.

           However, it wouldn’t have been so funny to six-year-old Marinette who ran from school with a Daisy in her hair and a big smile her face.

“Daddy, Daddy,” She’d squeal to her Papa later that day. She barely noticed he was still wearing bat uniform, except the mask. Or all her brothers were with him.

“Hey Sunshine,” Bruce smiled lovingly at his youngest daughter. “You have a good day at school.”

“Give ‘em hell, firecracker,” Jason called from the background.

           Tim and Dick laughed. Bruce just shook his head amused.

“I got a boyfriend!”    

           Silence.

           That day would forever be known as the day all the smiles died. Seven-year-old Damian just blinked in confusion. He didn’t know what had happened but he knew it was bad. And that it involved his sister. Was she in danger? Did she need help?

           Before Bruce could process or respond to his precious, baby girl, who was way too young to date (And what the hell was Sabine thinking?). Dick literally pushed him out of his chair like it was nothing. “What’s his name? Who are his parents? Where does he live? And where can I find him right now?”

           Marinette, being too young didn’t notice the threat in her eldest brother’s voice and the look of murder in his eyes, had no problem telling Dick all about her best friend Kim, who was super nice, and gave her a Daisy, and kissed her cheek.

           When the call ended, Bruce brought up the picture of the boy in question. A nice-enough looking boy to most, but he knew the truth. He knew the evil in his heart.

I have been waiting for you, Bruce thought, not just to Kim but to all the boys who would day date his daughter, since before she was even born. Before you took your first steps, I was preparing to make it so you’d never walk again.

           However, Kim was still just a child. He needed a kinder touch. He looked back at his children: Dick, Jason, Cassandra, Tim, and Damian, and made his choice.

           When Dick showed up to walk her to the school the next day, Marinette didn’t think to question how her brother got from Gotham to Paris so quick. (Cough, misuse of Zeta beam). Or why he was dressed in all black with a scary biker jacket on. She just shrugged and let him help her tie her shoes and carry her bright pink, hello kitty, and backpack.

           He held her hand the entire way to school, where Kim and his dad were waiting by the doors. Kim had another daisy in his hand that he gave to Marinette.

“This is Dick,” Marinette introduced her brother. “My biggest brother. This is Kim, my boyfriend,” Kim preened. “Look, Dick, Kim got me another daisy.”

           Dick beamed at his sweet little sister, “I see. Hey! Isn’t that you’re friend Rose? Why don’t you go show her?”

“Okay!” And she ran off.

           As soon as she was gone, Dick’s smile quickly disappeared and he glared at the little Casanova, and his father, who felt like someone had just walked over his grave.

“My sister is a little young for a serious boyfriend,” Dick hissed. “Don’t you think? Don’t want her to grow up too fast, right?” The two could only nod in fear. “Good. Don’t hurt her. Don’t make her cry. Because I’d hate to have to have another talk with you, Chiến. It might not go as… nicely.” And with that, he left to go find his sister, leaving two terrified people in in wake.

           That conversation would be the reason Kim broke up with Marinette over recess but to the girl’s dismay and why the boy wouldn’t allowed to date for another ten years.

           Looking back Kim would swear darkness and shadows started to fill the schoolyard. That Marinette’s older brother’s voice got deeper and his eyes turned completely black. He had been a living nightmare, one that would haunt his dreams for years.

Marinette wouldn’t get another boyfriend for years.

 Chat Noir aka Adrien Agreste; The Boy who just didn’t want to Get Neutered

           Marinette never considered Adrien or Chat Noir her boyfriend. He had been her best friend, her partner, and for a long time, her crush. However, before Marinette found out who was behind the mask, and he earned the title of her best friend in the whole world.

Chat Noir had the title of Guy who can’t take a hint.

           They had been just thirteen at the time. Chat had been spending for more and more time flirting with Ladybug and joking around then actually taking the fight seriously. And when he wouldn’t get the response he wanted from his Lady, he’d pout or throw a tantrum and storm off. It had been getting to be a real hassle. And as much as she liked Chat, she had been seriously considering Master Fu’s offer of getting her a permanent partner to replace him.

           Then one day if all change. All the silly behavior, most of it anyway, and the constant flirting all stopped and never started back up. It would take Marinette months to find out why.

           Unbeknownst to Marinette, her Papa, Bruce had been keeping a watchful eye on the deteriorating situation. The flirting, his daughter’s frustration, the lack of care. It had to be stopped. Chat Noir had a few lessons to learn.

           Bruce glared harshly at the image of the cat-themed Superhero. He was proving to be a useless partner for Ladybug. And a prime example for a sexual harassment claim. “You’re sure you can handle this,” He asked son.

           Damian scoffed, “I will teach that alley cat the true meaning of fear.”

“Go.”

           When his son was gone and Bruce was once again alone in the Batcave, he smirked darkly at Chat Noir and all other boys who would come and go. “When you were still playing war in the school yard, I was perfecting headshots. You can’t catch up at this point.”

           One night, after a particularly hazardous fight with an Akuma, Chat Noir had been running home when suddenly everything went dark.

           He woke up, tied upside down, and gagged. For a few moments he thought Hawkmoth had finally gotten, wondered if this was the end.

           When a sword pressed against his throat, and a chilling voice whispered in his ear, “Care to find out just how many lives you really have, fleabag?”

           At the moment, Chat Noir no longer wondered if it was the end. He knew it was.

           A boy, Robin, he realized glared fiercely at him.

“I should kill you,” Robin sneered. “I should rip you limb from limb and leave your head mounted on a spike to show the next fool who thought he was worthy of my sister’s hand. Ladybug is too good for the likes of scum like you.”

           Chat Noir gulped. Sister? Ladybug was Robin’s sister. Adrien’s eyes widened, that meant Ladybug was Batman daughter. He was going to die. He was just going to disappear and his father, or most likely Nathalie, wouldn’t even notice until he failed to show up for his next appointment.

Gorilla would notice though, Adrien thought, he’d miss me.

           Robin pressed the tip of the sword to Adrien’s face until blood was drawn. “You will cease your incessant flirting with my sister. You will train harder for your battles. And you never, ever, leave Ladybug to fight alone again. Am I clear?”

           Adrien nodded his head earnestly. He’d never flirt with anyone again, he swore. He wouldn’t even celebrate Valentine’s Day. Or anything.

“And if for some miracle,” Robin hissed, “My sister deems you suitable to date, you will treat her will respect. You will never touch her without permission. And if you hurt her, Consider my genes a mark of Cain; you will suffer seven times whatever you do to her.”

           Chat Noir whimpered.

           A smoke bomb later. Chat Noir’s bonds were released and Robin was gone.

           It took a long time for him to stop shaking.

           He never flirted with Ladybug again. He worked harder and became the partner she deserved.

           And when Adrien discovered Marinette was behind Ladybug’s mask, he only managed to stumble a little.

           However, when Marinette told him that her brothers was coming for a visit; she couldn’t understand why he paled and stuttered out excuses for photoshoot he never mentioned before in far, far away countries. That same day, Adrien had his father taken them to Australia for vacation under the threat of Adrien dying his hair pink. He wouldn’t return for a month.

Jon Kent: The Boy who, in retrospect, really should’ve known better.

           Marinette’s first real boyfriend was the son of her father’s best friend, Clark Kent, otherwise known as Superman.  She had been only fourteen and it had been a summer romance while she stayed in Gotham. She had thought Jon was perfect; handsome, kind, funny…

           Invulnerable to most weapons and had amazing healing factor.

           Plus it’s not like her papa would kill the son of his best friend, right?

           Right.

           It had all been going great… until it wasn’t.

“I welcome you in my home,” Bruce hissed at the picture of Jon Kent on the bat computer. “I trained you. I trusted you. And you betrayed me.”

“Let me speak with him, father,” Damian demanded. “He is my friend. He will listen to me.”

           Bruce shook his head, “That’s why I can’t send you. You’re too close to the situation. He snuck past all our defense. Now I have no choice but to do same. J?”

           The Asian girl smirked, “Little Superboy will know dread.”

           Jon had been visiting the fortress of Solitude when… it happened.

           Before that day he had never dreamed the place would be anything less than safe, anything other than secure.

           His dad had just flown off to help someone in Brazil. Jon waited patiently for him to come back while he dreamed of his beautiful new girlfriend. Marinette was amazing, perfect, and the nicest, sweetest girl ever.

           When suddenly he felt a tickle in his throat, and he tried his best to clear it but it just got worse and worse. Until Jonathan Samuel Kent, Superboy (now that Connor was going as Krypton), fell to his knees as he struggled to breath.

           No matter what he did, the more breaths he took, the worse he felt. It was like his lungs were on fire.

“Do not struggle,” A voice said. Jon looked up see Blackbat, Cassandra, standing above him. How did she get into the fortress? Not only could only a Kryptonian open the doors but only a member of El could be let in. It was impossible. “Struggling makes it worse.”

           Jon coughed, “What?”

“The air,” Cassandra waved her hand around. “It is filled with dust. Green dust of Kryptonite. It has disable you and your powers. It’s concentrated. You will not die. The alerts of the fortress were disabled. No one is coming to help you, villain.”

           Jon shook his head frantically. He wasn’t a villain. He wasn’t a bad guy. This had to be some mistake.

“No, not villain,” Cassandra corrected. “Not yet. A thief who thought he could earn my family’s trust and then steal away our most precious jewel; our princess. And do it without consequences. I am here to teach you better.”

           Superboy flinched at her words.

“You will not pressure my sister,” Cassandra hissed. “You will be the gentleman we believed you to be. If you cheat on her, I will ensure you never have children. If you strike her, I will know. She will not keep your secret. You can’t make fire feel afraid. And I will come for you. Do you understand?”

Jon nodded, fear in clear in his eyes.

“Good.” She leaned forward, right into the young superhero’s face. “Some say you and your father, your cousin Kara, and Connor, are invincible. That you can’t be stopped. That you are gods among us.” She scoffed. “Let me make this, if you break my sisters’ heart, you will learn, boy of steel, that even gods bleed.”

           And then she was gone, and with her all traces of kryptonite. It didn’t stop the chill that filled Jon to the core.

           It was to no one’s surprise when Superman showed up at the Batcave not long after. “Bruce,” Clark asked with his arms out. “What the fuck?”

           Marinette’s relationship soured when suddenly Jon was too scared to hold her hand, her be alone with her, or kiss her. She got the hint that he just wanted to be friends and broke it.

           She found out a year later what really happened.

Luka Couffaine: The Boy who decided he didn’t want to sing his tune yet.

           Luka had been Marinette’s first serious boyfriend. She was sixteen. They had been together for months and were getting to the ‘I love you’ stage.

           He was cool. He was funny. He was a budding Rock star. He had dyed green hair, tattoos and earrings. Luka went onto tour with his band every summer. He was older than Marinette by two years. He had quite a few previous girlfriends. And he hadn’t been scared off by the normal attempts by his other kids.

           In other words, he was Bruce Wayne’s worst nightmare.

           And the nightmare got worse, when for the first time ever, Marinette was bringing a boyfriend home for Christmas. It was all the confirmation he needed that the things were serious.

           It was why he knew he had to send the greatest soldier he had. Luka Couffaine would rue the day he decided it was good idea to ask his princess out. “Are you ready?”

           Tim nodded. “I’ve done my research,” he declared. “I know what makes him to tick. I. Will. Break. Him.”

“Excellent,” He drawled out the word like it he tasting fine wine. Not caring at all that he sounded like a superman.

“You really think he’s a threat, dad?” Tim asked. “Because I can take care of it. I can have him eliminated. Ra's al ghul owes me a favor. It’ll look like an accident,” He promised. “It’ll look like he just… disappeared.”

A sense of pride filled Bruce. Tim was his most capable and resourceful soldier. He would make a great batman. Any of his kids would.

Batman stared the picture of the boy on his phone as he fought the urge to crush it in his hands. “No,” he finally answered. “I’ve known plenty of rock stars and so called bad boys in my day.  Angel’s smart,” he said using Marinette’s codename. “I have been routing out indifference apathy from her life, her childhood was filled with love and affection. There are no daddy issue for his teenage talons to latch upon. Just… make sure he understands who he is dealing with.”

“Understood.” And then call ended.

           He looked up and saw all the other Justice League members staring at him with expressions of awe, fear, and confusion.

“…Marinette’s got a new boyfriend, huh?” Diana asked when the call disconnected. Amusement in her tone, she knew Bruce would never seriously hurt a kid.

“Poor guy,” Barry said with a shake of his head.

           Clark pinched his nose, “You can’t keep scaring guys away from her forever. Eventually, she’s going to find one who isn’t afraid of you.”

“And then she’ll marry him out of spite,” Dinah added.

           There were snorts from the other league members.

“Like that’ll ever happen,” Oliver said with a shake of his head. “That kid would have to be the biggest moron in the universe. I’ll pity his family.”

           Marinette had constantly warned Luka about how overprotective her family was. Luka hadn’t thought much of it. He dealt with overprotective fathers and brothers before. Eventually they grudging begin to like him. Or realize that if they actively hated him, it would just make the girl get attached.

           He was excited for Christmas, excited to prove himself to the girl of his dreams, and impress her by dealing with her entire family. Luka didn’t understand why Adrien looked so afraid when he told him. Or why he asked what type of flowers he liked.

“For the funeral,” Adrien shrugged. “I need to know what to buy.”

           Luka had laughed, thinking the blond was joking. He had already met a two of her brothers; Dick and Damian. They had been growls and threats but nothing he couldn’t handle. But Adrien didn’t laugh. He just shook his head and promised he’d be there for Juleka. Luka thought he was overreacting.

           However, nothing. NOTHING. Could have prepared Luka for the first time he met Tim.

           Luka had been walking home with Kagami, his long-time friend and one-time rival for Marinette’s affection. It was board daylight, there were tons of people around, and then they had made the apparent mistake of walking by an alley, when suddenly they were pulled into the back of a van, hoods thrown over their heads, and their hands bounds.

           He didn’t know how much time had passed. Or where they were being taken. All he saw was darkness. All he felt was fear. Was this how died?

           When the hoods were finally removed, the two teenagers found themselves in what looked to be a deserted warehouse, bound to their chairs, with a teenage boy not much older than they sitting across from them, looking absurdly comfortable given the situation.

My name is Timothy Drake-Wayne. I am Marinette’s older brother,” He said. “Let me make something clear before we begin. The last hour never happened. This conversation never happened. We never met. And if you say otherwise,” Tim’s eyes narrowed.  “No one will believe you. I was just by dozens of witnesses in Mexico with my boyfriend less than two hours ago. But if you do tell anyone, there will be consequences. Do you understand?”

           They nodded not daring to say a word.

“Luka, Luka, Luka.” Tim smiled an eerie grin that should look more at home on the monsters from Horror movies, and not on such a handsome face. “I hear you’ll be visiting us over the holidays. Must be so exciting for you, meeting your girlfriend’s family. Are you excited, Luka?”

           Luka swallowed hard. He never thought he’d hate the way his own name sounded. “I was- I mean I am. I am.”

“Good,” Tim said. “I just wanted to offer you a bit of advice. So you can know to expect. You see it call all be a bit… daunting to newcomers. Some people don’t understand the Wayne family’s unique tastes. Okay?”

           He nodded.

           Tim still smiled. In fact he never lost his smile the entire time. Yet his eyes were empty like there was no real life in them. “When you first come to my home, you will see the bone carving over the doorway. It will be hard, but try not to imagine your own femurs so expertly carved.”

           At this Kagami’s eyes widened. She had done her best to remain calm but somethings were too much.

           Tim smile widened, “There are one or two rooms you will not be allowed in. However, accidents happen and we understand. But we do ask that you pay no attention to our… ample crawl space. Or the smells that can sometime come from it.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Luka stuttered. “Sure, no problem. Man.”

“Try not to go into Father’s playroom,” Tim continued on. “It will be easy to spot. It’s mostly empty, apart from a rubber mat and a drain. He gets so testy when stranger go in there. You’ll hear strange noise from time to time but just ignore them. That is just father… playing.”

           The green-haired boy just stared. Because what the fuck.

“Just follow that advice, and you should be fine,” Tim promised. “Though you are a pretty one.  You both are. And we like pretty ones. Oh the things we do to pretty ones”

Luka whimpered. Kagami felt tears build in her eyes.

           Tim laughed, “Now, now, none of that,” He said channeling his inner Brucie. “We’re not going to hurt. We’d never hurt Marinette’s friends.” He promised. “We would hurt people who hurt Marinette because people who hurt Marinette are not her friends.”

           Red Robin looked over the two, “What I’m trying to say is. Break my sister’s heart, and we will kill you. I will kill you. You won’t see if coming. You won’t know we’re there. And if you’re lucky, you might not even feel it. Clear?” They nodded. “Excellent. Now you’re going to leave the same way you came. Remember not a word.” He smiled got even bigger.

           They felt hands on their shoulders.

“Oh and Kagami,” Tim’s voice rang. “Should romantic feelings spring to life between you and Marinette again, just know our sister Cassandra is much scarier than I. And a much better shot.”

           Then the black hoods and complete darkness came gain.

           When they were finally let go, in the exact same place they had been taken, neither Luka nor Kagami spoke for what seemed like forever. Their minds still wrapping around what had just taken place. However, it was Kagami who finally broke the quiet.

“Well, it appears I dodge a bullet, huh,” She shrugged, her face not betraying the fear she still felt. “Sucks for you. I’m going to go propose to Chloe. I know can I take her mom in a fight. And that she’s not a serial killer.” Kagami then gave him a grave look. “Happy holiday, Luka. I’ll send best flowers to your funeral.” And the she was gone, literally fleeing down the crowded street, leaving Luka alone with his thoughts and sense of his impending doom.

           He broke up with Marinette an hour later.

           It would take weeks before he would willingly be in a room with her again.

Kaldur'ahm: The Boy who regretted ever walking on land.

           Marinette had met her next boyfriend through her brother Tim. Ironic, considering she had just found out what he did to Luka. She had gone in for some extra training with the Black Canary when she spotted him. Kaldur; aqualad. Marinette had never talked too much with him before but found he was a very calm person and level-headed. A good leader, no matter how much Tim complained.

           They had spared together one day. And another. And Another. Then he asked her out. It was sweet… While it lasted. And it didn’t last long.

           Batman had looked at Kaldur’s picture, scoffed, and said, “Jason?”

           The sound of a gun clocking was heard, “Little Mermaids going down.”

           Unlike his brothers, Redhood had no time for mind games. He went for the quickest route.

           Aquaman burst into room where the justice league meeting was, “He shot Kaldur,” He roared to Batman. “The Red Hood shot Aqualad!”

           Bruce didn’t bat an eye, “Is he alive?”

“Yes,” The King of the seas said quickly. “But that’s not point.”

“Seems like it is,” Bruce said and went on with the meeting leaving a stuttering, red-faced Aquaman still standing there.

It was to one’s surprise when Kaldur dumped Marinette and was gone. Disappeared to the safety of Atlantis. And when he came back, Marinette was barred from Young Justice Headquarters.

It was on that day, that Marinette Dupain-Cheng-Wayne decided enough was enough.

 Roy Harper-Queen: The Boy who should start making better life choices

           It was weird to say but Marinette met the boy who would turn out to be the love of her life when she was ten-years-old. And then sometime after her eighteenth birthday, she would team up with his clone to go rescue him. They became friends, went on missions together. It was a year later that he asked her out.

           Roy was pissed at the world, ready to die for anything if it meant he’d went fight, had a rude mouth, feared nothing and no one, and didn’t play by anyone’s rule but his own. In other words, he was perfect.

           Marinette just never meant to fall in love. She certainly didn’t expect to say yes when proposed.

           They had been keeping their relationship a secret from both their families for over two years. They were happy together. They loved each other.

           But more importantly, they could plot revenge together.

           And revenge was sweet.

           It all played out during a Justice League meeting. Roy, Red Arrow, and Ladybug had been full members for quite some time. The meeting was just about to close, when Roy stood up, “I have an announcement to make,” He said. “Red Arrow will be withdrawing from missions for the perceivable future. As will Ladybug,” He looked at Marinette who nodded firmly.

“What’s going on, Roy?” Oliver asked his once wayward son, with a frown.

           Batman eyed them suspiciously. As did the other members of the batfamily, all were present. Apart from Alfred because Marinette liked Alfred.

           Wonder Woman frowned, “Are you going solo again, I thought you were happy.”

“We’re fine. We’re very happy,” Roy said slowly before taking a deep breath and doing the bravest thing he ever would in his entire life. “Ladybug’s pregnant and I’m the father.”

           A few seconds passed before the words were processed in the Superheroes mind.

           Bruce’s eyes widened, his mind stopped working, and then a snarl ripped form his throat as he moved to attack. The batkids joining him.

“Alpha Code Angelbug” Flash shouted.

           That was all the other league need to go into defensive positions around Roy, against the batfamily. Marinette remained where she was with glee in her eyes. Superman stood in front of Roy, blocking him from view and potential danger.

           The Flash, Cyborg, Black Canary, Wonder Woman, and the Green Arrow stood in front of them. Oliver aimed at arrow at Batman, “Don’t move!” He yelled. “Don’t you dare move, Bruce. I’ll do it. Roy’s my son. And I won’t let you hurt him.”

           Batman growled, “He. I. My daughter!”

“Get Roy out of here, Superman,” Wonder Woman ordered. “We’ll hold him off but we can’t do it for long.” She stepped towards Bruce. “Marinette’s a grown woman. She makes her own choices.”

           Dick shook his head, anger clear on his face, “Dude, you were my friend.”

           Damian snarled, “Harper’s a sneak and a coward.”

“No honor,” Cassandra agreed.

           Jason just looked at his best friend, “I love you…. But you’re dead.”

           Tim just growled.

“No one’s dead or dying,” Marinette said as got up. “Because I’m not pregnant,” She said loudly, drawing everyone’s attention. She walked to her boyfriend and pulled him out from behind his shield. “But Roy and I have been dating for almost three years. And we’re getting married. You can be happy for us. Or I can never talk to you again.”

           Roy grinned, “Pops,” he said to Oliver, whose face was torn between relief and fury at it was prank. “We thought you and Bruce could be the main wedding planners. With the rest of the Queens and Waynes helping out; you know now that we’re going to be family. ”

           With that the two lovebird left the room, leaving the chaos they had created.

           Silence filled the room as Batman and Green Arrow stared at the other.

           Oliver gulped. He let out a breathy chuckle, “So I think a wedding in Star City would be great. Lots of Lilies. The Queen family loves lilies.”

           Batman’s eyes narrowed, “Gotham, roses.”

           Black Canary crossed her arms, “Star City would be safer.”

“Gotham is far more beautiful,” Tim snapped back.

           And just like that, battle lines were drawn. Justice League members’ face turned weary.

           Whether they knew it or not, that was Marinette and Roy’s last act of revenge.

           Forget Batman vs Superman.

           Try Bruce Wayne versus Oliver Queen: billionaire against billionaire, father against father. Elsewhere, thousands of journalist, photographers, florists, and caterers trembled and they didn’t know why.

[sparkleofpizza]

Being a Kent and dating a batboy - headcanon

Tim Drake

You were Clark’s adoptive daughter, he had decided to take you in after your parents left you behind;

You were Conner and Jon’s little sister;

Very overprotective over you;

You had known Tim for a very long time now, since he was Conner’s best friend and all;

You though he was very cute, not that you would admit it to anyone;

Lois knew - she knew everything, but didn’t say anything to you, letting you tell her yourself when you felt comfortable enough to;

She knew the boys would freak out if they found out, even Clark;

Lex Luthor was planning something big and bad, very bad;

Lois was out of the country for some conference she would be covering for te Daily Planet and they’d be damned if they let anything happen to you, so they did the most logic thing they could think of at the moment: send you away to stay at the Wayne Manor while they sorted things out;

You weren’t a super and although you knew how to fight they couldn’t risk you getting hurt;

 You were offended they thought you couldn’t handle yourself, but knew they were only doing it out of love;

You also wouldn’t pass up the opportunity of spending some quality time with Tim without one of your brother lurking around;

He was over the moon to know you were staying over for a while;

The both of you did everything together;

Stayed up all night working on cases;

Drank a lot of coffee;

Went on little coffee dates, not like you actually called it a date;

Watched movies and lots of tv shows;

Sparred together;

The nights Tim left for patrol were the worse, you would stay up waiting for him to come back, worried out of your mind;

I mean, your brothers and father were fighting a big threat back home, and your crush was risking his neck to save the city, it is impossible not to worry;

So one night you wrapped yourself up in one of his blankets and lied on his bed, waiting for him to return;

Oh, when he saw you so peacefully asleep, he felt like his heart was going to explode, you were just so so so adorable;

He lied down next to you, groaning a bit since he got hurt during patrol;

You sat up, eyes wide open when you heard that sound, turning around and grabbing his face in between your hands;

“Are you hurt?” You asked, way too serious “It’s just a broken rib” He smiled at you, leaning in your touch

To this day you still don’t know what gotten into you, but you pressed your lips against his in a heated kiss, pouring all of your emotions in it;

He obviously kissed you back;

You spend the rest of the night in each others arms, professing their love for one another;

Actually, you started to spend most of your nights like that;

And days too;

You were always in each others embrace;

You were afraid to tell your brothers and father that you and Tim were dating;

You were pretty sure Conner would freak out, you are his little sister and you’re dating his best friend;,

The both of you would sneak out a lot after you went home;

Whenever Tim was around you and your brothers or his brothers were there too, he had to fight back the urge to just wrap his arms around your waist and prep kisses all over your face;

You would sneak off a lot, not really wanting anyone to know about your relationship;

Damian was the first one to find out about you and Tim and surprisingly allowed you to tell the news to everyone when you were ready for it;

Lois knew, of course she knew, you couldn’t just get your first boyfriend who was also a vigilant and your brother’s best friend and just not tell your mother about it;

It was a chaos when everyone found out;

You and Tim were cuddling in the Cave, him working and you sitting on his lap, massaging his scalp and playing with his hair;

Conner yelled and tried to kill your boyfriend the moment he saw it;

Jon tried to kill him too, Clark was just too shocked to say something;

Bruce stood still watching the scene unfold before he tried to break them free;

Jason slid some money to Dick, loosing the bet they had placed on the both of you as Damian shook his head in shame;

The fight had escalated way too quickly;

You were so frustrated you said you would only talk to them when they learned how to behave like proper human beings and not treat you like an object of possession;

Walking alone I’m Gotham at 3 am couldn’t possibly be a good idea, but there you were, on your own only wearing a hood and not even carrying your phone with you;

You ended up with a superficial cut on your side and a bruised hand after kicking 4 thugs asses on your own;

Tim was the first to find you, pulling you into a tight embrace, but panicking once he saw some blood dripping - it was really a small cut, but he carried you to the hospital despite your protests;

Your father and brothers soon learned about where you were, they were kind of shocked that Tim thought you should get medical help when you clearly had a very superficial cut and Alfred could’ve handled it in a blink of an eye; 

That kind of made them start to change their minds about you guys relationship;

Of course it doesn’t mean that Jon and specially Conner didn’t threatened to kill Tim very slowly if he ever hurt you, and that they were always keeping an eye on you;

So secret make out sessions had to become even more secretive and silent, God you hated super hearing;

You once had to stay with your hair down for almost a week because of a hickey Tim left on your neck, and from there on you both agreed that hickeys were only allowed in the body parts that would remain covered in clothing;

Overall, dis-considering your family overprotectiveness, you were just too happy;

Tim made you happy and you loved him.

Damian Wayne

You were Clark’s baby daughter;

Actually just two years younger than Jon, but they still treated you as a baby;

You didn’t really want to take on the mantle of being Supergirl, so you only ever did superhero activity when it was extremely important;

That being said you weren’t a big part of meeting your family vigilantes and superhero acquaintances;

You actually randomly met Damian not knowing he was your brother’s friend - you knew of him, but didn’t remember his face;

He was in Metropolis to visit Jon and they were supposed to meet at an ice cream shop, but he got lost, running into you. You being he nice person you are decided to take him there, and then once you saw your brother, you were really confused until you realized they were friends;

Damian thought you were a bit stupid, he knew who you were and you didn’t recognize him - he was just bitter that you didn’t remember his face;

You took it upon yourself to make up for the fact that you didn’t remember him, you were feeling so guilty over it;

So every time you saw Damian you would brightly smile at him and ask him how he was doing, ask him about his pets - you learned that from Jon - ask him about Robin, but he didn’t seem to want to talk;

You were sure he hated you, and that made you really sad;

You just had a minor huge crush on him;

One day you had a horrible day at school, people were mean, you failed a geometry test and it just straight up sucked to the point that literally anything could make you cry, so when you only muttered a small hello upon seeing Damian he knew something was up, and he was onto it to find out what it was;

Oh boy, once he cornered you and saw your big round sad eyes full of tears and lip quivering from trying not to cry he promised he would break every single bone of whoever had done that to you;

See, he had a crush on you too;

He started tutoring you on geometry, and you actually improved, he was done with school, but was so smart and that made you a bit more attracted to him;

Your mom, Lois, asked you about your feelings towards him, but you just brushed it off, you didn’t confirm nor denied it;

One day during one of your study dates, Damian placed his hand on your thigh, you tried to ignore it, but before you could realized it you were both kissing each other with you being lied on bed with him on top of you;

That became normal and shortly after you two were dating;

Damian wanted to make things right, so he planned a dinner with both his and yours family to announce you two were dating;

Everyone was shocked, Damian was dating? And it was you????

Jon wanted to jump up his neck and kill him, how could he date his little sister? The bro code!

Damian was unfazed and so were you, not letting anyone get in the middle of your relationship;

Clark was a bit weirded out because you were dating Bruce’s son, but he knew he was a good kid so it was ok for him, Conner thought it was odd and gave Damian a threat if he ever hurt you, Lois was over the moon; 

But they were all a bit skepitical about your relationship, everyone thought you wouldn’t last too long;

You were happy everyone took it better than expected, Jon would get there someday too, he couldn’t be mad at you both forever;

Or so you thought;

You and Damian had a date planned? Better think again, Jon is there to ruin it;

You two are making out? Better run fast because Jon is ready to punch Damian;

The truth was that he was feeling left out, Damian is his best friend and he didn’t say anything about liking you, he had to find out when you both got together, and well you’re his sister dating his best friend! It is weird for him! 

Everyone soon found out Damian meant serious business with you, the hardest and most horrible way, but they did;

You were out on the field with everyone, it was one of those times there was a big threat and you had to help out;

You were about the get shot and Damian just jumped in front of you, taking the bullet for you;

“Did you just take a bullet for me?” You yelled, kneeling down and pressing on the wound He smiled weekly at you “Of course, beloved, I couldn’t let you get hurt” You looked skeptically at him “You do realize I’m bulletproof, right?”

Jon was flipping his shit once he saw his best friend, collapsing by his side and apologizing for ever thinking he was just messing around with you, and also stating he was stupid for jumping in front of a bullet;

You stayed with Damian 24/7 during his recovery, doing everything for him and just being extra cuddly and lovely;

Jon stopped bothering you, stating he was 100% on board of you two dating, but the moment he saw you making out, Damian without a shirt and you on his lap, boy... He was traumatized.

[birdy-bat-writes]

Headcanon- Being Tim and Conner’s Civilian Best Friend

Request: Could you do headcanons for what it would be like to be Tim or Conner's civilian best friend?

Yes, of course, lovely Anon! First of all, thanks for the really great request. Second, I have no self-control, and this was an amazing request that got the cogs turning so here I present you with both Tim and Conner plus a thing.

 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tim

-       You and Tim had been buds forever. You frequented the same coffee shops for years and knew of each other’s existence, but you never actually spoke until he was in your middle school class at Gotham Academy.

-       He had a habit of speeding through last night’s homework every morning, ten minutes before class started. You always wondered what he had going on after school that took up so much time.

-       The two of you got pretty close. You even went over and met his family one day. Dick loved you, Jason thought you were a robot, a scary child with a large dog watched you from afar- you were told his name was Damian, and Bruce Wayne gave you a firm handshake.

-       After years of knowing and trusting one another, you learned that he was red robin. You didn’t freak out, you just kind of stood there staring at this panicked, coffee-fueled maniac, realizing how much sense it made.

-       The dynamic stayed the same, but you became even more of a mom as you got closer.

-       “Tim, only one espresso shot in your coffee.”

-       “NO, you cannot sleep for 48 hours and stay awake for the next 72, you’ll end up in a comma!”

-       “Tim, the human body needs actual food.”

-       “I know bats are nocturnal but you’re not a bat! The sun is good for you!”

-       You bring him breakfast because this genius only wakes up early enough to get dressed and pick up a travel mug of coffee. Anything from grapes to a sandwich. You can basically give him anything at 7:30 am and he’ll eat it without question.

-       You once gave him toast with a paper on it and had to tell him to spit it out because he didn’t even notice.

-        As a habit making a second copy of all your homework and notes because he will most likely forget and even though he’s smart enough to finish it super quickly, you don’t want the poor sap to have to rush through work 10 mins before class starts when he’s already sleep deprived.

-       You go shopping with him for anniversary presents for Stephanie. Sooooo much teasing.

-       Movie nights with him are the best. It’s rare but once every two weeks, you can drag him away from all cases and red robin work and just sit and watch a movie with him. It almost always results in him falling asleep before the end but you don’t mind.

-       It always made you happy to see your best friend actually sleeping. It’s one of the few times you can him relax.

-       Jason no longer thinks you’re a robot and Damian watches you from up close now. Dick says that means he likes you. You take pride in that.

-       He also super protective of you. He’s very careful not to let a anything to do with red robin come back to you.

-       When he’s worried about your safety, he calls Conner and that usually goes something like this:

-       “Hey, Y/N! It’s nice to see you! How have you been?”

-       “Conner, why are you acting weird? I saw you yesterday.” And then he’ll find some way to drag you off to Metropolis for a few hours. Sometimes he’ll convince you to let him fly you to Smallville and you always say yes because you love the Kents’ horse.

-       Tim used to think you didn’t know that he called Conner, but you figured it out really quick. Now Conner just shows up and you pick up your purse and leave.

-       “So, what is it this time?”

-       “They think Poison Ivy is spraying some weird plant gas thing in your area.”

-       “Oh. I’ll just text him. He had better be careful, we have a project due in a week.”

 Conner:

-       Tim’s other bestie became your bestie too.

-       Tim introduced you to him before you found out he was red robin. When you found out that Conner was Superboy, you weren’t even surprised. It made sense.

-       You got to see Titans Tower once. It was fun have your very own superhero escorts into the building.

-       You don’t hesitate to mom him around too.

-       “Kon, I know you’re invincible and stuff, but your human side needs a jacket. It’s below freezing outside.”

-       The Kents love you and Jon is the most adorable child. They are invited to every family event you have and omg Lois makes the best pies.

-       Piggyback rides in the sky.

-       You’re his rock and he talked to you about all of his issues about family. He trusts you just as much as he trusts Tim at this point.

-       He comes to you for relationship advice.

-       Conner is definitely the cheekiest of all of your friends. He’ll play pranks on you with Jon and Tim for the fun of it, which usually results in him receiving uncoordinated randomized punches from you. Jon gets away with it because he’s a cutie-pie.

-       You receive so much teasing from him over every crush you have, like, holy guacamole! You can’t even try to deny it because he can read minds for one. But then, he can hear your heart rate increase! Darn superpowers!

-       Now, as a reflex before he can even say anything, you just go “Shut up.” But that doesn’t stop him. Why would it?

-       This sweetheart will go everywhere with you when you need him and refuses to let you drive from Metropolis to Gotham at night.

-       “I can fly back, Y/N. It’s not a problem for me. You on the other hand, live in Murdersville, USA. You’re not going alone; I don’t care if Batman is there. You know Tim would agree with me.”

-       Helps you with shopping for birthday gifts.

-       Big protective baby.

-       He’ll join in on movie nights and actually stay awake. He usually carries Tim to his bedroom and tucks him in which elicits a few eyebrow dances from you. ;)

 TimKon:

-       Both of these guys will protect you with their lives because like they’re your best buds and while you’re not exactly a superpowered hero or a Bo staff-wielding, bat trained detective, you would do everything you could to protect these boys.

-       You are somehow their baby and also their mom, perhaps because you force them to eat and sleep and limit Tim’s coffee intake and he actually listens to you.

-       When they are together, they are such softies! Endless teasing about how they are like a married couple.

-       “Well, Steph seems to have some competition.” *eyebrow wiggle* ;D

-       It’s Besties Movie Night! You’re all chilling, the popcorn is ready and you’re ready to- *beep beep*

-       And in the middle of the movie they have to go for a Titan thing. They look at you apologetically. You assure them that it’s alright, give them their hugs.

-       You basically tell them go have fun, don’t die, come back safe and you’re finishing the movie without them. And they groan and go off on their mission.

-       They come back around dinner time just to make up for the time they didn’t get to spend with you.

-       They find you watching SpongeBob and eating Nutella from the jar. “Yay you’re back!”

-       You flip back to the movie you didn’t have the heart to finish because it just wasn’t the same without Tim’s commentary about how its scientifically inaccurate and Conner’s constant nagging about how the flying looks so fake.

-       “Aww thanks for waiting, N/N!”

-       “You’re welcome.” You said.

-       “You love us too much to finish it without us, don’t you?” you just grumbled. “Oh come on. Admit it, you love us.”

-       “Not as much as you love each other.” You joked.

-       But it was true. You love your boys.

[thebookwormfairy]

Daminette/Maribat Fairy Tail Au Part 2

Part 1

As the months turned into years Marinette's bond grew stronger with her spirits and her guild mates

Durning this time she gained 2 more golden gate keys, Pollen spirit of subjection, and Kaalki spirit of teleportation

Kaalki was one of Damian's favorite spirit because most of the time she eliminated the need for long travel on vehicles that make him sick

Marinette was able to use star dress with Tixx and Pollen now, but Kaalki refused to do it so far, which Marinette respected

Damian, Marinette, and Jon's team became one of the top teams in the guild

Though they didn't have an official name a lot of the other guild members called them team Hatchling much to their chagrin

Marinette also noticed that Damian was very protective of her

He still let her fight and go on missions with other people, but he was also quick to shield her or step in front of her when facing off against dark wizards

Marinette acted like she was annoyed with it sometimes, but really she was flattered and couldn't help but feel a little flustere at his actions

Jon sometimes joked that he felt like a third wheel, but never made him feel left out or unwanted

They were a tight knit team so much so that when Marinette, the youngest of the group, turned 18 they decided to pool their money and buy a house together

They ended up buying a nice 2 story house close to the guild

It had 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms

It was decided early on after Damian almost burned down the kitchen that cooking would be left to Marinette and Jon and Damian would do any repair work that was needed around the house

About a month after moving in together Marinette started to wake up with Damian in her bed

Not like that you weirdos

Marinette would go to sleep alone in her bed and wake up snuggling with Damian

Not that she minded, but she did wish that he would at least ask before he snuck in

Damian claimed no knowledge in how he got in her bed

He says that he would fall asleep in his own bed and wake up in hers

When he told his brothers they all got the same smug look

Dick: oh you're growing up so fast hatchling

Jason: I guess we should be expecting wedding bells in the future now, huh?

Tim: Should have known, you wouldn't bring just anybody back to the guild with you

Damian: What are you morons babbling about? And I brought Marinette back because she's a powerful wizard

Dick: We're talking about how you are showing all the signs of a dragon slayer whi has found his mate

Damian: WHAT?!?!

Jason: That's right Demon Spawn, it looks like you found your mate

Tim: Dick acted the exact same way when he first met Kori

Damian continued to deny it until one day he found Marinette trying on her new white sundress that flowed around her like water

Something just clicked in his brain

Marinette was his mate no doubt about it

Now he only had to tell Marinette that

And he had every intention to tell Marinette there was just never a good time

As time past the Grand Magic Games approached

This is the first year that Damian, Jon, and Marinette were competing along with Dick, Jason, and Tim

This was also the first year that Marinette's old guild was competing

Their team consisted of Adrien, Alya, Nino, Lila, Natalie, and Ms. Bustier

Unknown to the Justice League guild Grabriel had a nefarious plot cooking up

Gabriel had ordered Lila and Natalie to try and get Marinette's keys no matter what

Marinette was the only person who stood in his way of attaining the final 6 golden keys

Once he gets those keys his wish can be granted and nobody will be able to stand in his way ever again

This wasn't the first time he tried to get the keys from the blasted girl

He sent wizard after wizard to get those keys and all were defeated and either sent back or sent off to jail

He even tried to send a dark guild after the girl and that led to her joining freaking Justice League!

He hoped that with all of the choas from the Grand Magic Games that getting the keys would be easy

Oh boy was he wrong

Marinette was nervous

This would be the first time Marinette would see her old guild in about 3 years

She hoped for the best, but new she wouldn't get it

And she was proven right as her, Damian, and Jon were making her away back to their hotel after exploring the city when they were stop by her old team

Alya: Oh if it isn't the weak little wizard that abandoned us

Marinette sighing: Hey guys how is it going

Lila: Great our team's status has gone way up since you left. We should have kicked you off the team way before

Marinette: You didn't kick me out I left on my own after you abandoned me with no way to protect myself from a dangerous wizard

Nino: Dont be so dramatic dudette. It's not like you got seriously hurt or anything.

Lila: In all honesty the only downside was losing that quick clean up your spirit did. You should have really left her and the rest of your keys with us.

Lila held out her hand like she actually expected Marinette to hand over her keys to her

Marinette stepped back covering her keys with her hands

Damian stepped in front of Marinette and Jon stepped closer to her side

Damian: You know compulsive rings are illegal. Luckily for us we were trained on how to spot those and other illegal rings right away, because their weakness is awareness

Lila growled under her breath

Why couldn't Marinette make this easy for her. It's not like she even deserve those keys

Adrien glaring: And who are you?

Jon: I'm Jon her guildmate

Damian: I'm Damian her...Guildmate!

Damian wanted to say mate, but he still hadn't had that talk with her yet about it and this was definitely not how he wanted her to find out

Alya snorting: Anothe rguild actually took you in? Who did you trick to pull that off

Marinette: I didn't trick anybody! I earned my spot in Justice League!

Marinette showed off her guild mark to her ex-friends

All their jaws dropped

Damian: That's right so unless you want to make some very powerful enemies you'll leave us alone

Damian wrapped his arm around Marinette's shoulder and lead her away from her ex-guild mates with Jon on her other side running her arm in comfort

The games started the next day full of different competitions and different match ups

Marinette hadn't had to go one on one against her ex guild yet until she was put up against Lila in a match up

The two girls stood across from eachother glaring

Lila in the taunting voice how about we make this more interesting Dupen-Cheng. If I win I get your celestial keys if you win I will admit every lie I've ever told

Marinette glaring even harder: NO WAY LILA! No decent celestial wizard would trade their keys away on a bet. My spirits are my friends. No, they're more than that they're my family, I would rather die then let you touch even 1 of them!

Lila with and evil glint in her eye: So be it. If you win it's not like it would actually count. You'll just hide behind you spirits the whole time

Marinette glared at the girl wanting to prove her wrong

The battle that followed was brutal

Marinette didn't call her celestial spirits right away she used her star dress to fight Lila

She would switch between her star dresses impressing the crowd

She switch from ladybug, to black cat, to turtle, which was a soldier looking outfit, to Bee, which was black overall shorts with a yellow off the shoulder crop top striped tights and yellow converses with her hair in a bun.

Marinette finished Lila using her fox star dress creating a illusion of herself to lure Lila out and knocked her out with a blow to the back of her head

Marinette won

She felt a weight ahe didn't realize was there lift off her shoulders

She just proved that everything Lila had ever said about her and other celestial wizards wrong

She felt her teammates engulf her in a hug yelling congratulations before lifting her up and carrying her out of the stadium cheering

The rest of the games were just as exhilarating the final match up that will decide if Justice League or Miraculous Moth would win the whole tournament was between Damian and Adrien

Damian remember all the times Marinette cried over how her old team treated her and he wanted revengs

Nobody treated his mate like that and got away from it

The battle was brutal if one boy gained the upper hand the other would take it back quickly

But Damian won the match up and the tournament with a well time shadow dragon roar

Justice League piled into the stadium surrounding Damian as they cheered over their victory as Adrien was being carried out by medics

Marinette squeezed her way through the crowd reaching Damian

Marinette: Congregations Damian you did great

Damian: Thanks Ang-

Marinette cut him off with a kiss on the lips

Damian froze for a moment before wrapping his arms around her waist and kissing her back enjoying every second of it

The two vaguely registered that the cheering seemed to get louder but ignored it

The guild continued the celebrate throughout the night

Most of the guild was so hungover the next day that they had to put off leaving till another day

A decision they would soon regret as they were attacked the next day by Miraculous Moth

Apparently Grabriel was tired if waiting and decided to attack Justice League whe. He thought they would be at their weakness

Miraculous Moth wasn't as powerful as as Justice League, but they had more members

It was 4 to 1

But Justice League refused to give down without a fight

The battle that followed destroyed half of the town they were in

Luckily Barry, Wally, and Kaalki were able to work together using speed and teleportation magic to get the civilians out of the town

During the climax of the battle Marinette finally learned what type of magic her former guild master possessed

He was a celestial wizard just like her

He also had 6 golden gate keys

During the fight Marinette called put Tikki and Plagg while having Wayzz star dress while Gabriel called his own spirits

Gabriel: Give up you stupid girl! You're no match for me!

Marinette hiding behind her shield: Why are you doing this?

Grabiel: To bring back my wife and to gain power over the celestial king

Marinette: You're planning on using the 12 golden gate keys to form a key for the celestial king!?! That will destroy the other spirits! IT WILL KILL THEM!!! I CAN'T LET YOU DO THIS!

Gabriel: And what are you going to do about it?

Marinette darted her eyes around trying to think of a solution when her eyes landed on Damian and she remember a spell her grandfather taught her. One that only the most powerful celestial wizards could cast, and one that must only be used in emergencies.

Marinette closed Tikki's and Plagg's gates before yelling to Damian

Marinette: DAMIAN CATCH!

Marinette threw her keys to Damian who gave her a confused looked but trusted Marinette and her apparent plan

Marinette charged towards Gabriel not dropping her star dress until the very last minutes

Marinette grabbed his keys not letting go as Gabriel tried to claw them out of his hands: Scattered these keys to the four winds. Use the stars as their guide to lead them to partners. Let them shoot across the sky like falling stars and hope that they land within good hands!

As Marinette finished her spell Gabriel's key ring exploded sending his keys across the continent.

The shock wave from the explosion pushed Marinette and Gabriel back

The shock was just what Justice League needed to end the battle and win

Gabriel: NNNOOOOO!!! What have you've done?

Marinette: I've scattered your keys and I won't let you hurt any of them ever again.

With the battle over and Miraculous Moth in custody life was able to settle down

Damian was finally able to talk to Marinette about them being mates

They started dating and 2 years in after a sorcerers' weekly article (a/n: going to do a seperate ova post telling that story) Damian marked her as his mate showing everybody they were together forever

Team Hatchlings adventures continued on for many years

Through marriage, kids, and old age the team of three remained the best of friends, Damian and Marinette welcoming Jon's wife into their team with open arms

No matter what the friends stuck together and fought for what was not only for themselves and their friends but for the future.

@loysydark

@mikantsume

@doli09

@krissykat0207

@czgamz

@myazael

@renscorpio

@mochinek0

@daminett4life

@kuroko26

@vixen-uchiha

[stephaniebrownlove]

Steph + Meeting the Superfam

My headcanons for Steph’s fascination with the Superfam inspired by this post. 

I’ve also written a fanfic for when Steph met Jon, you can find it here. 

When Steph was little she’d tie a blanket around her shoulders like a cape and run around her house. “I’m Superman! Look at me, I’m Superman!” she’s sing-song to herself, coming up with nonsense words to fit the melody she created. She’d pretend to save stuffed animals in mortal danger, whisking them off the Terrible Bed and into the Closet of Safety. She’d save the city of Living Room from all the Evil Chip Bags and Alien Soda Cans by attacking and throwing them into the Phantom Zone, otherwise known as the trash can. 

When Steph was in middle school she was hanging out with some ‘friends’ at the mall. They weren’t doing anything in particular- drinking soda from fifty-cent refillable plastic cups from the gas station and poking their noses into shops that looked cool. In one shop there were posters, and Steph saw one of Superboy on clearance. She bought it and tacked it on her wall because well, he was hot, and she definitely had fantasies. It stayed up through many room renovations and she never stopped liking it, no matter how the boyfriends she brought home commented on it. 

  When Steph was in high school she became Spoiler and met Robin (definitely impressed and wow he’s cute) and Batman (definitely not impressed-ok kinda-and wow he’s grumpy). She never thought of herself as a real vigilante, but now she realized she was, and had contacts who had actually knew Superboy and Superman. She started imagining meeting them too, a private secret in the back of her head. Maybe one day it could happen. Maybe. 

  When Steph became Batgirl she thought she was going to die, trapped underwater in a fast-filling metal box. But she didn’t die, and that was because Supergirl saved her. They’re best friends now, but Steph will never tell her that she doesn’t actually remember their first meeting because her brain just short-circuited. She vaguely remembers a flying figure, the color blue, and really bright yellow hair. At some point they talked, but Steph has no idea what she said and she refuses to ask Kara. All she knows is it was the best near-death experience of her life. 

  When Steph and Kara went on a mission together and freaking Batman and Superman showed up, and Superman actually spoke to her, Steph played it cool. Inside, she was freaking out, and was it bad that she enjoyed knowing Superman and Kara would know? She didn’t think so. When Batman wasn’t looking, she got a picture with Superman. She keeps it saved and on her phone to look at at all times. Kara’s mildly amused by this. Steph doesn’t care, she still can’t believe it actually happened and when she checks her phone and sees the picture her heart jumps. 

  When Steph and Robin teamed up with Young Justice, she met Superboy face-to-face for the first time. He was the first super she didn’t hit it off with right away. It took a few interventions (with Tim moderating) before they figured out their relationship. Eventually, they fell into a rivalry-based friendship, but they also had each other’s backs when it mattered, and bonded over their mutual Robin. Steph has not and will not tell Kon she had his poster on her wall (or that it didn’t come down after she met him). She has many, many prank videos, internet trend videos, and random recordings of her, Kon, and Tim. Those will never be released to the public, but Barbara found them and occasionally watches them for her own amusement. 

  When Steph met Jon, she was at the most boring Wayne gala of all time. Jon and Damian were equally bored, and she kidnapped them both, taking them to her house for good food and the quality entertainment of Netflix. She fell hard for the scrawny kid and immediately decided she would be just as responsible for him as she was for Damian in the field. Steph hummed the theme to the Superman song she’d made up when she cooked for them that night, and though Damian doesn’t tell her, Jon sometimes hums the tune when they go out on missions together. Damian doesn’t know what it means, but he’s secretly glad Steph approves of his friend. Steph is fierce as all hell if any villain gives either of the boys so much as a scratch. When Dick was Batman he didn’t worry about them as much and could breathe a little easier when Steph was out  in the field, watching over them. 

  When Steph met Lois, she was thrilled and intimidated. Lois was a supportive professional business woman who worked in a field Steph knew nothing about, but was definitely intrigued by. When Lois gave her her number, Steph felt honored and also nervous. What was she supposed to talk about with Lois? She didn’t have to worry, because Lois took the lead and started to mentor her. Lois was one of her references for getting into Gotham University’s nursing program and was amazingly supportive in Steph’s life outside of being a vigilante. Steph never had a female role model and when Lois stepped in, she filled in a part of her life Steph didn’t know she was missing. Sometimes, when she goes over to the Super house to talk with Lois, she sees Kara or Kon or Jon and they always make her feel welcome. It’s the first house she’s been to that feels like home.

[reddrobins]

robins spirit [d.wayne]

Older! Damian Wayne x Super! Reader

Request: I love your recent damian fanfic! 🥺 could you pls do another one with “I’d hurt anyone who ever left a scar on you.” with a reader who’s a vigilante that often spars/fights with him. They show up at the wayne manor with a bruise on their face after fighting with Robin over a stupid argument and Damian’s concerned. But then they figure out what happened and he feels rly bad. Thank you :) + *knocks on your door* so I just thought of something... What if a Kent/Super! Reader x Damian? Oki bye *closes door*

Authors note:  This is so terrible I’m so sorry, I was really stressed today and I apologize for the shit writing

Summary: A new vigilante emerges in Gotham, one that's super. Batman and Robin find out and Bruce sends his son to confront this new suspected metahuman. After a rough night, Damian leaves ‘Spirit’ badly wounded, so when (Y/N) Kent comes over the next day with the same scratches, Damian gets suspicious.

You were tired of living under your father and brothers' spotlights. Hell, you were even under your mother's spotlight in civilian life. So,  at the ripe age of seventeen, you decided to take matters into your own hand and became the vigilante known as Spirit.

The first few nights on the streets of Metropolis went horribly. Not only did you run into your father, who at the time didn’t know it was you, a multitude of times, but everyone seemed to think the ‘S’ on your uniform stood for supergirl. 

You were enraged, could you just, for one night, not be a Kent or a Super? You needed a change of scenery, so you did your research.

As you searched away on your laptop, looking up distances between cities, you came to realise that the only far enough place for you to make a name for yourself was in Gotham.

So here you were, perched atop the Gotham National Bank building, on the prowl for any villain that deemed tonight a good night for trouble. 

“Come here often?” You spoke out as you felt a certain presence behind you. You had to admit sometimes super hearing comes in handy. 

The figure, that seemed to be walking towards you, stopped its movements. 

“Listen pal, I know you’re there, why don't you make this easier for you and just turn yourself in.”

“Tt.” The figure gave.

You stood up from your crouching position and began to walk towards whoever this mystery person was. “If you want to do it the hard way…” 

You swung your arm at the masked figure only for it to be caught. Damn, you thought. This isn't just any robber. The person caught a supers punch. I mean hey you were only half Kryptonian, but still.

“Impressive.” You quip as you go in for another hit. This time the assailant moves forward and you catch a glimpse of them in the light, “Robin?” You pause, what the hell was Damian doing here?, leading Robin's hit to go unblocked.

It hits your cheek and you scrunched up your face, fuck, he has a good punch. Once again, only half-super, so the sting was still there.

Robin grunts, going back on the attack when you put your hands up in a surrender, “Hey! D-Robin, we’re on the same team, calm it down!”

The masked teen doesn't listen and dives for another hit, “How do I know you are not lying.” He asks, landing another punch to your side.

You groan, not in pain but frustration, why did Damian have to be this stubborn, “I’m a vigilante, just like you. I’m trying to help out the town.”

Robin rolls his eyes, though you can’t see it from behind the domino mask. “Prove it.”

You blankly stare at him, “How?”

He finally resists from landing another hit on you, “Why are you at the bank, unless you plan to rob it?”

It's now your turn to roll your eyes, “I could ask the same of you short stack.” You hated to admit it, but Damian was in fact taller. 

If there’s one thing you got from your mother, it's your attitude.

This seems to catch the young hero off guard as he sputters, looking for an answer. “I’ll have you know I am the same height as you, If not taller.” Then he grits, pointing his now unsheathed weapon at you, “Answer the question.”

You gently tap the katana away with your fingertips. “Fine. I’m not from Gotham, but I know about your high crime rate and I just wanted to help out, okay?” You lie. Metropolis’ crime rates weren’t peachy either but at least in Gotham you had a name for yourself. 

“Batman and I have it covered.” He said lowly.

“Listen if you don't want me here, I’ll back off, but I just wanted to help those in need.” 

Robin squinted at you, unable to figure out your m.o., were you really who you claimed to be?

“Gotham isn’t looking for more amateur heros, so go back to wherever you came from.” With that, he grappled off of the roof and off into the night. 

“Father. We have an issue.”

Bruce didn’t bother to look away from the batcomputer, this wasn’t the first time Damian had barged in with that sentiment. “What is it Damian?”

The teen took his cape off, as well as his kevlar chest plate, “There’s a new vigilante. I’m not sure what she calls herself but she has immense strength, I believe she may be a super or maybe a metahuman as her punch was difficult to block.”

The older man nodded at his son, of course he already knew this, Bruce was aware of every person that came into Gotham, even those unannounced. 

“I’m aware. She calls herself ‘Spirit’. I’ve deduced she’s no older than you, Damian. I’d like you to get to know her. Or at least what she stands for.” 

“Should I take her down?” Damian asked. 

Bruce spun the chair around, a stoic look on this face, “No. just purely find out who she really is. No violence.”

The next day soon became night and here you were, back in Gotham. Damian really thinks he can just ban me from a city? You thought to yourself, hah, good luck with that bird brain. 

You looked around your area, scoping out to see if the coast was clear. After a thorough check, you did a super jump and landed atop a building. 

“Nice jump there, Spirit. I thought I told you not to come back.”

You spun around, Robin? Was Damian seriously following you now?

“Going to have to try a lot harder if you want me to stop fighting the good fight.” You crossed your arms, “Listen, I don’t know your problem with me. I’m just trying to help out, just like you. Just like Batman.”

Damian clenched his fists and stomped toward you, “you are nothing like me, I’m welcomed in this city. You are not.”

You frowned. Oh if only Damian knew who he was actually speaking to - “Seriously, why do you hate me? Afraid I’ll steal your thunder or something?” You pushed his chest trying to get him to back up. 

Apparently, you also forgot you were half-kryptonian as when you pushed him, he stumbled back, hard. 

“Tt, watch it you freak. I don’t want to fight you, but I will if I have to.”

Your heart hurt at the name but you brushed it off, Damian didn’t know who you were. 

You rolled your eyes once more and sat down into the ledge - just like the night of the bank. “I’m sure you would. Listen Robin, I’m just trying to help those in need. Can you really hate a girl for trying?”

The teen vigilante paused,  she did seem sincere, he thought, maybe he could trust her. 

“Fine. But if I find out you’re only in my town to cause trouble, I will end you.” He glared at her and she smirked back. 

“I'd like to see you try. But fair enough. Consider this a partnership.”

Sticking out your hand, you eyed him to shake it. 

Damian refused and simply took out his grappling gun, once again disappearing into the night. 

You poked your cheek in the mirror. It was times like these you wish you had all of your dads powers as this bruise was very ugly to look at. 

He fights very well. You thought as you pinched the sore skin. Even though it had been a day since the incident, the bruise forming was still as purple as ever. You didn't know how you were going to make it through today. Tim and Conner had a planned hangout and after your mom said you needed a little more ‘Conner time’, you had to tag along. What would Damian think of the bruise?

“(Y/N)! It’s time to go, we’re going to be late!” Your brother yelled from the living room. 

“I’m coming, Conner, just hold on!” 

You tried to put some concealer on the bruise but it just wouldn’t mask the ugly discolored skin. 

“(Y/N)!” Conner yelled again. 

“Alright, alright, hold your fucking horses.” You whispered to yourself. 

Bursting into the living room, you kept your head down so as to not alert any of the Kent household of your new shiner. 

“Holy shit! (Y/N) what happened to your face!?” Exclaimed Jon as he flew past you. 

You looked up, annoyed at your twin brother's antics. 

“Jonathan Kent, No flying in the house.” Your mother yelled from the kitchen. She then turned to you, “(Y/N), where in the world did that come from?” Reaching out to brush your cheek, you swiftly pulled away, avoiding her eyes at all costs. If there was one thing you didn’t need your family to find out about, it was your late night trips to Gotham City.

“Nothing mom. I just fell in my room is all. Promise, it’s not a big deal.” Looking up to your older brother you signaled to the door, “Time to leave?”

He gave you a toothy grin and nodded, “Yeah c’mon. Tim’s waiting for me.”

-

Conner ran up the steps to the Manor and pounded on the door, far too excited to see his best friend. Meanwhile, you slowly made your way up, really not wanting to have to hang out with the two. 

You still didn’t get why you had to come. She claimed that you and Jon hung out too much and that you needed to get closer to Conner. You rolled your eyes at the memory, you were 17 not 7. Plus, now you had to face Damian.

The two large doors swung open revealing an ecstatic Tim Drake, “Conner! My man! So glad you could come.” He then leaned in, “Did you have to bring your little sister though?” 

Thanks to super hearing, you knew exactly what Tim had said and you grumbled in response. Of course Conner didn’t tell him I was coming. 

Conner laughed and gave Tim a hug, “Don’t worry dude. Just make her hang out with Damian or something.” He whispered.

You blushed at those words, mentally cursing Conner. That fucker knew you had a crush on the youngest Wayne. Why would he do this to you? Especially when you looked like this.

“Alright alright, come on in guys. Bedrooms upstairs to the right but you already knew that.” Tim winked. You followed Conner when he stopped you, placing a hand on your shoulder. 

“Um not you though. Sorry (N/N) today’s bros only day. I’m sure you can stay down here and find a book to read.” He smirked at you knowing full well what Tim would say next. 

“Actually,” Tim said, “Damians in the library painting if you’d like to join him. I’m sure the devil child wouldn’t mind a buddy.”

You glared at the two of them but then sighed, walking towards the large house library. 

Knocking on the door, you called out to see if anyone was in there. 

Unluckily enough, Damian came to open it. You kept your head down as to avoid attention from your killer battle wound. You did not want Damian to find out about your nightly activities, he would never stop nagging you then.

“Kent.” He greeted, “To what do I owe the pleasure.” Damian said mockingly. 

You rolled your eyes and pushed past him, finding a seat on the sofa. 

“My lovely brother decided to ditch me for yours so here I am.” 

Damian chuckled, walking back to his paints. “How poetic.” He remarked. Then asked, “How’s Jon?”

You shrugged still looking at the floor, “He’s good. You know just being the same goofy asshole he’s been since he was 10.”  The young Wayne teen laughed at that in agreement. 

“And you? How have you been Damian?” You asked. 

“Annoyed. There’s a new vigilante in town. Claims to be the ‘Spirit’. She’s been challenging me while on patrol.  I’ve been having small spats with her here and there, but they’re driving me insane. She's almost as bad as Todd.”

You couldn’t help but look up, smirking, after all, it's not everyday you got the oneup of Damian.“Awe does little ol’ Damian have a crush?” You teased. Hope glimmered in your eyes. 

Damian was about to roll his eyes when he caught sight of your face. His focus latched on to the large black and blue mark on your cheek. His heart stopped, he knew where that came from. 

Because he was the one that did it. Then the dots clicked. 

“You! You’re Spirit? What the hell Kent? Do you know how dangerous Gotham is?”

Damian marches over to you in annoyance, “Do you know how difficult you have made my life? Not only do I think about you daily as (Y/N) Kent, but now nightly as Spirit!?” He blurted out. 

You froze. Damian thought about you? Does that mean…

“Damian, does that mean you like me?”

His cheeks flared a pretty red color as he looked at his shoes, “If I were to say yes, would you be in agreeance or make a fool of me?” 

You chuckled as you stood up from the couch and placed your hand in his. “Damian I’ve liked you for such a long time it’s unbelievable, I just can’t believe you like me-“ 

He interrupted you, “Beloved, you are the sun in my life, and I pray that I can make you mine.” 

You blushed furiously, “Of course.”

Smiling, Damian leaned in and captured your lips. He kissed you desperately, like he’d been needing this for years. 

He went to further the kiss and put his hand on your cheek, causing a hiss of pain to erupt out of you. 

You pulled back, holding your bruised cheek. You laugh, “You pack quite the punch.”

Damian scratched the back of his neck, embarrassed. “I truly apologize beloved, if I had known it was you, I would’ve gone lighter, I’d hurt anyone who ever left a scar on you or a bruise for that matter.”

You rolled your eyes, though flattered by Damians words, you could handle yourself. I mean you were half-kryptonian after all. 

“I appreciate the sentiment Dami, but I can handle myself. Really, you saw how good I fought firsthand.” You squeezed his hand lightly. 

“I know. I would never question your strength. I love that about you.”

You pecked his lips “Good. Just remember who kicked your ass last night.”

Damian wrapped his arms around your waist and pulled you close, “I don’t think I could ever forget that. It was quite humbling.”

You scrunched your nose at his sarcastic tone, “You’re a jerk.”

He smirked and then leaned close, forehead pressed into yours. “But I’m your jerk. And that’s all that matters right now.”

[ashes-in-a-jar]

Tma relisten Episodes 11-15

So this round already has two other posts out of it about Oliver because he Bae.

These have alot of ideas regarding entities changing around reality, controlling non victims to set the stage, and turning around what people love most to their worst fear. Also insane abilities of the crew to obtain hard to access info and evidence! And some more Jon sass. Enjoy!

11 dreamer

Wow this episode had alot. I made a separate post with a theory about Oliver's statement here and a realization regarding him and Jane Prentiss here. They are alot to unpack

Oliver is so. Freaking. Relatable! Learned economics and hated it. Nearly had a breakdown like him because of it. "going to stay with some of the few friends that had survived my year of stress-fuelled outbursts and constantly cancelled plans." yep. That.

Boyfriend Graham ey? You notebook eating Graham?? Wow that guy is full of surprises.

I love the dream sequences and their descriptions it's a really beautiful thing to try and picture.

Its interesting how he went from passive to desparate to passive again about death. He tries but can't help. I wonder when the dreams started to bother him so much he sought after the silence of point Nemo. Was it when they became so full of red because of the apocalypse coming closer? Hmmm

Another person named John. I guess that makes sense it's a common name. But I forgot how many people are fully named in this podcast. Hundreds of names to come up with! Jonny I'm quite impressed!

He worked with Jane Prentiss in the magic shop! I can't believe I forgot about that! Wow small avatar world indeed.

"It led me to a room, the label of which was still visible, and read “Archive”. I entered to see walls covered with shelves and cabinets stretching off into the distance. These shelves were coated in a sticky black tar, which I knew at that moment was the thickened, pulpy blood that pumped through each and every one of those veins." everything that has to do with the Fears I bet. Full of death and destruction and stolen from the veins to be out on display for the Eye's pleasure.

Yo Jon is scared of this he's seriously considering going to Elias for advice

" I had Tim look into it, as I don’t entirely trust the others not to have written it as a practical joke" wait. He trusts TIM? Not to do a practical joke? How. Why. Eh?

"died in the line of duty" fuck you Jonah.

Now Jon will get every new statement immediately when it's made. Perhaps this was Elias' intention all along. To scare him into making sure he does not miss any paranormal activity recorded by the institute.

12 first aid

I'm not immune to more Gerry badassery, hell yeah

And we get polish Martin which hell yeah! Even if Jon doesn't believe it. I'm sure he's repressing the fact that he's thoroughly impressed.

I think it's really interesting the effect entities have on people who are decidedly not their victims. Everyone leaving no questions so the entity can set the scene for the scare. Like with Gillespie how no one lived in the apartment building he was in etc. Alot of work into a handful of people being genuinely scared.

Gerry's burns stopped at the neck? How did he manage that. Also it's hilarious to imagine that he's like "yes burn all of me but please. not my goth makeup"

Zippo lighter with eye design!! And Jon has web design! They are brothers (joke but still really interesting)

Liquids were boiling around her and she didn't feel the heat. Also an interesting effect just for the scare.

Gerry got eye superpowers like Jon if he can function while injure and filled with painkillers.

“Yes. For you, better beholding than the lightless flame.” Gerry knew she'd be haunted by a Fear from that day on and realised that perhaps being watched would be easier for her specifically to deal with than the Desolation. I guess that's a way of assessing people. Which fear would least bother you.

Jon is already enamoured with Gerry you can tell. He can't wait to hear more from him. Just you wait Jon.

They really can access alot of information huh. CCTV Interviews files. Pretty impressive for a non-research team. They're so good at it they'd rather do that than actual archiving.

13 alone

The sound editing in this episode is not that great it was a bit to get used to.

We get a glimpse at the Lukases which is... Ugh

Jon is actually trying to be nice. Granted it's not working and she is a bit of a standoffish person herself who just went through a bad time but alot of her reactions are not his fault. He was trying to be considerate giving her space to record but he did stay when she asked.

She had already leaned into the Lonely before the incident it's interesting to see how some of these statements start with a person actually liking the aspect that later turns to fear. Same happens in lost johns' cave.

Evan Lukas sounds like an avatar of the exact opposite of the Lonely. At least to her. That's a really interesting effect from someone, especially a Lukas.

But maybe dying wasn't his family killing him but him not feeding his patron which he tried to leave. Really tragic.

She was in Martin's domain eyyy!

It's got a bit of buried aspects to it with the grave stuff and all.

"My fingers dug into the soft cemetery dirt as I looked around desperately for anything I could use to save myself, and my hand closed upon that heavy piece of headstone. It took all my self-control to keep a grip on that anchor, as I slowly dragged myself away from the edge of my lonely grave." The headstone was her anchor? But it said forgotten. I wonder how it helped her pull away. It probably had to go together with Evan's voice. Like the rib and the tape recorders having to work together! I just wonder what meaning the stone had for her.

"I’d be tempted to chalk this one up to a hallucination from stress and trauma, if it wasn’t for the fact... " God he does believe her heavens. He's not a skeptic!

This is when Jon's dreams start which... Good luck Jon.

14 piecemeal

Rentoul is terrifying sonofabitch and I would never want to meet him irl

I remembered them talking about how he was supposed to be a person who cursed alot and they couldn't do it because of sensor and I have to agree this could have been much better for the story. I tried imagining curses in some places.

LOL Jon reading this is funny. Trying to voice act the bad boy. Doesn't sound right on his voice.

With these kinds of statements happening alot where the person does something bad, the institute has to be in touch with police over them. The nda has to include that.

Hello Angela! I really wonder what her deal is. She scared the bid bully so she gotta have creepy vibes to the extreme.

Another lighter! Hmm do I have to start following the lighter motiff in this podcast. This one has a topless woman on it. Flesh lighter?

Salesa's also appearing that's cool! Noriega was probably looking for an artifact to reverse the curse. Didn't work tho since they left with the crate. The buried crate perhaps?

I'm wondering. Was this written? Because the statement sounds like he's talking. If so, Where's the recording?

Oh Jon your attitude towards Martin is so bad. He works so hard and it's not even in what he's good at, sorting and filing like he knows how to do from the library. God.

What's the deal with all the furniture gone? Did he think it'll help not get injured? He's not that smart if he thought that would help him.

15 lost Johns' cave

Ack a bad statement she was not a good person all around

Another example of the entities setting the stage by controlling others not to interfere with the victim's experience.

Also another example of the person liking the subject (cave exploration in this case. And the dark for that matter) only for it to turn against them.

Not much to say about this one other than its one of the scarier ones for sure. And her recording in the end is really the cherry on top. There is alot of discrepancy between what she believed happened and what actually did which shows how much the fear plays with and changes around reality. That's also how she manages to lie in a statement to Beholding. It wasn't a lie. It was her version of reality and she did not remember saying those awful words.

Taught me alot about cave diving and how much I will never do it in my life.

The Dark was mixed into this as well so it wasn't purely Buried.

Btw Where did she get the candles she was found with?

It feels like she made a choice. Didn't want to spend her last moments with her sister and then didn't want to die. She chose her sister to be taken over her. Her sister called for help and the candle coming closer might have been her! But she just shut her eyes.

How did Tim gain access to the recording?? Wow that's some prime evidence.

Martin is claustrophobic amongst other things huh? Live how Jon just dismisses this as an excuse not to work. At least he didn't push it.

[thattimdrakeguy]

Tim Drake in Wonder Comics Young Justice so far

#TimDrakeIsTheBestRobin is something I been seeing Brian Michael Bendis tweet out a lot, but I just started to think about Tim, what all he’s actually done in Young Justice so far as we’re about 7 issues in, and well, he’s done nothing of note.

While the issues so far has shown Tim to be the most in-character he’s been since the New 52 (and even a little bit before), he’s done freaking nothing and half of the year is almost over. The only thing of note he’s going to do this year so far is change his identity, and that’s not only disrespectful to the fact they marketed Tim to fans on something else, but it’s also awful story telling.

The other members in their spotlight issues got to do stuff that actually added to the plot while showing off their personalities, like Cassie had her issue with Zeus that showed how she liked to earn her spot while also being spunky. Conner had stuff set up with S.T.A.R Labs that showed off his rebellious side, and Amethyst had her whole world showed off for the first arc, but Tim got nothing in his.

Tim in his own spotlight didn’t do anything that showed off his personalty. He didn’t even have a plot set up. Stephanie even had a plot set up. Tim’s plot was how he remembered his past timeline (thanks to Zatanna), and going to Metropolis to see where Conner was. So basically, now that he found Conner, there we go. That’s it. His big set-up in issue 5 is done before we even got to see it. 

Tim didn’t have any personalty in his issue, or actually do anything in it besides get his memories back thanks to someone else, and all it showed is that he loves his girlfriend and Conner, nothing about his own personality.

From the sounds of it though, Tim’s going to be pretty important for some of the next arcs, but at the same time, he’s getting a new costume and identity, which isn’t a good sign. Especially since the costume’s color scheme stands for boring.

One of the things about the build up to Young Justice was how it seemed to be getting rid of everything people didn’t like about their treatment and getting the characters set back on track. They gave them costumes that fit their personalities, Patrick Gleason almost always (literally only 2 panels I can remember not liking) was able to draw them perfectly as well as get the tone perfectly, and they were the most in-character they been in years for the issues so far.

Now they’re already changing stuff before the years over. 

Tim has had no build up to having a need for a new identity. 

There was people that wasn’t happy with Tim being Robin again though, they preferred him being Red Robin, but in Heroes of Crisis (which I would recommend avoiding since it’s crap, and certainly Tim’s singular panel) it said he was still Red Robin even though he had his Wonder Comics costume on. Which means he was literally Red Robin still, he just went by Robin with Young Justice.

I really liked that since that meant if you wanted him to be Red Robin still, he was, and if you were happy he was Robin again, he was. That’s a fan pleasing decision that I approved.

So why would Tim want to change his name AND costume now? Especially considering he just got this new Robin costume that fits his personality to a T, and still has his own name to use when having two Robins would be confusing.

Why would there be no build up in the story to this apparent identity change unless him being back on track was just a marketing stunt for more people to buy the issues?

What would be the real life reason for it be, besides they just freaking wanted to?

Are you telling me in the middle of going dimension to dimension that Tim’s gonna think it’s a good time to change his identity?

Did Didio ask for this?

Was it Bendis?

Why?

In what world is this considered good story telling?

Doing stuff at random to change stuff that made people happy isn’t good story telling.

I’m aware some people wanted him to remain Red Robin, but as seen in Heroes in Crisis, he still is, he just likes to go by Robin when he’s with Young Justice. So that problems already been figured out. He’s Red Robin if you want him to be, and that’s actually canon, he’s just also Robin if you want him to be.

If they’re so willing to out of no were change the basic identity of Tim Drake in the middle of an arc, when they just got his character back on track after almost a decade. Why should I trust they care about Tim to do him justice? 

They might like him, but does that doesn’t mean they care about Tim’s character enough to do what fits. At this rate it’s gonna be just another DC comic that relies on sudden shocks and changes in desperate attempts at headlines or to please their selfish desires of doing what ever they wanted because that’s all they thought about.

They could even finally allow him to interact with the plot more than once in a substantial way, but when they treat him like he doesn’t matter that much why should I feel like they’re really gonna care about him?

The act of suddenly changing a character randomly is something people do when they do not care about a character.

In fact it’s even something some people do when they dislike or hate a character.

If Jason Todd suddenly became “Finch” with no build up in the story or a quality reason, while he was on another planet, just after they brought back his friends, while getting his story back on track right prior, and in the new story he didn’t even get to choose his own name, it wouldn’t be considered a good story would it? It would feel like they had no idea what they were doing, or they at least didn’t give a crap about him or fan loyalty.

To be honest though, I’m not that upset Tim hasn’t done much as far as the plot so far. It’s very understandable to me. The other characters deserve the page space more than he does. Tim (even if he wasn’t in-character) got to have plenty of page time in other comics compared to them. So that’s not a problem of mine, it’s just a bad sign when adding it up with other stuff.

You don’t get rid of the stuff they used to market the series this soon and have it be a good sign of stuff. That’s something people do as a publicity stunt. Something cheap and scummy.

You don’t have the character do essentially nothing of note by himself in his own spotlight issue that’s supposed to be focused on him and have that be a good sign.

The other character’s spotlight issues told you a lot about them.

What’d Tim’s spotlight issue tell you about him? He loves his girlfriend, he ran away from home with her, and he loves Conner. That’s not much of a personalty showcase like the other ones so far. That’s practically nothing.

Right now he is the most useless and boring part of the team.

So much so that his apparently new costume is brown and gray. Colors that stand for boring and dull, especially or at least together.

It’s starting to feel like a gag at Tim fans expense, because of all those antis that call Tim the boring one.

I’m aware it’s so soon in this comic’s run that it seems hasty to judge, but the signs aren’t lining up well for him. Already doing nothing even in his own spotlight, having his identity changed like it doesn’t matter, not adding a thing to the ongoing plot besides some lines, aren’t, good, signs.

If Tim gets to stay Robin/Red Robin and keep his current costume after all of this, I’m not gonna be upset I made this post complaining about what did not end up happening, because I’d be too focused on being happy that it turned out they did care about the character more than headlines and what practically only they wanted.

Like, Tim hasn’t even been out of character during any of this. The most out of character he’s been is kissing Stephanie so intensely, the rest he’s been fine.

It’s just a lack of care for him.

Even if they’d just left him with the identity he currently has with Robin/Red Robin, while he does nothing important, that’d be a lot more calming, because that at least means they won’t be messing with what got some fans excited. He’d at least be left alone to not be ruined with rushed not-thought-out decisions like they’re building up.

I remember Bendis saying Conner’s gonna be changing his identity too in some upcoming issue, or at least implied it by saying Conner’s gonna talk about Superboy with Jon (what ever that means).

If he messes with his costume too to go back to the T-shirt and jeans, then I’m gonna be even more upset because I know dang well that costume made a heckuva lot of Conner fans happy, to have that taken away from them so soon would be unfair too, and I’m pretty sure he was intended to wear his T-shirt and jeans look this whole time given that they refer to him wearing a shirt when he’s been wearing freaking tights in the actual comic, which been adding up to my fear of that.

Then there’s Bart and Teen Lantern who have been treated even with less respect. While Bart saved the day, he still hasn’t gotten a spotlight issue showing anything important about him, and Teen Lantern has done even less than Tim as far as the plots concerned (although she will be getting a spotlight issue here shortly).

But I understand that, there’s only so much page space, like I said, I’m not even upset Tim hasn’t contributed much to the plot, it’s understandable. It’s just, why couldn’t he have done anything interesting during his own flashback? Why are they messing with him so soon at such a random time when they were making so many fans happy? Why change what’s making a lot of fans feel safe and secure with this comic?

Why can’t Tim Drake be treated with respect?