#axion labs

[dp-references]

Axion Labs

Damon's work room as a security guard

The old dog kennel

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[thesoulspulse]

I wanted to make a ghost powered version of Trish who calls herself Glitch and she has Technomancy powers, aka the same abilities as Technus to control and communicate with any electronic device. Unlike Technus she focuses on the latter which is talking to or even creating a new consciousness in certain machines with enough processing power for it that she already shares an emotional attachment too like her tablet and such.

As for how she got these powers lets go with an accident at Axion Labs while trying to help Danielle deal with a major problem where Trish gets zapped while trying to hack into the system to force Technus out of it which inadvertently gives her most of the same abilities. In a way, she's kinda replacing Vallen in getting an 'upgrade.' Trish can't sense ghosts directly but she can indirectly detect them through various inventions from both Fenton Works and Axion labs.

P.S. It's a little like how things work for Daniel in my Danny Program/Ghost In The Machine AU.

[raveyardantics]

Cynophobia

Summary: Dogs have a long and complicated relationship with death in mythologies all around the world, and even though he doesn’t get a lot of moments in the series, Damon Gray -coincidentally- also has a complicated relationship with death and dogs..

Character(s): Damon Gray, OC(s)

Content Warning(s): Horror, gore, body horror, graphic animal death, torture, possession/exorcism

Word Count: 4,850

“There is a flame that I've been fanning, there is a fire waiting to catch

There is a Hell that has been building from the moment we first met

If there ever was a time, if there ever was a chance

To undo the things I've done and wash these bloodstains from my hands

It has passed and been forgotten, these are the paths that we must take

Cause you and I, Tom, we are men, and we can bend and we can break”

                           -The Hounds, The Protomen. Act II: The Father Of Death

The sound of a dog barking near his ear and the sensation of fur covering his whole body made Damon Gray shoot awake and instinctively reach for the gun he’d begun keeping in his desk. 

Disoriented from sleep, his scrambling hands found nothing but the lamp beside the couch where he had fallen asleep, knocking it to the ground and causing him to fully compose himself as his mind caught up with his body. He wasn’t in his bedroom, he was in their tiny apartment’s living room. There wasn’t a dog, there was a movie playing on the TV that he claimed to be watching as he ‘rested his eyes.’ And lastly, he wasn’t covered in fur, but rather a blanket that Valerie had no doubt tossed over him when she came home from work and found him sleeping. He smiled to himself at what a paranoid old man he’d turned into since becoming a father so many years ago.

Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, Damon made his way down the hall to the bathroom to wash off his face. The dog on the tv was aggressively barking now, and even though he’d turned it down before getting up, the sound was enough to flash him back to the incident at Axion that had nearly cost him everything. He had never exactly been a fan of dogs -in fact he had always preferred cats- but he had also never been able to hate them either. In fact, when he learned about the Mastiff Protocol at Axion Labs, he’d been thoroughly impressed by how well trained the “volunteers” (the corporate word for the dogs they had been preparing to use as security) had been. He knew that the breed was highly intelligent with an excellent memory and even better guardian senses and he had to respect the work ethic of any creature that determined… but he also had to acknowledge how superior his security system was. 

.Was.

He stressed the last word in his mind as he sighed and finished cleaning his face. No matter how much he tried to convince himself otherwise,he couldn’t help but blame himself for the Green Hound incident.  Of course, he hadn’t known what they would do with all those dogs after agreeing to use his system, let alone that one would ignore the old adage of ‘letting sleeping dogs lie’ and instead start tearing up the lab in what seemed to be some act of revenge, but maybe it their (or rather his) security was a bit better they could have cut down on the damage and he’d still have a much better job. Maybe then his daughter wouldn’t be spending her school nights giving herself gray hairs chasing ghosts and he wouldn’t feel himself flinch every time a dog barked too loudly in his direction.

Speaking of, he thought, suddenly aware of the relative silence of the apartment, Valerie’s way too quiet tonight…

Damon loved his daughter, really he did, but that girl could snore in a way that gave a sawmill noise envy, and the fact the he didn’t currently hear her cutting logs drew his attention. They had an agreement that she’d always be back in the house by 10pm on a school night and a quick look at his watch told him it was too late in the evening for the silence of an empty room. Rounding the corner to her room, he listened at the door for a bit for the miraculous sound of a normalized sleep volume, but instead he heard nothing. Well, nothing would be an understatement; Damon Gray heard the absolute sound of emptiness on the other side of the door.

Knocking twice on the door, he whispered her name.

“Val? Sweetie?”

Silence greeted him. A door cold to the touch.

“Valerie…” he called again, this time louder and slightly concerned.

There was a response this time, the sound of tiny claws scraping against the door. Damon recognized the sound from a trip to his grandmother’s house in Florida years ago, it was the sound of a dog excitedly scratching at the other side of the door. Desperately flipping the mental switch away from fear, his mind went back to rational parent mode and the scratching became more excited at his presence. As disappointed as he was that his daughter was apparently breaking curfew again, he was entirely too tired to deal with a smuggled animal ruining the security deposit. “Not the worst thing your teenage daughter could bring home, old man,” he told himself as he grabbed the doorknob, “count your…”

The door opened inward into an ice cold abyss. In front of him there was only the top of a glowing white stone staircase and, as far as he could see in any other direction, there was simply darkness. He moved to close the door as an immediate reaction to the sight, his mind shutting down and opting to reset the scenario. However, halfway through the motion a voice cut in to his mind.

But then where’s your daughter, Damon?

It was a rough and scratchy thought, a mocking thought that rested in his mind despite the voice that had put it there not belonging to him in any sense. 

His angered grip tightened on the doorknob to the point of almost causing him pain, and as he grabbed a few deep, panicked breaths, he stepped silently into the blinding darkness, the phantom scratching at the door transforming into a wood splintering fervor the second he released his hold on the anchor to the outside world

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

The staircase into nothing was held up by nothing and was seemingly eternal. He almost wasn’t thinking straight as he made his way down; turning around was out of the equation (even if he’d wanted to, the one time he had looked behind him whatever entrance or exit to the path had existed was replaced with more stairs curling up into more darkness) and there were a few moments when he considered just rushing into the darkness just to get to the bottom so he could throttle whatever was at the end of this haunted path. He couldn’t bring himself to sprint forward though, the thought of the path ending abruptly and him falling into the nothingness forever kept him from making any careless moves.

He wasn’t sure how far down he’d traveled before he reached some sort of bottom, but given how strong the damp smell of mildew and age had gotten for him he was sure he was approaching some sort of end. As if on queue, the steps ended and he found himself deep enough in what he chose to believe was warm water that the bottom of his feet were submerged. Suddenly, a light appeared from the north of his position, pale red illuminating everything around him and giving him a definite direction to move in as he heard something splashing around behind him in the darkness

The water was foamy and churned, and as he skimmed towards the light he couldn’t help but think of the beach in the summer. It was a delusional thought for sure, Damon knew it, but he needed the familiarity to keep himself sane moving forward and not a sobbing mess scared out of his mind. There was no sunlight in this place, but there was a light to guide him.. There was no ocean breeze but there were waves lapping at his ankles.

There are no sharks in this place but there are things with teeth and hunger all the same…

The voice in his head was louder this time. Closer.

The world shook at this realization, and whatever imagined path in the darkness Damon was standing on sunk for a bit, submerging him before being bobbed back to the surface. He gasped for air as he resurfaced, scrambling in the churning fluid for stability and desperately wiping his eyes clear to avoid being robbed of any other senses in this place. When he finally got his vision back fully,  he noticed that the environment had changed once again. Whatever floated through this space with him had risen up to his knees now, his feet completely lost to him beneath roiling foam. He was walled in by what seemed like cages on both sides now, but rather than the polish of smooth steel, the bars he saw around the pool that was once an ocean were all roughly hewn from one continuous block of ancient yellowed stone. The red light from before was now directly over him, and even though he still found no source for it, he chose to believe he had made some kind of positive progress.

Curiosity got the better of him however, and as the paralyzing thought that he was actually the one in the cage started bubbling in his mind, he made his way across the flooded path towards the wall on his left. At first he saw nothing on the other side of the bars, just more of the same darkness he had wandered down stretching ad infinitum, but as he opened his mouth to call out, two burning yellow lights manifested from the blackness. 

Instinctively, he jumped back just as the sound of paws scrambling across stone filled the room. Some were farther away than others, but the one that he had just peered into wasted no time filling with the massive visage of a ragged and decaying dog. Its eyes were lanterns against a midnight sky, circles of pure gold set against the green fur lining most of its body. The creature snarled at Damon, baring its teeth against the bars before going into a barking frenzy and bashing its skull against the solid brick separating them. It was unrelenting in its attempts to get out, and as the sound of bones breaking against stone intermixed with the feverish barking, Damon could only watch in horror as the creature’s head split open from the central impact, its eye bulging out from a freshly shattered skull and teeth bending against each other before breaking loose of the jaw and dribbling down the wall. Blood, thick and black against the red lighting, pooled in the cage before overflowing into the flotsam, bone fragments and brain matter carried out towards him on a wave as the beast continued thrashing against the prison.

Now he ran. The corridor went on endlessly in either direction, and even though he no longer had a sense of direction, he no longer cared. Damon ran straight in the direction he was facing and he prayed that there would be an end to this. Every cage he ran past, the creatures seemed to get more and more intense in their desire to be free. Teeth breaking against stone, reabsorbed and healed into the shattered jaws of monsters only to fly out again in a mist of blood and tissue. Fur coming off in slick sheets from full body charges against something archaic and unbreakable, bones that wished they could say the same snapping against the impact before mending themselves back into gouged flesh.

Maybe they were telling him he was going the wrong direction. Maybe this was all some cold pizza and guilt inspired nightmare to teach him a lesson. Maybe he didn’t fucking care. Damon ran… until the sound of breaking stone behind him crumbling into the building river of viscera finally caused him to look back.

What he saw was massive, just looking at it almost caused Damon to drop to his knees as a sense of hopelessness washed over him. It was easily the size of a passenger plane, a body of pure cosmic black that rippled with muscles and purpose, the pool barely soaking the base of its massive paws as it trudged into the room and stared him down amidst the cacophony of violence that still played all around them. However, the creature almost looked bored watching him frozen in terror, or rather it would have if there was only one head to be bored of him. In addition to the eyes that watched him, Damon noticed an additional head on either side of the creature's central one, each one resembling some combination of wolf and, ironically enough, a mastiff. Something writhed in the spaces between the creatures’ ears, barely visible in the dim light if not for the reflection from the snake’s scales. The auxiliary heads growled at the walls as it moved towards him, each step sending a tidal wave of gore in every direction and quieting the prisoners as they retreated back into the nothing that they’d sprung from with whimpers of defeat. 

The dog had not barked since it arrived, and now that it had quieted the hell-raising around them, it looked content to temporarily puzzle over Damon’s existence in this space. Each head tilted to the left in confusion, and as he slowly stepped back, he watched its ears perk up, alert but not making any direct move against him as the others had. After watching each other in silence for a bit, the dog decided to take the lead, throwing his massive body across the path and blocking the direction he had just run from. It laid all three heads on its paws and proceeded to ignore Damon with a huff of further boredom, the ripples churning the waters again even across the parking lot of distance between them still.

He didn’t need to be told twice. Turning to go once again, he shuddered as the pale eyes from the cages watched him with burning hatred. Something shimmering in the ‘water’ caught his eye before moving on though, and as the creature behind him howled loud enough to shake the planet, Damon Gray picked up the Axion Lab dog collar and ran harder than he ever had in his life

He ran until the minutes became days, ignoring the rising sensation of the slurry that now reached to almost his waist as deafening fear drove him through the darkness. By the time he stopped, the eyes on either side had fully retreated back into their stone prisons, leaving him alone in the quiet again under the hazy red light. He had started calling out Valerie’s name again once he was sure he was alone, convinced that finding her was the key to finding the way out. 

Of course, he thought, heartache dragging him down as he moved forward, that’s assuming she’s actually even here.

As if responding to his thoughts again, something else splashed in the nearby darkness, something large, snapping his concern from the internal to the external again. 

“Val?” He called, taking a tentative step forward. “Val is… is that you?”

Burning hope and icy fear clashed in his heart as he called out again to the noise.

“Valerie!” He yelled, the steam of uncertainty driving him forward as another unseen splash sent waves in his direction. “Valerie, can you hear me?!”  

He was terrified of an answer. If It was her, then they’d be together and maybe they could figure this place out. Maybe. But if they couldn’t? If the sea just stretched forever and this was some cruel glitch in reality, well… the idea of dragging his daughter through a directionless void forever was worse than anything he’d been through. Honestly, his mind was racing so quickly in the direction of the noise being his daughter, he almost didn’t consider the alternative.

Almost.

“Va-”

A flash of teeth appeared in Damon’s mind, biting into the name and dragging it away into the muck. He stumbled in his motions, kicking up his own wave from the infinite pool and splashing it against the nearest wall. He couldn’t afford to fall again, couldn’t bear to see what happened when the ‘water’ got too high against him and the horrible things he imagined below the non-surface moving their way upward. 

As he prepared to creep forward, now trying to be more cautious despite all his previous thrashing, a geyser erupted directly in front of him, throwing foam and debris against the cages and completely soaking Damon again. Luckily for him, he had thrown his arm across his face this time, shielding his eyes and mouth from the ocean spray. His dripping body was the only sound now, and the water around him had gone completely still, only disturbing where the drops from him hit the surface.

He could also feel someone else there with him now.

He didn’t bother calling out to his daughter again, he knew that whatever had calmed the waves was too cold of a presence to be anything living. It reminded him of the lab incident, it reminded him of being in the Fentons’ basement, it reminded him of being the last one in the cemetery after his father’s funeral; it was the feeling of death walking. And walk it did. Damon heard each movement as it closed the distance between them, a casual stride through the flood to reach him. He didn’t run. He couldn’t run. It felt as though gravity had magnified a thousand times and glued him to the spot where he stood, a primal fear that recognized that hunters responded more aggressively to sudden movements.

Hot breath coated the back of his neck, a primal warning from a thing that didn’t breathe and didn’t care. Damon wanted to close his eyes and swing on it, if he couldn’t flee, he wanted to fight so badly, to fill the silence with something other than the judgmental huffing of something that reeked like ancient tombs. Fear and anger made him tear up, violently shaking in the stilled waters as the image of his daughter flashed in his mind again. Suddenly, the feeling moved from behind him, and as Damon looked up for the first  time he saw the creature was now directly in front of him, red eyes peering down and cutting through the darkness like wet clay.

It was massive, easily over seven feet tall, with the head of a large or white wolf sitting atop the body of a lean and athletic man whose skin was the same color as Damon’s. They wore a white and gold longskirt and on their right hip they carried a massive mace. It raised a hand to his chin, lifting Damon’s eyes to meet their own as their ears perked up and their nostrils flared, and while the hand was human in shape, its nails were rough and jagged claws.

TO ME UNHAND THE STONE ANCHORED TO YOUR SOUL. FROM ME SEEK PASSAGE.

He heard a voice in his head again, different this time, and as he was about to ask what they meant, the creature jabbed its free hand into Damon’s chest and squeezed. Shock ran through his body, and the horror of the situation demanded his attention enough that Damon’s eyes shot down the fresh wound, expecting a splatter of blood and pulp to be running down his chest. To his surprise though, what he saw was somehow even worse; hands, not his own but coming from him nonetheless, had grabbed onto the stranger's wrist where he had been punctured.

He did scream this time, and as the silence was disturbed, the wolf-headed creature slowly withdrew their hand from Damon’s chest, pulling more and more of an alternate body out as he retreated. It didn’t hurt him in a physical sense, but the more the others struggled against each other the more Damon flashed in and out of memory, his mind struggling under the weight of whatever was happening.

There had been an accident. A man was dead and the lab was giving him the day off.

The sea had started to recede from him, which is lucky considering he would have fallen to his knees screaming anyway from the pressure inside his head.

A secret folder. Layouts to a model of his security system that was supposedly not in use anymore. Termination order.

The phantom was fighting back, trying to push its way back inside of his chest despite the claws shredding whatever soulself had been stitched together in its new home.

Termination order. Stolen funds. Termination order. Poisoned bags of dog food. Termination order. A speeding car blowing through a red light. TERMINATION ORDER.

With one final pull and one final scream in the darkness, Damon watched as a pale husk was separated from his soul, the new body thrashing in the water as the wolf-headed figure offered him a hand up from the shallows. The last memory burned away as he accepted the help, standing in the ocean again with only the bottom of his feet submerged. 

A Black Dog on a highway, smiling with human teeth. A speeding car unable to stop at a red light. A sudden weight in his chest. A hazy face in the mirror that wasn’t his. A man was dead and the lab was giving everyone the day off. 

“....T-Tom?” Damon asked, looking into the eyes of a dead man once again, “Tom Callumson?”

The figure stopped trashing and laser focused on Damon, completely ignoring the clawed arbiter that stood between them. Tom Callumson had been the man in charge of Axion Labs security, he had hired Damon and when he had been fired the first time they said that Tom was the one who agreed to let him come back in any capacity. Tom Callumson had also died earlier that day, a car crash after running a red light and meeting the grill of a freight truck with the driver’s side of his Camaro. Tom Callumson had also also been reported to have been mumbling to himself over the past two weeks about how ‘they’ were out to get him, which had begun to worry the company about competition stealing their designs…before Tom began complaining about hearing…

“Scratching at the door…” Damon whispered to himself.

“Gray? GRAY?!” Tom yelled, a wild look of fury in his eyes. “It should have been you, Gray! You uppity fucking prick! Over some rank fucking dogs?! SOME FUCKING DOGS?!”

His eyes darted around the room in paranoia, but whatever Tom was seeing now Damon was completely blind to it. He wouldn’t have cared anyway, his mind was too busy connecting the threads from their jumbled up set of memories, piecing together a timeline that made sense for him. The termination orders, they’d been signed right before Damon even had his interview, but the names… Curie, Turing, Tesla, Kirby, Redi, Lovelace… he recognized them as the ‘volunteers’ that Axion had gotten rid of as security due to poor performance. That would explain why they were so eager to get rid of him after the Green Hound incident, he was just the fall guy, those poor dogs never had a chance but he was the sucker who, unfortunately, gave them an excuse.

He had also been covering up some less than spectacular security failures in his free time too, taking bribes from other companies to look the other way as some equipment had been messed with before major testing could be done. In fact Damon was remembering right, Tom may have cost a few scientists more than their pound of flesh when things had gone wrong.

All Damon could do was look at him in disgust. Death had stolen his body but it seems his rotten spirit was just as determined to break the rules, staying behind like so many others in the last few years to make things miserable. Fishing the Axion collar he’d gotten earlier out of his pocket, he rolled it between his fingers, the silver of the pendant a perfect match for fading light of the broken soul glaring at him while pinned standing to infinite nothingness.

“Somehow, Tom,” he said, flipping the tag over to see his hitchhiker's name etched into the stained metal in the dim red light, “I think the dogs are the least of your worries now.”

The wolf-headed creature had been standing beside Tom this whole time, and with a nod he reached out his hand for Damon to place the collar. Relieved to be rid of it, he tentatively dropped it into the beast’s palm, flinching a bit as Tom made another attempt to lunge at him with hatred in his eyes unbound to humanity.

The attempt was short lived however, and as the wolf-headed man wrenched Tom’s head back into his grasp and jammed the silver medallion of the collar into his mouth, Tom began to scream. The noise cut through the darkness like an explosion, bringing back a collection of barking and howling from the cages as eyes lit up observant and hungry on the other side of the darkness. Liquid silver began running out of the corner of Tom’s eyes like tears, and Damon noticed that the water had started boiling underneath him, the sea churning  into a mass of whip-like tentacles each lined with cynodonts that had seemingly leaked through their confinement for the sake of furthering punishment. He took a step back and closed his eyes as the mouths began ripping chunks out of his former coworker, each bite stripping away spectral flesh. The falling silver began to harden into chain-links still connected to his eyes, and as Tom tried to choke out defiant screams, something under the surface began pulling at either side of the chain, slowly dragging him deeper into the nothingness as the sound of ripping and tearing increased in ferocity. Damon didn't want to see what was happening to him, but as the sounds of muffled screams slowly trailed into rattling metal, he couldn't help but spare one final look. Tom was waist deep in the infinite by the time Damon managed the strength to open his eyes, silver chains being pulled from his eyes and mouth where the obol had disintegrated and started overflowing. His skin was tiger-striped with gashes, and where there was once what could be called flesh, there was now matted and disgusting fur, the scabbed lines where they met oozing a vibrant green in the darkness. 

Damon wanted to reach out to him, he wanted to make it stop even if for the selfish reason that the longer he watched the sicker he felt, but as he moved forward, the wolf-headed creature rounded on him, putting themself squarely between Damon and a steadily sinking shade of Tom.

He hesitated, waiting for the creature to make a move or even speak. “Is…is my…”

SHE IS WHERE YOU SHOULD BE DAMON GRAY. NOW BEGONE FROM HERE, THIS IS NO HOME FOR INNOCENCE.

Once again not waiting for him to respond, the creature shot his hand out with impossible speed and jammed the tip of his pointer finger into the space between Damon’s eyes. The world collapsed into true darkness as his eyes rolled back into his head, and he stumbled for a moment before he began to fall backwards Expecting to feel the warm sensation of water on his back at any moment, he braced himself for the soft impact of waves, only to instead feel the hard crush of drywall against the back of his head. His eyes shot open on impact, the blurry shapes in the darkness across from him no longer the hulking visage of a monster but instead forming into the door to his daughter’s room once again.

Senses flooded back into him; the mildew smell was released into the artificial citrus scent of the air fresheners around the house, the static quiet replaced with soft snoring bleeding through the hallway, pale light at the end coming from the tv where the dog was no longer barking for its owners attention. He was home… but he had to be sure. For the second time tonight, he grabbed the doorknob to Valerie’s room with fearful intensity, opening it slowly,  but this time rather than the yawning silence of a void, Damon was met with a wall of sound, his daughter passed out at an impossible angle that would have destroyed his back if he ever tried to recreate it. Despite everything he’d been through tonight and the near airplane level decibels, he smiled at the small victory

Well, this should be a home for innocence, he thought to himself, the burning eyes of a wolf-headed man still engraved in his mind. With a sigh somewhere between He closed her room door and made his way back to the living room where his laptop was, flopping on the couch as the credits rolled on what he was supposedly watching. He knew he wasn’t going to be sleeping for a while, he knew that there’d probably be a long while before he could comfortably close his eyes and not have to hold his breath at the slightest chance of eyes glaring back at him in the darkness, hungry and resentful, but for now at least… he could start searching for a new job.

 —-----------------

Hello everyone, thanks for reading. I haven’t done a strictly horror piece in a while but I wanted to pull something  from my drafts and I figured I’d start the year with something a little more off the wall. I’m a big fan of horror in short story format and especially with a show like Danny Phantom I feel like if you look  beyond the action angle that they typically take with the children and think about the adults who aren’t strictly dedicated to fighting the supernatural there’s a lot of potential to explore the darker elements, hope you enjoyed, and remember: No corporation is your friend and they’d all just as soon drag you into hell as they would flip a light switch.

[duchi-nesten]

Everyone in this family has a secret identity now smh

This is the banger new Lore™️. I was joking about secret agent Cujo once but felt very enabled by the gwe people so it’s now canon in the shared cujostody au. I will never mention it again, but just know it’s canon. It happens. It’s true I swear. This is what he does whenever he’s not with Val or Danny. Nods.

Shared Cujostody AU Masterpost

[starry-bi-sky]

I am absolutely loving your Danyal Al Ghul au. While I have a soft spot for the whole plotline of Danny becoming his canon personality almost right after breaking away from the LOA all because of Jazz, I'm just as much for your take in which he goes through the same character development as Damian.

Now I'm curious. You already tackled his relationship with Dani, will you eventually take a stab at when he, Sam, and Tucker meet Gregor? Given that it's one of my hated episodes as I couldn't stand Sam's infuriatingly hypocritical attitude to Danny's suspicions of him, I'd kill to see your spin on it.

Aw, thank you! Danyal Al Ghul aus are what got me into DPDC first, so I have a major soft spot for them. That being said, uh, its exactly that soft spot that causes me to have Many Opinions about the trope you just mentioned. Like the trope is all fine and dandy, i don't blindly hate it, my main issue with it is that most aus i've seen treat his backstory as an ex-assassin more like a pretty cosmetic accessory rather than something that actually should have had an impact on him. Especially if he remembers being in the league.

Like i cannot stress enough the fact that being in an ecofascist assassin cult (regardless of his standing in it) should've left him, in some way or another, screwed up morally and psychologically because that's just how development works. Nature vs. Nurture is like a game of tug-o-war that never ends, where they are constantly fighting against each other and one side usually has the upper hand or greater influence. Children model the behaviors of the adults around them (ex: bobo the clown doll experiment), and what impacts them in childhood can stick with them permanently.

Like how my psychology professor put it: a baby's brain is like wet cement; if you slap your hand on it, it leaves an imprint, and the cement dries that way. The same rings true for small children.

I could go on, but I frankly have so many thoughts on that alone that I would end up completely derailing from the second half of your ask, and I don't want to be more critical than I already have. Especially since you just mentioned you have a soft spot for the trope.

[Okay, hold onto your hats because this is long. Naturally lmao.]

Gregor! Man, I'll admit I last watched the show back in middle school on a dodgy illegal website (it had surprisingly good audio and visual graphics, and full episodes. But really annoying porn ads.) but I only made it to like season 1 before my hyperfixation faded and I lost interest. So I never actually saw the Gregor episode.

But... it is relatively easy to find free websites that stream Danny Phantom :), so finding the episode took me like. Thirty seconds. Plus the Tv.Tropes recap page because my damn earbuds just died and im out in public as of rn.

I'm not sure if I'll write something for the gregor episode like I did with Dani, since Dani's a bit of a special case in that she's a clone and tends to be a reoccurring presence in DPDC, and I thought the new dynamic with Danyal would be interesting.

Plus, I'm not a big amethyst ocean shipper for the pure reason of I'm just not all that interested in it; its kinda bland to me. I'll admit I've entertained the thought in this au due to the whole balcony scene i wrote, but I would've entertained the thought anyways if it was Tucker in that position instead. Big multishipper, me.

But, if I had to make it official? Danyal is not interested romantically in Sam when the Gregor episode happens, regardless of his relationship with Valerie. Who, speaking of I'm trying to think about how that would go, and I'm torn between including him almost-dating Valerie or not.

Because on one hand it helps point out Sam's hypocrisy (and i love her but i am always happy to point out her flaws and address them in au) in this episode in terms of Danny spying on them, but on the other hand I'll want to include a lot of set up in order to make Gray Ghost work in this au and wow will that take a while.

Especially with the Flirting with Disaster episode because it happens due to Technus' meddling, and Danny is, well, the son of the Batman? A trained assassin? An ex-assassin nonetheless, but still an assassin? A prodigy child in this au? He might not have needed to use most of his skills in the last few years, but like... there's just a bunch of 'what if' and 'well technically...' and 'would he? he could, but would he?' things that is getting in the way of my thought process and making my head spin.

.

Mmm. Okay. Flirting with Disaster occurs relatively the same as canon with a few exceptions; like Danyal noticing the strange coincidences, and he might take the idea into proper consideration because Sam has a point it is strange, especially out of nowhere.

However,,, he really enjoys Valerie's company, and he does really like her. He's been adjusting to civilian life for the last four years and while he's made a lot of progress, he's still. an ex-assassin child living like a wolf amongst sheep. This is normal, typical teenager stuff, and usually his friends like to encourage him doing normal teenager stuff.

So he's stubbornly holding out on the thought that this is normal, that ghost stuff isn't interfering here. He's a little hurt that his friends are discouraging this, he's not bothered by the fact that Valerie is a ghost hunter and he a ghost -- his mother is an assassin, and his father is Batman, and they still had a relationship. (Granted, he's not gonna tell them that)

If anything, being diametrically opposed to each other but still being in love is part of the family! Granted, usually both parties are aware of said opposition to each other, but he'll make a special exception this time around.

(And man now that i'm thinking about gray ghost, im now thinking about various like. scenes i could write between the two of them. maybe in a reblog.)

Anyways uhhh things relatively go the same as canon. Yeah. I think Sam still has a crush on Danny and still spies out of jealousy with Tucker.

.

Now, the Gregor episode! With that out of the way; the TVTropes recap for this episode isn't the best because it doesn't go into detail about the entire episode like it does with Flirting With Disaster and Shades of Gray.

(which i looked at earlier because I made a section of this post talking briefly about what changes I'd make to the Shades of Gray episode to help set up Gray Ghost, but ended up deleting because it was kinda irrelevant for the matter at hand.)

So I'm taking in bits of the episode clips at a time, I'll try not to get too nitpicky about how each scene goes because then it's gonna take me a longer time to write this.

But! First thing's first; since Danny is not romantically interested in Sam, he is also not jealous of Gregor. He is however, a bit eyebrow-raisey at him in their first introduction, but that's because Gregor is coming off as obnoxious.

Danny thinks he's kinda annoying, and it doesn't take a genius to see that Gregor is trying to impress Sam. But since they've only known him for five minutes he takes the good faith assumption and assumes that Gregor is genuinely trying to show interest in Sam's interests too because he likes her, so he keeps mum. The fake hungarian accent is weird, but it's overall harmless, so he doesn't point it out.

He does do the spying thing when he starts suspecting that Gregor might be working for the GIW. The episode only has this happen twice, but for the au this happens a handful of more times over the course of the week, with Danyal's suspicion steadily rising more and more each time.

Hah, when he brings up wanting to spy on Sam and Gregor because of this reason, Tucker still does his "woah! you wanna spy on Sam?" thing.

Danny immediately turns to him, completely unimpressed, and crosses his arms. "Tucker," he says, deadpan, "you and Sam spied on me and Valerie."

He uses a combination of his ghost powers and his regular stealth ability to spy on them. He's hiding in a tree when they're skipping rocks, close enough that he can use his powers to hear them talk but far enough away that he has a good view of their surroundings.

He's invisible in the cinema, but doesn't accidentally get in front of the projector. He checks the inside of the room for the GIW, and then waits outside the actual room itself, keeping an eye on the area and occasionally flying in to watch the movie out of boredom. It reminds him of being back on a recon mission with the League, but it doesn't end with him orchestrating someone's death.

Then when they're at the mall he stays in human form, blending in with the crowd. He runs into the GIW there, but realizes that they're not there because of Gregor; they're just shopping. They didn't show up at either of the last two locations, and he follows them to make sure they're not also trying to blend in. But they're literally just there for shopping.

Danny is rather pleased with this turnout; so far Gregor isn't a spy, he's just annoying. The next day at lunch he asks Sam how her date with Gregor went, and that's how she figures out he spied on them, because well, she didn't tell him that.

"Have you been spying on me?"

Danny messes with his food a little bit, and Tucker is sinking into his seat with embarrassment. He frowns, "Only last night. Those incompetent government dodos--"

His lip curls up; he gets all 'Shakespeare-y' (as Sam and Tucker put it) when he's insulting someone, "--kept appearing whenever Gregor did. I followed you and him last night to make sure he wasn't a spy."

A roundabout way of saying, "I was worried".

Sam is, as canon, furious. Danny understands why, he knows generally speaking that people don't like being spied on. But he's confused on just how angry she is, and is a little irritated by it.

"Why would you do that!" She exclaims, "That's way out of line, Danny."

"How? You spied on me when I was going on dates with Valerie." He narrows his eyes, and points his fork at her, "I'm not blind, I noticed."

"That's different, we told you why we were suspicious. And we don't have ghost powers like you do."

"I don't need ghost powers to sneak around, Sam, you've seen this firsthand. And I just told you why I followed you, I thought he was working with the guys in white--"

"So you think someone can only be interested in me if they're after you?" (this is a paraphrased quote, folks ;D)

"No! If that was the case I would have voiced my concern the moment I thought it. I don't get why you're so angry, you spied too."

Iiits.... a mess. Sam storms off with Gregor, Tucker tags along because okay, yeah, maybe Gregor isn't with the GIW, or maybe last night was a fluke. Either way he ends up tagging along. Danny overhears that conversation between the GIW and Mr. Lancer, and maybe he's right, maybe he's wrong; but something is up.

I've gotten to that scene in the locker room where Gregor tells Danny that he knows he doesn't like him, and I've paused at Danny's reply to say this: Danyal doesn't even bother trying to deny it.

"I know you do not like me."

"You're right; I don't."

"Ah, let me finish. I know you do not like me because you want to protect your friend, Sam, and I respect that."

"...That's correct."

"Good! Because I am going to ask her out."

"I had a feeling you'd say that," he stands up, claps his hand tight on Gregor's shoulder, and leans close to him with a threatening smile, "so you understand me when i say; if you break my best friend's heart, you're as good as dead, right?"

"Ah,, yes. I am so glad we got that cleared out of the way, and now I hope after we can.. how you Americans put it, hang out?"

In the episode he hugs Danny and gives him a la bise (which is that french greeting where you kiss someone on the cheek two or more times) after they end their conversation. But here, when he goes to do that to Danyal, Danny leans away, points an accusatory finger at him, and says; "Absolutely not; we are not close."

The next scene after that is like, end of day. Sam, Tucker, and Gregor walking away. Sam looks over her shoulder to glare at Danny, then gets forlorn. Tucker looks back and just looks forlorn.

(When did I start narrating each scene?? Eh, I'm writing this in brief spurts of time throughout the day. Don't fix what's not broke)

After that there's this whole scene with the two GIW agents that have been chasing Phantom all episode. They're there because they have Tucker's PDA that Skulker took, and it's got the information of their purple backed gorilla assignment on it. They've been going around seeing who Tucker associates with in hopes of catching Phantom.

Uhh ahaha and that is where this gets a little interesting imo, and also allows me to mention that im retconning Danyal's (already) redesigned ghost form. Which I've wanted to retcon even before this moment bc it was just too busy. I'll get to that in a moment.

The GIW suspect Gregor for being the Phantom because of his white hair and green eyes, which is all fine and dandy until you remember: Danyal (and by extension Phantom) has that very noticeable, rather identifiable facial scar that goes across the middle of his fucking face. The GIW could easily suspect that Phantom hides his scar with makeup if he's in disguise, but if they meet a kid with a seemingly identical facial scar and similar disposition? Hoo boy.

Solution? I've got two: Gregor is canonically a kid from Michigan who faked everything to impress Sam. Considering he knows she's gothic and knows that she's ultra-recyclo vegetarian? He probably watched her from afar or got information on her somehow. His hair is dyed, his eyes might just naturally be green, but if he notices that she's got a crush on either Danyal or Phantom? A little sfx makeup could help him recreate a similar looking scar.

My second solution that's gonna happen anyways bc its that suit redesign; Danyal does hide his face as Phantom. Ghosts are emotional creatures and its a popular headcanon that their interests, ambitions, etc, influence the way they look as a ghost, not just their death. A big reoccurring theme of my au is that Danyal did not leave the League unscathed, and that being an assassin is an important part of his identity.

So i'm discarding the hazmat suit look entirely and leaning into the 'assassin' thing. But the general (stylized) feel is like, white ribbon/cloth vambraces that he has used as a garrote at some point, a hood, a gaiter scarf-type thing. I'm keeping the cape. I did a doodle a few days back that's not the official redesign, but a redesign for Phantom. I may reblog this post with that attached because it's got the general feel down. There's very little white involved, but the inside of his cape flares out and looks like the night sky.

Now, the hood and gaiter scarf gets rid of most of the problem, but Danny's hood doesn't stay on all the time, so the GIW have likely seen the upper half of the scar. :] Gregor's own drawn-on scar doesn't have to be 1:1, but it looks close enough, right? A small scar cutting through the edge of his brow and ends right below the corner of his eye. A 'cool, badass' one opposed to Danny's 'garish' scar.

But! Back to the episode scene. Canon Danny gets written off as being 'too prepubescent' to be Phantom, and honestly it'd be hilarious if Danyal was written off for the same reason (he's calling them idiots in his head if they do). But instead -- leaning into the GIW's incompetence here -- he gets written off as being too mature or too talkative. Or something equally as absurd.

Sam breaks up with Gregor for canon reasons, but when Gregor does his "i really like you, but, come on-!" and gestures to tucker, he adds on "and that scary friend of yours too, seriously!"

Things go relatively the same as canon after that. Danny does end up apologizing for spying, however. Sam does it first. Sorrows, prayers, all that.

.

Things usually end up changed or different when I actually write it down, so I'd likely add more or adjust different scenes according to the flow of the oneshot. This is just like, a general vibe of how things would go, and where some of the more obvious changes would be if I did write this oneshot.

Hope you enjoyed! Thanks for the ask :]

[reanimatedgh0ul]

no see bc if we had actually gotten a scene in shades of gray where vlad struck a deal w valerie to become her benefactor and promised to help her get revenge on danny

it could've directly paralleled this scene from bitter reunions and it would've perfectly established how vlad's relationships w danny and valerie are meant to mirror each other from the very beginning

[artemismoorea03]

DPxDC Prompt: Who's Child Is This?

Inspired by an ICarly Clip. "Mr. Wayne, we have your son here."

Bruce blinked, then checked the number on the phone. It was from the police station. He then looked around the table which had fallen silent when Alfred had brought him the phone.

Dick, Jason, Tim, Duke, and Damian were all accounted for. Even Jon was there so they couldn't have misidentified him as his kid.

"Which one?" Bruce chose to ask.

"Tim Drake."

Bruce looked at Tim specifically as he tilted his head confused. "Are you sure?"

"Oh yeah, Mr. Wayne, we know your boys by now."

"Right... alright, I'll be there in a couple of minutes. Can I ask on why Tim has been taken into custody?"

Tim tilted his head even further while some of the others around the table started chuckling.

"He was found trespassing near the new Axion Labs at the edge of the city. The owner chose not to press charges so we're sending him home in your custody."

"I see, I'll be there soon. Thank you for the call."

"Of course, Mr. Wayne, we'll see you soon."

Bruce ended the call then looked at his kids. "Apparently, Tim has been arrested for trespassing near the Axion Labs construction site."

"And you didn't even invite me?" Dick chuckled at Tim, "We could have had so much fun together."

Tim scrunched his nose at the idea. "No way, that whole area is an OSHA violation. If I went there it wouldn't be out of costume, whoever that kid is was risking his life just walking within a block of it."

"Well, I'm going to go down there and see what 'Tim' was thinking." Bruce got out of his seat, "I'll be back soon."

"New brother?" Cass asked as Damian growled.

"We're going to assume no for now, but we may have another for dinner depending on what's going on."

"I will prepare another seat while you are gone, Master Bruce."

"Thanks, Alfred. I'll be back soon."

-

When Bruce walked into the police station he immediately noticed 'Tim' sitting in front of one of the officers desks. It was a newer officer and it was clear that neither Detective Montoya or Commissioner Gordon were in or somebody would have noticed that this kid definitely wasn't Tim.

Yes, the kid had black hair which was on the shorter side but his hair fell in front of his face more than Tim would wear it, and his eyes were unnaturally blue. He was pale in an old hoodie, blue jeans, and red shoes. The biggest difference though was that this kid looked like he was only pushing 15, not 17. Yes, he looked quite a bit like Tim but anybody who had spent more than five minutes with Tim Drake would know they weren't the same person.

"Mr. Wayne." The officer called as Bruce walked over, looking at the kid.

He was thin and pale, which a tired look on his face. He also shrunk away from Bruce when he walked over.

Bruce knew what a kid in trouble looked like. So he smiled down at the kid. "You know, Tim, when I said you could go to the lab to do your science homework I didn't expect you to go all the way to Axion Labs."

The kid looked at him, surprised then seemed to quickly catch on. "What can I say, I had to see what terrible science looked like. Sorry for making you come down here."

"It's fine, but are you okay?"

"Y-yeah, totally." He said, his hand subconsciously moving to his ribs as though he was hurt.

"Alright then you are grounded."

"What?!" 'Tim' squeaked, "Come on-"

"Nope. You are ground... for... 'til... college."

"FOR 'TIL COLLEGE?!"

"For 'til college!"

The officer cleared his throat then held out a clipboard. "If you sign the red x's you can take your son and leave, Mr. Wayne."

Bruce took the papers, quickly looking over it and signing it. It was strange to see that all of the handwriting on the paperwork was adult writing. Had they even asked this kid his name? Once everything was signed he passed it back over to the officer who nodded.

"Looks good. Thanks Mr. Wayne and you stay out of trouble. The whole city knows your face. You're just lucky Mr. Masters didn't want to press charges."

"Yeah, so lucky." The kid rolled his eyes, then stood up and looked up at Bruce. "Can we go now?"

"Sure thing, chum. Come on." Bruce said, leading the kid out of the station and to the car. The kid seemed hesitant as he looked around, his eyes narrowing when they landed on a gentlemen with silver hair in a ponytail, only when the man smiled at 'Tim' did the kid speak up again.

"Come on, Dad, let's get out of here before the stalkers find us." He said, climbing in the front seat and closing the door, much to the annoyance of the silver haired man.

Bruce climbed in the front seat, buckling in and driving away from the station. "So... 'not Tim' what's your name?"

"Danny. Just Danny... sorry about all of that Mr. Wayne. That guy took one look at me and started calling me 'Tim' and when I tried to explain that I wasn't 'Tim' hey called me a liar. But if I gave them my real name then... somebody else was going to come collect me and I didn't want that. So... I let them call me Tim. I'm sorry, I hope it didn't put you out..."

"Not at all. But... are you okay? Why were you at Axion Labs?"

Danny seemed hesitant, "I... it sounds crazy."

"It's Gotham, kid. Crazy things happen all the time..."

"Right... well um... I-I was kidnapped from my home and taken to Axion Labs. I-I escaped and when I was trying to leave the grounds the police saw me and thought I was trespassing. Since the cops were I decided to play along with it..."

Bruce frowned, "Kidnapped? Is... is there somebody I can call?"

Danny shook his head. "I have an older sister who is probably going crazy looking for me but other than her and a couple of friends there wouldn't be anybody. My parents... they were kind of involved. They... they found out something about me and tried to hurt me, I ran to somebody I knew I couldn't trust because I thought maybe he would get his head out of his ass but I was just being an idiot." Danny hugged himself. "You can drop me off anywhere though, you don't have to bother yourself with me or my shit."

Bruce pulled to a stoplight and reached over to the kid who flinched, Bruce waited until he relaxed before Bruce patted his head. "I'm not going to just leave you on the street. Besides, it's late and by now my butler has already dished you some dinner. So at least for tonight you're welcome to stay with me and my kids. We'll get some food in your belly, make sure you're not wounded, let you call your sister, and find a way to get you home. Sound good?" He asked, moving his hand away.

Danny looked at Bruce, seeming a bit untrusting for a moment before he glanced at something near Bruce and relaxed. There was nothing with Bruce, he wasn't carrying anything, but whatever Danny was seeing was enough to put his mind at ease. "Okay... but if anybody tries anything be warned, I bite."

Bruce chuckled, "So do most of the others. You'll fit right in."

'But just what the hell is going on with this kid? Does it have anything to do with that man outside the police station? I've got to get to the bottom of this before this kid leaves, especially if he's still a target.'

[sykloni2]

I guess it's bit up to interpretation what happened and why, but I've never got the view that Damon did anything that he wasn't hired to do.

Damon's boss is the one who is enthusiastic about "smelly security dogs" being gone. Damon himself only talks about the upgraded security systems. To me this has always given the idea that dislike for the dogs came from the Axion Labs/Damon's bosses. His boss is very happy with Damon's work before Danny and Cujo wreck the place, so the boss is definitely on the same page with what is happening, contracts have been signed and this has all been agreed on.

Of course, there is possibility that Damon was the one who proposed getting rid of the dogs, but to me it seems much more logical that it would be the company's idea. I don't see a reason why Damon would specifically want to get rid of the dogs. It's not like it's his money that goes into them. The company on the other hand might think automated security system would save them money in the long run (giving an opportunity to not only get rid of the dogs but maybe also lay off some security guards).

The other thing you mentioned was that he "automated his own job", which isn't really accurate. It's more like he automated his employee's jobs.

It's mentioned that Damon had multiple employees working under him, so it was not his job in the first place to work as a security guard. I would assume his position was more managerial and keeping systems running etc. He only becomes regular security guard after the Cujo incident.

You know something we don't talk about enough?

Cujo.

More specifically how Cujo came to be.

The episode he debuts in shows Valerie's dad showing off a new fancy high-tech security system and showed a bunch of recently emptied kennels where the security dogs were.

This actually implies that he got rid of the dogs, which mind you are very expensive to house, feed and train. Which means he stole thousands of dollars of company assets AND automated his OWN JOB. Like, there was no way he was keeping his job after this even if the inspector guy gave him a pass on whatever check he was doing.

It's been a while since I've seen the episode, but as a kid, I got the implication that Mr. Gray euthanized the dogs, which is a super dark origin story for Cujo

[fantasticstoryteller]

Plot thought. Go forth, Tumblr, and play.

The Team is on a mission to infiltrate Axion Labs. There are just enough red flags to ping the Justice League's radar, but not enough evidence for them to do anything. So, the mission.

The mission has been derailed. They found a cloning chamber. A cloning chamber. And there are clones!

Granted, the clones aren't of Superman, but that didn't much matter to them. They were clones! In tubes! Children clones that were being forcefully aged!

Conner may have accidentally smashed a few things. And Tim may have--accidentally, he swears!--hit a few keys that opened the pods prematurely. And Cassie definitely, with intent and on purpose, bundled up all three clones in clean lab coats, and Artemis absolutely grabbed two of them to load them in the ship. What? Were they expected to just leave the children there?

What did the League mean, "there's no one to take care of them?" Duh! The Team can do it! They rescued the children, after all.

*

Meanwhile Dan, Danny, and Dani are trying to figure out why they're not back to full size yet after having been rescued from the GIW.

[on-the-clear-blue]

Dead Man's Diner pt 6

Bruce's eye twitched as he forced the well-worn grin on his face.

It was a subtle thing, one that Tim would have thought he had imagined if he didnt know better, but he did.

Across from the both of them was Vlad Masters, he was a tall man, taller than Tim but still shorter than Bruce, all of him screamed rich villian, that is other than the way the second Bruce made a comment off hand about the Gotham Knights football team.

It was then the cruel looking man melted away, and Vlad Masters devolved into a chattering 40 something that knows far too much about the Green Bay Packers.

"Oh if I could go back in time and see that touch down again I could die a happy man" Vlad said with a wistful looking smile on his face, eyes glazed over in memories before he seemed to snap out of it and shake his head, a light dusting of pink came across his cheeks, lighting up his papery skin.

"Ah...do please forgive me...I seem to have gotten a tad bit carried away..." Tim bit back a scoff as he leaned back into his chair, they had been talking for almost a full hour and nearly all of it was Vlad ranting.

Bruce let out a small chuckle that sounded fake even to Tim, "No worry Mister Masters! Perhaps next time the Knights go against the Packers we can share a box!"

Tim knew this was to help sell the whole 'Brucie' act, but he still couldn't keep the cringe on his face, "B? Um...the Knights are a minor leauge team they...ugh forget it." Rubbing at his eyes, Tim cut off the words that Masters looked ready to say, "What was it again that you asked for a meeting Mister Masters? Something about..."

Looking down to his tablet, Tim sent a check in timer, if Vlad was to strike it would be soon "some sort of collaboration? With your subsidiary Axion Labs?"

Masters seemed a little taken back from Tim's thinly vailed bluntness but pushed onward, "Of course, my dear employees at the labs have been working on an interesting new energy source! You see it's fully green and has a positive net energy production." He paused for a moment and a sneer like condescending grin got plastered on his face, "That is Mister Wayne, meaning it produces more energy then we put in it."

Bruce's eyes crinkled as his cheesy grin could only grew more, "Thank you! I was just about to ask, my dear boy Tim here is far better at understanding all that...wiggley wobbly science things!"

(Liar) Tim thought before sending Masters a bashful smile, "I know enough that what your saying is astounding to hear...why come to Wanye Enterprises with this?"

Masters grin was predatory as he spoke smoothly "Well~ Lex and I have a...bit of a history so I couldn't possibly be able to work this with him, Queen Industries are more biotechincal in nature, while WE is far more wide spread! Not only do you have a tech division, but also medical, defense and mechanical divisions!"

Things were clicking in Tims mind, Masters wanted to use WE to distribute, make them stake their own reputation for what Masters was peddling.

Bruce's persona was slipping slightly, his blue eyes steely as he looked Masters down, "We will need a working concept before we can press onward for anything else."

Masters kept the grin on for a second longer before it slipped, "Of course, I will go above that and even send my two top scientists here to demonstrate-"

He was cut off by a shrill ringing coming from Tim's tablet, making him wince as he rushed to imput the code for the check in timer, sending the man a small smile Tim spoke, "So sorry about that, I thought I put that on silent...but do look at the time Bruce, We have a meeting with Lucius in twenty minutes, did you get those slides done?"

Sending Bruce a sideways glance, Tim watched as the man stiffened but shook his head, "I did not. I am sorry Vladdie, but we will have to cut this short, I am sure you know how many meetings it takes to run a company...but please, do meet with Maddie my receptionist to schedule those scientists of yours to come over yes?"

Tim could have sworn he saw a blood vessel pop as Masters hissed a little before he gave a terse nod, "Of course...Maddie you said? Yes...I do think I will speak to her." The man seemed to calm rapidly at the name, and seemed to almost float out of the meeting room.

---

Bruce let his persona fall the same time his head fell into his hands, the heels of his palms rubbing at his eyes.

There was silence in the meeting room, he could hear Tim's fingers pattering against the tempered glass of his tablet, and the soft chatter of the office from the outside and the ever faint sound of wind whipping around the high rise tower.

Picking his head up, he looked to Tim, doing a few hand motions, "DO. BUG. SWEEP" Getting a nod in response, Bruce went over the meeting.

Something was definitely strange about Masters, he was only 48 and yet fully gray, his skin was waxy and looked translucent, deathly pale, he had a cain but didn't have a limp.

Not to mention a seemingly tense history with Lex Luthor, to the point he would seek out WE instead of Lex for his seemingly miracle energy source and-

"Clear B, not a bug in place. "

"Hn" Bruce grunted in response, trying to get his brain back on track.

The energy source was another thing that was sticking out to Bruce, it sounded far too good to be true, it broke the laws of physics to-

"Bruce? What do you think of him? Suspect or...?" Tim spoke again, and Bruce let out a small sigh, his deductions would have to wait till later.

"I think we will need to monitor him closely, I have Drs Fentons are his lead researchers..."

---

Scrunching up his face, Danny stuffed his face into his elbow before sneezing thrice, groaning for a moment before he straightened up, rubbing at his nose, the Halfa came over to the sink in the kitchen of the Diner.

It was his second day as an over night chef and he was honestly having fun? Like cooking is so much cooler when the food wasn't actively reanimated and trying to kill him.

The diner was at a new place, now it was on the old rail ways that ran through Park Row, or how the people that lived there called it Crime Alley.

He had been nervous at first, because he had felt the familiar shiver of entering another beings haunt, but thankfully the diner was stationed just out of the haunts bounds.

Biting back a little yawn, Danny flipped a page in Lunch Ladys, only to see the recipe shift and change, going from a tuna casserole to one for a classic chili.

Blinking a few times at the book, he sighed, "Well alright then." Taking note of the ingredients, Danny drummed his fingers in the book, it was obviously more than just a simple cook book, with it, you know, actually shifting and changing each page.

Shaking his head, Danny straightened up and stopped leaning over the counter, "So...Spooktastical Chili? No that sounds dumb...Cursed Cauldron Chili? Closer..." thinking out loud, Danny set a massive pot over the stove, flipping the flame on as he work shopped cheesy names for his new dish.

---

Jason had an itch.

The kind that just wouldn't go away no matter how hard you scratched at it.

The problem he couldn't get even a second of relief since the itch was in his chest, right dab in the middle.

Rubbing at it as he groaned, Jason rolled off his bed and stood, it was late, he had finished patrol an hour ago and he just...

Felt the itch to do something, to go see something that was just right out of reach.

Sighing as he stumbled around his room, grabbing discarded jeans and an old hoodie with the arms cut off, slipping them on as he left the small bedroom of the safe house.

Stopping in the tiny kitchen, Jason did his best Bat glare (tm) at the empty refrigerator, letting out a grumble as he slammed the door closed.

"Fuckin...shit." flipping the cabinet doors open he glared at the small tub of mostly empty peanut butter and sleeve of crackers that were clearly ripped into by a rat.

"Fuckity fuck fuck..." sure there were spices, so many spices, but he wanted to eat, not cook, Alfred had spoiled that feeling into him through many years.

Slamming them closed as well, Jason growled as he stomped over to his boots, toeing them on before he stormed out of his safe house, fumbling with his keys to lock it behind him.

And with that he set out on the Alley, letting his feet carry him through the streets, he waved at some of the friendlier working girls and boys, but kept walking.

It took a moment for him to realize where he was going, to that little mom and pop diner that closed years ago, they used to give him left overs when he was still one of the dirty street rats trying to live...

"Since fucking when did the lights in that place turn on?" Stopping outside of what he had thought was a clossed down diner, Jason squinted at the banner stretched above the doorway.

"Big C's diner? No...old guys name was like Tony, so ain't their kids that wanted to take over..."

Before Jason could stop himself, his hand was already around the door handle, and he was pulling it open.

[faerynova]

ECTOIMPLOSION TIME!!!! i got paired with @fridurwrites and it has been SO SO SO FUN making this fic with her. we probably leaned more into collab territory than the event is intended for but thats fine the fic is a banger

this isnt actually the art that i created for the event tho! i made art for every single chapter, but the initial submission that inspired the comic will be in an upcoming chapter :] get excited for that later

read [DYING TO KNOW YOU] on ao3!

Eight months ago, no-shit ghosts appeared for the first time, heralded by the terrifying lightning-cloud shadow shape of the Amity Park Phantom. Six months ago, the Phantom and what can only be described as a hellhound annihilated Axion Labs, causing Damon Gray to be demoted and shattering the balance of Valerie Gray's life. One day after that, a box arrived with a suit and instructions, and the Huntress took to the sky for the first time. Barely a month later, her suit was destroyed, and she was given a new and terrifyingly responsive powered armor by an unseen benefactor right when she needed it most. She's hunted ghosts in as much of her spare time as possible ever since, even surrendering the boy she maybe loves in order to protect him better. As the son of the eccentric but capable local mad scientists, she hopes he'd understand if anyone ever learned who she actually is. Sometime in the last thirty-six hours, thousands of monstrosities poured into Amity Park, and Valerie finds herself reluctantly fighting alongside the Phantom in a desperate defense. It's been nonstop, but she has to keep both her home and the ring she received yesterday safe. Even if it means putting herself on the line.

[thesoulspulse]

Looks like Vlad’s up to his old tricks again. But hey, at least his heart’s in the right place since he’s only doing this to keep Dani safe. Too bad purposefully waking up then subsequently pissing off an ancient evil so he can replace Pariah Dark as the new Ghost King isn’t exactly what she had in mind when he told her he’s working on something big to help deal with the “ghost problem” in Amity Park...

[wheneverfeasible]

I’ve been sucked into the DPxDC crossover fandom despite not keeping up with DC comics or shows in YEARS really, but I’m so into it lmao. One of the things I love is that depending on how everyone is aged, Danny is shipped with just about anyone 😂

But it’s always with Danny going to Gotham and dealing with the DC world. What if…

What if DC Character(s) of Choosing were the ones who moved to Amity Park for whatever reason? Maybe Wayne Enterprises is opening a location there, maybe taking over Axion Labs/Vladco or something, or maybe just simply one or more of the kids are doing a student exchange program thing. Whatever.

But what if it was the DC character having to deal with the strangeness of the DP universe instead of the typical other way around?

I just think that throwing Batfam into Phantom’s world could lead to interesting new stories.

[help-itrappedmyself]

Summoning Game Show Part 7

Masterpost

Okay. This is technically the end of Summoning Game Show! There is room to write more, but that probably won't be coming for a little bit. Thank you to everyone for reading and commenting and sharing. I am so so happy that people liked it and interacted and everything. I had a great time and I hope you like the end.

~~~~~

Red, Nightwing, and Robin soon find themselves in an office/meeting room of sorts. They’re seated on a couch in front of a table. 

Danny closes the door behind them. “I would offer you a drink, but I don’t think you could drink it.”

Danny takes a seat on a loveseat across the table from them. He has a small green dog with a spiky collar sitting in his lap and he pets him absentmindedly as he gets settled. Robin is laser focused on the dog.

“What would you guys like to talk about?”

“Who is that?” Robins asks immediately.

“This is Cujo!” Danny smiles down at the Cujo and he wags his tail when he hears his name. “You guys don’t mind him being in here right? He’s mostly well behaved.”

Robins shakes his head. “We don’t mind. Just…”

“Ah, dead animal. Well, animals get ghosts too.” Danny explains. “ Personally, I like to think that Cujo is happy.”

“His collar says Axion Labs.” 

Danny nods at Robin, fingers playing with the collar. “ He used to be a guard dog for them.” 

“What-” Robin is cuts off as Danny and Cujo start glowing more brightly, Cujo starts growling and his form flickers.

“Never- never- ask a ghost how they died.” The boys all nodded, and Danny and Cujo stabilized as they calmed down. “It’s very rude. Now, to business, why did you want to summon me? ”

“We do a lot of travel, space, dimensions and everything and we just wanted to learn more about this realm. Maybe set up communications, that kind of thing. A learning experience.” Nightwing explains.

“I mean, we clearly don’t know enough considering we didn’t know you could help Hood. Or that he needed help in the first place.” Red mutters the last bit. 

Danny eyes them all warily. “Historically, we don’t really do well when people want to learn more about us. What exactly do you need this information for?

“”Just to learn. I told you, I like to know things.” Red said.

“Well, I can’t just give out any information, but if you want to ask me some questions until Hood gets back, I’ll answer what I can.”

“What is this place actually called?” Nightwing asks.

“Oh, it has lots of names, because it’s lots of places. This is the Infinite Realms, home to all afterlives and the dimension between dimensions.” 

“Home to all afterlives?” Red is flabbergasted. Red wasn’t sure that he believed in any afterlives, and now there are multiple? “So you’re all dead?”

“No.” They wait a moment but Danny does not elaborate.

“So there are living people here?” Nightwing asks.

“Obviously.”Danny makes a face at them. “Everyone here is living. You need better terminology. Humans are very narrow when it comes to life and death.”

“That’s because usually you’re either dead or alive.” Robin is struggling to comprehend the possibility of an in-between.

“That seems very narrow-minded coming from people who came here with someone both alive and dead.”

“Hood?” Red asks.

“Hood is alive.” Nightwing states.

“And dead!” Danny chirps. “There are many in-betweens, most leaning to one side or the other. Hood leans more towards being alive, but his being alive is dependent on ectoplasm, so he’s at least a little dead. Though the fact that he was able to live with the ectoplasm he has means that he is mostly alive.”

“What is ectoplasm and how did Hood get it?” Red is very curious now.

“Oh, everything. Most of the Infinite Realms is made out of ectoplasm , including most creatures in it. “ Danny puts his hand together and green liquid pools in it. The same green as everything outside.

“So, that’s probably the Lazarus pits.” Red mutters. “ Explains the exposure bit.”

“You have ectoplasm in your dimension?” Danny asks.

The boys nod. “There are a few pools of it around. One guy in particular likes to hoard them to keep from dying.” 

Danny frowns. 

“That’s a violation. Ectoplasm is poisonous for humans, radioactive.” Danny complains. “And if his ectoplasm is as bad as the ectoplasm in your friend, that is not healthy.”

“It would be, he’s the one who exposed Hood to it in the first place.”

Danny groans. “Alright, I’m going to need a list of all the locations you know of in your dimension, and if you have a way for me to contact whoever is hoarding the ectoplasm that would be great. I’m going to have to take care of that.”

There’s a knock on the door and Danny calls, “Come in!”

Frostbite opens the door for Hood, who comes in without his helmet, but with a mask on. “Guys, this is my new doctor. He’s great.” Hood says.

“Glad you’re doing better!” Danny smiles at them both as Hood takes a seat. Frostbite nods his head, then leaves again, shutting the door behind him. “Frostbite gave you a rundown of what’s to do and what’s going to happen now that you have healthy ectoplasm?”

“Yep, explained all the side effects, but I’m already feeling much better.”

“Wonderful! So If you guys wouldn’t mind just giving me that information so I can follow up on it, I think we’re done here.”Danny stands, putting Cujo on the seat as he vacates it. 

“We would like to be able to get in contact with you, if you’re coming to our dimension, that way we can tell the rest of the heroes what you’re up to and everything. Is there any way to communicate between our dimensions?” Red asks.

“Frostbite also said I would need to discuss a way to get fresh ectoplasm from you until I can create my own reliably.” Jason cuts in.

“Well, looks like I have lots of business in your dimension. Do you guys have communicators that you use? Anything from your dimension on you right now?”

They all nod. “Cool, hand me something, two-way, that you don’t mind losing because after I fix it up you won’t be able to contact anyone except for me on it.”

Red hands him a phone, Danny opens it up and messes with the insides before putting it back together. Then he turns it on and calls his Ghost business phone so he would have the number. He hands Red back the phone, picking his own up. “What should I name you guys? Is it always going to be Red on the phone?”

“Probably not.” Red says. “Especially if Hood needs things from you as well. Just put us under Bats.”

“Bats is weird, but whatever you say.” Danny finishes with his phone and smiles up at them. “Thanks for competing! I’ll be in touch.”

[jamiethebeeart]

Dannymay Day 15: Field Trip // to Axion Labs! (Really just a recruitment tactic for the future)