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petite-phthora · 1 month ago

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I can be the Edward to your Bella

[DP x DC fic]

[Love at first… murder? - part 22]

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Part 1

Ao3

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They separate after a moment. Once again, two pairs of glowing green eyes meet. They let silence wash over them once again as they gaze at one another, locked in embrace.

After a while, Danny breaks the silence with a small sigh.

“I guess I might as well explain some more, if you still have some questions? I haven’t quite explained everything you should know yet, I suppose,” He offers.

Jason gives a small nod.

“Yeah, I… I’d like to know more, if you don’t mind…” At Danny’s nod he continues. “You keep mentioning ectoplasm, which I think is what I have previously always known as Lazarus water. Could you tell me more about it?”

Danny smiles at him.

“This is ectoplasm,” Danny says, putting his open palm between them and letting ectoplasm pool on top of it.

Jason flinches and leans back a bit, eyeing the ectoplasm apprehensively.

“Yeah, looks like Lazarus water to me, apart from the lack of bubbling” He replies stiffly. “And you’re – we’re—made of this stuff?”

“Essentially? Yes. Though we are only partially. But that doesn't matter right now”

“It sounds like something that should matter right now”

“Nah, right now the important part is that your ecto,” Danny emphasizes by pointing at Jason, letting the ecto disappear in the meantime, “is not healthy.”

“Something's wrong with the Pit? Pfft, I could’ve told ya that” Jason huffs sarcastically.

“Well, this Pit you keep referring to seems to be some kind of corrupted or contaminated version of the standard ectoplasm. And this Lazarus water you mentioned? Well, ectoplasm is not supposed to be bubbling, so…”

Danny lets out a small hum as he thinks.

“Like I’ve said before, from what I can guess, this corruption might be partially responsible for the madness you’ve referred to. And it’s probably the thing that has stunted your core growth.”

“My what growth?”

“Your core. Each ghost has a core. It’s the entire culmination of their being. Their vital organs, heart, brain, soul, etc. No matter how damaged a ghost’s physical body gets as long as their core doesn’t get damaged they can recover.

“You can think of it a little like the gems in Steven Universe,” Danny adds on, slightly unhelpfully for Jason as he has never heard of Steven Universe before, but he just nods along.

“If the core gets damaged, or even worse, destroyed, then the ghost is ended. They fade away, their entire existence getting erased in the process. It’s a fate worse than death…” Danny trails off before shaking his head a bit to clear it.

“Anyway, each ghost core also has an element or theme it is inclined to. We call it a core-type. For example, I have an ice core, making it so that I don’t get cold easily, and it gives me some ice powers as well.

“But I also know someone with a shadow core, someone with an electrical core, a fire core, etc., etc. Baby ghosts haven’t quite grown into the core-type yet, so you have nothing to worry about for now.” Danny says reassuringly.

Jason pulls a face at being referred to as a ‘baby ghost.’

“Right, and I’m supposed to have one of these cores but, what, the ‘contamination’ in the Pit stopped it from appearing?”

Danny shrugs. “Yeah, pretty much.”

He then gives Jason a contemplative look.

“I might be able to get rid of the corruption myself, as ghosts have a built-in filter so shit like the Pit madness doesn’t happen.

“But seeing as I’m not a full ghost and I haven’t really seen contamination like this before, I’m not entirely sure it’s healthy for me…” He trails off before giving a small shake of his head. “And I’m no doctor, either. So, you’d probably have to see Frostbite for an official diagnosis and treatment plan.”

“Frostbite?” Jason inquires.

“He’s my ghost doctor” Danny explains. “I can talk to him about it beforehand, see if he knows more about this corrupted ecto situation. Though he might ask you to come by for a checkup either way.” He shrugs.

Jason agrees before bringing up another question. “So, whenever someone dies, they just,” he makes a vague gesture, “Go to the Ghost Zone and become a ghost? Why haven’t we really come across any ghosts like that before?”

“Not everyone that dies becomes a ghost,” Danny shakes his head slightly, “And not even every ectoplasmic entity, or ecto-being, is someone that has died.

“Ecto-beings can be people who died, if they died a traumatic enough death with enough raw emotion and enough ambient ectoplasm in the area for them to form a core.

“But that certainly doesn’t happen often. And not every ecto-being is like us either. Yes, you have those with a physical body, but then there’s also shades.

“Shades are formed when there’s enough ambient ectoplasm in the area they died to kickstart their core formation, but not enough to sustain the entire process.

“They have a core, but due to the lack of ecto during its formation they can’t use a lot of ecto at once and it takes longer for them to replenish. This also makes them unable to be tangible or visible for long periods of time.

“Besides the consciousness of dead people being ghosts, there’s also the neverborn. True to their name, the neverborn were never actually born in the traditional sense.

“They could be sentience given shape by enough raw emotion occurring in an area saturated with ambient ectoplasm, like most blob ghosts.

“Or then there’s also the ones who are more forces of nature and/or abstract concepts taken physical form. These are the Ancients, and they embody concepts like Time, Space, Weather, or Dreams, for example.” Danny explains.

“There’s the personifications of places or beliefs taken shape, and then there are also the neverborn formed through ghost procreation.”

Jason raises an eyebrow.

“Ghosts can give birth?”

Danny makes a so-so gesture with his hand.

“Yes and no? It’s not exactly comparable to human conception, but two ghosts can come together and combine parts of their core to create? spawn? form? a child together?” He shrugs “I don’t know the exact workings or details, you’d have to ask Frostbite for more information.”

“Huh..” Is all Jason can say in response.

“Then you have the liminals, zombies, demons, and other dead-adjacent beings that I won’t get into right now.” Danny dismisses before pausing thoughtfully. “Though, I’ll clarify revenants a bit as that was what you were initially.”

He continues at Jason’s nod.

“A revenant is, in simplest terms, someone who died in an area without much ambient ecto, and with an immense need for revenge. A need so strong in fact that, despite the lack of ecto necessary to form a core in order to become a shade or full ghost, their potent emotions remain after death.

“And these emotions are what tie the remains of the person’s soul to their body, which together are able to take control of the corpse in order to enact that revenge, despite the mind of the person being long gone.

“Now, as soon as they have been avenged, they usually go back to their grave, if they have one, and well, die again, I suppose... The emotions fading and letting go of their hold on the soul…” Danny rubs the back of his neck before moving on.

“Well, last but not least, there’s us, the halfas. There’s only about four—well, five—of us in existence currently.

“Like I’ve said before, halfas are half-dead and half-alive. We have a living human body, and a ghost form we can transform into that is completely made out of ectoplasm, like the average physical-bodied ghost.

“We also have all the basic ghost powers, like flight, invisibility, intangibility, overshadowing, ecto-rays,” as Danny starts listing the basic ghost powers, he ignores Jason’s interjection of “I’m supposed to have ghost powers?!”

“But each ghost, depending on their power level, can also have some powers exclusive to only them. I know of a ghost with musical mind controlling powers, a ghost with wish granting powers, there’s my ghostly wail, and more.”

“So… If I get cleansed of this uh, corrupted ectoplasm, I’m gonna have ghost powers?” Jason asks again, a strange and thoughtful expression on his face.

“Yeah, probably. Though we won’t know which individual powers you’ll get till you get them.” Danny shrugs. “I’m also not quite sure how fast your core development will be and how fast your powers will appear once the corrupted stuff is gone.” He admits.

“While the stunted growth could have slowed the entire process down permanently, there’s also the chance that, once your proto-core has the freedom to grow, with some healthy ecto as a boost, your core might grow instantaneously because it’ll finally have the space to do so after being repressed for so long.” He looks at Jason’s chest, deep in thought, before shrugging again.

“But like I mentioned before, I’m no doctor. So, we’d need to consult with Frostbite first to be sure. And as for not being aware of ghosts before and not having met any, that’s just mainly due to the lack of reliable portals around.” He explains.

“There are only two semi-permanent portals that I know of, both of those artificial, and one of those is in my parents’ basement. Natural portals do occur, but ghosts rarely use them if they happen to come across one.

“It’s because the locations and duration the portals stay open are random. Besides, whatever time period they open in is also unpredictable. If you’re not careful, you could end up in ancient Rome.” Danny pulls a face before shaking his head a bit to clear his mind.

“Lastly there’s ghosts who have the power to open temporary portals themselves, but it’s quite rare amongst ghosts, so most just rely on the artificial ones to enter this dimension.”

Jason throws him a questioning glance. “Why do ghosts wanna enter this dimension anyway, if their home is in this Ghost Zone, I’m assuming? Is unfinished business like an actual thing, or?”

Danny pauses, thinking over his answer.

“Well, each ghost has their reasons for coming to this dimension. Some wanna view this dimension like tourists, others might come through the portal to visit for a quick brawl—”

“They come here just to fight?”

Danny nods.

“It’s very socially stimulating and healthy for ghosts to throw down every once in a while. It’s basically the ghost equivalent of puppies playfighting or friends checking in on each other and asking how you’ve been, you know?

“It helps them feel more, well, alive. We, as halfas, don’t really have the urge to fight other ghosts as much due to still being half alive, obviously. But some still visit me sometimes just for a quick fight.

“Though I do have to remind them sometimes that I’m more squishy than them, as the attacks they use sometimes would be fine for a full ghost, but for a human...” Danny winces before quickly moving on.

“But anyways, another reason for them leaving the Zone could be cause it’s just easier to manage their Obsession in this dimension than in the Ghost Zone.”

At Jason’s interjecting question of “What’s an obsession?” Danny elaborates. “Each ghost has an Obsession, capital O, and it’s what keeps them mostly sane and keeps them from fading.”

“For example, my Obsession is space, though we thought it was something else at first. But then you have other ghosts, who might be Obsessed about things like boxes, being remembered, technology, etc.

“Ghosts can also have multiple Obsessions, but it depends. It all varies from ghost to ghost, but that’s the basic gist of it. And for a lot of ghosts, it could be more difficult to fulfil these Obsessions in the Ghost Zone, instead of here, where they might have more access to their Obsession.

“Though, either way, for us halfas it’s a bit different. Because we’re still partly human and alive, we’re not as bound by our Obsessions as other ghosts might be.”

Jason nods a little, taking it all in. At the small lull in conversation, Jason brings up a slight change of topic, having enough information he still needs to digest for now.

“So, ghosts, huh?” He starts. ”And here I thought you were some kind of vampire meta”

Danny sputters after hearing Jason’s admission.

“A vampire meta?! What gave you that idea?”

Danny looks at Jason incredulously. Jason gives him a considering look before starting to list his ‘evidence.’

“Well, let's start with the fangs and pointed ears—”

“That doesn't have to mean anything!”

“—Next off, you’re cold to the touch, impossibly strong, impossibly fast, as you appeared in no time after I texted you about your sister— “

“But I have an ice core! And that was— “

“Not to mention the fact that when I asked how you got there onto the roof that fast, you told me you flew, which, you could do if you were, oh, I don’t know, a bat—”

“I wasn’t a bat though! I’m not that good at shapeshifting yet—”

“And besides all of that, I’m around 90% sure your sister drank some of my blood when biting me. And family members with the meta gene having similar powers isn’t uncommon—”

“That’s just how Ellie is! I think she got that from Vlad more than anything,” Danny protests.

Jason raises an eyebrow before putting on a fake serious tone of voice.

“I know what you are…”

Danny blinks and pauses before pushing him gently with a laugh. “Jason—”

“So, you’re telling me you don’t sparkle in the sun?” Jason asks with a grin.

“Dude, you’ve seen me outside during the day before!” He smiles.

“It’s Gotham! The sun doesn’t shine here, which is obviously why you moved here. So, you wouldn’t easily be found out by going outside,” Jason argues teasingly.

Danny falls still for a moment, giving Jason a pondering look before grinning.

“You wanted to be like Bella Swan, with your own dramatic romance novel moment, didn’t you?”

Danny’s grin widens as Jason stills.

“That’s it, isn’t it?!”

“No. No, no, no—” Jason starts vehemently denying it as Danny pushes on.

“You want to be a main character in a YA romance novel—”

“I do not—”

“It’s alright, Jason. For you, I’ll be the Edward Cullen to your Bella Swan” Danny tells him reassuringly, patting his back lightly as Jason just sighs and hides his face in his hands.

“You’re gonna be the death of me” He groans.

“Well, fortunately for you, ‘till death do us part’ doesn’t really apply to us, Ghost Boy.” Danny jokes.

It does the job, and Jason gains a small smile on his face as he shakes his head at Danny with a huff. He then moves his gaze from Danny back to the side, onto Gotham. Danny follows his gaze.

They stay seated in each other's hold, enjoying the other’s company and presence. It was getting quite late.

“Shall we go back?”

They gaze out over the city from their spot, city lights reflected in their eyes.

“Yeah… let’s…”

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Taglist:

@i-always-say-yea @uraniumwizard @why-must-i-be-like-this @griffinthing @i23432i @imsotiredfanficlovertm @jaguarthecat @arkita-shadow @noideawhatshappeninghelp @jaitwin5 @apple-juice16 @mossy-bonez @harvestandhearth

#dpxdc #dp x dc #dc x dp #dcxdp #dp x dc crossover #dead on main #dead on main ship #dp x dc fic #basically a lot of ghosts fight socially and some seek out danny for that #halfas dont have that urge to fight as much #ghosts often forget halfas dont have those same insticts and dont know that their fights are meant as friendly playfighting #so they need to be reminded and make this clear to the halfa #or get their asses genuinely kicked by them with the halfas then holding grudges against them #ghost punching danny too hard in the shoulder in a friendly way: :D #danny: ouch that hurt! >:( you wanna fight?!#ghost: :o i mean if youre up for it sure! ^-^#ghost after being souped for a week due to a grudge: ohh wait--

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