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britcision · 9 months ago

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AND HERE WE ARE! Totally getting this out in February well done team! And this is gonna be our last chapter before a wee teeny tiny time skip and Jason’s finished core! What a beautiful day 🥰

We’re getting another two-parter too, because Danny and Jason refused to let me get to the end of this lil introductory arc without at least one more pile of abject fluff! But finally, we’re ready to begin the plot!

Once again, the link to the AO3 version is in the first chapter and the 15th chapter; you can see it in the text for the link if you wanna subscribe to be told when it updates 😁

First Chapter:

Previous Chapter:

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So That Just Happened part 1

Back in her own room on the other side of the country from Gotham, Sam Manson reclined back into giant, coffin shaped body pillow her beloved girlfriend had given her when they moved and contemplated her phone.

The brand new Wayne-chat was blowing up satisfactorily, although apparently Tim was a massive stalker too. That was probably a good thing; it meant she hadn’t actually nuked Tuck’s chances with his nerd-crush. Now they could bond over their mutual stalker tendencies.

But, did that make her revenge less effective?

It wasn’t like she was actually out to ruin his life, but she’d kinda like to leave a mark. Something that would make him think twice about letting her think he and Danny had fucking died in Gotham in her absence.

Or. Well. Gone radio silent in Gotham, which was probably actually worse because if they were dead she’d know exactly where they were.

The Wayne chat were all pretty sure Tim and Tucker were together too, and Sam’s new best friend Babs had even pulled up the feed from their living room tv somehow. Sam wasn’t exactly the tech wizard Tucker was, but… after seeing that, she disconnected her and Val’s TV from the wifi.

And settled in to remote watch Tuck get his ass kicked at Spiderheck, apparently. At least for a little while; until something else on her phone caught her attention.

It was… almost funny. While she knew she was a whole three timezones away, she’d never really felt left out before. Like maybe she should have stayed on the east coast…

Not that she regretted it, of course. She had a good job, a good school, a wonderful girlfriend who’d been so excited to get into a good school and really go to town on the business department.

(Apparently there were posters of Val’s face in the ethics classrooms. Sam refused to ask if they were golden example or dire warning.)

She was just… a long way away. Even a long portal away, and… being back with the guys, even in Gotham, made the quiet of their comfy little apartment seem lonely.

Huffing, she turned and traced her fingers through the leaves of her mimosa plant on the windowsill beside the bed. They curled gently shut at her touch, and made her smile. Just like always.

She was happy to be home. She wasn’t technically liminal enough yet that it was her haunt, but… well, for all the jokes Val made, Sam had to admit she’d put down roots. She loved her job at the greenhouses, and her internship at the botanical gardens.

She loved scaring the hell out of the dudebros in Val’s business classes who thought ethics were a waste of time. She loved sharing messages with Jazz about the boys, laughing that even three hours ahead, Tuck and Danny still couldn’t get up before them.

She was kinda considering texting Harley about Timblr too. Not like, for any particular reason; if Tim’s family weren’t gonna embarrass Tucker enough, Harley probably wouldn’t either. She’d probably think it was adorable.

Or, y’know, worrying evidence of obsession. Psych types worried about stuff like that, usually.

Sam was kinda also considering sending Harley Jazz’s number. Jazz might still be skating just on the neurosurgery side of the line, but she’d always been big into psychology. Big enough to try and triple major, and only drop to major-major-minor after the third pre-exam meltdown.

And she could use having someone else do the shrink bit on her a little more often. Although really, for that Sam should make her a professional appointment; friends didn’t ask friends to psychoanalyze their overprotective pseudo-sisters. And Jazz could use more friends.

Jazz could use a transfer to a specialty that would let her sleep once in a while, a more stable supply of fresh ecto, and about six weeks in a meditation retreat to get the accidental telepathy under control, but more friends would be good too. And less stubborn insistence on her second try for double majors.

Maybe the switch to psychiatry full time would be good for her? Or psychology. Sam was a little fuzzy on the difference, which one Jazz was currently still minoring in, and which one Harley did.

(Jazz’s current second major was neurosurgery, which Jazz insisted was totally less taxing alongside a neurology major because it was the same body part. She was the only person in her class attempting the double major though, so.)

Humming tunelessly to herself, Sam flicked back into the group chat. Babs was still sharing the feed… brows drawing in, Sam frowned at the little spider figures still fighting to the death. Now, she wasn’t as big of a gamer as she used to be, but she was pretty sure Spiderheck didn’t actually offer red berets.

Snorting a laugh, she flicked back out of the chat and opened a new one, adding both Jazz and Harley. All it needed was the perfect name… something that would grab both of their attention.

Obvious. Child’s play.

Snuggling back into her coffin pillow, Sam grinned down at her phone screen.

Danny Has A Boyfriend chat was live.

Having eight legs wasn’t exactly the same as suddenly having four new ones, or two new legs and two new arms. While the first two were definitely functioning as “hands”, being the ones to pick up and use all of the weapons, Tim had quickly learned that he could grip with any of the eight “feet” that were available.

Yeah, spinning a laser staff all the way down one side of his body and up the other was fucking cool.

He’d adjusted pretty quickly during their “practice” round, while they all got used to the web slinging and worked out how to open the boxes and use the weapons.

(Tucker had swung himself into the lava by accident, so they’d started a second round.)

Tim felt pretty much ready to go, although if he was honest with himself… his only actual complaint was that he didn’t have a camera.

Conner had asked Tuck at the start of their second round if his powers had been nerfed to make it “fair”. Tucker, sweet innocent Tucker, had managed to convey a sidelong look even looking at even without a face on their little blob bodies and said he didn’t think Conner needed a nerf.

He just needed to understand how the powers worked, and they could be incorporated into the system. Which, well, was like catnip for Conner.

At least Tucker seemed a lot less flustered about talking to him while they were both spiders, because Conner had started talking his ear off about TTK and hadn’t stopped since.

Tim was kinda considering swinging over and taking them both out, just to get the game moving. But Conner was cute when he got really into something, and being a headless little spider body did not seem to have changed that.

He spent the time practicing with the webs instead, spinning and tossing himself around the map. It was pretty similar to using a grapple, although he wasn’t exactly sure whether or not the web was coming from his own body.

If it was, it was coming from inside a foot, which wasn’t how actual spiders worked… but Tim was pretty sure that was on Spiderheck, not Tucker.

Being able to run around upside down was the biggest change for him, and pretty cool. Tim scuttled around under a couple of the higher platforms for a while, planning his strategy.

Honestly, he was pretty sure TTK was going to wind up fucking Conner over rather than making anything easier for him. You’d think that flying would be an advantage in Spiderheck, at least as far as avoiding lava or an out of bounds, but Tim knew pretty explicitly how far it took Conner to stop.

It wasn’t exactly on a dime, and in this game? The pace didn’t exactly allow for imprecision.

And they were wasting time talking about it rather than getting used to having an extra six hand-feet.

Still upside down, Tim twisted until he could see the other two spiders. Which was when he learned that… they did kinda have their faces on them. Just, instead of being in a face position, on the front of his body that he was seeing out of, it was just sorta… plastered across the body.

Like a photo skin mapped onto a flat blob.

He considered letting the other two know; if anyone walked into the room, they’d probably be able to see their little faces on the screen. If they were just standing around talking.

Also, the pictures’ mouths weren’t moving, which hadn’t been weird when Tim was listening to them talk and didn’t think they had mouths. Kinda was to look down on Conner’s smiling face and hear his voice at a mile a minute.

Tucker probably already knew, and might have done the faces on purpose? And if he hadn’t, it was gonna be pretty funny to see what happened when he noticed.

He’d gotten progressively better at actually talking to Conner the longer he wasn’t actually looking at him, and the focus being on the game had helped too. Face in the game? Probably gonna throw him again.

And it was probably time to get things actually moving, so he could enjoy that.

Humming softly to himself, Tim scuttled across to the loot crates, found himself a double ended lightsabre, and dropped down on Tucker and Conner’s heads.

“Sooooooo…” Danny clapped his hands, doing his best to make his broad grin at least look a little innocent as he floated sideways into Jason’s field of view, “not that that wasn’t adorable and dramatic and everything, super touching, buuuut…?”

He almost laughed as Jason jumped, having apparently forgotten Danny was there for a hot second, then pulled his hand back from Lady Gotham’s to glare at him. The Lady herself didn’t bother hiding her chuckle, settling back to recline once more on a cloud of smog.

“Was there something you needed, Phantom?” She asked with a dry amusement.

Danny shrugged innocently, sticking his hands in his spectral pockets. Much more dangerous than regular pockets, but he’d not been doing more than blob wrangling lately.

“Not so much what I need, just, y’know, trying to keep things on track. I dunno if you’ve got other plans for the night Jay, but we were with Frostbite for a while and if you did…” he trailed off, and Jason grimaced.

“Not what you’d call set plans, but…” Jason trailed off as well, and Danny could feel the guilt even before it tried creeping in.

Nope, not having that. He’d almost talked himself into that bullshit already tonight, none for Jason. He nodded airily, floating up to drape an arm over the larger man’s shoulder.

“All I’ve gotta do is get to bed before midnight, so I’m not rushing now that Tucker’s found himself a new ride.” Waggled eyebrows punctuated that comment with enough emphasis that Jason snickered, darker feelings pushed aside without finding purchase.

“What, you don’t wanna go watch that train wreck in person?” Jason teased with a lopsided half smile.

Danny pulled a face, both at the thought of Tucker’s goddamn disastrous attempts at flirting and… well, the possibility of running into Bruce again. Maybe Constantine.

Danny was maaaaaybe kinda avoiding the wizard since he’d started collecting the other contracts on his soul; it wasn’t like he wanted them for nefarious purposes, it was just fucking weird. He didn’t like owning people. Not even overgrown Sour Patch Kids in trench coats.

(At least Constantine was still alive though. Those unlucky souls who died still bound to Pariah damn near went through a full reboot. No memories, no personality, none of what Danny would have thought of as like, the core components of a soul.

So far nothing anyone had done had been able to help them, and Danny had a nasty feeling the final answer would be Ending them. The Observants didn’t want to, they were perfectly happy with a thrall army so long as they controlled it, but Danny was firm.

No slaves, no thralls. If the only way he could free them was through a final and permanent death… he would.

But Clockwork was still looking, and so long as the ancient of time thought there might be a way… Danny held out hope too.)

For now, he shook his head quickly, holding up both hands.

“No way man. Bruce already hates my guts, I’m gonna keep a healthy distance.”

For both their sakes, really. Jason’s mood every time Bruce had spoken to him today kinda proved he hadn’t listened to Danny’s advice and stepped up. Not that Danny had exactly expected him to; again, hated his guts.

Jason pulled a face but didn’t bother to argue; he’d probably rather not actually deal with the old man for a third time either. Instead he just shrugged, turning his attention back to Lady Gotham.

“Do you know what time it is in Gotham now, my lady?” He asked, and the really weird thing was that it didn’t actually sound weird.

Danny always felt awkward and formal whenever he tried to address a ghost by their title, and Lady Gotham was the very worst because she never bothered to hide when she was laughing at him. Which was, y’know, every time he said it.

(He wasn’t gonna just call her “Gotham�� though. That would be worse, so he just sucked it up.)

On Jason’s lips, words like “my lady” just sounded right. Danny flashed back for a moment to snow in a graveyard, and Jason knelt before him quoting Shakespeare. There was something in Jason that was just made for flowery language and dramatic proclamations.

Lady Gotham clearly agreed, bestowing a fond smile upon Jason before inclining her head back for a moment, those red on black eyes glowing suddenly brighter. Looking into the living world, or right up Clockwork’s ass?

“It’s coming to ten o’clock,” she said softly, something almost like regret in her tone. The smile that she turned back to them was softer, sadder.

Danny’d feel bad about being the one to point it out, except, yeah. He’d had to. Ghosts in general didn’t exactly think about time. It was a problem for the living, so - him. And Jason.

Who didn’t seem nearly so sorry with the answer. He nodded, fingers beginning to drum against his thigh.

“Time for a few more questions, then.” That wasn’t a question, and if Danny was completely insensate or possibly locked in a sensory deprivation tank he might have warned Jason about talking to a powerful spirit like that.

It’d need to be a damn good tank for him to miss all the signs though; Jason was so in the good books. Lady Gotham just smiled and nodded, gesturing once more with her traffic cone.

“Of course. And, of course, we will have plenty of other opportunities to speak. I may spend much of my time here, but now that we have been introduced… I can also speak to you there, if you would like?”

It was a delicate question, and Danny hesitated, suddenly wondering if he should… well, elaborate again.

“Uh… yeah, sure? I’d like that?” Jason asked, clearly confused by the reticence, and that made up Danny’s mind.

“She’s not going to sound the same,” he explained quickly, giving Lady Gotham a quick smile. She smiled back, gesturing for him to continue, because none of the damn older ghosts explained shit for themselves.

Danny totally didn’t roll his eyes.

“Like, the way we talk to her in the Infinite Realms is kinda the abstract? She looks kinda human,” he added, gesturing vaguely at the Lady.

Jason’s brows furrowed for a moment, but he felt more curious than concerned.

“So… she’s an anthropomorphic personification, but not in the living world?” He asked, and Danny’s eyes nearly crossed.

He turned to Lady Gotham, hoping that this might be some weird city slang, and she laughed at him. Again.

“Yes,” she agreed with Jason instead, which absolutely did not help. “It’s easier for me to speak with you here, using eyes and ears like your own. But building and maintaining this shape in the living world is… complicated.”

“Because her real body there is the city,” Danny added, privately resolving to ask Sam what the fuck Jason was talking about later.

Honestly, Jason would probably get along real good with Mr Lancer. They both liked weird words.

At least he actually looked a little confused too now; Danny had freaked the first time Lady Gotham talked to him out in the city itself. He gave Jason a consoling pat on the shoulder.

“You’ve gotta see it to believe it, man. Just… it’s gonna be weird.” Not the most helpful, sure, but Danny was doing his best!

Jason nodded slowly, willing to table it for now, and refocused on Lady Gotham, something darker now welling in the purpose building inside him.

“So you said the Joker wasn’t from the Curse,” he said bluntly. Danny flinched, more from the lack of any aura inflection than the remnants he could feel.

Yeah, a lotta Gothamites hated the Joker specifically, but if Danny had even the faintest doubt of who’d killed Jason… the black, leaden lump of Death in Jason’s aura wiped it out.

Lady Gotham stilled too, her own smile fading as she regarded Jason. Those red and black eyes were suddenly so much older, so much sadder.

“Yes,” she agreed softly, lowering her traffic cone to rest at her hip. “Are you sure?”

‘Are you sure you want to know?’

Or ‘Are you sure you want to know now?’

Danny wouldn’t put money on which she’d intended, but it didn’t take a genius to know the answer to both. Stubborn, emotionally repressed, and self destructive as hell, bat-training only left one answer.

Jason nodded firmly now, his jaw clenching.

“Yes.”

Lady Gotham studied him for a moment longer but didn’t argue, inclining her head gently.

“Then I will be brief. While the Curse has always been part of the city, feeding on fear and despair, in recent years we have both felt… something else. I told you of the malevolence on the land?” She asked, and Jason made a soft, impatient noise.

“And that it’s where the Curse comes from, yeah. And that the Joker is different,” he prodded.

Danny made a face. He was usually very much on the side of blunt answers, and knew full well that the Lady wouldn’t actually like, break Jason for being mouthy. He was very, very used to seeing favouritism from the outside, and Jason was clearly a firm favourite.

Maybe because he was currently Gotham’s only actual part ghost child? (To be fair, Danny didn’t think that’d change much in the fullness of time; Jason was his favourite of all the bats alive or dead.)

Whatever it was, his interruption only brought a flicker of a smile to the Lady’s lips, which vanished just as quickly.

“Yes. The Curse is indeed the original manifestation of that malevolence, given form and now, purpose. But even that malevolence came from somewhere; Gotham lies on a crack between worlds, older than time. Every world in the multiverse exist along certain markers; certain weak spots. Gotham is one of them.”

“Of course it is,” Jason grumbled beside him and Danny shifted closer, brushing their shoulders together.

Personally, he figured that if Gotham was a weak point in the universe and all the bad shit just leaked through, they were probably doing pretty well for themselves. Then, he’d seen the depths of the Ghost Zone; he knew what else could be trying to leak through.

Which, obviously, meant the good luck had to end.

“When the Joker died,” Lady Gotham continued, only to be cut off by a startled “What?!” from Jason and a totally-super-dignified squawk from Danny.

“You are not gonna tell me that asshole’s a ghost!” Danny moaned, dragging his hands down his face. Honestly, if he’d missed a whole actual ghost in the city for an entire year too, he was never going to live it down.

Like any of the other ghosts had any fucking clue what it was like being half alive… or living fully inside a city spirit’s haunt. Let them visit Lady Gotham’s and see what they sensed.

“Who the hell killed the Joker?!” Jason demanded, something weirdly like panic spiking through anger. “It wasn’t fucking Bruce-”

Lady Gotham silenced them both with a pointed look, shadows growing suddenly long and dark under her stare. Then she returned her gaze to Jason, her expression sombre.

“The Joker is not a ghost, nor a halfa. Bruce Wayne resuscitated him, which may be all that kept him from becoming a manifestation himself; he was killed not only in Gotham, but by a nexus point, in rage and revenge and hatred.”

There was something dark in Lady Gotham’s eyes now, something black and burning and for half a second Danny could swear he felt that rage himself, deep in his chest.

“Something else leaked through in the short time that he was dead,” she went on, her gaze firmly locked on Jason’s and Danny couldn’t imagine just how much the older-younger halfa was feeling under its full force. “Something small, and hungry, and craving death because it was denied his - the death I believe would give it shape.”

It wasn’t enough for Jason, that much was obvious; bitterness-frustration-grief hung in the air in a cloud almost thicker than the Lady’s smogs, and this time Danny gave in to temptation.

Let his own soothing-sorrow-loss twine through, even if he didn’t exactly understand the cause of the feeling. Jason startled a little, knocked from grumbling something that hadn’t been for anyone but him, but his hand reached back for Danny’s. Squeezed tight, even as the bitterness deepened.

His eyes narrowed, he remained focused on Lady Gotham though.

“Of course. Of course he fucking brought the clown back, even after someone did the world a fucking favour,” he hissed through his teeth, then raised his voice more clearly. “So, what? No one can ever kill the Joker, or Gotham gets another curse? Who’d fucking notice at this point?”

A genuine sorrow and pain passed across Lady Gotham’s face but she schooled it, kept her own aura calm and composed… or at least in closer than they could feel. There was probably a reason she’d put space between them again.

“Not quite, but close,” she agreed softly, those red bat eyes somehow more gentle even against the black pupil. “This other entity is already here, growing each day. Every violent death in Gotham is being consumed by it, which I will admit has strengthened the truce between the Curse and myself. Neither of us wish to feed it any more than necessary.”

Danny’s brows furrowed at that and he tried to think back to everything that Frostbite had ever told him about spirits. Not the dead-people kind, but the Neverborn; entities, concepts, ideas given form. Like time, and cities.

“So… when did the Joker die?” He asked cautiously, and felt surprise jolt through Jason. Lady Gotham gave him a quick glance, and cocked her head at Jason himself.

“Not so long after Jason did. A matter of months, less than a year, though he was dead less than a few minutes.” There was something in her tone, a weight on the words that made Danny think he was on the right track… but that she didn’t want to say it.

Which. Well. That was all kinds of bad fucking news if an entity as old as Lady Gotham was wary of speaking it into being. Luckily, Danny was just a fucked up little half ghost who had absolutely no supernatural tie ins to things like belief.

And he believed in just laying all the cards on the table before he decided if he had to flip it.

“That’s really young for any kind of belief spirit,” he said bluntly, watching Lady Gotham’s eyes. Saw… just a hint of something, creasing the corners, and seriously considered reaching his aura to hers for the first time today.

It’d save so much time to just get the message through feeling, but… if she preferred words, the words had to be important, and Jason probably needed words.

Fuck, they’d all need words, because this was going to be a goddamn bat-briefing if Lady Gotham was filling them in, and Mr Emotional Repression Is My Soulmate was not going to be up to aura reads.

Chewing his lower lip, he thought through the next stage a couple times before speaking slowly, watching for any hint he was still on the right path.

“If… it’s grown fast enough that you both noticed… it’s not new?” He tried, wondering briefly if he’d retroactively doomed them all by thinking about “what else could break through” from the depths of the Zone.

Lady Gotham shook her head though, gesturing impatiently through her smoke to clear it… maybe the first sign he’d ever seen that she didn’t control it entirely.

“No. That much, we are both certain of. This entity… it is new and unformed, with no Name of its own. At the moment, all of the fear it wreaks is only feeding belief in the Curse, which is why it only has death. But there is already a will there, long before it should even have awareness. And it wants to grow.”

“Oh great, so Joker’s got a Pitty 2.0 but his is on the outside,” Jason quipped, irritation sparking through him… and Danny was kinda glad to see it, honestly. Just a little flash of the guy he’d been getting to know in all the dark.

Even Lady Gotham managed a brief smile, and didn’t actually bother refuting it; closing her eyes for a moment, she waved her hand and the clouds of smog between them solidified briefly into a model of the city. Buildings only, but with horribly empty shadows between them.

“The Joker’s death gave it an entrance, and his revival denied it his shape, his Name, and the fear he commands. But it is no longer fixated on killing the Joker - and it was, for several years. It pushed him before it had the power for anything else, driving him further, feeding poison to those around him, trying to have him killed so that it could become The Joker, the pure essence of every bloody mark the clown left on Gotham. And it very nearly succeeded,” she added softly, her gaze turning back to Jason with an almost tangible sorrow.

Something in Danny’s gut iced over, and suddenly he was really, really glad he didn’t know what she was thinking.

Bruce looked better as he rose from the table, Diana decided, watching her old friend closely. For all that he’d come with an actual reason for his doom and gloom (for a change), his attitude during the briefing was positively relaxed compared to their own discussion that followed.

He would still be worrying and fretting, she knew him too well to believe anything else, and… she knew why. While Diana had no children of her own (though she had met and heard of other versions of herself who had), she did dearly love her own proteges, and those of her friends.

She remembered Jason as the young, sweet boy who’d stumbled over every word he said to her and stared at her like she’d hung the stars. She remembered Bruce’s grief, Batman’s rage, and the shadow that hung over the Dark Knight with every step until Tim Drake took him to heel.

She knew that there was too much there, the guilt and pain and loss and grief for Bruce to see Jason objectively, and she didn’t begrudge him that. Nor did she condone it.

It only hurt both men, and while she would not give her opinion when it wasn’t wanted… well, she was aware Bruce spoke to Clark of his worries around Jason much more often than he would to her. This time though, she’d had no choice.

She knew the man well enough to know what was truly scaring him in this situation; that Jason would be taken from him again. He was at least as upset by this “Danny” boy as the thought of war with an entire realm.

It would have been cute, if he wasn’t a grown adult man who prided himself on critical thinking. Or actively forcing his son away with his own actions at every turn.

Still, there was one piece of counsel she could give. The thing he hated the most of all was a mystery. And while she also didn’t usually condone his stalking-as-a-sign-of-affection…

“Batman.”

He stopped in the doorway but didn’t look back, still as a statue. At least he was listening.

A fond smile pulling across her lips, Diana shook her head. Let the formal tones of Wonder Woman return to the voice of a friend.

“You see many dangers in the unknown. Perhaps you might reassure yourself by getting to know young Danny Fenton as a person, rather than a potential threat.”

He stayed frozen in the doorway for a moment longer, then nodded his head sharply and swept away.

Diana stifled a chuckle. Honestly, for all Constantine had come to her as if the world were about to end… all of their problems with this Infinite Realm were perfectly clear to her.

The American government had overstepped drastically with their Anti Ecto Acts and would be brought to heel.

The new ruler of the Infinite Realms had turned their head in this direction, and guided them to what must be fixed.

And young Jason Todd, while far from the only hero who had died and returned, had been chosen by this ruler to be favoured with protection, in exchange for service.

Of course, it may all blow out of control and become as dire as her dear friend already seemed to believe it was, but for all Bruce was constantly creating contingencies and backup plans, he very rarely had to use most of them.

She turned her attention to John Constantine instead, the magician seeming much less inclined to make himself scarce than usual. At least he had also calmed considerably, and was even smiling in his own crooked fashion after Bruce.

“You know he’s gonna go stalk that poor kid even more now?” He asked sardonically, pulling another cigarette from his pack but not reaching for the lighter.

Diana hesitated for a moment.

She’d meant for Bruce to talk to Danny, preferably directly. But Bruce did not like talking to new people; not without thorough research and a chance to prepare.

Then she shrugged.

“If it will keep him from disrupting our already tense situation with the Infinite Realms, better that he distract himself with more fatherly concerns,” she said simply.

Constantine snickered again, then frowned.

“Wait, fatherly concerns? For some kid his boy’s known like, a week?”

This time, Diana didn’t bother to restrain her smile, glancing down at the phone in her pocket.

“Merely a week, perhaps, but according to Wonder Girl they have already been caught at least once without their trousers.”

Which hadn’t been part of the official presentation, of course. Nor apparently whatever Bruce had already shared with Constantine, as the mage promptly nearly swallowed his unlit cigarette and began choking.

Diana gave him a carefully gauged slap to the back, sending the now soaked and crumpled smoke across the meeting table, but politely did not laugh.

Jason was pretty sure he was going to puke. Or scream. Maybe both.

It wasn’t bad enough that Bruce had refused to kill the Joker, to stop him from killing anyone else, no, he’d fucking brought him back to life. Given the fucking Joker the chance that none of his victims ever got.

None of them except Jason.

And now apparently even wanting the bastard dead was all part of some master fucking plan to make the fucking asshole even worse.

He’d wanted Bruce to be the one to avenge him from the second Tallia pulled him out of the Lazarus Pit, but when he’d come to Gotham… when his plans to carve out his turf, provoke the Joker with an old alias, set the trap had suddenly become stuffing heads in a bag…

He’d thought about it. A lot. About just hunting the fucker down, putting a bullet between his eyes, and leaving him in the Batcave deader than dead.

Had nearly done it, but no. He’d wanted… he’d wanted Bruce to choose him. To put him first, to say he loved Jason more than some moral stance, to value Tim’s life more, and Steph, and Cass, over the fucking scum who would have happily killed every last one of them with a smile on his face just to see if Bruce finally broke.

And Bruce hadn’t.

Bruce had nearly killed him.

And in and around that whole mess, he’d never gotten around to actually thinking about how his fucking daddy issues had saved the Joker’s life for… years, by now.

Jason wasn’t killing anymore. Not like, actively. Intentionally. Not because he thought Bruce was right; something, someone, had to be willing to stand up for the people of Gotham and actually stop fuckers like the Joker from killing them.

But… well, Crime Alley was his territory, and a scared enemy, a cowed enemy who’d seen their life in Jason’s hands and knew just how easily he could end it was more useful than dealing with the power vacuum, or the next million upstarts who’d think they knew better, would be better, and could take on the Red Hood themselves.

Ironically, keeping fuckers like Black Mask and Great White Shark alive and in power (at severely reduced scale) saved him time. Kept him from dealing with all those upstarts himself.

That was how Waylon had put it, back when Jason was considering adding to his bag of heads. It was… like farming. Keep them low, but keep them stable. Break anything new they went for, or anything that got on his turf.

Let them harvest some of the power hungry fucks who thought they could take a piece of the Alley.

And then Dick had noticed. And reached out. And didn’t stop until Jason gave in and reached back.

When Danny came to Gotham. Somehow, it all swung back around to Danny.

And the fact that if he actually believed what he told Bruce, he could have gone to kill the clown himself at any time since returning to the city.

And he never had. The time wasn’t right. Something came up. Something went wrong, or broke, or distracted him before he thought too hard about it.

Killing the Joker hadn’t even been in his original plans for his triumphant return. He’d just wanted to take back the Alley, prove his point to Bruce. Keep his home safe.

When had killing the Joker become such a big part of the plan? Who the fuck had gotten into his fucking head, redefined him as the last moment of his fucking life, demanded his new life be all about how the last one ended?

Eyes narrowing, he looked searchingly into Lady Gotham’s face just in time to catch her slow nod, like she’d heard every thought. Like he’d been speaking aloud.

“I could not stop it from reaching to you,” she said softly, her voice heavy with sadness, “but I could… distract. Get in the way, make its path harder. That you did not give in…”

Something soft, something proud flickered in her eyes again, and it made him want to squirm.

“You may not have consciously known that you fought yet another enemy, yet you triumphed regardless. My dear Jason…” she sighed, heavy with sorrow, and reached out a hand again as though to cup his face.

Jason found himself moving to meet her before he even thought about it. Stopped himself just before it actually got him anywhere.

He wasn’t done being angry yet. He wasn’t even sure he’d actually started. If he could ever, would ever, be angry enough for this.

There was something building in him like a tide, riding high on resentment and his spiralling thoughts. It wasn’t green tinted like the pit rage, his vision was still clear… if anything, it felt sharper, like everything had been dialled up to eleven. Like the terrible, roaring anger was seeking a target.

“I am sorry that you have been robbed of your justice in this way,” Lady Gotham said quietly and once again Jason’s focus narrowed down with her intensity, like she was the only real thing in the world, “that even your own emotions of this, your death, have been used against you. It is…”

She hesitated, actually looking to Danny for help herself for the first time. Judging from the sudden low horror Jason could feel from the other man, he might actually be under reacting.

Or the tide was still rising.

He felt like razing the whole city to the fucking ground, with his own hands, brick by brick. Or puking. Or screaming until his lungs ripped out of his chest, if only he could move.

It felt like something had reached into his brain and cranked up the contrast, made the already neon brights of the Ghost Zone brighter, the shadows darker, the very air prickling at his skin like needles with the urge to do something.

Because if he moved, did anything, he wouldn’t be able to stop. Not when every muscle ached to tear the whole universe apart.

He was almost a passenger in his own skin as something else, a different, slow boiling rage barely under control clamped him in a vice.

“So y’know we talked about not asking about how ghosts died?” Danny said slowly, his voice suddenly low and hoarse.

Jason managed a stiff nod, every muscle twanging tight with tension. It had been pretty important, pre-Ghost-Zone.

And he could put the pieces together, right from the tight hot center of that ball of rage that he was pretty sure was his own core.

“This is worse,” he said gruffly, not bothering to look over. Didn’t have to, when he could feel the face Danny was pulling through the worry-worry-fear-anger-horror still surrounding him.

He… fuck. He was a little afraid of what he might do, if there was even an ounce of pity on Danny’s face, and honestly that panicked him more than anything else. All the rage wanted was a target, and he didn’t think he’d be able to choose what it was.

Danny nodded anyway, making a conscious effort to try and reign his aura in. Like he couldn’t hear the subtext, feel it in Jason’s, or like he could and didn’t care.

It left him feeling cold, icy and alone, but still relieved under the echoing slam of rage in his veins. A little more alone in his own head. A little less watched. Judged. Not good enough.

“Like, worse than worse, dude. Ghosts will throw down and rip each other apart just for fun and no one’s actually hurt, but… you don’t fuck with somebody’s death. You just don’t. It’s the worst thing you could do to a ghost, worse than Ending them. Not even Pariah Dark…”

“Exactly,” Lady Gotham hissed, baring her teeth in something not even remotely a smile, full cheeks and lips suddenly gaunt and hollow as the teeth became fangs. It lasted barely a moment, a flicker before it faded, but it snapped Jason straight out of his fury with a sudden shock of terror.

She’d been intimidating before. Effortlessly, gracefully powerful and commanding, the kind of person people would beg to step on them without a hint of aggression. Those teeth though… just the moment of that rage, of something so powerful suddenly nothing but raw, feral danger…

It wasn’t even directed at him but it still felt like a bucket of cold water down his spine. An instant urge to duck his head, show his throat, convince this much larger predator that he wasn’t a threat.

She was immediately contrite, turning her head away as her face cast into shadow, only the red pupils still visible.

“My apologies. It is… less personal for me than it is for you, yet it seems still too close to my heart.”

Forcing himself to swallow, Jason took a couple of deep, heavy breaths. The anger was still there, kind of. He could feel it in an almost distant way, past the hammering of his heart, but it wasn’t all he was anymore.

It was just… a feeling now. One he was in control of.

The shadows were just shadows again. The green of the Zone no longer blinding.

He blew the last breath out slowly, and let the remnants of the anger go with it.

“No, uh… it’s fine. I think that helped, actually,” he said awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck and suddenly embarrassed at just how tense he’d become.

Justified, apparently, from both the other ghosts’ reactions, but that didn’t mean Jason wanted to feel so out of control. How close to just… being carried away by the anger.

No matter what anyone else said, no matter what the damn Pit or Joker-monster or whatever the fuck else tried to do, Jason Todd was not going to be defined by rage.

For one thing, he’d never live it down.

Danny sagged beside him, relief as tangible as that last breath flowing out of him, despite the core of concern underneath. That was fine; Jason was still concerned too.

And maybe thinking about his stash of ecto-candies again, but he honestly didn’t feel half as drained this time. He wasn’t even scared of Lady Gotham anymore - that moment had ended as soon as it started. As soon as she’d tucked those terrifying needle-like teeth away. Now she just looked…

Proud. Proud, and fond, and so, so sad. Like Alfred had been the first time he presented Jason with his very own Robin suit for the field.

It choked something inside Jason just a little, made his throat tight and breath hitch.

“You are so much more than anyone gives you credit for, Jason Todd,” she said softly, her sclera softening briefly to a bright, sunshine yellow. Like the cape he’d drowned in as a boy flying from her rooftops, “and they all think far better of you than you believe.”

That caught him up for a moment, confusion pulling into the absolute fucking mess of emotions he was pretty sure he was projecting to all and sundry.

Then Danny sighed heavily and draped himself sideways over Jason’s shoulders like a particularly lanky and bony scarf.

“Yeah, yeah, and your ghost mom is fucking terrifying. Did not need that reminder, Ladyship,” he tossed at Lady Gotham with a cheeky wink, effectively steam rolling the tension yet again.

Jason could have kissed him, but from the angle Danny had flopped on, his options were armpit or hip, and neither appealed.

Sassy comebacks, he could handle. Reassurances that people didn’t think he was a complete sack of shit, apparently not.

The whole batfam were just perfect poster kids for mental health, alright?

The Lady herself laughed softly and inclined her head, not arguing the point.

“Of course. Still, I am sorry Jason.”

He cut her off this time, raising both hands and stopping just short of reaching for the back of his neck again, which was about where Danny’s waist was sat.

“Don’t be. I… think I needed to be knocked out of my head there. I really do feel better now,” he added, and Danny huffed a noncommittal noise and ruffled his hair.

“Yeah, well. You’re allowed to be pissed about it,” Danny informed him like he wasn’t sure if Jason actually knew that.

Which, obviously, Jason absolutely wasn’t. He had a pit ghost baby to teach good habits to, and Danny still had no idea what Jason was like when he actually lost control of the anger. But he could appreciate the sentiment.

And deflect like a Robin.

“Oh, is that a royal decree?” He asked archly, and while this noise was no more coherent than the last it was decidedly more whiny and drawn out into wordless protest.

Which still ended in a very quiet “yes.”

Luckily, quiet enough that Jason could pretend he didn’t hear it.

“Anyway, I’m good. Still gonna kick this thing’s ass for messing with my head, and maybe put it in a blender, but for now I’m good. Chill vibes only for Pitty,” he added with a roll of his eyes when Danny made a confused little chirping sound.

Lady Gotham chuckled softly to herself and nodded, resettling herself to recline on her smog clouds once more.

“Indeed. You currently have more pressing concerns; as little as I enjoy the present situation, it can wait. The Curse and I can monitor this new being’s behaviour through the rogues it has affected; they are noticeably becoming more violent, while the Curse is swaying the rest towards being less. For contrast,” she added before Jason could ask.

Which… might actually explain why Riddler had tossed a broken game box at Croc and the Wayne gala rather than trying to fix it. He’d stripped most of the interesting stuff according to Tim’s report, sure, but Nygma never let a thread go.

So he wasn’t gonna be on this new bad guy’s kill list.

Nor would Waylon, and Harley had been more destructive than homicidal for years. Already making a mental list on the events he’d caught wind of in the last few weeks, Jason didn’t even realise the conversation had moved on without him until Danny stuck a wet finger in his ear.

“What the actual fuck!” Jason demanded, trying to shrug the ghost off his shoulders. And while there was deadass no weight to Danny in this form, it was frankly unfair that he just rolled with the movement like he also didn’t have bones, snickering.

“You had Resting Bat Face,” he explained with a grin, twisting upwards to look down at him in a way that actually really shouldn’t have been doable with a human spine - and Jason had grown up around Dick Grayson, who ran the limit of everything a human spine was capable of.

“He does best with a problem to solve,” Lady Gotham noted with a sly amusement. “This one, however, has no time limit as yet. If I thought you would listen, I would have insisted on telling you at a later date.”

And that was just pointed enough that Jason rolled his eyes, feeling his cheeks flush in spite of himself. He just… liked to have all of the information. It’s not like he was Bruce.

“Yeah, well, I like to know what I’m dealing with,” he grumbled, folding his arms and scowling at Danny. Who grinned back and ruffled his hair.

“Well, either way. Not like you need to pull the spandex back on imminently, right? There’s plenty of bats around,” he offered hopefully, and Jason felt a quick pang.

Danny… really didn’t want him to have to be a vigilante. He could taste it in the hope, in the worry, in everything his king was putting off. For some reason, he seemed to think Jason had come back to life and left the masks behind.

Like he hadn’t even thought about why Jason was still in fighting shape to be his fucking knight in the first place.

He knew he’d be annoyed if it was anyone else trying to insist he stay out of the game. He’d shot at Dick more than once for suggesting he go home when he was injured; the rest knew better than to say a word.

He hadn’t even considered giving up the vigilante life when he came back from the dead… except that brief period when he’d sort of been a rogue. He’d never even been a normal crime lord, most of them were way less hands on.

If he looked at the future now, he couldn’t imagine ever giving it up. The rogues would apparently literally always be a problem; the city would always need protectors.

That thought had never made him sad before, and yet…

Was it really the first time anyone had suggested he’d done enough? He’d died, and sure Jason was back now, but Danny seemed to really, actually believe he could stop wearing the mask.

That he’d given enough, given everything, and could and should just have a peaceful life now.

It made him almost ashamed to admit that he’d never even considered the possibility.

For all Jason railed against teen heroes, he’d only stopped being one for a temporary villain arc. Which was apparently at least partially supernaturally motivated, which was fun.

It’d shut Bruce up if Jason ever dragged that out in an argument, but Bruce already thought Jason was too volatile and susceptible to being controlled. Never mind that he hadn’t actually killed the Joker and started the apocalypse or whatever, all Bruce would hear was “someone else made Jason a villain so it could happen again”.

He’d probably try and take Jason off the case of this mystic whatever that was feeding on death. Fuck that noise. Until Bruce got a face to face with Lady G, Jason probably wouldn’t even tell him the details.

(Honestly, if there was even half a chance of avoiding that subject altogether, he’d take it. Bruce got ornery about magic in his city in a way none of the Robins had ever enjoyed dealing with, and that had been back when he and Jason had a good relationship.

Now… well, Constantine had been sticking around, so hopefully he could handle that mess and Jason could just get the actual work done.)

He gave Danny his best reassuring smile anyway, rolling his eyes and reaching to try and ruffle his hair. Found that he actually couldn’t quite reach with the way Danny was twisted around him, which was kinda weird.

“Yeah, yeah, I heard Frostbite. Side effects of the forming core could be pretty much fucking anything, and til Pitty pops out I’m not even gonna do research on anything that’ll set us off.”

Which wasn’t the same as saying he wouldn’t start the case. He could arrange what he already knew, start a plan of action, and organise his next steps without doing any additional research, after all.

Something about Lady Gotham’s delicately arching eyebrow let him know that she, at least, was onto his bullshit. Lucky for Jason, Danny just accepted the words, grinning and twisting around to wrap his whole head in a hug.

And then flowed back off his shoulders like a fucking liquid before Jason could worry about having to breathe.

“That’s great! Oh, and we should set up your haunt too! That’ll help!” Danny enthused brightly, clapping his hands and doing his best impression of a totally solid human that was apparently not his default.

Maybe it was a ghost thing.

Just so long as he never did it in human form, Jason could ignore that he definitely shoulda felt a ribcage being squeezed like that…

And no, Jason absolutely wasn’t wondering about what else Danny could use that noodley flexibility for. Totally not letting Dick know either… for competitive gymnast reasons, definitely.

No one wanted to deal with that.

And then his brain fizzled to a halt as Danny’s actual words penetrated and a sliver of concern slipped in.

Because… yeah. They’d talked about haunts. It was practically the first topic on the list; what to do in someone else’s haunt, what to never ever do even near someone else’s haunt, what a haunt meant to a ghost.

It was soul-underwear again, one of the most sacred parts of a person’s soul; their truest, actual home. Fortress and power source.

Halfas had to have them too, since Danny and Frostbite had both insisted that keeping and maintaining his haunt were going to be vital to his health while his cores stabilized. As in, Frostbite told him not to leave it for long and suggested redecorating as a soothing activity.

(Danny’s was officially Amity Park, which had not escaped Jason’s notice when he was apparently being put on haunt-arrest. It might have been an older halfa thing; very few ghosts actually stayed in their haunts all the time, although Jason could see the temptation.

It also might have been something else, and Jason had this thing about secrets and surprises down the line. He’d ask later, if he couldn’t work it out himself.)

Danny called Crime Alley Jason’s haunt, and that had felt right from the first time he’d said it. Crime Alley was his, his territory, his space, his home more than anywhere else. He knew it inside and out, could feel its moods and taste the changes in the air when something went wrong.

Baby ghosts usually couldn’t claim a haunt of any size as their own, but Jason knew that the Alley belonged to him.

That was before he’d met Lady Gotham. And if she was the spirit of the whole city… maybe he’d been wrong? Maybe it was just through her that he knew it so well?

He found himself looking to her uncertainly, searching her face in case there was any trace of displeasure. Any sign she didn’t want another ghost’s haunt in… well, what was kinda her physical body.

He couldn’t see or feel anything, but when she’d already been so careful about keeping her feelings her own… no better time to ask, really.

“Yeah… about that…” this time he did scratch the back of his neck, Danny safely down beside him. Which was about when he realized that he had no clue how to word the question.

Haunts were personal, he knew that much.

Then again, Lady Gotham said she was his ghost-mom. That had to include stupid questions. Blunt it was.

“Is it weird if I have a haunt in the city? I mean, it’s obviously your city, duh, but how do I… it feels like I’m squatting in your closet,” he said finally, giving up on not being just the most awkward creature in a thousand mile radius.

Danny’s mouth opened and closed a few times, excitement fading to a confused fascination as his words sunk in.

“Y’know, that’s a really good point… except it’s more like he’s squatting in your kidneys,” he pointed out to Lady Gotham, turning to face her too.

Lady Gotham chuckled softly and took a slow drag from her traffic cone, which had almost stopped smoking.

“Ah, I forget the limitations of a halfa’s knowledge… all ghosts begin with a haunt within their parent’s, Jason. From the moment you returned to my arms I opened up the Alley for you, and it has been yours ever since.” She paused to blow out a long plume of smog, which shaped itself into a tiny row of very familiar buildings.

Jason didn’t have to see more than a couple to know what they were; he could feel it right down to his core.

“When you are older, stronger, you may desire another, although being in the mortal world is already a degree of distance, but Crime Alley will always be your first,” Lady Gotham continued as Crime Alley bloomed from the smog before them, tiny and yet more than just an image, more than just a replica; the real thing in the scope of her power.

There were no lights in tiny windows, nothing moving through the smog, and yet it was still clearly alive. No, filled with things that were alive, people and noise and even the rats.

And it was his. His beating heart.

Lady Gotham’s smile was a tender beacon in the fog, her hands coming up to caress the smoking Crime Alley and gently waft it in his direction.

“Every crumbling brick, every pothole, every shadow. It is a heavy responsibility, and one I shall share with you until you decide you no longer need my help, but it will always be yours, Jason. It would not have accepted anyone else.”

The cluster of smoggy buildings fell apart as they reached Jason and for a moment he nearly panicked trying to keep them together, but… he was suddenly washed in a wave of old, familiar scent.

Not the burned rubber and pollution of all the rest of the smogs, the constant smell of the city. This was… floral. Soft, and sweet, and chemical in the way that cheap perfumes always were because they couldn’t have afforded the good ones.

Watered down, because they could get even that so rarely that she would begin refilling the bottle with water when it was barely half empty. Catherine Todd’s favourite perfume.

It hadn’t covered the stink of cigarettes and worse coming from the very walls of their apartment; he’d only smelled it when she was holding him close. Shielding him from Willis’s rage, tucking him into bed, cuddled up on the couch to wait out the rain or sickness.

The smell of home.

It brought tears to his eyes, the pressure of the day threatening to spill over and overwhelm him again.

Intellectually, it felt like another moment that should have been terrifying. More than any show of teeth, this was her strength. Who and what she was, she could break him with a wave of her hand, a wisp of smoke, and yet…

He felt warm. Comforted. Wrapped in her smile and at peace in a way he hadn’t in… fuck it had been years.

There was something else too, a layer under the flowers that only the deepest detective-trained parts of him tried to pluck apart; it was part of the home smell, inextricable, but it didn’t make sense. Wasn’t the perfume. Just the very faintest hint of baking far away, and Catherine Todd had never been able to afford…

Oh.

Of course not. Because Catherine Todd, his mother in every possible sense of the word but one, had never met Alfred.

So, the good news: Tucker was currently in the lead for Spiderheck. Bad news: they’d finished the first set (Tim won, but he’d been two ahead from the start which was cheating), and… the game had ticked directly over into another set.

They hadn’t been planning on changing any settings, so it was fine, and Conner and Tim hadn’t noticed anything wrong.

But… Tucker was beginning to worry, just a little. He’d done video games before, with Danny and Sam; no worries, they’d taken a turn directly in pretty much every game they’d played together.

Just, y’know, he knew Danny and Sam really well. And Tim and Conner were really cool, and he understood a lot more about how the Supers worked than he ever had before? But, maybe that was why he’d kinda screwed up.

Because he wanted things to be fair, and didn’t want them to think he’d given himself extra advantages. So they were all spiders, all the same.

And he wasn’t completely sure where the meta controls were?

Danny and Sam always insisted he have a version of the controller somewhere, so they could flick to the menu (and sometimes run riot there too). Last time they did Spiderheck, he’d put the buttons on his stomach, so Danny and Sam could try and hit them for an extra level of difficulty.

But he wanted to be fair. Didn’t want extra powers. And, apparently, technopathy had sorta maybe converted that wish into him not being able to feel it while he was spidered up.

All his combat moves were fine! The break, grab, web commands were smooth and easy, just like every other time he did them. Different attacks, no worries. And, obviously, he hadn’t stood still and tried to look for the code, because they were playing Spiderheck and that was a really easy way to get wiped.

Dodging another swinging attack from Tim, he scuttled at top speed across the platform and jumped behind a box. No weapons here, and he scanned quickly for the next spawn point.

Which, normally, shoulda shown up on two levels; the normal game vision, and the white lined underlay of the code, which he could always see through from top to bottom of the level.

(This was usually an active impediment rather than an advantage in Spiderheck; it was way too hard to know what he could stand on.)

He couldn’t see one, just the platform above and the wall behind.

Maybe he should take an early death, just to give himself a little time to work this out. Just so he could stop worrying. He was 21, he’d had these powers for years, he totally knew how they worked by now.

He just, maybe, might have gotten overconfident.

Danny would never let him live it down if they all had to be rescued from Spiderheck.

And, way more importantly, Tim Drake-Wayne and his super hot boyfriend would only remember him as the loser who couldn’t even control his powers.

Nope. Absolutely not.

A loud buzzing heralded the arrival of one of the spinning laser traps, and Tucker made up his mind. Just one early death. No worries. He had a two win lead, and honestly he’d rather lose the set than admit he’d fucked up.

Scuttling “away” from Tim’s probable next attack, Tucker scurried into the path of the spinning laser trap.

And saw, at the very last second, Conner swinging in from the other side, directly into a laser.

Shit.

Sam was comfortably snuggled down into her pillows and thoroughly enjoying the chaos her new chat was creating when she finally heard the door. A little too buried to easily get up, or look particularly graceful doing it, so instead she stuck a hand straight up into the air.

“In here, love!”

And, like the angel of mercy that she was, Val only made her wait ten minutes to get out of all of her winter gear and put the kettle on before coming to save her from her fate.

“Not the fastest rescue I’ve received,” Sam teased, even as Val hauled her easily to her feet. Val grinned back and pulled her in for a quick peck.

“I wasn’t aware I was being timed. I can do better.”

“I bet you can,” Sam laughed, draping her arms around her girlfriend’s shoulders. Val gave her another, deeper kiss, then drew back enough to press their foreheads together.

“So, how was Gotham? I saw Danny made the front page,” she teased back, and Sam hesitated.

In amongst all of their various plans for disaster, it hadn’t really come up that whatever they did at the party, it was sure to make the gossip rags. Front page though? That was probably an achievement.

And, given what she herself had done, really annoying.

“What, they gave the front page to him? I blatantly accused at least two CEOs and Lex Luthor of weaponizing misogyny, with citations, and Danny got the front page?” She huffed, drawing back and folding her arms, fully intent on turning away to sulk, but not remotely objecting when Val’s arms snuck around her waist and pulled her back in.

Val’s chin tucked in over her shoulder and the taller woman snickered.

“I know, right? Sadly cold hard facts just fade away in the face of a scandal.” Val sighed dramatically, then dropped a kiss on the side of Sam’s neck. “You’re on page seven. It’s mostly about your parents, but using Lex’s name got a couple other points in. Oh, and Vicki Vale did a three page piece on how Brucie Wayne specifically upholds the patriarchy. I think she quoted you.”

Sam considered that for a moment, her arms automatically coming around to cover Val’s for a brief squeeze. It wasn’t like she’d actually been planning to change anything at the gala. Mostly she’d just wanted to be heard.

It could be an interesting starting point, though. Especially since she got to pick her outfit for the next gala; her mother hadn’t even specified that it had to be a dress on the document, which was definitely a peace offering.

Cass Wayne had looked really good in that suit.

Her cheeks suddenly hot for absolutely no reason, Sam twisted in Val’s arms to kiss her again.

“I’m sorry my mom’s… the worst,” she finished lamely, wrapping her arms around Val again.

The whole fall-from-grace thing may have been seven years ago, and Val had more than moved on, but. Well. Sam didn’t exactly believe all the scars had healed.

Especially when Val stilled for a moment in her arms.

Then she chuckled, wrapping her arms a littler tighter around Sam and lifting her off her feet.

“Hey, at least she’s not actually a bigot. It’s always nicer to be hated personally than in general, y’know?” She teased, echoing something Sam was pretty sure Danny had said to her back in her Phantom-hunting days.

Sam huffed and wrapped her legs around Val’s waist too, raining kisses down on her face.

“Yeah, well, she can still shove it up her ass. You’re my date for the next gala, if you actually want to come.”

Which.

Well.

Was about when she realized that the next gala was probably going to be extra interesting, after all their shenanigans. Maybe they should have been more discrete? More careful?

Her worry must have shown on her face, because Val gave her a very gentle bounce to shake her out of it.

“Hey. Samantha Manson. I would be delighted to go to the next gala with you, and tell all the little journalists that yeah, I’m that Val,” she said firmly once Sam had refocused on her. Then she grinned. “I’ll even be on my best behaviour and not one up Danny until the second one.”

That made Sam laugh again, hugging on tight even as Val turned and easily carried her through to their little kitchenette and sat her up on one of the counters.

“Hey, did you get that autograph from Harley for me by the way? I wanna send it to my dad for his birthday,” she added, sneaking another kiss and then pulling a pair of mugs next to the steaming kettle.

Sam considered hopping off the counter. Didn’t bother, reaching behind herself instead to pull her favourite tea for the month and drop a bag into her mug.

“Yeah, a couple actually. And she said if we wanna meet Ivy she’ll let us know when they’re back on the west coast, but it won’t be any time soon.” That hadn’t been particularly surprising, but it still made Sam a little sad.

Just another reminder that they were on the outside looking in all the way over here.

Valerie stilled, coming back and resting both hands on Sam’s thighs.

“Do you miss being on the east coast?” She asked quietly, those gorgeous green eyes so large and gentle.

Sam hesitated a moment longer, then sighed and let her head thunk back against the cupboard behind her.

“Honestly, I think I just miss being closer to everyone. It’s not far for Danny with the Zone, but if you or I wanna visit anyone we have to hop on an airplane or spend weeks driving, neither of which are good for the environment. We just… get forgotten out here, stuck out of the loop.”

Val raised an eyebrow, a smirk on her face but eyes still soft with understanding.

“Oh, like you’re one to talk. I thought I’d pick up a new phone and rejoin the group chat that day, but suddenly I gotta wait nearly a week for “new secrets”,” she teased and Sam sighed, shaking her head. Not quite able to lift all the way out of her funk.

“Yeah, I know… it probably woulda been fine, Danny shouldn’t have dropped anything at all in the main chat if he didn’t want everyone to see it, I just…”

“Wanted to be more sensitive than he is,” Val finished the sentence, leaning in for another kiss. Not needing to reach up even with Sam sat on the counter. “That’s why I’m still dating you.”

It did pull a smile from Sam anyway and she draped her arms over her girlfriend’s shoulders again.

“For some reason. So, what did you think?”

Val shrugged, her hands sliding up to settle around Sam’s waist.

“About a new halfa? Probably sucks for him. Especially when he’s gotta come out as dead to his family. The Waynes aren’t exactly known for being stable,” she pointed out when Sam snickered.

Which was a fair point.

“They’re actually worse when there’s more of them,” she mused, glancing back towards the bed where she’d left her phone, “and the oldest’s a cop now.”

This time it was Val’s turn to snicker.

“Yeah, I heard. Tuck already sent me the blow by blow of you eviscerating the poor guy.”

Sam preened. Deservedly.

“Hey, you know me, I’m not gonna play nice just cuz I’ve been dragged to some social function.”

The snicker turned to a chuckle as Val leaned in, rubbing their noses together.

“And you know me, baby girl, ACAB all the way, and I still think that should extend to the Justice League. Heard half of Batman Inc also showed up, did you let them have it too?”

“You know I did,” Sam purred, locking her ankles behind Val’s back and nipping playfully at her lower lip. Val laughed, her hands creeping slowly up the small of Sam’s back.

“That’s my little leopard. Tea’s done.” And then, totally unfairly, she reached back with one hand and pulled Sam’s ankles apart, slipping free with a laugh as Sam pouted. “Hey, you’d be more upset if I let it over steep.”

“I can make more tea,” Sam grumbled, finally slipping off the counter, but a rebellious smile made it onto her face anyway. Val toasted her with the french press.

“True that, darling, but I’m not wasting the good coffee beans. Daddy asked me four times if I was sure about taking the train but honestly, he’s a state away now, it’s not worth a flight.”

Setting her teabag aside, Sam squirted in some vanilla agave syrup and took a deep breath. Gotham was fine, but no hotels could match her home tea stash. Not even the Waynes could.

“Beautiful, strong, environmentally conscious, and a Daddy’s girl. How did I land you again?” She asked innocently as Val dropped creamer into her own mug.

“By being all of those but the last one,” Val countered easily, taking a mug and holding an arm out for Sam to tuck under. “Now c’mon, if I’m going to the next gala you need to tell me allllll about a certain cutie Cassandra Wayne,” she cooed, making for their couch.

Sam’s face flushed red and she made to duck away instantly, but those damn vigilante muscles made it so hard.

“Okay, veto, you’re not allowed to do that anymore! My mom is trying to hook me up with her!” Sam did not whine. She. Protested. With dignity. Totally no idea why Val snickered, holding her coffee up and away in her other arm.

“Yeah, that’s the point. How funny would it be if Danny and I both stole a Wayne from you?” She asked with a vicious grin.

Which… did make Sam pause. Because that would be really funny. And Cass would almost certainly be down for it; she wasn’t as loud or attention seeking as any of the boys, but Sam could recognize the wicked gleam in anyones’ eyes when they enjoyed the chaos.

Then she sighed.

“No, we have to be good for the next gala. Otherwise no one’s going to listen to what I actually have to say.”

Val hummed an agreement, guiding her to sit on the plush, well loved cushions. It was an old couch, and a hand-me-down from Sam’s work, but it was just too good to pass up. They could both lie comfortably side by side on the seat, if they snuggled just a little, and the back was wide and plush enough for two throws.

“Okay. The gala after that, then. It’ll make our slow burn long distance romance all the more compelling,” she added when Sam snorted, finally releasing Sam to sink comfortably into oblivion.

Sam swatted at her and put her tea down on the table.

“You’re dreadful. I love you. We’ll ask Cass, lemme just get my phone and I’ll hook you into the group chat with her, Steph, and Babs. They’re Wayne family friends,” she added at Val’s questioning noise, “I haven’t met Babs yet, but Steph is great. You’re gonna love her.”

“Only if we’re going for some three’s company action,” Val snickered as Sam jogged to the bedroom, flipping her girlfriend off as she went.

Jason was quiet as they left the Zone. It wasn’t entirely unexpected, especially after the day he’d had and the emotional whiplash.

Danny was doing his very best not to let it bother him. He remembered the early days of being a halfa, how much he’d second-guessed himself, how much every new change and discovery had rocked his world. And he’d been a teenager, all hormones and fire and energy.

He hadn’t even been dead a month before shit got weird.

Jason was twenty-two, and had already been dead for almost seven years. Danny’d like to think he’d found ways to cope, but seven years in himself he was pretty sure he still hadn’t.

Whatever Jason had dealt with in those six and a half years was being ripped up in front of him day by day.

If there was anything he wanted, anything he needed, Danny would be there for him in a heartbeat. Before he could even have to ask, if possible. Aaaand the only thing he couldn’t do that for was if Jason needed space.

Lady Gotham had been able to open them a portal directly into Jason’s apartment; Danny preferred to aim high enough to miss walls and buildings on the way back, but it was her city. She knew exactly where everything and anything was - the portal had been in the back of Jason’s front door.

Danny totally wasn’t jealous. He could come back out almost at the same place he’d gone in, if he was quick. And he could go intangible anyway.

It was still really cool to watch the city spirit do it, the way the realms opened easily and willingly at her touch. She’d given Jason a token, a coin that had to be at least six hundred years old that showed the city’s skyline. Apparently he could use it to get in touch with her, or get back to the Zone on his own if Danny couldn’t take him.

Danny was fine with that. For sure.

The Infinite Realms were dangerous, but the token should bring him straight to Lady Gotham, in an emergency. And then Danny could follow and find her, and find Jason. It was a super reasonable backup plan.

He still found himself hovering in the doorway, unsure if Jason wanted him to stay or go while the other man shrugged out of his coat, boots, and shoulder holster that Danny had totally missed this entire time. And then walked directly into the bathroom.

Danny hovered a little closer, entirely unknowing what exactly he’d do if Jason was crying. Or screaming. Or beating a hole in the wall away from prying eyes. Or, actually using the bathroom for its intended purpose, apparently.

Because Danny forgot Jason was still in mandatory human form at all times.

He couldn’t hear anything from inside the bathroom with the door shut anyway, not even movement or the sink running. But then again, Jason’s family knew Superman personally. That probably lead to some inside jokes and really specific precautions.

Danny hovered back to the door. Stared around at the incredibly clean, well organized display of video games and weaponry on the walls, the double shelf of books.

This, he was beginning to suspect, was a third, larger, more expensive apartment. The furniture and room layouts were about the same, but he was like 80% sure the apartment they’d played MarioKart in hadn’t had as much stuff.

This one had some dishes waiting by the sink though. Given how well organized everything else was, they stuck out.

…

Five minutes. Jason was still in the bathroom.

Danny hated waiting. If he was going to stick around, he could justify it by helping out. He rolled up his sleeves and got to work.

———————

Part two imminent! All my love to the tag list, you’ll be following the link on this one so you don’t get both separately

Part 2:

Tag list: @welcometosasakiworld @someonebored0100 @stealingyourbones @starkcravingmad @frostedthroughghost @akikkobara @rainbowbunny0159 @littlefeather345 @violet-catsarelife @serasvictoria02 @wolfjackle @blacksea21090 @secretdestinywerewolf @anime-hipster-the-amazing @undead-essence @skitscratched @blackroserelina @snoodly-boop p @mayoota-blog @xysidhe e @little-apricot-the-writer @chaoticmistake @the-legal-shipper r @bun-fish @aroranorth-west @demon-cat-goes-woof @perfectwastelandcreation @onyxlightdragon @larks-and-katydids @peachesandcreamfemboy @jesus-camp-the-sequel @may-rbi @mothman-the-mothman87 @viyatrix @stargirl1331 @idfk-man10 @thedepressedrobin @skulld3mort-1fan @rootsmudge @ravenshadow17 @cankoking g @phantom-dc @mentalcarebear @magic-pincushion @redamancyardor r @lyra689 @itsparadoxlacuna @alcorbearson @asphyxia778 8 @why-must-i-be-like-this @tkiesai @greenpyrowolf f @frivolous-pastel

#dp x dc #dpxdc #dc x dp #dcxdp #danny fenton dead and loving it #dfdali #dead on main ship #chapter probably 18 part 1 #so that just happened #in which there is LORE #and SPIDERHECK #and LESBIANS #feast my children feast

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krysmcscience · 9 months ago

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MOGUS ART DUMP TIME

Have you ever wondered what would happen if Brown, Red, and Green raised a kid together? Probably, because there's no fuckin' way that kid would end up normal by any stretch of the word, and it would be absolutely hilarious to watch the assured family drama unfold.

Have you ever wondered what would happen if the kid they raised came from an entirely different canon universe altogether? Probably not, but that's what's about to happen in this fukken post, because in an alternate timeline, the kid these three adopted turned out to be Shio. (Yes, that Shio - the one whose canonical appearance typically requires a Body Horror warning. If you want additional context about who tf Shio is, there’s a simple summary of them in this post (some of the deets for other characters is, kinda outdated or wildly inaccurate now, ahaha, C A M), or you can read the WIP for the novel they’re from here. Although, there’s some good or bad news if you take the latter route, depending: Shio doesn’t show up until the end of chapter three, and you already have hella spoilers going in, LOL.)

That being said, get ready for some family photos of our favorite trio of gay space pirates, who have managed to accidentally adopt an impostor baby from a whole other universe, which is a totally normal and average thing to happen to anyone ever, no big deal. Pay no attention to the fact that their brand new impostor baby used to be a literal war criminal, one who attempted to rage-quit life so hard over being dumped that the creation deity of their universe took one long look at them and decided, 'Ya know what would be funny? Resetting this piece of shit back to Babby Status without any memories whatsoever of who they used to be, and then tossing them out into space for a trio of some of the biggest chaosmongers in this other reality’s existence to stumble across and adopt because they think they've just found some weird cute animal, rather than a fully sapient being that is going to molt into what looks like a human baby in a little less than two years. That would be So Fucking Funny and it needs to happen Right Now.'

'Look at how tiny and cute and huggable this lil guy is, surely they will stay this way forever~' Oh, Brown, you poor sweet naive little man. Shio's only three here, they've got plenty of time to grow. >:3c

Plenty of time to grow and decide that they're more of a 'he' than a 'they' this time around, even.

Sweet/sad fact about Brown - he refuses to allow a child of his to go without love and support because of the way he lacked those things growing up (and in general). Hilarious fact about Brown to follow that up with, though - that does not mean he will be responsible and NOT put his all into teaching his child to become a notorious space pirate just like him (with - of course - the Full Backing of Green and Red). So, Shio might not become a war criminal, per se, but, uh. He is Definitely still gonna wind up becoming a criminal. <:]

Yes, Red's shirt says 'Puppy Cannon', and it is indeed a reference to 'Party Cannon', why do you ask? Shio's shirt, meanwhile, says 'Squish Bab', whereas Brown's says 'I woke up like this (48 hours ago)', and Green's gauges have 'BlaXk HUle' on them. (Crinkle assures me it's pronounced the same as 'black hole', and while my brain understands this logically, my eyeballs still have doubts.)

'Well, Shio has gotten bigger and taller than me despite him only being 13, but surely he won't get any bigger than this, right???' Keep dreaming, Brown, this isn't even Shio's final form size.

Has Shio already accompanied his parents on several heists and raids on MIRA property while in some manner of disguise by now? Not according to any of Devon's paperwork. Which Shio helps with on a consistent basis to give his parents some alone time. And who wouldn't trust the beloved Admiral's part-time assistant~? He's such a calm, quiet, and responsible young man~ ;) Pay no mind to the fact that, against Red's wishes and to Green's not-so-secret delight, Shio and Brown have recently and very intentionally caused a full-blown society-wide panic back in Shio's old universe, thanks in part to them learning about his past life and making a series of videos on social media entitled 'Shio Survived So Get Ready For ~Kill All Humanity PART TWO~ LOL'.

In case it's not fully legible, Brown's shirt reads 'I went to another universe and all I stole was my *awesome kid* (and 50 thousand dollars) ... (and a car)'. Meanwhile, Green's 'Slutstomper' gauges are in reference to an absolutely raunchy electropop band from Shio's ex-universe. Red's shirt will be revealed in the next photo, and I can assure you, he does not understand what it means the way Green and Brown do, and it was all Green's idea because he just has, you know. So much class.

'I can't believe my son can lift and carry all three of his parents like it's nothing now. I'm so mad, yet I couldn't be prouder.' People who knew Shio before they got reset tried to warn you that they were an Absolute Unit, Brown, but you didn't listen. This is what happens when you don't listen. 23 years later, you wind up with an adoptive son who can easily pick up not just you, but both of your boyfriends along with you.

Has Shio gone back for another visit to their old universe with Brown by now to fake going on a Kill All Humans crusade for the sake of causing more mass panic? ...Maybe. Did they trick Devon into letting them borrow one of his ships for this endeavor? ...Possibly. Did Red end up so furious that he made both of them do three months of community service to make up for it afterward, and banned them from letting Green go along to help them properly socialize? Well, yes - absolutely yes, in fact - but to be fair, they both knew Green would have spent most of his time there being a slutty menace and flirting with everyone, anyway, and neither of them wanted to have to deal with that. They were already being punished as it was (by having to help a bunch of needy people with a smile), so, no need to make it worse for themselves.

Brown's 'Stabby Babby' shirt definitely features an angry baby holding a knife on it, but Shio's arms are in the way because he's Just That Massive. Also, I apologize for Green and Brown (but mostly myself) for allowing that Pupknot shirt to exist on poor innocent Red. In Shio's defense, he has crafted a very solid mental block around what the joke is and thus Also does not understand what it means. And in my own defense, after coming up with two other puppyfied metal band names, how could I resist the horrible joke that would come out of doing the same to Slipknot? (Okay, that's less of a defense and more of an outright admission of guilt.) As for Green's decals and patches, if anyone wants to see the full-size versions of them for whatever reason, let me know, because I put an absurd amount of work into them, and I want a reason beyond my own fragile artist ego to compile them all into a single cohesive image. Also, in regards to the 'VB' on Green's gauges and one of his patches, it stands for 'Video Bois', which is sort of an AU-canon term for their polycule (video cables = RGB = Red, Green, Brown).

Oh, wait, what's that eldritch creature way off in the background, you ask?

...

Don't worry about it. :)

#among us #art #fanart #original characters #only shio is mine lol #crinklytinfoil #NSFA #brown is the supportive dad #green is the cool dad #and red is the sweet dad #they are Excellent Parents and yet - at the same time - Terrible Parents XD #their child is loved and supported and taken care of #their child is also a terrifying force of a space pirate who likes to play Secret Mind Games with their targets #still better than what COULD have happened with shio tho #because i cannot stress this enough #they were a Literal War Criminal in their past life #also i actually did not realize the implicit What The Fuck in the Pupknot joke until i was already halfway done with the logo WHOOPS XD

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arthyritis · 1 year ago

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Hairy guys lmao

*old southern man voice* nothing quite like the bond between a boy and his dog

@intothebutterflyburrow

#my beloved #irisona #irisona monster au #they are.. so beloved to me #babs lil tail wagging ahaksjsjs #i am going to dream about them so hard /hj #thank you for this its so cute good night 😭

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montyywritess · 9 months ago

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emo shit below about my beloved so just scroll, it just doesn't feel like journaling or free therapy unless i hit the post button. idk why, ask god, i just got here.

ill be real honest. ive been crying a lot the past few days. not even cute lil tears because i thought of a happy memory. i've been ugly sobbing, silently sobbing. locking myself in the bathroom kind of cries. i can't even say that it's been triggered from anything, it's just genuinely a constant. i wake up, she's not there on my bed. i go to the kitchen, she's not in her bed. i feed the cats and our other dog, and i accidentally keep making two bowls of food. i leash up lola and go to get babs' harness and leash next. i'm half asleep sometimes and my hand plonks out, expecting to feel her beside me and she's not.

idk if this is just my particular grief that im wading through or because autism heightens everything but i had babs for 14 years, i was 13/14 when i got her. she was with me right up until weeks before i turned 28. and my grief for her has mangled with this weird sense of nostalgia. she was literally in my life during my most formative years, when i became who i am, learned REALLY tough lessons. and grieving for her feels like i'm grieving my childhood? my adolescence? a part of me? an innocence of my life, and then other versions of my life too. ones i'm not proud of, ones i am. she was there, she was a part of them. it could almost be described as really poetic or poignant timing. i no longer need those people i was, i no longer am them. but i really needed her. i don't really feel like myself.

is this even normal i feel like im going insane. i just cant doooooo this man. like i know the cycle of life, i knew the time was going to come. i just cannot handleeee it.

#and as always i will punch a mf so fucking hard if they say pet loss 'isnt the same' go fuck yourself if it even flickers in your brain

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3amsnek · 3 years ago

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A lil Liten for the solstice (and the soul) :]

Happy winter y’all!

Click for better quality

Reblogs > likes, please don’t like this if you’re not going to reblog it

#my art?#my oc art #liten #winter solstice #wanted to make a lil something since this is our winter holiday and the bean seemed a good choice :]#they have Cocoa and they are Cozy #also return of the scarf!#I haven’t gotten to drawing my bab much this year have i #:(#must remedy that #might be doing a bit of a redesign at some point soon? I’m conflicted because og design my beloved but like rn they Do Not Have Ears because #well #I simply forgot to give them to them when I first made a doodle that became this lovely child #I also added another spike to the top of their head because I always think there’s one there even though the original doesn’t have it #this is definitely not the point of this post the point is happy winter and happy winter solstice to anyone else who celebrates

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lilakennedy · 6 years ago

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hey my lil dudes -

i thought after my recent, quite out of nowhere posts, where i had asked for some form of help it would be good to like? give a little update now?

overall you guys managed to throw fuckin 520,17€ my way (yes im counting the 17 cents).

that’s absolutely nuts to me, and while it wasn’t the needed 1.4k € that were so suddenly demanded for rent, it was still enough to help us settle A LOT of things.

my mother also thought i was messing with her when i finally showed her my paypal balance, until she realized i was serious and started crying with relief. she also asked me to thank you guys if i can - so here.

luckily, just giving the owners of this house some of the money needed was enough to calm things down and the oldest of the brothers is also way easier to deal with and more open to actually communicate.

now i just wanted to share where exactly all your money has gone, because i feel like you deserve to know what the weird german tumblr person did with your money -

like i said, most of the money went to the rent issue.

during the time i had the post(s) going around, we had gotten another bill of 110€ which would’ve dragged us to court if we wouldn’t have been able to pay it within two weeks. luckily, we were able to take this money from the 520€ and immediately got out of that mess.

we were able to get my dog some needed pills.

my mother was able to buy a certain medication that she had needed to leave out for weeks now.

we decided to use 15€ to get fuel for our car, allowing us to not only visit my grandma for her 82nd birthday, but it’s also a huge relief for both my mother and i to not have to carry all our groceries back home all the time.

so, to everyone that shared or gave, thank you so so much. you managed to do something that my mother had thought impossible.

#i thought this post was needed yk?#a lil update #also i mean i could go into the salty details of how a certain big beloved blog ignored mine and my friends requests for help to share this #but i wont ;)#also im not gonna put this into any tags #just leave it here on my blog and for my followers to see if they are interested #lila post #oH ALSO INCASE ANYONE THINKS IM VAGUEING THEM SDJFHDSG dw certain big blog doesnt follow me so it aint you my lil babs #im just still a bit Unimpressed by their behaviour but what can you do i guess if you have many followers no one cares eh #ok sorry this is a wholesome thankful post sdjfhsd #no but i genuinenly mean it when i say thank you

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ephemerensis · 2 years ago

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Oatmeal Raisin // Jason Todd x GN! Reader

lil fluff piece. platonic! but any kind of relationship can be implied. jason has a lil craving for cookies that you help him out with. tim is allergic to peanuts which idk if that’s canon or not but…

—

As far as you were concerned Jason didn’t like you, not really. He got along with you civilly, certainly. But in all your years of friendship with one Timothy Jackson Drake, you hardly spoke. So you never really got to know Jason the way you got to know the others. At least not at first.

It was difficult to get to know any of them actually. Especially before you were let in on the whole Batman thing, and even after. It was hard for them to open up. And that was fine, because you understood that. And they were trying and you could appreciate that.

Naturally, Dick was the easiest to like and it got even easier when you found out that he was your beloved Nightwing. You were in love with Nightwing; owned all the memorabilia, had postcards of him plastered on your wall, knew his patrol routes as well as a civilian could so that you might just catch a glimpse of your favorite masked crusader. When you learned that you knew him? Dick became the sole recipient of your constant doting and gushing about how cool he looked on TV and what the latest magazine had to say on his relationships, his impacts on Bludhaven and so forth. You both shared a sense of humor, corny dad jokes and all.

Damian was trickier. You weren’t exactly good with children, which was bad enough, but he acted so maturely for his age it was hard for you to not feel intimidated. But as you fell for Titus, he yielded himself slightly. And when you learned that he could be swayed by the promise of a bedtime story (Jane Austen of course), so long as it was offered without condescension, it’d sealed the deal.

You bonded with Stephanie and Cass over disorganizing Tim’s meticulously arranged utility belt and hiding away all his suit capes around the manor. You argued with Babs over which stage of the hero’s journey Bruce was at in his developmental arc. You didn’t galavant the streets with them in search for crime, nor did you share tragic secrets in hushed solemn tones. Being a friend was enough.

Until eventually, you clicked with everyone over time. Everyone but Jason.

That’s not to say you didn’t like him. You admired him in your own way. He was pretty cool. He never missed a shot in training and if you were lucky enough to catch him in a talkative mood he’d teach you about the vital points to aim for or how to break off the safety switch on a gun so it wouldn’t interfere with your performance and throw you off (not a true story, just a hypothetical.) “Essential street smarts.” That was the extent of your interaction.

Until one night, you found him knocking on your window.

How he got your address was another story, probably the same way Tim knew your credit card number or how Cass found your Netflix password, but regardless he was at your window tapping away. You opened it, letting him in.

“Hey… If you’re looking Tim or something, he’s not here.

Jason clambered through the window, taking his hood off and setting it on your kitchen countertop on the way.

“Timberly? No no, I’m not here for that loser. He keeps talking about how much you like baking though, is it true?”

His back was to you as he tugged the gloves off his hands to run his hands under the water from your faucet. He sure knew how to make himself feel at home.

“Yes. Yeah. I do. Why?” Your brows knit in visible confusion as he turned off the water, wiping his hands on the towel you hung off the oven handle.

“You know how to make oatmeal raisin cookies?”

“I’m sorry? Oatmeal raisin?”

“Yeah. You know how to make them or not?” Turning around, the muscular man crossed his arms, looking down at you from across the room almost condescendingly, like it was a challenge.

“...you know what? I do know how to make oatmeal raisin cookies. Go run and buy raisins, I’ll start on the batter.”

Sure enough, within ten minutes Jason came swinging back through your window with a jumbo bag of raisins. After nagging him for walking through your living room with his boots on and making a quip about how he’d never finish that many raisins, you invited him to the kitchen.

He was a terrible cook. You didn’t know how he succeeded in mistaking flour for sugar, but he managed. After scrapping the first batter he added four extra eggs to and halfway through the second, you kicked him out and took over completely.

“No, I insist. Let me do it, it’s okay. Just sit over there and read a book or twiddle your thumbs or something, please.”

A half hour later, your kitchen was soiled but they were baking. Closing the oven with a satisfied huff, you looked over to Jason as you straightened yourself up.

Jason was watching you. But not in the critical way he fixed his gaze on passerby’s on the street or the hard gaze he’d set on his targets; just watching you. Calloused hands tossed a bullet cartridge between them as his feet swung to and fro from your barstool chair. He looked so boyish, it was almost cute.

“They’ll be done in twelve. Why oatmeal raisin? I’m not judging or anything but I make a mean chocolate chip that blows raisins out of the water.”

A tap sounded as he placed the cartridge down on the marble counter with a shrug.

“S’what my mom used to make.”

Slinking over to the adjacent chair, you took off the oven mitts to rest your face in your palms, looking at him expectantly to continue.

“What? We’re telling stories now?”

“I mean, you almost never talk to me and then you swing in asking for the least popular cookie type to date— I think a story time might be in order.”

“You’re keeping your mouth shut short stack, no one hears any of this.”

Huffing a giggle, you motioned zipping your mouth and flicking away the invisible key as he rolled his eyes.

“I didn’t exactly grow up rich. We’d have oatmeal every other day, mostly because that’s what she could scrape together. Fucking twat I was, couldn’t stand it. Threw a tantrum couple times ‘bout how tired I was of it. So she made oatmeal raisin cookies.”

His gaze was on his hands as he spoke but his eyes seemed to see anything but.

“I don’t want to get into all the details but, no matter how she treated me or raised me, she was still my mother. Afforded me this much kindness. Sometimes I almost miss her. So. Oatmeal raisin cookies.”

Wide eyes watched him, at a loss for words as your mind ran to process a response.

Breaking free from the recesses of his mind, he turned to look at you as he continued.

“Alfred usually makes them, but he’s out of town on business so… just thought I’d swing by I guess.”

The beep of the oven took you out of the trance.

Blinking, you stood. Clapping your hands together and reaching for the oven mitts.

“Well! I don’t know how good hers were, but mine are pretty hard to beat.”

Pulling the tray out of the oven, you let them cool a moment as you sought out a plate. Transferring them over, you slid it in his direction with a smug smile.

“Yeah, nothing beats Alfred’s, bud.”

He brought one to his nose, taking an obnoxiously loud whiff, cocking an eyebrow almost animatedly.

“6/10, more cinnamon could’ve been in order.”

“It’s not my fault you dropped like half my jar in the first batch!”

“Don’t yell at your food critic. Three point deduction.”

You scoffed, crossing your arms, “my apologies, my liege.”

Without missing a beat, he’d managed to shove the entire cookie in his mouth in one bite with the same cocky arrogance he’d held before. Mid chew, he stopped, looking at you in bewilderment before reaching for another one.

“What the fuck did you put in this?”

You burst out grinning, “Love, rainbows, and cyanide, it’s a secret recipe.”

If he heard you, he didn’t acknowledge it; scarfing down another with hesitation. Not that you minded. His usually stoic, suave, aura paled in the way his face lit up.

Between the two of you (mostly him), three tray fulls evaporated in the span of half an hour.

Packing up the last few batches you’d prepped and insisting he take the raisins home, you handed him a bag to see him off with.

“These got any nuts by any chance?”

“I used peanut butter, yes.”

“Thank you for your service, I will be passing on some to Tim.”

You snorted, “You’re not killing my best friend.”

With his hood back on, bag in hand, he clambered halfway out your window before turning his head back towards you.

“...can I come back for these? When Alfred’s busy that is.”

It caught you off guard.

“Yeah. No yeah, absolutely! Whenever you want. I’ll keep my window unlocked.”

“Not in this city you’re not.”

—

if you guys read the Last Cup of Coffee fic sgdjdd this was a deleted segment because i wanted to focus more on Tim 😭😭 recycling content at its finest tbh

#jason todd x you #jason todd #jason todd x reader #jason todd fluff #tim drake #tim drake fanfic #batman #dc #red robin #damian wayne #dick grayson #jason todd fanfiction #red hood #red hood fluff #red hood x reader #red hood fic #batboy fluff

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rzyraffek · 2 years ago

Note

Odd request, but could you mess around with slashers x gn/male partner who gets seasonal depression or it gets worse when the weather gets crummy? It's been raining for a while where I am and could go for a little comfort, haha.

Possibly Brahms or Billy Lenz? Or anyone else you really want to write.

Can do🌼 If anything here is not accurate please feel free to let me know i really dont want to offend anyone🌺

They/them partner with masculine features okay? Because it might get confusing to read when everyone has he/him pronouns i really hope that you dont mind i just know it wil get confusing

(Sfw) (Request open)

Billy Lenz👽

What you mean seasoned depresion? Doenst sound tasty? He does not belive in long words.🙄

At first he will think that his partner will just be sad for whole winter(or other season but Winter/Autumn is pretty common) which is upsetting because he loves winter. But when he finally understands what being depressed means, he will do his best to be useful

Even if they dont have Energy to leave bed/ do anything in hause, he will stay with them, at first he might talk but if they arent in mood for that he will just keep them company. Its his way of saing 'hey im here for you its gonna to be okay🌼'

He cant cook but if he sees that they were avoiding food latley or just not leaving their room for a while, he will bring them choco pudding

If his partner is cis-man and they grow a bread(and it gives them disphora) he will help them shave it. Like yeah Billy is silly chaotic goblin man but u seen him? Either he has testosterone level -5 or he knows how to shave

Also if they feel bab when weather is gloomy he will just cover the Windows? No Windows=no weather affecing them, easy😎😎😎 (thats billy saying that not me)

Overall 9/10 wont force them to talk to him and will give food

Brahms Heelshire

He knows what it is, but its still heartbreaking to see them like that

If depresion goes hard like hard to the point they cant leave the bed. You remeber how in every Brahms headcanons i mension that you have to help this guy take a Bath? Yep its reverse now. Now He takes care of them

I know that Brahms is a lil bebi boi lil shmol bebi men, but he can get mature if he wants to, he will bring them tea, headpats and warm words. He will probably avoid talking at first, but its because he feels like walking on minefild, NOT because of them being depresed, but because he knows that he sometimes gets angy at random stuff and he really desnt want to yell at them

Hes more happy to give them hugs and lay in bed with them (of couse if they want to)

He will try light up the mood with good dinner or a nice walk around the mansion.

Will spend more time with you, but if you need space he will understand

Overall 8/10 tries his best to light up the mood by being romantic gentleman. Will bring you tea -2 points for being british

Yautja (hes here only because i have funny ideas)

Wym mental health?? Season makes ur brain go not good?? I- my beloved we are on spaceship rn wym

The idea of depresion itself is pretty new for him, so they need to teach him

He will go 😨wym you sick in mind and theres no medicine? 😓aww man 😍 i guess I will stay by urside and help you with anythin u want😈

This guy will pick you up and carry you everywhere u need to be. U need to take a shower? Boom. You are hungry? Watch him speerun cook some pasta with salt and kechup (he has No clue how to food)

Will cuddle

Again if any of those make their partner uncomfortable he wpnt do it, those are just sugestions. Also I know that depresed people arent just little sad bolls without Energy to get out of bed. But he doesnt know that! He didnt know depresion exsisted till 3minutes ago!

6/10 acts like his lover is shmol sad Ball, and will baby them around

#billy lenz #billy lenz x reader #billy lenz x y/n #slasher x reader #brahms heelsire x reader #brahms headcanons #brahms the boy #brahms heelsire #brahms x reader #yautja x reader #yautja #slasher headcanons

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thebomb-thebird-andtheburntbitch · 3 years ago

Text

Uppies!

b.katsuki / f.reader

genre: domestic, husband!bakugou, wife!y/n

warning(s): mizusu is babie, she throws a lil tantrum- but nothing daddy can't fix

w.count: 3k

synopsis: katsuki comes home early to relieve the babysitter hired to take care of mizusu. you come back home to your daughter sitting on her father's hip and listening to kiddy music with dinner on the stove. katsuki realizes just how warm his two girls make him.

-x-x-x-

a/n: ive been stressed and i think bringing mizusu, the beloved baku-child, back will make me feel better. bc she's precious. she's still a lil bab in this one :D

-x-x-x-

It was just after noon when Katsuki's mobile started to violently ring in his pocket. It was a special ringtone he set to be horrendously obnoxious so it'd gain his attention every time it went off. He knew who was calling before he could even dig the device out of his pocket because of it. He only briefly looked at the caller ID every time out of pure habit.

-Zusu's Sitter-

He only barely clicked his tongue, half expecting this phone call at some point today. He swipes his thumb across the screen then presses the phone to his ear.

"Tapping out, kid?" He holds no teasing or malicious tone, it was more like a statement he was finalizing before the person on the other end spoke.

Katsuki and yourself had hired a babysitter for the days you and he both had to work and couldn't easily get out of it or swap out between morning and afternoon shifts. You had hired some teenager who was looking for experience in childcare as well as make a quick buck during breaks between terms. However, this morning when they showed up after you had already left for you, they didn't look the best.

They had reassured Katsuki that they could work and that they were just experiencing a small head cold, maybe even something as unremarkable as allergies. Though, the parent in him kicked in and made the teen promise to call him if their fever spikes up. Both for the teenagers sake and for the fact he didn't want his little one-year-old daughter catching a fever either.

On top of that, he gave them specific instructions to call him instead of you.

Compared to him, you've been practically pulling your hair out trying to adjust back into your work life. Even though your maternity had been up for a while, you had been doing exclusively desk and paper work for your agency- still a bit too paranoid about going back into the field now that you were out of practice. You had only recently put that hero suit of yours back on and started back on daily patrols in different city limits and sectors.

He didn't want you rushing home in a frenzy because your daughters babysitter was sick. Katsuki could just walk out of his agency, saying his daughter's sitter was out of commission and he wouldn't even be slapped on the wrist the next day.

"I'm very sorry, sir!" The teen practically cries into the line. "I really thought I could go all day, but my fever jumped out of no where and I don't want Mizusu getting sick because of me."

Katsuki breathes out of his nose as he raises from his desk. He looks at the clock hanging on the wall that read 12:04, although if memory serves that clock was a bit slow.

"It's fine," he huffs, but still not really annoyed. He grabs a sticky-note pad from the corner of his desk and starts scribbling on it as he speaks separately into the phone. "Go ahead and put Zusu in her play pen for now, but wash your damn hands before you touch her. Keep her there until I get home," he rips the top sticky-note off and flips it over to the hero who sat in front of him in their own little desk space. "Even if she starts fussing, don't take her out; she'll be fine."

"Of course. I'll keep my contact with her to an absolute minimum!"

"Good," the hero who read his note gave him a cheeky thumbs up and he rolls his eyes in return before he's kicking his gauntlets, that had already been discarded since their too bulky to wear at a desk, under his desk. They're hidden further under the wood when he pushes his chair forward to join them under the desktop with his foot. "I'll be there in 15."

He ends the call and is already in the changing room of the agency as as he starts peeling his hero suit off. Normally, cutting work short would annoy him. But whenever it's about you or Mizusu, he can't bring himself to grimace at the early self-dismissal.

-x-x-x-

The outside sounds of cars and general white, background noise all fades into nothing as the front door of Katsuki's home he shares with you and his little girl shut behind him. The jangling of his keys was the loudest noise he registered until he hear the small, whiney sounds of Mizusu's fussing further inside.

Katsuki chuckles to himself as he hangs the keys up on the keyring holder beside the door as he heels off his beat up, aged loafers and trots inside. The duffle on his shoulder is filled with his suit and belt, bouncing off his hip as he walked with his hand stuff in his joggers; a habit he's had since middle school he's never been able to break.

Rounding into the living room, he sees his blonde headed daughter in the middle of her playpen, a wall of semi-stable plastic walls to keep her out of trouble, but still a large enough play space for her overwhelming number of toys. On the couch- a decent distance from her- is the sitter, sitting on the cushions and trying to ease his child's tantrum from there.

A fruitless effort, but he gave an A for effort.

"Alright, Girlie," Katsuki speaks towards the fussing toddler while simultaneously announcing his arrival since the sitter obviously hadn't heard him come home at all. "That's enough." And like magic, the fussing died down to a rather pathetic sounding whine. "You ain't fooling anyone with that fake fit," he pulls the duffle strap over his head and off his shoulder to flop onto the living room floor by the couch. The teen sitter stands as he approaches, although a bit unstable on their feet; from the fever he assumes. "You're free to go," he tells them, "need me to call a cab?"

"No sir," they decline politely. "I can make it home just fine." They quickly leave the house, not wanting to raise the possibility of anyone else getting sick- no matter how slim the chance. Katsuki stood at the edge of Mizusu's playpen as she had rocked herself up from her bum to her feet, waddling towards her father before plopping herself back down.

He's quickly disassembling the plastic wall and creating an opening so if she gets back up again, she could waddle closer and reach his legs. Though, she does neither. He stands above her still as she stares up at him. It was like some silent, blonde stare off between father and daughter, but there was no winner or loser.

After what he assumed was approximately 15 seconds, she grew bored and lightly kicked her legs before raising her little arms, that still had their baby chub on them, up towards his towering form.

"Papa, uppies!" Her speech was still somewhere limited, but she knew how to demand being picked up. She was still just a little thing, barely able to understand that she can stomp and wave her arms around at the same time. So of course, her manners- or lack thereof- weren't the best. Although, she was a total sweetheart most of the time.

Katsuki almost rols his eyes at the thought of his mother telling him over and over again how lucky he was that Mizusu was an easy baby. Must've taken after you, rather than him in that department. He smirks at the thought of him always being a little terror back in his young youth.

"Papa!" Mizusu cries again, her little hands opening and closing in urgency. "Uppies!" Katsuki bends his knees, squatting down to get closer to the floor-planted toddler. HIs arms were outstretched, elbows resting on his bent knees.

"What do we say when we want something?"

The little girl dropped her hands before she teetered herself up onto her chubby feet again and waddled between his legs and pushing her hands against his tee clade chest.

"Uppies, please," she whines softly, like she was on the verge of tears. Crocodile tears to be certain. Mizusu was also at the age where she would fake cry to get what she wanted. Although, it never got her far. Both he and you could tell the difference between an attention-seeking cry and a real one.

Though, when his little girl was right in front of him like this, he couldn't help but see your qualities in her. He smiles as he brings his arms down from his knees and lowered his head down to kiss her little forehead. He swoops his arms around to her sides before she was ensnaring her fingers in his tee in preparation to be hoisted up.

He gently stands before he was slotting his arm under his rear, her legs on either side of his chest as she looks up at him. She giggles, finally happy she got what she wanted.

"Good girl," he told her. "Always say 'please' and 'thank you'. That's what mommy tells you to do."

"Thank you, papa!" She speaks far too loudly for being right in front of his face, regardless he smiles at her. She wraps her arms around his neck, resting her face against his shoulder and swinging her little legs behind him. Her heels bounce weakly off his hips, but it almost feels nice since he's always so sore or pensive due to work.

"You're welcome." He pats her back a few times before he's spinning on his heel. "Want a snack?"

"Yes, please!"

-x-x-x-

When you came home from work, it was just past five in the afternoon. Seeing Katsuki's car in the drive way, shoes in the entrance, and keys on the holder bewildered you. He was supposed to be home after you today, but he somehow managed to beat you. Maybe he just had nothing left to do at his agency and left early because he was bored, he's done that before.

The faint sounds of music become clearer the further inside you march and before long, you follow the noise into the kitchen. You peek around the corner to see Katsuki supporting Mizusu on one of his jutted out hips. His other hand was stirring something boiling with plums of steam rolling out of a pot on the stove. You couldn't help noticing how far he held Mizusu away from the stove, even turning his chest away so she was as far as possible.

Her hands were above her, one lost within Katsuki's hair the other in the waving towards the fan above the stove you could hear whirring just under the sounds of the music playing from Katsuki's phone.

It was Mizusu's favorite song as of the moment that was playing through the phone speakers. Her small legs bounce in Katsuki's hold and her little heels kicked into his back and stomach, but he acted as if they didn't effect him- and they probably didn't.

When the song ends, she's cheering almost immediately.

"Papa, play again!"

"It'll play again in a second, be patient."

"Am patent!"

When the song picks up again, you suppress a laugh of your at the excited wiggling your daughter kicks up in her father's arm. You would never tell him that you saw him start to lightly bounce on his heels to the familiar rhythm of the children song that probably haunts his dreams.

Your brought out of your little dreamscape by a shrill "Mama!". Your daughter giving you away. Katsuki turns and sends a small glare at you; he would never admit that there was a flush on his cheeks even if you pointed it out to him. You approach the duo and Mizusu was adamant in her new goal of getting out of her father's hold and into yours.

You easily take her, letting Katsuki's arm fall to his side as he set the pot he was stirring down to a simmer and placed a lid over it. He turned around fully to see you nuzzling against against Mizusu's cheeks, making her laugh and weakly push against you to cease your ticklish actions.

His chest felt warm watching you both. Once she 'escapes' your nuzzling rampage, she throws her head down and buries her face into your neck where you then turn your attention to your husband while rubbing her back.

"How'd you manage to get home before me?" You ask and only receive an eyeroll back.

"Wow, welcome home. I missed you today too, babe." You send his eyeroll back to him.

"Hello, Katsuki," you greet before he's kissing your cheek.

"To answer your question, I came home around noon." You gape at him. "Sitter got sick, so I left the agency early." You bounce Mizusu on your chest while he explains.

"Why didn't they tell me? I would've stayed home today."

"They thought they could handle it, but I told them to call me if they couldn't. To their credit, they lasted longer than I thought."

"Katsuki," your tone slightly on the stern side made his shoulder slack.

"I can handle, Zusu. You've been busy gettin' back into the swing of things. You don't need to worry every second of everyday," he tells you while his hands comes up to the small of your back, using his thumbs to rub lightly along your spine. You know he's right, but it's not like you can just turn your brain off. He pushing his lips against your temple before his hand slides down to lightly tap your ass. "Go put, Girlie in her highchair. Our food's done and I'll grab something for her to eat too."

You nod at him, a bit frustrated with yourself, but you knew he was coming from a good place. You take a breath before stretching that smile back on your lips and bringing your daughter away from your neck to look at you.

"You ready for dinner, Zusu?" Her eyes light up. "It's papa's food tonight!" You spin around, as Katsuki shuts the music playing from his phone off, inwardly thanking every god above because the sound of his daughters favorite kiddy song was grating on his very soul.

"Papa's food!" She cheers in repetition. Katsuki watched as Mizusu easily let you settle her into her chair and latch her in before sliding the plastic tray in front of her.

He continues to watch as you walk to the fridge to grab her something to drink- finding the premade bottle of deluded juice Katsuki had set in there earlier to chill- and set it within her grasp. She almost downs all of it before you tell her to not gulp it all because after that juice is empty she's getting water- which she dislikes because it's 'icky'.

And still he watches as you all eat together at the table and talk, even Mizusu as she chimes in with random sounds. Words she can barely say yet, and indecipherable babbles you always nod and agree with that keep her entertained.

"Katsuki?" You call as you reenter the kitchen after setting Mizusu in the playpen where she stares focused on the late night show she always gets to watch before a bath and bed. He hums as he continues to wash the dishes. You come up beside him and he smiles at the small action of your hand coming to rest on his back. "You alright? You've been sorta quiet. I can take Mizusu's next day so you can rest if your tired."

"That's not it, I ain't tired," he tells you as he sets a dish in the opposite side of the sink as it waits to be rinsed of soap suds with the rest of them. "Am I not allowed to be quiet sometimes?" He chides and you scoff at him, pinching against his spine that he just chuckles at.

"I'm just checking on you, hard-head."

"I ain't no hard-head."

"Yeah, tell it to the judge."

"And who's that?"

"Me and Mizusu."

"That would be 'judges', babe; plural."

"Oh shut up," you snort as you start taking the still sud-covered dishes before rinsing them and putting them in the dish strainer. The rest of the chore is finished in a blanket of quiet, ears open for any sound of Mizusu possibly causing mischief just beyond the kitchen.

As you wipe your hands of any remaining water that tries to travel down your arm and off your elbow, Katsuki comes up behind you. Settling his arms on your hips, he rests his forehead on your shoulder and you lean back into him.

"You alright?" You ask him again, much more softly this time and he just lightly hums. It's a lighthearted sound, the sound he makes when he's still too embarrassed to say aloud that he's happy. And he is. He's so happy it hurts and he just wants to soak in it all. In you, in his little Mizusu, in this house.

"I love you... like a god damn lot." You bring your hand up to push his head against the side of yours, cheek pushing against his skull. You take in the lingering scent of last nights shampoo and briefly wonder how his shampoo stays fragrant for so long- or maybe it's just his natural scent. Regardless, it's nice.

"I love you too. Like way more." He scoffs against you.

"Impossible."

"Papa!" Mizusu calls from the living room. He actually laughs lightly against your shoulder, hot air micro-dampening your shirt sleeve and warming the skin beneath before he's kissing it lightly and detaching himself from you.

"Duty calls 'papa'," you tease. He grabs you by sticking his index finger between the fabric of your bottoms and your skin. Yanking you lightly against him, he was urging you to follow him back to the living room with his lips quirked up. His smile was mischievous enough to show his gums, yet he couldn't hide the tenderness in it either.

"You're not free of duty either, 'mama'."

-x-x-x-

#bakugou #bakugou x reader #bakugou x y/n #bakugou x female reader #bakugou fluff #bakugou scenarios #bakugou fanfic #bakugou katsuki #katsuki bakugou #bnha #bnha bakugou #dad!bakugou #mom!reader

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muffindaddystyles · 3 years ago

Note

Soft dom harry makes subby reader upset subspace?

MEANIE ANGRY H :D BUCKLE UP FELLAS

Y/N's day is been shitty so far. It started with an ache in her lower abdomen from Harry’s morning stiffy bulging against her asscheeks fattening everytime he snuggled into her to hoard her warmth and blankies and to stuff his face in her neck with incoherent blabbering.

She wanted to wake him up with her hand, mouth, hole— anything around his cock and to please him and dull the burny feeling in her tummy -- but -- she had an important workshop at UNI that was must needed to be attended.

The time she managed to knock herself out of her needy and lusty headspace, she was getting late and whirling around the room and closest like a thunderstorm -- burying a snoring Harry under the heaps of clothes and littering the floor with her shoes collection, the kitchen got treated much more worst with maids being not around (she’s used to Harry waking up earlier than her and making her a full course brekkie) after making a laughable ruckus of cabinets all she stuffed her mouth with was a chocolate protein bar.

The stars were still not in her favour. She was grabbing onto her hair until far when she missed the bus (she usually don’t take buses, Harry makes sure the driver drop her off safe and secure) and it started raining leaving Y/N with nothing but a bare head to take all of it as she already left the bus shelter to stop a taxi.

If all of that wasn’t much of a tragedy and humiliating, Y/N slipped the moment she stepped out of the vehicle and on the slippery curbs of the building, she saw her life flashing right infront of her eyes as the papers tucked in her armpit fled everywhere and landed on the rainy mud sadistically along her. It gave her a serious hit in her ankle and completely yanked her hip, still being a stubborn-head she picked herself and went inside despite how many glares the cleaning staff threw her way for bringing the dirt with her feed all over the shiny floors.

She felt bad.

Stupidly bad.

Her workshop teachers were kind enough to accept her late arrival, but her designs for fall got rejected and they’d have been a huge milestone for her to get her dream internship.

Y/N felt awfully, teeny, pathetic and little while slumping into the corner of the bus and holding her breath to refrain from crying these little liquidy bitches out of her eyes.

Reaching back home she was met with pure chaos, bumping into petrified and agitated employs from Harry’s company scurrying out of their main foyer and she could persist but to ask what happened only to be informed in stammers that the staff messed up big and caused a loss of million dollars— making Harry terribly mad and fire people left and right.

It wasn’t a joke at all.

Because once, she steps inside, bag falling from her shoulder as she sighs in exhaustion feeling her muscles stiffening everywhere but one particular spot's hurting wrenchingly— her foggy mind couldn’t figure it out yet. She peeks into Harry’s home office to be met by a very annoyed, aggrieved, furious Harry pacing in his office all whilst with a phone against his ear shouting at someone who was destined to be humiliated today just like her and she pouts gingerly seeing his features skewered tightly into displeasure, the vein that curves along his temple prominent with blood pumping erratically in his body.

His head snaps up at the door’s creak and albeit his eyes softens a little, the kink of brows and the scowl on his lips is still there and he watches her paddle towards him carefully knowing anything at the moment would burst his chimneys out and she wants to be good for her daddy.

“Hi.” She speaks timidly, pout getting more rusty when the greetings not returned and instead he keeps all of his attention on the phone keeping a loose arm around her.

She grumbles, when he gestures down at her to give him a sec and untangles himself from her walking away and huffing and puffing into the phone.

How could he!

She feels so denied and rejected and kicked like it’s done to those affection starved lil puppies.

Her clingy tendencies flying high drunk and wooly. The needy beastie inside her wanting nothing more than take a bath where Harry could cream her back in her favourite berry bubbles, massaging her head and whisper sweet nothings into her ear, then lots and lots of cuddles, maybe he'll be generous enough and let her keep him snug inside her while they watch movie because she had such an awful day.

But, No! He's trying to escape free from her because she’s such a burden for him now.

Her eyes turns glassy, her shoulders slumping sadly and out of nowhere she’s feeling cold and barren as Harry’s voice becomes a wafting fume for her— an indication she has gone under too much.

“Daddy . . .” She stomps behind him, circling his footsteps like a whiny puppy and grapples at his dress shirt gasping sullenly when he swats her dainty hands away and glares down at her in dominance, his tone harsh as he blocks the receiver with his palm and mouths at her with a huff, “Stop being needy fo’ once. I’ve clearly some important issues to care for, Y/N.” Poor Y/N's deathly grip on his shirt loosens sorrowfully and her chin wobbles as she nodded still wanting to be good for him and if it wasn’t enough to give her the biggest heartbreak of the year— he even rolled his eyes at her too grumping under his breath about something how he turned her into a spoiled brat himself.

“Okie. . .” Her voice strangled and small. She shrinks into herself but wasn’t paid any heed from Harry and without another word she leaves him as to be it.

Having a huge breakdown in her room didn’t help at all. A painful headache hitting her like a train as she clumsily strips down, wearing one of his t-shirt heavily drenched in his scent he keeps for her under her pillow anytime she needs it and hides under the blankets with tears still running down her swollen cheeks— slipping into a light slumber from all of weariness and crying.

Once the smoke cleared from Harry’s mind and his capabilities of rational thinking coming back to him, he was reminded of how he denied his baby of his littlest of affection and tenderness when she clearly looked so glum and sad and upset.

He wanted to whip himself in head.

He’s such a twat that he let work come between them.

He curses himself. Making a sprint to his bedroom, knowing he’d find her none other than there and he was right puffing out a disheartened sigh when his eyes falls over his princess buried under all of these layers of blankets, he crawls up towards her carefully not to startle her awake.

Grunting at himself when he finds she’s been crying, he strokes a thumb up her blushy cheeks and her wet lashes, kissing her puffy eyelids and her little sad unhappy pout away.

He frowns. Feeling her feverish and flushed under his hand, “Hey puppy . . .” He thumbs down her throat getting a little fretful when she doesn’t stirs, however she’s such a squirmy little one and he moves the blankets away to let her body cool itself smiling proudly at his shirt swallowing her whole is when she snuggled herself more into her stuffie letting the shirt ride up her thighs and hips exposing a ghastly bruise of red and purples and he frowns not remembering it being there before.

Now. He feels shittier. Wanting to jump of the cliff for being a shitty sadist boyfriend to his only beloved.

“No!” Y/N whimpers loudly, squirming away from his touch as he examines her gently and it sent shockwaves to each of her tissues and lions causing her an undeniable pain.

“Puppy, shh, shh. ‘s just me, making sure if y'okay.” He scrambles closer to her towering her to cradle her face and kiss the tip of her nose—- his face falls drastically and his heart cracks miserly when Y/N pushes him away with a sorrowful mumble not even letting him wipe the drool away from the corner of her mouth as he usually does.

“’M okay . . .” She tries to knuckle the sleepiness away with shivery hands, “No you’re not —...” He’s cut off by her angry pout and her silly efforts to keep as much distance between them as possible, “I don’t need, Daddy . . ‘m big and I could take care of me self.” At her puny waver realization dawns upon Harry and his brows shoots up to his hairline feeling nauseous and terrible for not taking care of his babylove earlier.

He’d have never let her be away from him if he knew she was in her subspace.

“Y/N baby . . . I didn’t mean it, darling —--...” With gentleness he tries to approach her but she wraps her arms around her petite figure in a protective manner, haziness taking best of her and Harry’s chest suffocates into itself, being a dom it’s your responsibility to make your subby feel protected, loved and happy and he even failed at that.

He quickly cups both of her hot cheeks in his nippy palms when she hiccups sadly, a sob threatening to slip out, “Yes you did! You meant it. Said you spoiled me, I don’t want your money, promise! I just want you and y'shooed me away saying Y/N’s too needy . . .” Harry flinches at her words. He never even spared a thought to this negativity that she chooses to be with him for his money because he knows out of all the people she’s the only one who loves him out of the boundaries of status and money.

He realises how stabbing they'd have been to her when she was so sensitive and floaty wanting nothing more, just him.

How deep she has gone if she’s taking her own name in third person.

“’M sorry baby. So sorry. Swear on myself, didn’t mean to hurt my baby, knows tha’ work shouldn’t be an excuse t’ make y'feel unloved—- but those bastards got a tick outta me.” He rambles on frantically. Afraid she’ll think he’s lying and would finally make up her mind to leave him.

“You didn’t?” She asks with so much innocence Harry nearly cries out, “’Course I didn’t! How could I? You could never be needy, Bab. I love you so much and you’re my whole word, forgive me please?”

“You’re forgiven,” She let a small smile flutter up her features, a tinge of gleam in her previous dull eyes brightening the whole room and Harry immediately bunches her up in his lap.

“Can I kiss you?” He asks her, not sure if she still needs space from him and would rather be better without him but she bobs her head shyly and he chuckles softly before touching their lips together into a tender loving kiss and brushes their noses up and down murmuring sweetly coy to her.

“Now, could y'tell daddy how y'got this bruise baby? How did ya get hurt?” He coos, brushing her sweaty hair back and rubs her sweet gland behind her ear delicately, “Oh yeah . . . this, was raining and slipped.” She murmurs, hissing a gasp jolting away when Harry glides his fingers gently down her hip bone and fresh tears springs in her eyes as she buries herself in his chest, “Daddy hurts. . .” . “Oh babypie. Daddy’s g'na take care of his love.” He lays her down gently kissing her forehead when she whines for him to keep on holding her, “’M right here darling. G'na prep us a bath, make my baby alright.” Saying this he quickly disappears inside the washroom and next their room’s sursuring with marble tub filling with warm water, Harry throws in her favourite pink coloured bath bombs and rose essences and throws their towels in the warmer coming back with her as he left her to be, he has decided he’s gonna love on her whole night, “My baby’s the best, ain’t she? She’s my bestest girl.” He coos down at her sweetly and slides his forearms under her knees and back picking her up carefully and brings her to his chest securely.

She closes her eyes, biting down a whimper when Harry dips them in the water some it sloshing down the edges of bathtub and it envelopes them and gives a stingy feeling to her bruise before soothing it down.

He rubs her arms, and circles smoothing patterns on her tummy and kisses her a gallons as she melts in his embrace and he let’s her sink into him more, nibbling and sponging wet ticklish kisses on her neck making her purr and become a puddle of softness in his hold while she takes her time to mumble all the bad events that happened to her and he felt so guilty of not asking her how she’s and how her day went when she came to him, in need of some of his lovin.

“I love you so much, bab.” He suckles her earlobe, toying and plucking her bottom plush lip, “Was prick to me love —.. you deserve all my lovin,” He noses at her jaw, not forgetting it to mark it with his pecks and sloppy bites.

“’S okay daddy, y'had a bad day too.” He’s grateful to have her in his life. She cares about him, maybe more than he does for her and he feels himself lucky for it.

“You want me to help you relax?”

“Can I have you?” Her tone bashfully desperate and coy, Harry meanders their fingers together and kisses her knuckles softly.

Considering her wound still being sore and pulp, having sex would be painful for her and she might not grasp it in her hazy mind but Harry doesn’t want to hurt at all.

He plants a little noisy smooch to her shoulder when she nods, she mews and purrs when Harry glides his palm all the way down her body and cups her pussy digging his palm into her mound and coats his digits with her arousal dipping the pads of his fingers into her entrance, “All this wet f'me?” Palming her tits while whispering sweet nothings into her ear when she gasps and closes up on Harry scratching nails into his bended knees.

“Shh, shh puppy, jus' relax hmm? Feel yourself.” With sputtery inhales she does as he says, soon two of his fingers slips inside her and he strokes her pussy and pulls them out making her all whiny and pushes them back with a squelching noise, fucking her with it smiling and stopping when her thighs parts falls again his’s completely.

“Daddy!” She writhes and whines, trembly hands trying to bring Harry fingers back to her pulsating wetness, “You’re the cutest.” He smiles against her lips giving her cheeks several squishes and pats her head loving to see his adorable princess all flustery for him.

On her demands. He slicks his fingers back inside her and caresses the insides of her thighs while she pants and sinks onto his knuckles blabbering out daddydaddydaddy weepily.

“Cum fo’ me, puppy. Feels good? Yeah? My baby feels nice?” He rasps in her mouth, curving and petting the soft spot inside her pussy and sucks onto her upper lip when she moans and mewls loudly gushing all over his finger and he keeps on fucking her till she’s all sleepy and balmy against his chest.

Harry coaxes her tenderly, smoothing his hands all over her twitchy spots and patches sloppy kisses all over her face that makes her all giggly and shy—- the amount of endorphins spiking high in her system.

“Love you so much, daddy.” She mushes puckering her lips into his throat.

“Love you too, pup.”

#dom harry x subby y/n #dom harry x sub reader #dom!h x sub!reader #dom!h x sub!y/n #dom harry #harry styles fanfic #harry styles story #harry styles one shot #harry styles blurb #harry styles smut #cute harry #harry styles #harry smut #harry styles fanfiction #fluff #harry angst #hsh

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