#danny gets the batman interrogation (tm)

[kooorey403]

He wakes slowly.

He sees it first, light peeking through to the back of his eyelids, soft oranges dancing around his vision. He hears soft voices suddenly, and he feels his face twitch. The voices stop for a moment before increasing, someone's hissing something, an argument- another is trying to hush them.

It was starting to get annoying, really. Couldn't they see he was trying to sleep!?

He wriggled his toes, and shifted before feeling himself break out into a full body stretch and yawn. Distantly he hears someone shout "Oh fuck!" and it makes snort mid yawn.

He sits up, feeling a bit lethargic. He whines, feeling the nastiest crick in his neck he's ever had.

He blinks the sleep out of his eyes and sees a dark-haired woman holding fire staring at him with wide eyes. He squints and notices two other figures in the room, a blond guy with a wrinkly trench coat, and a ghost. Damn, he thought it felt a little cold. But, it didn't look like he was posing a threat to anyone.

"...What?" He croaked out, and holy! His voice was wrecked, what the hell.

A silence rang through the- ...room? Place? Actually, where was he right now? The last thing he remembers was...

"Are you the one who's been leaving us messages?" Magician Woman asked, making Danny break his train of thought.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"The messages!" Trench Coat Dude stepped forward. "On the bright green sticky notes that keep showin' up everywhere! The ones that led us to you."

Danny feels realization pass over him. Clockwork.

He lets out a groan. Damn it, Clockwork! Seriously!? Now he was bringing in randos to do his dirty work!

He thumps back on the altar he was on. Turning away from the three people in the room, he settled into a good sleeping position. He wasn't gonna do it. He wasn't. Whatever it was. He was tired. He just woke up, and if he has any say in it, he'll have just gone to sleep in a second.

He hears the flutter of paper, and a green glow peeks in his eyes, but he refuses to know what the sticky note says. He assumes the other three read it, because a second later he hears Trench Coat Dude say, "I'm not dealing with this. I need a bloody drink." Then there's a flash of light and Danny feels one less presence in the room. Which is honestly the only appropriate reaction to Clockwork's BS.

Ghost Guy steps closer to him.

"Hello?"

Danny doesn't answer.

"Are you dead?" Ghost Guy asks bluntly, making Danny twitch.

Magician Woman hisses something at the guy, but Danny gets up with a sigh of resignation. Swinging his legs off the altar, sitting up.

"You know, "dead" is such a final state of being. I think I prefer the term: expired."

Ghost Guy glances at Magician Woman who only gives the same sort of sigh of resignation Danny had.

"I'm Deadman," the ghost says, making Danny snort.

"A little on the nose, doncha think?"

"I was called that before my death, actually," he says, making Danny's eyebrows raise.

"Zatanna," the woman introduces herself. "The other man was Constantine."

Danny considered the two of them.

"They call me Phantom," he says.

Zatanna steps closer. "Phantom, we have some questions for you."

"Uh." Danny nods. "Okay, sure, why not."

"Do you know why you're here?" Deadman starts.

"Yeah," Danny says immediately, before trailing off, "I was helping- wait, I was..."

He was... He was on a time quest. Crap. Oh no. No, no, no.

Clockwork.

"The sticky note," Danny says suddenly, holding his hand out to Zatanna. "What does it say?"

Zatanna furrowed her brows, but handed it to him.

'He'll be a wonderful addition.' Danny sees, written in a neat black scrawl.

"What the hell does this mean?" Danny groans. Why can't he make sense on the first try? Clockwork can't just be normal for once?

"I think I might have an idea," Zatanna says.

Danny looks up at her, she gives him an awkward smile

"Phantom, do you know what the Justice League is?"

Danny messes up big time on a mission to the past for Clockwork. How does he mess up you may ask? Well he ends up getting ceremonially buried as a death god in ancient Egypt. Yes, he is embarrassed about the whole scenario thank you for asking.

To make matters worse, they doused him in blood blossom oils. Not enough to kill him, but enough to weaken him big time and put him in a deep sleep. Danny spends the next couple of thousands of years sleeping the blood blossom oil off. He wakes up just in time for his tomb to be opened by a grumpy guy in a trench coat, a weird magician lady, and a ghost dressed in red spandex. Nope, he was not dealing with that. He rolled over and went back to sleep.

The JLD had been running around chasing after green sticky notes for weeks. They finally found this hidden ancient tomb with a lot of inscriptions pertaining to the dead. When they finally enter the inner most chamber, they find a young boy resting on top of an altar. He's definitely not dead because if he was, he would have long since decomposed. However at the same time, he's not breathing.

In the middle of their discussion on how to proceed, a familiar green sticky note floats down from nowhere. It reads "He'll be a wonderful addition." What? Constantine instantly pulls out a sigil and teleports away muttering something about needing a drink, Deadman goes to investigate the kid, and Zatana just sighs. This was about to be a long day.

[evilminji]

I think it is VITAL that "pull him away from the machine" involves Bruce just... reaching forward, grabbing the back of Danny's rolls chair, and gently dragging it back. Like, "you're done here, kid. Time to stop. Let's get you a burger." Sort of Concerned but Still Telling You No More Crime type Batman that comes from a place orpf CARING?

And Danny tries to roll forward. Maybe shove the hallucination to get back to work, blinking in Sad And Tired Confused Puppy blinks. Like? This? Clearly NOT their guy. His handler is. THIS is a kid taken advantage off. Time to go, buddy. Work can wait. Let's get you a nap, a burger, and a trustworthy Adult, okay? No more Crime(tm).

And he doesn't WANT a burger? He has Burger trauma, Mr Hallucination Batman. Alright, pizza it is. Or some Thai. Pick your favorite. You can think about on the way to the batmobile. *Nightwing picks him up under the armpits like a small animal and carries him out of his workroom* *he blinks blindly at the late night streetlights* too bright...

Just? This Skungly, sad looking teenager... sitting in some hole in the wall restaurant's booth, blocked in by a softly fussing Nightwing, being fed til he bursts by the owner's mom who is AGHAST at his state. So SKINNY! So pale! Sad and waifish! Eat more food! All the food! Who has done this?! Ooooh she will- *dark and probably violent things that are scandalizing her son and delighting her grandchildren*

Is he in trouble? A bit. But intent matters. And Nightwing is VERY good at getting people to talk. Not hard interrogation tactics, but the subtle soft ones. Friendly and leading prompts. Mindless chatter, in which the Truth slips out. And this kid? Finds the Mad Scientist shtick WAY to normal to be anything but second generation AT LEAST. Legitimately can not tell where the line between normal engineering ends and the Super Sciences begins.

And lawyer worth their tuition will have him in therapy and out with a "don't do it again" by the end of the day.

His HANDLER on the other hand? Knew damn well what he was doing. AND who he was selling too. That guy, they'll throw the book at.

The problem is where are they gonna stash him, that his ex-clients either can't find or can't GET. That will ALSO give him a stable, NORMAL, life. And support his frankly breath taking intelligence.

Bruce calls Lucius Fox.

It is nearly 1am, he WAS asleep next to the love of his life, and this BETTER be good, or so help hi-... You want him to WHAT. He doesn't even HAVE a-... Yes he KNOWS, you know basically everyone at that office and can get the license fast tracked, that not the-... Of course he has space! You think he'd throw a child out on the STREETS?! But that's not the damn-! Bruce don't you DARE hang up on-*click*

#NailedIt

Bruce is going to pay in BLOOD and untold suffering, but Lucius will definitely be taking on Danny as a ward. Now if you'll excuse him... he needs to update his will.

Danny is still very confused. But he's full now. People are being nice. He's choosing to call it a really good dream and pass out. See ya in the morning, nice hallucination peoples. He loves you. Good night. *leans against Nightwing and immediately passes out*

imagine with me Danny ends up in Gotham some how and is a mad scientist that is hired to make cool shit and gets BANK but then the bats crack down on the shit and they see a 13 year old boy with big ass goggles with machinery all around him and looks up for a second before glancing up again as if confirming what he saw and then slowly turns around “Hi…? I swear if these are one of my delusions than I will be complaining to HR- wait am I… HR?”

Danny ends up in Gotham after Nasty Burger happened, but to not become Dark Danny, he buried himself in machine work, using some blueprints from his parents' lab as a baseline and then eventually creating his own.

Some guy in Gotham found him one day and decided that he had a talent for making stuff like this, and that he'll pay Danny handsomely if he made some things for him, and, well. Danny was pretty low on money from his parents' bank account after blowing most of it on machine parts.

So he accepted.

Then the guy started requesting some other things for some other people and he eventually became his middleman for the big hitters in Gotham who wanted his stuff. Well, not that he knew his stuff was being given out to the big hitters that also include villains, since he spent most of his time just building, then eating, then passing right the fuck out, and repeat.

Then the bats crack down on him, and Danny's been making some shit for more than 24 hours already with no rest time and just a little snack here and there, and then he questions if he accidently inhaled something he wasn't supposed to because the bats are literally in his workshop/house.

So he thinks he maybe high as shit right now and then just treats them like they weren't there and goes back to making his thing because that one guy said a person with a fuck ton of money wanted it. Then Batman pulls him away from the machine and he's like: "Huh."

Still thinking this is a massive hallucination because he's high as a kite, he tries to get Batman to let go, but his grip is pretty strong, then he pokes him and then goes: "Oh, maybe this isn't a hallucination."

"Oh sugar honey iced tea."