#he doesn't want them scared

[lavenoon]

Sometimes you try to prank-scare the new hire and eat dirt instead, but you made them laugh so all is well <3

[claraoswalds]

#mrs flood who are you: time lord edition

[kazanskyy]

iceman + his concern for maverick post-hop 31

[aq2003]

like the important thing you must keep in mind about ten when you see him do literally anything is that he's soooooooooo so so so bad at actually isolating himself from other people. so TERMINALLY bad at it. he thinks to himself "i don't need human connection because everything i do causes pain and destruction to those around me :(" but then he experiences a crumb of human connection and his heart starts to spill out of his chest

[just-an-enby-lemon]

I think more media should work with the concept that you can still love someone you never forgave. You can still rebuild and create a new relationship with someone but also be "what you did to me was wrong and I trust you to not be like that again and want you in my life but I can't won't forgive that, won't forget the hurt you caused. I love you but there will be days I won't be able to see you because the trauma you gave me is back and I'm just so angry and sad and at least you never asked for forgiviness just to be here, just for friendship, because you know that this are things I can give you."

[flowerakatsuka]

pov : you're the rest of the sextuplets meeting kuroba for the first time.

[heretherebedork]

Just... Wan being afraid of dating because it might change everything like rejecting his advances won't change anything at all. Like pretending it never happened is something people can do, truly. Like rejecting Beer would meant that they could return to the limbo of pining and friendship.

Wan in love and afraid to be in love because the last time he fell in love he lost the person for two years and just found out that he left because he didn't think he mattered to them (after a love confession?!!?!) and timing was off and now he's rejecting Beer because he associates love with being left behind and unimportant to the person he loves.

And so he clings to friendship as a safer choice even though his friendship with Beer is built on Beer being in love with him and him loving him back. How is he going to handle his jealousy? How can he be jealousy and needy when he's already rejected him?

This is gonna be rough but it has to be because Wan has to get past his own fear of rejection and loss and the only way, honestly, is going to be Beer starting to move on after the rejection.

[littlefankingdom]

~ From the DC Vault: Death in the Family: Robin Lives!

Ok, two things here.

Firstly: Alfred's authority on Bruce! The use of the full name ("Bruce Wayne") with the font-size reduced for Bruce's answer ("Yes, sir."), this is a child not watching his tone as he speaks to his parent and being reprimanded. Alfred has so much more authority on Bruce than Bruce has on any of his children.

Secondly: Alfred pointing out the obvious (that some people still miss, like DC because where are the batkids in the movies adaptations??? Where are they???) that Bruce's story is about him building his own family. A family, not by blood, but a loving caring family. Bruce isn't made for loneliness, he tortures himself in it because he thinks that's what he deserves, this man needs a family. He even took Jason because he missed having a kid after Dick left. Bruce yearns for a family since he lost his parents in that alley.

ALSO, THE JUSTICE LEAGUE IS HIS FAMILY TOO!

[nelkcats]

Kryptonite is ecto-sugar

After the ghosts realized they could create food out of the ectoplasm they needed to survive, they got a little creative about it. Many ghosts began to ask those who were chef's in their lives for sugary products: desserts, more than anything.

The problem was that the Realms did not have a star as bright as the sun, and because they were in the land of the dead it was very difficult to farm. But after much persistence they managed to obtain a plant similar to sugar cane with the help of Undergrowth.

With this, many ghosts came together to help in the process and "ecto-sugar" (later called Kryptonite) was created, which they managed to alter enough for it to multiply without the help of the plant.

However, they got too excited, the quantity of sugar increased and ended up in different sizes, there were big or small pieces everywhere.

Because of that some of the final products were simply unusable and were thrown away in random places on the Realms. Somehow this ended with the ecto-sugar multiplying its amount and ending up as little crystals everywhere, buried in the floor of the floating islands.

Even some of them were discarded in natural portals. Unfortunately for the Kryptonians, the ecto-sugar fell directly onto a desolate part of their planet and began to multiply. When the first Kryptonian discovered it, he realized he was extremely weak to it, and since he thought it was originally from his planet he named it "Kryptonite".

The real reason they were so weak to it was because the ecto-sugar was made from start to finish with death, and developed in a lifeless environment without natural sun. Naturally, with Kryptonians being glorified plants, this ended being extremely harmful to them.

[nakaremfarlei]

Was just thinking about the amount of animals Obi-Wan interacts with compared to literally everyone else and in the Clone Wars episode where Kamino gets attacked he literally gets saved twice by the same ray-like animal and just...

The growth from judging Qui-Gon for the 'pathetic lifeforms' he picks up to whatever he has going on during the Clone Wars era. He must have gotten that from Qui-Gon though, right?

And because it's my brain and it's rotting with all the star wars stuff I am consuming I was thinking of Obi-Wan saving all these creatures and the 212th having to deal with that. Surely they made one of the rooms pet proof in case one of them needs a new home. There also have to be clones who love that because of course Obi-Wan can't really take care of rescues on top of all his duties.

After the first few times this happens Cody learns to order animal food and other necessities. And if the Republic doesn't fulfill these requests or asks too many questions he'll just have to make sure to organize them on planet during the campaigns.

[silverwhittlingknife]

hi Silver! o/ because that fanart made me wonder - would you happen to know when/where Dick's stuffed elephant plush Zitka turns up in the comics?

GREETINGS CAM <3333 THAT ART WAS SO CUTE

Yeah, I think your instincts are right - it's a truly adorable bit of transformative fandom, but I'm 95% percent sure it's not comics canon. Barbara has canon plushies, but I don't think anyone else does.

I got kinda invested in the investigation (it's hard to prove a negative!) and I ended up typing out an entire History of Elinore/Zitka, so, uh, if you're curious, meet me below the cut for:

Where does Elinore / Zitka - the animal - appear in comics?

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

Where does Elinore / Zitka appear in comics?

We're gonna go in chronological order!

Dick's circus elephant friend was first created for practical reasons: in Batman 436, Marv Wolfman does a big expanded flashback to Dick's circus backstory as a way to subtly show us Tim before officially introducing him (so that we can have a technically-solvable mystery-of-Tim's-identity in LPoD). In this comic, there's an elephant named Elinore who loves Dick:

Aww. Such a cute elephant!

Batman 436 comes out in August 1989. New Titans 60 comes out a few months later, in November, and guess what? When Dick visits the circus, he is suddenly surprised by an unexpected blast from the past! It turns out that even though it's been years, Elinore still remembers him!

Here's the part where Elinore remembers Dick:

SUCH a cute elephant. I love her.

(Guess who else still remembers Dick even though it was so long ago. Guess which other character is about to be an unexpected blast from the past. Guess which character Elinore is directly paralleling guess guess guess sorry everything is about Dick and Tim in my mind but I can focus I swear)

Four years later, in 1993, Batman: The Animated Series retells Dick's origin story. They like and keep Wolfman's elephant, but they change her name to Zitka:

Wolfman doesn't return to the elephant beyond those two appearances, and a few years down the line, New Titans gets cancelled and Wolfman's not writing Dick anymore anyway. So the animal gets abandoned for a while, until Devin Grayson, a fan of both Wolfman and B:tAS, revives the Wolfman-era Titans team in JLA/Titans and then the ongoing series Titans 1999.

Grayson then brings back the elephant in a flashback to Dick's past in Titans 16 (Jun 2000), where she imports the B:tAS name. Sometimes I'm skeptical of TV-to-comics imports, but honestly, I endorse this one. You lose the alliteration, which is a shame, but IMO Zitka is a better elephant name than Elinore.

Here's Dick with the newly-christened Zitka in Titans 16:

Grayson also briefly references the elephant in Gotham Knights 20 and - in a final angsty callback - in Nightwing 88 (Feb 2004), where Zitka tries futilely to comfort Dick in the midst of his trauma conga line:

... And... honestly, I think that's it for comic appearances? The two Wolfman comics plus the three Grayson comics.

Both Wolfman and Grayson are writing multiple titles - Batman, New Titans, Titans, Gotham Knights, and Nightwing between the two of them, spanning a big chunk of Dick's post-Crisis canon - and both writers use the elephant for heartwarming moments of nostalgia, which means if you're doing a post-Crisis readthrough for Dick, Elinore/Zitka feels memorable. But I don't think she actually shows up that much.

For post-2011, I am not as well-informed - throwing this out to the dash? anyone know? - but I feel like Zitka the heartwarming symbol of Dick's heartwarming circus past is, uh, thematically very at odds with the Court of Owls evil!circus vibes, so my instinct is that this story element was almost certainly dropped in the reboot.

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

In WFA, yes; in main comics continuity, no. Technically, I have not read every comic ever published, so I could be wrong!! But I don't think so.

Below, find my rambling reasoning on the tonal vibes of pre-Crisis, post-Crisis, and post-2011, and why this particular story element doesn't seem right to me for the first two.

Pre-Crisis (...okay, mostly the Silver Age): stuffed animal, yes or no?

tl;dr no, requires too much background knowledge on the part of the reader, plus the elephant wasn't a thing until later

Elinore doesn't get created until post-Crisis, but also just generally, pre-Crisis callbacks are more along the lines of this reference in Batman 129 (published in 1960), where, wow, Batman and Robin are hunting jewel thieves - and it turns out Robin recognized this strongman! BUT HOW?!

The comic goes on to recap Dick's entire origin story in flashback, on the assumption that you may not know it.

(BTW, if you'd like to know more about Haly's Circus throughout the years, nightwingology has a great post here summarizing a lot of fun plotlines and characters!)

Basically: Silver Age comics are very self-consciously episodic and kid-friendly; they're not generally gonna do overly-elaborate callbacks because they don't know what comics their kid readers may have randomly picked up or remember.

By the time of post-Crisis, comic books were being written for an adult audience buying from the direct market, i.e. readers who are collecting whole runs & don't need or want Dick's origin story to be recapped to us in full every time it's referenced. That's why in post-Crisis, we get stuff like "hey, neat, this particular soda brand is getting mentioned in several different books!!" or "in order to understand this story arc, buy SIXTEEN DIFFERENT COMICS in FIVE DIFFERENT RUNS and read them ALL ACCORDING TO A NUMBERED ORDER and also you better be following the individual plotlines and recognize these five minor characters who we don't bother to introduce!! Good luck!!" But the elaborate post-Crisis plotlines - and subtler worldbuilding like a stuffed animal callback to Dick's backstory - don't make a lot of story sense UNLESS you're imagining your readers as completionist adult fans.

So IMO a stuffed animal wouldn't be a pre-Crisis thing unless it was The Episodic Story Of the Week, and I don't think a stuffed animal is action-adventure-y enough for the fast-paced storytelling of the Silver Age. (Unless it, like, came to life and tried to eat you or something.)

Post-Crisis: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr: no, Dick's a manly tough guy, he's not gonna have a stuffed animal, that'd be lame, like something Tim might do

Part of the edgy grimdark adult vibes in 80s/90s comics is that some characters who used to be kinda silly & goofy & lighthearted - like Batman and Robin - get reimagined as Serious and Angsty and Edgy in a Tough Cool Manly Brooding Way. This massively affects characterization for Bruce, Dick, and Bruce and Dick's relationship.

(I obviously love this change & love the tense Bruce-and-Dick interactions, but plenty of fans of the earlier fluffy comics really disliked the edgy retcons of Miller / Wolfman / Starlin / et al.)

The upshot is that post-Crisis is a period when you could have a recurring reference like a stuffed elephant, but you wouldn't have a stuffed elephant, not for Dick. I think a toy like that would be too cutesy / childish / effeminate to give a male character in post-Crisis, unless you were poking fun at him.

Now, you could probably let Tim have a stuffed animal, because Tim is sometimes cool but also sometimes a tryhard loser who is faking being cool and not entirely pulling it off (see e.g. the Robin comic where he practices tough-guy faces in the mirror, or the Teen Titans comic where Conner discovers his cringy Enya CD, or when he's fanboying over Connor and it's awkward, etc etc.). A stuffed animal would be deeply embarrassing, and you'd have to be careful to compensate by having Tim do something cool afterward - but Tim's character concept allows for "he's kind of a loser sometimes."

But Dick isn't!! In post-Crisis, Dick's a tough / impressive / "cool guy" character, the kind of guy anyone would want to be, even in the flashbacks where he's Robin, and even in the stories where he's more lighthearted than angsty. It'd be kinda lame for Dick to have a stuffed elephant, so he wouldn't. I feel like Dick would be more likely to poke fun at it if someone had one, like when he's making fun of Wally for liking the Hardy Boys. Dick could have a Batman action figure, at most, and if he had one he would have it ironically.

Basically: in post-Crisis, a male character hugging a stuffed elephant feels more likely to be a punchline to me, not something poignant. (Even with Tim, Tim could have an embarrassing stuffed animal, but he couldn't hug it when sad - that's too far. Maybe Booster Gold might do this. Probably he wouldn't, but spiritually, he would. Sorry Booster ilu! <3)

Instead, Dick instinctively deals with his inner turmoil like the TORTURED ACTION HERO he is: by punching things and brooding and yelling and joining the mob and sleeping on rooftops and going on obsessive secret missions and acquiring Angsty Stubble!! Just like Batman!

(Technically I don't know if Bruce ever joined the mob but you know he would.)

Anyway as you know this is my favorite continuity and I am poking fun affectionately, but uh, yeah sdfsfdsfs. No stuffed animals.

Post-2011 / Infinite Frontier / Wayne Family Adventures: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr it's in WFA! Probably not anywhere else, but it could be.

Post-2011 stuff tends to be cutesier overall, most of all in the current Infinite Frontier era. So I don't feel like this would be tonally out-of-line with IF comics. Taylor tends to go for more meme-y references rather than fanfic references, though.

So the obvious best fit is WFA, which is aiming for a rough approximation of Silver Age family-friendly vibes - wholesome, episodic plots, Teaching Good Moral Lessons For The Youth, etc. - plus lots of Easter eggs for fanfic readers and some comic references.

And look, here we are:

Aww.

Whew - that's everything I could find!

Anyway as you can probably tell, I LOVE the elephant, so this was a very entertaining rabbit hole to go down, thank you <3

[bonefall]

I’m rereading Po3 and despite its flaws I really enjoyed the introduction to the three. Jaykit isn’t mentioned to be blind in the first few chapters and instead they chose to show how much MORE capable he is compared to his littermates; until at the end of chapter 3, he brings up his blindness on his own. It makes forcing him to be a medicine cat SO much more frustrating because it really feels like they’re setting him up to be a warrior and choose his own fate (note i haven’t finished the reread this is just my first impression)

I like how you seem to take that path in BB regardless! It makes his arc so much more enjoyable

His arc in canon is super frustrating because he's such an independent character who clearly wants to make his own decisions in life, but then he just gets shoved into the medcat den. I LIKE that he ultimately goes there and that he enjoys it; but it was still really fucked up that they stripped away his autonomy in the process.

Re: they are not real, they are writing choices. Taking away the choices a disabled character can make over their own life, forcing them into a celibate nun role, and then going "awwwww dont worry see? he likes it! This was the best thing for him :)" was fucked up.

And imo it didn't have to be that way! You wouldn't have to go the FULL route I did with big changes, he could just be more involved in the descision to stop being a warrior apprentice and it would be fine. Minor change that would make a world of difference.

I do also have to interject to say though... blindness should really not be an extremely severe impairment for a ThunderClan cat.

I'm dead serious.

Whiskers are built-in sensors that tell you the exact position of everything within several inches of your head, ears swerve to pick up sound, and the jacobson's organ provides a sense of smell so keen that I have an entire Clanmew expansion draft because I needed to make WORDS describing the power of this sense that humans do not have. I cannot stress enough how delicate their other senses are, felines do not rely on their sight like primates do

ThunderClan lives in a mixed-oak woodland, where sight is already often obscured by foliage, objects are close together (for whiskers to feel), and nearly every movement makes noise against the leaf litter. RiverClan and (moor-running) WindClan cats would have a harder time with this disability than Thunder or Shadow.

Cat sight SUCKS to begin with. It sucks BADDD. They don't have color vision, they're significantly nearsighted, and they can't track up-and-down movements well. WC doesn't write realistic cats (more like small fuzzy people really) and I also work with more humanesque eyesight, but the only thing Jay should really lose is an ability to rapidly track a small animal swerving fast. Blind cats are often still excellent hunters in spite of that!

So it's an extra big waste that they railroaded him into a position he didn't choose, saying he couldn't be a warrior. This is the perfect disability to write, if you want to explore how ableism can impact the characters in this society who ARE legitimately still capable of nearly full independence, but still need to find accommodations for what they can't do.

In the same arc they're doing the dumb Cinder Reincarnation Plotline, no less!! Where SHE is also feeling like she has no choice over her "destiny," and gets a conflict over a potentially disabling injury

"Oh nooo if cinderpaw breaks her leg she wont be a warrior!"

"What the f-- Im Jaypaw and im reporting live from the scene where a Category 1 Idiot Moment is taking place. Woman breaks leg, suddenly everyone believes she is a horse, more at 11."

One of these days I should really make "herb guides" just covering how various sensory disabilities impact the lives of Clan cats and some tips for writing them as warriors, especially between Clans. Stuff you wouldn't usually consider, like how much noise deaf cats tend to make, how RiverClan would get a ton of sinus infections and lose their sense of smell, being blind in Sky vs Thunder, etc.

[phoenixcatch7]

The Wayne doll house

Have some haunted doll au, since it's been bubbling away in my mind.

The bat cave is large and sprawling, many layers and tunnels and hollowed out cracks in the walls. It takes many years to fully reinforce to prevent stray kids from tripping into stagnant waters or fall down crags as he once did. The doll cave, as it becomes known, is in one of the deepest, darkest corners, one where the lights of the furnished caverns above don't reach.

It's one late night sitting at the computer when it suddenly occurs to Bruce that his first encounter with a doll was at the well entrance, many levels above.

There was nothing there when he went back.

-

The justice league stared at the subaru. The subaru, having no eyes, did not stare back.

The seven of them had just finished a very long, arduous mission, and narrowly escaped government censure after the base they'd been raiding had turned out to belong to some corrupt official. With the alert up, they couldn't escape through city airspace, or even in their hero suits.

So civilian it was.

Batman had hotwired some bloke's car while the rest of them ducked into alleys and shop bathrooms, but the problem remained. There was seven of them. And five seats.

"I can shift into something more suitable for being carried," suggested j'onn, "but I believe one of us might have to hide."

"Foot well?" Hal tried, and everyone looked around at the tall, bulky, broad heroes.

"Think they'd have to go in the boot," Barry finally said. Everyone immediately turned to him. "No."

Batman spoke up before the discussion could devolve.

"I think.... I would be best for that."

The team stared.

"Batsy?"

Having no lungs meant he could not drag in the tired sigh he wished, but whatever force allowed this body to talk was capable of approximating something suitably resigned.

"As I am, I am... incapable of fully passing as human. It would be best if I remained out of sight."

"So just? Go change? I swear we won't be weird about whoever you are under the mask. Even if you're like, bald."

"Thank you, Wally, but I'm afraid I'm being serious." Reaching for the mask in broad daylight was unpleasant, but the glue and wires held as he gave it a few thorough tugs. "It doesn't detach."

Everyone stared. Clark reached out as if he wanted to check, but withdrew.

"Do you even have a civilian identity??" Oliver eventually asked. "Because at this point I'm genuinely not sure."

Wayne Enterprises and Queen Industries had a meeting that same evening. "Hn."

"Can we go back to the 'incapable of passing as human' part?!"

"We can discuss it in the car," he snapped, stalking past Barry and popping the boot. "In case you haven't forgotten, we're on a time limit."

For once, that seemed to encourage them, and batman, with great dignity, folded his joints and cape into the small space, ignoring Hal's mutter of 'what kind of contortionist -' as he slammed the lid. With a little shuffling he managed to activate his comms.

"I will inform the watchtower of our delay."

"Batman, they're tapping all outgoing signals, you can't -"

"It won't trigger," he interrupted, before he twisted his consciousness and sent it spiralling across the country.

Bruce awoke with a groan, stretching his limbs and taking a moment to marinate in his annoyance before he reached for the comm and voice modulator on the beside table.

"Batman to watchtower, we've encountered delays. If the Texan state government calls we haven't entered the state in six weeks. Batman out."

-

"Alien?"

"No."

"Reanimated corpse?"

"No."

"Uh... Demon?"

"Hm. No."

"You're not just a meta human, are you?"

"No."

"Vampire?"

"No."

"Robot??"

"No."

"Batsy, please, someone's got to win the bet eventually. How do we even know you're not lying?!"

"You don't," Batman said, not looking up from his paperwork and Flash groaned, letting his sticky notes fall to the floor as he buried his head in his arms.

"One day," he bemoaned to the keyboard, "one day we'll figure it out."

"Until then please keep your eyes on the monitors."

Flash groaned again.

-

Robin ducked under superman's arm as he scuttled down the corridor, laden with the night's haul of snacks. The real problem wasn't getting them - stopping league members from raiding the kitchen would be extremely counterproductive - but keeping them until he could return home to his human body to eat them. Batman had started searching him each time they left and it was really cutting into his daily sugar intake. Unfair! Just because he didn't actually use energy to stay up my night to fight crime, it felt like he did!!

'Oh, you're broken, Robin, oh, don't go out until the glue has fully set, Robin' his arm was fine! It wasn't like there was much crime to be fought on the watchtower anyway! At least not physically.

So he was pretty pleased with himself until he went to set the snacks down and found that the tar like glue they used had soaked through the sleeve and gotten all over his chocolates.

With his other hand, he tried to pry them off, wincing as the wrappers tore and stuck. He tried to shake it, ignoring the way his elbow rattled in the joint.

"Come on, come on - aw, cheezits."

The arm fell off. Robin stared despondently at the limb, surrounded by torn wrappers and dripping black glue where it connected to the elbow. The sour stink of formaldehyde filled the air.

He was going to be in such trouble with Bruce.

The click of the door jerked his head up.

Flash stood in the doorway, wide eyed. Robin stared back.

Flash screamed.

Oh yeah @dehydratedmockingbird have a thing

[dayshorizon]

ABAcelsus keychain designs 🗝️🩸

I love this dedicated wife and her axe husband 🩵💛

[ancha-aus]

RealAgeAU Drabble - Starcrossed

Here we go! the next Drabble :D @spotaus

As the poll ended it gave me two options and I wanted to write a Cross POV. So. Starcrossed :D

First: here Prev: here Next: here

Timewise?

We are about... a Month and like three weeks in. So a month of Nightmare being alone. Three weeks of him being with the gang. about a small week after Killer soul-adopting Nightmare (with Dust adopting Nightmare in the first week as the madlad he is).

Okay? We good timeline wise? okay.

As always, unedited and unbeta'ed. This is not ever going to change unless i one day decide to make a full story of these drabbles and add extra stuff and change the chapters up.

Anyway!

*------------------------*

Cross rubs his face as he continues to walk "Dust."

Dust just hums to let him know he heard.

Cross shoots him a look "He has legs. he can walk." with he, Cross obviously means Nightmare.

Dust doesn't even look at Cross or look in anyway surprised by that sentence. Instead he just keeps walking as he holds Nightmare in his arms "I know."

Cross stares at him but Dust doesn't continue to speak.

He groans "So why isn't he walking?!"

Dust shrugs and instead bounces Nightmare up a bit to enable Dust to have a more secure and stable hold on Nightmare.

Nightmare for his part does not look bothered as he just relaxes against Dust as he looks back over Dust's shoulder and watches other people go about their day.

Cross rubs his face "honestly what is the deal with you and carrying him?"

Dust shoots him an amused look "I want to."

Cross throws his arms and hands out "That can't be the only reason!"

Dust shrugs "Don't need more reasons."

Cross glares at the ground as they continue walking. He looks up and points at a store "This one?"

Dust looks at it and shakes his skull.

Cross groans loudly "What is wrong wit this one?!"

Dust raises a brow "Wrong style."

Cross crosses, heh, his arms as he glances at Dust "You know. this whole clothes shopping thing would be a lot easier if you actually picked a store to enter."

Dust shrugs again "Not good enough." and he gently bonks his skull against Nightmare's.

Cross can't believe this is the same Dust that got his own clothes by walking into the frist store he saw and grabbing the first set of clothes he saw. before calling it a day. Dust's wardrobe was hardly ever actually his size.

Now? The first store was too low quality; then not the right colours; then wrong materials; then too bland; then too sexy, with this one Cross had agreed and questioned why they would need a shirt for a six year old with the words 'lady killer' on them; then to tight and restrictive; and now just 'not good enough'.

When Cross agreed to help Dust get Nightmare new clothes instead of breaking and entering a place wiht Killer he had hoped it would be the less stressful option.

Cross rubs his face "Wiht you being this picky he is never going to get clothes that fit him."

Dust shrugs again and seems fully unbothered. Which may just be because Nightmare primarily still wears his stuff.

Cross doesn't get it. well he kinda does. Babybones are cute nad he also notices the need to take care of him but. It is Nightmare! It is a matter of time before he is an adult again and then none of this will have mattered! Or maybe they will have and then what? How would he recover from this?!

It is best to remind himself that this may be Nightmare and he may be six but Nightmare will one day become that powerful and formidable monster again and so to keep treating him with the respect he deserves!

They walk silently through the twon for a moment and Cross can see that Nightmare is dozing in Dust's hold. completely content and trusting.

Cross shoots a look at Dust. "I just don't get it...."

Dust blinks nad looks over "What?"

Cross feels himself grow warm with embarrassment. He hadn't meant to say it out loud and he says as much.

Dust rolls his eye lights and waits with a raised brow.

Cross grumbles but tries to explain "How can you... treat him like a babybones that easily?"

Dust tilts his skull and glances down at Nightmare before looking back at Cross "Because he is one." the way Dust says it implies it is the obvious answer.

Cross groans as he tries to explain more "But he used to be big and an adult. Or at least look like one? How can you jsut... switch to seeing him as a babybones?"

Dust tilts his skull adn snorts "easy. people change. people you watched grow up or grow older, do you still treat them like kids even though they are adults. because you knew them as kids?"

Cross blinks nad speaks "This is different?"

Dust shakes his skull "I don't agree. it is the same concept. just slightly different. he used to be a child. magic gave him the body and brain of an adult. but his soul was sitll a child and once the magic was gone he is a child again. So you treat him as a child."

Cross frowns as looks to the side "What if he becomes on adult again?"

Dust starts to grin "I mean. that is usually how growing up works."

Cross knows he is blushing again and glares "You know what i meant."

Dust chuckles and shrugs "The same still implies. We will just be lucky we managed to skip the teenage years with him."

Cross wasn't sure what he expected as answer but maybe he should have seen something like this coming. Dust was after all all for this parentship thing they have going on right now... and Dust is a very smart and logical person. Of course he managed to find comparisons to normal day life and managed to accept it more easily. Hell Dust probably has even more examples ready to use if Cross asks for it.

It is still just... difficult to accept for him. Cross will need more time. Luckily none of them seem to mind him lagging behind in this case. Killer had also taken longer than Dust to accept the situation fully, but Killer managed to work it out.

Horror is much chiller about what is going on. He didn't seem surprised at Dust's reaction and even less at Killer joining the 'parent-camp' with Dust.

Maybe there is just something wrong with him... it wouldn't be the first time...

Cross sighs as they stop by the plaza and manage to just see the house that Horror and Killer should be robbing. "well, either way we are soon out of time and will have been unsuccessful" great. the one thing they had to do was get Nightmare a spare outfit. They didn't even need to try shoes and-

Dust freezes "fuck."

Cross turns "what is wrong?" as he says it he sees Dust eye the plaza around them, all while he ducks further and further behind the fountain as Nightmare shakes.

Dust looks around the plaza "Stars. All three." he glares "empty... can't make a break for it using the crowd as cover..."

and a teleport would be too loud and will clue them in on them being here. Fuck indeed.

Cross sneaks a look and sees the three skeletons talk and converse casually. the rattling from Nightmare is a sign of pure fear and Cross feels himself grow worried even as he texts Horror and Killer about their emergency.

How... how would they react to Nightmare being a child? Dream had already made it clear that he thought Nightmare was corrupted and none of his brother had remained. What would he do if he saw Nightmare?

Best case scenerio would be him kidnaping Nightmare and locking him away... Worst case just... dusting him. Make sure Nightmare never becomes the powerful being he can be.

Cross notices that they have been seen as Dream looks shocked while Blue waves and starts to shout "Hey! DUst and Cross!" Cross acts as if he didn't hear or noticed them.

Cross stares at Dust "What do we do-"

and Dust just, undoes his own hoody. he pulls it over his head and even ignores the red scarf that falls to the ground next to Nightmare- wait when did Dust put Nightmare down.

Dust puts the hoody on Nightmare with one smooth motion and pulls the hoody up, he next uses the strings to make it tight and tests to make sure it doesn't come off easily.

Dust stares at Nightmare as he quickly puts on the scarf again "You just keep your face and skull against my shoulder and neck okay? Don't glance, don't react. Just act shy or asleep. Nothing will get you." and Dust picks him up again. Nightmare, without a single word, pushes his face into the soft scarf and together with the large hoody there is nothing visible that could be used to indentify him.

Holy shit that is so smart-

"Hey you two! We didn't expect to see you just hanging- what... is that?!" Blue looks beyond excited as he stares at the tiny bundle that is Nightmare. Cross feels his anxiety and panic turn hotter into a raging fire. Dont. get. near. him.

Dust just shoots Blue a look and speaks in a quiet voice "sh. quiet."

Blue gives a sheepish look and speaks much softer "oh. I am sorry. The kiddo is tired?" Dust just nods.

Cross sees his change and nods as well "We were taking a quick break but were going to leave again." he can see Killer and Horror look through the window of the house they are robbing and sees them see their situation.

Blue looks sad but nods "Yeah. I get that-"

Ink interrupts him "How did you two get a child?!"

Dream looks suspicious but doesn't say anything.

Fuck, he can probably feel Nightmare's fear doesn't he? and he wouldn't know it is fear directed at the Stars... Oh no.

Dust raises a brow and doesn't even bother to answer as he starts to take a few steps back, away from the Stars. Cross cna see that Horror is climbing down the side of the house as Killer glares at the Stars.

Ink gasps "I knew it! You two kidnaped a child!" he holds out his hands "Hand the child back and we will find their parents!"

Dust growls as he steps further back.

Cross panics and answers without thinking "We didn't steal him! He is Dust's you idiots!"

dead. silence.

The three Stars look shocked at Cross and Cross can actually see both Horror and Killer also stare at him in shock.

Ink snorts "Really? and who is the other parent?"

Cross huffs "First off, you don't nessesarily need two parents to make a child, learn basic monster biology first before making claims. second, obviously it is" think think think think think just say something! "me." NO NOT THAT!

The silence of before is NOTHING compared to the silence now. Cross is actually sure he can hear a pin drop in one of the stores around them at the moment.

No one moves and it doesn't help that Cross can see both Dust and Nightmare shoot him incredulously glances.

Oh please someone shoot him because Horror even pauses his own climb to shoot him a raised eye brow while Killer is ACTUALLY wiggling his eye brows at him.

Just end him. Please his mind did not work with him. He had just been thinking so much about how everyone had been treating Ngihtmare and how he saw the situation.

Dream is the one who coughs and looks to the side awkwardly "oh. wow. euh... congrats? I didn't realise you two were... you know... an item." please please please please shut up. "and a babybones as well! Wow! That is... unbelieveable!"

Blue nods "Yeah! No one knew!"

Cross still can't find the words and is actually afraid of what he will say next. Dust however shrugs and has managed to pull his face back in his normal bored look "prefer privacy. it is no ones business." and he raises a brow at them.

Blue smiles brightly "of course! We won't tell others. stars knows everyone wants a quiet moment nowadays..."

Dream nods before quickly changing the subject "right! We were just curious what you two were doing out and-" he looks horrifed "Oh stars... you two are on a date! A fmaily date! and we crushed it and interrupted it and we are so sorry!"

Cross suddenly understands why Chara and Gaster would use the reset and overwrite power. please just let him change this moment to have been anything else. please.

Dust hums and shrugs. Not really answering any question.

Dream still looks embarrassed "anyway! we... euh... well... were wondering what you were doing. Now we know that that is great! euh... So... my brother just... doesn't mind this?"

Any embarrassement disappears. Hot rage in his body. Cross glares as his crosses his arms.

Dream sputters but continues "you know... be is so against positivity... and this... this is a beautiful and wonderful thing! Doesn't he...isn't he..." he smiles sheepish.

Cross glares "no. He doesn't. In matter of fact. He is very fine with the situation at hand. very willing to help in a way he can." Cross isn't even lying. While Nightmare doesn't like having been changed back he isn't diffficult anymore and more than happy to stick with Dust, and them all, now. Nightmare is also not fussy when out and about on missions and aside from being grumpy he is a perfect good babybones.

Dust nods "you should stop talking about people you know nothing about." he looks at Cross "lets go. he is tired."

Cross nods and sees Horror sign at Killer to get down as well. Killer shrugs and just lets himself fall from the third floor right into Horror's arms. The two disappear into some side street.

Cross nods and looks at Dust "you first." Cross will just walk behind Dust and make sure the Stars don't get any glimbs near the end.

Dust nods and turns easily as he walks away, Cross can see how Dust changes the hand mid turn and Nightmare sinks a little lower. Making it that his skull doesn't even peak over Dust's shoulder.

They walk away in silence and take many turns to get some distance. As soon as Cross is sure the Stars can't hear or see them he says so. Which causes Dust to nod before sprinting, Cross is quick to follow.

They reach the edge of town in record time and Cross glances back "okay. we are good. we are fine... we got out."

Dsut nods before looking at him very amused "we made a babybones?"

Cross feels himself grow warm for so many reasons as he sputters "I panicked! I am sorry I implied we were- that we did!" he hides his face.

Dust chuckles and pats his shoulder "It is fine."

Cross relaxes and smiles in thanks.

Dust raises a brow "Killer will never let you live this down."

Cross groans "just end me."

Dust hums "I don't know. I don't think killing the other parent of my child works in my favour." he grins so goddamnit amused.

Cross is never going to hear the end of this.

*-----------------*

First: here Prev: here Next: here

Cross was so close to soul-adopting Nightmare but then the Stars interrupted and Cross panicked.

Also, important. Noticed how Cross only apologised for implying he and Dust made the babybones together? But not that he is a parent? Cross is getting there. It will just take him a while.

[valhallavalgrace]

How are you adjusting to the whole Norse mythology situation?

LEO: I’ve mostly been bugging some of the older einherjar, and Hunding, a little bit, to figure this place out. Do you know how cool it is that some people have been here since the industrial revolution?? There's no way that I'm the first of my dad's kids to make it here. I just don't know who to talk to about it.

((Leo's coping mechanism re: Norse mythology is just hating himself more bc of course he doesn't belong in his own afterlife. but he won't admit that to anyone bc he doesn't know who can be vulnerable with.))

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