#like im a kid trying to be like them
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we are loonies and we are proud
#crying in bed because im so stressed#and regretting my gcse choices#because ive lost all love for art#i hate art#i dont even draw anymore#and im leagues behind everyone else who does art#my friends are so good at art and i feel embarassed standing next to them#like im a kid trying to be like them#not to get venty on main wow#this ones being deleted trust
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sometimes you gotta lure your overly-studious ravenclaw gf into spending time with you 🥰 📚 ( from 'Every Teardrop is a Waterfall' by Kat_12739 on ao3, GO READ IT!!! the first story is about seb falling sick and still pushing himself/not admitting he's sick until he ends up in the hospital, the second story is about the birth of seb and clora's daughter and seb's reaction to clora almost dying in childbirth, and the third is about dealing with a fussy newborn lewis😭🥹THEY'RE SO GOOD AND SWEET AND SOMEWHAT SAD (not to mention beautifully written) so go check it out!!💖💖 )
#READ SO I CAN YAP TO SOMEONE ABOUT THEM🙏😩💘#the seb sickfic made me realize how much i needed barely functioning and sick seb (but him still trying to be tough)#theres also a part that cracked me up bc at one point seb is so sick he cant even see straight but he just thinks to himself:#eh its fine.... ill just ask ominis how HE functions without vision later🤷 LMFAO#so stubborn...JUST LET CLORA TAKE CARE OF YOU MFER🤺🤺🤺#defs gonna be drawing more from it especially sick seb LMAO but also seb having a tea party with celeste🥹🥹#hogwarts legacy#sebastian sallow#sebastian sallow x oc#sebastian sallow x mc#sebastian x mc#hogwarts legacy fanfiction#sebastian sallow fanfiction#hphl#choccyart#also i was never planning on writing anything about clora giving birth or abt the kids so to be able to read it WAS AMAZING#THERES A PART WHERE SEB IS HOLDING CELESTE AND CRYING AT CLORAS BEDSIDE THAT I NEED TO DRAW😭😭#LIKE SRSLY seb being conflicted and not even wanting to HOLD celeste bc he doesnt know if clora is alive or not... IT WAS SO SAD BUT GOOD#i honestly dont know what seb would do if clora died in childbirth tbh.......i could honestly see him resenting celeste#esp since she looks so much like clora😭😭#LETS JUST NOT THINK ABOUT IT!😃👍#(still thinking about it)#like this line in the fic: “Sebastian hesitated; if this was Clora���s last gift to him he wasn’t sure he wanted it.”#😭😭😭ITS SO GOOD UGHHHHH😭 TY AGAIN FOR WRITING THESE💖IM SO TOUCHEDDD💖💖
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not him trying to seduce stay to get drenched in water..
#hyunjin#skz#stray kids#bystay#staydaily#skzco#gifs#him ordering them around with his fingers like that. just like that orangutan called amber on tiktok#[me trying to find humor in this situation to conceal the fact that im hanging on by a thread]
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if poof Peri turns into the baby version of whatever Cosmo and Wanda turn into would he turn into a smaller butterfly or a caterpillar
#if they try to fly away would they carry him like a bird#like imagine being out and seeing these two butterflies and one of them is just dragging a caterpillar by there already small legs barely#being able to fly#ive been thinking about this for a couple of days..#or would Timmy just carry him#random kid running around with a caterpillar cupped his hands with two butterflies trailing after him#im choosing to believe he turns into a caterpillar cause its funnier#fop#fop poof#fairly oddparents a new wish#fopanw#cosmo cosma#fairly oddparents#periwinkle fairywinkle cosma#fop peri#wanda fairywinkle cosma#fop wanda
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The posts ive seen about "I really hope the bad kids dont hurt the rat grinders :(" is giving the same energy as the hangman to fabian going "we should be nice to her cause if we just keep being nice to her then she'll stop being so mean!!"
#THE WAY I WAS CHEERING AT SEEING HOW INTENSE THE BAD KIDS GOT IN THE FIGHT#LIKE YESSS#LETS FUCKING GO#GET THEIR ASSSSSS#“theyre just kids” BRO SO ARE THE ENTIRE REST OF THE SCHOOL AND THEYRE NOT MURDERING INNOCENTS WHILE TRYING TO SUMMON A CORRUPTED RAGE GOD#TO SUPPOSEDLY RULE THE WORLD???#its actually so easy to Not murder other kids and summon a rage god to rule the world#insanely easy to not do that#“cut his head off so he wont be revived”#“IM GOING TO SKIN YOU”#“loser says what?”#I LOVE THEM#THE ENERGY#OPTIMAL#INCREDIBLE#FABULOUS#i love my bad kids soso much#im going so insane over this episode i need to stop posting about it#dimension 20 fhjy#fhjy spoilers#d20 fhjy#fantasy high#dimension 20#bad kids#the rat grinders
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happy "our marriage is never gonna recover from this" day
#this is why you share your plan with 1 (one) other person; kids. otherwise you end up embarrassing yourself in front of the people#you were trying to impress (and the man youve fallen head over heels for)#nyxtalks#ofmd#our flag means death#izzy hands#israel hands#ed teach#edward teach#blackbeard#september 1st#s01e04#Discomfort in a Married State#gif#i didnt get the colour grading quite how i wanted it but i had fun tweaking them! its all learning; baybeee#im having fun! hopefully new laptop will have the power to let me control more things. maybe#(or maybe thats just skill issues ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)#yall gotta be nice to me ok im still figuring things out#also like. as i said earlier. i knowwww this scenes been giffed to shit. but also not so many with the leap year note! so.#i learnt that 1717 was NOT a leap year in the process of making this. djenks i feel betrayed & lied to#did YOU remember we had a february 29th this year? because i sure didnt. i squandered her
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I'm in A Mood™ (stressed) so im going back to my roots of melting two character together into one person. So bruce wayne!danny fenton. Danny Fenton who, for eight years, grew up in a beautiful gothic manor with his mom and dad under the name "Bruce Wayne". Playing piano with his mother, running around the manor with his father.
Then when he's eight it's ripped away from him. There's blood on his hands and pearls pooling at his feet, and both his parents are dead in front of him.
And he gets shipped off to distant relatives "the Fentons" shortly after, Alfred close on his heels because someone needs to take care of him, someone that knows him. Bruce goes to the Fentons for the safety of anonymity. Gotham's press wants to sink its teeth into him.
Danny misses his city even if it took everything from him. There are shadows in his eyes and he's pale as a sheet even beside his distant cousins, and they change his name to "Danny Fenton' because nobody should know that their newest child was illustrious orphan Bruce Wayne.
They call him Bruce behind closed doors. Danny prefers it that way, he clings onto the name -- the one his parents gave him -- like a lifeline. He makes friends with Sam and Tucker. Tucker takes one look at the willowy, morbid little boy standing in the corner like a shade, ghosts in his eyes, and drags him out into the sunlight, and takes him over to Sam.
When Danny is twelve, he's still not over it -- and he's a little obsessed with the Fentons' research, with the morbid. He has books upon books on death, murder, detective work. Anything he can get his hands on. And stars. He loves stars.
Alfred owns the apartment next to them and comes over regularly. Danny clings to him.
When Danny is twelve, he's still quiet, meek, a shy little thing prone to being bullied. Freaky little Fenton with the night in his eyes and too-cold skin even before he put one foot in the grave. in a sleepover in his room with Sam and Tucker, he tells them the truth. They're his friends, he trusts them.
"My name is Bruce." he murmurs, voice quiet as the breeze, always quiet. he's staring at his star-covered sheets.
"Like Bruce Wayne?" Tucker asks, a joking tone in his voice.
Danny smiles a little, lamb-like with insecurity. "I am Bruce Wayne." And he takes them down to the lab, disrupting Maddie and Jack, to prove it. Sam tells them of her own wealth then shortly after. They start calling Danny "Bruce" in private too -- its trust. Thats what it is. It's trust.
Sam goes to media functions and comes back with aching feet and complaints on her tongue -- and Danny soaks it up all like a sponge, splayed across a beanbag chair with Tucker in her room. He's not envious of her, he used to go to events with his parents and they kept him safe from the ugly of Gotham's Elite. For the most part. He's had comments made at him, he doesn't miss them.
Alfred returns to the manor semi-regularly, Danny goes with him. he wanders the hallways and helps Alfred clean, the last thing either of them want is for their home to fall into disrepair. He brings Jazz with him next time, then Tucker, then Sam. They all help him clean, and he shows them his room. The one across from his parents', it feels strange.
When Danny dies when he's fourteen, the first adult he tells is Alfred. He and Jazz go over to his house more often than they stay in the Fentonworks building. At least at Alfred's, the food doesn't come to life. Alfred sits at the kitchen table and weeps when Danny tells him, Jazz is upstairs, and its just the two of them.
Danny's ghost form wears pearls around his wrist and the gloves look stained with some kind of black substance. He looks like a child who died in a lab accident, but he also looks like a child who has shadows dripping off his shoulders, curling at his feet, hanging from his eyes.
because amorphous blob batman has my heart always and danny/bruce will not escape it even in death even if that IS the only reason im giving him Mild BatBlob Vibes...so far
when they go to the manor, alfred helps danny make a pile of stones between Martha and Thomas' graves, nobody but the two of them (and sam and tucker) will know what it means. (not even bruce's children later down the line, not for a long, long time)
danny dives into ghost fighting on shaky feet and not half as witty as he once was in one world. he's skittish, skittering between blasts from shadow to shadow and clumsily making his way through each battle. but helping people lights a fire in him. he still has shadows dripping off his feet but there's a purpose in his eyes.
and god help him, he's going to help people.
#dpxdc#dp x dc#danny fenton is not the ghost king#dp x dc crossover#dpxdc crossover#dpdc#dpxdc prompt#this is just me torturing danny for a little bit because im stressed and i cried for an hour while i was driving so im taking it out on B#thanks for being my little stress ball danny#aha my old middle school habit of frankensteining two characters together is resurfacing again :) yall should've seen my wattpad drafts#in middle school. i had 50 of them and most of them were me combining two characters together to make one person and putting them in one au#my most memorable being skydoesminecraft and harry potter. THAT was a fun worldbuilding experience#do i think that growing up with the fentons would fix bruce/danny completely?? hurm. no. dont kid yallselves jazz is not a licensed#therapist not even at like. nine when she meets danny. she's not helping him through his trauma in the slightest. she's nagging.#she's his sister or sister-like figure before she's his therapist. would he be#*entirely* like canon bruce tho?? no. dannybruce is a mix of the both of them. but this is still the first post of the au and is more so#just me doing the equivalent of popping a stress ball so nothing is smoothed over. mostly im just trying to keep bruce's trauma prominent i#danny's character because he IS Bruce. i dont want him to just be 'danny with bruce's backstory but without any of the ugly bits'.#danny and bruce is used interchangeably because they're the same person but sorry if his personality feels imbalanced i came up with this o#the spot. was going to type more but the stress has left me. for now. watch ur back danny 👀
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Details in Stan's letter that still haunt me
(how long will I continue thinking about a two page letter that's technically not even that long because Stan's handwriting is fricking large? .....you don't need to worry about that.)
The bro code only shows up in the Lost Journal pages, and to me Stan's message feels like it purposely echoes Ford's "miss you" in the college photo (and for some reason the message doesn't appear in the website version of the photo?) ....or alternatively Stan simply noticed how distressed Ford was about this entire thing and wanted to support him in a way so he can be sappy but without the kids knowing, or both!
Stan's claim about the Oregon lottery contradicts what the Lost Legends website said about Tate McGucket's ability to predict the winning numbers!! ...but also breaking into the Lottery HQ is definitely a very Stan thing to do and it's not the first time small gags have been retconned
Despite spending most of his letter nonchalantly destroying him, the taunt about ripping a dollar bill in half is the only part where Stan is directly responding to Bill. Maybe it's the two of them having similar ways of thinking but it's rather specific considering Bill taunts the reader about it...
And after Bill spends an entire book calling Ford Sixer despite normally using a pretty wide range of nicknames for him, Stan then spends his letter mainly referring to Ford as Sixer, even though post-Weirdmageddon he tends to use a mix of nicknames. And it's not like he'd gotten to see Bill himself for long, let alone see him steal that childhood nickname (that is only used twice in the actual show btw!). Did Ford tell him what happened or...?
With all this and the website's "still on your mind" message, what I'm getting at is my tinfoil hat theory of Stan somehow seeing some of the pages the irl readers saw, even when it should be personalised to the specific reader, and he's been lying about it for some reason. Considering that the book flat out doesn't make an attempt at convincing Soos, I find it a stretch that whatever Bill was telling Stan via the book was an attempt to convince him either.
Wouldn't be the first time Stan's skimmed through a book and lied about what it meant to him.
(...Now I kinda wanna see a story about the family reading their versions of the book and making fun of it while Stan is improvising every single one of his pages and blatantly ignoring Bill's attempts to mock and taunt him)
But also I'm fascinated by the letters that only showed up on the website (aka the Soos+Wendy+McGucket+Pacifica ones). I'm assuming that Mabel had stuck them on after Stan's letter... but they were basically eaten by the book itself because seeing Stan's letter kick-started Bill's breakdown which takes up the rest of the book
#im wearing this tinfoil hat with pride i know something is up!!!!#like three things in one letter??? ...i mean the handwriting is another thing but for another reason that i already mentioned elsewhere#(of course i also love the idea of same coin theory being flat out the reason why stan's perceiving the book differently)#gf meta#stanley pines#stan pines#ford pines#book of bill#bill cipher#also i'm still kinda annoyed that pacifica got a letter over candy and grenda cos like.... she didn't really do anything in w3 lmao#meanwhile grenda literally ripped bill's eye out and the girls were the main ones holding him off!!! give them respect hirsch!!!!#they helped with the unicorn spell!!!! they're an extended part of the group!!!! they saved stan before!! give my girls respect!!!!!!#also some folks are assuming that the 'miss you' message was directed at mcgucket but if it was for him#i feel like it'd be scribbled on the page itself and not be part of college ford notes in the bg (and ford would use a different cipher)#mind you the photo itself is a day after he met mcgucket so there's no reason why ford would direct it at him#they literally just became besties!!!#and this is a ford recently estranged from his brother and is still trying to convince himself he only feels anger towards him#(i saw some saying that ford shared the bro code with mcgucket too and im ??? theres an entire page about him hiding his childhood stuff#i get there's the 'oh disney!!!' easter egg now but ford at that time was pretty touchy about anything regarding stan#(alex saying that if mcgucket had found his stan o war photo ford wouldve lied and#brushed it off as an inspiration to his career in science instead admitting that he's holding onto it cos he misses his twin)#plus he'd show another recent code that wasn't made by literally kids if he really wanted to share one imo#but also j3 is him using them to hide info from mcgucket!!!)#two sides of the same dollar bill#thisisnotawebsitedotcom
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been thinking about them lately ok
#lots of doodles ok these arent even close to finished and never will be#dhmis humanizations#dhmis duck#dhmis yellow guy#dhmis red guy#dhmis#anyways. i think rgs crush on duck is insaene in general i think its WORSE WHEN THEYRE HUMAN#i also think its really fucking funny#obsessed with this tiny balding little man who is Mean To Me#hes like a kid who would get bullied in high school to me#like idk. theyre da same to me in human au. which i suppose this is an au even tho im just trying to translate them as closely as i can#in my heart theyre still in the pink house#this is not like the apartments au to me at all. so to me the dynamic is still the same#and for those of u who dont remember that dynamic is RG being down bad for duck bc he WEIRDLY is godbless. but also insanely evasive and sh#and duck does not act like anything is happening between them but also in his head theyve been married for 30 years. but its obvious to him#so he doesnt feel the need to say anything duh.#and if he ever brought it up it would be a best friend debate again#'you think IM your husband?!?!' of course you are !! :] 'IM NOT. YOUR HUSBAND !! YOU DONT HAVE A HUSBAND!!'
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i love how fantastically selfish paul is as a concept. they chose to go together, to be together in the river, a mutual sacrifice so they wouldnt have to go it alone or use the other. and they just left a trail of people behind them who loved them, but not enough to save them
#sorry im thinking about how like#the sixth were gideon and harrows first real friends#no ulterior motives they werent trying to envoke house politics shit#they were just Nice#and the sixth did them a massive favor (watching nona) and the ninth helped them too#(gideon told cam pals last words and also saved her life harrow found pal in the river)#its just. GUH. the most genuine people they know are just gone. forever and ever#and thats before i even get into the sixths parents#camilla specifically did not talk to her dads before they did it SHAKING HER you are INSANE to me#sorry guys you csn never see your kids again you Can visit their walking tombstone though
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#I KNOW IM A FEW HOURS LATE BUT#HAPPY MOTHERS DAY#SOBBING OVER THEM#I LOVE FOUND FAMILY#its silly but i think nojiko and nami would be the type of kids to get into fights with other island kids. like all the time#my art#art#digital art#one piece#one piece art#cat burglar nami#nami#nami one piece#nojiko#nojiko one piece#op nojiko#op bellemere#bellemere#one piece bellemere#mothers day#pink#anime#a little quick and rushed I WAS TRYING TO FINISH IT BEFORE MOTHERS DAY ENDED
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congrats on baby #2!🥰👍 part 2 to this post bc seb is a smug ass bitch when it comes to getting clora pregnant. and ty @rednite-dork for sending me the original pic ages ago LMFAO... i knew as soon as i saw it that i had to redraw it eventually 👼
#anne 1000% took the picture LMFAO......lewis-induced vomiting#i wanted to have the design of their kids out before drawing this since seb has to be holding their firstborn....widdle chubby ceweste#choccyart#sebastian sallow#sebastian sallow x oc#sebastian sallow x mc#clora clemons#hogwarts legacy#also ive started on the seb and clora as curse breakers oneshot🥰im still only on the outline and still ironing things out but#im excited to start writing it hehe......protective adult seb does stuff to me....🧎♀️🧎♀️🧎♀️#the premise is them investigating a town that has a bunch of strange occurrences going on that might be bc of a cursed object#AND THATS ALL ILL SAY..............clora living her sherlock life fr#OMG WAIT thats actually a cute idea LMFAO i should legit have clora try to channel sherlock when shes investigating BAHAHA😭😭#if anyone has any ideas/things theyd wanna see abt them as adults on the job lmk send me an ask/anon or reply im open to suggestions#the oneshot is gonna be pretty lighthearted and slice of life so#tho there IS a smut scene at like the very beginning that i wasnt planning on BAHAHA but thats just what happens when u write seb...😮💨
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"if we make america worse and more of a dictatorship that will be even harder to unravel and make it the way we want the country to be, maybe then everyone will join our Glorious Revolution!" bb girl you cant even be in the same room with someone who thinks you should vote, how in tf do you think you're gonna unite people to fight in The Revolution with you? it's gonna be you and your 5 friends, i hate to break it to you.
#i dont think you realize how repelling you and your politics are to everyone else#you get all of your validation for how Smart You Are from your friends and ignore any kind of feedback that suggests you should#change or do something differently. thats the only reason you're so convinced average people will go along with you bc you keep getting#affirmation from the people who ALREADY agree with you- but you have NO IDEA how to bridge the gap between people who agree#with you and disagree with you. you're horrible at convincing people of your side of things outside of straight up guilt tripping them#or bullying them like a highschooler. im sorry but the tools you learned to survive with as a kid aren't gonna help you in this situation.#the ONLY THING you can come up with to bridge that gap is a bloody revolution. thats how bad you are at this.#and you're also so bad at this and unimaginative that you dont even realize how THAT might not even be enough.#you cant imagine ANY kind of avenue to getting people to change AT ALL outside of blood and fire. and thats why people call you#an authoritarian.#i'll be honest- i really do think the world would be a better place if we did incremental change under a democratic president who wont#set the world on fire vs the godkingemperor republican WHO WONT EVEN LISTEN TO YOU AT ALL EVER AND MIGHT KILL YOU#FOR PUTTING UP A STINK. idk if you noticed but if that evil fuck gets into office we are severely outnumbered if he gets police#n shit to go after his own citizens. letting trump win is making this battle so much harder than it needs to be.#you are choosing trying to fix the world while its exploding vs trying to fix it before it explodes at all.#what is this like a procrastination thing? you wanna wait till the last minute to try? idfgi. wtf is wrong with you#throwing minority lives away to prove a point. and then you try to tell me you care. gtfoh.#accelerationists should never be taken seriously.
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updated Sleight ref!!
#i changed his colors !!#treat this as a suggestion than a solid ref. i spent like 3 hours drawing and redrawing the legs bc i couldnt get the shape right so if u#wanna draw them more planti or digi i do not mind ^_^ get silly with it!! same goes for pelt pattern do whatevr u want with it#the pelt pattern is loosely based on a snowshoe cat which was fun to play with. as u can see they kinda have a butterfly motif going on#if u squint the ear tufts kinda resemble luna moths or swallowtails with the long tail at the end of the wings#i was kinda torn about changing the costume color but it clashed too much with the new color palette so i had to change it#i didnt include the cape here so its easier to see the costume but ill draw it another time if i remember lol#its also a lil hard to see but i put pinstripes on their pants but thats optional. their design is pretty flexible anyway#god im pretty attached to this guy already. hes like semi fan character semi regular character... oc... thing#i should draw more furries. i followed some furry artists for giggles recently and its true what they say. u need furries in your life#btw while i was drawing this i was fooling around while trying to figure out his costume color and colored it as kaito kids suit for fun#and i just stared at it for a solid 5 minutes before saving a picture. maybe ill post it later#my art#myart#my oc#oc#furry art#fur#furry#laika's comet#laika's comet oc#fan character#sleight#ref sheet#oc ref sheet
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For the ghostlights drabbles: “Say my name” with a favor being called in?
Duke had saved Phantom years ago, back when he was just out of high school and working to take down a branch of the government that was kidnapping and experimenting on people, targeting magic users and metas. Phantom had been working on his own to take them down, and they met in the middle, trashing a lab and freeing as many people as they could.
They had managed to shoot his back, knocking him down and making him bleed a glowing green. Phantom couldn’t move, protecting two kids with his body, and Duke couldn’t reach them in time before they were taken away by another swarm of agents.
He was able to go after them in time, free Phantom and the kids, and evacuated the victims before Phantom rained hell down on the facility.
At the end, standing in the background as they watched paramedics treat the victims and take them towards the nearest hospitals, Phantom had turned towards him and thanked him.
Or rather, he thanked the Signal and offered him a bracelet with a rounded orb of ice, glowing faintly in the dark. If you ever need me, he had said, Hold this, and call me name.
Phantom vanished once the last of the victims were transported to a safer location, and Duke hadn’t seen him since.
He’s kept up with news about Phantom as best he can, but from what he could tell, Phantom is based primarily in Amity Park, Illinois, and the town is fiercely protective of their hero. News rarely leaks out of there, and with them running on their own servers and independent internet, it was nearly impossible to get in from the outside.
Phantom remained a curious and distant figure in Duke’s life. He holds onto the bracelet still, guarding it carefully and sometimes running his fingers over the ice that never melts.
But he doesn’t call in that favor. He’s never to.
At least, not until now.
Sucking in a breath, Duke prepares himself and holds the orb of ice in the palm of his hand. He’s in civies, unable to hide his identity for this, and closes his eyes. ���Phantom,” he says.
For a moment, nothing happens. Duke blinks his eyes open and frowns, mind already forming new plans to contact Phantom. Then the ice goes bitingly cold, almost painful, and the temperature in the room drops dramatically. The ice lifts up from his hand, floating in the air, then cracks open.
White-blue light spills out of it, growing brighter as it seems to swallow up the room entirely. Duke hurries to back up, an arm thrown up to protect his eyes. His breath mists out before him and he shivers as the sound of ice cracking fills the room.
And then, just as suddenly as it started, the light disappears and the cold fades away like a bad dream.
Slowly, Duke lowers his arm and looks up at Phantom, floating in the middle of his living room with a crown made of ice, engulfed in blue fire, hovers above his head. He looks older, more regal, holding his head high.
He regards Duke carefully for a minute, then tilts his head and says, “Signal?”
“Yeah, it’s me. Man, I’m so glad you came.”
“You… need help with something? You’re calling in your favor now, right?”
Duke nods. He understands Phantom’s confusion; being in the hero business means that favors like these tend to be used only during the most hopeless of times, when the world is close to ending, when the chances of getting out of a situation alive is close to impossible. It’s exactly the kind of thing Duke was expecting to call Phantom in for.
Not the kid sleeping on his couch.
“You’re a ghost, yeah?”
Phantom blinks at him. “Ghost king, now. Why?”
“Well…” Duke rubs the back of his neck, nervously. “I didn’t really know who else to call, and I can’t do this on my own since I’m not a ghost. But this kid got attached to me and won’t leave, so now I’m taking care of her and I have no idea what I’m doing.”
“I don’t know why you think I have any experience with kids but—”
“She’s a ghost.”
Phantom stops short. “Ah. I see.” He floats down until his feet touch the floor, and then he’s standing like any other person. “Where…?”
Duke looks past Phantom’s shoulder, and Phantom turns to follow his gaze. Chelsea, the ghost girl, looks to be around nine years old and is fast asleep on the couch, curled up under Duke’s softest blanket.
“Signal,” Phantom says quietly, “What, exactly, is the favor you need from me?”
“You can say no,” Duke starts. “I get that this is a lot. But I need help raising her. And since you’re a ghost, I figured you could help me learn about the ghostly side of things. You don’t have to raise her with me or anything! Just… I would appreciate any help you’re willing to give me.”
Phantom doesn’t say no. He doesn’t say anything. He just stares down at Chelsea, an unreadable expression on his face.
On the couch. Chelsea shifts in her sleep, brows furrowing as she makes a choked noise in the back of her throat.
Moving on autopilot after so many nights of this routine, Duke kneels next to the couch, fishing one of her hands from beneath the blanket. He gives it a few reassuring squeezes, keeping it a slow rhythm to pull her gently from her nightmare. She settles down in just a minute, brow smoothing out as she continues to sleep.
The silence grows and Duke is all too aware that his heart is the only one beating.
He doesn’t hear Phantom move. Doesn’t realize he’s right next to him until he sees Phantom’s hand reach out towards Chelsea. When Duke looks, Phantom is sitting on the floor next to Duke, looking at Chelsea with something soft and devastated in his eyes. His hand hovers about her head for a long moment, then slowly lowers to rest on her head.
The touch looks gently, barely putting any pressure on her head, but it’s enough to make Chelsea’s eyes snap open, suddenly wide awake. She stares at Phantom with wide eyes, then sits up and looks between him and Duke.
“Who are you?” she asks in a small voice that makes Duke want to stand against the world to keep her safe.
Phantom smiles. It’s casual and charming and makes him look like anyone else, as if he’s not a powerful king from a realm unreachable to humans. “Hi there,” he says, “I’m Danny. I’m a ghost like you. Signal called me and asked me to meet you.”
The Ghost King is good with kids. Who would have thought?
Chelsea looks at him for confirmation and only relaxes when he nods. “I’m Chelsea. What do you mean ghost? I’m not dead.”
Both he and Phantom tense, carefully keeping their expressions neutral. She hasn’t told him much at all, just that her parents were gone and forgot her and she got hurt, so she wanted to stay with ‘Mr. Signal’ because he’s a hero and heroes keep people safe and he was the only one who was Black like her. Duke hadn’t had the heart to say no, and began searching for her family, only to find that her parents had fled the state, and likely the country, after killing their only child through neglect and a dangerous environment.
It was then that he realized that her powers were not because she was a meta, but because she was ghost.
It still hurts to realize how young she is, how much of her life had been stolen from her in an instant. Duke hadn’t been brave enough to broach the topic with her, instead choosing to let her grow comfortable in his presence, get them both settled into a routine now that he was her primary guardian.
“I know it sounds scary,” Phantom says, “And you may not want to believe me, but it’s true. I’m sorry that you died so young, but that just means you get to hang out with me and other ghosts from now on!”
Chelsea crosses her arms over her chest and glares at him. “I am not dead,” she says.
“Cici, I’m sorry to say this, but you are,” Duke cuts in. “That’s why I called… Danny. You have new powers as a ghost, and he can help you get used to them.”
“I’m not dead!” she says again.
“Kid,” Phantom begins, but Chelsea shakes her head hard and hops off the couch.
“I’m not lying! Watch, I’ll prove it to you!” She closes her eyes and scrunches up her nose, concentrating. Her hands curl into tight fists by her sides, and the glow around her grows dim. Two faint, stuttering rings of light appear around her waist. They flicker and wobble in the air, as if weak and uncertain of their own existence, then split apart, one moving up towards her head while the other falls to her feet.
Beside him, Phantom sucks in a sharp breath, but Duke can’t turn to see what’s wrong when he’s trying to take in the sight of Chelsea suddenly full of vibrant color, looking more solid that he’s ever seen her, very much alive.
“See?” she says proudly, lifting her arms and doing a spin to show off her right she was. “I told you I’m not dead!”
“No, you’re not,” Phantom agrees, sounding shell-shocked. When Duke is finally able to look away from Chelsea to check on him, he looks awed. There’s the smallest smile on his face, just the slightest upturn of his lips, but it makes him look softer.
Duke turns his attention back to Chelsea before he can be caught staring. “Cici, can you come here for a second?”
She goes before he’s finished speaking, crossing the space between them in a single jump, then grins up at him. Her hair is a bit of a mess, the two buns he managed to get her hair into falling askew. He makes a note to visit the old aunties in the Narrows later to ask them to teach him how to do hair. For now, he holds out a hand and Chelsea drops an arm into it.
It seems to good to be true, having her be alive, but her pulse is steady and strong when he presses his thumb against the inside of her wrist.
“Well,” he says, leaning back and letting go of her arm. “You certainly proved us wrong.”
Chelsea doesn’t have much time to look smug before PHantom quietly says, “You’re like me.”
“What?”
“You’re like me,” he tells Chelsea. “A halfa.”
She tilts her head to one side. “What’s that?”
“Someone who is half human and half ghost. Both dead and alive.”
Duke blinks, taking in the words, then turns to face Phantom so quickly he’s worried he might give himself whiplash. Halfa, he said. Like me, he said.
And sure enough, two rings of light, bright and strong, appear around Phantom’s waist before splitting in half, moving over his entire body.
Gone is the Ghost King, all powerful and adorned in dark clothing with a crown of ice above his head. In his place is a guy who looks to be Duke’s age, eyes a deep blue and his black hair messy, feet set solidly on the floor. He looks completely normal, completely human, and no longer an impossibility.
“You still up for learning how to use all your new powers?” Phantom asks.
Chelsea grins. “Yeah!” And then, with a quick flick of her eyes going from Phantom to Duke that he almost misses, very innocently asks, “Are you going to stay with us then?”
“I… don’t know?” Phantom looks to Duke for an answer.
Already, Duke can see this going two ways. The correct way forward, the normal one, has Phantom popping in every so often, taking Chelsea out for a few hours to work on training her and her powers. It’s easy and routine and they can keep their boundaries uncrossed and be professional.
The other path is what Duke wants most that he shouldn’t impose onto the literal Ghost King. He could have Phantom living with them while he’s on Earth and out of Amity Park, having a place at the table, a section in the closet for his own clothes, a quietly domestic night together while Chelsea sleeps where they can get to know each other more, get to know each other outside of news reports and texts on a screen.
“You can stay with us if you want,” Duke offers, casually, “It might keep my apartment safe from her powers acting up on their own again.”
“Are you sure? I could always just fly in on the weekends or something.”
“I’d appreciate having you around. So you can help Cici.”
“If you don’t mind,” Phantom says, looking away. Like this, fully alive with a beating heart, it’s easy to see the blush steal away across his cheeks.
“I don’t.”
“I don’t either!” Chelsea pops in, looking far too gleeful by their awkward conversation.
Duke can’t help but laugh, feeling lighter than he had in ages. The relief of knowing that Chelsea is alive, for the most part at least, eases the guilt of thinking he had been too late to save her, that there was no chance she could have made it out and had a future, makes him feel weak. All the exhaustion of the past few weeks hits him all at once and he wants nothing more than to collapse in bed and sleep for twelve hours.
“Alright, squirt,” he says, reaching out to pat her head. “It’s late. We can talk more in the morning, so go to bed. In your actual bed this time, not on the couch.”
Chelsea stands up taller, ready to argue, but Duke gives her a Look™ and she quickly shuts her mouth, nods, and drags her feet back to her room (the former guestroom he can never give any of the other Waynes ever again, once they find out about her).
Sighing, Duke collapses onto the couch once he hears the door shut behind her. Phantom joins him after a few seconds, sitting tentatively on the edge of the couch. The cushion moves beneath his weight, another reminder of how solid and alive he is right not.
Duke wants to touch him, to reach out and feel for himself his pulse, the warmth of his body, his chest lifting with each breath.
He doesn’t move. He stays where he is, hands carefully still, and tries to think past the dizzying thoughts of she’s still alive, I’m not too late, he’s still here, he’s alive.
“Rough week?” Phantom asks, voice purposefully light.
“Something like that.”
“You should get some sleep too.”
“I don’t think I can. Not after everything. My mind’s too loud right now.”
Phantom shifts closer to him, hesitant in a way that Duke has never seen before in him, and asks, “Want me to stay with you until you mind quiets down some?”
“Yeah. I’d like that. Thanks, Phantom.”
“You know, if I’m going to be around so often as Chelsea’s halfa mentor, then you might as well call me Danny.”
Truth be told, Duke didn’t think that was his real name. He’s glad to know it’s not.
“Then call me Duke.”
“...Are you sure? You could still hide your identity from me.”
“Nah, I trust you. A name for a name, yeah?”
Danny smiles. “Duke,” he says, testing out the name, and it’s never sounded better than when it falls from Danny’s mouth.
“Danny,” Duke returns. He belatedly realizes that they’ve leaned towards each other, drawn together like gravity, stuck in each other’s orbit. It feels natural. It feels like this is where they’re meant to be.
Maybe he should be more cautious. They’ve only meant once before, after all. But he’s read all he could on Phantom and has seen how Amity Park loves him. He’s stressed and exhausted and trying to figure out how to look after a half-ghost child that’s already been dealt a bad hand in life. He should be keeping Phantom at a distance, watching over him carefully to ensure he isn’t a threat to Chelsea.
But Duke saw how he acted with Chelsea, so gentle and understanding and kind. That’s all he needed to see.
He may not know much about Danny, but he knows this: he is trustworthy.
Enough to entrust his identity to him.
Enough to entrust Chelsea to him.
It’s more than a favor; it’s a promise to walk this road together.
There’s no one he’d rather do this with.
“Thanks,” he says again, “For all of this. I know it’s a lot.”
Danny shrugs. “I don’t mind. Really. It’s nice to know there’s another halfa out there, no matter how she came to be one. Makes things feel less lonely.”
“Will you tell me more about halfas?”
“Later. Once you get some proper rest. We’ve got time, haven’t we?”
“We do,” Duke agrees, affection settling warm in his chest. “We’ve got plenty of time.”
Learning how to control her new powers won’t be easy for Chelsea. Learning how to take care of her won’t be easy. Learning how to do things together, as Duke and Danny rather than the Signal and Phantom, won’t be easy. But Duke knows with a certainty he feels in his bones that they’re going to be fine.
So long as they’ve got each other, they’ll be fine.
#ghostlights#dc x dp#dp x dc#dcxdp#dpxdc#dc x dp fic#prompt fill#my writing#thought a lot abt what the favor could be but i could not resist the idea of surprise co-parents once i thought of it#here's a kid who clings to someone she knows is safe bc she is scared and alone!!#heres a stressed out hero trying to take care of a kid with no knowledge of how to do that!! and the kid is a ghost!!#heres a ghost king expecting to be used as a weapon and called in for a big battle suddenly finding another halfa!!!#so much going on here. so much to think abt with this!!!!!#i do love found family like this where they all kinda stumble into it and do their best to make it good#also could not resist making yet another oc. chelsea has my whole heart i love her <3 shes my daughter first#the bats dont know abt chelsea yet!! bc she can go invisble. its all been instinct every time they pop over to visit duke#soon she'll be able to control it and meet them properly#by properly i mean dukes gonna go over for sunday brunch and a little girl is gonna pop out from behind him like 'hi! im new!'#they will all love her of course. they will be shocked but happy!!#and a little less happy abt the GHOST KING duke has been hiding in his apartment that hes co-parenting with#sorry for the long tags im obsessed w this idea i want to Expand on it#maybe one day... with my other wips out of the way...
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:D
#okaaaay so.... im sorry about the watermarks- from what ive read this is best practice for protecting your art from ai#though i worry it wont help at all. i just want to try#ive never cared about people reposting my art but the ai stuff makes my skin crawl#anyway if for some reason you want the version without a watermark just tell me and i can email it to you i dont care who has it#knd#kids next door#my art#I JUST WORRY THE WATERMARKS ARE STILL NOT BLOCKING ENOUGH like i worry theyre too light. but i hate using them
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