#present darkness

[starry-bi-sky]

I am loudly pushing the batdad agenda i am loudly pushing the— DPxDC Prompt

“Woah. You look like shit."

Granted, that’s probably not the first thing Danny should be saying to the guy that just bit the curb, but in his defense; he’s not running on 100% right now either.

The man -- tall, towering, and broader than Danny is tall -- whips around on his heel, black frayed cape flaring out impressively. Danny would've whistled in appreciation, but he takes the time instead to wipe the back of his hand across his mouth, smearing the blood running from his nose across his cheek.

"Sorry." He blinks widely, not even flinching as the man with the horns zeroes in on him. "That was rude of me. I have a really bad brain-to-mouth filter; Sam says its what always gets me into trouble."

And she's not wrong either, per say. His smart mouth is what landed him in this situation -- with blood blossom extract running through his veins and cannibalizing the ectoplasm in his bloodstream. Thanks Vlad.

The man grunts at him; a short, curt "hm" that shouldn't make Danny smile, but he does because he's somewhat delirious and probably concussed. The man keeps some kind of distance, sinking towards the shadows of Gotham's alleyway like he dares to melt right into it.

If it's supposed to scare Danny, it doesn't work. Danny's never been afraid of the dark; he's always been able to hide himself in it. He blinks slowly at the mass of shadows.

"You look hurt." The shadows says, blurring together around the edges. Danny squints, and licks his lips to get the blood dripping down his chin off. Ugh, he hates the taste of blood.

"I am." He says, "My godfather poisoned me. M'dying." The agony of the blood blossom eating him from the inside out looped back around to numbing a while ago, so all he feels is half-awake and dazed.

"Hey," Danny stumbles forward towards the man, a bloodied hand reaching out to him. "You-- you're a hero, right? You're not attacking me; which is more than I can say for most costumed people I've met." Maybe it's a poor bar to judge someone at, but he's already established that Danny's not in his right mind.

The man makes no change in expression, but Danny realizes blearily that it's hard to tell with the shadows on his face. He stays still long enough for Danny to latch onto the cape -- stretchy, but almost soft under his fingers.

He looks up blearily into the whites of the man's eyes. "Can you help me? I don't-- I don't wanna die." Again. He doesn't wanna die again. He blinks slow and lizard-like. "I mean- I'll probably get to see mom and dad again, but I told them I'd at least try and make it to adulthood."

There's a clatter down the street, and Danny's ghost sense chills up his spine and leaves a bitter, ashy taste in his mouth. He immediately knows who it belongs to even before the deceptively gentle; "Daniel?" echoes down the way.

"Daniel? Quit your games, badger, Gotham is dangerous for children."

Danny's mouth pulls back, and blood spills against his tongue. "Please." He rasps, and grabs onto the shadow's cape with both hands. "Please. He's going to kill me. Please--"

"Daniel? Is that you?"

His lips part, dragging in air to plead with the darkness again. He doesn't need to, the whites of his eyes narrow, and the cape whirls around him before Danny can blink. Soon swaddled in shadows, the Night lifts him up, and steals him away.

[thenewgirl76]

Taking advantage of Constantine's tendency to zone out during debriefings, Danny sneaks up on him from behind while invisible and goes eldritch abomination before becoming visible.

Danny: JOHN CONSTANTINE! I'VE COME FOR YOUR PITIFUL SOUL!

Constantine: BLOODY HELL!

*magic blasts Danny, knocking him to the floor and causing him to revert to his normal ghost form*

Constantine: You miserable little brat! I told you to cut that shite out!

*lying on the floor wheezing in both pain and laughter*

Danny: I regret nothing

The rest of the JL and JLD members either snicker in amusement or shake their head in disappointment.

[rugwurm]

smells like hell

[iphigeniacomplex]

it’s very easy to tell the good satires and pastiches from the bad ones because the bad ones are too afraid to live within the form. like if you are doing work with fairy tales and you are refusing to look closer at the underlying logic and unspoken rules of what can seem at first to be a senseless form, you are not going to create meaningful work. to borrow a turn of phrase originally used by maria tatar, if you refuse to enter “the house of fairy tale” as anything more than a gawking tourist, you will miss the particular order to the way the table is set, the rooms that are locked vs the rooms that are simply difficult to enter, the set of the floorboards and the position of the furniture. whatever you build will then be a gilded imitation of how you believe the house of fairy tale ought to look, the table set according to your educated specifications and every door open. there can be no interrogation of themes from a writer who views the form as beneath them!

[thevoidstaredback]

Barry knew something was wrong when he woke up that morning, but he couldn't place what. There was nothing wrong in the house, nor with his family. His team were as normal as they could be, and none of his rogues had gotten out, nor was anyone causing any trouble in Central City. Then, just as he'd gotten off work at the police station, an emergency meeting for the Justice League was called. Ugh, David's gonna be pissed that he has to call out again!

The Watchtower, when he got there, was a mess. Heroes were obviously panicking, and there must be magic users on board because there were things flying every which way. The meeting room, however, was somehow worse.

"What the hell is going on?" The Flash demanded after ducking behind a chair.

"Constantine and Deadman are on a warpath!" Aquaman helpfully supplied from where he was hidden behind his own chair.

"I gathered that much," Flash shouted over the noise of a chair being shattered against the wall behind him.

Aquaman scowled at him. "The hell do you want me to say? I don't know what's got them so upset!

The door opened again, announcing Batman's presence. He cleared his throat and the room instantly fell silent. Things kept flying around, but they were much more lax than they had been. Cautiously, the gathered heroes emerged from their makeshift hiding places to sit in their chairs.

"What's this about, Constantine?" the Dark Knight asked once everyone was seated.

Instead of the Brit, the ghost beside him was the one to answer. "You idiots-" he growled, "-have really fucked up this time!" he shouted.

Flash idly noticed that only the heroes operating in America were present. Huh. He had a dream just like this last night!

Or was it the night before?

"Slow down," Wonder Woman said. The Flash quietly joined her for her next line, "What's going on?"

The Flash continued to speak with Constantine, his voice quiet and simultaneous with the magic user's, "The US Government are more aware than any of us-" Flash's voice got louder as he spoke with the occultist. Aquaman side-eyed him. "-are comfortable with. The fact that they hid it 'til now is baffling."

"Flash?" Aquaman muttered to him, "Are you okay?"

Flash shook his head and continued speaking in tandem with Deadman, his eyes going wide. "It's been brought to my attention that your government has been targeting my people." The ghost was now looking at Flash, too.

Flash finished for him, "They've taken a child."

Ulike his dream, the room was silent. Everyone's eyes were on The Flash.

"Flash?" Superman asked, "What's going on?"

"Time Loop."

Several tense seconds that Flash knew they couldn't afford to waste passed. Batman said, "Time loop?"

Flash nodded. "Time Loop."

"What do you know?" Wonder Woman asked.

"The government took a child. We need to get to Amity Park, Illinois and get a handle on the-" he looked to Deadman, "-ghosts?" When Deadman nodded, he continued, "Ghosts and see if we can get any information out of them."

Zatanna entered the room then, just as Barry remembered she would, turning the projector on and joining Constantine and Deadman at the front of the room. She didn't start speaking, though. Instead, it was Constantine.

"Phantom's a small time hero in Amity Park. For a while, he was the only thing standing between an interdimensional war." He looked The Flash in the eye, "How many loops is this?"

If Zatanna was surprised about the whole time loop revelation, she hid it well.

Flash shook his head. "Two, I think."

Batman took over the conversation from there, Robin at his side, probably communicating with his own team. "Flash and Superman, you need to check everywhere for Phantom; keep your comms on and open. Zatanna, Constantine, and Deadman, I want all the information you have yesterday. Everyone else, set up a perimeter ten miles out from Amity Park-"

Deadman froze, just as Barry knew he would, and disappeared. Zatanna's and Constantine's phones both started ringing. Then, the alarm started to blare.

"Robin," Batman continued through the noise of the heroes jumping into action, "What do you have for me?"

"Amity Park, Illinois," the young vigilante stated, reading the information off of his wrist computer's holo-screen and relaying it as quickly and coherently as he could, "It boasts to be the most haunted place in America. It's a hot spot for ghost hunters, though other supernatural 'experts' frequent there. Other than that, there's a firewall completely blocking off information coming out of the town. I don't think it's a stretch to say that there's limited, or at least filtered, information going into the town."

"Hm." Batman tapped his comm, "Cyborg, get me all the information about this town as you can."

"Got it."

"Robin,"

"On it, B."

"Hn."

***

Barbra was having a pretty normal day. She'd had a pretty good day at school, finished all her homework, and had even gotten to spend some time with her dad! Then, just as she was ready to go out as Batgirl, Batman called her.

Normally, Batman calling her isn't a cause for alarm. However, she knew for a fact that he was with the Justice League today. It was why she was getting ready to go out so early!

Ghosts, as it turns out, are elusive. Whether it's purposeful or not, it doesn't matter. What does matter is why the hell Batman, who hates dealing with anything supernatural, needs her to find information on ghosts of all beings!

She really wants to know what goes on in that man's head.

Actually, no, she really doesn't.

"Hey, Dickie," she greeted.

"Hey, Barbie," there was a smile in his voice, "What's up?"

Right the the chase. "B's acting weird."

A goran. "What'd he do this time?"

The hostility when talking about Bruce was not lost to her. "He's got me looking into ghosts. Any idea why?"

"Ghosts? He's with the JL today. Wally said there was an emergency meeting called about an hour ago."

"That's what I thought! But he just called and has me looking into ghosts. You think there's a correlation there?"

A sigh. "Most likely. Why doesn't he just ask the JLD? You've got more important things to be doing than doing research for him."

"Aw," she cooed exaggeratedly, "You do care!" She could practically hear his eyes rolling on the other end of the line. "Anyay, while I've got you here, are you gonna be coming to Gotham any time soon? I haven't seen you in a while."

Dick was quiet for a moment, the small chime of an incoming call making him groan in frustration. "Probably a lot sooner than I would like."

"Oh?"

"Bruce's calling. I'll let ya know what he says."

"Got it. Good luck, D."

"I'll need it." he scoffed, hanging up.

What a mess.

Part 6 Part 8

[goodomensafterdark]

Writers Guild Presents - Tethered - Ch 7 - Memories

Big thank you to @gleafer for accepting to let me use this piece as illustration to this chapter! Go support her on Patreon -we promise that your loins will catch on FIRE ;)

Written by NegotiationReal6508 on our subreddit!

Chapter 7 of work in progress

TW/CW: Angst, Discussion of attempted suicide, implied character death, panic attack, some light smut.

Summary:

Crowley wakes up in a mental hospital with no memory of how he got there. Without his demonic powers, neither the doctors, nor the people who claim to be his family will believe he is who he says he is. With the evidence against him mounting, his only lifeline to the real world is a cryptic note left by an unseen messenger. The longer he stays in this hospital, the harder it becomes to recall for sure, is Crowley really a demon of Hell? Or has his entire existence been nothing more than a delusion conjured by a grieving mind?

Excerpt:

Crowley stood in a noisy airport at the arrivals gate holding a bouquet of red roses, fidgeting nervously. All of his usual laidback swagger was buried under a blanket of anxiety, his spine was a solid metal rod. He was always a little bouncy when Aziraphale came to visit, but this time was different. Crowley hopped his feet up and down like the floor was burning hot sand. He juggled the little box in his jacket pocket as he stared at the sliding glass doors, willing the familiar head of blond hair to appear through them. Were the roses too cliché? Maybe he should have gotten the peonies instead. Too late now.

“There, I see him.” Crowley turned to the young man beside him. “Are you recording?”

“Yeah, it's on,” said Adam.

“Right, here he comes.” Crowley shook out his shoulders and trilled his lips. He knew he looked ridiculous, but it was an airport; no one ever looked their best at an airport. He moved towards the beacon that was Aziraphale’s gleaming smile. His heart thudded like hoofbeats in his chest. Breathe, he reminded himself. Breathing and walking, those were the two main requirements at the moment. He had no idea what his facial expression was, he just hoped he was smiling too. God, Aziraphale was so gorgeous, even after eight hours on a plane. How was that even possible?

“Hello, my darling!” Aziraphale greeted him.

“Hi,” said Crowley, because that was about as eloquent as he could manage. He unceremoniously handed the bouquet to Aziraphale.

“Oh my!” Aziraphale chuckled. “Flowers? What's the occasion?”

And there was Crowley’s opening. Aziraphale was reaching out his arms for an embrace but Crowley needed to do what he came to do first. He bent down on one knee, and pulled the little box from his pocket.

Continue reading on AO3

Or start from chapter 1 - Dies Lunae

Special thanks to my beautiful betas: u/KotiasCamorra, u/Paperclip_Ninja

[the0verboss]

Gortash week Day 2- Worship/Betrayal

Gortash conducting worship, Durge commiting Betrayal

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Shout out to all artists who had to work without any strong direction or instruction.

I wish you a merry “the client likes it anyways”

[giddlygoat]

i have a vision. in my mind, luigi’s fit is a bit more maximalist, and no two leathers or denims match. he deserves more variety in his look.

[byjovewhataspend]

the students got too rowdy after curfew and erasermic had to come out and scold them

sort of the goth couple equivalent to that 'flowing sheer robes vs sleeping cap and nightgown' couple meme.

[jinbeshawaiianshirt]

day 7: HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABYGORL 🎂💙💙💙

[bullagit]

due to personal reasons i am now firmly on team “i hope aziraphale does change heaven for the better actually (going on the assumption that his return is as straightforward as it seemed etc” 

like if the alternative is just this ohhh he’s so NAIVE and SOFT and so WRONG and he’ll have to LEARN A TOUGH LESSON etc etc nonsense then yeah 1000% go for it babe knock it out of the park

i hope choosing hope and kindness pays dividends. i hope the soft traits that made other characters continually disparage and underestimate him and his intelligence turn out to be his greatest assets bc i kinda don’t give a shit about a “toughen up it’s the only way everyone else knows better” life lesson for this character

(which like honestly a lot of the rhetoric is dismissive of the fact that persistent goodness in the face of an existence of disparagement takes great strength and that at the end of the day aziraphale has always been able to stand up in his own way)

[gunsatthaphan]

03/09/1998 - happy birthday to the king, the legend, the light of my life (and the actor that he is) 🥺

~ ⋆˙⟡ ♡˙⟡ ✨🫶🏻💘🫳🏻🐈‍⬛🍊⋆˙⟡ ♡˙⟡ ~

[vivrhan]

　 yeah, 　my 　boyfriend’s 　pretty 　cool

but　　he’s　　not　　cool　　as　　me　　@fairytopea

[wolfythewitch]

what would an interaction between odysseus and your tma sona look like lmaoo

Jumping up and down on his raft to see if it capsizes :]

[thevoidstaredback]

Batman pulled up a world map as soon as the alarm started blaring. There was a red dot centered in Illinois, so that's where the map zoomed in.

"That's Amity Park!" Robin exclaimed.

Batman hummed. "Robin, contact Red Huntress and find out what's going on from her end." The boy nodded and left the room. "Constantine, Zatanna, figure out what's going on."

"Already on it, Batsy!" Constantine called in English before going back to his now four alternating conversations in Esperanto and Latin. Zatanna didn't even acknowledge the order.

"Everyone else," he continued as though he hadn't been interrupted, "set up a perimeter a few miles out from the town. Keep it in your line of vision, but don't get too close." He turned to look directly at The Flash. "I want you to run recon. Make sure this is the only place they're coming from. Once we find out their goal, that's what you'll be looking for."

"Aren't they looking for a child?" The Flash asked. He was ignored.

The heroes emptied the room swiftly, quick to ZETA as close as they could to the town before setting up a perimeter ten miles out. Close enough to see the town, but not close enough to cause any panic.

It was nearly twenty-five minutes later before Constantine and Zatanna joined them all. Though, they were both quick to make it known that the town was wholly aware that they were there.

Constantine went to join the hero's block-in, though he didn't stay in one place. He moved from hero to hero, keeping both eyes and one ear on Amity Park. If it was going to move, he would be aware of it only seconds before it did. He needed to be ready.

Zatanna pulled five of the American based heroes away from their posts to explain what she knew. It was barely any better than a recap from the meeting that they had vacated.

"Like we tried to explain earlier, they're looking for a child that the US Government took from them."

"The one from the pictures right?" Aquaman said, "Phantom??"

Zatanna nodded. "Yep. He's the town vigilante; Operating for several months longer than Red Huntress. From what Deadman told me and Constantine, Phantom is a baby ghost; he's only been dead for about a year." She ignored the various reactions. "He's also favored by several Ancient Beings."

"'Ancient Begins'?" Superman asked.

"Think Primordials,"

"Oh, dear," Wonder Woman muttered.

The magician continued, "Don't attack any of the R̶͎͔̿̅ḛ̴̗̦̯̭͇̰̎͑a̸̻̜̤̼͕͔̘̱̫̓ĺ̴͉̘̥͚̪̹́̈́͋̓͜m̶̬͇̅͑͌ṣ̷̨̺̜̣̮͔̤͕̃̍́͂ denizens under any circumstances. They're already going to be hostile towards us, we don't need to give them another reason to be."

"A bit late for that, don't ya think?" A new voice called, startling the heroes into falling into defensive stances.

It took several seconds to find the source. When they did, Batman asked, "Who are you?"

The being, female in appearance, was above and slightly to the left of the group. She looked to be in her late teens with teal-grey skin, a slight teal glow, and flaming teal hair tied in a high pony, bangs framing her face. Her eyes glowed the same radioactive green as Phantom's had in the picture, though less so. She was wearing black pants, a black crop-top, grey knee boots, and a single black elbow glove. There was a guitar strapped to her back that gave off a slight purple glow. Even from where the Justice League heroes were standing, they could feel heat radiating off of her.

"It doesn't matter who I am, does it?" the girl sneered down at them, "What matters is that you dickheads took on of ours, and we intend to get him back." She very obviously assessed the group, not hiding her distaste. "Phantom told me this world had other heroes." She lowered slightly, crossing her arms over her chest. "Where were you."

"Excuse me?" Green Lantern asked.

"Where were you?" she reiterated.

"I'm not quite sure what you mean."

"You're talking about the threats here, right?" Zatanna asked.

The being turned her full attention to the magician. "You knew?"

Zatanna nodded. "My colleagues and I have been keeping an eye on Amity Park since the rifts opened up last year."

The girl's eyes narrowed and she nodded at the five heroes. "These your colleagues?"

"Technically."

"I don't much like technicalities," she hummed. "You must be the one Deadman told us about."

"You know Deadman?" Green Lantern asked. He was ignored.

"Yeah?" Zatanna nodded.

"I'm Ember," she said after a moment, touching down in front of Zatanna. "Deadman convinced the Council to hold in Amity Park until the end of the day. The second the sun goes down, we act on our own."

"I'm Zatanna," she shook her hand, "We're going to find him."

Ember glared, her grip tightening. "You better. He's done more for your world than any of you could ever acknowledge." She turned her glare on the five heroes before flying back up. "And once he's back with us, where he belongs, we'll think about calling a ceasefire." She left before another word could be said.

Zatanna fell into a crouch, her hands covering her face. "This is a nightmare," she whispered before popping back to her full height. "That could've gone better."

"It also could've gone worse." Aquaman tried to console. It didnt work.

"Well, you heard her, we have less than twelve hours to find the kid before the R̶͎͔̿̅ḛ̴̗̦̯̭͇̰̎͑a̸̻̜̤̼͕͔̘̱̫̓ĺ̴͉̘̥͚̪̹́̈́͋̓͜m̶̬͇̅͑͌ṣ̷̨̺̜̣̮͔̤͕̃̍́͂ denizens set themselves loose."

The group shared a loo, quickly moving to pass on the word to everyone else. Off to the side, Superman was relaying to The Flash.

***

Barry had worked on time limits before. Hel, he was usually pretty good at meeting them ever since he got his powers! What he wasn't great at was working under huge amounts of pressure.

He had to cover the entire United States in less than twelve hours. Easy, done. Adding on every out-of-country US Base around the world? Slightly less easy, but still very doable. Looking for a child in what was probably a secret, undocumented, or at least heavily covered, US Base is a bit harder, especially undetected.

Normally, the Justice League would have no problems with making their opinions on matters known, but this was a delicate matter. Even more delicate than the Metahuman Rights Act and Diplomatic Missions to other worlds. This was an issue they'd not been previously aware of, and the dimension that it most affected was now very close to decaring war.

No pressure.

He'd already cleared all of the known Government Bases along the East Coast and was steadily moving inland. Superman, upon Zatanna's and Constantine's advisement, was being productive away from Amity Park. With The Flash covering the US and Superman literally everywhere else, they had hopes of finding the child within the next few hours. The problems were going to start anew after that.

Batman was already working on several extraction plans based off of the blueprints for every US Gov. Base he has access to- don't ask. But, without knowing the actual building's layout, guard posts, shifts, security, whereabouts, etc., no one could make a concrete plan.

There were too many unknowns and it was upsetting everyone.

Robin had managed to get ahold of both his team, readying them for evacuation, and Red Huntress. Apparently, there was nothing she could do. She'd tried to capture the ghosts - as she'd called them - but they'd quickly overwhelmed her. Everyone was locked in their homes until further notice. Luckily, the ghosts seemed content to them the humans alone as long as they stayed out of the way.

There was now five hours until the sun set in Illinois, and Barry had only just cleared the Midwest.

Nothing. Not a single hint as to where they were keeping this child! They had the two fastest heroes out looking for him, the had pictures of what he looked like! By all means, they should have found him already! And yet, they were still empty handed.

The people of Amity Park were getting restless. The ghosts that had taken over Amity Park were getting restless. The Justice League were getting restless.

Constantine and Zatanna had declared that the town would likely not be moving any time soon, not that anyone even knew what the meant. They'd still be keeping an eye and ear on the town, but it no longer had most of their focus. Instead, they were trying to get ahold of Deadman with little success. If they didn't reach them soon, one of them would have to go into the town proper and talk to the ghosts. No one was very excited for that.

Minutes before the sunset in Illinois, Robin received an emergency call from Red Huntress. One that everyone was patched into.

A boy was missing from his house. Daniel Fenton, son of the town's resident Ghost Hunters, hadn't been accounted for.

The sun set over Amity Park Illinois.

Part 3 Part 5