Jason *struggling Not To Laugh*: Bruce. You Aren’t Gonna Believe What I Just Did.

desperate for a tv show filmed like modern family or the kardashians of the batfam, titled “watch out for the waynes” or something like that.

bruce signed for the limited series to keep up appearances.

dick acts like a love island contestant.

damian is only ever in the corner of shots, staring into the soul of the cameraman.

cass, similarly, does not contribute much, but looks to the camera like she’s in modern family whenever shit happens.

tim finds every way to be the last laugh, the one-liner guy, the “unexpected, effortless, fan favourite™️”.

duke frequents the interview room.

jason sends subtextual messages to the audience through the books he’s seen reading in a scene:

bruce and tim are having a tiff about who’s idea is better while jason’s reading “the metamorphoses - book iii 339-358” (narcissus).

everyone’s having a grand old time at a gala while jason’s at a table reading “vile bodies”.

damian’s in a mood and nobody’s picked up on it yet while jason is seen reading “american psycho”.

nobody can find steph and tim and jason’s sat literally reading the back of a “dazed and confused” dvd to get his point across.

I love the headcanon that none of the Bats are supers, but over time? Gotham is slowly messing them up, one by one.

Bruce smiles at Clark one day in the Cave, and his eyes reflect the light back like a wolf's

Jason suddenly has tiny fangs, but nobody has the nerve to mention it

Alfred literally doesn't die

Dick can jump higher and faster than ever before, but barely notices it

Tim is awake for three days straight and doesn't blink

They're all subtly, but noticeably different. Gotham-blessed, or cursed, or something in between.

Dick: Hey guys what’s up?

Damian: Silence! this is a debate I intend to win.

Dick: huh?

Jason *eating popcorn* : You’re gonna wanna see this

Tim: BY FAR IT IS ONLY LOGICAL TO ASSUME-

Steph: LOGIC HAS NO PART YOU’RE JUST BIASED

Jason: They’re fighting over who was the loosest cannon Robin which caused the most chaos

Dick:

Dick *reaches for popcorn*

Jason *slaps his hand* : Nuh-uh Goldie only the one with the title of MOST CHAOTIC ROBIN gets to eat popcorn

Tim: YOU ARE A LITERAL ASSASSIN WHOS TRIED TO MURDER SEVERAL PEOPLE

Damian: REMIND ME OF YOUR BODYCOUNT?!

Dick: what now-

Drake: THAT WAS BARELY ANY AS ROBIN

Steph: Dudes I was literally Robin to piss off my dad and became friends with poison ivy and Harley

Jason: You’re all just competing for second place

Dick: .. wait what about me?

Everyone *stops and stares*

Damian: Nightwing, this is serious

Tim: Yeah dude I remember your reputation as Robin and you haven’t changed

Batman: .. are you all done with the bust?

Steph: BATSY! Just who we want to see! So.. tell us, who was the most chaotic robin ever

Batman *without hesitation* : Nightwing

Penguin *tied up after the bust* : Yeah it was blue

Damian:

Tim:

Steph:

Jason:

Dick *steals popcorn* : Y’all better start putting respect on my damn name

What do you mean the latest villain in Nightwing’s solo was in the audience the night Dick’s parents died? Is there anyone in the DC’s universe that was NOT at this show?

Mariette: And, in the end we're all human beans.

Tim: And together we will rice.

Jason: Lettuce pray.

Marinette: Ramen.

Dick: *wiping away his tears while clapping* That was beautiful!

Damian: What did I just witness?

Oh, I love this an inordinate amount.

This guy covers children's songs in the style of various artists, and he's incredible.

I'm weirdly emotional about it?

Harmonies of the Multiverse

THEME

When Jupiter collides with autumn, a single moment is born between two entities. Equal harmonies with balance, dancing along a fine line of too far and too near, of brightest and dimmest, of perfect alignment. People say that on an equinox, the sky divides into two parts, golden light and silver darkness.

For Damian Wayne, it meant heading to the rooftop instead of sleeping peacefully in his bed, staring at the sky, but not seeing anything. His eyes would remain blank as they stared up at the twinkling stars almost covered by the rancid smog. He learned at too young of an age that life was not about myths and fairytales, but of monsters in the form of flesh and bone which held their smiles on their face and their daggers in your back.

The equinox meant facing the demons of his past.

He always knew he was never the best person. He wouldn't ever be as selfless as Dick, he wouldn't be as level-headed as Tim, or even as passionate as Jason. He wouldn't have his father's ingrained need to help the dying cesspool they lived in, and he would never have Alfred's heaven-bound level of patience. There would always be that selfish, rash, cold-hearted, narcissistic, impatient prince lying inside of him, waiting to rear its foul head. It surfaced every second he held a blade in his hand, at every mob member terrorizing innocents and criminals alike, every abuser, every villain. A voice inside him purred to rid the world of their filth, of their moral grime. And every single time, it grew louder and louder and louder and louder.

Each time a criminal escaped through his grasp was another chip in his fortitude.

Each time an innocent civilian broke a smile at him, only to die minutes later from an explosion was a stab in the wall between morally good and vengeance.

For every stabbing heart, for every gutless cry of a mother who lost their child.

Wouldn't it be so much easier to erase them before they could commit such barbarisms?

The cold kissed his cheeks, so much like a viper's poison, and he shook his head, banishing the thought from his mind. Ah, she's still inside my head.

Maybe symphonies are built on a beautiful melody. However, the melody would never work if they worked on different concepts. The one his father blasted into his mind was a righteous march, darker in tone than most melodies, but an overarching victory for Good reigned. It taught him patience, morals, ethics, light against darkness.

But, his mother taught him the cellist's devil nature. The darker tones, the echoing, vibrating puppet master giving the audience the illusion that the melody is in control, but in reality, all the melody can do is fall victim to the villainous, tragic whirlpool of misery, murder, and fascist brutality. She placed the blade in his hand, had him earn her love through feats of glorious atrocities, built him up from the ground up into the perfect weapon, too jagged and unpredictable to be used for Good, but whittled down, rusted and corrupted for far too long to be remolded into something useful.

Now, he didn't know where he belonged. Did his melody rise above the dark cello nurtured in him? Or will the melody drown under the alluring, tempest bass driven through his heart, buried deeper than the center of the Earth?

The wind, maybe sensing his demise, could do nothing but blow harder to calm his feverish head filled with questions he could not answer. The somber cold stung the sweet chapped lips all too used to the desert's ice and fire of his childhood, but it stung more bitterly as the North Atlantic ocean blew in the new change in season. Gotham was an outlier. A ghost town of improbabilities and plausibility all clashed together to create a cesspool of madness, hate, and impossibilities.

He wondered why his father, or his ancestors before him, would ever want to stay in a city like this for the rest of their rich, detached lives. Why they would ever choose to spend their lives in this miserable landfill, giving what they have to make the ever-draining city a better place. Why they gaze at the buildings and streets with fond gazes. Why they find it so easy to smile at a Gotham native without feeling like they will get a knife's edge poking their sternum the moment they show their backs.

Squeezing his eyes shut, he cursed God that he was not given this ingrained sense of belonging and mercy to Gotham like all of his family before him.

Pages rustled on in the breeze, and, by miraculous luck, the cover tipped open. Blue light shone through the darkness beyond his closed eyelids, but he did not notice beyond the salty river squeezing through the crevice.

"S'il te plaît, ne me dis pas que tu pleures." Please, don't tell me you're crying. Soft French carried over the quiet din. "I never know what to do when you are crying."

He pried his eyes open, and a vision filled his eyes. A girl, no older than he was, but with a more youthful smile cracked in sorrow, dressed in a midnight blue evening gown glowing in the darkness, blowing in the wind to its own rhythm as it reflected the stars ten times brighter than Gotham Fair's lights. She floated over the torn book of ancient Tibetan magic he brought with him that night, just like he did every solstice, her legs crossed underneath her in an informal squat. Cheeks blossomed like dusky luminescent wisteria, and constellations made of stars brighter than Rigel lost across the bridge of her nose. Her blue crown of hair burned a halo around her, framing bluebell eyes that looked older than a thousand of his lifetimes staring deep into his own green eyes.

The only word he could say was, "Marinette."

Her grin made his heart's symphony subito pianissimo. "Hi, Damian. Happy Autumn Solstice."

================

not me wanting to make this a full fic ;v; (hence the chapter title "theme")

for @jumpingjoy82 for the maribat gift exchange 2022 (i posted on time on archive, just not on tumblr ;v;)

The first time Damian calls Tim his brother is when Tim is beating his ass at Mario Party and after Tim steals yet another star Damian throws his controller down and yells, "I am your BABY BROTHER!"

Jason: 'You'll never find the body' is such a boring threat. A better threat would be; 'You'll never stop finding the body.'

Tim, bored: Or just say, 'They'll be finding parts of you for at least four months...and you'll still be alive for three of them.'

Jason: Now that's a threat!

Dick, covering Damians ears: *horrified silence*

Damian, to himself as he paces around his room, trying to put his feelings into words: Marinette is a work of art. Specifically, a stained glass work of art. Because when the sun hits her she lights up a room in all of her beauty and I fall in love all over again.

Dick, Jason, and Tim eavesdropping on him: Holy. Shit.