Failed Rogue Danny

A dead man walking.

Danny being half dead he obviously looks like a corpse. Pale grey-ish skin, no life behind his eyes, it's an inconvenience at best. Everyone he meets tells him he looks like a walking corpse. And then he moves to Metropolis, everyone looked at him like he was a zombie. Some people asking him if he was okay and some even calling an ambulance.

Danny was on a field trip to the daily planet and he meets the tour guide Clark Kent. He shows the kids and teenagers around the building and Danny (not wanting to be there pretended to pass out) jazz (jazz tagged along) was freaking out. Clark listened in on his heartbeat and heard dead silence he started panicking so when jazz yelled "CLEAR" and Danny suddenly jolted awake it shocked him... he still couldn't hear his heart beat.

(time skip a few weeks later) Clark is still in shock and awe at what he saw and heard that day. He got the kids name... Danny Fenton.

(TO BE CONTINUED)

(im bad at writing ik this is my first time EVER writing a story)

Surprise! Your brother is alive!

While Tim was working with the Ra's and the League of Assassins he learned that Damian had a twin that went missing a few years before Damian came to Gotham. This is information he took a mental note of for later as he was more concerned with find Bruce at the time.

It's something he honestly forgets about though, and it isn't until months had passed after the time stream incident that he even recounted it. When he does Tim decides that maybe finding out what happened to Damian's twin would help mend their own relationship.

Thinking that maybe the reason Damian is so angry is because he never got to properly bury his, at the time, assumed dead brother. Only Tim doesn't find something that needs to be buried; he finds Danny Fenton.

Now Tim knows that he should probably go and inform Damian and Bruce that their brother and son respectively is alive. But that would ruin the surprise reveal he was already planning out in his head so he doesn't do that. Instead, Tim travels to Amity Park with one goal in mind: Convince Danny to come back to Gotham with him.

Subject: Danny Fenton

Oracle opens Danny Fenton's personal files finding a list information. Including a list of people:

Jack and Maddie Fenton- parents

Jazz Fenton-sister

Vlad masters- #1 enemy/baby daddy

Dani- daughter

The family is quite concerned about the seemingly normal boy they have just met at the gala.

Bruce is holding himself back from attempting to adopt the kid

He broke through to the surface, taking large desperate gasps of air before getting sucked back beneath by the current. Danny fought against the water as hard as his little paws would allow.

Just when he felt all hope was lost and he was sinking, a large hand enveloped his entire body and hefted him back into the open air. Shivering and coughing out water he didn't catch whatever the man had said. He continued shivering violently as the guy wrung out Dannys fur.

The mans hands were warm despite the brown leather gloves covering them. They made Danny feel comforted and energized almost as if the man had...oh gods! He did! The man had ecto inside of him! Thank the ancients! Now he just had to stick with glove guy and he could recharge! It would be slow but still!

"Here we are little guy." The man said and Danny noticed all at once that the man had been walking the whole time Danny had been stuck in his head. He looked around and noticed the Animal Shelter sign in front of them.

No. No! Danny needed to stick to this guy if he ever hoped to become a human again. But despite how he dug his claws into the flesh of the mans exposed arm and yowled the man in the red mask managed to get him lose and left him in the care of an animal social worker.

Danny was checked out and placed in the tiny jail cell alongside other kittens and cats, many who were scared, miserable or just desperate for love and attention. This of course meant he needed to plot a jail break. Fortunately, he could still used most of his powers but without any ecto around he would have no way to recharge them outside of food or indulging in his obsession.

Needless to say Jason was a little startled when he woke up the next day to not one, but five little kittens meowing at him for food. He swears the one sitting smugly on his chest is the same one he dropped off at the animal shelter yesterday, but that couldn't be right...

One call confirmed it. All of thier animals had escaped last night and there was a suspiciously animal sized arch taken out of the wall with an unknown tool. Demon brat would be delighted at the news.

Unfortunately for Hood the smug little black cat he rescued yesterday had decided that his shoulder was the perfect perch and stayed there more often than not. Little guy got into food often but refused to eat kibble and any attempt to get the kitten away from the mashed potatoes resulted in violence or density shifting to get back to the food.

At this point danny almost didn't care if he returned to being human so long as he got to eat more of his humans cooking. He swears Jason is magical because everything he makes tastes amazing

I'm who you failed au

Danny moves to Gotham and decides to be low key about heroing. Sticks to the background, doesn't tell people his moniker.

Danny runs across Batman one day, and Batman asks who he is. Batman has already done his research, consulted the right people, and knows this new guy is a ghost. A spirit.

And Danny, fresh from a night patrol and listening to Sam chatter on and on about Edgar Allen Poe in his comm all night, suffers what is commonly known as a brain malfunction. A brain fart, if you will.

So he goes completely still, unnaturally so, and stares eerily at Batman. Now realistically, he's mentally screaming into the void that is his thoughts.

"I'm all that remains of your biggest mistake."

And then Danny turns invisible out of sheer embarrassment and nopes out.

Meanwhile, Bruce is now convinced his city is being haunted by the ghost of a victim he couldn't save.

Damian Wayne vs the World

Sixteen year old Damian Wayne is on the hunt for a younger sibling. Being more discerning than Bruce 'child collector' Wayne, Damian's firm criteria for Batman's latest adoption problem includes but is not limited to: black haired, blue-eyed, tolerable humor, not evil, and most importantly - younger than Damian.

Lucky for him, fourteen year old newbie vigilante Danny Fenton is the perfect fit. Now, to fulfill his end of their deal, Damian must defeat the evil government organization hunting Danny in order to gain a baby brother.

Or, @livinghalfway your post made my brain go !! but in such a different way I figured it was better to make a separate post, hope you don't mind/enjoy still

~~

Damian Wayne re-entered Tim Drake's life like a gnat revealing itself in a closed bedroom space. Tim was in t-shirt and a boxers, maneuvering ramen into his mouth with one hand and scribbling out an epiphany on a murder case with another, when Damian's demonic dulcet voice echoed down from the ceiling. "Drake," said Damian, judgemental, "You live like this?"

Tim nearly choked on his ramen, because the day Damian doesn't attempt to murder him - however doubtfully accidental this incident might be - is the day Darkseid decides to be friends with the Justice League. "Fucking knock," Tim coughed out. "And get out. No one invited you in."

"Put better traps if you don't want me here," said Damian, dropping from the ceiling where he'd crawled in on wall-clamps.

"This is my apartment," said Tim. "It's called courtesy."

Damian sniffed. He padded around to Tim's desk and frowns at his cases, then said, with no further lead up, "I need your assistance."

"No," said Tim.

"You did not even listen to my request."

"Don't need to," said Tim. "Answer's still no. Door is that way. Bye."

"Father says mutually assisting each other is beneficial," said Damian.

"Father," said Tim sarcastically, "blamed me for you exploding a glitter bomb in the batcave two weeks ago."

"That is your fault for not being able to provide evidence to the contrary in an appropriately efficient manner," said Damian. He squinted down at Tim. "And he apologized. Eventually."

"I would not have glittered the batcomputer," said Tim. "Do you know how much of a pain in the ass it is to backup those servers? No, because you don't like tech work, you just profit off it."

"Blaming me for Father's mistake," said Damian, "Most mature of you. But we must put our differences aside. I have selected a new family member and I need you to dismantle a government organization."

That drew Tim up short. He blinked down at his ramen as though it might explain Damian's words to him, but the ramen remained disappointingly uninformative. "Repeat that," said Tim, gesturing with his chopsticks. "Slower, and with more detail."

Damian pulled out his phone and sent him an email. Silence surrounded them in the brief moment it took Tim to set aside his chopsticks and open the email. The subject line was titled 'New Baby Brother', which birthed all sorts of horrifying nightmares of Damian Part 2: Demon Child Boogaloo. The teen in the inserted picture, however, was reassuringly not in possession of Damian's bone structure.

He did have black hair and blue eyes. "Who am I looking at?" asked Tim.

"Daniel Fenton," said Damian. "He is fourteen years old, enjoys puns, and has recently awakened 'ghost powers' that allow him to transform into the vigilante Phantom to fight other ghosts."

"Is he also an orphan with a tragic backstory?"

"No," said Damian, and Tim relaxed. "But that will not be an issue. We can share custody if they cannot be removed from the picture."

"Jesus H, kid."

"I am joking, of course," said Damian blandly. "Murder is wrong."

"Ha ha," said Tim. "If he has parents already he's not joining our menagerie."

"He will," said Damian, with a smug upwards tilt of his lips. "He and I have a deal."

"So you're coercing him in addition to stalking him. Anything else you want to share with the class?"

Damian considered this query with a serious frown, which was how Tim knew this was not a flight of fancy or a very early midlife crisis (although with their lifestyle and Damian already having died before...).

"He has," said Damian after a moment, "a rogue that calls himself 'The Master of all Technology' and is a technopath." This was clearly meant to be of interest to Tim, and not to be a stereotype, but it kind of was.

"Great." Tim turned his attention back to the email the demon child sent him. He scanned through it quickly. There was apparently a secret and evil government organization dedicated to the investigation and extermination of 'ghosts' and other paranormal creatures in the world. Their latest efforts were focused on the town of Amity Park, Illinois, which was 'infested with ectoplasmic pests'. Their words, not Damian's. (It was specified in the email.)

"Okay," Tim drummed his fingers against his desk. "Before I help you defeat this secret evil government organization so that," he opened the email attachment with a contract on it and squinted at the legalese, "this poor newbie teen you've harassed into signing this joins the family in exchange."

"I did not harass him," Damian huffed. "It was a gentleman's agreement."

"Does he know that?"

"I am not a politician, Drake. I thoroughly explained the terms and legalities before presenting any contract. Now ask your question."

"Why are you doing this?"

"Because," said Damian, tone implying 'you are stupid and haven't noticed something obvious, idiot'. "Father has begun saying he misses the noise around the manor and looking wistfully at old pictures."

"We still live there though?" said Tim. Damian looked flatly at him. "Sometimes."

"If you lived there frequently enough," said Damian, "you would already know Father is having...empty nest syndrome." Damian sounded disgusted. "I refuse to tolerate whatever inadequate and incompetent child he will find."

"So instead you found an incompetent and inadequate child for him?"

"Don't be stupid, Drake," said Damian. "I would not have chosen someone inadequate. Daniel is merely lacking formal training. Father can rectify this. It will keep him occupied for at least the next two to four years, which gives me enough time to find another black-haired, blue-eyed, tolerable child I approve of to be his successor and my second younger sibling." Damian paused. "Or until one of you procreates and gives him a grandchild."

"You're really serious about this," Tim whispered in horrified awe.

"I am serious about everything I do," said Damian. "Now, you will help me defeat this evil government organization so that our new sibling joins us."

"Okay," said Tim, but his mind snagged on a minor, throwaway detail, so utterly in odds with Damian 'Demonic Jealous Child' Al Ghul it surely came from another person - "Did you just call this kid your successor?"

Of all the problems Danny thought he'd have fleeing Amity to another universes version of Amity, called Goth Ham or something, he didn't think the first big one was gonna be a fricken clown. Yes he was technically, but not really, homeless, had no money, had no forms of identification and was by now considered legally dead by his home government, and non existent by this one. But he could handle those with relative ease. But a clown? To be honest he was surprised he hadn't run into a clown themed psychopath until now, well... if he didn't count Vlad.

Once upon a time Danny would have felt bad about stealing but he was over taking the moral high ground with such petty things. He was only half dead, he needed to eat. And he thought he'd done enough good deeds in his short life to be allowed to just take what he needed without money. Besides he was never caught on camera or by security systems, they always 'mysteriously' shorted out. No one ever got hurt cause he just went after closing. And he never targeted small mom and pop operations, only large corporations who logically wouldn't miss the products taken by one small 15 year old. So ... Well maybe he was still sort of taking the moral high ground but come on he wasn't heartless.

He'd set up a tent in one of the only alleys that weren't overtaken with homeless people already, he supposed even a city with a millionaire as generous as Bruce fricken Wayne not all issues could be solved. He'd learnt a neat trick from Desiree, who's haunt in the GZ was stereotypically a lamp, to make a space much bigger on the inside than it was on the outside, eat your heart out Doctor Who. Technus had designed a generator that could produce energy from a small piece of highly concentrated ectoplasm, which Danny could form by compressing his ectoblasts into crystals. A single crystal lasted months. And the tech savvy ghost also rigged a system that connected to the cities water and waste systems so he had fully functional plumbing. So from the outside it looked like he was living in a medium sized tent. But on the inside he had a full multi bedroom apartment. He was quite comfortable, and the shield around it was designed to keep out ghosts and deter humans, playing on that sensation they naturally had to avoid something weird.

So when a clown walked straight into his home he was caught a little off guard. Since his home was sound proof he hadn't heard anything from outside, and had been walking from the kitchen to the unliving room, his little inside joke to himself, cradling a bowl of popcorn wearing pyjamas he was startled enough to blast the weird thing wearing a purple suit right the feck back out.

Joker hadn't expected to run into a young meta human that night. But as the only Batling that actually used guns was on his ass like a mouse on drywall he had just ducked into a tent intending to take whomever was inside hostage. He hadn't known what to expect inside but a teenager in the threshold of a high scale apartment wasn't exactly it. And the he was shot by something bright and green, even though the brat wasn't armed.

A pale face emerged from the tent looking down on him, a young boy, looked like he could have been one of the little projects that Wayne guy was always taking on, as the clown lay sprawled on the filthy ground of the alley slightly winded. "You startled me." He said with slight concern. "You alright?" The joker laughed. A crazy laugh. Crazier than usual. Someone in Gotham asking the Joker if he was alright? Hilarious.

"You're not from around here are you kid?" He wheezed between cackles, the concern seeming to grow on the child's face making it funnier. The brat shook his head, stepping out from the tent fully and crouching by the man, who was now laughing so hard nothing but a wheezy rasp was getting out. He was examining the scorch marks left on Joker's suit, even reaching out and patting the man's chest.

"No physical wounds, but maybe you hit your head?" He mumbled. Joker took a deep breath and laughed even louder. "Dude, that's distracting, quiet, I'm trying to make sure whatever's up with you isn't my fault." He then, with sheer audacity placed a small, freakishly cold hand to the man's mouth. He yelped and jerked back when Joker lurched upwards into sitting, a few strands of his usually slicked back green hair falling into his face as he gave the kid a wide grin, eyes wild. "Mmm... No I think your kind of crazy has been brewing for a while." He decided, the Joker gave an unnerving giggle.

"You've never heard of me? Surely I've been on the news." Joker said feeling generously social. The kid eyed him wearily as he stuck out his hand. "Name's the Joker, last name Joker, first name The."

"I feel like you've got a buzzer on your hand." The kid said, not taking the handshake. The Joker raised his hand revealing the buzzer with a way too many teeth grin.

"Guilty. Listen, kid, think I could hide out in your little abomination of space in there?" The Joker leaned really close to the boy, watching the youths nose crinkle with disapproval of the invasion of personal space.

"I suppose..." He murmured. The Joker leapt to his feat with a loud 'Great!' and didn't even wait for the boy before stepping inside to inspect the property inside. He picked up the discarded popcorn and made himself at home, vaguely aware that the child had also re-entered the tent.

After a moment he looked over his shoulder to see the boy standing awkwardly, watching him with confusion and concern. He liked concern, it meant he could manipulate that. "You just gonna stand there like the world's scrawniest scarecrow?"

The boy shuffled his feet remaining where he stood, clearly uncomfortable about the Joker being there, but he sensed it wasn't because he was a clearly psychotic clown who'd barged his way into the kids home. As he studied the kids expression trying to discern what exactly it was that made the kid weary, cause the clown thing was usually enough, he noticed faint scaring across the boys face. Mostly the left side, fanning out in jagged lines from a pinpoint somewhere under the collar of his shirt. He turned away mulling this information over while flipping through the channels of a massive tv, how did the kid get better reception in this impossible tent than the system rigged up by that cable Guy he'd kidnapped a while back?

Eventually the kid sat down, granted it was as far away from him as possible, this was a normal response to sitting with the Joker. "Wanna know something kid?" The boy's wide eyes glanced away from the screen, where a tasteful documentary on common bats was playing, curiosity evident though he remained silent. "I'm not a good guy."

He expected a bit of fear maybe, but the withering look he received was far from that. Icy eyes seemed to say in a snarky tone 'No kidding?' "Didn't really expect a man dressed like Ronald McDonald's lesser known cousin oozing criminal King pin energy to be an upstanding citizen." He responded looking back at the tv. "I'm not exactly a good guy either."

The Joker's grin grew, this kid was interesting, he'd been around the block if he could note that Joker wasn't just any old psycho. "Is that so?"

"I mean I had my moment of vigilante justice and all it got me was the hatred of my parents, homelessness and being declared legally dead. But you learn to pin point the dangerous ones." The boy grumbled, pulling his knees up to his chest and staring intently at the screen. "You're a dangerous one."

The Joker laughed. "Got a name or are you just dead teen walking?"

"Danny."

"Not a very heroic name."

"Not a very heroic guy."

"You've been in the hero business and you've never heard of me?"

"Purple and green Court Jester named Joker? No."

"Cuts deep kid. I'm a little insulted. Bet you know Batman. That's not fair."

"Batman? You think that instead of some grape and apple looking dude I'd know a furry?"

Joker wheezed, a furry, he'd have to add that one to his routine, bats would love that. "You must be from outta space or somethin kid."

"Or something. How long did you need to hide here?" Danny asked now watching the Joker as the man hunched over imagining the glee of calling the stone cold Batman a furry.

"Not really hiding when I threw a tracker on him."

Danny and the Joker whipped their heads around to see who Joker recognised as Red Hood, and who Danny recognised as another madman in a silly costume. He really needed to figure out a lock system. But something about the man also gave Danny a sense of interest. Something that felt familiar. "Ah, well. When you put it like that." Joker grabbed the kid, noting idly that the jagged scars were down his arm as well. "What we have here is a hostage situation."

Danny glanced at the 'weapon' he was supposedly being held hostage with, a small hand held canister, painted green and purple with a sinister grin painted in the centre. "What's that?" He asked, though honestly he assumed it was a gas of some sort, which didn't really affect him since he could just turn off the need to breathe when it suited him.

"Laughing gas, lethal laughing gas." The newcomer growled. While the Joker rambled about this guy, Red Hood he called him, ruining the punch line Danny simply turned invisible and intangible. The Joker and Red Hood were both understandably surprised. Red Hood muttered something about a 'Meta Human'.

"Okay, well, I felt bad for hitting you earlier but you officially overstayed your welcome." Danny said reappearing to the side, he then glanced at Red Hood. "And you weren't even invited. So...."

And like that he was gone. Not just him. His entire home, the tent it was crammed into, everything. Every trace of the kid was gone. Joker stared at Red Hood who was temporarily thrown off by the magic trick of the century. So naturally the Joker started running, dropping the canister behind him as a treat. It had been a weird day. Even for him.

Meanwhile Jason Todd stood wondering if he should be worried about this new Meta Human in Gotham who seemed to, even if temporary, been chumming it up with the Joker. If the deranged clown managed to get a Meta Human in his arsenal there'd be trouble. And Danny? Danny had relocated behind a local fast food restaurant, he deserved a burger and fries as a treat for dealing with Goth Ham City Crazies.

To be continued maybe?

Family Dinners - dpxdc

"Holy shit, you're Bruce Wayne!" Danny gaped, jabbing a finger at the man sitting at the head of the table.

The bustling dining room goes silent as everyone turns to look at him.

"Danny, who did you think was going to be here?" Tim asks, disbelief plain in his voice and Danny feels his face flush red.

"Sorry, I, uh, I guess I just never put it together. Tim Drake-Wayne. Wayne Manor. It, uh, makes sense now." He laughs sheepishly and scrubs at his neck before slumping back down into his chair.

"Well," Tim says with an indulgent sigh, "at least I know you're not just friends with me for my connections."

"Yeah, I'm really sorry, I just never thought about it, I guess."

Danny sinks lower as everyone around him laughs. Come to dinner, he said, the food is the best, he said, ignore the family, he said. Danny really wishes he'd listened to Tim and just ignored them—almost as much as he's regretting accepting the offer in the first place—but... he's having dinner with Batman.

Ancients, that's so weird!

The last time he saw Batman was in the future and, suffice it to say, it was not going well. There hadn't really been time for family dinners there.

Wait. Family dinners?

He peers around the table, openly gawking at everyone as it all clicks into place.

"Everything alright, Danny? Now realising who everyone else is?" Tim asks with a roll of his eyes.

"Uh... something like that..." Danny mumbles as everyone laughs again.

From further down the table, the smallest Wayne scoffs and clicks his tongue.

"I thought you said he was smart, Drake?"

"So, you all do it, too, then?" he asks, ignoring the jibe. Danny's only a little bit jealous as he thinks of how much easier they must have it, how much easier it'd be if his family had been on his side, too. "You all work together?"

"Nah," Dick says from across the table with a brilliant grin. "Tim's the only one that works with Bruce, we all have different jobs. I'm a police officer in Bludhaven."

"Disgusting." Danny blurts out without thinking—because seriously, what kind of self-respecting vigilante would also be a police officer?—before clapping a hand over his mouth. "Sorry."

The whole table laughs again, the loudest being the blonde girl a few spaces down from Dick. Look, Danny wasn't really paying attention to names when they were all paraded in front of him. Dick only gets remembered because his name is a joke.

Come on, Danny, recover!

"That's, uh, not what I meant, though."

"Oh?" Dick asks, cocking his head slightly to the side. Is it Danny's imagination or does his smile tense slightly?

"Yeah, I mean like, you know, in costume. It must make it so much easier to have everyone together like this."

"Costume? What do you mean?"

Yeah, Danny's not imagining it, everyone tenses up at that. It's really only now that he's realising that this probably isn't how he should bring up that he knows about their... night time activities. In fact, he probably shouldn't be bringing it up at all.

"Uuhhh..." Danny looks wildly around the table as he continues making his stupid noise. Think, think, think! There must be a way out of this!

"Danny?" Tim asks, looking concerned.

"Oh, Ancients, this isn't how I wanted it to go at all," he mutters, slipping even further into his chair. He's almost on the floor now and he so, so wishes it could just swallow him up.

His real first meeting with Batman was meant to be cool! He had planned to be Phantom, maybe save them from a tight spot, prove his worth as a mysterious and powerful ally as thanks for the help Batman gave him in the future.

"Danny, what are you talking about?" Tim starts tugging on his sleeve in an attempt to pull him back up from his pit of despair.

Eventually, Danny relents and sits up straighter, hiding his face in his hands and whining all the while.

"I'm sorry, I just didn't expect him to be here and it threw me off so now I look stupid and it's so embarrassing!" he wails, flailing his arms wide. "Why wouldn't you warn me that Batman was your adopted dad, Tim? Couldn't you have let me know?"

"I'm sorry, what? Danny are you alright? There's no way Bruce can be Batman, look at him!"

"Yeah," the blonde girl laughs from the bottom of the table, "look at him! That's a wet noodle of a man! Batman can actually do things, B is incapable of pretty much everything."

"Thank you, Stephanie," Bruce sighs, massaging his forehead.

It's... Those are the first words Danny's heard Batman say since everything went down and it's enough to knock him out of his embarrassment.

It's really good to hear his voice again. Especially now, when it's strong and healthy and full of personality—even if that personality is little more than a tired father right now—far better than how it had been, at the end.

Danny sits up, back straight, and grins. He's got this. He remembers it perfectly. Some people count sheep to fall asleep, Danny repeats his mantra to be certain that he'll never forget it.

"Gamma alpha upsilon tau iota mu epsilon, 42, 63, 28, 1 colon 65 dash 9."

Once again, the whole table falls into silence.

"Holy shit..." breathes the other D name (Duke? Danny's pretty sure he's Signal) from opposite Stephanie. "Isn't that...?"

"The time travelling code." The littlest Wayne says stiffly. "We have met in the future?"

"That's not just the time travelling code, Dami." Dick says, looking between Danny and Bruce. "That's the family time travelling code."

Danny's grin freezes in place.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"1 colon 65 dash 9." Dick explains, still flicking between him and Bruce. "It means you've been adopted into the family and we should all treat you as such, no questions asked."

"Tell you what, I'm about to ask a question." Danny says, dumbstruck. "You just told me it was a code to identify time travellers, not anything about being adopted! What the hell, B?"

Bruce looks about as shellshocked as Danny feels.

"We must have been close," he says finally, after opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water a few times.

"No! Not that close!" Danny reels back, taking a deep breath ready to refute it all, but... "Well, I mean, you found me when I first got stuck, and you helped me get better despite being... And then we fought together against the, uh, bad guy, before he, um, he... before you couldn't."

An uncomfortable beat passes while they all pick up on what Danny tried so hard not to say.

"So, you're not from the future, then, you travelled there and came back?" Tim asks, breaking the tension and leaning forward with a glint in his eye.

"Yeah, it was a whole end of the world thing, but don't worry about it," Danny says with a hand wave, "It's all kosher now, won't ever happen."

"What did happen?"

"Seriously, don't worry about it, we cool."

"How long in the future was it?"

"About ten years? You were pretty spry for an old man, B," Danny laughs, wishing they'd get off the topic of what happened and get back to the adoption bit.

Everyone shares degrees of a cautious smile as they relax out of the shock, and Dick—whose grin is the biggest—says, "No wonder you got the family code, you're already riffing on him like one of us. How long were you there for?"

"A week, before I managed to get back to my present and stop him then."

"A week? Jeez, B, that has to set some kind of record, seriously."

"Oh!" Danny says, sitting bolt upright and blinking in surprise before pointing at Dick and bouncing in his seat. "You're Nightwing!"

"What?"

"That's exactly what Nightwing said when Batman told me the code! Makes so much more sense now."

Dick laughs and claps his hands, delighted.

"You were not formally adopted?" The grumpy small one—Dami?—asks, his face pinched.

"I didn't even know I was informally adopted."

"And your parents? Are they alive or dead?"

"Damian, stop—"

"They were dead in the future, but they're alive now." Danny says, looking down. He fiddles with the tablecloth, twisting the fabric around his fingers as he fights down the pang of sadness that he always feels when he thinks of them now. He forces a bright smile on his face and hopes it doesn’t look too strained. "I just, uh, can't talk to them much, anymore."

"Damian," Dick warns, "1 colon 65 dash 9. Treat them as family, no questions asked."

"This is Damian treating him as family, the little turd has no manners." Tim scoffs, rolling his eyes, but he gently bumps shoulders with Danny to knock him out of his funk. Danny can't help but send him a watery smile.

"I have the most exemplary manners, Drake, unlike some people." Damian spits, crossing his arms with a pout. "I was merely ascertaining his status to see how he could possibly fit into the family."

"I know this is all a bit sudden, Danny," Bruce smiles, ignoring Damian and reaching out to lay a warm hand on his arm, "for all of us. But if I felt strongly enough to give you that code after spending a week with you in the future, then you are more than welcome in this family, if you so choose it. I think I can speak for all of us when I say we'd like to get to know you a bit more."

"I know a threat when I hear it, Bruce." Danny snorts. "But, yeah, I get it. I'm sorry this is all so weird, it really wasn't how I wanted to find you again, but... I'm glad I did."

"So are we, Danny." Dick says, with a warm smile. "And formally or not, 1 colon 65 dash 9 means you're family. Welcome to the fun house! No take backs or refunds, sorry. You're stuck with us."

Ridiculous Dead Serious idea:

Danny is in some kinda competition that Damian is also in, and they’ve been sniping at each other back and forth throughout the whole thing.

Until one day Danny goes, “You want me so bad it makes you look stupid!”

And Damian stops. Considers. Interrogates himself and his motivations like a good detective. Has a facial journey as he goes through the five stages of grief.

Danny was expecting a snide comeback and now he is legitimately worried he’s somehow triggered the snooty rich kid. Trying to decide if he wants to apologize or awkwardly make his way out of the room to give him time to recover.

Damian sorta hates himself because… yeah, yeah he does. He is attracted to the bratty little fucker and has been… pulling pigtails? Antagonizing to remain in his thoughts and field of vision, to watch his face get red and his breath quicken, to make him lean aggressively into his space and growl at him???

Damian is horrified. How did he misjudge himself so badly? Is this how mother felt when she discovered that Father was a complete mess and only fell more in love?

“Uh, dude? Are you… okay?” Danny reaches hesitantly towards him but doesn’t quite touch.

“No,” Damian says, schooling his face into a bland mask. “In fact, I may need you to support me.”

Panic flits across his companion’s face. He rushes to his aid, ducking against his side. His arm wraps around Damian’s back and a hand settles on his waist. Too gullible.

Damian mourns his own good sense.

Part 4.5: all night

After HG mess, Grian had to pull an all nighter to finish his job

(Clothes inspired by @schwepsee fanart!)