The meeting stops.
All heads turn towards the terrified looking teenage alien? Maybe? Who is hovering halfway in and halfway out of the ceiling.
"...Yes?" Captain Marvel ventures, looking unsure.
"Okay, so there's these deep sea divers who are completely like, pressure saturated? Or something? But their little capsule thing they live in is severed from the ship cuz of a hurricane. I can absolutely phase them out, but I don't really know what to do with them? Because like, I think humans explode if they experience rapid pressure changes? Will the human divers explode if I make them intangible? Or will they explode if I take them up and make them tangible? If I take them up and keep them intangible, will they still explode if turning intangible didn't make them explode in the first place? Sorry, I'm a little pressed for time and Google wasn't giving me answers."
The room is silent as the older heroes take this information in.
That. That is a very oddly specific question.
It also devolves into a massive debate on whether intangibility would count as a pressure change, whether or not humans really did explode, and what, exactly, happened to human bodies when they were made intangible.
Aquaman secrets the kid alien hero out of the meeting room to get the location so he can send his people to the divers.
Phantom has been part of the Justice League for a while and though he looks young he is just as experienced if not more so then most of the league's heavy hitters. With a historical record going back to the very beginning of civilization as a guardian of balance and a hero whoever he meets, it was only natural to add him onto the roster.
Not a lot is know about his species as the rift to his home dimension was closed long before the information black out dropped from Amity Park and even after it dropped all the records appeared to be wiped clean.
But it was assumed even though he looked young it was probably some sort of glamor or disguise. They had seen many of his kind during meetings with their leaders "the Council of Ancients", none of them looked as human as Phantom did, so it stands to reason he changed his appearance to be more familiar to those around him.
With dull teeth, soft hair and human skin.
When John or other JLD members call him an eldritch baby in so many words, they assume he is talking about his young appearance. No one corrects that assumption, least of all Danny who knows that he is very young compared to other ghosts, being dead for only five years.
It isn't until they are fighting an evil magic user that it becomes clear, the magic user can see immediately that Danny is hiding his true form subconsciously and decides to turn the League against each other by "revealing the monster within". When Danny is struck by the spell he collapses in on himself and the other heroes with him are concerned both for him and of what the spell will turn him into when they realize the intentions.
In a bright flash of light Danny's true form is revealed.
His white hair is a brilliant bright flame, his eyes are a void of black with shining green spotlights for pupils, his hands became claws and so have his feet. His black suit became a covering of black fur and he has a tail very reminiscent of a certain Ancient (cough Frostbite cough), if they look closer he even has the beginnings of ice like horns growing from his temples beneath his bangs. All of this along with fangs that look a little too big for his mouth together would be unsettling…
…if not for the fact he was very much the size of a five year old.
The baby comments make sense now…
Imagine Tim obsessing over getting Dick to be Robin again for Batman, then being shot down, then reluctantly taking up the Robin mantle.
Then Superman dies and comes back, and Tim gets an Idea. And starts researching how to bring people back, not in a Solomon Grundy way but a Superman coming back way.
And he goes grave robbing (robin, get it?) And Jason's body isn't there and there were signs of someone breaking out and, holy undead resurrections Batman, the Batfamily looks for Jason.
Only to find evidence of him getting "retrieved" by the League of Assassins.
“Bruce! They’re not coming!”
Bruce Wayne’s newest adoptive son shouts at him with worrying certainty, especially considering the turn this kidnapping incident has turned into. What, with the falling burning plane all around them.
“Superman can hear-“
“No, Bruce. That’s just some stupid marketing ploy the Justice league uses to deter crime.” Danny sighs bitterly, (tiredly, hopelessly) as his shoulders slump slightly.
"You're awake! I got that coffee you wanted." Said the literal adopted bait in a hospital gown. He push aside the rolling chair and pick up a plastic cup tray with four Death Coffee from the Cafe that he literally banned off from Bruce bribing them all.
Tim look like he could cry as he snatch the coffee mug and inhale the sweet sweet scent of caffeine addiction. Sipping it every now and then as he speak to the kid.
"Um.. so how did we met again,..?" Tim asked cause his deprived coffee brain doesn't remember yesterday trauma of going to every Cafe in Gotham that told him he was banned from then until Bruce said it was OK.
"It's danny, and you look like you were going through obsession deprivation near the abandoned warehouse next to that fancy car, blabbering about dam- dang interventions, they can't stop me from having coffee and I asked if I can get you some coffee?
Then you shoved 3000 dollars in my face with the second crazed yet scariest look I ever seen, but i did got your coffee and you cried, but told me not to tell anyone then pick me up as a anti-intervention accompline, you drove us into this cool bunker then passed out after drinking 3 of the 6 coffee, and I started playing minesweeper on your computer, though weak password by the way." Danny said going back to playing minesweeper, nibbling on a chocolate muffin from that Cafe.
"So far 10 outta 10 kidnapping experience though, at least you didn't try to adopt me like the previous Fruitloop before, plus I got money out of it to last 8 months out there." Danny continued saying as he had literally beat Tim's minesweeper record.
Ok now do the batkids sneaking back IN after sneaking out
Cass: *crawls through the vents*
Dick: *scales the wall and silently parkours through every room*
Jason: *commits arson as a diversion*
Steph: *disguises herself as furniture*
Damian: *mails himself in a package for same-day delivery*
Tim: *stages his own kidnapping and subsequent escape*
Duke: *walks in through the front door while Bruce is distracted by everyone else*
“Hey. Hey Tuck. Tucker. Tuck look. Look.”
Tucker looked over the edge of the screen lazily, the half interested words on his tongue dying as he let out a wheeze of laughter. “Oh my Ancient Sands, dude, how did you manage that?”
Danny had, for the last near year, been trying to mix shapeshifting, thank you Amorpho, with duplication. Something he’d apparently succeeded in today, if the massive fuck-you hydra standing before him was any indication. The very pleased looking, well did it count as a hydra if it had wings too?
“You need to show Sam. Oh my Sands we need to show Val too. And Wes. You did it dude!” He floated up to look at Danny, who did a little twirl to show off. He shook his head, flecks of gold and sand falling from his hair as he laughed.
“Do you think,” Danny lost it in laughter as several other heads echoed his words, from whichever the main him was. “Holy ancients that’s great- do, do you think we can make a dragon club? Hydras are totally dragons right? Do you think we could pull a Tiamat?”
He landed on a head, taking a selfie to add to the groupchat labeled Preparations. “Dude, we should, but let me send this to the others first… But I am so down.”
They can, in fact apparently, pull a Tiamat- with a little help from Princess Dora, practice in front of Frostbite in case something goes wrong, and some advice from Pandora on controlling extra limbs. Honestly, who is going to want to mess with Amity when there’s a giant dragon? And hey, maybe they can break the barrier now!
The heads for those wondering who I was thinking of for each lol And perhaps what they might all get ((1) Kwan, Pressurized Water) ((2) Wes, Sonic Blast) ((3) Sam, Poison Gas) ((4) Star, Plasma) ((5) Danny, Ice Breath) ((6) Paulina, Acid) ((7) Tucker, Electricity) ((8) Valerie, Fire Breath) ((9) Dash, Pressurized Wind)
There are not enough aus where Frostbite adopts Danny.
Frostbite comes to the realisation that the great one who defeated Parish Dark is a neglected child and goes 'well that won't do'. Maybe Danny has to leave the living world and Frostbite's tribe takes him in. Danny gets a clan and a whole tribe of people as a support network and a stable environment to feel safe in. Maybe he even manages to finish his schooling!
Maybe the Observants try to have Danny thrust onto the throne because they think he'll be easy to manipulate if they force him into unprepared and tear him from his haunt. Danny is panicking and so the Far Frozen are like. Well :) according to the law of the Far Frozen realm and customs of the tribe that the child is a ward of, Danny is still a minor until his coming of age ceremony in about fifty years or so, so until then :) the Observants council would never violate Far Frozen law like that, would they? :|
Thus Danny is free to live his life and maybe find a new candidate in the meantime.
When young ghosting are extremely tired or have exhausted their core too much, whether it be from fighting or just using up too much ectoplasm, they can merge with their parent in the ghost zone. The core of their parent and the welcoming warmth it gave often allowed for fast recoveries. Dani was too weak even with her eco-shots and Danny allowed her to rest inside him until she was one hundred percent again.
One minor thing was that even with the core, there's still a bit of a change that's physically noriceable. And while ghosts and those of the Infinite Realms understood, humans often didn't.
Which was why Danny was met with mortified and angry gazes when he appeared to the next Justice League meeting with Dani resting inside of him. It didn't help with how bad he explained the situation either.
Bernard: i lied. i don’t like sex. put your clothes back on babe and watch my power point presentation about What The Fuck Is Going On Between Batman And Twoface
Tim: …
Danny Fenton is so damn sick of rich fruit loops. It’s worse now, since he’s one of them.
It’s not Vlad that he’s with, thank the Ancients, but Danny isn’t sure that this is better.
Because he’s Timothy Drake, a baby, and he’s been reincarnated after the Ancient of Reincarnation accidentally drank too much wine.
He’s going to kick their ass so hard when he gets back.
Danny huffs. He rolls over, ignoring the silent manor. Sure, he’s read the comics. Sure, he laughed and imagined being adopted by Batman- come on, Danny had black hair and blue eyes even back then, he was totally adoption bait- when his parents gave him reason to lose trust in their love. But that’s it, that’s all he thought it was. A day dream, a wish for a universe that didn’t exist.
Danny hadn’t understood the reality of the whole Infinite Realms thing, a place he was now the King of. Batman? Real. Danny? Reincarnated. Hotel? Trivago.
Like, this wasn’t what he meant, dammit.
And now he’s stuck as Timothy Drake, and Ancients, he was starting to see parallels.
——
Danny tried photography. He really did. He wanted to at least stick to the source material. But that’s not who he is. Even with the shiny new brain that memorized, catalogued, and put together clues at the snap of his fingers, but Danny’s never been one to take photos. It’s a respectable art, for sure, but Danny preferred to live in the moment instead of capturing it to remember forever. It’s just-
He watched the Graysons fall. He watched Dick Grayson turn into Robin. And Danny can’t and won’t ever betray his Obsession like that, ever again. He can’t let Jason die for his “story” to begin. That’s not how Danny works.
He’s there to protect.
Danny hasn’t ever been just Tim. Danny was also Tim and the Ghost King without a haunt. But now? Gotham is his haunt. He, in lieu of an actual city spirit, is Gotham. He’s also a Drake. And Drakes were meant to hoard.
Batman and Robin? They are his.
He claimed them, as a Drake. But that claim is weak. So he claimed them as their city, and that is a claim that will never be able to be challenged.
Danny’ll be damned before he allows some lanky starved clown beat the life out of one of his Robins. So, for the first time in his nine years on this planet, Tim-Danny goes ghost and flies.
“Who- who. Are you?” Robin slurred from his place in Danny’s hold. He is broken, yes. But not dead. Danny infuses some of his vitality, his ecto, into Jason’s injuries to help them heal.
“Gotham.” Danny replied, layering his ghostly voice with those of the city.
“Goth’m?”
“Gotham. Sleep, little bird. Your city has got you.”
When Robin, Jason, settled with a sense of trust that tugs at Danny’s core, Danny carried him to Batman, whose eyes were wild and manic. He glared menacingly at the green and white ghost in front of him, who was holding his broken and beaten son-
Well, it’d be menacing if Danny hadn’t watched him eat bricks and mortar, crashing into a building while using his grappling gun.
“You-”
“I am Gotham.” Danny cut him off. Despite his wary nature and natural paranoia, Batman settled at his city’s gaze rested on him. Danny knew that Batman recognized his city. Batman’s head bowed, but his eyes stayed on Robin. “You were supposed to take care of Robin.”
“I- I know.” And that voice was all Bruce Wayne the Dad instead of Batman the Vigilante. Danny gently placed Robin in Batman’s arms, taking in the tremors as he held his son close.
“Go back, Bruce. And make sure Jason knows how much you love him.”
He laughed as Bruce whipped his head upwards. “I am your city. You are mine as much as I am yours. I’ve known of you before you were born.”
Technically? Not untrue. But Bruce will chalk it up to weird magic shit. It’s not like it’s a secret that Gotham’s kind of curse. Besides, this way, Danny will be able to help out more often. And Bruce won’t be able to connect Tim Drake to the “Spirit of Gotham.”
“Return, my knight. This is not your city. I can not protect you as well as I can in Gotham.”
“Thank you… Gotham.”
Danny sighed. He wondered when he’ll have to field questions from a John Constantine. He’s pretty sure Bruce will call in magical help, even if it was his own city he was investigating.
Batman’s lucky Danny liked him enough to allow it.