Chapter Text
“Get back here, ecto-scum!” Maddie yelled as she fired off another shot from her ecto-blaster. That thing had killed her Danny and was using her poor baby’s body. And this had been going on for almost 2 years. Her poor baby. But she was bound and determined to get kill that ghost scum and lay her poor baby’s body to rest. If it was the last thing she did.
“Tell him, fudgecakes,” Jack called while aiming the Fenton bazooka at the thing. Of course, Jack’s shot went wide (his shots usually did), but Maddie didn’t fault him for that. She took another shot at Phantom which landed. Her face twisted into a baleful grin when Phantom shouted in pain, but Phantom’s flight didn’t falter, instead he got further away. Damnit.
Phantom took one last look back at the two hazmat-wearing scientists before turning invisible and rocketing up into the stratosphere. Tears were streaming down his face as he turned towards the slowly rising sun. He had one of his many go-bags on his back and began racing east. He and his friends and Jazz had gone over worst-case scenarios and escape plans many times. There weren’t too many cities that he could go to which had the same amount of ectoplasm in it, so he was limited in his choices. His first choice was Gotham, much to the dismay of his entire team. But he told them that Gotham had all of the Bats and an insanely large population of homeless teenagers. The GIW and the Fentons (even if they were batshit (hehe) crazy wouldn’t dare invade Gotham. Plus, Phantom was pretty sure that Gotham had a sentient City Spirit. Eventually, his arguments won out.
Phantom, bleeding and exhausted, finally landed in a grime covered alley. He carefully checked to make sure no one was around and made sure there weren’t any cameras (not that they would have been able to see anything; most cameras glitched out around ghosts anyways) before he allowed his transformation to wash over him. He scrunched his nose in disgust at the smells of the alley; blood, piss, literal shit, vomit, and other less pleasant (read identifiable, not that Danny was thrilled to be able to identify any of the other smells) wafted over his nose. He looked around to see if he could find somewhere to hide for a moment.
There.
A bit of cardboard in the dumpster. Danny snagged it and then dragged it behind the dumpster. He flopped down and winced in pain as the motion aggravated his wounds. He opened his go bag to see what all was in it. He found an envelope of cash which he quickly phased into his thigh. This was Gotham and showing that he had any cash on him was just asking to get mugged. The second thing he found was a burner phone (thank you, Tucker), again quickly phased into a random body part. He found a small wallet with a new id, phase into yet another body part (he was going to run out of body parts at this point). The med kit was a very welcome sight and could stay in the bag, as could the clothes, the thermos, the wrist ray, and a few other items that had been packed. He sent a silent word of thanks to his team before turning his attention to the med kit.
The med kit was an industrial sized one, thank the Ancients. He pulled out an ecto-dejecto and pressed the injector hard against his thigh. He let out a hiss of pain as the needle released the healing ectoplasm into his system. It was one of the few inventions of his par…Jack and Maddie that he was truly grateful for. It hadn’t worked as designed, but that worked in his favor. The next thing he pulled out was the Fenton Fishing line. Danny lifted his shirt to see where the last shot Maddie had gotten on him. It was red and angry and definitely needed a few stitches, at least until the ecto-dejecto kicked in, which wouldn’t be for another few hours. His stitches were clumsy and uneven (they usually were when he had to do them on himself), but eventually he was able to tie the last one off. He wrapped the wound in a layer of bandages and then burned the used supplies with a carefully placed ectoblast.
Now his next problem. Where would he sleep for the night. His first thought was to seek out abandoned buildings, but he quickly discarded that thought. He remembered Jazz’s PowerPoint on Gotham. Too many rogues attacked, and abandoned buildings and warehouses were prime realty for rogue attacks. Plus, there could be other homeless people, and while Danny himself had never been homeless before, he knew that there was some kind of rule or hierarchy within the homeless camps. And he was pretty sure that they would NOT take kindly to a new homeless person encroaching on their perceived territory.
His second thought was to try to find an apartment or hotel to rent. But he discarded that just as quickly. While he was fairly sure that Tucker’s new id would stand up to scrutiny, knowing Fenton Luck and the fact that he was now in the city where the famed Oracle was supposed to be squirreled away, well, he wouldn’t put it past something triggering an alert somewhere. Either his id was fake, and it would bring the Bats on his head, or it would ping on the GIW radar. Neither was a good option.
Sleeping in the alleys or out in the streets was just as bad of an option as the first and for the same reason. But in some ways, they were actually worse. Sleeping out in the open is just as likely to encroach on another’s territory as it is to get him noticed and/or kicked out for being there. He didn’t know Gotham’s law about sleeping in public places, and it wasn’t like that was something he had to worry about back in Amity.
Before he could truly panic, a cop call rolled by and stopped at the mouth of the alley. A metaphorical light bulb went off over Danny’s head. Even if Danny thought ACAB (thanks Freakshow and his mind-control bullshit), that would be absolutely PERFECT. It would be like hiding in plain sight. Sure, cops worked for the government, but who would think that he would sleep in the back of a cop car. No one did that willingly. It would be like him going to the GIW. As long as he could maintain his invisibility and intangibility, he would be fine.
He grabbed his bag, made sure that he had everything and raced to the car before it could pull away. He made sure that no one was already occupying the back seat before phasing inside. He stretched out along the bench seat and listened to the radio chatter for a few moments before drifting off to sleep. He would wake every so often when the car would move spots, but otherwise, his slumber was rather peaceful. When he heard the cops say something about ending their shift, he was brought into full wakefulness.
He stretched carefully, grabbed his bag, and then phased out of the door. He made a note of the unit number so that he wouldn’t sleep in the same one twice. He meandered over to another alley and pulled out his phone. He was surprised to see that he slept for almost 6 hours, and it was just after 2 in the afternoon. His stomach rumbled, reminding him that it had been a while since he’d last eaten. He sent a quick text to the Team Phantom group text that he’d landed in Gotham and had managed to find somewhere to sleep. He didn’t go into detail (they didn’t ask) before phasing the phone back into his thigh. He reached into his other thigh for the envelope and grabbed some cash. He pulled a few dollars out and makes his way to what appears to be a grungy diner.
He ordered his meal, a nice hamburger with a chocolate mint shake (not as good a Nasty Burger) and left the waitress a nice tip before wandering back out into the murky Gotham streets. His next problem would be to find a place where he could shower and change his bandages. He figured he had several options for this. He could either sneak into a hotel, a gym, a truck stop, or something like a community center. He pulled out his phone and began googling what would be his best options. Everything would likely have cameras, even if he planned on using his invisibility. A hotel would probably be the better option, with a community center coming in a close second. He decided to go with the hotel option because he could use his invisibility to check whether or not a room was occupied. If it was, then he could back out, no harm, no foul. If not, then free shower. His bag had included the basic toiletries so that was one less thing to worry about. And just like with the cop cars, he would make sure not to use the same one every night. He would also alternate between hotels and the two community centers that he’d found.
For the next couple of months, Danny would say that his life was decent. It wasn’t great because of the whole, you know homeless thing, but it wasn’t horrible either. He had a roof over his head, if you counted the sleeping in the back of cop cars as a roof. He had enough money to last for a few months (thanks, Grandma Ida), and he was getting a decent shower every night. He stopped a few low-level, petty crimes; his Obsession wouldn’t let him NOT interfere, damnit.
And then things went to absolute shit.
Danny had been sleeping so well, till suddenly he wasn’t. The car was flying down the pock-marked roads. Something about a trafficking-ring bust that the Bats had busted. It had been a BIG bust too. Black Mask AND Scarecrow had teamed up. The car pulled in front of the busted up warehouse (again, this was why he didn’t sleep in the damn things), and Danny hastily grabbed his go bag and phased out. He panicked trying to find a new sleeping spot. It looked like every damn cop car in GCPD was there.
FUCK!
Where was he going to sleep now? He couldn’t risk a hotel, and he got quite a few side eyes just using the laundromats. He had to close his eyes to prevent his “scary eyes” from flashing (fuck you, Vlad, his eyes were NOT scary, they were an emotional and trauma response) green. He took another look around when his eyes locked on a weirdly armored vehicle that was oddly reminiscent of the GAV. Unlike the GAV that was all silver and green that just screamed cartoon villain, this vehicle was solid black, but just as heavily weaponized. Danny didn’t care; he still phased into the back seat. Danny curled up into a small, tight ball and promptly went back to sleep.
He didn’t notice when the motherfucking BATMAN, and no less than three of his associates jumped into the vehicle with him. Nightwing, who claimed shotgun, Red Robin, who’d been slightly injured with a mild concussion, and Robin also slightly injured with a broken wrist were in the back. Red Robin and Robin both began shivering as Danny unconsciously made the temperature around him colder than other areas.
“Tt. Father, I demand you turn up the temperature,” Robin demanded.
“Y-y-yeah…B…it’s c-c-c-cold b-b-back here,” Red Robin stammered.
“Hn” Batman grunted, but he reached for the temperature control anyways.
The rest of the ride back to the Cave was quiet, not even Nightwing could get the younger Bats to talk. The Batmobile rumbled to a jerky stop which caused Danny to wake and lose his invisibility. The four vigilantes stared at this random ass teenager who just fucking appeared in the goddamn BATMOBILE in absolute shock. Danny let out a startled “eep” before phasing out of the vehicle and into the Cave proper. He didn’t get far because he realized he was well and truly lost. The four vigilantes jumped out of the vehicle and got into battle ready stances.
“Uh…” Danny said intelligibly.
“Who the fuck are you?” Another vigilante snarled at him. Danny jumped and floated in the air for a few seconds. His ghost sense kind of but not really went off when he looked at the man. The man wore a deep red helmet, a black leather jacket, some sort of Kevlar armor. Danny could make out the outline of Bat symbol across the man’s chest. Danny could see glowing green flash from behind the lenses of the man’s helmet, and all four of the other vigilantes instantly forgot about the random teenager in the Cave.
“Hood, stand down,” Batman ground out.
Rage/Pain/MINE/PROTECT/MINE came from the brick shithouse, and Danny let out another startled yelp.
Calm/Friend/like you Danny sent back, and the one called Hood instantly relaxed.
Batman turned and placed a heavy hand on Danny’s shoulder, and Danny slumped in defeat. Batman frog-marched the boy to the large meeting table. Danny held up in hands in surrender. Batman shoved him in a seat, and Danny nearly folded over the table but refrained from doing so. He did, however, draw his knees to his chest, crossed his arms across his knees, and laid his head down so that only his eyes could be seen.
“Umm, please, I’ll go wherever you say, just please don’t turn me over to the government. They’ll vivisect me. I’ve seen their plans,” Danny pleaded.
The mouths of all the gathered Bats dropped open in horror. Even Signal, the daytime hero, had gathered in the Cave was absolutely flabbergasted. Hood placed a hand over the center of his chest, right where his own Y-scar was. The only scar that the Lazarus Pits hadn’t taken away when he was dunked in it after his resurrection. Red Robin was the first to regain some semblance of cognitive function.
He spluttered for a few minutes. “But…but…but they can’t. That…That’s against the Meta Protection Acts,” Red Robin finally stammered out.
“Uh, but I’m not a meta. According to the Anti-Ectoplasm Acts, I’m considered an ecto-entity. Which, also means that I’m a non-sentient, non-sapient ball of post-human consciousness and/or emotion that’s imprinted on ectoplasm and if found I’m to be handed over to the Ghost Investigation Ward or as we call them the Guys In White for extraction, experimentation, and extermination since we don’t feel pain.”
Danny watched as Red Robin’s fingers flew over the keyboard on a laptop that he pulled from who knew where. He didn’t know what the vigilante was seeing, but his lips had thinned into a very thin line. Danny didn’t even know it was possible for a person’s lips to almost disappear like that.
“Wait. Wait. Wait. Ectoplasm. Like ghost goo?” Hood asked, incredulously.
“Yeah. Exactly like ghost goo. It’s what we ghosts are made of,” Danny snarked.
“Well, you look pretty damn alive for a ghost,” Hood snarked back.
Danny considered for a moment. “I’m a rare case. The other ghosts call me a halfa, half ghost, half human.”
“How does one become half ghost?” someone, probably Spoiler, asked, voice full of skeptical sarcasm.
Danny bristled, and his eyes flashed green. Everyone at the table tensed, waiting for the murderous rage that usually accompanied that color. Did this boy have something to do with the League of Assassins, after all? “Please don’t ask. Ghosts tend to react violently when people ask about their deaths.” Nearly everyone at the table inhaled sharply, including Danny. Danny forced himself to calm down.
Batman felt bile rise in his mouth and had to choke it back down. This was another child he’d failed. Danny didn’t look like he could be a day over seventeen, and that was pushing it. He met Red Robin’s eyes and had a silent conversation with his son who only nodded. So far, the mysterious teenager had been telling the truth. About the Anti-Ecto Acts. At any rate.
“Why are you in Gotham?” Batman asked instead of the 100 other questions rolling around in his head.
“It…it wasn’t safe…my par…some scientists began hunting me because they were in league with the GIW. The day I left, one of them got in a good shot. And the other one was aiming a bazooka at me. He missed, but the first one shot me again. I managed to grab my bug-out bag and run. When I landed in Gotham, I was…wounded.” Another sharp intake of breath followed this statement. Danny dropped his head on his arms. But no one missed how the boy had almost said his parents. Hood was seeing green. Again. He forced it back down.
“Where have you been living all this time?” Signal asked.
“Umm…Mostly in the back of cop cars. I would take showers in different hotels, truck stops, and even in the community centers. But I would sleep in the cop cars. I figured if the GIW came looking for me here, they would ask the local law enforcement, and I would hear it over their radios.”
For a solid blink of time, everyone sat in silence. Hood was the first to break it by laughing so hard he had to pull off his helmet. Nightwing looked laid a hand across his chest in mock offense, but Danny could tell the vigilante was fighting a smile. Soon enough, everyone except Batman and Robin were either laughing with Hood or smiling. Batman brought his hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose and gave the most Tired Dad sigh to ever dad sigh. Robin was scowling at everyone.
“That’s the best thing I’ve ever heard,” Hood gasped out, wiping tears that were leaking out from his domino mask that he’d had on underneath his helmet. “Can we keep him?” Hood asked, as if he were asking to keep a lost pet or something. Danny was so confused.
Batman sighed. Again. He knew that he would never live down the “adoption bait” jokes he heard, and the boy would fit right in. And in the deepest parts of his brain, he had already begun filing the mental adoption papers. Oh god. Maybe, he really did have a problem. But then again, Wayne Manor did have the room, and the boy needed help, that much was obvious. He was far too skinny, and Alfred would skin him alive if he turned the boy away. And if he put the boy into the foster care system, he’d likely end up as part of a meta trafficking ring, much like the one they’d busted up tonight. He’d only just gotten Duke out of the system before something had happened. Then, he realized that he didn’t even know the boy’s name.
“What is your name?” Batman asked softly, dropping his typical Batman growl.
Danny blinked up at him. “D…Danny, sir.” The other vigilantes began laughing again. Danny was still confused. Hood made another “c’mere” motion followed by safe/mine/protect coming from a sort of pseudo core. Danny hopped out of his chair and walked over to Hood.
“Danny, we’ll do everything we can to protect you. You’re safe here,” Hood said fiercely, wrapping his arms around the smaller boy.
“Oh. I…I…ca…can’t. You’ll get…You’ll get in Trouble,” Danny flinched away from the kindness the older man was showing him. Tears began forming in the corners of his eyes.
“Danny, you let us worry about that. We’ve handled far worse than some mere government schmucks. Hell, most of us of punched gods and walked away. We can keep you safe. We want to help,” Hood spoke softly the boy who had begun trembling in his arms. Even Robin nodded.
“But…but…what about the Anti-Ecto Acts? If you get caught harboring me, you could get charged with TREASON!” Danny stammered. His heart rate actually in the normal people range for once, which meant it was jackhammering for him.
Hood pulled the boy in close and held on tight. Danny tensed as the buff arms held on tightly but then melted into the hug. And that was all he needed before the flood gates opened. The rest of the Bats sat in silence, listening to Danny sobbing in Hood’s arms. After what seemed like hours, Danny finally quieted down, hiccupping softly against the larger man who, somehow, reminded him of his dad, no, never again his dad, Jack. The other man’s sort-of core began softly purring which startled both of them.
“YOU DIED TOO?!?!” Danny whisper shouted as he looked up at the man. He kind of knew, but this was just confirmation of the fact, one he’d hoped to ignore. “No, wait. Ignore that. I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. It caught me off guard. I didn’t mean…” Danny babbled. Hood reached down and ruffled Danny’s hair with a bark of laughter to show that he wasn’t offended.
“Yeah, kid, I died too,” Hood said softly. The rest of the Bats tensed. Usually, whenever someone mentioned Hood’s death, fists were flying. He picked Danny up and settled him in his lap. Danny squawked but immediately leaned against Hood, emitting his own purr in response.
“You don’t have to tell me how. I can sense it, just not the specifics,” Danny mumbled around a jaw-cracking yawn.
“Is there any thing we should avoid talking about?” Red Robin asked.
“Yeah. Like I said, don’t ask about how a ghost died. If they offer first, that’s one thing. But speaking of it causes them to relive their deaths. And most ghosts don’t form under, well, peaceful or happy circumstances. It can cause them to lash out, often very violently.” Danny heard a soft, “that explains so much” that he wasn’t sure he was supposed to hear but super-hearing was bitch sometimes. “Next thing to know is that all ghosts have Obsessions. They’re not…” Danny swallowed thickly. Hood rubbed his hand on Danny’s back; the action bringing Danny a small measure of comfort. These people knew Hood died and still accepted him so maybe it would be ok. “I know the word obsession has negative connotations, but for a ghost, it’s what anchors them to the Living Realm. If they don’t fulfil their Obsession, it will cause the ghost great pain and eventual death.”
“But aren’t all ghosts dead?” Spoiler asked in disbelief.
“Uh, yes, but also no.”
“What even does that mean?” Red Robin exclaimed.
“A small percentage of ghosts are formed from those that died. But then you have the Neverborn, those who were never alive to begin with, the Ancients, who are concepts like Time, Hope, Sleep/Dreams, Weather, given form, and then you have the other afterlives that inhabit the Infinite Realms, like Heaven, Hell, Valhalla, and many others. All of their inhabitants, like demons from hell, would technically be considered an ecto-entity if not technically a ghost.” Multiple Bats groaned at this admission. “But back to Obsessions. When a ghost Fades or is Ended, that’s it. No more. No reincarnation. No more afterlife. Nothing. They’re just gone. And an Obsession can be anything. Back home, one ghost’s Obsession was being remembered. Another ghost’s Obsession was boxes.”
“BOXES?” Red Robin snorted.
“Boxy is an absolute menace. Especially that time he managed to get into an Amazon Warehouse.” At least, Danny’s voice had gained some strength.
“I’ve brought everyone some food,” an older man with a British accent in a finely tailored suit and also wearing a domino mask appeared from somewhere pushing a snack cart in front of him. Danny startled so hard that he would have floated a few feet in the air if not for Hood’s arms wrapped around him. “Does the young master have any allergies?” Hood nudged Danny to answer the question, so he shook his head.
“I don’t like toast. The only allergy I have is an extinct flower called Blood Blossom or Rosa Sanguis. It’s one of the only things that can like kill me all the way,” Danny said as the older gentleman nodded succinctly and set a plate in front of him. Danny’s eyes began sparkling. He’d never seen such an array of food that was actually edible outside of fast food. “Oh ANCIENTS. This is so good. And I didn’t even have to fight it first.”
Hood choked on his own food. “Kid, what?” Hood choked out after hitting himself in the chest to dislodge the food that had gotten stuck.
“Let’s just say that ectoplasm stored in the fridge can have an interesting effect on the food stored there,” Danny said after a sip of some hot chocolate that the gentleman had brought to go with the food. “The hotdogs were rebelling against the sandwich meats. And the fruits and veggies were holding the cheese hostage the last time I looked in the fridge.” Hood wasn’t the only one who choked at that particularly concerning statement. What even was this kid’s life? Batman heaved yet another Tired Dad sigh. He seemed to be doing a lot of those and pinched the bridge of his nose again.
“Did anyone ever try to call the Justice League?” Batman finally asked.
“Yeah, we tried. But we were ignored, or told to stop calling in pranks because ghosts aren’t real, and eventually we just gave up,” Danny said with an air of resignation. Hood clenched his arms around Danny.
“What is the name of your town?” Danny looked extremely uncomfortable at the question, but Hood ran a hand down his back.
“Amity Park, Illinois,” he answered softly,
Batman pulled a tablet from somewhere…WHERE DID THAT EVEN COME FROM???...and begun looking into the Justice League’s files on the Watchtower to see if Danny’s claims were true. They couldn’t be true. He didn’t want them to be true. His fingers clicked against the screen of the tablet in a furious rhythm. He hoped against all hope that Danny’s claims that the Justice League had ignored a child in danger were false. The Leage knew ghosts existed, after all, they had Deadman. And Red Robin had once worked with Secret, aka Greta Hayes. How? How could they ignore something like this?
Batman’s lips disappeared almost like Red Robin’s had earlier. A total of 15 calls originating from Amity Park had been placed to the Justice League’s Helpline. A total of 15 calls had been ignored or dismissed. He saw a whole slew of names: Jasmine Fenton, Tucker Foley, Samantha Manson, Dash Baxter, Paulina Sanchez, Lance Thunder, William Lancer, Harriet Chin, Star Thunder, Kwan Chin, Wesley Weston, Jeremy Manson, Pamela Manson, Kyle Weston, and Daniel Fenton. Batman paused at the last name. The boy had introduced himself as Danny. OH GODS NO!!! Danny, who said he was half ghost had personally called the helpline only to be told that ghosts didn’t exist. Pain flared in Batman’s head, and he quickly shoved his cowl off, secret identity be damned. Somewhere, Bruce noted that there were several gasps from the table. When he looked up, Danny had his face covered by his hands. At Bruce’s nod, the rest of the vigilantes at the table quickly unmasked as well.
Hood was trying to pull Danny’s hands away from his face. “No. No. You can’t. The GIW will hunt me down. You can’t.” Danny began hyperventilating and actively fighting against Hood’s pulling hands. “Just let me go back to sleeping in the back of cop cars. I’ll be fine.”
Calm/safe/SAFE Jason attempted to calm Danny down in the same manner that Danny had calmed him down earlier. But he noticed that Danny’s breathing eased, and he hung limply against his arms. Jason began carding his hands through Danny’s hair, an action he’d seen Dick do for Damian several times and thought it would further help relax the teenager.
“Perhaps, this is a conversation better suited to be continued in the morning, after breakfast” the gentleman in the suit instructed with a raised eyebrow.
Jason stood up and hefted Danny up with him. Danny squeaked in surprised as he flopped over the walking tank’s shoulder, but he didn’t put up much resistance. “Y’all heard the man. Last one up has to handle Condiment King the next time he acts up,” Jason taunted, already at the elevator. Everyone scrambled from the table as the doors closed. Danny huffed at their antics.
But maybe, just maybe, it would be ok. Batman had looked really mad when he realized that the calls for help had been ignored. Danny cracked another yawn. He sent a quick “I’m still half-dead” to Team Phantom and promised a more in-depth update after he got some sleep. Tomorrow was promising to be an interesting day, if nothing else.