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thebubblesareevil · 1 year

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Secrets for the Soul

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 5

“That concludes our meeting for tonight, thank you all for making time to join us.” Announced Batman, finally ending this tortuous l, though necessary meeting. Diana stood from her seat and said her goodbyes intent on getting back to Danny for movie night. If she hurried she could stop and pick up ice cream, her hopes of the frozen treat were dashed however when she was stopped by a hand on her shoulder.

“Diana, a moment of your time?” Batman asked with a gruff voice. Diana silently mourned her ice cream as she smiled back and the two stepped away from the zeta-tubes. “As you are aware, Black Canary is leading the training for the covert team. However Canary brought it to my attention that while Superboy is doing well in his training, he is getting very little experience fighting opponents of an equal or greater power level.” Diana frowned.

“He is the teams biggest heavy hitter, it would do them no good if he were to falter when given a challenge.”

“My thoughts exactly, which is why I would like you to take some time to spar with him. Show him what it means to fight above your level.” Batman nodded,

Diana looked at Batman, skeptical “Wouldn’t Superman be better suited for this task.”

“Things between them are a bit…stained to say the least.” He ground out.

Diana frown, “I would be willing to engage the young one in battle, however Superman needs to figure things out with the boy. He is only a child, he needs guidance.” She said firmly.

“I know your hands are already full, we can work out a schedule at another date however I would like it if you would come by this weekend to meet him.” Diana raised her brow. His eye twitched “Please” he added.

“Now that wasn’t so hard was it? Alfred’s been pestering you about manners again, huh?” She smirked. Batman grunted. “That should be fine, I’ll be there Saturday morning at 10, and Batman? I won’t hold back.” She said with a savage grin.

“I would expect nothing less.” And with that Diana took her leave. It was a short flight from the Zeta point to her apartment, when she arrived Danny looked up from his Mars book.

“You’re late~” He said with a grin “You know what that means. You forfeit your movie choice!” Diana sighed as she went to get changed.

“All right, fair is fair, did you pick up dinner?”Danny nodded as he scrolled through the movie choices.

“Chinese is on the counter, drinks are in the fridge.” He shouted as he set up the movie. “Comedy good?” He asked as she made her way to the fridge.

“Sure.” She replied, opening the fridge she grabbed the drinks sitting next to the chain covered stew labeled ‘Danny’s! Do not touch!’

Grabbing the Chinese she made her way over and plopped herself on the couch. “So what are we watching?”

“Only one of my favorite ghost comedies EVER! The Grudge! It’s hilarious, trust me!” He tilted his head in a picture of innocence. “By the way, why were you late, something wrong with the league?” He inquired, nudging her with his elbow. Diana scoffed.

“We are a team of international vigilantes, something’s always wrong. However, in this case, Batman stopped me to ask a favor. There is a young hero who packs quite a punch, however unlike you he has mostly fought people who are physically equal or weaker than him. He needs to train with someone stronger than him to get used to fighting stronger opponents. I’ll be meeting with him on Saturday morning.” Danny nodded.

“Cool, I’m gonna be hanging out with Travis. We were planning to check out the arcade near his new job.” Diana smiled.

“It’s a pity he left the museum, where did he end up going?”

“He got a job on the boardwalk, at that smoothie shop. Y’know with giant monkey on the window.” Diana nodded.

“They do have good smoothies. Grandfather expects us for dinner that night so don’t stay out too late.”

“Sounds great! Hopefully I can get the recipe for that stew, it’s way better than Lunch Lady’s… don’t tell her I said that.” Diana frowned.

“So long as it doesn’t try to eat my lunch again, my poor sandwich it was so young, so tasty.” She replies dramatically with her hand on her heart. “Now start the movie, I wanna see what passes for ghost comedy.” She passes Danny his mushu pork and he presses play….

Two hours later Danny is asleep on the couch as Diana stares at the tv, reevaluating her definition of humor. Looking down at her peacefully sleeping cousin, she couldn’t be too mad. But she could ask around for the best chick flick she could find as payback.

———————-

Saturday morning came, and as promised Diana made her way to a zeta tube. When she arrived at Mount Justice, Batman was already there and based on their reactions he had already briefed them on todays training. She grinned, this was gonna be fun.

She wasn’t wrong either, they each took turns trying to knock her down, each failing more splendidly than the last. When it came time for Superboy to face her she readied herself to face the strength of Superman.

Unfortunately for Superboy, he did not have the same strength as Superman. Diana had also been regularly sparring with Danny, so her evaluation of his strength might have been a bit…skewed to say the least.

Unfortunately only hindsight is 20/20 and so when Superboy charged she immediately countered with full force, and he went flying across the room. After crash landing Superboy quickly righted himself and started charging her once more. Diana, while impressed at his enthusiasm, frowned at how easy it was to push his buttons. She grabbed her lasso and quickly subdued him. He fought against the bindings, though he had no hope of destroying the magical artifact. Diana released him only when he calmed down. She looked Superboy in the eye with a smile.

"You did very well young one, your warrior's spirit is admirable, however you must use it at the right time. When fighting an opponent that you know is stronger than you, you must used that spirit wisely. Wait until you find an opening before you strike, otherwise your opponent will use that strength against you, as I did."

Superboy clenched his fists and grit his teeth, Diana knew that look well. He was frustrated, her advice was likely akin to something he hears quite often. Diana sighed, "I will not tell you to purge yourself of this spirit as it is a useful tool, one I myself use when fighting overwhelming enemies. It is nothing to be ashamed of. However you must be careful not to be consumed by it. I have known many who let the rush of battle consume them. It has never ended in their favor." she approached Superboy, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"I will work with you on this journey, young one, so that you may learn as I did." she said with a smile.

Superboy looked surprised "Seriously? Why? What do you get out of this?" Diana laughed

"What else?! I want a proper rematch! You have impressive strength, I would like to see what you can do with it with a little extra training, young one." Superboy looked her in the eye for a moment before looking to the side.

"My name is Conner." he said with a blunt tone. "And...thank you."

"It's my pleasure Conner, now come, our time today is short let's see who else wants to try their might."

She turned back to see Kid Flash slowly inch behind Artemis. She gave a predatory grin, "It seems we have a volunteer!"

-------------------------

Meanwhile...

Danny woke up with his alarm at noon, and couldn't help but revel in the amount of sleep he got, a whole eight hours. He briefly considered snuggling back into the world's comfiest, and coldest, comforter, gifted to him by Frostbite. He slowly closed his eyes before his second alarm went off reminding him that he does in fact have to get up, as he has plans today.

He dragged himself out of bed, still wrapped in his comforter, and made his way to the kitchen. After starring into the fridge for roughly five minutes, as though it held the secrets of the universe... or poptarts, he grinned and grabbed his leftover stew. Pouring some into a bowl and reheating it, he slowly made his way to the table to savor his blob ghost stew. He jumped only a little when his phone started blaring once more, he scrunched his nose before looking at the caller ID. It was Travis. Danny sighed, it was too early to talk.

"Hnnghh?" The sound of laughter exploded from the other end.

"I'm sorry sleeping beauty, did I wake you?" Danny released a massive yawn.

"Nah, mm jus eatin breakfst? Wazzup?" He mumbled, watching the tiny blobs swim around in his stew with half-lidded green eyes.

"Hey I ran into a buddy of mine, mind if he tags along?" Danny scooped out a particularly plump blob and took a bite.

"Hmmm" Travis laughed.

"I'm gonna take that as a yes. We'll meet you at Café Loco before we head to the arcade, you sound like you need it. Were you up playing video games again last night?" Danny once more responded with a noncommittal, “hmmm” because no he was not playing video games. He was flying invisibly around the city and lost track of time, who wouldn't it was beautiful.

“Alright man, I’ll let you get back to you’re breakfast. See ya soon.” And the call ended.

Danny put his phone back down and finished eating before he started getting ready for the day. He threw on some jeans and a t-shirt, taking a moment to consider the jacket. His core would keep him cold, normally he wouldn’t bother but…. He sighed grabbing the jacket. Being a teen hero left him with more than a few scars, Travis was led to believe he got them in the accident that killed his “parents” but this new guy… it would be annoying to explain again, best avoid it entirely.

He grabbed his wallet and headed out, walking down the street he greeted familiar faces, stopping to pet Mrs. Perkins’ dog as he made his way to the bus stop. It wasn’t a long ride, and when he arrived he clambered out of the bus. Heading towards Cafe Loco like a beacon in a storm. He beelined it to the counter, nearly crying at the lack of a line as he ordered his cappuccino with 4 shots of espresso.

Travis found him huddled in a corner booth, curled around his coffee, watching people pass by. He saw a perfect opportunity and slowly snuck up to the booth, he was inches away from tugging the earbuds out of his ears when Danny suddenly turned his head to look him directly in the eyes. Travis jumped back with a shout, Danny took a long sip of his coffee, the stranger next to Travis covered his mouth trying his best not to laugh.

“Why is it so hard to scare you?! I swear this guy has eyes in the back of his head!” At this point the guy next to him scoffed.

“Or he saw your reflection in the window.” He said, pointing at the offending surface.

“Who’s side are you on?!” The stranger shrugged and Danny chuckled.

“I don’t think pointing out the obvious counts as taking sides. Your Travis’ friend right? I’m Danny, nice to meet ya.” He said, the other guy smiled.

“I’m Matt, nice to meet ya. Is the coffee here any good?” Danny nodded, pulling his coffee closer.

“It’s okay at best, he just likes it because they don’t limit his espresso shots because he bribes them.”

“It’s not consider a bribe of it goes in the tip jar.” He said with a wide grin. Matt blushed.

“Oh really, I’ll have to try that.” He coughed into his hand. “So, uh, you said we were going to the arcade.”

“Hell yeah! You said it had all kinds of new and retro games! Plus desktop gaming! Let’s go!” Danny stood from his seat. While he may never reach the overwhelming height of Jack Fenton, Danny had grown to be a respectable 5’10. He was quite proud of this fact though he didn’t think of it too much, considering his cousin was over 6’. But still he wasn't that tall, right? Danny thought,

'So why the hell did Matt just look at him like he was 10 feet tall? Sure the guy wasn't huge, but he wasn't exactly short either.'

Matt backed up just a bit, rubbing the back of his neck and looking away, "Yeah, let's get going before it get's too crowded." Danny downed the rest of his coffee and they headed out. Along the way they started talking about the upcoming school year, as it turned out Matt would be joining him as a junior at Gateway High.

Despite Travis' not so subtle diversions, Matt eventually made a rookie mistake. He asked what Danny wanted to do when he graduated. For the next hour Danny went on and on about how he wanted to build space ships, and how amazing space is, and did you read the Daily Planet interview with Martian Manhunter?!

Not to say Danny ran out of things to say about space after an hour, especially when Matt was giving him his full attention even when they got to the arcade and started playing. No, as someone who worked with Danny until his parents made him quit, Travis knew EXACTLY how long winded Danny could be when it came to space so he did the only thing that could distract him from space. He brought up his cousin.

"So I here your cousin is single and ready to mingle, according to Mrs. Doris, you think if I gave her my number I'd have a chance?" Travis wiggled his eyebrows. Danny looked at him as though he just said he put jelly on a tuna sandwich.

"Dude first of all, you're like 17 it's not gonna happen, second of all, and I cannot stress this enough, she is way out of your league." Travis pouted as Matt laughed at his suffering, not knowing his sacrifice.

"Ahh whatever man, let's just play. I hear there's this new game added to the online corner. Something called Doomed?" Danny froze, slowly turning to face Travis.

"Did you say Doomed?" his eyes were wide.

"Yeah? Have you-" Danny grabbed both teens by the arm and dragged them over to the desktops. Over the next few hours, the three of them made characters and a crowd gathered as Danny dominated level after level. Eventually though his alarm went off, reminding him to head home for dinner. After they said their goodbyes, Danny took off leaving Matt and Travis alone.

"Don't even think about it." Travis said, Matt tensed.

"He has single handedly increased the foot traffic in the space exhibit from the sheer amount of people who come to flirt with him. Him and his cousin are next level man." Matt's face turned a fiery red. Travis looked at him with pity. "If it makes you feel better, he has yet to actually say yes to anyone. To be fair though, I don't think he realizes their flirting when he's in space mode." Travis shrugs.

Matt nearly wept.

---------------

Danny dug into the lasagna with extreme gusto, while Diana ate at a much more restrained pace as she ate her second helping.

"You've outdone yourself, grandfather. Dinner is absolutely divine." Diana complemented the elderly (at the moment) Ancient. He gave her a proud smile.

"I should hope so, I got this recipe from Naples in the 15th century, from a lovely family of noodle makers. I tweaked it a bit based on it's evolution, I'm quite proud of how it turned out." he said with a grin as his form shifted to that of a young man. "But enough of that, how was your day today? I know you were planning on training the young Kryptonian clone today, how did that go?" grinning, Diana raised a brow, Danny perked up.

"Have you been spying on us grandfather?" Danny laughed.

"He's always spying on us, trust me. But who cares, what was that about a clone?" Diana sighed, resigned.

"Conner is a clone of Superman. Normally it would be his responsibility to train him, however he has been a bit... reluctant to interact with the boy." Danny scrunched up his nose.

"Did he try to kill him yet?" Diana looked at Danny, surprised.

"Superman may object to training him but I assure you he has not intent-" Danny waved his hands.

"No, no, not Superman. Did Conner try to kill him yet, it's like, a clone rite of passage." Diana stared at Danny. Danny stared back.

Clockwork drank his tea, fully aware of what he started.

"I'm gonna need a little more explanation than that." Danny shrugged

"I mean, he's gotta try to kill his original at some point. Just to get it out of his system y'know. My clone didn't last a full day before she tried to kill me." Danny shrugged, taking another bite of his lasagna.

Diana gave him a look like she was praying to the gods for patience, honestly she probably was, before she finally responded.

"When exactly were you cloned?" Danny shrugged.

"When I was like, 14 I think. I know it was after I met gramps, now that is a crazy story." Diana took a deep breath.

"We can get to that later, can we focus on the clone that tried to kill you? Please?" Danny set down his fork on his now clean plate.

"I guess, there's not really much to tell. My dad's best friend, who hated him by the way, wanted me to be his son because we were the only existing halfas, he's not technically he's more alive than he is dead, and because he was in love with my mom, she despised him, I told him no when he repeatedly demanded for me to join him, of course not he's a fruitloop, so he cloned me, a couple times actually but none of them were stable so they destabilized, and Ellie, the only stable clone, posed as my cousin, she is now kinda, and when my back was turned she tried to kill me. It's cool though, she realized Vlad was a fruitloop and we beat him up." he shrugged. "Like I said, there's really not much to tell." he explains before he starts to sneak over to the cookie jar.

Diana looked over at her grandfather, "What?" he nodded in symathy.

"I understand it's a lot to take in, however I assure you any future murder attempts perpetuated by young Ellie are completely harmless. She spends most of her time these days exploring the realms or spending time with Pandora." Clockwork explained.

Diana sighed turning to Danny "And you were okay with this? Being cloned by your enemy."

Danny swallowed his bite "Oh, hell no. I was pissed. Not only did he violate my privacy, he stole my DNA! He made a kid to replace me! So I kicked his ass and stole my clone." Diana looked to the heavens for advice, Clockwork set a hand on her shoulder.

"The gods will be no help when it comes to things like this. Trust me." he smiled. "And how was your day Danny? Did you have fun making friends?" Danny grinned.

"Definitely! He let me blather on about space!" Diana's eyes went wide.

'Dear gods, not another one.'

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#danny phantom #dp x dc #clockwork #diana prince #Wonder Woman #dp demi god au #I posted this and forgot the tags #I need to go to sleep now #I forgot to change the clock on my laptop!#I thought it was 3am #it is 4!#part 4 was posted at 4am #I’m dead inside but I love it

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