Steve shows up to work one day with a baby bjorn complete with sleeping baby on his chest and Robin is like Steve....what the fuck?
And Steve says "I would've called you last night but she'd only stop crying when I held her and my parents were fighting, obviously, and I had to figure out how to make her bottle then I fell asleep with her on top of me and I think my dad legitimately forgot about us even though this is his fault, and there's no one to take care of her so I had to bring her. Sorry."
That is a lot and answers very few of Robin's questions.
"who...is she?"
Steve brightens and smiles down at the baby who's tiny baby fist is scrunched up in his work vest. "Oh! My half sister. Her mom works for one of my dad's business partners and brought her to my parents while they were away last week so they came home, mostly to dump her off on a nanny they forgot to hire--hence my baby holder here--and fight. Turns out dad cheating is easier to ignore when there isn't actual proof of it."
"oh. Woah."
"yeah. Anyways, ready to rewind some tapes?"
So they start work Steve logging returns into the computer and cupping the baby whose name I don't know yet's head. Then the little baby wakes up, making little baby noises, and Robin is not one for babies really, but Steve coos and picks her hand off his chest and waves it at Robin.
"see, that's your auntie Robin! Say hiii auntie Robin!"
The baby chews her tongue at Robin and blows a spit bubble.
And how is Robin supposed to not be charmed by that?
"awww," she says, letting the baby grab her finger, "yeah, I'm your auntie Robin. Your big brother's gonna take care of you so good huh? You'll know your way around retail in no time."
Steve giggles.
It is then that The Gremlins decide to show up and Cause Noise. Baby sister starts to cry and Steve takes her to the back to get her to calm down and change her, comes out (ignores the party's questions. Giving them Ultimate Mom Pose with Bonus Effect of Baby) hands her to Robin who is a little nervous but she will not let her new niece (?) Down, and goes back to find and heat up a bottle.
Eddie, who drove the gremlins and was looking for something in his van comes in, sees Robin holding the baby and is like huh? What's this?
And then Steve comes out with a bottle and a baby blanket over his shoulder, reaches for the baby from Robin and tries to get her to latch on the bottle with quiet words and gentle hands and Eddie is not okay he's not fine he's having a melt down because Steve with the kids is one thing but Steve with a Baby is something very different and he should not be expected to keep it together seeing this
Part 2.
Part 3
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i'm so used to there just being random unidentified bones laying around everywhere in these damn books that it finally occurred to me, just now, to wonder where the bones on new rho came from. y'know, the bones palamedes always tried to teach nona necromancy on.
they're his.
palamedes, who always loved teaching, living on borrowed time in a body that's not his own. palamedes, mentoring, teaching- parenting, by sixth standards, mind you. and that boy is sixth, through and through.
and the entire point of teaching nona necromancy in the first place was to try and determine if nona is, well, nonagesimus, right? so it has to be bones, it can't not be bones. bones are, like, her whole thing.
but they're not in the nine houses, anymore. things are different, on new rho.
they burn bones here. dig up the cemeteries. a society terrified of zombies will evolve to dispose of its dead differently.
the only bones he has access to now are his own. (camilla wouldn't let anyone take them- skull or hand, doesn't matter. they're still him, and she doesn't let go, remember? it's her one thing.)
palamedes woke up every morning wearing someone else's body to then gently place the shrapnel of his own in the cupped palms of a girl who's the closest thing he'll ever have to a daughter and try to teach her- how did the angel put it, again? normal school, as much as possible, for as long as possible.
(but hey, in a roundabout way, at least it's a chance for him to touch camilla again, right? nevermind that she's not there to feel any of it because he's in the driver's seat, that he can only stay for fifteen minutes at a time. it's atoms that belong to camilla touching atoms that used to belong to him, and that's close enough. he'll take what he can get, these days- if she can be their flesh, he can be the end. so what if holding his own bones is a mindfuck? so what if looking at them makes him nauseous? surely he can suck it up and deal with it for fifteen minutes. it's the least he can do— his poor camilla was the one who had to scrape the bloody pulp of them off the floors of canaan house.)
(speaking of, here's a fun fact: we actually only see nona practicing with the bones one time, on-page. camilla's final line in that scene, before palamedes takes over, is none other than: 'keep going. there are some bones left.' ow!)
remember, too, that the only part of dulcinea, the real dulcinea, that palamedes ever physically touched, was her tooth- the one that ianthe gave him, pulled from the ashes cytherea burnt her down to. he only ever touched dulcie once, and it wasn't until after she was already gone, but that doesn't matter- it still happened, and you can't take loved away.
in this same roundabout, bittersweet, by-proxy sort of way, palamedes has been physically touched by nona, too: the atoms she currently occupies, touching atoms that he used to occupy, and never will again.
the main interaction we've seen between palamedes and his mother took place back on the sixth, with her acting as mentor and him as pupil: the two of them studying a set of hand bones, juno encouraging him every step of the way.
we know that harrowhark's "most vivid memory of her mother was of her hands guiding harrow's over an inexpertly rendered portion of skull, her fingers encircling the fat baby bracelets of harrow's wrists, tightening this cuff to indicate correct technique."
they're still small for a nineteen year old, but the wrists are bigger, in this new set of memories nona's making. and it's not an inexpertly rendered portion of skull anymore- it's a hand, now, albeit one crafted from [a piece of skull reassembled (painstakingly—passionately—laboriously reassembled) from fragments, manually, and not by a bone magician, from the skull of someone who, soon after death or symptomatically during, had exploded.] and the identity and origin of these bones is no mystery at all. they belong to palamedes, and he's consented to their use for this purpose, and that matters.
but the details are just set dressing, really. the foundation of the memory is the same.
palamedes and his mother, juno and her son.
harrow and her mother; pelleamena and her daughter.
nona and her father-mother-teacher; palamedes and his daughter.
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DPxDC idea/prompt Pen Pals
(Probably more idea but you can run with the concept... im so srry XD)
Basically Danny and Damian are pen pals- until Damian receives a letter with Lazarus Water and Blood smeared on the page.
WHAT IF Danny and Damian were pen pals before Danny's accident. A school project for 8th grade. Damian was reluctant to participate but due to it being a grade and being pestered by his siblings that he would just scare the kid off anyways, he deciding to partake in this pen pal.
Danny whose not suffering at school, just living a normal life at the moment, is being teased by Dash saying his pen pal could smell loser before even opening the letter. Asking Danny if his parents even let him open the letter or blast it thinking its a ghost.
Which makes Danny who wasn't into this idea of writing a stranger more determined to do it. Besides they might only get one letter and teachers drop the subject. They might not even get it. So what the heck.
Turns out they become the only ones that constantly wrote each other- even mailing it in person once the school ended the program. (Damian having a post box set up for letters)
At first it was awkward. Danny commented/asking if Damian really was their age or some teacher pretending to write back instead of sending out the letters. If so. He sucks at it because what kid writes perfectly grammar letters and big words to convey something is cool. Guess its better than pretending he knows slang.
Damian furious writes back, offended! Also asks if he isn't younger, because everyone with basic english should know to capitalize their letters!
This goes back and fourth. Danny writing back every chance he got, and Damian doing the same, even being told not to at the dinner table. It goes from offended at each other to being curious.
Danny asking Damian more advice on english because it isn't his favorite subject. Damian asking more about how to sound like his age. Then it devolves to animals. Danny wishing he had one, but his parents didn't want one getting into the lab. Damian happily sending picture of his animals. Danny talking more about the stars.. etc.
Until Accident happens- Danny starts having trouble writing the letters. His pen with phase through his hand and replies between them got longer. Danny justifying this by saying he's having trouble with schooling this year.
Damian also been unable to send as many replies because he's been busy with teen titans and other heroics. Though he's encouraging Danny saying Danny is far smarter than that school even is aware of.
Until one day, after months of not being able to reply. He finds Damian's letter again. It makes him feel better. Even if Damian didn't know him... this person still believes in Danny... Though Danny feels guilty about it- it compels him to write him again.
He was about to finish the letter when he gets blasted by a ghost. He returns from the fight, beaten and bloody. He picks up the letter and sighs at the green stain left on it. Folding it up he stuffs it into his bag.
Next day after hurrying off to school, his mother finds the letter after it had fallen on the floor. She read a little bit of it and immediately recognize it was to Danny's penpal. She takes the opportunity to try her knew anti-ecto spray and mails it for Danny.
"Boy just like his father. So messy. I'll have to give him a lecture about ecto-contamination again."
Damian just returned from a mission from Teen Titans, been gone for three months. Alfred informs Damian he had received a letter from his anonymous pen pal in his absence. Damian had almost forgotten about the pen pal- thinking his pal just didn't want to answer anymore.
So eagerly he goes to his room to open the letter, but immediately blood drain from his face as his eyes zoomed back the feathery ink to the green blotch of lazurus water.. having almost evaporated.. leaving a water stain that glowed... and more importantly.. the human specks of blood that was revealed with the driest parts of the stain.
Damian immediately rushes to the cave.. only to find out his paranoia was right.... and was it his fault his friend was harmed?
Also the idea of Damian talking to Phantom in his robin suit. Asking how Daniel Fenton was.. and Phantom surprised and slips out a "Alive as much as he's dead."
Damian glaring and Phantom corrects, "He's fine. He has parents that are ghost hunters is all." Stressing his situation complicated.
Phantom just so shocked his pen pal is a hero- annnnd also cursing his mom for sending a letter like that. HE KNEW IT WOULD SEND IMPLICATIONS!
but idk if I figured out a good way for Damian to see the smeared letter. I just think it be fun.
Also Damian thinking he's to blame for league going after the fentons when he wasn't. At least not as early as he thought. He's very focused on saving/protecting Danny Fenton.. which makes Phantom's job harder.
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