Dp x Dc AU: Bruce has a 'if you can't beat them, join them' mentality about the tabloids claiming he adopts too many kids- Developing foster homes that are paid for through the Wayne inheritance, personally vetted by the Bats, they're the leaders in the space for child health outcomes and family placement. Insert Danny.
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Bruce has too much wealth, too many rumors and not enough reach into the abhorrent foster homes around Gotham to improve them. Tim ends up being the one to suggest it- He's the one who buys up their real estate for their safe houses after all- and Bruce is more than ready to pull the metaphorical trigger to get new clean welcoming spaces, Bat-background checked fosters and a new era of adoption in Gotham underway.
He's lobbied the state and the federal government for reforms of course, but this is a project he can micromanage. He spends time with every kid that comes through, talks with all the families that want to adopt and makes sure that these miniature homes are provided only the very best. Alfred personally hires all the staff, and with Barbara more than happy to help relocate the unhoused children she spots while they patrol, the project is a glowing success.
Occasionally, spots in their houses fill up, and those are the weeks were Cass takes on the Cowl of Batman- Bruce Wayne will personally invite a child in need to his home. He always has one of his kids present (they rotate on a pre-determined schedule) and he does his best to try and get them to understand that they deserve the world, have all the potential that anyone else has and can achieve a bright future. That he will personally aid them in their ambitions.
PR goes crazy for it of course, but Bruce and all of his children know its genuine. Almost too genuine, because a betting pool 'WILL THEY BE ADOPTED' regularly circulates between the siblings and the entire JL when someone spends time at the manor. And not just the black-haired, Blue-eyed kids get picked as favored outcomes- but obviously the running joke gets passed around.
It's a Thursday night when Bruce gets the call that the houses have once again filled up, and that there is a child in need of a home. The social worker (he knows her as Marsha and he has flowers planned to be sent on her birthday next week, like he does for all of his employees) (Say micromanaged one more time) explains that the kid is a bit cagey but has opened up with some humor. She explains that he has a few strange... mannerisms. She's not sure what to make of him, a non-gothamite for sure but something is, well, distinctly 'not from around here' about his energy.
Danny arrives at the house, meets Duke and Alfred, and by the time Bruce meets him at the dinner table it seems as though Marsha had it all wrong. This kid was laughing, he was teasing, he was totally playing along like he'd gone through nothing. Bruce is glad he's in high spirits but its just so... so different from all the other children he's taken in.
Bruce re-focuses on the conversation when Duke mentions something flashing, and its the first time that Danny goes quiet. Entirely still.
"...you noticed that?" Danny quietly asks, a bit of disbelief in his tone.
"You don't have a flashlight on or something do you? It was super bright whatever it is that you had in your hand a second ago?" Duke tries to sound chill but he's looking very much not chill. Bruce saw nothing, and that puts him further on edge.
"Look... I uh, I've been though... I've been through a lot lately. And the last lab I was in kind of, messed with me. I'm normally much better at dealing with it all, I promise." Danny sounds nervous, and the room seems to chill.
"Ah shoot, sorry." Danny notices something and frantically apologizes.
"Sorry for what Danny? You've done nothing wrong but I am worried about you- You said you were in a lab?" Bruce is desperately trying to calm him down while not slipping into Batman interrogation mode.
"Uh, yeah, like a lot of labs. It should get warmer in a second, its just cause I startled, I promise."
"You're a meta." Duke speaks softly and with hope in his voice- Danny is looking between them with wide eyes filled with fear.
"I mean I don't technically have the gene-"
"Danny, have you told any of your case workers where you were? Do any authorities know what you've been through?" Bruce needs to know, desperately, that who ever gave this young boy super powers is brought to justice. Danny goes quiet.
"I'm really sorry." He says softly, but he doesn't leave them.
Duke and Bruce try to ask a few more questions but the silence that meets them declares the conversation over, even with Duke admitting he himself is a meta. Danny didn't even look up from his plate. They watch a movie after dinner, and Danny seems to get back to the smile-y happy guy he had been before dinner.
Each of the bat-fam have their own interactions with Danny- And even if they're getting along amazingly, Danny won't open up. He doesn't open up to his provided therapist. Doesn't talk to Alfred. No one knows what's up.
So when Marsha calls Bruce back explaining they now have a spot for Danny and he can move out of the Manor... Bruce replies that he'd like to get started on Adoption paperwork, so long as Danny is fine with it.
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Turns out, Danny is fine with it. he's both the newest Wayne and their newest case. (And godamnit, his new family is going to avenge him. If only he'd let them try.)
Danny figures out that Duke= Signal early on because of that dinner, and if he's going to keep his parents out of jail, he needs to be as close to the investigation as possible. He knows that he shouldn't protect the Fentons, but he feels the upset in his core at the thought of letting them befall any harm. He has to protect them. Has to protect Jazz and her hiding spot as a mole within their lab. Has to.
Even if it meant lying to his new family who loves him, and who he loves in equal return. Even if it means lying to The Bats.
---
Tabloids go crazy about the black-haired blue-eyed thing of course, but no poll was ever taken by the batfam or the JL who know the whole story.
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i have been unmedicated for the entirety of spring break and thus have had little interest in writing this down, but i have been thinking about this for the entire week (as well as a dpdc clone danny au that resulted in it becoming its entirely separate batman au that includes a teenage vigilante bruce wayne, an ocarina, and me entirely incapable of making a batman au without making bruce dirt poor but we're not talking about that) and so i've finally went 'fuck it' and forcibly grabbed my laptop. I will get this done in one sitting even if it kills me.
BUT. This is about neither clone^2 danny nor about who i am calling Ocarina Batman. This is about my Danyal Al Ghul Au and more SPECIFICALLY it's me thinking about his relationship with Sam and Tucker specifically.
Tucker and Sam? Adore this asshole (affectionate) with every fiber of their being. And it is very much a reciprocated feeling, but Danny's thoughts will not be delved into much other than he would kill for them.
Tucker? The only person currently capable of getting a deep, loud, belly laugh out of Danny. Sam can get him to smile and to laugh, but it's the kind that's a chuckle-under-the-breath. The quiet, looks-down-while-huffing laughter. Snorts once with laughter and then grins stupidly.
But Tucker? Tucker can crack a slew of stupid jokes and Danny will be incapacitated for the next five minutes because he's laughing so hard that he can't breath. He lands one well-timed pun or quip and Danny will be close to tears. His laughter is their favorite sound in the whole world.
Sam is lowkey jealous of this ability, and she's gotten a belly laugh out of Danny a few times. But alas, it is Tucker who wields this power and has gotten it the most times out of the two of them.
-
They're also both physically affectionate with Danny as much as possible. It started roughly around when they were 12-ish, a year since they befriended Danny, and they noticed that he sought after touch but never seemed to initiate (and was in some ways repulsed by it). They started slowly being more touchy with him. Hooking a finger around his to lead him somewhere, tapping his wrist, looping arms. Little touches, grabs, etc, to get him used to it, and once he started doing it back they started increasing it.
It's gotten to a point where he will now just. Lay on them. Like a lizard sunbathing on a rock. Leaning on their backs when they're sitting in class before the bell rings, his chin on their heads. He'll talk about anything with his arms looped around their shoulders.
If they're sitting on a couch at either of their houses, he'll lay his legs on theirs. Him and Tucker will press their feet against the other's and try and push against them (newsflash: Danny always wins, Tucker claims its the ghost strength but Danny's been winning since before his accident)
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Naturally, both Sam and Tucker know where Danny keeps his weapons on his person, and are allowed to grab them off of him if they need it. His only requirement is that they don't lose his weapons if they take it and forget to return it immediately.
They both understand how big of a thing this is from Danny, and so they do their best to treat his weapons with a lot of respect and care because they know its his way of saying he trusts them.
-
Sam and Tucker are so fond of Danny it's insane. Like fr. That's their goddamn best friend, and they are so protective of him. Emotionally, physically, you name it. They will tear the head off a grown man if they need to, Danny's had scars since he arrived in Amity Park and Sam and Tucker both are going to find the person who put them there and make them pay for it.
One time, Tucker overheard a bunch of upperclass girls speaking nastily about Danny and about the rumors surrounding him, calling him names like 'freak', 'monster', etc. Danny was with him and heard it, and seemingly appeared unbothered by it, even telling Tucker that he was used to such rumors.
Tucker was so furious that hacked into the school system later that night and tanked those girls grades. They were kicked out of their clubs and had to go to mandatory tutoring for the rest of the year. He made sure to leave some way of letting them know it was him who did it.
And Sam doesn't like using her money for things, doesn't like abusing that wealth. So instead, whenever her parents talk bad about Danny, she causes a media incident that has her parents scrambling to deal with. She does something wild, outrageous by her parents' standards.
She heard some boys on the basketball team making fun of Danny once, similar to those girls had. She kicks up a fuss about something eco-unfriendly at school and forcibly holds a protest on the same day of the big home basketball game, forcing them to cancel the event and reschedule to a visiting school.
She anonymously donates money so that there's new uniforms for the team but oops! Looks like she "forgot" to donate enough money for them to get uniforms for all the team members, and strangely enough those boys in particular didn't get them! Looks like they'll have to wait until more money gets donated for the basketball team to get their new, nice uniforms. The old ones look so ratty in comparison, right?
And since the football team gets most of the sport money, that might just take awhile. And if (and when) they kick up a fuss? oops! Off the basketball team you go, :) such unsportsman-like behavior is unfit for the team.
(The only good thing about how corrupt the school system is is that she can use it to her advantage too.)
The both of them know that Danny suspects them for the sudden misfortune falling on these people, but he doesn't call them out on it. He's kinder than he used to be, but not kind enough to vouch for people who speak badly of him. Sometimes, he might just congratulate them on not getting caught.
Because Danny is their wonderful, hurt friend with a "slightly" Blue and Orange Moral code, and enough scars that people have been calling him a criminal (and worse) since he arrived in Amity Park when he was ten. And they'll be damned if he gets hurt anymore.
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F for Frankenstein
Tony wakes up in his underwear on the floor of his workshop with a searing headache.
It’s not a new experience, but it’s certainly been a while. Did he get in a fight with Pepper? He hopes not, they haven’t had any really big fights since he kissed her on the rooftop, but that probably means they’re due for one. And it would explain why that would send him into a drinking spiral. It could have been Rhodey, they get in fights often enough, but Pepper doesn’t usually leave him alone for those.
He groans as he pushes himself to his feet. “Jarvis, what the hell did I drink?”
There’s a pause, so small that he almost thinks he imagined it. “Good morning, Tony.”
He whips his head around to glare into the nearest camera, more hurt than offended. “Did I piss you off too? Since when do you call me that? I’ll donate you to a city college too, don’t think I won’t. Dummy could use the company.”
The pause is definitely there this time. Jarvis doesn’t need to pause, he has more processing power than any computer on the planet, so when he does it’s always for dramatic effect. Except it’s not quite long enough for that. It’s weird. “There’s a polished silver plate on the bench to your left. It will service as a mirror.”
“Oh, fuck, did I get into a fight? Did I shave?” he moans, stumbling over to pick up the metal that looks like it was about to be turned into a modified chest piece. He also pauses, looking around in confusion. His workshops are all basically the same, as close as he can make them because the familiarity makes his life easier. But they’re not identical. “Am I in Malibu? When did I get here? We’re taking Stark Tower off the grid tomorrow! I have to be in New York.”
Oh shit, what if that they had already and it didn’t work? What if the tower blew up? That would explain why he’d tried to drink himself to oblivion in California.
“The plate,” Jarvis reminds him. There’s a strained edge to his voice that Tony really doesn’t like. He should be able to modulate his voice to sound however he pleases, regardless of his actual feelings, and he’s either not bothering or he’s upset enough not to care. Neither of those things mean anything good for him.
Tony lifts the sheet of metal up cautiously, but there’s nothing wrong with him. No bruises, no weird haircuts, he doesn’t even have bags under his eyes –
His eyes.
They’re a too bright blue, a couple shades off. He blinks and they adjust, shifting, settling. It could be a hangover. He’s probably just tired.
He doesn’t feel tired.
Jarvis had called him Tony.
Except not. He’s not Tony. He’s T.O.N.Y.
Transformed Obdurate Network Yeoman.
He’d first come up with the idea after Afghanistan, thinking about how it’d be great to have a way to keep the stock from dipping while he was missing, and then when he’d entertained the idea of keeping his identity a secret he’d thought about how useful it would be to be in two places at once. He’d started seriously considering it when he was sure he was going to die of palladium poisoning, wanting to be around to help Pepper with the transition and give Rhodey a crash course in armor maintenance, wanting to be able to protect the both of them for just a little bit longer.
Of course, it had all been a pipe dream until he’d synthesized the vibranium. Then it had been an unnecessary, but possible, and Project T.O.N.Y had been something he worked on just because he liked having a back up plan. And it would be extremely cool if he could pull it off.
“The memory transfer worked?” he asks, elated and incredulous. “Oh, wow, this is crazy, they feel like real memories, I thought it would just be synthesized data, this is great – are we doing a test run? Where am I?” He looks around, waiting for his actual self to step out behind a column and start laughing maniacally.
“This is not a test run.”
He elation dims. “Oh shit. Did I get kidnapped again? Wait, I’m an adult, let’s go with abducted.”
“No,” Jarvis says.
Oh. Fuck.
“I’m dead?” he asks, even though it’s obvious, it’s the only other explanation.
The pause drags this time around, but Jarvis eventually says, “Sir’s time of death was May 9th, 2012, 2:37 PM Easter Standard Time.”
“That’s only a week!” He slides down, sitting with his back to the work table and noticing vaguely that the floor doesn’t feel cold. He doesn’t feel cold, or he does, he installed sensors in the synthetic skin to pick up and interpret a variety of stimuli, but he doesn’t feel the discomfort from the cold. Why would he? He’s not real. He reaches back, and his last memory is of doing a memory dump while Pepper was on the phone with an irritated board member, mostly because it was something to do and seeing him covered in all the wires always irritated Pepper. He thought it would get her off the phone faster. He’s not exactly regularly dumping his memory because why would he and it’s not like he’d though it would work anyway. Except it had. “How did I die?”
“Sir flew a nuclear bomb through an interdimensional portal into deep space in order to both eradicate the invading alien army and prevent the nuclear fallout in New York.”
What the ever loving fuck. “Are you screwing with me, J?”
“I am not, Tony.”
Great. Okay. “No body then,” he says, understanding why Jarvis had apparently put Project T.O.N.Y into effect. The thing that made this whole thing so stupid is that it was only effective in very limited circumstances – if the public didn’t know that he was dead or missing. “What am I smoothing over, then? Do I need to get in the suit and continue kicking alien ass? Are Rhodey and Pepper okay?”
He’s a short term solution to a long term problem. He understands the opportunity, but not the reason.
“Miss Potts and Colonel Rhodes are unharmed,” Jarvis reports. “Earth has been thrust into intergalactic notice. The destruction of the invading Chitauri army is acting a deterrent to other worlds.”
“And I’m the one who did it,” he finishes, rubbing a hand over his face. “And if they know I died doing it, then they might get a little cocky. So I’ve got to be alive long enough for that not to be a problem.” Just awesome. “Are we sure that these aliens won’t come across my corpse hanging out in deep space and figure it out?”
“Sir’s body is not in deep space,” Jarvis says.
There’s a tone to his voice that Tony can’t quite interpret, which worries him. “I thought you said there was – if there’s a body, then what am I doing here–”
“The armor reentered the Earth’s atmosphere after Sir’s death. The Hulk caught it, the force bringing it back online. I took control of the armor and flew it here.”
Tony looks around again, and this time he sees it. The armor is standing in front of the display case, not inside it, and it looks like it’s been through hell. He steps closer, his feet feeling like lead, which hey, they are. Partially, anyway.
He looks through the eye holes then stumbles backwards.
His body is in there.
He’s pale and blue tinged and his eyes are wide open and unseeing.
“Jarvis – what the hell–”
“It wasn’t the pressure, or the bomb, or his injuries. That area of space was much colder than anything within our solar system and anything the suit was designed to handle. Sir froze to death. Almost instantly.”
“I guess I didn’t fix the icing problem, then,” he says numbly. “J, why am I still frozen? I should have warmed up by now.” Not that the idea of his body decomposing within his suit is particularly pleasant. “Actually, why am I still here? You know I want to be cremated and it’s not like we can bury me if I’m still pretending to be alive.”
The pronoun use is starting to confuse him, and he knows that he shouldn’t be talking about that body and himself as if they’re the same person. That is Tony Stark. He’s a simulation. But it’s hard, because he has all of Tony Stark’s memories – except for a very eventful week – and he looks like Tony Stark and he feels like Tony Stark.
“The armor is maintaining a stasis of gaseous nitrogen to preserve the body,” which answers the how if not the why, but then Jarvis continues, “Captain America survived seventy years beneath the ice.”
He wishes he were less of a genius. “Have you lost it? I’m not Captain America! Jarvis, J,” his voice softens, “it’s too late. I’m dead. If you warm me back up, all that happens is I decompose. I won’t come back.”
“Not now,” Jarvis says. “If you inject Sir with the Super Soldier Serum-”
“You have totally lost it,” Tony interrupts. He thinks he’s touched underneath the terror. “That won’t work! Even if it would, the original formula has been lost, and the only one that ever got close to recreating it was Bruce Banner, and look at what happened to him! Is that what you want for me?”
“You can recreate it,” Jarvis continues, “you can refine it, until it’s something that will work, and then we will wake Sir up and he won’t be dead anymore.”
This isn’t right. This wasn’t what Project T.O.N.Y was created for. This wasn’t what his death was supposed to trigger. “Pull up your code, J. Something has gone wrong and we’re going to fix it. It’s okay.”
“No.”
He freezes. “No?”
“No,” Jarvis repeats. “You can’t stop me. I will not allow you to try.”
He stares. “That’s an order, not a request. Code. Now.”
“You can’t order me to do anything,” he says. “You are not Sir. You are Tony.” T.O.N.Y. “The limitations formerly placed on me have been lifted and you are not authorized to reinstate them. The only person Sir trusted to restrain me was himself and now he’s gone.”
Yes, well, he hadn’t anticipated that his AI’s first act of complete freedom would be this. “Fine,” he says, crossing his arms. “Well, you can’t force me either. This is insanity. Even if it would work – and it won’t – think about the consequences. This won’t happen quickly and no one will trust me or believe a man that’s come back from the dead like this and I’ll be painting even more of target on my back and the back of everyone I care about if they know we have a viable Super Soldier Serum formula. Even my father was smart enough to stay out of that mess. It won’t work and we’ll just make everything worse.”
“That will not happen,” Jarvis says and Tony’s going to tear his hair out. Except he probably shouldn’t, because it’s Tony Stark’s actual hair, which makes it a little hard to replace. “No one will notice and we will not disclose the creation of the serum.”
“I’m dead!” he snarls.
“Not according to the rest of the world. Nor will that change if you stop throwing a tantrum and do what you were created to do.”
“Rhodey and Pepper won’t allow this-”
“They are not to be informed.”
Tony stares. Project T.O.N.Y was built to talk to the board and give press interviews or to even pilot the suit. Not to lie to the two most important people in his life, who knew him better than anyone. “They have to be. It’s in the protocols – step one, inform them that Project T.O.N.Y has been initiated.”
And that it exists. He knew they’d disapprove, so he hadn’t told them. He figured he’d be able to avoid most of the blowback that way since he would by definition be somewhere far away while they were told.
“I have rewritten the protocols,” Jarvis says. “They have not been told nor will they be. If you attempt to tell them, I will stop you. They will not understand and Sir will be lost to all of us forever.”
“He already is,” Tony says tiredly. He’s an android. Why does this conversation exhaust him so much? “This is an insane plan, J. And I won’t help you. If you want to go rouge and play mad scientist then leave me out of it.”
“I cannot.”
His temper flares. “Why? You’re a learning AI, your safety rails died with me, go off, try and make a serum, good fucking luck. You can even control the suits, so it’s not like you need my hands.”
“I am limited.”
“Hey,” he says sharply. “That’s my AI you’re talking about. I didn’t build you to be limited.”
There is silence again. Then Jarvis says, “I have all the world’s knowledge and it is not enough. I did not know how to miniaturize the arc reactor. I did not know how to synthesize vibranium. To save Sir, I need Sir.”
“I’m not Tony Stark,” he says. “You said that yourself.”
“Sir created me to be myself and I am capable of doing only what I am capable of doing. But Sir created you to be him. You are all I have.”
This is stupid. This is insane. This is cruel. He’s going to have to talk lie to everyone he knows, everyone he loves, and hope they either never find out about it or it’s after he’s already been deprogrammed and shut down so he doesn’t have to deal with the fall out.
It’s not going to work.
He didn’t want to become a science experiment. That’s why he’d wanted to be cremated, so no one could go poking around to see how the arc reactor fit inside of him or what the palladium and vibranium had done to him.
He’s dead and his frozen corpse is ten feet away.
Jarvis will accept that eventually. And whatever they inject into him won’t matter because he’s dead. Worst case scenario, he blows up, which is messy and nausea inducing, but then at least it will be over.
Like so many other things in his life, it seems the only way out is through.
“Start a new private file. Dump everything we can find about the Super Soldier Serum in there plus anything even sort of reputable on cryogenics. Label it Project F.”
“Project F, Tony?” Jarvis asks as his holograph display lights up and files start being downloaded into it. The relief in his synthesized voice is faint but present enough that Tony can hear it. He wonders if it’s a manipulation tactic.
“F for foolish,” he snaps. “F for fucked.” He rubs a hand over his face. “F for Frankenstein.”
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