#zantanna is already so done with all of this

[spacedace]

DPxDC snippet/prompt:

-

“John.”

Zantanna’s voice had that cadence to it. Faintly strangled. Forcibly calm. Her rising blood pressure and rapidly approaching limit for his special brand of excitement evident in every single letter of his name.

Felt like old times.

“Z.” He said, smoke curling out of his mouth and billowing towards the dreary grey sky above. The one nice thing about Gotham, it had the same gloomy dark ambience of ol’ London town. “Long time no see. How’s show biz been treating you?”

He saw the faintest of twitches at the corner of her eye. Could almost hear her counting to ten in her head. He smiled at her winningly, leaning back against the damp bricks of the alleyway as he waited. More smoke drifted upward from beside him in time with a bored sigh. Patience was running out on all sides it seemed.

“That’s a child.”

“Sharp as ever.” He said, taking another drag. He nudged the child in question beside him gently with his elbow, glancing down with a sly grin. “See this is why the Justice League pay her the big bucks. Nothing gets past our Zantanna Zatara.”

He got a cloud of smoke blown directly in his face for that, little shit.

“John.”

“Z.”

“Why do you have a child? Why is the child smoking?”

“Long story.” He said with a wave of his hand.

“I learned it from watching him.” The kid said, with the same cadence as that old American commercial. All dramatic and overwrought emotion. The gremlin swooned against John's side in an imitation of collapse, hand holding the lit bifter coming up to their forhead to really sell the melodrama. He nudged his ghostly companion off, grinning at Zantanna’s slipping patience as he did.

“Don’t worry about it. Kid's fine.”

“A child wandering around with you in a dark ally in Gotham smoking cigarettes is fine?”

“I mean, I’m already dead. And short. It’s not like smoking is gonna be able to do any worse to me.”

#dpxdc #dpxdc prompt #john constantine #zantanna zatara #dani phantom #danielle phantom #elle phantom #danny fenton #i wrote this with Elle in mind since I have an entire Paper Moon AU brewing in my head with her & John #but it absolutely could be danny instead #zantanna is already so done with all of this #she's having flashbacks of John smoking in the corner with baby Jason Todd when the kid was still Robin and Bruce losing his shit about it #she wants to say not her circus not her monkeys *so badly* #but very unfortunately John and his bullshit probably is her deranged little monkey in her very on fire circus #and now he's got a feral dead kid following him around this can't be good

[mxtantrights]

famous dc!au (dick's version)

TRACK TEN: CAN I HAVE THIS DANCE

It felt like every other hour you were seeing links to gossip rags about Dick and Zantanna. It was mostly your fault, once you click on one link they all start popping up and finding their way to you. You shouldn’t have clicked it in the first place. But you can’t really help yourself. 

Seeing him with her only made you a thousand percent sure that he didn’t have any romantic feelings for you whatsoever.

You fix the white dress robe that’s laid on your body one more time. Then you put your phone into your bag and walk over to set. This time is a bit different. The video is more elaborate you think. The director gave you the general idea of it, but she also said it would make more sense after adding effects and stuff to it. 

You would be dressed as a Grecian person. And, as if the world wasn’t already throwing you for a spin, Dick would be Apollo. All that you know about the greek god, you knew Dick was anything but that. Yes he was good looking and yes he’s had several relationships. But the version you learned about was cruel and manipulative. Dick was never that.

You walk onto the soundstage for the day. It was nothing but a painted blue sky with clouds. It didn’t look cartoonish, more realistic. You couldn’t help to look around in awe.

-

Dick walks onto set and sees you glancing around. Your eyes full of wonder and your mouth ajar. He stays right in his place, not wanting to disturb you. He’s scared. Scared that he might slip up and say something about his feelings for you. Or that he might just make a total fool of himself. Or both. Honesty both happening at the same time would be more his style and would send him to an early grave.

A tall PA comes up to him and gives him the run down of what todays’ shoot entails. Honestly he wasn’t paying attention when his team explained to him the video concept. He knows he’s in good hands. Directing his video this time around is The Music Meister. He’s well known for getting the video to go along with the lyrics and the temp of the song. 

Your eyes find his and you smile. But it doesn’t seem to reach your cheeks like it usually does. Dick wonders if something is upsetting you. He wonders if he can even ask you in this capacity. Would that be weird? Surely he can ask in a friendly and non-overreaching way. Yeah, he can do that.

He waves at you, and you wave back at him. Then a makeup assistant is pulling you in another direction. He watches as you go and then looks over at the PA who has seemingly stopped talking. Dick lets out a strangled breath. The PA probably just saw him drool after you, he wants to hit himself over the head.

“I’m sorry about that—“ Dick starts. “Nah, no worries. You’re just getting into the headspace. That’s fine.” The PA says.

And Dick can’t tell if the assistant actually believes that or is just giving him an out. Either way Dick is happy about it and smiles and nods. The PA decides not o pursue the object of getting him the details about the shoot and just walks away with a smile. 

-

If it wasn’t enough to have to see Dick during the day, you have to see him at night too. It’s not like you hate him now. On the contrary hating him would be easier than—you know. But right now you have feelings for him that aren’t going anywhere anytime soon and the dace instructor is telling you to lean your body onto his.

You let out a chocked breath and follow instructions.

“If this—I know this isn’t something you signed up for so if you’re uncomfortable we can ask for a change in the video.” Dick whispers to you.

You can only really hear him because he’s this close. His voice goes straight to your ears above the noise of the music playing in the background and the instructors directions. 

You shake you head, “I’m good. I’ve just never done this before.” 

The instructor tells you to toss your head back and for Dick to position his arms around your waist. The directions make you want to upchuck with how nervous you’re getting. You can see why Dick would think you’re uncomfortable. You slowly extend your head back as you feel his hands on your left and right sides. 

You hadn’t realized how good he is at holding something. It’s weird. It’s not something you should be thinking about, but it is. Dick Grayson is holding you from losing your balance and you feel like he’s never going drop you. 

You let out a breath, knowing that you had been holding it here and there with being this close to him like this. You can practically feel him breathing on your neck.

The only other man in the room directs Dick to drag a finger up the curve of your front, from your stomach to your neck. Your eyes go wide as you feel it happen and all of a sudden you’re giggling and pulling your head back up. 

You slap your hand over your mouth. You can’t believe you just did that. You remove your hand and look at the instructor and Dick. “I’m so sorry—I’m really ticklish I should’ve said something about that before we started.” You admit.

Dick looks to the man, “can you give us a sec?”

The man leave the two of you, holding his hand up to signal it’s a five minute break. Dick then turns to you with a smile.

“It’s okay. I should’ve asked before I went and followed his directions.” Dick says.

You clear your throat, “Well, I’ll tell you now that I’m ticklish, I can be pretty flexible and I like to crack my joints sometimes.” 

Dick laughs at that, “These are all good things to know.”

You smile.

-

This smile is different. Dick feels like a weirdo for knowing this, for knowing how your smile goes past your cheeks and both rows of your teeth show and your nose moves. He knows these things and he feels like a lovesick puppy. 

“That’s a nice view.” he says.

Of course he doesn’t mean to say it. It just falls out of his mouth. If Damian and Jason were here, they would scold him. Or, Damian would scold him for just flirting like the back of his hand and Jason would scold him for using such a cheesy line. 

But he means it. 

The smiles you set his way easier today weren’t real. He knows it. 

“What is?” you ask.

“Your smile. I don’t know I just,” Dick scratches the back of his neck, “earlier it seemed like something was eating at you.” 

You rolls your shoulders at his words. The boy wonder wonders if he’s struck a nerve. When he hears the small puff of air you let pass between your lips he definitely thinks he said something wrong.

“I mean something is, but it’s just hard to talk about.” you answer.

Dick nods his head, “I’m here if you wanna talk, or not talk.”

There is a silence between the two of you. Dick knows how that sounded and puts his hands up in surrender, his brain can’t make the words fast enough. It’s only when you let out a hearty laugh that he realizes he can calm down a bit. God, your laugh.

“Promiscuous.” you tease.

“I’m sorry I didn’t mean that like—I meant like we could hang out and not talk about it. Like go to the aquarium again.” Dick replies.

“I understood what you meant. And yeah we can hang out again for sure.”

And before he can say anything to that, the dance instructor comes over to you two and claps his hand once, asking you to take positions again. Dick bites his tongue and turns to you fully. You place yourself right in his hold this time, your eyes sparkling. Like you might laugh again if he were to drag his hand up your front but you wouldn’t mind it. He wouldn’t mind it either.

#dc imagine #dick Grayson x reader #dick Grayson imagine #dc x reader #dc x you #dick Grayson x you #dc fic #dick Grayson #dc #famous dc! au (dick’s version)

[wrennajites]

The Times He Tried to Say I Love You

Who doesn't love awkward teenage love?

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

“Any day now Crypto!” Oliver shouted over the sound of the walls screeching towards them. Cat and him were back to back and he was defiantly getting worried about how they were gonna get out of this.

“There are no codes for these doors! It’s a one way ticket to pancakeville.” Alec groaned over the comlink and even Oliver could here him furiously typing. So that was it, there was no hope. The doors continued sliding and he was pressed up against BlueBolt’s body.

Oliver swallowed. “Hey Cat.”

Cat grit her teeth as she pushed against the doors. “No names in the field J.” Oli could feel her shoulder blades protruding against his and it took quite a bit of his own strength to keep from her shoving his face in the door.

“I need to tell you something.” Cat’s hands gave up as the doors closed in on them. The raven haired girl was silent.

“I l-“

“Got it! Override code Alpha3425.” Cryptic spoke over the comm and the doors began to slide back into position and the two heroes were released.

“What were you going to say back there?” Cat and Oli had gotten out of the area as soon as physically possible and were now running down the white corridor to make up for lost time. Their hard boots hitting the floor and echoing along the metal walls as Oliver thought about what to say.

“Nothing.”

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

Oliver was staring at the emerald green eyes in front of him, trying to avoid their intense gaze.

“Well Oli, what’s your truth?” Catharine quoted Wonderwomen as she stared at him. Jamie sat next to him and then Alec and the rest of the team. A night of training had ended in what was supposed to be a short game of truth or dare. Who knew that Robin had a crush on Batgirl or that Wally would probably do anything to complete a dare, including prank calling Superman himself. So far the game had been fun and filled with laughs, until Oliver had made the stupid decision to choose truth.

“I’m not sure what I could tell you, that you guys don’t already know.” That wasn’t a lie. Oliver wasn’t convinced that a secret identity was so necessary. The team were his friends and they deserved to know about him. “No crushes? Oli I find that hard to believe.” Jamie spoke up with a knowing grin on her face.

“I uh, I do have one…” Oliver turned his head to the side to hide his blush and avoid the questioning gazes of his friends.

“Hang on I need food for this.” Wally sped off towards the kitchen and returned to couch area. The coffee table had been moved aside to make room for the team on the floor. With M’gann laying on Conner’s shoulder and Zantanna and Robin poking each other, Oliver felt, lonely.

His gaze immediantly went to Cat. His heart ached to have her lean on his shoulder or have her head on his lap. That was his truth. He had the biggest crush on Catharine Grimm.

“Okay I got one.” This was a now or never moment. A moment of forever rejection or a new chapter of his life. “I ha-“ Cat turned and she smiled at him and all his courage vanished.

What if he ruined their friendship? Or she would reject him and never be able to even look at him again.

“I had a crush on Wonderwomen when I was eight.” His hands covered his face in shame but not of shame for speaking the truth but out of shame for being scared.

The rest of the team was a fit of giggles and even Conner smiled but Oliver was disappointed in himself. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“I’m not going to do it Jamie.” Oliver adjusted his tie and glared at the brunette in front of him. Her pale blue dress spun as she turned towards him and her hair was flung into his face.

“Just one dance, if you ask her, I’ll take your patrol free for three nights, whenever you want.” Jamie always drove a hard bargain, and with mid-terms coming up, he could defiantly use the extra time.

“Fine.”

Oliver walked over to Cat and took a second to take in the short green dress she had on for the Spring formal.  Her hair was actually done and she had the slightest amount of make up on, and overall she was stunning.

Oliver cleared his throat. “Hey Kitkat.” The girl turned and smiled at him. Oliver reached out his hand to her. “Dance with me?” He gave her his best smirk and she thankfully grabbed his hand and he led her out to the dance floor. “I didn’t know you were a dancer.” Oli spun her around.

“You become a vigilante at night, learn some acrobatics through Nightwing and you pick up a few things.” Oliver wrapped his arm around her waist and was surprised by how natural this felt.

“Hey, there’s been something I’ve been wanting to tell you.”

Cat’s smile fell and for a moment Oliver felt bad. He should have this last bit of happiness before she rejects him right?

“You know what? It can wait. Let’s have fun.” ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Oh shit.” Oliver lifted his foot out if the water that was slowly filling the room they were in.

“Stupid, stupid, stupid. I really should have led us through the briggs entrance.” Cat’s hands scoured the metal door that had locked them in the hall. The underwater housing they had broken into was flooding. Something had jammed the side door and it was never able to fully close. And of course as a plan B the housing immediately shut off that hallway with a three foot thick iron door. The portion sectioned off however was steadily filling with water.

“Alec?” Cat called for her brother.

“There is defiantly something blocking the doors. If you make sure to get it I can Shut the doors manually.” The water was at Oliver’s chest now, and he suddenly wished for the days when he didn’t know what wet spandex felt like. Cat seemed a lot more alarmed them him however.

“Blue?”

Cat was hyperventilating. “I-I can’t swim.”

Oliver turned fully towards her. “What?!”

“I can’t swim!” Cat looked hysterical and the water was at her neck now. Oliver swam over to her and wrapped his arms around her waist.

“Looks like I’ll just have to swim enough for both of us.” Oliver began to kick as the water went above his head. “How are we on that door Cryptic?”

“I can defiantly shut it manually but one of you is going to have to get whatever that object is unstuck, and there is a major downside.” Oliver frowned “What kind of downside?”

“Once you go through the hatch that leads to door it will automatically shut behind you and it won’t open again.” Oliver let that sink in.

“I would call that more than a downside Alec, but I’ll do it.” Cat froze.

“No you won’t. Alec there has to be another way. A code or something you could hack. Or-“

“Cat look at me.” The girl stared at him and she looked the most scared he had ever seen her since the night he met her in that alleyway. “Swimming is easy just gotta kick your feet and keep your head up okay?”

“No I don’t need to, because your going to be here, you’re going to help me and-“ Oliver put his hands on her cheeks and kissed her. He didn’t have time to let her kiss him back.

“Cat I love you, and I always have. You’re the most beautiful person that I have had the honor of meeting but right now I need you to be brave okay? I need you to keep you’re head up and say bye to Jamie for me?”

“Oliver!” Oli kissed her forehead one last time and took a deep breath. He went under and felt Cat looking for him with her hands, he dodged her reaches and gave one last look at her before he swam through the door and watched as it shut behind him.

[spacedace]

It was the final hour. Doomsday at their door, with only hours left before the world was consumed entirely and every last living thing was devoured right along with it.

Summoning the High King of the Infinite Realms was the only option left, and even then felt more like choosing a firing squad rather than a noose at the end of the day. Pariah Dark might - might - accept the task of destroying the foe they faced, but tmit would come at a cost that was near equal to doing nothing at all. Provided the tyrannical ruler simply didn't let them all die, an entire planet dead was an entire planet to add to his endless armies.

They had to try. Stupid and suicidal as it was.

Zantanna and John worked in silence as they created the summoning circle, hands shaking and stomachs cramping as they worked under the apprehensive eyes of the rest of the League. They all understood that no matter what happened, they would all likely end up dead by the end of it. That the best case scenario meant that death was only the beginning of their problems.

Candles were lit. Insense burned. Blood spilled. Words spoken.

Nothing.

Nothing.

It failed, not so much as a flicker of magic. Which was impossible, they'd checked and confirmed a dozen times that they had the right ritual, that they were following the steps, they had done everything right way wasn't it working? What had they done wr-

"Ugh, gross is that blood?"

Elle Phantom, fifteen minuted late to the site of the ritual with both the boys Super, the most murderous Robin and a sugary abomination of an iced coffee from Starbucks, scrunched her nose in disgust as she looked at the summoning circle.

"This ritual is so out of date, where did you even find it? Wait is that Latin? Who tries to summon someone from the Ghost Zone in Latin?"

John had burned through every drop of alcohol and cigarette he owned hours ago while trying to find this bloody damn ritual and was very much not in the mood for the little hellspawn's color commentary on the process.

"I don't bloody well seeing you providing with any alternatives for summoning the Ghost King." He swore, turning away from the gremlin to tear through the ancient book he and Zantanna had discovered with the ritual inside.

There was a loud slurping noise as the undead hero sucked the last remnants of her drink through the straw. John's brow twitched, even Zantanna - who usually seemed endeared by the chaos goblin - looked at the end of her rope.

Then - "Oh, is that who you wanted to summon? Why didn't you say so?" She drifted over, handing her empty drink off to a disgruntled looking Batman, and began rummaging through the unused magival supplies left over from the - failed - summoning circle. "Here, give me like, five minutes."

John was fairly certain his head was about to explode.

"You know how to summon the Ghost King? You?"

Phantom rolled her eyes at him. "Duh, obviously."

"Obviously." Zantanna repeated, looking like she was half a moment away from having a breakdown. She didn't try to stop the ghostly girl, though, and to be fair neither was John. They were already fucked, might as well let the gremlin try her hand at it.

It took less than the five minutes Phantom had claimed she needed.

When she was done there was a significantly smaller circle on the ground. At the cardinal directions of the circle, written clockwise she'd drawn not any magical runes but instead what appeared to be the Roman Numerals for one, then two, then something akin to a sideways T with an additional mark rising upward from the long horizontal bar, then the letter L.

It had to have some kind of ancient magical significance John didn't know as Shazam made a noise like a dying goose and squeaked out the word Loss like it was a question. Phantom gave the Champion of Magic a sharp toothed grin before adding some words in a language John didn't know before she finally allowed gravity to pull her back to earth and plant her feet on the ground.

She wiped her hands together a bit dramatically, looking pleased with herself, but at that point John didn't care. He could feel the building magic, heavy and oppressive as she had begun her task. Unlike the circle he and Zantanna had attempted, this one was working.

He couldn't help thr nervous swallow he gave as Phantom then declared, with a strange amount of seriousness. "All that’s left are the words."

She took a deep breath, eyes closing for a moment, and the world went utterly silent around them. This, John could feel, this was the real deal. Fuck him sideways the hellspawn was actually doing it.

Phantom's eyes opened, glowing with that bright eerie green light of her power. Another deep breath and then -

"You are my dad! You're my dad!" He watched, any scraps of hope she'd instilled in him dying an undignified death as she gave a terrible little wiggle dance while she sang(?) Off key, "Boogie woogie woogie!"

Every last person on Earth was going to die and one of John's last moments was going to be spent watching the little undead shit do the Macarena. Well fuck him, he guessed.

Then there was the sound of the veil between the world's tearing in two and the fucking Ghost King was standing in Phantom's summoning circle screaming in a screeching falsetto:

"When will you learn? When will you learn that your actions have consequences!"

You know what actually at this point John would rather the apocalypse kill him.

#dc x dp #dp x dc #danny phantom #batman #justice league #danielle phantom #danielle fenton #john constantine #zantanna zatara #danny fenton #ghost king danny #Danny got to make up his own summoning rituals when he became king #there's a general one but he also has personalized rituals for each of his family members #all of them involve memes #the day is saved #but it's also the day that the Justice League find out Elle is the daughter(?) of the Ghost King #except for Damian Jon and Con #they already knew

[inkweaver22-blr]

Okay, so, a while ago there was this post in the Phandom about a theory relating to Reality Trip.

I can't find it now, but the basic gist was that the reason the tail end of the series was... inconsistent, shall we say, with it's character developments and their illogical decisions was that Danny messed up with the Reality Gauntlet. He was supposed to turn the world back to normal, but instead turned the world into what he perceived as normal.

Danny, being a 14-15 year old teenager, probably doesn't have the perception to really see others as nuanced and complex individuals. So everyone he knows becomes the flat, one-note personalities he subconsciously views them as. It explains Vlad's sudden shift from calculating chess master to over-the-top world-dominating villain who doesn't think things through amongst other things.

Other than the people he knows personally, it's likely no body else was effected by this flattening of character or else society might have ground to a halt.

But what if certain famous individuals that Danny knew of were?

Say like, oh I don't know, the Justice League?

What if at the end of Reality Trip, Danny not only accidentally turned the people he knew into living caricatures of themselves, but Earth's greatest Heroes as well? More thoughts under the cut.

It probably wouldn't be the entire League, only the really big names that Danny would have preconceived notions about. So Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Flash, and Martian Manhunter all become what he thinks of them as.

Superman becomes Kal El full time and Clark Kent ceases to be. After all, Superman is an alien and lives in his fortress. Everyone knows that. All of his already overpowered abilities somehow get stronger due to the idolization from a teenager.

Batman becomes even broodier and mysterious. He seems to be able to literally merge with the shadows now. He's quicker at solving crimes and mysteries but the leaps of logic he makes aren't actually logically and he seems to be able to pull the answers from nowhere. After all, Batman can solve any crime. But just supernaturally knowing the answers can't be admitted as evidence in a courtroom.

Not sure what to do with Bruce Wane. He's famous so he wouldn't disappear, but he's probably not high on Danny's radar. Perhaps he and Batman are now two separate people?

Wonder Woman becomes a bit more viscous in her fighting style. Her somewhat dismissive attitude towards those who identify as male returns and is dialed up. Literally starts using Xena battle cries because "Amazon Warrior Princess".

Green Lantern goes full Space Cop. Citing laws and regulations people are violating.

Flash takes things even less seriously then he already did and behaves hyper-actively.

Martian Manhunter, who normally doesn't volunteer what Martian culture was like, is now constantly comparing human culture with it.

Needless to say, those close to these six notice the changes immediately and are Not Happy.

It's Zantanna who discovers the residue of a powerful magical item on them and she and the League's B Team head to Amity Park to figure out what's going on.

Danny is, naturally, horrified by what he's done, especially since he destroyed the gauntlet. Luckily, the thing is tied to reality itself so can't so easily be unmade.

Thus, Reality Trip 2: Danny and the B Team Search for the Gauntlet, begins.

#Danny Phantom #Justice League #DC Universe #Reality Trip #Superman #Batman #Wonder Woman #Green Lantern #Flash #Martian Manhunter #Zantanna Zatara #Phandom #Danny Fenton