rory

Bruce: Why is your kid on a leash?

Lex: It isn’t a leash, it is a safety harness. Do you imagine I would come to your slum of a city and not ensure my son won’t get snatched by local thugs?

Bruce: That is a leash.

Kon: *scratching his head with his foot*

Lex, tugging the lead: Stop that.

Bruce: l-e-a-s-h

Lex: Grow the fuck up, Bruce. Besides, isn’t that your kid?

Dick: *swinging off the rafters while a concerned parent yells for help*

The gala hall is a cavern of marble and chandeliers, full of Gotham’s usual perfume of money and unease. Bruce sees them enter, Lex gliding with the stiff caution of a man who has anticipated disaster so thoroughly he almost welcomes it, and Kon, humming, weightless, tethered like a wayward balloon.

Bruce steps toward them, face unreadable.

“Why is your kid on a leash?”

“It is not a leash,” Lex replies without turning his head. His tone is a scalpel. “It is a safety harness. Do you imagine I would enter this crime-ridden monument to poor planning without ensuring my son is not abducted by your local fauna?”

Kon scratches the side of his head with his foot, still floating.

Bruce stares. “That is a leash.”

Lex gives the lead a curt tug. “Kon. Feet. Down.”

Kon giggles and rotates midair like a lazy planet.

Bruce spells it out. “l-e-a-s-h.”

Lex’s jaw clenches so hard it could cut glass. “Grow up, Bruce.”

Just then a shriek rings from across the hall. Not fear—outrage. A guest points upward, scandalized.

Bruce tilts his head. One of the enormous velvet drapes is swaying wildly near the ceiling, billowing in a way fabric should not billow unless someone—some small, extremely determined someone—is climbing it like a living mountain.

Lex cuts Bruce a murderous look. “…Is that your child?”

Bruce doesn’t bother looking. “He is enriching himself.”

“You have a child climbing eighty feet of drapery.”

“Self-directed learning,” Bruce says.

Lex blinks once, twice, as if recalibrating the universe. “You called me irresponsible.”

Before Bruce can retort, Kon’s eyes light up—bright, delighted, terminally reckless. “Climb?” he chirps, and rockets upward so suddenly that Lex is nearly yanked off his feet, dragged skyward by the leash he insists is not a leash.

“Kon! Descend this instant!” Lex’s voice goes shrill in a way only terror can produce.

The drapery sways harder. Kon arrives near the top, greets the mysterious drapery-climber with a cheerful “Hi!” and immediately grabs the fabric to join the ascent.

Bruce finally looks up and sighs with the resignation of a man who has accepted that physics will always choose violence in his presence.

Lex is still being dragged upward, shoes scraping against polished floor, dignity dying a slow, agonized death. “Bruce! Help me!”

“I told you,” Bruce says, moving with grim inevitability, “it’s a leash.”

“It is a safety harness and I swear—Kon, if you tear that fabric I will—”

The chandelier groans. The drapes quiver. There is a brief, suspended moment—still, sharp, as if the world inhales.

And then the entire upper fixture gives way.

Two small bodies fall, laughing as if plummeting is a game invented for them.

Two grown men sprint.

Bruce catches Dick. Lex catches the other, barely, collapsing backward with Kon curled against his chest—warm, heavy, safe.

Kon beams at him. “Again!”

Lex closes his eyes. “Absolutely not.”

Bruce dusts off his own kid and murmurs, “At least mine doesn’t need a leash.”

Lex glares at him over Kon’s wild hair. “Say ‘leash’ one more time,” he snarls, “and I will sue the chandelier manufacturer, the drape supplier, this building’s architect, and you.”

Bruce lifts a brow. “In Gotham? Get in line.”

Kon, blissfully unaware of parental warfare, hugs Lex’s neck. “Fun.”

Lex exhales, defeated but holding him tighter. “…This is why I use the harness.”

Bruce says nothing. His silence, somehow, is worse.

Lex scowls. “Not. A. Leash.”

:::

Later—after the adults finish arguing in low, lethal voices about structural integrity, liability, and whether Gotham’s chandeliers are built to code—the two boys are set down on a quiet balcony overlooking the city. It’s meant to calm them.

It does not calm them.

Kon dangles his legs off the stone ledge, humming. Dick sits beside him, bruised only in the way that children are—more exhilaration than injury, adrenaline fizzing through his small bones.

“You climb good,” Kon says solemnly, as if offering a diplomatic commendation.

Dick brightens. “Thanks! You float good. You look like a balloon. But, like… a cool balloon. A superhero balloon.”

Kon beams. “Papa says no floating inside buildings. I forget sometimes.”

“I forget rules all the time,” Dick confesses. Then, conspiratorially: “Bruce says I need supervision.”

“What’s supervision?” Kon asks.

“It’s like… when they stare at you real hard so you don’t die.”

Kon thinks about this, eyes narrowing in concentration. “Papa stares a lot.”

“Yeah, Bruce too.”

They share a small, solemn nod—for the burden of being small and fast and too alive in a world designed for slower creatures.

Dick leans closer. “Hey. When you grabbed the drape with me? That was awesome.”

Kon kicks his feet. “It was fun. You weren’t scared.”

“You weren’t either.”

“I had the harness,” Kon says, matter-of-fact, tugging at the strap around his chest. “Papa hates it.”

Dick grins, wicked and bright. “Bruce hates mine too.”

Kon blinks. “You have one?”

“Yeah,” Dick says. “It’s invisible. It’s called ‘Don’t embarrass me in public.’ It’s worse.”

Kon gasps. “Invisible leash?? That’s terrible.”

“Yeah,” Dick sighs dramatically. “He doesn’t let me swing off monuments unless he’s the only adult watching.”

Kon considers this with the seriousness of a philosopher. “We should trade.”

“Trade what?”

“You get the leash,” Kon says, patting his chest. “I get the invisible one. Papa won’t see it.”

Dick’s laugh echoes over the rooftops—bright, irrepressible. “Deal!”

They bump their foreheads together like they’ve invented a pact.

Below, Bruce and Lex both look up at the sound—two men carved from tension and mutual disdain—and find their respective sons perched shoulder-to-shoulder on the balcony edge, swinging their legs in perfect, uncanny synchrony.

Bruce mutters, “They’re bonding.”

Lex mutters, “This is a disaster.”

Above them, the boys lean closer, whispering like conspirators.

“Next time,” Dick says, “we should climb the outside of the building.”

Kon’s grin goes incandescent. “Yes. And float.”

“Float and climb.”

“Climb and float.”

Another solemn nod. A shared oath between tiny agents of entropy.

Hal: Why can't I Summon it back?!

The pickpocket

Hal: Why isn't coming back!? I can sense it! But it won't come back.

Meanwhile, Danny slaps the ring off his hand after the third time the thing launched itself onto his finger. Thankfully, his intangibility lets him smack his palm against his hand, like he's squishing a bug to get it off without hurting himself.

"You have been chosen,"

“Quit it!” he snapped, shaking out his hand. “I don’t need more powers—I barely manage the ones I have!”

The ring hovered in the air, humming with offended purpose.

You have been chosen.

“Nope. Absolutely not.” Danny backed away, palms raised. “I’ve been chosen enough times in my life, thanks.”

The ring launched itself again with a determined shwip. Danny phased; it passed through him; he batted it aside like a dodgeball. It hit a wall, wobbled indignantly, and went right back at him.

Above the alley, Hal Jordan hovered, increasingly panicked. “I can sense it—it’s right there—why isn’t it listening to me?!” he hissed, gripping the air like he could yank the ring back through sheer willpower.

Batman, on a nearby ledge, crossed his arms. “Because it wasn’t yours to begin with.”

“What does that even mean, you furry fuck???”

Down below, Danny grabbed the ring mid-lunge, holding it between two fingers like a cursed Cheerio.“That’s it. We’re done.” He swung his arm back. “Be gone from me, you clingy space parasite!”

And with the strength of someone who had absolutely hit his limit, Danny yeeted the Lantern ring straight into the sky.

It shot upward—past the rooftops, into the clouds, out of sight.

Hal stared. Speechless.

Batman said mildly, “Jordan, a teenager with ghost powers just threw your replacement ring into low orbit.”

Danny dusted off his hands and muttered as he walked away, “If one more magical object tries to adopt me, I’m filing a cosmic restraining order.”

:::

Hal stood before the Council, shoulders tense. The Guardians hovered, robes glowing, expressions identical blends of disapproval and cosmic dread.

“So,” one Guardian began, voice echoing, “you allowed the ring to be taken.”

“I didn’t allow anything,” Hal protested. “The kid didn’t steal it—the ring chose him.”

A ripple of alarm passed through the chamber.

“Impossible,” another Guardian said. “The new prototype rings do not choose without our approval.”

“Well,” Hal said, rubbing the back of his neck, “this one did.”

The Guardians stared at him, then at the ring floating innocently in containment.

The ring emitted a plaintive choooseeeen, vibrating like a lonely Roomba.

“And the candidate?” the eldest Guardian asked.

Hal winced. “Rejected the ring. Violently.”

Silence.

Then—

“He—he threw it?”

“He threw the ring?”

“Into space?”

“Does he understand what he rejected?”

“Does he understand the sacred significance—?”

“He called it,” Hal said reluctantly, “a ‘clingy space parasite.’”

Utter horror.

One Guardian actually clutched their chest.

Another fainted mid-hover.

“We must retrieve the child,” the eldest declared. “Someone who can overpower a power ring’s insistence is either a galactic threat—”

“Or,” another whispered, “the greatest Lantern of the age.”

Hal sighed. “Or he’s just a tired teenager with ghost problems.”

The ring, quivering in its field, whispered longingly: Choooseeeen…

:::

Danny was brushing his teeth when the bathroom mirror flickered neon green.

He froze.

Then a hologram burst out of the mirror—an ancient blue figure with giant eyes and robes that looked too expensive to touch.

“Greetings, new Lantern!” it boomed.

Danny spit toothpaste. “WHAT—NO—”

“You have demonstrated great willpower,” the projection continued, oblivious to his panic. “Your training begins immediately. Please refrain from physical violence toward your ring. It is deeply traumatized.”

Danny stared.

The hologram flickered. “To begin, please recite the Oath.”

“No?” Danny said, voice cracking. “What part of I threw it into space did the ring not understand?!”

The hologram ignored him. “In brightest day—”

Danny slapped at the light like it was a bug. His hand phased through it.

“STOP,” he groaned. “I’m not joining your intergalactic Boy Scout troop!”

“…in blackest night—”

“I HAVE SCHOOL TOMORROW!”

The projection paused as if buffering.

“Student… obligations detected. Recalculating assignment. You will be contacted soon.”

Danny slumped against the sink. “Please don’t.”

The hologram vanished.

From somewhere in his backpack, muffled but unmistakable:

chooooseeeen…

Batman: The reports conclude that about six or seven magical artifacts were stolen.

Billy, who has an apartment, a job, pays taxes, and goes on social media at max half an hour a day to update things for Whiz Radio: Golly, Mr. Batman sir this sounds serious, maybe we should get more people on the case!