#jayslade

thank you anon!

wip tag game.

this was born of me going "what if daemons but also soulmate au"

which. if you, or anyone reading this, isn't familiar with daemons, they're a concept from Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy series?), which. i have not actually read (yet). they're a physical manifestation of the soul; tied to their person and present from birth. as children, their form is constantly shifting between animals until eventually when they're older, they settle on one.

however, i used animal spirit rather than daemon because the main thing i've taken is "animal representation of the soul" and i'm not really using the rest. the spirit doesn't appear until the person is much older in this AU (when exactly? i'm unsure since i'm still working out all of the details though) and is the manifestation of the soulmate's soul rather than their own.

the very very loose plot i have is that jason's soulmate spirit comes to him and he is initially quite unenthused about the whole thing. the spirit is a one-eyed white wolf, so there's not much mystery about who it could be at least, and it doesn't take long for word to spread and get back to slade (through billy ofc) and for slade in turn to then show up in gotham. (his animal spirit is a magpie, if you're curious! i can't resist the bird theme~)

a snippet:

Jason is twenty-one when the white wolf comes to him.

sound logic, sir. now get railed for the first time in decades

heheheh that's just how it goes, you're walking along one day and then suddenly a ship grips u by the throat and won't let go! idk how deranged I'll be about it, it's possible this will be a casual interest, too soon to assess the damages yet, but I will say it's a very different flavor of ship than my usual and it's very refreshing!

Here are some of the broad concepts that I find compelling:

First is the psychological impact upon one Dick Grayson. He has an extremely fraught, complicated, violent-yet-sometimes-allied relationship with both of these characters. I'm not sure how yet, but I'm convinced learning about them being romantically involved would deal 12d6 psychic damage to him and I want to see it happen

Second is that Slade has several kids, bad relationships with all of them, and most or all of them are older than Jason. This could result in an amazingly awkward and fucked up step-father situation that absolutely no one wants. Except for me. I want it. I want to see Rose introduce them as "My step-father Jason (neutral but on thin ice) and his husband Slade (derogatory)."

Third is that somehow, against all odds, they end up being super good for each other. Slade's track record with relationships is... Very Bad as far as I understand it. Jason's track record with relationships is basically nonexistant but also no part of this man is well adjusted about anything. Every character that knows of them could reasonably expect their relationship to be some kind of toxic nightmare tar pit. But what if it wasn't?

Horrible, terrible, no good power couple who make each other deeply happy and mentally healthier.