#saving daylight

Jazz knew her best quality tended to also be her worst one. She knew her optimistic attitude often blinded her from the red flags others practically smack her with. From the deadly house she lived in as a child to the government sanctioned genocide, the reality of it went right over her head until she found her brother dead, his core the only thing remaining of who he'd been.

She knew her optimism blinded her. That's why when she started dating Jason, she also asked her friends Johnny and Kitty to be roommates with her for a while.

"He's a crook" Johnny said. "Red Hood's gang based on affiliation markers,"

"So a bad guy," Jazz sighed, a bit disappointed.

"I mean not really? You are living in Hood territory," Kitty said.

"He's a good guy then," Jazz smiled.

"He could be," Johnny agreed. "We'll have to hang around a bit more to find out."

Jazz stared into her coffee mug. This whole 'is he isn't he' was driving her batty. She just wanted to know if falling in love with him was okay, of her son would be safe, if he could be trusted. Because she knew it wouldn't be long before she fell for his boyish smile and charming personality.

Kitty squeezed Johnny's hand on the table, and Jazz sighed again. She wanted what they had. A love that not even death could separate or stop.

"Even if he's not the one," Kitty said. "We'll make sure the cutie is safe. There'd be no harm is seeing where this thing you've got with Jason goes,"

Jazz nodded, and smiled at the text poppingup in her phone screen. "Good," she said. "Because Jason asked my out to coffee tomorrow morning and I need someone to watch Danny,"

-

Dani needed to get out of her apartment more. Ever since her template died, things have been weird. Dark Danny, the evil Dan, now known as Dante, became her so called Father. How could a future version of her template exist if her template was dead? Simple. Alternate universe.

Dani had accepted that and stopped caring. Jazz was her cousin now, and she had a legal identity and she had to go to school all the while she watched the core of her once template re-grow a body in Jazz's stomach for nine-months. Her template didn't look anything like he used to now. Before he was literally reborn. An entirely new person with her temple's core.

And she watched him learn to talk, and walk, and start kindergarten.

It happened so slowly but too fast and now she just didn't want to think about it anymore.

So she tossed notes at the other weird kid in her class. And when he forcefully held her hand in the hallway she smiled.

It was easy to forget her issues when she was dragging Wayne around. The bird nest above the senior science laboratory window. The carving of initials in the old stadium bleachers that could possibly be his father's. The weird relationship the volleyball coach had with the soup lunch lady.

Her worries drifted to the back of her mind with every quirked eyebrow or haughty smirk.

"If you like animals then you should accompany me to the rescue center this weekend." He said.

Dani looked away from the bird nest they'd been watching. "I'd love too!"

"Then it shall be a date. I will pick up you up at nine Saturday morning. See you tomorrow Danica,"

Her name, so new and still so weird to hear, sounded special on Damian's lips.

"See you tomorrow Damian,"