📚

Jazz sighed loudly, bringing his attention back to the real world enough that Danny noticed the sounds from the television.

“Been buying him dog beds, dog jackets, the whole kit and caboodle,” Dick Grayson said on daytime television, hateful and fascinating despite Danny’s best efforts to look away. The studio audience laughed. Danny didn’t see what was funny about that. He watched resentfully as Dick somehow lounged even harder on Poprah’s big comfy sofa, preening under the approval of strangers. “Bruce, on the other hand-“

Danny shut the TV off and tossed the remote across the room. He buried his face in his hands and let out a strangled scream. 

Everything reminded him of that mess. It had been a horrible week.

‘I really… What if Damian was telling the truth?’ He modulated his breathing. ‘Jazz was interested in keeping me safe. She would lie to keep me away from them to keep me safe from rodeo clowns and chemists. It made some sense. I am not smart enough to be a Fenton.’

“Oh, look at this.” Jazz leaned against his side and flashed her phone in his face to show him a celebrity gossip article. “Look at Damian Wayne in his new suit this morning. It’s Armani. What do you think that’s for?” 

“Stop,” Danny whined piteously. He felt so low. He was muck. He was a base and bad guy.

“He’s got a tie on,” Jazz said. “Like a little gentleman.”

He opened one eye, still hidden behind his fingers.

“And I think he got… no, not a haircut, but it looks really different.” A frown came across in her voice. “It reminds me of old photos of Dick Grayson.” 

He had to look. “He does,” Danny breathed, reluctantly fascinated. Damian didn’t really look like Dick, but you could see the influence. Would Danny look like Dick if he moved his part and added volume… He pulled his fingers out of his hair before Jazz could notice. 

She was too busy frowning at her phone. “I do feel bad,” she muttered. Her socked feet flexed in the air and she grimaced. “Damian seems like a sweet boy. And he’s obsessed with you.” She cast a rueful look at Danny. He blinked back at her guilelessly. “He would want you to go to school. I bet you’d get all the benefits of association with the family.”

“Yeah.” Danny shrugged. “I bet they could get me a job in space.” He scratched at his face. “I might have to fight space crime, though.” Like a Green Lantern or something. Space bat? Would they make him a Space Bat? The unending vacuum of space sounded less scary than Gotham, to be fair, but he was more into the idea of exploration.

“You’re not allowed to fight space crime until you have at least your first Doctorate,” Jazz warned. She shook a finger at him. “You can’t embarrass us in front of aliens.”

Danny just shrugged again. He was vaguely certain he was capable of embarrassing his family and race in front of literally any audience, but he didn’t feel like fighting with Jazz right now. 

Hey. He frowned and sat up straighter. “Hey Jazz?” Danny asked. She was clutching at her stomach with one hand and frowning in distraction. “Do you feel like maybe you’re being slowly pulled through time and space?”

“…What?” Jazz blinked at him. 

“Just saying.” Danny shrugged. The room bled green. “Hmm.” He stood up. “Jazz?”

She was staring at her hands. “What?” Jazz said, baffled, as she went intangible and fell a few inches from the sofa to the ground. She shrieked and Danny lurched to help her get her balance as the world around them went static and re-emerged as a circular room lined with dark benches. 

“Good afternoon, helpless ghost infants,” greeted a skeleton in a guard uniform as Jazz scrambled to her feet and plastered herself to Danny’s back. “You’ve been summoned to court.” He had a nametag written in a language that Danny didn’t know. Dumbfounded, he stared around the room. It was huge, with high windows that let in vibrant green light. The center of the room was the lowest point. It sort of seemed like  the bench where a judge would sit.

“I am not an infant!” Danny scowled. “I am 15 years old!”

The skeleton gave him a politely dubious look. “Is that so,” he said. He definitely didn’t believe him. Danny sulked.

“...I am not a ghost,” Jazz said. ”I am a living human.” She held her hands out. “Look at that, that’s blood in my body. Not ectoplasm.”

The skeleton managed to frown slightly. He leaned forward and inhaled. “...That’s a mix. I see ectoplasm, ergo, you are a ghost.” He gestured forward with a hand. “Have a seat, proceedings are about to start.” 

“I have- what?” Jazz blinked rapidly. She made a gibberish sound.

“What?” Danny said. The room lit up with a faint glow as ghosts materialized into place in the stands. Jazz jumped out of her skin and grabbed at his arm. She stared around with wide eyes at the gallery of strangers.

Every one of them was looking at the two of them. Some of them had cameras and notebooks.

“...Should you maybe be Phantom?” she asked, very quietly. 

Danny took it all in and transformed wordlessly. 

“Greetings! You can call me Alcesta!”

Jazz shrieked and flung herself backwards, away from the grinning pumpkin-headed ghost who had greeted them. 

The ghost looked taken aback by this reaction. She smoothed down the front of her Victorian-era gown and took a moment to compose herself before grinning down at them again. “...my apologies for startling you. Have a seat, ghostlings.” She gestured them to a seat towards the center. “I’ll be your barrister today. If you have any questions or requests, direct them to me.”

“I have a question,” Danny said. “Why am I here?”

“That’s a fantastic query to start with, you’re doing wonderfully,” Alesta praised. She bullied him into a seat so fast his head was still spinning when she pointed across the room. “Your Father is suing for custody of you.”

“...No,” said Jazz, sounding lost.

“Yes,” said Damian Wayne, wearing the little suit and tie that TMZ had snapped a photo of him in this morning. He gave them a weird little nod-bow thing. “I am sorry to undermine you, but your home environment is clearly unsafe. It would be irresponsible of me to leave you there.”

Jazz opened her mouth. She closed it without saying anything.

“Please, sir,” Alesta shrilled. She held up a hand and blasted Damian back. Danny yelped. The preteen stumbled but caught himself without injury and sniffled loudly in affront. “You may not approach the minors at this point in proceedings. Really!” Flustered, she sort of… ruffled. She turned back to them with a whisper. “Things aren’t settled yet,” Alesta explained. She sort of sniffled. “Deadbeat parents are not guaranteed custody.”

“..He is not a deadbeat,” Danny defended weakly. 

“Oh?” Alesta raised an eyebrow. Why did she have an eyebrow on a carved pumpkin face?

“I ran away, he didn’t leave me.” Danny lifted his shoulders in a half hearted attempt to hide. “He’s just… He’s not my father, that’s all. I have a father already.”

Alesta’s mouth thinned out to a mere slit. “Hmm,” she said, and turned away. “The judge will be here soon.”

A gong rang out. Danny looked around for it.

It rang again.

Everyone else was seated. Jazz slowly sank down to the bench next to him, the last person standing in the entire room.

A skeleton in another guard uniform cleared their throat. “All rise for his honor, chief justice of this court,” they announced.

‘We literally just sat down,’ Danny thought, baffled, but he copied everyone else.

The ceiling blew open. Sort of. It unpeeled like a can and a miasma seeped inside. It was black and choking. It crawled and danced through the air and coalesced into a vaguely humanoid form at the empty bench in the middle of the auditorium.

“Be seated,” hissed the miasma. Something sparked.

They sat.

“The first case on the docket is D. Wayne, suing the kingdom for emergency custody of minors,” announced the second skeleton. Damian nodded as heads turned to him. He looked totally unsurprised by this. Of course he was, Danny realized through his shock. Damian had planned this. “Wayne has evidence to show the existence of consent to custody of the middle child, Phantom Danny. Wayne has physical custody of the youngest child, Phantom Dani. Wayne sues this court to grant full custody of all three Phantom kittens, who are represented by Barriest Alesta.”

“Three?” Jazz shrieked. “He’s suing for custody of me? I’m 17!”

“Kittens!” Danny felt his jaw drop in outrage. “I am not a catb-”

“Hi!” Dani chirped. “I love him!” She was right at his elbow, wagging her tail rapidly. She was also a dog with a human mouth. 

Raven was hot on his heels. She began floating slightly in agitation. “Of course. But there are other options to explore, proper channels.” The words came out through gritted teeth. “American child protective services for Danny, at least. The situation may be different if Dani has no legal identity...”

He respected her more for saying those heinous words. It was important to cover all the foundations. However-

“We have already contacted the appropriate child protective services, you know it to be true.”

She was silent. “I don’t like it,” Raven said. “That boy in the Fenton house was alive. Literally alive. But he is also the same person as that ghost. I don’t know how to square those facts. Supernatural things can be dangerous. Very dangerous.” She cut him a serious look and started walking on the ground again. Damian allowed her to stare him down to try to add weight to her point. “He seems like a nice boy, but we don’t know enough about the situation.”

Damian repressed a sneer. She was only concerned. It was… appropriate to her role. “Something is very wrong,” Damian agreed. He indulged himself to pull out his cellular device and sent a curt message to his father to inform him that he knew he had kicked Snitches. Punishment would come swiftly.

“Superboy messaged while we were inside,” Raven said, voice going distant. “He and Secret drew the Fentons away across town. We need to check in on this extra-governmental agency that’s been harassing them around town. And I believe they have located our mysterious clone.” She stopped and made uncomfortable eye contact. “You absolutely may not adopt her to Dick for the time being. Do you agree? We need more information. Do not get her a legal human identity and adopt her to Dick.”

Damian stopped midstep. His phone still showed a half-finished message to Father, a threat trailing off. He thoughtlessly sent it as-was and put the phone away. “Very well.” He tried to sound as neutral as possible about this. “Let us go and rescue the children from ghost hunters and catgirls.”

Raven snorted. “Very kind of you.” She wiped her arms in a circle and a vent opened in the firmament for them to step into. Damian did not require prompting to step inside. He came out on the other end of Amity Park into a cloud of disgusting smoke.

“Vile,” he observed, wrinkling his nose. Someone had recently deconstructed a van. A white bumper was abandoned on the pavement at the end of a trail of broken metal, catching sunlight. A wheel spun slowly on an axel that had been liberated from the task of transporting metal.

“It’s ass fault!” A child with a large scrape over her face cheerfully informed him. Her grin showed a missing front tooth, which was incredibly charming. “Burning ass fault!” 

Secret had her hands over her mouth to hide a giggle at an understandable mistake. How uncouth and perhaps even bigoted of her. He made a mental note that she must be punished at a later date and set his sights on the new child who had so happily reported to him.

Damian looked down at her crossed ankles, and noted the way she was bobbing in the air. “You must be Dani,” he said, holding out a hand. “I am Danny’s father, Damian.” Her scruffy hair moved as she cocked her head to the side in confusion. She had human ears. Hmm. 

“Hm.” She looked at his hand mistrustfully. “Are you evil?”

Superboy made a so-so gesture with his hand and scrunched his face up. Secret smacked him on the back of the head, but Jon was not entirely incorrect.

“Not anymore,” Damian answered honestly. He drew back his hand, as it was obvious she did not want to shake or sniff it.  “I was raised in an ecoterrorist assassination conglomerate, but I have since repented.”

“So you don’t have an evil lab in your basement?” she confirmed. Her eyes narrowed. “And aren’t you small for Danny’s Dad?” She was open in her suspicion. Very charming indeed.

“I have a lab in my basement, but it is not evil. Would you like to come and see it?” He ignored the sound someone made. “And I am small, but he was smaller than this when we met. He was smaller than you, in fact.” He looked her up and down. She looked to be perhaps… seven years of age?

Dani let out a surprised laugh. “He was smaller than me?”

Behind her, Raven drifted over to begin conferring with Jon and Secret in low tones. Damian loftily ignored their plotting and returned to coaxing his child home. He did not need to involve Richard in this venture! Dani was wholly unclaimed.

Damian kept his tone mild. “I have his first pawprint impression in this book.” He withdrew the scrapbook from inside his jacket. “Would you like to take a look?”

It transpired that Dani did desire to see this evidence. She laid her own hand against the paw print and giggled. “Itty bitty,” Dani crooned. 

“Dani,” Damian said casually.

Everyone turned to look at him. 

Perhaps he did not say it casually enough. He rallied regardless and kept his tone mild.

“Do you think that you could become a cat? Danny can become a cat.”

She stared at him for a moment and then shook her head. “If he can do it, so can I,” Dani declared. She tossed her hair. “I was created to have all of his abilities and more!” She settled into a strange stance with tight fists and wide feet. “Going cat!” Her entire face scrunched up in concentration.

Nothing happened.

She turned a little red.

Nothing continued to happen. It was a shame. It would have been easier to take her home if she had a feline form.

“Hmm.” Damian did not sigh. “Perhaps you are too young-”

“Got it!” Dani shook her sleeve down to reveal not a hand, but a paw! A darling speckled paw! He clapped once.

“Whoa.” Secret drifted closer, fascinated and disgusted. “Why can you do that? I don’t think I can do that. Are ghosts supposed to be able to do that?”

Dani sniffled and twitched her nose. It was turning black gradually. “If Danny can do it, so can I,” she repeated. 

“A solid hypothesis,” Damian praised her. “You are very clever, Dani.” He adjusted his stance to look over her better. His heart raced with excitement. “This does not cause you any discomfort, does it?”

Her expression fell to a curious blankness. She was silent for a long moment. “No. It doesn’t hurt.” Dani shook her hands again and began to shrink. Her jaw was tight with obvious tension. 

Damian hovered and observed with fascination as she shrank in size. Her ears migrated up her skull and curled into a new shape. “You are a marvel,” he praised. “Your ears are perfect. You have such an elegant coat. I see you have kept your blue eyes for a striking effect.”

“That’s a dog,” Jon observed. Secret slapped at him to silence him.

“A what?” said Dani in a human voice from the muzzle of, yes, a dog. “I’m a cat, right? Four feet, tail? I’ve seen this kind of thing around a few times. A cat.” She lifted a clawed paw pointedly. “Um, cockadoodle doo?”

“They are essentially the same thing,” Damian lied smoothly. He knelt in front of her. “May I touch your head?”

“...Don’t melt me,” said Dani. Her little body was tight with nerves.

‘We will have to kill Mr. Masters. How unfortunate. I will have to contact Mother or worse, Todd.’

Mental note set aside, Damian set to work on gently petting his new child. Dani was stiff at first, but he could read her body language well enough to know that she wanted desperately to press herself against his hands and receive parental attention. He was so focused on his new child that he hardly noticed the sound of approaching footsteps and the huffing of a civilian.

“Have you seen a little girl?” A goth teenager sweated bullets onto the sidewalk. “My, uh, little sister.”

“No, sorry,” Raven said, deflecting the civilian away.

Damian smoothed down Dani’s ears. She didn’t even seem to notice the teenager take a few bracing breaths and then resume her run down the road, desperately searching for her sister. He spared a moment to wish her well, but he could not afford to help every wretch in middle America. As a parent, he simply had to prioritize.

Dani began to purr. Her whole chest vibrated with it. 

“Most excellent.”

“Alright, I have seen enough,” Raven said. “Remember what we agreed?” 

“Yes, of course,” Damian agreed. “He is uninvolved with young Dani for now.”

Raven made a sound of disagreement but turned away. 

“I’ll look into those two leads. Come and see me tomorrow. I think we might need to infiltrate the GIW facility.” She waved a hand at Dani. “I don’t need to know anything more about this,” she said, and stepped away into a portal. “Superboy, can you get him home? Thanks.” 

“Wait for me!” Secret lunged to fit into Raven’s portal back to Titan’s Tower. 

“Hmm.” Jon crossed his arms and bobbed in the air a bit, watching Damian parent with fascination. “I didn’t expect that you’d come home with a kid, but this is a natural escalation of what you were already doing. Maybe even a genetic inevitability.” He ignored the rapidly building irritation from both Damian and Dani as he locked his hands behind his head and mused foolishly. “I guess she might love patrolling with you,” he shrugged. “She ran out into traffic when she saw Secret to start a figh- ow!” He shrieked and flailed away from Dani’s teeth, which were needle-sharp. Damian felt a swell of paternal affection. What a clever modification to the body of a Siberian husky. The teeth were better when sharper and longer.

“I bit you before and I’ll bite you again,” Dani warned, feet splayed out for a good solid base to attack from. “I didn’t start that fight, I just finished it. She was on my turf!” Her tail stood straight up, much like that of a feline. How precious.

“You bite?” Damian said, thinking that over. Well. Of course she did. Babies bit. He knew this fact. And she ran into traffic? Boldness was admirable, of course, but she had to be taught some caution. School was a troubling barrier, but there would surely be some sort of boarding school that would accept her. “But of course I would not oppose her if she chose to patrol with me. In fact, I had begun training with Danny on cooperative maneuvers. Would you like to use a dartgun?”

Dany stared up at him with her uncanny blue husky eyes. “Boy, would I ever. Do I need some kind of license for that? Also, what is a dart gun?”

Damian was startled into a laugh. “No, of course not,” he assured her. “I will, of course, have to enroll you in an educational institution to demonstrate that I am taking proper care of you. Once you have finished your courses, I will personally teach you to use any weapons that you desire.” He paused and considered how to describe the concept. “A dart gun is a mechanism for launching a very small needle or blade at high speed. It may be combined with poisons and chemicals to interesting effect. I have a few design concepts for combining it with a feline theme that I may begin to modify to suit you.”

“....Yeah,” Dani said, in response to some silent internal debate. “You can be my Dad.”

Danny grimached. “That makes sense!” He wriggled his way into the seat a little further. “Um, I probably should have said something before I left. I apologize.”

“None is needed.”

“How did you find him, though?” Jazz pressed. She had her pleasant face on, but Danny knew her well enough to see that she was tense. 

“By the utilization of closed circuit cameras, I was able to confirm that Sni-Danny boarded a bus at the Gotham Depot to a center in Chicago and transferred there to a bus that went to Amity Park.” Damian inclined his head at Raven. “I was able to receive more specific information from my associate, here.”

“...She just looks like a normal goth loser,” Danny said doubtfully. She dressed like Sam, and that was really uncool for an adult. “What, did she do a ouiji board reading or something?”

“Something like that.” Rachel gave him a sharp smile. 

“I knew from the start, of course, that you were no mundane feline,” Damian assured him. The words came out in a practiced rush. “The supernatural nature of your arrival in Gotham city seemed to confirm that Amity was your origin, given the environment here. So I have sought you out to take you home, to safety.”

That was touching and scary.

“Right.” Danny said slowly. “That’s impressive.” He cleared his throat, uncomfortable. “But as you can see, that was a fluke. I am actually a human boy, in good health.” He held out his hands to demonstrate that they were not paws.

Damian stared at him a long time. “Danny,” he said gently. “When you came to us, you had worms.” His large green eyes were wounded, as if he felt pain for Danny and his worms.

Rachel startled and smacked her head on the floating ghost pendant light that was over the sofa. 

While she cursed, Jazz sniffled. “I admit that the lasers do not inspire confidence,” she said piously. Danny rolled his eyes. 

Damian cut her off. “The lasers would be acceptable if they were calibrated appropriately,” Damian said. It was positively scathing. His face was a little thundercloud, screwed up with violent disdain. “They should never endanger residents. I would never allow such a thing in Wayne Manor.”

“Unfortunately, it really isn’t your business.”

Everyone looked at Jazz. She had her haughty face on, the one that said, ‘I was a varsity cheerleader for two years until I decided I had better things to do. Please understand how far above you I am.’

(maybe Danny projected meaning into that a little)

“You are an elementary school student. I checked. Although I have to say I am impressed with your published paper about igneous rock. It is extremely commendable that you got published in an academic journal at age 10. I didn’t get published until I was 15.” The worst thing was that she was so sincere. “You cannot adopt Danny, even though you adopted him as a cat, because a child cannot enroll another child into school. And Danny has to go to school,” she said firmly.

“Yes!” Damian looked sort of scarily intense. He leaned forward, eyes glinting.

“The situation is not what we thought,” Rachel said in an undertone. “Maybe we should talk about this, Damian.” 

He looked at her and then clearly disregarded her. “Danny will not be adopted by me,” he said stubbornly.

“Damian, please.” Rachel looked stressed. 

“He will live with his real father, Dick Wayne,” Damian announced triumphantly. “It will not surprise anyone to discover that he had a secret child with a bewitching redheaded woman with far more education than he. Danny will live in Bludhaven and have the best tutors, and I will visit him every day to apply flea shampoo and care for his nails.” Damian clenched his hands into fists as he vowed.

Danny fell off his chair with a thump and hit his head on the carpet. “What?” It came out as a squawk.

Jazz’s mouth fell open. “That’s ridiculous,” she sputtered.

“Is that why I’m not good at science?” Danny vaulted up, eyes wild. He felt his hair flying around his head with static. “And why I’m weedy and weak?” He rolled up a sleeve to jab at his arm demonstratively. “Look at me, Jazz, it makes sense! I’m not strong or smart like a Fenton, and it’s because of Dick Wayne’s genetics!” He fell back down, shocked. He stared at the ceiling in disbelief. 

“Yes, that’s it.” Jazz put both of her hands on her face, voice heavy with sarcasm. “Dick Wayne is responsible for your failing grades in math, not that you sleep 4 hours a night and eat garbage and never study.”

Oh. Fuck. Danny felt his eyes widen as he put together a puzzle. “Is that what’s wrong with Dani?” he asked. “Vlad was expecting-”

He cut himself off. Everyone else had a pained expression because they thought he was speaking in the third person. “Not me, Danny with a Y,” he explained. “Dani with an i, my semi-successful clone made by Vlad Masters to replace me.”

“...with Vlad?” Jazz looked disgusted. “Vlad made himself a child? He is not parenting material.”

“Another?” Damian said sharply. “There is another baby?” He looked at Rachel urgently.

“Yeah, she’s like 3 days old now. Vlad kicked her out yesterday,” Danny explained distantly. Oh, man, it was all coming together now. "That's why she's so flippy!" 

Jazz let out a long sigh. “This is ridiculous,” she snapped. “Danny, they’re lying. And they can get out of our house.” She put her hands on her hips. “Dick Grayson is not your Father, you are not dumb, and Dani did not inherit acrobatic tendencies from anyone but you. You’re a cheerleader.” That last bit came out positively scathing.

“A male cheerleader,” Danny clarified quickly.

“Yes, I assumed so,” Rachel said. She looked like she had a headache. 

“I will support you no matter what subtype of cheerleader you are,” Damian said stubbornly. 

Jazz took a deep inhalation. “I respect that it has nothing to do with you as a person, and I believe you are as qualified for cat ownership as anyone else,” she told him. “But I am not trusting the Wayne family with my little brother.”

Danny blinked at her. Damian looked confused for the first time in their acquaintance. 

“Because of Jason Todd,” she said, raising her eyebrows and dipping her chin pointedly.

Danny looked at everyone’s face. “You said that like we would understand it.”

He said that at the same time that Damian said, “Understandable, I will keep them apart.”

“Bruce Wayne’s first adopted child, who died under extremely suspicious circumstances!” Jazz full-on scowled. Then she blinked as she processed what Damian had said. “Wait. What?”

“Oh, he is dead,” Damian said, as if he had just remembered this information. He cleared his throat. “No ill fate shall befall Danny,” he said. “I will cut the hamstrings of his enemies.”

Danny thought speculatively about Dash Baxter. He raised his hand to ask a question.

“No, Danny,” Jazz said.

He put his hand down, but Danny had to argue. “He put my head in a toilet this week. That’s the action of someone who might not deserve hamstrings.” 

“That’s unfortunate. Nevertheless.” Jazz cleared her throat. “Ever since I realized that you got turned into a cat and stole Tim Drake-Wayne’s phone, I have been looking into the family.”

“Tablet,” Danny corrected. “I used his tablet.”

Rachel put a hand on her chin and just watched. She looked incredibly old and tired, like, at least 36.

“I found a forum that talks about the mystery, and I have seen some very convincing information,” Jazz continued. “I am not convinced that Bruce Wayne is not responsible. I am sorry.” She rounded on Danny, and she was genuinely apologetic. “I can’t allow you to get adopted by anyone who might have allowed via incompetence their child to get murdered by a rodeo clown.”

“He is not a-” Damian cut off his outrage and took an extremely audible inhalation.

Danny put his hands up. “Hey, we don’t need to be hostile.” He felt his shoulders hunch up. “Mr. Wayne seemed alright,” he said vaguely. “He did kick me the once, but I think it was incompetence- oh, that’s the thing you said,” Danny said, realization dawning as soon as he said the word. He frowned. “Hm. Did that support your point?”

“He what,” said Damian. He went white with fury. “Excuse me. I need to make a call.”

Danny swung open the door before Jason could dwell too deeply on it. His crop top rose high as he leaned on the door, showing a sliver of tan skin that Jason wanted to run his fingers along. “Hey there.”

“Hey,” Jason said and then floundered for a moment before he just held out the bottle of wine. “Not sure if this goes with what you’re cooking tonight, but if not, you can have it another time.”

“That’s sweet, thank you,” Danny said as he took the bottle with a little smile. “Come on in. Dinner still needs a little bit, but we can get this open to enjoy.”

Jason nodded even though Danny was already turned away. He was so quick to show Jason his back. Only after making sure the door was secured did Jason move on. His fingers twitched, wanting to check over the rest of the security of Danny’s apartment. He took a breath and let it out slowly.

“All the windows and stuff are covered if you want to take off your mask,” Danny called from the kitchen. “Not even a laptop open.”

It’s easier to listen to Danny and remove his mask than it should be.

Easier to want to be Jason than it should be.

“Will you be going out after this?” Danny asked from the kitchen.

“Maybe. Probably,” Jason said. He hadn’t really thought about it. Going out as Red Hood was just who he was.

“Maybe that depends on how long I keep your enchanting company around?”

“Maybe. The night is young, though,” Jason said. He accepted the glass from Danny and gave the wine a little swirl. He hadn’t seen Danny pour it. He knew the bottle was safe, as he brought it, but he hadn’t seen Danny pour it. He should have gone to the kitchen to watch.

“To the young night then,” Danny said. He clinked their glasses in toast before taking a sip of his own. He held out his glass with raised brows. “This is good.”

Jason gave an offended noise. “You think I’d bring bad wine?”

Danny just shrugs, unconcerned. He moved to sit down, folding elegantly onto his couch. “I just didn’t expect it to be the kind of thing you paid attention to.”

“I… maybe had some help,” Jason admits. He glances from Danny to his wineglass.

“Oh, shit. Shit. I’m sorry, Hood,” Danny said. He got up, more speed than elegance now, and left his glass on the coffee table. “Here, I’ll take your glass for dinner. Or I can pour it back in the bottle and then drink from a fresh glass to show it’s safe? I shouldn’t have just poured it in the kitchen like that.”

Jason… he doesn’t know what to say to that. To Danny’s concerned offer.

Danny smiled, sadly, and reached out. One hand took the glass of wine. The other reached out and brushed over Jason’s brow. “You’re so expressive like this, without your mask and your hood.”

“I, um,” Jason cleared his throat. “Just you thought of that so quickly…”

“Comes with the job,” Danny says, short words ending that line of questioning quickly. “What would make you feel safe enough to drink the wine?”

“I trust you,” Jason answers with a frown.

“You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t, but that doesn’t mean that your brain feels safe. What would make you feel safe?”

Jason actually thought about that. Danny gave Jason the time to think about that. “I… pouring it back into the bottle would work, I think.”

“Okay. Come on, come to the kitchen with me.” Danny hooked his fingers in Jason’s and moved them forward with a little tug.

With them both in the kitchen, Danny carefully poured the wine back into the bottle. He gave it a good swirl before pouring a fresh glass, which he toasted Jason with before taking a sip. Jason huffed out a little, half laugh at Danny’s dramatic flair about it all. But it did help. Jason took the glass from Danny’s graceful fingers and drank.

“Next time, I’ll remember,” Danny said.

“Next time?” Jason asked instead of dwelling on the hangups of his own brain any longer.

“Of course next time. This could be a thing, if you want it to be. I mean, with our schedules it will have to be a flexible sort of thing, but it could still be a thing.”

Jason tilted his head. “I… yeah, I’d like that, this being a thing.”