Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

               “Gotham is missing a hero tonight,” the reporter announced. Danny frowned at the screen in concern. “After last week’s attack by the Silver Banshee, there have been rumors that Red Robin was injured during the fight. We now have confirmation from a source inside Gotham PD that Batman has been looking for the young vigilante since the attack.” The screen showed footage from the Silver Banshee attack where Red Robin was fighting off a ghostly skeleton with his bo-staff while Nightwing was in the background fending off attacks from the Banshee herself. “As you can see here, both Nightwing and Red Robin are thrown from the fight by one of the Banshee’s screams.” Banshee turned toward the camera and screamed sending both vigilantes tumbling out of sight and cracking the camera. “We see Nightwing return to the battle later, ultimately helping Batman subdue the supervillain.” The screen cut to a shot of Batman and Nightwing working together to get a muzzle on Banshee. “However, Red Robin is nowhere to be found. We can only hope that the young vigilante is off healing and not off the streets for good.”

               “Turn that off, Danny,” Jazz ordered. Danny sighed but grabbed the remote and turned the TV off. “You invited me over because you had a problem. What is it?” Jazz was sitting at the second-hand table in the small open kitchen area of Danny’s 1 bedroom apartment. Danny bit his lip, glancing down the short hallway at his bathroom door.

               “Promise not to get mad,” Danny said.

               Jazz frowned. “What did you do?”

               “So you know that Banshee attack they were just talking about? The one where she summoned a bunch of ghosts?” he started. Jazz narrowed her eyes. “I may have accidentally been summoned. I got out of there as fast as I could except…”

               “Except?”

               “Uh…”

               “Danny.” She glared at him

               Danny sighed. “Just, uh, come on.” He went down the hall to the bathroom. Jazz followed suspiciously. Then he opened the door. Sitting in the sink, looking pissed, was a small red and black dragon. It was maybe a foot and a half long. It had black wings, horns, and claws, but the rest was red except for around its blue eyes where it had black scales almost like a mask. It spread its wings as wide as it could and stood on its back legs hissing at Danny and Jazz. Danny sighed again.

               “Is that a dragon?” Jazz asked. Danny nodded. “Why is it here?”

               “I have no idea. I think he’s a ghost because I can make him listen to me like the other ghosts, but I’ve never met him before. Plus, I think he’s stuck,” Danny said.

               “Stuck?”

               “Stuck. Like Dorthea and her brother, but not able to get back to his non-dragon shape. But they have cursed items. He doesn’t. Or, well, if he does I haven’t found it.” Danny rubbed his neck, frowning at the dragon. It went back to all fours and huffed at them. Then it jumped from the sink, gliding toward the door. Danny grabbed him out of the air and he struggled, growling and hissing, trying to get out of his grip like a cat. Danny tossed the dragon back into the bathroom and closed the door. “I think the curse may be on him,” Danny continued. “Dorathea transforms when she’s mad and the little dude is clearly pissed. So I figured that I could get him to calm down and then find out where he lives in the Ghost Zone so that I’m not just leaving him out for somebody like Skulker to grab. But it’s been a week and nothing’s changed.”

               “And what do you expect me to do?” Jazz asked, eyes getting wide.

               “Uh, I mean, you’re good at getting people to calm down. And you’ve got the de-escalation certificate from last year.”

               “Danny! That’s for people! Not miniature dragon-ghosts!”

               “Hey! He used to be a people. Or, well, something like it. I mean, he understands English and he’s a lot smarter than any of the animal ghosts. I know he’s stuck, but I can’t help him if he keeps trying to scratch and bite me every time I try and talk to him.”

               Jazz crossed her arms and glared at Danny. “He’s a dragon, Danny. As far as I can tell, he doesn’t talk.” Danny dug something out of his pocket and held it out to Jazz. Jazz sighed. “The Ghost Gabber.”

               “He talks. It’s just mostly threats and I can’t make him calm down enough to get him to see that I’m trying to help him.”

               “How are you keeping him in the bathroom?” Jazz asked.

               “Honestly? I have no idea. I don’t think he knows that he can phase through the door and I don’t want him to know until I’m sure he’s not going to terrorize the whole damn building.” Danny flinched as he heard a crash in the bathroom. “Jazz, please.”

               She sighed. “Fine. But we are both going in there.” She grabbed the Ghost Gabber from his hand. “And if he bites me, I’m telling Sam about that time you stole her makeup.” Jazz opened the door before Danny could reply. The dragon was in the tub, fighting to free himself from the shower curtain that he had apparently pulled down. Danny went in first and tried to help as Jazz closed the door behind them. It took a moment, but Danny managed to get the dragon free from the curtain and only got slightly scratched in the process. The dragon immediately wriggled out of his grip and onto the bathroom floor, hissing at them again. Jazz closed the toilet lid and took a seat. Danny hopped up on the sink and sat. The dragon looked between them uncertainly, backing up as far as he could in the small space.

               “Dude, please just chill,” Danny groaned.

               Jazz held the Ghost Gabber out toward the Dragon. “You can talk into this,” she said.

               The dragon hissed at them. “I’ll bite you!”

               “You can do that, but you’ll be stuck like this until you let someone help you,” Jazz said.

               The dragon growled. “Release me.”

               “I’ve told you,” Danny sighed. “We can’t release you into the Ghost Zone like this. And I’m sure as hell not letting a dragon out in Gotham.”

               “What Danny means, is you can’t go around as a dragon. We understand that you’re scared and in a place you don’t know. But we really do want to help.”

               The dragon growled again quieter this time. “I don’t need your help.”

               “Then you’ll be stuck in my brother’s bathroom until you figure it out on your own,” Jazz said calmly. “I know you’ve been here for a week already, so clearly you are having trouble with this. You may be right. You may be able to figure this out without us. But we can help you get there faster. Don’t you have others who are missing you?” The dragon’s tail trashed. “We do want to help. Let us.”

               The dragon growled into the Ghost Gabber. “How?”

               “I know a few people who can probably help,” Danny said. “Then, as a last try, if none of them work out, there’s a guy who owes me a favor who should be able to find a solution if he can’t fix it himself .”

               Jazz frowned as she looked at Danny. “Who?” She asked.

               “Trench coat guy.”

               The dragon tilted its head and growled. “Constantine?”

               “You know trench coat guy?” Danny asked.

               “Danny, focus. Who first?” Jazz sighed.

               “Right. Uh, Dorathea. She came by when a few days ago, but said she needed to talk to him to figure it and he tried to set her on fire. She said she’d come back if he calmed down.”

               Jazz shot him a look. “He can breathe fire?” she hissed.

               Danny shrugged. “He’s a dragon.” He tilted his head, then looked down at the dragon. “Hey, what’s your name?”

               Instantly the dragon puffed up, wings spread and teeth bared. “NO.” His nostrils poured smoke.

               “Easy! I just wanted to know what to call you! Don’t set the fire alarm off again!” Danny yelped.

               “It’s okay. We won’t ask again,” Jazz soothed. “We can come up with a nickname or something?” she suggested, eying the dragon uncertainly. It relaxed some and the smoke thankfully stopped. Danny sighed in relief. “How about we just call you Dragon?”

               The dragon growled. “No.”

               “Red?” Jazz suggested.

               “No.”

               Jazz looked at Danny, apparently out of ideas. “Drake?” Danny suggested. When Jazz looked confused, he shrugged. “It’s one of the monsters from the new Doomed update. It’s a red dragon.”

               “Fine.” The dragon huffed, but his wings relaxed against his back and he stopped baring his teeth. His blue eyes looked almost amused.

               “All right. Drake, if you promise not to destroy my apartment, we can go to the main room to summon Dorthea,” Danny said.

               Drake growled. “I will not destroy anything,” he agreed.

               “Good,” Jazz declared. “Let’s go.” She got to her feet and opened the door. Drake waited for her to leave before he followed. Danny sighed. Hopefully, Dorathea could help them. He took a moment to rehang his shower curtain before joining them in the living room. Jazz and Drake were sitting on the couch. Jazz had the Ghost Gabber sitting in front of Drake so that he could still be understood.

               “Summon your friend.” Drake eyed Danny curiously.

               Danny nodded. He grabbed the circular rug that he kept rolled up behind the couch and rolled it out in front of the couch. The rug had a ghost summoning circle painted on it minus the symbols for the names. “Jazz, hand me the chalk.” Danny pointed to the table next to the couch. Jazz tossed him the chalk. Danny snatched it out of the air and drew Dorathea’s name symbol in the blank spaces.

               Drake growled curiously. “You’re actually summoning.”

               “Of course,” Jazz said. “Dorathea’s a ghost.” Drake looked as surprised as a dragon could. “Do you, I mean, you know about ghosts, right?” Drake didn’t respond. It made Danny anxious, but he was already committed to helping the dragon and keeping him safe. His damn obsession wouldn’t let him leave a dragon that small out on its own. He was going to help even if this was some random Gothamite that got cursed by the Banshee. Plus, he kind of liked the little angry lizard. Danny stood up when he finished drawing. He made his eyes glow and poured his power into the circle. The white paint and chalk glowed green. Slowly, the black and green swirled together and Dorathea rose from the circle.

               She gave a deep curtsey. “My King,” she said. “Are you still having dragon problems?” She looked around and spotted Drake and Jazz on the couch. She inclined her head to Jazz. “Regent. Have you come to help as well?”

               “Dorathea, it’s nice to see you again,” Jazz said easily. Drake looked between Jazz and Danny in alarm.

               “Thanks for helping, Dorathea. Can you take a look at Drake?” Danny asked.

               “Drake?” Dorathea asked.

               “It’s what the dragon wanted to be called,” Jazz explained. Dorthea nodded. She floated over to the couch and knelt down in front of Drake. Drake eyed her warily but stayed quiet and didn’t puff up.

               “May I?” Dorathea asked, hand reaching for Drake.

               Drake’s tail thrashed again, something Danny was learning he did when he was anxious. “Do what you need,” he growled. Dorthea smiled gently and ran a hand along his back. Drake stayed as still as a stone. She continued to run her hands gently over Drake’s scales. Eventually, she floated back to the circle. Drake shuddered.

               “My King,” Dorathea said, “It is a curse as you thought, but I regret that I am unable to help. The cursed object is within his scales. It’s a part of him in a way that my own curse will never be. Only he could remove it if he knew how. Assuming it was not an intrinsic part of him.”

               Danny frowned. “How could he remove it?”

               “I do not know,” Dorathea sighed. “A curse like his is very individualized. Perhaps a magic practitioner would be able to discern it, but it’s beyond my abilities.”

               “Can you at least tell us what the cursed object is?” Jazz asked.

               Dorathea looked at Drake but shook her head. “It’s not for me to say.”

               “Thank you anyway, Dorathea,” Danny said. “I’ll see if Frostbite knows more.”

               Dorathea curtseyed again. “Always happy to help, my King.” Danny let the summoning go and she vanished back into the Ghost Zone.

               “She definitely knows what the cursed object is,” Jazz declared.

               “Jazz,” Danny huffed.

               “You saw that right?”

               “Yes, I did, but she, unlike you, knows how to respect people's boundaries.” Danny glared at Jazz but there was no heat in it.

               Jazz frowned. “What do you mean?”

               “Drake clearly doesn’t want us to know who he is. And whatever the cursed object is, Dorathea probably thinks it would tell us who he is. Ghosts keep secrets for good reasons,” Danny explained.

               Drake growled. “I’m not a ghost.” Danny and Jazz both looked at him in surprise.

               “Uh, what?” Jazz managed.

               “I’m not a ghost,” Drake repeated.

               “Dude, you followed me here and passed out after the Banshee summoned a bunch of ghosts. The only other people who did that were the ghosts,” Danny said. “So either you’re a newly formed ghost or you’ve got a strong ass ghostly curse on you.”

               Drake bared his teeth. “I’m not a ghost.”

               “Well, you’re definitely cursed,” Danny snapped. His eyes flared green. “And it’s a ghostly curse. So, for the moment, you are a ghost.” Drake flinched away from him.

               “Danny!” Jazz yelled. She glared at him and crossed her arms. Danny glared back at her. She gestured to her eyes, not backing down. “Stop.” Danny huffed but closed his eyes for a moment. He wasn’t even sure why he cared if Drake admitted he was a ghost or not. (He’s not acknowledging the fact that a cursed human isn’t inherently one of his people and a ghost is.) “What have we said about the posturing?”

               “Not helpful,” Danny muttered. When he opened his eyes again, they were back to blue. He went to the kitchen and grabbed a washcloth. He got it a little damp and returned to the carpet. Then he started trying to wipe away Dorathea’s name on the rug.

               Jazz frowned at him. “You normally don’t get like this. Are you okay?” she asked.

               “I’ve had a pissy dragon in my bathroom for a week, Jazz. I couldn’t leave him here alone so I haven’t been in the Zone since the stupid Banshee summoned me.” Danny scrubbed a little harder than was strictly necessary to clean the name marks. “Just feeling a little possessive.”

               “Do you want to go get Frostbite instead of summon him?”

               “No. Especially since Drake isn’t a ghost. Frostbite needs to see him to help and Frostbite only leaves the Zone if he’s summoned. If I went to Frostbite, I’d have to bring Drake with me.”

               Jazz nodded in understanding. “And that may make his curse worse or harder to undo.”

               Drake growled uncertainly. “I didn’t mean to cause problems.”

               Danny let out a dry laugh as he retrieved the chalk to draw Frostbite’s name in the circle. “You didn’t. Whoever cursed you did. Nobody asked to get cursed.” Danny got back to his feet.

               “Danny’s right,” Jazz said. “This isn’t your fault. And Danny was the best person you could have followed. Ghosts are literally his domain.” Jazz grinned at her joke. Danny gave her a flat look. “Oh come on. That was a good one!”

               “Yeah. Great,” Danny said, voice dry. “Good job, Ghost Getter number one.”

               “Hey!” Jazz sounded offended, but she was grinning.

               Danny looked at Drake. “Okay. So, since you’re not usually a ghost, heads up. Frostbite is a Yeti. He’s really smart and usually pretty nice. He just looks scary. Oh, and he’s got an arm that’s mostly made out of ice. You know, just so you don’t freak out.” Danny stood up and glanced around his apartment. “I really hope he doesn’t break the ceiling.” Then he let his eyes glow and poured his power into the circle again. The black and green swirl opened wider as Frostbite emerged.

               “Greetings, Great King!” Frostbite proclaimed loudly. “What a joyous day to be summoned!” Frostbite barely fit in the room, having to duck some to avoid hitting his horns on the ceiling. “And your Regent joins you, I see.” Frostbite smiled at Jazz. “But who is your fiery friend? I haven’t met him before.” He eyed the small dragon. Drake’s tail thrashed several times.

               “Frostbite, this is Drake and he’s not normally a dragon,” Danny said carefully. “That’s why I summoned. I was hoping you could tell us how to help him.”

               Frostbite schooled his face. “I see,” he said.  “I will see what I can learn.” He knelt down in front of the couch, but that didn’t bring him much closer to Drake. “Hold still, little friend,” Frostbite ordered. He held his ice arm over Drake and it started glowing bright blue. Whatever he was doing took longer than Dorathea’s examination had. Drake looked like he was struggling to keep still, a low rumbling growl building in his chest the longer it went on. It was a wordless growl though since the Ghost Gabber stayed quiet. Finally, Frostbite sat back, looking serious, focused on Drake. “You are a very unlucky person, but you came to the right place for help,” he declared.

               Drake growled. “Explain.”

               “Frostbite?” Danny asked.

               Frostbite got to his feet. “It appears that Drake has been cursed by one who was cursed themselves. I can also say with certainty that this curse was not meant for him.”

               “Does that make things better or worse?” Jazz asked.

               “Better,” Frostbite said. “From what I have gathered, the curse would have been far worse if it had hit its target. And it would be much harder to fix.”

               Danny frowned. “Fix? So we can break the curse?”

               Frostbite grimaced. “Not quite, Great King. But we can make it more manageable. More like your curse.”

               “I’m not cursed.” He tilted his head in confusion.

               “No. You do not call it a curse, nor is it a curse in the strictest sense, but your death would have been a curse for many. You owned it though and have grown into your powers well.”

               “Wait. You mean being a Halfa?” Jazz asked. “So, there’s a way to make it so that Drake can change his form like Danny does?”

               “Exactly, Regent.” Frostbite gave her a small smile. “Drake will retain the powers that his new form has given him, but he will be able to resume his life, just as our Great King has. It is the best solution. The only other option would be to remove a part of his soul to remove the curse. He would lose the skills and memories associated with that part of his soul. Something I suspect would be especially traumatic for him.” There was a knowing look in Frostbite’s eyes.

               Danny frowned and looked at the nervous dragon on his couch. “Drake, do you understand what he’s saying?”

               “I will either lose a part of my life or I have to accept not being human,” Drake growled. Frostbite nodded.

               “We’ll be here to help,” Jazz said quickly. “Either way.”

               Danny nodded. “I haven’t been human since I was fourteen. It’s not as bad as it sounds. Just as long as you aren’t trying to get into a space program.” It was a bad attempt at a joke, and based on the concerned look in Jazz’s eyes, Jazz saw right through him. “It’ll be different, but I can help with the ghost stuff. And we can always call the Trench coat to see if he knows something that would be better before you have to decide.”

               Frostbite frowned. “Your Highness, I would be careful with trusting Constantine. He does not act in good faith.”

               Drake let out a snort that sounded like a laugh. “No one trusts him.”

               “It’s still your choice,” Danny said firmly. Frostbite bowed his head slightly. “I didn’t get a choice. I have to live like this. You don’t. You can choose something different. What do you want to do?”

               Drake looked around the room, eyes fixed on Danny after a moment. He growled. “My life is mine. I won’t lose any part of it. I’ll live with the curse.”

               “Very well,” Frostbite said. “Take me to a place where you feel safe and I will release your form. I swear I will keep your secrets, even from our King.” Drake’s tail thrashed.

               “Danny, don’t you have a spare PDA?” Jazz said suddenly. Danny nodded and grabbed it from his room. He handed it to Frostbite. “That already has a way to contact me and Danny. Plus Tucker and Sam. They also know about all this ghost stuff too. We’ll let them know you may reach out.”

               “Is there anything else we can do to help?” Danny asked.

               “I have all the power I need to free his form,” Frostbite said. “I will leave your gift with Drake and return here when I am done. I assure you, your newest subject will be safe with me.”

               Danny sighed. “Please don’t call him that.”

               Frostbite ignored Danny. “Are you ready, little dragon?” He held his non-ice hand out in front of the couch. Drake looked uncertain as he slowly climbed into the yeti’s hand. “Guide me!” Frostbite yelled. He phased through the building and out into Gotham. Danny instantly felt anxious. He knew he could trust Frostbite, but there was something about Drake that made Danny’s protective instincts feel so much stronger. Jazz got up and put an arm around Danny, careful to step around the still-swirling summoning circle.

               “He’ll be fine, little brother,” she said. Then she pulled him into a hug. “When Frostbite gets back, go with him through the Zone for a bit and cool off.” Danny nodded.

Chapter Text

            Tim was grateful for his Nest. Most of the time, it was just a useful place to hide from his siblings or keep his backup gear. Because most of the time, Tim stayed at Wayne Manor. But this was not most of the time. Tim looked down at the clunky PDA in his hands. Someone had clearly added some homemade mods to it, though he had no idea what the mods did. He’d have to spend some time learning the new tech. Well, the old tech. Tim sat it down on his coffee table with a sigh. He’d been at his Nest for a few hours now. Frostbite had left him, promising not to tell ‘their King’ his identity. Once the yeti was gone, Tim focused on everything except what had happened. He focused on getting out of the Red Robin gear he had still been wearing when he changed back. On taking a real shower and eating real food, not just the deli meet that Danny had been giving him. On checking for wounds. On making sure his Nest was still secure and hadn’t been invaded by his siblings while he had been stuck.

            But he was out of other things to focus on. Either he had to tell everyone everything that had happened: the ghosts, Danny, Jazz, being a cat-sized dragon for a week, and being stuck with ghost dragon powers for the rest of his life. Or he had to find a believable lie. He could say that Banshee blasted him into the same place she summoned the ghosts from. But there was no guarantee that his family hadn’t already checked there. He knew they had probably called Justice League Dark to take care of Banshee once they got her subdued. And Constantine knew about the Ghost realm. Or Zone. Danny had called it the Zone. And there was no believable lie that he’d purposefully cut contact for a week without injury after a fight like that. Tim was usually good at lying. Usually excellent at keeping secrets. But hiding ghost powers from a family of detectives wasn’t something he could do on his own. At least, not for long.

            He needed backup. Someone else who knew how to lie to the rest of the Bats and get away with it. Someone who knew exactly what had happened with the Bats while Tim had been gone. Someone who wouldn’t turn around and tell Bruce the second Tim wasn’t around. Someone who wouldn’t cave under pressure. Someone who respected the supernatural enough to believe him and not turn him into a science experiment. Someone who-

            Fuck. Tim knew exactly who he needed. He just had to hope they would answer a phone call from a fucking PDA. He couldn’t risk turning on his phone until he was ready to face the whole of the Bats. He also had to hope they didn’t just laugh in his face.

            It took Tim a minute to figure out how to make a call with the PDA, but he got there. “Who the fuck is this?” Jason growled as he answered.

            “Jason, it’s Tim.” Tim took a deep breath. “I need help.”

            Jason didn’t answer for a long moment. Tim was worried that he’d lost the connection, but finally, Jason spoke. “Prove you’re Tim,” he ordered. “What organ are you missing?”

            “My spleen,” Tim huffed. He hated that code, but it was one of the few things he and Jason had agreed on. Jason was the only other Bat who knew he was missing a spleen. And he only knew because he’d seen the surgical scars that Tim usually kept hidden.

            “Where are you?”

            “I’ll send you the address.” Tim ended the call. Then he quickly sent Jason the address to his Nest. Jason was there in twenty minutes flat. He had his gun drawn and aimed at Tim when Tim opened the door. Tim sighed.

            “Replacement,” Jason said in greeting. Tim figured it was a good sign that Jason was in civies.

            “Get inside,” Tim ordered. He left the door open and returned to his couch. Jason closed the door behind him, but he didn’t lower the gun. “If you’re going to kill me, go ahead and do it. Save me from this conversation.”

            “Where’s the fun in that?” Jason lowered the gun and shoved it in the holster on his hip. He walked over to the armchair and took a seat. “Where the fuck have you been, Replacement? B’s losing his mind. All the other Bats are too. You’ve even got Dick snapping at people.” Jason grinned.

            “It’s not funny,” Tim said.

            “It’s kind of funny. You have a bunch of people worried about you and you call me. That’s like Mary Shelley calling Lord Byron for writing advice.”

            “Byron never tried to kill Shelley.”

            “Never say never.” Jason shrugged. “But seriously, talk.”

            “When Banshee knocked me and Nightwing down, she tried to cast a spell on him. I got in the way,” Tim said. He had to keep this as simple and direct as possible. “She had said something about bringing out the darkest power within and as calm as Dick is now, he hasn’t always been.”

            “I take it you got in the way on purpose.” Jason arched an eyebrow.

            “I saw the world where he got turned into a vampire. No one wants Nightwing to go dark.”

            “And the stalker who forced his way into vigilantism is better?” Jason shook his head.

            Tim sighed. “I figured I’d be easier to take care of.”

            Jason’s hand was traveling back toward his gun. “So, did you call me here to kill you?” he asked.

            “I wish.”

            “Then?”

            Tim grimaced, looking down at his hands. “Then things got weird. I don’t remember exactly what happened after I got hit with the spell. There was a blurry bit of flight and walls. The next thing I do remember was being locked in a bathroom.” Jason burst out laughing. Tim glared at him but kept talking over top of him. “And I had been turned into a dragon the size of a cat.” Jason’s laughter got louder. It was rare to see Jason laugh so much, but Tim wished it wasn’t at his expense. When Jason’s laughter finally died off, he looked at Tim.

            “Are you fucking serious?” Jason asked. “The darkness within was a mini dragon?” He grinned. Tim just looked back at him. Jason’s eyes narrowed and his grin vanished. “You’re not joking.” Tim shook his head. “Bull shit.” Tim grimaced. He had hoped he would get farther into the explanation before Jason tried to call his bluff. But he was ready. Frostbite had forced him to practice changing several times before he left.

             Tim stood up and stepped around his coffee table. Then he closed his eyes and focused on the burning feeling that Frostbite had called his core. He tugged at it and felt it envelop him. He could feel the way his body shrank and changed. Then it stopped. He felt his tail thrash behind him and opened his eyes. Jason was still in his seat, mouth hanging open as he stared at Tim. Jason looked different with dragon eyes. There was the same kind of greenish glow that had clung to Danny. But Danny’s glow seemed to be a part of him. The glow around Jason was darker and kept twisting around him like ropes.. Tim growled at Jason and blew out a puff of smoke. Not enough to set off the fire alarm, but enough that it was noticeable. “Holy fuck,” Jason breathed. “Who the fuck was keeping you in their bathroom ?” The green glow around Jason wrapped around his neck as anger glinted in his eyes.

            Tim made himself change back. It was harder than turning into the dragon, pulling and stretching him in painful ways. Frostbite said it would get better. Tim wasn’t sure he believed him. Tim was panting once he was human again. He stumbled back to the couch. “Damn,” he muttered.

            “Tim,” Jason said, voice low. “Who took you?”

            “Nobody,” Tim managed. Idly, he wondered how concerned Jason had to be to be using his name. He looked up and caught the frown on Jason’s face. “Honestly, nobody took me. He said I followed him. Apparently, he deals with ghosts. I guess he’s half ghost or something. When Banshee started summoning, he got dragged out there too. He thought I was just another one of the ghosts Banshee summoned that followed him after the fight. When he realized I was different, he locked me in the bathroom.”

            “Ghosts? How is someone half ghost? What does that even mean?” Jason demanded.

            “I have no idea! I’ve only got about four hours on you, Jay,” Tim snapped. He was startled by the feeling of sharp teeth that suddenly filled his mouth. He closed his eyes and forced himself to breathe.

            Jason only gave him a few seconds. “What was that?” he asked. “What just happened?”

            Tim ran his tongue over his teeth, making sure they were human before he let himself talk again. “I’ll get there. Just let me get through this.” Tim opened his eyes and forced himself to look at his brother. “The guy kept shoving this device in my face and telling me to growl into it. I don’t know how but it turned the growls and roars into words. He kept trying to ask me questions I didn’t understand or questions trying to figure out who I was. So I kept snapping at him. I didn’t remember following him. I thought he’d taken me. The first time he tried to figure out what was going on with me, I breathed fire and set off the fire alarm in his apartment. But today he brought a girl in with him when he tried to talk to me.”

            “You calmed down for a girl?” Jason snorted.

            “No. She actually explained things some. Not much, but enough for me to trust they weren’t actively trying to find out who I was. Just wanted to help, I guess.” Tim shook his head. “They let me out of the bathroom and started summoning ghosts they thought might know what was going on with me. Turns out that the half-ghost I followed is the Ghost King and the girl is his Regent. The first ghost they summoned was a bust. She could see it was a curse but didn’t know how to fix it. The second knew more.”

            “But still not how to fix it,” Jason decided, “Since you can turn into a dragon now.”

            Tim sighed. Here came the hardest part. “That was my choice,” he said. Jason straightened in alarm. “There were three choices and none of them were good. First, I could try my luck with Constantine finding a solution and I’ve seen the results of that go badly way too many times to think any solution he’d find would be good news for me. Second, they could’ve removed the curse entirely. But, according to the ghost, it would have taken my memories of the part of my life that the curse had latched onto. And he said that it had latched on to my mask. So, it would’ve taken the memories of my time as a vigilante. I would’ve lost everything. Most of my childhood was following you and B. And it would’ve been gone. All the training, the knowledge, everything. Just gone. Third was this.” Tim gestured to himself. “The ghost knew a way to soften the curse. To make it so that I wouldn’t be stuck as a ghost dragon all the time. He said that I had to change daily at first, but I could learn how to control it. I could get used to it, I guess.”

            “So a crap shoot, a pile of horse manure, or a shit pie,” Jason grumbled. “Damn.”

            “Nightwing still would have been worse,” Tim said. “Even if he’d made it to where I had without hurting anyone, he’s older. He would have lost so much more. And he probably wouldn’t have made it there. The ghosts agreed.”

            “You do realize how weird that sounds, right?”

            “I do. That doesn’t make it less true.” Tim ran his hand through his hair and tugged on the ends.

            “Okay.” Jason blew out a bunch of air. “What happened earlier? With the teeth.”

            “I’m not stuck as a dragon, but that doesn’t mean that the dragon isn’t a part of me. Even when I look human, I’m not. I’m still a dragon.”  Tim rolled his shoulders and ran his tongue over his teeth again. “Sometimes it’s going to come out.”

            Jason leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and folding his hands together. “Okay. Okay. So what now? Why’d you call me?”

            “Because I don’t want anyone finding out.” Tim looked over at Jason. “And I’m not dumb enough to try and keep this secret on my own.”

            “Out of all of us, you probably would be able to,” Jason snorted.

            “Not well.”

            “You followed me and B for years and we never noticed.”

            “This is different.” Tim glared at him. “Everyone will be trying to figure out what happened to me over the last week. Everyone will be looking for me the moment I turn on my phone or computer. I need more information on where they’ve been looking and what they’ve been trying. You know. And you won’t tell them what happened to me.”

            Jason frowned. “Maybe you should tell them. This isn’t hiding a body. This is something changing your biology.” Tim glared at him again and he felt his eyes change. The green glow around Jason was faded now that Jason was calm. It vanished when Tim’s eyes changed back. “Fine. But you’re gonna owe me big time.”

            “I figured.”

            Jason was quiet for a long time. “They never checked the ghosts out,” Jason sighed finally. “After that fight. At first, no one even knew you were missing. Too much chaos with the civilians. There were a few fatalities and Banshee caused a lot of damage around the city. Babs knew you weren’t responding, but we didn’t know you were missing until we gathered back at the Batcave. Dick said he saw you get knocked down by Banshee’s scream, but he never mentioned hearing a spell. Not surprising since he couldn’t hear half of what we were saying for the first two days afterward. Bruce had us checking all the safe houses. Dick checked with the Titans and the Young Justice teams. Babs was checking all the hospitals daily for Tim Drake and Red Robin. They were heading down lots of paths but no one started getting really worried until yesterday. I don’t think it’s occurred to them to look into ghosts yet.”

            “So if I say that I was stuck in the Ghost world for the last week, they’ll believe me?” Tim asked.

Jason nodded. “If you can keep your teeth right and your eyes from glowing.”

            “I’m not heading back to the manor or the Batcave until I’m sure that won’t happen,” Tim huffed.

            “How are you gonna be sure? I mean, this is like being dunked in the Pits level of different.” Jason shook his head. “How do you know that you’re not gonna snap and start blowing fire the next time the little demon insults you?”

            “I don’t. But the guy I followed? The Ghost King? Supposedly, he’s like me. Said that he hasn’t been human since he was fourteen. He claimed he could teach me. And the ghosts he summoned agreed.” Tim chewed the inside of his cheek, looking down at the PDA on the table. “Until I learn, I’ll keep my distance. B was probably gonna bench me for a while anyway after disappearing like that. I’ll call him and tell him that I got stuck in the Ghost world. That I need time to deal. He’ll tell everybody else and they’ll leave me alone for a bit. At least for as long as it takes Babs to get through my firewalls and find this place. That should buy me enough time to at the very least keep the dragon from slipping out around other people. And time to learn more about ghosts.” Tim looked back at Jason. “Right now, all you have to do is keep your mouth shut. And when I get back on patrols and cases, you’re my failsafe. If I lose control, you take me out. If you can’t, use that PDA to contact Danny. That’s it. And whatever I owe you, I promise I’ll take care of it.”

            Jason shook his head again. “This is a horrible idea,” he declared. Tim nodded. “Give me a five-minute head start before you turn your shit on.” Jason got to his feet. “And if this goes bad, I knew nothing about it. Deal?”

            “Deal.”

Chapter Text

               Danny figured that Drake would be curious, but he hadn’t expected so many questions so quickly. Drake had to be a journalist or something. He was asking questions that Danny hadn’t even thought about after his accident. Like how did the Ghost Zone work? What made being a halfa different from a full ghost? How did royalty work in the Ghost Zone? Were ghosts attracted to other ghosts? Did his curse mean that Drake was going to get attacked by ghosts now? Could ghosts get hurt? Was there a form of death for ghosts? Danny answered them the best he could. He would guess that Drake knew most of what Danny knew by the end of the second day. Well, at least about the Zone. Drake hadn’t gotten to how the living world saw ghosts yet. Danny was sure it would come next.

               But then Drake started asking about Danny and why he was in Gotham. At first, Danny tried to keep things vague: he was studying engineering. He’d moved to Gotham for college. But Drake kept pressing and eventually Danny found himself answering honestly: yeah, he’d wanted to go to space, but being half ghost meant that his heartbeat was just too slow. He’d never meet the physical qualifications. Drake shared some too, though he was still very guarded about anything that might’ve been too identifying. Danny learned that Drake was an only child before he’d been adopted. Now he had half a dozen brothers and sisters that he struggled to get along with. Drake had lost his parents when he was a teenager. And Drake wasn’t planning on going to college.

Phantom: Why not?

Drake: I already know what I need to. Anything I don’t, I can learn easier outside of school.

Drake: I probably could get away without finishing high school too

Drake: but B wouldn’t like that.

               Danny had gotten a few messages about ‘B’ so far. B was Drake’s adoptive parent. Drake seemed to idolize him and was really worried what B would think of him if B found out about Drake’s new powers.

Phantom: But college is so much fun

Phantom: *eye twitch*

Phantom: Seriously though. Jazz would give you a full lecture if she heard that

Drake: I’ll make sure not to mention it.

Drake: How’d you get through high school with powers?

Phantom: Friends

Phantom: If it wasn’t for Tuck and Sam, I wouldve been vivisected

Drake:...

Drake: Vivisected?

Phantom: Ask Jazz about the GIW.

Phantom: U don’t have to worry about them.

Phantom: They were disbanded last year after the antiecto acts were repealed.

Drake: I have so many questions.

Phantom: I’ve got class, so I won’t be answering for a bit. Ask Jazz if you really wanna know

               Danny shoved the PDA into his bag along with his computer and his book for his physics class. Then he jogged across campus to the science building. He only had a few minutes to spare when he got there before class started, but he checked to see if Drake had messaged anyway.

Drake: Just searched vivisection

Drake: WTF

Drake: This was a real concern?!?!

               Danny didn’t respond, but he couldn’t help finding Drake’s worry a little funny. At least in retrospect. Back in high school, it hadn’t been funny at all. Every month the GIW got braver in Amity Park, locking down the school and doing random scans of the students to make sure they weren’t ‘ectocontaminated’. If any registered on their equipment, the student would be quarantined in a lab until they tested ‘clear’. Usually, they were subject to things that Sam called torture. Tucker had been good at knowing what days the GIW would be doing the random scans so Danny had managed to avoid it. But Valerie had been picked up a few times. Along with Sam and Tucker. They all refused to tell Danny about the labs but insisted it would be worse for him.

               Elle had been caught by them once before Danny had managed to convince Vlad that advocating against the anti-ecto acts would help them all. When they had finally gotten her out, she’d wake up screaming. She refused to travel anymore after that and didn’t leave FentonWorks until the GIW was officially gone for good. Now she was doing better and working on her sophomore year in high school. She was planning on trying to get into Gotham University too.

               Danny missed most of the class, daydreaming about how good his last year of high school had been. Finally able to be a little more open with his powers. (Sam said that him being Phantom was the worst-kept secret of Amity Park.) But the only adults who knew were his parents and the ghosts. It was still tense, but his parents had been surprisingly okay with him. And they were great with Elle. Especially after Elle decided to stay with them. These days, the only thing that made them uncomfortable was the whole deal with him being King.

               Admittedly, Danny was uncomfortable with it too. When he fought Pariah, he hadn’t intended to claim the throne. He hadn’t intended anything. He had just been trying to save his town. But the Observants had insisted. They showed up a month after Danny beat Pariah. Danny said no dozens of times. But they kept showing up in his house at the worst times, trying to declare him king. Eventually, Jazz had intervened. (After one too many interrupted study sessions where Dash had pretended he hadn’t seen a giant cloaked eyeball following Danny to the bathroom begging for him to accept the crown.) She had convinced Danny that he could still have a relatively normal life if he accepted the crown. Then she had offered to be his Regent while he was still in school. The Observants had been ecstatic. Danny had not been.

               But now he wasn’t as worried about being the King. He’d learned a lot from all of the ghosts. Especially Clockwork, Freight Knight, and Frostbite. Jazz was still acting Regent until Danny finished college, but Danny was starting to get more responsibilities. And it wasn’t nearly as much as he’d thought it would be.

               Except for Trenchcoat Man.

               Because fuck Trenchcoat Man.

               Trenchcoat Man had been Danny’s first solo assignment from Clockwork and the Observants. He had thought it would be easy: find the dude’s soul and give it to Clockwork to watch over. Except that Trenchcoat Man had apparently sold his soul multiple times. Danny had to fight three archdemons, plus several other Ancients in order to collect all of the claims to Trenchcoat Man’s soul. It had taken him the better part of his summer between high school and college and he would be damned if he let Trenchcoat Man ever try and make deals in the Infinite Realms again. Especially with his soul.

               Danny left campus after class, heading to the nearest coffee shop for an afternoon pick-me-up before he had to head into the Zone and deal with Ember and Kitty’s current duel. (They fought from time to time, but it usually only lasted a few days and did minimal damage. They had been fighting for nearly two weeks this time and they had nearly destroyed both of their keeps. Skulker and Johnny were getting genuinely worried.) As he was heading out with his prize, someone ran directly into him and spilled his coffee all over his shirt. Danny was grateful it had been a frozen coffee, but that still left him covered in coffee almost a mile from his apartment with no afternoon pick-me-up.

               “Oh my gods. I am so sorry!” the man in front of him said, blue eyes wide as he shoved something in his pocket. “I wasn’t looking where I was going and-” The man stopped talking and a light blush colored his cheeks as he met Danny’s eyes.

               “It’s fine,” Danny said instantly. The man had pale skin and shaggy black hair that brushed his ears. He was slightly shorter than Danny. Danny’s only thought was ‘damn, he’s pretty’. “It was an accident.” Danny smiled, suddenly not very worried about his lost drink.

               The man gulped. “Uh, let me, I can buy you a new drink,” he said.

               Danny checked the time on his phone and sighed. “Nah, I don’t have time for the line. Don’t worry about it.” Danny liked the stunned look on the other man’s face. “Unless, maybe you’d want to replace it another time.” The man’s blush darkened and he gulped again. Danny dug an old sticky note out of his bag and a pen. The man just stared at him as Danny jotted down his phone number and held the note out to him. “If you’d like, we’ll set it up. Make a date of it.” Danny winked. “I’m Danny, by the way.” The other man’s hand was shaking some as he took the sticky note from Danny. “Hopefully, I’ll see you around.” Danny grinned and walked around the stunned stranger.

               Danny was nearly past the next store when he heard the man yell. “Tim!”

               Danny turned around and saw the man facing him, face still red. “Nice to meet you, Tim!” Danny yelled back. Danny turned back around and kept heading to his apartment. He was honestly a little surprised by how forward he had been. He wasn’t usually that confident around new people. But there was something about the pretty man. Something about Tim that Danny really liked. He felt his core humming in his chest, pleased with the way Tim looked when he had gotten flustered. He let his mind wander to other ways that he could make Tim flustered.

               He got a text before he made it back to the apartment.

Unknown Number: Hey, this is Tim

Unknown Number: From the coffee shop

Danny: Glad to hear from you ;)

Tim: I’m really sorry about running into you.

Danny: I’m not.

Danny: You’re really cute

               Tim didn’t respond for a while and Danny was worried that he’d been too blunt. But he wanted Tim to know. He needed Tim to know how pretty he was. To know how delicious he looked. Every instinct in Danny, human and ghost, wanted to get closer to Tim. Wanted to get to know Tim inside and out.

Tim: You don’t even know me.

Danny: We can change that.

Danny: Are you free Friday morning? We can do coffee.

Danny: Sitting down, just in case you’re worried about spilling it again.

Tim: 10am?

Danny: It’s a date ;)

               Tim didn’t reply to that, but this time Danny wasn’t worried. He would get to see Tim again and it was only two days away. He just had to survive Ember and Kitty first. He found the two ghosts on Skulker’s Island just as Ember was about to unleash a flame of sound on Kitty. Danny landed in between them. “Whoa! Easy Ember! There aren’t that many trees left!” Danny started preparing himself to block her guitar, fully expecting a fight, but Ember backed down.

               She smiled wickedly at Danny. “Heya Baby Pop,” she said.

               “Hey! Get out of the way!” Kitty flew over, looking mad, but her face changed when she landed beside Ember. “Oooohhh!!! Phantom! Tell me all about it!” Kity demanded, suddenly grinning.

               Danny frowned. “Uh, what?” He looked between them.

               “Come on, Baby Pop, spill!” Ember said. She slung her guitar onto her back. Then Kity and her shared a look. “Mine or yours?”

               “Mine!” Kitty declared. She blew a kiss and opened a portal. Then the two ghosts flew at Danny together, each hooking an arm with his and flying him through the portal and into Kitty’s house. They threw him into a large armchair and stood over him. “Now spill! Who is it?”

               “Who is who?” Danny asked.

               “Whoever made your core buzz like that!” Ember said. “It’s a wicked harmony.”

               “My core? You can hear my core?” Danny looked between them.

               “Of course we can.” Kitty rolled her eyes. “Are you back with Sam?”

               “Don’t be stupid,” Ember scoffed. “She never made him buzz like that. I bet he found some new girl in Gotham.”

               “Oooohhh! A Gothamite?” Kitty squealed. “Tell us everything! Who is she?”

               Danny looked between them again feeling a little bit of a flush on his cheeks. He rubbed at his neck. “Um, it’s actually a he,” Danny said.

               “He? Baby Pop, you going punk on us?” Ember grinned. “Tell us about him!”

               Tim’s flustered face flashed in Danny’s mind and he smiled. “Uh, he’s, he’s gorgeous.”

Chapter Text

           Tim slammed his head against the wall as he stared at his phone. Danny’s last message was still on his screen. Was he being taunted? Or had Danny really not noticed it was him? Tim didn’t see how that was possible if Danny could see things the way that Tim could.

               It had been four days since Tim had gotten home. In that time, things had gotten both worse and better. It seemed that Frostbite had been right, the change between his forms wasn’t nearly as painful as it had been at first. And it took less energy each time he changed. And the control slips had gotten smaller, easier to hide. But there were other things that happened too as his two sides tried to find a balance with the other. His teeth were sharper. And he was always hot. And then there were his senses. It was most noticeable with his eyesight. Originally, his ability to see the ghostly green glow around certain people was something he could only do in his dragon form or if his eyes changed. But by the second day, he could see that glow around himself in the mirror without his eyes changing. And when his siblings found him on day three, he could see thin ropes of green around Cassandra, Steph, and Damian. Especially Damian. So when he ran into Danny in front of the coffee shop, he saw the green before he recognized Danny.

               The flirting had been unexpected. Not that Tim was against it. He wasn’t blind. Danny was attractive and seemed smart. If they hadn’t met the way they had, Tim would have no objections to dating. Well, there was also the power imbalance. Danny was the Ghost King and Tim was a new ghost. Half ghost. Dragon? He hadn’t gotten clarity on exactly what he was yet, despite all the questions he’d asked. Tim knew a lot about ghosts, the Ghost Zone, and the hierarchy of the Infinite Realms. He knew that Danny was a Halfa because of how he’d died and lived at the same time. Tim hadn’t asked how he’d died since the only message that he’d gotten from Jazz was a warning that it was rude to ask how a ghost died. (And Tim preferred the way Danny answered his questions since Jazz reminded him too much of Harley. He hadn’t tried to message anyone but Danny on the PDA.) But Tim didn’t know if he had any ghost powers that went along with his dragon powers.

               Was Danny testing him? Did he know that Tim was Drake? Was he trying to see if Tim would be a threat? That’s what Tim would’ve done if he were in Danny’s shoes. But Danny hadn’t done anything the way Tim would have. Tim wouldn’t have bothered to see if the ghostly dragon that followed him home with a bunch of other ghosts was actually a ghost. He may have helped find a solution to the curse if he’d bothered to realize it. But Tim wouldn’t have had the patience that Danny had with him. And he definitely wouldn’t have offered to help after they found a solution to the immediate problem. If Tim had been in Danny’s place, he would have followed Frostbite, found out who the dragon was, and kept an eye on him in case he became a threat. Possibly made a threat as Red Robin, warning against using powers in Gotham.

               But Danny hadn’t just helped, he was nice. Taking the time to explain what he could to a complete novice like Tim. And Danny had checked on him. Before Tim had even worked out how to begin his line of questions, Danny had reached out, making sure that Tim had done okay overnight. So it may be possible that the invitation to coffee was exactly what it seemed: Danny, the half-human college student, asking a random stranger on a date because he thought they were cute. Nothing to do with ghosts or dragons. But then what was Tim meant to do with that?

               Tim banged his head against the wall again. How could he be so bad at this? The first time out of his Nest in days and he managed to run into one of only two people in the whole city that he didn’t want to run into. “Uh, Tim?” Dick said, poking his head through the door and smiling gently at Tim. Dick had been at his Nest with Tim since they found it. The only exception had been overnight while Dick was on patrol and Tim had locked himself in his room to shift. Tim looked up at his brother from where he was sitting on the floor of his bedroom and groaned. “You okay, Timbers?”

               “Just dying,” Tim muttered. Or was he already dead? He still had a heartbeat, slow as it was. 30 beats per minute was bradycardic for a normal person. But Tim didn’t have any of the other symptoms that bradycardia usually caused. And Tim wasn’t a normal person. Especially not now.

               Dick took a seat beside him and bumped their shoulders together. “You’re not dying,” Dick said calmly. Tim groaned again and dropped his head to his chest. “Talk to me. What’s going on?”

               “Too much and not enough. All at the same time.”

               Dick let out a quiet hum. “Is this about the ghost world?”

               “Zone,” Tim corrected instead of answering.

               “Er, what?”

               “It’s called the Ghost Zone, not the ghost world. It’s not exactly a separate world. It’s connected to our world and anything that happens there affects us over here. And vise versa.”

               “Ok. Tell me about it,” Dick said easily. “What was it like?”

               “I don’t remember,” Tim lied. You can’t remember a place you’ve never been. “It’s just bits and pieces. Green and black swirls. A yeti with an arm made of ice. A girl with green skin. It’s a blur. And then I woke up here.” Enough of the truth that Dick wouldn’t be able to see through it, but not enough to ask questions about.

               “Sounds like a lot,” Dick mused. “B didn’t say how you ended up there.”

               “Banshee’s spell.” Almost the truth. Close enough.

               “Is that what happened after she screamed?” Dick looked over at Tim. “I couldn’t hear anything but ringing in my ears for an hour. Still hard to hear sometimes, but Alfred said I should mostly recover. All I know is I saw her coming towards us and you got in the way of some kind of blast. Then you were just gone. I thought she screamed at you again. You shouldn’t have gotten in her way.”

               Tim grimaced, thinking of what would have actually happened if Dick had gotten hit instead of him. “You were down. If it had been me, you would’ve done the same thing.”

               Dick laughed and nodded. “Probably.” He bumped their shoulders together again. “Hey, maybe if you got out of this building, you wouldn’t be losing your mind.”

               “I’ve left,” Tim huffed.

               “To get coffee.”

               “I still left.”

               “Come to dinner tonight,” Dick said. “Alfred wants to see you. And even Jason said he’d be there tonight, so if you come, we’ll have a full table. Plus, I know B would feel better if you were at least seen in the Batcave soon. We get that you needed some time, but I think the reluctance is starting to worry him.”

               “What reluctance?” Tim frowned, looking over at Dick. Dick raised his eyebrows. “Seriously.”

               “Tim, usually you’re trying to get back on the streets even when you’ve got a cast on. You taking a break is nearly unheard of. Even if it’s just for a few days. And, if Red Robin isn’t seen soon, I think some of your friends might start to worry. The news did a whole story on how you disappeared after the Banshee attack.”

               Tim grimaced again. “Vicki Vale?”

               “She likes a good story.”

               “This isn’t a story. I’m fine,” Tim snapped.

               Dick grinned at him. “Prove it. Come to dinner.” Tim glared at him. “Or you can tell me what was actually making you bang your head against the wall. I’ll take either one.”

               “I hate you sometimes,” Tim decided.

               “We’re a family of detectives. We all know how to spot someone dodging a question.” Dick bumped their shoulders again. “Look, you don’t have to go out tonight. And I’m not trying to force you before you’re ready. But come to dinner. Please.” Dick’s dark blue eyes bore into Tim.

               Tim groaned and banged his head against the wall again. “Fine. But just dinner.” Dick beamed at him.

               Tim drove himself to the Manor and got there at the same time as Jason. They met on the stairs as they walked in. Jason scanned him. The ghostly ropes around him were dim as he let out a sigh. “Dick?” Jason asked.

               “Dick,” Tim agreed. He pushed the door open and hesitated at the wave of noise that washed over him.

               Jason pushed past him. “Come on, Replacement,” Jason huffed. He headed straight for the dining room.

               “Be nice!” Dick yelled chasing after Jason, though Tim wasn’t sure where he’d come from.

               “Yeah! Be nice!” Steph echoed as she came down the stairs. She grinned at Tim. A small rope of green twisted around her waist like a belt. “Glad you made it, Timmy. Alfred made your favorite.”

               “Master Timothy!” Alfred said as he emerged from the dining room.

               Tim took a deep breath and smiled. “Hey Alfred,” he said, coming inside and closing the door behind him. “Sorry, I didn’t come by earlier.”

               “Not at all. Recovery takes time. I trust you are well rested?” Alfred gave Tim a small smile.

               “Better than I usually am,” Tim admitted. He felt heat on his neck and couldn’t stop himself from turning around. Bruce was coming out of his office, eyes fixed on Tim. Tim shouldn’t have been surprised to see a bit of green mist twisting around the older vigilante. But he hadn’t seen a mist before. It was always ropes or a glow. Not misty spots of fog that shifted around someone. Maybe it was from the time travel thing? Or maybe it was from how long Bruce had spent in the dark shadows of Gotham.

               Alfred let out a hum. “Master Bruce,” he said. “Dinner will be served in just a few minutes. Do not be late.” Tim didn’t have to look to feel Alfred and Steph walking away from him. That was new. Helpful, but new. Bruce scanned over Tim, face creased with worry.

               “Uh, hey B,” Tim said nervously.

               “Tim,” Bruce replied. His face pinched in concern.  “Glad you could make it.” Tim nodded. “Will you be joining us on patrol?” The concern was still there under an arched eyebrow.

               Tim was going to say no. He knew it was a bad idea, but he made the mistake of glancing around when he felt another pair of eyes on him. Damian was staring at him from just behind Bruce, eyes narrowed and ropes of green circling his arms. “Maybe.” The word was out of Tim’s mouth before he could stop it. Bruce and Damian gave identically satisfied nods.

               “Good,” Damian huffed. Bruce blinked and looked over his shoulder at his youngest. So he hadn’t noticed Damian trailing him. “Dinner is being served.” The boy ushered them both toward the dining room, which was full of noise as everyone chattered with each other. Tim forewent his usual seat to sit beside Jason. Dick raised an eyebrow but no one else seemed to care. Dinner was uneventful. Or as uneventful as any dinner with all of the Bats and Birds could be. The problem came after dinner. Steph and Cass cornered him as he was trying to head to the door.

               “And where do you think you’re going?” Steph demanded, hands on her hips. 

               “Uh, my Nest?” Tim said, trying not to project any nerves that Cassandra could pick up on. 

               “You mean you’re not joining us on patrol? Seriously? Tim, you never avoid patrol this long. Did you get hurt or something?” Steph stepped closer, scanning him. Cass put a hand on her shoulder, frowning. “What?” Steph looked back at Cass.

               “Not hurt,” Cassandra said. “Gunshy.” Well, okay, Tim could work with that. At least, he could’ve if it was Dick or Bruce who heard Cass say that. With Steph though…

               Steph’s eyes got wide. “OH.” Then she grabbed Tim around the shoulders, grinning wickedly. “I can help with that.” Cassandra nodded in approval as Tim was dragged to the cave. Steph forced him into the changing area and somehow Tim found himself standing over Gotham half an hour later. 

               “This is a bad idea,” Tim muttered.

               “You’ll be fine,” Oracle replied. “Welcome back, by the way. You have to stop by the clocktower sometime and tell me all about your trip. Anyway, I’ll make sure you’re on the low-level stuff tonight. I know you’re out of practice.”

               “Thanks, O.” Tim was still nervous as he pulled out his grapple and began his patrol. He knew he was near Jason’s area, like usual, so he felt a little more sure that if something happened, someone would know what to do.

               Gotham looked different than he was used to. Every shadow was alive. Sometimes full of strange-looking ghosts all huddled together. Sometimes the shadow was a ghost, moving and twisting with the people that slipped around it. There was a green mist that clung to places like it did around Bruce. Most of the ghosts ignored Tim as he went past, but every so often one would try to fly up next to him. It took all his control to not react. He still had the cameras in his domino mask and they couldn’t see the ghosts. A green vulture hovered in front of him when he perched on a corner for a moment, like a living gargoyle. “Great. Another one,” the bird huffed eventually before flying off. Tim had to take a moment longer before resuming patrol just to keep from panicking at that comment. He made a mental note to ask Danny about the ghosts in the city. 

               The patrol itself wasn’t anything out of the ordinary at first. He stopped a couple muggings. Broke up a drug deal. Saved a street kid from getting grabbed by some people in a black van. He let them go and relayed their info to Jason since the van had headed back toward Crime Alley. Tim let himself relax into the normalcy of it as he swooped in to stop another mugging. The victim took off running after Tim knocked the first of the three muggers into a wall. “You should know better by now,” Tim said, smirking. 

               “One of the birds,” the second mugger breathed.

               “Get it together,” the leader huffed, aiming his gun at Tim. 

               “Really? A gun? You must be new if you think I’m gonna be scared of a gun.” Tim pulled out his bo staff and swung it at the guy he’d knocked into a wall, making sure he wouldn’t get up. He went for the leader next, sweeping at the man’s legs and knocking him to the ground. He slammed the end of his bo on the guy’s hand. The leader released the gun and let out a shout. Tim was about to kick the gun away when a shot rang out. He felt something go through his torso and saw the bullet impact the brick in front of him. He made himself leave it, kicking at the man behind him. Then he picked up the discarded gun from the leader and threw it at the man behind him. It hit its target, knocking him out. Which left only the leader. A quick blow to the temple and they were all down for the count. Tim didn’t let his focus slip, zip-tying the three muggers while they were down.

               “Red Robin, report!” Oracle ordered. “I’ve got reports of shots fired in your area.”

               Tim took a breath and made sure his voice came out clear. “All good, O. Three muggers ready for pick up here. One of them got a shot off, but he missed.” Tim’s voice wavered on the last word.

               “All right. GCPD is three minutes out,” Oracle replied.

               “You sure it was just the three of them?” Red Hood asked. Tim recognized it for what it was. Jason wanted to make sure that Tim was okay.

               “Just the three. But I think I’ve had my fill for the night. Red Robin out.” Tim cut his com line and looked at the bullet embedded in the wall. It hadn’t missed. It had gone right through him. It answered a question, but not in a good way. Tim wasn’t just a dragon. He was a ghost dragon. Which meant that there were probably more powers that Tim had. Powers that he couldn’t know about and therefore hadn’t even started learning to control. “Fuck.” He raced back to his Nest and quickly divested himself of his gear, feeling his shift pulling at him as the stress of his new powers built up. Then he shifted and curled up in the nest, a messy pile of blankets and pillows hidden in the tub, he’d made for himself in his bathroom. He forgot to lock the door.

               Tim woke up about an hour later to the noise of people talking. “Dick, leave it,” Jason snapped from outside the bathroom. Tim tensed, backing up in his nest. “He said he was fine.”

               “Then where is he?” Dick demanded, closer to the door than Jason was. “If he was fine, then he’d be here. I know he’s not at the manor and the only place I haven’t checked is the bathroom. Unless you know where he is and why he ran off like that.” 

               “Why would I know shit?” Jason huffed. Dick opened the door and Tim froze as his brother scanned the room. “What the fuck are you doing, Dickhead? The Replacement’s fine.” Dick was still dressed in the Nightwing suit, escrima sticks in his hands, but not lit up. Tim felt it when Nightwing’s eyes landed on him like a heat building in his chest. Dick’s mouth hung open. Jason stepped into the doorway behind Dick, helmet in his hand, and spotted Tim. Then he sighed. “Really?” Tim growled. This was not his fault. Dick spun to face Jason.

               “You knew about, about this?” He gestured at Tim. Tim growled again. “What? I mean, where’s Tim? Why is there a dragon in his bathroom? What the fuck is going on?” Jason glared at Tim. Tim glared back. But then he closed his eyes and shifted back. It hurt and the shift wouldn’t fade fully, still trying to pull him back into his dragon form. “Jason, seriously, talk to me. Where is Tim?”

               “Right here,” Tim muttered as he opened his eyes, which he knew were still glowing. Dick turned to face him slowly and the whites of his domino widened. Tim just knew they were about to make a mess. He never should have gone to dinner in the first place.

Chapter Text

           Dick had been worried about Tim since he’d turned up again. He could see that something was different, but he had no idea what. At first, he’d put it down as what Tim claimed it was. Culture shock from another realm of existence. But after the first few days, Dick knew there was more that Tim wasn’t saying. There was something he was hiding. And the biggest hint of all had been Red Robin. Because if Tim was as fine as he was claiming to be, Tim would’ve been back out as RR that first night. Just for a sense of normalcy. Except, he hadn’t been there. And he was continuing to not be there. Every night that RR wasn’t on the street was another clue that something was wrong. 

           Dick’s first guess was that Tim was injured and hiding it. And anything that would leave him injured enough to keep him off patrol was bad. That’s why Dick had been staying at Tim’s Nest for the last few days. Tim locking him out during the night just made Dick more certain that Tim was hiding an injury. He’d been hoping that Tim would cave to Alfred at dinner or admit that he was hurt. Honestly, he hadn’t been expecting Tim to agree to patrol. Then there was the gunshot and Tim just vanished. By the time Nightwing had made it to the alley, the muggers were coming back around and being picked up by GCPD. One of them babbling about RR being a ghost. Originally, Dick was going to dismiss it. They had all been called shadows or ghosts at some point, but Red Hood was perched on the building across from him. And that was a red flag. 

          Dick went straight toward Tim’s Nest. Jason intercepted him inside and they went back and forth as Dick systematically checked for Tim. He’d found Tim’s Red Robin gear discarded haphazardly on his bed but there was no other sign of Tim. Then he found the bathroom. 

And the whole ass dragon in the bathtub.  

          The dragon was about the size of a large cat, curled in a ball surrounded by pillows and blankets. Its glowing blue eyes were fixed on Dick. It had two black horns that curled back against its skull and a ring of black scales around its eyes. Two bat-like wings were pressed against its back, but the rest of its scales were blood red. Dick’s mouth was hanging open. “Really?” Jason sighed. Dick felt his eyes widen. The dragon let out a growl that vibrated through the room.

          Dick turned to Jason who didn’t look surprised. He actually just looked resigned. “You knew about,” Dick hesitated, “about this?” He gestured behind himself to the tub. There was another growl and holy shit. Did Dick just offend a dragon? “What? I mean, where’s Tim? Why is there a dragon in his bathroom? What the fuck is going on?” Jason didn’t answer him. Instead, Jason continued to glare behind him at the fucking dragon in the gods damned bathtub. Dick may have been starting to get really worried. Because if there was a dragon here, where the hell was their brother? “Jason, seriously, talk to me. Where is Tim?”

          “Right here.” The voice sounded like Tim’s but it also sounded wrong in a way Dick couldn’t describe. It sent a chill up his spine. Dick turned around slowly and his eyebrows rose at what he saw. Tim was standing in the tub right where the dragon had been. He was looking at Dick with the same glowing eyes. The black horns curled back, nearly blending in with Tim’s hair. Red scales were spotted across his skin, grouping at his joints and around his neck. The contrast almost made him look paler than normal, like his skin was translucent. Tim chewed on his lip and Dick saw pure white fangs instead of his teeth. Tim was still in his plain black under armor, picking at the hem with clawed fingers.

          “Tim?” Dick’s voice came out strangled. Tim sighed. 

          “We’re not doing this in the bathroom,” Jason huffed tightly. Tim sighed again but made for the door when Jason stepped out of the doorway. Dick watched with a mix of worry and fear as Tim walked past him and he spotted tightly folded wings on Tim’s back. What the hell had happened to his little brother? Jason led the rest of them back out to the living room and dropped onto one of the couches with a pointed look at Tim. Tim growled and bared his teeth, eyes glowing just a little brighter. Jason barely managed to conceal a flinch.

          “It wasn’t my fault some dumbass tried to shoot me!” Tim huffed.

          “The horns, Tim,” Jason snapped back. “Fuck is with the horns.” Dick just looked between the two of them, bewildered. He didn’t know where to start. 

          Tim growled again. Then he turned to glare at Dick. “Sit down!”

          “Timmy,” Dick started, scanning over him again, still not sure he could believe what he was seeing.

          “Just sit, Dick. It’s…complicated.” Tim wrapped his arms around himself. His wings moved to mirror the motion, like a living version of Batman’s cape. Dick took a seat. “Long version or the short version?”

          “Just the truth, Red,” Jason said. “I’ll fill him in on the details if he wants.” Tim frowned at Jason. “Your scales are coming back.” Tim and Dick both looked at Tim’s arms and saw that Jason was right. And the longer that they watched, the more Tim seemed to be changing back into a dragon. He was shrinking and his eyes seemed to be flickering between a reptilian eye and a normal human one. Well, a glowing human one, since they still hadn’t stopped glowing. 

          Tim bit his lip nervously and Dick could see that his teeth were getting sharper again. “The truth.”

          “Tim, what happened? Are you cursed?” Dick asked, leaning forward in the chair he’d found.

          “Cursed.” Tim let out a sharp huff that wasn’t quite a laugh and smoke curled from his mouth and nose. “Technically, yes. I lied about what happened with Banshee after she screamed. She cursed me. I didn’t get sent to the Ghost Zone, I was turned into a ghost. A ghost dragon, to be specific. The only way to ‘break’ the curse would have required losing my memories of vigilantes, which is basically my entire life after the age of seven. The other option was this.” He gestured to himself. “Softening the curse so that I could still have a human life. Or some of one.” He grimaced and tightened his arms around his torso. “I have to shift daily. If I go too long or get overwhelmed, this happens.” Tim punctuated his statement with a full body flinch and shrinking several inches, scales crawling up his neck and starting to circle his eyes like a domino mask. “I left patrol early because the dumb goon didn’t miss. The bullet went through me.”

          Dick’s eyes widened. “You were shot! Tim!”

          “It didn’t hit me,” Tim hissed, baring his teeth. “It went through me . I’m not just a fucking dragon, Dick. I’m a ghost dragon.” Tim flinched and that seemed to be all he could get out because he curled in on himself, body bending in ways that even Dick found uncomfortable to watch. Tim let out a constant growl and Dick could hear the scales scratching against each other as they covered Tim’s skin. Tim fell to his knees with a whine and his wings spread out behind him as his body continued to shrink until the cat-sized dragon collapsed onto the floor with a tired groan. 

          “Damn, Red,” Jason said. “That looked worse than last time.” The dragon looked up at Jason tiredly and bared his teeth.

          Dick just stared at the dragon for a few minutes, trying to take everything in. Finally, he looked up at Jason. “What the fuck?!” he breathed.

          “Yep. ‘Bout what I said at first. The kid’s fucked and wanted to keep it a fucking secret so bad that he called me to help him.” Jason leaned back and crossed his arms. “Like a dumbass.” 

          “A dragon?” Dick pressed. He looked between Jason and Tim. Tim managed to get to his feet, but had only stretched for a moment before resituating himself on the ground staring at Dick. 

          “A ghost dragon.”

          “How did Banshee turn him into a dragon? And why? What purpose would that even have?”

          “Well, see, that’s where you gotta remember that Banshee wasn’t aiming at Timbo. She was aiming at you.” Jason leveled Dick with a flat look. Dick frowned. “She was casting a spell to ‘bring out the darkness within’ or some shit like that. Apparently, even the ghosts think it’s a good thing Tim took the spell and not you. For one thing, it would’ve been even harder to fix. For another, as much as Timmy acts like a supervillain from time to time, he’s at least in control when alternate versions of him come back in time to kill people. You, Dickiebird, tend to be sadistic. I read the file on the whole alternate world with the Vampires and your alternate’s short tenure as Vampire King. Makes my bloody messes look clean.” Dick shuddered, remembering the horror he’d felt reading over that file. “Who knows what you woulda been. A ghost dragon that’s still Tim in every way that matters is a dream scenario compared to that nightmare.”

          Dick flinched as possibilities rushed through his mind. He knew how bad he could get when his temper ran away from him. Some things were hard to feel guilty about, but that didn’t mean that he needed a temptation like having any kind of meta or super or, well, ghost powers. At the same time, he would always take the hit for his siblings. Always. “Tim, you didn’t have to block her,” Dick said. “You didn’t have to do this for me.” Tim huffed and rolled his eyes. 

          “I have to agree with the lizard on this one, Goldie. Only one who coulda been a safer choice to take the hit wouldn’t have been a Bat.” Jason’s eyes looked closer to green when Dick looked over at him. “But it doesn’t matter now. He can’t take back what he did.” 

          “So how do we fix it?” Dick demanded.

          “Weren’t you listening? This is fixed!” Jason gestured to Tim. Tim tensed and tucked his wings and tail closer to his body. But his eyes stayed on Dick. “From what he told me, the spell latched on to a part of his life. All the memories, all the skills, all the knowledge, all the people that came from that part of his life. Spell latched onto his mask. None of us would be okay with losing that much. Hell, most of us hardly have a life outside the damn mask. Especially if we’re counting any memories of people we would know without being vigilantes. Like your friends in the Titans. Or Tim’s Young Justice team. He had a choice, Dick. Take the curse like this and get used to it or lose almost everything. He made the same choice I woulda.” Jason glared at Dick. Dick deflated, looking back at Tim. “So now we adjust.”

          “We adjust,” Dick echoed. “We just ‘adjust’ to our brother being a ghost dragon.”

          “Yep.”

          “And how in the hell do we do that? I don’t exactly know any ghosts that I can ask for help.”

          Jason smirked. “Fortunately, Red’s got that covered. After Banshee cursed him, he flew off following the King of Ghosts. That’s how he got enough help to get here.” Tim grumbled slightly. It reminded Dick of the way Tim would correct them under his breath. Except he had no idea what Tim would be correcting. Jason rolled his eyes. “Even when you can’t talk you’re a pain in the ass.” Tim growled. “I can’t fix whatever the fuck I got wrong if I don’t know what it was!”

          “Jason,” Dick said, with a small smirk. Jason rolled his eyes again. “The King?” Dick tilted his head curiously.

          “Apparently the guy summoned other ghosts to help and gave Timbo a tricked out PDA to contact him with. For questions and shit. All we gotta do is make sure the scaly little beast doesn’t freak out and show off his new fangs and shit around people who are gonna care.” Jason paused and frowned at Tim. “I’m guessing you still wanna try and keep this from B, don’t ya?” Tim’s eyes got wide and he nodded instantly.

          “Tim, you got turned into a dragon,” Dick said as gently as he could while he was still trying to accept the reality of the situation. “This isn’t like hiding a wound to go on patrol. This is like somebody stole a vital organ and you didn’t bother to tell anybody. It’s the kind of thing that your family needs to know.” Jason let out a snort and Tim went stiff. Dick frowned. “What? Wait. Tim, did you lose an organ?! TIM!!!” Jason cackled and Tim tried to hide his snout with his front claws. “Oh my gods, no! No! You cannot do this to me twice in one day! Please tell me that it was just something like you forgot to tell Alfred that you had your tonsils or appendix out when you were a kid! Please!”

          “Nah, Goldie, Timothy here lost his whole ass spleen while he was looking for Bruce.” Jason grinned. Tim whined and suddenly the dragon disappeared. Jason and Dick both stared at the spot he’d been in. 

          Slowly, Dick looked over at Jason. “Ghost dragon,” he said carefully. “Not just a dragon. A ghost dragon. Jason.” Jason didn’t look at him. “If Tim’s a ghost, does that mean he’s dead?” Dick felt sick and Jason didn’t answer. But there was suddenly a weight in his lap and pinpricks of claws digging into his Nightwing costume. Slowly, Tim shimmered back into the visible spectrum, looking up at Dick with worried blue eyes. “You’re not dead, right?” Dick asked. He hated how choked his voice sounded. Tim shook his head. Dick felt himself sag as tension he hadn’t even noticed left him. Without thinking too hard about it, Dick gathered Tim in his arms and held him as close as possible. Tim squirmed some, but didn’t actually try to get away. “Okay. We can talk about telling Bruce in the morning. Or whenever you can actually talk. I think there have been way too many surprises tonight.” 

          “Definitely,” Jason grumbled.

Chapter Text

               Danny regretted talking to Kitty and Ember instantly. Was he excited about his date? Yes. Did he want to share that with people? Also yes. Did he want some advice about what he should wear and how to get ready for the date? Sure. But he should have known better than to just blurt things out to the first ghost he saw. And with Kitty and Ember handing them gossip was like showing the Box Ghost a box. You know what’s going to happen. And happen things did. By the time Danny had gotten up the next day, the entire Ghost Zone knew about his date.

               He was informed of this by the Fright Knight who decided that anyone wanting to court the King of the Infinite Realms had to best him in combat and that Danny needed to know that at seven in the damn morning. And after the Fright Knight showed up, ghosts just kept coming. Danny didn’t have any classes until the afternoon, thankfully, so everyone from Skulker to Clockwork to Desiree showed up in his apartment with various threats and pieces of advice. There were even a couple Observants who showed up and complimented him on taking his role as King seriously enough to begin courting a consort before officially taking the throne. Danny had resisted the urge to blast them only because Frostbite had been there when they arrived and he was making increasingly desperate signals against attacking the Observants.

               The phone call came just as he was getting his stuff together to head to campus. The caller ID wasn’t helpful; it only showed a blocked number. “Hello?” Danny said hesitantly as he answered.

               “Daniel, how nice to hear from you,” Vlad mused.

               “What do you want, Vlad?” Danny sighed. “I have class.”

               “Now, now. That’s no way to treat an old friend. It's so rude to try and rush a conversation.”

               Danny rolled his eyes. “Vlad, either spit it out or I’m hanging up and you can try and threaten me later.”

               “All right. Really, Daniel. You should learn some patience. How would your paramour respond to such impertinence? Hmm?” Vlad paused, but Danny bit his tongue, not wanting to give the older man anything to work with. “Nothing to say? How unlike you.”

               “My having a date has nothing to do with you,” Danny growled.

               “Of course it does,” Vlad declared. “You are the Ghost King. Any love interest affects all ghosts. We have to be sure that this boy isn’t working against us.”

               “Vlad.”

               “In fact, I’ve thought of a brilliant way to ensure exactly that. I’ve decided that Dalv Co. will be putting on a charity event in Gotham in two weeks. You and your new friend are invited. Expected really, since if you don’t attend with your partner, I will ensure that you can never set foot at Gotham University again without being constantly plagued by ghosts. See you then!” Vlad hung up before Danny could respond. Danny glared at his phone. Okay. Fine. Vlad was pulling another stupid stunt. He could deal with that. He just had to hope that their coffee date went well, because otherwise forcing them to be his date to a freaking gala with Vlad was going to be torture. 

               Vlad tossed his phone on the counter and returned to the experiment he’d been conducting, but before he could fully shift his focus, he was interrupted by the appearance of one of his spies from Gotham. “You aren’t gonna believe this,” the bird announced. Vlad glared at him. “There’s another one.”

               Vlad frowned. “Another what?”

               “Ghost boy vigilante type. Running around with the Bats, hanging out on gargoyles and everything,” the vulture huffed. 

               “And did you stick around long enough to know who this new ghost boy is?” Vlad hissed.

               “A Bat.”

               “Which Bat?”

               “The red one.”

               “Which red one?!”

               “The red bird one. Red Rooster or something.” The vulture fluffed his feathers up and sighed. “I look like a bird expert to you?”

               “Red Robin?!” Vlad snarled.

               The vulture perked up some. “Yeah. That’s the one. And it’s new too. Nobody seen him like this before.” 

               Vlad grinned as he turned away from his experiment. It could wait. If he could get this new ghost boy before Danny knew about them, he could finally get the power he needed to overthrow the little brat.

               Danny came back after a late dinner to find Jazz waiting for him in his apartment. He sighed and locked the door behind him. “I gave you a key for emergencies. My having a date is not an emergency?”

               Jazz perked up on the couch. “You have a date?”

               “You didn’t know?” Danny snorted. “Guess that makes you officially the last to know. Kitty and Ember found out and they told the whole damn Zone.” He dropped his backpack on his table. “What are you doing here, Jazz?”

               “I think we need to figure out who Drake is,” she said, easily changing topics. Danny glared at her. “It’s important.”

               “We talked about this. He didn’t tell us for a reason.”

               “That was before he gave my number to his brother,” Jazz said firmly. Danny’s eyes widened. “Actually, he gave my number to two of his brothers. Apparently, they thought it would be helpful to talk to someone who was in the same situation as them.”

               “Okay. Not ideal,” Danny admitted with a grimace. 

               “No. But, honestly, I would understand that to some extent. But the questions these two have been asking me–” Jazz shuddered. 

               “What have they been asking?”

               “One of them asked if Drake had a grave. That same one also asked, and I quote, ‘how would you define someone who died and came back from the dead months later and was dipped in a pit of supernatural green water and turned into a raging monster?’ And I didn’t know how to answer that. I don’t even know where to start to answer that. The other one started out differently. Just asking the normal concerned sibling stuff that I thought of when you had your accident. Then he started asking about what makes a person become a ghost after death and how someone could find specific ghosts. Which raised a lot of red flags.” 

               Danny stared at her. “What the fuck?”

               “So, first, could you start by helping me unpack that mess of a question the first one asked? Then, we need to find out who Drake is. And get him and his brothers in therapy before one of them tries to fight a Bat or summon a demon.” Jazz crossed her arms. “So, dead but came back? I’m guessing not a zombie.”

               Danny took a seat beside her. “No. Not a zombie. Not if they actually came back all the way, with a heart beat and everything. I mean, the best way to describe them would probably be a remnant. A member of the dead returned to the living.”

               “And the whole rage monster thing?”

               “That I may actually know about,” Danny admitted. Jazz raised her eyebrows. “Clockwork calls them Lazarus Pits. It’s basically naturally occurring pools of ectoplasm outside of the Ghost Zone. He wants to plug them up, but the Observants won’t let him. They say that since the pits are naturally occurring, he shouldn’t interfere. His argument is that when humans get tossed in them, they get contaminated with ecto and that can drive alot of people crazy.”

               “Why would humans go near them then?”

               “Because they heal. Like, you could be dying and if you get tossed in the Pit you’re fine. Physically anyway. Usually, there’s a big period of blind rage where people who were exposed to the ecto kill everything in sight for a while. Usually a few hours. Maybe a day or so if someone has been exposed many times. If someone did that with a remnant, then it might make the whole rage thing worse.”

               “Danny, no. How? How could it be worse than a killing rampage?!”Jazz demanded.

“Remnants aren’t fully alive. They’re close enough to count, but they’re still denizens of the Infinite Realms. Expose them to a Pit, and you’re just bringing out that part more. But none of the pits have pure ecto so it’s corrupting. The rage wouldn’t be a one time thing. More like an ongoing issue. Well, probably. I don’t actually know. I’d have to ask Clockwork or the Observants.” Danny frowned, considering. 

               “Danny.”

               “You think they know someone who went in the Pits?” Danny asked. 

               “Oh Ancients. This family is concerning. We have to find them.” Jazz looked at Danny with wide eyes. Danny just shrugged. “Danny, I’m serious! Drake is going through something incredibly difficult and his family is clearly not stable enough to handle it.”

               Danny gave her a flat look. “Jazz, our parents wanted to tear me apart. Molecule by molecule,” he said. Jazz grimaced. “I had an archenemy before I turned fifteen. An archenemy who cloned me multiple times. And flirted repeatedly with our mom.” He and Jazz both shuddered and gagged a little. “Not to mention I had to fight the literal Ghost King less than a year after I half died. We don’t have any room to tell Drake that his family isn’t stable enough to help him adjust. His family is at least trying to understand and they don’t have to worry about random ghost attacks. I mean, yeah, those questions are bizarre and I really don’t want to have to clean up some kind of summoning mess in Gotham, but until something actually happens that makes me concerned for Drake’s safety or Drake tells us himself, we aren’t going to look for Drake’s identity.” Danny glared at Jazz until she sighed.

               “Fine,” she conceded. “But I’m not going to stop messaging his brothers. And I will be trying to convince them to get actual therapy.”

               “Not surprised,” Danny groaned. “Did they give you names?”

               Jazz shook her head. “They used pseudonyms like Drake. Birdie and Undead. Three guesses which is which.”

               “That’s concerning,” Danny decided.

Chapter Text

               Tim was having a problem. And it wasn’t the dragon thing. Jason and Dick had both agreed to keep it a secret until Tim was ready to tell Bruce. At least, they had once he’d put them in contact with Jazz. Tim probably should have at least warned her that his brothers may reach out, but she hadn’t sent him any messages, so it was probably fine. Plus Dick had agreed to join Jason as his back up on patrols so he felt a little better continuing to go on patrol. 

               No. Tim’s problem was his date with Danny. He had decided to walk to the coffee shop, since it wasn’t far from his Nest. And that is when the trouble started. Because there was a green vulture following him. And it hadn’t just started following him, if he was right. Because he’d seen the same bird during his patrols the past two nights. He hadn’t seen it, but it must have followed him all the way to his Nest if it was now following him while he was in civies. There was something off about it, though. For one thing, it was the only ghost following him. Most of the others had given him a cursory glance during his first patrol back and moved on. Same with any ghost he’d seen in civies. They may have put together who he was, but it didn’t seem like they cared. And Danny had told Drake that he wasn’t trying to find out who Drake was. After he’d scolded Drake for giving out his sister’s phone number. Tim’s not gonna apologize for that. 

               The vulture had another odd thing about it too. Not the fez, though that was confusing. It seemed like the other ghosts were avoiding it. Like they were afraid of it almost. But Tim had decided that he’d ask Danny about that after their date. He still hadn’t decided if he should tell Danny that he was Drake or not. Tim had planned to use the date to see if Danny’s intentions were as pure as they appeared. But with the vulture following him, Tim was worried he’d have to out himself just to get rid of it.

               When he got to the coffee shop, the bird followed him inside, phasing through the wall and disappearing. Tim could still feel its eyes on him like a heat in his chest. Danny wasn’t there yet, so Tim took a seat at an empty table to wait. The bird was still watching. Tim bit his lip and glanced around, trying to see if he could find it. He paid attention to the heat he felt and stopped when he felt it get stronger. He was looking at a spot behind the counter when it felt the strongest. He guessed that was where the bird was. The bell on the door jangled, but Tim didn’t look away. He didn’t want to risk the bird moving. “Hey!” Danny’s voice made Tim jump, and he looked to the other boy. “Nice to see you again, Tim.” Danny smiled broadly, letting his bright blue eyes scan over Tim, not caring that Tim noticed. Tim felt his cheeks burning.

               “Uh, yeah. Good to see you too. I, uh, wasn’t sure you’d show,” Tim said. The heat of the bird’s eyes had faded, but he could still feel it. “I mean, we didn’t really meet in the best way.”

               “I thought it was pretty cool,” Danny said, eyes glinting. “Honestly, I wasn’t sure you’d show. You’re way out of my league. Anyway, you want to get some drinks and we can chat for a bit?” Danny jerked his head toward the line at the counter.

               “Right. Yeah. Sounds like a plan. I mean, I do owe you for the other day.” Tim scrambled to his feet. “After you.” He gestured nervously to the line with his hands. He didn’t know why Danny got him so flustered, but it got so much worse when Danny grabbed one of his hands and tugged Tim along with him. Tim was a vigilante. He was a dragon. He was a ghost. There were about a dozen ways he could’ve gotten out of the hold Danny had on him, but he just stumbled after the other man. Danny’s hand was cold, but it felt good on his hot skin. Like a balance. It felt right, and that was a terrifying thought. Tim could feel his heart rate picking up, and he couldn’t tear his eyes away from Danny. 

               “You okay?” Danny asked, head tilted curiously. 

               Tim blinked at him dumbly for a moment, wanting to know how their hot and cold balance would feel if they kissed. Danny’s smile fell, and Tim shook himself. He needed to get control of himself before he did something stupid like blow smoke or disappear or something. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. Just haven’t been on a date in a while. A little nervous.” 

               Danny grinned again. “Yeah, I haven’t dated since high school, so I get it. I promise we can go as slow as you need.” His voice was sweet and genuine, and it made Tim’s face burn. Then Danny let out a gasp, and Tim felt the heat of the vulture’s eyes burning into him again. Danny released Tim’s hand and looked around with a frown. His eyes narrowed at the counter. Tim tensed, trying to locate the dumb bird again. He didn’t have to look hard. The barista screamed, and all of the blenders started running at full speed. The vulture let out a cackling laugh, and the menu screens crackled as they fritzed out. Danny let out a growl, and Tim had the thought that he probably shouldn’t have found it as attractive as he did. The vulture shimmered back into the visible spectrum with another laugh.

               “Shit,” Tim breathed. Danny glanced back at him, and Tim saw the warring emotions on his face. A feeling he was all too familiar with: conflicted feelings over keeping someone you cared about safe versus taking out the bigger threat. The bird dove at them before Danny could decide what to do, so Tim grabbed his hand and dragged him out of the way of the swooping ghost. They tumbled to the ground with the momentum, and Tim rolled to make sure that Danny landed on top of him, trying to keep the other man from getting hurt. The impact knocked Tim’s breath away.

               Danny’s eyes widened. “Are you okay?”

               “Fine,” Tim managed.

               “See you soon!” the vulture yelled. Tim and Danny watched as the bird flew out of the shop through a wall and disappeared as Signal landed on the sidewalk outside. Oh perfect. As if Tim’s life wasn’t going to be hard enough after this anyway. Danny got off of Tim and stared at the street with a frown. Tim pushed himself up with a sigh. He looked around the shop. It had been destroyed. Just as bad as any rogue attack. The screens were sparking and falling down. The blenders had practically exploded, sending blades and coffee drinks all over. The tables and chairs had all been pushed around and trampled in the panic. 

               “Well, that’s not normal,” Signal said as he walked in. Then he looked at Tim, and his head tilted. Tim sighed. He’d been purposefully avoiding Duke since he wasn’t sure how much Duke’s meta powers would let him see what had happened to Tim. Signal just stared for a moment.

               “Uh, you’re one of the Bats, right?” Danny said, looking between Tim and Signal.

               Signal looked at him. “Yeah. Signal. Are you both okay?” Signal looked between the two of them.

               “We’re good,” Tim said. Danny nodded, and they helped each other up. 

               “Good. GCPD should be here soon. You should stick around to give them your statement, but maybe you could tell me, uh, what the hell happened here?” Signal gestured to the shop. One of the lights made a crackling sound and fell to the floor behind them.

               Tim was working out a way to respond that wouldn’t get him into trouble when Danny started talking. “Ghost attack,” Danny said flatly. “We got them all the time in Amity.” He shrugged. Tim and Signal both stared at Danny. “I’m surprised it doesn’t happen more here. Gotham’s the only place with anywhere near the same amount of ambient ectoplasm as Amity Park.”

               “Say what?” Signal said.

               Danny grinned. “My parents study ghosts. They’re ectobiologists. This,” he gestured to the shop, “is so minor compared to some of the stuff where I come from.”

               “Ghosts,” Signal said flatly.

               “Apparently,” Tim said, chewing his lip. Danny shrugged again and hesitantly took Tim’s hand. Tim looked over at him, face flushing again, but he didn’t pull his hand free.

               “Is it any weirder than a murderous clown?” Danny asked. Tim and Signal both flinched at that. “Er, sorry. Probably not someone that you guys bring up much.”

               “Not really,” Signal said. “But thank you for the, er, information? I guess. I don’t know. Make sure you tell GCPD everything you just told me. I’ve gotta get going. There’s a robbery that I need to get to.” Signal left just as quickly as he came. 

               “Sorry,” Danny said with a sigh. “Not a good first date.”

               Tim let out a laugh. “Ghosts?” he said. “I mean, I’ve had better, but it wasn’t my worst.” 

               Danny narrowed his eyes. “Really?”

               “Yeah, there was the time that my date tried to kill me. And the time before that, when my date hit me with a brick. This,” Tim gestured around them, “is just another day in Gotham.”

               “Except for the ghosts,” Danny pointed out cautiously.

               “Except for the ghosts,” Tim agreed.

               “And that doesn’t, I don’t know, bother you?” Danny licked his lips and scanned Tim’s face. Tim wanted to laugh again since he was pretty sure it was him who had brought the ghost attack on.

               “Not really.”

               “You don’t care that my family is a bunch of ghost nuts and that this kind of thing will keep happening?” Danny pressed.

               “I mean, it’s Gotham.” Tim shrugged. Really, ghosts were just a change of pace from their normal rogues. Though he’s sure they’ll be out soon. They always were. Besides, Tim’s family was worse.

               “So, does that mean you’d want to try again?”

               Tim knew better. He really did. But he liked Danny. And he couldn’t stop his mouth. “Absolutely.”

               Duke was waiting for Tim at his Nest, still decked out in most of his Signal stuff, though he’d discarded his helmet on Tim’s coffee table. Tim sighed and closed the door behind him. “What happened to the robbery?”

               “False alarm. Bank trainee accidentally hit the silent alarm,” Duke said. He scanned over Tim with a frown. “What’s all over you?”

               Tim looked down at himself, then back up at Duke in confusion. “Uh, what?”

               “What’s all over you?” Duke repeated, gesturing to Tim. “I haven’t seen you much since you got back. And every time I’ve been over here before, you’ve been hiding or something. Even at dinner the other night, you were still hiding. And I think it’s because of whatever is all over you.”

               “And what exactly are you seeing?” Tim asked cautiously.

               “It’s like you’re radioactive,” Duke said. “I mean, I’m used to seeing some of that around Jason’s or Damian’s eyes, but I’ve never seen it all over like this. And that guy you were with was the same way.”

               Tim blinked. Okay. He could work with that. “I mean, I haven’t noticed anything,” he said as casually as possible. “And I wasn’t avoiding you on purpose. Not any more than the rest of the family.”

               “So you have no idea why you look like a green glowstick when I use my powers?”

               “I’d guess it has something to do with ghosts. I spent a week in the Ghost Zone. Danny’s parents study ghosts. Jason and Damian have both died before. It’s the best guess I’ve got right now.” Tim shrugged. Duke narrowed his eyes. 

               “And who exactly is Danny?” Duke asked. “Is he your boyfriend? Is that why you were so worried about us hanging around when you got back?”

               Tim sighed. “We’ve been on one date, and a ghost interrupted it. I don’t think that makes us boyfriends.”

               Duke grinned. “But you want to be.” His grin got bigger. “I’m telling B.”

               “Do not tell B!”

Chapter Text

               Jazz knew, objectively, that her parents' experiments had greatly impacted both of their children, not just Danny. She knew that the only reason she hadn’t been picked up by the Guys in White when they cracked down was that she hadn’t been there. If she had, she doubted very much that she would have been released until the Anti-Ecto Acts were repealed. She knew that her position as Danny’s Regent also granted her some position among the ghosts she ran into. The only thing she didn’t know was to what extent she had been affected by these things. It wasn’t usually relevant. After all, she wasn’t transforming or phasing through walls like Danny. The biggest physical thing was her eyes, which tended to glow green in the dark. Jazz was harder to overshadow than most people and was more affected by Anti-Ghost weapons. 

               She could also see ghosts. Not ghosts that were invisible or anything. No. She could tell that someone was a ghost because she could see the glow of ectoplasm around them. She hadn’t actually realized that wasn’t normal until she had mentioned how no one else reacted to the glow that Danny had, and Sam had explained that Danny wasn’t glowing. It was something that she had developed after high school, though, so in the long run, it hadn’t really mattered for her. She could see ghosts, but they couldn’t tell that she could see them. Unless they were the few ghosts that had seen her while she was working as Regent or one of Amity Park’s regulars, ghosts did not care any more about her than any other human. And that was fine by her. When you weren’t living in a city that was constantly getting attacked by ghosts, it was very easy to go throughout your day not caring about ghosts at all, even if you could see them. Honestly, Jazz never thought she’d have to worry about ghost attacks in Gotham. 

               And she didn’t. Any ghosts in Gotham who wanted a fight targeted Danny. 

               She did have to worry about getting mugged on the way home by an idiot with a gun. This was partially her fault. She shouldn’t have stayed so late at the shelter she was working with for one of her case studies. She knew that walking alone, after dark, in Park Row was not a good idea. But once you survive Pariah Dark, human threats don’t seem like a big deal. Jazz held her hands up as the man shoved her into an alley and pressed her face against the brick wall. “Where’s your money?” the man demanded. He jammed the muzzle of the gun into her back, and Jazz let out a gasp. “Where is it?”

               “Front pocket,” Jazz managed. “On the left.” She felt as a hand fumbled around her hip and started digging in her pocket for her wallet. 

               “Really, Benny? Third time I’ve caught you.” The mechanical voice made her mugger freeze. There was a loud thump as someone landed on the ground near them. The mugger immediately pulled his hands away from Jazz. Jazz turned around and found one of the vigilantes staring at the mugger as he backed out of the alley. He was wearing body armor with a red bat on the chest and a leather jacket over it. His face was hidden by a red helmet that glared at the mugger with white LED eyes. And wrapping around him like a noose was a rope glowing bright green. Jazz couldn’t help staring. “Three strikes. I warned you.” 

               “Hood, it ain’t what it looks like!” the mugger said frantically, hands raised above his head. 

               “See, you said that last time, too,” Hood said casually. He pulled a gun from the holster on his hip and tilted his head. “And I told you, if I found you pulling this shit in my territory again, I wasn’t gonna just send you back to lock up. I told you that you’d be paying my toll for your little stick-up act.” He leveled his gun at the mugger. 

               “Don’t!” Jazz yelled. “Just, just call the cops. But don’t shoot him.” The helmet looked at her curiously. She could feel him scanning her. The green rope seemed to dim as it twisted away from his neck. 

               Then he let out a put-upon sigh. “Well, Benny, guess you get one last chance. You'd best thank the lady.” Hood gestured with his head to Jazz as he put his gun back in its holster. The mugger sagged in relief and started blubbering gratitudes to Jazz. Right up until Hood kneed him in the gut. He ripped the gun out of the man’s hands and tucked it in the back of his pants. Hood then slammed him against the wall, in a move nearly identical to the one that had been used on Jazz. He pulled a pair of zip cuffs from his pocket and slipped them on the mugger. The mugger wheezed out another ‘thank you’ in Jazz’s direction as he was dropped on the ground. “Now, am I gonna have to knock you out, or are you gonna wait here for the cops like a good little mutt?” Hood cocked his head.

               “I’ll stay. Promise!” the mugger yelped, cowering away from Hood. Hood nodded in approval. Then he turned to Jazz, green ropes far dimmer than they had been, and gave her a salute before he fired his grappling gun and was gone. Jazz was too stunned to move for a moment. Then she shook off her distraction and turned back to her mugger.

               “Are you okay?” she asked. She was hesitant to get too close to the man who was sitting and leaning against the alley wall after his manhandling, but he looked like he was actually going to stay there and wait for the cops.

               “Thanks to you,” the mugger said. “Hood don’t change his mind often.” He looked at the street anxiously. “You should get outta here before the cops turn up or they’ll try and get you to turn Hood in.”

               Jazz frowned. “He just attacked you and threatened to shoot you. Why are you worried about the Red Hood getting arrested?”

               “He’s good for the Alley,” the mugger said solemnly. “He got the other Red to set me up with one of the Wayne work programs. Just needed the money to make it to the first paycheck.” He leaned his head back against the wall. “He knows what it’s like out here. Thank you for stopping him. Really. If you hadn’t, he wouldn’t have stopped. Hood don’t bluff.” 

               “He was going to kill you,” Jazz pressed. 

               “Naw, Hood don’t kill muggers. Just traffickers and those that break the rules. All he woulda done is a rubber bullet in the leg or somethin’. Maybe a few broken bones. Still enough to keep most of us from trying much. But Hood can’t be everywhere at once, and a guy’s gotta eat.” The mugger sighed. “Really, you oughta go. The Alley pigs are worse than Hood could ever be.” Jazz hesitated, but she’d had enough experience with being on the wrong side of law enforcement that she knew to take repeat offenders' warning about cops at face value. She headed down the sidewalk, crossing to the other side to make sure she didn’t get stopped. It didn’t take her long to get to her bus stop, but she felt someone watching her the whole way there. She didn’t relax until she was finally on the bus. She’d take ghosts over vigilantes any day.

               Her apartment was only a little further from campus than Danny’s. In the same neighborhood, even. Thankfully, it was one of the safest neighborhoods in Gotham and was one of the least visited by the vigilantes. Jazz sighed as she closed the door behind her and turned on the lights. And she froze. Sitting on her couch, watching her was the Red Hood. The green ropes were still dim and twisting around his shoulders and arms. “Jasmine Alica Fenton,” he said. Jazz shuddered at the mechanical tone of his helmet’s voice modulator, and her stomach dropped at her full name. “How’d you do that?”

               “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jazz managed anxiously. She knew that the Red Hood didn’t target civilians, but the fact that he was in her apartment was making her question that knowledge. “I didn’t do anything.” Hood got to his feet and walked toward her, telegraphing his movements like he was trying to avoid scaring or startling her. “I was just trying to get home.” 

               Hood tilted his head. “You don’t even know you did it, do you?” he asked. 

               “Do what?” Jazz asked. 

               “You know anything about me?” Hood asked suddenly, turning his back on her. “The rumors they pass around. You heard them?”

               “You’re one of the vigilantes. The most violent. The only one who kills. You’ve carved out territory in Park Row and even Batman doesn’t cross the barrier lines without your say-so.”

               There was some sort of huff that almost sounded like a laugh. “That’s not what I’m talking about.” He sat back down on her couch and stretched his arms out along the back of it. His jacket lifted up some, showing off the holstered guns on his hips and the knives in their sheaths along the inside of the jacket. “That’s the kind of stuff you can get from a search engine or a news story. I mean, the on-the-ground, whispered-on-the-corner, no-one-even-knows-where-they-started rumors.” Jazz shook her head. “Figured. Otherwise, you shoulda guessed who I was the moment you saw me.”

               “You’re the Red Hood,” Jazz said uncertainly.

               “And you’re the Regent for the King of the Infinite Realms,” he said. “And I want to know how the fuck you managed to silence the Pit with just a few words.” He leaned forward, resting his arms on his knees. Jazz stared at him, heart racing. How did he know her? How did he know about the Infinite Realms? What did he mean that she silenced the Pit?

               “What?”

               “Give ya two guesses to get there.” Hood sounded smug. “Drake seemed to think you were the smarter one. Though I think he likes your brother better.”

               “Drake. You’re one of his brothers,” she realized. Her mind was reeling. “The Pit. As in the Lazarus Pit. You’re Undead. You’re the Red Hood.” Her jaw hung open. 

               “Got it in one,” he said darkly. “You never did answer that question I asked you.”

               “I was hoping it was hypothetical,” Jazz whined weakly. “And that you wouldn’t actually need the answer. But you’ve been in a Pit, haven’t you? That’s why you asked?” She couldn’t see his expression, but the helmet’s gaze leveled out, and she just knew he was judging her. “Were you actually dead before you went in? Please say no.”

               “Why?”

               “Danny said that if you did die and come back before you went in, then it could be worse for you than for other people.” Jazz shook her head and, without thinking, took a seat on the other end of her couch. “What the hell is my life?” she muttered.

               “Weird as fuck,” Hood replied easily. “Wouldn’t be as dangerous if you weren’t walking around Crime Alley in the middle of the night.”

               “It wasn’t that late when I left the shelter,” she huffed. “And I am not calling it that. There’s no reason to throw an entire neighborhood under a label like that.”

               “Been that way for decades. Got an actual answer for me?”

               “Were you ever actually dead?”

               “For a few months. Came back long before I was dropped in the Pit. Never have figured out why.”

               “Okay. So, you’re a revenant that was also healed by a Lazarus Pit. As far as we can figure, anyway. Revenants are technically alive, but because they’ve died, they’re closer to dead than normal people. Doesn’t really affect much, except Clockwork says that they’re more sensitive to ectoplasm. And the Lazarus Pits are just pools of corrupted ectoplasm. Which means that being put in one as a revenant would be like tying yourself more to the Infinite Realms and the Ghost Zone every time you went in. And when you have a living body and an undead soul, that interaction can be incredibly unstable. So, instead of the one-time Pit Rage problem, it’s an ongoing problem. I guess the best answer to your question is a revenant with ghostly anger issues.”

               “Huh. Never thought dying could’ve changed how the Pit affected me,” Hood admitted. “What about my other question?”

               “I didn’t do anything,” Jazz insisted. “All I did was ask you not to shoot that guy.”

               “You didn’t ‘ask’ nothing. You ordered.”

               “You’re the one with all the weapons. Even if I did order you to do something, you’d never have to agree to it.” She shook her head. “And I think that whole interaction was unnecessary. It was just a wallet. I don’t even have that much cash on me. It definitely wasn’t worth shooting anyone over.”

               Hood sighed. “See, anywhere else, I’d probably agree with you. But when you’re as desperate as most of the Alley folks are, the only way to stop the crime is a hard line and a whole lotta help from good services. Otherwise, nothing gets better. People’ll keep dying, and it won’t be me killing them. The Big Bad Bat gives me leeway in the Alley ‘cause even he knows it takes a different method to keep the most vulnerable people there safe. Benny ain’t a bad guy, but he also ain’t got the training to be waving that gun around. If he doesn’t stop, someone’s gonna get hurt, but a desperate man will take chances others won’t. He knows the risks. But his sister’s sick, and her meds take more money than they got. He’s trying to stay away from goon work, so he’s resorting to the only thing he can think of that ain’t that. Red Robin got them in touch with one of the good programs, but things take time. All he’s got to do is keep on the narrow until it comes through. And that’s one hell of an ask. And it means that the enforcer’s gotta be a big enough threat to keep them in line.” Hood shrugged. “It’s the way things work around here.”

               “Because the nuclear deterrent has worked so well in the past,” Jazz huffed.

               “You don’t gotta understand, but that’s how it is. And unless you’ve got any clue how you did what you did early, I’ve got to be getting back to it.” He got to his feet.

               “Wait,” she said. He turned back to her. “I may not know what I did, but I know something.”

               “And what is that?” He tilted his head.

               “I can see the ectoplasm around you. It’s like ropes. And it was glowing really bright when I first saw it, but it dimmed after I asked you not to shoot him.”

               “You can see ectoplasm?”

               “The Pit corruption, or whatever you want to call it. My parents study ghosts, and their experiments left their mark on me and my brother. He’s half dead. And I can see ecto-entities. As a revenant, you count.” She shrugged. “And the ropes around you are still dim, in case you were wondering.” Hood considered for a moment before he nodded and headed for the door.

               “Be seeing you, Fenton,” he called over his shoulder.

Chapter Text

                Tim sat on his bed and glared at Dick. “No,” he said flatly.

               “Tim,” Dick said tiredly. “It’s important. Especially if you want to keep patrolling or want to try going on missions anytime soon.” He crossed his arms.

               “The answer is still no.”

               “Tim.”

               “I’m not going to work on this with you. And I’m sure as hell not gonna do it with Jason. The only person I’d feel comfortable even trying to work on this with is Cass, and I’m not telling anyone else until I have to. If I work on this, I will do it on my own.” Tim bared his teeth, and his eyes flashed bright blue.

               “You fell through a roof last night,” Dick replied flatly. “Either you let me or Jason help you learn how to use your new powers, or I tell B, and you get benched for the foreseeable future.”

               “For a second. I got back up before anyone else noticed.” Tim crossed his arms and looked away from Dick.

               “Only because Hood shot someone at the same time. You got lucky. Tim, if you can’t control this stuff, it’s going to get you hurt. You need to work on this. And if you don’t, I’m telling B.”

               “Why does B need to know? I’m handling this!”

               Dick sighed. “You’re not handling this. You’re avoiding this.”

               “Just because I’m not talking to you, doesn’t mean I’m not talking to someone,” Tim hissed. Dick didn’t respond. He just looked at his brother. After a few moments of quiet, Tim let out a groan and fell back on his bed. “This sucks. I don’t want this to be a thing. I want to go back to being a normal person and not a fucking ghost dragon.”

               “So you admit–”

               “Yes, Dick, I’m avoiding it,” Tim snapped. “Like you did when you found out.” Tim lifted his head and gave Dick a pointed look. Which was fair. Dick had made it through the explanation. And until they made the agreement to keep it from B. Then he’d left and went to have a freak out about his little brother being potentially half-dead in his own apartment for a bit. But he was back on patrol with Red Robin now, trying to help. 

               Suddenly, both their phones buzzed. Tim sat up with a frown. Dick dug his phone out of his pocket and pulled up the message in their family group chat. It was a screenshot of a security video that showed Tim and another boy with pale skin and black hair holding hands in a destroyed coffee shop. It was followed by a message from Duke that read: Look what I found. The whole image was covered in static, but it was still clear enough to see the blush on Tim’s cheeks. Dick looked up at Tim curiously. “Uh, Tim, who is that?” Dick asked.

               “I’m hacking his whole suit,” Tim declared. He got to his feet and stormed past Dick toward the fish tank that hid his opps center. Dick followed him.

               “That’s not an answer. Also, what’s with the static? It’s been all over you in every picture or video I’ve seen of you since you got back.” 

               “Ghosts and technology don’t mix,” Tim grumbled. The tank sank away, and he went straight to his version of the Batcomputer. “That’s why the PDA is the preferred method of contact. Also, why I had to upgrade my coms before I went out.” Several more messages came through in the chat.

PurpleQueen: OMG!!!

PurpleQueen: Timmy! That’s a BOY!!!!

Undead: gross

BatCass: !!!! <3 <3 <3 !!!!

Rainbows: Tim’s date is Danny

               Dick looked up at Tim. “Tim, are you dating the Ghost King?” Dick asked. Tim flinched. “Oh my gods! Tim! What the fuck?”

               “It was one date!” Tim shot back.

               “Tim! You’re a ghost! He’s literally your King!”

               “He doesn’t know that. He doesn’t even know that the Tim he met is Tim Drake yet.” Tim pulled up a page of code and started typing furiously, probably breaking into Duke’s suit. Dick’s phone went off again. This one was a private message from Jason.

Undead: tell the dragon im headed over got a development to match his new bo

               “Oh gods,” Dick groaned. “I hate this family.” Tim glanced over his shoulder at him. “Also, I’m against you dating this guy. I don’t care if he’s the nicest guy in the world. It’s like dating your boss.”

               “No, it’s like dating your King. He’s not my boss. From what I can tell, he doesn’t even use his Kingly powers much. He lets the ghosts do what they want as long as they aren’t hurting people, and if he can stop them without commanding it, he does. He’s basically a ghost vigilante,” Tim explained. “And, like I said. He doesn’t know that I’m Drake.” 

               “Jason’s on his way. And, regardless of what he’s gonna say, we’re all going to talk about training your ghost powers. Also about power imbalances in relationships.” Dick checked the group again since more messages had come through.

DaddieBats: Congratulations, Tim. He looks very nice.

Undead: you text like youre ancient

PurpleQueen: Timmy!!!! Answer us!!! We need details!!!

BatCass: Yes! Cute!

Rainbows: They were on a coffee date

Demon: Of course. Drake couldn’t be creative enough to do something that wasn’t cliché.

Undead: you also text like youre ancient

AllKnowing: *image*

               Dick opened the image from Babs and found another video screenshot. This one was from outside the same coffee shop, probably pulled from a street camera of some kind. It showed Tim’s face very clearly flushed looking at the other boy and a crushed plastic coffee cup on the ground between them. There was still static on the image.

AllKnowing: Cliche but cute

PurpleQueen: You spilled his cofefee??!!???!!! Ajrahufgah

BatCass: ?? !! <3 <3 <3

               “You know our siblings are losing their minds over this, right?” Dick said because Tim hadn’t looked at his phone since the first message.

               “I figured. This is why I told Duke not to tell B,” Tim growled. He let out a huff of smoke. 

Rainbows: not even the best part

Rainbows: cause Tim cant be normal abt anything

Rainbows: date was attacked by a ghost

               Dick’s eyes widened. “You were attacked by a ghost?” He looked up at Tim.

               “I’m going to follow him on patrol, steal his grapples, and set fire to his bike,” Tim hissed.

               “Tim!”

               “Yes. There was a ghost attack. Yes, I think it was targeting me, not Danny.” Tim finally stopped typing and turned his chair to face Dick. “Before you ask, I don’t know why it was following me, and I haven’t seen it since.”

               “Great. But it did attack you? I mean, what happened? What, what did it look like?” Dick frowned. Tim was a dragon, and Dick had seen several different stages of shifting that Tim could manage. He had no idea what other ghosts would look like.

               “Uh, it looked like a green vulture with a fez,” Tim admitted. “I’d show you, ‘cause it followed me on my first couple patrols back, but ghosts don’t actually show up in videos. At least, not with most cameras. I’m working on adapting some of the tech in the PDA to work, but for the moment, no photos or videos.” Tim shrugged. “The bird followed me to the coffee shop. When me and Danny got in line, it made all the blenders go haywire, messed with the screens and the lights, and scared everybody in the shop. It was a mess, but nobody got hurt. Signal got there after the ghost left.”

               “Do you think that this ghost vulture knows that you’re Red Robin?” Dick asked. Because that was a question he had to ask now. Gods, his life was weird.

               “It’s a definite possibility.”

               “Tim,” Dick started. Suddenly, the screen of Tim’s computer fritzed out and Tim bolted to his feet. He shoved Dick away from the computer and glared around the room, eyes glowing bright blue. There was a cackling laugh.

               “Go on and shift!” Someone yelled. Tim let out a growl. Dick glanced around for something he could use as a weapon.

               “Show yourself,” Tim ordered as his eyes fixed on a spot near his Red Robin suit.

               “You first!” they called back. The lights in the opps center cracked and went out with varying sizes of explosions. “We’ll handle this bird to bird.” There was a flash of green, and Tim pulled Dick out of the way as it hit the table behind them, leaving scorch marks in its wake. Tim let out another growl, this one much louder, and he jumped in the direction he’d been looking. Before he landed, he was in his dragon form. But it was different this time. He was bigger than usual, nearly the size of a Great Dane, as he tackled something that Dick couldn’t see. After a moment, Tim got whatever he was fighting pinned, and a green vulture shimmered into view. Tim growled and bared his teeth. The vulture glared at him. Then it disappeared again, and Tim seemed to lose track of it. Tim spun around, but apparently couldn’t find it because he let out a frustrated huff of smoke and looked at Dick. Behind him, his opps center was a mess. The computer was smoking. The lights were mostly shattered.

               “Uh, you okay?” Dick asked hesitantly. Because how the fuck are you supposed to react to a ghost attacking your half-ghost brother? Dick was going to have to talk to Jazz again. Tim huffed but dipped his head in a nod. Then he closed his eyes and shifted back. Except it wasn’t fully back. It was about the same as the night Dick had found out. His horns were still there, as were his wings and several patches of scales, and his eyes were still glowing and reptilian. “Tim?”

               “I hate that stupid bird,” he growled.

               “What the fuck happened here?” Jason said as he peered into the room. 

                “Ghosts,” Tim huffed.

                “They’re attacking your Nest now?” Jason frowned.

                “I would say that vulture definitely knows that you’re Red Robin,” Dick decided. Tim glared at him. “Which makes my earlier points all the more important.”

                “I will bite you,” Tim said, baring his teeth.

                “Get out of the danger zone, idiots. We have things to discuss,” Jason said. “Like Timtam’s date. And the Ghost King’s sister.”

                Tim and Dick frowned at him. “Why do we need to talk about her?” Tim asked.

                “‘Cause she got mugged in the Alley last night. Let’s go.” Jason jerked his head to the rest of Tim’s nest and walked off. 

                “Are you stuck?” Dick asked tentatively.

                “If I say yes, are you going to say I told you so?” Tim glared at Dick. Dick stayed quiet and went to find where Jason had gone. Jason was sitting on the couch in the living room, with his feet propped up on Tim's coffee table. Dick took a seat in one of the armchairs. Tim followed a few minutes later, still partially shifted. Jason arched an eyebrow. “Don’t,” Tim said.

                “Your wings are out, Red,” Jason said with a smirk.

                “I’m working on it.”

                “You’re not doing a good job.” 

                “All right,” Dick sighed. “Tim, this is why you need to be working on learning how to use your new powers, not just trying to suppress them. You can’t just disappear every time you run into another ghost. And you can’t exactly leave here looking like a godzilla extra.”

                “I’m working on it,” Tim repeated.

                “No you aren’t. Doing the bare minimum is not working on it. That’s not going to make it any easier if that bird comes back. You need to actually train with these powers. Just like any other skill.” Dick crossed his arms. 

                “Dickhead’s right. I saw your trip up last night. You’re lucky I shot that guy when I did,” Jason said.

                “Don’t act like you did that on purpose. You were going to shoot him no matter what. The timing just happened to line up,” Tim said.

“Exactly the point!” Dick exclaimed.

“If I agree to let you two help me with the ghost powers, can we move on?” Tim grumbled. 

                “Only if you actually let us help,” Dick said. “Starting today. Because, clearly, there are a lot of things to learn. I mean, you were three times as big as you usually are when you shifted just now. And it doesn’t look like your partial shift thing is pulling you either direction like it did last time.”

                Jason frowned. “He can be bigger?”

                “Apparently,” Tim said. “I wasn’t actually thinking about being bigger. I was just trying to get rid of the stupid vulture that’s stalking me.”

                “I’m gonna need more than that,” Jason decided after a moment.

                “It’s a green vulture with a fez that followed Tim on patrol for a couple nights, attacked him on his date, and now destroyed his opps center,” Dick explained.

                “Got it. And you’re sure it was after you on your date? Not the Ghost King?” Jason asked.

                “Pretty sure. It followed me there, not him.”

                “And you’re dating him?”

                “It was one date!” Tim groaned. He sat down on the floor, crossing his legs and letting his head drop into his hands. He looked up again almost instantly with a grimace, and ran one hand through his hair slowly, hesitating when he felt his horns. He let his hands fall to his lap and sighed. “For the record, all I did was run into him by accident. He’s the one who gave me his phone number. He’s the one who asked me out.”

                “You still agreed to go,” Dick pointed out. Tim scowled. “But it was just the one date, right? You’re not planning on– Oh gods. Of course you are. When is the next one?”

                “I’m meeting him after his classes tomorrow,” Tim admitted. Jason snorted a laugh.

                “Tim,” Dick whined, slouching in his chair. “Why are you doing this to yourself? He’s literally a king!”

                “I know!” Tim snapped, fangs bared. He took a breath and reigned himself in some. “I know, okay. I know all the reasons why it’s a bad idea to even go near him, let alone try and date him. But, I don’t know. I like him. And he likes me. Not because I’m Tim Drake-Wayne. Just because he likes me.” Tim’s cheeks were red.

                “Gross,” Jason decided. “I mean, I’m going to vomit if you keep talking like that. But sure. Date our king.”

                Dick’s eyes widened. “Our?” he hissed. Tim frowned at Jason.

                Jason let out a heavy sigh. “I told you I stopped his sister from getting mugged last night. Apparently, since I’ve died before, I’m part of the whole ghost stuff. Something called a remnant.”

                “She told you this after you stopped a mugging?” Tim asked in disbelief.

                “Well, see, not exactly. Mugger was on his third strike and I was about to shoot out his knee caps,” Jason admitted. “But she did something. I don’t know what and she sure as hell doesn’t. All I know is that she told me not to shoot him, and green I didn’t even realize was there faded.” 

                “Green? Like, the Pit?” Dick clarified. “She stopped the Pit?”

                “Seemed like it. And it still hasn’t come back. I swear I haven’t gone this long without some of it coming out ever. And she had no clue what she’d done. All she could tell me is that she could see the ectoplasm around me and it dimmed after that. Was still dim when I went to find her to figure out what she’d done.”

                “You stalked her?” Dick sighed. “Jay, you can’t be stalking civilians as the Hood. It scares them.”

                “Ectoplasm?” Tim said, tilting his head. “Is that what it is? I mean, I figured it was the Pit.”

                Jason narrowed his eyes. “You sayin’ you can see it too?” Tim nodded. “And you didn’t think to mention that I had ectoplasm on me?”

                “I mean, I thought it was just the Pit. Damian has it too. And Cass and Steph. Bruce has this kind of mist that I think came from the time stream thing.”

                “Wait. No. Hold on!” Dick exclaimed. “Are you saying that everyone but me and Duke have ectoplasm on them? Even Steph?”

                “If that’s what it is,” Tim agreed. “That actually makes sense, now that I’m thinking about it. Duke said he could only see the green glow on your and Damian's eyes. And, well, all over me and Danny. But if it’s ectoplasm, that can easily be explained. Danny and I are half-ghost. And, if we can assume the Pit influence is ectoplasm, you and Damain have both been exposed to it.”

                Jason waved that off. “Sure. But you can see it, right? Like, you know what it looks like right now?” Tim nodded. “And?”

                “It’s really faded right now. Like, dimmer than I’ve seen it before. Usually it’s pretty bright and it gets brighter when you get mad. And it’s, uh, it’s like ropes kinda and they’re usually wrapping around your neck, but it’s kinda just resting on your shoulders right now.” Tim grimaced. Dick just stared at Tim looking worried. 

                “Huh,” Jason said. He leaned back on the couch. “Like ropes? And all four of us have them?”

                “Yeah. Cass and Steph only have a little bit and it usually sits around their waists. Damian’s is brighter than theirs, but not as bright as yours normally is. There are two ropes and they like, lace up his arms.” Tim frowned. “I’m really not sure I’m describing any of this right.”

                “It’s about how Jazz described it, so you’re fine.” Jason chewed his cheek absently. 

                “I am so sick of learning concerning things about my siblings,” Dick muttered. “Tell me there’s nothing else we have to worry about.”

                “I mean, Jazz knows that Hood is Drake’s brother, but that’s not a big deal.”

                “Jason,” Tim growled. “Seriously? If she knows anything about the Bats, she’ll be able to figure us out too.”

                “You think I could just ask her a bunch of questions about ghosts and the Pit dressed as the Red Hood without giving her a panic attack if I didn’t tell her how I knew who she was?” Jason snapped, glaring at Tim. Tim let out a huff of smoke. Dick looked at the ceiling, wondering if there was any possible way things could get worse.

                The vulture crashed into Vlad’s desk in his Gotham office, scattering his papers. Vlad’s eyes burned red and he let out a growl. “What on earth are you doing?!” he demanded.

                “He’s a dragon,” the vulture wheezed. Ectoplasm oozed from claw marks on its neck. “The bird’s a dragon.” Vlad didn’t get a chance to get more answers before the before faded into green dust and likely returned to the Ghost Zone. He’d have to wait until it reformed before he could figure out what it meant. But he’d already found out that Red Robin was Daniel’s newest attraction. Really, all that was left to do was to create a worthy trap for the upcoming gala. And ensure that one Timothy Drake-Wayne had no choice but to attend.