Wow, two chapters in one day. And they are long ones too!
I hope you enjoy, and let me know what you think!
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Losing control wasn't common for the Bats. Dick, having been taught since he was nine how to master patience and stealth, found losing control easy to avoid. He knew how to keep calm and passive in the face of the worst humanity had to offer, but he wasn't sure how much longer he could keep a straight face. It's been nearly a month since Danny, his little brother, had been taken by the GIW. They had searched every potential place for him, but haven't found anything. His worry only got worse after he had hacked the computers to see the results of the DNA test. Bruce hadn't been happy, but luckily he had understood Dick's desire to know. He had just gotten his baby brother back, and now he lost him again? How fucked up is the world where fate decided to give you back one of the most important things in your life only to laugh in your face and take it back?
Even Batman was struggling.
Dick had noticed the endless all-nighters and the world-weary look on his guardian's face. Alfred had attempted several times to get Bruce to rest, only to fail time and time again, and in one memorable occasion, Bruce had lashed out at the butler only to apologize immediately after. Alfred understood, so did Dick. Bruce was taking this just as hard as Dick was. All of the Bats had grown attached to the tiny Halfa, despite the short time of knowing him (it was nearly impossible to not fall in love with the kid immediately after meeting him.) Bruce and Dick wanted to adopt him, but couldn't while the GIW was still at large.
They didn't know what to do.
Both of them now sat in the Batcave, seeing as they couldn't trust themselves to not harm (mentally, emotionally, or physically) the Leaguers and Young Justice Team. They had been hitting dead end after dead end and hadn't left the computer in days. Dick was hovering over Bruce as he sat in the chair, running possible facility sites. For once they were out of costume, both only in loungewear, solely focused on the computer screen as it slowly loaded data. Both (uncharacteristically) were oblivious to their surroundings.
It's understandable they didn't notice the two ghosts and the halfa appear. They were behind them, after all. They waited for the two to notice on their own. Skulker cleared his throat.
"Hello?" They didn't look up.
Danny sighed, annoyed. (He's had a long ass month and had no patience for this.) The boy stepped to the Bats and hovered over Bruce's other shoulder, peering at the computer. He rested an elbow on his guardian's shoulder and his chin on his palm (all without recognition.) He sat there for a minute before shattering the silence.
"Ce cauti?" (What are you looking for?) Both Bats jumped, and Dick even let out a (manly, definitely manly) squeak. Danny jumped too but stayed in the same spot over Bruce's shoulder. Both of the humans turned to the source of the noise, seeing Danny. They blinked a few times as if clearing their vision before Danny was abruptly pulled from the air over to Bruce and Dick, both gripping him tightly. Danny was in Bruce's lap and Dick was hanging off to the side. They both hugged him before looking over him frantically.
He had a few bruises and scratches, he had a practically healed burn on his face and was slightly pale, but overall was fine. The two didn't seem to be letting go anytime soon and Danny didn't bother trying to get away. Instead, he readjusted so he was actually sitting rather than just collapsed awkwardly. He shifted until his back was against the Dark Knight's chest and he was facing the computer, Bruce allowed the readjustment, moving his arm across Danny's abdomen to secure him. The boy tilted his head at the screen, still curious as to what they were looking for.
"GIW facilities. We were looking for GIW facilities." Danny nodded, understanding their intentions, but the repeated name was making him uncomfortable. He shifted his gaze, eyes skimming over the other monitors before his eyes caught his name and he focused on that. It wasn't searching for anything, but rather looked like it was the result of something. After a second he realized it was a DNA test. He was about to ask but a cough drew their attention back to the ghosts. Danny had forgotten about them.
Bruce swiveled his chair around quickly, Danny yelped, unprepared for the rapid movement. Bruce's grip on him tightened as he tensed, ready to defend. Dick, who was running a hand through the boy's hair trying to pick out leaves and dirt, had stilled and tensed like Bruce.
"Hello. I am Walker and this is Skulker" The warden gestured to Skulker. "We are ghosts. We have been watching the Halfa for a while now because he is the key to our freedom in the ghost zone."
Danny could feel Bruce relax slightly and his near-bruising grip slackened marginally. Dick's hand, still buried in his black hair, had also gone lax, however, both Bats were still on edge. Danny wondered why they let down their guard, even if it was only a little.
He had a feeling that they were sleep deprived. Danny felt amused but also exasperated. (For being highly trained individuals, they could be human disasters.)
Skulker and Walker had gone on to explain the political crisis that was going on in the Ghost Zone and how Danny was' involved. They also explained what they knew about the GIW. (Bruce had covered his ears. He could still hear with his enhanced senses, but it was a nice sentiment, nonetheless.) They talked about the plan and who was involved. They answered questions patiently about the revolution or ghosts in general. They explained what was being done and had informed the two about the human children with them, reassuring the Bats that neither were permitted anywhere near battles. Sam and Tucker could come over to the mansion every once and awhile, as long as it was arranged. The three adults and one teen had proceeded.
"We don't plan on taking the boy from you since you are capable of caring for him and training him, but we will keep watch over him and only get involved if necessary. However, he needs to be informed and we will be more active in his life when he gets older, so he can choose whether or not to help us. We are still unsure about how Pariah will proceed, but we will keep you updated, and unfortunately, we can't help with the GIW. Now if you do not have any further questions, we need to go back to the base. If you need us, use this. Please only if it's an emergency or if something has happened or changed." Walker handed Bruce a small communication device. The Batman nodded and the two ghosts disappeared.
Bruce had contacted the team, telling them that they needed to meet tomorrow. He then turned his attention back to the kid in his lap, who was looking at one of the many supercomputers in front of them. He glanced over to Dick, who was looking at the same monitor. Following their gazes, his eyes landed on the DNA results. He hadn't gotten the chance to talk to Dick and Danny about them and was planning on it when they had found Danny. Unfortunately, that plan had been ruined when Dick hacked his system and found out, but regardless it still warranted a sit down and a proper conversation.
"They were positive." Dick nodded absently, his eyes now trained on the boy who was still staring at the screen with wide, curious eyes.
"Positive?" The young boy asked, moving his focus to Bruce, struggling to look at the man without turning his whole body.
"Danny, do you know that you were adopted?"
Bones broken and twisted in inhuman ways...screaming and rushing..."MOMMY! DADDY!"
Danny nodded, shaking his thoughts away from the eery images and voices echoing through his head.
"Do you remember your birth parents?"
A small trail of blood dripped down his mother's pale face and the salt and pepper hair of his father greased with the crimson liquid.
"Îmi amintesc cum au murit." (I remember how they died.) Danny deadpanned, obviously trying to detach himself from the memory of his parents. Dick flinched and Bruce nodded sympathetically.
"Do you remember your brother?"
Brother? What brother? A sharp panic flashed through his system like it always does when he doesn't remember something.
Danny has an eidetic memory. To have an eidetic memory is to have the ability to vividly recall images from memory after only a few instances of exposure, with high precision for a brief time after exposure, without using a mnemonic device.
Although the terms eidetic memory and photographic memory are popularly used interchangeably, they are also distinguished, with eidetic memory referring to the ability to view memories like photographs for a few minutes, and photographic memory referring to the ability to recall pages of text or numbers, or similar, in great detail.
The word eidetic comes from the Greek word εἶδος (pronounced êːdos, eidos, meaning the distinctive expression of the cognitive or intellectual character of a culture or social group).
Most commonly, children--
'You're doing the thing again.'
Ah, right. Point is, Danny became dependent on his memory, using it as a weird source of comfort. Whenever he couldn't remember something, it scared him.
So finding out about a gap in his memory large enough to forget having a brother terrified Danny.
He didn't answer, instead staring blankly at Bruce searching his expansive memory for a hint of a biological sibling.
A pair of hands were holding him from running to the corpses of his family...the hands restricting him from rushing forward in hysterics were gone leaving his skin cold at the absence of external heat.
But that could have been anyone. He shook his head, eyes still distant.
"You had an older brother. He was seven when your parents died in Haly's circus. They were sabotaged and had fallen in one of their acts, dying on impact. They had been killed by a man named Zucco, who was apprehended by Batman after I adopted Dick. You and your brother had been too young to participate in the circus, so you watched from the sides as your parents did their acts. You both had been front and center when they had fallen, and your brother held you back from running to your parents. But he had been torn away by the panicked crowd and you two were separated. He was found by CPS a day before you and had been adopted quickly. He had been in and out of the system on the same day because I had pulled some strings and called in several favors." Danny stayed silent and let the man finish his story, "we had searched for you, and it turned out you had been found sitting beside your family the next morning when the police had arrived at the scene and you were taken to the station, then transferred to an orphanage."
"Am ținut mâna mamei mele toată noaptea. Mirosea ca sângele și mâna ei se înghesuise în timp ce timpul trecea. Nici măcar nu m-am uitat la chipurile lor. Doar stătea acolo." (I had been holding my mother's hand all through the night. It smelled like blood and her hand grew icy cold as time went on. I never even looked at their faces. Just sat there.) He recalled it like it was a fact to be shared, not like it was a sad memory. He stared straight ahead, not looking at anything. Bruce glanced at Dick who was tense. He gave the teen an apprehensive, but a sympathetic look.
"When you had first turned human, Dick and I had noticed the obvious similarities and decided to run a DNA test to see if it was a match. It was."
Did you know that children are pretty much always 50% related to the mother and 50% to the father? But this is where the exact percentages end. Other kinds of relatives share on average around the same amount of DNA. So siblings share around 50%, closer to 25% of their DNA, half-siblings less 25% and so on. Which means for Danny, since half of his DNA is replaced with ectoplasm, he shared 25% of DNA from his father and 25% from his mother, which means any siblings only share approximately 12.5%--
"Danny?" His attention snapped to Dick, his brother, with wide eyes. Dick looked almost nervous, and Danny couldn't comprehend a logical reason as to why. Danny phased out from Bruce's hold and, quite literally, jumped at Dick. Out of instinct, the older boy caught the Halfa and Danny held onto him. Dick was holding him gently, carefully as if he were fragile. Danny buried his head in Dick's chest, using his powers slightly to hover above the ground so his head is tucked under the older's chin. After a few more moments of holding him like glass, Dick tightened his grip and rested his chin on top of Danny's head. Neither said anything, But Dick looked over to Bruce, seeing his soft smile, he smiled back.
Danny was still unsettled. As happy as he was about finding his brother, not being able to recall this fact left him uneasy. He'd get over it eventually, this isn't the first time he discovered a gap in his memory due to a trauma, but he still was shaken. He vainly tried to clear his mind, only managing to slow down his thoughts slightly, and focused on his brother.
He smelled like mountains and snow. It was a sharp contrast to lilies and vanilla. But that's ok.
He's not picky.
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I hope you enjoyed, and expect less plot and more Batfamily and Young Justice stuff for a while.