Chapter Text
Darkness.
It was all he could see.
He couldn't remember how long he had been trapped in this prison.
Time had no meaning to him anymore.
It felt like forever.
Forever he had been sitting in limbo.
There was no up, nor down.
There was no light, nor dark.
There was no time, nor space.
There was only him and his slow, muddled thoughts.
Suddenly, his solitude was interrupted when the walls of his prison warped, light and air assaulting his senses. He could barely take the too bright light. His lungs screamed in protest as they were filled with air for the first time in who knows how long. He could feel the cold floor underneath his white gloves as he gasped, convulsing.
He couldn't take it.
His battered black suit faded to a pair of tattered blue jeans and a white and red t-shirt under the white rings of energy covering him. His dead green eyes giving way to a dull blue, followed by the white bangs in his face darkening to a pitch black. The young halfa managed to gasp again before blackness filled his vision, and his mind sank into sweet oblivion.
Above the prone teenager, Flash, along with the other senior members of the Justice League, stared at what the speedster had done. When the superhero felt The Batglare™, he glanced up at the Dark Knight.
"Oops?"
His shrug and apology seemed to stir the other shell-shocked Leaguers.
"What was that?" Superman asked. No one could answer.
Flash handed back the white and green thermos to the Bat. "I guess that's what it does."
Batman took the device, inspecting it as Wonder Woman and Martian Manhunter checked on the teenager. With a nod from Batman, the two took the boy to the infirmary, Manhunter giving a promise to keep them updated on the boy's condition as they left.
With the boy gone, the attention in the room shifted to the cylindrical device in Batman's hands. Green Arrow raised an eyebrow. "So, what does it do, exactly? Spit out teenagers? It's not going to start raining boys and girls, is it?" The archer asked, eyeing the thing warily.
Superman gasped as only a superhero in a cape can. "The energy is gone!"
His outburst earned him a few stares.
"I mean," he elaborated, "the high concentration of energy is gone. There may be a little residue, or that could just be the device's energy, but the massive energy that Batman was talking about is gone." His eyes met the Bat's. "It must have been the boy."
After a millisecond of hesitation, Batman turned on his heel, his cape swishing behind him, to head to the Medbay, where he knew the strange child had been taken.
He glanced down at the device in his hands. If he didn't know better, he might think it was a fancy, futuristic thermos.
'There's no way it's a thermos.'
The device, labeled Unknown P, was found in the Watchtower itself, after Savage and his allies had been kicked out, and the League had the time to perform damage control. It was heavily locked up, several security measures put in place so that no one could get to it, complete with electric currents and kryptonite to deter the more gifted Leaguers.
Guess they weren't expecting Batman.
He had cracked the protection after several days of hard work, and he finally got to see what was hidden in the most protected safe on the plane- . . . well, it was in orbit, but you get the idea. To his surprise, it appeared to just be a high-tech food container.
But, of course, Batman wouldn't be Batman if he didn't run tests before making decisions. His stomach dropped a bit, however, when he discovered that the device, whatever it was, was leaking powerful energy. Upon closer inspection, it seemed that the device was a container of some kind, and the energy it contained was escaping, leaking through minuscule cracks in the walls of the device.
The real kicker came when the energy matched that 0.01% of unknown that he didn't tell anyone was in the chips Savage used. Evidently, Savage had used a tiny portion of that energy to power his mind control chips.
Batman left that part out of debriefing.
When test after test came back with more questions than answers, Batman had finally been forced to come clean to the senior members of the League. He explained the anomaly to the best of his ability, and asked for help.
Yes, the Batman asked for help.
Flash was nearly crying in joy, and Batman repressed a groan when he realized that Flash was going to lord it over him that he managed to figure out how to open the darn thing.
" . . . Stupid speedster . . . " he grumbled as he walked. He made it to Medbay exactly three seconds before the speedster in question zipped up next to him, Superman following close behind.
"So, whatdoyouthinkthiskidis? Hecan'tbehuman. Youthinkingmetahumanoralien? Mybetisalien. Thattechwastooweird. Althoughthewierdtechcouldbewhatmadehimameta. Iguesshecouldbeeither."
His speech took about two seconds total. Batman took a moment to translate the fast speech into English before opening the door with a solemn, "Let's find out.”
Beep.
'What was that?'
The halfa took stock of his surroundings. He couldn't feel restraints on his wrists, and he didn't hear the telltale hum of a ghost shield nearby. That was promising.
Beep.
'What is that awful noise?'
"His heart rate is way too slow. Whatever that thing did to him, he's barely alive. His breathing is deep enough, but too slow to survive on for long. Help me put in a breathing tube."
Danny's eyes snapped open at that. No way was anyone sticking a tube down his throat, thank you. He quickly had to shut his eyes against the bright lights of the room, his eyes not being used to light after his time in the dark.
" . . . Nnhg . . . " he groaned, hoping against hope that that would be enough to deter them. He hadn't used his voice since that incident, and even that little amount of strain on his vocal cords was painful.
'No voice. Great.'
Beep .
"He's waking up!"
Danny managed to peel his eyes open to see the face that went with the disembodied voice he was hearing, squinting against the light as he did so.
"Can you hear me, kid?" The red blur asked. When Danny tried to clear his vision by blinking, nothing happened.
'No sight. Fantastic.'
He tried nodding in response to the question, but the small act made stars dance in his eyes, and pain erupt in his skull. He couldn't have stopped the whimper escaping his lips if he tried.
He knows because he tried.
"He can hear and understand us, but I do not believe he can see us properly." A slower, deeper voice said.
Danny tried opening his eyes again, and this time, a greenish blob had joined the red one. He guessed the green one was the deeper voice. He tried moving, hoping that it wouldn't be as problematic as his other attempts at functioning, but his muscles screamed in protest. Another pained whimper escaped his lips as his eyes shut against the pain.
The red and green blur looked at each other before moving to get the breathing tube and pain medication. The poor boy clearly needed it.
When the higher, faster voice started explaining to the boy what they were going to do with the breathing tube, the mysterious child clamped his mouth shut, giving an imperceptible shake of his head. Luckily for him, Batman was still in the room. Imperceptible was a moot point where the Bat was concerned.
"Don't."
The red and green people looked to the black blob, and Danny felt equal parts relieved and terrified. Whoever the black blob was, he seemed to understand what Danny needed, but he still wasn't sure what the red and green blobs were going to do to him.
"Why should they not aid his breathing?" A distinctly female voice asked. Danny cringed at the volume. Batman noticed.
"Keep it down, Diana. I think the boy's normal breathing is this slow, same with his heart rate. Am I right?"
The boy once again managed a nod, albeit a painful, grimacing one.
"Stop nodding if it hurts. Blink twice for no and three times for yes." The black blob ordered, taking a step closer. The boy blinked thrice.
"Why three times for yes? Why not one?" The red blur asked.
"Because he would try not to blink so he didn't send the wrong message, and he would end up doing even more damage to his eyes." Came the cold reply. Danny cracked a small smile at the quiet, "oh" that followed the retort.
Batman paused, considering. "Would you like us to let you heal on your own?"
Three blinks.
"Would you like us to empty the room, or leave someone with you?"
Two blinks followed by three.
"I'll stay with you then. Maybe you could answer some of my questions about this thing." Batman stated, holding up the round device he still had in his hands.
Danny's eyes went wide. He couldn't see the green and white blur with anything resembling clarity, but he would recognize it anywhere.
The Fenton Thermos.
Batman and Manhunter both noted his distress at the object, so the black vigilante tucked it back in his cape, while the Martian stepped between the two to shield Danny's view. He appreciated the gesture, but they interpreted his tensing incorrectly. With difficulty, he managed to push his hand out, palm up, hoping they would hand it over. Batman reluctantly handed over the device, eyebrow clearly raised through the cowl.
Under the watchful eye of the founding members of the Justice League, he took the device, dragging it up to eye level, inspecting it with his hands to make up for his lack of eyesight. With a hoarse grunt of effort, the halfa pressed the release, a switch that converted the soup container into a belt. Everyone in the room was tensed, waiting and watching.
The boy seemed better able to move at this point, and he managed to wrap the belt around himself. The task was made easier when the colorful female blur helped him up. Once the belt clicked around him, it hummed, signaling that it was doing something. The superheroes gathered around got in battle positions, remembering that this boy was somehow connected to Savage. They felt a little ridiculous when the boy merely sighed, relieved and laid back down. The tense atmosphere in the room slowly dissipated.
"What's it doing?" The red one asked.
Danny sat up with the help of the woman again. He could see now that she had long black hair and a very skimpy outfit. He turned to the machine that had kept up a slow, steady beep during his short stay in this room, gesturing to it as the heart monitor showed his heart beat strengthening and increasing in pace ever so slightly.
"It's helping you heal?" Red asked. Danny blinked three times. "Why can't you speak? Are you mute?" Danny blinked twice. "Did you take a vow of silence?" Danny blinked twice. "Is it that you just don't want to talk to us?" Danny gave two more irritated blinks.
This whole guessing game was getting old.
Batman handed Danny a pad of paper and a pen.
There was an incident, and I won't be able to speak again until I heal.
Red puzzled over the paper for a minute before turning to the boy. "How do you know it will heal? Has this incident happened before?"
Danny was healing much faster now that he had the thermos back, but when his head snapped up in alarm at the implications of it happening before, his neck cried in protest at the movement. He grimaced, rubbing the back of his neck before shrugging in a "no clue, bro" manner. He grabbed the pen and paper again.
Call it a hunch.
He could see well enough now to tell that Red had raised an eyebrow. "A hunch? You're as bad as Bats!"
Danny was so confused, and apparently it showed.
"He's talking about Batman." A new voice said. This one was deeper than Red, but not as deep as Green. He needed to get their names, he couldn't just call them colors.
But the new voice was definitely going to be blue.
'Okay, I've got Red, Black, Green, Rainbow Woman, and now Blue. What's with the outfits? Were they on their way to an anime convention?'
On the paper, he wrote:
Who's Batman?
Dead silence reigned.
The atmosphere in the room was supercharged. It started getting a little bit uncomfortable. When Danny thought that they maybe weren't going to answer, the mood in the room shifted, and someone finally spoke.
"Don't worry about that." That voice was Black, but there was something odd in the sound of his voice, like he was forcing out words he didn't want to say. "First priority is you. You need to rest and recover."
Danny nodded. So far, the people that had rescued him were nothing like the GiW that captured him. He could bide his time, waiting to escape. It would be easiest to escape with Red, he was pretty sure, but Green gave him the willies, and something about Blue was off. Black would be impossible to dupe, he knew that already.
Can Red stay with me?
He showed the paper to Black, correctly guessing that he was the one in charge.
"Red? I suppose." He turned toward 'Red'. "Red, will you stay with him?"
Some snickers were heard, but Black ignored them. Danny couldn't help it. He didn't know their names.
'But they probably know mine.'
If he was being honest with himself, he had hoped that calling one of them a color would prompt them to introduce themselves.
Evidently not.
"Yeah, I'll stay with him. Just let Kid know where I am, I promised to help him train later."
Black nodded, and with a rustle and swish of his cape, ('The dude has a cape????') he was gone. The rest filed out of the room, and awkward silence reigned.
They sat there, occasionally sneaking glances at each other, trying not to stare, but having nothing to do.
After about two minutes of this, Danny heard something vibrating. He glanced over at Red and had to do a double take. The guy was tapping his foot at unearthly speeds. It was his foot that was vibrating.
Danny's jaw dropped, and Red seemed to realize his mistake.
"Oh, sorry. Bats said not to use speed yet. Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you." His foot stilled, and he took a step back.
Danny closed his mouth, still staring at Red. There it was again. Was Bats a name? Was that Batman? Who was Batman? And when had they spoken? Were they speaking with their minds? Just who was this Batman???
He grabbed the paper that had that question on it and shoved it in Red's face. He paused, seeming to think it over, before sighing, walking to the other side of the room to grab a chair, and sat down next to Danny's bed.
"Do you know anything about the Justice League?"
Danny shook his head.
Red sighed. "Okay, so Batman. . ."
Flash had explained everything, or at least, everything that the public knew, per the Bats' instructions. After mulling it over, Danny admitted that he had heard of some of the members of the League, but only some, like Squirrel Girl, Mister Miracle, Ice, and Lightray. He said that they were his friend's favorite superheroes growing up, but they were only in comics. This only confused Flash more, though, because none of them were still with the League, if they ever were, and none of them had comics about themselves.
At least, he was pretty sure they didn't.
So now Flash had to tell Batman about the kid, or Danny, without Bats chewing his head off.
"I'm just telling you what he told me!"
It wasn't working.
"How can he know about Mister Miracle, but not Doctor Light? How does he know of Ice, but not Fire? How does he know who Lightray is, without having heard about Orion? And who even is Squirrel Girl?!?!"
After Batman finished his tirade, Flash spoke up again. "He said those were the superheroes in his friend's comics as a kid."
"What about now? He's still a kid." Batman was still irritated and on edge. Something about this kid wasn't right.
"Apparently, he now prefers an mmorpg called 'Doom'. He says it's very popular, but he still keeps the comics for reference. Apparently, our little Danny was a struggling metahuman superhero back in his hometown. Guess he's been under the radar. Did you know his name was Danny?"
"Doom?" Batman asked. He chose to ignore the superhero comment, storing it for later deliberation because this really wasn't right. Dick had played every rpg game ever made for strategy training. He had never heard of 'Doom', and Batman himself had personally searched for every game.
Without another word, Batman strode through the halls, leaving Flash behind, intent on answers. When he reached Medbay, he barged in, typical intimidation tactics being his fallback.
He needn't have bothered. The room was empty.
"Computer, locate all unidentified persons aboard." He tried to remain calm, and he'd fool a lot of people, but not all.
"What's going on?"
Of course, the Boy Scout would get involved. Maybe give the kid a lollipop for evading the gosh darn Batman.
"Unidentified persons in atrium."
Clark raised an eyebrow at Bruce, but he was already gone. The Kryptonian just sighed, heading toward the atrium himself.
He was so far from home it was laughable.
So, he cried.
He could move around just fine now, and his ghost half's sight was just fine, but to his human half, the world was still blurry. He had his Fenton ecto-filter belt to thank for that. It uses the same tech as the containment field of the thermos, but in reverse. Instead of sucking in ectoplasm, it filters it through, cleaning it, and sending it to the wearer to absorb. It reminded him of home.
He wanted to cry.
He wasn't in the mood to make noise, and it hurt to anyway, so he cried silently.
He knew now what had happened. He had to have ended up in another universe. The confusion rolling off everyone in the room except Blue, er, Superman, had already set his mind spinning, but his "talk" with Flash had cemented it in his mind.
'I don’t think we’re in Amity Park anymore, Cujo.'
He had no idea how, but somehow, he had managed to make it to another dimension, or universe, or something. He wasn't sure what the proper terminology was, but he didn't care.
Right now, he just wanted to cry alone, looking at the stars.
When Batman got to the atrium, he scanned the room for the boy, but came up empty handed. He wasn't there. Batman turned to his buddy in blue. "Do you see him?"
Clark shook his head. "I've x-rayed the whole tower and found nothing."
Batman's eyes widened.
"That's not possib- . . . Try infrared. He may be invisible."
Superman complied, but still came up empty handed. "It's no good, Bru-, er, Batman. I can't see him anywhere." He paused, staring behind a potted plant near the window of the atrium. "Hey, Bats, that plant is too cold."
Batman could not believe this guy, sometimes. Total farming mama's boy, to care about the temperature of a potted-. . . Wait. It couldn't be. Could it?
"You're thinking what I am, aren't you?" He asked, but the Boy Scout didn't answer. Instead, he turned to look at Bats, an unreadable expression on his face, and that's saying something because this is Batman we're talking about.
"He's crying."
Batman said nothing. What can you say to that? "Aw, poor kid?" "Tough luck, buddy?" "What is this crying of which you speak?" Yeah, he was going with 'none of the above'.
"I'll handle it." He said, voice clipped and leaving no room for argument. Superman nodded, aware that Batman was way better with kids than he, and he took off, a metaphorical cloud of dust floating where he had been standing .034 seconds ago. With a long-suffering sigh, Batman strode over to the potted plant that was thankfully void of any other Leaguers.
'How the Ghost Zone am I supposed to get home?!'
Danny was nearing the point of hyperventilating, and someone would hear him, and that would be bad, because he wanted to be alone, when Batman strode up.
"Missing home?" Was his only warning before the caped crusader was crouching down next to him.
To say he jumped would be an understatement. A wet, garbled noise escaped his throat in shock, and he startled into visibility. He had hoped that people would leave him alone if he was invisible, but clearly this was flawed logic where Bla-, er, Batman was involved.
Once he calmed down and wiped away the tears, he saw Batman sitting there, nonchalantly watching the stars in an awkward crouch behind a potted plant, talking to a half ghost. He figured it should have been funny. Batman turned towards him, seeking an answer now that Danny was calm(er), and Danny nodded. The Dark Knight seemed to ponder his answer before turning back to the view.
"I'm not sure how much you've figured out about how you got here. . .." He peeked at the teen out of the corner of his eye. The boy shrugged, wiggling his fingers in a "so-so" motion. He can work with this. "But we're pretty sure you're not from around here." He finished, looking for a reaction without tipping the kid off.
Danny seemed to deflate, shaking his head.
"Do you know where you're from? Or where you are?" Batman pressed.
Danny nodded, paused, then shrugged.
Batman noted that he shrugged, rather than shook his head. He had some idea as to where he was, but he wanted confirmation.
'Smart kid.'
"I'm not sure how you managed to get here, but I think you might be from a whole different world." He ventured. Danny nodded again.
There was a moment of silence before Danny pulled out the pad of paper and pen from before.
I'm from another dimension or something.
Batman nodded, confirming Danny's fears. Furiously wiping away new tears, he started scribbling again.
Do you know how I can get home?
His eyes were pleading, and Batman didn't have the heart to tell the kid that he had no idea. It was obvious that the kid wasn't evil, but he made Batman nervous. The vigilante knew very little about the kid, but he was already trusting him and feeling all fatherly.
'Curse you, father complex!'
"I know a few people. I'll see what I can dig up."
He watched as a little hopeful light returned to the kid's green eyes.
'Wait, green?'
It took a lot of effort, but he managed not to let it show when he finally noticed that the kid next to him once again had snow white hair and glowing green eyes like he had when he first escaped the container.
He was starting to piece together the story. Since Danny had no memory of it, most likely he jumped dimensions while inside the thermos prison. Savage then got his hands on it and used the kid's energy to aid the mind control chips. He had been used, much like Speedy, or rather, Red Arrow, had been. After all, Flash had said the kid was a metahuman superhero in his own world.
"In the meantime, I have a place where you can stay." Danny nodded his assent. Not like he really had a choice.
Decision made, Batman stood, motioning for Danny to follow. Batman led the way through hallway after hallway until Danny was thoroughly lost, finally coming to stop in a big room with a giant window, and weird round things in the wall. Danny swallowed nervously. They looked like inactive ghost portals. Batman walked purposefully towards one, but didn't make it there before Red entered the scene.
Now, Danny had already realized why they called him the Flash. The super speed was obvious when the guy was agitated or excited. However, Danny was not expecting the whoosh and wind that accompanied the speedster zooming by, so he felt perfectly justified with his instinctual ghost shield that stopped the superhero in his tracks.
THUNK! "AH!!"
For a guy with super speed, he was a little slow.
"What just happened?!" Danny dropped the shield like it burned him. "What was that?!" Silence. "BATS!"
Bruce, who was becoming more and more impressed with Danny and his abilities, merely raised an eyebrow at the boy, who promptly panicked. He really did not want possibly the only person who could get him home to be mad at him. Before he could grovel at his feet, another superhero interrupted.
"I'm impressed."
Danny stared up at the new guy, glowing green, five feet off the floor.
"Not many people can land Red on his butt without lifting a finger. Not bad." He landed, the glow fading, turning to Batman, who had been watching Danny's reaction with amusement. "This is the kid from the device, right? What’s your name, kid?"
Danny shrank into himself, not sure how to handle the situation, especially without talking. His voice was still MIA.
"This is Danny. He's from another dimension. He'll be staying at Mount Justice until we can find a way to get him home."
Green Lantern raised an eyebrow. "You're not going to pick up another one, are you? I know you've already got another bird in the nest."
Danny was beyond confused, and now Batman looked mad.
Er, madder than he usually looks.
"Why can't Dick understand the meaning of covert?" Danny heard Batman mumble, thanks to his advanced hearing as a ghost. He chose not to comment.
"He has a home somewhere. Until we can get him back, he'll be staying." Danny belatedly realized they were talking about him. Before he could try asking, however, Batman turned to the computer on the wall near the big, round things, punching buttons like they had kicked his puppy.
'Maybe they had. This is a pretty weird universe.'
With the coordinates set, Batman stepped into the Zeta tube, motioning for Danny to follow.
He didn't.
Excuse him for being mildly traumatized by the thing that half killed him.
"What's the matter, half-pint? Follow the big, bad bat." Flash taunted, still sore over the ghost shield incident. Batman didn't miss when Danny flinched when Flash said "half". He filed it away for later examination.
With obvious reluctance, Danny stepped up to the platform with Batman. A few disembodied computer voices and suddenly the whole world turned white.