Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

For the first fourteen years of his life Danny was different from everyone else. Every person on earth had a soulmate whose pain they are cursed or blessed, depending on your outlook, to share. When one person is injured, they both feel the pain. Only serious injuries like deep scars manifest physically on the uninjured soulmate.

Danny never saw any evidence of a serious injury bloom across his skin from his soulmate. He never felt the sharp snap of a childhood broken bone reverberate through his own perfectly intact limb. In fact, Danny never saw or felt any evidence that he had a soulmate at all.

For a while everyone just assumed that Danny’s soulmate was younger than him, that they would be born at any moment but as the years went by and his pale limbs stayed untouched by any marks besides his own, everyone accepted the truth; Danny Fenton simply didn't have a soulmate. It was fine, Danny was FINE. Sure, Middle school was tough but then he became Phantom and everything changed. 

Becoming a superhero is both the worst and best thing that can happen to a teenager. On one hand you get the cool costume, the adoring fans and the most rewarding job in the entire world. On the other you also get chafing, rabid critics and evil arch nemesis’. Honestly, Danny had seen it all- or at least he thought he had. 

“Look, it's right there in front of your face!”

“Oh my god not this again, Wes.” Star groaned.

Danny would have groaned as well if he hadn’t been upside down and invisible, slowly crawling across the classroom ceiling in pursuit of a small ghost bug that was in turn, chasing the flecks of light on the ceiling that reflected off Paulina’s bejeweled phone case.

“Phantom. Fenton.” Wes stressed, ignoring the barrage of balled up paper scraps and small bits of trash that bounced off his neck and shoulders. “I mean come on people!”

“Fenturd isn’t cool enough to be Phantom.” Dash retorted in an annoyed voice.

“Also, Phantom is dead.” Paulina tacked on, barely bothering to take her eyes off the page of her romance manga for enough time to roll them at Wes.

Danny wasn’t surprised, Wes had confronted him a few times about his theory that he was Phantom and sworn to “expose his secrets.” Unfortunately for Wes (but fortunately for Danny,) Wes was well known for his outlandish conspiracy theories and being among the ranks of such ludicrous theories as “Richard Grayson is The Red Hood,” “Golden doodles are secretly people in suits,” and “Lex Luthor has a love child with Superman,” helped his secret identity more than it did harm it.

“They have the same first name!” Wes shouted. “Phantom uses the Fenton’s tech, they have the same injuries,” Wes listed. “Fenton always disappears when ghosts show up, they even both get that dumb look when they’re concentrating-“

“Sounds like someone is paying a lot of attention to Fenton.” Star teased.

“Do you have something to tell us?” Dash asked.

Danny tried to ignore the teens underneath him, the last thing he wanted was to overhear some sort of love confession from Wes. The butterfly ghost (ghosterfly?) was just a foot in front of him now and it only took him a second to carefully scoop it into his thermos.

“It’s not like that!” Wes insisted, “I told you Fenton is-“

“Is not Phantom!” Dash interrupted. “Give it up Wes! Phantom uses the Fenton’s tech because they’re the only ghost hunters in town and Fenturd disappears because he’s running from the ghosts.”

“What about the injuries?” Wes asked.

“What injuries?”

“Phantom’s injuries!”

Danny paused to listen. He thought he had heard all of Wes’s evidence about him, but this one was new to him.

“Look,” Wes pulled a thick three ring binder out of his backpack, slamming it on the desk in front of him and ignoring the snickers of his peers. “I’ve been keeping a log of all of Phantom’s most serious fights and coinciding injuries.”

“That doesn’t prove anything.”

“And” Wes continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted, “all of Danny’s suspicious injuries and illnesses. Look, they're all right after one another. Fenton is Phantom.”

“No, that can’t…” Dash began, trailing off after leafing through a page.

“What about two weeks ago when that blue guy punched Phantom through the wall at the movie theater?” Star asked suddenly.

“Yeah. Oh, wait.” Dash frowned down at the binder. “It says Danny was out sick the day after, said he had food poisoning. I remember that.”

“Oh. My. God.” Paulina snapped her manga shut and turned to the group. She had a gleam in her eye that could only be described as victorious “They’re soulmates!”

“What? No!” Wes argued “How would that even work if Phantom is dead? They’re the same person! Haven’t you been listenin-“

Dash put his palm over Wes’s mouth, muffling the rest of his sentence.

“No, Let Paulie talk.”

“Impossible soulmates.” Paulina stated as if it were an explanation and then rolled her eyes when they didn’t get it. “Come on guys, it's like the oldest trope ever. Two people who can’t be soulmates- aka Phantom because he is dead and Danny because everyone knows he doesn’t have one.”

Danny suppressed a flinch from his spot on the ceiling. 

“Just because he’s dead doesn’t mean-“ Star tried to interrupt, but Paulina waved the romance book in her hand and continued to talk.

“It’s just like Romeo and Juliet. A tragic romance. Phantom died before he could meet Danny so instead, he must have dedicated his afterlife to watching over his mortal soulmate. Danny can’t bring Phantom back to life, but he can try to keep him safe from the ghost hunters.”

 “Danny must be giving Phantom the Fenton’s ghost tech to keep him safe!” Star gushed. “That is so romantic!”

“But Fenton is such a wimp.” Dash objected, “There is no way he is Phantom’s soulmate.”

Suddenly Paulina let out a gasp and punched Dash’s arm.

“Danny is a wimp you idiot.” She yelled at him.

Dash blinked back at Paulina without comprehension.

“And you have been beating him up.” Paulina explained, “No wonder Phantom looks so tired all the time! You have to leave Danny alone so Phantom can get some rest.”

“Oh my god.” Instead of the glee Paulina had used those words with, Wes’s whisper was one of horror. “You’re all idiots.” He buried his head in his hands as the other teens continued around him. 

Danny almost fell from the ceiling in shock. He had been trying to get Wes to give up his conspiracy theory for almost a year and Paulina had just accomplished it in under five minutes. Sure, she had done it by using his evidence for an even more insane conspiracy theory but somehow it worked. 

“I’ll take that,” Paulina snatched Wes’s binder from where it was still lying on the desk and began to leaf through the pages of evidence. It was only a matter of moments before the entire room of teens (minus one Wes who was bemoaning his fate in the corner) were hunched over it, fitting all of the facts into the soulmate narrative they had decided on.

After he was done tracking down the other dozen bug-like ghosts that had escaped along with the ghosterfly, Danny thought back on the conversation he’d overheard earlier in the day. He had been mortified but never expected the rumor to gain any traction, and he definitely hadn’t expected anyone to actually believe it. It was an insane conspiracy theory and he assumed it would be mostly ignored like all of Wes’s ramblings.

Danny was wrong.

The rumor spread like wildfire.

At first Danny thought about denying the rumors of course, and the first few times people mentioned it Danny had, but the benefits to being your own soulmate quickly began to make themselves clear and it wasn't like anyone believed Danny’s denials with all the evidence to suggest otherwise. One unexpected benefit had been the excuse for his weird behavior and disappearances around Phantom. Two, rather than being the weirdo with no soulmate Danny was now the soulmate of a popular important hero which in turn made him important to his classmates almost overnight. And third, was the most unexpected and best benefit; Danny’s parents no longer tried to hunt “that menace Phantom.” They still weren’t fans of him, but they had ceased all physical assaults for Danny’s benefit.

As Danny’s ghost fighting escapades got more and more dangerous, he realized that his lack of a soulmate was perhaps the only thing that allowed him to endure hero work. If he had a soulmate, he would have to explain why he had enough scars for two people all on his own. Plus having a soulmate would mean he would have to worry about the pain he was forcing them to endure every time he got into a fight. It was better for everyone that the world thought he and Phantom were soulmates. It was better for everyone if Danny was really alone.

oOo

“Be on the lookout for something causing an atmospheric disturbance.” Robin’s trademark serious mission voice came from the tiny earpiece deep in Superboy’s ear canal.

“Roger.” Superboy confirmed at the same time as Wonder Girl and Impulse. 

“You got it, Wonder Boy.”

“Aye aye, Captain.”

It was unseasonably cold on top of the warehouse where Kon had been waiting for something to happen for the last hour and a half. He wished he could get up and move around.

Kon hated missions like these- not because they were particularly dangerous, in fact they would be better if they were. If they were dangerous at least Kon wouldn't be bored out of his mind.

Three months ago, when Robin had first started tracking the group they were investigating tonight, the authorities were still working under the assumption that just one group couldn’t be responsible. Since then, Robin had connected the half dozen robberies the authorities were investigating with another twenty, a handful of murders, and one high profile kidnapping. In each case every recording device on the premises shut off simultaneously and the group failed to leave behind a single shred of physical evidence. They never set off any alarms, no dogs were ever heard barking and none of the entry points at any of the scenes showed signs of tampering; thus their nickname The Phantom Thieves.

Cassie thought the name was corny but there was something about it that Kon liked.

The only reason Robin got interested enough to notice the connection between the crimes at all was because one of the murders had been committed in Jump City and the target of one of the robberies was a subsidiary of Wayne Enterprises. Within hours of spotting the similarities between the two, Robin had a list of similar crimes and a map tracking their path picking up near Montreal to DC then zigzagging across the Midwest hitting Los Angeles, Jump, and moving north.

The Phantom Thieves never left behind any witnesses to their crimes. People living by the crime scenes never saw or heard anything suspicious and none of the victims of their other crimes survived; all except one. The kidnapping victim: sixteen-year-old pop princess Moxie Marshall, was returned alive and well to her penthouse apartment in Boston less than an hour after her father (and career manager) paid the two million dollar ransom.

The Police had questioned Moxie after she was returned but there wasn't enough evidence for them to move any further with the investigation. Moxie remembered waking up to find herself in a locked room that she later found out was a non-operational walk-in freezer at an abandoned fast-food restaurant. Someone brought her meals twice a day but otherwise Moxie was left completely alone for just over nine days except for day three and seven when she woke up in a different location, first the basement of a church and second the office of an abandoned car dealership, without any memories of being moved.

Assuming that Moxie’s testimony was entirely correct (which Robin emphasized wasn't likely considering how much stress she’d been under and lack of reliable timekeeping device) and that the Phantom Thieves chose similar locations when they were traveling without a hostage as they did with one; Robin created a list of probable locations for their temporary base along their route. Tonight, the team was staking out an abandoned industrial park just outside of Salem, the ninth mission of its kind in the last two weeks, and if the last hour and a half was any indication, the ninth failure in just as long. Despite logging over forty hours of stakeout time they hadn't seen so much as the shadow of one of their targets.

“How sure are you that the temperature difference from your ‘unsubstantiated reports’ were caused by a cold front?” Wonder Girl whispered over the comms. 

“Not very.” Robin admitted without any shame. “Why?”

“It’s weird but I swear it’s like ten degrees cooler between building G and H than it was between F and G.”

Kon listened as Robin explained to Wonder Girl how to pull up the temperature reading from her suit which she hadn’t had a reason to use before. 

“Sixty- three degrees.” Wonder Girl finally answered. “No, fifty- nine. And still dropping. Robin?”

“Standby for backup.” Robin told her, then before Kon could volunteer Tim ordered him to proceed to her location with caution.

Kon had to resist the urge to punch the air in victory as he stood and stretched. Finally! He was going to go insane if he had to stay still any longer.

Stealth missions always sucked, especially because Superboy so often got stuck watching exits while the rest of the team did the actual sneaking. Just because he was tall didn’t mean he couldn't be stealthy, just look at Batman. The guy was built like a refrigerator, but no one tried to put the Dark Knight on exits!

Kon walked across the flat roof, occasionally making the jump from one nearly identical building to the next. The industrial park was made up of a row of small office buildings and admin offices with warehouses connected in the back. Behind those buildings was an alley where delivery drivers could drive right up to the warehouse docks. Each row shared the back alley with the next row.

Kon was already partially through his next jump when a stabbing pain reverberated through his ankle and it buckled beneath him. Instead of the top roof Kon felt his knees connect with something smooth an instant before the skylight cracked and he fell into the warehouse below.

The warehouse was, thankfully, empty of inhabitants and Kon froze from his spot on the ground to make sure he hadn’t been heard. There were no shouts of warning or surprise.

Kon sighed in relief, silently thanking the universe that no one was there to see his embarrassment. Cassie for one would never have let him live down falling that far for no reason other than surprise. Kon looked at his ankle and it was fine, without even a hint of angry red.

It was dark in the warehouse, not enough to impede Kon’s vision but the moonlight streaming in from the skylights caused long dark shadows that somehow felt sinister.

The pile of broken pallets and boxes beneath him shifted as Kon stood up and his joints throbbed in protest. Maybe he needed a vacation, usually he could take a fall like that without feeling anything. 

He had landed in the middle of one of the steel cantilever racks that were placed in a line down the center to create an aisle. One of the big steel beams groaned and began to fall forward. Kon barely caught it before it hit the ground with what would have been a sizable noise. Unfortunately, Kon was too busy keeping the beam from hitting the ground to pay attention to the other side and as he caught it, the back swung into a forklift. The tiny forklift slowly toppled over onto its side with a soft thump. Then the lights flashed, and the alarm started.

All at once Kon could hear the sound of running footsteps and cursing. He wheeled around, expecting to see a group of people converging upon him from the shadows but they were just as empty as before. He knew the sound must be carrying from somewhere else in the park but he couldn't shake the feeling of being surrounded. 

“They’re here,” Kon told the rest of his team. “And they know we’re here.”

“Wonder Girl. Impulse. Status report.” Robin ordered, ignoring the obvious question of how Kon had given them away.

Cassie heard people moving near her and Robin ordered her to try to get a visual and Kon to continue to her location- slowly.

“If we lose them tonight, they’re going to disappear again and it might be weeks before we get another shot.” Robin explained briefly.

The Phantom Thieves, it seemed, had scattered from somewhere near the south side of the complex as soon as the noise alerted them to their visitors. They disappeared into the shadows of the complex so completely that Kon was almost convinced that he was imagining the too soft sound of their heartbeats.

Kon’s ankle throbbed in protest as he did his best impression of Robin’s sneaky shadow walk. When he got close to where Wonder Girl was supposed to be Kon heard a door close to his right and paused.

“W.G. was that you?” Kon whispered. “In-” he checked the building in front of him. “G-one point eight?”

“Nope.” Wonder Girl responded immediately. “Did you see something?”

“I heard someone open the side door. Are you close?” Kon asked.

“ETA forty five seconds.” She responded.

“Come in through the front offices.” Kon instructed as he opened the side door marked ‘Employees Only.’ “So, they won't be able to leave that way.”

This building looked like it used to be used for some kind of manufacturing and large pieces of equipment lay strewn across the floors like corpses at a crime scene. Movement caught his eye and Kon quickly spotted two of the thieves.

“Superboy, I’m on my way to your location.” Robin warned him. 

When the thieves saw Superboy, the two tried to speed up but even with the pain in his ankle Kon was on them in seconds. Seeing them up close Kon couldn't help but notice that they didn't look like the kind of people who could pull off the crimes they were guilty of. They didn't look like people who spent years mastering the art of fighting or burglary, Kon had met those kinds of people before, and these guys looked- well average. They wore the same dark robes as all the others did but the slightly shorter man wore a heavy looking medallion over his.

Instead of running towards the offices, where they might have been able to split up before running into Cassie, the two ran towards the corner, effectively boxing themselves in without a means of escape. Something about the whole situation seemed off and later Kon would realize that a group as successful as this one shouldn't have made that many mistakes, but for now Kon was focused on other things. 

“Just turn yourselves in.” Kon told the thieves as they reached the wall, and he slowed down in his approach. “I’d really rather not hurt you.” He gave them a smile that he knew was just a smidge too wide to be interpreted as completely friendly.

The taller of the two actually laughed at that and they both took a step back, closer to the wall.

So much for the easy way.

Before Kon could take another step, the tall one walked back through the wall. 

Kon lurched forward to catch the other criminal- then his vision blurred. He felt the adrenaline first but he was frozen in place. He barely saw the shorter one escape; he didn't even question how, Kon was too busy trying to remember how to move. 

“I see them outside on the south side.” Robin’s voice interrupted Kon’s panic. “Superboy, cut them off on your side. I’ll herd them towards you.” 

Kon tried to speak but all that came out was a squeak. He felt himself fall to his knees as pain reverberated through him like a tidal wave. Rao, it hurt!

“Damnit!” Wonder Girl swore after a moment. “We lost them again!”

“Superboy?” Robin called. “Where are you? Come in.”

Kon couldn't breathe. Why did it hurt so bad? He hadn't felt anything this painful since Cadmus. He could tell that someone was saying something but it sounded far away like the whisper of a stranger that his mind let float away on the breeze without processing. 

“-erboy?”

Kon felt a hand on his shoulder and when he blinked he could see Wonder Girl in front of him. She must have done a sweep of all the offices and found him here.

He opened his mouth to answer but all that came out was a groan.

Cassie gently pulled his hand away from where it was ripped around his opposite forearm and pushed up his sleeve.

Cassie gasped and Kon finally looked at his own arm where some of the pain was coming from. There in the middle of his forearm was a dark red circle about the size of a half dollar coin. When he flipped it over there was a matching one on the other side.

All at once everything made sense to Kon, although when he looked at her face he knew that Wonder Girl hadn't had the same realization.

Kon had a soulmark. 

Kon had a soulmate.

And they were hurt.

Chapter Text

Cassie hated debriefs. 

Don’t get her wrong, she knows they’re necessary for the team. The debriefs help the team categorize what they know about the enemy. They help prepare them for future threats. They establish team bonding and strategies and yada yada, but that didn’t change the fact that she hated them. She preferred the action. To immediately jump into a fight as soon as they knew it existed. Not sit around for 10 hours discussing all the ‘maybes’ or ‘what if’ scenarios. Especially when it’s basically going over the same thing again and again. 

It had been 2 weeks since the team had lost the trail for the so called ‘Phantom thieves’. And already it had caused so many problems. 

They tried staking out the next locations the thieves might target but it seemed their mysterious attackers had caught onto their strategy. All traces of them had disappeared. Even more so than before. It was like they completely dropped off the grid. 

That didn’t mean the attacks stopped though. Oh no, they continued but the team no longer had any way to track them. At least not unless the crime was actively happening and they were called in for backup. Cassie couldn’t count how many times Tim had them head out to Metropolis, or Missouri, or even freaking CANADA only to find some politician already dead or some priceless artifact stolen. The Phantom thieves would just appear, and then disappear. And then they would have to stay behind and spend the next few hours at the crime scene and scour the surrounding area for even a hint of a clue to their presence. Only to find nothing. 

Every. Single. Time.

Cassie had never been this tired in her life . 

And she wasn’t the only one. They were all dealing with the stress differently. Cassie glanced around at her teammates who had taken different spots in the semicircle of couches in the tower common room. After the dozenth or so meeting, they decided to move the debriefings to the common room since they knew it would take a while and it was just more comfortable. Tim had rewired the movie projector to show the data from the tower’s main computer.

The bat in question stood at the forefront of the room, opening up a dozen different computer screens displaying the latest gathered information on their new enemy. Which unfortunately was just that they were superpowered, contained abilities like intangibility, invisibility, and possibly some kind of EMP for cameras. That there was more than one. And that they were super frigging annoying (that last part wasn’t actually added to their list, but Cassie still felt it was a valid addition.) 

Of course, Tim had compiled it more neatly and more detailed in the actual file. Either way, it wasn’t much. Yet they had gone over it so many times even Bart could recite it from memory at this point. And he didn’t have the best attention span. 

So far, their best bet was to try and predict where the Phantom thieves would strike next and head them off. Tim had basically locked himself in the control room, piling together various files of data to try and predict a pattern. He got cut off from his coffee supply on the third day in. Even then, one could clearly see the dark bags under his eyes. It seemed he was taking the continuous failures of this case a bit too personally. 

Bart had started stress eating (or was that normal eating?) and had basically taken over the kitchen. He also seemed more jumpy. 

As the fastest teammate, Bart was usually sent ahead of the team to try and catch the Phantom Thieves before they disappeared again. 

He never made it in time though. 

Because of that, Bart became more…agitated. Even now, Cassie could see how his body was tense as a spring, even as he munched on a bowl of popcorn. His foot rapidly tapping against the carpet. It was like he was always half a second away from bolting at any moment. She didn’t know how he had this much energy. 

But even so, this wasn’t the worst of her teammates. Oh no, the person most affected by this had to be Kon. 

Just…it wasn’t really the thieves that were bothering him.

Cassie still remembered when she found him in that warehouse. Kon had impenetrable skin, so it was rare to ever see him in pain. He was always the first to get up after being struck down and very few things besides kryptonite could even scratch him. She was used to Kon being the one to carry his injured teammates off the battlefield, and she’s seen him shrug off an explosion like it was nothing. So, to see him on the ground like that, unconscious and holding his arm in pain…it scared her. 

The fact that he had a literal bullet wound didn’t help. The team immediately stopped their pursuit of the enemy to rush Kon back to the medbay despite his protests. It took even longer for them to realize that despite the appearance, the wound wasn’t actually bleeding, nor was any skin punctured. 

And then the fact that they were looking at a soulmark sunk in…and they had more questions. Like why Kon never told them (answer: he never knew), if he ever experienced the phantom pains prior to that night (answer: probably?) and then despite confirming Kon wasn’t actually injured they did a full body checkup anyways to see what other scars he might have. 

Needless to say, Kon wasn’t happy about it. But he was happy to find out that he did indeed have a soulmate after all. Well…more like shocked silent, but Cassie knows the joy was there. 

Kon, like the others, assumed he wouldn't have a soulmate due to his…unique circumstances. Kon was obviously bothered by not having a soulmate, despite trying to hide that fact. Probably since everyone seemed to have one, and the few who didn’t have soulmarks were because their soulmate died. 

So the team just…never brought it up. It was a touchy subject. Besides, soulmates didn’t have to be romantic and they made sure to let Kon know that even if he didn’t have a soulmate, they would always love him.

As for the scars, they learned that Kon just assumed that since he was a clone, he wasn’t as invulnerable as the original superman. And that living with occasional bouts of pain was only natural which. No. Kon, no . 

So that was a whole other conversation. And once he realized that yes, he had a soulmate, and yes, always had one, it was like some sort of switch flipped. Kon had immediately demanded to be let out so he could search for his soulmate because they were injured . That was a bullet wound . And Kon had felt his ribs crack before (and again, why did he never mention this?!). Broken bones, bruises, and all manner of injuries from his soulmate since he escaped Cadmus. And while these injuries might be normal for a hero, it was not normal for a run of the mill civilian. So he had to get to them now .

The only reason the team was able to hold him in the medbay was because he didn’t have a clue how to find them. That didn’t stop his panic though. And since Tim was hogging the control room for the Phantom Thief case, Kon took literally every other device in the tower to search soulmate platforms, matchmaking sites, and Cassie found on her tablet a concerning search history involving the distribution of guns. 

So…hopefully the government doesn’t see that . 

Bart and Cassie had basically been the only thing keeping their other two teammates functioning the past weeks as they spiraled further and further. The constant dispatches to the Phantom Thief locations wasn’t helping either, especially when they led to dead ends. 

Which brings them to now, sitting in front of Tim who had called them all down for, surprise, yet another debrief. Cassie smooshed herself into the couch, getting comfortable, fully expecting to spend the next 5 hours hearing them go over more dead leads. Except…something was different. 

Instead of being hunched over the computer screen and half mumbling to himself as he looked over their list of clues, Tim was smiling. He stared at the team with a manic grin, eyebags so dark he looked like a panda, hair and clothes disheveled from lack of sleep.

Which…while concerning wasn’t nearly as off putting as him actually showing joy. Usually that meant he either found a breakthrough on a case or was about to commit some sort of crime. Often followed by an explosion of some sort. And Cassie for one, was hoping it was the former. 

Please, please be the former. They did not need another lawsuit after the New York incident.

By the look on Bart’s face as he made eye contact with her, he was probably thinking the same thing. Great, so they will probably have to get ready for damage control if this case finally made their teammate snap. Meanwhile, Kon was barely paying attention, picking at the edge of his jacket and tracing the lichtenberg scars over his left arm. 

Ok…so he’s going to be no help at all. 

As Cassie and Bart were having their silent conversation and Bart was slowly setting his bowl of popcorn down in preparation for…something, Tim’s smile only seemed to get larger. 

Cassie really hated debriefs. 

“Ok so as you all know, we haven't been able to locate the Phantom Thieves ever since the warehouse incident?” Bart elbowed Kon so that at least the Kryptonian was paying attention. “We know their general abilities as discussed previously.” Oh yes. Many many times. “And so far they seemed to be using some form of cloaking ability or technology to hide their presence. Currently, the only footage we have of them is from the warehouse.”

Cassie didn’t understand where Tim was going with this. “I thought you said the warehouse footage was unusable?” 

Tim’s grin got impossibly wider. “I did. But take a look at this.” Tim pulled up another screen behind him. It displayed a shaky video of someone jumping across the warehouse roofs at night. “This is the footage from Kon’s body cam-“

“We have body cams?” Bart questioned. 

“-and at first the footage is fine.” Tim continued, ignoring Bart. They all watched as digital Kon made his way across the roof until he suddenly stumbled mid jump and crashed through a skylight. The footage got a bit shaky as digital Kon flailed and tried to grab something before ultimately hitting the ground with a high-pitched shriek. 

Meanwhile, real Kon groaned, now fully paying attention and trying to bury his face in his hands as Cassie and Bart chuckled. “Is showing this part really necessary?”

Tim stared deadpan at him in his coffee deprived state. “Yes”. 

Then the video continued. Digital Kon got up and looked around and while the warehouse seemed normal at first, the farther digital Kon got in, the more the team started to see a strange static around the edges of the film. Then, right when Kon was about to open a door and come into contact with the thieves, the footage seemed to twist and warp, almost twisting in on itself, until it became completely indecipherable. Not even audio could be heard over the static white noise. 

Tim clicked his remote to pause the video and turned to the team with manic excitement. “See?!” 

The other three teammates shared a look before Bart carefully spoke up. “Uhh…what exactly are we looking at?”

Tim seemed exasperated that his team wasn’t immediately getting it. “It’s not an EMP! The footage didn’t just immediately cut out. And sure, there was static but did you see how the footage warped? That wasn’t normal. It was more like there was some sort of interference. Plus, I checked that warehouse while you guys were taking care of Kon. All other technology was working fine right up until they came into contact with the thieves. I ran the footage through 47 different screening processes just to be sure.”

Ok, now this was interesting. Cassie leaned in further. “What about signs of outside interference? It wouldn’t be the first time a rogue has had help.”

Tim clicked on the computer some more and brought up another screen. “There was no evidence of hacking or tampering. Scans of the area also turned up nothing. No foreign signal jams, no strange material signatures, the only things that were tampered with were the visual and audio recording devices. Plus, if we look at the CCTV footage from a nearby building-” He brought up a new screen overlaying the previous video and pressed play. “-the minute the thieves exit the building it does the same strange warping. That’s not normal.” 

Bart had relaxed back into the couch after it was clear this was just normal, hyper focused unhinged Tim rather than potential supervillain Tim. He had grabbed a few kernels and started munching on them again. “Well…this is all very fascinating but how does it help us?” 

Tim exited out of the screen and pulled up a digital map of the US with multiple red dots scattered across it like stars. “These are the spots that have been hit by the Phantom Thieves. We’ve been trying to track them via unnatural reading from their abilities and by trying to figure out where they’ll strike next. But clearly that hasn’t been working. So I’ve been trying to triangulate a new pattern to their movements. And that’s when I realized…how is it we know these places have been hit by the Phantom Thieves in the first place? It’s not like anyone sees it happening. So how do we know it’s them rather than just some random assassin or another rouge?”

Kon looked up at this. He seemed to be in deep thought as he considered the question. “It’s the cameras.” He realized. “The cameras always go down whenever they are supposed to catch them on video. And the temperature in the area drops.”

“Exactly!” Tim points excitedly at the Kryptonian. “We’ve been trying to track the temperature drops but we’ve been ignoring the cameras. If we want to find the thieves, we need to find places where the cameras glitch out.”

Cassie tilted her head in confusion. Something about that wasn’t right. “But wouldn’t that still make it so we can only find them when they’re committing a crime? We’ve been focusing on the temperature to predict when an attack might happen. The cameras only glitch out when they are actively stealing something. How is that different from the local authorities informing us the thieves are there and calling us in?”

Tim got a strange glint in his eye. “That’s if they were only using their powers for crimes.”

Suddenly, the other three heroes perked up. Finally getting what Tim was hinting at. 

Bart looked excited. “You mean we could track them when they disappear, or or or if they try to hide themselves when they go back to their hideout! Or super-secret base!” Bart’s grin was infectious. “That’s so crash.” 

Tim said nothing as he pulled up a new image overlaying the map. This time, blue dots accompanied the red. They were far more frequent but seemed scattered out. Yet each red dot had a small cluster of blue dots surrounding it. “I realized it two days ago after their most recent break in at the museum. Once I figured that out, I made a program to track the strange camera distortion. Most of them seem to be centered around the thieves’ targets and then they seem to fade out. So unfortunately, there’s no trail to follow.” Tim’s forehead scrunched in frustration at that fact. “I think they use the camera distortion in the main area and then have some other way of getting around. They probably find a place with no cameras before they leave the area and I suspect they might be using civilian clothing to blend into crowds. That makes sense considering most of their targets are in crowded areas.” Tim mumbled that last part. He scrolled along the screen as if he was using google maps and despite the small blue clusters around locations with red dots, all the blue dots were scattered randomly. There was no pattern. “Everywhere else…well there are occasional distortions but they mostly seem harmless. I’m actually not sure what’s causing them as nothing is getting stolen or displaced. And the distortion spots don’t seem to be going anywhere.”

Cassie slumped back into her couch. Guess it was too good to be true that they got a lead. All she did was get her hopes up. 

“So, we’ve got nothing.” Bart voiced Cassie’s thoughts. He seemed slightly frustrated as he made sure to crunch extra loudly on his popcorn in discontent. All it did was annoy Superboy though who tossed a pillow at the speedster in defense of his sensitive ears. Served him right, Bart should know by now not to do that so close to the kryptonian. 

It devolved into a small pillow fight that Tim had to break up so he could continue. Cassie hoped this interruption didn’t mean they would have to move back to the meeting room for debriefs. She liked her couch seat thank you very much. 

“As I was saying .” He sent a glare towards Bart. “There’s no cluster in most places.” And just like that he got their attention again. 

Cassie was practically vibrating in her seat. “Wait you mean..?”

Tim’s maniacal grin was back as he brought up a new screen displaying a small town. “This is Amity Park. The most haunted place in America.” Bart snorted. Tim just gave him a stern glare to be quiet. “This town has the biggest collection of distortion I’ve ever seen. It’s in social media posts, videos, blogs, even the local news channel. Basically, any form of film. Most of them only last for a second or two but the sheer amount that happens is startling.”

Cassie watched the flood of new video screens showing different distortions. “Do you think this could be their main base?”

Tim hummed. “It’s possible. The distortions seem to have picked up in frequency in the last two years but there are a few cases of distortion that date back all the way to when cameras were first invented. Although they seem to have only happened every few months. It’s still more than any other location.” Tim grinned. “At the very least it’s worth checking out.”

Cassie felt like she was vibrating. Finally! They can actually do something besides sitting around all day and chasing cold leads. Even if the town proved to be useless, she would at least get to stretch her legs. Jump City had been disappointingly peaceful lately. A quick glance at her two teammates showed that they were just as eager to get out. And the teens were about to race for the door. 

“Hold it!” At Tim’s cry, all three stopped and turned towards their leader. “We can’t just rush into this. If it really is their main base of operations then we need to be prepared.” At this, Tim grabbed some papers and plopped down three thick packets in front of his teammates. “I’ve compiled all the relative information about Amity Park I could get on short notice.”

Cassie looked at the literal book Tim decided to lay before each of them and casually flipped through the first 50 pages in trepidation. She had only skimmed the top.

This was what he found on short notice?!

Did Cassie mention how she hated debriefs?

Bart eyed his own packet in equal horror while Kon tentatively poked his, as if the stack of papers were going to bite him.

The speedster looked up at Tim with pleading eyes. “Is all of this really necessary?”

Tim stared him down with zero remorse. “Yes. This town has a… history with strange events. Any information could prove useful.”

Bart flopped back into his seat in defeat, holding his 200 page packet with dread. His eyes losing hope. And then something occurred to him. “Wait…if the camera distortion has been happening for a while…what do the townspeople think it is?”

Tim only smiled in amusement. 

oOo

“Ghosts.” Bart stared at Tim in disbelief from where he was perched on the backseat of the car. “They think it’s ghosts .” 

Tim laughs from the driver's seat at Bart’s expression. After being given the packets the three teammates had managed to convince Tim (I.E. complain until they wore him down enough) that time was of the essence and that they could just read it on the way there. They all piled into a vehicle Tim had *caugh* ‘borrowed’ *caugh* from Batman and started the long drive there. 

The reason they didn’t just fly to the town or travel via powers and Robin cycle was because Tim felt this would work better as a stealth mission to gather information. It was the same reason they were decked out in civilian clothes instead of hero gear. Sitting in the car also gave them time to, you know, actually read the packet. 

Curse Tim’s perception of his team’s antics. 

It was mostly information on the town’s history with the supernatural. Reports of strange lights appearing, mysterious noises, floating objects, and cold spots were the most frequent throughout the years. They were going to get to the part about their actual mission but…they got a little sidetracked by Bart’s reaction. Perks of being a speed reader. He got to the good parts first. 

“Well, what do you expect?” Tim asked. “Amity has been having ‘mysterious events’ happening since the Salem Witch Trials. Actually, there are even some reports from before that but they only started really recording the events during the trials. Magic was a common factor back then so it was only natural they blamed what they couldn’t see.”

“But ghosts? ” Bart stared at his packet of paper as if it had betrayed him. Tim was finding the speedster’s reactions far too amusing. But to be fair, he wasn’t the only one. 

Kon slung his arm around Bart’s shoulder. “Come on man, don’t you want to meet a ghost?”

“No?!” Bart looked at the Kryptonian incredulously. “Why would I want to?! They’re dead people. Has anyone here ever watched a horror film? Nothing good ever comes from meeting dead people! They’re usually trying to kill you.” Bart forcefully shrugged Kon’s arm off him. “Besides, it’s not like it would happen anyways. Ghosts aren’t real.”

Cassie gave a mock gasp. “Bart! Are you…a non believer?!”

The speedster flung his hands up in exasperation. “I’m just saying that if ghosts were real, wouldn’t I know about them in the future?”

Tim hummed in thought. “Not necessarily. I mean, if ghosts have been around for centuries and people still don’t know about them, I doubt another few decades would change anything.”

Bart groaned and turned to Tim with a betrayed look on his face. “Why aren’t you on my side in this?! You’re like…a science guy. Shouldn’t you be the first to debunk this junk?” He slapped the packet in emphasis. 

“I’m sitting in a car with an alien, a time traveler, and a demigod.” Tim deadpanned. “I’ve decided to be open minded.” The boy’s grin said he was enjoying this. “Besides, we’re actually going to visit a science couple who live in the town.”

Kon tilted his head curiously. “Why would scientists live in a ghost town?” 

“Well maybe if you read your own packet, you would find out.” 

Cassie leaned against Tim from the passenger seat. “Aww, but why do that when you can just explain it to us?” She batted her eyelashes in innocence. Tim just rolled his eyes and scoffed. 

“They’ve been studying the energy spikes.”

“Energy spikes?” Kon asked. They had all decided to resolutely ignore Bart’s grumbling from the backseat about how all his teammates were against him and nothing made sense anymore. 

Tim nodded his head. “Apparently, everytime one of these strange phenomena happens, it left traces of an unknown energy source that the Drs Fenton have been documenting. It doesn’t seem to appear on any normal monitor devices so a lot of scientists claim that their research is false. But they swear they have a way of documenting this energy source and the science in their papers seems sound. If they’re the real deal, then this might be our ticket to tracking down the Phantom Thieves.” 

“Yeah huh, you sure their lack of support isn’t because they keep claiming the ‘energy source’ is ectoplasm?” Bart seemed to have recovered and was now pouting as he rested his head on the front seats. “Personally, I think this entire thing is some kind of town-wide hoax. They probably took the ‘supernatural’ shtick and decided to role with it. Made up a few rumors here and there. And Banda bing, Banda boom, ‘tourist trap’ . 

Everyone just turned to stare at Bart. 

“What? It’s happened before!” 

The stares didn’t recede. 

He scoffed. “No look! I’ll prove it!” Quicker than they could blink, Bart whipped out his phone and started scrolling and took a few seconds that Cassie figured was probably more like a few minutes for the speedster. Finally, he found what he was looking for and apparently, whatever he discovered made him laugh in disbelief and he proudly displayed his phone screen to the others. “Take a look at this! According to the official page, it warns that Amity undergoes frequent ‘ghost attacks.’ Now if that isn’t a publicity stunt I don’t know what is.”

Tim just gazed resolutely at the road. “And how do you know these attacks aren’t real?”

“If there were actual attackers. Wouldn’t the Justice League know about it?”

Kon smirked at the speedster. “Why would they? Ghosts don’t appear on cameras, remember?”

Bart spluttered and Cassie laughed at his face. “Well even if that happened. Wouldn't people at least report that they were attacked? That doesn’t seem like something you just ignore. Why haven't we gotten any reports huh?”

Tim chose that moment to speak up. “Because apparently, most of the attacks are dealt with by the local vigilante.” 

“Oh, there’s a vigilante now?” Bart looked like he was done with this conversation. “Ok fine, sure. So there’s a vigilante. And the reason we don’t know about them is because…?”

Tim shrugged but Cassie could see he was fighting a grin. “He’s a ghost too. He doesn’t show up on cameras either.”

“Course he doesn’t” Bart threw his hands in the air. Cassie and Kon snickered at the speedster’s misfortune as the red head just glared at them. 

The rest of the car ride was basically Bart trying to look up various websites as ‘proof’ that the ghost vigilante was just made up. Cassie was pretty sure Tim knew most of the rumors already and was just humoring the boy. At this point, Cassie didn’t care if ‘The Phantom’ was real or not, she was having too much fun messing with Bart. His favorite website seemed to be a blog by RedHeadsRulz that claimed some of Phantom’s abilities. 

“Look at this! Apparently, he’s capable of letting you see the dead using teddy bears, could probably take superman in a fight, and his weakness is toast? Toast?!”  

The team spent the hours taking turns picking fun at the speedster rather than reading their packets. In hindsight, probably not a good idea but in the moment, totally worth it. He was just too easy to rile up. But at least they had a good idea what their mission was. For all Bart’s complaints, there were a surprising number of matching reports for supposed ghost attacks. While Bart was convinced it was still staged by the town, Tim wanted them to investigate for further information. 

All too soon they reached their destination. Bart wasted no time storming out of the car. Thoroughly fed up with the team’s teasing at that point.

Unfortunately for him, entering the town didn’t make it better. But it absolutely made Cassie’s day. 

“Oh come on! They have merchandise?!” Bart pointed to the various stalls and stores with ghost merch, including stuffed ghost animals, ghost themed mugs, keychains, and a row of T-shirts with small green ghost figures on them and the words ‘I’m BOOtiful’ printed on them along with other various ghost puns. “And they even have…what the heck is this thing?” He exclaimed, looking at a small bobble head that resembled a stylised D with three spikes on the end. Now that Cassie was looking around, that D shape seemed to be on a lot of other merchandise as well. 

No matter where they looked, every store had some kind of ghost theme. 

Bart looked desperate as he turned to the others. “You have to admit, this looks so made up. Come on guys.” He was practically whining at this point. 

But unfortunately for him, the teen titans were absolutely merciless so they decided to ignore their speedster for now. 

Tim scrolled through his phone. “Alright, I scheduled an appointment to meet with the local scientists. While I’m doing that, I need you all to find out everything you can about these ‘ghosts attacks’ and the local vigilante if possible.”

“Is ANYONE listening to me?!”

Cassie gave a mock solute to her leader while Kon just nodded his head. Tim was about to leave when he stopped and turned to the group. “Oh, and this is a stealth mission. So please try and keep a low profile.” He gave a pointed look at Bart before walking away. 

The speedster in question gave an annoyed crunch on a bag of chips. “Wow. No trust I tell you.”

Kon looked at him in astonishment. “Where did you even get those?”

“What? I snack when I’m upset.” Bart shrugged. 

“And when you’re happy, and sad, and angry, and-” Cassie counted on her fingers. 

“What, like that’s a problem?” He dropped a few more chips in his mouth and had to snatch his bag away from Kon, who tried to grab a few chips for himself. “I don’t see why I can’t just do a fast pass around the town. If ghost attacks are really as frequent as they say, then won’t I come across them eventually?” 

“No powers.” Kon gave a disapproving look at Bart. “You heard Tim, this is a stealth mission. And I think the local populace will notice a giant red and tan blur.”

“Why not? Won’t I just be added to their ‘local phenomenon’?” He gave air quotes. “Oooh! Maybe I could become a cryptid!” 

“No making cryptid legends.” Cassie butted in. “You remember what happened last time in Canada?” Bart snickered at the memory as Kon blushed and avoided eye contact. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Cassie huffed. Seriously, sometimes she wondered if she was the sole braincell of their group.

“Alright!” Kon clapped his hands together. “So where are we going first?” Before the other two could open their mouths, a large scream echoed through the street. Immediately, the heroes became alert and sunk into battle stances as they tracked where the scream was coming from. In the far distance they could see signs of smoke rising in the air. Probably a fire then. 

Cassie and Kon slightly relaxed their stances while Bart looked like he was ready to vibrate in place. “Finally! Some action!” With a gust of wind, Bart’s casual jeans and T-shirt was replaced with a striking hero uniform with a red lighting bolt down the front. He posed for dramatic effect. 

“ No .” Kon quickly grabbed Bart’s arm and pulled him in to harshly whisper at the teen. His voice firm. “What part of stealth mission do you not understand! Let the local fire department handle it.” Kon looked around frantically to see if any of the fleeing civilians had caught onto the speedster’s sudden change of clothes. Bart took his moment of distraction to twist out of the clone’s hold. 

“Aww common. It’s just a little fire. Besides, I’ll be too fast to see! I’ll catch up with you guys later. Ok? Ok, bye now!” 

Kon reached out to try and grab the boy again but the Kryptonian wasn’t fast enough and only grasped empty air. 

“Darn it!” Kon exclaimed. 

Cassie looked at the empty air where her teammate used to be and then turned to the fuming Kryptonian. “Sooooooo. I guess it’s just you and me huh?” 

Kon just groaned. 

After Impulse ditched them, the two remaining Titans set to work trying to find what they could on the ghost attacks and recorded phenomenon. Tim had given Kon a device disguised as a phone to track any strange readings. Unsurprisingly, it came up with nothing, just like when they tried to track the Phantom Thieves. Whether this was a connection or there really was nothing to track was up for debate. So, if they couldn’t get the readings themselves, they had to resort to option two. Firsthand accounts. 

Surprisingly, finding information about the ghost attacks wasn’t hard. The townspeople were all too happy to talk about them in great detail. As if they weren’t normally running for their lives on a day-to-day basis. 

The hard part was believing these attacks were real. 

A ghost obsessed with boxes? A child playing pirate? A cyborg hunter who goes after fellow ghosts, a lunch lady? Cassie was finding it harder and harder to ignore Bart’s claims about the townspeople just messing with them. 

At one point they tried to stop two teenagers who seemed to be rushing in the fire’s direction. (And speaking of fires, what was taking Bart so long?). The Latino girl seemed to be dragging along her redheaded friend who resembled Tim when he had missed his morning coffee. Which meant that kid looked completely done with life. Cassie had gone to grab the boy when she felt an awful shiver run down her spine, as if her very soul had been dunked in the rivers of Tartarus, and a faint breeze carried the voice of a woman hissing in her ear, just barely audible over the sound of her heart beating. 

Cassie looked around frantically for the source of the chill but found nothing. 

Kon had noticed her strange reaction and asked if she was alright. It took a few minutes to recover and by then, the pair of teens had already vanished. And with them, that strange feeling. 

Weird, she could have sworn she just sensed the presence of a Greek curse.

Hmmmm. It was probably nothing. She likely just stumbled into one of those cold spots Tim kept ranting about. So they continued their interrogations without further interruption. 

When asking about the ghost attacks seemed to be getting them nowhere, they started asking about the local vigilante. Explaining that they were out of town and doing a report on vigilantes in nearby cities. 

The reactions were mixed at best. 

Some claimed that Phantom was a menace to society and did more harm than good. Others swore that he was a hero, and that the world would never be the same without him. The third party expressed pity, claiming in great detail that Phantom had such a sad story. The last group peeked Cassie’s rumor radar like never before so she dug into it. 

Apparently, it was only recently discovered, but Phantom's soulmate seemed to be living in this very town, which is why he protected it. They only realized because the poor boy was covered in scars after so many of the ghost’s fights. Cassie saw how Kon had unconsciously started rubbing his lichtenberg scar, currently hidden by his leather jacket, once the topic turned to soulmates. She wanted so badly to comfort her teammate and give him a big hug. She knew how much he had been thinking of his own soulmate recently. At the thought, Cassie subconsciously rubbed a small scar on her thumb where her own soulmate had cut it when she was six. She was lucky her soulmate wasn’t as accident prone as Kon’s or she would likely be in the same boat as him. Constantly worried. But they couldn’t focus on that at the moment. 

The information they were gathering was important. She didn’t know how yet, but she was sure Tim could get something from it. Unfortunately, they didn’t get any more information on the supposed soulmate of Phantom, but people were more than willing to share their knowledge on the ghost himself. Which wasn’t actually that much. The guy just appeared, dealt with whatever ghost was attacking, then disappeared to supposedly lick his wounds. And no matter how hard they looked, no one seemed to know of a way to contact him. The general consensus was that you should just stand around until a ghost attack happened because he was more likely to find you.

They had been talking for a while when Kon suddenly grasped his arm in pain, letting a short hiss escape his teeth. 

Cassie was immediately by his side, excusing herself from a conversation with an old man and comforting her teammate. “You ok?” Her eyes shone with worry. 

“Yeah.” Kon grunted. “Yeah I’m good, just a sting.” He rolled back his jacket to peek at the wound. It was slightly red but didn’t seem like it would scar. Although it was directly over the lichtenberg scars so that probably didn’t feel good. Cassie could tell Kon was pretending it wasn’t affecting him but she knew her teammate by now. They had been asking and receiving the same answers for a while so Cassie felt it was about time they deserved a break. 

And Kon clearly wasn’t in an investigative mood anymore.

The two heroes had decided to take a break at a local snack place called Nasty Burger. Cassie had laughed as Kon’s face scrunched up at the name, but their food wasn’t actually that bad. Still, Cassie didn’t like the sudden silence they found themselves in as Kon slurped his milkshake and poked the bun for his Nasty BLT Burger Supreme. 

“You gonna eat that?” She asked. 

Kon only scrunched his nose up in contempt. “It smells like fire.” 

Cassie peered at the innocent looking sandwich. Besides all the grease making its own lake beneath the burger, it looked harmless. Maybe Kon was just in a bad mood. 

“So…” she started. “You want to talk about it?” Cassie gave a loud slurp of her soda. 

Kon looked at her and then went back to staring listlessly at his food. 

“We’ll find them.” She reassured. It was the only thing she could do. But they would find them. No matter how long it might take. As soon as the Titans finished their current case, she knew all their focus would be diverted to finding Kon’s missing soulmate. She was pretty sure Tim had already started a program to identify the scars on the arms of civilians through CCTV footage. Was that illegal? Eh….the better question would be, was that necessary? In which case, definitely. 

As if reading her mind, Kon gave the demigod a half grin. “I hope so.” He muttered. 

Right at that moment, a loud bang had everyone in the burger joint turning towards the entrance where a panting Tim had slammed open the door. He looked frazzled. Rumpled clothes, leaning against the door frame, and drenched in sweat like he had run a mile. His gaze swiveled around frantically until he finally locked eyes with his teammates and then stood up and walked purposely towards them. 

He grabbed Kon’s arm and in the most serious tone Cassie had ever heard said, “You need to come with me.” Then he just started dragging Kon out of the building. 

“Hey, wait!” Cassie explained, trying to make sense of her teamate’s erratic behavior. Was this it? Had he finally snapped? Had meeting mad scientists unlocked something in him? “Tim? Tim! Hold on!” But he just ignored her as he resolutely dragged Kon out of the burger joint. Cassie quickly dug into her pockets and slapped down a fifty, hoping it covered their bill and then raced out after them. They hadn’t moved far as it seemed Kon finally snapped back to his senses and refused to move from the front street. No matter how hard Tim yanked and pulled on his arm, the Kryptonian stayed in place.

“Kon you have to listen! This is important. Look I found-“

“KON!” A red and tan blur suddenly crashed into the clone sending him stumbling back and making Tim lose his grip if he didn’t want to faceplant into pavement. Bart was still in his hero uniform and had practically wrapped himself around the Kryptonian like a Koala. Then started muttering rapid fire, making hand motions too fast to follow and speech slurred as he tried to explain...something. Cassie got every fifth word but she did make out his sudden “YOU GOTTA COME WITH ME!” At the end of his tirade. 

“No, he needs to come with me .” Tim interrupted. Cassie could only gap as Tim completely ignored Bart’s hero uniform. You know, something they really shouldn't have , let alone flaunting it in the open. 

She was just thankful no one was outside at the moment. 

“Look, I know your ‘mission’ is important” Bart made quotes with his hands. “But this is serious. Come on Kon, we might still be able to catch him.” Bart grabbed Kon’s right arm and started pulling the confused Kryptonian in the direction he just came from. 

“This isn’t about the mission.” Tim hissed as grabbed the clone’s other arm. “Kon, listen, I found a lead on-”

“Oh it’s not about the mission? Then it’s even less important.” Bart ranted over Tim. Then they started arguing and yanking at the poor clone and Cassie figured this was probably a good time to step in. She tried to get between them but the squabbling had turned to screaming and shouting over each other, each determined to be heard over the other. 

It ended up with Tim on one side of Kon with Bart on the other, each pulling his jacket so hard it looked like this might finally be the thing to rip it, while both were leaning in to scream in the clone’s ear. Kon was trying to make sense of his situation and all that was happening with Cassie in the middle trying to push the two apart and relinquish their claim on their teammate while using Kon as a jungle gym to do so. 

Boy what a sight they must have made. Cassie was surprised no one had come out of the burger joint to investigate. 

“I’m telling you it’s-”

“You have to go-”

“White hair-”

“Weird gadgets-”

“And the dragon was like-”

“But the fishing line-”

“Ripped right in half!-”

“Saw the scars-”

“They were glowing green- ”

“ENOUGH!” Kon screamed. He ripped himself out of their holds and grabbed each of them by the collar of their shirt to hold them up in air jail like misbehaving puppies. Cassie backed away and silently thanked the universe Kon only had two hands. “Ok, now. What. Happened?” 

“I SAW YOUR SOULMATE!” They screamed in perfect sync. 

“…”

 They slowly turned to face each other. 

“…huh?”