Chapter Text
They all woke up in the afternoon and then left his and Danny’s bedroom. Jaydan and Ellie padded across to their rooms to freshen up quickly, as he and Danny did as well. Danny finished first and, with a soft lingering kiss, left him to make comfort food, likely some more scotcharoos.
He turned over in his head how he would tell them all the things he had learnt from Dick last night. Soon enough his shower was over, and he got dressed, and Danny was cutting a fresh pan of scotcharoos. Cryo-kinesis rocked. He walked over to the couch and plopped himself down, half laying on it, knowing Danny would be there in a moment to cuddle into him.
Jaydan was already sitting cross-legged on the loveseat to the right, like he preferred, with a thick sherpa blanket tossed around his shoulders. Ellie was on the right in the big plush chair petting Mallow. Mallow had been her fifth birthday present, picked up from the shelter and named marshmallow but baby talk slurred it, and Mallow was the de facto name, much like no one called Danny Daniel unless it was a formal first meeting. The kitten had gotten darker as it grew and now looked more like a slightly over-roasted marshmallow that was burnt in places. He had joked about renaming Mallow to Toast once, and Ellie had cried, “Why does Papa wan Tata to hate Mallow?” It was adorable, but well, no renaming the kitten.
Once Danny came and sat with them, curled up into his arms, he started.
“After you all fell asleep, I went digging, and I emailed Dick Grayson Wayne directly. We talked for a bit, mostly apologizing for his youngest brother, Damian Al Ghul Wayne.”
Ellie gasped, “Wait, like Aunt Talia, and Great Grandpa Ra’s?” she screamed
“Yes, Ellie, he’s Aunt Talia, and Bruce Wayne’s son. He is 15, a year older than you, and none of them knew that their oldest brother Richard, or Dick, whom Bruce adopted when he was nine after someone killed his parents, had a sibling. Damian bought a poster from 1990 announcing Sparrow and Damian thought it was Dick's mother joining their circus act.” He held Danny tighter as he wondered if this was at the core of the deep - seated fear of the circus. Danny would need time with a therapist again after this.
“He and his brother Timothy or Tim used a sample of Dick’s DNA to look for a family. Dick is 11 years younger than Tata. I told them we had never known Tata was adopted. The people who had taken him in until he was 15 said nothing, and authorities never mentioned records or adoption when he went into foster care after that.”
“Apparently we should go visit the local detachment, Ellie; your DNA filled in your map with Tata. And filling Tata out matched with data they had on a child who went missing at 16 months old. Your DNA on the site matched too Dicks as a niece.”
Jayden’s face scrunched up. “So Tata’s a missing person?” He asked
“Yes, they have listed Tata as missing since he was 16 months old.”
“So Maddie and Jack aren’t our grandparents? Someone else was? And now we have a bunch of new uncles?” Elie asked
“And aunts. You guys know that Tata was born with fragile bones? What I was able to put together with their help is that shortly after Tata was born, they broke their wrist. The doctors were worried Grandpa John or Grandma Mary had hurt him. Because they lived in a traveling circus, they moved a lot, so when Tata got hurt, they went to different hospitals, and the doctors called the Department of Child and Family Services.” He couldn’t help but take a big breath and let it out to steady himself for this next part.
“At 13 months old, they abandoned Tata at a hospital with another broken wrist. After multiple ER visits for broken bones, grey eyes and his trouble crawling, they diagnosed Tata with osteogenesis imperfecta type O1. Then, from the special orphanage, they were placed until Tata went missing. Jack and Maddie registered Tata for daycare nine weeks later. What happened in between we have no idea, might be able to have a lawyer question them about it after we go and get the DNA match confirmed by police.” he finished what he’d been able to dig up on his love's history they had had no idea of. He pulled Danny closer, kissing his love’s head.
“Well now we know why I never really looked like Jack or got as big as Jazz did or anything.” Danny snarked, and the kids chuckled.
They stayed there eating the scotcharoos for a little before it came up again.
“So what's going to happen now? Are we gonna meet them?” Jaydan asked nervously.
“I spoke to Dick. He was sorry, and he wanted to meet. They live in Gotham; apparently, they're those Waynes. So we should be careful. I set up the meeting to be in two weeks in Happy Harbor. Honestly we mostly just worked on figuring out what happened with Tata,” he admitted.
“Okay, let’s get everything set up, and we'll go to Happy Harbor the day before to relax and get a lay of the land and meet them.” Danny said.
The next two weeks were full of interviews with lawyers and police and even more phone calls trying to figure out what happened between Danny going missing and the Fentons having him. They held tight that they had just found him in the GAV and decided to keep him. Clockworth said he could show Danny if he wanted, but he felt it was better not to . Just because you had access to information did not mean it was information you needed or would serve you. He went to Tucker after that to piece his feelings together there. In the end, they decided they didn’t want to know and left it. Clockwork may be a cryptic bastard, but he was the best and only grandpa Danny ever had, so they all trusted him. Finally it was time. Two weeks had gone by, and they were at the cafe in Harbour Waiting for Dick, Barbara, and Damian. It might seem odd, the group they had selected, but Dick was his brother and Barbara his fiancée. Damian was a cousin as well, and he would need to tell him about that. A knot formed in his stomach, a cold sweat prickling his skin as the weight of the impending conversation settled upon him. His core jittered in anxiety against his ribs, a frantic buzzing against the quiet hum of the cafe, and he had to consciously unclench his jaw. The kids weren’t much better, and he was trying for them, but now he was meeting them. He hoped he could get the words out without tripping over himself. Jayden and Ellie, fidgeting with their straws and exchanging nervous glances, received a glance from him as well. He offered them a reassuring smile, a silent promise that he’d navigate this minefield as carefully as possible.
A chime announced someone entering, and his heart leaped into his throat. He stood, forcing a smile he didn’t feel, and prepared to face his family–and the truth. Sure enough, there was an average - height man, built like a professional acrobat with black hair and blue eyes, just like Danny's. His face was a little more square, and his eyes a little more down turned but the resemblance was clear. Beside him was a woman with short red hair who looked shockingly like Jazz except she had spring green eyes, not teal. Following behind, clearly trying to hide his nerves, was Damin. He felt it in his core and saw Ellie and Jayden perk up as well. Liminal. The green of his eyes, the smell of sewer as he got closer. Damian had been put into one of those pits of Waste Ecto that kept trapping ghosts and putrefying in the ever-present hate and anguish. He braced himself, ready to speak, and stuck his hand out.
“Hi, you must be Dick. I’m Danny.” Dick grabbed his extended hand carefully to shake, then let go.
“This is my husband, Tucker, and our kids. Jayden is 29, and he works mostly with vetting and screening all the charity’s Spectre supports and setting up the ones we run ourselves. And our daughter Estelle, though she prefers Ellie.”
All of them clocked the shock of Dick’s family looking at the kids, especially Ellie. She looked nothing like Danny other than the shape of her face and eyes, with her Sienna skin, and tightly coiled ebony hair up in space buns. Even her eyes were Tucker’s, a deep ocean blue instead of Danny's pale ice-blue. And as much as Ellie was Tucker's baby girl, Jaydan was Danny’s baby boy. Danny imagined Dick felt like he was looking at a picture only a few years behind. Ice-blue eyes and pale skin with a hint of olive undertones, fluffy, curly black hair cut short but still shaggy, the square of his jaw and the point to his nose even slightly crooked, it was almost funny that both had crooked noses. Jaydan had gotten into a fight at school, and he wondered if Dick had done the same.
“It's nice to meet you all,” Barbara had broken the silence.
This may have been another case where fifteen years was the longest they could go before things went to honeycombs, but it always ended well. Danny was happy to meet his new family. Finally the Knot in his chest and the buzzing of his core settled as he sat and got to know them and made plans to meet up with the others. Damian was so nervous. Tucker’s wish was for Damian to accompany Dick and Barbara to meet them before they introduced them to all the Waynes. They wanted it to be small and relaxed, and the Waynes all together drew a lot of attention.
Why Tucker had asked for him. Then, as they entered the agreed-upon cafe. He saw them.
An older and softer-looking version of Baba, a boy who looked like Baba had when he had first been sent to father. An African American man and teenage girl.
Danny stood and greeted them. Baba was being especially gentle, like he was with newborn kittens. Would he need to be that soft? He’d never been gentle with people before; if anything, everyone he knew was tougher than normal, not softer. Ellie looking up shocked him out of it all. With the surrounding aura, it was clear she was Danny’s, but you wouldn’t know looking at her.
As they talked, they realised the personalities were flipped. Ellie may look like Tucker's miniature in female form, but she was Danny’s in intellect and interests. Jaydan, as much as he looked like a copy of Danny, was Tucker's in intellect and interests. Barbara got along with them well, and he noticed Danny trying to steer Baba to speak to him and Danny trying to get him to talk to Ellie.
“Do you like swords?” he asked her and saw her light up.
Soon enough, he had been so lost in the conversation that he hadn’t realised they had left the coffee shop and were walking into a restaurant that was empty other than their family. Clearly, Dick and Danny decided it was time to meet everyone.
Baba pulled him aside. “Thank you, Dami, for the best birthday gift ever.” With a ruffle of his hair, he continued walking. It wasn’t the gift Damian had intended to give Baba, but it seemed it was even better.