Drabble 20-"Cousins"
Danny was nervous.
Today was the day his friends-his new family-met a member of his old family. He had worked so hard to keep the two separate. Especially since his parents are hunting him down. Apparently they can accept the fact that he's bisexual, but not the fact that he's half-ghost. Typical.
He never told them about Dani because of what would have obviously happen, but he knew Valerie would do her best. She and Dani had become as thick as thieves ever since he had to leave Amity because it had gotten so bad there. The ghosts had more or less stopped hunting him when they realized that's what his parents had been doing. In fact, Skulker even offered him his lair to stay at once. Danny had taken Clockwork's offer instead.
But now he was with the Avengers, and his parents had learned the hard way not to come near him or Sam and Tucker, who had been granted rooms at the Tower. Along with being Danny's closest friends, they were also great additions to the team.
After all that he was really hesitant about bringing Dani into the spotlight. But fate (or Clockwork) has that special way of punching him in the face repeatedly until he loses some of his teeth.
And then Dani had saved his loser but from the bad guy. Stark was already setting up a dentist appointment when Danny and Dani had finally picked off the rest of the bad guys. Now they were at the Tower, both of them under the other Avenger's intense stares.
"Who is she?" Steve asked. He was already mad about Danny at sixteen fighting and saving the world ("Seriously, dude, it's okay! I've been doing this since I was fourteen!"), but this girl didn't look to be more than maybe fourteen. She was really small so it was hard to tell. But she was obviously younger than Danny.
"We're cousins," Dani answered before he could, crossing her arms over her chest defiantly, looking Steve up and down. Almost as if she was challenging him to doubt her.
"Cousins?" Tony said skeptically, raising an eyebrow. There was no way. Not even cousins looked that alike. "Yeah. Okay. Now why don't you tell us the truth."
"Dani, it's fine. They're pretty chill with this kind of stuff," Danny said, placing a hand on her shoulder. Dani relaxed her stance but she still kept her guard up.
"Wait, your name is Danny too?" Clint asked through his sandwich.
"Dani with an i," Danny explained. "She's my clone."
Clint choking on his sandwich would have had him laughing if it weren't for the serious atmosphere. Tucker snorted once, but he was always really bad with the right moments and what not. That's why Sam was there to elbow him.
"Clone?" Steve was shocked. He was unbelievably mad. He was starting to see red, not because of Dani and Danny but because of the person who would put children through that sort of thing.
"Well, Steve, you can thank Plasmius for that. He's been trying to clone me for years now. Dani here was the only one that lived. And had enough of me in her to realize that Vlad is a crazy fruitloop." Danny said Vlad's name with such venom that it almost intimidated them. But Sam, bless her, gave Steve a reassuring arm squeeze that told him they would tell him the whole story later. Then she stepped forward with a big, playful grin on her face.
She put Dani in a headlock and ruffled her hair, laughing as the smaller girl struggled. And just like magic, the tension in the room mostly disappeared. Danny couldn't help but be thankful.
"So," Sam started as she finally let go of Dani, "How was Europe?"