Phantom goes into the bathroom with his suit, preferring not to change in front of us (I don't blame him). Jazz and I sit on the edge of his bed, impatient.
"Well?"
He comes straight through the door, not bothering to open it. As soon as he is in full view, he strikes a ridiculous superhero pose, displaying his suit.
The suit fits him flawlessly, and I have to admit, it does look very comfortable, and it's not stretchy like I thought it would be. He also wears the white/gray gloves half up his forearms, the boots of the same color half up his calves, and a matching utility belt around his waist. I helped with the belt, given my particular expertise for the clothing article.
On his chest, there's the DP symbol, and there's a white collar, but everything else is black.
I clap my hands. Jazz has the biggest smile on her face.
He releases his stance and floats down to us, smiling slightly.
"But wait!" I shout. "There's more!"
Jazz gives me a puzzled look; Danny a curious one.
I jump off the bed and sprint over to a drawer, throwing it open and grabbing the gift inside. It's just a plain white box, because I despise wrapping. I'd hidden it here before the mission last night, but Danny wasn't there when I woke up.
I give him a huge smile as I hold it out to him.
He gives me a confused look and takes it. After pulling off the top of it, he pulls off the tissue paper Alfred had wrapped the gift in.
I watch the bewilderment as he pulls out the sheer black fabric. It comes undone, and I can't contain my smile.
"You got me… a blanket?"
"What, no…" Now I'm confused. "It's a cape."
He lights up. "Really?!"
"Yeah, it's upside down." I seize the clasp and pull it away from him, displaying it right side up. It's black on the outside and white on the inside. I actually used one of Batman's old capes for this, simply taking off the ragged ends and adding a hood and stealth tech to change the color.
The emblem is the DP symbol, of course, and courtesy of Wayne Tech's newest 3D printer.
Danny's eyes shine as I throw it around him, and he pulls the clasp shut. "How did you know I've always wanted a cape?!" he cries, turning around in it and waving his arms to move it.
"Tuck told me," I boast. "Something about two parts of your personality splitting so you could be in two places at once. One part of you used a bedsheet. By the way, that's a special Kevlar-pylon weave, built to be light but durable. So you shouldn't be able to break it."
Shouldn't. But probably will.
"And I didn't get you a mask, because it tends to hurt super-seers rather than help. Y'know, like Superman and Superboy."
"Super-seers?" he snickers.
"Yeah. You can see better than other people, right?"
"Yup! And I can see in the dark."
"Cool," I tell him. "Now let's go meet the team!"
"Um." He gives me a wary look.
"No, it'll be fun! They all helped me get you out of that place, and they've been dying to meet you."
Jazz rolls her eyes.
Danny gives a tight nod, and I frown at his sudden change in temperament. I just give him a big smile and take off to the mission room, where Canary is giving the daily training lesson. Danny easily keeps pace with me, but Jazz opts to walk leisurely behind us.
We enter the room just as Artemis upends Kaldur onto the floor. Her name lights up announcing her victory.
Canary nods approvingly. "Very good Artemis. Remember to keep your fists loose until you throw a punch. You'll over strain yourself. And Kaldur, you're in the surface world. I know it can be difficult to accustom yourself to the air density, but don't punch so hard, you over extend."
They both nod and leave the ring.
"Who's next?" she asks with a grin.
"Hi!" The Team turns to me, including Superboy who I know knew we were already there. "Guys, meet Danny!"
M'gann gives a smile and a wave, Artemis nods once, Superboy folds his arms and the rest of the team actually says hi outloud.
I glance back at him to make sure he's not freaking out. Luckily, he isn't. He looks nervous, but not panicked. He mutters hi, too. Improvement.
"I like your costume," Wally offers. "It doesn't look very comfortable, though. Is it rubber?"
"It's a mix of nitrile rubber, teflon and tyvek. Chemical, biological and nuclear protection. It uses cooling agent between the layers that stiffens when something tries to break the individual layers and also keeps it breathable and cool. So yes, it is very comfortable." He folds his arms to end his speech.
I chuckle. He is so defensive of his suit!
"Anyway, this is the team…" I leave the introduction open ended so they fill it in.
"I'm Miss Martian! But you can call me M'gann. And this here's Superboy!"
Of course she's the first one, and the one to introduce Superboy. I roll my eyes under my mask.
Danny gives them a wave.
"Call me Artemis. And the one who can never shut up is Kid Mouth."
"It's Kid Flash," he corrects with a defensive frown.
"I'm Zatanna." She gives a warm smile to us both. Wink wink.
"You may call me Kaldur, but my hero title is Aqualad."
"And you already know Tucker and Jazz," I tell him. "And you can just go by Phantom, if that's cool."
"Why?" he asks, tilting his head slightly.
"Phantom strikes people more as a hero name."
"When did I agree to get a hero name?" He narrows his eyes at me. "Are you still concussed? Or did I already agree to this?"
"No. I just think you should."
"I don't think that I'm quite ready for something like that…" He reaches up to rub his neck. "I mean, I just got healed and my memory-"
I interrupt. He's starting to blame himself for the memory lost, and he shouldn't. "Let's find out, shall we?" I hold my hand out towards the sparring ring with a hint of challenge. He gives me a wary look. "Unless you don't think you can fight me…"
He raises one eyebrow. "You are going to eat those words."
Laughing, I hop onto the glass, and it recognizes me. Phantom stops hovering and lands on the glass, and it recognizes him too.
"How does it do that?" he asks, looking at his name.
I shrug. "The Cave scanned you when we came." Without warning, I launch forward, feigning a punch before dropping to the ground and sweeping my feet. To my slight surprise, he'd floated back into the air.
Using my momentum, I flip back up and hold my stance loosely, waiting for him to throw the first punch. He just wraps his arms behind his back, smiling smugly.
"You fight me first," I prompt.
"But defense is the best offense," he replies.
I aim a punch at his chest, where his head would be if he were on the ground. "It's offense is the best defense!"
He moves back and then up to avoid the kick I'd sent too. "Eh, they both work."
I send a complex combination of kicks and punches, unavoidable in his current position, but to my surprise they all miss.
With a frown, I poke where Phantom is obviously standing. It's as if he's a mirage; my finger goes right through. "That's not fair," I sulk. "No phasing out."
He shrugs. "Can't help it, that's how I fight."
"Well, fight on this plane of existence," I whine, and he just shrugs, lowering. I throw a punch and it actually lands. And wow, he's hard. Batman said Danny's bones where more durable than a human's, but wow, that's rock solid. Like punching Superboy.
Danny actually throws a punch this time, but I twist and it glances off my arm. I throw two more punches, and he lets them land but swings a kick into my side. Instead of letting the momentum throw me off, I use it to carry me into a backflip, where I land on the balls of my feet. Without breaking the movement, I push off the ground and launch myself at his feet.
He upends over me, but I curl into a somersault and land right back on my feet, Danny collapsed on the ground. I give a huge smug smile, but no victory is announced. Confused, I look down to make sure Danny's actually there.
"Um, I took you out, right?" I ask him, to be sure.
He just gives a huge grin. "Sure ya did. But I'm not the original."
Before I can make sense of his words, my knees are buckled underneath me, and a weight at my shoulder slams me into the ground, knocking the breath out of me. Luckily, it's not hard enough to hit my head, because I am still pretty concussed, as Danny would put it.
But Batman prepares for that with shaded masks and a regular drug dosage, to make sure I don't regress.
I bend my head up, Danny materializing from the air. He smirks at me as the Danny on the ground disappears. The victory appears in the air, handing it to Danny.
He offers his hand and I take it, hopping up. "I had no idea you could duplicate!"
Kaldur nods, a slight smile. "That could definitely come in handy."
"I had no idea you could do that!" I repeat, then laugh, not deterred by my defeat. I will destroy him at another date.
"Neither did I." He frowns.
"My theory was correct!" Jazz exclaims, her eyes shining again. Danny looks at her in confusion. "You have an obsession to be a hero, and if you are a hero, your memories come back! Well, there's a lot more to it than just that, of course, but that's the gist."
"No memories came back," he notes.
"No, but you haven't saved anyone yet."
"But I'm not ready to do stuff like that."
"Yeah, but we don't have time to search for the perfect scenarios and treatments for you. Tucker and I have been piecing together what the GIW have been planning, and we don't know what it is yet, but it's huge. We don't have time to tiptoe. Besides, if you got into it, it'd take you about three seconds to realize it is against your very nature to take things slow. You rival Kid's impulsivity."
He's silent. "I don't know whether to take offense or agree," he mutters, rubbing his neck.
"Would Batman even let us?" Wally asks.
"It's your team," Black Canary tells us. "Besides, it's not like we've ever been able to stop you before."
I snicker behind my hands, and the team has similar responses.
Kaldur glances around the room. "Any objections to Phantom making an addition to our team?"
Danny starts to raise his hand, but I smoothly pull it down for him. The team all shakes their heads, or smiles, or in Conner's case, folds their arms.
"Will you join us, then?" Kaldur asks Danny.
"Um…"
"C'mon," I whine. "What's the worst that could happen?"
He purses his lips. "Sounds like something that was said before I died."
Tucker laughs. Everyone looks at him like he's being insensitive. "What? It just wouldn't be Danny Phantom if he didn't make jokes about his death. By the way, it wasn't exactly what Sam said but it… No wait, wait! I remember, it was 'C'mon, Danny! Aren't you curious?'"
To my surprise, Danny smiles. "Yeah, that seems about right."
"So, c'mon Danny! Aren't you curious?"
Danny folds his arms and rolls his eyes at Tucker. For a few heavy seconds Danny just floats there, before sighing and muttering, "Fine.."
Sorry about that cliche... But I simply couldn't write a crossover without the sparring scene. It's against my inner fangirl.
Anyway, y'all are being so patient! I'm not trying to drag it out, but I don't want it to seem rushed. Hopefully it doesn't seem too long. But I do have almost every loose end attended to, including:
Sam's disappearance (I know I shouldn't spoil it for y'all, so all I'll say is **patience, grasshoppers**),
Danny's human identity (I'm so excited for this it's gonna be great),
his returned memories,
his parents (swear I didn't forget 'bout them),
Vlad,
Axion labs and Wayne Industries' deal
AAAAND
That pretty much covers it. Please please tell me if I missed anything, because that could get really annoying to fix later. And also I think I'm going to put a little Dani clone action in here pretty soon. Should I ship her with anyone? That'd be kind of cool to see.
Anyway, l8rs!
(Wow, that was really lame, don't hate me)