While Danny's fight with him was heavily assisted with the help of other ghosts, and he'd needed to use a suit, he had still been the primary fighter in that fight.
This puts Pariah Dark in a...very odd position after he gets out of the Foreversleep again.
Because this is a baby ghost. This is a child.
Officially, for all intents and purposes, Phantom is engaged to Pariah Dark. He has permission to utilize Pariah Dark's lair, command his servants, use the Ring of Rage or the Crown of Fire, and essentially act on Pariah's behalf when Pariah is out of commission.
Phantom. A child ghost in both form and age.
Pariah may be many things, but a cradlerobber is not one of them.
However, in ghost culture, if he were to turn Phantom away that would be a huge mark of disrespect towards Phantom, his lair, and his Fraid. Phantom would be marked as a target for other powerful ghosts to hunt down, and his Fraid would be hunted for sport, all for the crime of just being a child that was unfamiliar with their customs.
Sure, ghosts are already hunting Phantom for sport, but Pariah Dark does not want turning Phantom away to add to it; the boy's Fraid has remained relatively safe so far. He doesn't want a child ghost to be beaten into his core or that child's Fraid to be shattered because that child ghost happened to be, legally, a runaway child bride. Which is...a whole other disgusting thing and title he refuses to let any child have branded on them courtesy of him, Pariah Dark.
So he changes the rules.
He's Pariah fucking Dark, what, like he can't? Who's gonna stop him?
He decrees that defeating a royal doesn't mean earning a place as their spouse, but instead earns a place in their Fraid.
He decrees Phantom his son. As Phantom is now his son, that means that the Fentons are his kin by extension, and Amity Park/all of Earth a haunt that belongs to his own kin.
So he begrudgingly extends protection over all of it, as well as actually starts doing boring meetings and shit because his new son has, apparently, made a lot of powerful friends in the Zone, and he doesn't want to show discord to the outsiders.
So he'll respect his new son's contacts and alliances.
For now.
But news travels slowly, and Justice League Dark doesn't hear the addendum when they research new hero Phantom.
They find text regarding the old rules.
Just after they've found text essentially confirming that sightings of Phantom in the past were the result of time travel, just after Phantom himself slipped up and said he'd only been dead one year.
To say Diana of Themyscira is furious is an understatement.
She's ready to start a war.
For those who do not know, Wonder Woman is a member of Justice League Dark in it's current member list.
Tim: Bruce, I’m gay
Bruce: oh
Tim: oh?
Bruce: I mean you being gay sort of ruins the entire edgy thing the batfamily has going on
Tim: what?
Bruce: because you’re gay.. you’re happy..??
Tim: when Dick uses the term gay he means something different than me
Dick, poking head into room: no we mean the same thing, I just didn’t want to explain it to him
Tim: no Bruce, I’m bisexual, I’m into men and woman
Bruce: oh, congrats? Me too?
Tim: WHAT?!
Dick: Superman was my co parent at one point I definitely saw them kiss
Tim: again, WHAT?!
Clark’s favourite post-big-mission-destress is using his super hearing to tune in to whatever bullshit Bruce has to deal with on the batplane ride back to Gotham with whatever batkids were on hand during the fight.
Bruce: alright is everybody strapped in-?
Tim: -fucking told you to move up- BRUCE TELL DAMIAN TO SHOVE IT
Jason: oh my god did you see Green Arrow eat shit when that guy shot at him?
Dick: Jason YOU shot him
Bruce: Damian you have to let Tim- Jason that was YOU-?
Jason: hey i TOLD him to move out the way it’s not my fault the bullet ricochetted off a lamppost into his leg-
Bruce: i told you to leave the real bullets at home- TIM STOP HITTING YOUR BROTHER
Duke: WAIT I LEFT MY IPOD BACK AT THE FIGHT
Tim: how am i the one getting in trouble- HES LITERALLY GOT HIS KNIFE OUT
Damian: i told you if you got in my way during the battle you would regret it and WHAT DID YOU DO?!
Stephanie: shut up Damian you were totally about to kick it, Tim saved your ass.
Tim: THANK YOU! AND WHAT DO I GET IN RETURN?
Jason: who the fuck takes an ipod to a fight we literally have bluetooth in the comms
Duke: who the fuck dies to the Joker he’s literally just a guy
Jason: OI-
Stephanie: *cackling*
Bruce: OK- Damian and Tim, opposite sides of the plane! Duke we can’t turn back now, i’ll just have to get you a new ipod-
Dick: BRUUUUUUUUCE JASONS BLEEEEDDDIIINNNNGGG
Jason: shut the fuck up you fucking snitch!
Bruce: WHO’S BLEEDING?!? JASON-
Stephanie: hey Duke can i paint your nails- TIM GIVE ME BACK MY PHONE
Damian: Father, Grayson has passed out
Bruce: WHAT-
Jason: HAH! I WIN THE BET HE FUCKING OWES ME 20 DOLLARS
Tim: what bet?
Jason: we both got stabbed so we didnt tell anyone to see who could stay awake the longest
Bruce: WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT-
Duke: do you guys even understand how many songs i had downloaded on that ipod? it was fucking engraved, man
Stephanie: Damian stop moving your fucking hands you’re gonna mess up the nail polish
Damian: I HAD TO ITCH MY NOSE
Jason: does anyone wanna see the video of Green Arrow eating shit or what?
Tim, Damian, Duke, Stephanie: YES
Bruce: WE HAVE TO GET DICK A BLOOD TRANSFUSION-
-back with the Justice League-
Clark: *sitting back with his eyes closed, a serene smile on his face*
Barry, whispering to Ollie: what’s he doing?
Ollie: i think it’s a post-battle meditation thing, calms him down
Barry: man, i should really start getting some healthier habits. i never bother meditating.
Ollie: he truly is an inspiration to all.
Peter creating like. a jammer. to stop all electronic devices within an area, including even Stark’s tech so that he’s not accidentally caught on a secret device changing in and out of his suit after a close call
And then he gets kind of lazy and just has them stay up in certain areas instead of dismantling and reassembling it every time he changes
Which means eventually someone notices that they’re up there, and it’s incredibly suspicious, and it gets linked back to Peter, and fuck he’s under investigation again for being a supervillain
I like to imagine that he has one set up near the Baxter building cause he hangs out with the Fantastic 4 a lot and it’s Reed who finds the device and starts investigating Peter
i probably wont ever write jaysteph because i dont think they ever date i do think they hook up just once though because he's perfectly stephs type (enormous ego) (closeted as something). i think it's great sex even but i dont think they do it again. My issue as a writer is that i dont actually want to write the sex i just want to write pillow talk. and not sappy pillow talk either. one time i sucked my boyfriend silly and then we had 1.5hrs of Gender Discussion and Slur Discourse. who cares how much they love each other or how good who is at munching whoevers carpet I want to hear about how one time you thought your ex was cheating on you and you went up to him and his date in a huff and it was his mom
Headcanon that bludhaven hates heroes with a flaming passion bc theyre just cops in tights but love Nightwing and therefore vehemently deny his hero status to anyone and everyone.
Like there is no official Nightwing merch bc he’s a criminal he’s committing a crime okay vigilante justice is in fact not legal and he’s not TECHNICALLY on the justice league and he’s NOT TECHNICALLY the leader of the titans anymore. But there are about 400 different Etsy stores that make hoodies, crop tops, joggers, sweats, sunglasses, bracelets, t shirts with nightwings logo or some art of him on them.
Like they love this guy and will get into beef with any Gotham national who tries to claim Nightwing is THEIR hero.
1) hes not a hero he’s a criminal fuck you
2) you have a hero and just bc he’s shit at his job and needs our guy (who is NOT a hero) to help him sometimes doesn’t MEAN SHIT
people are walking around with tiny v shaped blue tattoos or embroidered on clothing but again NOT A HERO BLUDHAVEN DOESNT DO HEROS
There are coffee shops with bad nightwing pun names nightbird, beanwing, nightwinging it and so on
Every third piece of graffiti is this man’s logo
Every sandwich place or fast food chain has a ‘secret menu item’ that’s not actually secret bc everyone orders it and it’s just one of their normal items dyed blue (sodas, desserts, burger buns, condiments so on) some places will sell wings fried in blue panko bread crumbs and call them them ‘nightwings’ ofc these are ALL off the menu you can’t see these items and if you try to order them out of the city you get weird looks.
Superman goes on tv and says Nightwing is one of his favorite hero’s and bludhaven riots. wtf nightwing is your favorite hero you fuckin poser
1) nightwing isn’t a hero he’s a criminal so back off
2) he’s ours you and your frou frou fancy city that hasn’t been nuked by a sentient pile of radiation can fuck RIGHT off
Naturally the only person in bludhaven who is unaware of this is Dick Grayson bc tbh this man is too busy to give a fuck about what his city thinks of him. They trust him to get shit done. Good that’s all he needs okay he has 22 reports he needs to log he’s busy.
Tim Drake professional nightwing fanboy however is fucking furious about this because.
A) dick was a GOTHAM hero FIRST and bludhaven can suck it
B) fuck you nightwing isn’t just a a hero he’s THE HERO and the BEST hero and don’t be rude bc you have a complex
C) all of the cool nightwing merch only ships around bludhaven so has to get it ordered there and it’s just a hassle and he’d pay double he swears just let him get it delivered to where he is please Everytime he stops by bludhaven he leaves with 10 new pieces of nightwing merch and bc he has so much. Damian doesn’t think he notices when some of his doubles mysteriously go missing. He does.
D) since they are anti hero they are firmly unhelpful whenever he or Steph show up bc a case has lead them to the city
The one plus side was watching Jason Todd having a mental breakdown bc apparently in bludhaven redhood counts as a hero and is therefore hated.
“Yous worked with the bat yous a hero thems the rules”
“I KILL PEOPLE”
“Yeah so do cops and people always call them heroes”
“Okay but I kill people to protect the general public I put down scum”
“Cops say they do that too”
“I- okay you know what I’m a hero fine okay. Why isn’t nightwing a hero”
“Vigilante justice is a crime”
“I’m documentably worse than a vigilante”
“But you have worked with the bat”
“For money yeah”
“See you even get paid, face it you’re a hero which means you suck”
“You realize Nightwing has worked with the bat right like way more than I have”
“Listen that ain’t his fault okay, the bats incompetent and so are the rest to you idiots. He’s a nice guy and a good neighbor don’t mean he’s a hero”
“I- what the fuck is in this cities water”
“I don’t fuckin know but it’s prolly better than whatever gothams got in its harbor”
“I- yeah you’re probably right”