damian, from being confronted about their relationship: have we not established that already. i've been doing our taxes for the past few years?? how can someone get any closer than that???
ohmygod i can't. of course damian would just be comfortable with the way things were already. for someone who just gets damian more than anyone else, it sure took a lot for jon to finally understand that his best friend feels the same way, and i honestly i can't blame him
i love the way you delved into damian's character through jon's eyes!! the way he can see how everything is affecting damian while everyone is just writing him off as an unfeeling asshole. how he just supports damian's decisions and reassures him that he's trying to be the best person he can be, and already accepting him for who he is for already. this is the sort of friendship/relationship that damian genuinely needs even in canon and i love you made that potential into a reality!! the sad thing is how their relationship has deterioted (and it's totally not bc there's no older brother dick grayson trying to make sure that their relationship wouldn't get so very bad. nope.)
it breaks my heart everytime how everything is still terrible and dysfunctional the family is even in an au. probably worse actually. tim isn't even the main focus here but you can just tell the hell he went though from getting the short end of a stick once again.
it's nice to see damian trying with jason though. he knows he can't make up for what he did but he's not letting that take away that second chance, whether it be actually trying to be a brother or finally killing the joker to say he sympathizes. also with the way jason immediately tries to run away when damian and bruce started fighting. noo jason they're doing it because they care about you. (the fact that he casually calls bruce dad now will always be the highlight of this beautiful series)
and jon!! it's nice to see the chemistry between him and connor, how he wasn't cold towards him, but not very friendly either, just civil. and he even tried hinting at it at damian before it got too late. i also love how the entire family's just embraced being a full-on reporter at this point.
You know in my head the taxes thing starts right after the whole 'I love you' exchange which Damian kind of takes as, yep, we're in it for the long haul and Jon barely notices as a gesture since Damian's whole family is in business and Bruce sometimes winds up doing Clark's taxes. I don't think their relationship ever really deteriorates, not even when Jon goes on some dates with other people. They're always going to be friends and partners. Anything else is just extra.
Jason is fun to write in this verse. It's interesting to think of Jason getting adopted into a house where the only other kid around calls Bruce 'Father'. As well as a house that's just suffered a pretty big loss. Even if Damian and Bruce wind up with, in some ways even more friction than Dick and Bruce, I really think having that kind of network around would have changed him a lot. If I wind up revisiting this verse again, I'll have to make sure to have some more Jason. (But alas, Tim and Damian are the fascinating ones to me in the reverse robins universe).
Jon and Conner worked surprisingly well as a counterpoint to Damian and Tim. I need to read some more Superboy in the future.
(The reporter family thing is REAL. You will be accidentally interviewed at the dinner table because they cannot turn it off. It's a problem)
oh my. of course damian took that as a cue to just do their taxes. and jon took it the completely wrong way. hell, he probably shrugged that whole i love you thing off as either a dream or a totally platonoc thing. i can't.
oops. i meant how damian and bruce's relationship deteriorated!! (idk how i could even forgot to mention bruce's name, sorry) it's just that i honestly believe that dick (and everyone else probably) are trying to make sure that damian's relationship with his father doesn't get any worse than theirs did. and now that damian's the oldest, he has no one to back him up or mediate their fights.
yes!! this is the sort of au where jason comes off the best possible way to have a solid good relationship with his dad and his siblings!! i can just see him casually calling damian bro at one point where damian just falls off a ledge or something from completely being taken back. he calls him bro just to either annoy or get something out of it.
but i couldn't agree more! tim and damian has had always an interesting relationship and even on their own, now that their roles are all switched up, damian's just this dude trying to make up for what he did but in a very damian way that tim just takes advantage of this just to be an asshole
I think you're right about Damian and Bruce. Canon!Damian has a certain amount of hero worship for his father and I think the others (especially Dick) want to preserve that and Batman's ideal for as long as possible. The fact that Dick was Damian's first Batman was also kind of huge, because it provided a roadmap for where I think Damian wants to end up in the future. Here... I feel like without Dick around, he's much more torn between Batman's way and Talia's. Contrasting this verse with the way Dick and Batman part ways with canon (Damian leaves but Dick gets fired) I think the issues are... less explosive, but weirdly deeper. Dick's always known he's a good person. Damian struggles with getting there and knows his instincts are often bad. Realizing that Batman isn't always the pinnacle of morality keeps that friction there. It's also the reason Jon becomes his moral check, which is an interesting shift to see. Also, it's waaay more fun to write with friction in the Batfam that with everything going well.
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sunshineofrebellion Sun 12 Aug 2018 01:22PM UTC
Last Edited Sun 12 Aug 2018 01:28PM UTC
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InsaneTrollLogic Sun 12 Aug 2018 09:21PM UTC
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sunshineofrebellion Mon 13 Aug 2018 12:14AM UTC
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