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Everyone had a soulmark somewhere on their bodies. It can be for a lover, parent/child, or friends, but regardless the same thing happens when they die. The soulmark will glow for ever after.
Tim and Bruce were out on patrol one night, nothing was happening so they were just watching the city from a roof when there was a sudden bright light. Bruce tackled Tim to cover him but then they both realized where the light had come from. It was Tim’s soulmark. That could only mean one thing, Tim’s soulmate had died. But then it stopped glowing. Both boys looked at each other confused.
~
That night Tim was staying at Wayne Manor so Bruce could keep an eye on him. But while he was there his soulmark started and stopped glowing over and over and over again.
Bruce started searching for any information on why this was happening. They weren’t finding anything. Tim started getting homeschooled to avoid the odd questions about his soulmark and Robin got a new suit that covered every inch of skin so there was no way for anyone to see the soulmark glowing, or any other identifiable things.
~
One day when Dick was at the manor, he walked into the living room where Tim was working on some homework and his soulmark started glowing. Dick having no knowledge of the situation, stops, looks at how unfazed Tim is, and thinks there is definitely something wrong.
Dick sits on the couch next to Tim, ”Hey, Tim?”
“Hmm?” Tim responded.
Dick opened his mouth to speak only for Tim’s soulmark to stop glowing. Now he had other questions, but all he got out was, “What the fuck?”
Tim sighed, “Don’t worry about it Dick, Bruce and I are already looking into it. All I can tell you for sure, is that they are alive…at least right now.”
Dick did not look reassured. But he wasn’t going to push any further.
Bruce had been thinking about soulmarks a lot more after Tim’s had started acting weird so he was thinking about his. The glowing green pattern on his back that matched with Jason, his second son, the one that had died. But as Bruce was looking at it he realized it wasn’t glowing anymore. Was Jason alive?
Bruce told Tim about it. “Look for Jason, I’ll be fine looking for my soulmate on my own,” Tim promised.
Bruce just couldn’t hold it in, he needed to find Jason as soon as possible.
~
But that night they were going on a mission with the Justice League. Dick noticed the new suit and gave Tim a questioning look. Tim just gestured to his face where most of his freckles sat and Dick nearly slapped himself in the face, no shit.
They were up on the watch tower getting the briefing for the mission and then J’onn walked over to Tim. He looked at him before speaking to him telepathically so no one else would hear, “I hate to give you this option but perhaps they are being experienced upon.” If anyone could actually see his expression they would know something was wrong but they couldn’t and so Tim just gave him a thumbs up and walked away. He left the meeting room and took off. That couldn't be what was happening, it couldn’t be. Right, J’onn was just speculating there was no real reason to believe that was what was actually what was happening.
Tim wandered back to where Bruce and Dick were.
“Hey Rob, where’d ya go?” Dick asked.
“J’onn said something and I think it may be helpful for looking into later,” is all Tim said before they all left for the mission.
As soon as they were back in the cave Tim was sitting at the computer looking things up. Dick and Bruce looked over his shoulder to see what he was up to. He was looking up things on human experimentation. They left him to look.
~
Tim had fallen asleep while he was looking and when he woke up his freckles were glowing all over again. He was getting irritated with this, he needed to find them and soon.
However this time was different and they didn’t stop glowing. Tim was getting worried that something had finally gone wrong. But just after midnight the following day they stopped and he felt as though he could breathe again.
The following day Tim was in class with his distance learning teacher Mr. Lancer when his freckles started glowing again. Mr. Lancer gave him an odd look.
“What’s wrong Mr. Lancer?” Tim asked.
He paused for a second still looking at Tim, then he looked out the window and back to Tim, “I just noticed that you freckles glow green every time the ghost boy in our town here shows up.”
Tim shot to his feet so fast he almost knocked over his chair, “What’s the name of your town?” he demanded.
“Amity Park?’ Mr. Lancer replied quizzically.
Tim turned off the computer without another word and nearly ran down to the bat cave. He pushed Dick out of his way as he started frantically typing on the computer. Dick looked over Tim’s shoulder and asked, “What’s Amity Park and why are you looking it up so frantically?”
“Don’t worry about it. If I’m right you’ll know soon enough.” Tim said, not really explaining anything at all.
Minutes later Tim had directions to Amity park and he was off, he ignored Dick as he questioned him, he even ignored him all the way to the bikes. Dick was going to follow him, Tim was acting oddly so he was going to make sure he was ok. They were driving for a long time. All Dick knew was that they were probably going to a place called Amity Park.
Tim knew he was speeding but he didn’t care, if what he had gathered was true than his soulmate might be a resident of Amity Park, a place that is almost swarming with ghosts and a multitude of ghost problems. He had to hope that they would be alive when he got there.
~
Dick and Tim rolled into Amity Park at three am and weren’t confident they would be able to find who they were looking for until the morning so they got a room at a motel and stayed the night.
The following morning Tim was up bright and early only to find his soulmark glowing again. He looked outside and found that there was a ghost attack actively happening. He left the motel and headed in the direction of the commotion. He needed to find his soulmate. That was until the ghost grabbed him. He didn’t know ghosts could do that.
“Hold it right there Phantom or this boy gets it. You wouldn’t want an innocent civilian to get killed because of you? Would you?” the ghost asked, squeezing Tim’s neck just a little bit more.
The other ghost, Phantom, was hesitating. He seemed unsure of what to do. “Don’t worry about me,” Tim tried, but Phantom just looked even more concerned. He was the hero of this city, he didn’t want any of the people here to get hurt, he had read enough about him to know he was no threat to Tim.
Phantom made to move closer to the other ghost and Tim. He paused and looked at Tim again, he gave a smile. Phantom gave a weak smile back before he took off toward the ghost restraining Tim. He punched him in the face and the ghost tightened his grip on Tim’s neck, he couldn’t breath. He would be fine, he’s had worse happen to him before.
~
Dick had noticed that Tim was gone when he woke up. Luckily he had access to Tim's tracker from his phone. So he left the motel and followed the tracker to where he saw a commission in the middle of the street. There were two ghosts fighting, and of course the one person the ghost had decided to make the hostage was Tim. Only thing was Tim wasn’t moving. He wasn’t struggling like one might believe from someone who would usually be able to get out of a hold such as this.
The smaller ghost did something and made the ghost that had Tim vanish. Dick rushed forward and the ghost brought Tim to the ground slowly. Both of them looked concerned. Dick checked to see if Tim was breathing, he wasn’t. Shit. There was no heart beat either. He started giving him CPR. The Ghost apologized and quickly vanished. He seemed to be sulking but he couldn’t linger on that for too long he needed to save Tim.
What felt like forever later Tim gasped. Dick wrapped his arms around him, “Don’t dare do that to me again, you asshole.”
“Sorry,” Tim grumbled, voice hoarse from being strangled to death. Tim noticed that his freckles were no longer glowing. And a boy was standing nearby watching them. Tim made eye contact and the boy jumped and ran off. Who was he?
Dick dragged Tim to a restaurant called Nasty Burger, an odd name for a fast food restaurant but oh well, it was a lot like Batburger in Gotham. So when Tim spotted the same boy from earlier he didn't acknowledge him this time, just watched. The boy was sitting with two other people, a girl and a boy. They looked like friends. He was talking to them, but keeping an eye on Tim.
Suddenly there was an explosion from outside and the boy was gone, Tim’s freckles lit up and the girls and boy that had been with the other boy looked shocked in Tim’s direction. Dick looked at Tim quizzically, “What’s up Timmy?”
“I think I found him,” Tim said, getting up from his seat and leaving the restaurant. He followed the sounds of battle until he spotted the same ghost as before as he made the other ghost disappear. He watched as Phantom took off to the north. He followed as well as he could without being spotted.
He watched as Phantom slipped between two buildings and as he was facing the opposite end of the alleyway and then there was a glowing white ring around Phantom that split in two one traveling down to his feet the other over his head and now standing there was the black haired boy he had seen earlier. Additionally, just as the boy changed Tim’s soulmark stopped glowing.
“I guess that explains why you keep dying and then not dying,” Tim said leaning against the wall next to him. The boy worried around dropping into a ready stance like he was fully prepared to fight Tim. Then he seemed to notice who it was.
“Oh, so…I guess, hi,” the boy offered, a smile across his face.
Tim walked over to him, “Hi, I’m Tim, and I believe I am your soulmate.” Tim offered his hand for the boy to shake.
“Danny, nice to meet you,” the boy, Danny said.
“So, why do you keep dying though? I mean you were a ghost, now you are very clearly not?” Tim was very confused.
“Heh, yeah, why don’t we go back to the Nasty Burger and we can talk there. My friends will be more helpful in explaining.” Danny said, offering Tim his and for them to walk back together.
They walked back to the Nasty Burger together and instead of Tim going back over to Dick he joined Danny and his friends at their table. But Dick noticed them and walked over.
“What’s going on over here?” Dick asked, standing behind Tim.
“I found him,” is all Tim said. No further elaboration.
“Hmm, can you make him stop dying?” Dick asked. Tim just rolled his eyes and Dick pulled over another chair to join them.
Danny raised a questioning eyebrow. “This is my older brother Dick, don’t mind him,” Tim said in response.
“Ok. Sam, Tucker, This Is Tim, my soulmate,” Danny said.
“I mean we figured when you ran off and his freckles lit up like a Christmas tree,” Sam chided.
“Ok, now can you explain to him why I keep dying? You know I suck at trying to explain it,” Danny pleaded.
Sam rolled her eyes, “Danny’s parents are scientists, they were trying to create a portal to another realm, a place full of ghosts. They weren’t being very successful. They were about to give up. However, the three of us were in the lab looking at stuff and I dared Danny to go into the portal door and he tripped on something. He tried to catch himself before face planting on the ground when his hand landed on the on button that was for some reason inside where the portal to this other realm formed. So he was inside the portal when it opened meaning he died in the realm, but not the other one. So now he can change between human and ghost. So he technically dies all the time. That’s probably why your soulmark keeps glowing.”
Tim just nodded along with her. He was silent for a long moment before he spoke, “Well, that was dumb. Why the hell would the on button be inside the portal?” the baffled looks on the Amity Park residence were completely missed by Tim, “Also going in it in the first place was a terrible idea really Danny.”
Tim and Dick convinced Danny to let them come over to his house. And he eventually did. Tim and Dick talk to Maddie and Jack Fenton to see just how Danny’s home life is after how resistant he was to have them come over. They were staying in Amity Park for a couple more days.
Over those next few days when they learned that Danny’s parents were straight up trying to kill him whether they knew it or not.
~
Then Maddie Fenton actually managed to shoot Phantom the very day Tim and Dick were planning to leave. Tim and Dick had been walking down the street when it happened. They had just heard the spiel about ripping “The Ghost Boy” apart molecule by molecule from Danny's parents earlier that day and when they saw the green light from one of the Fenton’s gun zoom past them followed by a scream they both turned and there was Danny lying in a heap on the ground. They ran over as Dany transformed back into Danny Fenton and Maddie Gasped.
‘Shit,’ Tim thought. They needed to get Danny out of there and somewhere he could get medical attention. So, Tim scooped him up into his arms and took off with Dick following him. They went for the Motel they were staying at and quickly dressed Danny’s wound. He wouldn’t let go of Tim’s shirt though. He could see the terror in Danny’s expression as he sat with Danny on the bed.
“Hey, Danny,” Tim said, getting his attention. “What if you came back to Gotham with us? Instead of going back to that house.” Danny looked at him. His eyes got wider.
“Really?” He asked meekly.
“Of course,” Tim said softly. Without warning Danny surged forward and kissed Tim. Tim didn’t even hesitate to kiss him back. Dick left the room.
Danny pulled out his phone and sent a text to Sam and Tucker.
‘Been compromised, going with Tim and Dick. I hope to see you again,” Danny sent.
The three of them left for Gotham, Danny had written down his sisters, Sam, and tuckers phone numbers before leaving his phone in the motel room.
Tim had Danny in-front of him on the bike so when Danny passed out he could keep in secure.
When they showed up to Wayne Manor they heard yelling, and it wasn’t from Bruce. Tim ignored it and took Danny to his room.
~
Dick followed the sound of yelling, it was Bruce and a man he didn’t quite recognize from the back. Dick walked around to stand next to Bruce but stopped when he could see the guys face well enough, “Jay?” Dick really hoped he wasn’t seeing things right now.
The man turned to look at him and sighed, all the fight he was using against Bruce gone. “Yeah Dickie, it’s me.” He spread his arms so Dick could wrap him in a hug.
It was almost ten minutes before Dick calmed down and could finally tell Bruce what he needed to, “Uhm, Bruce, FYI, there is going to be someone staying with us for the foreseeable future. He is Tim’s soulmate and he is actively injured, though I believe he will be fine by morning.”
“Timmy found his soulmate?” Jason asked.
“Yep, and I know why he kept dying,” Dick said, rolling his eyes like whoever it was, had just as much self preservation skills as Tim did.
“I’m glad he found them.” Bruce said.