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"There is an expression in the Wasteland: 'Old World Blues'. It refers to those so obsessed
with the past they can't see the present, even less the future, for what it is."
— Doctor Mobius and Doctor Klein, Old World Blues
The day starts no different to any other. He wakes, hits snooze half a dozen times in a valiant attempt to fool his brain into thinking he doesn't have to get up for work. Eventually he rolls out of bed and pads through to the shower, sliding under the hot water with a tired groan, one hand driving his toothbrush, the other lazily dealing with his morning wood.
Never let it be said he can't pat his head and rub his stomach at the same time.
He throws on a suit and shoves a granola bar into his mouth and it's off to work, where he's sure Jeryn will take him to task for not taking better care of himself, since he knows he looks like shit. (Jeryn does, can tell with just a look that Danny hasn't slept through the night for a week running, and Danny has to promise tomorrow he'll go to the doctor for sure, for a check-up, really, Jeryn, he will, don't worry.)
So the day goes as expected; he fields Jeryn's worries and hides in his office and does as little work as possible until he can escape. It’s not that Danny doesn't like working; he does, just... he's tired and he'd finally fallen asleep just as his alarm went off, and he thinks, come on, he's the boss. Surely he can take a few days off, right?
Except lunchtime tomorrow is already booked up with an international video conference that he's postponed three times this week alone. And he's the boss.
Argh.
He's already thinking of his bed as he heads home—his lovely, comfortable bed, with his lovely, comfortable 1000 thread count imported sheets, and Danny's not hugely fussed on the expensive shit, but if it can help him sleep...
It's these thoughts that distract him, and he's in the wrong place at the wrong time as a kid comes barrelling out of an alley, eyes wide and bloodshot and glowing, hair standing on end.
"Help me!" the kid cries but even as he speaks he's swinging his fist at Danny.
Danny's never seen the kid before, but there's something about him that gets under Danny's skin (a shrill buzz almost higher than the threshold of hearing, the same spine-crawling noise that's kept Danny from sleeping this past week and that he tore his apartment apart to try and find). The kid doesn't appear to have any great special power; tank villains with super strength are a dime a dozen and normally Danny wouldn't have a problem putting a kid like this on his ass.
Normally.
Danny coughs and spits bloodily against the concrete. This kid doesn't know who he's picked a fight with. Danny might look like any other suit, but he can take a punch better than—
No—
Fuck.
The kid's got super speed too, something that lets him slip under Danny's defences, and somehow Danny can't seem to pull himself together, he can't seem to focus his chi, and where he could end this with a single punch, he finds himself—as embarrassed as he is to admit it—being pummelled into the pavement. Luke is never going to let him live this down.
Last thing he remembers is a kick to the head and a bright, bright light.
-
Danny wakes. He's warm and comfortable, and for some reason there's a body pressed against his back and another curled around him from the front. He can tell who the person is behind him is, and he'd know the one in front even with a blindfold on, in the dark, both hands tied behind his back. Suspended upside down. Over a snake pit. (Not that he's speaking from experience or anything.)
What he doesn't know, however, is why he's the meat in a Cage-Jones sandwich.
Jessica stirs when he does and presses a sleepy kiss against his bare shoulder. Danny freezes. "Everything okay?" she asks her voice low and warm.
"Um."
Then Luke stirs and his hand, which Danny hadn't noticed pressed against his lower back, slides down to grip his ass as Luke shifts to kiss Danny right smack on the mouth.
Danny recoils. "Whoa," he says. "What?"
"Luke," Jessica scolds sleepily. "Not yet. He's only just out of hospital." Luke makes a grumbly noise of dissatisfaction, which would be familiar to Danny in any other situation. The way he noses in to trail his mouth along the line of Danny's jaw is distinctly not.
"What?" Danny says again stupidly.
"D'you need anything?" Luke asks. "You feeling better at all?"
"Uh. I... don't... know?" He doesn't remember anything other than going to work, and Jeryn's fussing, and the tiredness that seemed to come from his very bones. Something obviously happened to him—or he's losing his mind—and there's an ache in his head, in his cheek, in his ribs.
It's only buffer of Luke's presence against the strangeness of the situation that keeps him grounded, despite the fact Luke's still got his hand on his ass and just kissed him. Wait, no, he's—he can't deal with that either.
"Excuse me," he manages, and bolts from the bed.
-
He locks himself in the bathroom, safe in the knowledge Luke won't kick down a door in his own house.
-
"You sure you didn't get brain damaged from that fight yesterday?" Luke asks, his brow crinkling in a frown as he picks splinters out of Danny's hair. They're sitting on the couch in the family room. Danny can hear Jessica in the nursery soothing Dani's grizzles. "You ain't making a lick of sense."
"Luke, I don't have brain damage—this isn't—" Danny stops, presses his fingers to the bridge of his nose. "This—all this—is not familiar to me," he says. He gestures around this place that's, god, it's meant to be their home, full of Luke' things and Jessica's things and Danny's things all jumbled together. "This is not my home. I don't live here. Luke, I live in an apartment a couple of blocks from Rand International. By myself. Not with you and Jess and I sure as hell don't—"
He has to stop, take a deep breath and reach deep inside for the calm that'll help him try to understand what on earth has happened. Because from where he stands, none of it makes any sense.
"Hey," Luke says gently. Danny knows that tone; with Jessica, with Dani, with himself when things haven't been going so well. Luke reaching out, though... Danny leans back, hands raised.
"Fine," Luke says, raising his hands in surrender. "Let me get this straight. You got hit on the head, and now you're telling me that you don't live with me 'n Jessica 'n our adorable baby girl. Brother, if that ain't brain damage..."
Danny looks at the photos in the frames next to him. There's one where he's asleep on this very couch holding the baby, not long after Dani was born. She's curled up in the crook of his arm butt-naked, and they're both asleep. He picks the frame up and Luke takes that as encouragement, reaching out touch the frame. "You remember this...?"
The hope in his voice saddens Danny. "No. I don't." He hands the frame to Luke. "Because this isn't me," he says quietly. He gestures at the livid scar on the abdomen of the Danny in the photo. "I don't have that, for starters." He hitches the hem of the t-shirt he pinched from the basket in the bathroom and points to his unmarred flesh.
The way Luke backpedals is so awful Danny can't help but laugh in self-defence and that, of course, gets Luke on his guard like he thinks Danny's possessed or under mind-control, which given their line of work is never a stretch. "Sorry," Danny wheezes. "God, sorry Luke, but the look on your face..."
"This some kinda joke? You got make up covering that scar—"
"No," Danny says, sobering suddenly. He doesn't want Luke to think it's a great big joke. "No, I haven't. I just—I'm sorry, this is really not funny at all. I'm not your Danny, Luke. I'm—I'm a Danny, and I have a best friend who is a Luke Cage, but it's not you."
Luke's gaze skips down to his side, where the lack of a scar burns beneath a thin layer of cotton. He swallows and nods once. "What's the last thing you remember?" he asks, like he's actually entertaining Danny’s words as truth.
"That kid. Yesterday. The fight." He knows that happened, because he still wears the bruises.
Luke looks thoughtful. "Wonder if it was somethin' to do with the energy signature that kid was broadcasting. Reed Richards even came down out his goddamn ivory tower to find out what was going on. We found you at ground zero, flickering in and out like—" He stops, looks at Danny with wide eyes. "That musta been when it happened. The kid was tripping balls on the highest dose of MGH they've ever seen someone take."
"And there are mutants with teleportation."
"Yeah, and some have had the power to cross realities."
"Maybe that's what happened to me." Danny scrubs at his face.
Luke shoots to his feet and that's when Danny realises that he actually believes him. That Luke, no matter the universe, will always believe him, even if the circumstances might seem too outrageous at first. "We gotta talk to Richards," Luke says. "He was the one investigating it - what happened to the kid, and to you, I mean." They dress in a hurry (Danny's things in the wardrobe alongside Luke's and Jessica's) and barely take time to say goodbye to Jessica who looks confused but not entirely unsurprised at their behaviour as Luke bundles him out the door.
It's late fall here, Danny can tell by the crispness in the air, when it's still summer back home. "What year is it?" he asks and then, "wait, don't answer that," because he's not sure he wants to know. Luke gives him a look, that - okay, it's clear Luke believes there's something wrong here, that this could really be happening. But still, Danny doesn't blame Luke for giving him a look like he's still not entirely sure Danny's not pranking him. It wouldn't be the first time. Not like this, of course, but... they tease each other, it's what they do.
"This way," Luke says, his hand resting a brief moment on the small of Danny's back.
It's easy to fall into step with Luke. It always has been.
-
"It's true," Reed says excitedly. "You're not from around here." He's got his limbs stretched all over the place for absolutely no reason at all that Danny can tell.
"Can you get me home?"
"Hm," Reed says, tapping his chin with one grossly distorted finger. "Let me call Tony."
-
Jessica calls Luke halfway through the tests, but Danny can't focus on that, because he's still being poked and prodded, losing blood to further examination as he's constantly bombarded with questions. "What is the last thing you remember? What did you see? What do you remember happening? What did you see?"
It's reminds him of—
"Danny, are you okay? You've gone as white as a ghost," Tony says.
Luke bulls in and pushes Reed and Tony aside. Given it's Luke, it's not really difficult. "That's enough for today," he says and manhandles Danny out of the examination chair. "I'm taking him home."
"But—" Reed whines but Tony interrupts him.
"We have enough to start work. If we need anything else..."
"Call me," Luke says but Danny doesn't focus on any of that. All he can think of is Who are you working with? Where is Daredevil? Where is the underground resistance located? Tell us Captain America's plans, and Tony Stark coming by to try and convince him to register, even after the silver dollar. Judas. Tony offered the carrot; Danny knew what the stick was.
"You okay?" Luke asks, guiding him into the elevator.
Danny means to nod but shakes his head instead. He's shaking, because he hadn't expected to be overwhelmed like that. He grips the rail in the elevator car and presses his forehead against the glass, steadying his breathing. It's not easy, but it's not impossible, either. He hasn't had to expend this much effort to quiet his mind since the Thunderer first taught him to meditate.
He needs time alone. He feels Luke's hand against the small of his back again and his thoughts scatter. "Let's get you home," Luke says.
-
They have a quiet room set aside for him, back at the house. Just for him. Danny tries to meditate, but instead ends up doubled over, clutching at his gut. He wonders if he's ruptured his appendix because it hurts, but the pain isn't in the right location. He lifts his shirt, terrified of what he'll see, but his skin is still unmarked.
That makes it hurt even more.
-
Luke says to him, "You look like him, but I can tell you're not now. You're... you're my old Danny from before we worked this thing out. You still got that fear everything's gonna be taken away from you in your eyes. And not just 'cause you've gone and got yourself swapped into another reality." Danny can't meet his gaze.
"What are you two talking about?" Jessica says from the doorway. "Where did you run off to this morning?"
Luke hesitates, and then says slowly, "Jess... this ain't our Danny."
"Luke..." Jessica says uncertainly. But she trusts Luke, and suspicious look she throws Danny and the way she turns slightly, an automatic mother's movement as if to protect the baby in her arms, breaks Danny's heart. No matter what reality he's stuck in, he'd never do anything to hurt that baby girl.
"We think there was somethin' with that kid on MGH the other day. This... it's Danny, right, but he's from another reality. You can still trust him," he adds. "He's still Danny."
"How do I know?"
Danny swallows and slowly stands. He holds up his hands, palm out, and approaches her carefully. They've never talked about this in any reality; not after she shamed him so thoroughly with a lie. But this... it's something she'll know, and Luke won't, but he's still—even now—too ashamed to say it loud enough for Luke to hear, even if this isn't his own Luke.
She watches him suspiciously, her grip on Dani tightening as Dani reaches for him.
"No, baby," Jessica says, pushing her hands down.
He speaks low, so Luke can't make out the words. Hopes it happened here as it had happened there. "You once lied to Luke. For me. Said I was looking after you when I really wasn't. He was hurt and I was—I wouldn't let you see him, 'til Misty made me."
It's the right thing to say because she relaxes immediately. He's surprised when she throws her arm around his shoulders. When she pulls him close, Dani bubbling happily between them. "I didn't do it for you," Jessica says against his neck. "I did it for him."
"I— I know. You told him you love him and he told you he loved you and I—god, I've never felt like such a shit before in my life."
"I know." She eases back a little, looks at him searchingly. "I know why you did it and I forgave you. I'm sure your Jessica did too. You shouldn't still hold onto it."
"I'm not holding on to it."
"Oh, really—" she starts sarcastically, but is interrupted when Luke clears his throat loudly.
"So you believe it's Danny?"
Jessica nods. She carefully hands him Dani, and he ducks his head so she can't see the tears that prickle in his eyes. "Ne-ne," Dani says happily, grabbing at his chin.
-
A couple of times he goes into Rand International, which little resembles the company Danny's dad had built. Jeryn doesn't pick him for anyone other than the Danny Rand he knows, and it's easy enough to pretend this could be the same Jeryn he's always known, even if he talks about things Danny doesn't understand in the slightest.
Since when has his company been a charitable organisation?
Work is confusing, to say the least. Home is worse.
Even though both Luke and Jessica both know he's not their Danny, there are still moments. Like the time Jessica grabs him on the butt on the way past to the kitchen and then they both have to pretend she didn't, or the time Luke went in for a kiss and then had to turn it into an awkward bro-hug. There are enough moments like these for Danny to realise that the three of them are incredibly close.
That him waking up in bed with the two of them is par for course, and not a rare thing because they'd thought their Danny injured. It makes his heart trip and skip in his chest.
(He sleeps in the spare room now.)
Danny wonders how his other self is coping. He's gone from a life with everything to... Okay, look, Danny's not one for wallowing in self-pity, but in comparison to what the other Danny has here, the poor guy has gone from everything to nothing. Even Danny can recognise how empty his own life is in comparison.
He tries not to hold Dani too tightly. She wriggles in his arms and touches his face and says, "Ne-ne!" He wonders if that's him.
"Is that how you say 'Danny'?" He supposes Daddy and Danny would be a little confusing at her age. She's not quite up to saying his name back home, although it's not for the lack of Luke’s encouragement. Danny guesses if he spent even half the time with her there as this Danny would here, it might be different.
"Ne-ne," she says as if in agreement, before yawning suddenly.
"C'mon, babygirl," he says, "let's put you down for a nap."
She's not keen on being put down and starts to yell as soon as he lets her go. Some things haven't changed and he still can't stand making her cry, so he picks her up again. She dozes off as he prowls through the house. He's not deliberately snooping, but it's the first time he's been left alone without Jessica or Luke hovering and it's interesting to see how Luke, Jessica and the other Danny fit together.
He finds the photos intriguing, as it gives him an idea of how the family works. A lot feature Misty and Colleen. Some are even of Luke and Jessica, and Danny and Misty, and he suspects, given the way Misty and Colleen are towards each other in some of the other photos, to keep the family respectable Misty will play Danny's date as needed.
Danny creeps back through to the nursery to put Dani down, but the moment her bottom hits the cot's mattress her eyes spring open and she scowls at him. "Sorry," he says hastily, picking her back up.
Eventually he ends up in his room—the spare room—curled up on the bed with her tucked in against his side. They're both asleep when Jessica comes home.
-
"I don't understand how I—he—ended up like this here. Your Danny, I mean. You said yourself that we're not that different. And I mean, I've—well I might have checked you out once or twice—" And when Luke smirks Danny can't help but laugh, shoving him. "Look, there's all the muscles and your tendency to wear the most easily destroyed shirts—all I'm saying is I'd have to be blind as—"
"Matt Murdock?"
"—not to notice. But I never would have done anything about it. Never would've thought to. It was just... sometimes guys check out other guys, y'know?"
Luke grins wryly at Danny. "It's cute."
"What?"
"The way you seem to think you did anything."
Danny blinks, stopping in his tracks. A woman in a power suit who'd been walking behind them makes a noise of annoyance as she nearly plows into him. "Sorry," he says, stepping aside. Then to Luke, "Wait. You did?"
"Mm, yeah well, kinda—"
"Oh, you mean Jessica did." He can tell by the look on Luke's face that he's hit the jackpot.
"Let's just say she gave a push where needed." Luke snorts. "You were all 'oh no, Luke, blah blah sanctity of marriage blah blah couldn't do it to Jessica'. It was pretty damn undignified."
Danny scratches his head. He loves Jessica; of course he does, she's his best friend's wife, even if he was pretty terrible to her when they first met. But the way she'd loved Luke, the way she'd gone toe-to-toe with that damn Fury projection just to keep Luke safe... shit, Danny couldn't argue with that.
Once he'd gotten to know her he'd realised how wrong he'd been about her, about everything. She was family too.
And now he thinks—
He takes a deep breath. "So how does it work?" he asks. Might as well know exactly what he's missing.
Luke gives him a sharp look. "You wanna know?"
"I asked, didn't I?" The challenging look works just as well on this Luke here as it does at home, and Luke makes an exasperated noise and pulls him over to a park bench.
"Well there's me and y—my Danny. And there's me and Jessica. Sometimes there's the three of us—"
"What about your Danny and Jessica?" Danny frowns. "Don't they... isn't there a 'them' too?"
Luke shakes his head. "They love each other, a lot, but it's not about sex, it's more..."
"Platonic?" Danny suggests.
"Yeah. Yeah, it's more platonic." Luke huffs a soft laugh. "Sometimes you—sometimes they make me feel like a third wheel with all the romance stuff."
"But I'm sure you always come first to her, like she does to you. You're married after all."
Luke makes an almost resigned noise. "That's what our Danny can't understand either. Just 'cause Jessica and I are married and have a kid don't mean you—he comes second. To either of us. We're all equals in this and I still can't get that through his idiot skull." His expression softens to something affectionate and wistful.
Danny's exemplary when it comes to poor decision making skills (how he managed to say yes to fighting Shou-Lao the Undying he'll never know), so it's no great surprise when he leans in, his heart thundering in his chest, and presses his mouth to Luke's. He wants to know. He wants to understand. Luke lets him for a moment, before he pushes Danny away. "You know I can't," he says. It's genuine regret in his tone. "You ain't my Danny, and anything else would be—"
"I know," Danny says ruefully. He's starting to wish he'd never convinced Luke he was from another reality. He knows the careful, stilted gestures that Jessica and Luke make now are aborted movements for what they couldn't help only days before, instinctively reaching out for someone who's no longer there. He sleeps in the spare room, and he looks after Dani, and they trust him like he's the real thing, but he's not—and neither of them ever forget it.
"Fuck, Danny, c'mere." Luke hooks an arm around Danny's shoulders and tugs him in. He slumps against Luke's chest with an unhappy sigh. "C'mon, trust the brains. Richards and Stark'll put their heads together find a way to get you back home."
And that's the rub. Danny's not even sure he wants to go back to his own reality. Everything here just... seems so much more suited to him. Rand International as he knew it is gone, and he's using his father's billions for good, for charity. Luke and Jessica, and he'd never, ever thought of it before this, before he came here. But he wants it. He wants to be their Danny, he wants to belong. He wants this to be his world.
He never realised how lonely he was. When he and Misty are on it's great, but they've been spending too much time off lately; he can't commit the way he should and it's unfair to her, especially now he's found something he'd commit to in a heartbeat.
He really is a horrible person.
And it's unfair, he knows, on the Danny who's on the other side, no doubt desperate to get back to this reality, to his family. He'd definitely not be thinking his other self would be here, yearning to usurp his life.
Danny takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. "What if they can't?" he asks. "What if you can't get your Danny back?"
Luke swallows convulsively and Danny realises guiltily that he's the first one to voice this fear. "Let's hope it don't come down to that."
-
The dojo is familiar. He owns it in this reality too, uses it to help teach kids not just martial arts but to be better people. There's a bathroom and plenty of blankets, so he folds them up into a bed and settles in for the night. He feels guilty, because Luke and Jessica are nothing but the best to him, but he can't take living in their house like he's the ghost they can't shake anymore.
When he snaps awake it's around 3 am. There's someone else in the dojo with him, someone stepping softly across the room.
It takes him a moment, but he recognises the silhouette and the tread. Jessica.
He pushes himself up into a sitting position and sees her head shift, tracking the rustle of fabric. "Danny?" The word hangs in the air.
"Yeah, I'm here," he says eventually, around the lump blocking up his throat.
Her shoulders sag a little and he can hear her exhalation of relief. "Oh, thank god." She shuffles in his direction, hands outstretched, stumbling a moment as her foot catches on the edge of the mat. The way she swears under her breath—quiet now, like Dani might be there to hear—almost makes Danny smile.
Almost.
Jessica inches across the wall until she reaches him, by which point her eyes must have adjusted to the darkness and she sinks to his knees by his makeshift bed. "Fuck," she says, reaching out. Her hand settles on his arm and she slides it down to his hand, linking her fingers through his. "Fuck," she repeats, and there's a quaver in her voice—of anger and despair—that he doesn't recognise. "We were so fucking worried. Luke... he's out looking for you too, we thought you'd—fuck." He never finds out what they thought, because she bites off the words angrily, yanking him forward.
She's shaking and she smells of lime and mint and baby powder. Something he'd never have noticed before he came here.
Jessica stays with him the remainder of the night, spooned up against his back. Even though they both know he can't be the Danny she wants him to be, she still holds him tight like she thinks he might slip through her fingers.
It's 6.30 am when he wakes and she stirs, blinking sleepily in the pre-dawn greyness, pushing herself up with one hand, using the other to push her hair off her face as she yawns.
"Were you scared if I disappeared you wouldn't get your Danny back?"
Danny guesses he deserves the slap.
-
Three days later Tony calls. He's put his head together with Reed and Doctor Strange and they've come up with a plan. When he sees the way Jessica and Luke cling to each other's hand he understands how much he doesn't belong here. He nods. "I'm ready to go home."
(He's not. It hurts. He hasn't been here long enough for it to hurt like this.)
-
"You ain't gonna Sam Beckett my boy, are you?" Luke asks Tony and Reed suspiciously, placing a protective hand on Danny's shoulder.
"I'm not 'your boy', Luke—"
"You Danny Rand?"
Danny blinks. "Um. Yes?"
"Then you're my boy. Don't matter what universe you're from."
Tony coughs delicately in interruption. "We can't guarantee anything, I'm afraid. The frequency is as close to what Kwan had been able to generate on MGH, but whether or not we can open a portal to his reality..." Tony shrugs. "We'll know once we open the portal."
It makes Danny uneasy to be back in the Negative Zone, even if it's allegedly not quite the Negative Zone he remembers. He's not sure how that works, but he guesses it's not as unique as he thought, and he has to trust that Reed and Tony know what they're talking about (the thought of trusting them here, though, makes his skin crawl). Only once had he ever thought he might never escape the Negative Zone; but once free he'd never thought he'd be back here again.
He feels Luke's hand on his elbow. "You okay?" Luke asks him in a low voice. "You don't seem right."
Danny scrubs at his face. "Yeah, I'm fine. It's just… being back here."
Luke blinks. "You've been here before?"
"Of course—not here-here, but yeah—"
Luke's looking at him like he's just grown another head.
Danny frowns. "You know, the Superhuman Registration Act? When Tony was arresting all his—our—friends? When I was arrested as Daredevil…? No?"
Luke shakes his head. "The SHRA never passed here. Some people," and his gaze flicks to where Tony and Reed have their heads together, "sided with the politicians who tried to bully it through after Stamford but we managed to fight it all the way." Danny doesn't think anything of Luke's use of 'we'. There were, after all, plenty of superhumans against the act back in his own reality.
"That would have been expensive."
Luke snorts. "It was the first real big Rand International charity endeavour." He smiles with the kind of easy, sweet affection that Danny rarely sees from his own Luke. "You stood up, Danny. You and Cap and Doc Strange were the face of the fight." He—god, he even has a damn picture in his wallet of Danny on the steps of a courthouse with Stephen Strange at his left shoulder, resolute, both looking slight in comparison to Steve Rogers at Danny's right. Luke shows it off to him like a proud dad.
It's difficult for Danny to take in; he knew there were differences between this world and his own, and not just because of the whole Luke-Jessica-other-Danny thing going on. But they were little things. Not something like this.
Something that this world's Danny had stood up against. He'd never—
He didn't even think of it. The SHRA was pushed through almost without opposition; people who'd been against it initially swung around in support (Reed Richards) and people who supported it initially (Sue Richards, Johnny Storm, Peter Parker) came out against it. It had been an utter nightmare that had seen Jessica and the baby flee to Canada as Luke—
"Danny, you okay, man?"
No, there had to be a difference in the lead up to how this reality could stop the SHRA from passing. They hadn't been able to—
"Danny?" Tony says, his hand on Danny's arm, and Danny can't help it because it's Tony and he's over that, he is, but...
He wrenches his arm away.
"What…?" Tony looks perplexed and Luke pulls him away, speaking quietly. Danny turns his back on them. He never thought he'd still be able to muster this kind of fury about what happened, when—and he's ashamed to even think it—it had led to some of the best times of his life with the New Avengers, even on the run from Tony and his super-villain-turned-enforcer cronies.
"Daniel?" It's Stephen Strange, his expression sympathetic and Danny wonders how much it annoyed Reed and Tony to need magic to make this work. (He doesn't hate the thought. He knows it would annoy them to no end.)
"I never did anything. I fought against it, but I never did anything."
"The events that happened here leading to the introduction and failure of the Superhuman Registration Act were not the same as where you're from," Stephen says gently. "I have gained some knowledge of events from your reality. Your reality had a group of youngsters with a television show, caught up in a situation beyond their control. We had a group of young mutants bullied by non-powered humans into a siege situation. There was… more sympathy from the general public, despite the number of non-powered humans killed in the Stamford explosion."
"Is that why you took a side this time?"
He's managed to surprise Stephen. "I… didn't take a side?"
"Not at first. You were… As Sorcerer Supreme you were neutral. Later though, you sided with those of us against it. You were a great help." Danny smiles encouragingly, because Stephen looks frankly horrified. "Really, you were. You gave us all home in the Sanctum Sanctorum when we needed it—"
"Danny, it's time," Luke says, touching his elbow.
But I haven't finished here, Danny wants to say. He wants to hear more about how this Danny was a hero who stood up for the oppressed, not just while wearing a costume and a mask. He wants to know why Stephen looks so disgusted at the thought that he didn't stand up in Danny's reality.
"It's now or never," Tony says. His tone is apologetic, like he knows Danny doesn't want to leave.
(Jessica clings to him, because this mightn't work and Danny Rand as she knows him might be gone for good. Luke settles for slapping him on the back, but Danny feels the tension radiating through him.)
He steps away.
-
Doctor Strange's magic tastes like leather between his teeth. When Tony switches on the machine he and Reed built, Danny can immediately hear that familiar high pitched buzzing as a shimmer forms between the machine's two pillars. It's going to work, he realises.
"Are you ready?" Tony asks.
No.
"Yes," he says through gritted teeth. The buzzing feels like it's going to take the top of his head off. He steps forward between the pillars.
It was meant to be one step, or so Reed said, except Danny finds himself stumbling. When he looks up he sees himself.
There's a moment when the two of them are only hand spans apart, and the other Danny smiles at him. "Don't worry," he says, and Danny has that stupid moment of is that what my voice really sounds like? He sounds like an idiot. No wonder he starts more fights than he successfully mediates if he sounds like that. "Everything will be okay."
Then the other Danny... he passes into him, and Danny coughs, chokes and staggers—
—and Luke is there to catch him. "Whoa, Danny, I got ya."
It didn't work, he thinks, except when he looks up, even through eyes streaming tears, he can see the differences. Luke looks tired, exhausted even. Stephen and Tony are there but Reed isn't. Nor is Jessica.
"Where...?"
"Stark's place."
Oh. Right.
Where he's meant to be.
-
Despite Danny's weak arguments against it, Luke takes him back to his and Jessica's home, and it's almost a physical blow walking through the door. He finds himself looking for photos that don't exist and wonders if he and Luke and Jessica could work it out there, didn't that mean there was a chance now he's back home...?
Except things are different here and Danny remembers the horrified look on the other Stephen's face when he was told he hadn't fought against the SHRA in Danny's reality. People aren't the same.
No, he's the wildcard now. He thinks of Jessica and Dani and of Luke. How could he ever try and insert himself into their lives, based on what he knows of them here? He couldn't do it. He's Luke's best friend and Dani's godfather and that's how it's meant to be. Nothing more. He'd do to never bring it up.
"So, is it true? You were in some kinda... thing with the Jessica and Luke over there?" Luke scowls.
...So much for not bringing it up.
"No," Danny says defensively, because it's true, it wasn't him. "The other Danny was."
"So you didn't…?"
"No." Danny thinks of kissing the other Luke. He'd been shot down so fast it didn't count for anything. He thinks of Jessica in the dojo, spooned up against him, her fingers tangled with his. "No, I didn't."
"Good," Luke says with an almost savage satisfaction and it rubs Danny entirely the wrong way.
"Why?" Danny turns on him. "You think that the idea is so terrible that in no universe you—you and Jessica could possibly want—" He stops himself, breathing heavily through his nose. He's letting himself get too worked up over this. He should just… he needs to let it go.
He's home now.
It's over.
Luke recoils in the face of Danny's wrath. Danny's supposed to be the calm one, the collected one. This? This is not Danny acting like the man Luke knows (thinks he knows) and Danny knows it. He doesn't care.
"I want to go home," he says eventually, and this time home is a sterile penthouse apartment. He thinks of falling asleep in the spare room at Luke and Jessica's with Dani curled up beside him, tiny hand gripping his finger with a child's fraction of her parent's strength and almost can't breathe for a moment with how much he wants to be back there.
Even with the way Luke and Jessica kept him at arm’s length because he wasn't their Danny. Even with that. He knows it's not fair, but he can't help it.
Has he always hated it here that much?
-
Everyone says to him, "Once you've been home a while you'll feel better, you'll see," like it's meant to help.
It's not that easy.
-
Danny's now spent twice as much time back home as he had in the parallel reality and nothing has changed.
He pretends, at first. Gets up, goes to work, goes through the motions of catching up on what has happened in his absence at Rand International. Jeryn is relieved to see him, but at the same time just reinforces that Danny has been gone. "Remember when you said—" he'll say, and Danny will have to reiterate that no, he doesn't remember, because it wasn't him and he wasn't there.
It's not fair to get angry at Jeryn, so instead he directs the emotion into digging into Rand International, looking at changing it from a private company into the charitable organisation it had been on the other side. It had been stupidly easy to get his eyes on drafts and paperwork documenting the early days of that change over there; he is, after all, Daniel Rand-K'ai, even if he isn't the one who made it all happen.
And although the other Danny had started from a different place—namely the fight against the SHRA—it shouldn't be too hard to change this Rand International to the kind of business model that had allowed the other business to become a charity. He understands how and where the other Daniel started the change, and it's not so hard when he gives a little push.
(Jeryn thinks Danny's making a mistake, but Danny talks him around. It's become something to believe in.)
-
Rand International can only keep him occupied for so many hours a day, though. He still goes home, alone, and lies awake in the darkness staring at the ceiling. He's going to need to replace all his gym equipment at this rate.
-
At some point while he was… gone, for lack of a better way to put it, the other Danny had the lock on the door to his balcony fixed, a fact Danny discovers with an awkward note and a key taped to the door when he returns back to his apartment. He thought he'd exhausted his capacity to be weirded out after everything that had happened in the past month, but the sight of a letter in his own handwriting that he didn't write sends him into another spin.
He just—
He can't do this.
It's stupid, really, with all he's been through in his life—he punched a dragon's molten heart, after all, in a mythical city in another realm; not to mention the slew of crazy villains he's fought, and the powers of his friends—why is it this that throws him?
He thinks of Luke's comment about Sam Beckett and wonders if he can even be sure he's back in his own reality. It could just be incredibly similar, that's all. There might have been more differences where he was, but that doesn't mean that it's the same for every reality. There could easily be differences somewhere where he doesn't see them.
Maybe the lock on the balcony door is a difference—
No, there is the note. He holds it tight in his balled fist and wonders whether he's lost his mind. Like he left it in the nowhere land between worlds. Everything will be okay, the other Danny had said, but it's not.
He goes to see Stephen Strange.
-
"You've been through a lot, Daniel," the good Doctor says gently. "It's understandable that you might feel out of sorts."
"How do I know this is even my world, Stephen?"
Danny closes his eyes and lets Doctor Strange into his mind. He knows he should be relieved when the Doctor assures him he's where he's meant to be, but the feeling something is missing lingers.
-
He snaps awake at the sound of the balcony door rattling and launches himself out of bed when he hears glass shatter. It's this adrenaline that settles him, and for the first time, as he pads silently through his apartment, he feels centred.
"Danny?" It's Jessica, standing in the puddle of light in the doorway, reflecting off the shards of glass at her feet.
"Jess, what the hell are you doing...?" He turns on the light, relief and disappointment making his voice sharp. He was really looking forward to hitting something other than a punching bag.
"Sorry about the window, the door isn't usually locked." She sheepishly rubs at the back of her neck.
He can't ever remember Jessica just dropping in on him via the balcony in the middle of the night before. Or at any time during the day. Or ever. Must have been something she did with the other Danny. It's uncharitable, but he can't help the surly thought wondering what else she'd done with the other Danny.
"Well, it's always has been locked when I've been here," Danny says, deliberately rude. That's enough for Jessica, and she's suddenly up in his face, her fist shoved under his nose. For a moment he thinks she might actually punch him and—well he's not going to hit Luke's wife, even in self-defence, is he? She's as much a superhero as he is; if she decides to teach him manners, he's going to feel it.
He's not sure it'd be such a bad thing.
"Fuck, Danny, look," she says, "this is hard for you. I know it is. It hasn't been easy for any of us, okay? We thought we'd lost you for good there—" She flattens her hand against his chest and all the air, all the fight, goes out of him. "We thought we'd lost you." Her voice breaks on nearly every word, and she ducks her head.
"Jessica—"
Danny tips her face up and the tears spill over, and while her mouth is twisted angrily, her chin quivers. She meets his gaze defiantly and he has nothing to say at all. Instead he pulls her close. "I'm so sorry."
"You've been so distant since you came back," she says, her voice muffled against his collarbone.
Danny curls his fingers through her hair. It's as soft as he remembers. She smells of lime and mint and baby powder. "I wasn't sure either of you wanted to see me. I haven't heard from Luke since I came back—"
Jessica shoves at him. "He was trying to give you space, you asshole," she says. "You made it pretty fucking clear you didn't want to see him!"
"Jess, I'd—I'd never not want to see him."
Her expression softens. "That's the way he took it. He's been cutting himself up inside over this." She reaches up and touches his face. "No one knows what happened to you over there. You're not—you don't want to talk to anyone and we're worried."
He can't help but close his eyes and lean into her touch. Her other arm tightens around him again. "Come home with me," she says. "To us."
She doesn't just mean to stay over until he's back on his feet and Danny releases her like he's been stung, pushing back. "Jess, I can't—" Panic threads through his tone. There's nothing he wants more. Two weeks in a reality not his own, living a life that's not his and it's all he wants, and Jessica—they'll both know he wants something he can't have.
"You can."
"The other Danny, did he tell you...?"
"Yeah. He told us all about what his life was like over there and... and it made so much sense. To both of us. I know Luke'd never admit it, but he's been more than a little bit in love with you ever since you guys met." She laughs, sudden and sharp and he knows that jealousy in his bones. "He never did deny fucking you."
Danny gapes at her. "But we've never—"
"I know that, you idiot. But he would've, if you'd wanted it." She tucks her hair behind her ear and gives him the same kind of look he's seen her give Luke, when she wants something he can give but isn't sure she can get it. "...Do you want it?"
And there they are, into dangerous territory. This is the step beyond what she's been implying—that they could have the life the other Danny had in that parallel reality—all along. And she wants him to say he wants it.
"Do I want what?" he counters, because two can play at this game.
Jessica's eyes narrow for a moment before her expression clears. She raises her chin. He thinks she's going to say do you want to fuck my husband but he's doing her wrong. She's better than that. "Do you want to be part of our family? Not just as Dani's godfather, I mean, but as, y'know," and she stops, casting about for the words, grimacing. "The three of us together. You, me and Luke. Equally."
He remembers the other Luke saying that, saying equally, and hesitates, biting back the 'yes' on the tip of his tongue. "I know what I want, and you say Luke wants this, but what do you want, Jess? Do you really want it or are you just saying it because you think you should?"
To be honest, he's kind of surprised she doesn't slap him, like she—like the other Jessica had, back in the dojo. He'd deserved it then and he deserves it now. Except she doesn't, she just looks at him. "Danny," she says and cups his face in her hands. "You're the most dense enlightened man I know," she says and draws him forward.
"Jessica—"
She kisses him on the mouth and for a heartbeat all he can think is how weird it is that it's not weird at all to be kissed by Luke's wife. When he grabs her waist she doesn't pull away, and when he slides his hands down to her hips and pulls her close she presses in against him. He was sure she wouldn't—
Then she grips his ass and catches his bottom lip between her teeth and he—god, he could just push her up against the wall and—
She pulls back, flushed and breathing hard, and says, "But this isn't about me. It's about you and Luke..." For a heartbeat there's a flash of fear in her eyes. She's scared he and Luke are the ones who won't work out.
"He's downstairs right?"
"How did you—"
Danny smiles. "You'd never have come here about this without him. Bring him up and we'll sort this out. Tonight."
-
As Danny guessed, Luke was waiting in the street outside Danny's building, and Jessica brings him up. It seems ludicrous because he's Luke Cage but he's holding Dani like she's a shield between them. She giggles and holds her arms out to Danny.
Jessica rescues the baby from Luke and Danny tells her, "The nursery is through that door."
"Nursery?" Jessica says, mystified, she pokes her head around the door then looks at him, wide eyed.
"It was... it was just in case you ever wanted me to look after her. If you two, uh, wanted some alone time. I wanted to make sure I had a place for her." Danny's not sure if the look she's giving him is a good one or a bad one. He'd bought everything that had been in the display, and set it up himself, ready for Dani's visit.
Her parents had never asked though, but with all the heroing they've had to do and with one disaster after another, it's no surprise it's been hard to get time off.
She closes the door behind her, leaving him and Luke alone.
"Um, hi," Danny says awkwardly, scrubbing a hand through his hair, suddenly feeling stupidly self-conscious about the fact he's standing there in only a pair of cotton pants, even though it's nothing Luke hasn't seen before. Danny doesn't like feeling vulnerable. He likes it even less in front of his best friend.
"Hey." Luke looks at the broken glass on the floor near the balcony door and raises his eyebrow.
"Don't look at me, ask your wife about it."
"Thought the lock was broken?"
Danny's surprised Luke can't hear his teeth grinding from where he's standing. "Clearly it's not," he eventually says, stuffing down his irritation at the time the other Danny got to spend with his friends, and spreads his hands. "What now? Do you really want this, Luke?"
Luke gives him a steady look. "Wouldn't be here with the rest of our family if I didn't, Danny." His posture is defensive and Danny realises he's not the only one with something to lose here. Luke's as scared he'll lose Danny as Danny is to think he might lose Luke.
But—
Our family. He said our family. Danny closes his eyes and breathes out slowly. "I'm glad. I'm really glad you said that."
"Hey, c'mon, when have you ever had to doubt me, brother? I don't want you doubting this. And it's not 'cause of what the other Danny said, either. We coulda just done nothin' and pretended everything was fine when you came back. But Jessica 'n me, we talked about it and we agreed we both want this. You. You hear me?" He taps himself on the chest with his thumb. "I want this."
It's the closest thing Danny's ever heard to a confession of love and he's pretty sure it makes him a giant sap when he chokes up a little, smiling foolishly at Luke. "Okay. I do too." He sounds like an idiot again, he's sure of it.
"Good. Yeah, that's great. Now, more importantly, since I ain't ever fucked a dude before, Jessica made me do some research. Y'know, for when—in case this—in case we—" He stops; maybe embarrassed, maybe not, Danny can't quite tell.
Danny stares at him, because the conversation's taken a sudden right-hand turn into something he wasn't expecting. "Uh," he says. He tries to imagine Luke googling 'how to have gay sex'. Tries not to imagine him looking at porn instead, maybe getting a little turned on and— "And...?"
Luke shrugs loosely, easily and then grins. "If you want that, I'm your man. I'm all over that shit." He holds out his hand. "C'mere."
"I don't... I'm not sure I'm ready for that yet?" says Danny hesitantly. He hadn't even thought about that side of it at all. He's only ever thought of the three of them together.
"'Course not." Luke beckons him. "We ain't even kissed yet. You gotta walk before you run."
-
Turns out Danny didn't really mean it when he said "not yet". It doesn't take long to get from a tentative kiss to mostly naked on Danny's bed, all hands and tongues and lips and no hesitation at all. If Danny had thought there might have been reluctance to throw away a lifetime of perceived heterosexuality to turn wants into needs, he's thoroughly mistaken.
There's no hesitation in the way he pulls Luke to him, cataloguing the unfamiliarity in the differences between Luke's body and the women he's slept with. Danny thinks of Jessica too, and how right she'd felt. Like this. Like Luke.
He'd slept with women who'd felt right before, but never like this.
And Luke's not hesitating at all, either. He moves with that single-minded focus Danny recognises as he presses his mouth against Danny's collarbone, his stubble rasping against skin as he slides his fingers down Danny's side, hooking over the waistband of his pants. Luke's thumb pushes down along the crease of Danny's thigh as he catches Danny's nipple between his teeth.
Danny breathes out, arching up under his mouth.
-
"Oh fuck, Luke, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon—"
-
"I've seen you pretty damn relaxed before, but this is something else," Luke says, trailing his fingers up Danny's spine. Danny had let Luke fuck him; it had been awkward and different and funny but good. Not the best sex either of them had ever had—practice would deal with that—but satisfying. A good start.
And Danny'll have bruises on his hips from Luke's fingers for days. He likes that.
He makes a pleased noise in the back his his throat. "Could do it again in a bit," he mumbles, "'f you want." This was a great idea. Why hadn't he thought of this before, again?
Luke laughs. "Yeah. Maybe next time I'll blow you." Danny blinks when he realises Luke is serious. Luke would totally suck him off. For some reason he'd thought Luke might not— "Could try out the tips Jessica gave me."
"I could grade your performance," Jessica says from the doorway and Luke jumps.
"Sweet Christmas, woman, where the hell did you come from?"
"C'mere," Danny says, rolling over and throwing out a hand in the direction of the door to make a beckoning gesture. Even now he thinks he should feel uncomfortable about making the request, but he figures since he just let her husband fuck him with her blessing, well. What is there to feel uncomfortable about now, right? He wants to get used to this.
Equals, he thinks. Yes.
Jessica sits the baby monitor down on the bedside table and shucks out of her clothing, down to her underwear. She slides into the bed behind Danny, leans over him to kiss Luke and then him ("Hello," she says with a pleased smile, because there's nothing to fear anymore), before snuggling in behind him. "You're the little spoon," she says firmly and kisses his shoulder.
"I'm... okay, I'm the little spoon," Danny agrees, bemused, and he's hit with a sharp stab of deja vu as Luke slides his hand down to squeeze Danny's ass. It's so familiar it takes Danny's breath away, especially when Luke leans in and presses his mouth against Danny's.
Except this time Danny kisses back.