DCU Fanfic: Puppetverse - Oops?
Title: Oops?
Fandom: DCU
Character(s): Booster, Michelle, Skeets, Rip, Ted
Pairing(s): Boostle puppets, pre-Boostle
Word Count: 988
Genre: General/Family/Drama
Rating: PG-13/T
Notes: After Prologue part 2, the Beetle and Booster puppet show up, giving Booster lab to mess in. ...that may have been a baaad idea. Cloning never ends well.
Link: N/A
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Michael Jon Carter had seen many things in his life; it was hard not to when one was a superhero and a time traveling one at that. When puppets of himself and Ted Kord as Blue Beetle showed up, sentient and offering a lab to tinker in with a promise that he could bring back Ted, he had been baffled and a bit suspicious.
Not that the suspicions had lasted long. Booster Gold should be looking these weird puppets, same ones that had dropped on Rip a few days earlier, but he did not feel up to it. He wanted his best friend back, and if the meant trusting sentient puppets that could possibly be evil, Booster was going to take his chances.
Booster had been gone for a few days, so Rip told Michelle to check up on him. When Michelle found him, she bit her lip as she tried to talk him out of using the lab as the puppets of Booster Gold and Blue Beetle played tricks on Skeets. It only took a few minutes for Booster to ignore what Michelle had said and make her promise not to tell Rip about the lab.
Like a good sister, Michelle did nothing to betray Booster's confidence in her though she warned, if something went wrong, she had every right to tell him 'I told you so' before she helped him clean up his mess. Booster agreed as he went back to cloning his friend.
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Booster was covered in soot and some unidentifiable fluids from the cloning chamber, but he was pretty sure he succeeded, until he heard crying. He opened the cloning chamber to find a newborn baby. His eyes widened as he picked up the wailing baby and wrapped it in his jacket. The baby's cries began to subside once Booster held him. Finding that odd, he looked the baby over.
The kid definitely had features that reminded him of Ted, which mad him think he accidentally brought his friend back as a baby which would be pretty weird. Then noticed a mark on the baby boy's hip, one that would only be there if a child had a parent from the future.
“Oh, shit,” Booster cursed, realizing he must of gotten his D.N.A. mixed with Ted's during the experiment. “This kid is mine and Ted's!”
He let that information sink in, holding the baby closer. He was really going to hear plenty of 'I told you so's' from Shel and get a hell of a lecture from Rip. Then Booster wondered if it would stall the lecturing if he named the kid after Rip, though he wanted to give him Ted's last name. Rip Kord, almost 'bwahahaha' worthy enough that Ted would approve.
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Rip decided that he really should know better. He knew Booster was sneaking a bundle of something into the compound, probably some sort of trouble he created that he was trying to hide. Oh, how Rip wished he could deny he was related to this man sometimes. His father was not this much trouble when he was growing up, was he? Auntie Shel would have told him, right? Man, he had a headache.
“Booster, what the hell are you up to?” Rip asked loudly, making Booster freeze.
Booster turned around and revealed the sleeping baby in his arms. Rip's mouth dropped when he noticed the resemblance the baby had to his old baby pictures. “What did you do!?” he yelled, waking baby him. “You're messing with my timeline!”
The baby start crying loudly, and Booster glared at him. “Look what you did! You scared him!” Booster said as he tried to calm the baby. “And how am I messing with your timeline?”
Rip quickly walked away from his white board to stand in front of Booster angrily. “Never mind that. He won't remember any of this. Now, put that baby back where you found it!”
“I can't!” Booster announced as he kept trying to sooth the baby.
Rip massaged his temples, his headache definitely trying to become a migraine. “Why the hell not?”
“Because I accidentally made him in a lab when I was trying to clone Ted, and my D.N.A. got mixed in, so this is mine and Ted's kid!” Booster blurted out.
Rip let his mouth hang open and his eyes wide. Booster laughed nervously as the baby fell back to sleep. While Rip was too shocked to move, Booster ran off with baby Rip Kord. A few minutes after Booster left Michelle came in with Skeets behind her.
“Rip?” she questioned, waving a hand in front of the still shocked. “Are you okay?”
Skeets suggested.
“No! No buckets of cold water,” Rip stated groping for a chair before falling onto it. “I... My whole life is a sham!”
Michelle frowned as Rip buried his head in his hands. “Rip, what happened? Is there someone that messed with your timeline?” she asked, placing a hand on Rip's shoulder. “Is there anyway I can help?”
Rip looked up. “Booster just ruined my life! I thought I knew how I was born, and now he's messed with it all because of his Ted Kord obsession!” he exclaimed before burying his face in Michelle's shoulder, wishing she was the Auntie Shel he grew up with, not young Michelle Carter who did not know he was her nephew.
Michelle awkwardly pulled Rip into a hug and rubbed his back gently. She looked up to Skeets for help. Skeets announced, flying off into Booster's room leaving Michelle with almost sobbing Rip Hunter.
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Skeets stated, as floated over to Booster who was watching the baby sleep in the middle of his double bed.
Booster cringed. “Well, it's not like I meant to!” he exclaimed in a hushed voice. “I have no idea accidentally making a baby messed with his timeline! I don't even know his timeline!”
Skeets replied.
“Hey!” Booster interjected.
<-he decided to make sure he'd be born, but now you've mucked it up anyway?> Skeets continued, undeterred.
Booster stayed quiet for a moment to digest the new information he had just received. “Rip's my son?” he asked, quietly and incredulously. “That...actually, makes a lot of sense to why he cared about bringing Michelle back, but not Ted. Michelle would be his aunt, so he'd care if she lived or died. Wait, I'm his dad, but now so is Ted because of what I did?”
Skeets replied floating over the baby.
“This has gotten very, very, complicated, hasn't it, Skeets?” Booster asked quietly.
Skeets chirped as Booster sighed.
“Can you watch little Rip while I take care of Rip?” he paused. “This going to be a headache.”
Skeets stated as he was left to watch the baby while Booster took care of Rip's near mental breakdown.
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Meanwhile, back at the lab that the puppets had given to Booster Gold, the Booster and Beetle puppets were doing their own experiments to bring Ted Kord back. They had gotten far enough to replicate his body before the Booster puppet stopped.
“Does the other me deserve this?” he asked selfishly.
Beetle puppet smiled, kissing the Booster puppet soundly. “Sure he does,” Beetle puppet answered.
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“Oh, Mikey, thank god you're back!” Michelle exclaimed, letting go of Rip to run over to her brother. “Please tell him you didn't mess with his timeline, so he can not have a breakdown.”
Booster gulped as his sister stared at him. “Umm...”
“You messed with his timeline!” she exclaimed, hitting his shoulder.
“Ow, Shel, I didn't mean to!” he exclaimed moving away from his sister. “It was an accident, I swear! It's not like I knew I was his father beforehand or anything.”
“I don't care if it was an ac-” Michelle stopped herself. “Wait, Rip Hunter's your son!?”
“Rip Carter,” Rip spoke up. “My real name is Rip Carter.”
“So, wait, that makes me his aunt!” Michelle exclaimed happily, hugging Rip. “I never had a nephew before. Am I a good aunt in the future?”
Rip smiled a little. “The best,” he answered, pausing. “Can you leave us alone for a minute, Auntie Shel?”
“Aww, he called me Auntie Shel!” Michelle squealed. “Sure, just don't maim your father too badly, even though he probably deserves it.”
Rip watched as Michelle left the room, then turned his attentions to his father. “How did you figure it out?” he asked quietly.
“Skeets made a guess, and I agreed with it since it makes a lot of sense,” Booster answered before running his hands through his hair. “Was I that bad of a father?”
“What?” Rip asked, a little shocked. “Why are asking me that?”
“I must have been a bad father if you came into the past to change that.”
“That's not the only reason I came back, and you weren't a bad father,” Rip paused. “Auntie Shel raised me, so I never really knew you outside of baby pictures.”
“I wasn't around? How does that not constitute as a bad father?”
“It wasn't your fault.”
“It wasn't... You mean I died.”
Rip looked away, turning to his blackboard. “We were never sure, so part of the reason I came back in time was to find out what had happened to you, since I had no way to do that in the future,” he explained as he started writing on the board. “Then I noticed that everything was falling apart. The time space continuum, the different Earths, and history was being re-written and messed with. All I could figure out was that my father would be able to fix it, meaning you.”
Booster watched as Rip added more information to his bored as a thought hit him. “...or Ted Kord,” Booster stated quietly.
Rip's writings paused before he turned to Booster with a stern look. “No,” he stated, shaking his head. “That can't be true.”
“Why not?” Booster asked angrily.
“Because he's dead, and there's no way for us to get around it. All my tests and theorems prove it,” he stated seriously. “There is no way for us to bring Ted Kord back.”
“Good thing I'm already back, then,” a voice said from the doorway of Rip's time lab.
“Ted!?” Rip and Booster exclaimed together.
Ted grinned from his place leaning on the door jamb. “Hi,” he said with a small wave. “Anyone care to explain what's been happening, and what did Booster do now?”
Booster ran over and enveloped Ted in a hug before he pulled away. “Wait, what do you mean 'what did Booster do now'?” he asked with a frown.
Ted grinned. “Well, that guy was saying everything was falling apart. It's not a leap to assume that you caused something to happen,” he said teasingly.
“That's not true!” Booster scoffed. “I never screw things up!”
Ted and Rip coughed at the same time. “What about the time you sent us to hell?” Ted questioned.
“Perhaps you remember messing up my timeline an hour ago?” Rip added.
“Or the time-”
Booster placed a hand over Ted's mouth. “No more! I get it! I'm a screw up!” he exclaimed.
Ted chuckled as he moved Booster's hand from his mouth before clasping a hand on his shoulder. “I was only kidding, Booster,” Ted said before looking at Rip. “Though, I don't think he was. How did you mess up his timeline?”
Booster laughed nervously. “You're going to find this hilarious,” he said, backing away a bit.
Ted raised an eyebrow. “I have a sinking suspicion that I won't.”
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“Huh?” Ted questioned after Booster finished explaining that they were daddies now, and the man standing on the other side of the room was the grown-up version of their son, who until now had not known he was genetic product of two men.
“Exactly!” Rip spoke up. “He messed with how was I created!”
“How do you know?” Booster asked.
“What do you mean?”
“How do you know this isn't the way you were conceived?”
“Because Auntie Shel would have told me!”
“Why? If I know my sister, I don't think she would have told you that story when you were younger, but knowing you now, I bet you never gave her the chance to tell you the truth anyway!”
Rip paused, thinking that over. “...you may be right, but this ridiculous! I have two biological dads! I'm a freak of nature!”
“...Superboy had two biological dads,” Ted put in.
Booster raised an eyebrow. “I'm thinking that's a bad example, Ted.”
“No, hear me out,” Ted stated. “Superboy had two biological dads, and he was completely normal for a half-human, half-kryptonian. The only reason he ever went on a rampage was because Luthor is a bastard.”
“Ted has a point,” Booster chimed in.
“Okay, fine. I really should have expected something like this when Aunt Shel never mentioned my mother, and any record of my birth was non-existent,” Rip stated unhappily. “Now that this is settled, I have work to do. Just because we're having a family reunion of sorts is no reason to ignore the problem of idiots other than dad messing with history.”
With that, Rip took some of his notes and left for his room for privacy. “I guess he gets the work ethic from me,” Ted joked, “because we both know that's not you.”
Booster rolled his eyes before pulling Ted into another hug. “Oh god, I missed you and your bad jokes,” he murmured, holding Ted tightly.
Ted rolled his eyes hugging back. “Yeah, like you're one to talk about bad jokes,” he said with a chuckle as they stood there, hugging like the other was going to disappear.
Fandom: DCU
Character(s): Booster, Michelle, Skeets, Rip, Ted
Pairing(s): Boostle puppets, pre-Boostle
Word Count: 988
Genre: General/Family/Drama
Rating: PG-13/T
Notes: After Prologue part 2, the Beetle and Booster puppet show up, giving Booster lab to mess in. ...that may have been a baaad idea. Cloning never ends well.
Link: N/A
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Michael Jon Carter had seen many things in his life; it was hard not to when one was a superhero and a time traveling one at that. When puppets of himself and Ted Kord as Blue Beetle showed up, sentient and offering a lab to tinker in with a promise that he could bring back Ted, he had been baffled and a bit suspicious.
Not that the suspicions had lasted long. Booster Gold should be looking these weird puppets, same ones that had dropped on Rip a few days earlier, but he did not feel up to it. He wanted his best friend back, and if the meant trusting sentient puppets that could possibly be evil, Booster was going to take his chances.
Booster had been gone for a few days, so Rip told Michelle to check up on him. When Michelle found him, she bit her lip as she tried to talk him out of using the lab as the puppets of Booster Gold and Blue Beetle played tricks on Skeets. It only took a few minutes for Booster to ignore what Michelle had said and make her promise not to tell Rip about the lab.
Like a good sister, Michelle did nothing to betray Booster's confidence in her though she warned, if something went wrong, she had every right to tell him 'I told you so' before she helped him clean up his mess. Booster agreed as he went back to cloning his friend.
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Booster was covered in soot and some unidentifiable fluids from the cloning chamber, but he was pretty sure he succeeded, until he heard crying. He opened the cloning chamber to find a newborn baby. His eyes widened as he picked up the wailing baby and wrapped it in his jacket. The baby's cries began to subside once Booster held him. Finding that odd, he looked the baby over.
The kid definitely had features that reminded him of Ted, which mad him think he accidentally brought his friend back as a baby which would be pretty weird. Then noticed a mark on the baby boy's hip, one that would only be there if a child had a parent from the future.
“Oh, shit,” Booster cursed, realizing he must of gotten his D.N.A. mixed with Ted's during the experiment. “This kid is mine and Ted's!”
He let that information sink in, holding the baby closer. He was really going to hear plenty of 'I told you so's' from Shel and get a hell of a lecture from Rip. Then Booster wondered if it would stall the lecturing if he named the kid after Rip, though he wanted to give him Ted's last name. Rip Kord, almost 'bwahahaha' worthy enough that Ted would approve.
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Rip decided that he really should know better. He knew Booster was sneaking a bundle of something into the compound, probably some sort of trouble he created that he was trying to hide. Oh, how Rip wished he could deny he was related to this man sometimes. His father was not this much trouble when he was growing up, was he? Auntie Shel would have told him, right? Man, he had a headache.
“Booster, what the hell are you up to?” Rip asked loudly, making Booster freeze.
Booster turned around and revealed the sleeping baby in his arms. Rip's mouth dropped when he noticed the resemblance the baby had to his old baby pictures. “What did you do!?” he yelled, waking baby him. “You're messing with my timeline!”
The baby start crying loudly, and Booster glared at him. “Look what you did! You scared him!” Booster said as he tried to calm the baby. “And how am I messing with your timeline?”
Rip quickly walked away from his white board to stand in front of Booster angrily. “Never mind that. He won't remember any of this. Now, put that baby back where you found it!”
“I can't!” Booster announced as he kept trying to sooth the baby.
Rip massaged his temples, his headache definitely trying to become a migraine. “Why the hell not?”
“Because I accidentally made him in a lab when I was trying to clone Ted, and my D.N.A. got mixed in, so this is mine and Ted's kid!” Booster blurted out.
Rip let his mouth hang open and his eyes wide. Booster laughed nervously as the baby fell back to sleep. While Rip was too shocked to move, Booster ran off with baby Rip Kord. A few minutes after Booster left Michelle came in with Skeets behind her.
“Rip?” she questioned, waving a hand in front of the still shocked. “Are you okay?”
“No! No buckets of cold water,” Rip stated groping for a chair before falling onto it. “I... My whole life is a sham!”
Michelle frowned as Rip buried his head in his hands. “Rip, what happened? Is there someone that messed with your timeline?” she asked, placing a hand on Rip's shoulder. “Is there anyway I can help?”
Rip looked up. “Booster just ruined my life! I thought I knew how I was born, and now he's messed with it all because of his Ted Kord obsession!” he exclaimed before burying his face in Michelle's shoulder, wishing she was the Auntie Shel he grew up with, not young Michelle Carter who did not know he was her nephew.
Michelle awkwardly pulled Rip into a hug and rubbed his back gently. She looked up to Skeets for help. Skeets announced, flying off into Booster's room leaving Michelle with almost sobbing Rip Hunter.
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Booster cringed. “Well, it's not like I meant to!” he exclaimed in a hushed voice. “I have no idea accidentally making a baby messed with his timeline! I don't even know his timeline!”
“Hey!” Booster interjected.
<-he decided to make sure he'd be born, but now you've mucked it up anyway?> Skeets continued, undeterred.
Booster stayed quiet for a moment to digest the new information he had just received. “Rip's my son?” he asked, quietly and incredulously. “That...actually, makes a lot of sense to why he cared about bringing Michelle back, but not Ted. Michelle would be his aunt, so he'd care if she lived or died. Wait, I'm his dad, but now so is Ted because of what I did?”
Skeets replied floating over the baby.
“This has gotten very, very, complicated, hasn't it, Skeets?” Booster asked quietly.
“Can you watch little Rip while I take care of Rip?” he paused. “This going to be a headache.”
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Meanwhile, back at the lab that the puppets had given to Booster Gold, the Booster and Beetle puppets were doing their own experiments to bring Ted Kord back. They had gotten far enough to replicate his body before the Booster puppet stopped.
“Does the other me deserve this?” he asked selfishly.
Beetle puppet smiled, kissing the Booster puppet soundly. “Sure he does,” Beetle puppet answered.
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“Oh, Mikey, thank god you're back!” Michelle exclaimed, letting go of Rip to run over to her brother. “Please tell him you didn't mess with his timeline, so he can not have a breakdown.”
Booster gulped as his sister stared at him. “Umm...”
“You messed with his timeline!” she exclaimed, hitting his shoulder.
“Ow, Shel, I didn't mean to!” he exclaimed moving away from his sister. “It was an accident, I swear! It's not like I knew I was his father beforehand or anything.”
“I don't care if it was an ac-” Michelle stopped herself. “Wait, Rip Hunter's your son!?”
“Rip Carter,” Rip spoke up. “My real name is Rip Carter.”
“So, wait, that makes me his aunt!” Michelle exclaimed happily, hugging Rip. “I never had a nephew before. Am I a good aunt in the future?”
Rip smiled a little. “The best,” he answered, pausing. “Can you leave us alone for a minute, Auntie Shel?”
“Aww, he called me Auntie Shel!” Michelle squealed. “Sure, just don't maim your father too badly, even though he probably deserves it.”
Rip watched as Michelle left the room, then turned his attentions to his father. “How did you figure it out?” he asked quietly.
“Skeets made a guess, and I agreed with it since it makes a lot of sense,” Booster answered before running his hands through his hair. “Was I that bad of a father?”
“What?” Rip asked, a little shocked. “Why are asking me that?”
“I must have been a bad father if you came into the past to change that.”
“That's not the only reason I came back, and you weren't a bad father,” Rip paused. “Auntie Shel raised me, so I never really knew you outside of baby pictures.”
“I wasn't around? How does that not constitute as a bad father?”
“It wasn't your fault.”
“It wasn't... You mean I died.”
Rip looked away, turning to his blackboard. “We were never sure, so part of the reason I came back in time was to find out what had happened to you, since I had no way to do that in the future,” he explained as he started writing on the board. “Then I noticed that everything was falling apart. The time space continuum, the different Earths, and history was being re-written and messed with. All I could figure out was that my father would be able to fix it, meaning you.”
Booster watched as Rip added more information to his bored as a thought hit him. “...or Ted Kord,” Booster stated quietly.
Rip's writings paused before he turned to Booster with a stern look. “No,” he stated, shaking his head. “That can't be true.”
“Why not?” Booster asked angrily.
“Because he's dead, and there's no way for us to get around it. All my tests and theorems prove it,” he stated seriously. “There is no way for us to bring Ted Kord back.”
“Good thing I'm already back, then,” a voice said from the doorway of Rip's time lab.
“Ted!?” Rip and Booster exclaimed together.
Ted grinned from his place leaning on the door jamb. “Hi,” he said with a small wave. “Anyone care to explain what's been happening, and what did Booster do now?”
Booster ran over and enveloped Ted in a hug before he pulled away. “Wait, what do you mean 'what did Booster do now'?” he asked with a frown.
Ted grinned. “Well, that guy was saying everything was falling apart. It's not a leap to assume that you caused something to happen,” he said teasingly.
“That's not true!” Booster scoffed. “I never screw things up!”
Ted and Rip coughed at the same time. “What about the time you sent us to hell?” Ted questioned.
“Perhaps you remember messing up my timeline an hour ago?” Rip added.
“Or the time-”
Booster placed a hand over Ted's mouth. “No more! I get it! I'm a screw up!” he exclaimed.
Ted chuckled as he moved Booster's hand from his mouth before clasping a hand on his shoulder. “I was only kidding, Booster,” Ted said before looking at Rip. “Though, I don't think he was. How did you mess up his timeline?”
Booster laughed nervously. “You're going to find this hilarious,” he said, backing away a bit.
Ted raised an eyebrow. “I have a sinking suspicion that I won't.”
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“Huh?” Ted questioned after Booster finished explaining that they were daddies now, and the man standing on the other side of the room was the grown-up version of their son, who until now had not known he was genetic product of two men.
“Exactly!” Rip spoke up. “He messed with how was I created!”
“How do you know?” Booster asked.
“What do you mean?”
“How do you know this isn't the way you were conceived?”
“Because Auntie Shel would have told me!”
“Why? If I know my sister, I don't think she would have told you that story when you were younger, but knowing you now, I bet you never gave her the chance to tell you the truth anyway!”
Rip paused, thinking that over. “...you may be right, but this ridiculous! I have two biological dads! I'm a freak of nature!”
“...Superboy had two biological dads,” Ted put in.
Booster raised an eyebrow. “I'm thinking that's a bad example, Ted.”
“No, hear me out,” Ted stated. “Superboy had two biological dads, and he was completely normal for a half-human, half-kryptonian. The only reason he ever went on a rampage was because Luthor is a bastard.”
“Ted has a point,” Booster chimed in.
“Okay, fine. I really should have expected something like this when Aunt Shel never mentioned my mother, and any record of my birth was non-existent,” Rip stated unhappily. “Now that this is settled, I have work to do. Just because we're having a family reunion of sorts is no reason to ignore the problem of idiots other than dad messing with history.”
With that, Rip took some of his notes and left for his room for privacy. “I guess he gets the work ethic from me,” Ted joked, “because we both know that's not you.”
Booster rolled his eyes before pulling Ted into another hug. “Oh god, I missed you and your bad jokes,” he murmured, holding Ted tightly.
Ted rolled his eyes hugging back. “Yeah, like you're one to talk about bad jokes,” he said with a chuckle as they stood there, hugging like the other was going to disappear.