Uncheck Active without 404? Or other way to deal with languages?

[joe_g]

Hey hello,
So i've got a site with no less than 13 languages. Not everything exists in all languages. The way "active" works is that if it's unchecked, then that particular language-version of a page gives a 404. What I'd like it to do instead is to still show the page, but with the content from the default language instead of throwing a 404. Ideally no page should ever give a 404. However, I suppose that's not so easy to accomplish?

The plan B would be for me to implement my own "active" switch. But I don't think there is such a thing as a multilingual checkbox (that can be checked individually per language). Or is there?

Maybe there is a third way I don't see right now?