#and then of course danny gets lost and has no idea how to get home anyway

[pricklenettle]

inspired by this post, Danny’s lost in the ghost zone and comes across pariah dark’s keep. I had to draw it and had The most fun with the spooky green ghost zone

[luxaofhesperides]

if you give a ghost a trauma: a parody fic

read on ao3.

Danny wishes to be sent someplace he could have a better family. Unfortunately, that lands him in a Gotham where tropes are made reality to the extreme. He really just can't catch a break. (or: a dcxdp parody fic where i make danny the only one able to see how bizarre things are. this does not help him in any way.)

. . .

“We’re gonna get you!” Maddie Fenton, a Bad Parent™ cries as she shoots her gun at Danny, her half dead son.

“No!” he wails, flying around as he dodges the shots. “I wish my parents weren’t trying to capture me for Evil Science Reasons! I wish I had a better family!”

“Lol, done,” said Desiree, snapping her fingers. 

Danny only has time to say Uh-oh before he’s sucked away into a magic portal and spit out into a dark and dreary city. In just the one second he’s there, before he even hits the ground, he hears gunshots, screaming, and the wailing of police sirens. Then he hits the ground and groans, releasing his ghost form to go back to being a human. 

“Where am I?” he asks himself, getting to his feet and looking around. The alleyway he’s in is empty and full of garbage just scattered around. Wherever he may be, it clearly needed to invest more in its sanitation department. 

He spots a fire escape on the side of a building and uses it to climb onto the rooftop, a totally normal course of action. Then he stares at the city, glowing with the street lights and neon business lights and a spotlight with the shape of a bat in it glowing on the clouds. 

“This might as well just happen,” Danny says, “My life is already so weird anyway.”

He stands there for some time, at a loss of what to do next. The wind is cold and brings with it a promise of rain, and from the looks of the dark clouds above him, it’s going to rain soon. Danny needs shelter, fast.

“Hey, kid, you okay?” says someone who snuck up behind him.

Danny shrieks and jumps, nearly going over the edge of the roof.

“Woah!” the person says, grabbing his arm and pulling him back to safety. “That was close!” 

Danny blinks up at his savior, then squints. This guy’s definitely not normal, since he’s wearing a domino mask and a lightly armored black suit with a blue bird emblem stretching across his chest. 

“Way to nearly kill him, Nightwing,” says a new person, dropping down onto the roof from the sky. This new person wears red and black, a pair of bandoliers crossing over his chest. 

“Well, I saved him, didn’t I!”

“Um, hi,” Danny interjects. “Thanks for grabbing me before I fell, but who are you?”

“You don’t know who we are?” blue bird asks rather incredulously.

“Do you think I’m asking just for fun.”

Red and black steps in with a smile. “I’m Red Robin, that’s Nightwing. We’re vigilantes trying to keep Gotham safe.”

Danny makes an educated guess that the city they’re currently in is Gotham. Not a city he’s ever heard before, but what does he know?

“Okay,” he says. There’s really not much else he can say.

“You never answered my question,” Nightwing says. “Are you okay?”

“Oh, yeah, just fine. No idea where I am or how to get home, but it can always be worse, you know?”

“Did you get lost?” Red Robin asks, pulling a holographic computer up from his wrist. Tucker would kill to get his hands on something like that. Danny wonders if he can get his own as a souvenir. 

“Something like that, yeah,” he replies. Another few gunshots ring out loudly through the streets, closer than they were before. Danny flinches, then ducks down a little, looking back towards the street apprehensively. “Um. You guys gonna do anything about that?”

The two vigilantes shrug, as if that’s an acceptable course of action. And then a hand shoots up and grabs the edge of the roof by Danny’s foot, making him jump in the air. Nightwing catches him yet again and moves him away from the ledge. 

A red helmet, leather jacket wearing guy built like a pro-wrestle hauls himself up the roof easily. There are guns tucked into holsters on his thighs and a red, block bat stuck on his chest. 

“Should I be concerned,” Danny says blankly. 

“Nah, it’s just Red Hood,” Red Robin replies, “The only person he ever tries to kill is me.”

“Cause you’re a replacement. And also, get over it, that was ages ago We’re good now. I haven’t even had a Pit Rage episode in months!”

“So the bullets you shot at me last week were just for fun?”

“Yeah, and they were rubber, so it’s not like you would have gotten hurt.”

Danny takes a few steps closer to Nightwing, hiding behind him. He’s getting bad vibes all around from that guy. 

“Tch,” a new voice says right behind Danny, making him flinch. A young boy with a sword steps out from behind him and joins the crew of vigilantes just hanging out on the roof. “As if he’s even worth that much attention.”

“Hello to you too, Demon Brat,” Red Robin says.

“How many of you are there?” Danny asks. “Don’t you need to like, protect the city?”

“Batgirl and Spoiler are working on it,” Nightwing says.

“We’re doing what?” another voice says, and a energetic blond girl dressed in purple armor hops onto the roof, tucking her grappling hook away. Following her is another person in all black, face fully covered, with stitches covering the mouth portion to make it seem as though they can’t talk. The person leaves the blond girl behind to head straight to Danny, making him take a few nervous steps back. 

“Dead,” she says, poking his chest with a finger.

Is that a threat? It feels like a threat. 

“No?” he tries. 

“What are you talking about, Batgirl?” Red Hood interrupts. “We all know the only dead person here is me.”

Everyone promptly groans, telling him to shut up about it and go one night without mentioning his death. 

Okay, that seems concerning! Is he another halfa? Is he like Vlad? Danny’s going to be so mad if he got dropped into another world directly into the hands of another Vlad. 

“You’re dead?” he asks, leaning away from Batgirl as she pokes him once more. 

“Yeah.”

“Same hat?” Danny tries, squinting at him.

“The fuck?” is the answer, which tells him that he probably doesn’t know what Danny’s on about. There’s still a 6% chance that he’s just lying to make Danny look like a fool, though. 

6% is more than 5%, which means it’s enough for him to just act on instinct and walk right up to the gun-wielding Red hood. He tries to consciously use his ghost sense, which is an odd feeling that reminders him of the moment before he hiccups. 

A light blue mist wafts out his mouth. 

Yep, the rumors are true: this man is dead.

“Once, again,” Red Hood says, “The fuck?”

“Seconded,” Nightwing adds.

“Third!” Spoiler joins in. 

Danny takes a page out of Batgirl’s book and pokes Red Hood’s chest. It’s very solid, only hard muscle, and reminds him a bit of Dan. That’s never a good sign. Something about Red Hood is making his skin crawl though, a sense of wrongness that sets alarm bells ringing in the back of his mind. 

“Did you come back instantly when you died?” he asks.

The white lenses of Red Hood’s helmet turn neon green. “Why the fuck are you asking me that.”

“Just checking. The green I’m seeing right now is making me think you’re a halfa.”

“What’s a halfa?” Red Robin interjects.

“An unlucky soul like me,” Danny responds, distracted. He lays his palm flat against Red Hood’s chest. The vigilante holds still, as if frozen, letting Danny do as he please. The ectoplasm he feels in other ghosts is usually calm, made unique by the personality of the ghost it belongs to, but it doesn’t roil and try to hurt the host like the ectoplasm in Red Hood is doing. 

He pulls back and looks around at the circle of vigilantes surrounding him. “Can anyone answer how he came back? Where did he even find this must rotten ectoplasm?”

“Pit,” Batgirl helpfully answers.

“Pit,” Danny repeats. “Like a pit of death? Toxic sludge? Landfill pit gone evil? What am I working with here.”

“Lazarus Pits,” the little one with the sword says. “How do you know about them?” He then pulls out his sword and points it at Danny, ignoring the way Nightwing hisses Robin, no! 

His name is Robin? Isn’t that just Red Robin’s name? Did this Robin have a color added to his name as well? 

“I literally don’t, but if it’s green and weird, then it’s probably ecto.” He turns back to Red Hood. “I’m gonna take care of it now.” And then he shoves his hand into Red Hood’s chest, ignoring the alarmed shouts from the other vigilantes. They try to pull him away, but Danny goes intangible, making their hands fall right through him as he gets a good grip on the ecto, sending his own out in a steady stream to chase the rotten flow towards his hand, then yanks it out. 

It’s green and goopy in his hands, steaming slightly in the air. “Ew,” Danny says. “That’s nasty. You were just living with this inside you?”

Red Hood doesn’t seem to hear him. 

Red Hood takes off his helmet and stares at the rotten ectoplasm in Danny’s hand. Nightwing approaches him cautiously, laying a hand on his shoulder.

“Hood? You doing okay? How are you feeling?”

“It’s gone,” Red Hood answers, shocked. “The Pit Rage. It’s gone. I haven’t felt this clear headed since before I died.”

“That must have sucked,” Danny says empathetically, then shakes the nasty ecto off his hand. It lands on the roof with a wet splat. 

Once again: ew.

“How did you do that?” Red Robin asks, crowding into Danny’s space. Batgirl slides up behind him, trapping him between them. 

“Did you not just watch me yank it out? It was easy. Anyways, y’all got jobs to do, and I got places to go. So I’ll see you never!”

He tries to fly away, but only manages to get a few feet before he’s pulled down by multiple people grabbing at him.

“What is going on here,” A low, gravelly voice demands. Yet another vigilante appears, gliding out of the shadows. This one is much bigger than everyone else, cloaked in darkness, with a helm that has two little ear things poking out on top. 

“Batman,” Robin says, “This meta cured Hood of his Pit Madness.”

“I see,” Batman replies, looking Danny over. “Are you an orphan?”

What the fuck. Who just asks that?

“No.”

“Are your parents well?”

“Sure? My mom was pretty energetic while shooting at me before I came here.”

“You do not have to be unsafe in your home again,” Batman says, grabbing something out of his tactical fanny pack. “You can live with us instead.”

He holds out fucking adoption papers.

Danny backs up as fast as he can, shaking his head. “Oh, no! No you don’t! I did not trade one fruitloop for another!”

“No new brother?” Batgirl asks sadly. 

“Definitely not,” he insists. “No thank you! I’m fine as I am and fully plan on going home.”

Batman frowns. “You said your mother was shooting at you.”

“Yeah, and? The food in our fridge comes to life every meal and we have to fight it. This is normal for us. Chill out and put those papers away.”

The entire crew of vigilantes seems very put out with Batman obligingly puts the adoption papers away. 

“Yeah, I’m done here. Go back to protecting the city. I’m just gonna… go.”

Danny doesn’t wait for them to say anything else before flies away, remembering to go intangible this time. He soars through the polluted streets of Gotham, weaving between tall buildings made with dark stone and decorated with gargoyles. It’s all very dark and dreary, which means Sam would love it.

She would not be loving the pollution, though. Danny certainly isn’t. 

“I wish I could go home,” he says loudly, looking up at the sky expectantly. 

No magic portal appears to yoink him back. 

“I wish I was at home again, and not here!”

Desire does not appear to help him out. She leaves him stranded in Gotham, pouting at the sky until he gives up and flies down to sit on a new roof and angst about his situation. Hopefully this time a gaggle of vigilantes won’t bother him.

Resting his head against his hands, he sighs. Then again, and again, loudly. “Man, this sucks,” he says to himself.

“What’s got a kitten like you so down?” someone says behind him.

“I’m so tired of random people sneaking up behind me on rooftops,” he informs them without turning around. If they wanna talk to him, they gotta got to him, not the other way around.

“Ah, ran into the Bats, did you?”

They’re called Bats? But only two were Bats. None of the other vigilantes fit the theme. That’s just lazy and inconsistent. They should rebrand to something better.

The person walks over and sits down next to him. Danny glances over and is startled to find a woman in a leather body suit, with a hood that has cat ears and googles with an orange tint. 

…Is everyone in this city just dressed strangely at all times? Is this the normal fashion of Gotham?

“What’s wrong? Cat got your tongue?”

“Sorry, didn’t mean to stare. Who are you?”

The woman laughs. “Oh, so you haven’t heard of Catwoman?”

“Nope. No clue who you are.”

“Well,” she purrs, “A pleasure to meet you. I’m a thief.”

The dots connect in his mind. “Like a cat burglar!”

“Yes, like that.”

“Man, this city is wild and I come from a place that deals with ghosts on a daily basis.”

“So what are you doing in a place like this? Gotham isn’t kind to newcomers.”

Danny sighs, yet again, and tilts his head back to look up at the cloudy, starless sky. “I made a dumb mistake and got sucked into a magic portal that spit me out here. I have no clue how I’m going to get home.”

“Do you have a place to stay?”

He glares at Catwoman. “I’m not open to being adopted. I’ll just eat any papers you send my way.”

“I wasn’t planning on it,” she reassures, “I have no interest in being a mother. But I have a spare bedroom if you need it, and I wouldn’t mind teaching you a few tricks of the trade. It’ll be fun, messing with Batman.”

Ah, so she’s doing this for Trickster Reasons. Danny can respect that. 

And he also doesn’t have any other options. Considering how much gun violence and general violence he’s hearing in this city, he’ll probably be killed an embarrassing number of times just from trying to find a place to sleep on the streets for one night. Between cold, dangerous streets with storm clouds hanging heavy over his head or a guest bedroom in the home of a thief with a theme, there’s really no choice.

“If you don’t mind me hanging around, I’d really appreciate having a place to sleep until I figure out a way home.”

“Come along, then! I was just about to turn in for the night.” Catwoman stands up, stretches, then takes hold of the whip on her waist and snaps it out. She takes a running leap off the building, then throws her whip out to wrap around a billboard to swing across the street. 

Danny watches her go, then follows her lead, flying behind her, ready to catch her just in case. But Catwoman moves with ease, clearly experienced in recklessly moving through the streets, and makes her way to a highrise apartment with no trouble at all. 

They land on a balcony just as the sky rumbles with ominous thunder. Another second later, and the clouds open up and heavy rain begins to fall. 

Catwoman throws the door open and they both scramble to get inside before they get drenched. The lights flick on, revealing a stylish modern apartment, filled with art pieces and ornamental bonsai trees. A few quiet cries come from corners of the room, and then cats appear, one after another, moving around Danny’s legs curiously before turning to Catwoman. 

“That was a close one,” Catwoman says conversationally as she takes off her hood and googles, revealing her face. Her pixie cut is messy and her eyes are bright and sharp, just like a cat’s. “I suppose since we’re going to be working together from now on, that we properly introduce ourselves.” She holds out a hand for to shake. “Selina Kyle. I look forward to the trouble we’ll cause together.”

Danny stares down at her hand, then takes hold of it. Looks like he’s going to be a thief! Well, it’ll be a fun story for later. 

He doesn’t want his name attached to his new life of crime, though. And, he figures, this is a fresh start. New life, new name. There’s one that pops into mind immediately, and he latches onto it, ready to step into the world of crime. 

“Call me Neal Caffrey,” he says, shaking her hand. “I’m ready to start when you are.”

[im-only-here-for-the-fandom]

Baby Lost, Baby Found

so first time posting on tumblr, i got inspired by the idea of danny phantom being jason todds father from the story apartment 31c by @faeriekit

its going to be a bit long so,

I headcanon that ghosts can asexually reproduce but it takes some time to make sure that the baby is stable than if there was two ectoplasmic donors so its not commonly done or well known . so when vlad tries to clone danny he doesn’t know that he’s actually growing a lab baby and in the test tube while its forming the baby splits, becoming two babies, one more ghostly (ellie) the other more human ( jason ).

Danny feeling a strange tug at his core urging him to find something, something very important to him and he has to find no matter what, searches for weeks before he finds ellie and jason before vlad ages them up and he falls in love instantly. he looks at his beautiful daughter and son, cradles them carefully and takes them home olny telling jazz, sam, and tucker about their true origins, his parents lecture him about ‘how irresponsible he was for bringing two children into the word’ and ‘how hard it is to raise them’ and ‘how much personal time you have to give up to take care of them’ despite them not noticing that he had disappeared for weeks or that they spent all day in thier lab only coming out for food and bathroom breaks or to put a sample in the fridge because the basement fridge was full {they still haven’t noticed he’s died} . the babyies needed a steady intake of his ectoplasm or pure ectoplasm to stabilize so took them to school with him, not trusting his parents inventions to not accidentally shoot at his kids but thankfully the ghost have calmed down with their attacks ever since he got the kids only going after him after school and during holidays and toning down thier destructive acts.

During the summer holiday vlad invites the fenton family to a cruise ship no doubt trying to enact one of his stupid schemes with jazz unfortunately (or fortunately) unable to join because she was joining a charity for helping less fortunate kids as a volunteer so that she could add it to her resume also because she’s just a really good person and wants to help defintley not to get out of the holidy cruise with val of course not . During one of the cruses resocking pit stops he has to change ellie’s diaper because he’s a goid dad, so he leaves jason with his parents reluctantly after the insisted that he would be perfectly safe with them, jason having a dormant core barley exhibits any ghostly traits while ellie having an active core regularly floats, so his parents were less liely to think jason was a ghost tgan ellie, not knowing that as soon as he left the box ghost came to cause mischief, his parents immediately entering ghost hunter mode forgetting about baby jason.

Enter Sheila also on the cruise running a fake pregnancy scam on multiple people, getting desprate when few men fall for it but needing more proof from her, she decides to steal baby jason who was conveniently unattended to in the chaos happening and leaves before the cruise before the ship departs. She successfully registers the baby as hers saying that she gave birth to him on a cruise thats why she has no previous medical records and naming him jason based on the custom onsie he’s wearing that had in bold Baby Jason written on the chest and starts her scam once again. This time she’s more successful in her scam getting large amounts of money from different men, her having blue eyes, the baby having blue eyes, most people having black hair made it much easier, but now the baby was getting older and its harder to scam people with a larger baby so she doesn’t want him anymore so she hands him over to the only man stupid enough to believe that was truly his baby, Willis Todd, she dumps him in gotham and leaves.

Back at the cruise ship danny finishes changing ellie only to come out to the aftermath of the box ghost and search’s for his parents so that he could get his son back only to discover that his parents have once again neglected another child, their grandchild, in favor of their ghost hunting ways. danny feels devestated his baby boy is gone and the ship had already sailed a long way out from their last stop, he should have never trusted his parents, he didn’t care that they neglected him, but thier neglect now cost him his son. he leaves ellie with jazz once they reach home and follows the tugging in his core once again trying to locate his son, but this time it’s harder it took him weeks to find his kids the first time and that was when they were stationary, now sheila keeps moving meaning the direction of the tugging keeps changing and it throws him off the right track, until she reaches gotham and the tugging suddenly STOPS, danny is floating in the middle of nowhere when his connection with his baby just disappears without a warning. and danny is just terrified, he doesn’t know what has happened to his baby.

Jason is in gotham now, which is a ectoplasm deadzone, despite it being heavily covered in death energy. any time ectoplasm is formed its immediately sucked away by those who have recently died, barely being able to take enough to pass to the afterlife, and with the amount dieing in gotham the amount of ectoplasm is barely able to sustain jasons baby core. he has stronger senses and a better immune system from his ghost half but other than sharper canine teeth he doesn’t develop other ghostly traits over the years growing up, if he able to seemingly disappear in the shadows and move as silent as a ghost, it’s attributed to gotham strangeness.

jason is now 15 and dies waking up briefly in ghost zone only for the ectoplasm to kick start his core and kicks him back into his body six months after his death, back in to gotham the ectoplasm deadzone now unable to support his active core leaving him catatonic for talia to find and dunk in the lazarus pit. he spends three years in with the league of assassins before returning to gotham mad with pit rage and the need for revenge against the joker.

danny, now the ghost king , has never given up searching for his missing, despite not being able to locate him his bond reassuring him his son was alive, having moved out with his daughter and sister when she turned eighteen and cut off all communication with his parents. he’s in a meeting in the ghost zone when he feels his bond with his son flare up strongly only for it to disappear from the ghost zone not a minute later, leaveing him no time to search for him, but the bond is there, if barely, but it disappears again when jason is dumped in the lazurus pit, his signature corrupted from how it was when he was young. danny’s core aches from the sadness he’s feeling, the bond he has with his son is seemingly gone, he doesn’t know what to do now.

A year passes and jason is now nineteen a year after he came back to gotham, having reconciled with his family. but now the justice league is facing a world ending supernatural threat and they need someone or something powerful enough to face it, so who else other than the benevolent and kind ghost king.

constantine has the main league members do the ritual with him batman, superman, wonder woman, flash, green lantern, because the requires a lot of power. so they chant his titles, The Benevolent and Kind, The Great One, The Gate and The Keeper, The Guiding Star, The High King Of Infinite Realms, and a portal starts forming and slowly danny emerges in full royal garb, white hair swaying whisply in an invisible breeze, eyes a glowing green galaxy, crown and ring on full display. Danny opens his mouth to speak only to close it when he feels a weak, sputtering bond from someone standing at the back of the room, he cranes his head searching for the orogin of this bond and spots a young man, then it clicks, thats his son, that’s jason. he can’t believe his eyes, he finally found his baby, after nineteen years, he sinks to the floor and sobs.

Jason had always felt a strange feeling if longing that never seemed to go away, at first he thought it was from a lack of care from his parents, but it didn’t seem right to him, so after he bacame robin, and found out about sheil he thought that was where the feeling of longing was coming from, but then she betrayed him and he died at the hands of the joker. and in that one minute in the realm of the dead everything felt right only to wake up in his own grave and then get dumped in the pit. After getting dumped in the pit the longing was gone, and in its place was rage, like he had lost something very important to him and this made him unbelievable angry, so he went to gotham to exact revenge, and ended up reconciling with his family.

a year later he’s stading at the back the room as the justice league summons the ghost king, and as the king emerges the feeling of longing that was gone since his death starts sputtering to life, he looks at the floating man and the longing gets stronger, they lock eyes and the man shudders and sinks to the floor sobbing, he wants nothing more that to run to him and hug him, hold him and never let go, he has never felt such intense emotions towards someone in his life.

As he slowly walks towards the ritual, danny lifts his and revrently utters his name “Jason”

[wolfjackle-creates]

Bring Me Home: Chapter 2 Part 2

It's Wednesday! Time for another WIP Wednesday. No Ghost!Robin today. I've been focusing more on this fic. I think I'm going to try and start alternating weeks, but there's no set schedule or plan and it's liable to change at a moment's notice.

Fic Summary: Tim and Danny are both neglected by parents who care more about their work than their families. They deal with this by spending too much time online and find each other playing MMORPGs. They keep up their friendship as Tim becomes Robin and Danny becomes Phantom and don't bother keeping secrets from each other.

First, Previous

1.3k words

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Cassie hissed, “What the fuck, Tim!”

“I know!” whispered Tim back. “Danny mentioned home security, but I had no idea it was like that!”

Bart shook his head. “Want help with that kidnapping scheme? I’ll join you on your road to villainy.”

“That’s the problem with Tim,” agreed Conner. “He makes the road to evil look like it’s really the best option. Count me in, too.”

Cassie groaned. “Damn it, you guys are right. I’m in.”

Before Tim could do more than flip them off, Danny was back. “The pop express has returned!”

Cassie was closest to the door and Danny passed over her drink first. Only to freeze as their fingers brushed.

“Oh,” said Danny who looked at their hands then up at Cassie and back to their hands. “Huh.”

“What’s wrong?” asked Cassie and Tim started to get a bad feeling.

Which was only worsened by Danny looking at him with a grin forming on his face. “Sooooo, Tim—”

“No!” Tim shook a finger at him. “You’d better not tell me what I think you’re about to tell me! You’re OP enough! No more!”

Danny raised an eyebrow. “You done?”

Tim sighed and decided to just collapse backwards onto Danny’s bed. He stared at the ceiling and waved a hand in the air. “Yeah. Go ahead.”

Danny, apparently, loved making him suffer and continued passing out the drinks without telling him what he discovered. Then the mattress dipped next to him and Danny was above him with a grin that wouldn’t melt butter.

“So, Tii-iim,” Danny sing-songed.

“Daaan-ny,” replied Tim in the same tone.

“Apparently I can sense metas. And aliens. Which is so cool. They feel so different to humans! I knew about my ghost sense, but didn’t realize that applied to other species.”

Tim just sighed and closed his eyes. “Of course you can.”

“Conner!” The mattress shifted again as Danny moved. “You feel like warm sunshine and it’s so cool. Bart, you feel like static. Which… little awkward for me, but it’ll be good. I should try and get over my fear of electricity. Cassie, you also feel like static, but in a totally different way. Can’t explain it any better than that.”

“Why is static a problem?” asked Bart.

At the same time, Tim said, “I’ll add it to the list. And the descriptions.” He cracked one eye open to look at Danny. “Will you promise to stop developing more powers for me?”

Danny laughed and nudged his knee. “No promises.”

Cassie looked between them. “Does this mean you know?” she asked Danny.

“Wonder Girl, right? And Superboy and Impulse?”

Cassie nodded. “And Tim told us about you.”

“My lips are sealed,” Danny promised.

Tim rolled his eyes and pushed himself up. “Just gimme my water and fix my phone.”

“Wow, Tim,” said Cassie. “Rude much?”

“No. Look, you’ve no idea how ridiculously OP Danny is. Almost every week he calls me saying he discovered something else he can do.”

“If you think that was rude,” added Danny with a laugh, “you should’ve seen the things he said to me when I got him killed in Elf Night.”

“Ugh,” Tim feigned annoyance. “Don’t remind me. Honestly, what were you thinking? You were a rogue! Why did you attack the boss head on like a barbarian? We lost weeks of game progress! Weeks, Danny!”

Danny just laughed and threw the water bottle at his face. Tim caught it easily.

“Just give me your phone, Slim-Slam.”

“Slim-Slam?” asked Conner.

“He tried to object to Tim-Tam. I made him regret it.”

Tim shook his head. “This was a mistake. Why the hell did I ever think it’d be a good idea to let you guys meet.” To hopefully get them to change the subject, he shoved his phone in Danny’s direction. “What do you need to do to this anyway?”

“We just need to make it compatible with ectoplasm. There’s enough ambient ecto in Amity that waiting a few weeks allows it to happen naturally, but that’s not an option for you guys. Tuck and I went through, like, fifty devices figuring out the exact quantities and locations to add ectoplasm to force the process without destroying the device. It took us ages, but we figured it out. Now Tuck and I get extra money from the tech geeks in town who don’t want to wait the month or so it usually takes for new devices to start working.”

“Speaking of Tucker, will I be able to meet him? And Sam? You’re meeting my friends, I want to meet yours.”

Danny shrugged. “Sure. I’ll text them to meet us at Nasty Burger in forty minutes.” He sat at his desk and set down Tim’s phone to do so. Then, he opened a drawer and pulled out a set of micropipettes and disposable tips in a variety of sizes along with an empty glass beaker. Then came out an electronics tool kit. Tim had a similar one, though Danny’s looked like it had been obtained piecemeal as nothing matched. Finally, he opened a different drawer and pulled out a vial of a glowing green liquid.

Tim pushed himself off the bed and moved to stand over Danny’s shoulder. His friends joined him.

Bart asked, “So what will you be doing? What’s that green stuff?”

“It’s ectoplasm. The stuff ghosts and their dimension are made of. Ectoplasm is… complicated. This is unshaped ectoplasm, also called pure ectoplasm. A ghost or sentient creature can impose their will on it and make it function in a specific way. Since I’ve died, I have an easier time shaping it than most humans. I’ll send ‘tech’ vibes at it to get it to fuse to the phone more easily and apply carefully determined quantities to the different parts of the phone.”

“‘Tech vibes.’” Tim couldn’t hold back the groan. “It’s like magic. I hate it.”

Cassie bumped her shoulder against his. “You get that from Bruce.”

“Damn right, I do.”

Tim watched as Danny popped out the sim card. “First thing I’ll do is add a hundred microliters to the sim card. Then I’ll take the screen off and get to work on the innards. Do you guys want new batteries, by the way? Tuck’s got a bunch of ecto-batteries. Could have him bring them along when we meet up. You’d never have to charge your phone again.”

“Hell yeah!” said Conner. “Sign me right up.”

Tim shook his head, but couldn’t hold back the smile. “What do you mean by never have to charge it again?”

“I mean an ecto-battery will power the phone longer than the computer in the phone will last. I’ve switched over all my electronics. Nothing in this house is hooked up to the electricity grid anymore. I haven’t used a wall plug in four months. Not since Tucker and I fixed the batteries my parents designed.”

Tim didn’t like the sound of that. “Two questions. First, if the battery outlasts the phone, how should we dispose of it. And two, more importantly, ‘fixed’? What the hell does that mean?”

Danny had finished with the sim card and discarded the pipette tip in the beaker. Then he set about removing the screen from the phone. “Just bring the phones back to me when you’re done with them. I’ll upgrade your new ones, too. And their designs were liable to explode, overload the device, or bring it to life so it attacked. But Tuck and I took care of all that. Now devices only attack if Technus manages to get through the portal.”

Tim could sense Conner trying to look at him, but he resolutely refused to look away from Danny’s hands. He was removing the cameras and adding more ectoplasm to them, though much less than the sim card needed.

Unable to get Tim’s attention, Conner asked, “Who’s Technus?”

Danny shrugged. “One of my rogues. Tuck thinks he’s the ghost of Nikolai Tesla. He’s interested in controlling all technology and will make himself a giant mechasuit cannibalized from any electronic he can find in, like, a half mile radius. Super annoying.”

---------

Next

So I've decided which episode of the show this will take place during! It's mid season 1, so Jazz knows about Danny but Danny doesn't know she knows. I don't think that contradicts anything I've written (need to reread it), but if it does, no it doesn't. I dunno if most of you know what micropipettes look like, but if there's any interest I can take pics at work tomorrow and post them so you can see what I mean when I talk about the tips and stuff. I meant to do that today and then I didn't.

Tag List

@gremlin-bot, @bonebrokebuddy, @britcision, @lady-time-lord-, @welcometosasakiworld, @akikkobara, @phoenixdemonqueen, @dolfay, @skulld3mort-1fan, @we-ezer, @markus209, @sjrose1216, @onyxlightdragon, @dragonsrequiem, @jesus-camp-the-sequel, @spidey29phangirl, @kyrianclawraith, @evilminji, @introvert-even-on-the-internet, @emergentpanda-blog, @lexdamo, @v-inari, @idontgetpaidenoughforthisshit, @longlivethefallen, @undead-essence, @xye-chan, @liandrin, @seraphinedemort, @kisatamao, @schalensitzbucket, @caelestisdreamer, @runfromthemedic, @nutcase8691, @channajen, @tonicmii, @ambiguouslyominous, @vythika96, @addie-lover-of-stories, @ironicvixen, @violetfox2, @pickleking8, @mysticalcomputerdetective, @ark12, @mygood-bitch99, @squirrel-wolf

Getting close to the point where I'll have to split the tag list in two! (I'll still add anyone who is interested.)

[halfagone]

So here’s a unique twist of a common prompt. Danny is the son of Bruce Wayne, whoever his mother is is up to you. However, Danny wants nothing to do with Bruce or his family for whatever reason, whether it’s because Damian treated him badly as a child or maybe he just doesn’t like how Bruce operates. Either way, they meet and the meeting ends badly. What do you think?

There are actually a lot of reasons why Danny might not want to stay with Bruce or stay away from Bruce. There is, of course, the usual "Danny has billionaire trauma" route that works for some arguments (although not all (but I'll leave that ramble for another time)). You could always go with Danny and Damian didn't get along (if we're doing a Demon Siblings AU). But I think the route that goes best is just that... Danny has a lot of Trauma™ and he's not ready to join another family.

Unfortunately those kinds of AUs would probably be the sadder ones because that can mean that he has problems and/or is cut off from Jazz too. Because as much as I love Jazz, she was never the bastion of perfection and older sisterhood that we sometimes like to paint her as. She tried, just like her parents did, and sometimes she failed. ㄟ( ▔, ▔ )ㄏ

In those AUs Danny is probably trying to live on his own. Maybe he's emancipated, maybe he's turned 18 already (I do have a fic idea where Danny moves out of the house after turning 18 despite not graduating yet, which is a thing you can do. Plenty of kids' birthdays pass before June graduation in the U.S., after all.) He's just started to stand on his own two feet and probably move past the neglect, both physical and emotional, that came with living with the Fentons.

Enter Bruce. Bruce, who has abandonment issues and is one paranoid motherclucker (and yes, that was intentional), who has just found out he has an unknown son from either a past relationship or one-night stand. Of course he's going to want to know more about Danny and catch up on all the time he lost with Danny. And the thing about Bruce is that sometimes he acts like a bad father purely because he doesn't know how to communicate his feelings and does all these things that come off as insensitive and/or overbearing.

Sometimes Danny might be able to make it work. But depending on the downturn his life might have taken... sometimes he can't. And for a Danny that might have just gotten that hard-earned independence... it likely won't be pretty.

---

Danny doesn't know what to make of Bruce Wayne. The man seems nice... enough. He's a bit too excitable, tries a little too hard. It's clear as day that he's trying, much more than Danny's adoptive parents could ever bother to sometimes, but it's... Danny would appreciate it more if Bruce just gave up.

He's happy to see that Bruce didn't willingly give Danny up. No word yet on Danny's bio mom, but at least he's got that going for him. He could do without Bruce's meaningful attempts to introduce him to the rest of the family or find out more about him.

Danny absentmindedly tugs at his collar. He really wishes he'd just turned Sam down when he had the chance. Tucker had balked when she extended the invitation out to him. Usually Danny would be her first choice, since he had some semblance of High Society Table Manners™ which usually Sam wouldn't give a shit about, but well, Tucker had gone once, got embarrassed to hell and back, and pretty much sworn off against it ever since.

He'd only moved out from Fenton Works three weeks ago. Danny could understand why she didn't want to ask him while he got settled in.

But well, she was his friend. And with the risk of her parents trying to openly marry her off to some rich guy (as opposed to subtly trying to marry her off, like they were doing now), Danny had taken one for the team and agreed.

If he knew this was going to happen, he would have just stayed home and figured out how to cook scrambled fucking eggs.

"I'm not very comfortable with this conversation right now, Mr. Wayne," Danny said plainly to the man. They were off in a side room at this point, tucked away from the rest of the crowd that would usually gawk at them otherwise. Already he'd turned heads when people recognized him as familiar.

To be honest though, even if they hadn't gone to a more secluded room, Danny still would have told it to the man straight.

"Oh, is it because your friend isn't here? I told you you're more than welcome to-" Bruce started again but Danny cut him off with a sigh.

"That's not the problem here, Mr. Wayne," Danny deadpanned. "I don't know why you're expecting me to be on board so quickly but I- I just turned eighteen. I have an apartment, I have a job. I know I'm still a kid in your eyes but I haven't been your kid in- ever. No matter what any paternity test ends up saying, which I still haven't agreed to by the way-"

"You're not even willing to try?" Bruce asked in return, like he'd been struck across the face.

It seemed genuine enough, like he was sincerely hurt by Danny's standoffish attitude. And Danny would feel guilty if he weren't so tired right now. He'd been tired for the past four years and he didn't need this on top of it all as some twisted cherry on top of the shitty whipped cream that was his life.

"No, I'm not," Danny told the man, straightforward. People had said no to Bruce before, right? Surely, someone had.

He began to doubt when Bruce just stared at him, dumbfounded. Danny didn't let the silence linger because he didn't linger, just moved on and left the side room. He could feel Bruce's eyes on him as he went, and then some of the other Waynes' eyes on him when he came into view. He ignored all of them and tried to find Sam.

Maybe her parents would even be willing to let him go back to the hotel room, after the huge 'scene' he'd just caused.

[nerdofspades]

Okay. DP x DC idea. What if the League met Fenton before they met Phantom. Not in a ghost fight. Not doing anything particularly weird. Just Danny Fenton trying his best.

When they first notice the ghosts of Amity Park they all get a little worried about it, but no one can beat out Batman's paranoia. Ghosts may not have caused too many problems outside of Amity yet, but he doesn't trust that to stay that way. So he researches.

He, of course, finds out about Phantom, but shelves his usual just-in-case-he-turns-evil plans until after he can get some ghostly experts to brief the League. He does some cursory research into Phantom's history and abilities, which of course drags up everything in the Amity News cycle and some references in both Ancient Egypt and Ancient Rome. (So Batsy gives up on the idea of finding out a human civilian identity. Kid's dead and his "life" has been lost to time until he decides to say something.)

But, more importantly, there are no good options for who to ask for lessons in ghost hunting.

First option: the GIW. Absolute morons who have never caught anything stronger than an ectopus, cause more damage to property than the ghosts, and have security so lax it doesn't even take Batman ten seconds to get in. Absolutely not. Not for the watch tower.

Second option: Vlad Co. Owned and operated by billionaire Vlad Masters who runs in the same social circles as Lex Luthor. He has better security than the GIW but the question with him is not whether or not he *could* keep the secret, but whether or not he *would.*

Third option: Dr.s Fenton of FentonWorks. They have the most cutting edge ghost hunting technology and the most published papers. But. Well. A brief survey of the town makes it very clear they are biased at best and bigoted at worst. Not something the League wants to associate with, but they are still the best of the bad options.

Or so they think until Bruce Wayne goes to open contact with them and notices the Fenton children. He knew about them before coming of course. Jasmine Fenton, top of her class with a full ride to Harvard and plans to major in psychology. Has historically been vocal about her distaste for her parent's work. Likely because of Danny. Daniel Fenton is a trouble maker barely scraping by in his classes that had an accident in his parents lab a year ago. Not the brightest and not well behaved, but by all accounts he's got a good heart.

And neither of then are very enthused about his presence in their home. Neither of them seem to care for their parents anti-ghost rhetoric either. Jazz tries to reason with them and Danny just rolls his eyes behind their back. And casually takes apart and fixes one of their inventions.

Bruce quickly makes a minor investing deal with the elder Fentons as cover and a quick way to keep and eye on their research and finds an excuse to get the kids out of the house to talk. Once out, he extends the Justice League's request for training with ghost hunting gear and a project to install anti-ecto security measures in their base(s). Danny is hesitant but agrees.

And Danny is so tired and so done with this crap when he's in the Watch Tower. (He's enamored with the space station for several minutes, but once he gets on track, the League think he's a mini Bruce. All business and telling them not to be idiots.)

He gives them a basic run down of what each item is and how to use it. Common ghostly abilities and power scaling. (Do not call him to consult on a blob ghost, ectopus, or other weak ghostly animal. But they are not to try and fight several of the stronger ghost. A fair amount of this tech will make their afterlives miserable, but won't actually do much beyond annoy them. Superman in particular should stay away from anything strong enough to overshadow. No one wants to fight a possessed Kryptonian.) He gives them plenty of thermoses, guns, nets, and specter deflectors plus some odds and ends for them to test out. And then he starts working on the shield, which he worked on with Tucker to upgrade so it would recognize his ecto signature as friendly (and a couple others like Clockwork, Pandora, Frostbite, and Wulf) so it wouldn't shoot him on the spot.

It would probably take several trips to get everything working properly, by which point Danny has likely made friends with a few League members. And a few of them have probably noticed something weird about him, but they ignore it cause he's a good kid and it's just a little weird. Won't hurt anything.

Constantine takes one look at the kid and is not seen again until months after he finally leaves.

But now they have working ghost defenses and they can protect people if a ghost tries to attack anywhere outside of Amity! (Yes, several ask Danny to install a shield at their personal hideouts as well. Batman tries to figure it out on his own and decides to just ask Danny for now. He'll figure it out eventually, but Fenton schematics are a pain and the power source doesn't look like anything he's ever seen before.)

Eventually everything is done and Danny goes back to his life with a large chunk of cash in his new bank account and a secure line just incase the league needs to consult with him again. Danny thinks that's the end of it until Batman shows up decked out in Fenton gear looking for Phantom.

Continue

[thenightwolf51]

So i just read this post about the Bats being Warlocks with Danny as their Patron and its super great, amazing work @aziraphale-is-a-cat and @percyisawesome

At first i thought Lady Gotham was going to be their Patron, because i immediately forgot i was reading a crossover, and that sparked an idea.

What if Lady Gotham doesn't exist and Phantom was the Gotham city spirit.

So DPxDC idea where Phantom was the first recorded Hero/Meta way back before the Justice League members were even born, because i love those stories, but if course no one knew that back then. Metas weren't a thing yet.

So things go as canon but eventually the GIW get worse and worse, especially as more and more of Amity becomes Liminal from ambient ecto leaking from the portal.

And the GIW, way too confident with the Anti Ecto Acts in place, decide that Amity Park is a lost cause. They launch a major attack the town and destroy the portal in the process.

And even though i think the surviving Amity Parkers would buckle down, stand strong, and rebuild their town. For the sake of this idea, lets say they don't do that.

Instead the survivors band together and decide they need to leave, get as far from the GIW's main base of operations as they can.

They go right.

They end up in Gotham, New Jersey.

Now, im messing with the timeline a bit. I still kinda want the DP parts to be early 2000s, maybe late 80s/early 90s at the least, so the uniquely DC events im pushing to later in time a bit.

So lets say Gotham, while still pretty old and with its history and subtle curses, never really expanded into the huge city we normally think of. No towering skyscrapers or really any huge buildings, is barely a small city at this point.

And then an influx of new residents from the west cause a need to expand. Over the generations the former Amity Parkers help Gotham become what we know in Bruces time. By then they're just Gothamites, and if their subtle limiality is to attribute for the modern Gothamite's durability and the eventual rogues' whole... thing well its been way too long to place blame on that random group of refugees.

And where was Phantom in all this? Watching over his people. The portal and his family are gone, he cant be Danny because the survivors believe he died when FentonWorks exploded, all he really has at the moment is these people who's lives he believes he inadvertently destroyed.

So he watches over them, then their descendants and the seemingly unfortunate people of their new home. This little city has afew old curses that are holding the residents back and making them miserable, its the least he can do to take some of them on for himself, just make things easier for the people.

Eventually the city becomes his new haunt, becomes a part of him as he helps it grow and expand. And some Amity descendants still spread the urban legend that is the Phantom of Gotham.

(Just a little side detail that im not sure how to add in but i really like the idea of Liminality eventually evolving or mutating into the meta gene if there's not enough ambient ectoto keep it active. Maybe the portal sent out a shock wave of radiation when it was destroyed. Not everyone was affected but for those who were it either was so subtle the effects fade within a month from the lack of enough ambient ecto or went dormant until it became a meta gene and no longer needed ecto.

I dont know, i mostly like the irony of Batman's "no meta's in Gotham" rule when most of Gotham was unknowingly built by the original "metas")

@hdgnj @dcxdpdabbles @nelkcats @nerdpoe @ailithnight @tathartiel

And @omnicrafts , hope your feeling better

[arbiterlexultionis]

Shoot for the moon, wind up amongst the Stars

So, obviously Danny loves space. Exploring it, experiencing all it has to offer, being among the first humans to step foot on other worlds, taking off in a rocket on a mission to take one small step for man has been his dream ever sense he was old enough to even know what it meant to dream. Danny is also a Fenton, and regardless of what his grades may say he’s smart, really Really smart. To an absurd degree, even for a Fenton, especially in matters of engineering. Blueprints were his picture books, college textbooks his bedtime stories and his parents old recordings of their Ivy League college engineering courses his Saturday morning cartoons. Even if he didn’t have the actual strength neccisary to do it he practically knew how to pull apart an engine before he had a good enough comprehension the the English language to give a half decent explanation of what an engine is. Each and every part known and understood on the deepest level possible, moving in his mind exactly as they should before he could even spell their names. A six year old Jazz damn near had a stroke when she found her two year old brother that she promised to protect from her parents weird Sci-Ance pulling apart the microwave and figuring out how to use the magnetron to send signals that he could detect on the family computer. By the time Danny was in “real” classes in elementary and moving onto middle school he was more than capable of helping his parents pull apart thrown away technology too piece together wonderful machines, and the only reason he didn’t was because he preferred to work on his own projects(It took Jazz nearly three hours to convince him that taking his homemade 7300 mW laser to school to make Dash stop shoving Tucker into lockers was a bad idea).

One night, Danny’s in phantom form flying through the sky’s of amity starring up into the endless inky black and blue of the night. Taking in the countless new details his enhanced physiology lets see, experience even without the aid of a telescope. Reminiscing about the dream he lost when he lost half his life. Mourning both those losses. Sure, he’s been to space but it’s not the same. He just sheds the pull of gravity and lets himself rise, it’s a magical experience in and of itself but it’s not the same as strapping himself into the spacecraft of his own design and embarking on a journey to the stars. It’s cheating. But it’s not like he’ll ever get the chance to experience the real deal, even if he could pass the physical there’s no way he could make it to NASA now that all his grades were in the toilet. And it’s not like he could achieve it in some other way, random civilians can’t just build spaceships in their basem…..

Danny stops mid air. He thinks. The specter speeder. Jack and Maddie built the specter speeder in their basement. Jack and Maddie built an honest to god spaceship in their basement. It could survive in the vacuum of space and under the weight of the ocean, operate in and out of atmosphere with or without gravity. It was a spaceship in every way that mattered, and they just Built It because they felt like it. And Danny was more than capable of producing technology of a similar level. He could do it, he could build a spaceship with his own two hands and let it carry him to the stars, to his dreams.

Danny’s rushing home before he even realizes he’s moving, a whirlwind around his room gathering up all his old designs, empty blueprints and reference materials. He spends more than an hour in a hyper focused state drawing up a slightly modernized, very Fentonized version of a Saturn V rocket. He’s barely a quarter of the way through the spitballing process of coming up with the design when he realizes he may or may not have over looked a very important part of the whole “screw it, I’ll do it myself” approach to getting to space, materials. There’s a limit to how many resources can go missing from his parents lab and how many charitable donations Vlad can generously(unknowingly) make to the cause before they all notice and start asking questions. So his designs are, unfortunately, put aside for the time being. He is disheartened for a moment, and in an attempt to cheer himself up he reaches for the nearest space themed entertainment he has, a Star Wars comic. The he stops, looks at the freighter on the cover of the comic. A lot of sci-fi ships are pretty small. Small enough to build without getting asked to many questions.

He spends the next several weeks tearing through as much sci-fi comics, movies and TV shows as he can, binge watching YouTube lore videos about Star Wars, Halo and who knows what else. After that, it’s time to get to work.

Weeks later, Lancer is standing on his porch on a nice, quite Saturday morning. It’s a habit he got into years ago, taking in the peace of his small little town in the early hours of the morning before it’s had a chance to wake up and start a ruckus, coming to appreciate and enjoy it even more now that ghost have been causing havoc and partaking in a little bit of bird watching while he’s at it. Slowly taking sips of his still far to hot cup of coffee, he stairs into the sunrise, taking in the countless colors and artfully blended shades. This is it. This is what he loves about his city. The quite beauty of it, so easy to miss and even easier to adore. What he loves about his job, the beauty of a new day, of the future, and all the possibilities it holds. Even if he does far to much work for far to little pay, it will all be worth it if even one of those students he has helped grow and learn go on to become doctors, police and engineers, saving lives and building the prosperous future they all deserve to live in. He breathes in, and then out. He is content.

A black spec appears on the horizon, undoubtably a flock of birds. Excellent. He begins to look through his binoculars, mentally trying to guess what species they’ll be when taking into account the time of year and day. He search’s through the sky for a moment, before going absolutely still. He lowers his binoculars and takes a long, long sip of his still scolding my hot coffee. It burns, he can feel pain, so he’s probably not dreaming. He looks back at the black spec in the distance, takes a long, hard look at it through his binoculars. It is still very much not a flock of birds. His is now 99% positive that it is exactly what it looks like. He breaths in, breathe out. He is no longer content.

Ten seconds later the easily identifiable UFO flys directly over his house, the iconic and extraordinarily loud screech of an imperial TIE fighter following it. His car’s alarm blares, as do the alarms of nearly every other car on the street, which is almost loud enough to mask the sound of alarms going off on the neighboring streets. He turns around, and walks back inside. Stops at the whiteboard he has hung on the wall by the door.

‘Note to self- give Mr. Fenton detention on Monday. P.S. bring a pack of disposable face masks and warn him of the dangers of flying a high tech spaceship where federal agents can look through the cockpit window and see him piloting it.’

At the very least he needs to tint the windows. Maybe make the window a one way mirror, and add some chrome detailing while painting the rest of the craft vanta black? That would surely look. (he glances at the guide to being hip for the unhip he has laying on his counter still open from last nights reading) Sick? Yes, it would surly look sick. He should also probably try and talk him into adding some cameras and such to the thing, that dome window has to have terrible visibility. At least a backup camera so he can parallel park and keep and eye out for any fighters trying to line up shots behind him.

[matchingbatbites]

"Now I have to remember you for longer than I have known you" Sorry, I make my self sad imagining Steve standing by the grave stone they put up for Eddie even though they couldn't bury him

GOD Anon just stab me next time, it would be kinder. (Jk jk I love this actually, thank you for blessing me with it) I've never cried while writing something until now, so I hope you're proud of yourself. Somehow this ended up being 1.1k so it's going under a cut. <3 This one does not have a happy ending folks, it's all just Steve being sad at Eddie's grave.

Steve feels almost awkward as he stands before the makeshift grave. He says makeshift because- can it really be a proper grave when there's no body to inhabit it? When it's just a slab of stone with some words on it, marking an empty plot of land?

He doesn't think it does, but it will have to do, will have to be good enough to bear the weight of their grief.

He'd brought Dustin by earlier, had stood off a little ways as the kid sat and talked to the stone, just like he had watched Max do- God, last month. Just last month when they'd nearly lost little Red, and the thought of that is what kept him closer to Dustin, the latent paranoia clinging to him like a second skin at just the idea of it happening again.

But Dustin is fine. He'd talked to the rock for nearly half an hour before Steve drove him back home, left him with his mother and a crushing hug. And then Steve had- gone back.

It's only been a week since it's been set into place, a chunk of stone resting on solid ground that the others have all visited in turn, trying to turn their grief for their lost friend into words, trying to unload their emotions onto something tangible.

This is the first time Steve has been here alone, and he- he doesn't even know if he should be. He hadn't known Eddie, not like the boys had and- and maybe that's the problem. For the first time in his life, Steve feels like something has slipped through his fingers, and he doesn't know what to do about it.

He sits on the grass, cross-legged in front of the stone, and reaches out to brush his fingers over the granite.

"Um, hi Eddie. I know everyone else has kind of had their turn just, uh. Just sitting out here and talking to you. I know we weren't really friends, but- but I wanted-"

Steve frowns, his fingers press into the stone as his free hand clenches around nothing.

"I don't- I'm not great with- with words. Not like the way Dustin described you. Fucking wordsmith he called you, whatever- whatever that actually means. And that- that's what fucking sucks about this whole thing, is that I won't- I'll never get to see that in action myself. Dustin talked about you so much, always saying how great you are- were-"

The slip-up stops him cold, and he sniffs, brings his free hand up to rub at his nose and keeps the other firm against the headstone.

"I have this, uh, memory. Of you. Right after you transferred into Hawkins Middle, and you were just so quiet and- and you got picked on, of course, because you were new, you were a stranger. And then one day you jumped in front of Danny Matthews who was just going crazy on this 6th grader, and you-"

Steve stops to laugh wetly, the memory still so vivid, even to this day. "You fucking bit him, and you told him that you had rabies and he- he went fucking crying to the principal. You got in so much trouble, but from that day on you never let that stop you from standing up for other kids.

"I was thinking about that the other day. How I've known about you for years, but never interacted with you. I was always too worried about what people would say about me. You know, Dustin is the one who really, finally broke me out of that mindset. And yeah, okay, he was trying to talk me into dating Robin, but- He's right, that little shit. It doesn't fucking matter anymore.

"So when- when everything went down with you- When we found you, I kind of had that in the back of my mind, because you were- you were both the kid I admired and someone I didn't know at all. And then I got to spend that week getting to know you, like for real, and you were everything Dustin said and more, and now-"

He takes a shuddering breath and scrubs at his face, finally lifting his hand from the stone to wipe at the tears that are starting to fall.

"Now I have to remember you for longer than I've known you, and it's not- it's not fair, Eddie."

A sob rips through him unbidden, and the floodgates open with it. Steve curls in on himself as his chest heaves and he gasps into his hands. He speaks around it as best he can, needing to get the words out before he drains himself completely.

"It's not- it's not fair that you can just come in- into my life like a fucking whirlwind before just- just vanishing. You gave me just a fucking taste of what it's like to know you, and that- that's what I have to live with for the rest of my life."

Steve sobs into his hands as he thinks about the what ifs, the impossible possibilities that have plagued him for weeks since they were forced to leave Eddie's body behind in that absolute hellscape. The 'Maybe's and the 'I should have's and the 'If only's that have been growing and stewing inside of Steve finally take their chance to claw to the surface, ripping out of him in something that grows too close to hyperventilation, but he doesn't fight it.

He lets it happen, lets every little want and wish and regret flow through him here, lets them all drip down between his fingers to land on the gravestone of someone who should not be dead. Who should be alive and happy and with Steve. He cries for something he lost before he ever even got close to having it.

At the end of it all he feels hollow, like a deflated balloon that's been discarded, just waiting to be trampled on. And yet. He's also lighter, like something inside him has shaken loose and he's finally able to breathe freely for the first time in weeks.

He cleans his face on the sleeve of his jacket, makes a mental note to wash it when he gets home, and just. Looks down at the slab before him. It's pretty traditional, and Steve thinks Eddie might hate how boring it is, but it's enough for now. It has to be.

Steve presses a kiss to the tips of his fingers before he reaches down and brushes them against the marker, smiling softly at the "Son, Friend, Rockstar" that adorns the stone. "I'll be back next week, Eddie. See you then, okay?"

[ectospacecadet]

Post AGIT SPOILERS

Dark Danny character arc

Ok so Dark Danny, or Dan for short, is now in a clone body of his past self. Cool. Personally I’d like to think that Clockwork made the transfer possible by having Dan’s time ectosignature be back to Danny’s own in this timeline. So he’s not got a 24/50-something year old ectosignature anymore BUT he still retains his memories of course. So he’s basically 16-17 years old now.

Why do I think his ectosignature being resynced to this timeline, so that he’s 16-17, should be a thing? Well mostly because I can see the darker NSFW side of this fandom rubbing their hands together and saying “well he’s an adult technically”, need I say more? 🤢

Anyway, aside from that, where can I see Dan’s character growth in the series?

Well, he’s human again for the first time in 12-13 years, he’s going to have to deal with teenage hormones once again. That’ll suck. Imagine going through puberty 3 times?

I don’t think he can go into his human form at first, I feel that seeing his own true human face would give him some form of PTSD. “Well he didn’t react before in UE” Because it was an illusion, not his actual human face. It’s different when it’s a fake face, but when it’s the same, flesh and blood, that you killed? That’s going to hit hard.

This is something he can work on with Vlad, giving Dan a chance to open up about all the wrong he did in his timeline, Vlad has no idea what Dan did, he just knows he’s a messed up ghost hybrid of himself and Danny.

———

I don’t think Dan will be at 100% power, not because he’s reverted to his 17 year old state, but because he’s still recovering from that battle. It doesn’t just mess with him physically but also mentally, so he trains at first but eventually it leads to a hesitant therapy treatment with Jazz.

This also gives Dan room to talk to Jazz about what he did to her, his own guilt towards that, and how he sees his family. Remember, he tried to kill them twice now, that’s going to really effect him. He lost his family from a stupid accident, but knowing he actually wanted them intentionally dead? How messed up is he that he would try to kill his family? How will he react now to seeing them and how affectionate they are with Danny?

As for Sam and Tucker, I think he’ll get jealous of that too, he tries to reconnect with them but it’s a bit difficult when he also tried to kill them. I don’t doubt that he’ll admit to them that he really did miss them, he says so himself in UE, his reaction when they hug him leaves him in a stunned shock too. Then he snaps out of it when Tucker insults him xD But yeah, I think he will try to befriend them again but shortly realises that their friendship wont be like before, that he needs find new friends.

———

Another thing, Vlad’s clones. UE takes place BEFORE Kindred Spirits, meaning that Dan had no idea that the clones existed, so how do you think he’ll react to seeing those for the first time? “What, you had a bunch of these just lying around?” Vlad can explain it all to Dan, about how dozens failed, “died”, and that’s gonna really piss him off.

Then Vlad lets him know about Danielle, a clone that somehow survived the process and surpassed the other clones despite being ‘imperfect’. Dan goes to find her in the GZ at some point, using Vlad’s own ecto-signature tracking device (based on the Boo-merang), he finds her in the frozen Tundra with Frostbite.

She’s with Frostbite because now she’ll be 14-15, meaning her ice powers started to kick in as Danny’s did, so Danny lead her to Frostbite’s world. It’s here that she stayed, found a home and her own identity. Her new name is Ellie. Dan then trains to learn how to use his own ice powers but struggles as he’s got two infused ghost cores. In these training sessions he learns more about Ellie and asks how she survived, he also relates to her more than just being his clone but also another one of Vlad’s ‘mistakes’. ✨Sibling energy✨

She explains that she’s regained her self confidence and her own identity, she liked being called Dani but felt that it was too close to being Danny, she didn’t just want to be ‘his clone’, she wanted to be herself. Dan takes a moment to consider this and offers for her to visit anytime, Vlad is trying to be better now.

———

Onto Valerie, Danny was only starting to have feelings for her around the time of UE, so Dan had those too. But obviously due to their animosity in the future and how he nearly kills her repeatedly, that’s gonna suck big time. He tries to get to know her again, much to Vlad and Danny’s dismay, Valerie isn’t exactly sure on how to feel about Dan since he looks so much like Danny. Which is explained with the statistic there’s an almost exact duplicate of you somewhere around the world, Danny found his and wanted to meet them, not only that but they had similar names, Dan being short for Dathaniel… Danny’s not great at making up shit on the fly, but Dan simply admits he uses the short version because of how dumb the long one is. I also believe that she’s working alongside the Mayor in the anti-ghost protection teams, her dad and the Fentons being the ones to help supply with Anti-Ghost weaponry. Also I do see Dan and Val trying to make it work romantically.

Again this is why Dan needs to be 16-17 again because dear god the implications behind a 24-50-something ghost in a 16-17 year old’s body just makes it so damn confusing on a ‘shipping’ level. I feel that it needs to be 100% clarified at some point otherwise it could get very VERY messy and people will scream p*do no matter which way you go because of the implications 💀

Alright, previous timeline Valerie. I am in agreement that there are 2 Valeries, you see them both in different places in the book so I don’t think they’re the same person. I’m gonna call her Val for this section.

Val is definitely not on Danny or Dan’s side, she wants to out both Danny and Dan as ghosts to Amity Park but struggles to provide proof. Both Dan and Danny have to work together when it comes to Val because she is a genuine threat, but also Danny thinks she can be reasoned with. Initially Dan doesn’t agree but over his redemption arc he basically winds up reasoning with her instead of just wasting her.

———

Alright, what about his relationship with Danny? Well… I don’t think he and Danny will get along initially, he’s… grateful that he didn’t leave him to disappear, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t resent him. Danny got his happy ending, Dan has to work hard to build things he’s lost, he’s not going to like being around him. They do start to act like brothers eventually, but Danny is clearly the favourite child when it comes to that. Dan eventually learns that he never really hated Danny, he just hated himself. He also asks how he managed to save his family, Danny says Clockwork helped.

Clockwork… OKAY BUT for real, why did Clockwork help Danny and save his parents, but not Dan’s??? Clearly he could have, but didn’t. “Everything’s the way it’s supposed to be”, so Clockwork must have seen a timeline where Danny would have to face himself twice just so he can become the bridge? Ooh Dan’s not going to like that. He had to suffer, to kill himself, his family, everything and everyone who died, just for the possibility of this outcome??? Damn. That’s going to suuuuck.

———

Final note: Dan isn’t going to be a good person just because he’s put in a clone. He has to relearn everything, go back to school to gain better social behaviours, try to learn how to fit into society again. He wouldn’t just be a ‘good guy’, think of him more as an anti-hero Danny Phantom. I don’t doubt that he wouldn’t agree with Danny initially about wanting to ‘help’ ghosts, but is quickly reminded about how Danny could have just left him to disappear.

I do also think Danny will take Dan to the old Ghost Runes, Dan is going to need his own purpose now. I’m not sure what that will be.

Thanks for reading!

[gretavanfleetposts]

Valence: Chapter Five

Author's Note: A special tag for @earthlysorrows because I wrote this entire chapter while watching the home shopping network and honestly? I think it shows.

Summary: The daughter of a drug lord, you're ready to take over the family business. Your father's only stipulation? You must marry the man he has picked out for you instead of the man you love in order to claim your kingdom.

TW: penetrative sex, oral sex (f. receiving), spanking, fingering, slight dirty talk (18+ minors do not interact), swearing, themes of death and dying

Word Count: 10k

Chapter Four Masterlist Chapter Six

“My brothers are dying to see you now that you’re officially a Kiszka.”

Jake stood in your bedroom doorway, leaning on the frame while watching you inhabit the room, as he usually did. Today, he stood in the doorway watching you silently collapse in on yourself as you unpacked your suitcase from your honeymoon a few days too late. You’d been avoiding it. And Jake.

“They won’t shut up about it,” he continued in a flatter tone as he talked about his brothers. “It’s getting really annoying, honestly.”

You were silent as you pulled garments from your suitcase sitting on your bed, disheveled from hardly any time left empty in the days prior. And truthfully, you were hardly listening to Jake as your mind rifled through images of yourself with Danny on your wedding night and then yourself with Jake on the last night of your honeymoon. They had each been so different and you weren’t entirely sure which felt more real. The only thing you were certain of was that Jake had been right. Things did feel different when you were far from home. They had felt less tangible, like they touched your real life a little less, despite the fact that you had felt them just as deeply as anything in your own home.

“Of course, you don’t have to come over if you don’t want to,” he spoke up again, a bit softer as you heard concern begin to lace into his words and his tone as your silence dragged on.

You halted your actions with a sigh, actions you were performing absently at best, as you lifted your fingers to your forehead to rub circles into the tension there. You squeezed your eyes shut tightly as the thoughts and the stress became unbearable.

Jake had forgiven you for being with Danny. Danny was unlikely to be so understanding. And you had absolutely no idea how to fix it.

You heard your bedroom door close behind you and the sound of Jake’s footsteps soon after as he closed the distance between you, reaching his hand out to grip your arm.

“Talk to me,” he pleaded in a whisper with a squeeze of his hand.

It took strength to will your thoughts into words, thoughts that squeezed past your lips as a tight breath, the exertion palpable as you still rubbed mean circles into the skin on your forehead.

“You were right. Feels so different being…here.”

Here being this place where you were with Danny, although you didn’t say that part out loud. There was no reason to. Speaking it would have only caused you to collapse.

You turned after a moment of silence, facing Jake as you breathed in deeply, lines of worry creasing your face and drawing down the corners of your mouth. You didn’t hide your emotions as you faced him. You didn’t hide the lost look written on your face as you sought his comfort.

"Jake, I…" you began, quieting quickly after as you thought about what you were about to say.

He stepped closer, bringing his hand up to hold your neck just at your hairline, letting his thumb run along your jaw as his eyes and his warmth encouraged you to continue. And the gentleness of his touch, the way his eyes searched your face, it made your chest swell with emotion as moisture threatened to spill from your eyes.

"I don't know what to do," you finished finally, a sound barely audible despite the quiet about the room.

He nodded in understanding before he brought his other hand up to hold the other side of your face as he put on his best reassuring look.

"Just worry about today,” he said softly. “We can figure the rest out tomorrow. One day at a time.”

You leaned into him, letting your forehead rest against his neck beneath his chin as you buried your face in him.

“I think I might fall apart before tomorrow,” you mumbled against his skin.

But he pulled your face back to look at him again.

“I’m not going to let that happen, y/n,” he shook his head.

You saw the sincerity in his eyes as he said it. It was a look that held in it the same feeling you had experienced as he’d held you on the last night of your honeymoon. It was a promise. And you might have leaned in to kiss him as a thank you if he hadn’t leaned in first to press his lips softly against your forehead, soothing the ache you had started with your fingertips and your overthinking.

You felt yourself sigh at the contact, your fingers reaching up to stretch across the material that barely covered his chest, gripping into the sides of the mostly unbuttoned shirt.

When he finally pulled away, your eyes lifted open slowly, even as your hands still clung to him.

“Have you talked to Danny?” he asked, his hands still holding your face.

You shook your head.

“I don’t even know what to say to him.”

It felt like there was nothing to say to him, truthfully. It almost felt better to say nothing at all than to try and come up with something to say to him.

“I’m sure whatever you would say, he would understand.”

You dropped your eyes to the silver medallion glinting on Jake’s chest, tracing the symbols with your eyes as you felt shame wash over you.

“I don’t think he would,” you whispered as you bit the inside of your cheek.

It felt shameful to admit out loud though you felt safe admitting it to Jake, maybe the only person in this whole situation who understood your internal battle. It was the truth, after all. Or your perception of the truth, anyway.

“I think you’re being too hard on yourself,” he answered, dropping his hands to your elbows and watching the way your fingers traced lightly on his shirt, losing yourself in the thought of what that conversation with Danny would even look like.

“We didn’t sleep together but I think I wanted to.”

How could you even say that to him?

But even though silence seemed like the better option, it felt more unfair to the boy who had loved you faithfully for almost 25 years. It felt cruel to leave him wondering, left to his own devices to fill in the gaps of your silence, to try and piece together the remnants of your feelings for him without even trying to help him decipher the confusion of your own state of being. But how could you help him understand what you yourself didn’t even understand? How could you be what he needed you to be when you hardly knew who you were or what you wanted anymore?

“Come on,” Jake broke your concentration as he took your hands in his. “I can’t drag you back to Italy but I can drag you to see my brothers.”

You breathed deeply to fill your lungs, to shake the more looming of your thoughts from your mind. It seemed like more of a promise to get you to Josh, the boy whose superpower seemed to be putting things into perspective. Where Jake had been born to listen, Josh had been born to speak. And now, as you found yourself unable to speak your feelings, it seemed Josh would certainly do some good.

So you nodded in agreement.

—

"There's the happy couple!" Josh exclaimed upon seeing you enter the large gothic structure that the Kiszka’s called their home.

And the sight of Josh alone was enough to bring a wide smile to your face as you practically jumped into his open arms.

He hugged you tightly, tighter even than the day he met you, lifting your feet off the ground as he held you against him.

It was funny to think about how different he was from Jake. When Jake touched you, it always felt so careful, so purposeful. But Josh reached for you so freely, like it took no thought at all.

His tight hold on you relaxed you a bit, brought you back down to earth even before he let your feet touch the ground again as he pulled away but let his hands hold your arms.

“Seems like Italy did you some good,” he smiled.

“Well I was told the place does wonders for irreparable emotional damage but turns out, all I needed was to see you.”

Josh’s smile scrunched up his nose.

“Hear that, Jake? She likes me better than you.”

“If you steal my wife, I’ll have you killed,” Jake retorted flippantly.

Josh gave him a tsk with his tongue as he shook his head.

“Such a beautiful tapestry of words, Jacob.”

You chuckled at their ability to be so tongue-in-cheek, even amongst a situation that still felt far less than funny. Somehow, you weren’t sure how, they brought levity to it.

“Where’s Sam?” you questioned as you noticed the absence of the lankier of the brothers.

“He’s around here somewhere,” Josh answered with a nod of his head toward the staircase behind him, before adding, “You’d better stifle that smile though, he’ll think Jake replaced you with someone else on the honeymoon.”

You gave him a playful push on the shoulder as you shook your head, finally retreating from his embrace.

“Oh I almost forgot,” he exclaimed suddenly. “I have a wedding present for you. Well, technically Sam helped pick it out but since he’s nowhere to be found, I’ll be taking all the credit.”

“Yeah, sounds like you,” Jake retorted with a chuckle, moving slyly to your side to wrap his arm around your waist, a more couple-y of gestures that you had yet to display in front of, well anyone, really. Though you didn't mind the contact. Actually you found it soothing, like a tether holding you to the moment, preventing you from slipping up into your atmosphere of thoughts.

"Oh no you don't," you heard suddenly, turning toward the sound to see Sam bounding down the staircase in a hurry.

As soon as the tall brother's feet hit the smooth wooden floor, he was pulling you away from Jake and into his open arms before quickly spinning you so your back was to his chest and his arms snaked around your shoulders.

"You're gonna love this," he mused in typical Sam fashion, pushing you forward while walking behind you quite clumsily given the fact that his arms still wrapped around your shoulders and sternum.

"But if you don't, we'll just find something you like better," Josh chimed in with his typical Josh smile. God you had missed that toothy grin.

"I'm sure whatever it is, I'll love it," you said with a smile, trying your best not to trip over the boy still clinging to your back.

"Don't speak too soon," Jake quipped from behind you, conveniently out of view for the eye roll Sam was likely sending him, "they have horrible taste."

You saw it out of the corner of your eye before you had even fully entered the room. The grand mahogany desk that had sat in the room the last time you'd been there with its back to the fireplace was gone, replaced with a different piece of furniture: a walnut desk, just as grand, with tiny blue Spanish tiles running down the legs. Like a piece of home but with none of the heartache attached. Only an ocean of blue tiles holding up the smooth wooden surface like waves holding a piece of wood afloat, the way the Kiszka boys seemed to be holding you afloat.

"Josh, Sam, you really didn't have to do this," you began, untangling yourself from Sam to reach for the desk, to run your fingers over the smooth surface of the top and the tiny grouted tiles down one leg, in awe of its beauty and its sturdiness, something you felt had been evading you lately.

"Well we couldn't let you be the only piece of you here," Sam smiled sweetly to you.

"Spoken like a true poet, Sam," Jake laughed.

Josh had a much more serious look on his face as he watched you admire the behemoth of wood.

"We wanted it to feel a little more like home, even if you aren't always here."

The truth was, it didn't feel like home. Home felt heavy. It felt like it sunk into the ground with the weight of duty and the lack of control you felt in your life. It felt less and less like the place you wanted to be as you watched the world within it crumble around you. But this place? The Kiszka house? It felt entirely different. It felt warm and inviting and safe, like the things that hurt you in your own home hurt a little less here.

"I absolutely love it, thank you," you breathed as you threw yourself back into Josh's arms where he held you tightly, only letting go when Sam started to get antsy, whispering, "My turn, my turn".

And Sam held you just as tightly.

The Kiszka’s were sturdy. They were strong. Maybe that’s why they were so good at holding you up.

"Have you eaten yet?" Sam asked as he pulled away.

You and Jake both shook your heads.

"Well come on then, there's work to be done!"

“We’ll get it started,” Jake offered as less of a request than an assertion for Sam while he slapped his arm around his younger brother's shoulders, pulling him towards the door to leave despite his protests, leaving you and Josh alone in the silence.

“Jake said it went well for the most part," Josh started when the other two boys were out of earshot, watching as you swiped your fingers lazily across the wooden surface of the desk.

“I’m sure he left out all the parts where I made his life more difficult,” you said as you kept your eyes fixed to the desk, thinking about your less-finer moments, moments Jake certainly deserved an apology for.

God, you had apologized more in the last month than you had maybe in your entire life. What would your father have thought?

“Nah, he kept those in,” Josh answered with a smile, earning a laugh from you as you plopped down into the chair behind the desk, silently hoping Jake had left a few details out.

Josh moved to sit on the edge of the desk next to your chair, facing the opposite direction as you sank into the leather armchair.

“Tell me how you’ve been,” he asked softly, folding his hands into his lap and abandoning the sense of humor from his demeanor.

You couldn't help but chuckle to yourself as you propped your elbows up on the desk and dropped your face into your hands, rubbing at your eyes deeply like maybe you could wipe away the more confusing of your feelings.

“I’m a fucking mess, Josh,” you breathed into your hands.

You thought about the breakdown you had had with Jake and wondered how much of it he had shared with Josh. Of course, Josh wouldn't judge you. You knew that. But still, it was embarrassing enough to feel so lost. You weren't used to the feeling. You didn't really want to be seen that way and yet here you were adding to the list of people who had seen you that way.

And then there was Danny who wasn't getting to see you at all. And the longer you avoided him, the worse you felt.

“You made it through your honeymoon. I’d say you’re doing just fine," Josh answered, before adding, "You and Jake haven’t even fought and you’ve been here almost 30 minutes.”

You lifted your head from your hands to fiddle with your fingers as a sigh escaped your lungs.

"Feels like I'm always doing the wrong thing nowadays."

"I think you're just doing what feels right in the moment and judging yourself after."

"I could have a bit more foresight."

“You have to let yourself feel the way you feel, y/n. You'll always find yourself pushing Jake away if you're afraid of how you feel about him, if you keep punishing yourself for feeling things you don't think you're supposed to feel."

You chewed on the inside of your lip, avoiding his gaze but unable to avoid what he was saying, how right he was. You knew you had feelings for Jake, as much as you didn’t want to admit it. And you knew those feelings were enough to change things between you and Danny, as much as you didn’t want to admit that either.

"It really wasn't a bad time," you whispered, thinking about the better memories you had made on the trip. "The honeymoon, I mean. In a lot of ways, it was harder coming home."

"Why's that?" he implored, his eyes still warm and kind, inviting you to share more and let him in, difficult as it was to admit the things you were admitting.

"I'm not experiencing my feelings in a vacuum, Josh," you whispered as you wrapped your arms around your own chest. "I'm hurting people."

Danny. You were hurting Danny.

Josh pushed off the desk to kneel by your chair, letting one hand rest on your knee while the other squeezed your bicep. And his eyes caught your gaze, lifting your stare to his own.

For a moment you wondered if he could see the guilt behind your eyes, if he could feel it too just by looking at you.

"Y/n, hurt is so very human,” he started slowly. “We feel it ourselves, we're products of the hurt that came before us, and yes, sometimes we even inflict it in others, despite our best intentions."

You felt moisture heating behind your eyes as he spoke, as you thought of the hurt that had defined the world around you. The loss of your mother had hurt you. It had hurt your father and your sister. The loss of the Kiszka patriarch had hurt Jake and Jake's hurt had wounded Josh. And your marriage to Jake had hurt you and Danny alike, your torment further hurting Jake in its wake. It was a web of hurt that you lived in, it seemed. Inescapable.

But Josh continued.

"We're not unforgivable for it. We feel it, we regret it, we try and make it right."

That was the problem though. You didn't know how to make it right, though figuring out how exactly you felt about Jake was probably a good first step.

There was a sigh not far from your lips as you sniffed back tears and thanked Josh for the desk. And he gave you a warm smile despite the fact that you could tell there was some protest in his eyes over you dropping the topic before you'd really delved too deep, even as he reached up to swipe moisture out of your eye with his thumb.

“I suppose we should help them make dinner,” he said as he still kneeled next to you.

You nodded. “Yeah, I suppose we should.”

You stood following Josh's movements but before you could make a move toward the door, he pulled you into another hug, not lifting you from the ground this time but still holding on just as tightly, letting his warmth spread through you.

If you could pick a defining feature for the twins, it would have been their remarkable ability to put you in better spirits, even despite your countless fights with Jake and the little time you had known Josh. It was like the twins really saw you, they saw your emotions, they saw your demons, they saw your thoughts before you even spoke them. Josh could cheer you up with just a smile it seemed, and Jake? Jake made you want to throw things against the wall while coincidentally taking all of the fight right out of you at the same time.

Neither of them could tell you how you felt though. Neither of them could decipher the entanglement of thoughts and feelings that you found yourself wading through. But they could throw you a line to reel you back in when you needed it.

Maybe that was good enough for the moment.

—

“I swear my intent is not to get you drunk every time you’re here. But you know, we like to eat, drink, and be merry.” Jake smiled at you from across his bedroom as he rifled through a pile of music only to select one with an, "Ah ha," before setting it down on the record player.

“It’s fine, I’m not drunk. Just very merry, I suppose.” You scrunched your nose up at the word. ‘Merry’. You hadn’t felt that way since you’d found yourself traipsing around Italy with Jake, and even longer before that.

“Sam and Josh have that effect on people,” he mused as he turned from the record player to watch you as you studied the mess of books piled atop the wooden surface of his nightstand situated neatly next to the bed on the right side, though the entire bed looked slept in.

“You don’t think you’re included in that?” you questioned him as you flipped through pages with notes written in pencil scribbled in the margins.

“I’m the brooding one, remember?”

You smiled at his remembrance of the term and set the book down.

“Well if I’m not mistaken, I was corrected.” You turned to face him, giving him an inquisitive look. “Romantic, I think it was?”

He smiled something smug and shrugged.

"It's been said."

You smiled back with a chuckle, thinking about how icy your first meeting had been and how quickly Jake had warmed the air between you. How, you weren’t quite sure, especially given how difficult you were making things, but nonetheless there you were, being perfectly amicable with one another. Playful, even, as Danny grew smaller and smaller in the back of your mind and with him, you abandoned your usual stress for the night.

And warm the air was as you felt a familiar feeling drop low in your stomach as you looked at Jake from across the room, a feeling that was growing increasingly prominent the more you and Jake spent time alone together.

Your smile waned a bit as the topic of the bed once again presented itself in your mind, prompting a flurry of nerves to rise in your chest and up the back of your throat.

"I should…probably get ready for bed," you said quietly as you fiddled with your hands in front of yourself, unsure of where to rest your eyes.

"Okay," he answered without protest. "Where do you want me?"

It felt an odd question given how your honeymoon had ended, like he was still hesitant to push things too far. But if you were to listen to Josh and just feel your damn feelings, you wanted Jake to push things a bit. And at the very least, you wanted to curl up next to him in bed and fall asleep with him. You wanted to wake up next to him, too, as cheesy as it sounded.

"I'm not gonna kick you out of your own bed," you said with a chuckle, still wringing your wrists as practically the only thing that separated you in the wide expanse of the room was the bed sitting heavy between you.

"You could if you wanted to," he answered softly, sincerely.

It brought a light smile to your lips as you shook your head and whispered back, "I don't want to."

"It does get cold in here at night,” he smiled. “The extra body heat will be nice."

You couldn’t help but let your eyes drop to the bed before you, but before your thought process could disintegrate into more feeling than thought, Jake spoke up again.

“Before you do, though, I have a wedding gift for you too.”

“I only need one desk,” you joked and he let a light chuckle fall from his lips.

“It’s a bit smaller than a desk,” he admitted with his eyes on you.

And the way his gaze fixed to your face, it almost had you turning away with a blush in your cheeks, though thankfully he disappeared into a closet carved out of the wall before you found yourself feeling too vulnerable under his eyes.

When he emerged, he held a small green velvet box in his hands, what looked like a ring box, and he crossed the room to where you stood, holding out his hand as it laid flat in his palm, offering it to you.

You felt your breath hitch in your throat as you took the box from him slowly, glancing up at him quickly before turning your eyes back to the green velvet between your fingers. And, opening it on its hinges just as slowly, you uncovered it, a ring made of silver with a circular medallion pressed in the center, a medallion that matched the one Jake wore around his neck, pressed flat with the edges of the symbols raised in the metal.

“I never gave you a proper engagement ring,” he commented quietly as you gazed at the piece of silver you held in your hands, adding quickly, “Although if you prefer a diamond, I’ll have it replaced.”

“No, no, it’s…” you started in protest, suddenly feeling tears in the back of your throat although you weren’t exactly sad. Actually, you weren’t really sure what it was you were feeling, other than something you weren’t quite prepared to feel for Jake.

Something much deeper than you thought you would ever feel for your betrothed, funnily enough.

“It’s perfect,” you finished in a whisper, barely a light breeze amongst the silence between you, the distance much shorter now but the tension seemingly multiplied by a million.

You raised your eyes back up to his, still watching you intently, and took a deep breath.

“Will you…”

He nodded without needing you to finish, adding a, “Yes, of course,” as he slipped the ring from the velvet’s hold with one hand and discarded the box onto his nightstand with his other, using that same hand to lift yours to him. And slowly, gently, he slipped the ring onto your finger, next to the simple wedding band that had been placed there in a daze a few weeks prior.

You weren’t in a daze this time though. In fact, there was nothing about the moment you would soon forget, not the glint of the metal on your finger in the dim lighting of his cozy bedroom, not the swell of emotions you felt as you took in the way it wrapped so perfectly around your finger, and certainly not the look of want in Jake’s eyes as you lifted your focus to him.

And you wanted him too. It was undeniable.

He seemed to see it, too, as you looked up at him.

“All you have to do is tell me what you want and it’s yours,” he practically whispered, his eyes flickering down to your lips.

You were good at a lot of things but voicing your wants when they left you so vulnerable wasn’t one of those things. In fact, just the thought of it made your tongue feel thick and fuzzy, unable to move or speak anything.

But god, did you want him.

“I’m not that good at this,” you admitted in a whisper as you felt nerves bubbling up inside of you, even as your chest suddenly rose and fell a bit more unevenly with the arousal that was pooling between your thighs at the dark look swirling like clouds behind his eyes.

“You’re doing fine,” he answered as he raised his hand to wrap it around the back of your neck, using his thumb to push against your jaw and raise your chin slightly.

“I-” you started, only it wasn’t the nerves that cut you off but rather the feeling of his lips connecting with the crook of your neck.

It felt incredible. And incredibly distracting.

“Yes?” he asked between open-mouthed kisses to your bare skin, his words prompting you to continue while his actions made the task feel almost impossible.

You thought back to the breakdown you'd had several days prior, the way you had collapsed against Jake with guilt and anger and fear, fear that Danny would never forgive you for wanting Jake. You still felt that fear too, it hadn't left you altogether. But Josh was right, you were punishing yourself for feeling the way you did. You had yet to just feel it without considering the consequences.

Josh was right. You had to just feel what you felt. And right now, you knew how you felt for Jake.

So finally, you found the words. And as you spoke them, you felt no guilt holding you back.

“I want you, Jake.”

His lips stopped their movements almost immediately and he pulled back, not too far but far enough to look you in the eyes as he took your face in both his hands, his own breath coming quicker and more shallow now. And you saw that deep look in his eyes again, one of warmth and intensity and sincerity, like you were finally on the same page.

“I'm yours," he whispered.

And then he connected his mouth to yours, pushing into you the way he had in the small townhouse in Italy, only needier on his part this time, the way you had been. It felt like a promise that he wasn’t going to put a stop to it this time.

He wasted no time deepening the kiss, eagerly pushing his tongue past your lips to taste you, all while you picked up where you had left off in Italy, your hands working to undo his belt, successfully pulling it from the loops of his jeans and discarding it on the floor.

But as it dropped to the floor, his hands were wrapping around your wrists again as he pulled away, dropping his face to breath against your neck.

“We should go slow, we should go slow,” he huffed out in bursts, struggling to find his breath, to compose himself.

For once you agreed with him with a nod, reconnecting your lips much slower this time and feeling him work his hands over your body, slowly, exploring.

It felt like he was touching you for the first time, lighting a fire in the path of his hands as he felt his way around your body, from the tops of your thighs, over the swell of your ass, up across your stomach before winding around to your back and drawing long lines up between your shoulder blades, until his hands reached into your hair and pulled, leaning in to meld into you.

He pulled back again a moment later, just to look at you, leaving you feeling extremely exposed despite the fact that the most lewd part of your appearance was merely your kiss-swollen lips. But he looked as if he were drinking you in, absolutely devouring you, and it brought a blush to your cheeks.

With parted lips and heavy lungs, he let his forehead fall against yours, your eyes fluttering closed at the contact as you lost yourself in the way he smelled, musky with just a hint of something sweet.

“Tell me what you like,” he whispered there, his breath fanning over your face lightly with the words.

But you had no idea how to answer. You didn’t really know what you liked outside of what you liked with Danny. You couldn’t really voice what it was you wanted, couldn't explain the way you wanted him, only that you knew you wanted him to touch you the way only he seemed to be able to.

Upon your silence, he came to a swift realization and suddenly he pulled back, his face growing softer as the dark look lifted from his eyes.

“You’ve never…” he began but you shook your head quickly.

“No, no, I have. Danny and I…I just haven’t ever been with anyone else," you explained, rather clumsily. "I don’t…really…know what I like outside of that."

You dropped your face into your hands with embarrassment and a muffled, "I’m sorry,” but he pulled your hands away with his own and a reassuring smile.

“No, no, it’s okay,” he breathed, just before his smile turned a bit more mischievous and the look in his eyes darkened again. “I can teach you a few new things.”

You felt your flutters in your chest at his words and at the obscene look in his eyes, neither of which you really knew how to respond to, which seemed to only amuse him further.

“Just tell me if you need me to stop, okay?” he asked, letting his mouth move to hover near your neck again, a feeling that was all too enticing for you to have any thought of stopping.

“I don’t want you to stop,” you breathed back, already melting into his hands again.

It earned a chuckle from his lips.

“I know," he nodded, letting the tip of his nose brush along your skin. "But if I push too far, I need you to tell me, okay?”

You nodded quickly, eager for him to continue his movements, his fiery touches, but instead of connecting his lips to your neck again, he dropped one hand to your dress zipper while the other held your face steady by your chin, forcing you to keep your eyes locked with his as he unzipped the dress, pulled the straps from your shoulders, and let the silk fall to your feet in a puddle that matched how you felt under his eyes.

“I’m going to taste you first, is that okay?”

You only nodded, unable to speak.

He pushed you backward gently, leaving you lying on the bed in just your underwear and bra, the typical set you might have worn any other night. Well, maybe a bit fancier if you were being honest, though it was nothing like the ridiculous garments Lily had picked out for your trip. No, it was much more you, much easier to get in and out of.

He kneeled between your legs, kissing your knees and thighs while he hooked his fingertips into the band of your panties, letting his eyes flit up to yours.

“You are so fucking beautiful,” he whispered between your legs. “And such a good girl when you want to be,” he said with another kiss to your shin before he slid your panties off and delved between your legs, licking one long stripe from your center up to your clit and earning a gasp from you at the sudden contact.

You expected him to be good with his hands but you hadn’t expected that same expertise with his tongue. You hadn’t expected the pressure to build so quickly between your thighs at the slight tease of his tongue and lips. Part of you had wondered if he was all talk. Clearly you had been wrong.

And as he settled into a steady rhythm on your clit, you found yourself unable to hold back the noises clawing at your throat, begging to be heard as some type of encouragement to the flicks of his tongue.

He settled into a steady rhythm on your clit not long before pushing a finger into you, earning a husky, “Fuck,” from your lips as your hips began to ride his face, moving before your brain even comprehended the desperation.

“More, Jake, please,” you begged, your hand finding his hair and gripping probably harder than you should have.

The whine in your voice sounded so out of place but the only thing you could focus on were the movements of his finger and his tongue, all while your hands grasped harder and harder at his scalp.

He didn’t stop you either, only added another finger to the mix, both curling up to tap the tender spot deep within you that had your eyes rolling almost immediately, any ounce of shame you had remaining flying quickly out the window.

“Oh my god, J-Jake,” you gasped out, your vision going blurry.

You were losing it quickly, his fucking hands. You should have known having watched him explore the world with his fucking hands that he would know exactly what to do with them. And he certainly did.

Your back arched harder as he pressed his fingers into you with more force, more intention, as his lips continued to suck and lap at your clit. And you knew you were close to the edge.

It was a trip off the cliff you were desperate to make on his tongue.

“Fuck, don’t stop, please don’t stop.” The words were like a mantra on your lips as you begged him to send you over the edge you were teetering so precariously on. And with a hum from his throat, you did unravel beneath him, suddenly, stars blearing past your eyes, pleasure unimaginable as you ascended from the earth and lost yourself in it. In him.

And your thoughts of Danny were nowhere to be found.

At some point you came back down, though you weren’t even fully aware that he had stopped what he was doing and was crawling up your body until he was looking you in the eyes, his lips parted as he caught his breath, even after he dipped his fingers in to quickly clean them off.

“You still with me?” he smiled.

You nodded silently, breathlessly, and pulled his face down to meet your lips and taste yourself on his tongue all while he unbuttoned his shirt and pants and did away with them as best he could without moving from his place.

“Are you sure you want this?” he asked softly as he settled between your legs, pulling one of your hands from his face, he pressed a light kiss to your palm.

There was no denying that you did. You were a dripping mess for him, in fact, and it had been a long time since you had wanted someone the way you wanted Jake in that moment. Maybe it was the first time you had wanted someone that badly, honestly. Of course, you had wanted Danny in the past. But somehow that want now paled in comparison to what you felt for Jake, lying beneath him with the cold metal wrapped around your finger to match his wrapped around his neck and dangling close to his heart. Yes, you were absolutely sure you wanted this, maybe the most sure of anything you had been in the past month.

'Let yourself feel your feelings.'

“Yes, I’m sure,” you answered.

He nodded, breathless as he grew harder between your legs.

"Turn around."

It wasn't so much a request as it was a demand, one that brought an aroused smile to your face as you saw your dominant Jake appear suddenly, the side of him you craved just as much as his intimacy.

You turned onto your hands and knees, a dripping puddle of arousal even given how badly you wanted to make him work for his control, control that he clearly thought came easily over you in bed. You wanted to make him work for it, but you were also desperate to feel him inside of you.

"Look at that, she can listen," he remarked in a tone that you couldn't let go unchecked.

“I listen just fine, thank you-”

But he cut you off with a harsh smack of his hand against your ass, earning a yelp that tumbled from your mouth at the sensation, a sensation you'd never felt before, a delicious mix of pleasure and pain that you wouldn't have thought would have meshed so well together. And as the sensation radiated through your skin and up your spine, Jake leaned down to whisper in your ear, the sound only heightening the euphoria you felt.

“I don’t think you want to run your mouth with me tonight, Mrs. Kiszka.”

No one had ever spoken to you the way Jake did either, certainly not in bed. If it had been anyone else, you might've even taken issue with it. But when Jake did it? It was like your brain short-circuited and you were putty in his hands.

You hadn't even realized you'd been silent until Jake wound his hand into your hair and used his grip to pull you up onto your knees, your back flush with his chest.

“Am I going to have to make you ask nicely again?” he whispered again, this time with his lips directly against the shell of your ear.

You smiled to yourself as you answered.

“You already made me come, at this point you’d just be denying yourself.”

He pulled your hair a bit harder at your response before adding his own, making sure you heard it.

“Oh, that was nothing compared to what I’m going to do to you.”

Without warning, he guided his cock through your weeping entrance in one swift motion, thrusting into you hard and eliciting a loud noise from you as you exclaimed, “Fuck, Jake!”

If it had felt like bliss having his fingers inside of you, having his cock seated within you was unimaginable, transcendental, otherworldly. You couldn’t describe it, couldn’t even make a sound.

“Fuck,” he whispered, almost too low for you to hear before he pulled halfway out and pushed completely into you again.

This time a moan from both of you split the silence in the air at once.

He stilled where he was, seated deeply inside of you, your body practically begging him to move as he brought one hand up to wrap delicately around your throat and dropped the other down to your clit to trace light circles over the nerves there.

"Show me you deserve my cock," he encouraged you with a low voice, like a promise that if you earned it, he'd give you more of what you wanted.

But you couldn't help but press a little further.

"F-feels like you already think I do," you croaked out, not quite as defiantly as you had been trying for, but it got the reaction you’d wanted as you felt another swift strike of his hand across your ass while he buried his cock deeper inside of you with one movement of his hips inward, earning a slew of expletives from you almost instantly.

"Always so fucking mouthy," he huffed out, his own voice struggling to stay steady by the sound of it.

You wriggled your hips as best you could, trying to find any bit of friction you could, but it was no use as he used two hands to prevent the movement you were desperately seeking. And somehow, the proximity of it, being so close to having him, unhindered, it made you desperate, and before you even realized it, the words were falling from your tongue and you were begging for him.

"Okay, okay, I'll be good, I promise." It came out as a whiny plea and if you’d had any shame whatsoever, you might have hoped he’d forget you’d ever begged that way. But the only thing you cared about was feeling him move.

"Oh, you've had a change of heart?" he asked sweetly, no doubt a smirk on his face at what he had reduced you to.

Though at the moment, you couldn't find it within yourself to really care that he was getting so much sick enjoyment out of watching you squirm for him.

"Yes, just please move, please, Jake," you begged again, suddenly regretting your choice to challenge him as you felt his cock stretch you out deliciously but were denied the feeling of him grazing along your tight walls and judging the spot you wanted him to find so badly.

He chuckled out an unholy sound that only made you want him more, a sound that shot straight down between your thighs and practically raised goosebumps on your skin.

"What, like this?" he asked with nothing short of accomplishment behind his voice before drawing out of you slowly and thrusting his hips forward, hard and deep, a feeling that knocked the breath from your lungs as you felt the tip of his cock soothe the ache inside of you.

"Fuck, yes, just like that," you moaned loudly, unable and unwilling to hold back your sounds and your feelings any longer.

He repeated the action once and then again, until he built into a sinful rhythm, grabbing your arms and folding them behind your back to use as his anchor against you, even as your lower half bounced with the force of his movements.

"Fucking perfect," you heard him mumble to himself under his breath, and for a moment you imagined him at the mercy of your touch, making sounds, each more beautiful than the last, whimpering for your touch as you made him squirm.

Ideas for another time.

"God, J-Jake, you-oh my god, you feel good," you breathed, almost in a sigh as your eyes rolled closed, feeling the burn in your shoulders as he gripped your forearms in one hand and your hip in the other, a burn that paled in comparison to the way he felt pressing into you.

"Say that again," he growled against your neck, his breathing growing more uneven with every solid thrust of his hips, every movement of his cock inside of you that clearly felt just as mind-numbingly good for him as it did for you.

"Jake, you feel f-fucking amazing," you repeated again.

It seemed to wake something up inside of him, the more intimate side of him that wanted nothing more than to hold you tightly to him, and he released your arms, opting instead to wrap one hand around your neck again and bring his other palm flat between your breasts. He dropped his face into the crook of your neck as he held you, as he continued to fuck you into a blissed-out state, letting your mind go blank against him as your head fell back onto his shoulder and your arms reached back for him.

"Shit," he whispered under his breath, barely intelligible.

He picked up the pace then, the clench of his teeth next to your ear signaling his inevitable break, fast-approaching by the sound of his breathing and the stuttering of his hips. You felt close to the edge too, for the second time that night, the thread deep within you tightening and tightening close to its breaking point. You were right there with him and you wanted to tumble over the edge with him.

“Fuck, Jake!” you cried out as the tip of his cock caught your g-spot on an upward thrust, and then another, and another.

He hummed out a half-groan like he didn’t know how much longer he could hold it together and the sound alone was enough to send you falling over the edge yet again. The dam burst and suddenly you were clinging to him like your life depended on it, unable to make even the smallest of sounds as the weight of pleasure pushed the air out of your lungs and dispersed it into the atmosphere around you, the atmosphere that he inherently owned. He had you in that moment, fully and unequivocally, you knew it. And you let him have you, you let him hold you, you let him ride out his own pleasure as you clenched around him with your own. He was practically the only thing you knew.

As you came around him, clenching on his cock, he came hard with you, milked dry by your tightness, a slew of expletives dripping from his mouth interlaced with your name, the only way you wanted to hear your name spoken ever again.

He held you tightly as he came down from his high, sweat beading at his hairline and matting small wispy strands to his skin at his forehead, eventually leaning forward to use his leverage against the headboard to lower you back onto the mattress.

“Are you okay?” he asked, almost completely out of breath, letting you roll onto your back as he repositioned himself back between your legs, dipping his head to press a kiss between your breasts as he awaited an answer.

But you only gave a silent nod and a light, "Mmmhmm," much to his dismay as he lifted his head, a tinge of concern to his features, casting his brows inward.

“Are you sure?" he tried for more of an answer. "I didn’t push things too far?"

You couldn't help the smile that spread across your face, even as your eyes remained closed and your chest still rose and fell heavily, the tingles of your orgasm still lingering and making your legs shaky.

“I'm amazing, Jake," you huffed. "You didn't push anything too far.”

He smiled back, a hint of smugness not far behind the look.

You were amazing although it felt too small a word to really describe how you felt lying in his bed, lying beneath him, his gaze soft and fucked into exhaustion. You were antsy with anticipation to do it again, you were flushed with heat that felt undeniably good, and for once, you didn't feel any confusion about the situation. Or at least you didn't feel it was as insurmountable as you once did, although if that feeling would last outside of the safety of Jake's bed, you weren't exactly sure.

“It’s not too late to banish me to the floor, you know,” he joked, though if you had wanted him to sleep on the floor, you were certain he'd oblige without protest.

You chuckled and met his eyes, gazing down at him lazily and trying not to lose yourself in how he looked post-orgasm, somehow, impossibly, more beautiful than he normally was, with his hair slicked against his forehead and his lips parted into a smile that touched his eyes despite him looking like he could curl up next to you and sleep for days, like he wanted to.

“What, use you for sex and then take your bed? Seems mean.”

He laughed then too, dipping down to kiss your chest again before letting his lips hover over your skin.

“Well, you’re not always nice,” he reasoned just before sinking his teeth into the side of your breast with a light nip, earning a jolt and a gasp from you beneath him.

“Tis better to be feared than loved," you breathed as you settled back into the pillow, your eyes fixing to the ceiling above you.

Your father certainly thought so although you really didn't feel the same. You hadn't ever since Danny had told you he loved you. Maybe that was why your father wouldn't let you marry him.

“You don’t want both?” Jake asked as he pushed himself down to rest his chin on your abdomen, giving himself a good view of your face while he traced lines against your skin with his fingertips.

You shrugged, trying not to draw too much attention to the subject. Love was a powerful word and an even more powerful feeling, one you weren't sure existed between you and Jake even given how enraptured you found yourself by him. Although maybe that was just you afraid to feel your feelings again, afraid of some admission being spoken in the safety of Jake's bedroom somehow hurting Danny where he stood.

“Maybe both would be nice,” you whispered, gazing down at him again.

Your own eyes searched his face, memorized how he looked, his hair spread over his neck and shoulders, disheveled from your hands, his face flushed and his eyes tired but never closing, never missing anything, his lips swollen, and more of a sense of playfulness than you had ever seen him wear.

'I could love him,' you thought to yourself.

It might not have even been a hard thing to do.

“We’ll have to get someone on that then,” he answered after a moment as a playful smile grew across his face, earning an outburst of laughter from you before he climbed up your body to capture your lips again.

—

Jake dropped you off early at your Spanish home despite his best efforts to get you to stay in bed with him all day. It was a tempting offer too but you had work to do, work you'd been neglecting in your sorry state that really couldn't wait any longer. So he had relented with a sigh and a barrage of kisses to your cheeks and nose and forehead, kisses that quickly turned from playful to heated as they moved to your lips. But even so, you eventually dragged yourself away, now finding yourself tiptoeing on terracotta floors, your heels in one hand as you slipped past bodyguards who wouldn't breathe a word of it except to each other, donning the same dress you had worn the day before but now with one of Jake's cotton button-ups tied up around your waist to fight the chill of the air after you'd emerged from the warmth of his bed and his embrace.

Now you tiptoed, down the familiar hall to your bedroom, trying not to disturb the peace and quiet of the home that had just barely woken up.

"Where have you been?"

It was Danny’s voice breaking the silence that startled you as he stood in your bedroom the way he had on the night of your wedding. Only you had been a bit more pleased to see him that night.

“Jesus, Danny, how long have you been standing there?”

"Were you with him?" he asked, ignoring your question altogether in favor of his own.

Of course you had been with him. Where else would you have been? Although you weren't prepared to have a conversation with Danny about it just yet, still not fully understanding the situation you now found yourself, wading through feelings you thought had only flooded the ground an inch and now finding the water at your waistline. You were treading waters a little deeper than you had previously thought.

How could you explain that to him?

You inhaled deeply before responding, trying to dance around the subject.

"Well, yes, but I hardly think that's a crime."

He had a disapproving look on his face, one that you hardly saw Danny wear and direct toward you. You suddenly felt like a scolded school child again, a sharp pang of guilt bolting through your chest.

"Did you sleep in that?"

You could hear the hurt in his voice even without an answer. He didn’t need an answer. He knew what he was looking at. And you didn’t want him to see it.

"Have you been waiting for me all night?" you asked, barely an audible breath.

His eyes dropped to his feet as he opted to look at anything but you.

"I'm just trying to understand what’s happening here."

You and him both.

"Danny, it's complicated. I would have thought you'd understand that."

He shook his head side to side, as if in argument although it seemed more that he was wrestling with his own thoughts and less with what you had said.

"Did the honeymoon…” He trailed off with a sigh before finally continuing after a beat, his eyes meeting yours finally as he finished his question. “Did the honeymoon go better than expected?"

You stiffened at the question, your demeanor turning much colder than it had been, practically chilling the air.

"I'm not even going to answer that," you snapped, your tone a bit sharper than you had intended.

And you watched his shoulders fall as he shook his head again, this time at you.

"Y/n, please, just talk to me. Talk to me like we used to.” He took a step forward, and then another, and then another until he was close enough to reach out and take your face in his hands. “Tell me you still love me."

Three simple words, that was all he was asking for. Words you had said to him before. But even as they formed in your throat, they died on your tongue, and you found yourself speechless at the worst possible moment, watching his face fall the longer the silence droned on.

It hurt, not being able to say it. It hurt even worse, you were sure, not to hear it.

Finally as your lips pressed tightly shut, he dropped his hands from your face.

"You can't even say it."

Did you still love him? And if you did, was it the same way you loved him a month ago? Did you still need him the way you had? Did you still want him the way you had?

"Danny…” you began finally, breathing deeply and slowly as you watched him take a step backward from you, followed by another. “I think maybe…I think maybe this will be easier on both of us if we stop trying to fight the situations we’re in. Put ourselves out of our misery."

It sounded so stupid coming out of your mouth. You had never been one to just accept any situation you were put in. And Danny knew you better than anyone so you weren’t even surprised when he huffed out a scathing chuckle under his breath. It stung, yes, but it wasn’t unwarranted.

"Is that what you've been doing? Putting yourself out of your misery?"

"I'm just trying to find a way to accept this and I think maybe you should too," you asserted at his implication, one that was not totally undeserving but nonetheless felt unfair.

"I'm sure he's more than willing to help you accept this," he spit back, anger flaring behind his eyes as he surpassed hurt.

"Danny-" you warned before he quickly cut you off, his voice rising in volume as his anger hit a boil somewhere inside of him.

"Don't 'Danny' me. He has been all too willing to go through with this whole thing. Have you ever thought that maybe he's using you, y/n?"

"Of course he's using me, Danny!” You raised your voice then to match his. Or exceed his, rather, ever the competitor you were. “That's the whole fucking point of this! We're using him too! I am, my father is!"

He seemed incredulous then, giving you a wicked smile and laugh to match as if you had outdone yourself. And to be fair, maybe you had.

"And you're just happy to live like that? A life without love? Just so you can have what, a fucking power trip?"

Your anger boiled over and suddenly you were yelling almost mindlessly. But who was he to judge? He wasn’t the one being given an inch at a time. He wasn’t the one who was sold off to someone else and told to do what was right for his family.

"Maybe I could love him! Did you ever consider that? And so what if I'll do whatever I have to to get what I want? It's what my father would do and I don't see you condemning him!"

"I didn't take you for a spitting image of your power hungry father but I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.”

His criticism enraged you and as you took a step forward to confront it, you could feel the blood pulsing through your veins, every inch of your body vibrating with liquid hot anger as the tempo of your heart pounded furiously against your skull.

"You knew this was what I wanted,” you seethed. “You had no problem with it when it was you in my bed."

You turned sharply to show him the door but he caught you by the wrist, spinning you back around to face him in a not-so gentle action.

"Things were different then," he hissed, his hand gripping you tightly.

"Nothing was different then," you retorted, struggling against his grasp to try and free yourself.

But he only tightened his grip, pulling you in closer to him with his explosive anger, determined not to let you retreat.

"Everything was different then! You weren't fucking your way to the top!"

It pushed you over the edge, past some precipice you didn’t even know you were teetering on, and before you even realized what was happening, your vision began to close in on itself and a drip of something wet touched the bow of your lip. Danny’s face flipped into something past startled too as he suddenly let go of you.

"Y/n, I-"

With two fingers, you brought them to the space between your nose and your top lip to collect the moisture there, pulling your hand back to observe the blood now smeared across your fingertips. You watched your fingers shake, soon realizing the tremors had overtaken your entire hand as you practically held your heavy pulse in your palm.

"Y/n, what's happening? What did I do? Talk to me," he pleaded, his words hurried and frantic as he gripped your shoulders.

But you could hardly see him, your vision still suffocating you in almost pure darkness now and the sound of his voice muffled to the point of distortion, like cotton filling your ears.

"Danny," you whispered before the whole world went dark and silent and the fast paced beating of your heart stilled.

Taglist: @lvnterninthenight @gretasmokerising @jordierama @allthatyouneedisinyoursoul @myownparadise96 @safarisammy @f-r-a-n-greta

[thesoulspulse]

Again, I’m not sure if I’ll keep the name Velvet but here’s some concept art of her for you guys! She’s a female clone of Vlad using the same methods used to create Dani/Ellie which is why they look so similar. He also stabilized her using a mid-morph sample from himself to avoid the same “flaws” Dani/Ellie had before Danny fixed her using one of his parents inventions...

Problem is, Velvet is just as intelligent as her Papa (Vlad has her call him that so he’s not reminded of the failed Danny clones) and puts the pieces together after being sent to eliminate Dani, the last remaining clone of Danny. They become fast friends though in spite of everything since the fight was more like a ghost-powered game of tag since they were so evenly matched and Velvet decided on her own to find out more about this long-lost sister of hers so to speak.

This whole plan of Vlad’s backfires when Velvet demands to have the three of them become a real family since she wants Dani/Ellie to stay and be her twin sister. She wants to protect Dani/Ellie, go to school together, train together, and thinks her Papa was an idiot for not seeing what a valuable treasure he was throwing way. And Velvet knows how to push Vlad’s buttons in just the right way to get what she wants since they share everything from their DNA to their selfish desires, and keeping her clone sister around is something Velvet refuses to budge on even for him.

Originally Vlad was only going to play along until he found some other way to get rid of that pest before she turned Velvet against him too, but after seeing how well they get along and how determined Velvet is to show Dani/Ellie the perks of staying and giving Vlad another change to do what’s best for her and their family, he gradually gives up on the idea. He never pictured himself as the father of two little girls for obvious reasons, yet Vlad soon discovers he’s surprisingly good at it because anything his little princess wants, she gets. It’s not as much of a struggle to win her love as long as he makes up for the one big mistake in her eyes to reject Dani/Ellie in the first place when she wanted to please him just as much until Vlad snapped and basically told her she was nothing but a disposable tool in his eyes.

Just t be on the safe side, Vlad tutors them both privately at home since he’s not ready to reveal Velvet to the public yet. Of course, Velvet taken matters into her own hands to make sure that if he tries anything funny she’ll go public herself and ruin his hard-earned reputation with a few crocodile tears. Short of that, with Dani’s help they know how to pull the best twin-like pranks to keep Vlad on his toes. Gotta keep the man humble after all if he plans on staying continuing to be a father of his own little nightmare child who loves him dearly but isn’t afraid to make her demands known.

[merv606]

I was just thinking: what if A Seduction and Mercy were set in Omegaverse? What would change?

I suppose Seduction!Terry would be pleased he got Daniel so young and breedable. He would waste zero time once they became official to stuff him with a pup, despite only being what, 18 lol? And keep on going because maybe he’s addicted to seeing the boy bred, and Danny takes to it so well…

As for Mercy!Terry, he would be angry and bitter that he didn’t get Daniel younger, but he would do all it took to make sure he could get him with pup and have a “legacy”. Daniel would be much harder to actually get with pup (in terms of psychologically because the boy is still fertile myrtle), but he’d probably be shocked that at his age he would still able too…Terry would be Very Smug. Maybe they have twins lmao. Daniel would miss his first two pups horribly though. Maybe he’d raise these two kill Terry once they got old enough omg. Lol.

Oh seduction Terry would 💯 breed him as soon as possible.

I don’t know if he would be up front and convince Daniel it was a good idea NOW - he knows the boy wants pups - just that he, “wants to wait a bit Terry.”

I could see Terry pulling the whole, “I’m not getting any younger sweetheart. I want to be able to play with our pup. You’re it for me and I’m it for you, so why wait? You’ll still be able to do whatever you want sweetheart - you know this. You can run your business or go back to school - I won’t stop you from doing what you want - have I ever? And the pups won’t hold you back.” (And it’s lost on Daniel he’s using plural now).

NSFW - dubcon associated with ABO trope - birth control tampering.

“You know you’ll have all the help you need - Nannie’s etc. you know I always give you/make sure you have everything you need?”

Terry isn’t lying, Daniel will have a life on easy street even with a gagle of pups BUT he also knows that no way will Daniel want to leave a pup once he has one - he’ll want to be a stay at home omega - Terry is willing to bet on it.

So Daniel agrees - I mean, Terry is it for him and he does wants pups and he can’t get the imagine of Terry playing with their pup - wants to see that for himself - wants to give that to Terry. And Terry is right - he hasn’t stopped Daniel from doing anything and he knows Terry will provide for them.

So, he lets Terry put a baby in him - and, it doesn’t take long either - not even a month off his pills and it happens.

Just as predicted, once the pup is here, he confesses to Terry that he doesn’t want to go back to running the store - or anything besides raising their pup - he just wants to stay home with the pup and be a good father and husband to Terry.

Terry just kisses the top of his head, smiling down, while placing a large hand on the disappointingly, once again, flat tummy - thumb rubbing soothing circles.

“Is that okay?” He asks.

“Of course sweetheart - whatever you want.”

He pouts a bit. “Terry what about what you want?”

The poor boy will never truly understand the depth of feelings Terry has for him - that as long as he HAD Daniel then he is happy - he has all he needs.

He leans down. “I Want to be able to put as many as I can inside you.”

So yes, what his boy wants is right in line with what Terry wants - Daniel tied to him forever.

“Now lie back and let Daddy put another baby inside you, sweetheart - where they belong.”

The second scenario is Terry just switching out Daniel’s pills for placebos -

When Daniel starts throwing up, a slight swell to his normally flat tummy, his chest getting sore and achy, and also bigger than normal - well he panics and takes a test.

It comes back positive and his stomach sinks.

They haven’t discussed kids - marriage yes, but not kids.

Daniel knows that he wants kids but does Terry?!

Maybe - and this is probably more likely - it’s almost right after Terry starts their sexual relationship - Terry knows he wants - needs - to lock that down as quickly - and as permanently as possible.

He worries about how to tell Terry and more importantly, his reaction.

God, what if Terry thinks he did this to like, trap him or something.

Daniel picks up his pills counting - making sure he never missed any.

There are signs that he’s hopes he’s hiding well, while he tries to work out how to tell Terry.

He takes to wearing Terry’s clothes to hide the growing bump - it’s showing fast due to how slender he is) and he’s gagging for it more than usual (which is a gif something - they go at it like rabbits anyway), and he’s eating seconds and thirds - which he hopes can explain the softness to him now. He’s getting the chef to make him some - shall we say - interesting dishes (even those he tries to limit when Terry isn’t around although every move Daniel makes gets reported back to Terry when he isn’t around).

Terry meanwhile - finds the whole thing endearing and is just waiting and waiting for Daniel to admit it - it’s almost like they’re back to how they started - Daniel as skittish as he was when Terry had made his true intentions known or just skittish if it’s the scenario of Terry doing it right away.

That is, he finds it endearing until discovering the real reason that Daniel is not telling him - that’s he afraid of Terry’s reaction.

Daniel finally breaks down, admitting it to Margaret, (who like Terry knew of the boy’s condition but not the reason for him not divulging it by now.

So while he will never admit to Daniel that he is in this situation because of Terry’s direct actions (well besides the obvious fact that he wouldn’t be pregnant if Terry wasn’t taking him every chance he gets) he cannot have his boy thinking this is a burden because it’s an accident - when the entire time it’s been an carefully orchestrated plan of Terry’s.

He sits him down, Daniel worrying the hem of Terry’s way too big sweatshirt.

“These things can happen, sweetheart. You don’t need to worry - i’m going to take such good care of you - of you both,” he stresses. placing a hand on the prominent swell of his belly.

Daniel sags against the older man in both joy and relief - he does want this baby - so damn much and now that he knows Terry does to - he’s never been happier - sobbing out as much to Terry.

“And you sweetheart, you’re going to take such good care of our pup. You were made for this - to carry our child.”

I don’t know how it happened - I swear I never missed a day - I checked - I ….”

“It couldn’t be helped baby,” Terry cuts him off. “Your body knew what it wanted it all, and in doing so you have made your alpha very very happy.”

“You’ll let me mate me now?”

Terry had asked and Daniel had said to wait - they were only a couple months in to their relationship at that point (and maybe that’s what prompted Terry to do it 🤷‍♀️ he justifies that as Daniel’s alpha he knows what’s best for him anyway).

He nods, taking Terry’s hand in his. “It’s not that I didn’t want to I just ….”

“I know baby.”

“We should do it soon - I don’t want to be showing too much,” he says.

“Of course,” Terry lies - for once knowing he’s not going to give Daniel what he wants. Although he’s going to talk to Margaret first thing tomorrow so she can start the planning right away he has no intention of a ceremony when Daniel isn’t visibly pregnant. He’s going to time it so that there is no doubt about the exact state his boy is in when he walks down the aisle to Terry and their future.

He wants everyone to be able to see what Terry has done to him.

“Now, let me see you,” he says, as he takes him to bed - another ”trick” Daniel had been using was sex with the lights off.

Like Terry doesn’t know every inch of his boy’s body regardless of whether he can see it well or not. Like he wouldn’t have noticed the new heaviness to those cute little 🍒 of his - how much more sensitive they are now (which is saying something - his boy always loved when Terry’s mouth is on them), or the extra flesh his fingers sank into when he grips him by the hips fucking into him roughly from behind - if this had truly been an accident and Terry hadn’t known form the minute it happened.

Spread out now, Terry licking and sucking even inch of flesh, paying close attention to the parts of him changed due to Terry, practically worshiping his little mate.

“Look so good like this sweetheart, full of Daddy’s seed. I may have to keep you like this.”

Daniel moans, spreading his legs for his soon to be mate.

“Such a pretty little pregnant pussy you have,” as he pushes inside, hand on Daniel’s stomach as he fills his boy even more, watching his equally pretty tits practically bounce which each bone deep thrust.

While Terry prefers to always come while inside Daniel - watching it drip out of the gaping hole when he pulls out, he discovers that while Daniel is like this, pulling out and coming on his stomach and tits may be up there as the best ways to come.

“Made to be bred.”

And well, true to the older man’s word, Daniel finds himself with pup again only mere months after the first one - Daniel had said he wanted more but to maybe wait a bit - but Terry had said he couldn’t get him pregnant while he was nursing - “No, I said it’s rare, baby - not impossible.” Although Daniel still swears Terry (and their doctor) said it was impossible.

Terry watches as Daniel nurses their pup, having to shift him around his growing belly, their brother or sister growing inside.

One of his favourite things is to watch Daniel nurse their pup / soon to be pups.

Terry doesn’t want him back on the pill as long as he’s nursing and he refuses to wear protection, sometimes pulling out when he promises he will but more often than not, he doesn’t - usually balls deep when he throbs and pulses out his release into his mate’s willing body.

Terry wants until Daniel has put the baby down, before stepping behind him and slipping a hand inside his shirt, fondling a nipple as his other hand finds their desired target - the warmth between Daniel’s legs - just as wet as his tits - and yeah - he’ll be keeping his boy like this for awhile.

As for Mercy:

I honestly thought about doing it as an ABO just so I could cheat - do the whole if Terry mates and breeds him then he’ll sort of bond with Terry regardless - like a forced bond.

He would begrudgingly accepts Terry - no real choice.

In that Scenario Daniel thinks he can’t get pregnant but still, on the off chance, he won’t let Terry near him unless his lets Daniel take his pills and Terry obliges, as it makes Daniel more cooperative.

He agrees because he knows he had replaced them with placebos.

TBH though, I can’t see Daniel doing that to his kids - raising them to hate and live a life centered around revenge. Even if it was warranted, it would hurt them - like a POSION - and even if he hates Terry I can’t see him doing that type of damage to his kids.

[dp-marvel94]

(Not) Alone - Chapter 8

Summary: Consumed with worry and scared after watching Dani almost die, Danny begs her to come home with him and meet Jazz. He wants to see her safe and happy and taken care of more than anything. An important reveal also weighs heavy on him – Dani isn’t the only living clone… and the other is him. He needs to tell her the truth; maybe that will convince her to agree to the idea of telling his parents. And she'll stay in Amity Park with him, where he'll never have to worry if she's safe ever again.

Meanwhile, Dani has mixed feelings. Still reeling from the loss of her clone siblings, Danny’s unexpected worry and care make her uncomfortable. And her own guilt… she hurt him and helped get him kidnapped twice. How can he care about a mistake like her? But having clean clothes and a bed is wonderful. And things aren’t as simple as she thinks.

Will Dani accept the help she needs and let herself be loved? Or will she push Danny and Jazz away and run again?

Word Count: 4,858

First-> Previous

Also on AO3 and Fanfiction.net

For a long time, the two talked, sharing memories of their lost siblings. Dani sniffled, leaned against her brother’s side. Her eyes traced the dim candle light. The other halfa’s even, soothing voice rang in her ears, not the deeper pitch she was growing used to but just as comforting, just as right as ever. 

Eventually though, Danny shifted back to his full size. She tucked herself under his chin, just breathing in the scene. The moon rose, the distant sounds of the town quieting as more stars blinked into existence. Here, sitting here next to Danny, felt so right, a soothing balm to her core. This… this was what she had needed.

Danny’s forgiveness, his acceptance of her, rang in her head. He had accepted her apology for yelling at him, unwilling to linger on the hurtful things she’d said to him. (But she… she hadn’t said anything about what happened at Vlad’s. She’d chickened out….) And the lies she’d been telling herself….Her head knew all those were false; she wasn’t a mistake, a burden. She was loved, wanted. She was good enough. And… with her brother’s support and encouragement, maybe her heart was beginning to believe too.

They talked more, cried more, hugged more. And together, finally releasing the tears and sharing the sorrow with another… the grief was somehow less suffocating. It lingered, promising to hurt for a while yet. But now, knowing she wasn’t alone anymore (and never would have to be again), Dani let herself begin to feel hope. 

Things would get better.

Finally, Danny stood. “Come on. Let’s go home.” He yawned. “I’m tired.”

“Yeah.” With her own yawn, Dani agreed. “Me too.”

With that, the two flew back to Fentonworks. A quick goodnight to Jazz. The two half ghosts shared the bathroom to brush their teeth. Danny offered a goodnight hug. And…

Dani was left alone in the guest bedroom. The girl yawned, stretching sleepy muscles. She was tired, she wanted to sleep. But laying here in the dark, in the quiet….

A familiar disquiet washed over her, making her insides twist. Everything had been fine, just minutes before. Her brother and her had talked, comforting each other. She’d apologized for yelling at Danny that first morning, for saying he wasn’t her brother, and he’d accepted her apology. But…

She hadn’t said everything. The words unsaid weighed heavy on her tongue, guilt choking her core. The betrayal, shooting Danny in the back, helping Vlad hurt him. Selling him out again, to the Red Huntress……

For just a moment, she’d thought of saying something, of pouring out all her shame. But…. She’d chickened out. She was a coward, too afraid to bear her humiliation again. Not after she’d lobbed those words at him before, that first morning. Her guilt was a weapon, used to hurt him, to push him away, to prove that she wasn’t lovable or worth helping. 

But he hadn’t understood. Dami had deflected the words, almost ignored them. Instead promising… he loved her. Of course, he forgave her. He knew none of it was her fault. 

And That. That was the cruel irony. The ugly parts of her brain still whispered that it was her fault. She was to blame. She shouldn’t have been so stupid, so naive. Vlad had manipulated her but she should have seen it, she should have known. She should have known better. And that… that was unforgivable.

And yet… Dani wanted to be forgiven. She wanted to be free of the shame, to find the strength to believe that it wasn’t her fault. But she couldn’t. Dami might forgive her but she couldn’t. She couldn’t forgive herself.

And there…there was no way Danny could….

And that was half of the problem right there. A tear slipped out of Dani’s eye at the thought. 

They’d talked about the fusion and she understood better now. But now, the guilt flared, thoughts torturing her. Her brother said he loved her, he forgave her. But was that just Dami talking? Her little clone brother… he wasn’t who she’d hurt and betrayed. That was Danny, just Danny, the person she was cloned from, her original. 

He hadn’t asked to be used and tortured. Betrayed and tricked. Cloned against his will and changed so vitally, so impossibly. He didn’t ask to be responsible for an imperfection like her. Before the fusion, he probably thought (still currently thought) she was a mistake. (And he would be right.) 

Dani rolled over in bed, shoving her face in her pillow. She needed to stop thinking like this. It wasn’t true. Dami was Danny. Danny was Dami. Whoever the boy sleeping across from her was, he was her brother and he cared about her. He wanted her here. He started this by begging her to come home with him. He’d brought her to the park, shown her the little grave for their brothers. Cried with her, comforted her. She’d needed to talk about the others. And…

The conversation she’d overheard this morning…. “I’m not deaf, Danny. I heard what she said to you before you told her about the fusion. She’s putting on a brave face but-”

Jazz… Jazz was right. She was putting on a brave face. The things she’d said then….. But she’d apologized. And Dami… Danny had listened, reassured her. He reminded her of the truth, that she wasn’t worthless, that she deserved to be loved.

But… but…. guilt still stabbed. And… He hadn’t brought up her meeting his parents again.

The thought hit her like a truck and the clone girl blinked, dread (almost terror) suddenly dropping in her gut. 

That… that was what was freaking her out. The thought of meeting the Fentons still… it still… terrified her. (Really? Terrified?)

Okay, terrified was a strong word. Yes, it scared her but….She (was trying to) trust Danny. He wouldn’t suggest telling his parents about him being half ghost, and about her, if he seriously thought it would put her in danger. And if something went wrong….She knew, especially after tonight, he would try to protect her. 

But living here permanently…. that was like too much. Too big a change. She could barely imagine herself having a home. Let alone parents, friends, classmates. (Not that she deserved that-) 

No. Dani shook her head. (She needed to telling herself the truth…) That was wrong. Danny said she deserved help. And she did. She deserved a home, just as much as anyone else. She could accept his help. And she should accept it but….

His parents…. Danny wanted her to stay here, for his parents to be her parents. That’s what he wanted. And how could she disappoint him and Jazz like that, after they’d been so good to her? How could she hurt Danny like that (again)? How… how could she say no? 

How could she say yes? 

But the thought of living at Fentonworks… uncomfortable, out of place, trying to be normal…. 

No, she couldn’t stay but…. What was the other option? Run off and break Dami’s heart again? Hungry, dirty, tired on the road? Alone again? No, she couldn’t do that, couldn’t be alone again. There was nowhere else to go… 

“Ugh.” The girl groaned, core twisting in two. “I’m never getting to sleep.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well…. She must have fallen asleep at some point. Dani thought as she blinked awake to soft yellow light. 

It was morning. And as is often the case… things looked better in the light. What had she even been freaking out about last night, anyway? Something about-

“Dani! Breakfast!” Jazz’s voice yelling up the stairs conveniently distracted her. 

The food was even better for lifting her mood, Dani digging into the (new, uncontaminated!) bacon the older girl had microwaved

“We should make a trip to the Far Frozen.” Danny suggested, swallowing his bite of cereal.

Jazz rose a brow. “I was wondering when you were going to suggest that.”

“Well, I’m bringing it up now.” The boy rolled his eyes. He turned to Dani. “How’s that sound?”

The younger halfa’s eyes lit up. “And meet this famed Frostbite! Yes, please.”

“Alright.” Danny gave a chuckle at her enthusiasm.

Finishing up breakfast, the three left the dishes in the sink. Danny packed snacks while Jazz gathered puffer coats, hats, and gloves for her and Dani.

The girl furrowed her brow, curious. “Why only two sets?”

Jazz handed over one of the coats. “Make sure this fits.” Then she explained. “You know Danny has an ice core. He never gets cold. He loves it, actually. But….” She gave a nod at the snug fitting puffer, plopping a hat on the other girl’s head. “We don’t know about your core. It’s better to be safe.”

Dani nodded, tugging the askew bean over her ears. “I should be nice and cozy.” She grabbed a scarf, wrapping it around her head, leaving only her eyes visible. Under the fabric, she grinned. 

Danny came into the room. “Speeder’s ready.” Eyeing Dani, he laughed. “Can you put your arms down?”

Head tilted in question, the girl lowered her arms to her side. “Yes?” The word came out muffled through the scarf.

“No, you’re supposed to wave your arms and let out muffled complaints until someone unwraps you and…” He trailed off, waving off Jazz’s eye roll and Dani’s confused look, “Never mind.” He pointed his thumb back towards the door. “Are we ready to go?”

Dani unwrapped herself. “Yeah!” 

“Awesome!” Danny went ahead.

“What was that?” The younger girl whispered to the red-head.

“A reference to a movie. For someone who hates Christmas, he really loves A Christmas Story.” Jazz shook her head, smiling. “We’ll show you later.”

“I triple-dog dare you!” The boy shouted.

“To what?!” Jazz yelled down the stairs.

“To say I like anything related to Christmas again!”

Dani laughed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The three flew through the Ghost Zone, Danny navigating. 

“It’s so big! Oh! What’s that?” Dani pressed her face to the window. Running to the other side of the ship… “What’s that?!”

The ghost boy chuckled, at the display. Huh. It hadn’t occurred to him that Dani hadn’t actually seen the Ghost Zone yet. Still, she was eating it all in with big eyes. Jazz explained what she knew while Danny focused on getting them to their destination as fast as possible.

The boy’s mind wandered, from excitement to showing Danielle the Far Frozen and introducing her to Frostbite, to more practical things. He would need to talk to his mentor about Vlad and what to do with him. And more importantly, they’d need to visit the medical facilities... 

Worry pricked his core. The ecto-dejecto had saved Dani. It seemed to stabilize her, just in time. But… how? How did that work? Danny had no idea. Was it even a permanent fix? His stomach twisted. Or… would his little sister be in danger of melting,… of… of Dying again? The yeti doctors would know. They… they would be able to help her if she did start destabilizing again. Right?

Soon enough, the icy shelf appeared in front of them. Danny flew for the familiar tunnel opening. Carefully, he pulled the vehicle into the cave and drove towards the dim light at the end. 

Less than a minute later, yetis in their hoverships arrived, to excited calls. “Great One!” “The Great Phantom is arrived!” 

Danny smiled at the eager greeting, much of his anxiety soothed at the welcome sight. “Icefang!” He called through the speeder’s speaker system with a wave. “We’re here to see Frostbite.”

Their escort led the trio in the speeder across the icy plains. White-gray clouds, a strange sight in the Infinite Realms, drifted across the even more strangely blue sky, buffeted by the winds. The yeti’s village with its icy futuristic buildings quickly approached. Hovering over the town square, Danny landed the vehicle. He floated out of his seat and looked back at Dani and Jazz, the older of whom was bundling up while the younger transformed. Once the girls were ready….

Danny grinned, throwing the door open. His eyes fell on a familiar furry figure. “Frostbite!” 

The boy flew out, practically crashing into his mentor and wrapping arms around him.

“Danny.” The towering ghost rumbled affectionately, returning the embrace. “How have you been, Great One?”

“Great!” The half ghost pulled back, beaming. “I brought someone you have to meet.” He motioned towards the speeder door.

Dani hovered in her ghost form, peeking over Jazz’s shoulder. “Um. Hi.” She waved shyly.

Frostbite grinned toothily. “You must be the Danielle young Danny has told me so much about!”

The girl blushed. “He’s told you about me?”

The taller ghost nodded. “Yes! I have heard many wonderful things from your brother.” His expression softened, smiling kindly. “He must be most relieved to have found you again.”

“Yeah.” Dani drifted forward, her own posture loosening. She looked at Danny. “It’s been great to be back. Hanging out and stuff….” 

“Wonderful! That is wonderful, young ones.” The yeti spread his arms, one great hairy arm scooping Danny up in a hug. 

“Hey!” The boy complained, laughing.

And the other arm…. For a moment Dani tensed, also swept up in the embrace. She remained frozen, eyes wide in surprise. Then…. She giggled, face buried in the furry chest. A string of muffled words…

“What’s that, Danielle?” The yeti tilted his head in question.

Dani’s head turned up, grinning. “You’re so fuzzy!” She giggled again. “And….” She schooled her expression, serious. “It’s Dani with an i.” She grinned. 

“Dani with an i.” Frostbite nodded sagely. Then…. “Dani with an i. How marvelous!” He laughed heartily, shaking both half ghosts with the sound. “How marvelous, child.” He opened his arms again, releasing the two. “Come! We must celebrate. A feast, dancing! And a tour! The stadium, the library, the Ice garden! And the ice drakes’ enclosure, we mustn’t forget that excitement! Young Dani with an i, you must see all the wonders the Far Frozen has to offer.” One hand waved, motioning towards a square, blue-white building. “But first, hot chocolate for our guests.”

“That sounds great.” Jazz finally spoke up, her breath puffing in front of her for just a second, only to be quickly blown away. “I definitely want out of this wind.”

“Oh! How rude of me to not greet you.” The yeti chief stepped forward. “Older sister of the Great One, Lady Jasmine! You have my salutations. How go your studies?”

“It’s been great, Frostbite.” The red-head’s eyes lit up. “I’ve been working on this new hypothesis and-”

“I thought you wanted hot chocolate.” Danny raised a brow, interrupting her ramble before it could start.

His sister rolled her eyes. “Alright, I’ll tell him later.” She started walking toward the building. “Let’s get inside.”

Danny turned with his own fond eye-roll, flying after her.

“Yeah! Hot Chocolate!” Dani cheered, following.

The group of one full ghost, two halfas, and one human entered through the automatic sliding doors. They continued down the carved ice corridors, Frostbite in the lead with the three siblings behind, Dani in the middle with Jazz and Danny to each side. The boy’s eyes took in the familiar halls, pointing out different parts.

“That leads to the library.” He pointed down a hall. “And there’s a weird mural with me down that hall. Oh! And that’s where we had that big dance that one time.”

They came upon a door sporting neon green, orange, purple, and red splotches, a strange pop of color in the blue-white surroundings. High-pitched giggles and excited chatter rang from the room.

“The nursery.” Frostbite hummed pleasantly. “The cubs sound to be having a most joyous time.”

Turns down a few more corners and they passed a square area with straight backed chairs in a row.

Danny pointed. “That’s the waiting room for all the medical stuff. They’ve helped me out a lot. Like when I first got my ice powers. And after the fusion.” The boy rubbed the back of his neck, looking to Dani. “I was thinking Frostbite could take a look at your core too. Make sure everything’s alright.”

Said yeti looked back. “I most certainly can.” 

Dani bit her lip, nervous. “Oh. Um… You don’t have to. I’m good.”

“It’s okay to be nervous.” Jazz offered a kind smile.

“Jazz and me will be with you the whole time if you want.” Danny added. “Plus, Frostbite’s the best.” He leaned closer, stage-whispering conspiratorially. “If you bring out the puppy dog eyes, I bet you can get him to give you two lolli-pops when you’re done.”

A hint of a smile graced Dani’s lips. “Really?”

“Oh, definitely.” Jazz leaned in too. “No one can resist puppy dog eyes.” She smiled, a little smugly, at her brother. “Danny would know.”

“Is that a jab about me and Cujo?” The boy raised a brow skeptically.

“You let him sleep in your bed. After he got sprayed by a skunk.” Jazz dead-panned.

“There was no ‘let.’” Danny air-quoted. “That dog does what he wants. There’s no stopping him.”

“Mom thought a squirrel had gotten in the walls and died!” 

“So?” The boy shrugged.

“She and Dad tried to knock down my wall to find it!”

Dani laughed, nerves quickly forgotten.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The group arrived at the eating area, Frostbite motioning to a long table with bench setting. “Rest here, honored guests. I will bring refreshments at once.” 

Dani looked around, eyes eagerly taking in the surroundings. 

At the same time…. “Nurse SnowFlake!” Danny exclaimed, waving. “Doctor FrozenHeart!”

Said two yetis looked up from their table, the nurse's eyes lighting up in excitement while the doctor nodded, smiling kindly.

“Your hot chocolate!” Frostbite announced, placing three cups on the table; two slightly glowed with streaming dark brown liquid, harboring flecks of green while the other surprisingly mundane mug contained lighter brown hot chocolate, without a hint of a glow. “And enjoy these pastries!”

“Thank you Frostbite.” Jazz grabbed a non-glowing Danish from the smaller plate. “Did you want to hear the theory I was talking about earlier?”

“Of course, Lady Jasmine.” The chief smiled kindly.

While the yeti chief and Jazz discussed her psychological study, Danny and Dani enjoyed their own hot chocolate and baked treats. With another wave, the boy successfully beckoned the other two. “SnowFlake. Frozenheart. You have to meet my little sister!”

The two medical professionals greeted the two kids, Dani still a little wary of the introduction. 

“So you both helped Danny when he came here about the core-fusion thing….” She worried at the edge of her glove.

The two adult ghosts traded worried looks. Then Snowflake smiled comfortingly. “Yes. I assisted Chief Frostbite with the Great One’s examination.” She patted Danny’s shoulder with her massive paw. “This one was a model patient for me.”

“Thanks.” Danny tried to smile but ended up grimacing. He’d been stressed, worried out of his mind then but he’d also been eager for the yetis’ help, desperately hopeful of their skills and knowledge. Guess he had been a model patient… until he’d had a self-destructive panic attack in the exam room and had to be sedated. Still…. Snowflake had helped on his next checkup after that and been as gracious as ever. “You’re really the best though. Both of you.” He looked to Frozenheart. “You and Frostbite and everyone else take really good care of me.”

The four talked for a while longer, Dani growing increasingly more comfortable. The two yetis shared stories of afterlife in the Far Frozen, especially…

“He froze everyone in the stands?!” The girl almost punched the table in her enthusiasm, giving her brother a scandalous look. “And I thought that bowl of mac and cheese was bad!” She snorted. 

“Hey! I literally had just got my ice powers that day.” Danny crossed his arms. “It’s not my fault everyone decided to stand too close and gawk.”

Snowflake laughed, covering her mouth with a paw. “Rest assured, the entire tribe learned our lesson.”

“That is a most astute observation.” Frostbite congratulated Jazz from across the table. “I believe you are embarking on a most remarkable work. I look forward to hearing how it progresses.” He turned to the group on the other side. “Now. I believe we should proceed to the medical area for Dani with an i’s examination, if we are to have time for the tour before the feast this evening.”

Instantly, Dani tensed again. “Oh. Right. That…”

Danny wrapped an arm around him in a side hug. “It’ll be okay. You’ve got this.”

Jazz smiled encouragingly. “We’ll be right here with you the entire time.”

Frostbite and Snowflake escorted the three siblings back through the building to the waiting room. They showed Dani to the examination room.

“You may sit there, dear.” The nurse motioned to the padded exam table.

Shuffling nervously, the girl floated over. She hesitated for a long moment, biting her lip, before settling down on the bench. Danny and Jazz pulled up chairs, sitting on either side. 

Frostbite began. “First, we will start with some basic measurements….” 

Danny squeezed his little sister’s hand, hoping to offer some comfort. More than a hint of guilt stabbed at his core for putting her through this. He didn’t remember much of Vlad’s lab and the man’s examinations. But there had been ectoplasm samples taken, painful tests of his powers. This, now… having her pulse measured, her reflexes checked must have felt uncomfortably familiar. An unsettling reminder of that time. And yet…

Dani gently squeezed back, her shoulders slowly untensing the longer the checkup continued. The yetis’ kind voices, their gentle hands soothed her worries. And… Danny slowly felt the ball of anxiety in his gut uncurl. There were no words, no looks of concern. Dani was calm, taking the exam so well. And everything… everything seemed to be normal….

“You’ve done excellent, Dani with an i.” Frostbite smiled comfortingly. 

“Very well.” Snowflake nodded. “You’ve been very brave.” 

The other yeti stepped towards the door. “Now, if you will follow, we will take a scan of your core and we’ll be done.”

Dani obeyed, rising from the table. The teens followed, again sitting on either side of her while the clone girl laid down on the table, the scanner hanging from the ceiling above her.

The younger halfa swallowed, eyeing the instrument a tad fearfully. “It doesn’t hurt, does it?”

“No.” Danny shook his head, patting her shoulder. “No. You won’t feel a thing.”

“You’re almost done.” Jazz squeezed her hand. “Then…” She leaned towards Dani’s ear, the corner of her lips turning up. “You can try for those two lollipops.”

“Three.” The boy whispered teasingly, poking Dani gently. “I’m expecting three.”

Dani laughed lightly. “Three? You’ve got it.”

“Great One, Lady Jasmine, remove your hands for now.” Frostbite gently instructed. “Good. Good.” He congratulated as the two obeyed. “Now on the count of three. One. Two. Three.”

There was a slight hum from the machine. Several flashes of light caused Dani to close her eyes. A pause, after the flashes and…

“Is that it?” The girl opened one eye.

“Yes.” Frostbite nodded. “Snowflake and I will assess your results and return to discuss them shortly.”

With another congratulation, the two yetis left. The younger half ghost sat up.

“See? That wasn’t so bad.” Danny patted her back encouragingly. 

And yet on the inside… anxiety still churned. Nothing had raised immediate red flags but… what horrible things could be on that scan, in those test results? Dani had been unstable to the point of almost dying just a week ago. The ecto-dejecto had saved her but… how? Would it last? 

“It kinda tickled.” Dani chuckled, a tad nervously. “Did you think it kinda tickled?”

The boy’s lips turned up. “Yeah. Kinda.”

He breathed, coaxing the anxiety down. Dani was fine. And the yetis knew what they were doing. They would help if she wasn’t… or if that changed in the future.

The three siblings passed the five-minute wait with light, idle chatter. Soon, Frostbite and Snowflake returned. 

The chief took a seat across from the three, smiling openly. “You appear to be in perfect health, young Danielle.” He began.

The two half ghosts both blinked, taking in the statement. Then….

“She’s okay.” Relieved washed over Danny, letting out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. 

“I’m stable. I’m really stable…” Her eyes widened, just as relieved as her brother.

“It appears so.” Frostbite reached out, patting the girl’s hand. Then he held out an icy rectangle, the portable screen Danny had seen the doctors use on his other visits. “Your core appears healthy. Well formed, without any cracks or deformities.” 

Dani studied the image with a tilted head. “It looks pretty.” She mused. 

Like Danny’s own core, hers was perfectly spherical. But the color… it reminded him of the ocean. A dark, watery blue-green. “Yeah.” Danny agreed. “It’s beautiful.”

The girl smiled at the words, the action. Then her brow wrinkled in question. “What’s that?” She pointed.

The older half ghost looked again, at a specific pattern of lines and spirals. A familiar pattern. “That’s our sibling mark, isn’t it?” His heart warmed at the thought.

“That is correct.” The yeti chief nodded. 

“Sibling mark?” Dani asked, looking at her brother with warm, soft eyes.

“Yes. Your brother bears a similar one.” With a few swipes, Frostbite pulled up the image of Danny’s core. “Or rather… two.”

The boy took in the picture. Oh, how much fear and anger seeing this blue and green circle for the first time had caused. But now he’d grown to accept, even appreciate it. Those twin marks of siblinghood, one for Danny and one for Dami. Now, to know Dani shared the same mark….

He smiled down at her affectionately. “See. We match.”

“Humm.” The girl hummed wordlessly, a hand tracing the pattern on his core. Then on hers…. “We do.” The corner of her lip turned up. “That’s cool.”

“Yeah it is!” Danny held up one arm, half-hugging her with the other.

“Yeah!” The younger girl cheered, one of her arms up too.

Jazz laughed at the display. Then… “It’s a huge relief that Dani’s stable, Frostbite.” Grateful eyes fixed on him.

“Yes, it is.” The yeti agreed. “Although…” He sobered slightly, taking on a more serious tone. “We must not throw caution to the wind just yet.”

Both half ghost’s put their arms down, a stab of worry hitting Danny’s core.

“What do you mean?” The red-head asked, looking just as concerned.

“I must propose caution and continued monitoring, as we have no prior data of Dani with an i’s core, nor knowledge of how this ecto-dejecto worked to prevent her destabilization.” 

The boy’s stomach twisted. Yeah, that was true….

“I do not mean to worry you.” The chief smiled comfortingly. “The information we have collected all support Danielle’s stabilization and her continued health.” Again, he patted the girl’s knee. “You will just require regular checkups, as any ghost child does.”

“Okay, that does make sense.” Danny breathed out, soothed by the explanation. 

He looked at Dani in particular. 

The girl looked up, biting her lip. Then…. She sighed. “Just to be sure… I am stable and healthy.” She put her hands together. “Like… it doesn’t look like I’m in danger of melting anytime soon.”

“No, young one.” Frostbite shook his head, eyes wide with compassion. “You are in no danger of that.” 

A bit more relief crept onto her face. “So I just need checkups with you to make sure everything stays good.”

Another nod. “I will give you the advice I have given your brother. Eat well, including a healthy supply of ectoplasm. Get sufficient sleep. Exercise your body and mind, most especially your powers. And listen to your body; that is the best safeguard against pushing yourself too hard.”

“Alright.” Dani nodded, considering. “So I’ll just do all that and I’m good?”

She looked to Danny who blushed, holding up his hands. “I’m not the best at following all that advice…. But I try!” 

The doctor narrowed his eyes seriously before giving a sigh. “I will send both of you with more vitamin supplements. Lady Jasmine?”

“Oh, I’m on it.” The older teen put her hands together, an almost smug look on her face. “These two can’t get anything over on me.”

The two half ghosts traded vaguely panicked looks.

“Actually, can I get full copies of both their medical information? And,” She pulled a notebook out from seemingly nowhere. “Last time you explained energy flux rates and core morphological changes. I have a few questions about that, as it relates to a healthy diet.”

“Of course, Lady Jasmine.” 

“And that’s our queue to leave.” Danny floated up, grabbing his little sister’s hand. “Thanks again for everything, Frostbite.”

“Wait! I have a question.” The girl looked up, eyes wide and seemingly anxious.

“What is it, young Danielle?” The yeti asked.

She broke into a grin. “Can I have those lollipops, now?”

A hearty laugh. “Yes. Of course.” 

In the end, after some profitable use of puppy dog eyes, Frostbite gave her three.

[homesickghoul]

Ascending Heaven

Danny "Jed Olsen" Johnson / Reader (fem) tw everything (nsfw, gore, horror, dubious consent, torture, dead dove: no not eat, cosmic horror, suicide themes, substance abuse and addiction, hurt no comfort etc) proceed with this in mind originally published by gghouleh in AO3 2021-09-25 -> ongoing Chapter 1

Birds are chirping and the gentle autumn breeze embraces your face, one that has already started to lose its tan. The days have turned shorter, darker, colder – much earlier than ever before, or so it feels to you. It’s odd, things feel different, emptier. Colors are greyer.

Some things never change, like the leaves that turn to shades of orange, some already falling off the branches, but the scenery still, in its decaying form resembles a painting from the better days. But even with the weather getting harsher, the golden sun smiling down onto earth is still enough to keep the air comfortably warm, allowing the most dedicated ones to keep dressing in their tiny crop tops and thin, colorful cardigans. Halloween is right around the corner, the sideways and porches quickly filling up with carved, bright orange pumpkins, and of course, the myriad of different decorations; like those plastic skeletons and zombies rising from the dirt and neatly mowed lawns.

On your way home, or more like; your dorm room, with each step you keep reminding yourself of its temporality. One more year, it would pass quickly. One day you’d wake up and all of this would be over. You walk past a group of kids gossiping and giggling about their costume ideas for later today, and you can’t help but to overhear the obvious classics: witches, little riding hoods and super mans. A smile takes place on your face, the group reminding you of the golden times of your own childhood. The good old times. That is if you try your hardest to ignore the parts that weren’t so peachy. You sound like an old lady. You shake off the thought. Fall has always been your favorite season next to summer, and not only cause of the weather but Halloween too, even now as a so-to-say-grown-up. It’s friday, you have the weekend off school, free from studying; you had promised to relax, but as a full-time student there's pretty much no way to acquire true peace, not really. It’s not only Samhain that’s due.

Growing up in a small town where everyone knew one another, their cousins and for fucks sake, even their best friend’s pet rock by name, caused you to be grateful for the fact that in this new town you were just a stranger to most. That, oh so, mysterious someone who they could get a glimpse of, never figuring out more than they were given. You prefer to stay in your own company, just making a few friends out of your classmates. After cutting almost all ties to your hometown, you try your best to forget about the past. It no longer haunts you like it used to.

Even with all those new people around you, after that desired fresh start in life, there is, still, this massive, unfillable hole in your chest that keeps leaking, leaving an ugly print everywhere you go. To fill it, you tried men, women too, quickly learning how it only made you feel worse about yourself. Alcohol, those fifty-fifty cocktails did the job for a bit, made you forget and bear the agony of being alive. Studying and working so hard that you did not have any extra time to get lost in thought, but God, it made you so damn tired, an empty, burned out shell. But guess for that exact reason everything, for a moment, was perfectly fine. It did its job. And you were fine. You slowly started to understand the people back home – though you didn’t want to. The thought made you disgusted, despise yourself a little more each day. You would never be like them. Chasing after something you cannot name or place, you lost the grip for a bit. But it’s fine, too, you’d always land on your feet. Mom said that once, you think. You’re holding too much, where would you put it? Sometimes you think about calling home. You almost pick up the phone. You didn't. Who would answer, anyway? _________________________________ Old, bad habits make an appearance every now and then. Standing in the kitchen, in the middle of a Halloween party, trying to quit drinking, you really are, but your friends drunk and having the time of their lives right next to you, makes declining nearly impossible.   You’re not going to be young forever, is what you keep hearing. But in that case, and in all honesty, you feel like you’ve lived enough. “Relax, it’s going to be fine.” Your friend keeps giggling while gulping down some mysterious liquid from a red plastic cup. ” It’s just one drink.” “It’s Halloween.” She continues her mission to make you loosen up a little, not quite understanding the damage she’s causing, which only proves your point – none of these people know you, and you don’t let them.

A man dressed as a mummy bumps into you and doesn’t even bother to say sorry. Something ticks. God, maybe you are just that easy. You cringe and bring the plastic cup into contact with your dolled up lips. Fuck it. It’s Halloween after all, could be the very last one, because who knows with all those Ghostface murders going on.

So, even with all these warning signs flashing red and screaming danger, call it the voice of reason if you will, you pour a drink, another one even, gain some confidence that actually has been lurking underneath the surface all this time and dance till your legs ache. You had borrowed your girl pal’s old costume from last year, too busy and maybe a little lazy, to make your own.

Flashes of red and blue, glitter on your skin. Stranger’s hands on your body, seeking, searching, inpatient on your skin, wondering what you’re hiding underneath your clothing, desire, lust, whispering sweet things in your ear, an angel on your left shoulder, devil on the other. Too bad though. You’re fixated onto the blasting music, your earthly body drunken, higher mind fleeing somewhere beyond, to a world with only goodness and happiness. Everything is good. Really. You’re not afraid. At least not as much as many others are. You know about the killings, the bloodbaths that were happening all around the campus and in the little student town surrounding it. Just earlier this week the police had gotten themselves a new suspect. That made things calmer around the campus. Nothing bad had happened since then – guess that’s why people agreed into having the party. No, it would have happened either way. Who’s to tell students not to party? Yeah, they could try. But as you dance, you feel untouchable, invincible even. Punch is spiked with too much vodka, you can’t taste it anymore, it’s like sipping water. You remember that actually being a symptom of blacking out. That’s when you’re supposed to stop – actually, a good few drinks before that point would be ideal. It’s alright, you don’t care, not right now. You want it. You need, crave it, this. You wonder why you ever stopped.

You dance till you can’t go on. Till you need a break. The party is still very much alive when you decide to wander up the stairs and escape into your and your roommate’s little hobbit hole to clear your head, cause knowing yourself, it is bound that sooner or later you'd most likely do something you'd regret. Your room is dark, only some dim fairy lights giving a faint glow on the painted walls, allowing you to see where you step. You have just enough time turn on the light before you get yanked from behind. You think it’s Janet, your roommate, trying to pull a funny prank on you – just like last year. It wasn’t funny back then, but looking at it now, you view it as a happy memory. “Jan, I’m not fee-“

You land on your back, finding yourself fighting for your life as a stranger, dressed head to toe in black, hiding behind a cheap screaming Halloween mask, tries to poke your eye out with a very real looking hunting knife. He slices your right arm as you go to block the blow. Blood gushes down onto your face and for a second you simply lay there, on the floor of your room, your safe heaven from the cruel floor, stunned. Soon enough the basic survival instincts kick in and without making a conscious choice to do so, you kick, bite and scream. Only the alcohol invading your system eases some of the pain that your body experiences now in nonstop.

The sounds of the party, music and laughter echo from behind the door, muffling perfectly your cries of help. It’s almost comedic, mimicking a scene straight from a slasher horror movie. Michael Myers wannabe.

But never in a million years you expected to meet your doom this way; in a stupid party with your classmates and a punch of strangers, everyone high or drunk off their asses.

You’d probably laugh about it if you were able to, but as the man above presses down on your windpipe and pins you down, a complete desperation starts to kick in, your vision going blurry and the sound of music dies. Instead, what you hear is a mix of your own heart beating, heavy breathing, and the blood gushing in your ears.

It would remind you of the humming of the seas if only the time and the place were different. Instead, you’re, um, drowning in the odd sensations, like experiencing your pulse in places you’ve never felt it before and probably shouldn’t without dying, so, without doubt, that building pressure in and behind your eyes, throat and chest must be one the most unpleasant sensations you’ve ever felt. And not very healthy.

The amount of will to live in you surprises you, although all the way from the start, somewhere in the back of your head, you acknowledged and agreed into the slim chances of survival, the terms and conditions. All these years of apparently lying how you wouldn’t mind. It comes when it comes. We’ll, the Grim Reaper is knocking on your door, ready to reap and collect, and you would do anything for it to go away. You’re not ready. You lied. This isn’t what you want. The knife cuts your chest even though you’re doing your best to kick and push your attacker away, but nothing seems to work and now starting to fully panic, you don’t really registering much anymore. Not really longer feeling your toes or your fingertips, cold sweat forming on your skin, and you just know that the knife hovering above your chest is just seconds away from sinking into your flesh for good. You’ve heard of animals, people too, going numb in the face of certain death, and right now, it’s oddly comforting. So, without thinking and fingers slippery from blood, you let go, not fully accepting your fate, but simply growing tired from the loss of blood. You experience this cold, stinging, sharp pain as your gut greets the blade. It causes you to cry out.

Knowing for a fact that Ghostface is looking down on you from behind his bloody mask, you stare at him with glossed, weak eyes, trying to get a glimpse of something, perhaps, human. There is absolutely nothing there. Seconds feel like eternity, and for a moment it's completely silent, but you’re probably just imagining it.

“Why?” You whisper, voice cracking and breaking. You don’t expect to have time to hear the answer as you are rapidly bleeding out from the blows before,  withering away from reality as you know it. “Unlucky timing.” He answers. Unlucky timing, that’s all, nothing more, nothing less. At the wrong place at the wrong time. It’s unfair. You don’t deserve this, right? But oh, oh, the fact how you are just a silly little victim, when you are a living breathing thing, how casual it’s for him, fuck, how he said it, what he meant: how you are but a bag of meat for him, and how you’d simply become one of the many lost to the murder spree, but years would go by and no one would remember, you’d be nothing but one more murdered college girl: it gets your spirit fuming, and for a second you think it’s enough to keep you going. You are wrong. This is karma. It's not what you want. You wanted more; of what? You didn’t even get to find out. You barely even got to live; you now understand. So, as your last act on this earth, you hang onto Ghostface’s arm when he goes to pull out the knife but manage to keep it in place, just a little longer. Purely out of spite. It’s almost like he allows you to do so.

You never feel him get off you or remember letting go yourself. Instead, you have this distant memory of coughing dark blood from your filled lungs. Life never flashed before your eyes; you remember thinking. Just a myth. Just a stupid, massive lie that they feed to people to glamorize death in movies. You never see the world-famous bright light at the end of a tunnel either; another tale to make people on their deathbeds be a little less frightened of the inescapable death. That’s right, walk into the light, Timmy, it is the gates of Heaven, Paradise after all those good years you spent on planet earth being a good little sinner.

No light, no flames of hell, nothingness, void. There is nothing, you see absolutely nothing as the dark, endless void consumes you. That’s the worst part of it, you are so very alone. It’s cold. You feel like crying, but your body is no longer there, or to better describe it, you are, no longer in it. Do not go gentle into that good night. ... You wake up, and before your eyes see a strange campsite and on your left a fire that doesn’t feel warm. It’s hell after all, you suppose.

[readyforthegarden]

I might out myself with this one

I am pretty ill and just having a hard time with it. I’m not mobile anymore, have no hair, and have such a hard time even thinking of common words. But tbh I think of how Josh would be such a good friend and support system through this. Like we know the boy is a saint! He would really put in the effort to force me to smile and gain just a little confidence back

Oh love, I’m so sorry for what you’re going through. I hope there’s an end in sight that brings you better days. I know I’m just a random girl who writes silly fics on the internet, but I want you know I’m in your corner and I’m praying and sending healing vibes for you to the universe!

Josh as a support system would be so amazing. He’s the friend that would give you the shirt off his back, so you know he’s more than willing to help with mobility issues. Look at his arms lately! He could for sure help you in and out of the car to go to appointments. And you know that appointment days are treat days with him. He’ll take you for ice cream in the summer and hot cocoa or lattes in the colder months. Sometimes if you have the energy and appetite, he’ll take you to a nice lunch and then to target or walmart. He has no issues pushing you around in a wheelchair if you need it. He’d prefer the fun of tossing you into a shopping cart and doing it that way, but the look of the old lady greeter as he hoists you into the basket makes him rethink. He makes sharp turns, makes silly racecar noises, anything to make you laugh and smile.

No hair? No problem. With his interest in film and theater, he knows people who know where to get the best wigs. Not a fan of wigs? Don’t blame you, they’re hot after a while and can be super uncomfy! Doesn’t matter, he reminds you of how perfect you are, how it’ll grow back on day, and that he would shave himself bald and give you his own hair if you wanted it (this is when you say you’d prefer Sam’s, and Josh gets lost in the idea of shaving Sam’s luscious locks and the chaos that would ensue if he woke up without them). On a beautiful fall day, you were feeling a little down, and Josh makes you dress up, and go into the backyard, and he has a camera, and he makes you pose for photos. You want to roll your eyes and try and make excuses, but he doesn’t relent. He poses you himself in the sunlight and takes photo after photo. The afternoon is spent that way, and when you go back inside to warm up a bit, he shows you a few of them. You’re surprised to see just how amazing you look. Your smile is gleaming, your eyes bright and shimmering. Josh reminds you that your beauty is truly from the inside, and it didn’t leave just because your hair has.

And don’t even get me started on the fact that if Josh cares this much about you, his brothers and family do too. Karen is texting you every few days, asking how you’re doing and if you need a mama to come visit and help you. Jake is on FaceTime with Josh, walking him through recipes while Josh is toiling away in the kitchen. He’s making so much food, you don’t know how you’re gonna eat it all, but he’s for tons of Tupperware at the ready to portion and freeze meals so all you have to do is reheat them. Danny sends you beanies from every golf course he visits (you lose most of your heat through your head!) and Sam brings Rosie over for snuggles and naps, almost always when you’ve had an especially rough time. You and Rosie doze on the couch while he and Josh clean and organize your home for you, making sure nothing falls behind and you don’t have to lift a finger.

My love, please know you have my whole heart with everything you’re going through. I hope my silly little fics can bring you some happiness and joy during these tough times, and please know of you ever, ever need one, I’m here. I’ll write you any silly little thing you want if it makes your journey easier 💖