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thebubblesareevil · 2 years

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Life on the farm pt 4 copy cat

It takes QUITE a bit of explaining for about how exactly Danny is apparently dead for Clark to be even mildly okay with it. Up until Pa tells him how he save his life at which point Clark was close to tears. Lois had to pull him off Danny before he was crushed to death. All in all they had a very interesting Christmas.

Fast forward a month and Clark mentions to Bruce how he has a new little brother and how apparently his parents have a habit of attracting the paranormal. This tips Bruce off and he suggests that Clark bring Danny by mount justice to see what he can do. Danny is pretty iffy about it and intends to say no when Ma tells him he should go. It might be nice for him to meet kids his age that he doesn’t have to worry about scaring. So Danny reluctantly agrees.

When they arrive via zeta tube Danny immediately takes off in search of a trash can before he vomits all over the entrance, cujo not far behind him. He ends up getting lost in the halls and walking into a training session with black canary. Danny watches, fairly impressed with the teen sparring with the blond, he had a bit of a temper but he wasn’t doing too bad. When she slammed him on the ground Danny gave a sympathetic groan, the teen twisted around glaring at him “Who the hell are you?!?” He stood up revealing the Superman symbol on his chest.

Danny immediately held his hands up to show he meant no harm. Canary tells him to calm down before addressing Danny “you must be the young meta Superman told us was coming. I’m black Canary, it’s nice to meet you.” The other boy scowled, much to Danny’s confusion.

“I wouldn’t say I’m a meta but sure, I’m here with Superman” he turns to address the teen. “you were doing real great in that fight. I’m impressed, but y’know…”

“I need to reign in my temper. I know!” Danny looks at him surprised, “actually I was gonna say that if you went in for a jab before she flipped you it would have thrown off her balance. Sometimes the most efficient attacks are the ones that don’t hit.” He looked at Danny confused, and a little bit relieved. Danny grinned “you didn’t lose the spar because of your temper, you lost because she’s more experienced. I used to get my ass kicked all the time. It just takes practice.”

“You fight? Would you care to try your luck?” Canary asked. Danny hesitated “uhm I’m not sure about that, I don’t usually fight the living…” canary looked at him confused “what do you mean..” before canary finishes her question they are interrupted by wolf charging into the room chased by… a small green dog?

Danny shouts “Cujo!” The dog stops and races to Danny, wolf hides behind Conner.

“What’s wrong buddy, he’s just a little guy?”

Danny laughs and says “I wouldn’t go that far, but he’s probably more concerned by the fact that hes a ghost. Animals tend to get pretty antsy near ghosts, working on a farm was an… interesting experience to say the least.” Danny laughs “we should probably go find Supes” the three make they’re way toward the living area where they find Superman with the rest of the team. He surveys the team guessing who’s who. He’s not sure about the magician, Obviously the red head works with the speedster, he’s not sure who the kid in the cape works with, Danny’s not sure if there are any archers in the league so he’s a little confused by the blond girl. The cute teen with gills probably works with aquaman. The moment he sees M’gann though, Danny stares with undisguised confusion. Conner notices the look and immediately gets defensive “you got a problem with martians?!” Danny swiftly turns to Conner “She’s from MARS!?!??” Danny is no longer next to Conner.

The whole team gets whiplash from the change as Danny bombards their resident Martian with questions about Mars and space. Superman laughs, “how come you weren’t this enthusiastic when you found out I was kryptonian” Danny gives Clark an unimpressed look. “You were raised on earth by Ma and Pa, she was raised on MARS you are not the same.” The whole team freezes, not that Danny notices much as he continues to ask M’gann about space.

Conner breaks out of his surprise “you’re related to Superman?” Clark goes to interrupt but Danny answers before he can.

“Yep, Ma and Pa took me in so now I’ve got a kryptonian big brother.” Conner clenches his jaw as Danny continues “but don’t worry I won’t be stealing your mentor, I’m pretty strictly a solo act, closest thing I had to a mentor was… an old friend.” Danny may be obsessed with space but he’s not a complete idiot so it’s pretty obvious at this point that Conner is trying to reign in his temper. “Is there something wrong?”

“He’s not my mentor!” Danny looks between the two “sorry my mistake the shirt threw me off. Just a fan then.” They all start to look at him weird before Clark jumps in

“He’s uhh, well he’s my clone” Danny freezes with a gasp he covers his mouth in shock and places a hand over his chest. “I can’t believe this. To think… I’ve finally assessed to the rank of middle child!!!” Danny throws his hands in the air in triumph. With a laugh he turns back to Clark “Why didn’t you tell me I had a little brother?! This is awesome!” Conner looks at Danny confused

Clark interrupted Danny’s excitement “he’s, well you don’t, he’s not my brother he’s my clone.” Danny brushes him off

“So what! He’s perfect little brother material. I’m assuming Ma and Pa don’t know, they’re gonna be so excited.”

“Danny! Calm down, no I haven’t told Ma and Pa, I didn’t want to worry them.”

Danny is confused “worry them, why would this make them worried?” Clark sighs

“Conner was made by lex Luthor, my arch enemy, with the intent to replace me.” Danny takes a step back, Conner looks away dejected even as his friends gather close around him.

The room goes cold

“Dude I think you need to chill” Danny says with an sharp grin. “I mean a clone I understand out of your control? A clone made by your arch enemy to replace you? I mean seriously, has he even tried to shoot you in the back yet?”

“He didn’t ask to be made, so stop treating him like it’s HIS fault.” Danny’s eyes have started to glow as the room seems to close in on them before all at once everything goes back to normal. Superman takes a gasp of air. Danny laughs “gonna be honest though, it kinda feels like you’re copying me at this point.” He says moving over to Conner, throwing an arm over his shoulder. “But let’s make one thing straight, and I mean absolutely no offense, but my clone is clearly superior.” Conner and Clark look at Danny shocked. “Your WHAT?!?” Danny laughs

“Yeah man, when I was 14 my arch nemesis cloned me in a attempt to replace me, didn’t work, only one was stable and she wants nothing to do with him at this point.” Clark looks at Danny pleadingly “that…that doesnt explain anything, why did you have an arch enemy.”

“Well I mean, originally he asked me to join him, but I’m wasn’t really a fan of him killing my dad and marrying my mom. He was obsessed with making me his son, major fruitloop man he’s crazy.” Danny shrugs.” Kid flash laughs

“I’m calling bullshit there’s no way.”

Danny laughs “think what you like but don’t come crying to me when Ellie haunts your nightmares”

Danny claps his hands “So what exactly are we doing today?”

——————

Meanwhile in the arctic in another dimension

a small girl is chasing after a group of penguins when a portal appears in front of her and she crashes face first into the large blue bearded figure that exits.

“CLOCKWORK!!” She laughs “wanna chase penguins with me?” The elderly ghost grins

“Perhaps another time, for now how would you like to visit your cousin for a little while. There’s some people that are DYING to meet you.”

The girl gives him an impossibly wide Sharp grin before letting out maniacal laugh

“Lead the way clocks!”

#danny phantom #ghost king danny #dc x dp #brain vomit #life on the farm pt 4 #sorry for the wait #this never ends #send help #hint of future cold current #maybe #Clark Kent #Conner Kent #SHES COMING!!!#there’s gonna be another part #I’m not sure when this is ending

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fangirlwriting-stories · 4 months

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Newbie Frustrations

Summary: Valerie meets Vlad for the first time when he asks her for a favor.

...

Valerie Gray does not need sidekicks, thank you very much.

She hasn’t had any kind of contact with the Vlad who sent her the suit before now, but if this is going to be what their meetings are like, she’s pretty sure she could do without.

But no, for the first time the person who gifted her ghost hunting equipment actually makes himself known, and Valerie is finding herself nothing but irritated by the interaction.

It’s more than a little disappointing. She’d thought before about potentially learning about and meeting who sent her equipment, and how she’d thank him. But when Vlad approached her, introduced himself, and took her to a training area he’d apparently had made for someone else, she found herself feeling a tad offended.

“You said they just started learning how to use the suits a couple weeks ago?” Valerie asks, putting her hands on her hips in an outward display of her irritation.

“Yes, but Miss Gray, please understand—”

“I don’t have time to babysit a couple of newbies!”

“Miss Gray, please,” Vlad says, holding up his hands. “Allow me to explain.”

Valerie crosses her arms, but doesn’t say anything else.

“These are two individuals who have been hurt by Danny Phantom just like you have,” Vlad says, which is… not what Valerie expected him to say.

“Really?” Valerie asks despite herself. She can relate to that, at least. “Who are they?”

“They ah, wish to remain anonymous,” Vlad says. “Surely you can understand that.”

Valerie gives a huff, but nods. She can’t imagine anyone learning about her identity as a ghost hunter. If these two want to keep their secrets, that’s fine.

“Fine,” she says. “But that doesn’t mean I have time to show them the ropes. I’ve got my own problems.”

“I understand, Miss Gray, but please,” Vlad says. He gestures towards the two small chairs sitting on the other side of the room. Valerie sighs and follows him over, then takes a seat across from him.

“I’m working with these two after a difficult time,” Vlad says. “Surely you remember what it was like to lose everything in your life to Phantom and his ghost dog.”

Valerie nods. It’s not a time she likes to think back on. She’d spent the week watching her life fall apart around her, with nothing she could do about it until Vlad sent her the ghost hunting gear. She’s adjusted better to it now, but there are still nights she goes to bed hungry and cursing Phantom’s name.

“These two are going through something very similar,” Vlad says. “I understand that it’s a lot to ask, but could you please be there to help them work through it?”

Valerie sighs. That’s a lot harder to say no to. If Phantom is ruining other people’s lives, and she really wants to stop him and the harm he’s doing, how can she not be there to support other victims of his?

Finally, Valerie nods, looking back at Vlad. “Alright,” she says. “When am I supposed to meet these two?”

“If you can come back here tomorrow, about an hour after school, you can meet them then,” Vlad says. “They’re eager to not put it off too long, I’m sure you can imagine.”

She can, though she doesn’t like it. She does, however, agree to it, even if she heads home trying not to think about it too much.

Vlad made a training ground for these two, and not for her. He met them first, and not her.

She supposes it was a bit much to assume Vlad would help her because he thought she was special. He’s just trying to take out Phantom like she is. She should just be grateful to have an ally who helped her become capable of joining the fight herself. Of course he reached out to others, especially if they’ve been victims of Phantom too. If he’d told her about them and then asked her opinion, she probably would have recommended they do the same thing.

…But he hadn’t asked her about it.

He’d met them first.

…

Today is a better one than most, because Dad’s work schedule lines up with Valerie’s, and he can pick her up and take her home instead of her adding an extra hour and a half by having to walk or take the bus. Valerie’s pretty exhausted from her own shift, and more than a little sweaty from staying in the Nasty Burger mascot the whole time. At least it’s getting colder, and she doesn’t have to wear the thing with the summer sun beating down on her.

Still, she stays awake on the drive home and listens to Dad talk about his day in favor of napping. It’s a lot of boring science talk she doesn’t really understand, but she listens anyway. If there’s one thing she can say the money troubles have done for her, she does like feeling closer with Dad.

Then, however, he finishes talking about his day and follows it up with “And how was your day, sweetheart?”

And obviously Valerie can’t tell him about the meeting with the Vlad or the coming meeting with Phantom’s latest victims tomorrow, so instead she talks about the math test that’s coming up that she’s not excited for, and how that’s definitely the biggest stressor in her life right now and it’s what she’s spending all her time thinking about.

…Okay, so maybe she doesn’t say all of that.

And maybe she doesn’t feel that much closer with Dad.

“I can help you study if it’s worrying you,” Dad says as they pull into their apartment complex. “You have tomorrow off from work, don’t you? You want to come by the lab after school and we can work on studying there?”

“Oh, uh, sorry Dad,” Valerie says with a wince. “I have to meet with Mr. Lancer tomorrow to ask for an extension on my English essay. I’ve been pulling too many shifts to have time to get it done.”

Which is… also true, actually. She’s going to have to head there right after in order to kill just enough time to match up with Vlad’s schedule.

Dad pulls them into a parking space, then puts the car in park and turns to face her. “Valerie, you know that your schoolwork needs to come before your job. If you need more time to get things done I can pull some extra hours—”

“No,” Valerie says instantly, maybe a little too quickly. But her Dad is too tired already, he can’t start pulling extra hours. “Really Dad, I’m okay. This is just a flukey thing, I normally have plenty of time.”

Though she’ll probably have plenty less of it if she has to start teaching two newbies how to ghost hunt—

“Alright,” Dad says, shutting off the car. “Just let me know if I can help in any way. And let me know when you want to study for that math test.”

“I will Dad,” Valerie says, thinking in her head about when in the world she’s going to find time for it.

She shakes the thought off as they both climb out of the car. She grabs her backpack that has her schoolwork and hidden ghost hunting equipment in it, and Dad grabs his briefcase and the projects he has from work. Dad locks the car behind them as they head up towards the building, and turns to Valerie as he uses his key to open the door.

“What are you thinking for dinner, sweetheart?” he asks, holding the door open behind him for Valerie as he walks inside.

“Do we have any ravioli?” Valerie asks. “The kind with the meat inside?” She needs filling food after an emotionally intense first meeting with Vlad followed by a long shift.

“I think we have a bit left,” Dad says with a smile as they both head for the stairs. The complex’s elevator is still under repairs for another week (read: month), but thankfully they’re only on the second floor, and it’s not long before they’re inside the apartment and heading towards the kitchen.

“I’ll make some lemonade while you start on the ravioli?” Valerie offers.

“Sounds perfect,” Dad says with a nod, so Valerie pulls the lemonade packets out of the cabinet and the pitcher off the top of the fridge.

She dumps the lemonade packet in the pitcher first, then fills it with water, and starts stirring it with a wooden spoon as Dad sits down at the table, done setting the water to boil on the stove. Valerie stirs for a little while longer, then sets the pitcher down on the table and goes back to the cabinet for cups.

She pours some lemonade in the two cups, then gets ice like Dad likes, and takes them both back to the table, handing the one with ice to Dad and sitting in the chair across from him.

“So hey,” Dad says as Valerie takes a sip. “Do you wanna watch the next episode of Scalpels and Secrets while we eat tonight?”

“Oh hell yes!”

“Valerie.”

“Heck yes!”

Scalpels and Secrets is a medical drama her and Dad have gotten hooked on. They decided pretty early on that they needed something to look forward to, since their life was likely about to get much harder than they were used to, and so they picked a cheesy medical drama to watch and get way too invested in. It’s sort of a joke, but also Valerie isn’t sure what she’s going to do if Kelly actually forgives Kevin for cheating on her again.

But after the day she’s had, an escape with her Dad to the world of overdramatic doctors dealing with stupid problems sounds like exactly what she needs.

So while her Dad boils the ravioli, Valerie takes their cups into the living room and turns on the TV. They knew they wouldn’t make the episode yesterday— Dad had a late shift and Valerie had ghosts to fight— so they recorded it, and by the time Dad walks in with two plates of ravioli for each of them, it’s cued up and ready to watch.

“Thanks Dad,” Valerie says with a smile at him as he hands over her plate. He sits on the recliner, since they only have one and, like he always argues, his back definitely hurts worse at 45 than whatever Valerie’s done to hers. (There are definitely some days after a long hard ghost fight when Valerie wants to disagree with him.)

But tonight she lets him with no argument and sits down on the ground next to the chair. And with that, Dad starts the show, and Valerie feels her long day drain out of her shoulders as she leans back against the chair.

But seriously, if Kelly takes Kevin back again, she’s going to scream.

…

Valerie goes through the next day slightly dreading the meeting with Vlad and whoever Phantom’s latest victims are. She’s not going to let any of them down, but she honestly wishes more than anything that there was someone else who could do this. She has enough going on in her life without adding on taking care of two ghost-fighting newbies.

She’s going to do it anyway, though. It would be a betrayal of everything she stood for otherwise.

So, after school, and after hanging around a little longer and successfully getting her extension from Lancer, she walks towards the building she met Vlad in yesterday.

She hears voices as she approaches, and stops outside before going in. She looks around for a second, confirming no one else is there, before activating her suit and walking quickly through the door.

Vlad is talking with two people, who are also wearing suits, one that’s red like hers, and one that’s purple.

Great, she doesn’t even have an originally colored suit—

Valerie shakes the thought off and clears her throat.

All three of them turn to face her, a little too quickly for them to have known she’s there beforehand.

“I’m told there’s some people who want to meet with me?” Valerie asks, looking back and forth between the two people in suits like hers.

The one in the red suit almost seems to shrink back slightly, and the one in the purple suit immediately stands up taller.

“Yeah,” they say, and Valerie is pretty sure she picks out a girl’s voice from under the suit, though there’s clearly some kind of voice modulator going on there. “You’re Valerie then?”

Valerie jerks backwards, then turns a glare at Vlad, even though he can’t see it from under the suit. For a minute she wishes he could. “So I can’t know who they are, but you told them who I am?”

“I’m sorry my dear,” Vlad says, looking genuinely remorseful. “I figured they would have guessed eventually. It’s not exactly private knowledge, what happened to you.”

Valerie feels her cheeks warm in anger and a little bit in shame underneath her suit, and is once again glad he can’t see her expression. She keeps her hood on, the fact that they know who she is be damned.

“Fine,” she groans, turning back to purple suit. “Yeah, that’s me. Vlad said you two are the newbies I’m supposed to help?”

“I’m not a newbie,” purple suit snaps. “We’ve been training for like a month and a half.”

Valerie raises an eyebrow, though still no one can see it, and looks around. “In here?” she asks.

“Yeah, so?” purple suit asks.

Valerie doesn’t say anything, just turns her gaze back to them.

“I thought you might appreciate having some allies,” purple suit says. “Since, you know, you’ve been doing this all alone?”

Valerie laughs a little, unable to stop herself.

“Hey, what’s that supposed to mean?” purple suit snaps.

Valerie doesn’t say anything, and glances back at red suit, who still hasn’t said anything and is now looking at the ground.

Oh, the ghosts are going to eat that one alive.

“Alright,” Valerie says, glancing back at purple suit, who she dubs “Thing 1” in her head. “Yeah, I’ll help you. But come with me, we’re not training here today.”

“You want to just fly out there in the open?” Thing 1 asks.

“Well, you’re gonna have to get used to that anyway,” Valerie says, crossing her arms. “We’re going a bit outside of town. Come on.”

She turns and walks back out the door, pulling her board up so she can fly as she does. She doesn’t look back, but eventually hears the sound of two other boards following her.

“Hey,” snaps Thing 1, flying up next to her. Thing 2 stays thoroughly behind her, and Valerie doesn’t pay them much mind. “You want to explain why you’re dragging us out to the middle of nowhere?”

Valerie glances over at her. “You’ve spent all your time training in there, have you?” she asks.

“Yeah, so? What, are you just jealous you never had someplace like that?”

Valerie laughs to cover the spark of anger at Thing 1 having guessed a little bit right. “As if,” she says. “That place is calm and stationary. Practically peaceful. Good for learning basic controls, but not much else. Ghost fights aren’t like that. They’re fast-paced, and they regularly change with no warning. You can’t be prepared for them if you spend your whole time practicing indoors.”

“Vlad never mentioned that,” says a new voice, and Valerie turns in slight surprise at the first time Thing 2 has spoken. Sounds like a boy, still with voice modulation.

She narrows her eyes a second later, turns in midair and crosses her arms. “Well it’s not his job to teach you everything,” she says.

Thing 2 doesn’t say anything in response, and after a second Valerie turns back to Thing 1. “We’re going out to the woods so you can weave in and out of trees. You need unfamiliar terrain to practice in.”

“Fine,” Thing 1 says, though she doesn’t sound happy about it. Valerie smirks a little under her hood.

She leads them all towards the outside of town, going on until they meet the woods, which takes them about half an hour. Valerie slows to a stop in midair and turns to Thing 1 and Thing 2, who have stopped behind her.

“So we’re just flying around the trees?” Thing 1 asks, glancing around.

Valerie smirks again. “Sure. But oh, one more thing.”

“What’s that?”

Valerie raises her blaster and fires it at the same moment, aiming for the space right in between Thing 1 and Thing 2. Both of them cry out in surprise and dart to the side.

“Hey, what the hell?” Thing 1 snaps. “A little warning would be nice!”

Valerie laughs. “You think ghosts are particularly inclined to give you a heads up? If you’re so qualified after your indoor training, prove it!”

This time she aims and fires right at Thing 1, who dives out of the way with an angry growl, then behind a tree for cover. Valerie aims for Thing 2, who hasn’t moved, like an idiot. But the second she fires at him, Thing 1 dives out from behind the tree and shoves Thing 2 to the side, putting herself right in the line of fire with just enough time to dive out of the way again herself.

Valerie laughs again. “Aww, that’s adorable, you like each other,” she says. “That’ll get you killed, you know.”

“You know, you could stand to be a little nicer,” Thing 1 snaps, whirling to face Valerie and firing her own blaster at her.

“There you go! You’re finally getting it,” Valerie says with a grin that Thing 1 can’t see. She dives easily to the side and fires again, once at Thing 1 and twice at Thing 2, who clearly needs a little more practice. Thankfully Thing 2 finally starts to get his head in the game, and dodges the blasts instead of waiting for Thing 1 to shove him out of the way again.

Thing 1 fires at her, and Valerie flies over in between the leaves of two trees, staying just low enough that she can dodge larger branches while still being able to use the leaves of cover. She weaves back and forth, as well as doubles back around a couple times, and while the leaves do make it a little harder to see Thing 1 and Thing 2, she still gets four shots in, which is four more shots than Thing 1 and Thing 2 get at her. In fact, most of the time after she fires a shot at them they whirl around from having been facing the complete opposite direction from her, meaning they clearly hadn’t had a clue where she was.

After a couple more minutes of this, Valerie takes pity on them both and flies up above the trees entirely. “Alright, truce!” she calls.

With a frustrated huff, Thing 1 flies up after her. Thing 2 follows a moment later, panting, and rests with his hands on his knees.

“Do you see my point yet?” Valerie asks, crossing her arms.

“Yeah, alright,” Thing 1 snaps. “You don’t have to be a bitch about it.”

“Excuse me?” Valerie raises her arm and fires another blast at Thing 1, this time not at all trying to miss her. She’s not aiming to hurt her, though, so Thing 1 just gets blasted back a few feet.

That doesn’t stop Thing 2 from leaping in front of her to prevent further blasts, though. So they’re both idiots.

“Hey!” Thing 2 snaps. “We’re on the same side here!”

“I am finding time in my life, which is always incredibly busy, to help you two not die,” Valerie snaps. “I don’t really have the time or desire to babysit, but I’m doing it anyway. And now you’re yelling at me because I don’t have the right attitude? Who’s the bitch exactly?”

“We don’t need babysitting—” Thing 1 starts.

“You’re right,” Thing 2 says, shoving his arm in front of Thing 1’s face. “I’m sorry. We clearly do need your help, we should be nicer about you offering it. Thank you.”

Thing 1 huffs and crosses her arms, but doesn’t say anything else.

Valerie looks at them both for a minute, then sighs. “It’s alright,” she says. “Look, Phantom messed up my life too, so I get it. That doesn’t mean I’m gonna go easy on you, but… I know what you’re going through.”

“Doubt it,” Thing 1 mutters, and Thing 2 elbows her in the side.

Valerie narrows her eyes at Thing 1. “Just don’t expect me to have time to help you every day,” she says, glaring at Thing 1, then Thing 2, even though they can’t see it. “I do have my own problems.”

“I understand,” Thing 2 says with a nod. “We wouldn’t ask you to anyway.”

“Good,” Valerie says. She looks around them with a sigh. “For now, I’d say you two should get outside more and practice in less familiar environments. And be prepared for things in an actual fight to change very quickly. I can’t always be there to watch your back.”

Thing 2 nods again. “Thanks.”

“I have to go now,” Valerie says with a nod back. “I have things to do. I’m guessing I’ll see you at the next ghost fight.”

She flies off before she can get an answer, heading for the Nasty Burger. She’s going to have to find some way to get enough energy to work as a customer service mascot for the next six hours.

…She’s doomed.

#danny phantom #valerie gray #vlad plasmius #damon gray #sam manson #tucker foley #tw emotional manipulation #everyone knows au #my fic

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felixcloud6288 · 8 months

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Fullmetal Alchemist Chapter 30

We've had one traumatic death, yes. But what about second trauma?

Y'know how Greed said Ed was the type who doesn't mind getting beat up but will lose his cool when others get hurt?

Greed is also that type of person. This is the only time he's been furiously angry, and it's after seeing Loa and Dorchet killed in front of him.

I wonder if Bradley knew Martel was inside Al's armor before she tried to kill him. If she had kept quiet and let Alphonse quietly sneak her out, I wonder if the scene would have ended with Bradley saying something like "Before you go" and then running his sword down Al's chest.

The scene transition after Martel is killed implies Al lost consciousness from the shock. I wonder how that works though. I know falling asleep and being rendered unconscious are two different things, but I'd assume there are some overlapping characteristics that should cause Al to be unable to fall unconscious because of his condition.

I wonder if Martel's blood spilling on Al's bloodrune might have momentarily disrupted the seal and disconnected Al from his armor and if maybe Ed pulling Al's soul might have had something to do with Al not having his memories to begin.

I've got no real ideas with that. If something comes up later, I'll talk about it then.

But Al managed to reach that silhouette of his mother and that's what caused him to lose his whole body.

Bradley demands to know if Ed and Al traded any information or made any deals with Greed and threatens to kill them if they did. Considering what Bradley is, it's pretty wild he'd make that threat. He was willing to kill one of their sacrifices to ensure their plan wasn't found out. Or maybe he was intimidating them into silence.

Al being a suit of armor was probably known to the Homunculi long before this point. Greed found out because of the rumors in East City after the fight with Scar, and Lust was on the train to Resembool. Bradley asking about why Al is a suit of armor might be the first time they considered him as a sacrifice candidate though.

I'm glad Ed pointed out the inconsistency from Bradley saying he wants to find out what the military conspiracy is but then killing a bunch of people who could have been potential leads. Of course we as the readers understand it's because the conspiracy goes all the way to the top at this point.

Wouldn't it suck if you bought a house in Central and there's a window that allows one of those searchlights at Central HQ to beam into your house?

The scene with Riza is playing out like that scene with that white girl in every horror movie, right up until she pulls out a gun and shoots Barry.

I just love how she hid a gun in her grocery bag. Did she put it there after leaving or does the grocery store stock fully loaded revolvers next to the pet food? And where did that other handgun come from? She's not keeping a holster of any kind and just before this panel, she was using her right hand to hold her groceries.

Her grocery bag also had dog food so she canonically has Black Hayate at this point.

There was a missing person flyer for Yoki.

We can still see the bullet holes Danny and Maria gave Barry.

We see the military banner. It's a horned(?) dragon(?) with a winding tail.

It must suck for the people whose office windows are behind the banner.

back

Spoiler Discussion

Bido being established as not at the Devil's Nest during the raid shows how far ahead Arakawa had the story planned.

Arakawa planted a little seed here which would bloom into a major plot point dozens of chapters later. Hindsight and this scene proves she planned to have Greed return and have him betray Father a second time.

#fullmetal alchemist #fullmetal alchemist reread

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quirkless-accident · 2 years

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Thermos

Danny gets badly injured during a mission/ arc/ training and Danny just "shrugs, ive had worst/ im fine/ tis but a scratch"

Shouta had a high pain tolerance. It just came with the territory of being a pro hero-and an underground one at that, where the work was a bit more strenuous, a bit more messy.

As an underground hero, he's seen things that give him panic attacks at the most inopportune times. When he closes his eyes he can sometimes see the blood staining his knuckles from beating villains half to death. When it rains all of his joints decide they want to ache simultaneously. He's got old injuries in every part of his body, and they want him to remember whenever they sky gets a little gray.

He's had most of his bones broken, and he's had his guts all but spilling out of him from stab wounds, and he's early bled out on multiple occasions.

But none of that could even compare to what Danny's going through right now.

It was an accident in training, but one thing led to another, and Danny's guts ended up actually spilling out a bit.

Danny had been sparring against Todoroki, and hadn't had enough time to dodge or go intangible. The ice spiked up and went straight through his stomach and out the other end.

Danny cried out, gripping the ice as green leaked from his mouth and the gaping hole in his stomach. Shouta was over there in the blink of an eye, barking at another student to go and get Recovery Girl.

"Don't worry about it," Danny said, giving him and Todoroki what probably would have been a fond smile, if not for the grimace coming in full force. "I've had worse. It's not even that bad, I promise."

"What do you mean you've had worse?" Todoroki asks, and oh. He's not calm at all. In fact, he looks a little too pale, but whether it's from the look of Danny's injury or the guilt that's no doubt eating him from the inside out, he can't tell. Hell, he can't even begin to process.

"Just stay awake, okay, kid?" Shouta says. Danny's arms are shaking with the effort of holding himself up so he doesn't slip further down the ice, but he just nods and smiles like nothing is wrong. "What's-what's your favorite show?" Shouta asks. He already knows the answer to it, it's some horror sow from the pre-quirk era that Danny has explained to him and Hizashi in length about. But Danny tells him about it again anyway, through choked out words and half-lidded eyes.

It doesn't take long for Recovery Girl and a swarm of medic bots to greet them. A couple minutes at the very most, but it feels like years.

"Hey, RG," Danny greets weakly from his spot above them. "How's it hanging?"

Shouta has never wanted to simultaneously choke and hug someone as fiercely as he wants to do now. But Danny being so calm, as unnerving as it is for Shouta, is probably helping everybody else out.

Recovery Girl gets to work and makes sure she's more than ready to treat Danny. When she's done, he uses his intangibility to slip out of the ice spike. As soon as he's free, he's strapped to a stretcher and wheeled out faster than Shouta can blink.

He calls of the rest of training and sends Todoroki to Hound Dog. He should probably stay and make sure they're okay, but his mind if whirling with what ifs and other, worse thoughts that he was doing his best not to think about.

Shouta had never lost a kid since his tenure at U.A.

He wasn't about to start now. And he certainly wasn't about to start spiraling. Not when Danny needed him.

He all but sprinted to Hizashi's classroom, not caring that he most definitely broke the door with the force in which he opened it. Hizashi was startled, hand already going to his directional speaker. But then he saw Shouta's face, and bless him, because Shouta didn't even need to say anything before Hizashi was at his heels, running with him to the infirmary.

He let them in, despite her strict rule about no visitors during surgery.

"Hey, Zashi," Danny greeted weakly from the bed. How he was still awake, Shouta would never know.

"How are you-" Hizashi paled at the sight of Danny's torso. In hindsight, Shouta probably should have told him what happened before leading him back here. "What happened?" His voice was barely above a horrified whisper. Danny, though, seemed just out of it enough to not notice his dilemma.

"Just a training accident," he lazily waved off.

"How are you still conscious?"

"Oh, uh-well, ectoplasm is thicker than blood, and it leaves the body a lot slower than blood. So I figured if I just stay awake I should be fine," Danny said with a shrug. "Can't hold my ghost form if I'm unconscious, you know? Stitching is a little harder cause my skin keeps turning to goo but it's whatever."

"It's what-" Hizashi said, cutting himself off with the sheer disbelief he was feeling. Because all of those words were very concerning. And sure, it was good to be in tune with one's own body, but how did Danny know that?

Shouta remembered him saying he's had worse. He doesn't want to really find out how worse it was. How close they could have gotten to not meeting Danny at all.

After answering a few ghost physiology-related questions, Recovery Girl shooed them out.

Neither of them talked, but they were both weighed down with the knowledge that if this had been any other kid, there would be blood staining their hands. There would be no cheerful welcome home! waiting for them when they walked through the door. There would be no family picnics and family beach days and family anything.

So they sat, and they waited. They didn't speak, but they did grip each other's hands as tightly as they could without hurting one another, giving gentle squeezes of reassurance whenever the other seemed to be spiraling. It was grounding, to say the least.

Recovery Girl didn't finish her surgery until late at night. She came out looking absolutely exhausted but satisfied with her work.

"He's finally resting now," she tells them. "And he turned back. He should be okay, though he's gonna be on strict bedrest until he heals up. With his natural healing abilities and my quirk it shouldn't be more than a couple of weeks."

Shouta and Hizashi both slumped with relief at the fact that their kid (and really, they've never discussed it, but it was an unspoken fact that Danny was their kid) would be just fine.

"He was in an out of it," Recovery Girl said. "Some of it was nonsense, but some of it was...Concerning. Whenever he's healed up I'd maybe talk to him about it. Or get him to talk to someone else about it."

"Yes, we will," Hizashi said immediately. HIs antsy nature was finally taking over, it seemed. "Can we-are we allowed...?"

"Go on ahead. Just try not to wake him."

"Thank you, Shuzenji," Shouta said. He knelt down and clasped her hands, giving them a thorough squeeze. She patted him lightly on the head before giving him a kiss goodnight. She ushered him into the room with Hizashi, and headed off to her own room that she used more often then she would like.

The room was bathed in a soft moonlight, but it didn't stop Danny from looking incredibly pale. He was completely still, too, which unnerve Shouta. Danny was always animated in some way, whether it be hard at training or bouncing his leg while he did homework. He was always in some form of constant movement. So to see a lack of it was...Well, a little bit weird. If it wasn't for the occasional rise and fall of his chest, Shouta would have thought he was a corpse.

But he wasn't.

He was staring at his son, who was alive and strong and so many other things that Shouta couldn't put into words because every time he so much as thought about it his throat would suddenly close up and his eyes would sting from something that wasn't his chronic dry eye.

He sank into the seat next to Hizashi, right up against the bed. With his left hand he held his husband, and with his right, he squeezed Danny's cold, limp hand, covered in callouses and Lichtenburg figures.

And for the first time all day, he felt like he could actually breathe again.

#tw: blood #tw: gore #tw: body horror #?#danny phantom #danny fenton #eraserhead #shouta aizawa #recovery girl #shoto todoroki #mha #bnha #my hero academia #boku no hero acadeamia

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redrobin-detective · 3 years

Text

the only ghost in Amity Park

Continuation of Half Of

______________________________________________

Only in Amity Park did the revelation that a local teenager was sorta, kinda a ghost just blow over in a few days. Sure, people still stared at Danny Fenton as he walked by and everyone was still wondering what exactly he was, but overall life had moved on. Star sighed to herself as she organized her notebooks, waiting for class to begin. Just another day.

Star herself really didn’t want to get involved in whatever was going on with Danny. She didn’t like him before he was a celebrity and didn’t plan on starting anytime soon. While Paulina still relentlessly, and vainly, pumped him for information on her dead boy crush, Phantom and he and Dash formed some weird macho bond or whatever, Star avoided him. He’d given her the chills since the day he’d walked into Casper High. When Danny’s secret had been exposed mid-attack, Star hadn’t been surprised. She didn’t need some ghost to tell her that there was something deeply, unsettlingly wrong with Danny Fenton.

Danny didn’t seem particular bothered, by his inhuman nature or by suddenly having his secret exposed. If anything, the nerd looked more relaxed than ever. Star had been watching him, they all had, but Fenton kept his ghostly antics to a minimum when in public. The occasional flash of green eyes when emotional, a grin of sharpened teeth. He made Mikey’s locker lock intangible the other day when the kid had forgotten his combination and he floated down the stairs instead of walking sometimes. It had been a week and it was frightening how quickly such strangeness had become almost normal.

“Alright kids, phones and notes away we’re starting class with a pop quiz. Hope you’ve all kept up with your weekly readings,” Faluca announced cheerily. The whole class, including Fenton, moaned and packed up their bags. Star supposed being an undead being haunting his own life didn’t make him immune from normal human problems. She was biting her lip trying to remember which antibody caused allergic reactions when she got an uneasy feeling. She looked up and was not surprised to see Danny Fenton looking around too. It had been a solid week without ghost attacks, looks like Fenton’s supposed vacation time was up.

Star stopped her writing and adjusted the bag at her feet to prep for evacuation. She briefly wondered what Fenton would do, what he could do? Did he also hunt ghosts, like his parents? Like Phantom? There were no blasts, no screams, no monologues but the dread increased when a ghost shield descended over them. Actually, it looked like it was just covering their classroom. Now everyone was looking up from their quizzes and out the window at the flickering, green shield.

“You’d think the administration would’ve warned me we were going to do a drill,” Faluca said but his voice was hesitant. Clearly this wasn’t planned so despite the lack of alarms, there was a good chance this was real. “Pencils down for the moment while I figure out what’s going on.”

“Mr. Faluca, I need to go,” Danny said, raising his hand. Star was so used to hearing the request she almost ignored him but the dread curling in her stomach made her look again. His face was pinched, sharp and his eyes burned with an icy fury like a sudden storm blowing in without warning.

“Mr. Fenton, I don’t think...” Faluca murmured uneasily. Danny frowned harder.

“It wasn’t a request, actually,” Danny said roughly as he stood up and began walking towards the door. He was almost there when the door slammed open and Fenton had no less than 3 ectoweapons pointed in his face. A few kids jumped back in alarm but Danny held his ground as half a dozen Guys in White agents entered the room and surrounded him.

“Spectral scum formerly known as Daniel Fenton, you’re coming with us,” one of the agents said.

“Danny not Daniel and it’s still my name,” Danny quipped, eyeing each of the government officials and their weapons. “And no, I’m not. I’m still alive, somewhat anyway, so I have rights. The courts backed me up.”

“Everyone who signed for your freedom doesn’t know ghosts like we do,” Another agent said so forcefully, some spittle flew out of their mouth and hit Danny’s cheek. Star watched it freeze and fall away the instant it hit his skin. “Your kind are too dangerous to wander around, you need to be contained and eliminated. Don’t worry, your parents will receive a sizable check as recompense.”

“I’m the one who needs to be contained?” Danny said slowly, evenly but there was a static to his voice that caused the hairs on the back of Star’s neck to rise. When she breathed out, she saw her breath was misting. Everyone’s was as the room temperature continued to plummet. “When you come in here and take hostages to threaten me?” Danny hissed, he took a step forward and his eyes took on a neon green glow. “You didn’t come to my home or on the streets, you came to take me in the middle of biology when I’m surrounded by civilians, kids.”

“You delude yourself into thinking you’re still human,” another agent scoffed. “Everyone knows ghosts are weaker when giving into their obsession.” Danny laughed, it was loud and mocking and like fingernails running down a chalkboard. Faluca, stuck in between Danny and the agents, was white as a sheet and gripping his desk like it was the only thing keeping him from collapsing.

“You know nothing,” Danny hissed, his voice barely recognizable as human. His hair and shirt floated in an invisible but angry breeze. Frost crawled up his arms and his face. Various ecto alarms were ringing on the belts of the agents and they started to look a bit nervous. He looked nothing like the kid who, minutes before, had clearly been struggling with their bio quiz. “You have no idea what you’re dealing with. You cannot come into my haunt and threaten my people to get to me. Protecting what is mine will always make me stronger!”

“This whole town is constantly under attack because of things like you!” One particularly brave agent said even as a few others had backed up. “Amity Park is on the verge of collapse because of all the ghosts!”

“There is only one ghost in Amity Park,” Danny said, he tilted his head, his black and white hair dangling in his face as he gave a sharpened smile. “There is only me and the ghosts I allow, ghosts who know the rules, who respect my authority here by keeping damage to people and property down. I am the only ghost haunting this town and why do you think that is?” One agent threw down his gun and ran through the open door.

“You’re-you’re a monster!” Another woman shouted, shaking as she stepped back before fleeing.

“I’m not the one who needs to threaten innocents to get to their target,” Danny sneered. “It’s a good thing you did though, I wouldn’t hold back if I wasn’t worried about collateral.” Another three agents turned tail and ran. Until there was only one left. His gun was still trained on Danny but his hands were shaking.

“You don’t scare us,” the agent trembled through the obvious lie having been abandoned by his comrades. “We’ll get you monster, if it’s the last thing we do.”

“Looking forward to it,” Danny drawled sarcastically as some of his horrifying aura dissipated along with the freezing grip on the room. Within moments Danny has settled back into more human form. While he’d been angry before, now he looked almost bored. At no point had he seemed afraid.

“You take your people and your equipment and you leave Amity’s borders by sunset tonight,” Danny declared resolutely. “If you have continued problems with my existence, you take it up with the courts. We settle this as humans but if you treat me as a ghost then I will fight back like one.” His eyes turned green again as a threat. As a promise.

“I don’t take orders from spooks!” The agent shouted, securing his finger on the trigger and preparing to fire. Star had ducked to avoid the blast so she missed exactly what happened. All she saw was the green glow and heard a strangled scream from the agent followed by a series of thumps. By the time Star had gotten back into her seat, Danny was aggressively pulling apart the ectogun with his bare hands. There was no sign of the agent and, around them, the ghost shield fizzled away.

“Jerks,” Danny grumbled, kicking at the remains of the ectogun he’d destroyed. “Sorry about that, Mr. Faluca. I knew they’d cause problems but I didn’t think they’d come to school.” Their teacher stared at Danny like a rabbit facing down a lion. “You okay?”

“Fine, Mr. Fenton, just fine!” Falcua grinned in a high pitched voice. “Shall we get back to our quizzes?” The bell rang just then and Danny did a little fist pump.

“Tomorrow then? After I get a chance to study more?” Danny asked with puppy dog eyes. It looked wrong on his face that had just threatened the government with bodily harm. Faluca just nodded dumbly, not sure what else to say. “Yes! I’ll pass tomorrow for sure. The attention kinda sucks but it does come with some perks.”

He walked back to his desk, ignoring the wide-eyed looks of the class when he stopped and gasped, his breath fogging in front of him. His lips pursed again with annoyance. A few people jumped in surprise as the Box Ghost, a familiar annoyance, poked his head through the wall.

“Child! Your requested reprieve is up and the Box Ghost is here to cause insurmountable square shenanigans!” He laughed heartily, stopping when the room temperature dropped again. Danny didn’t even turn to face the ghost.

“Your watch is off, Boxy. I have another 10 hours before I have to deal with you annoyances again,” Danny growled. “I’m feeling good right now, take advantage of it and leave in one piece.”

“Uh right okay then,” the ghost stammered, sinking back into the wall. “See you tomorrow.” Danny cracked his neck before he walked to his desk, grabbed his things and walked to the front of the room.

“Late bell’s gonna ring any minute, you guys should hurry if you don’t wanna be late,” Danny said as he left. Falcua’s strength gave out as soon as Fenton was gone and he hit the floor, one hand clutching at his chest.

“Jeepers,” Mikey surmised appropriately before stuffing his things in his bag and leaving as well. Star watched everyone loosen up themselves and begin gathering their things to leave. No, she would never like Danny Fenton but he and his ghost weirdness was just part of the deal now, whether they wanted it or not. Such was life in the most haunted city in America which was only haunted by a single ghostly entity.

#feral danny my beloved #i wasn't going to continue Half Of but I was Inspired (tm)#In an AU where Fenton and Phantom aren't known to be the same #Danny lets all his unholy elderich nightmare self out as Fenton and keeps Phantom as cute and friendly as possible #also Danny didnt kill the GIW agent lol #just intangibly threw the bastard outside and took his gun #I was inspired (obviously) by the implication of Danny being the only ghost to truly haunt amity #that any other ghost there is only there bc Danny allows them in #that you can come to Phantom's haunt but you must follow his rule or its Death 2.0 The Trauma Edition #also I lost my shit writing insurmountable square shenanigans so please appreciate it #I actually had two whole paragraphs on Star being sensitive to otherworldly things how it ran in her family #then decided that it kinda distracted from the story so i took it it out #but Its still somethng interesting #explains just why she dislikes danny so much (from what we saw in canon) compared to other A listers who tolerate him at least

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ghostgothgeek · 3 years

Text

Pull.

My first for the Phic Phight! 1,685 words.

Danny's been summoned. But not by who you'd expect. In fact, not by an actual person. Prompt by Greyheartwriter.

-----

Danny had been summoned before. Or rather, Phantom has. Usually by Sam, with Tucker occasionally tagging along. Typically when he was grounded. His two best friends always got a kick out of it. Grounded or not, they were going to hang out with their friend, especially when he insisted he should probably stay home “just in case”. He hadn’t gotten caught yet, but there have been a few close calls. Regardless, summoning Phantom was one of the rare moments the trio had to goof off and be regular teenagers. Well, regular enough anyway.

Danny sat with his elbows on the desk, hands gripping his hair in frustration. Falluca had assigned a large problem set to be done overnight. Like Danny didn’t have anything better to do - rest, catch ghosts, nap, hang with his friends, sleep. At 10:30 pm, he was almost done, he was just stuck on this one problem. He thought about calling Sam and asking for help, but he really wanted to try getting this on his own first.

He grabbed his pencil and tried writing out the problem for the 400th time when he felt the pull. “Oh no,” Danny muttered and looked around his room before trying extra hard to focus on his math homework and not the pull. It always failed, but he had been trying to train himself to ignore the pull. “Not. Now.”

Danny put his face closer to his paper and tried to focus, but the pull was getting stronger now. Ugh, why him? Why can’t people summon other ghosts? Well, that could get ugly and dangerous real fast, but come on! He was gonna kill Tucker and Sam. Or maybe…

Maybe his friends were struggling with the same problem as him and they wanted to put all their brain power together. But they could have just called. Regardless, he was still resisting the pull.

The pull was just a feeling of needing to be physically somewhere else. Or it started out that way, anyway. It was like holding your breath and forcing yourself to not hiccup again. You could try to deal with it absentmindedly, but usually it was all you could focus on until you were satisfied. And that’s where Danny was at now, the pull was beginning to consume all of his thoughts, it was beginning to cloud his brain of anything else. He gripped his desk as he felt another strong pull. Whoever was calling him had done it at least 3 times now. Again, Danny tried to focus on his paper.

Another pull, and Danny’s vision became cloudy. He felt anxious. He needed to be somewhere. What about math homework? That was supposed to be his top priority, they had a test on Friday. He gently started shaking as he tried to refrain.

He fell out of his chair at another pull, another call. Fuck it. He couldn’t hold on anymore.

He sighed, took a deep breath, and focused on the pull. He felt immediate relief as he answered. He felt the familiar feeling of following the call, like riding a waterslide or a rollercoaster in the dark. You had no idea where you were going, you couldn’t see anything in front of you. You didn’t know how long the ride would last and you had zero control. You were just being forced in a different direction, sometimes feeling the whiplash of the unexpected.

He could feel his core becoming colder. He felt his transformation into Phantom, and soon enough, the blackness was beginning to fade, and he tried to gather his surroundings. “Sam, Tucker, if it’s you I swear I’m gonna-”

Oh, OH. This was new. Danny didn’t even know that this was possible. He guessed it made sense though. Maybe Ouija boards were like cell phones in the Ghost Zone. Ghosts had to get a hold of each other somehow.

He turned his body as he slowly looked around. He didn’t know this part of the Ghost Zone. He didn’t even see any ghosts around. He started to panic. He didn’t know where he was, or who called him, or if anyone even actually called him at all. Was this some new stupid ghost power he had to learn to controll again? He just figured out how to keep his pants from falling down when he tried to flirt with girls. Not important right now, he reminded himself. He formed a small ectoball of energy in his hand, preparing himself for any attack.

But no attack came. Instead, he just felt a little nudge at his feet. Looking down, he sighed and dropped his ectoball. “Really?” He glanced down at his caller. “First of all, how did you even learn to do that?!”

Headbutting his ankle was the small green fluffball nicknamed Cujo, in his puppy form. To answer Danny’s question, he used his nose to nudge the planchette on the board, moving it around until Danny began to feel the pull again, though this time the pull wasn’t as strong because he was already in his destination.

Danny chuckled and scratched the pup’s ear. “What’s up buddy? I gotta finish my homework.”

Cujo barked and wagged his tail ferociously, sticking his butt up towards the air as he bounced around. Eventually, the dog dragged his squeaky toy towards the halfa and barked again.

“I can’t play! I have to finish my homework so I can try to get a few hours of sleep in a row tonight. Sorry dude, but no.”

The puppy’s excitement level deteriorated quickly. He let out a little whine, and gave Danny his best puppy dog eyes. Danny sighed as he rubbed the back of his neck. Cujo was adamant on playing, that much was clear. He called him 6 times already, what was going to stop the pooch from doing it again until he got what he wanted? Maybe just for a few minutes…

Cujo’s tail began wagging again as he could see Danny caving in. “Alright, alright. I needed a break anyways.” He formed another ectoball and threw it as hard as he could. “Go long, Cuj!” He smiled as the pup darted after the ball at lightning speed and stretched his muscles for the few seconds it took for Cujo to return with the ball. The pup barked excitedly.

Danny smiled, he always wanted a dog anyway. He threw the ball for Cujo for another few minutes, before playing tug of war and teasing the dog with the squeaky toy. “Who’s a good boy?” Danny said in a voice only reserved for Cujo and other animals (except for Sam’s pet snake...he couldn’t use his little baby voice on that thing, it was too weird). He rubbed the dog’s belly, laughing when Cujo’s back leg would twitch in response to the belly rubs.

The phantom yawned as he laid down on the ground next to the pup, using one hand to prop his head up and the other to scratch Cujo’s chin. “I’ll admit, you are making me feel more relaxed.”

Soon enough, Danny was snoozing with the little puppy curled up into his side, snoring softly. Though, the moment of peace didn’t last more than 15 minutes as Danny woke up to the feeling of being pulled again. He groaned, gave Cujo a little kiss on his head, and answered the new call.

Sure enough, he was in the middle of Sam’s room, falling to her rug as he was still too drowsy to make a better landing. He heard Tucker’s laugh and jolted up, shaking the remaining grogginess out of his head. Danny groaned, “what?!”

“Look who woke up on the wrong side of the...rug…” Tucker tried. Danny could feel Sam rolling her eyes as she offered him a hand so he could stand up.

Danny couldn’t help but let out a low growl, “Tucker…”

“We’ve been trying to call you for 25 minutes already! Guess you didn’t have your phone on you. Thank the goddesses for Ouija boards,” Sam stated as she straightened out her skirt.

“Why? What’s wrong? Is there a ghost?” Danny examined her room, making a face at the snake that he swore was glaring at him.

“School starts in 4 minutes, dude,” Tucker explained as he grabbed his backpack.

“You gotta fly us to your house to get your stuff then fly us to school, and maybe we won’t get detention this time,” Sam put her backpack on as well.

“Ah, fuck,” Danny quickly grabbed his friends’ arms and flew as quickly as he could to his room, grabbing his backpack and flying to school. His parents were already in the lab working on stuff, and Danny doubted they even noticed he was missing and almost late for school. A bomb could go off in the town and they would be so immersed in their work that they wouldn’t hear it. His overattentive sister, on the other hand, had apparently been trying to get a hold of him for an hour now, only stopping when Sam texted Jazz that they had Danny with them.

The trio landed in the bush as the first warning bell rang. Danny transformed and they ran into the school together, making it to their homeroom late, but for once luck was on their side as the teacher wasn’t paying attention...her car alarm mysteriously went off.

Danny pulled out his notebook and realized he still had to finish that math problem. Shit.

He turned as Sam tapped his shoulder, handing him her homework. He smiled gratefully.

“Don’t worry, Tucker had to copy mine too. That problem took me 5 hours to solve. You both owe me.”

Danny sighed in relief and nodded. He had 10 minutes to copy this down, and it was two pages long. It should be a crime to assign problems that long. He pulled out his pencil and started scribbling down the solution when he felt it.

Another pull. Damn that dog. No, he loved Cujo. Damn that Ouija board. “Remind me to find Cujo a puppy friend,” the halfa muttered to his friends.

#phic phight 2021 #danny phantom #stephanie writes sometimes #danny fenton #sam manson #tucker foley

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lexosaurus · 3 years

Text

Everything Was White: Part 12

[see all chapters]

Read on: [ffn] / [ao3]

---

The alarm was blaring.

Danny recognized the noise immediately. But his eyes were still slow to open, his arms were slow to turn off the offending sound, and his brain was slow to recognize that the white ceiling above him was just his bedroom ceiling.

His body was numb. Nothing felt real.

He grabbed his phone off his nightstand and unlocked it. The screen was too bright, but he didn’t care. He’d been through worse. What was a little eye strain to him, really?

There were text messages, but Danny ignored them. The government likely already read them first, so if they were important, Danny would probably have woken up back in his cell rather than his cozy bed.

Ghosts like Danny didn’t get to have comfort. He was unpredictable. Dangerous.

“You’re a feral beast.” Operative O’s deep voice rained down on him. “You need to be trained.”

Danny opened the Twitter app only to be faced with a crushing amount of notifications and his name on the top of the trending list.

He should have felt nervous. Anxiety should have gripped his stomach. But...it didn’t.

He felt nothing.

Numb.

He clicked on his name and scrolled through the tweets. As he suspected, that damn video of him at the PHP littered his screen.

Protests have begun to break out near the health clinic Phantom is attending. [image]

I don’t understand, why doesn’t he just fly into the building or something? Can he not fly?

Is phantom over?

It’s so gross how people feel the need to harass a teenager trying to recover from trauma.

imagine being a teen trying to get emergency mental help and then THAT walks into ur class

What the fuck did the government do to him?

He was numb.

Nobody knew what really happened in there, and Danny wanted so badly to keep it that way. And the worst part was, he thought that if he just forgot about it, tried to move past it, then it would all go away. And no one would ever know.

Except Vlad did find out. Somehow, Vlad had managed to get a hold of classified government files about Danny, and if what he had implied was true, then he had learned everything.

And if Vlad knew, then…

No. He wasn’t going to think about it.

Danny knew from the moment he’d stupidly revealed himself that his life was not his own anymore. He knew that he was going to be nothing but a government possession from that moment till the day he died.

He didn’t deserve to get upset over this.

He pulled up a blank tweet and started typing. His movements were robotic. Stilted. But one slip-up, just one reason for the public to get suspicious, and Danny knew that some seedy corner of the internet would pounce on the opportunity to dig deeper into Danny’s life than he was comfortable with.

Danny Phantom @dannyphantom Thank you everyone for the support. I’m back home with my family and am healing.

Before he could question what he was doing, his finger was already pressing send on the tweet. He watched as almost immediately, notifications popped up in his inbox.

But he didn’t open his notifications, he didn’t look at the replies. Instead, he closed the app and shut his phone off.

He didn’t care anymore.

Maddie knocked on the door and asked him a question, and he responded with the right answer for her to leave. He got up and started his new morning routine of sitting in the shower for ten minutes, getting dressed, brushing his teeth, and heading downstairs for breakfast before leaving for six hours of mandatory therapy.

He stared out the window, watching the morning traffic pass by him. He couldn’t remember if he shampooed his hair or if he just sat under the scalding water. But it was fine. He was just a government-issued robot now. Whatever.

There were people lining the highway when Danny pulled into the PHP center. They were shouting different things, holding different signs, their cameras armed and ready as soon as the GAV came into view. The police were there, making sure no one escaped into the parking lot, and there were therapists waiting outside.

They didn’t know. They had no idea what Danny had gone through, why he was there.

And it didn’t matter. Not to them, not to Danny, not to the police or the news stations filming the scene or to the government or Vlad or anyone else.

Danny wasn’t in charge of his life anymore.

He was only here because the government had decided he could stay free.

For now.

The therapists escorted him into the building. Danny felt hollow. Sick.

No, he was fine.

Maddie hugged him, told him to have a good day, that she’d be back to bring him to more therapy after, and Danny nodded. At least, he thought he remembered to nod. He might not have, though.

There was a window in the lobby. A white van was parked along the street.

The APC news van.

Jazz was right. Danny was just being paranoid about the white van outside of their house before. He was so stupid.

Even if it wasn’t a news van, what would it matter? He didn’t control his life, what would he care if they finished him off in some back alley? What would it matter if they snuck him into their van and held him captive for the rest of his life in some damp containment cell?

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Danny spaced out for the morning meeting. He couldn’t remember if he managed to read off his paper for the other teens. His voice wasn’t working today. His head hurt. His chest hurt. Everything was numb.

They had art therapy today, run by a tall, lanky man with sandy hair and a clean-shaven face. He told the group to paint what they were feeling today, to channel their emotions onto their blank sheets of paper.

But Danny felt nothing. He had nothing to give.

He must have stared at his paper for too long, because the therapist tried to talk to him, ask him if he was alright, if he was having trouble with the exercise.

Danny didn’t respond, instead choosing to pick up the green paint and squeeze some of it directly onto his paper, rules be damned. It was too dark, so he grabbed the white paint and smeared it into the green. The color still wasn’t right, but Danny didn’t know enough about art to make it right, so he just kept spreading green across his paper. A dash of yellow, then some white, more green.

Time was up. His paper was green.

“Good job, Danny. What do you think?” the therapist asked.

Danny stared at the paper, studying the streaks of yellow within the brush strokes. “It’s not the right shade of ectoplasm.”

The day continued with more emotion-managing lessons and group activities but Danny didn’t care and nobody could understand that. He was done with this, he was tired, it didn’t matter.

It was lunchtime, and Danny had no appetite. It felt like he had just eaten breakfast. His stomach was still full, but he had a sandwich sitting in front of him that he needed to eat or else they would tell his parents.

Danny held the sandwich between his fingers. It looked like sandpaper.

He didn’t want to eat it.

The therapist was looking at him. She was probably talking to him too, asking him questions about his day. But Danny ignored her. After all, didn’t he need to eat this lunch? How could he possibly eat and talk at the same time?

The teens were talking around him, but Danny blocked them all out too.

They were noisy.

It was like they weren’t even there.

Danny wasn’t human. He didn’t care.

But you do care.

He didn’t.

He was numb.

Eat up like a good little dog.

I’m not a dog.

Something inside him snapped, and he yanked on his cold core, channeling all his energy to his fingertips. His fingers tingled out of the tangible field, and the sandwich fell to the table.

“Whoa!” The blonde girl jumped, her eyes trained on Danny’s transparent skin.

“Danny?”

There was an audience. Danny had forgotten about them. His core faltered, and the power faded from his fingertips.

He should have felt embarrassed by this emotional display. He should have felt horrified that he’d allowed himself to act so inhuman and disgusting in front of these innocent bystanders.

But he was still numb.

“Sorry,” he said. “I was bored.”

“That was sick!” the brunette boy chimed in. “You can do that on command?”

“Usually.” Danny’s gaze flickered over to the therapist, who was giving him a strange look. He turned his attention back to the fallen sandwich.

Maybe he would get kicked out of the program for this. For being too dangerous. That would probably be for the better. Then he could go free into the world. No more schedule, no more therapy, no more dissecting his emotions or talking about his trauma.

Who cared about his trauma, anyway? Certainly not him.

“So you still have your ghost powers, then?” the blonde girl asked. “People were saying online that you lost them. The government took them or whatever.”

Danny brought his hand up to his face, willing his fingers to fade to invisibility. “They’re locked. But...I...they’re there. I’ll get them back.”

He would get them back. He needed them.

Especially now.

Which was how he found himself sitting quietly outside his mother’s door. Waiting. He should have knocked probably, but he didn’t. Couldn’t. He didn’t know why, he knew he should just go back to his room, go to sleep, stop bothering his parents about this, but he needed his core back.

His mom would understand. She was a ghost biology expert, right? She would get why he needed his core back now.

He raised his fist to knock, but he must have already knocked before because the door opened, revealing his mother dressed in teal pajamas on the other side.

“Danny?” She frowned, her brows pulling cautiously above her eyes. “What are you doing up, sweetie? Everything alright?”

“I, uh—” His voice was scratchy. He broke eye contact, staring down at his lap. “My—my core.”

“Something wrong?”

He licked his lips, his mouth dry. “I need it back.”

“Sweetheart,” she said in a patient tone. “We talked about this.”

“No. you talked.”

She sighed. “Danny, it’s nearly eleven. Can’t this wait till morning?”

“No. No. I need it.”

“I told you, hun, your core and body need time to heal properly first before we make any drastic changes to your physiology. Just give it a few more weeks, alright?”

“Weeks?” Danny’s voice rose in alarm.

“I promise it’ll be all worth it.”

Static rang in his ears, and a steel claw clutched at his stomach.

His mom didn’t understand. Why would she? She was human. Humans would never get it. She didn’t understand.

“No, I can’t…”

“Danny, you need to trust me. Your body needs to rest.”

“You don’t understand.”

She regarded him for a moment before opening her door fully. “Why don’t you come in and we can talk, then. You can tell me why this is so important to you.”

Danny peered inside the door, at the surprisingly average-looking bedroom before him. He could go in, tell his mother just how wrong he felt cut off from his core, how he was being blackmailed by Vlad, how there was a distinct record of every detail of what the Guys in White had done to him, how he had never felt so defenseless, so vulnerable in his life.

But he wouldn’t, and he knew he couldn’t. There was no way he could put it all into words. He was a ghost, she was a human. He couldn’t explain this to her.

Skulker and Vlad may have forced his revelation, but they gave him more secrets than he could ever have dreamt of handling.

Danny turned away. “It’s fine. Good night.”

“Hun…”

“Night, Mom.”

There was a tense silence before Maddie finally relented. “I love you, Danny.”

“You too,” he said reflexively. The words tasted sour on his tongue.

She didn’t understand. If she truly loved him, she would give him his core back right now, but she didn’t.

No, he was just being paranoid. This was just his Obsession talking. He didn’t need his core, he was just as much human as he was ghost. So what if he had to be a little more human for the next few weeks? Isn’t that what he’d always wanted?

To just be a regular human?

Maybe that was what his mother wanted. Maybe that was why she was postponing removing the chip. Maybe she was too afraid to see her son as a monster. A ghost.

But that was crazy. She loved him.

She was telling the truth.

His parents accepted him.

---

“You seem quiet today.”

Danny leaned back against the sofa, his arms crossed and his eyes looking anywhere but at the blonde figure sitting before him. The stress ball sat untouched on the table next to him.

He didn’t feel like doing therapy today. He didn’t want to talk.

His mom was human, his therapist was human. No one was going to get it.

“What’s on your mind, Danny?”

“Nothing. I’m fine.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes.”

He was fine. There was nothing to talk about. Even if there were things to talk about—and there weren’t, this was all just his Obsession going haywire—it wouldn’t matter anyway because he was defenseless and the government was going to kidnap him again. It was only a matter of time.

“You finished your first week with the PHP group today, right? How has that been going?”

“Fine.”

“Can you tell me about some of the activities you’ve been doing?”

“I don’t know.”

She sat there for a moment, as if giving him time to elaborate. But Danny wasn’t going to elaborate. He didn’t feel like talking today.

He looked out the window. The leaves had changed color, the ripe greens fading to yellows, oranges, and reds. In another few weeks, the ground would be littered with fallen leaves.

Summer had barely just begun when he was dragged from his house, drugged, and locked away. And yet, even though his entire world had come to a halt, time still moved on.

The clatter of the therapist’s clipboard falling on a side table jolted Danny out of his musing. He flinched, his eyes snapping over to see the therapist rising from her chair.

She stretched her arms behind her back and walked over to the closet. “You know what? It’s been a long day. Wanna play a game?”

“Um...are we allowed to do that?”

“I don’t see why not.” She grabbed a box out of the closet and placed it down in the center of the room.

Danny peered at it in confusion. “Jenga? Of—of all the games out there, you’re really gonna make me...make me get on the floor for Jenga?”

“Oh, come on, it’s fun.”

“You must throw some wild parties,” he remarked, rolling his eyes. Nonetheless, he slid off the couch and slowly scooched himself towards the middle of the room. As long as he didn’t have to explain why he was two seconds away from ripping his own core out of his chest, he would go along with whatever game she threw at him.

The therapist carefully tipped the box upside down, sliding the lid up to reveal a tower of multi-colored wooden tiles jigsawed together.

“So here’s our marvelous tower,” she said. “You can reach that alright?”

“Yeah.”

“So normal Jenga rules. We switch off trying to remove a piece without causing the tower to collapse. Except, for this game, after you remove a piece, you’re going to pick a card from this stack—” She pointed to a deck of large cards set up next to the Jenga tower. “—and then answer the question on the card that’s the same color. So if I take a purple tile out, I’ll answer the purple question on the card. Got it?”

Danny glanced between the cards and his therapist’s eager face. He was fairly certain Jenga never involved a set of cards before.

Maybe he’d forgotten the rules. It wouldn’t have been the first time his brain had betrayed him. “Am I being quizzed?”

“Don’t worry.” She pushed up the sleeves of her blue cardigan. “They’re just basic therapy questions. Nothing too bad.”

No. This was a trick, wasn’t it? To get him to talk?

He wasn’t going to fall for it. “I thought we weren’t—weren’t doing that...today.”

“The questions aren’t too deep. Honestly, I mostly just use this game as an icebreaker for new clients. But Jenga’s pretty fun all the same.”

He must have still looked too suspicious, because she threw him an easy smile and went, “Here, I’ll go first.” She carefully nudged a green tile out of the stack and drew a card. “Okay, so the green question on here says, ‘Describe yourself in three words.’ Well, I’d say I’m kind, I think I’m rather nerdy, and I’m a bit of a cat lady.”

That...wasn’t so bad. Maybe this would be an easy game.

He doubted any of the questions asked him about his core. Maybe he could loosen up a bit, go along with this icebreaker game, if only for an hour before sinking back into his internal panic.

“Cat lady?” he tried.

She chuckled. “I’m surprised that’s never come up! I have two at home.”

Right, his therapist had a life outside of therapy. Outside of his problems.

But it wasn’t like he knew her name. At this point, it was just too embarrassing to ask. Maybe she had told him that she had cats, and he just couldn’t remember. Maybe he would forget it again tomorrow.

Whatever. It was fine. He couldn’t care about things he didn’t remember. “Uh…” Danny pushed a purple tile out of the tower. “So I just pick up a—um, a card?”

“Yup, and read the purple question.”

Danny looked down at his card and rolled his eyes. “Oh, figures. ‘If you had superpowers, what would they be?’ Well, I’m dead. Does being dead count?”

She laughed, her voice light and airy. “Of all the questions, huh? Okay, let’s modify this a bit. If you could only keep one of your powers, which would you take?”

“Probably intangibility,” Danny said, his lack of hesitation surprising him.

“Oh? Why?”

“Well…” He rubbed the back of his neck. Where the chip was. “It’s the most useful, isn’t it? I can just...you know...I have no physical stuff in my way. I can just phase through any—anything I need. Or—no. Almost anything.”

Not shields. Those could still trap him.

Thankfully, she didn’t try to pry further, just offering him a kind nod and a “that makes sense” before pushing out another Jenga tile. “Blue! Alright, my question is, ‘What is your favorite feature about yourself?’ Hmm...that’s a bit tough, isn’t it? But I think my favorite thing about myself is my hair. When I was a teen, I used to straighten my hair, but then when I got to college, I stopped doing that and just let it be. Now I quite like my curly hair. Okay, your turn!”

“Okay.” Danny leaned over and pushed a red tile out of the tower. “Okay...my quest—question is…‘What is your biggest hope for your future?’ Oh...”

He did want to be an astronaut. But that was before, when he was still human. And then he was caught between thousands of volts of ecto-electricity and that future vanished right before his eyes.

What did he want to do with his life? What did he hope would happen?

He wanted his core back. He couldn’t let himself be so vulnerable for much longer. His chest felt like it was tearing itself apart, he needed to—

Breathe. And answer the question.

What did he hope for his future?

“I don’t know. My future’s kinda...ruined, isn’t it?”

“Try to think on a smaller scale.”

“I…” Danny ran a hand through his hair. He wanted his core back, he wanted to be Phantom, he wanted to protect Amity Park. But he couldn’t say that. It made him sound too ghostly. Too inhuman.

Humans didn’t have these kinds of otherworldly desires. She would think he was a freak if he told her. She wouldn’t know how to react.

“I want to finish PT.”

“That’s a good goal to have.”

“Your turn.”

Humming, she nudged a tile out of the Jenga tower and flipped over a card. “Okay, my question is, ‘What is something you were worried about when you were younger?’ Let me think…oh, here’s one. When I was young, my older sister moved out to live with her boyfriend. It was really scary because I had never lived without her, but we kept in touch and everything turned out okay.”

“I haven’t either. Lived away from Jazz I mean. Like—like for real. But she’s going to college next—next semester. I think she, uh...deferred a semester.”

“And you know, it’s common to feel worried about a sibling moving out. Periods of transition in life can be the most stressful for us, but it’s important to recognize that things will be okay.”

Danny looked down at the carpet. “I guess.”

Some days it felt like Jazz was the only one truly on his side. He was a lab rat, too well known and too hated to ever have a future, forever condemned to a vicious cycle of evading people like the Guys in White and Vlad for the rest of his life. Jazz was leaving him in a few months, his friends would follow in a few years, and in the end, Danny would be alone.

But he was fine with that. He’d accepted it. It was just his life now, there was nothing to say about it.

“It’s my turn, isn’t it?”

“Yup! Go right ahead.”

Danny removed another tile. “‘How do you think others view you and why?’” He paused, throwing the therapist a bitter look. “This is rigged.”

“Not rigged, that’s just a very lucky pick.”

“Lucky to who?” Danny groaned.

What was with the universe finding new ways to torment him?

“Humor me,” the therapist said patiently.

Danny glared at his card, tapping his fingers against the edge. It wasn’t like the public opinion of him was exactly a secret, but it still hurt. Constantly. Like some scab he kept telling himself to ignore, but ignoring it was impossible because the public would never leave him alone.

“Not good,” Danny muttered. “People hate me.”

“Being in the public eye is very stressful for anyone, but to be unique in your way adds on an entirely different layer. People are afraid of the things they don’t understand, and that makes them forget that at the end of the day, you’re still a person.”

“Yeah.” Danny’s eyes were trained on the colorful tower before him, which was starting to blur as the prickling behind his eyes increased. He ducked his head and blinked, hoping to save face before it was too late.

“That doesn’t mean everyone feels this way, though. But sometimes it can feel that way to you because the ones who are the most afraid, the most hateful, are the loudest voices in the crowd. But remember, Danny, you won that court case for a reason. You have more people on your side than you think.”

“I won it for now, you mean. I don’t...I don’t think…” His voice failed, and he pressed his fingernails into his palms. He took a few shaky breaths. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay, Danny. Why don’t we talk about the case for a minute?”

Tucker’s words echoed in his head, how it was televised. How millions of people all around the globe probably tuned in for it, or watched streams online, each person with their own opinion of him.

But he didn’t want to think about that right now.

“No,” he said. “Can we—can we just continue the game?”

“If you’re not ready to talk about it, then that’s okay. Thank you for letting me know.”

“It’s your turn.”

“Alright.” She pushed a block out of the tower. “So...alright, my question is, ‘What memory do you treasure the most?’ To that, I think fishing with my dad as a child. He was a big support for me when I was growing up, and I really valued our times fishing together as important bonding moments for us.”

Danny nodded politely, trying his best to not appear like he was counting down the seconds until therapy was over.

He could feel his emotions building inside him, threatening to topple the carefully constructed dam guarding his secrets. This was such a simple game, these were such simple questions, so why did he feel like he was failing?

He pushed out a Jenga tile—a red tile—from the tower and grabbed a card, scanning the questions until he found the red one.

What are you afraid of?

The words echoed back to him, and he pushed the card away. He didn’t want to look at it, he didn’t want to read those words or hear her voice because saying the question would mean he would have to talk and he only agreed to this stupid game to get out of talking.

There was so much he was afraid of that he had no right to be afraid of. Because he deserved this. Getting revealed was his fault, he was being reckless. He deserved all of it.

The experiments with the Guys in White. The pain, the way his skin was torn apart. How they threw him in a vat of ectoplasm the next day to heal, and how the ectoplasm entering his lungs made him feel like he was drowning because even though ghosts didn’t need to breathe, he still used those organs reflexively as Phantom. But he was in too much pain and his brain was too hazy to fight back. He could only sink into the darkness.

The red bag. The way it tasted, smelled, how it haunted him every day and how he revisited those moments every night in his dreams. How he would wake up each day and the drawer on his nightstand would be shimmering in the morning sun, as if tempting him to open it up, grab the bottle inside, let it help just for one day. It can take the edge off, he can be functional. Who cares if he’s cheating? It’s just for a day...

The public. The people. Their judgments, their words. How he was, on a molecular level, so vastly different from them. How he could never be the same. He would never have a normal life, he could never have a normal job, a normal family, normal friendships, ever again. There would always be something there, something alien between them.

Even between him and his best friends. There was just something... different ever since the portal accident. It had brought them closer together, sure, but in other ways it had also driven an invisible wedge between them. Because Danny would always have his powers, he would always be a half ghost, and there would always be things now that Sam and Tucker would never understand.

How much would change now? Now that he was in the public eye, now that he’d gone through government torture? Now that his brain didn’t work the same?

And his core. His humanity. Why were his parents so apprehensive about it?

What are you afraid of?

Why wouldn’t his parents let him down into the lab? What were they hiding? They said his core was damaged, but it had been months since he was ripped open. His surgical damage had healed, his broken bones were back to normal, and even though his nerve endings in his chest and spine were still fried, they had been slowly mending themselves too.

Ectoplasm healed faster than human physiology. His core should have been fine by now.

What was the truth?

“They accept me,” Danny said automatically.

“Who does?”

Who accepted him?

Sam and Tucker did.

His family…

Did they?

“I don’t know.”

“You have people in your corner, Danny. Your parents, your sister, your close friends. They all care about you. We’re all here for you, even if those loud voices in the public tell you otherwise.”

But if they cared...

“Then why won’t they let me have my core back?”

“Your core?”

“My powers. My ghostliness. Ectoplasm.” Danny let his eyes flair to emphasize his point.

If his therapist was scared of his otherworldly display, she didn’t show it. Instead, she continued to look at him with her neutral expression, free of the judgment he’d come to expect from people since the accident.

And for some reason he couldn’t explain, that irritated him.

“You mean the inhibitor chip?” she asked.

“Yes. They told me it was because my core...it was damaged but—but it doesn’t make sense! It doesn’t...”

“Have you talked to them about this?”

Of course he had. They kept repeating that his core was damaged. And they were probably right—for a time, at the very least. But that was months ago.

Why hadn’t they scanned his core recently? Shouldn’t they be happy to learn it was healed? Shouldn’t that make them relieved?

What were they afraid of?

What are you afraid of?

“Do you think it would be helpful if I talked to your mother about this?” asked the therapist. “As a way to introduce the topic? She likely doesn’t know how much it’s bothering you.”

But that didn’t make sense either because Danny brought his core up every day. His parents knew how much it was bothering him. They had to have known, right?

So why were they doing this to him?

What were they hiding?

What are you afraid of?

---

Danny tried to remember a time where walking from his living room to his kitchen didn’t require a list of steps to be taken beforehand—a time where he could just get up and walk. But those memories were far too distant now.

And besides, this was his reality now. A reality where something as simple as walking made his head spin.

He shouldn’t dwell on the memories of how easy it used to be for him, he shouldn’t have snapped at Jazz for getting a cup of water for him because he knew the glasses were too high to reach from his wheelchair, he shouldn’t allow this irrational anger to overtake him every time the creeping anxiety of his future as Amity Park’s ghost hero came into question.

He just needed to focus on where he was now. Curled up on his couch avoiding his parents.

Everything felt wrong this morning when he woke up. For a moment, he had managed to convince himself that he was just being paranoid. That it was just his damaged nerve endings freaking out as normal. That once he took his medication, his problems would go away.

But they didn’t. He still felt wrong. His chest still felt wrong.

It was manifesting in other ways too. He couldn’t walk as long today at PT. His physical therapist told him it was just a bad day and that his body was probably just tired from his busy week. But Danny knew that wasn’t right.

It had nothing to do with him being tired. He wasn’t sick. He wasn’t anxious.

His core was the problem. His parents were the problem.

He tried asking about his core again on the way home from PT, using conversation techniques he went over with his therapist at the end of their last appointment, but Maddie just brushed him off. Said they would talk about it later.

But then later came and...she didn’t.

Danny tried asking his father, but he brushed Danny off too. Said Danny needed to focus on healing first.

But how was he supposed to heal when he was missing half of himself?

He felt wrong. So wrong. His body was too bound by gravity, it was too empty, it wasn’t listening to him.

He pressed his palms into his forehead. His hands were clammy. Shaking. Speckles of cold touched them—or was that his tears? Was he crying?

No.

He pressed the heel of his hands into his eyes. What was wrong with him? Why was he acting this way?

The government had him in a cage. They tormented him in ways he would rather die than live through again. But then it ended, and he was freed. He was allowed to go home, he could live his life as a legal person again.

Except, he wasn’t free. Not at all. He was still trapped here in Amity, in his house, in his body. He had no control. Not over what he ate, when he slept, where he went, what he could say, what he could think.

Half of him was still locked up tight with no hope of escape.

His water glass was empty. It would have been too embarrassing to ask someone to help him, but he was so thirsty and dehydrated and he just really needed this to work. He needed his body to respond to him. For one moment, please, just let his body respond.

Gripping the water cup in one hand and his walker in the other, he tried to stand, to walk over to the kitchen sink. But balancing everything was so difficult, his body was still fatigued from PT, and he knew he wasn’t going to be able to do it but he just needed to try.

But he couldn’t do it in the end. The cup slipped out of his hand and tumbled onto the carpet, thankfully saved from shattering on impact by some last shred of luck the universe decided to pity him with.

And now Danny too was on the floor because he couldn’t bend down to pick the cup back up like a normal person, and he didn’t want to call for help, and he couldn’t use any of his powers, and he felt so trapped. So helpless. So vulnerable.

He tried to swallow the lump in his throat, but it was too stubborn and he was too useless.

A tear splattered against his hand, and he gripped the floor, his body trembling.

“Stop crying. Stop it.” he hissed.

He was weak.

Plasmius, once nearly his equal, had so severely overpowered him the other night. It was embarrassing. On the hierarchy of ghosts, where was he now? At the bottom with the blob ghosts?

But those ghosts could still fly. They could still turn intangible. Things that Danny couldn’t even do.

Hell, he was so weak that even the Box Ghost could defeat him now.

“Stop crying.”

He crawled back to the couch, the thought of getting water abandoned on the floor along with the last semblance of his dignity. Another tear fell from his cheek, and he desperately tried to ignore it, ignore his dry throat, ignore the pain in his chest, ignore his core and the Y-scar on his body and his new place in the ghost hierarchy as lower than dirt, ignore everything. Just focus on getting back to the couch. Shut down, go numb.

He was fine, he was okay.

He just needed to push through this. Just toughen up, quit whining. Life wasn’t fair. So what if he was now just a regular human? Hadn’t he been human for the first fourteen years of his life? He needed to suck it up.

Dragging himself back onto the safety of the couch cushions, he pulled one of Jazz’s throw blankets around his body and pressed a pillow into his face.

Never in his life had he been so tempted to scream, to curse, to finally let the last brick fall and allow hell to break loose. But his parents were in the basement, Jazz was upstairs, and he was fine.

He was fine.

---

Huge thank you to tumblr user and writer @imekitty for proofreading this chapter. She’s amazing and I owe her my life.

And as always, thanks for reading!

---

#danny phantom #everything was white #chapter 12 #my writing #fanfiction #phiccs #danny has A Bad Time

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glitterytidalwavedragon · 3 years

Text

Expanding into my other Fandoms (I’m gonna have to take a stance) Read the whole thing please.

One of my oldest and most beloved anime is Inuyasha. As of late I have been binged watching the hell out of it as I am getting my BFF into different anime shows. We are really close to entering the Yashahime part of the series, and she asked if I planned to write fanfiction involving the one character which made me even watch the show as a 10-year-old.

Sesshomaru

The first episode I ever watched involved this aloof, entitled dog fighting his brother over the sword in their father’s grave. Specifically, it was part 3 of that whole episode series were Kagome pulled out the sword. I at the time had 3 dogs of German Sheppard/wolf hybrid, they were MASSIVE dogs, fell in love with the big white fluff that was Sesshomaru’s demon form. I use to sneak staying up and watch the show faithfully to see the goodest boy as it was only on at 11pm EST on adult swim. Which meant it was bad and I was breaking the rules, I felt like a rebel.

Now I hesitated answering that question. She has no idea of what is in Yashahime, she is being careful not to spoil it so I told her I didn’t know. Recently, to find out what the feel is for Sesshomaru content, I looked into the tag on tumblr…

OH MY GOD.

Sesshomaru’s tag is FLOODED with hate. Like every four post, there is hate, distain, and attacking happening. As someone who watches Yashahime, I quickly knew why.

Sessrin.

Even now I sigh. And I sigh HARD. I am not for, nor am I against the Sessrin train. Same for the Sesskagu train. I think both sides need to look at things on a logical prospective. I plan to do just that. I know I will get hate from the either side and maybe some support as well. But if I am going to do anything in this fandom (as I like doing ships and reader inserts) it will come up.

So, like my Kaiba post, and my Sebastian Heel post, I will use my research skills as well as my COLLEGE DEGREE WHICH HAS BOTH ART AND MEDIEVAL HISTORY labelled on it to explain why this progression in the story is normal to anti-Sessrin fans and why this isn’t a crime by story standards nor should we look at it as a crime.

AS WELL

Explain to Sessrin fans why it is so weird for non-shippers to see it play out and why so much hate formed.

As I let out another sigh, we shall begin. Let’s start at an historical prospective. (Links at the bottom).

PLEASE READ THE WHOLE THING! I’LL BE ABLE TO TELL!

I will start with the information I can access right away.

While finding charts on the life-span of common folk in 1590’s Feudal Japan is rather difficult, Ancient.edu states that the average lifespan was about 50. To put this in perspective, the average lifespan of Europeans at the time was somewhere between 40-45 with the latter being rare. Since most of us reading are not from Japanese descent, I will through Europe in this first.

If we look at the same time frame of 1590, we are looking at most of Western Europe had now entered the age of Renaissance. According to sources from Learning Resources in association with the National Gallery of Art, marriage was not what TV drama’s from HBO or Hulu depicted. By today standards they would be a crime, as the average age for marriage of an adult female was age 14…

The reasoning behind the young marriage age had multiple factors. First being, females were considered an adult once they were menstruating. Birthing also proved to be fatal, and since the lifespan was at best 40 and 45 if they were lucky, there was really no room to wait. Also Europe at the time had became hugely focused on making sure blood lines were legitimate, meaning to ensure the girl was a virgin, the moment she was able to reproduced she was married off. Those they married were not young teenagers either. Most marriages, a man would be in their thirties, and had probably multiple wives as women died more than men when not counting the battle field.

To make matters worse for the Renaissance Lady, these marriages would leave many young males unable to marry and if their husband died in battle, well, unfortunately they were not seen as desirable. This was due to the idea of a ‘free woman’. Should the girl not have a father, brother or uncle to return to as they too died, a widow had her freedom. But that freedom came at a cost. She would be assumed to have slept around, and in many writings, such as the Canterbury Tales, where Geoffrey Chaucer writes about a Window on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land survived her five husbands and the men in her family. In short, she was made to be a slut and to be looked down upon as no man controlled her.

The point of talking about Europe is because that is something most of us Non-Asian or Japanese people consume and like to paint in large romantic brush strokes of knights and magic. Honestly, reading G.R.R.Martin Song of Ice and Fire, he uses this model as we see the Queen of Dragons, Danny start off at age thirteen shortly after she had her first menstruation.

Now let’s look at Feudal Japan.

As stated before, the lifespan was around 50 years. In some populations, this was even shorter. Nagaoka, Hirata, Yokota and Matsu’ura’s on demographic data at the Yuigahama-minami area in Kamakura, Japan and found both male and female remains that suggested life expectancy to have ended around age 24-25. This was largely due to living conditions and public health. In areas like these, it would make the most sense to marry and repopulate quickly as the expectancy of life was half the national average at the time.

To my frustration, I could not find a clear marriage age for Japanese women at the time of the edo period. HOWEVER, where there is a will there is a way. I took a look at famous Lords or Daimyo’s of the time. The average age of marriage of their wives was between 12-14. Much younger than I expected, but it made sense considering this is a time where war ran the show and marriage was strictly about political gain. One of these Daimyo’s was Masamune Date, who was also 13, but then as he got older took concubines who became considerably younger than him as he became older. The goal was to have as many children as possible for hires and for political marriages to gain power.

Now lets look at Inuyasha the MANGA

Lets get the manga timeline proper here. The whole adventure took place in 11 months, a month shy of Kagome’s 16th birthday. Doing a few estimations, Rin would have travelled with Sesshomaru about 8-9 of those months. But before we get into the relationship, lets look at something the ANIME made a huge mistake with in the beginning and tried to fix as the story went on.

For some reason I could only fine gifs for the Early appearances of Sesshomaru so bear with me.

Early appearances in the manga

^ He was so fickle and a trickster then...

Now early apperances in the anime.

Later appearance in the manga

Laster appearance in the anime

Notice the issue here?

Sesshomaru was CONSIDERABLY younger looking in the start of the manga. In the anime, he started off looking like an fully adult male. But as the anime went on, they tried to make Sesshomaru look younger with subtle changes to his jaw line, eye size, and his height. Yeah, his height had changed. They made him shorter.

While in the manga, we see this young-teen looking demon, slowly mature over 11 months to look like he is in his later teens and by series end, closer to being in his late teens or twenty. Yes, art changes over time, but the anime went a reverse route. I can only guess they spoke to the author of Inuyasha about her ships, as they did Drama CDs, and realized the mistake that was made in making him more mature than he was.

You can’t tell me he doesn’t look closer to his manga self in the final act, because he does.

Since we are on the topic of the anime, lets be clear. The anime timeline and manga timeline are very different. The story in the anime (in the English) suggests that OVER a year has past since Kagome started her journey. They try to fix this in the final act, but it was still so muddled as previous seasons are to be taken as cannon. This could have been due to an translation error in the early production when the anime no longer had anymore manga material to reference. But whatever the case, for English viewers the time the group spent together felt much longer.

So now we come to the heart of the issue.

Because of the mistakes of the anime, a lot of anti-sessrin see the relationship as father daughter. I’ll be honest, watching the anime and solely the anime as a teenager and as an adult (as the manga was on hold for a very long time due to author’s health. I was in college when it finished.), I too thought it was just a father-daughter relationship and Jaken the nanny who got punched all the time. In fact, the English took hard liberties with Kagura, as the English dubs often do with characters, and made it very clear her feelings for the demon lord and Sesshomaru very much recognized them (though he never responded). Even in her death scene, it felt as if he was saying good bye to a friend more than love interest. But who really knows, as there are things that point otherwise. When another demon mock’s Kagura’s death, Sesshomaru gets super pissy.

The manga did also play with this fact when it came out in English, idk if the wording or message is different in the Japanese. Translation errors happen a lot even in todays releases, look at Kuroshitsuji. So of course most anti-sessrin’s did not see this coming in Yashahime when Rin was named mother. In fact it felt like a betrayal as we were sure Sesshomaru had no romantic feelings.

Then there was the Kohaku/Rin mashup that was hinted left and right. The English anime, with its overly dramatic and blunt emotions made it appear one way. That in the end the two kids would probably be married. Then the anime as a whole made Sesshomaru older than intended. I can see why and understand how this became a problem.

On the other side of that coin.

If you followed the dub, seen ‘Swords of an Honorable Ruler’ and read the manga… Sesshomaru was not fatherly to Rin at all. In fact, Jaken picked up all of that leg work. Rin worried for Kohaku, but clearly loved Lord Sesshomaru. Sesshomaru cared about Kagura but he almost CRIED when he lost Rin.

We have to remember that Sesshomaru and Rin’s relationship must have been very hard for the demon. While we never see his mental process expect for a few rare times, we have to remember he hated humans. In the movie, he blamed a human for the early death of his father, Sesshomaru killed without mercy. It made sense that he wouldn’t be fatherly to Rin as her just being there should have caused countless inner conflicts. Hell, he even says his father’s weakness was humans, and look who picked up that trait.

Sesshomaru was designed to, someday, walk in his father’s footsteps. So sess/rin, not a surprise. Also when you see it in a historical perspective, Rin having kids around age 15-16, makes sense. In fact you could argue he waited too long for the time period.

We also need to look more at the manga when concerned with Yashahime. 8-9 months is all Rin travelled with him and he was like hold up, and left her at the village because he KNEW she needed to come to her own conclusion. That no matter what she picked he would live with and protect her. Unconditional love on his end. She cannon wise spent YEARS living with humans and MONTHS with Sesshomaru. Again, by manga standards of cannon.

Now I can already hear the screaming about age and what not. Some sources say Sesshomaru is over 900, by the rule of thumb, if we look at anime and movie releases, we have Sesshomaru being over 500 with no define age and Inuyasha around 270 years old being more pinpointed due to the movie. Just by going by ANIME CANNON. Kagome and Inuyasha, you have a 15 year old with a 270 year old man. If you say being pinned to the tree doesn’t count, then you have 220.

Also, here is something very interesting. In the episode where Inuyasha meets the unmother, he tells her, thinking it was his mom, she died when he was very small and we have flash backs later in the series of him being small running from demons. Demons clearly age much slower than humans, even half-demons. Inuyasha can be 270 but mentally and physically be 15, the same logic works for Sesshomaru, who in the manga is not much older than Inuyasha.

In the manga, there wasn’t any grooming, in the anime, there was a ton of mess-ups but no grooming.

Would this fly in todays world? HELL NO! NO, its gross, she’s a kid. Stop.

I know any fanfic I write will lean heavily on the side of father/daughter because that is what I grew up seeing on the screen. I can’t think of Rin as an adult because years of seeing her as a cheerful little girl. It’s like seeing G.O.T Arya about to have sex for the first time in season 8… I remember when she was a kid on the show. It was way to weird and I had to look away until it ended. But that’s my 2021 mentality.

But Inuyasha is not taking place in 2021. Feudal Japan is a whole other era with its own beliefs, morals and way of life. Those who understand this have nothing wrong with them. They just understand history.

Also, just to bang some nails in…

Anyone remember Bleach? Remember the MOST accepted couple was Ichigo and Rukia…. Rukia who was hundreds of years old and Ichigo who was 15… or Ichigo’s mom who was a teenager and his dad also hundreds of years old.

Most of this also boils down to Sesshomaru being a dude. As in reverse roles in animes its accepted and they don’t have the same historical context. Inuyasha is based off of historical context of Feudal Japan.

We need to stop spreading hate. We can’t accept some forms of literature because its European fantasy but bash other fantasy based literature for doing the same thing.

Sure, its weird for those who were use to seeing the father/daughter dynamic. Yes, there are extreme sessrin fans who post really questionable illegal content when they decide to leave Rin as an 8-year-old…

But this wasn’t ever meant to be perverted. The story was meant to make sense on a logical and historical base.

I hope everyone takes the time to read this. I love Inuyasha, I love Sesshomaru. I am just sick of seeing so many people fighting over what should be the revival of a beloved series. While yes, there is still room for sess/rin not being a thing, until it is stated otherwise, why hate each other? This fandom will only lose people by doing this. Calling people names or accusing them of illegal endorsement can hurt someone these days over social media.

Tumblr allows you to block tags. You don’t have to read anything or watch anything you don’t like. We gain nothing from attacking each other but can lose so much by doing so. Fanart, really good fan fiction, friends, ideas, sharing fond memories. Both sides have the right to feel as they feel, but no right in hurting each other.

A fandom is meant to bring people together. Not start a war…

Thank you.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/ajpa.20402

http://www.italianrenaissanceresources.com/units/unit-2/essays/husbands-and-wives/#:~:text=Marriage%20not%20only%20reflected%20order,to%20ensure%20the%20bride's%20virginity.

https://www.ancient.eu/Canterbury_Tales/

https://www.ancient.eu/article/1424/daily-life-in-medieval-japan/#:~:text=Just%20as%20Japanese%20people%20today,in%20Western%20Europe%2C%20for%20example.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Date_Masamune

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megohime

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ladylynse · 3 years

Text

Chapter 6 [FFN | AO3] of Forewarning

All Dipper knew was that there was something buried in some special thermos behind the shack; all Danny knew was that he had no idea how he'd gotten here.

Based off this artwork by @hashtag-art. Happy birthday, @bibliophilea!

(beginning | previous)

-|-

Once safely back at the Mystery Shack, Wendy turned off the golf cart and grabbed her supplies from the rack in the back. It had been a bumpy ride, but she’d only needed to sacrifice one bag of marshmallows to the forest. That wasn’t bad, considering how many creatures she was fairly sure lived there.

And, fine, maybe it made her a little paranoid to think that some of the bumps she’d hit had been deliberate, a growth of tree roots just so or deep holes suspiciously covered with leaf litter, but it wasn’t like she voiced her thoughts to anyone else.

Besides, whatever lived in the forest seemed happy with the occasional sacrifice of candy. At the very least, she’d never been stopped by something yet, and she took a lot of shortcuts through here by herself. That wasn’t exactly recommended, even for those who knew the territory well. When her family went out for apocalypse training, they were supposed to pair off. They didn’t always, but they did more often than not.

It’s easier to survive if there’s someone you trust around to watch your back, but you have to know how to fight if there isn’t.

Whatever had stopped by the Mystery Shack wasn’t bringing the apocalypse with it—she was pretty sure about that—but she didn’t want this to turn into that. Taking the twins to see the haunted grocery store? Sure. She still hadn’t been sure they’d actually see ghosts despite the stories—no one had been until it had happened—but that was different. That was contained. That was very much not in the Mystery Shack. Where the kids slept. With only the oblivious skeptic Stan around to fight the things that went bump in the night.

Now, if those things were corporeal, she wouldn’t be concerned. The man knew how to punch, and he’d punch before asking questions. But whatever had turned up this time clearly had the option to not be corporeal. Like a ghost.

She remembered the footprints appearing in the scattered baking soda a split second before the boy who’d visited earlier appeared. The same boy who had flashed a careless grin and flipped through postcards and keychains and magnets in the gift shop before taking a tour with Mabel.

Whatever he was, he wasn’t a ghost, but he was entirely too much like a ghost for comfort.

There was no sign of Stan yet—not a surprise; she hadn’t heard his car—but chances were good he wasn’t far behind her.

She saw Soos walking in from the lane and raised her hand in a wave. He spotted her and held a finger to his lips before pointing, and something cold and heavy settled in her gut as she spotted three figures by the woodshed: Mabel, Dipper, and the not-a-ghost boy who’d called himself Danny.

She cursed under her breath as she hurried to meet Soos. “That’s him,” she hissed. “We need to get him away from the twins.”

“Did you find anything in town that we can use?”

“I bought a couple more boxes of salt.” Silver was expensive—too expensive for her, anyway—and she wasn’t exactly guaranteed to find holy water even if she tried breaking into a church, mostly because she didn’t know where she’d look for it. She could’ve bought a cast iron frying pan, but she might as well grab one from the kitchen. The ideas of what they might be able to do had quickly fallen apart when she’d realized what was actually feasible. “It’s better than nothing.”

“What about garlic?”

“For a ghost?”

“You said he wasn’t a ghost.”

“Close enough to a ghost. And, anyway, there should be some in the kitchen. We can always chop up a couple of cloves and see if it does anything.” If it didn’t, and they didn’t waste it, they could always throw it into hamburger meat or make garlic bread. “How long has he been here? The kid?”

“Just a couple of minutes,” Soos allowed, “but this isn’t the first time the kids have met him.”

Wendy closed her eyes. “I know, I just…. I’d hoped they wouldn’t realize he wasn’t normal.” More to the point, she’d hoped that he wouldn’t come back. What the hell did he want, anyway? Sure, he’d said something about fixing whatever was wrong, but their ideas about what needed fixing weren’t likely the same.

“They might not. He was pretending to be normal when he talked to me.”

“He talked to you?”

“Just to ask after Dipper and Mabel.”

Wendy frowned. Soos didn’t sound too optimistic that Mabel and Dipper wouldn’t realize there was something weird about the kid, and frankly, she thought he was right. Mabel might be more forgiving, but Dipper…. “We’ll play it cool. Keep doing whatever you were doing. Try to keep an eye on them without being too obvious about it. I’ll prepare the fire pit.”

“The wood, campfire forks, hot dogs, marshmallows—?”

His gaze had wandered pointedly down to the box of salt pressing against the white plastic bag she carried, its blue label clearly visible. “Yeah. I won’t ring it thickly enough that it’s noticeable, especially since it’ll have to be in the gravel where nothing’s growing anyway, but if he’s going to pretend to be normal, then we’ll see how long he can keep that up.”

“And if he’s not affected by the salt?”

“We cross that bridge when we come to it.”

“And if we’re wrong and he is normal after all?”

Wendy snorted. “If he’s normal, he’s only normal for here.” She saw Soos shift uncomfortably and added, “If Stan comes back before I’m finished, give him the pitch about taking measures to ghost-proof the Mystery Shack and advertising doing that because it’s haunted. He’ll know how to get more of what we need, even if he doesn’t think it’ll do anything.”

“What if he’s not bad? The kid, I mean. Not everything is bad. Not everyone is bad.”

The kid had claimed he wasn’t a threat. He’d said he was stuck, that he just wanted to go home, that he had to fix something, not break it. What if it hadn’t been a lie? She didn’t see how his sneaking around could mean his intentions were honourable, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t missing something.

On the other hand, if he were simply determined to show a friendly face to the twins to get them to lower their guard, only to strike once he’d fooled them—

Wendy wasn’t sure if she wanted to take that risk. Having a healthy amount of suspicion now and apologizing later sounded much better to her than being overly trusting and being burned—especially if she wouldn’t be the only one caught in that fire. She and Soos had lived their entire lives here. Mabel and Dipper had not. They might not yet appreciate the degree to which not everything was as it appeared.

“You don’t need to be ready to attack,” Wendy finally said. “You just need to be ready to defend.” Soos nodded, maybe thinking her words were for both of them, but they weren’t. She had no intentions of simply being ready to defend. She wasn’t about to attack unprovoked, but if this kid did anything that set off alarm bells for her, she’d act on her gut. She trusted her gut more than her head. It was reliable in these sorts of situations.

The trouble was, her gut should have made a call on this already. Instead, she was still conflicted, and more time to mull it over on her trip into town hadn’t helped. Part of her still wanted to take the kid’s words at face value, but the little she’d seen of what he could do backed up the part of her that insisted he was far too dangerous to blindly trust. Soos wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, but there was so much that could seem innocuous at first….

The knowledge that Soos was right and they had no idea if salt would actually help defend them didn’t make this any easier—especially when Danny was clearly interested in Mabel and Dipper. Soos had mentioned Dipper having a book, and she remembered seeing glimpses of it before. If that’s what the kid was interested in, how was she supposed to help Dipper and Mabel protect it while still protecting them?

Salt first. Purifying fire and questions later, if the kid decided to stick around for it. As long as he wasn’t hurting her friends, she was willing to give him a shovel and see how deep he dug.

XXXXXXX

Danny didn’t see the journal around, but Dipper apparently didn’t need it to draw his magic circle thing in the dirt. To be fair, Danny didn’t know if it was the same one as before, but he also didn’t want to find out. Which meant taking the initiative and trying to explain before they decided to pull more magic stuff on him.

“Please don’t do whatever you’re planning on doing,” he said, keeping his voice low in the hope that the guy he’d been talking to earlier wouldn’t hear it. “I just want to talk, I swear.”

“Are you ready to explain now?”

That was Dipper, with a bite in his voice that reminded Danny a bit of Valerie. Dipper might not sound even half as malicious as Valerie could when she was spitting curses at Phantom, but he was appropriately wary. “Yeah. But you have to promise you won’t try any magic stuff.”

“No. You’re not defenseless, and I’m not swearing away my ability to protect anyone.”

Oh. Right. He might think that particular promise carried more weight than a regular promise. He seemed to think giving his word would make it impossible to break. Danny didn’t know of any ghosts with that power, and frankly he didn’t want to meet one who had it. “You don’t have to. I just…. I promise I’m not here to hurt you or anyone else. I only want to talk. And not, y’know, risk being exorcised if you don’t believe me.”

Mabel looked from Danny to her brother and raised an eyebrow. He scowled at her but said, “Fine. If you don’t do anything except tell us the truth right now, I won’t try to exorcise you.”

Not ideal, but it wasn’t like Danny was planning on lying through his teeth to them, anyway—or that he couldn’t still attempt a lie if he felt he needed to. He had a feeling it wouldn’t work, though. He hadn’t had a whole lot of luck earlier. Maybe seeing through that thing was a kind of survival instinct around here, just like Secret Lab Guy had said.

Come to that, though— How had he had an entire conversation with someone, spilled half his life story to that someone, and not actually gotten their name?

Whatever. He’d ask later if he didn’t figure it out before then. It just proved the point, though. These people were good. Sharper than he was used to, unless almost everyone in Amity Park had already figured out his secret and was just being nice and waiting for him to make some kind of grand announcement.

Yeah, right. If Amity Park’s continued obliviousness wasn’t natural, then Vlad had done something. Not something Danny would thank him for, exactly, but something he wouldn’t fault him for, either.

“Thanks. Can I sit?” There weren’t chairs. There weren’t even logs. Dipper would be able to tell that he was staring at the circle drawn in the dirt, though, and know the question for what it was.

Mabel reached out one foot and drew a line through it with the toe of her shoe. “Yup!” she said, dropping down in place. “Pull up some grass.”

Dipper glared at her as Danny sat down on a patch that was more gravel than grass, but the other boy didn’t say anything; he just settled down and looked like he’d be ready to grab the axe beside him at a moment’s notice. Danny didn’t really want to find out if he knew how to use it. Then again, going by the assorted sizes of split logs nearby, he wasn’t overly skilled; even if it wasn’t a normal axe that Danny could avoid with intangibility, there was a good chance that Dipper was clumsy enough with it that he’d be easy enough to avoid.

“I’m sorry about not being entirely straight with you earlier when I said I would be.” Danny didn’t know where to begin, but an apology seemed smart when he still wanted their help.

“Which time, Phantom?”

Well, at least there wasn’t any lingering doubt. Danny sucked in a breath and let it out slowly to give himself a bit of time to think. Mabel looked ready to listen, but Dipper…. He still wasn’t sure about Dipper. “This isn’t exactly something I tend to tell strangers,” Danny said slowly, “but you’re right. I’m Phantom. I’m the one you let out of the thermos.”

Dipper was still practicing his glare, but Mabel asked, “So what are you? You’re not a ghost. We’ve seen ghosts.”

“I’m still a ghost,” Danny said, since as far as he knew, that was true. “Just…part ghost. Part human.” He rubbed the back of his neck and offered them a smile. “Remember when I joked about being the poster boy for interdimensional safety?”

“You expect us to believe you were in some sort of accident,” Dipper said flatly.

They didn’t need to know all the details, but— “Yeah. Lab accident. It didn’t kill me, or at least I don’t think it did, but I did get ghost powers, so that’s cool. Not something I’d recommend to anyone, but cool.”

Okay, Dipper definitely didn’t believe that, but Mabel nodded as if Danny had said something normal and not what probably sounded insane. “Why were you in the thermos?”

“Clockwork, I think. He’s the one who gave me the message to warn you in the first place, remember? Also the one who likes to pretend he doesn’t interfere but interferes like this. I thought it was Vlad, until I…until I realized how long it had been. And, no, before you ask, I don’t know who wrote that journal. I wasn’t lying about that. The only important bit I lied about was ‘Danny Fenton’ being a friend.”

“Why fess up now?” Dipper’s question was a challenge, sure, but Danny could hear the genuine curiosity behind it. Chance were, he wasn’t a great liar, either.

“Because I might need your help to get home. Especially if that help involves you trusting me enough to let me help you and you not trying to kill me first.”

“What were you looking for earlier?” Danny blinked, trying to figure out what that meant, and Dipper must have read that confusion on his face because he elaborated, “Mabel heard you. We know you were back before you showed yourself now.”

Right. She had been in the gift shop area, hadn’t she? “I was trying to find some clue about what else I’m supposed to do here.”

“And?”

That meant did you find it? Danny might’ve promised them the truth, but he’d also promised the other guy that he wouldn’t blow that secret, either. More or less. Hopefully that wasn’t what he was supposed to do here? “There’s something weird about this place,” he said instead. “It’s got this…feeling. I don’t know how to describe it.” It was something unnerving, like the feeling the Fright Knight could give you, but with more…. More I’m-watching-you vibes. Vlad times a hundred. If he didn’t need to stick around to get home, he’d be gone by now. Whatever Clockwork was trying to warn these guys away from, it felt like a danger on par with Pariah Dark.

Not that he’d be able to explain that to them.

Mabel reached over to poke Dipper in the arm. “Show him the journal.”

That would make things a lot easier for him. “I could tell you what it has wrong about ghosts. Or at least about me,” he offered. He wanted to do that regardless, but if he could give them more reason to show him, well….

“It seems to be right about you,” Dipper said, “unless you want to pretend that you’ve never been affected by anything we’ve done.”

Danny blew out a breath. “Look. Being part ghost doesn’t mean I’m exempt from everything that works on ghosts. It also means that I need to be careful around hunters, including you guys. But I’m not here to fight you or steal something or whatever your book says about me. I’m the good guy, I swear.”

“The good guy. Who needs his own little dedicated section in the journal.”

“Dedicated section?” That sounded worrisome. How much info did these guys have on him? Some of it had to be accurate, but if it was just full of things he’d done as a ghost with no context, like the stealing—

“More like a paragraph,” Mabel interrupted, “and it’s not even in the same language as the rest of it.”

Wait.

“Not the same language? What language is it?”

“See for yourself,” Mabel said. She elbowed Dipper when he didn’t immediately produce the journal and offer it up and then hissed a few things in his ear for good measure, which finally seemed to convince him. He pulled the journal out from beneath the vest he’d been wearing earlier, flipped through to the right page, and turned it around to show Danny.

Danny leaned closer, but he didn’t recognize the language, either. If it was something ghosts spoke, he’d never seen it written down, but aside from Wulf, most of the ghosts he’d met spoke English. He didn’t know how many other languages they spoke, though. He’d never asked. If this was some common language he had yet to learn….

“It might be the way it’s coded,” Dipper admitted, “instead of actually being in a different language. Some passages in the journal are coded, but they’re all the same code, except for this. I haven’t had any luck cracking it.”

Danny frowned, reading the page over before Dipper could take it away. He couldn’t see anything about a thermos or anything else that would have led them to him in the first place, but there was a bit of gibberish above that section written in green ink that might be the first code—

Wait. Green ink? Everything else in here was black or blue or some kind of brown that Danny really hoped wasn’t blood. “What else is written in this colour?” he asked, pointing to the passage.

“That’s it.”

“In the entire book?” That didn’t make sense. “But…why?”

“When I find the author of the journals,” Dipper said bluntly, “that won’t be one of the first questions I ask.”

“It won’t even be one of the first hundred,” Mabel added. “Dipper’s never understood the importance of colour.”

To be fair, it wasn’t typically high on Danny’s list of priorities, either, but this colour thing was definitely strange. How many other weird things were in that book if this didn’t make the list?

“Does it mean something to you?” Mabel asked.

Danny hesitated. The fact that it happened to be the same colour as his eyes—or his ectoplasm—in ghost mode could be a coincidence, but things tended to be a lot less coincidental when Clockwork was involved. Danny wasn’t really ready to bet that whoever had written this journal had simply run out of every other colour of pen that day. “Maybe,” he admitted, “but only in that it might point toward me.” Or another ghost like him. Hopefully not Danielle.

“So do you know who wrote it?” she prompted.

He shook his head. “I don’t know the handwriting. That’s not saying much, though. There are a lot of people—and ghosts—I know whose handwriting I’d never recognize.” He wasn’t even sure he’d recognize the Ghost Writer’s handwriting. “What does the other part say about me?”

“That something was stuck in a thermos behind the shack,” Mabel answered immediately, ignoring her brother’s glare. “Which it was.”

“It’s a Fenton Thermos, something specifically designed to contain ghosts. My parents build them.” If he wasn’t trying to keep his secret anymore, there was no harm in admitting that. “They’re paranormal scientists and inventors.”

“Like the author of the journal is,” Mabel said, shooting Dipper a pointed look. “That must be why the bit about the thermos is in there.”

“Not— I mean, I’m not thirty years old. Seriously. Do I look that old to you? I just turned fifteen last week.” Well. Last week for him. Not for whenever this was, five years in his future. “Me being in the thermos is Clockwork’s fault.” Probably. Except Clockwork wouldn’t have needed to catch him in a thermos to force him back here; he could’ve simply asked and called in a favour if Danny had complained, which he would’ve. More likely, Clockwork had merely taken advantage of someone else capturing him in a thermos, and that list of possibilities was long—and included more than one ally, even when the capturing was intentional.

“I don’t know all the details, okay? I just…. I haven’t met a ghost besides Clockwork that messes with time.” His evil future self didn’t count, not when Clockwork’s power had still been the vehicle for everything he’d done.

…Danny really hoped this had nothing to do with him. Now that he thought about it, he didn’t appreciate the thermos parallels.

Of course, now that he thought about it, the fact that he’d been stuck in a thermos had to be deliberate. Sure, it was a way to skirt the notice of the Observants, but Clockwork had messed with the timeline before without doing anything sneaky like that. If the thermos was important…. Coupled with the fact that there was a portal being built beneath a place called the Mystery Shack….

“That’s why I’m here.”

“You care to share with the class?” Dipper asked.

“The thermos, the portal—”

“What portal?”

Oops. “The, y’know, whatever, it doesn’t matter, the point is, you said the author of the journals was a paranormal scientist? Maybe an inventor, too?”

“No, no, don’t change the subject. What portal?”

“Like a portal to another dimension?” Mabel queried. “Is that why you talked about interdimensional safety earlier?”

Oh, crud. They weren’t going to let his slip about the portal go. So much for that secret. “Just…never mind that right now. Paranormal scientist. Inventor. Like my parents. He probably didn’t know them, it would’ve been too early on for them to have made a name for themselves, they might not even have been together yet, but…. Okay. This is gonna sound crazy—”

“Crazier than everything else you’ve said?” Dipper asked dryly.

“—but just go with me on this. Please. I know what happened when my parents messed stuff up, and—”

“And you’re warning us so we’re prepared and more careful,” Mabel finished. “So I don’t get impatient and Dipper doesn’t get complacent.”

Danny frowned. “What?”

“Your warning,” she repeated. “You’re not trying to get us to stop what we’re doing. It’s a terrible warning for that. That kind of thing just makes you wanna do it more, whatever it is. So you’re actually warning us to be more careful than you think we would be otherwise.”

Danny opened his mouth to tell her that warning someone not to do something obviously meant they shouldn’t do it, and then he remembered all the times his parents had warned him not to touch stuff in the lab.

Right.

Maybe she wasn’t wrong.

Just because that was what a warning meant, didn’t mean it would always have the desired effect.

Moreover, Clockwork would know exactly what to have Danny say to get the desired effect.

He’d thought he’d come to help with the portal, but he still didn’t know the blueprints of his parents’ portal as well as Tucker did. If this were just about helping them build or fix the portal in the basement without bad consequences, Tucker was a better choice than he was, and Clockwork could most definitely have arranged that.

But Danny had joked about being the poster boy for interdimensional safety, and he could still disassemble and reassemble most of his parents’ weapons in order to tweak them, even if he wasn’t as good at it as Tucker, and he’d be an idiot to keep ignoring the fact that Clockwork had made sure he had a thermos here.

The thermos wasn’t for him. It had never been for him. It had contained him, sure, but Clockwork must’ve made sure he was stuck in one so that he’d think of this. So that he’d think of what they’d done with his evil future self. And so he’d have it when he needed it.

There was a portal in a secret lab in the basement of the Mystery Shack, and the thermos written about in Dipper’s journal was for whatever was coming out of it.

(see more fics | next)

#gravity falls #danny phantom #phantom falls #crossover #fanfiction #gf fanfiction #dp fanfiction #my writing #ladylynse #snippets #crossover snippet #gf snippet #dp snippet

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nikkzwrites · 4 years

Text

Oh, Danny Boy | Thomas x F!Reader | One-Shot

I normally write my x Readers in second person, but I decided to try out a third person x Reader fic! I hope you like it!

Prompt: No Prompt, but the fic is about a woman who lost her childhood love in World War I and the consequences Thomas Shelby has for being... well... Thomas Shelby.

Genre: Angst. Just a WHOLE LOT of Thomas Shelby Angst.

Word Count: 2.7k

When Arthur said that he had another Shelby to inform of John’s death, Thomas bided by, yet he didn’t quite know what his elder brother was speaking about. All he knew was that if they were important enough to alert about John’s passing and about the possible danger, it would be best to get them here so that they couldn’t be used against the family later. When he went down to greet the small family that Arthur had informed to come over, Thomas was taken aback. There before him was a young boy, unmistakably a Shelby, with a woman, who he had not seen for at least the same amount of time as the young boy, next to him. The boy even walked like a Shelby. His head held high and proud of himself. He was frozen as he watched Arthur walk down to greet them.

The year was 1919. They had just gotten back home and were helping families prepare funerals for the men who didn’t make it back. There was one family that had lost a father and brother, but the girl, not much younger than John was there mourning three lives; one of her father, one for her brother, another of her childhood sweetheart. She couldn’t have been much older than the youngest legally allowed into the war when it first started. Then again, that boy was one of the youngest in their squad at the top of the war, so it made sense. At first, she was just another one of the thousands to Thomas, until she opened her mouth to sing with a few of the other widows. Her voice was so gentle, yet overwhelmingly filled with grief. It was as if listening to an actual angel endure the heartbreak of humanity’s downfall. If he were not back from France, had he not gone, he would have broken there, but, alas, he had seen it. He was there on the ground of France. He was never going to be that man again.

His blue eyes watched as when she went to thank everyone for coming. People were slowly trickling out to make their way to other funerals. This was the Shelby boys’ last stop, though so they stayed behind with her. Arthur grabbed hold of her and cradled her as if a precious being. Before she was the picture of graceful sorrow, but once the towering man’s arms were around her, holding her close to him, she completely let every built agony out. She was alone in this world now. The only anchor she had right now was them. He watched as she clung to his brother.

Arthur held the poor girl. One arm around her waist and the other massaging her head. “It’s alright love, let it out,” Arthur cooed to her, “I know, I know.” He kissed the side of her head, “Cry it out, love. Get it all out so you can carry on.” He looked towards his brothers and said, “John, stay out here with me. We’ll finish this stuff out here. Tommy, go on in with her, can you make her a bit of tea and send her off to bed?”

Thomas nodded, “Right.” He snaked his arm in between the girl and his elder brother, “Come on, love. We’ll take good care of ya.” He wrapped his arm around her waist to help walk her into her house.

They walked into a large empty house. Thomas actually preferred it this way, the maids, workmen, everyone else were away until the next morning. It was just going to be her, her horses, her dog, and the Shelby boys for the night. He helped her into the kitchen and sat her into one of the chairs. He chuckled and started to look through the cabinets, “So, I don’t think a girl like you would know where they kept anything, do ya?”

She giggled and wiped her eyes. She slid past him and stood on her toes to grab a tin, “I actually know where everything is. After my father and brother left, I cut the staff down considerably. We only have one cook, one footman, a maid, and the stablemen and farmers.” She turned and started to prepare the tea.

Thomas laughed, “Oh, so only you and like eight people. Okay.” He watched her do her work. She started to stare off though. Thomas knew that the glassy eye look well. He walked up behind her and whispered, “Hey.” He let his arms slide around her waist again. He leaned his head down and kissed right under her jaw, “Aye, love, come on.” He took her hand and said, “Let’s get you into bed.”

Her doe eyes looked at him. He could tell she was looking at someone else rather than him, but Thomas didn’t mind. He understood what that feeling was like, wanting someone else so badly, but accepting any love you can get because that person could never give you that love again. She moistened her lips and nodded, “I can go start the fires in the guest bedrooms.”

He shook his head. He spoke in a rolling soft voice, “I’ll take care of everything.” He kissed behind her ear. He pulled her close to him and asked, “Would you ask him the same thing, hm?”

She laughed, “Well, he didn’t have two brothers to worry about and he’d be sneaking in through the window to avoid my father.”

“Well, you can go upstairs and I can climb my way up,” He kissed her forehead, “you heard me, go on up.”

She started up the stairs, turned back to him, and smiled gently, “He had a pretty, beautiful Shire mare. White as the newly fallen snow. She should still be in the stable if you want.” She turned and headed back up the stairs.

Back in his right head, Thomas wondered what happened to that horse. It was a beautiful mare. He greeted the woman and the young boy. The boy’s piercing ice-blue eyes bore straight through him. That was no question his son. His wavy near unruly, from what Thomas could tell, dark hair was only being tamed by it being cut so short. He looked at the boy and asked, “So what’s your name, son?”

“Daniel,” the boy responded, “I’m named after my father.”

Thomas laughed and shook his head, “No you aren’t. But I’ll talk to your Uncle Arthur and your mother about this. Go on inside. You can meet ya brother.”

Daniel looked up at him, “Uncle Arthur says you have horses. Can I go see em? I’ve been training my own foal.”

Thomas made a face. He was such a straightforward boy. Strong boy. A boy who didn’t follow directions well, but was a boy used to negotiating to get what he wanted. The boy was just like him. Thomas growled, “You don’t want to meet your brother?”

“I don’t have a fucking brother,” Daniel replied with a frigid glare.

The woman looked down at the boy, “Language, Daniel Thomas.” She turned her head up and stared into Thomas’ eyes, “Mr. Shelby, my son adores horses. Could you please allow him to stay with them? Danny has a hard time adjusting to new places if I, Arthur, John, or his teacher are not with him.”

Thomas sneered and asked without taking an eye off Daniel’s mother, “Ada, can you take Danny-”

“Daniel,” The boy interrupted. He readjusted to stand taller as if that had something to do with it, “My name is Daniel, Mr. Shelby.”

“Can you take Daniel to the stables,” Thomas pleaded through gritted teeth.

Ada nodded and put an arm around the boy. She smiled and commented, “Daniel is such a handsome name. You know you are just the age of my son, Karl. Would you like to play with him as well?”

Daniel looked up at her, “Maybe. Does he know how to ride a horse? Or does he know how to shoot?”

Ada looked at Tommy surprised then down at the boy again, “No. He grew up in London, but he knows chess and other fun games.”

Daniel shrugged, “Later then. After dinner perhaps.” He walked with Ada to the stables.

Right when Thomas knew the boy was out of earshot, he turned to Arthur and the mother of his eldest son. “When were you going to FUCKING TELL ME that I had a son,” Thomas growled approaching the younger woman.

Arthur started to try to intervene but she held out an arm and stood her ground. She sneered and stared straight at him despite him trying to tower over her, “Hopefully never. I was banking on this conversation taking place in Hell.”

“Come on you two,” Arthur pushed Thomas away from the woman. He stood between them and tried to reason, “What much better would it have done if she did tell you? Eh?”

“COME OFF IT,” Thomas roared, “You know I would have made it right Arthur!”

“Made what right,” She yelled at Thomas, “Marry me? My heart was buried in the ground! I always was going to love someone else! I had fucking money!”

Arthur turned and pushed her away from Thomas, “Yeah, and look at Daniel. He’s an amazing boy.”

Thomas stormed up to get into her face once more, “For all you know, that could have been my only child! You robbed that boy of a father!”

“FRANCE STOLE THAT BOY’S FATHER,” She yelled pointing down into the ground. Her chest heaving from the screaming match. Seeing his eyes genuinely hurt by her actions, she stopped fighting. She panted out her frustration and took a deep breath. She calmly looked up at him, “But luckily he wasn’t, huh, Mr. Shelby?” She shook her head of her malice. Her voice changed to a softer, more gentle tone, “I’m sorry for your loss. She was a kind woman. She lived up to her name. Now, thank you for inviting me to John’s funeral. May I go now?”

Thomas seethed. He, too, slowly let his anger out from his breath. He could tell her honesty from the way she spoke. He nodded then called to her back, “Be downstairs as soon as you get settled for the family meeting!” He watched as she turned around. He cocked an arrogant smirk, “You are a Shelby after all. You had that blood in you for a time.”

She turned back to her mission into getting into the house, “I’m sorry sir. I believe you’ve mistaken me for someone else.” She walked into his house with two small bags to go and get settled.

Thomas turned to his brother, “How long have you two fucking known about this?”

“Johnny didn’t know until after Danny was born,” Arthur explained.

“And you,” Thomas questioned.

Arthur took in a deep breath, “Since the day she knew she was pregnant.”

“Why didn’t you tell me, Arthur?”

Arthur looked at his brother sorrowfully, “Because she wanted to keep em, Tommy. She wanted to keep em and she didn’t wanna marry you. She had enough money where she could raise him no problem. Look at him, Tommy. That is a well loved boy.” He pointed towards the stables.

“Does he know anything about me,” Thomas asked miserably. He waited for Arthur to respond and when he didn’t he asked again, “Does he know ANYTHING about me Arthur?”

Arthur nodded solemnly, “That’s why John and I would go visit em, Tommy. We wanted to make sure he was a proper Shelby boy. She’s done so much for him. That boy can probably outshoot Finn and definitely out race him. He’s a really smart one too.”

“That doesn’t mean he knows me, Arthur,” Thomas hissed.

Arthur sighed, “Aye, but he does. He knows you from the papers and from me sitting him down and tellin em about you. He doesn’t quite care for it, to be honest.”

Thomas took out a cigarette, moistened it by rubbing it against his lips, then lit it to smoke, “Me neither.” He turned to walk back into the house.

Later that afternoon, after John’s funeral, Thomas sauntered into her room, “Thank you for staying.”

“Didn’t have much choice,” She said, “Arthur asked, I stayed. Nothing to it more than that.”

He nodded, “I saw you, after the gunshot. You stood and drew a pistol. Where’d you learn to shoot?”

She shrugged, “Picked it up after my Papa and Georgie died. I had a Shelby boy and if anyone found out, I needed to be able to protect myself and him until he could shoot for emself.”

“You could’ve eaten with us,” He told her. He poured both of them a glass of whiskey.

The woman shook her head, “I’m not a Shelby. I didn’t belong there.”

“You belong there, because I say you belong there,” He growled as he took a sip.

She shook her head, “I don’t belong anywhere, Mr. Shelby.”

There was a cry. Both of them turned their heads. Daniel walked in with Charlie crying behind him. The boy huffed at the two adults and walked past Thomas to lead Charles to his mother, “He couldn’t sleep.” He walked back out to go to their room.

Her heart melted, “Oh darling boy.” She scooped up Charles and asked, “Darling, Charlie, would you like me to help you get to sleep?” She pet the boy’s head so that he could rest it into the crook of her neck and started to hum. She stood and walked into the hall to sing to the boy. She sang softly and danced slowly with him until he was completely asleep.

Thomas stood in the doorway watching her. His eyes watched every small twirl she made as she sang to his younger son the spices of Scarborough Fair. Her barefeet against the wood made it easy to gently sway Charlie to sleep as she sang to him. Thomas stared at her, but he was looking at his late wife.

When she returned from putting Charlie to sleep, Thomas’ forlorn eyes pleaded with hers wordlessly. She calmly walked into the room and closed the door behind her.

One morning, he went on a ride with Charles and Daniel. He took in the misty air of morning. For the first time, in a long time, he felt as if he could grasp it. Everything he ever wanted was just there in his veiled vision. When they rode back, he spotted it, the car that dropped her off. He handed Charles to Mary so that she could walk the boys in. Thomas walked to Daniel’s mother, who was putting the bags into the car.

He grabbed her arm roughly and walked them a bit away from the car, “Where do you think you’re going?”

She turned to the man, “Back home. Danny and I belong back home.”

Thomas shook his head, “You said you didn’t belong anywhere. Well now you do. You belong to me and Charlie.”

She sighed, “Thomas.”

“Don’t you dare Thomas me,” His eyes squinted from the searing pain of tears building. His nostrils flared, “Danny deserves a father and Charlie deserves a mother. It’s perfect, ain’t it? This?”

“Tommy-”

“No,” he roared, “Don’t fucking Tommy me when you’re taking my fucking son away from me again.”

“Lizzie’s pregnant, Tommy,” She somberly forced a smile with a shrug, “What do you want me to do?” The news punched him. His head reeled. He blinked, shaking his head. Why did this have to happen now? Thomas took a step back from her as her voice bubbled back to the surface of his understanding, “- were never going to work. You and I. We both love someone who isn’t there, Tommy. It’s unfair for us to act like anything different. Charlie can still have a mother. You don’t have to worry.” She let tears fall from her eyes.

Thomas was silent as he watched Danny and the woman who gave him Grace again drove away. He gripped Charlie’s hand as Charlie waved them goodbye, completely unaware of what it meant. Thomas closed his eyes and whispered under his breath, “And all my grave will warmer, sweeter be, For you will bend and tell me that you love me, and I shall sleep in peace until you come to me.”

#peaky blinders fanfic #peaky blinders fanfiction #thomas shelby x oc #thomas shelby x reader #tommy shelby x reader #tommy shelby x oc

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nastyburger · 4 years

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What are your thoughts on Cores? Are they all a type of element? (i.e Ice, Fire, Plant, Electric, etc) Could they be based one some kind of temperature slider? What kind of core would the Lunch Lady have? Would she have a simple hot/fire Core? Or would she have a sort of strange “Meat” Core? Idk I’m asking you

i love the concept of cores! i like to think cores are like the ghost’s mind and heart (but rolled into one and put in their chest) with the “mind” half being their obsession and the “heart” half being their element. i like to think theyre all elemental like fire ice and all that! i feel a core merely fuels the ghost, and the element is just a minor detail dictating certain features (do they feel more hot or cold to the touch? is their image slightly more fuzzed out like fire or pulsing with electricity? are they more rigid yet see through like ice? ect. though these traits are hard to see unless your looking really closely or have a good eye like frostbite taking one look at danny and knowing he has an ice core). like its more how the ghost is comprised/holding its ectoplasm together so i dont believe it dictates what their literal powers are.

hmmmmm think about it like atla nations! like sokka is very clearly water tribe with his clothes, culture, weapons, and natural inclination to the cold but that doesnt mean he’s a waterbender. i think about cores like that basically if that makes any sense! a good example of core not equaling power would be ember, she would have a fire core but her powers is clearly based on sound and music despite the aesthetic! which brings us to our next point..........

im very inclined to the idea that obsessions are wrapped up along in the core. its essentially the gas tank to the whole operation. the more a ghost indulges their obsession the more powerful they become and this is where their true power comes from. the actual elemental part is just the outer shell glue holding everything together and only particularly powerful ghosts, ghosts fortunate enough to have their element and obsession align, or ones simply smart enough to figure out how to tap in would learn their element and use it outwardly.

lets use danny as an example of “a powerful ghost using his core”, danny’s power was building so much that he physically felt freezing no what temperature it was or how much he bundled up. even in ghost form he was constantly shivering. danny’s core was literally freezing him from the inside out and needed to release the excess energy, he had no choice but to learn how to do this and just use ice powers. on the other hand though, this means he can use his ice powers far more frequently and exclusively as his main mode of attack if he wanted to. basically ghosts in this category have no choice but to use their elemental core lest they become a ticking time bomb of repression to themselves (i also like to believe tapping into ones core is very difficult to do hence danny needing to be taught instead of like accidentally releasing it or something, many ghosts born with the POTENTIAL to have this really powerful core ability often cease to exist because it destroys themselves from the inside out. thats why theres not many of them). other examples of this category would be frostbite and undergrowth.

contenders for the “fortunate enough to have their element and obsession align” would be technus. electricity is probably the most common type of element for this category in all honesty. technus is obsessed with technology, and while i would say most of his powers are “possessing” technology with his basic package of ghost powers theres no denying the dude definitely has some sparks flying. i feel like if your obsession is already close to your element then its only reasonable you stumble upon a natural way to use it. but heres the key difference between a ghost like technus and a ghost like danny: if technus can use electricity all the time then why bother possessing electronics? simple answer is thats just not sustainable. danny is literally overfilling with energy, he has so much excess its spilling over and will literally kill him if he doesnt blast off a couple of ice beams here and there. technus is pulling energy from his core, its not excess, hes just tapping into this extra reservoir of power, but if he uses it TOO much he will have the exact opposite problem of danny. basically expending too much of your own battery that you die from lack of power. unless you are the first category of ghosts, tapping into your core at all should be used sparingly.

“simply smart enough to figure out how to tap into their core” would be ghosts like ember and skulker. a musician pop star would have nothing to do with fire, likewise a hunter with electricity, but these two are able to minorly use their element abilities. “smart” probably isnt the right word to use here, but more or less for one reason or another, these ghosts figured it out and are now using their cores. thats basically all there is to it. though i will say, having a core strong enough in general to have power to tap into in the first place is another deciding factor for all three of these categories. with that, lets move on to the last set of ghosts.

going aaaaaaaall the way back to your original question of whether or not a ghost like the lunch lady would have a “meat core” or something like that, the final group of ghost are ones that simply dont use their elemental core at all. they instead lean into their obsessions. ghosts in this category can be here for a number of reasons, perhaps the shell of their core is very minor and weak and they cant use that elemental power no matter how hard they try, perhaps theyre so focused on their obsession they may not even need their elemental, perhaps they just simply cant learn how to tap into their core at all because they dont have enough sentience.

i would say the lunch lady and the box ghost are the “too weak to use their elements” ghosts, but that doesnt mean they are powerless! i like to think all ghosts have a “basic package of ghost powers” with levitation/telekinesis being one of them, the only difference among the ghosts is how their obsessions dictate their natural affinity towards certain things. so while the lunch lady doesnt LITERALLY have a meat core, her obsession gives her the natural inclination towards food and meat. she can control these things with the most accuracy and power, it allows her to do things like making the meat suit and whatnot, its just what she’s best at controlling. regardless, these ghosts can never learn how to use their elemental core but thats okay. their obsessions is just a different path to take. speaking of which........

“so focused on their obsession they dont even need their elemental core” is clockwork. hes just so powerful on his own, why would he need to use that? does he even have an elemental core to control? who knows and who cares because the dude can LITERALLY CONTROL TIME. another example would be desiree, maybe even the ghost writer. these guys already gain so much power from their obsession it doesnt matter whether or not they have the ability to use them or not. thats sorta the beauty in this category! because you know who else can fit in here? TUE box ghost. thats right, just because your elemental core is too weak to tap into doesn’t mean youre weak. in the ultimate enemy, the future box ghost is genuinely powerful. his abilities to control boxes extend beyond just levitating and throwing them around, he can make these pink plasma boxes and hes a genuine threat to behold. he leaned into his obsession and it developed enough to this point of power. again, loop this back to the atla comparison i was making earlier, just because someone is a nonbender doesnt make them weak! those nonbenders lean into learning different skill sets until mastery and become very formidable foes. just because youre not born with it doesn’t mean you cant git gud. on the other hand......

the very last kind of ghosts are the “cant learn how to use their core because theyre not sentient/intelligent enough”. these are ghosts like the blob ghosts, ectopusses, maybe even cujo and other animal ghosts if we’re being honest. using your core doesnt come naturally, it needs to be taught and learned, you have to actually train to use it. so in cases like these ghosts, they just dont have the thought process to do this. hell, some of them like the blobbies may not even have fully formed obsessions. their more scribbles, raw ideas, pure emotion giving sentience to ectoplasm. with cujo (assuming he has an elemental shell strong enough), you could argue that you can train him to use his core like its a dog trick, but in all honesty this would be very very difficult to do and whether or not cujo can use it on his own is debatable.

#and thats all my thoughts on cores and how that works!#im so sorry i just brain dumped all my core hc into one ask lmao #im always down to talk about ghost cores lol #seance #Anonymous #ghost core theory

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honeypwark · 4 years

Text

[ Blue's Clues ]

↳ Signal Era

↳ Lily goes out for some ramen. She adopts a little friend along the way. She hides him from her members.

m.list

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

The thing about being the youngest in Twice is that it takes fifteen minutes of convincing to let the older members let her go to a convenience store just down the street on her own. Then she has to rush out as quickly as possible once getting permission, lest Jeongyeon change her mind before she can leave.

A serving of ramen and two banana milks later, Lily is on her way back to the dorms. The sun had just begun to sink below the buildings of Seoul when she'd left the dorm, but night has fallen fully now.

As she passes the empty space between two buildings, she hears a whimper.

She stops and looks down the alleyway.

There's another whimper.

"Hello?"

There's scratching and then a little woof.

Curiosity getting the better of her, she walks off the sidewalk and into the alley.

Ten minutes later, Lily is entering her bedroom for the second time that night after returning home, this time with a small brown puppy in her arms. She couldn't bring him in the front door, so she'd left him down at street level and went to get him via fire escape once she was sure the coast was clear.

All the other girls are either in their rooms or in the living room watching a romcom. All of her roommates fall in the latter group, making it easy to enter her room unnoticed. If easy means climbing through a window and falling.

Lily grabs a towel and wraps the puppy in it, walking out of her room with a change of clothes to make the act more believable. She makes it to the bathroom and unwraps the puppy.

"Don't look at me like that," she says when he looks up at her after shaking himself out, "Do you want to get kicked out?"

Lily showers in record time to leave time for the puppy afterwards, his fur left several shades lighter than it had been.

"What should I name you?" she wonders, finishing drying the puppy. "Picket? Danny? Harold?"

She cringes at her own name choice, "No, definitely not Harold."

She continues to think as she blow dries her hair. She puts the hair dryer back in its rightful place and knows what she'll name him.

"I'll name you Blue," she says quietly, picking him up, "Like Blue's Clues. Plus it's my favorite color."

He licks her cheek and she giggles, making sure to keep quiet.

She wraps him back up in her now damp towel and goes back to her room. She sets Blue on her bed and quickly tosses her dirty clothes in a basket.

There's a knock at the door, "Lily?"

Lily lunges for her bed and throws her blanket over Blue, "Yes?"

The door opens and Jihyo appears, "No perverts, stalkers, or drunkards on your convenience store escapade?"

"Nope. Nothing too exciting. Pretty boring, actually."

"Okay, goodnight."

Jihyo hugs Lily then leaves for her own room. Before any of her roommates can enter, she jumps into bed and fixes her bedding so Blue is situated under the blanket. She props the blanket up with her leg to allow him more breathing room and keeps a hand on him to keep him quiet and still.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

"Why is there poop on the kitchen floor?!"

Lily looks up at Mina's shout, her members all doing the same. The other girls all rush to the kitchen to see what Mina's talking about, but Lily hangs back then runs to her bedroom. She'd left Blue in her room when she and the other members had left for the day in the morning. As she nears her room, however, she sees the door cracked open just enough for a small puppy to squeeze through.

"Ah!"

"Why are you screaming?"

"Dog!"

"Dog? I love dogs!"

"Don't touch it! We don't know where it's from."

"It might have rabies!"

"Get it out!"

"I've got the broom!"

Lily runs toward the commotion. Sana is being held back from Blue's tiny form by Dahyun. Nayeon holds a broom, pointing it at Blue.

"Wait, don't hurt him!"

Lily rushes forward and scoops Blue up in her arms.

"Lily, don't pick him up!" Jeongyeon says.

"No, he's harmless. See?"

Blue licks Lily's chin and she laughs.

"He's... huh?" Jeongyeon says,

"He's harmless. And he's mine."

"Lily, you don't have a dog," Momo says.

"Yes, I do; he's right here."

"Since when do you have a dog?"

"Since last night."

"'Pretty boring,' huh?" Jihyo says.

Lily looks at the ground bashfully.

"How did you hide him from us?" Mina asks.

"How'd you get him in without us noticing?" Chaeyoung adds.

"Those... are both very interesting stories."

"Well, I'm sorry, Lily, but we can't keep him," Jihyo says.

"Wha- why not?"

"We're idols! We don't have time to take care of a dog."

"But we're home a lot of the time. And when we're not, I can leave him at a friend's house. Somi and Evelyn would love him. And I'll take full responsibility for him. I'll buy his food. I'll wash him. I'll potty train him. I'll take him to the vet. I promise he'll be well-behaved in no time."

"He must be someone's pet already," Jihyo says.

"I found him in a plastic tub in an alleyway. Whoever his owner was left him to starve to death."

"Poor thing," Sana coos, stepping closer to scratch him behind his ear.

Jihyo looks at a loss, "We can't keep him; Jeongyeon, help me out here."

Jeongyeon nods and walks over to Lily, "Lily, I know you've got a good heart, but a shelter would probably be the best place for him."

"A shelter where he'll just be another puppy," Lily argues. "You know that they kill dogs if they're not adopted by a certain age? I can't let that happen to Blue."

Jeongyeon internally grimaces: she's already named him.

"Lily flower-," Jeongyeon starts.

"Please, unnie?"

Lily looks up with the biggest puppy dog eyes she can muster. It's damn impressive how she manages to look more adorable than the little puppy in her arms. Jeongyeon can literally feel her will give way.

"He... is really cute," she says, patting his head.

"Unbelievable," Jihyo mutters. "Fine, we'll keep the dog."

"Yay!" Lily squeals, jumping around.

She sets Blue down and runs over to Jihyo, wrapping her arms around her tightly, "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"Yeah, yeah," Jihyo says, "Just stick to what you said about training him."

Lily nods seriously, "I will."

Jihyo casts a glance at the kitchen, "Especially potty training."

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disaster-bay-leaf · 3 years

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Ok so these were the cutest~ (ㆁωㆁ)

4, 6, 7, 9, 12, 19, 22, 23, 28, 33, 34, 46, 47, 52, 59, 60, 63, 66, 83, 87, 88, 93, 99

I kno I listed like....all of them lmao but feel free to answer whichever you want and ofc you can ask me in return Baybe ( ◜‿◝ )♡

uHUHUHUHU much content for me to answer, im happy bebe 💜💜💜✨

4 - how do you take your coffee/tea?

hm coffee either Very Black No Sugar (for the sleep deprived me) or iced latte three sugars and theres no in between

and as for tea its All Black Teas That Exist, cinnamon-flavoured especially (but basically all teas that come to mind when u think “autumn”), and rooibos!!! okay basically the only oke i dont like is any type of green tea (which is sad because they look cool but my tastebuds said ✨no✨)

6 - do you keep plants?

honestly id l o v e too because i love plants but,,, im kinda horrible at taking care of them though still way better than the majority of my family (research helps) so the only plant i own is kinda a small-palm-tree-looking thing in a bigass glass jar that i saved from my mother’s plant-destructing hands and its mostly doing well (the ends of its leaves are starting to be yellow tho and im worried:((( )

7 - do you name your plants?

yes!!! though the current one was named by my sister and its called “pickett” after fantastic beasts shsjjsj

9 - do you like singing/humming to yourself?

oh god oh dude you have n o idea

i have absolutely n o singing voice but its something i do constantly to give my brain the right amount of stimuli so basically i listen to music 24/7 and hum to myself 99% of that time

12 - whats your favourite planet?

oh i actually didnt think about this for so long but either pluto (hes a planet screw nasa) or saturn (RINGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) or venus (girls,,,and libra,,,)

19 - do you keep a journal? what do you write/draw in it?

okay im gonna be completely honest with yall and say that my every single try at keeping a journal failed spectacularly and i lost motivation after like a few months so my only journals rn are my fancy fake-leather-bound calendar to note tests and assessments into, a kinda roughed up notebook that i uses for noting down poems or scribbling or passing notes in class, and a kinda fancy bullet journal notebook that i used as a book of shadows for a while but since my fountain pen died i didnt touch it

22 - are you a morning person?

n o

i am so not a morning person but i wish i could be because honestly dawns are beautiful

but as it is rn im either sleep deprived all the time and loathe every second of being in an awake state or (if i have a few days of schoolbreak) my biological clock moves forward a few hours and i sleep 2am-10am

23 - whats your favourite thing to do on lazy days with zero obligations?

except for the fact that i dont remember the last time it happened, i would probably spend it drawing outside, watching anime with my sister and riding a bike around the forest

28 - sunrise or sunset?

i love sunrises because its so peaceful and everyone is asleep but also i subconsciously immediately correlate them with waiting for a train to take me to school (because thats basically the only time i see them) so its a bittersweet love especially with my fucked up biological clock

but sunsets are really really pretty too and i see them more often so i cant choose

33 - whats your fave pastry?

and isnt that a millior-dollar question dhsjjsjsj

either cinnamon rolls (i absolutely adore them) or that one specific type of cupcake-shaped-thing made out of shortcrust/bread/whatever its called and filled with vanilla pudding

34 - tell us about a stuffed animal you kept as a kid. what is it called? what does it look like? do you still keep it?

awwww this is cute

okay so basically my two favourite stuffed animals (i still have them, they sit in my wardrobe) were two teddy bears (like maybe 20cm high each of them) and one was pure brown and the other was silver-brown and they had stereotypical polish male names “Waldek” (read. Valdek) and Stefan (i think tho im not sure if i remember correctly, my memory is a feeble thing sometimes

46 - tell us the worst pun you can think of

what dog would never bite you? a hot dog *badumtss*

47 - what food do you think should be banned from the universe?

huh a year ago id say pineapple pizza but i guess i dont hate pineapples that much anymore (tho putting them on pizza is still an abomination) but i think that if id ever want to get rid of anything it would be parsley, i hate that freakin herb (does it count as food tho)

52 - what are your favourite memes of the year so far?

the ever given for sure shsjshjsjsjsjjsj

but bullying tramp stamps is gold and pure tumblr energy too

as for fandom memes: im in love with all keeping-up-with-the-todorokis variations and the fact that the entire bsd fandom looked at fukuchi and said “biTCH” and thats one of the only things we’re unanimous about

59 - whats your favourite myth?

i always liked the kora/persephone myth (though demeter is an overbearing parent to the nth power), loki and thor crossdressing at a party to get mjolnir back, atalanta because shes a queen and id politely ask her to kick my ass, and cassandra because she deserved better, and theres a l o t more because alas i was a mythology nerd but this post is long enough for me not to make this section 20 times longer sjjsjsjsjsjks

but there are a lot of slavic myths that are very cool too, though we dont know that much about them as about the greeks for example

60 - do you like poetry? what are some of your faves?

o o o o h yeah i do like poetry because to create such a beautifully sounding thing with only words someone has to be a genius

some of my favs are: some works of nakahara chuuya (thank u bsd for introducing me to this man’s beautiful imagery in his works i swear to god the descriptions do it for me) (also his poem about having hangovers is a mood like i feel you buddy), the raven by ea poe (i know everyone likes it but hOLY DAMN THE INTER/INTRAVERSE RHYMES ARE LIKE,,, BREATHTAKING) (and aso im a slut for gothic horror), and many more but also That One Poem From Welcome To Nightvale about reaching the island in the west,,, only perfect vibes from it

63 - are you fussy about your books and music? do you keep them meticulously organised or kinda leave them be?

okay heres the thing. for anyone else both my playlist library and my bookshelf would be considered pure chaos of a mad man b u t they actually have a highly focused system which means that i sort them based on their vibes, lovability and (in case of books) their age and whether or not theyre a part of a series so i would say my bookshelf is rather organised (when a quarter of it isnt occupying my desk that is) and my music is more organised than not but sometimes it gets out of control and i have to sort it entirely again

66 - what would your ideal flower crown look like?

either entirely constructed of simple white daisies, entirely constructed of only white roses, or something that probably would win a “how many different coloured flowers can one fit in a flower crown” competition

or something purple (maybe not belladonna)

83 - whats some of your favourite album art?

god i dont know if it counts but hozier’s wasteland baby is probably one of my absolute favourites and no one shall beat that

“thrifted youth” (dalynn) and “standard deviation” (danny schmidt) have very aesthetic covers too

also the iconic p!atd too weird to live, too rare to die! album cover,,, its just iconic what can i say

and last but not least matt meason’s pink-and-black album covers (though bank on the funeral is really pretty too but like,,, “who killed matt meason” d o e s it for me and so does the 2017 tribulation single)

87 - what are some movies that you think everyone should watch at least once in their lives?

this is such a hard question because im not a really cinematography-oriented gal but i suppose that (at the risk of not going deep enough into the cinema world):

- the princess bride

- inception

- night at the museum

- SPIRITED AWAY

- forrest gump

- truman show

- E.T. (i cried okay)

- the lord of the rings (because damn me if this isnt one impressive adaptation)

- parasite

and one more personal recommendation: “ready or not” with samara weaving because goddamn i dont usually watch this genre but holy s h i t is it good

93 - whats the hairstyle you wear the most?

honestly just plain hair down (because having curly hair is a menace), split in the middle when i have longer hair and split on one side when its short

also low ponytails or half-up-half-down when im exercising, or double french braids when my hair doesnt cooperate enough to look presentable in any other form

99 - list some songs that resonate with your soul whenever you hear them

this is difficult because my music taste is a goddamn rollercoaster on a good day, but heres some:

- me and the sky from “come from away” musical (this is sort of a test song for my mental stability, if i cry i aint stable)

- dancing after death by matt meason (okay most songs by matt meason except for like,,, hallucinogenics maybe)

- tears and rain by james blunt

- i will follow you into the dark by death cab for cutie

- almost home by mxmtoon

- anything by hozier really but shrike especially

- payphone, the cover by alex g (i cried to this song so many times)

- burning pile by mother mother (can i roast all my problems please)

- long way from home and cleopatra by the lumineers

- autoclave by the mountain goats

oooh that was c o o o o o o o l as fuck thank you sm so much bebe (and sorry for the long post @everyone else)

#smadhuman being pure af #bay answers #long post #very long post #ask #asks

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