#Danny: can I at least get like. a juice box or something. a fucking cheese cracker or something

[daddyplasmius]

GIW Agent, attempting an interrogation: You see my problem here. I mean, how am I supposed to know if you're a human that's part ghost... or ghost that's part human.

Danny, shrugging: maybe you should flip a coin?

#Danny Phantom #source: Power Rangers RPM #because I'm watching it again! #this just seems like something Danny would do if his secret got out & he was being interrogated #just sit there being like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ #Danny: can i go now #GIW agent: no we still haven't decided whether we can legally experiment on you yet #Danny: can I at least get like. a juice box or something. a fucking cheese cracker or something #Tucker in the other room also being interrogated: I won't talk! #GIW agent: *clicks his pen* #Tucker: okay you got me I'll talk! it all started when I was born... #*twenty minutes later* #GIW agents: *eating popcorn* #Tucker: -and then when I was two I had this nightmare that I was falling into a black hole--you know typical two year old nightmare #this entire interrogation scene (in Power Rangers RPM) is literally perfect for that tho #RPM is actually just the Ultimate Enemy but without ghosts isn't it #I love Ziggy so much. he should be allowed to say fuck #Ziggy should be allowed to say ''Dylan you dumb fuck'' when Dylan asks ''What's a Pow-er Range-er?'' #Ziggy: why's my car got big fuckin anime eyes on it? #K: it's not anime you piece of shit weeb I'll kill you #Dylan: *thinks he's in the Walking Dead* #everyone else: *is in a children's show*

[tendertenebrosity]

TJ and Danny, part 3

Third part, probably of 4, of my pieces set in @wildfaewhump‘s Path Verse! Other parts here and here. 

TJ sat in the little windowless room that was put aside for them to use in between court cases. There was a plain wooden table, scratched with graffiti here and there, and a few chairs with vinyl-covered padded seats.

He had his blindfold off. Compared to the cubby TJ spent his time back at the agency in, it was a strange, chaotic, worn sort of room, and he let his eyes wander over the surfaces with mild curiosity.

On the table in front of him sat a triangular packet of rigid clear plastic, with a couple of untouched sandwiches in it, and a little rectangular box of juice with a straw. He ignored the sandwiches, pulled the juice over, and took a cautious sip.

“… abso-fucking-lutely ridiculous. I know we’re short-staffed but there must be something you can do.”

TJ bit his lip and glanced over at the door. His handler had started the phone conversation attempting to be quiet, but that seemed to have been forgotten.

He turned the juice around and around in his hands, looking at the bright colours on the label. His headache had faded. His handler had left him a bottle of cold water and some paper hand towels, so he could wash his face, and that had helped a lot.

He still felt… weak. Shaky. Overflowing with other people’s emotions and memories. His stomach uneasy with fear and guilt, not sure how much of those belonged to him as opposed to being left over from other people’s.

The blinding hatred hadn’t been his, easy enough to tell because TJ was sure that he wasn’t capable of that kind of thing. Anger, not his either. The fear, there’d been enough of that in this morning’s readings, but it could also be his. Today’s readings hadn’t gone well.

I used to be good at this. I used to be able to do it. Why is it so much harder?

The conversation behind the door continued. His handler’s voice went even more gravelly, like it did when he was trying - and failing - not to lose his temper.

“Look, it’s been nothing but grisly murders and fucking nauseating assaults for two fucking weeks now. The Path’s about to go fucking cuckoo, and I won’t be far behind it, lemme tell you. If you – ”

He broke off. Whoever was on the other side of the phone call must have interrupted.

“Is it too much to ask to get, I don’t know, some fucking tax evasion or shoplifting cases? You can’t tell me every unit you have is on the non-stop murder train,” he growled. “You must have somebody doing something fucking lighter. Swap us out with them for a day or two.”

TJ sipped the juice, the taste of it sour on his tongue. He wished whoever was on the phone would agree. If TJ couldn’t go home to curl up in his cubby, a promise that the next few cases wouldn’t be violent ones would be better than nothing.  Still tiring, still difficult, he still wanted to cry at the thought. But better than nothing.

“Look, it can’t keep doing this. Apparently I’m not fucking allowed to pull the plug on a reading anymore, so what am I supposed to fucking do exactly?”  

TJ traced a finger along one of the scratched lines on the tabletop.  

“Yeah? Oh yeah? Well what about the agency’s fucking reputation when he pukes in the fucking judge’s lap, or when the journos get a nice shot of me hauling his comatose ass out of the courtroom like a sack of – ”

Silence.

“… yes. But –”

More silence.

“I understand that, but fuck it, what am I supposed to –“

The longest silence yet. TJ shivered, clutching his shoulders with his hands.

“Yes. All right. Fine,” his handler said, biting the words off through gritted teeth.

That seemed to be the end of the conversation. After a few moments, TJ heard a quiet thump on the door, like someone had hit it with the palm of their hand or maybe leaned heavily against it.

Another few moments, and then there were three much more deliberate knocking noises. “Blindfold,” his handler called through the door, but TJ was already reaching for the black cloth blindfold across the table.

He had slipped it over his head and settled it over his eyes by the time the door creaked open and his handler’s heavy footsteps entered the room. He smoothed the material across the bridge of his nose, lights dancing against the familiar black for a few seconds, and then settled his hands in front of him on the table.

The handler regarded him in silence for a few seconds. TJ fiddled with the cuff of his undershirt with his fingers, adjusting to the darkness again.

The handler sighed, pushed the plastic of the sandwich packet across the table with a scraping noise. “I told you to eat.”

“Can’t,” TJ said, knowing he sounded sulky, knowing there was nothing he could do about it. “If I eat I’ll throw up.”

“Well, if you don’t, you’ll faint,” the handler growled. His fingers closed around TJ’s wrist, picked it up roughly, shoved the plastic of the sandwich packet under his hand. “Eat the sandwich.”

He settled into the chair opposite TJ, making a lot of noise clattering it against the table as he pulled it out. TJ tried not to wince.

“At least eat half,” the handler added, his voice gentler. “C’mon. You’ll feel better. Half, and if it makes you feel worse you don’t have to eat the rest.”

TJ nodded in surrender. His fingers patted around in the plastic until he found a triangle of bread, and lifted it to his mouth.  

The sandwich was dry. But, he chewed and swallowed the small bite he’d taken, and it went down OK. The taste of ham and cheese reminded him of something – some teasing thread of memory, he wasn’t sure what. Something he’d tasted, or smelt, in the last few days? Was it…

He wrenched his mind away from it firmly. No. Probably not even his memory. Possibly not even food related, and he was queasy enough as it was without getting sucked back into thinking about the first case. He focused on the now. In the now, TJ could feel the hard edge of the chair under his thighs, and the air conditioning blowing gently, cold on the wet strands of hair at his forehead. He could hear little electronic bloops as the handler did something on his phone.

TJ paused between tiny bites of sandwich. “Head office is m-mad?” he asked timidly.

The phone clunked as it was set down on the table. “Nothing to do with you, kid,” the handler said gruffly. “Busy week. You and me, we just do the assigned cases best we can. If head office - ” He cut himself off, with a scraping noise like he’d dragged a hand across something rough.

He picked up the phone and the beeping started again. TJ reached out, and found the juice where he remembered leaving it. He ate in silence for another minute, little nibbles of bread and cheese and ham, while the airconditioning hummed.

“I’m sorry,” TJ whispered.

“What for?”

“F-fucked up today.”

He heard the puff of breath that meant his handler was either annoyed, or stifling amusement. TJ thought the latter this time. “What’d I tell you?”

“Oh. Sorry. I mean, I messed everything up.” Sandwich gone, TJ folded his arms, grasped his elbows with his hands. “I d-didn’t – I didn’t get any of the readings right, I got s-scared and had to stop, a-and I threw up everywhere and, and, and – ”

“Don’t be stupid. You didn’t fuck up, you just...” A tap-tap-tap noise – the handler drumming his fingers on the table. “Look, the readings got done, perps got put away, that’s what counts. This afternoon and tomorrow we’ll try to be neater about it, but it did get done.”

Neater. Yes. Better. TJ sighed, feeling a little reassured. He still felt a little like this was his fault, but if his handler said it wasn’t, that had to be so.

“Feel better?”

TJ considered. He didn’t feel as sick as he had expected to. It did feel good to have something in his stomach, and he felt brighter, more alert. “Yes.” His hand went out again to get the other half of sandwich.

“There, see, I do know what I’m talking about.”

#TJ and Danny #Path Verse #comfort #whump drabble #telepathy #gruff caretaker #blindfolded #my stuff #profanity #dehumanisation #it as a pronoun #See TJ has someone in his corner #too bad being an advocate for his welfare #is uh #exactly nowhere in his job description