#but this all started from the weird train of thought that ectoplasm was created as the slough of life

[redrobin-detective]

Now that I’m a little less out of my mind delirious I can talk about the theory on ectoplasm, ghosts and their formation that I wrote out at 3am and it’s miraculously not total malarkey. 

So basically, energy can be neither created nor destroyed just merely changes forms, yeah? That principle holds here but in most energy transactions some energy is lost (usually in the form of heat or whatever). I proposed that ectoplasm is some of that lost energy but, moreover, it’s anti-life. If all living things were a body, ectoplasm is the dead skin cells left behind. Anything living sheds a sort of energy, the energy of purpose and memory and emotion all these immaterial elements that make up life

This ectoplasm doesn’t really have material form since its more like the psychic aftermath created by the energy of living things. After billion of years of living things, there’s a LOT of ectoplasm being created, so much so that it naturally slipped into the cracks on the universe and formed the Ghost Zone. Anything that goes from living to not ends up there, like a stick being pulled downstream. 

So, living thing dies and you have a soul without a body in the Zone. Most would ‘move on’ and dissolve to become part of the atmosphere of the Zone (if you’re religious you could also say the GZ is like a purgatory where they decide to stay or go and from there would go onto their afterlife of choice.) Souls do not like being without bodies and, strong ones with will and motivation, can take the ambient ectoplasm of the Zone and craft a sort of body to house them. This is a traditional ghost as we know it, about half of all Zone residents. The rest are formed from the Zone having never been properly alive but gaining form from the psychic leftovers of the living, these are usually based on strong ideas and concepts from the real world. If they’re powerful enough, they can gain their own sentience. 

So ghosts are souls holding themselves together, literally, through sheer force of will. They need the ectoplasm to exist, to sustain their body. I imagine a lot would remain in the zone and create their own afterlife there as they contemplate why they couldn’t move on. Some can go to the human world but either can’t or don’t wish to interact, these are most of your haunted areas where there’s something but they’re nothing more than shadow and cant do anything. The ghosts that we see in canon, who are very solid and able to interact in the human world, need to find sustainable ectoplasm outside the Zone. Remember how I said ectoplasm is the slough of living things? Making the living to exert more of their liveliness through emotions or memory triggers produces ectoplasm they can use. Fear, the human desire to stay alive, is a powerful and easy source of ectoplasm which is why a lot of ghosts are out to frighten people. Ectoplasm sustains their form but their obsession, what keeps them from moving on, motivates them so usually their method of gathering ectoplasm/fulfilling obsession overlap. 

I also vaguely was thinking about how ghosts are inherently different from the living thing they came from. Think of it this way, electric passes differently through solid objects vs liquids. The energy of a soul responds differently in a physical body vice an ectoplasm body. It doesn’t automatically make them evil or whatever, it just means they will be changed from their previous self (that’s not even factoring in the traumatizing nature of death on a soul). Ghosts react to things in a way that humans just might not understand and vice versa. 

#danny phantom theories #I know not all of these ideas are unique #but this all started from the weird train of thought that ectoplasm was created as the slough of life #that its the snakeskin or dead skin cells or whatever analogy you want thats a natural biproduct of being alive #that nonphysical psychic energy leftover #idk I'm still kind of workshopping it but I think its kind of interesting #not sure what to do with it haha #not bad for 3am when I think I was getting near the hallucination part of sleep deprivation

[jadedragoness]

Review: Peace Talks

First Read Through Reaction

Now staring off, knowing that the book was essentially part one of two did mean that I went in expecting that there would be plot lines that wouldn’t be resolved. I did NOT expect that nearly zero of the plot lines would be resolved, at all. Yikes. Now, I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy it. I did. But it felt like there were 50 to 60 pages missing that should have been in the story to at least wrap up minor plot lines before heading into ‘Battle Ground’.

Warning: Full of Spoilers

Such the arrival of the Outsiders those Cornerhounds. Um… Outsiders and at no point that Harry wonder why in the hell they were called to Chicago? Or why they were targeting him and Ebenezer. Seriously, unless the author totally forgot we know that Outsiders can only be called by mortals. So human wizards brought them. So was it someone in the ‘Black Council’ or was it the Formor, since we know from previous stories that they grab humans and mind-whammy them and also modify them. And we know that they’ve been pretty focused on grabbing minor practioners for a couple of years now.

Hell, even just knowing why Thomas attacked the svartalf King would have been good to know in the book even if we don’t find out who it was yet.

That being said lets start of with things I didn’t like.

Thing Which I Wasn’t All that Pleased About:

1. Butters in that threesome relationship.

Now, let me explain, it’s not because its a poly relationship. I don’t even twitch over how Justine and Thomas include others in the sexual part of their relationship. It’s because I kept wondering if Marci was even into dudes. As far as I knew she was only into girls. And now she’s suddenly bi?

What the hell?

I think my reaction has a lot to do with how skewed the sexual orientation gradient in shown among Named characters. You have straight men. Straight women. Bi women who are shown to be blatantly into men and women…and that’s it, now.

No lesbian women with zero interest in men. No bi men. No gay men. No asexual characters. No trans characters. No gender fluid people.

I know that this due to the author’s eye and while it hasn’t irritated me much in the past as we keep getting more and more books with more newly introduced characters the lack is becoming more and more glaring to me. Especially, as I have drifted into reading other series that manage to be way more inclusive about this sort of thing in great and amazing ways *sighs happily over Rivers of London series*. And I don’t just mean in passing with random nameless scenery people that never talk which have popped up in the Dresden Files but with actual characters that have names, dialogue and contribute to the series.

So it really, really annoys me that Marci went from being the only lesbian who is a named character to joining the horde of bi women in the DF verse.

Okay, so its not really a Butters issue to much as a grumble about the spectrum of gender and sexually needing better representation.

*grumbles* Step up your game, Butcher.

I will add that I’m head-canoning that actually the relationship here is Butters with Andi, Andi with Butter and Marci, and Marci with Andi. That pretty much with Butters running around being the new Knight Andi didn’t like how her boyfriend wasn’t paying attention and gave Butters the ultimatum of letting Marci in as Andi’s girlfriend or they broke up.

… yeah, I’m totally liking that spin way, way better.

2. That Marcone took forever to show up! ARGH! I love him ok.

Considering how early he was name dropped in the story the amount of time it took him to show up… Jim Butcher is a damn Marcone-tease. *glares hotly in author’s direction*

3. I don’t like it that Murphy is so hurt. I don’t hate it. I think I’m just uneasy about the future implications.

Having reread the entire series before reading ‘Peace Talks’ I fully expected some lingering injury but not to that level. I’m actually worried about her chances of surviving any upcoming battle, and not just in Battle Ground. There’s even more danger coming down the pipeline in future books and she won’t let herself stay ‘safe’ when she could be watching Harry’s back… so its a worrying problem.

Now if she died I have no doubt that her being recruited to be a Valkerie is an option. But then I remembered how those warrior women go out into the world with ‘clients’ and of the two we’ve seen they’ve been attached to ‘monsters’ aka Lara and Marcone.

Unless, the payment isn’t cash and she can be attached to Harry. *hums in thought*

But then I have to wonder how much Murphy would accept that role. She’s also a pretty devout Catholic as this book reminded us so that is also something that would make her say no to the offer.

4. That the younger Wardens who had so looked up to Harry being so damned suspicious… ow. That hurt. I may have teared up and sniffled into a tissue thinking about it. And then sobbed because so much of it came from Carlos… Carlos! The man went into the Deeps with Harry! Ouch.

5. Rudolph… that roach.

Ugh, I’ve had the disturbing thought that now that magic and the supernatural on the path to being exposed to all of humanity, scared humanity too, that will end up with a resurgence of a new Inquisition and the killing of anything eldritch. And you know that Rudolph would definitely be in it. *shudders in disgust* Creep.

BTW I totally don’t believe that Rudolph answers to Marcone. It doesn’t make sense as to why he was so pushy go get Harry during ‘Changes’. I had thought he was answering to the Red Court but with them being taken out of the picture… now I wonder if he isn’t answerable to the Black Council.

Things I Did Not Expect:

1. Damn… when Ebenezer sent that spell through Harry and ‘killing’ I was so shocked even though I was pretty sure there was a twist coming. Mostly because of what it says about Ebenezer.

Ebenezer actions killed Harry.

Sure it was a fake body that brought no harm to the real Harry. But if Harry hadn’t thought ahead? If he hadn’t used his brain to ask Molly to create a fake? Eb would have killed his own grandson.

Sure it was an accident but it could so easy have resulted in a dead Harry. I was crying so hard I wondered if my eyeballs were loosening in their sockets. Argh.

2. Bonea…. Harry your naming skills are simply weird. I’m so glad that Susan named Maggie.

Although Bonnie is a pretty great nickname.

Thinks I Found Utterly Hilarious

1. The line about the best offense being a T-Rex? Gold. Pure gold.

2. When Harry figured out there are angels in the hilt of the Swords of the Cross and Butter’s immediate reaction of horror because he’d accidentally laundered the hilt, giving it a ride in a washing machine.

OMG! I had the instant image of a miniature angel screaming and growing dizzy when going through the spin cycle.

I know that makes no sense but that’s where my mind went, okay.

3. The conjuritis. Omg, it’s so gross with all the ectoplasm leaking from Harry’s nose but it’s sooooo funny. Also the way he kept getting the ‘aren’t you too old for this’ from Ebenezer and then Lara made me giggle even harder.

Then I thought: dude, it’s like chicken pox, something you got as a kid but if you never had it you get it when exposed later in life. So one of his kids has it. Probably Maggie too.

4. When Sanya pretended to have his hand lopped off. I straightened up and was so worried Sanya had lost a hand. Then when I realized he was pretending to freak out Butters and Harry I admit to laughing way too hard. Got me too.’

Also there’s no way that Sanya was actually defeated there. He’s younger and better trained then Butters, I don’t care how light (Heh) the new sword is. He definitely threw that fight to test his hunch.

5. Murphy’s inability to handle being flirted on with a red-headed warrior woman. Sooooo funny. I mean, Murphy could have said a number of things such as ‘I’m exclusive.’ or ‘I’m not interested in women.’ But she just floundered. Heh heh.

6. I continue to find it completely hilarious that Lara, a couple of centuries old vampire, seems to keep learning a lot of power moves from Marcone.

Such as: having trained fighters that are NOT food, well… mostly. Having those mines installed in the walls. And now hiring a Valkerie of her very own.

I keep thinking, yeah, there’s no way she’d win in a fight against Marcone because there’ s no way that Marcone has let slip all of his tricks.

Things I Really, Really Liked:

1. Marcone. Everything Marcone. *heart-eyes*

And then he proves why he’s so damned scary by standing up to the Titan. Then to the ghouls. Then after proving his bad-ass quotient if off the charts he gets everyone organized to fight.

Yeeessss… It proves to me that when it comes to protecting Chicago he is actually the best person after Harry. Hell, in some ways he’s better than Harry. Now, I’m not saying he’s a white knight or anything like that. Just that he has the intelligence, the ruthlessness, the will, the power and the men to provide the most protection to the city’s mortal denizens. At least when there’s a war raging with multiple enemies who will be attacking at various points.

And oh, I can’t wait to see how he’s going to get revenge for the death of his people. Omg, he’s going to kill the Formor so hard. *goes starry eyed thinking about more Marcone*

But why did he have to appear so late in the book?! *wails in a heart-rending fashion*

There better be a ton more Marcone in the next book! *makes desperate gimme gimme hands*

No, I don’t have a Marcone addiction… I can stop anytime I want to. *sneaks off to mainline some “Even Hand” straight into the brain*

2. The return of Goodman Grey! Oh, I hope he’s around a lot! I’ve really grown to like him.

<b>Things Which Blew My Mind or Were Just Freaking Awesome: </b>

1. Dad!Harry is actually the most amazing Harry. Forget the magic flinging and the fire storms… this is the best Harry.

Just the way he takes care of his kids…. *turns to mush like ectoplasm*

2. Murphy and Harry are finally together! Yay! Yay! Hip hip hooray!

Now, I’m a rather shameless Marcone/Dresden fic writer, but as I never ever expect this to be canon I’m content to write it as fanfic for my own sense of delight. However when it comes to canon I’m full on board with the Karrin and Harry relationship. Be it friendship or romantic, I think its great.

3. Marcone… that is all.

Random Speculation

1. I find myself wondering about Ebenezer’s rage against vampires. And my brain muttered this theory: Maybe Harry’s grandmother was killed by White Court vampires.

Whoa.

It would explain the vitrolic rage.

And if Lara was involved it would also explain her flash of shame.

We don’t know anything about Harry’s grandmother, not even her name. So… that’s a thought.

2. River Shoulders teaching Harry.

Oh man, oh man, I hope Harry learns shape-shifting.

And thinking about it I had to wonder if the animal-shifting had anything to do with knowing the animal in question which of course made me think…

Harry should learn to shape-shift into a T-Rex.

He already knows how one is put together and the mind of one. And he knows that it’s possible to add extra mass to a shift from the Nevernever in the form of ectoplasm… so

Harrysarous Rex, baby…. I may have to write a fic with this premise.

3. Oh, if it’s possible to make a ectoplasmic body can Harry learn to make one for Bonea? After all Maggie would probably really enjoy getting to play with her little sister that way. Even if Harry can’t do it all the time and it wouldn’t last longer than a day. That would be delightful.

4. Okay, not this is more head-canon than speculation but… considering how hard Harry has been made to be analogous to Merlin I can’t help but wonder if Marcone is suppose to be Arthur’s analogue. So wielding Amorrachius *coughs*Excalibur*coughs* would make sense.

…it’s not just my Marcone-love talking dammit.

Speaking of Merlin, I’m convinced that he’s behind this whole ‘starborn’ thing. Seriously, otherwise its way too convenient that a wizard with that power is born every 666 years. It smacks of a spell.

And if that’s the case it also feeds into my pet theory that the whole reason we have Outsides at the Gates is because Merlin was the schmuck who drew them to our reality in the first place. And everything surrounding the war with the Outsiders are his attempts to try to fix what he broke.

*lost in pondering thoughts*

Things I Have Questions About

1. Did Harry forget he has The Ways Map from his mother? I would have thought he would have figured out a way (heh) to get to the island somehow. He was on it for so long I thought for sure he’d spend time exploring it. Also we knew from ‘Skin Game’ that even tiny factors can change where the Way goes in the Nevernever. I doubt the ENTIRE island has Ways that lead to a bad place. Especially for Harry now that he’s the Warden.

2. Also why didn’t Harry get Lea to help him? After all unless she’s moved it since ‘Changes’ her garden is still on the other side of the sub-basement.

3. What did Lara use that first favor from Mab on? *eyes her suspiciously*

4. Where are the Za Lord’s Guard? *wondering about what been happening with Lacuna and Toot-toot*

5. If Harry gets kicked out of the White Council (good riddance, since they haven’t exactly been all that helpful lately) can he get enough signatures to be added as a member of the Accords in his own right? After all being Warden of Demonreach has got to mean a lot to the older members.

Then he wouldn’t be reliant on Mab’s protection.

I can’t help but hope this proves to be the case, especially if in ‘Battle Ground’ Harry ends up taking down that Titan. Because he needs as much protection and influence he can gather if he’s no longer White Council to protect himself, his people and his kids. Especially if he eventually gets rid of that Winter Knight mantle like I hope he does.

6. How in the hell (pardon the pun) did evil demon Sasquatch survive being turned to mush by Hade’s Ice Gate? Or the shades that were part of the security system that almost got Harry?

*frowns* The only reason I can think of would be the coin of Ursiel being the factor. I doubt a Fallen Angel is allowed to stick around in the Greek realm of the afterlife.

7. WHERE IS BOB?! Seriously, if Butters doesn’t give him back...

#peace talk spoilers #the dresden files #john marcone #full of speculation #can't wait for more #harry blackstone copperfield dresden #karrin murphy #spoilers #the dresden files spoilers

[tired-college-student-writing]

Here we go Loopty Loo

Summary: Graduation was supposed to signal the final time they all spent time together at UA, to show they have all grown into the Heros they dreamed of being.

It was supposed to be, but when has anything ever been easy for class 1-A?

Pt1 (HERE)

Pt2

___________________________________________

Loop #82

___________________________________________

Aizawa blinked sluggishly as he pulled his head from his podium and gazed across the classroom with critical eyes. The entire class appeared to slowly be waking up, some at their desks, some from the positions on the floor that they had collapsed into when their sudden lapse of consciousness hit.

Now, Normally, Aizawa would be on high alert in a situation like this, especially on the first day with his new first years, but this was different.

“I get to start with you guys this time,” Shinso piped up, staggering to his feet from where he had been laying in front of Momo’s desk, “Look like all 20 of us are here so no Gen Ed to worry about, or trying to hide anything from someone.”

“That’s a relief,” Mina sighed leaned back, in her seat, “Last time it was such a pain trying to act surprised at the LOV crashing things for Mei’s sake.”

“Momo,” Aizawa cut in, “If you will.”

The girl simply nodded and turned her back to the class as Sato and Shoji moved to stand with their backs to her, blocking her from view entirely as she pulled her shirt up and created the usual items, a large collapsible whiteboard and an array of colorful markers.

Deku silently handed her his lunch in exchange for the items as he and Iida quickly set up the offered materials.

“We all know the rules,” Iida started, writing a large 82 at the top of the board and quickly listing off the rules below, “but I’ll restate them anyways if you would like to complain about this take it up with Sero who forgot to inform us that he was a descendent of All for One in Loop #24 and ended up leaving the LOV quirkless after they tried to kidnap Denki.”

Aizawa simply zoned out at this point, knowing he’d be called in to inform the room of the changes he could recall at the end. It was ritual at this point, though they still could not figure out why they were looping.

When they had first started no one had said anything. Confused past their limits on why they felt like they were doing everything over again, trying hard not to change anything. It wasn’t until the third loop did they realize that while the rest of the world seemed to run as it always did, the nineteen teens and teacher were reliving the years the hero’s spent at high school over and over again.

Mineta seemed to be the only student in 1-A not to remember their previous loops, which made it easier kicking that annoying little grape to the curb the second he could justify it. Luckily during the third loop, Midoriya outshone his original first assessment making it easy for Aizawa to expel the lowest ranking member of their class. When Shinsou had made it into their class before the Sports festival that loop the boy had looked nearly sick.

On the fourth loop, they realized why when he was placed directly into their class at the beginning of the year and he nearly had a panic attack. Not that they could blame him, they had all gone through a similar fate earlier in the loops. Since then they rarely saw Mineta, but having the exact same class every time was never a guarantee.

In fact, there seemed to be very little rules to this whole looping business they have found themselves in.

The class was often the 20 that they had currently, but not always, sometimes having one or more of them fighting out from the Gen Ed classes, or even having another student placed with them.

They were often awoken on the first day before the first Quirk Assessment, but sometimes they wake up earlier, though rarely do they wake up after the assessment. While they had awoken as early as Aizawa’s third year in UA, leaving all of the students forced to grow up from age two with teenage memories, the latest they had ever woken up was after Deku and Bakugo’s first fight.

They almost always were planning their respective roles as students and teachers in UA training to be heroes, quirks, and appearances intact, but every once in a while…

“The Bakusquad have all switched quirks,” Mina called once the rules were listed, “I have Electrification, Denki got Hardening, Katsuki got Acid, Hanta got Explosion and Eijiro got Tape.”

Tenya nodded, “I believe that the Dekusquad is the same, with the exceptions of Tsu and Izuku, seeing as I have zero gravity.  Shoto and Ochaco?”

“Endeavor was very mad when my exhaust pipes popped out,” The still split haired boy said with a slight grin, “He was sure I’d be his perfect child with my appearance.”

“How pissed is he going to be when I use Half-Cold Half-Hot during the SPorts festival?” Ochaco asked, letting ice and fire form on her hands, curiously on the opposite sides to Shoto.

“Enough that we’ll want all the pictures,” Izuku chimed in, “I still have One for All, so no need to worry about that. Anyone else switch?”

Turns out that yes, this was a quirk shuffling loop. Shinsou, Kyoka, Ojiro, Momo, Toru, and Sato all kept their quirks the same, but while Koda and Shoji had kept their appearances, the tall boy now possessed Anivoice while the shy boy could transform all his limbs and even spout additional limbs if he wished.

The other switch that made the entire class start laughing however was when Dark Shadow made an appearance, only for the source not to be the blushing emo bird-like they all expected.

No, the shadow appeared from Yuga, the boy still twinkling with mirth as Fumikage mumbled the confirmation that he possessed Navel Laser.

Slowly the entire classroom came back to each other, after all this wasn’t the oddest thing they’ve had to deal with during the loops. No other relevant information surfaced, as the students voiced other minor changes they could remember.

Finally, they turned to Aizawa with a single question on their mind. He decided to draw it out some.

“Seems like I’m dating Tensei this time,” He hummed, “I also have a ring stashed away, but worried it would be weird to propose with Tenya in my class.”

Iida snorted, “Interesting, We’ll talk about how to ask him later. Now answer the question, sensei.”

“What question?”

“Oh come on Sensei,” Denki groaned, “Do you still have erasure?”

“Ah,” He hummed, scratching his cheek in thought, “Nope,”

Before his students could start pestering further, the door swung open and All Might popped in, “I AM HERE!”

“Yagi!” The teens cheered as the hero powered down, his thousand-watt smile not dimming in the slightest.

The skeleton of a man had apparently been looping with them from the start, even though it took them much longer to notice then it probably should have, even if the kind man had forgiven them entirely too easy for leaving him on his own until they all noticed in the twelfth loop. Now he was practically Aizawa’s co-homeroom teacher, encouraging all of the students to call him Toshinori, though they usually stuck to his family name as they did with Aizawa.

Izuku squinted at him, always the first to notice the difference with the older man, “You’re not quirkless.”

Heads snapped up as the blond man let out a full belly laugh, “Nope, it looks like the previous users shuffled quirks around a tiny bit, my boy.”

“Neat,” Aizawa said from behind the current #1. The man yelped, coughing blood slightly making the excited whispers from the students cease as they slowly turned back to where Aizawa still leaned against the podium on the other side of the room.

“Oh shit,” Shinsou mumbled, only to jump as another copy appears behind him, smacking the back of his head lightly.

“Language.”

“Copy,” Iida hummed, jotting it down, “Though it seems to work different then Ectoplasm’s clones. Anything else we should know?”  

One copy of the homeroom teacher shrugged, “Hizashi named me Agent Emulation this time.”

The one still leaning on the podium gave a slight smile, “I like Eraserhead better, but oh well.”

“Oh you’ve almost finished,” Toshinori said reading over the list, “This should be an interesting loop.”

“Just need your contribution, Toshi,” The clone next to All Might hummed, “So which of the six or seven quirks do you have on top of One for All?”

Instead of answering, the blond wrapped an arm around the clone and started floating towards the ceiling, earning a startled yelp as the Aizawa wrapped around him in shock.

Midoriya smiled sadly at the display, “Float, Nana’s quirk.”

After so many loops, there wasn’t much the group didn’t know about each other, so no one commented on the late-mentor, as Yagi slowly sank back to the floor with a chuckle as the clone dissipated in his grip with Aizawa pouting at the front of the room.

“Anything else to add?” he grumbled with no real heat.

“Oh!” Yagi said as if remembering, “I’m married in this go around!”

“Ooooh,” Toru cooed, “Who is it? Is it David or Tsukauchi this time?”

Yagi laughed a little uncomfortably, “Actually it’s Atsuhiro Sako, better known as Mr. Compass. It seems neither one of us is aware of the others… activities.”

“WHAT!?”

___________________________________________

So this is just a fun little story I’m gonna have fun with. Each chapter will be a loop or multiple loops exploring similar topics and just being all around fun and slightly cracky. 

Feel free to suggest an idea if you have one!

#bnha #boku no academia #aizawa shoto #yagi toshinori #midoriya izuku #bakugou katsuki #iida tenya #todoroki shōto #mina ashido #all of class 1-a #execpt for the grape #time loop #AU

[a-n-conrad]

Fighting and Flirting (Bakugo x Reader)

Chapter 24: Tension

[Summary: You said something you didn’t mean to let slip, and now you don’t know what to do. While you pick back up with training, there’s a bit of extra drama that you have to work through.]

Masterlist

Wait. Wait, shit. You didn’t mean to say that. Why would you just blurt that out? He didn’t need to hear that you loved him, he had other things to focus on right now. Besides, you didn’t need to make things awkward, right now. You had just gotten him back and you were going to screw it up.

“Shit, I’m sorry, Katsuki, I-” you started scrambling to apologize. You really didn’t think that through before you said it. You didn’t know what to do. You didn’t know how he’d react. Shit. 

He opened his mouth to say something, and you could feel your whole body tense up. Honestly, with everything that was going on recently, you had no idea how you’d handle his reaction. You didn’t exactly have time to deal with mourning a friendship that you lost. You were honestly relieved when you were interrupted by a knock on the door.

“Hey, Bakugo? Is (Y/n) in there? I can’t find her and it’s time to eat,” You could hear Kirishima ask through the door.

“Oh, yeah, we were just talking,” You responding, heading to the door, before frantically adding, “I’ll talk to you later, Katsuki.”

You closed the door behind you a little harder than you meant to. Kirishima looked a little confused, so you figured that your tone was a bit more frantic than you meant for it to be, too. He didn’t ask about it, though, and you really appreciated that. You were sure he’d figure it out himself.

- - - - -

FROM HIS PERSPECTIVE

She left Bakugo alone in the room after that, and he was too shocked to move. Why was she so quick to leave? Did she really mean what she said or did she just say that to make him feel better? She always did try to make him feel better, even if he didn’t like to admit it. He hated admitting that she actually helped him. Not because he didn’t want help from her, but because he didn’t want help at all.

Was that all it was, though? A way to make him feel better? Why else would she be so quick to apologize? Obviously she said it to make him feel better, before realizing how cruel it was to lie to him about that. Right? 

But that wasn’t really what she was like. She didn’t just say things like that. And even when she did try to lie, she wasn’t very good at it. She always looked guilty. She didn’t this time. She looked like she meant it. 

He was confused and he didn’t really know how to handle it. Did she mean it? If she meant it, where would they even go from there? Did he feel the same for her? Did he even know what that felt like? To be honest, Bakugo had never really loved someone like that before. He hadn’t even had crushes in middle school. He was too focused on getting into UA, and relationships would just distract him. 

He had to admit the way he felt for her wasn’t something he’d felt before, so maybe he did feel the same way. And in all fairness, she’d be a distraction to him either way. She distracted him the whole semester already, and obviously it hadn’t slowed him down that much. 

Maybe he just needed to talk to her. That always seemed to help him figure things out. Yeah. That’d help. He just had to talk to her about it the next chance he got.

- - - - -

You went to bed early that night. The rest of your classmates decided they wanted to judge each other’s rooms, and you were a bit too out of it to participate. Shoto had actually insisted you head back to your room. Apparently, you had seemed so jittery and spaced out that he and Deku had decided that they’d drag you to Recovery Girl if you didn’t head to bed.

You honestly didn’t think you could sleep. All you could do was sit awake thinking about what you’d do next. To be honest, the more you thought about, the less you wanted to do anything. You knew you couldn’t tell anyone. There was no way they’d understand why you couldn’t just talk it out with Katsuki, but you couldn’t talk to him about it. You were so scared of the rejection that was pretty much inevitable, that you were sure you were going to have a heart attack of you thought about it any longer.

A swarm of butterflies started to fly around your room. You hadn’t even noticed you were making them until your room started to light up with the soft glow they were putting off. You really were stressed about this.

- - - - -

The next day you were back to training. You hadn’t gotten a lot of sleep, but you welcomed the distraction. And as Aizawa explained your assignment you were excited to get to work. You’d be working on specialty moves, which would obviously take a lot of time. And since you had only ten days to do it, stressing out about that would at least give you a reason to be as stressed as you were. 

Aizawa sent you all away to go change into your hero costumes before heading back to Gym Gamma, and you honestly couldn’t help but feel a bit less tense, even if it only was for a moment.

Your good mood was interrupted when someone grabbed your wrist, though. You felt your heart drop as you turned to find Katsuki looking at you. He looked nervous, and you could feel your heart break a little. He lowered his voice to talk to you, “Hey, can I talk to you?”

“Ah, sorry, I really should go get changed,” You say before you can even think about it. You know you’re really just drawing things out for yourself, but you really can’t bring yourself to face it just yet. You really just needed- well, you didn’t know what you needed, but you didn’t want to face Katsuki just you. 

“Yeah, I know, but do you think we could walk and talk? It shouldn’t hold us up too long,” You could tell he was trying to be gentle with you, and that only made you more anxious. 

“Sorry, Bakugo,” You could see confusion enter his eyes when you said the name. Normally, you would’ve backtracked, but maybe it was better this way, “I, uh, wanna get some illusion practice in while I walk and I need to focus.”

You can tell that he knew you were lying, but you really weren’t about to do anything about it. You freed yourself from the grasp he had on your wrist, it wasn’t tight, so it was easy to get out of, and pretty much jogged away. You could pretty much feel his confusion as you left, though you really couldn’t bring yourself to do anything about it.

- - - - -

Training was a good distraction. Cementoss had reshaped the gym in order for you all to have a little space to work, and most of you had gotten a clone from Ectoplasm to work with. That meant that you didn’t have to work with any of your classmates, and that meant that you wouldn’t have to explain any of your weird moods to them.

You honestly had no clue what kind of specialty move you’d be able to do. To be completely honest, you kind of hoped you’d be able to do something that would be a little more physical. Maybe you’d be able to figure something out, but mostly, it’s likely you’d just end up making some sort of disorientation move.

Either way, you started out with some sparring. And you had to admit, maybe you were going a little harder than you ever thought you could. You threw punches harder than you ever had before and maybe imagining the face of Tomura Shigaraki replacing the face of Ectoplasm had something to do with that. God, you wanted to punch him. 

You were really getting fed up and angry, and the scar on your face was burning just thinking about the villains, despite the illusion you had been keeping up over it. You swept his legs out from under him, and with a single stomp to the chest, the clone you were working with was destroyed.

Ectoplasm sent you another clone, though you noted that it came with a bit of a concerned look. You figured you should probably actually try to think up a new move with this one, or you were sure you’d end up in a meeting with Principal Nezu.

To be honest, your best illusion so far was your stealth one. The only issue was that it took a lot of effort to keep up with all of your movements. Maybe if you could find a way to think of a way to make it apply more to your opponent in a way that would make it easier for you to keep it up longer and do it more often.

You sat and worked it out for a little while. Maybe, if you could just create a bubble with an illusion wrapping around the person it would disorient them enough to fight them. You could make it look like the illusion from the inside and clear on the outside so that you could still see the person you were fighting. All you had to do was think of an illusion that would disorient someone enough for them to lose their ability to fight back, though you had to admit that this strategy would likely only work if you could isolate a single person.

After a few rounds of fighting, you finally found one. You had to get rid of all of the landmarks that they’d based their directions off of, but if you just made it go black, they wouldn’t spend as much time looking around. You needed to distract them along with disorienting them. So eventually, you settled on the illusion that worked best to disorient Ectoplasm, which happened to be a galaxy design. The stars and swirls of color made it a little harder for someone to focus on trying to find their way around purely based on their other senses, and that left them with no extra focus for them to try and figure out where you were. Your last trial with the ectoplasm clone ended up with him accidentally walking so close to the edge of your platform that all you had to do was push him off.

It would work well enough as long as you could get one opponent separated, and as long as they didn’t have some other way of navigating. You just had to practice it a bit more so it would be easier to do multiple times. But it was time for you to head back to the dorms for the day, and you needed to get ahead of your classmates to hopefully avoid the awkward conversations.

- - - - -

FROM HIS PERSPECTIVE

It was pretty obvious that she was avoiding him. Maybe she really didn’t mean what she said. Or maybe there was something else going on. There wasn’t exactly a way for him to ask her about it, and it was seriously starting to piss him off. 

“Yo, Bakugo,” Kirishima walked up to him as he watched (Y/n) basically run to the dorms, “What’s up with (Y/n) recently?”

“Fuck if I know, Shitty hair,” He growled, “She’s obviously fucking avoiding me.”

“Why don’t you just talk to one of her friends? I’m sure they know what’s up. Like Todoroki or Deku have to know what’s going on.”

“There’s no way I’m asking the nerd or Icyhot for anything!”

“Whatever, man. That’s up to you.”

He supposed it might help, though the thought of having to ask one of them for help made him feel a little sick and incredibly angry. Maybe it was worth it though. Not talking to her was starting to make him… what was the term? Anxious? Sad? Whatever. He didn’t like it. Maybe he could just find a way to ask them without actually making it seem like he needed their help.

Luckily for him, he didn’t actually need to go looking for them. Apparently Deku had an extra bit of confidence today and pulled him away from the group walking towards the dorms to talk to him.

“Kacchan, what happened with (Y/n)?” Deku asked, he looked legitimately concerned, “She’s been really out of it since you guys talked yesterday.”

“God, why does everyone keep asking me this shit? Why does everyone think I did something?” 

Deku looks around to make sure no one else is around before asking, “Did you reject her?”

“What?”

“I thought she’d hold off on telling you for a while. Please tell me you weren’t too harsh on her.”

“Why the hell do you think I rejected her? Why do you even think she’d ask me out, Deku?”

“Because, the only reason she’d start avoiding you is if you hurt her like that. She just talked to me about this a while ago, Kacchan,” Deku sighed. This was honestly one of the only times the two of them had talked without Deku being afraid of him. It was strange.

“You just talked about what? She actually likes me? I thought she was lying.”

“You rejected her because you thought she was lying? You know she’s not that good of a liar.”

“I didn’t reject her, damn it! I didn’t even get a chance to respond and she hasn’t talked to me since! That why I thought she was lying!”

Deku looked a bit surprised at his outburst, which was odd. The outburst itself wasn’t odd, so maybe it was just what he said. He supposed Deku really thought he just rejected her. Honestly, he shouldn’t be surprised that Deku thought he’d hurt her like that. 

“I think you just need to find a way to talk to her, Kacchan. I’m sure it’s just a misunderstanding. Please, don’t hurt her, though.”

“Why do you care so much, Deku?” He snapped.

“Because she’s my friend. And I don’t want her to get hurt.”

- - - - -

It had been a few days since training started, and it was getting pretty close to when you’d have to take the provisional hero license exam. You still couldn’t sleep, and the anxious feeling in your stomach still wouldn’t leave. In fact, it was getting worse. You had been actively avoiding Katsuki, and you could tell he was getting frustrated with it, and the exam coming up wasn’t exactly calming your nerves.

Anyway, all of this is just to explain why you tiptoeing past all of your classmates’ rooms to go to the kitchen at one in the morning. You needed to move, you needed some space, and you needed a drink. You were sure your eyes were red from both a lack of sleep and from crying, and you hadn’t bothered putting up the illusion over the scar on your face, but it didn’t really matter. You were alone. Or, at least you thought you were.

It wasn’t until after you made your way into the kitchen and had gotten yourself a glass of water that he made his presence known. You nearly jumped out of your skin when he cleared his throat. 

“What are you doing up so late?” The very familiar voice asked. You lived in the same building as him, you really had to be stupid to think you could avoid him forever.

“I can ask you the same thing, Katsuki? Don’t you always go to bed early?”

“I couldn’t sleep,” he muttered. You still hadn’t turned to face him, but you could hear him sit down at the counter behind you, “Can you please talk to me?”

Your heart was pounding, but you knew you couldn’t avoid the conversation forever, “What even is there to talk about, Katsuki? I was an idiot and I said something I shouldn’t have and I ruined any chance at friendship I had.”

“You didn’t ruin anything, Sunshine, you just didn’t give me a chance to respond,” He sighed, “Why does everyone assume I’m going to reject you?”

“You just never really seemed interested, Katsuki.”

“I know at least three people that disagree with that. Seriously, I can’t get Mina to leave me alone about you,” He chuckles a little, “I understand if you changed your mind, (Y/n), I’m not exactly ‘boyfriend material’, but I’m not rejecting you.”

You finally turned to face him at that point, “Really?”

“Yeah, really, you dork. I’d like it if you’d go out with me sometime when we get a chance.”

“Of course, ‘Suki,” You really couldn’t stop yourself from nearly jumping to hug him. You’d be lying if you said you didn’t miss him. And you can tell he felt the same when he relaxed into the hug. 

Taglist: @ohnosiren @thatpersonwithissues @winchester-wifey

[A/N: Sorry this chapter took so long to put out. There’s a lot going on in this world, but if you have a bit of spare change to throw at a writer, Venmo me at user Al3x13l. All money I get through venmo before eithher the protests end or before July 4th (whichever comes first) will go to Black Lives Matter related funds.]

#bnha #mha #bnha x reader #katsuki bakugo x reader #mha x reader #bnha katsuki bakugou #bakugo

[phantomphangphucker]

Ectober Day 6 & 24: Silence & Nothing - Nothing To Ring In The Sound Of Silence

Logic says nothing gets to exist forever, but Danny has made a habit of defying both logic and the laws of the universe. But that’s just Danny, not everything or everyone else.

*Note: So I combined these two days in this fic because it just flowed so damn well for me. Originally this was just supposed to be for ‘Silence’ but it evolved. I didn’t really feel it long enough to break into two chapters.

It’s been a long time. A long time since everything happened. A long time since there’s been anyone. Danny stops in his floating to stare at the dilapidated statue of himself, speaking purely to hear sound, “the world’s been silent a long time”.

It hadn’t happened suddenly, of course it hadn’t. That was part of how Danny knew in his gut that he might not be able to do anything. See Danny’s problems, his fights and the catastrophes he stopped, they always popped up suddenly with great alarm. But the slow decay and breaking down of everything’s genetics had crept up on everyone.

It had started with the oldest of creatures and things. Old world ferns and bugs and birds. No one gave much of a damn besides those who truly loves those things. Sure some people mourned the extinctions, but humans had been driving things to extinction for a long time. Most of the world even rejoiced when misquotes seemed to get hit, but the fields of science went into a panic. Because with that drop, so too did many others decline in numbers; bats most notably.

But it wasn’t until some fruit plants started to go that the rest of the world began to worry. There had already been a food crisis and this would make it worse. Other people only cared that they would never get to eat another banana or leaf of lettuce again.

But the commotion was enough to get Danny curious. If this had started back when Sam was still alive, he would have paid attention sooner. But it had been a long time since her, or Tucker, or even Amity. It had hurt when the town had to be abandoned, no longer able to financially support all the excessive damage. Course Danny still protected the place, but repairs didn’t happen much. Leaving the place too destroyed to be inhabitable by humans. But Danny was part ghost, something stagnant, something that didn’t do ‘change’. So he never really left, just made Amity his lair in genuine. Modifying and altering it as he pleased. The roads glowed, the nasty burger always had ectoplasmic food even if no one worked there, buildings began repairing themselves, colours changed according to the halfas mood, etcetera. The rest of the world was perfectly content to let their saviour do as he pleased with the place and it even became something of a tourist hotspot and shrine to Phantom.

But it was also firmly a place no one wanted to actually stay in, catering to Phantom and Phantom alone. And he was weird, he’d always been weird. But after a few hundred years being stuck in between life and death. After losing all his human connections and many of his ghostly ones. He became a little too weird for most of humanity to handle long term. The snapping of fangs, the paranoia, the ease with which he could become a soldier on the battlefield, the utter disregard for his own safety, the treating of serious injuries like old friends and minor annoyances. He was too weird for most ghosts as well, the exception being other older ghosts. But most of those older ghosts were too stick in the mud or loners to be close with Phantom. An endlessly social, silly ghost filled with good-natured trickery and wanderlust. His lair was much the same, prone to playing tricks of the eye or leading people in circles. Sometimes disabling other ghosts powers at random or stealing their things only to return them as soon as the ghost left. The food that grew there, only appealing to Phantom himself. Mustard pickles that tasted of flowers, milkshakes made of frosted flakes that were somehow smooth not crunchy, apples that screamed with the texture of strawberry mousse. So while the place got plenty curious eyes and worshiping filled minds, it didn’t get any permanent residents. Other than the famous half-ghost himself.

And Danny didn’t really mind the silence, the chance to be alone, that his abandoned ghost town of a lair now granted him. It was a nice break from the constant action and sounds of battle that was his everyday life. So he relished it, the silence, the same way he relished floating lazily through the starry sky.

Smiling with nostalgia, Danny lands on the roof of the nasty burger, ghostly tail curling around the sign. Now Amity stood as one of the few places that wasn’t destroyed, that hadn’t crumbled to rot and litter. The irony of that makes Danny laugh. As he puts his head in his hand and looks up at the clear starry sky, light pollution no longer possible. He’d never thought he’d be upset about that. But he is. He is because of what it means. The lack of electricity, the lack of importance for it, the lack of humans, the lack of need for it. Danny’d always adored his night vision, did even more now, but what he wouldn’t give to get slightly blinded and startled by a fluorescent lightbulb suddenly going off. This thought gets Danny floating off the building to poke at a few lightbulbs. Sure electric had stopped being a thing in Amity long before the rest of the world. He had basically told everyone not to bother, seeing as he could and did just light the place with ectolights. What he hadn’t expected was having to eventually light the whole world with them. Now, well, now he didn’t even bother. There was no one or thing to make light for.

Danny himself hadn’t paid attention to, hadn’t really worried about, what was happening until the platypus went extinct. Other mammals rapidly following suit. And when the canines and felines got hit, that’s when the chaos started. When everyone started giving a damn in genuine. When the research got funded like crazy and became the focal point of news or awards.

Danny himself helped out by finding things for the scientist faster than any other person really could and bringing it back faster than even the best hovercoppers or jets could. This was the point where Danny managed to throw the world through another loop, surprise everyone again. No one really knew he was easily as intelligent as his sister, that his mind couldn’t decay because of his halfa state. Couple that with his body being constantly covered in a hazmat suit and being naturally antibacterial, well he was extremely helpful for the scientific and medical community. But Danny couldn’t help much when medicines couldn’t be made any more or when plastic became increasingly rare.

That was another thing about Danny and his problems. They came at him head-on and he faced them head-on. It was a battle, always something he could physically do. But not this time. This had been something marching forward slowly, decaying and eating away at all of life. So Danny did the thing he knew best and looked for ghostly reasons. Searched the Zone for any clues. And that, that’s when he truly began to worry, to freak out. Because the Zone wasn’t getting bigger, it wasn’t gaining any of the dead souls. Sure not everything that died became part of the Zone, but usually at least a third did. For nothing to be going to the Zone? That was more than just worrying, that was logically impossible. Asking around didn’t yield any results, and ClockWork had been concerningly impossible to find. In fact, Danny recalls, ClockWork had been impossible to find ever since then. Which makes him shiver, the implications of that were deeply concerning. Even if the enigmatic time ghost was supposedly immortal, like Danny. He’d even tried finding the other Ancients for answers, to no luck.

By the time he had hopped back into the mortal realm, the scientists had figured it out.

ClockWork had once told him that everything you see, everything you touch, all of it. Everything had a time limit. Everything was at the mercy of time. Even something as simple as genetics or air. And that time was apparently up. Everything’s genetics were functionally breaking down, Mother Nature being unable to reform it anew.

Danny remembers asking if they could reverse it, cloning was perfectly viable now just incredibly immoral and thus illegal. But of course, exceptions were made, except it didn’t work. No matter what they did the clones were never stable. Even cloning things as basic as chemicals failed. It’s chemical makeup or genetics turning to useless goo near instantly. As if forming those things lost was no longer even possible. In the end, Danny wasn’t too surprised, considering what he knew of Dani and her fate. Though a clone of him she had been, she wasn’t immortal, she was never truly stable. Eventually needing more and more treatments till it simply no longer lasted more than minutes. The two had made an agreement, had decided to let her fade with the closest thing to a father she ever truly had. And the closest thing to a daughter Danny would ever have. It would be unfair to bring a child into his half-life intentionally, so he never did and never would. That was a night he had grieved harder than almost any other before it, the ghosts and humans morning the loss with him, knowing exactly who and what the little black and white halfa girl was.

So with cloning written off, they had tried to create near exact replicas. Slightly changing things to try and achieve something stable yet similar enough to the original. There was some success on the smallest level before some extinct plants and missing medications became a lesser worry. Because then, then humans started to fall. Birth rates fell, till eventually there wasn’t a single baby in months. People started dying younger and younger. Started being unable to heal even paper-cuts or recover from the simplest of colds. Everyone became highly trained in first aid purely to keep their own bodies from falling apart on them. Synthetic skin and bones had never been more popular. Bionic limbs became so commonplace that seeing someone without any biometal was startling.

Danny did his part by being a highly mobile medical expert and being a pioneer in Biomech. Seeing as his very specialty was self accessing and self-treating injuries. Sure he frequently had to remind himself that these were humans and that they absolutely could not regrow limbs or liquify parts of their bodies to make reforming breaks easier. But he made it work and his knowledge had been vital for the survival of smaller towns and countries for a long time.

But then everything came to a head, Danny finally got the big impact he was used to. There wasn’t enough humans, nuclear plants were failing, safety measures weren’t being followed, people were ceasing to care. Danny tried to help keep order, but there’s only so much one guy can do. Getting any malfunctioning bombs off the planet, or cleaning water polluted with massive chemical explosions, or making sure collapsing skyscrapers didn’t destroy entire towns; took precedence over being a leader to the humans. Many parts of the world became uninhabitable in a very short amount of time and eventually, all Danny could do was check those areas himself for any change; giving reports back to the humans when he could. But it was at this point that Danny started to not relish the silence or being alone. He was too alone, everything was too quiet. No bugs buzzing, no undercurrent hum of electricity, no animal cries. It made his own voice jarringly loud in comparison, so he fell into silence more and more. Not just to avoid disturbing things or feeling too loud. But also because there started to not really be anything or anyone to talk to more and more.

He’s then reminded of a conversation he had with a young twenty-three-year-old scientist who looked something like a patchwork doll, as he floats to weave in between building windows slowly.

“It’s been a while since I’ve heard a good joke from you, Phantom”.

“Telling them to dirt and rubble feels pretty foolish”.

She had laughed, “yeah, I guess it would”, there was a sigh, a pause in the conversation, “I think maybe you should. Your humour is a pretty vital part of who you are”.

“I’m not fading. I can’t”.

“I know. It’s just. It’s worrying honesty. You always have a joke to throw around, no matter the situation or how bad. Now you seem at a loss”.

“I am at a loss. Ran out of Avengers End Game ones a while ago and those aren’t even relevant anymore. No one even knows what ‘Avengers’ is now. I ran out of material and there doesn’t really seem to be a point to saying them over again”.

“See that, that’s why it’s worrying. You may only be half-ghost, but you’re still not a creature of change. If anything you’re more inclined against change than full ghosts. And yet here you are, changed. And ghosts... ghosts only change truly when reverting back isn’t an option anymore”.

“I’m still perfectly capable of making jokes and finding humour”.

“That’s not really what I mean. I’m saying that... that I don’t really think the reason why you’re out of jokes can be reverted”.

Danny hadn’t responded to that simply watched her with sad eyes and with facts creeping into the forefront of his mind that he didn’t want to hear.

While she continued, “I think your being can tell, knows on some level, that this isn’t a battle for you to face. Isn’t an enemy you can fight. Isn’t a world for you to save. That this just can’t be fixed, can’t be stopped”.

The was a pause for a while before Danny had nodded slowly and stopped floating to sit on the counter, “I’m never one to back down or give up. But, yeah. I don’t have the drive, the protective desire, that I should”.

She had only nodded and gotten back to work.

Shaking his head to clear away the memory, that had been a big thing for him. Really realising his obsession wasn’t acting up, that he didn’t feel the need to help. It had really sealed the deal for him, as all the life around him slowly dwindled away. Which resulted in him spending more and more time with the collections of young humans, less and less time off on his own. The people noticed, seemed to understand. But also strongly had no desire to acknowledge why Phantom was spending as much time with them as he could. Like one does with a dying parent or a pet on their way to being put to sleep.  

It wasn’t long after that when Danny noticed something else, the Zone was...shrinking. Ectoplasm was seemingly beginning to decay and break down as-well. And unlike with the Mortal Realm, the most complex things went first. The most sentient of ghosts. And unlike the Mortal Realm it happened fast; in days even. Pandora’s fading had been cataclysmic, Danny had to hide away her box after ghosts kept stealing it. And that had started a long trend of Danny having to find this artifact or that potentially world-ending weapon, and hide them away. Being forced to split his time between the two dimensions as everything fell apart. Both sides had noticed this change in behaviour. Commenting that Phantom seemed like a man running around trying to keep the sky from falling down. Danny had cracked a few jokes about that, but they lacked the bravado and mirth they usually held.

And by the time the Zone plants started to wither away, Danny had pretty well abandoned the Zone. Instead spending what time he could with the remaining humans and living animals. All there was to see in the Zone was buildings and the occasional flora, which hardly needed his comfort. But all the same, he elected to not tell the humans. Not wanting to stir up hopelessness or panic. Though his actions told them all they needed to know. They just didn’t tell him such.

At this point, humanity was functionally split between anarchists and small communities. The communities eventually falling into anarchy themselves, as people lost any belief in things ever getting better. Danny had watched, tried to keep some level of order for a while. But eventually saw the pointlessness of it and people just trying to have some damn fun at the end of the world. Finally acknowledging what this was, what it had been; the apocalypse. And with this acknowledgment he changed, he joined what was left in screwing around. Unnecessary destruction, reckless self endangerment, the rock star lifestyle. Drugs, sex, and rock and roll. Fast, loose and with complete disregard for the future. What was left of the humans flocked to him at this point, riding the high of someone who could let them do things there’s no other way they could do. To say a lot of things had been crossed off bucket lists and final wishes granted, would be an understatement. Even if it made the loss of each individual person hurt Danny all the more. He really was always a self-sacrificial fool. A weaker more selfish person would have just left everyone to their fates. Not walked by their sides till they eventually could walk no more. Till the world fell and life simply stopped existing.

But Danny did, always would, as he was left standing looking between two worlds were nothing existed anymore. Where there wasn’t even air to make sound or any single thing besides him to break up the silence.

Danny runs his fingertips across the green road, slowly floating to sail outside of his lairs boundaries. To a vast empty expanse, buildings to ash not having his ectoplasm to build them up again and again. Chunks of the planet itself breaking off as the planet's core cooled away. The bits of hard ground illuminated by his glow and the few still travelling light of dead stars alone, the sun having winked out long ago.

Danny turns intangible and slips into the ground, floating down to sit on the Earths core. Before being jarred by his ghost sense going off for the first time in eons. Turning his head to his old mentor and friend, in their white beard and simple purple cloak. Turning his head away as he speaks, “it’s been a long time, Father Time”.

Earning a smirk from the Ancient ghost, “indeed”.

The two sit in silence for a while, Danny laying on his back on the Earths core, “makes sense I guess”.

“You hardly needed me. You and the Earth”.

Danny snorts, “I guess that says it all, doesn’t it. Nothing to do and nothing to help”. The two fall back into silence again, before Danny sits back up and leans into ClockWork to cry. Just the knowledge of something, of someone else being there made the sound of it less massive, less jarring, less painful. As ClockWork rubs his back, giving a level of comfort only a being that saw the end coming and had existed before all other sentient things, could provide.

Danny eventually sniffling and wiping his nose, “is there anything I could have done differently?”.

ClockWork sighs, knowing the self-punishment and blame had been coming, “I’m sorry Daniel, but this is how it has to be. Like all things, everything must have its end. To eventually fade into oblivion and the nothing”.

Danny curls his fingers into ClockWork’s cloak, “but me, I’m still here. I’ll still be here”.

ClockWork pats his head fondly, “of course. Always. Even nothing needs a guardian. And, as it always does, something comes from nothing”.

Danny nods, makes sense he was an Ancient himself but that hardly phased him. Instead asking, “so there will be life again?”.

“And therein lies something that not even time can tell”.

Danny gives a somewhat hallow smile, “I thought you knew everything”.

ClockWork bops him on the nose with a soft smile, “only nothing can know what nothing has in store”.

Danny rests his head on ClockWork’s lap, “so me, the Ancient guardian of nothing”.

ClockWork pets down Danny’s hair as he speaks, “as it always was to be”, leaning over to kiss Danny’s hair, whispering as to not break the silence to severally. The silence that their young companion had grown comfortable with and would surely be surrounded by for a long time to come, “and nothing needs nothing to truly flourish”.

Before fading away and leaving Danny alone to sleep on top of the very core of the planet he loved so very much. As even it too began to crumble away into nothing, having been the last remaining thing in the universe. Once sustained only by Danny’s will and ectoplasm. Now falling away finally, as his being accepts what he truly is. The nothing after something and the nothing before something. The one true constant of the universe. For nothing doesn’t need something to exist but something never exists without nothing. Leaving nothing as the guardian of the universe and the guardian of nothing to guard it all forever.

End.

#Danny Phantom #phandom #ectober #ectober 2019 #danny fenton #clockwork #oc #apocalypse #post-apocalypse #end of the world #end of the universe #too quiet #immortal danny #ancient danny #god danny #phantom planet compliant #death #major character death #melting #genetic disorder and #abnormalities #angst #hurt/comfort #implied drug use #future fic #Amity Park is Danny's lair #fanfic #phanphic #have a fic suck my dick #phantomphangphucker

[lonely-bored-writer]

Is Everything Okay? Ch. 9

Danny jumped up with a start. He blinked away the grogginess that laid in his eyes, trying to catch what it was that woke him up so roughly. His hands landed on a wet spot on the bed, looking down his eyes widened. His gaze fell onto his chest, and a groan escaped him. Blood drenched the bandage around his chest, and the sheets on the bed. Rolling onto his back with wince, he paused, taking a deep breath.

He still felt immensely tired, but he knew his alarm should be going off soon enough. His eyes fell once more on the stained sheets, his mind racing on what he should do. He could phase the blood out, but where would he put it? Pulling himself into a sitting, shaking his head clear of the tired foggy that began to gather again. He gathered the medical supplies back together from where they scattered.

He felt the throbbing radiating from his chest, grimacing at the feeling of the bandage peeling away from the torn skin. Danny scowled himself for being an idiot, he should have worked this properly, rather than just throwing a gauze over it. He rolled up the soiled wrap, placing it by the sheets, grabbing a cotton ball he covered it in rubbing alcohol and worked to cleaning the wound.

The sharp burn that erupted on contact only weaseled a tiny wince from the teen. The feeling was all too familiar to him, his movements all done robotically from muscle memory. His mind drifting to random thoughts before his realized something, a groan escaped him. He didn't finish his homework, and he's been doing so well these past three days.

"Daniel?" A knock sound at his door, causing the teen to jump, the rubbing alcohol fell to the floor. Danny was never so glad that he closed it before it fell. "What was that? Can I come in?"

"No!" Danny yelped, startled that Lancer was up. His alarm didn't go off... Danny cursed himself, leave it to him to set the alarm for PM rather than AM. "uh, no. I'm okay... I'll-"

"Bridget Jones' Diary!" Lancer gasped, his eyes glancing between Danny's bandaged chest, and the blood soak sheets and cotton balls near him. Danny took on a dear caught in headlights look, eyes widened in fear.

"I-I-I can explain!" Danny jumped from the bed, every part of him was yelling at him to run. To just turn around and phase out through the wall. He pushed down the very instinct to turn invisible, Lancer didn't need to start questioning how the teen disappeared before his eyes.

"What happened? Masters is in custody, who did this?" Lancer stepped into the room. "We need to get you to the hospital-"

"No!" Danny furiously shook his head. "It was just a scratch, it's not as bad as it seems. That just, uh, gathered overnight."

"Overnight?! You came back injured?!"

"No... I, um, snuck out after dinner..." Danny trailed, his gaze dropped to the floor, a hand rubbing the back of his neck while his other wrapped across his chest. "We were just... We-"

"Daniel, tell me who did this." Lancer's tone made anxiety flare in Danny. There was no way he was getting out of this.

"We ghost hunt, okay." Danny sighed defeated, he wrapped his arms around his abdomen and kept his eyes downcast. "My-My parents aren't the best, and Phantom can't be everywhere so when Sam, Tuck and I helped him once, we got him to let us help him on night patrols."

"Is that why? Did Masters really-"

"Yes!" Danny's eyes landed on Lancer, his eyes hard with truth. "Vlad did like to beat the crap out of be whatever chance he did... usually during the patrols but I couldn't just let the town get overrun by ghosts!"

"Daniel, this is dangerous, you could get seriously injured. This isn't a game." Lancer's face clearly showed his concern. His hands motioning to the blood covered bedding. "Did you not think I would find out?"

"My parents never did." Daniel mumbled, his eyes flickered downwards. "Just, let me do this?"

"Daniel-"

"No, look. I can balance this. Vlad was what messed everything up, but I can do this." Danny pleaded. Even though he knew Lancer couldn't truly stop him, he would try. He was staying with the teacher, he needed to at least have his permission.

"Two conditions." Lancer sighed after a moment of silence. Danny's nod prompted him to continue. "First, if it starts to take a large toll on you physically or mentally, you will take a break. Second, if you get injured like this again, you come to me. Deal?"

"Yes, yes." Relief flooded the teen's features, causing a small smile to slip its way onto Lancer's face. "Thank you"

"And he's just okay with us hunting ghosts?" Sam asked, doubt evident on her face. Danny shrugged, pulling a book from his locker. The trio crowded around their lockers, going over the events of that morning.

"And he insisted to drive you?" Tucker added.

"I'm telling you, it's like Lancer is naturally a protective parent." Danny closed his locker, turning to his friends.

"Now we know that the ghost hunting excuse would work just fine." Tucker urged, his face trying to communicate the words he didn't want to say.

"What?" Danny questioned, the trio sharing goodbyes as Sam parted from them.

"Dude, you should take up Clockwork's offer." Tucker exasperated, throwing his hands in the air. Danny sighed and shook his head, the duo pausing in front of Danny's class.

"No Tuck." Danny shook his head again to emphasize his point. "Unless something extremely unfix-able pops up, I'm not doing it."

"Okay man." Tucker put his hands up in a surrender form. "I just hope it all goes well." Tucker offered a smile, before the two shared farewells. Danny sighed, walking into the classroom and flashed his teacher a small smile. He found himself in the back of the classroom, eyes glued to the blank notebook before him. Keeping his ears trained on the ticking of the clock, rather than the gossip around, waiting for class to start. Also waiting for when he won't be the hottest gossip.

"Hey Fenton." Danny looked up startled to find Dash taking the desk next to him, the blonde smiling at him.

"Hey Dash" Danny nodded, offering his own small smile. Ever since the first meeting at the park, the two created a small friendship, although this is the first time any of them confronted the other at school.

"Everything good?" Danny could clearly see concern in Dash's blue eyes. Daniel nodded, his smile staying on his lips.

"Yea, just a little weird... Ya know?"

"Figure staying with a teacher would be." Dash nodded. Danny was going to retort back when the final class bell rang, cutting the conversation to an end. Leaving Danny's sentence unspoken...

Thursday evening, and Friday went by without too much of a hitch. Most of Daniel's issues came from ghosts who have finally decided to comeback, but never answer Danny on why they left in the first place. He hasn't gotten any new cuts that would need Lancer's attention. He planned to keep up his side of the deal they made... Only if he was bleeding.

Now, Danny found himself pacing back and forth waiting for Smith to tell him he can go in to see his sister and mum. Four days have passed since the last day he had seen either of them, well he noticed Jazz in the halls but she usually steered clear of him. Which he couldn't blame her, he knew she would do anything to keep the case from being corrupted.

"You keep pacing like that you'll pace yourself a hole." Anderson joked, his eyes stayed glue to the magazine in his hands. The teen huffed, flopping into chair of the waiting room. "You'll be in soon."

"Not soon enough-"

"You can go in." Danny jumped up, following Smith towards the room. Tears pricked at his eyes, a lump forming in his throat. "I was able to pull a few strings so that you guess can have your privacy." Daniel looked up shocked, a smile sliding on his lips.

"Thank you, that's-that means a lot." If Smith heard the slight crack in his voice, or the watery affect the pushed back tears had on his vocals, she didn't mention it. Instead, she rested her hand on his arm and gave him a smile.

"Good Luck." Danny thanked her again before opening the door and stepping in. The tears slide down his face when his eye's landed on the tired faces of his family, dark bags cleared under their eyes.

"I-I'm so-so sorry!" Danny cried, pulling the two of them in a hug. The guilt that had been building, and released a little with his father, came crashing on him. "I got dad arrested!"

"Sh" Maddie soothed her child, it broke her heart to see her baby boy hurting. It broke her heart more knowing that it has been happening for some time and she never noticed. "It's not your fault. It's the awful man, Vlad Masters. Your not to blame."

"Danny, none of this is your fault. It's basic victimology, but you caused none of this." Jazz ran her hand through his hair, her own tears stayed at bay while his mother cried her heart out.

It took a few minutes. The trio just stood there crying, Jazz gave into her tears after a few seconds of holding back. Danny felt his heart clenching knowing that he was the cause of his always strong sister cracking.

"Why aren't you guys staying at home?" Danny question when the three migrated to the table in the room. "The signs off..."

"We figured any evidence they might think could be there won't be tampered with if we stayed somewhere else." Jazz answered. "I won't be telling you where little brother , because knowing you you'll try to visit." The three chuckled softly.

"Where have you been?" Maddie asked, not being able to bring herself to finish the sentence.

"I, uh, first stayed at a holding home." Daniel informed, wringing his hands underneath the table. "The agents were asking who would take me in, and Mr. Lancer said he could. I started staying with him on Wednesday."

"That's nice of him." Maddie smiled. "Remind me to get him a gift basket."

"No ectoplasm please." Jazz retorted, dragging a chuckled from Danny.

"Have you seen dad?" Danny questioned, regretting it when the mood darkened. "I went to, um, see him the other day..."

"We did." Jazz nodded.

"We actually went yesterday." Maddie added, a small smile fell on her lips. "He was ecstatic you came to visit."

"Of course I did, Smith and Anderson are trying to keep contact minimal." Danny mumbled the last part, his eyes falling onto the table.

"Danny-"

"I'm so sorry to interrupt." Smith called from the now open door. "I know you three still have half an hour left, but there has been an emergency."

"What happened?" Maddie jumped from her seat. A sense of dread filled Danny, curling tightly around the knot that already sat in his stomach. The dread mingled and entwined with the depression and Anxiety that already sat there, causing a much more intense fury of emotions. He swallowed thickly, his eyes never leaving the concerned, and worried look on the agent's face.

"It's-It's your husband." Smith rushed, she was flushed in her cheeks. Her whole posture and face screamed she was in a rush, screamed that something tragic happened. "He's been-He's been stabbed. He's at the hospital."

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