The eighth part of my Midnight, Texas story. There is only one parts left after this! Yay! So this one is a little on the dark side, but it still has a happy twist at the end. Forewarning. The next one will not have that happiness. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Warnings: Implied child abuse. Implied alcoholism. Talks of drug abuse. Shitty mothers.

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The air was knocked out of Manfred's lungs as Bobo was thrown into him causing them both to fall to the floor. Both men wanted nothing more than to stay where they were and take a breather, but they weren't anywhere close to figuring out what was going on.

It had started a few days ago when random things started happening at Home Cookin'. None of it had been truly malevolent. If he was honest no one had even really noticed that there was something supernatural going on.

With everything else that was happening in the town no one paid attention. Add that with the fact that they were all exhausted and they missed a few things that were happening. It wasn't their fault it was so small and could be played off as not supernatural.

So some silverware was missing a few times. That just meant it hadn't been placed out. People's jackets were on different chairs than they had been sitting. Unless that was where they had been sitting and they just forgot.

Now that Manfred took time to think about he realized that they should have figured it out a lot sooner. That was what happened when they were stretched beyond their means. Things fell through the cracks.

It wasn't until Manfred started to feel sick when he was in the restaurant for too long. He didn't know what to make of that, but he had overlooked it. He was tired and didn't really want to deal with anything more than he already was.

So he hid what was going on with him. That only lasted a few days. Emilio called him out on looking a little pale and everyone had jumped on him. He couldn't believe that one town had so many mother hen's.

After that they started to watch him all the closer. They watched as the feeling of sickness got worse and worse until he was practically doubled over in pain just from standing to close to the building.

He had hated having to avoid the restaurant while they tried to figure out what was going on. It was one of the few places in the town where all of them could go. In truth all of them ended up there at least once a day. He didn't want to lose that.

Today was actually the first day that he had walked into the building in weeks. They had all grown angry at having their place taken from them. So they went there looking to take down whatever it was that was there.

Something that Emilio, Joe, and Fiji had been against. It never did any good to enter a fight if you didn't know what you were fighting. They hadn't been able to come up with anything after researching though. So they went with the last resort.

It hadn't taken long for Manfred to figure out that it was a ghost. Actually, that was something everyone figured out when the doors slammed shut behind them leaving them stuck in the building alone.

That didn't make any sense to the psychic. Ever since he came to Midnight he had seen ghost after ghost. None of them had been shy about wanting to talk to him and none of them had tried to pull the haunting card.

They all knew what he was and they knew that they could talk to him. It might be a bit annoying, but it was better than when a spirit attempted to get his attention while staying out of his line of vision.

All of that should have told them that there was something more than just a haunting going on. They just wanted it to be over though and get a break from the evil that was coming into their small town.

You'd think that they'd have better ideas than they did, but no. With their collected years of supernatural living they had acted on impulse and now they were in the middle of a fight with something they didn't know.

Standing up he nodded at Bobo telling the man that he was alright. He wasn't sure how much longer that was going to last though. He wasn't even sure how long they had been locked in the restaurant anymore.

"Come on, you son of a bitch!" Olivia yelled before barely dodging out of the way of a knife.

Manfred opened his mouth to ask the assassin if she was okay only for the rug to be pulled out from under his feet. Literally. A gasp of pain left his lips as he added more bruises to his already marred skin.

It might sound weird, but he felt as if he was the target for whatever it was that they were attempting to fight. Though it could just feel that way considering how many times he had been knocked off his feet.

Closing his eyes he took a deep breath getting ready to get back on his feet and join the fight once more. He really couldn't wait until all of this was over and he was able to get back to his home and sleep.

"Manfred!" Joe suddenly yelled causing his eyes to shoot open.

His eyes went wide when he saw the light fixture falling towards him. He barely had time to think that he should move before he was being lifted in someone's arms and moved. Looking up he saw electric blue eyes staring down at him in worry.

"I have never been so happy that you are a vampire," he panted out as he was placed on his feet once more.

"Are ghosts normally this angry?" Lem questioned ignoring his statement as they both dodge a plate.

"Rarely," he offered before taking a deep breath, "Hey! We get it! You're pissed about something, but is this really helping? Talk to me and I can help you."

The chair that was flying towards Fiji stopped in the middle of the air before falling to the floor. It felt as if the warmth had been sucked out of the room as a familiar smoke started to swirl in the air before him.

As the smoke became more defined a dark chuckle rang through the room. He took a step back his eyes darting around. It didn't take much to figure out that he was the only one seeing what was going on. He really hated that.

"Talk?" a familiar voice suddenly spoke making him gasp and take another step back, "Do you really think I want to talk to you?"

"M-Mom?" he whispered staring at the figure before him.

He felt as if the whole world had stopped as he stared into the green eyes that he had once known. They were filled with so much hate and disgust that was directed solely at him. It was a look that he was more than familiar with.

"Don't call me that!" she yelled surging forward to smack him across the face.

"Manfred!" Fiji called out when he stumbled into the wall at the hit, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he offered barely registering his words as his eyes darted back to his mother, "I'm… I thought… Xylda said that you moved on."

"And you believed that bitch?" his mother scoffed with a twisted fake smile, "Do you really think I'd let myself be seen by her when I still had so much to do?"

"Tell me what you want to do. I'll help you move on."

"Move on? You want to help me move on? How could I move on when my good for nothing son is still alive?"

"What? I… You're still here because of me?"

A dark laugh came from her lips as she took step after step closer until they were toe to toe. Her hand came up to caress the side of his face before moving to grip his neck tightly. Gasping he felt his feet leave the floor until he was dangling in mid-air.

"How are you still alive?" she growled out her eyes glowing, "I watched as you took pill after pill. As you drank so much your liver was starting to shut down. I watched as you almost died time and time again! You should be dead by now!"

"I..." Manfred tried to say his hand coming up to claw at hers.

"But no. You couldn't give me that one thing. You had to find this place. You had to delusion yourself into thinking that you had friends! I should have killed you when I had the chance. Ended those powers with that bitch mother of mine!"

"Manfred? What's wrong?" Bobo questioned stepping closer only for his mother to place a hand to his chest and send him flying back into the wall.

Manfred watched through the black spots as Fiji and Joe rushed to the man's side putting their hands on his chest as if he was hurt. A wave of anger crashed over him as he focused on the woman once more.

Seeing someone that he had begun to consider family hurt by her was too much. He didn't know where it came from but a surge of power came over him. Putting his hand against her stomach he pushed her way from him.

"Don't touch my family," he growled landing on his feet.

"Your family?" she laughed sarcastically, "You think that anyone would ever want you as their family? I'm your mother and I wish I had killed you myself!"

"Shut up! You're done."

"Oh, Manfred, I'm just getting..."

"No. Gwendolyn Alice Bernardo, go to hell. And never come back!"

The ghost started to move forward a smirk on her lips only to freeze. Her face contorted into a look of pain as the room was filled with an icy wind. He watched as she took a step back her eyes filling with fear.

Raising his arm up he tried to block his eye from the wind without losing sight of her. He barely heard it above the noise but with the way her mouth dropped open he knew that she was screaming in pain. He was glad that he never had to listen to that sound.

A moment later everything fell silent as if nothing happened. He stood there looking at the spot his mother was just standing before taking a shaky breath and looking away. He hoped he would get that image out of his mind someday.

Blinking a few times he looked over the people in the room before they finally landed on Bobo. Moving quickly he ran to the man's side and fell to his knees. A disbelieving grin came to his lips when he saw no blood.

"You're okay," Manfred muttered resting his head on the man's chest, "You're okay."

"Yeah," Bobo grinned patting the psychic on the back, "I'm okay. You?"

Looking up Manfred glanced around the room. Everyone had gathered around them as if they were building a wall to protect them. A smile came to his lips when he thought that. He couldn't believe what he was seeing, but he knew that he never was going to walk away from it.

"Yeah," he nodded staring up at his family, "I'm okay. We're okay."