Title: In the End
Author: AkizukiSakura
Series: Danny Phantom
Genre: Hurt/Comfort/Romance
Rating: M/R
Pairing(s): Vlad/Danny (Pompous Pep)
Spoilers/Warnings: Spoilers for The Ultimate Enemy, but eventually plot divergent. There may be flashbacks or mentions of other shows later.
Disclaimer: Danny Phantom is owned by the esteemed Butch Hartman and all subsequent copyrights. I claim no ownership of this series, nor do I make monetary profit from the writing of this story.
Summary: We all know that Clockwork stepped in, stopped time, and saved Danny's family and two best friends – and a teacher that cared for his students despite their ridicule of him – from certain, explosive death. But what if he hadn't?
Notes: The prologue starts out with a quote from a song – but I don't know if I'll do it for every chapter. It just seemed to fit well with the title and theme.

Prologue

Time is a valuable thing
Watch it fly by as the pendulum swings
Watch it count down till the end of the day
The clock ticks life away

-Linkin Park, In the End

-DP-

How had this happened? How was it possible? He was the hero, right? How could the hero win…and still lose so horribly? So drastically? So utterly, damnably, with finality that could not be disputed?

The Ghostly Wail had taken everything out of him that could be taken without resulting in his death, but the young hero wished he had died. That monster had been right. He didn't have the power to save them. He was weak, he was helpless – he'd had to rely on the power of human inventions to take his enemy down.

Dan, Dan, his name was Dan – not Danny, not Daniel… He would be remembered as Dan, could not be confused with that sapphire-eyed hero, would not be allowed to go by such an innocent name…

He had defeated his enemy. He had won. The evil phantom was locked away in a thermos – a weapon modeled after a soup container, of all things! – but the damage was done. The damage was irreversible, could not be changed, could not be erased, could not be fixed.

The image would forever be ingrained in his mind, forever and ever, never to be covered, never to fade. The image of his family – mom, dad, Jazz! – of his friends – Tuck, Sam! – of a teacher, even. They had all made fun of the teacher that shouted out the names of required reading when he was frightened or angry.

Danny had always 'disliked' the half-bald man for pushing him to do better in class, for making him read those books – had always pushed him, shown him he could do it when Technus had first made an appearance. Never had the raven-haired youth felt so academically accomplished, never had he realized that he was not as mediocre as he had thought.

But that teacher was gone, too. That teacher – Mr. Lancer! – was dead, and the last words he'd spoken to him… The last words that teacher would have heard…

"I'm guessing this explains my periodic absences, huh?"

And finally a scream of anguish when he realized that he could do nothing for them – all six of those lives! – and when the boiler overheated. Wasn't that what that student had blabbered on about? That student that had failed the C.A.T., the one that everyone had laughed at when he'd tried to explain? It wasn't the most luxurious job in the world, certainly. And perhaps he could have tried harder…

But the fact remained that he had been right and that Jazz – my sister is dead, gone, never gonna analyze me again, dead, dead! – had been wrong. Jazz had not known about Dan, that sadistic, evil phantom. Jazz had worried for her baby brother, had donned the Peeler in the hopes of saving him.

And they had all perished because he had taken to long, had wasted too much energy, had not been astute enough in the future to get here sooner, and they were all dead, gone, never gonna come back, gone!

What was he supposed to do? What could he do as he lay on the street, baby blue eyes wide in terror? The eyes of everyone that was doomed stared back at him, bound by ectoplasm – he couldn't even take their last words. He wouldn't ever hear how his parents – and his teacher – felt that they had been around the ghost boy, around Inviso-Bill for so long and had never recognized him.

He might have screamed – might have yelled, cried, shouted, pleaded – when the telltale sounds of pressure escalated to new heights. He might have begged for forgiveness, might have prayed to any listening god, might have promised anything for their lives… But in the sound of the explosion everything was lost – even, mercifully, the screams of the doomed as the heat burned away the ectoplasm, and then their skin. In his gaze the sheer heat, the brilliant, mocking colors were reflected, and he could only lie there, just far enough to escape the most dangerous of the heat.

It was almost a relief when a stray hunk of twisted metal struck him just as he'd managed to struggle to his hands and knees, as bits of shrapnel and wood sliced through his cheeks and arms, as a spar of wood embedded itself in his shoulder. He was detached from what should have been excruciating pain – he could hear nothing, see nothing and, finally, he fell back onto the pavement.

Blue eyes – eyes that should have been full of the hope of youth, the promise of a future, the weariness of a teen – closed and then he thought no more.

-DP-

I seem to have a habit of really short prologues followed by decent-length chapters, but I didn't want to launch directly into a story here.

Credit where credit is due: Din Kelion (love you, love you, have for a while, always will) is the inspiration for this story. In her ficlet "Clockworks" this is one of the universes mentioned, and so I go to thinking…

And, yes, I have her endorsement here.

For now this is it, but I'm already working on the next chapter – I didn't want to cram too much into this if no one liked it.

Word count: 1,071

-AkizukiSakura