Author's Note: Yay! I did it! Actually updating before the two month mark. I promise this story is almost done and then I'll edit this sucker and put it back up in its better version. Hopefully. At some point.

*Then*

I ran from Tucker's home, pushing my legs harder and harder to move faster. I could hear Tucker running behind me to keep up, calling out my name into the night. Tears stinging my eyes and fear crushing my heart, I pressed on.

This couldn't be true. It just couldn't be. No way was he dead…. How could Phantom be dead? After everything? No… it couldn't be true. My parents would prove to me it wasn't.

The pounding of our shoes against the pavement was the only other noise that registered in my brain.

"Wait up, Danny!" Tucker panted from behind me. "Just stop, hold up. Tell me what's going on."

The pain in my chest grew stronger and stronger until I stopped running, a few feet ahead of Tucker, and leaned against a wall for support. My panting gasps were interrupted by sporadic cries. What happened to him? Had he been defenseless in the ghost zone and easily over taken? The brick felt scratchy beneath my fingers and I curled my hand into a fist, landing a punch to the wall. I cried out as the blood ran from my knuckles and curled my hand to my chest, wondering how on earth I was ever going to be put back together.

"You've gotta tell me what's going on man. I don't understand.. what's going on?" Tucker put a hand on my chest and I instantly threw my arms around him, holding on to anything that would hold me up. I was breaking down and I wasn't strong enough to hide it.

"Whoa… Danny, what is it? What's going on? What did Clockwork mean with everything he said? Who's dead? A part of you? What does it all mean, Danny?" his questions fell out of his mouth faster than I thought was capable of speaking but he managed to ask them.

I clung to him, crying out against the unfairness of it all. Crying for the loss of my other half, crying for what my parents had done, crying for everything. I clung to my best friend and he held me until my sobs finally subsided enough where words could come to me again.

Somewhere during the middle of him holding me, we'd sank down onto the pavement and stayed like that, me clinging on to him like he was the only life raft I had, and he holding me together.

Sputtering sobs left me every few minutes, followed once or twice by a hiccup and I started to speak, spilling the whole story to him. I backed up to the day of our graduation, told them about how I'd drank an energy drink even though I wasn't sure of the effects. I told him about how my parents had taken it from me, insisted I was being possessed by a ghost… I told him everything.

When I was finished, my quiet cries had stilled and I sat there on the curb, completely numb. I'd cried everything out and there was nothing left inside of me. No room for anything other than this crushing sadness.

"So… your parents really just took it from you? They just released your Phantom half into the ghost zone?" Tucker asked, his brows creasing like they did when he was confused.

I nodded, the ache in my chest making me want withdraw and curl in myself. I picked at the dried blood on the back of my knuckles as I tried to guess his unspoken question. A few minutes passed in silence and I gave up trying to figure out my best friend's brain. With a sigh, I dropped my hand back to my side and looked at him. "Yeah, that's exactly what happened."

He didn't say anything at first, just glanced away from me. Another few minutes passed in silence and I stared out across the street, watching cars in the distance, wondering where they were headed or where they were coming from. Their mundane errands seemed miles away from what I was dealing with. I felt like normalcy was simply a concept – one that I knew nothing about.

Tucker exhaled and finally turned back toward me. "What did Clockwork mean that you'd killed him?"

I shook my head, running my hands through my hair. "I don't know. That's the only part I don't understand about what he said. He said he assumed it was me, but that he'd go back to that day and watch the events for himself."

"What's going to happen to you?" he asked quietly and I gave a shrug.

"Who knows? The Observant's might order me to be killed or this might not even register on their radar," I stood, dusting my hands on the back of my jeans. "Either way, I have to get to the truth. I can't wait around for Clockwork to double and triple check everything. I have to go home and talk to my parents."

With a lump in my throat, I started walking toward my house. Once I turned the corner, it was a quarter of a mile and I was home. My feet, earlier pounding against the concrete eager to get home now dragged themselves forward. Only a few more feet to the corner. A few more feet and a quarter of a mile to the truth.

Tucker fell into step beside me and I glanced at him. He gave me a smile. "Moral support."

I stopped walking. "No. This has nothing to do with you. Go home, Tuck."

He crossed his arms. "Come on now. I want to be there for you when you talk to your parents about what happened. What if they don't know what happened to Phantom? You'll need someone there to research the ghost zone, help you figure out what actually happened."

"Tucker you can't help me with this," I said and gave a shrug. "Just go home."

He sighed. "Danny, when are you going to realize that you don't have to do this all on your own?"

"Honestly? Probably never. Because I have to do this alone. I've been alone since the day I became half ghost. You and Sam were there for me but neither one of you really understood and you never knew what it felt like to have these powers," I glanced down at my fist, exhaling heavily. "You never understood even though you tried to. I've always been alone, Tucker. You and Sam have been great but you're not there for me. You never have been and you never can be."

"Bull shit!" Tucker spat, hands moving to his hips. He fixed me with a glare. "Like hell we haven't been there for you. It was me and Sam that sewed your wounds closed after every fight. Sam and I carried you home when you were too exhausted to even walk, when you'd drained yourself of every last bit of energy. Sam and I were there. Always. You're selfish if you think you've always been alone. Not when me and Sam have helped you every single day. We sacrificed as much of our time and energy as you did fighting these things, forcing them back where they belonged. You want to be selfish and claim that you were always alone, go ahead. At least look me in the face when you spit these lies again."

I raised my eyes to his. "Tucker. I love you and I love Sam. But I have always been alone and if you'd open your eyes, you'd see that."

He shook his head. "I can't believe this. Are you blind?"

"Are you?" I countered and he sighed, looking away again. A minute passed in silence and I started toward my house again.

"You're being stupid!" he called after me and I shook my head, continuing on my way home. It was better this way. I wouldn't drag anyone else down like this. At least this way, everyone else could live and move on. At least this way, it was just me dealing with the fall out.

At least this way, it was just me alone.

*Now*

I curl in on myself, afraid to speak what comes next. Sam runs her fingers through my hair, quietly murmuring words of encouragement. I don't feel so alone anymore as I realize that she wants me to tell this story just as badly as I need to tell it. My chest aches as I finally look up at her again.

"He didn't die because he couldn't remain stable. He died for me," I whisper the last part, burying my face into the pillow again, her fingers stilling in my hair.

"What do you mean?" she questions, her voice quiet. I responded with a quiet whine into the pillow, the words burning to leave my throat, but I made no move to speak. With tears threatening to overwhelm me, I turn toward her.

"You can tell me," she whispers, giving my hand a squeeze. "I promise I'm not going anywhere."

I give a groan, curling further away from her. "I don't want to do this," if I said the words, it made it all so much more final.

"Tell me what happened. I know you need to," she whispered, gently coaxing me into speaking once more.

My voice shook as the words left my mouth but I pressed on. "Wh-When I got home… my parents were in the lab…"

*Then*

I walked down the set of stairs into the lab, my voice caught in my throat, trying in vain to choke out the words I knew I needed to say.

Before I could even speak, my mother turned around and noticed me standing there.

"Danny?" she called across the room and I cleared my throat.

"What happened to him?" an exchange of glances between my parents and I repeated my question louder, this time providing context. "Phantom. What happened to him? I just had a conversation with one of my old allies and he says Phantom's dead, so what happened to him?"

My father awkwardly tightened and untightened the cap on a bottle of some sort of chemical. He glanced at my mother then back to me with a shake of his head.

My hands clenched into fists as I realized I was so tired of the lies. What were they hiding from me now? What could be worse than him being dead?

"Tell me," I spat, words snarling from my throat in a way that made both of my parents look up at me. "I'm sick of your lies and your bullshit. Tell me what happened."

My father set the chemical bottle down on one of the counters and sighed heavily, glancing back toward my mother. A broken sob leaked from her and I closed my eyes.

"Please… just tell me," I managed before she spoke.

"It was an accident," she whispered. "It was just an accident, you weren't supposed to have died. Millions of people have it happen over and over and they make it out, we couldn't understand why our baby boy wasn't… why he couldn't be alive…" her sobs broke up her sentences and my brain tried to grasp on to any amount of sense from her words.

"What are you talking about? Millions of people have what happen to them?" I dragged my fingernails through my hair, wishing she'd quit beating around the bush.

"The car accident," she managed before another bout of crying overtook her. When she straightened back up, she finished her sentence. She clung to my father for support. "When we got to the hospital, the doctors had pronounced you dead. Your body was moved to the morgue," she broke her sentence off and glanced at my father. "That's… that's when your father…"

He cleared his throat. "That's when I took off. I went home, got in the specter speeder and ventured into the ghost zone," my father shook his head as I stood there dumbfounded. He'd actually gone into the ghost zone? My father, the one who hates ghosts, went into their realm.

"I didn't know if he would be in there or even if he was still alive. I just kept calling and calling out for him to show himself," he scratched at the stubble on his chin. "He eventually showed himself and told me he knew what had happened. He said he felt the very moment the… the life left you," he managed to choke out the last few words before tears ran down the sides of his face. He took a breath. "Then… then he came with me. Willingly. He phased directly into the specter speeder and flew back with me to the hospital. I showed him your body and he told me he'd fix it. He phased into your skin and I went to find your mother."

My breath caught in my throat. He was dead because of me? He'd used his form to revive mine? My parents looked at me as my throat closed up. I couldn't process what they were telling me. He was dead and he'd done it to save me.

"Never thought a ghost would be so selfless…" my father trailed off and shook his head once more. I curled my hands into fists.

"He wasn't just a ghost," I spat, looking down at my hands and as they blurred in front of me, I realized tears had formed in my eyes. I would never be put back together. Ever. I was doomed to be a human for the rest of my life. That knowledge sat like a rock in my chest.

I looked back up to my parents, clinging to one another like they'd just relived the whole thing instead of only telling me the story. "Where do we go from here?" I voiced the question aloud, wondering if there was anywhere to go from here.

"We can start over. Move on from here," my mom said, taking a step closer to me.

I held my hand out in front of me, squeezing my eyes closed. Move on from here. He was dead because of me. I would never be put back together… and my parents wanted us to move on from here. I shook my head as my voice cracked. "No. We can't move on from here. Nothing can ever be fixed from here."

"Danny, we can't fix what we did but we can move past this," my father spoke this time and I shook my head again, gritting my teeth.

"No," I repeated. My voice broke as I said it once more. "No… it just doesn't work like that. It can't work like that," shaky legs turned me around and managed to carry me up the stairs and out of the lab. I leaned against one of the living room walls for support, mind reeling from everything my parents told me.

It made no sense. Why would my Phantom half sacrifice himself to let me live? What kind of selfless act was that?

I pushed myself off the wall and started up the stairs, ready to pass out on my bed and pretend this day never happened. My legs felt weak beneath but I pushed on, knowing what tomorrow would bring.

I would go into the ghost zone tomorrow, against Clockwork's warning. Maybe one of the ghosts would see me and take me out. Phantom had died and now so would I.