Chapter 2: Omertà
Danny heard a voice. "..anny'sss...urrt an..ee's nott...aking up!" it said. It sounded like a bad recording playing under water, filled with both static and the sound of pounding waves.
There was a shrill ringing in Danny's ears, and he felt like he was being pulled up from the bottom of a deep dark abyss. A hard surface materialized under him, pressing into his side uncomfortably.
Another deeper voice answered the first quietly. Their words were too quiet making them completely indecipherable. Danny didn't catch any of it, but their tone sounded desperate.
The first voice didn't reply.
Danny tried to move, but his muscles seemed unresponsive. Alright start out smaller. He curled cold hands into loose fists. His fingers trembled and were almost numb, but they obeyed the mental command. Okay, good, it was all about the small victories.
The more he woke up, the more he realized, something was very wrong. Sure, he almost immediately figure he had some how fallen on the floor, which wasn't good of course, but he felt...strange. There was a cold ball at the center of his chest, and he almost felt like he was being tugged, almost physically pulled across the floor. He had to rationalize it a some sort of hallucination, or, well he didn't know what he would do.
As his finer senses came back to him, he picked up the smell of ozone and just a hint of burnt hair. A metallic tase in his mouth also made its presence known.
Finally, he cracked open his eyes. He was lying on a tiled floor and—was it just him or was there a weird green tinge to everything?
He didn't know what was going on, but he figured getting a better look around would help. He tried to move his body again, not to sit up, that still required way to much motor function, but to prop himself up on an elbow.
Stiff, painful muscles responded. He let out a groan and almost immediately felt someone trying to help him sit up.
"Danny are you alright? Are you okay?" He finally recognized the voice. It was Danielle.
His muscles screamed as he moved too quickly, and he doubled over as his head began to spin.
"Are you okay?" she asked again.
"Yeah, I think so." His voice was horse like he had screamed his throat raw. "What happened?"
There was a pause, then Danielle simply said, "The portal."
Danny lifted his head. His twin's anxious face was bathed in green light, coming from a source behind him. He twisted around, ignoring the way his muscles twinged, and saw a massive green vortex behind him.
That feeling of being pulled came back to the forefront of his mind. That tug in his chest came from the portal.
Oh, yeah, the portal turned on...somehow.
He muttered a curse under his breath and turned to Dan. "We were inside..."
Danielle let out a half hysterical chuckle. "Yeah you guys were, and guess what? Neither of you have a scratch on you, but me? I'm starting to go gray and," she held up her arm.
Danny hadn't quite acknowledged what happened to her arm at first, too busy wondering how he hadn't immediately noticed the brand new white stripe in her hair. It touched the edge of her bangs then was swept up along the side of her head and ran into her ponytail.
Then it finally hit him. Holy shit—her arm!
The sleeve of her gray henley was singed at the cuff and had a couple of burn holes in it. She pushed up the sleeve to display a pink patterning of raw flesh in the shape of a lightening bolt. It twined all the way up to her shoulder and didn't stop there.
Danny's eyes became the size of saucers. "Oh, my god! Are you alright?!" he exclaimed, reaching out to his twin.
Danielle pushed his hands away and rolled her sleeve down to hide the marks. "Yeah, I'm fine. It doesn't even hurt."
"You're kidding me?! That doesn't hurt?!" Danny squawked.
"It really doesn't," she said.
He sat back on his haunches. There was a beat and then he said with a dazed calmness, "Did we just die?"
Danielle rolled her eyes. "Not unless ghosts have a heart beat."
Danny held his hand over his heart. Yeah, it still beat in there, but something new seemed to rev along side it. He didn't really want to deal with that right now, so he let his hand fall back into his lap.
"How long was I out?" he asked.
"For at least ten minutes," his twin answered. "I was only out for a couple of minutes—or at least that what Dan says. He woke up first."
Without warning, her hand flashed out and she hit him in the arm. It didn't really hurt but Danny still let out a sharp 'ow!'
"That was for scaring me, jerk," she said.
"It's not my fault," he complained, rubbing his arm.
Dan let out a harsh laugh, reminding Danny he was still there. "Are you forgetting how this all started?" He scathed. "If you hadn't tried to follow me—"
"You were messing around with it in the first place!" Danny pulled himself to his feet using the edge of a table. "If it's anyone's fault it's—"
"Enough! Just stop it!" Danielle shouted.
There was a beat of silence. They stopped bickering, but continued to glare daggers at each other.
Finally, Dan lifted a shoulder in a lopsided shrug. "You know what? I don't really care what you think as long as you don't tell anyone about this."
Danny glanced at Danielle to gauge her thoughts on this. He could tell she seemed to agree with Dan.
He turned back to his older half brother. "What? Are you afraid of getting in trouble, Dan? Mr. I-Don't-Give-A-Shit-About-Anything?"
He gave Danny an unimpressed look. "We'll all get in trouble, dipshit. Besides none of us got hurt."
Danny scoffed. "None of us got hurt?!"
"I'm fine, really," Danielle said, knowing he was referring to her. "Let's just get out of here."
"Brilliant plan, Ellie," Dan intoned. "That's why I tolerate you." He turned and began to make his way up the stairs.
She shot a glare at his back but didn't say anything.
They followed him up the basement stairs, Danny the closest behind him. Once he reached the top of the stairs, Danny expected him check if the cost was clear before barreling out into the living room. His older half brother did no such thing.
Danny scrambled out of the doorway, and as quickly and quietly as he could, checked in the kitchen. There was no one there either.
"They all left," Dan stated. "The assault RV isn't in the driveway. I checked earlier."
"Oh," Danny said a little sheepishly. "They...probably went to the grocery store."
"Perfect timing," Dan muttered as he plopped down on the couch. "Now, we are all in agreement that no one's going to talk, right?" He looked directly at Danny as he said it. There was just a hint of a threat behind his words.
Danny scowled. "I'm not going to say anything," he muttered.
Dan tapped his ear. "I'm sorry, I didn't quite hear you. Could you speak up?"
"I said I won't say anything!" Danny snapped. "Are you happy now?"
Dan lifted a shoulder. "I don't know." He turned to Danielle. "Ellie? Got something to say?"
She frowned. "I already said I wasn't gonna."
"Good. I am happy, by the way. Thanks for asking," Dan said with a smirk.
What a piece of—
"Danny," his sister said before his thoughts could spiral, "can you help me with this?" She held down the one white lock of her bangs.
"Yeah sure," he grumbled.
...
"Just for men you say?" Danielle chuckled evilly. "Not anymore!"
While they rummaged through the house, looking for a solution to Danielle's new skunk stripe, Danny found their Dad's Just for Men: Beard Addition that he bought a long time ago when he was trying to grow out a beard and then never did. He had just shoved the box of dye in the back of their medicine cabinet and let it be forgotten to the ages—until now.
Danielle, already changed into an old t-shirt in case she got any dye on herself, unceremoniously dumped out the box's contents onto the counter, making Danny wince at the noise.
He picked up the box. "It says you're supposed to mix the two parts into the little plastic pan thing," he said, picking up the plastic container and setting it right side up, "then leave it on for only five minutes."
Danielle snorted. "Yeah right, it'll probably have to stay for a lot longer to work on actual hair,"
"I don't know..." Danny said, looking over the box again.
"I do. It's what my gut tells me," she said, already haphazardly mixing together the ingredients with the little brush the kit provided.
He watched her swirl around the two parts, making what had the appearance of dijon mustard. His nose wrinkled. "How is that supposed to turn your hair black again?"
"Bruh, I don't know—alchemy maybe?"
He snorted and rolled his eyes.
As she began applying the dye to her hair, he caught sight of the Lichtenberg figure on her arm. He quickly looked away, a heavy weight sinking back into his stomach. "Can I go now? You seem like you've got this under control."
"No, stay!" She grabbed his arm.
"Why?"
"Just to make sure you're far away from Dan."
Danny snorted. "You can bet on that," he muttered, but stayed in the bathroom with her.
"You know, maybe we could try this on your peach fuzz," Danielle mused as she worked her way up to her scalp. "That could be fun."
"Uh, hell no. It would probably look like someone drew on my face with a sharpie and then tried to wash it off.
She chuckled. "Yeah, you're probably right. We both know I have more facial hair than you."
Danny gave her a martyred look. "Rude!"
As soon as the conversation began to lull, she started up again with, "You know after this we should hide out in my room and watch 'the Crocodile Hunter'."
She must still shaken up from the accident. When she was upset she either talked a lot—or if she was really upset, not at all.
Well, of course she was still shaken up. He was too. But he was glad she was talking and not in "Shutdown Mode".
"Ellie, you need to get a life outside of the Crocodile Hunter," Danny said, a small smirk curling the corners of his mouth.
She snorted. "I do. But I also have the entire series on tape, so why not watch them? There's only so much time left before my VHS inevitably breaks, you know?"
"Or the tapes themselves get damaged," Danny added.
She whirled around to face him. "Exactly!"
He chuckled. "If either one breaks, I'll find the set on DVD and give it to you for our birthday."
She turned around to continue working on her hair. "If you did that, you'd be the best brother in the whole freaking world."
"Better than Dan?"
"It's not a contest, but yeah."
He heard the loud motor of the GAV pull up into the drive way and then the front door open and close.
"I'll go deal with them," Danny said, before leaving the bathroom.
He walked into the living room to find it devoid of Dan, but now occupied with with his parents. His dad still looked like a sulking mess.
His mother, holding a couple bags of groceries and looking even more tired than when she left, said on her way to the kitchen, "Go help Jazz get the groceries in."
"Okay, Mom," Danny called over his shoulder as he walked to the door.
The door swung open again, nearly smacking him in the face. Vlad stood in the doorway, of course not holding any grocery bags. "Oh, I'm sorry, my boy," he apologized.
He started to move out of the doorway, but paused, still blocking Danny's path. A too wide smile suddenly stretched over his face. "You three didn't get into much trouble while we were gone, I hope."
Danny felt a jolt of electricity go through him. "No sir," he answered, a little too quickly.
"Good," Vlad said, still with his creepy smile and went in.
Danny descended the steps to meet Jazz by the RV. "I think that took about ten years off my life," she muttered, leaning back into the RV to grab a few more bags. After the ones she took, there were a few still left in the back seat.
"What, the grocery run?" Danny asked.
"Yes," she sighed. "Dad cried in the freezer section."
Danny's face pulled into a grimace. "Ah, I see."
"Take the rest of the stuff in, okay?" she said, before brushing past him. "Also," she threw over her shoulder, "you could have at least grabbed a jacket off the rack before coming out here."
Oh, right, the cold.
It was probably supposed to be below freezing, but it didn't really feel like it to Danny. It actually felt kind of nice to him. That was a little worrying.
He was ducked into the GAV to get the last of the groceries when he heard a loud sound like the ripping of heavy fabric. He startled, nearly dropping the bags he had accumulated, and popped his head out to see what the noise was. He almost dropped the bags again when his eyes landed on what he could only assume made the noise.
A swirling green vortex—much like the one in his basement—floated about twenty feet in the air. He stood there, half-in-half-out of the RV, staring at it for a little less than twenty seconds, but it felt like he stood there staring at the green vortex dumbfounded for forever. Then suddenly it simply closed in on itself and ceased to exist.
It took him maybe another twenty seconds to recover.
"Welp, that happened," he finally said to himself and hopped out of the GAV.
He quickly made for the front door, determined to put the strange phenomenon out of his mind. Maybe he'd tell Danielle later, maybe he wouldn't. Maybe he'd just completely forget about it. Who knows? Groceries where the main objective right now and he was going to stick with that as long as he could.
He met Jazz in the kitchen putting up food. Everyone else had vanished. Danny assumed they had already gone back into the lab. Of course, no surprise there. Then his stomach sank.
The portal.
Sure enough, hardly a second later, his Dad came bounding up the stairs.
"You kids gotta see this! The portal, it works!" he boomed.
"What?!" Jazz balked. "But it doesn't—it couldn't!"
"But it does! Come on!" their dad said, heading back down to the basement without waiting for them.
Jazz let out a groan. "I think they've finally lost it. What do I bet you we find an empty hole in the wall?" She turned to Danny with a tired look, only for it to quickly morph into one of worry. "Are you alright? I was just kidding."
Danny swallowed. "I, uh, I'm fine," he said unconvincingly and forced a smile just as unconvincingly.
Jazz sighed. "Well, I guess we should at least go look."
In the lab they came upon their dad spinning their mom around happily, and of course, an active ghost portal.
Jazz froze, her brain seeming to buffer. Danny would have found it hilarious that his know-it-all sister was finally faced with something she couldn't explain, except he was too busy being worried that his parents or even Vlad might figure out the portal hadn't just turned on by itself.
"We're really going to have to start working on that probe design we've had drawn up for months now," Maddie said, giggling and still being spun around.
Jack put his wife down, still holding her to his side. "Hey, Vladdie!" he called out. Vlad who stood quietly inspecting the portal turned to look over his shoulder, an unreadable expression on his face. "What do you think of all this?" Danny's father said. "Isn't it kind of like that little project we started all the way back in college is finally finished?"
Vlad smiled and turned to face Jack fully. "Oh, no, Jack, this is just the beginning really." His words made a small shiver creep up Danny's spine.
"You're right, V-man! We have so much to do!"
Before they got hooked into another conversation about ghosts, during which the rest of the world didn't exist, Danny interrupted them. "Uh, hey, can I go? I-I have some things I need to do, so..."
"Oh, yes, fine, fine, we just wanted you to see it honey!" Danny's mother replied, turning to him with a beaming smile. Danny tried to give her one back that didn't look too forced.
Danny climbed the basement stairs quickly. Someone else's steps echoed behind him, Jazz by the sound of them. As he reached the top he turned to look. His older sister wasn't far behind. She met him at the top of the basement stairs, taking the step just below his.
"What the—What is that thing?" she asked, just stopping herself from cursing.
Danny shrugged and turned away. "The Ghost Portal, apparently."
She overtook him, standing in the doorway to the basement, forcing him to face her. "There is no such thing as ghosts. I don't know what they have going on there, but it can't be a portal to the afterlife, or something."
Danny simply shrugged again, not meeting her eyes. "I don't know..."
"Come on, don't tell me you've started to believe their garbage!" she hissed.
"I. Don't. Know," he repeated. "Now could you move out of my way?"
Jazz sighed and left him at the entrance to the basement. He stepped out into the living room, just catching sight of her before she disappeared back into the kitchen.
He went back upstairs and knocked on the bathroom door. Danielle came out with a towel wrapped around her hair.
"What took you so long, dude? I thought you died, or something," she said.
"Mom and Dad found the portal," Danny blurted.
Her face fell slightly. "Yeah, well, it's not like we could've hidden it from them."
She loosed her hair from her towel. "Anyway, how does it look?"
Danny frowned, inspecting her hair. "Well, I guess it works—at least for now. Do you think it'll wash out?"
"How should I know?" she said, toweling her hair. "I am, by no means, a hair expert."
"What'd you do with the box and the other stuff it came with?" Danny asked.
"Threw it in the trash, duh."
"Don't you think someone's going to be curious as to why there's a used box of Just For Men in the trash?"
She paused toweling her hair. "I think you're being a little paranoid."
"Somebody'll see it, like Jazz or Dad or Mom and they'll wonder why—"
"Alright fine," she groaned. "I'll deal with it. Just get off my back, okay?"
Danny blew out a quick breath and looked down at his sneakers scuffing the floor. "Sorry, I'm just—you know—" He noticed his hands were still shaking a little bit. Were they like that the entire time?
Danielle rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I know. We've all had a shitty day."