More cursing in this one because teenagers will be teenagers.
"C'mon, dude, you cannot tell me you aren't hungry. I don't care which form you've been hanging out in, it's been all night!"
Danny sighed and scuffed his shoe along the floor a bit, uncertain. Tucker was right- he was hungry. But he really didn't like being away from Sam at the moment. He needed to be there to make sure she was okay-
"Go on, Danny, we're here and we'll call you if anything changes," Valerie offered.
Apparently his face showed just how little that idea eased him, though, as Danielle quickly followed up with her own idea. "I could keep an eye on her until you get back and come get you if she starts to wake up."
Danny sighed a bit. Yeah, okay. He wasn't winning this one. "Alright, let's go get some food. But you're paying, Tuck."
"I'll take it as a dub anyways!" he cheered, hauling himself up from the waiting room chair and practically dragging Danny from the room. Danny just went with him, suppressing a yawn on the way.
While Danny hadn't slept much- he was in a vent, how could he- he had still waited a good while to return to the waiting room to check on the others which... yeah, doing the quick math, he hadn't eaten in maybe 17 hours or so. Not his worst but definitely not healthy, either, even for a half-ghost. He couldn't pull the same stuff when Sam was awake and aware or she'd kick his ass and worry too much about him when the attention should be on her. So he might as well be able to answer honestly if she asked when he'd last taken care of himself.
The hospital seemed relatively calm, which was probably a good thing. It meant nothing was falling apart outside. Danny was sure there must've been at least one ghost attack since the day before, but he would have to deal with it later or hope his parents had handled it. Or at least tried to handle it.
"Soooo..." Tucker started. Danny glanced over at his best friend and noticed he was clearly trying to find his words. "It's cool you can use ice in Fenton form now."
Danny stopped in his tracks. When the heck had he done that? It was the one power he was consistently unable to manifest in human form aside from his wail. Something-something ghost core being different between his forms and blah blah blah. He honestly didn't pay attention to Frostbite's explanation aside from how he could work on getting better with it, but it still hadn't yielded any results.
Tuck stopped as well once he realized Danny wasn't beside him anymore and turned to look. "What? Too soon?"
"No, no- when did I use my ice in this form?"
Now Tucker looked as confused as Danny felt. "When we asked you to at the warehouse... did you not notice?" Danny thought back over the events of the previous night for a brief moment but then just shook his head. He didn't want to think about it. Not yet. "Oh. Well, I'm sure since you did it once now that you'll be able to again. It's power progress, right?"
In theory, sure. But Danny was still surprised. He had only thought about last night in passing and never voluntarily. He needed to make sure Sam would be okay and was out of the woods before he could go through all that. But. Well, to be fair, he didn't expect to have done something new and not remember it. He could remember using his ice to help take care of Sam, but he didn't have any clear memory of which form he'd been in at the time. It hadn't mattered then.
Ah well, he'd deal with it more later. At the moment, he figured he should take the opportunity to catch Tucker up to speed.
"So I haven't decided if Val or Dani should know yet, but dude, Sam's mom was awful last night-" The re-telling of the overnight argument and the few continued spats of the morning so far was enough to last them the rest of the trip downstairs and into the cafeteria. Tucker was as outraged as Danny was but had some soft pride in Mr. Manson's response. It was a good thing to see at least one of them caring about Sam's well-being.
"-seriously messed up, honestly. And literally, she can't even be bothered to tell us anything? Practically criminal! We've been here longer than they have, and what, just because we aren't related we don't get to see her yet or know what's going on? Super rude," Tuck continued to rant as he went through the process of ordering delivery with his phone. Danny was taking advantage of the free coffee set-up while he listened, having been through the same emotions already. Did they have his usual coffee? No. Duh, why would a hospital publicly carry a coffee named Death Inclination? But he could get by with some extra cups of the plain stuff instead. Which was why he was brewing an entire pot.
"When are they not like this, though, Tuck?"
Tucker heaved a dramatic sigh. "Yeah, I know. Still shitty of them."
"Still shitty of them," Danny agreed, grabbing the largest of the disposable cups and filling it to the brim with the freshly brewed coffee. Some people could consider themselves coffee coniesours with the way they drank their bean juice. Whatever the opposite of that was is how Danny classified himself. If it had caffeine, he'd drink it. So he barely set the scalding pot back onto its plate before he started chugging. Was it actively burning his mouth and throat and everything else because it was too hot? Yes, yes it was. Would that be healed up in the minute or less it would take to pour the second cup? Also yes. Not like he had the time to actually enjoy his coffee usually, so there didn't seem much point in taking his time now. Especially when it admittedly tasted like the back end of a skunk.
"Okay, food has been ordered and should be here in about ten minutes with the MSDS," Tucker confirmed as Danny brought the now-empty cup back down to fill it with the rest of the coffee in the pot.
"I thought Sam took you off the delivery plan again," he prompted, giving Tuck a raised eyebrow and choosing to ignore the dumb nickname and subsequent acronym they'd given the 24 hour delivery service that the Manson household employed (along with every other uber-rich family in town)- the Manson Speedy Delivery Service. Sam hated the nickname but in the funny way where using it around her typically earned a pillow thrown at the offender and a roll of the eyes.
His friend simply gave a wicked grin and a wink. There truly was nothing Tucker couldn't hack.
Danny snorted and started to down the next cup, once again not bothering to wait for it to cool or even making it taste good. If he didn't plan to leave the hospital until Sam did- and he currently refused to actually leave- then he wouldn't have access to his regular source of ecto-smoothies or his good coffee for a while which meant he'd be drinking quite a lot of the crappy stuff. Especially when it took so much of it to do anything. Anymore, his morning routine included two cups of Death Intention coffee- the equivalent of four normal cups- and then followed it up with a smoothie of whatever fruit happened to be in the house blended up with ectoplasm harvested from the batch he'd been cultivating in the bottom drawer of the fridge for a few months. It wasn't gross if it was his own and whatever he could grow. Or at least not as gross. Besides, it tasted a lot better to him than anyone else and perked him up way more than caffeine ever could. He just couldn't drink too much or he'd start sneezing for whatever weird reason. He'd given up trying to understand his biology and just rolled with it instead anymore.
"Sooo... how're you doing, Dude? Honestly. Like yeah, I know we're all worried about Sam right now and we should be. But you're looking pretty rough, too. You sure you should be hanging out there all the time and not waiting with us more? If she's stable and not really changing right now..." Ah. Great. Of course that just had to happen. You have one massive mental breakdown that results in the destruction of a- condemned!- building...
Danny finished his cup and started brewing his second pot of coffee before he answered. "I'm fine, Tucker. I know I say that a lot, but seriously. We just gotta take care of Sam right now. When she wakes up..." He didn't feel ready for the conversation just yet, though the doctors expected to be able to wake her up in the afternoon and had already started to ease her off the sedatives. How would she take the news? Obviously not well. But would she cry? Get angry? Both? Would she blame him for not being quick enough to-
Tuck pulled him around so Danny met his eyes for a brief moment. He couldn't keep Tucker's gaze and looked off to the side. This wasn't about him right now. "Danny. C'mon, man, you're gonna be worried about Sam but there's gotta be more than that going on..."
"Tuck... I just can't worry about me right now. Not when she's like this... We can talk tomorrow, 'kay? If she's doing better then." At least that would give him time to put his thoughts together.
Tucker sighed but relented. "Alright. Just don't back out on me again, man. Or I'll call Jazz." Danny looked back up at Tuck to give him a challenging eyebrow as if to dare him. In response after a moment, all Tucker did was start attempting to do the worm with his own eyebrows- something that never failed to crack Danny up.
The tension broken, Danny turned back to the coffee pot and poured up his next cup. This one, he downed the same as the others, but he finally put a lid on it when he emptied the remainder of the second pot into his cup. "C'mon, I bet the food'll get here soon."
Tucker was more than happy to lead the way towards the front entrance of the hospital at the reminder of food and while Danny had intended to save the last cup of coffee to drink alongside his meal, it sort of didn't last until the end of the hallway where he discarded the empty cup in the trash. He was just so tired, and it did so very little for him.
He fully expected to continue to be extra tired for the next however-long Sam was in the hospital for. Oh hooray.
Danny didn't, however, expect a familiar shock of red hair that quickly had him doing a double-take back to the front lobby waiting room they'd just passed by. What the-
"The heck are you doing here, Weston? Hey, Kyle." Was it ever a good idea to engage in conversation with Wesley Weston? No. Did he do it often anyways? Yes, yes he did. Danny just couldn't help it, though- it was more often than not a hilarious exchange. One of the only people who knew his secret and not a single person believed Wes. It was kind of incredible, really. And Kyle was chill as hell if a bit weird. And that was coming from the ghost kid. Tucker paused and turned back, a grin lighting up his face.
Unsurprisingly, Wes's face darkened considerably at the sound of Danny's voice while Kyle shot him and Tuck an easy smile and wave. Yep, high out of his mind as usual. "The fuck do you want, Fenton?"
Danny glanced to catch Tucker's eye, mischief bouncing between them. Might as well have a little fun if he was trying to calm down during this little break. "Oh come on, I just asked a question."
Wes just glowered at him. Kyle glanced at him and laughed before ruffling his younger brother's hair which did nothing but piss Wes off more as he shoved Kyle away. "Our dad's fuck buddy got his ass kicked and landed in the ER. Wesley, here, is grounded so Dad dragged him along."
Danny had to contain his laughter as Wes protested, swatting his brother's hand away from him again. Tucker was failing at his own poker face which just continued to tick Wes off which was always great fun. "You're the whole reason I got grounded, hiding your stash in my room! You wouldn't even get in trouble for it- you're 18!" Kyle just laughed again.
"Wait, who is your dad even screwing around with? Wasn't he with Star's mom like a month ago?" It was definitely not Danny's business whatsoever, but the infamy of Walter Weston's attempts to sleep his way to the top of the social circles around town was the only type of gossip Danny enjoyed. And that was only because it drove Wes insane.
Kyle was always perfectly fine to supply the deets, too. "Oh, he was, but his boss has been his long-time, secret run around."
Tucker cracked up laughing again. "His boss? Man, he really must like getting fu- woah... Danny, dude, you okay?"
The very little color that Danny's face usually held had drained away.
He was here. He was here. In the hospital. Somewhere near them. Somewhere near Sam.
Danny didn't think about it any further- there wasn't anyone in the room who didn't know his secret, Wes didn't have any electronics to record with from being grounded, and Tuck would take care of any security footage for him but Danny didn't even consider those at the moment. He just morphed right then and there and jumped up through the ceiling to make sure Sam was safe and then figure out where the bastard was to make sure he knew damn well not to come anywhere near them.