Danny smiled up at Jazz, as their parents shuffled around the lab in the background. The two of them had just finished a game of hide and seek, in which Danny had won 5 times in a row, and were now playing rock paper scissors to see who'd pick next. And when Danny won once more, he cheered in absolute delight while holding his chosen rock in the air.

"I want to play tag!" He exclaimed, making Dan jump and crack the beaker in his hand.

Dan knew all about Danny's tag, and it was definitely not safe for anything that wanted to live or had the ability to die. "No, Danny. You can't play tag with Jazz."

"Why not? I won't cheat-I promise!" Danny said with big eyes, watching as Dan dumped the slightly green beaker into the garbage. He was lucky no one saw that, and his hand would heal up in a minute or two.

"Why can't he play tag?" Came Jasmine's question, but Dan could only think of why he shouldn't play tag. At least not with someone they didn't need dead.

"Danny doesn't exactly... Play fair. Why don't you show him a video game or something instead?" The full ghost dodged, opening a drawer he knew specifically held around 25 beakers. Jack was always prone to breaking them-hence his thicker gloves and extra glass items. In fact, Dan could almost recall the Jack and Maddie of his original timeline discussing the amount of money they needed to set aside for beakers each month for some of their more explosive experiments.

"Video game?" Danny asked, while Jazz said. "I don't think he's old enough for anything I have..."

That made the older phantom glance at her. "You don't look like the gaming type."

Jazz shrugged. "I kind of got into them when I started tutoring Tucker. He let me borrow a few and I guess they just stuck... You know, I think I have Doomed lying around upstairs somewhere. I bet I could teach him that."

Danny looked up at that, remembering that his dad mentioned owning Doomed, and beamed. "Yeah! I wanna learn to play that!"

Seconds later Danny was dragging Jazz upstairs by the hand, followed by Dan's shout of "Don't kill each other!" The metallic lab door then shut, leaving the full ghost alone with the hunters. And while Dan expected to simply keep working, Maddie asked him. "...Do you have anyone waiting for you two?"

Dan cleared any remaining glass off of the table before he began mixing things in the beaker, trying to remember that old formula for Vlad's synthetic ectoplasm. It had been so long since he even attempted it, but he was sure he could remember. He had 25 attempts at it anyway. "No, it's just the two of us. Before Danny it was only me. Everyone I knew died when I was 14. You tend not to get too many acquaintances after a thing like that."

"I can understand that... My son, my Danny, would have been 14 this year." Maddie said softly, but Dan said nothing to that.

Instead, he focused on how their timelines didn't seem to be synced together, rather than the bitterness that formed in his chest at Maddie's words. "My son, my Danny"? The full ghost was certain he would have broken another beaker, had Jack not slammed his hand against the table and said. "Those ghosts are always ruining things! They have no good in them at all! What kind of monster would steal someone's baby boy!?"

Dan would have remained silent, but his curiosity got the best of him. "What would you do if your son died and was now a ghost?"

The two scientists looked at each other for a long time. They occasionally glanced at Dan, but his back was turned to them as he leaned over the metal work table. He stared into the blue liquid within the beaker, being reminded of Danny's eyes and cheerful face.

Maddie finally replied. "Well... He wouldn't be our son anymore. The ectoplasm would have corrupted him, and we would have no other choice but to kill the ghost and put him out of his misery."

Dan gives a "hmm" but refuses to say anything else. He knew his eyes were glowing red, and saying anything would only make himself more agitated. But oh, he wanted to say something. Tell them how utterly wrong they were about how ghosts worked. Tell them how loving Danny was with ectoplasm pumping in his veins. Tell them how they were horrible people for everything they would have done to Danny.

But it wasn't worth it.

Instead, Dan poured took a breath and forced his eyes to turn blue. Turning around, he gave the two an empty look. "I'm going to take a break. The formula I was working with is in the notebook." And with that, the full ghost made his way out of the lab and away from those two. He couldn't understand why part of him ever wanted to protect them.

"Got ya!" Danny's voice suddenly rang through the living room as Dan stood in the door frame. The sound brought a smile to his face as his son celebrated his victory, despite the bitterness in his mouth.

Jazz then looked up from her laptop screen and noticed Dan. She greeted him with a smile "You know your son is incredible, right?"

"Of course I do-I raised him." The man said, leaning over the couch to see that Danny was indeed racking up points like a mad-man. "He's a fast learner."

Dan then made his way around and to the front of the couch, sitting beside Danny to watch him play. The boy really was a fast learner-he was fast at everything-though that habit often costed them quite a few plates and a wall once.

"I like playing with Jazz. She's really fun!" Danny said as he paused the game, just as he was taught.

Jazz giggled. "Yeah, this is nice. It's like I finally have a little brother."

Dan gave a humorless chuckle at the irony. "Mind if I give it a try?"

Danny nods, eagerly handing over the laptop before he shifted so Jazz could see better. The two then watched as dormant gaming skills shined through after so many years. Danny was awe struck, and Jazz was staring at Dan as if he just grew another head. The man was also incredibly relaxed about the whole thing-pressing buttons with astounding timing.

"How is a 40 year old man so good at video games?" Jazz questioned, earning a snort from the full ghost.

"I'm 34, actually. And believe me when I tell you, I played this game a lot when I was young." Dan said, handing the laptop back to Danny.

Jazz looked at Danny briefly before asking quietly. "What is it like...? Your timeline?"

Dan sighed tiredly before he leaned into the couch. "Half of the world is a complete wasteland, while small cities are scattered here and there with survivors. Most of the creatures you see around are ghosts-and even then they're scarce. You could probably go a long time without seeing anything that can move by itself."

"...Why do you want to go back?" Jazz asked him, voice barely above a whisper.

"...As nice as this place is, this isn't our home. We don't belong here." Dan said, placing a hand on Danny's back and being met with a smile.

Jazz gives a small smile of her own, opening her to speak-only for the slam of the laboratory door to break them apart. And then they hear Maddie shout, ecto-gun aimed at Dan. "Get away from our son, ghost!"

A/N: You know, I hate cliff hangers... But I'm doing them anyway because I require more time to edit. (And yes, hrisi292. The only reason you may not be able to tell is because I take a considerable amount of time trying to break apart sentences I decided to glue together in order to make my writing sound somewhat "professional". [I mean, look at what I just wrote.]) (Also, Acidwing, please do not remind me of writing for science in any way. I feel terrifying flashbacks of pre-labs I never finished because they literally bored me to sleep coming on... I have a problem.)

...Right, the story. Next chapter will be up some time tomorrow, and I have nothing else to say. I must now go complete other things because the world likes to make you not do what you'd rather be doing.