Cirque Berserk

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10
(RE)call

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The wind was blowing all around him. He felt like he was floating, a sensation which briefly made him smile until he opened his eyes and saw the sky was quickly becoming distant and that things all around him were just a blur of colors which blended with the dark that engulfed him.

He was falling, he realized, but did not have the heart - or time – to actually scream with the terror he felt zinging through his veins.

He could feel it, mere milliseconds had passed, but he could feel himself slowly start to grow too close to the ground – too close to splatting wide like the pancakes he loved so much.

A white hand suddenly lashed into his sight and he choked a scream as his shirt scrunched up above him and nearly crushed his windpipe. His feet scraped the ground before he was up once again and then his back crashed to the rocky floor.

"Owww," he groaned, sitting up and shaking his head. He rubbed the aches that arose in his back and glared at his best friend, who was looking paler than he usually did. "Took you long enough, Danny!" Tucker scowled, adjusting his glasses. "Sam, tell Danny it took him long enough!" He crossed his arms over his chest and furrowed his brows when Danny scrambled weakly to his feet before diving head-first into the freezing lake water.

"Danny?" Tucker frowned, standing up and wincing when his lower back protested. "Danny! Sam?" He looked around and froze.

Sam had fallen first, he remembered that much, and she had fallen into...

The lake.

"SAM!!" Tucker bolted to the shore of the lake, dragging his feet against the thick soil as the water froze the blood in his legs. "DANNY! DANNY! SAM!" He watched the water with poorly concealed fear and paled when Danny shot out of the surface, Sam's limp head bobbing with the water currents.

Tucker helped Danny drag Sam out of the water and rest her upon the shore, peering down at her pale skin and even paler lips.

He watched Danny pat her cheek and ground his teeth when he looked just about ready to cry.

He never did.

"Wake up, wake up, wake up," he kept mumbling, touching her throat and feeling a weak heartbeat and shakily hovering it over her before repeating the actions – as if doing it enough would change the outcome.

"What did Lancer teach us?!" Tucker asked, panicked. "Er—Mouth to mouth, right? Oh, crap, how do you—Sam was the only one who was paying attention!!" Tucker gripped his beret but paused when he noticed he no longer had it over his head. His eyes found it floating in the lake water but he was too panicked to actually go and get it.

Sam wasn't really breathing.

Danny kept pressing his palms into her chest, mumbling to himself, eyes greener than he had ever seen them, and Tucker watched with wide, terrorized, eyes when Sam never reacted. He saw Danny lean down and blow air into Sam's mouth, continuing to press on her chest and watch his friend merely whimper when she did nothing.

"Wake up, wake up, wake up," he whispered, eyes wide with growing fright as Sam only got paler. "Please, wake up!" He gave a hard press, putting most of his body weight into the plunge, and Tucker watched with frozen shock as Sam suddenly jerked up, gasping desperately for air, clawing her hands into the sand, and gurgling out mouthfuls of water.

Danny tilted her head to the side, running a violently shaking hand down the side of her cheek as she breathed in greedy gasps of air.

"Sh-she's alive," Tucker mumbled, dropping to his knees as the shock wore off. "She's alive. Danny, she's okay now! You did it! You did it, DD, you saved her! I knew she wasn't the only one paying attention in Lancer's class!" He scooted closer to Danny, who blankly stared at Sam as her breath evened and she fluttered her eyes closed. "Danny?"

"I have to go," he whispered, swallowing thickly at Tucker's silent stare. "I have to go. Now. They're expecting me back and I—"

"You.. you mean you're leaving us?" Tucker asked, voice plunging into a whisper. "Just like that? I-I thought—"

"I have to go," Danny said, voice stronger than before. Tucker saw the dead determination in Danny's eyes, the struggle it took for the boy to stand on his feet as he stared down at Sam's body, which was alive thanks to him. "You don't understand. They need me there. After I took hold of that staff... I noticed something strange. All of the ghosts that had been under its control have obeyed without hesitation but once the control broke... they were lost. They don't remember anything. They have nothing but the circus Freakshow ran. For Gods sake, they can barely talk!"

Tucker saw Danny suddenly jerk back, eyes blinking as if he had gotten sand into them. When he looked back up, a strange emotion filled his emerald eyes, before Tucker saw the old spark which was Danny filled them once more.

"They lost everything?" Tucker asked, brows drawn in. "Everything?"

"Everything," Danny nodded, sounding dazed. "I doubt they even know the concept of death – they think they were always like that." He looked down at his hand, twitching his fingers and feeling something like dread and fierce indignation clash.

He felt conflicted.

He was a ghost. He was dead. But something inside screamed otherwise, thrashed to be released but he simply didn't know how to release that anxious entity.

What was happening to him?

"How would you know?"

Danny pointed weakly to the right and Tucker saw the staff which had once had Danny in its clutches lie upon a rough patch of rocks, broken in half.

"Because I... don't know who you are," Danny swallowed. "I-I don't know who she is but she... she means a lot to me. I feel it. I know she does but I don't know who she is."

"You don't know... me?" Tucker choked, voice strained with disbelief. "You honestly don't know me?"

Danny shook his head slowly, worrying his bottom lip as he continued to stare at Sam. "No. I don't."

"I'm Tucker. Tucker Foley! I'm your best friend, man, I've been your best friend since elementary school!" Tucker screamed, standing up and clenching his jaw against the tremors that threatened to expose his spiraling emotions. "She's Sam! Samantha Manson but she hates it when people use her full name and—"

"—She's an ultra-recyclo-vegetarian and she hates the color pink and she absolutely loathes it when people judge her by her appearance and she thinks her parents nag her too much about her preference of dark colors—"

There was a jab of disgust in his gut and Danny clutched it. It felt like something was trying to tell him something.

What was happening to him?

"—And you've been in love with her for the last five years!" Tucker finished. Danny looked up at him, a haunted, scared, look in his eyes.

"I-I..." Danny's lips trembled. "Don't tell her," he whispered, body shaking not from the cold but from the sheer overload of emotions he felt. He felt possessive over this girl – he felt a connection with her, a deep one that had him nearly giving into the buckle of his knees and crushing her in his arms. He couldn't explain it. He felt protective, almost animalistically so, over this girl he could not remember yet at the same time did. "Don't tell her about this. It'll tear her apart."

Tucker shut his eyes, gripping his head as he felt a headache pound his thoughts into scraps and pieces that refused to fit together. "It'll tear her apart even more if I don't!"

"I don't remember you but if we really were best friends... please," Danny pleaded, turning fully to him and looking at him straight in the eye.

Tucker liked to believe this was all a lie; that Danny would suddenly smile and say 'surprise!' and everything would be just dandy once again and they would be able to continue on with their lives.

But the uncertainty in his eyes, the sheer distant glint in them, told him otherwise as Tucker flashed his eyes to Sam, who coughed out more water and weakly brought a hand up to wipe away the sickly warm water. Her eyes crossed when she opened them and he saw her simply slip into sleep once more.

"Okay," Tucker laughed harshly. "Okay."

"There has to be a way I can regain my memories," Danny rushed, feeling the need to reassure. "How can I know all of this without having at least some form of remembrance? How could I know that she likes—likes to fly at night when I visit her in her room?" Danny ground his teeth, fingers digging into his skull. "How can I know that but at the same time not?"

"I have no idea what's going on," Tucker confessed, shaking his head. "But... this staff—Freakshow putting you under his control, getting manipulated by that staff thing... it screwed you up, man," his voice cracked. "Are you sure you don't remember? Nothing at all?"

"I feel as if.. I haven't seen you in my life," Danny said, something inside of him just breaking at the sight of Tucker's pained face. "But I know you. I know I do! But..." he suddenly looked up, into the inky black sky. "I have to go. I'm sorry. I'll try to regain my memories—I'll fix this but just..." he hesitantly glanced back down at Sam, who breathed easily. "Don't tell her. Whatever you do, don't tell... Sam."

Tucker merely watched Danny take a step back, force himself to bend his legs in order to lift off. Before he did so, Tucker whispered:

"You're a halfa."

"A.. a what?" Danny asked. His jaw hurt from having it clenched so tightly for so long.

"You were in an accident a couple of years ago. Sam convinced you to go into your parents Ghost Portal and-and you pressed something inside of it and when you came back out, you were like this," Tucker explained, motioning to him. "A ghost. But you could transform back into a human at will. Maybe that's why you remember."

Danny dropped his gaze to his hand, tracing its outline against the black of the ground with his eyes. "I don't know. I feel like I've been like this for all of my life."

"But you haven't. You haven't died yet, Danny Fenton, you're still alive somewhere inside there." Tucker watched Danny flinch away, hold his head, and grind his teeth against a sharp jab inside his skull.

"I—have to go," Danny strangled, disappearing from sight before Tucker could blink. A gust of air made Tucker shiver, had him straining to stay still and not reach through the air like an idiot in a desperate attempt to drag back his best friend.

He dropped to his knees, where he stayed like that for two more hours until Sam awoke, groggy and grouchy and unaware of the developments that had happened just a few hours prior; unaware that, despite the grief that had drowned her violet eyes when Tucker told her Danny had left, everything had been for a cause and the hate she harbored for Danny was nothing more than smoke and mirrors as the boy didn't even remember her.

"... and I said, 'no! You can't do that because its unjust! I thought you were a lawyer!'" Star cracked up, slamming her fist upon the table in the Nasty Burger. Valerie smiled thinly, eyes flickering back and forth from Star to Sam as the former joked none-too-funnily about recent events.

Tucker tapped his fingers nervously against the table top, watching Danny simply stare at Sam while the girl desperately ignored him and sipped her strawberry shake more frequently than was considered casual.

"Star, that wasn't even funny," Sam deadpanned, ignoring the look of indignant astonishment that fleeted Star's face.

"How would you know!?"

"Because I'm not laughing and I don't see anyone else, either," she snapped, effectively shutting up Star albeit she felt a little hurt by the sheer bluntness of it all. Star sipped her diet coke and watched Danny, whom she had greeted enthusiastically, slowly drop his gaze to the table.

From where she was sitting, she could see him clench his hands into fists.

"So!" Tucker cleared his throat, offering a wary grin. "How was everybody's day? Huh? Come on, someone's gotta' be having a crap—except Sam, you don't count—" he ignored Sam's curt 'hey!' and continued. "—so? Anybody? Fine. I'll just share my day. It started with toast—"

"Next," Valerie interrupted blandly, smirking when Tucker shot her a sharp look.

"But I haven't even started!" he protested.

"Doesn't matter," Val sighed, "I can already tell it was going to be boring. Just like that one time you tried to narrate your whole day."

Tucker flushed pink. "You promised you would never tell anyone about that!!"

"Too late now," she grinned rakishly, laughing when Tuck groaned and Danny cracked the first smile during the entire hour. In her peripheral vision, she could see Sam lock her jaw and grind against the straw stuck between her teeth. She saw her flick her eyes to Danny twice before settling upon the sweating cup of soda Danny had ordered seconds after his arrival.

He hadn't ordered anything to eat.

Tucker had stuffed himself so full of meat, it made Val cringe.

And Sam had ordered a simple strawberry smoothie when Valerie returned with a tray of stuff akin to lettuce and carrots.

Star ordered diet coke and extra-small french fries.

Valerie had gotten a simple drink, just like Danny.

As Sam continued to drink her smoothie, she couldn't help but to think bitterly how utterly uncomfortable this so-called 'reunion' was. She tried her best to glare daggers into Tucker's skull, to which he ignored and she cursed his immunity, but after a few failed tries at that she direct her ire to Star, who started to ignore her as well.

Next victim: Valerie.

And with just one challenging stare, Sam backed off. She sunk deeper into her seat, trying her best to ignore the way Danny kept looking at her. Any other time she would have blushed and felt mildly flattered – perhaps she would even caught his eye – but in this moment, in that time, Sam felt nothing more but uncomfortable under his scrutiny.

It wasn't lusty.

It wasn't interested.

It was confused.

There was a strange look in his eyes that made her fidget with the hem of her shirt. Her leg bounced up and down nervously and Sam had to watch herself as she kept referring to the time every few seconds if she let her guard down for even one second. She could feel her face heat, sweat start to bead on her forehead, and her heart race when he leaned back into his seat and crossed his arms over his chest.

All the while, Danny kept staring.

He had not once moved his sight from her. Despite the tingling feeling she still felt, the uncomfortable atmosphere simply didn't mesh well with the emotions she wanted to feel. She needed to get out. She needed him to stop staring. She needed him to STOP whatever he was doing to make her feel this way.

"Stop looking at me," she said, voice coming out sharper and fiercer than the pitiful voice in her mind.

Danny never so much as blinked.

"I'm not looking at you," he responded, voice cool and collected.

"Yes, you are," she grit. "What else can you be looking at? My cup?"

"What if I was?"

"I would have noticed the way your eyes slanted towards the cup," she replied with conviction. "Stop staring at me."

He smiled coldly, making her stomach knot. "I thought you were all about the Amendments and the constitution?"

"That has nothing to do with this," she forced through her clenched teeth.

"I think it does," he continued, voice almost taunting. Suddenly, his eyes turned a clash of blue and green, a color not like Danny; a deeper color than before. A color which reflected the maniac and malicious sparkle she had never once seen in him. The sparkle she had seen in other rogue ghosts. "It's America – I can do whatever the hell I want, right? Or have you given up on that ideal just like everything else?"

Her heart pounded so hard, so fast, and she stared with wide, wide eyes at Danny's sly and grinning ones. Suddenly, it stopped. The mixture of colors became one solid color – a bright baby blue – and she watched him jump, as if startled, before he stood and stumbled away from the table.

"Excuse me," he murmured, face pale, lips vaguely trembling. They all watched him walk clean into the door and shove it open. They all watched a boy with his friends scowl at Danny when he roughly pushed past them as he exited.

It was silent for a few seconds.

"Well... that was unexpected," Tucker laughed nervously.

Sam abruptly stood, gazing at the door Danny left, before grabbing her bag and mumbling a shallow, "I have to go," and exiting the restaurant as well.

Star looked between Val and Tucker and popped her lips. "Um, I'm going to refill my soda." She slid out of the table, walking away from them as fast as she could.

Valerie finally dug her nails deeply into the table, eyes narrowed. "You moron," she hissed, "how could you bring him in here knowing that Sam still feels hurt from his desertion! Ugh, you're so lucky she didn't blow up and punch the kid in the face! What the hell were you thinking?!"

"I was thinking that maybe I could bring them back together," Tucker hissed right back. "They need to talk to each other one way or another, Val, or else how do you expect them to make amends?!"

"Oh, I don't know," Valerie growled, sarcasm dripping off her words, "maybe once Sam felt comfortable saying his name, for one?"

"And when do you think that'll be!?" Tucker said, exasperated. "It's been five years, Val, five. She's gotta' snap out of it someday! Why not today?"

"Did you hear what he said to her?" Valerie snapped. "He literally mocked her! Sam! Queen of mocking! Do you really think that Danny would say that to her if he wanted to become her friend again?" She pinched the bridge of her nose. "You just made things so much worse for Sam and I."

"But—that—I can explain that!" Tucker protested feebly. He pushed his glasses up, eyes conflicted as Valerie waited impatiently for an answer. "It's just—" he's not himself, he wanted to say, because he told me that his ghost side acts up sometimes. But how could he say that when Danny had specifically told him not to tell anyone? Danny had told him this during their ride to the restaurant, to warn him ahead that he might say some callous things against his will; that sometimes he couldn't control himself, sometimes things got 'complicated', whatever that meant.

"Right," Val said flatly, after a few moments of watching her boyfriend gape like a fish. "You can't. So just admit that you're wrong and let's move on with our lives." She sighed, as Star flirted with some high schooler who looked much too young to even be thinking about hitting on her. "I wonder how Sam is holding up right now..."

"Fine," Tucker whispered, hoarsely. "Just fine. It's Sam! She's the strongest girl I know.. er, aside from you, babe." Tucker turned and peered through the window, watching as Danny rubbed his eyes out vigorously while leaning against the hood of his car. He saw Sam's car had long since been pulled out and dropped his gaze when he found that perhaps this had been a bad idea. But the reunion had worked for something, at least: perhaps now Danny would explain to Sam the reason why he had left, the reasons behind the stretching grin and heartless words he had said today.

"Hey, I'll be right back, alright?" Tucker forced a smile, walking out of the restaurant and to the car where Danny leaned against.

"He hates her," Danny whispered once Tucker was close enough.

"What?"

"He hates her," Danny shut his eyes. "He hates her. My ghost counterpart hates Sam."

Tucker was rooted to the spot, completely floored by the information. "But you... you remember, right?" Tucker asked, voice dry. "You remember us, right? You got your memories back... right?"

"I regained my memories a few days later," Danny revealed, dropping his hand from their position over his eyes. They were blue. "I appreciate you acting like nothing pretending nothing happened but... ever since Freakshow controlled me with the staff, I haven't been the same." He clenched his hands. "My ghost self and my human self fight for dominance most of the time, even though I can subdue my ghost half most of the time. It seems the staffs power over my ghost self awakened my 'alter ego'," he air-quoted, "and now it's pretty much pissed off half the time since I'm in control nearly every second of my life. But sometimes my control breaks and-and stuff like this happens." Danny lowered his eyes, tone laden with guilt. "I want to apologize to Sam but my other half strongly dislikes her for some reason. He hasn't accepted her yet and he refuses to let me go meet her again."

"Does.. your other half hate me, too?" Tucker asked, hesitantly.

"No, he thinks your annoying," Danny chuckled, as Tuck scowled. He sobered up quickly. "But now I have the issue with Sam. I never thought my other half would put a barrier between us like this – it usually behaves and follows my demands. I don't know what makes this different than any other time."

"So, your other half – it's your ghost half, right?" At Danny's nod, Tucker continued. "And that was why you couldn't remember anything about your past, right? Because you were ghost that time so I assume..."

"I got the hang of switching from human to ghost a couple of hours later." Danny explained. "I kept messing up in the beginning, though, and sometimes I'd end up with white hair and my regular clothes or black hair and green eyes. Once I got that down, things only got worse." Danny sighed heavily. "I began liking trickery and I found speaking with regular people annoying. It took me a year to notice that I'd changed ." He pointed to his mouth. "I don't remember getting a lip piercing. I don't remember buying all these clothes," he gestured to his shirt, "or planning half of the events in Circus Gothica. I don't even remember my first show. I sometimes don't remember my shows. It scared me at first but I eventually accepted that sometimes, if I wasn't careful, my other half would take over for a while before I woke up or something jolted me back to reality."

Tucker listened quietly, absorbing the information with apprehension. It seemed to him like Danny had been through a lot during his absence.

"Why doesn't he like Sam? Or you, or whatever?" Tucker asked, once Danny had decided that leaning against his car was a bad idea as it could activate the alarm and stood by it instead. "You like Sam, right?"

"Yeah," he replied, "I like Sam a lot." His shoulders slumped, frowning as he crossed his arms protectively across his chest. "And I noticed that if I like something, my ghost self usually doesn't."

Immediately, Tucker caught on.

"So if you really like Sam...?"

Danny grinned lopsidedly, eyes flickering a blur of colors before settling on the startling blue-green that made Tuck sick. "Danny wasn't kidding; you're pretty smart, four eyes," Danny's grin broadened, as he flipped his hair out of his eyes and he combed it back with his fingers conceitedly. "You caught on quicker than I anticipated. But yes, Danny-boy here loves Sam." His grin held a tinted edge to it, something dark and mischievous that made Tuck resist taking a step back. "So in return I can't stand her."

It all fell into place in Tucker's head, as he watched this new Danny lean back upon the hood of the car casually; shark-grin almost too disturbing to stare at for too long.

This is going to be harder than I thought, Tucker swallowed. How am I going to reconcile Sam and Danny when Danny's ghost half hates her guts?

Yes. Things had become much more complicated than once thought.