He didn't know how long he cried, but Jack figured that it had been quite a while. By the time he quelled his tears long enough to pick himself up from where he had collapsed in the damp grass, the fire had reduced the barn to nothing more than a pile of smoking embers.
Wiping his nose on the back of his sleeve, the man leaned against the side of the Fenton Ghost Assault Vehicle, dampness seeping uncomfortably into the seat of his trousers. Danny's good arm hung over the side of his seat and through the open door, brushing the top of his father's head.
Jack really should take the boy to a hospital, but knew that as soon as Danny went in there, the Guys in White would make sure that he never came out. Besides, halfas healed really fast, didn't they?
The memory of Phantom lying weak and gasping on the laundry floor flashed through Jack's thoughts, and he nibbled on his lower lip nervously.
The fingers on his head were freezing, and this finally spurred the man into action.
Gently lifting his son from the seat, Jack sat back on the ground. Gathering the lanky boy in his arms, the hunter drew the blanket around both of them in the hope that he could transfer some warmth. At least the night was only slightly cool, with no breath of wind to steal heat from the two beings huddled together.
He could have simply turned on the car heater and shut the door with Danny inside, but the man currently wanted nothing more than to hold his son close.
Tilting his head back to lean against the vehicle's exterior, Jack stared at a sky speckled with spots of light.
"I wish you could see them, Danny-boy," he whispered. "The stars are so bright out here without the city's lights. Maybe you could even point out some constellations to me."
Danny lay still and silent in his father's arms, and Jack sniffed as fresh tears spilled down his cheeks.
He was such a failure.
A failure at ghost hunting, at inventing, at protecting the people he cared about.
But most of all, Jack Fenton was a failure at being a friend and father.
Vlad had been that way since college! How had Jack not noticed that he had turned his own best friend into a hybrid? No wonder Vlad sought revenge to such a horrible level. Jack had to apologise, to somehow make everything right between them, but the more he thought about it, the more he realised that reconciliation with Vlad was pretty much impossible.
That still didn't excuse the billionaire's treatment of Danny and Maddie.
Jack felt his heart break as his fingers danced through black hair. What had he done to Danny?
The teen shifted under his father's touch, and Jack frowned at this unexpected development. Danny couldn't have fainted more than an hour and a half ago, but as Jack continued the stroke his hair, the boy groaned and cuddled closer to the source of warmth.
The burns on the ghost child's face had faded so that they were barely visible.
Lifting the blanket, Jack stared at the stump of his son's arm. The charred flesh was no longer inflamed, and glistened with a fresh layer of ectoplasm.
Swallowing down bile at the grisly sight, Jack tucked the blanket back around his boy. If Danny was fully expected to regenerate from a pile of dust that would have been burned in the fire, and if he could re-grow half of his own heart, then wouldn't the kid easily replace his missing forearm? Maybe that's what the ectoplasm was doing already.
Danny moved again, taking a deep breath and letting it out as a sigh.
"Danny?" Jack called softly, stroking the side of his son's face. "How are you feeling?"
The halfa mumbled something incoherent, bleary blue eyes blinking open. He turned towards his father as though trying to settle back down, but the motion obviously hurt – Danny was awake in an instant, crying out and clutching the stump of his arm to his chest. Jack held his shoulders, keeping the boy as still as he could to prevent them getting tangled in the blanket. After a moment of struggling, Danny collapsed back into his father's arms with a whimper, hand still clasped tightly over the site of amputation. Jack belatedly realised that he probably should have bandaged the spot earlier, as well as tend to any other injuries the kid might have.
"Danny…?"
"It hurts," the teen gasped, scrunching up his face.
The sight sent pain shooting through Jack's chest, a small voice whispering in his thoughts that every single injury on Danny's body was thanks to him. Every time he had attacked Phantom, Jack had been hunting his own son. And it was all because the inventor couldn't get a stupid portal to work.
"Where's Vlad?"
Jack shrugged as much as his awkward position would allow before moving the boy to sit more upright. "Gone," the hunter said.
"Oh." Groaning, Danny pulled back the blanket to uncover his glistening stump. "Well, that's healing nicely."
"Does that mean your powers are back?"
The halfa nodded, getting shakily to his feet. "Yeah, but they're too weak for me to fight anything. We have to go warn Mum about Vlad."
Jack helped his son back into the vehicle, fury building within him at each small sound of pain.
Yes, he was angry at Vlad for doing this to them, and for keeping a grudge over an accident that took place over twenty years ago. But more than Vlad, Jack was furious with himself.
How could he have let this happen?
Jack Fenton may be a brilliant inventor, but even he had to admit that he was a careless one. He lived by the policy that hazmat and fume cupboards were adequate protection, never bothering to factor in the involvement of additional people. His workspaces were dangerous, full of hazards that were never addressed because Jack reasoned that so long as he wasn't disturbed, nothing would go wrong.
Vlad disproved that back in college, and Danny had done it again a few short years ago. Jack had simply been too blind to see it until now.
Even worse than having a dangerous lab in their own home, Jack had frightened his son so much that Danny didn't even tell his parents when he became half ghost! The kid had been scared of him for years, and this upset Jack more than anything else.
Buckling into the driver's seat, the burly man double-checked that Danny was wrapped tightly in the blanket. "I'll make this up to you," he promised.
The boy shook his head and hunched tremoring shoulders. "It's not your fault," he whispered.
For now, Jack would simply agree to disagree – Danny's pale face was far too determined, and it wouldn't do to waste the teen's little remaining strength in a petty argument.
They were both silent until the lights of Amity Park glowed on the horizon.
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you."
Jack tightened his fingers around the steering wheel. "I didn't exactly make it easy," he responded. "I guess that I have a lot to thank you for."
A shrug, and Danny turned his head to look out the window as they entered the outskirts of town. "You've saved me plenty of times as well. Remember how you beat the crap out of Skulker when he had me at his mercy just before Christmas?"
"I also shot at you," Jack reminded him.
Danny waved his good hand. "Whatever. I get shot at all the time, so don't worry about it."
"It's my job to worry about you," Jack answered, taking a sharp right.
"Home's the other way," Danny reminded him, ignoring the man's comment as they pulled into the town's twenty-four hour supermarket.
"I think that we need some bad day food." Jack passed Danny a handful of change. "Could you use the public phone to call your mother?"
Nodding, Danny slid intangibly through the car door. "I'll meet you back here," he announced, limping across the parking lot in the direction of the phone box.
Jack parked the car and trotted in the opposite direction, managing to collect all the items he needed and exit the store in under five minutes.
Danny wasn't at the car when the hunter returned.
Deciding to drive over to the phone booth to save his boy the walk back to the car, Jack dumped his groceries in the back before heading for the driver's seat.
Taped to the steering wheel was a white glove covered in blood. On the dashboard there was a message scribbled in permanent marker and very familiar handwriting.
IT'S EITHER YOU OR DANIEL
YOU HAVE 24 HOURS
-V