Wow Danny has it rough, but eh cuteness between him and Tadashi so yay~

Please review

~CWA


CHAPTER SIXTEEN


Danny Fenton

Telling Fred everything has taken a huge weight off my chest. I feel like I can really breathe. Live. I feel so free. I can't help but whistle and hum a but as I play my music from my phone on my full blast as I work. I just feel like I can do anything now that I'm absolutely free. I feel like a new man- a new ghost. A new halfa. Whatever. It all means the same.

I'm well aware that the others are looking at me every now and then with curiosity- probably wondering why I'm in such a good mood. Though Fred seems to understand. Every time I catch his eye, he gives me a big grin and a thumbs up before I return to working. Strangely enough, Wasabi isn't here yet for whatever reason. A part of me hopes that he's on a date with that Jade girl so I can end up meeting her.

I hum a bit more enthusiastically, occasionally singing under my breath to the song. In my defense, I am in an extremely good mood, so much in fact… That I could dance. Without even thinking about it, I'm dancing across my little lab as I work, eagerly singing and humming along to the music without a care in the world.

"~It's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new life, for me... And I'm feelin' good..."

I let out a few more overly done moves to the beat, feeling a bit like some sort of Jazz performer from like the 1920s. Or is it 1940s. Hm. I always do get the times mixed up. I think I can feel Lancer turning in his grave knowing that I don't even know History that well. Or English for that matter. What can I say? I'm a scientist at heart. It's in my blood. And ectoplasm for that matter.

My moves may, or may not, be a bit… out dated. I'm vaguely aware that half of my so-called moves aren't really moves. The sprinkler. Dancing chicken. Robot. But for the most part, I just stick to the occasional spins, hip movements and other vague-dances that are practically universal for dancing.

"Is Danny… dancing," I hear Tadashi whisper somewhat-discretely to Honey Lemon as I freely move to the beat of the music.

...Maybe I'm over doing it a bit. But I lose myself to the music and frankly, I could really care less if I'm making a fool of myself because anything that I'm doing now is not going to be worse than any of the embarrassing stuff from High School….

"It seems that way," Honey Lemon answers with a half-heartily shrug, "Whatever got him into a such a good mood… Well, I'm not complaining. It's kinda nice seeing him so happy."

I get a wicked gleam in my eye as I turn to Tadashi as the next song starts up. I make a come dance with me motion. Seeing the look in my eyes with the gesture, he backs away a bit slowly, blushing as he frantically shakes his head and waves his hands around like nope, not me, not going to happen. Heh. Like he gets a choice. With a big grin on my face, I quickly grab him by his wrist and drag him over, causing Honey Lemon to laugh at us as Tadashi suddenly finds himself being my dancing partner.

I have to give it to him, considering how sudden this is, he's doing pretty well. It doesn't take him long before he's willingly dancing with me. Our hands are interlocked as we twist and turn with laughs. I know full well that Honey Lemon is already video taping us on her phone and even GoGo is looking slightly amused at us as she shakes her head. Fred is laughing the loudest, however, and asks off-handedly to a few of the other students who they think is the better dancer….

"I think Fred is starting a betting ring on us," Tadashi comments as I twirl him around, "I'm not too sure how I feel about that."

His face is beat red just at the thought, but I just laugh as we continue to dance to the music playing from my phone.

"Come on, Tadashi, aren't you eager to know whose the better dancer between the two of us?"

He doesn't comment and just makes a face at me as we dance away. After a while, just as the song comes to end, I decide to end our little duet the only way I know how. Dramatically. I give him a big twirl before I pull him in close, our bodies grazing against each other as I give him a wicked smirk. Our faces are close enough that if I lean in only a little bit farther...

"...I think I won, Tadashi."

He blushes and sputters as I set him free. The other students have a mixed reaction, but most are clapping or letting a few whoops before they returned to their business since all the excitement's died down by now. I have a cocky grin on my face as I turn toward Honey Lemon, GoGo and Fred. Honey Lemon is clapping giddily as Fred lets out a shrill whistle with a few cheers of his own. Even GoGo is, reluctantly, giving a few slow claps with an amused look on her face.

"Thank you, thank you," I bow deeply toward them, "I'll be here all year- quite literally, I mean it is college and-"

I look up briefly from my bow as I hear someone enter the lab. Looking past the others, I see Wasabi as he holds the door open for someone else to enter. The others turn their attention away from me briefly enough to glance back at Wasabi and his mysterious guest. Ohhh I hope it's the girl he's talked about. I've really been looking forward to meeting her. And seeing if she knows any embarrassing stories about him either.

I can see her as she enters the lab, laughing a bit at whatever Wasabi said to her prior. But as soon as I really see her- every last detail, my eyes widen. The dark skin. The cute, slightly crooked nose. The beautiful eyes. Kinky hair.

But that's impossible. It isn't here. She is not here. She just can't be. My eyes widen and I lose my balance on my half-bow, causing me to stumble forward with a few sputters. My breathing hitches as I feel my heart, as slow as it is, speed up as I clutch my chest.

She can't be here.

She's dead.


The battle is getting worse. I never expected it to get this bad and yet here I am, desperately fighting off every single ghost I come across, careful to not hit any of my allies or friends. But that's hard to do when I can barely even see more than three feet in front of me due to the thick cloud of ghosts. Most aren't even sentient, not in the way that other ghosts are. They're like feral animals. They just attack and kill anything they come across. In this case, it's us.

I'm vaguely aware of the almost-crippling pain in my sides. No doubt I've broken a few ribs. Again. I have more bruises than I can count. A few stray cuts ooze a mix of ectoplasm and blood and I wipe at the cut on my lip as I fight to keep some of it from going into my mouth. At this point, it's a miracle I have died from lack of sleep and exhaustion. Not to mention hunger. I can't even remember the last time I had a chance to even eat something more than a Fenton Nutrition Bar. Even then I didn't even eat the whole thing and it wasn't even that big to begin with.

I'm sure others around here somewhere, possibly even close by. It's kind of hard to tell from all the ghosts that are swarming around me. But I can hear the fighting from the others, but from the way it echoes around me and mixes in with the screams and wails of ghosts, it's hard to tell how far away it is and where it's coming from.

I'm not sure how long we've been fighting like this. Days? Weeks? It feels like a lifetime. Sometimes I just want it to be over. And I mean over. Over in the sense that I don't even care about dying at this point if I had a choice. But I can't leave knowing that my friends and my allies are still fighting. I can't leave them. I can't just be selfish. I'm a hero. Heroes don't do that.

Sometimes I don't want to be the hero.

But they started this war and I'm going to finish it. Eventually.

"Danny, need a hand over here!"

I can hear Valerie's voice, as strained and raspy as it is, but I can't see her. I scream out her name in a desperate attempt to find her, but I can't hear anything over the screams from the ghosts around me. I end a few nearby ghosts attacking me and take to the skies. My eyes are wide as I frantically look around, trying to find her. Panic starts to grip me when I see no signs of her, but I'm finally able to spot a few ghosts being blasted away by her familiar gun.

She's a bit of a distance away, but I can see why she called for my help. Ghosts of all sorts are crowded around her as if they're focusing on her; she's the greatest human threat to them with her experience as a ghost hunter and deadly precision. All the fighting is wearing down on her and it shows. Her reaction time is getting slower and slower and the ghosts… The ghosts are just getting faster and faster.

I can see a particular skeleton ghost- relatively weak compared to some of the others, but the sword it holds makes it dangerous if you don't see it coming…. And Valerie doesn't see it coming.

"Valerie!"

I waste no time in trying to reach her to help her. Save her. I stop short when it's too late. She turns around just in time for the sword to come down, leaving me there standing in absolute shock for a brief moment before the grief and anger flood over me.


"...Is he okay…?"

"Danny can you hear me?"

"Danny, you're really freaking me out."

"Look at me, Danny."

All the voices mold together and it's hard for me to determine exactly who is saying what. After a few moments, I'm able to at least bring myself back to the present. My body's broken into a cold sweat and my heart is racing. But I find myself laying on the ground on some sort of pillow or someone's lap with a concerned group of friends looking over me. Tadashi's face is the closest to mine and judging from the angle, I think it's his lap that my head's actually laying on. His eyebrows are furrowed in concern, but I can see the relief in his eyes as he realizes that I'm at least awake.

"Are you okay," Wasabi asks hesitantly as he leans down to my level, "You just freaked out on us there."

I don't really want to move from this position. I don't think I could even if I did want to really. My body's tired and if not for the group of people around me, I would probably just fall asleep right here and right now. Granted, my dreams would be full of nightmares, but sleep is sleep. I guess. I'm still trying to regulate my breathing as I cross my arms over my body,

"...Depends on what you define as okay," I whisper, my voice coming out a bit raspy.

My eyes slowly go over each and every one of them. Each of them look concerned and worried about me. Fred is still freaking out though, clinging to Honey Lemon with fright as he struggles to figure out what happened and what to do. GoGo shows sympathy like she understands my little episode. Honey Lemon is biting at her nails a bit, her leg twitching, looking like she wants to say something but isn't sure what to say for once. Wasabi looks like he's trying to refrain from touching/comforting me and I can feel Tadashi running his hand slowly over my head as an attempt to comfort me.

But then my eyes fall onto Jade. She looks a bit freaked out and unsure of what to do. Her resemblance to Valerie has thrown me off quite a bit, and thrown me into an unexpected panic attack, but I can deal with it. I can handle it. Besides, she's not Valerie. She's her own person who I just need to make sure I don't scare off because Wasabi obviously really likes her.

"What happened, Danny," Tadashi whispers a bit softly.

"Just a panic attack," I try to sound nonchalant as if it's no big deal, "I haven't had one in a while… But it happens sometimes… I'll be okay. Eventually…. Did I pass out?"

"For about three minutes," GoGo replies easily, the same sympathetic look in her eyes, "Longest three minutes of our lives so try not to do it again."

She hesitates before she just pats my head as she walks by, heading straight toward her work station. I know she cares, but she still has work to do and now that it's obvious that I'm okay she's free to do her own thing. She tries to make a show of getting back to work to encourage the others to do the same. It works. Hesitantly, the others double check to make sure I'm okay and after reassuring them that I'm fine, they go back to their work stations. Jade hesitantly puts her hand on my arm and whispers something along the lines of I'm sorry, but I reassure her that it's not her fault. I even offer to treat her and Wasabi to drink at the cafe, which she accepts after Wasabi gives her a small nod of okay.

With that taken care of, Wasabi drags Jade off to show him his lab and it's not long before everyone is back to their usual spots- even if it's done reluctantly and they still glance back at me every now and then with concern. I see GoGo glance back at me with the same concern everyone else has, but there's something else too. Oh. She's giving me that look. The you okay now that I've gotten everyone away from you look. I give her a small smile before I nod slightly, causing her to nod back before she returns to her work.

I have to admit, with just me and Tadashi (who can't get up even if he wants to since I'm still on his lap), it feels a lot better. Less crowding. I can at least breathe now. So I do. I close my eyes and relax on top of Tadashi as I take some deep breaths. I can see still feel him absently playing with a bit of my hair, which brings me even more comfort. Though there's still a sort of absent feeling in my chest. That memory and panic attack has done nothing to help the feeling of homesickness.

"We agreed to wait five minutes before we called a nurse or took you to the office," Tadashi finally speaks up, though my eyes still remain close, "….So you get those panic attacks often?"

Panic attacks were something I got even before I was a halfa. They've just been something I've always had and dealt with. Sometimes I go a whole year without one and then it just hits me. Sometimes it's months. Sometimes the intervals are just hours. It all depends. But after the battle, it's just gotten worse. Going a year without them just doesn't happen and I'm just lucky that it's been this long since my last one- enough time that I've even forgot all about it. Course it helps being around so many friends.

"Sometimes," I hum a bit, "Night terrors. Panic attacks. The whole like. Sometimes they just come out of nowhere and turn a good time into an absolute shitty one…."

I hear him give a sharp intake of breath and I feel his hands tense on my head before he forces himself to relax.

"Do… Do you need help? Is there something I can do? Something you need?"

His voice is so soft that even I have to strain to hear it. I crack my eye open just enough to see the absolute fear on his face at the thought that he can't do anything to help for this. I suppose that, like me, Tadashi has a bit of a hero complex when it comes to helping others. Heh. Figures. I shake slowly shake my head at him before I close my eyes again, relaxing on his lap. He's actually pretty comfortable, but I can still feel that's pretty tense.

"….Maybe I can add that into Baymax," I hear him mutter to himself, "He should be prepared for physical and mental illnesses and injuries…."

He continues to mutter a bit to himself as I just lay there. I don't plan on moving anytime soon anyway. So for now, I think I'll just lay here. Not like Tadashi has anything wrong with it.


That night, I have several choices on what I can do. Work on my blueprints. Work on another project all together. Work on my portal downstairs. All of my plans include not sleeping and staying up late. As tired as I am, I'm trying to put off going to sleep because I know that it'll just bring nightmares. Of course, it doesn't help that Wasabi isn't here either. He sent me a message explaining that he's going to be out with Jade again- along with another long message about the aftercare of panic attacks and to be careful tonight. Sheesh he's worse than Jazz, I swear.

I don't exactly like being alone at night. Not after today anyway. Being alone, while it was comforting just after the panic attack, feels wrong right now. I mean, I'm in my dorm room, at night, in the dark, alone. Makes me feel lonely and uncomfortable after today. I bite at the inside of my cheek a bit as I debate on what to do before my eyes go to the clock. It's pretty late, but not too late…

Making up my mind, I quickly call up Fred.

"Yooo Casper, you doing okay?"

I roll my eyes a bit at the nickname, though it does bring a small smile to my face.

"I'm fine, Fred, but I was wondering if I can come down there and hang out with you tonight? Wasabi is out so it's kind of lonely in here after all that's happened today."

"….Yeah, sure. No problem, Casper, I'll let Heithcliff know you're coming."