it's still 11ish here so I'm not late for Christmas hehehehehe
Here I am with Part Two to the Vortex "arc!" If you haven't checked in on the fic in like a month, please be sure to read the previous chapter, because this is a direct sequel of sorts to it.
Not much to say here, so let's get started!
Danny looked over to Wes and held out a hand, a confident smirk on his face. "You ready?"
Wes gulped, not at all ready. He had no idea how he would be expected to help in a fight like this. But if there was one thing he was certain of, it was that he trusted Danny, with all his heart.
Steeling his resolve, he nodded, firmly clasping their hands together. "Whenever you are."
Danny's smirk fell, expression now resolute. "Then we'd better hurry."
And then Danny was hauling him up, up, cutting through the rain that practically hung in the air like a veil. When Wes looked down, he found that they were already high enough up that the town was nothing more than a swath of blues and grays and browns. And they were still rising higher and higher, the two of them disappearing into the angry gray clouds. Wes almost couldn't even see Danny through the thick fog.
Finally, they stopped when they had nearly crested the storm. They'd flown high enough that, when Wes looked to his side, he could see the blue film that marked the planet's atmosphere. They were just barely contained within it.
He should have been having a much harder time breathing, he knew. But he supposed that was being a Halfa for you.
After that fleeting thought, Wes came to a more sinister realization. There wasn't another ghost in sight. There was nobody up there except for Wes and Danny themselves.
But even so, Danny stayed close, nearly flush against Wes's side in a clear attempt at protection. Despite their apparent solitude, Wes knew better than to assume that they were safe.
"Reveal yourself, Vortex," Danny barked at the surrounding storm. "Whatever you're planning, the jig is up!"
And still, for a moment, nothing happened. But just when Wes was starting to think this really was just a freak weather phenomenon, the clouds around them began to shift, swirling in a manner that clearly wasn't caused by an errant gust. If anything, it looked like Danny and Wes were the focal point of it, the smog circling around them. And then the mass rose up, concentrating itself in an imposing cone of smoky gray.
Finally, it took on a more solid shape, colors shifting until in its place was not a localized tornado, but an enormous green ghost, arms crossed as he looked down his nonexistent nose at the two. The tip of his spiraling tail disappeared into the clouds below, the ectoplasmic green vaguely webbing itself through the blanket of fog.
It was clear to Wes, right then, that these clouds weren't clouds at all. They were nothing more than an extension of this godlike entity, and if that didn't drive existential fear into one's heart, Wes didn't know what would.
"Ah, yes, I suppose you wouldn't let things lie," Vortex boomed, voice like thunder itself. He bent down to loom over the pair, and Wes couldn't help but shy away in response. "Even so, I didn't think you would be smart enough to... catch onto my plan so quickly."
"Of course I would be," Danny boasted, jabbing a thumb at his chest. Still, he visibly faltered. "...So, uh, why don't you tell me all about your evil plan? You've gotta be dying to monologue."
"You would be right," Vortex chortled haughtily. He twirled his wrist, and as he did so, the clouds next to him spun in a spiral pattern, shapes and colors forming in the spaces between. Before long, they refined themselves into a static image, that of a massive bench like one would find in a university lecture hall. The structure had so many seats that not all of them could be seen in the picture, and upon them floated countless beings, nearly featureless save for their eccentric cloaks and singular, bulbous eyes.
"Observants?" Danny asked.
"Yes, it was no thanks to you that I ended up back in their custody," Vortex growled. "Not that they could contain me, and they knew it. I made sure of that."
The picture fogged and shifted, revealing a new scene in its wake. The room was nearly destroyed, soaked and scorched in countless places. Many sections were frozen solid. Only a handful of seats remained intact, dozens upon dozens of Observants laying wounded and unconscious among the wreckage.
"Without their precious barometer," Vortex gasped, "they were no match for my impressive might. They begged me for mercy, and I, oh so graciously, offered them a deal."
"And that deal would be?" Danny dared.
"I wouldn't annihilate them immediately," Vortex replied with a mad grin, "if they gave me the means to destroy you once and for all."
"...And you couldn't do that without their help?"
"SILENCE!" The clouds surrounding Danny solidified around him, holding him in place. When Wes rushed over to free him, he was met with the same fate.
"Of course I could crush you without a second thought," Vortex sneered, the rigid fog squeezing ever so slightly tighter in demonstration. "But I didn't want to just finish you. I wanted to ensure that every last moment of it... hurt. And once the Observants were properly pressed, they were more than happy to hand me your obsession to exploit."
At Wes's side, Danny was bristling. Vortex was playing a dangerous game, needling something so taboo and so personal. But if he meant what Wes was sure he meant...
"...What have you done?" Danny growled. His glowing green eyes pierced the smog.
"I've been brewing the perfect storm," Vortex replied, completely unperturbed by the threatening display. "I set out to make your miserable little village so uninhabitable that no one in their right mind would want to stay. A shame that they wouldn't appreciate such an intricate work of art, but... humans aren't exactly known for being intelligent. And if any did stick around, well..." At this, he smirked. "Nobody to protect, nothing to fuel your desire to protect."
Danny grit his teeth, still putting up the fruitless struggle against his bonds. "You're wrong. We made sure everyone got out."
"Are you certain about that?" Vortex drawled.
Danny stilled, and so did Wes. Of course they were sure; Tucker had confirmed it himself. But...
"Even if you did get everyone out of that wretched place," Vortex went on, "you've left your precious friends below to keep looking. And the other humans are all still so close, so vulnerable. All it would take is a... flick of my finger, and everything you love will be gone. All of your fighting... for naught."
Danny's hair floated around his face, flowing counter to the wind that cradled him. Minuscule little particles twinkled along his jumpsuit. "You wouldn't dare."
Vortex's jagged maw stretched into a grin. "Watch me."
The clouds surrounding them froze in a near-instant, and with a flex, Danny broke free, immense chunks of ice flinging in all directions. Vortex cackled, spinning and dissolving into a mist that the shards harmlessly passed through. But Danny had no intention of letting up. He sucked in a breath, then exhaled a massive gust of freezing cold air that frosted everything it touched.
Vortex was unencumbered, reforming from an unafflicted mass and gathering the fresh slush for himself. It crackled with power, and then was launched towards its creator, knocking him askew.
"Foolish boy," Vortex guffawed. "Your ice stands no chance against my might!"
"Then try this on for size!" Wes cried. He flashed, and Vortex recoiled, rubbing his eyes with more annoyance than actual pain. Still, Wes used the brief opening to break free from the partially frozen fog he was still encased in. He made to form his tail, only to screech when he warped his injured ankle during the attempt.
Danny's attention shifted in an instant, eyes blown wide. "Watt?!"
The distraction cost him. Vortex used a breath attack of his own, overtaking Danny with a stream of fire. Danny howled, but only for a second, as he then formed an expanding sphere of ice to distance himself from the scorching heat. It melted almost instantaneously, but it gave Danny just enough time to avoid the remainder of the blast.
By then, Wes had recovered from the initial bout of pain. Electing to keep his legs even if it would rob him of his mobility, he rushed ahead, dragging his fingertips along the fringe of cloud below him, letting the ambient energy invigorate him. He should have felt empowered by the fact that such a fleeting touch was enough to almost fully energize him, but instead, it unnerved him. From that alone, he knew Vortex was only showing off a fraction of what he could do; the moment he started taking things seriously, it would be over. They would be overwhelmed in an instant.
But they still had a shot. If Vortex wasn't trying yet, then that meant there still had to be an opening, and Wes would find it.
Unfortunately, Vortex was still paying attention. Barely sparing Wes a glance, he simply flicked him aside, sending him briefly crashing through the horizon line before he picked himself back up.
Danny ground his teeth, hands coming together to release a rather impressive ectoblast. But all Vortex had to do was blow on it to send it off-course, the beam veering instead towards the ground.
Danny gasped. "No!"
The pair couldn't see where it landed. Wes knew by the angle that it hadn't struck Amity Park, and they were lucky to be solitary enough that the nearest neighboring town was a good mile away. But even so, it was impossible to say where the blast had ended up.
"Don't you understand?" Vortex jeered. "You can't protect your weak little humans! Your powers are nothing compared to mine. You're mosquitoes against a god! They'll be gone the moment I will it. You can't save them all... You can't even say you've really saved any of them."
Danny growled. Ectoplasmic energy licked at his rigid form like flame, his eyes dancing with a quiet rage that Wes didn't think he'd ever seen in them.
"If you can get rid of them," Danny demanded, "then why haven't you?"
Rather than reply, Vortex simply grinned. Agitated, Danny once again went on the attack. He was readily thwarted, the two trading blows back and forth.
Even if Vortex refused to answer, Wes was almost certain he knew the reason. His entire plan was hinging on being able to exploit Danny's obsession. Danny needed to protect Amity Park. If the citizens were dead, he could fly into a rampage. If they were safe, then he could protect them. But by ensuring they were in a peril Danny couldn't prevent, of which he couldn't know the actual severity, then Vortex was all but guaranteeing that Danny couldn't draw power from them. They weren't being directly threatened, but they weren't safe, and Danny couldn't say whether or not his efforts had saved anyone at all.
He was fighting his hardest, but Vortex had also made sure he would be at his weakest.
It was cunning and underhanded, but it was a weakness Wes didn't share. Even in his uncertainty, Danny was overwhelmingly powerful. He'd stopped Vortex once before. All he needed was an opening, and Wes would do whatever it took to make that happen.
…Somehow. He wasn't sure how he was going to get close if even Danny couldn't touch him, but he didn't wonder for long. Vortex wasn't paying Wes any mind. As far as he was concerned, the newer Halfa wasn't a threat. And considering that he was the source of the power that Wes had managed to round up, he was probably right. But that didn't mean he couldn't be one heck of a distraction.
He slipped out of the visible spectrum, and in the same moment, Vortex and Danny parted, the latter significantly more beaten and bruised than the former. But he was still standing, despite the exhaustion making itself known in his features.
"Are you about finished?" Vortex rhetorically asked. "I think it's time we end this."
Not on Wes's watch. Once he was close enough, he gave one of Vortex's antennae a hefty tug. With an irritated gasp, the weather ghost whirled around, raking the sky with his gloved claws. But Wes had already darted well out of reach, snaking his way all over Vortex's impressive form.
"What do you think you're doing, flea?" Vortex didn't wait for an answer, clenching his fists as he rapidly increased his core temperature, until whatever counted for flesh was nearly as hot as magma.
"Yeowch!" Wes cried, flitting away before he could be flash-fried. Even so, he still found himself patting at smoldering sections of his suit, visible once more.
Vortex cooled, and at the same time, he smirked. "There you are, pest."
But Danny's attack was already in motion. A growl bubbled up his throat, the air before him rippling with the eager energy characteristic of his ultimate move. Once it was all in one place, he sucked in a massive breath, preparing to let it loose...
...only for Vortex to twirl his finger, quite literally stealing the breath from Danny's lungs in the process. He momentarily choked as he found himself suddenly robbed of oxygen, and then wilted, the remainder of his strength leaving him after the ordeal.
Vortex cackled madly, flinging the borrowed Wail back at its creator. It ruptured on contact, the shockwave sending both him and Wes tumbling and somersaulting. They collided, just barely managing to anchor each other and stop their freefall.
So this was it, then. Danny, with all the tenacity in the world, yet sapped of his power without a purpose to tether him. Wes, raring to go but with none of the brute force to back it up. Vortex, floating before them, still looking no worse for wear. Even after Danny's impressive onslaught, not a mark could be seen anywhere on his form to indicate he had weakened.
They couldn't stop him. Danny wasn't strong enough, and Wes was just dead weight.
"Any last words?" Vortex drawled. He brandished both his clawed hands as he prepared his final attack.
Despite his ragged state, Danny inched himself in front of Wes, ensuring that whatever came, he himself would take the worst of it. Even at times like these, Danny refused to let Wes become collateral. He didn't breathe a word, settling for leveling his opponent with as chilling of a glare as he could muster.
Vortex shrugged, not at all bothered by the defiance. Between his hands, a spark jumped. That spark rapidly became something more resembling a localized storm, vivid green power raging so brightly that it could blind if one were to look at it directly.
"Do you remember this?" Vortex teased. "Just one blast was more than enough to put you out of commission for ages. Imagine what this could do... with a little more oomph."
Danny remembered, if the sweat beading at his temples was anything to go by. But boy, did Wes certainly remember. He'd never heard Danny scream like that outside of that one isolated instance; the sound of it made his Wail seem like a harmless squeak in comparison. Wes never wanted to hear him scream like that again.
A nasty shock was coming, and from how it sounded, there was a chance Danny wouldn't survive. But Wes figured he was just about perfect for it.
At the last possible moment, he shoved a flabbergasted Danny out of the way with all the force he could muster, putting him out of the line of fire. At first, it seemed not to matter, as the massive bolt made its way for him regardless, Vortex just barely being able to adjust his aim before launch. But before it could get anywhere near Danny, it sharply veered away, Wes's core guiding the bolt towards itself until it struck Wes directly in the chest.
Wes's first thought was, oh, this isn't so bad. Vortex's power, in its electrical form, was almost perfectly compatible with Wes's core, being readily absorbed like water to dry soil. Not a single spark escaped, every last dreg being lapped up almost greedily.
His next thought didn't form coherent words. His core hit its limit, and then spilled over in an instant, giving Wes no time to react before the first scream tore itself from his throat. It was like someone had injected his veins with an entire tanker of gasoline, and then taken a match to it. White hot agony seared every nerve, oozed from every orifice. There was so much energy, and not nearly enough room to contain it all, and yet it all remained trapped beneath his flesh, like someone had tried to plug a boiling kettle. It was all bubbling up under the surface, too fast to keep track of and with no hope to reel it in.
He wasn't any better of a sight from the outside. Danny could only watch with awestruck horror as Wes blazed, his aura flickering so brightly and so madly that frightened violet had become glaring white. He clutched at his face, the jittering blotches of tortured purple being the only things marking it as such, and then at his chest, where even more vivid light protruded and spasmed like a candle in a hurricane. Errant white sparks broke from the mass and dissolved, Wes's silhouette becoming less and less clear as he rapidly became overwhelmed by the function of his own core.
And that scream. That shrill, echoing shriek sent a thrill of frantic dread down Danny's spine, and every cell in his body wanted to look away, to run. He was sent back to five months prior, when Wes transformed for the first time. The sound back then was nearly identical. That was the moment when Danny realized just how dire things had become.
Wes was harnessing the power of a lightning strike, and it was going to kill him.
Vortex cackled, amused by the sight. "It looks like this one is destabilizing. But, I wasn't aiming for him." He once more brandished his claws, gathering up another ball of concentrated electricity. "This one will be for you, boy."
Danny's eyes went wide. He was about to be knocked out of the sky, probably to his death. Next to him, Wes was wasting away. Before them, Vortex was in his prime and in his element. They couldn't even slow him down. He was about to be free to ravage the planet however he wished. It was over.
But Danny had one last gambit: the original plan; try to turn Vortex against himself. It had worked before, at any rate. Wes was likely in no state to respond to him, but Danny had no choice but to hope.
"LET IT GO, WATT!"
It should have been impossible to hear him over the din, but all the same, Wes answered. In one last act of desperation, he threw his arms forward, releasing his pent-up energy all at once.
It didn't matter that he wasn't in direct contact with Vortex. He had more than enough power for it to make the leap, striking his opponent with enough force that the clouds rattled with thunder. The energy that Vortex was still gathering burst, and the result was a shockwave that had Danny careening out of control for the briefest of moments.
This time Vortex was the one who screamed, struck with the full force of both catastrophic shocks. His twister-like tail fizzled, his entire form drooping and dizzy. Luckily, Danny recovered before he did, fumbling for his thermos before hastily uncapping it. Vortex was too disoriented to even try to fight the tractor beam, though he let out one last shout before the cap could close, swearing his return and swift vengeance.
Danny slumped, shoulders heaving with exertion. The fight had taken more out of him than he cared to admit, but finally, it was over. And this time, he was going to make sure he handed his catch over to Clockwork; his stasis bubbles should be more than enough to contain Vortex.
Mercifully, things had gone quiet. Almost too quiet.
Danny looked down, and gasped. Wes was in freefall, rocketing towards the ground head-first. After an attack like that, there was no chance he was still conscious.
"Wes!" Exhaustion forgotten, Danny dove, arms outstretched. Wes was so far ahead, and the ground was coming in fast, but Danny was faster. Slowly but surely, he closed the distance between them, fingers ghosting the black jersey as he made a mad grab. Until finally...
"I've gotcha!" Danny caught Wes with plenty of time to spare, the two being low enough to just start being able to pick out unique buildings beneath them. The flooding had already started to recede without the unnatural forces keeping it there. Danny picked a random spot and touched down, carefully setting Wes down to assess the damage.
It wasn't looking good. Some time during the rescue, Wes had transformed, but no flash of light had been present to indicate such. He was a ghost, and then suddenly he wasn't. He looked no better like this than he did before.
His skin was more pale than usual, save for severe bruising around his eyes and mouth, and it reeked like ozone. Many places on his face and arms were red and dark, a smattering of lesions that had bled and then seemingly cauterized. It was as if he had been burning and dissolving from the inside out, an image not helped by the fact that much of his outfit was tattered and charred. For as bad as he looked on the outside, Danny was sure it was worse on the inside.
That thought had his stomach sinking with dread.
"...Wes?" he tried, obviously getting no response. He prodded gently at his shoulder, and still Wes didn't react. He only jostled limply at the touch.
Alarmed, Danny put his fingers up to Wes's throat to feel for a pulse. After a few frustrating seconds where he realized his gloves would make that difficult, he instead pressed his ear to Wes's chest. The heartbeat he heard was rapid and faint, but he was almost certain he was just hearing the echo of his own.
"No, no no no no no..." Danny only became more frantic when he couldn't find any obvious signs of life, shaking Wes harder in a desperate attempt to elicit some sort of response. "Wes, come on, you have to wake up now, get up." But despite all of Danny's efforts, Wes remained stubbornly unresponsive.
Finally, Danny rocked back, staring in despondent disbelief. "...This is all my fault." And it was, wasn't it? He had asked Wes to accompany him to the battle with Vortex. He knew that Wes wasn't nearly strong enough for such a foe. Maybe Danny had hoped the storm would aid him; Vortex was susceptible to his own attacks, and Wes was just about the perfect candidate to harness that power. But Danny hadn't predicted that Vortex would let loose so much in a singular attack, when he really, really should have seen that coming a mile away.
Wes was going or gone, and it was all Danny's fault.
"...Please wake up," Danny eked out, one last-ditch plea in the hopes that something would happen.
Shockingly, Wes stirred. He didn't ease back into consciousness; rather, he jerked awake, wracked with a hoarse sob and an immediate well of tears. He was in too much pain to do much else.
But that pain was the last thing on Danny's mind. He shook with relief, head hanging. "Oh thank the Ancients," he wheezed. He took Wes's cheeks in both his hands, pressing his lips to his forehead. They left a minuscule patch of frost when he broke away, which almost instantly melted. And then he went in for another, and another, showering Wes's cheeks and temples with desperate affection.
Wes squeaked in shock, not at all expecting to wake up to a flurry of freezing cold kisses. It was like Danny was leaving him little miniature ice packs, soothing the worst of the painful heat that lingered in his face. "D-Danny, what–?"
"Don't you dare scare me like that again," Danny hissed, finally stopping his onslaught to force their foreheads together.
Wes wheezed, and the sound could have been either an ache or a laugh. "Only if you promise you aren't gonna start helicopter parenting me again," he grumbled.
"You're alive, and you're going to heal, you're gonna be fine," Danny rushed out, neither a promise nor a denial.
He said it mostly to reassure himself, but at the same time, he knew it to be true. Wes may have been hurt, but he was in nowhere near as sorry a state as Danny had seen him before. If Wes could survive a tree through the chest and still be raring to go less than a day later, then he would recover from this, too. He was going to be alright.
If Danny didn't accidentally suffocate him first.
Wes squirmed, resisting the enormous hug. "Ugh, not so tight, my head feels like it's gonna explode!"
({O})
Several minutes later, the two of them, both in human form, made it to the desired evacuation spot, where they knew their families had already sequestered. The Fentons were making their rounds, doing a headcount while making sure no "pesky ghosts" ambushed the vulnerable citizens. Walter was nowhere to be seen, but based on how everyone had begun flocking to some sort of large drone-produced screen a short ways away, Wes was sure he would find him near there.
But that still left questions as to the purpose of the screen. "What do you think that's doing there?"
Danny frowned. "Vlad's probably about to try to save face. I know I wanna see how he tries to salvage this mess."
Well, Wes certainly wasn't opposed to watching the mayor make a fool of himself again. Arm slung over Danny's shoulders for support, the pair made their way towards the crowd, struggling to see the screen from the edge.
They only had a few minutes to wait. Soon enough, Vlad's smug face appeared on the translucent display. Wes was pleased to hear the immediate resounding waves of boos.
"Now now, I know you're all upset," Vlad said, tone light as ever. It was hard to pinpoint where his voice was coming from; there wasn't a speaker in sight. "However, please save your dissent for the end. This message is prerecorded, so I'm unable to take feedback at this time. If you have any questions or concerns, you may address them to my secretary by fax or phone."
"This'll be good," Danny snarked.
"I know we've all been struck hard by this natural disaster," Vlad went on, dabbing at a dry eye with a handkerchief supplied to him by someone off-screen. "There's no doubt that many, if not all of you, have lost precious valuables to the floods and tornadoes. But please, rest assured that all possessions will be replaced or reimbursed to the best of my capabilities. I will use every last resource at my disposal to make sure it's done.
"As for your homes and businesses, they will all be fully repaired and up to code in a week's time. I'll even throw in free cable installations! In the meantime, all evacuation shelters are available for lodging, and they will all be fully stocked with food and supplies. All working individuals will also be paid for the duration of renovations."
There was murmuring among the crowd. It wasn't any better than his initial promise, really, but considering the current state of affairs, it was worlds better than nothing at all. Any safety net was a blessing. Upon realizing this, the citizens began nodding approvingly.
"And to address the cause of the storms," Vlad continued, "I'm well aware that many of you find me at fault, which I can assure you is not true at all. But it was no organic storm, either. My resources have deduced that it was the result of ghostly activity."
Wes blinked. "Is he... actually about to tell the truth?"
But Vlad wasn't finished. "In fact, such horrible weather was caused by not one, but two evil spirits!"
Suddenly the screen was overtaken by a still photo of Phantom and Wraith, one ghost much fuzzier on-screen than the other. Still, with colors like that, his identity was unmistakable.
Danny sighed. "Of course he isn't."
"The storms were all part of what seems to be a sinister plot from these two," Vlad claimed. "Phantom was the one who brought the wind and snow, and his little sidekick appears to be able to harness lightning. You have him to thank for your power outages and fires. Although a motive is unclear, the current theory is that they were trying to barbarically engineer a dire situation in which to rescue the populace from, in order to fuel their sick and twisted obsessions."
A series of gasps cascaded throughout the crowd, some disbelieving, and others in shock. Most trusted Phantom to keep them safe from ghostly threats, but the new ghost was a mystery. So few people had seen him, that nobody could really say what his morals or capabilities were. And if Phantom was working with him, how worried did they need to be? Could the mayor have been telling the truth?
"Oh come on!" Wes cried, tossing his hands up. "Neither of us can do rain or heat waves. How's he gonna explain that?!"
"He isn't," Danny replied. "He's hoping nobody thinks about it, and knowing how things work around here, they won't. Welcome to negative publicity."
"Ugh," Wes groaned. "This is like freshman year all over again."
"—so I do hope you'll continue to put your faith in our town's state-of-the-art anti-ghost resources," Vlad was saying. "In the meantime, please take advantage of the amenities provided to you, and remain calm while we ensure that things go back to normal as soon as possible." With that, the screen disappeared, the drones projecting it scattering to fly off to who-knew-where.
"...This blows," Wes muttered.
"You'll get used to it," said Danny, sounding no happier about the situation.
"WESLEY!"
The two of them jumped, but didn't have to wonder about the origin of the shout for long, as Walter shouldered his way through the crowd. Once he'd broken through, he all but sprinted for his son, stopping just short of him to frantically reach and retract, eventually settling on grabbing his cheeks and pulling him forward for a closer look.
"Oh, no, look at you," he fretted, turning Wes's face every which way. "I was worried sick about you, and now you're all black and blue. If I'd thought the search and rescue would be so dangerous—"
"Please don't blame him," Danny cut in. "I'm the one who asked him to come with me. I'll take responsibility."
"Oh, your foot," Walter whined, having apparently not heard Danny speak. "What on earth happened out there? I know the rain didn't do this. Come on, let's get you taken care of. You're in terrible shape, sport!"
"Daaaaaad, I'm gonna be fine," Wes groaned, though he didn't resist his father's gentle tugging.
"I'll make sure of that," said Walter. "Putting yourself in danger like that? Fighting Elsewhere-knows-what after telling me you were only on rescue duty? Not on my watch. You're grounded for the next month, do you hear me mister?"
"I'm WHAT?!"
Aww Walter, don't be so hard on your son. He was trying to do the right thing. (But also don't be too hard on Walter because he is a Terrified Single Father kjfbgsfbkfd)
Wes has been gay long enough, it's about time Danny got to also be a little gay
Next update, we get to see some direct maybe-repercussions resulting from this fiasco. Should be a lighter one, but tune in if you want a little side character lore ;)