All she could see was green. Green sky, green ground, green clouds, if one could even call them clouds, and green blood staining her hands and clothes. She didn't know what she was doing or where she was going. She had a vague idea. Go to the Far Frozen, find Frostbite, get help. But she'd never even been to the Far Frozen before, and she had no clue how to get there.
She'd hoped that the portal would open up where it usually did. There were lots of ghosts there, at least one might be able to direct her to Frostbite, or get Danny help some other way. But instead, it had opened up in the middle of nowhere, the only tangible item within sight being a single strip of green road that seemed to lead to nowhere. But right now it was their best bet.
At least Danny had stopped dripping ectoplasm. That was probably good. He was still breathing, and his chest was flickering with light, even through the layers of sewn up skin and bandages. His core was probably being put through a lot of strain trying to fix everything.
Her foot caught on a ripple in the road. She stopped herself before she fell and dropped Danny, pausing her journey to take a minute to steady herself. she couldn't afford to drop him. Not with how narrow the road was, not with how deep the fall would be. She really tried not to look, but when she did, all she could see under the road was emptiness.
She didn't know how long she had been walking. It could have been hours, it could have been 20 minutes. She couldn't remember. This was probably a bad Idea, she wasn't going to find help out here. And even if this road led to help, she wouldn't be able to get there in time. She'd probably pass out from exhaustion and she couldn't afford that. She couldn't afford to leave her brother alone in the open unprotected. Not hurt like this.
She should probably go back, and then what? Ask for help from a human doctor? Expose her brother as something less than human? Risk him being experimented on again? And what about her? What if she was found out? What if the murder of her parents was traced back to her? She's almost 18, old enough that they may put her in an actual prison. She couldn't protect Danny from behind bars. She couldn't risk that
So where did that leave her? Unable to go forward, unable to go backwards. Stuck in the middle. She couldn't just stand there. Danny was hurt, he needed her to help him, he needed her to save him, but she didn't know how to do that. For once in her life she had no plan, no idea what to do. She shouldn't have left him alone with them, she knew better. She knew what they wanted to do with Phantom, what they had been threatening for over a year. She knew that they were dangerous, knew that they might hurt him.
She had almost asked him if he wanted to go out shopping for food with her, so that he could get away from them for a bit. Maybe find some things they needed that she had forgotten to put on the list, or pick out something cool to try out in the foreign foods section like he always did. Why didn't she? Was she thinking that he might get some homework done instead? Maybe catch up on some sleep? Or was she just too lazy to walk back upstairs to ask him after getting to the front door?
This was all her fault. If she had just taken a few seconds to go get him before leaving then none of this would have happened. She wouldn't be carrying her unconscious brother's broken body across an infinite path in another world, with no chance of survival no matter what she did. She wouldn't be sobbing in the middle of nowhere about having to hurt her parents in order to stop them from killing their own son. She could have done something, but she didn't.
She stopped walking. She didn't know when she had started walking again, or what direction she was facing now, and kneeled down to the floor. She held her brother tightly, as if something would steal him from her if she didn't. This was all her fault. She thought she knew what she was doing. She thought she could protect him. She thought she could do this all alone. But instead she let him get hurt. Again and again and again. She should have asked for help the second she realized they had been hurting him, or even before that. The second she realized that they weren't raising them.
She felt a pull coming from behind her and turned around to come face to face with a portal. It sang to her, beckoned her to come closer, she stood up and started to back away. She wanted to turn away from it and run, but she couldn't stop looking. It was beautiful, it felt like home, she wanted to touch it.
It pulled harder the farther she got away from it, like it wanted her. Soon enough she couldn't move back anymore. It was too strong for her. She tried to just stay where she was. Ride it out, wait for it to disappear. These portals never stay long. But her foot slipped and she fell. Her arms automatically went to break her fall but she dropped something. Danny. He was being pulled towards the portal, he fell off the road into it. The portal started to close.
She got up as fast as she could and ran. She didn't know if her feet were even touching the path or if she was being dragged through the air to the portal. But she needed to get to it before it closed.
She needed to protect her brother.
And the portal closed.