The inside of the thermos is like a midday nap. You close the blinds and lay down on the couch for "just a minute" and the next thing you know, it's dark outside and you're left wondering what day it is.

Normally, Danny would come out grumbling at his friends or sister for souping him. When Danny came out of the thermos this time he didn't say a word. He hovered for a second, taking in his surroundings. Tall pine trees, a light dusting of snow on the ground, and a campfire in front of him. He let his transformation wash over him. He wasn't in Amity Park anymore so there was no need to give the GIW any help in tracking him.

Then, Danny turned to face the biggest uncertainty in the area.

"Why?"

"It was the car's defenses." Jazz's voice sounded horse from where she sat on a blanket beside the fire.

"The car doesn't have a capture device on the inside, just the out." Danny would know. He helped install the tech to insure his sister stayed safe.

"Dad added it."

"When?"

"It was the car!" Jazz repeated her earlier statement, adding more volume to it. "It was-" Her head drooped and her voice dropped down to a raspy whisper. "It was the car."

Danny's lips parted ever so slightly to insist that it wasn't but the tear he saw slipping down Jazz's cheek in the firelight made him stop.

Danny shut his mouth and let out a long exhale.

"Yeah," he finally said. "That's a good feature to have in case a ghost tries to overshadow the driver."

Danny knew it wasn't the car's defense system but when he saw the tension fall out of Jazz's shoulders he couldn't bring himself to care about what- or who souped him.

Danny walked over and joined Jazz on the blanket. She shivered despite her close proximity to the campfire so Danny took off his coat and draped it over his sister's shoulders. She reached over and squeezed his hand in thanks.

They sat there together for a few seconds, or minutes, or maybe even an hour, watching the flames crack and flicker.

"I didn't cheat this time." Danny broke the silence.

"Hmm?" Jazz snapped out of her trance.

Danny's eyes didn't leave the embers crackling at the base of the fire. Is that what their house looked like after it exploded? Nothing left but flickering dust?

"The last time they-" Danny couldn't say it. Despite dying and coming back himself he couldn't say that his parents died. "The last time something like this happened it was because I cheated on my Carreer Aptitude Test. But I didn't cheat on my math final."

"I belive you," Jazz said.

"So why did it happen?" Danny tore his gaze away from the fire to glare at the sky. "I've been doing everything right. I tried so hard so why are they gone? What did I do?"

Jazz tried to place her hand on Danny's shoulder but he shrugged it off and jumped to his feet.

"Let me fix it!" He yelled into the sky. "I don't know what I did but let me try! Tell me what I did wrong! I'll go back and stop myself from telling them. I'll turn myself into the GIW! I'll make sure I fully died in that portal just let me bring them back!"

Danny didn't know what he expected from his outburst. A green sticky note, a swirling portal, Clockwork doing a time out, just, something. But nothing happened. The sky remained dark and the only sounds to be heard were the crackling of the fire and the soft hooting of a far off owl.

Danny fell to his knees and let out a warbling sob. Jazz grabbed him and pulled him into a hug. They sat there as Danny stained her coat with his tears and snot and Jazz sobbed into his hair.

"Don't say that ever again," Jazz said as she finally pulled out of the hug.

"What?"

"Hurting or killing yourself."

"I mean I'm already dead-"

"Danny," Jazz's green blue eyes stared down into Danny's soul. "I mean it. Promise me you won't put yourself into a position like that. Not for me, not for our parents, not for anyone. I already almost lost you once and I can't take it again. Mom and dad made this choice and now we have to live with it so that it wasn't for nothing."

"What do you mean they made this choice?"

"Viridian."

Viridian. Code Viridian. Whoever was nearest would wipe the lab computers, set the portal to blow, and escape into the Infinite Realms on the speeder. If it had been carried out fully, Jazz and Danny would be working on getting a portal open to retrieve their parents.

But the first explosion wasn't the portal blowing. The first explosion was from something else. If Jazz decided to take the two of them into the middle of nowhere then-

"I checked the news online," Jazz said. "They found a piece of the speeder a block away from the explosion."

Then their parents never made it through the portal. The second explosion wasn't even what- wasn't what-

Ancients.

How was Danny supposed to keep himself from falling to pieces if he couldn't even admit to himself that they were dead? He had to handle this well. He wouldn't be Dan. Clockwork wouldn't give him another chance. Clockwork could suck it. Aparently Danny's life falling apart was only the time ghost's problem when it led to Danny destroying the world.

But the world still had Jazz in it. It still had Sam, and Tuck, and Val. Danny couldn't snap. Not when it would hurt them. He had to keep moving.

Danny swallowed past the lump in his throat.

"How long has it been?" He could feel time passing in the thermos but not in the same way it passes outside.

"Four days," Jazz said, and then anticipating his next question she added, "We're in southern Missourie. There is a Greyhound station about a six hour walk from here. You have a seat on a bus leaving early morning two days from now. It's going to North Carolina where you will get on the Amtrack to New York and then take another Greyhound to Gotham. I used the ID Tucker set up for you to book your tickets."

Jazz said all of that in her "therapist voice". It's the tone she used when she was trying to distance herself from what she was saying.

Jazz wasn't processing this well either.

Not that Danny blamed her.

"And you have a plan to keep you safe?" Danny asked.

"I'm going to-"

"No," Danny cut her off. If the GIW targetted his parents because of him then it would be best for him to know as little about Jazz as possible until things were safe. "It's better if I don't know right now. Just- promise you'll get in touch with me when it's safe?"

"Oh little brother," Jazz pulled him back into a hug.

The two of them slept curled up together in the backseat of Jazz's car that night. It reminded Danny of when he'd have nightmares as a kid. His parents often worked late in the lab so instead of bothering them he'd sleep in Jazz's bed with her.

Danny pretended that that's what all of this was. He'd just had a nightmare of everything happening. He knew it wasn't true but it was all he could think of to get himself to fall asleep. Maybe when he woke up he'd find himself in his sister's room at Fentonworks with his dad cooking breakfast and his mom reading a paper. Maybe when he woke up they wouldn't be dead.