Alright chapter 7! I started this 10/2/14. I will probably be writing quite a bit this weekend as my husband is with his dad for a few days.
So it picks up again here. I've been fairly light on the angst so far, but that will soon change. Danny has been through a lot more than his friends and family realize and it has scarred him deeply. I scared myself with some of the things I came up with.
And to answer anyone who has the question: No, Danny is NOT the same boy he was. So if you don't like a dark, brooding and less morally convicted Danny, I probably wouldn't go any further. Well, he won't stray TERRIBLY far from his morals. He does have an excuse. :)
Disclaimer: I do not own DP or the characters except those you don't recognize. I do, however, own my own home now! It's 84 years old and needs work, but it's charming and has almost an acre!
Hope you wanted a longer chapter! (Especially you, SamXDanny!)
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Chapter Seven: Murder
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"AAAAAHHHHHHH!"
Sam jumped from the couch at the scream. Her feet tangled in the blanket that had been over her and she fell face first on the floor with a yelp. She gently put her hands on either side of her and pushed herself up. "Ow…" she groaned.
A commotion made her eyes snap to the bedroom doorway. Danny!
She forced herself to her feet and ran to the bedroom. She skidded to a halt, tapping the door frame as she heard the adjoining door open. Two pairs of feet thudded after her into the bedroom.
She didn't even think of the light switch; her focus was solely on getting to Danny. Thankfully, either Tuck or Jazz was conscientious enough to turn a light on.
She was grateful for the light, but it wouldn't have mattered. This was an almost every night occurrence now that Danny had recovered from his injuries enough to be in more than just a vegetative healing state.
The half ghost thrashed about in bed; the covers long forgotten on the floor. DJ was in the corner of the room barking at the flailing young man. Sweat beaded Danny's brow and he screamed again as he arched his back.
"Danny!" Sam shouted over him. She made it to the bed and didn't hesitate to put herself in the line of fire. Her hands grabbed his shoulders to hold him down. Tucker was right behind her and held his legs. Jazz grabbed DJ by the collar and led him from the room before returning to help restrain her brother's legs.
The hybrid bucked and thrashed about, too strong to be contained by his human friends. "It's just a dream, Danny!" Sam screamed into his pale and clammy face. "Wake up!"
Her shouting didn't deter her best friend. His night terrors were incredibly hard to break and it was becoming increasingly harder to wake him up.
When Danny's head popped up and collided with Sam's forehead she cursed. She had had enough! The goth let go of his shoulder and slapped Danny, hard, in the face. "Wake up, damn it!"
His head snapped to the side and his eyes instantly opened. His dilated pupils contracted as the bedroom came into focus, his body stilling except for his heaving chest.
Danny turned his head to see a glaring, but worried, Sam straddling him. A sudden stinging feeling on his cheek made him work his jaw. He brought his unrestrained hand up to feel his cheek. "Why do I feel like I was hit in the face?"
"Uhh, because you were, dude," Tucker answered from Danny's feet.
"You're getting harder to wake," Jazz explained.
Sam sighed heavily and sat back, running a hand through her hair in relief. She glanced at Danny when he cleared his throat and quickly noticed his reddening cheeks. Realizing she was still straddling him, her own cheeks flushed and she hurriedly clamored off him and the bed.
The half ghost pushed himself into a sitting position, grunting with the effort. As he came up, his head began to spin and he grabbed it. "Ugh…"
Sam winced. "I'm sorry," she immediately apologized. "I didn't mean to hit you that hard."
Danny shook his head, his shoulders bobbing slightly with a light chuckle. "It wasn't you. I usually get a headache after these dreams."
"What kind of dreams?" Tucker yelped after asking his question. His wife glared at him. "What? I was just asking!"
Danny held his hand up to stop his sister as she went for another jab at her husband. "It's alright, Jazz." He dropped both his hands and sighed heavily, exhausted. He may be asleep during the dreams, but it certainly wasn't restful.
"I guess they're not technically dreams," he started. "More like…memories."
Sam scrunched her brow in confusion. "Memories?"
Danny never lifted his eyes from the bed. "You wouldn't really understand unless you've done something you'll regret the rest of your life."
There was tense silence in the room. Jazz shifted nervously. Trying to dispel the uncomfortable silence, Danny said, "It doesn't matter. It didn't really happen anyway."
"But you just said—"
"Just drop it, okay?" Danny cut Sam off, his hard glare more than enough for her to close her mouth with a 'click'.
–
An hour later and the tension was still thick. Danny appeared to have calmed, but his brooding and sulking manner was a red flag to steer clear for now. He was usually this way after being woken up from the nightmares, or 'memories', as he had called them. But this time he was taking longer to come out of it. Sam knew their questions had something to do with it, but she also suspected it had been much worse this time. It took a lot more to wake the hybrid than previously.
Danny was sitting on the couch playing tug-of-war with DJ. The dog had taken a very fast liking to the young man. He had a small smile on his face. The straightforwardness of dogs made him envious. They were easily amused and the smallest of gestures made them happy. Oh, to have a life so simple.
His friends and sister were across the hotel room. Sam was mostly quiet, but his heightened hearing told him his sister and Tucker were talking about how much they missed Chase. He felt a pang of remorse jolt through him. His friends had left everything behind to come find him and yet he was acting like an ungrateful child.
He knew he was being unfair. Since the day he crashed through the glass balcony doors he had done nothing but yell or shut them out. He owed them at the very least for finding him and giving him the courage to run.
His eyes glazed as his mind went back to the last four years. No matter how much he knew he needed to talk to them, he couldn't do it. The things that were done to him, the things she did to break him, no one should ever hear. And if they ever knew what he did to them…
He shook his head. No, that hadn't happened.
But it didn't matter how often he told himself that or how often he watched his friends when they believed he wasn't just to reassure himself they were there; it had been real to him.
He thought back to the night he spent curled up with Sam on the bed. Though she did see him in just a towel, the light had been dim and he had been very careful not to let her see him in the light. She had surprised him. He hadn't expected her to be up which was why he had waited until the middle of the night to shower.
His body was scarred. He hated it; it was a constant reminder that he was her pawn.
Danny let go of the rope toy and DJ took it, happily shaking his head back and forth in an effort to kill the toy. The half ghost put his elbows on his knees and brought his hand up to rub down his face. He often wished he could go back in time and prevent himself from ever getting into that portal.
But he had already tried that and his supposed Guardian wouldn't help him! Said it would mess with the time stream or some such nonsense. He scoffed. Like going through the past four years was his destiny.
He was brought out of his brooding by a strange sound. He instantly perked and turned his ear towards the door. His friends and sister were still talking, but he tuned them out and concentrated on the hallway.
It was very quiet but there were definitely the sounds of footsteps. He could also hear the chafing of pants and clinking of metal.
His eyes moved frantically back and forth as his mind tried to piece together what his ears were hearing. It seemed like forever but in reality it was only moments.
His companions jumped and DJ barked in alarm when Danny suddenly bolted from the couch and shouted, "Get into the bedroom, now!"
"What's going on?" Sam asked her voice a bit shaky from his sudden outburst. Danny got to his friends and received protests as he shoved them towards the bedroom.
He stopped and stood tall, his eyes firm. "They know I'm here."
The look in his eyes was all they needed, and the trio made a beeline for the doorway. "Come on, DJ!" Sam commanded and the collie was quick to follow his master into the bedroom.
And not a moment too soon.
The door to the hallway erupted, splintered wood flying in all directions. Danny quickly turned intangible to avoid the wood fragments and invisible to avoid detection. Five men, all in black military style outfits, walked stealthily into the room. The half-ghost rolled his eyes. Like the door exploding didn't already alert everyone to their presence.
Several had knives strapped to one thigh and a pistol strapped to the other. One, the lead man, had a large machete hung over his back and a band of grenades over his shoulder. All except the lead man carried the Chinese type AK56 SMG which was similar to the AK47 and outfitted to shoot ecto-bullets, and all were wearing masks.
The lead man carried a lighter weapon than the rest, but it was much more deadly. It was a smaller AR type and the glowing green chamber indicated it shot pure ecto-energy.
Danny glared. They were sent by the Headmaster, alright. At least he knew the fight would be relatively easy for him, they were practically mindless drones. He squared his jaw and went into 'fight' mode.
As they approached him, he moved to the side. Danny spun in a circle, his foot coming up and slamming into the back of the head of the leftmost gentleman. The man fell face first with a grunt.
The rest of the men backed away and pressed a button on their masks, the eye lens' illuminating green. Danny cursed under his breath. They were using ecto-goggles and were able to see him while invisible. Knowing it was futile; he dropped invisibility and intangibility and simply flew at his assaulters.
Danny easily dodged a shot from an ecto-gun and spun in mid air bringing his flight path to the side of another of the men. He reached out and ripped the gun from the man's hands effectively knocking the guy off balance and, with a flip of the gun, smashed the butt of the weapon into the man's head. He fell and didn't get up.
The man's companions regrouped and backed away, firing their weapons in sync. Danny brought his hand up and formed a shield. He smirked as the shield absorbed the energy from the weapons. It was a neat little trick he'd learned while under the service of the Headmaster.
It also gave him a moment to study the head goon a little more. There was something familiar about him. His uniform was a little different than the other men and he sported more powerful weapons.
But Danny was growing tired of playing defense and turned the energy around and fired back. The lead man somersaulted out of the way, the beam hitting the guy behind him and slamming the man into the wall, debris flying in all directions from the impact.
Danny's eyes narrowed as his suspicions were confirmed. Their leader was part of the Headmaster's Jing Zu, or elite soldiers. This man was not a mindless drone like the others.
The other men were soldiers who showed potential but didn't have the skill the Headmaster was looking for. Their minds were wiped clean and all self preservation taken from them. It's why the guy in the back didn't dodge; he doesn't feel pain or fear. This made them dangerous, but easy, targets.
The Jing Zu, however, was another matter. These men had all the skills of seasoned warriors. They were the best of the best, the cream of the crop, and very few men passed the rigorous tests set before them by the Headmaster. These men were allowed to keep their faculties and their desire to live. This made them much more dangerous than the others. They were a lot harder to kill.
This was not going to be as easy as he thought.
–
Meanwhile, Danny's friends and sister were in the bedroom, DJ hiding in the corner with Sam. The door was slightly cracked and the three were huddled against the wall next to it. They cringed at the sound of ecto-guns firing. Sam felt as if she was going to have a heart attack. He was out there all alone!
She moved for the door but a firm hand on her arm stopped her. "Let go, Tucker!" She turned around and glared.
"There's nothing you can do, Sam. Just leave it."
Her eyes narrowed. "I won't leave him out there!"
Tucker shook his head, his grip tightening. "He's done this alone for four years, he's fine."
She ripped her arm from his hold but pushed herself against the wall, arms crossed. The anger fled from her eyes, replaced by desperation. "You don't understand, Tucker. What if he…what if he kills them?"
Her dark-skinned friend became rigid and at Jazz's confused look the goth knew she had said something wrong. Her gaze switched from Tucker to his wife and back. Sam's eyes widened as it dawned on her. "You didn't tell her." It was a statement not a question.
Tucker wiped a hand down his face. "No, I didn't tell her," he answered anyway.
"Tell me what?" Jazz asked.
"What the hell, Tucker? Why would you keep that from her?"
"I told her you found him!"
"Keep what from me?"
"I thought you said you were going to tell her everything!"
"I told her what was necessary!"
"Told me what?!"
"You didn't stop to think she'd want the truth?!"
"I was trying to protect her from the truth!"
"TELL ME WHAT?"
The arguing pair snapped their heads to Jazz at her shout. The red head was clearly aggravated. Her glare effectively put her husband in his place while Sam decided to also turn her glare back to Tucker.
His eyes pleaded with his wife to not force him to tell her. He wanted her to see it was best if she didn't know-that she didn't need that kind of burden on her conscience. She needed to stay in the dark about this. Tucker knew for a fact that Jazz held her baby brother in high esteem and if she knew the truth…it would crush her.
But she wouldn't relent. He sighed; his breath heavy with dread. "Danny…He's the one who's been killing all these people in China."
Jazz furrowed her brow. She briefly glanced at the door as a thud sounded outside. "That doesn't make sense; Danny would never do that," she finally replied.
Sam stepped in. "I saw him, Jazz."
"It couldn't have been him," the older girl again denied, clearly confident.
The goth took a breath and steeled herself. "I know what I saw. I even talked with him after. It was him. He…killed that man."
Jazz's shield looked like it was beginning to break, but with a shake of her head she shirked it off. "No! He wouldn't—"
She was cut off by a loud crash from outside the room. Debris went flying into the bedroom door, swinging the door inward. The girls screamed and even Tucker yelped as he moved to dodge the flying objects. DJ barked in alarm and fled under the bed.
The dust cleared, revealing three crouching friends with their hands above their heads. They exchanged glances, but it was Sam who voiced what they were all thinking. "That can't be good."
The trio rushed to the doorway to get a look at what was going on. Sam gasped at the three men sprawled in various places on the floor. Upon closer inspection, however, she could tell they were all at least breathing. The feeling of relief washed over her, but it didn't last long. Danny was facing off against his last two opponents.
The half ghost floated in the middle of the room, green energy summoned in one hand. His stance was overtly confident but cautious.
The men were on either side of him forcing Danny to quickly switch his gaze from one to the other. The Jing Zu shot first and Danny flew back a few feet allowing the shots to hit the guy on the other side of him.
The man grunted and fell to one knee, but remained upright and aimed his weapon at the now snarling hybrid. Danny flew at him and went to send his readied ecto-blast at the man.
A sudden shout of "Danny!" made him lose concentration. His gaze shifted from the man to his sister only momentarily, but it was enough.
Seeing his chance, the mindless crony let loose on the trigger and ecto-bullets lit the room in green light. A gasp escaped Danny and he twisted in mid flight to avoid the projectiles. Most flew past him and broke dishes in the kitchen area but three hit their mark.
One grazed his right arm; another sank deep into his shoulder and the third went into the right side of his chest. He gritted his teeth against the pain but was unable to keep back a shout of pain when the ecto-energy in the bullets reacted to the ectoplasm running through his body. Sparks snaked over his body at the electricity the reaction generated.
Jazz's hand flew to her mouth. Her brother just got hurt and it was all her fault!
The Jing Zu, meanwhile, had watched the exchange. He noticed Danny's lapse in concentration when the girl called out to him. He grinned wickedly. She was obviously important to his prey.
The reaction dimmed and the halfa's eyes snapped open and focused on his target. They were glowing much brighter with his fury.
Danny growled and formed an ecto-blast in his hand, quickly encasing it in his ice energy. The green and blue glowing ball solidified right as he let it loose. The man shot at the ball of energy and Danny only smirked as that was what he was counting on.
The ball exploded and sent the man reeling back into the wall. However, he quickly righted himself and once again pulled the trigger. His gun jammed and he threw it to the ground reaching for his pistol.
Danny went to take the chance to officially KO the guy but a searing hot pocket of air right behind him made his instincts shout 'Move!'. He took a detour and veered to the right, the blast from the ecto-gun the Jing Zu carried flying past him and hitting the man directly in the chest.
The pure ecto-energy was harmful, and even deadly, to ghosts, but the human man didn't stand a chance. He was immediately incinerated, nothing but ash floating to the floor.
Sam and Jazz both screamed, not just because they had just witnessed a man lose his life, but also because they knew that could have been Danny.
Danny turned on the Headmasters chosen soldier, his eyes a swirling vortex of hate.
Hugo frowned. This hybrid felt no fear even in the face of certain death. Although, technically, he was here to capture him, not kill him. He would have to tread lightly with this one, but thanks to the humans who had suddenly appeared in the room, he had an idea on how to get the half ghost to come willingly.
He dodged a flurry of ecto-blasts from his adversary and dove behind the couch. Danny growled again and flew to get a better view. The Jing Zu kept out of sight, much to Danny's growing frustration.
Danny floated to a stop, glaring daggers at the couch. "Come out you bastard!"
"Tsk, tsk, tsk," came the voice from behind the couch. "You're so pathetic thinking you can run from the Headmaster."
Danny's frown deepened. "I'm through being her puppet!" He floated towards the kitchen, coming around the couch trying to get a good line of sight to fire.
An infuriating chuckle. "You're never through with her. She's through with you." Hugo took the opportunity to move around the other side, his tracker telling him Danny was scooting around the opposite side. "If you weren't her favorite pet, I'd have killed you the second I came in the door."
Danny continued to move around, unwittingly putting more distance between him and his friends and sister. He didn't realize the man was moving closer to them.
But Tucker did. He spotted the man scooting around the corner of the couch towards them. He backed up a step and grabbed onto the girl's shirts to pull them back with him. He merely wanted out of the line of fire. It wasn't until the man's eyes met his and the grin spread across his face that Tucker realized too late that they should be running.
'Oh, no.'
Hugo bolted from his spot on the couch, his gun raised behind him and firing blindly to keep the hybrid busy. Danny snarled and flew after him but the ecto-blasts flying in his direction made advancing difficult. He fired his own back but, in his weaving around to avoid his enemy's blasts, his own went wide. It was too late when he realized his friends hadn't retreated back to the bedroom.
Tucker pulled harder on his wife and best friend. Sam got the point and backpedaled as fast as she could without running Tucker over. Jazz was slower, trying to turn around first. There was a bottleneck at the adjoining door and the force of the shoving pushed Tucker and Sam through backwards but left Jazz on the other side.
A scream and Danny saw red. In fact, so did his friends as his eyes flashed from green to red and back. Hugo grabbed Jazz by the arm and spun her around, twisting her arm behind her, which was what elicited the scream, and put his ecto-gun to her head.
He could feel the waves of fear rolling off her. Tears were now flowing freely down her cheeks as she shook in his hold.
Danny stopped and glared, pure murder in his eyes. Sam had only a moment to think that she hated that look on him.
Hugo took the opportunity and leaned closer to his prey, inhaling her sweet perfume. "This one smells nice. Too bad it won't cover the stench of death."
"Get your hands off her!" It wasn't from Danny. Sam's head whipped to Tucker. He had stood and now had his fists balled at his sides looking ready to pounce on the man that held his wife.
The Jing Zu raised a brow. "My, my, aren't we brave?" He wrenched Jazz's arm a little tighter and she cried out. He was daring Tucker to move.
The furious husband took the bait.
Tucker launched himself at the man ready to beat him into oblivion. Danny knew his best friend didn't have a chance and, while his enemy was distracted, flew at Hugo himself.
Hugo grinned at the senseless boy and switched his aim from the girl in his arms to her husband. The gun glowed brighter as it charged up.
Sam screamed. "Tucker, no! Get out of the way!" She reached for his foot to trip him and get him out of the line of fire, but she missed and grasped at air.
"Tucker!" Jazz pleaded for him to stop.
As the gun reached full charge Jazz was suddenly pulled and then pushed away. The gun fired but the shot was thrown and hit the ceiling. The red head stumbled into Tucker before turning to see what happened.
Danny had grabbed Hugo by the neck and had him in a stranglehold. He held on tightly waiting for his enemy to drop the gun. In the background he could hear Sam's protests and pleas for him to stop. That made him angrier. Why should he stop? Why should he let this man live? He tried to kill his sister. He tried to kill his best friend. This man was a threat that needed to be eliminated.
Weren't all threats meant to be eliminated?
He was too far gone into auto pilot to care that his friends and sister were there. He was trained for this, built for this. This was what he lived for, the whole reason he was created. This was his purpose. He had done this so many times that his mind simply shut down and went on automatic. His muscles had the memory down and could execute the motions on their own without logical thought.
There was an almost blank look in his eye. It was a look that told Sam he was too far gone to save.
Danny repositioned his hands and as he heard Sam cry his name again, he snapped the man's head to the side with an audible crack.
Jazz screamed again, this time because she was witness to her brother, her baby brother, the little boy who had once ran to their mother crying because a baby bird fell from a nest and died, the town hero who would cry every time an innocent got hurt during a ghost fight, kill a man without a second thought. Sam had been right.
The scream jolted Danny. The hybrid shook his head to clear his mind. Man, he really hated when his self defense mode kicked in. Everything was sort of a blur afterwards.
When it cleared a little he looked at his sister in confusion. Her hand was over her mouth and her eyes were wide. Tucker's were as well. Sam's…they just held disappointment.
He looked down. Oh yeah…
While he would have preferred not to kill the man, he knew the Jing Zu was dangerous and that the man would stop at nothing to reach him.
"I'm sorry you had to see that," he said softly.
Sam finally stood, Danny's eyes following her movement. Her disappointment was replaced by anger. "How could you, Danny?"
His own anger instantly flared. "You'd all be dead had I let him live!" His fists clenched.
Sam defiantly marched up to the halfa who had just murdered someone and bravely jammed her finger into his chest, ignoring his flinch of pain from his bullet wounds. "You don't get to decide who lives and who dies! You don't get to play God!" She emphasized each 'you' with a jab.
"You don't even believe in God!" Danny exploded, his eyes burning brighter.
"That's beside the point! You could have simply held him there until he lost consciousness!"
Danny sneered. "You don't understand!" he shouted, mocking her. "That man was dangerous! He was one of the Headmaster's chosen! That means that he would come after me no matter where I went. He'd follow me to the ends of the Earth if he had to and would use you to get to me!" His face was right in hers, their foreheads practically touching.
Sam placed a hand on her hip and steeled herself, not allowing herself to be intimidated by her best friend. "I was unprepared this time, but I can take care of myself!"
The white-haired half ghost scoffed. "You haven't seen what these guys can do. Only the best become chosen. They have to survive trials that you couldn't even dream of. You. Understand. Nothing."
Hurt briefly flashed in her eyes and he regretted his words. "I've taken care of myself the last four years. Just because you were gone doesn't mean the ghosts stopped coming. The three of us were still Team Phantom holding down the fort until you came home! I'm not a child anymore, Danny. I know how to fight!"
An emotion passed Danny's face quickly enough that Sam almost didn't catch it.
Fear.
She calmed slightly and took a small step back, her eyes searching his luminescent ones. "What are you so afraid of Danny?"
He swallowed hard and looked away, refusing to meet her eyes.
Meanwhile Tucker was trying hard to calm his wife down. She was still shaking from the attack and in complete melt down mode from seeing her brother waste another person.
"I-I can't believe…Sam was right…you were r-right…" her eyes were glazed over, her mind reliving the scene over and over trying to find an explanation.
Tucker held her firmly in his arms, rubbing her back. "It's alright, Jazz. It…was a shock, for sure. But…Danny's still in there. He's still your brother."
"I don't know who he is anymore."
Those words cut Tucker deep. This was what he had tried to protect her from. His best friend was still in there, just…warped. They had no idea what he'd been through the last four years.
He continued to rub his hands up and down her back while she mumbled incoherently into his chest. He sighed. He didn't have the words to say to her to make her feel better. Nothing he could say would make this alright. She'd have to talk to Danny, if she was willing. Though, he wasn't sure what good that would do as the halfa had yet to talk about any part of his being away. All they knew was that he was taken by someone called the "Headmaster" who had forced him to kill.
Danny's moral convictions made it hard for Tucker to understand exactly what the Headmaster had done or said to get him to kill at all.
'I guess that's what makes this so shocking.' He thought. Danny was a good person to the very core.
"Tell me, Danny. What are you so afraid of?!"
Sam's shout brought Tucker's attention to the pair. His brows knitted in confusion when he saw the powerful half ghost practically shrinking away from the shorter female.
Sam growled. She opened her mouth to ask a third time, but Danny stopped her. His eyes finally landed on hers, the pain, the raw agony showing through despite his attempt to hide it. "I'm afraid of losing you!" he barked. He took a shaky breath, running a hand down his face as his emotions threatened to spill over. "I'm afraid of losing all of you." His hand dropped and his gaze again met hers. "If I had to kill a hundred men to keep you safe, I'd do it."
She wanted to rail against him, to shout, to yell; to argue that they had already had this conversation when they were sixteen. He was never to put their lives before someone else's. Did she want to die? No. Did she want to be saved? Yes. But if saving her life meant someone else losing theirs, she didn't want it.
When they were sixteen the conversation had been taken lightly, she knew. It didn't matter if she was serious or if they all were serious; the reality that ghost hunting was dangerous hadn't set in yet. At sixteen they were still young and naive and believed it was simply a new sport, you know aside from the lack of sleep and failing grades.
She opened her mouth to say just that but Tucker's firm "Sam," and the shake of his head made her stop. She sighed heavily, the anger seeming to go with it. She instead decided to change the subject.
"How did they find us?" It was a question that had burned in the back of her mind the second the door exploded.
"Damn it!" Danny's curse made her jump, not expecting the sudden outburst. "The tracker!" his hand flew to the right side of his neck.
"The what?"
"The tracker!" he said again, his eyes meeting hers. "There is one in my neck, they tracked me here!"
Sam's initial shock melded to annoyance. "You just thought of this now?"
"I forgot about it!"
"How could you forget they put a tracker in your neck?!"
"Stop it!"
The bickering pair turned their eyes to Tucker who was still consoling his wife. Danny glanced at his sister, guilt flashing across his eyes.
Tucker glared, fed up with their constant bickering. "All you have done since we found you, Danny, is fight! You two are best friends! You both need to get the hell over whatever the hell this is and start acting like adults!"
Two pairs of wide eyes stared back. He turned back to Jazz having clearly gotten his point across. "There are bigger problems here than just you two," he added, his arms tightening around his now quietly crying wife.
Guilt once again slammed into Danny at seeing his distraught sister. All signs of anger fled him and he deflated immediately. He gave Sam a somber look-one she returned. Tucker was right. The half ghost motioned towards the couch and they left the married pair alone while they went to talk.
They sat down with a few feet between them. It was almost awkward which made both sad. There was a longing to be close again. Without knowing it, they both wished they could bridge the gap that had formed between them.
Danny sighed. "I'm sorry I forgot about the tracker. It was put in years ago and…I never gave her a reason to use it."
Sam simply nodded and accepted the apology, never offering one of her own. Danny didn't want it, anyway. It was his fault this had happened.
"What do you mean you never gave her a reason to use it?" she asked.
He ran a hand through his white locks. "This could take a little bit. You should probably work on getting the tracker out and patching up my wounds while I explain."
–
Ok so I cut it off here because this is already WAY longer than the other chapters. Honestly, I had several more pages to this chapter, but I HAD to cut it. It was just too long! I stopped and cut this on 12/2/14 which means two months after I started it. Yeah…hit a writer's block partway through. The next chapter may take as long since Christmas and my one year anniversary is coming up! BUT Since I'm writing this in advance anyways, that doesn't matter for updates!
As usual, review if you liked it! It lets me know I can keep posting!