"And… This man spoke to you?"

"Yes, holy sh—oh my God, Yes, Fenton—!" Dash planted his palm on his forehead as he erupted, "Th-That's what I've been sayin'!

Steepling his hands in front of his mouth, Danny took a struggled breath in through his clogged nose, looking deeply into the quarterback's frantic eyes. They were doing laps around the kitchen, in each corner, as if scouring the space for this elusive 'blue' man. His pupils were pinpricks of black against an ocean surrounded by white sand. Danny didn't think Dash was trying to pull anything— not that it was completely out of character for the jock to try— but he never had the patience for mind games or the follow through.

Danny didn't believe Dash was lying. You couldn't fake that kind of terror.

The ghost boy drew his blankets further up his torso, tutting, "Then there's only one conclusion that we can come to…"

Not expecting the ominous trail off, Dash leadingly asked, "and that is…?"

"You and Kwan do drugs to each other."

…

"What."

"Grass." Danny went on, "Speed. Adderall. You wanna stop but you're just addicted to the feeling."

Hands dropping from his hair to the table, Dash blinked in disbelief, "I don't have to take this."

"Well there's a first time for everything."

"Nobody even calls it grass, Fenton!"

"So you admit it!" The ghost boy exclaimed, and pointed.

Dash was going to explode, "Oh my fu—"

Finally coming to the rescue, Jazz who up until this point was listening to these inane flurries being hurled from both sides of the table with her eyes closed tight and brows knitted, finally snapped— "GUYS!"

The boys briefly ceased fire and glanced up at her.

Her sigh was deep and from the center of her being— it was more close to a hiss. Or a slow leak from a punctured tire, Jazz reasoned, "This… this isn't productive."

Danny's head lulled and hung over the back of his chair as he laughed, "No, but it is funny."

Dash wondered if the younger Fenton was trying to goad him again— "Do you ever take anything seriously?"

For a second, Danny fell quiet. Pulling his head up and adjusting his posture. He fixed his stare to Dash.

… and for a moment. For a second at most, he thought— maybe he had finally broken through.

"... Has anyone ever told you, your forehead vein is off-putting?"

Exhaling shakily, Dash pursed his lips and closed his eyes, "Uh, it's been real… it's been real, something guys, but—but I'm gonna head out."

The jock excused himself, "It's getting late, and I've got a dog and a DVR to attend to. So—"

Blowing a raspberry, Baxter pushed his chair out and turned to exit the kitchen.

Jazz began, "Dash—"

Before Dash crossed the threshold to the entryway, he playfully shook Jazz's shoulder, "Jasmine, light of my life, apple of my eye, the peach in my pie. It's been a pleasure as always."

"Dash, c'mon." She shirked him off.

With a strained laugh and wild stare, Dash proceeded to the stairs, "I'll see ya in the funny papers!"

With one comically large step he ascended the stairs to gather his things left in Danny's room.

lulling his head onto his shoulder tiredly, Danny posited, "What do you see in that guy?"

Bowing her head, Jazz pressed her tear ducts.

Kwan-solo @ 6:09pm: you are okay, right?

Kwan-solo @ 6:09pm: The rain is really coming down. If ur stuck, my sister can get the truck or smthin.

Kwan-solo @ 6:10pm: Just be careful.

Dash had plucked his phone from the desk and went over his text messages…

Resting his hip on Danny's desk, Baxter attempted to be satisfied with at least one person caring about him.

Why wasn't that enough?

Staring at the dark screen, he waited for another message to pop in and for his flip phone to suddenly buzz in his hand. Waiting on validation that would never come.

Dash flipped his phone shut, setting it back down on the desk. He threw his head back and covered his eyes. Hoping that when he opened them it was as if this was all one stupid dream.

"What are you doing?"

jumping nearly six feet out of his skin— Dash spun around, a newly acquired pocketwatch rattled on his chest.

"God— Stop! Doing that!" The living exclaimed, "You're lucky I didn't throw something at you—"

Clockwork stood there in the corner of the room by the door. Lingering as if he'd always been there. stuck between his adult and elderly form.

The ancient one asked again, "What are you doing?"

Eyes shooting open, nostrils flared, Dash spread his arms wide, gesturing to his bag and his surrounding things, "What—what does it look like—?"

"Running away?" Mr Clockwork tilted his head, "or did you mean for that to be… rhetorical?"

Hands falling to the outsides of his legs and landing with a dull slap, Dash snorted, "I—Look—I've had a very… extremely trying day."

"Of course you have." Clockwork adjusted the grip on his staff as his upper back began to fail him again, "You're trying to help the Fentons. Which by all accounts is and will always be a near impossible task."

"Near impossible task…?" The young man groused, turning his back, shoving his books into his bag with more force than necessary. A deeply ironic smile tore into his cheek, "Yeah tell me somethin' I don't know."

"I'm standing here talkin' to a friggin'ghost like that's somethin' normal thing that everyone does—"

Dash snapped his head back to Mr Clockwork, "Why didn't you show yourself to them, huh?" He waved his hand dismissively towards downstairs, "Maybe, you're not even real— I'm gonna wake up and they're gonna congratulate me and hand me my wisdom teeth in a freakin' ziploc—"

Despite the stuffy room, a chill played across Dash's shoulders, and a realization hit him, "I can't leave with this thing on, can I?"

"Afraid not." Unflinching, Clockwork replied.

He almost fell to his knees, "GOD—" The young man attempted to keep his legs under him as fought to find the words, "Why is it so important for the time space continuum or— or whatever— that-that I stay here, huh? You said— you said they would be okay—"

"Oh, it's not. don't be so eager to assign yourself meaning. You may not have been put on this planet with innate purpose, that's the beauty of humanity. You find it all on your own. There's nothing stopping you from taking the pocket watch off and running away. Back to your friends, back to your blissful ignorance. But that wouldn't make you very happy. Would it?"

"What're you tryin' to say?"

"You like Daniel Fenton. You want his approval. You want his validation. You want him—

"What?!" Dash gasped, stammering out a denial, "No! Th-that's not it at all. No I-I don't. I don't care—"

It didn't matter if time was frozen around him, he couldn't allow anyone to hear that.

"Even if I didn't have omniscience I could tell." A hint of a smirk appeared on his wrinkled and decaying face as it continued to melt with gravity, "Regardless, it's frankly none of my business what you decide to do."

The living flushed, and covered his eyes.

Mr Clockwork presented two hands, two options, "There's a universe where you stay. Then there's the universe where this question persists in the pit of your stomach and eats away at you every night. Each exists, but you can choose which Dash Baxter you want to be."

"Perhaps it is selfish of me, but I think Danny won't get many opportunities to be a child much longer. I'd rather he spend them with you. Carefree, shallow, and distracted."

Dash growled, his hands involuntarily clenching, "Shut up."

Shifting in front of the bedroom door, puttering away and mumbling, "Growing pains are to be expected—"

"I said, SHUT UP!" Ripping off the watch, feeling the clasp break against his nape, Dash shouted—

And like that time resumed.

The rain started falling, beating against the windows, and clouds were being stirred by the howling wind outside.

He was alone.

The freshman glared at his now empty fist. Then scanned the rest of the room for any signs of the undead—

Gathering his jacket, Dash huffed, "Papa smurf lookin' jagoff—"

In the blink of an eye, Clockwork was gone. If he was even there to begin with.

Ooooo, I'm so gonna regret that later—

The living took a shuddery breath, scolding himself for his temper… and continued to pack his things.

The kitchen, by contrast, was a picture of mundane chaos. Jazz was scavenging the plastic grocery bags on the table and tearing the cabinets apart for solutions— she needed solutions.

As a temporary fix she returned to the paper towel roll just in proximity of the sink.

Jazz mumbled, her voice distorted and thick, "Ugh, this is ridiculous."

She twisted another paper plug and jammed it into her nose.

"Yeah, yeah, tell me about it," Danny retorted, forehead beaded with sweat— he extended his ghost tail underneath his blanket and struggled to coil the tip around the fridge handle. He had to prop it open to get some cold air. The wooden chair scraped against the tile squeaking loudly.

With a scowl, the elder Fenton snapped, "I was referring to you."

"Me? What'd I do?" Danny lulled his head back on the chair to look at his sister.

"Nothing!" Jazz shouted, "You did nothing. You do nothing. It's what you always do. 'cause you're a child and I have to be responsible for you—"

Rolling his eyes, the younger exclaimed, "You're only three years older than me Jazz, stop being dramatic—"

"Dramatic? Really?"

Danny interjected, crossing his arms and scrambling to sit up, "I didn't ask for your help!"

"Y'think this is how I want to be spending my time?" She muttered, shutting the cabinet doors hastily in her search, the contents inside rattling in protest.

"Could've fooled me." The younger remarked under his breath.

"What?"

"I said you could've fooled me!" Danny challenged, swishing his tail about, "Gah—it's like you don't have your own life so you're obsessed with mine!"

Something fell. A glass clattered into the sink. Jazz had blinked and it was in front of her, broken— Did I do that? Why did I do that?

Her hand now bared a small cut across the top of her palm, just right below her fingers. Pearls of blood began to trail and fall as she tilted it toward the drain.

Jazz ripped another paper towel from the roll and applied pressure to the wound. She hunched in on herself.

"I'm not a baby. I know what I'm doing— I've had my powers for half a year without your help." Danny continued on his tirade. Completely unaware. Unaware that, his sister was cut open and bleeding.

Jazz reflexively clamped her fist, her face screwed into a pout. Her teeth grit, she squeezed the paper towel into her palm until she was trembling. The elder Fenton hissed, "...You can be so… difficult…"

She was sure he wasn't listening. He never does.

"Y'know that?" It was a long, bitter sigh. It was her fuse extinguishing before it consumed her. Jazz wouldn't give him the satisfaction of a complete meltdown.

The lights in the kitchen began to flicker and buzz.

"Is that all you got?" Danny scoffed, and tried using his tail to adjust the position of his chair again, fighting against the floor, "I hate how you never fight back— it's like you have to—to feel superior about everything!"

Each time the chair legs gasped and creaked, Jazz felt it in her bones. Her muscles tensed and became rigid. Hurriedly she began to sweep the broken glass in the sink into her bloody hand. She had to clean it up.

She sniffled, whether it was because of the impending sickness or her emotions were getting the better of her, was anyone's guess.

"And you know what else—" Danny finally managed to get his tail out of his way and turn around fully, using his arms to lift himself up.

He landed back down on his seat and saw his sister. She still wasn't looking at him, like he wasn't even worth the effort of eye contact.

Danny wanted to be angry, he wanted Jazz to be angry— because at least that meant she was listening, "I just…"

Slumping back into his chair before he propped his chin up on his fist, he trailed off, "...Whatever."

Bounding down the steps from the top floor, the freshman sports prodigy entered the scene. Dash landed in the entryway with all of his things in tow—

"Alright, not that you would believe me, but that guy—" The jock snarled, nearly beet-red in the face, "Clockwork—"

He threw a hand towards the stairs, "Clockwork was up there."

"And now he's down here too. Again." Dash more exasperated than scared, gestured to the other side of the kitchen, "See? He's right there by the phone."

From the table the younger Fenton scoffed, adjusting his blanket over his tail, "Here comes Baxter with his imaginary friends again…"

"Do you want to cork it?!" Dash barked.

This vague threat caused Danny to snicker. And the fluorescent bulbs overhead seemed to stabilize with a steady white light.

Sympathetically Jazz turned toward him, wincing as she stowed her injured hand behind her back, "I appreciate your concern Dash, but I told you— with my parents' tech, we'd know if there was a ghost in here."

She was trying to placate him, and he knew it.

Against his better judgement, despite every gut instinct telling him something was terribly wrong in this house. Dash forced himself into the kitchen, propelling himself from the entryway onto the tile floor.

Steeling his resolve, Dash attempted to challenge her again, "Could it be at all possible that this… ghost stuff— isn't an exact science? Maybe there's like… variables they didn't account for. Maybe there's, like, some ghosts that can't be detected with computers… because they're like… I dunno— old as balls?"

Contributing nothing of any value Danny stretched his arms above his head, "To be as old as balls it'd roughly have to be one-hundred-forty-eight-million years old—"

"Oh my goddddddddddddd—"

Trilling his fingers against his arm impatiently, Danny quietly quipped, "I'm just surprised you knew what 'variables' meant."

The older Fenton shook her head, "Even if they're just fighting delusions, I trust my parents' equipment."

"Didn't you say it glitches out and thinks he's dead half the time?" Dash pointed a thumb at Danny, deadpan.

Danny paid a glance at his sister, curious to know if she had something to counter that. Interested to see if she'd defend him at all.

"Uh… well—" Jazz cleared her throat.

Before Dash could get an answer, his eyes darted to the basement door. It was as if he tried to ignore what was there at first.

Then without another word the jock started to move.

Jasmine shifted her weight as the jock brushed past her on a determined march.

"Dash?"

"He's gone now."

Both Fentons were perplexed, "Sorry?" "What?"

Dash was equally confused as he clarified, "Clockwork. He's gone."

He continued on his path to the basement door—

"You can't go down there." Jazz tried to dissuade him.

Indifferent Danny said, "Hey, you heard her, if you come out with a third eye you can't sue us."

Rolling his eyes, Dash continued and began to reach for the doorknob—

But before he could find footing at the top of the basement, Jazz had grabbed him by his shirt sleeve.

And he hesitated—

Jazz was the only thing that anchored him to the moment. Anchored him to reality.

She warned him, "Dash, you really don't want to see what's down there."

By all accounts, she was absolutely correct—

Dash really didn't want to know what was going on down there. He didn't want to be involved anymore. He was beyond done.

He didn't want to come over in the first place.

But—

His silence conveyed every single thing he wanted to say. Her eyes were locked on his and they were engaged in a wordless conversation.

Jazz held him there.

Everyone held their breath.

And then the landline right next to Dash's ear went off. Flashing red and ringing so loud it echoed throughout the empty house.