Kakinouchi cracked his neck and fixed his crimson eyes upon Danny’s. “You act before thinking,” red eyes flickered with a reminiscent light, “instinct can only get you so far without practiced knowledge.”

~

This wasn’t what he had imagined happening when he had ran all gung-ho into the hospital building. Certainly not being pinned against a wall, not being able to transform into Danny Phantom, and definitely not having Yamashiro Kakinouchi right in front of him and yet not being able to do a thing about it. No. That’s not what he had imagined at all.

Danny took a deep breath, wincing as the blade across his chest dug closer to his ribs, but played it off as a sneer instead. “Is that the only reason why you wanted my attention, to give me some advice in fighting?”

“I would not categorize this encounter as such; however, what you have said does have some merit.” A bemused grin danced along the shadows of Kakinouchi’s gaunt face.

“Well,” he barred his grinding teeth to ward off the creeping fear, “thanks, now let me--”

Danny bit down hard on the side of his mouth to keep from crying out as the sword’s sharpened edge pushed off of his ribs and away from his bleeding flesh. He coughed up a bit of blood into his fist as he tried to fill his uncompressed lungs to their max, all the while glaring at the deceased man before him.

Kakinouchi sheathed his sword. “Rest.”

Danny pounced, but the ghost vanished.

“Hmm … It seems that you are still able to move,” spoke the disembodied voice.

The halfa swayed, his vision phasing in and out. “Where are you?!”

A hand came to rest on his left shoulder. “Regardless, you must rest.”

“Shut up!” Danny twisted his torso with his fist at the ready, but faltered as the pain shot through his chest. His fist was easily caught and Kakinouchi came into view once more.

“What,” Danny blinked slowly, “what did you do to me?”

“Nothing to bring you this far gone,” the hand on his shoulder moved to his neck, “you have done this to yourself.”

There was a distant, yet focused look on the older man’s eyes, looking at Danny but not seeing him. “What good is a warrior not prepared for battle?”

A pinprick of pain and the world was a swirl of black.

“Rest now; it is what you both need.”

Then there was nothing.

000

Tucker didn’t bother to park his moped, just drove it right up to the front doors and jumped off. His feet didn’t stop once they touched the ground and faster than he thought he could go, he was already running through the automatic doors, dodging nurses, doctors and guards as he advanced towards Sam’s door.

But a human wall of a guard obstructed his entrance, physically stopping him in his tracks when he ran full speed into him.

“Could you please move out of the way? I have to see Sam.”

The large man, who appeared to be of German descent, remained stationary. “I am sorry to inform you, but Miss Manson will not be seeing anyone for the rest of the day.”

Tugging on his barrette with a mixture of impatience, frustration, and anxiety, Tucker glared at the guard. “Why not?”

“That information,” black sunglasses reflected the fluorescent lights, “is none of your concern.”

“Sam is my best friend and my other best friend’s parents are the ghost hunters that the Mansons, your employers, hired to take down the ghost who got Sam in the condition she is now. I am very concerned for her and,” brown boots stepped forward, “I don’t think it’s all that fair for you to let Danny in and not me.”

A large and tanned hand lowered itself to the boy’s shoulder, keeping him in place. “I assure you that no ‘Danny’ has made it past this door. Still, even if that were the case, I must decline your request. Mrs. Ida Manson has given specific orders--”

Tucker shrugged off the guard’s hand, alarms going off at the back of his skull. “What do mean Danny didn’t come here?” A thought occurred to the teen and he felt the mental alarms lose strength.

“Of course you wouldn’t see him,” he whispered to himself. “Listen, Grandma Manson and Sam would make an exception for me. And I’m sure Nurse Amy wouldn’t mind so much either.”

“Miss Sprague is in no position to allow such … demands.”

Sea foam green eyes narrowed. “She’s part of the hospital staff and she used to be my babysitter. The Mansons trust her and they know I’m not a physical threat. So,” his hand reached out for the door handle, “I’m just going to let myself in, alright?”

Tucker’s fingertips didn’t even brush the metallic handle before the guard grabbed him by his extended arm and gave it a hard tug downwards.

“If you are going to be so persistent, I will tell you then that Miss Sprague has been subdued because of her recent possession by Yamashiro Kakinouchi.” The German guard released the meat lover’s arm. “Luckily, Miss Manson was not harmed when the ghost revealed himself. He vanished before he could be captured, but precautions were procured and Miss Manson was taken to her room, where the only ghost shield is located and active.”

Ghost shield? Tucker did a double take. If there was a ghost shield around Sam’s room, then that means Danny couldn’t possibly have gone intangible to get into the room. Especially with Mr. Tall-Buff-and-Serious guarding the door, there was no way the young ghost hunter could take the front way. The alarms wracking his mental world came back full force at the severe lack of Danny Fenton. It was an absolute shame that the adolescent would have to wait until later to receive an answer to his unspoken question.

“Mrs. Ida Manson is very concerned for her granddaughter and has explicitly … explained that she will be protecting Miss Manson from within the shield’s perimeter. I would not like to provoke any outburst from Mrs. Ida Manson, so it would be best if you left.”

“Wait,” Tucker’s eyes widened in surprise as a more pressing thought entered his mind, “Amy was overshadowed by Yamashiro?”

The fair-haired guard straightened the lapel of his blazer. “Yes, but I would keep that information to yourself. Now run along--”

“Didn’t the alarms go off?”

“Yes,” a pause, “but only after Kakinouchi released Miss Sprague from his control.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Tucker said more to himself than the large German. “I need to talk to Sam.”

The nicely tailored man gave not an inch. “I do not care if you are Kamui himself. This is a place of healing and I assure you that your friend is safe and resting well. No harm will come to her here. You, of all people,” the guard’s voice had become silky and heavy with an Asian accent, “should know this already.

“It is on my honour that I say these things and it is by my upbringing and moral code that I keep my word.”

Tucker understood what was being said and who was speaking to him, but that didn’t mean he liked the sound of the man’s voice, his vice grip, or the way his eyes glowed red through the dark lenses of his sunglasses and locked onto the far wall.

“I, however, cannot say the same for foolish young boys who rush headlong into a fight without thought.” The guard’s hold loosened before his entire body swayed as something, or rather someone, smiled wickedly back at Tucker in a haze of green smoke that quickly vanished into the air.

“What happened?” asked the recovered German, his accent thick and heavy.

But Tucker was already sprinting down the corridors to the room behind that certain wall. He had a feeling he wouldn’t like what he saw, but at least he would know where Danny was.

000

How long had it been since that day? That bright summer afternoon when everything went to Hell?

Tucker refocused his dazed vision on the Bible placed in the built-in shelf on the pew in front of him. Sunday … A day? No … He remembered starting work at the Nasty Burger on Monday … vaguely. That would mean … A week? Had it really been a week? Glancing at his father’s watch, the date was eight days later than what he last remembered it being. A whole week had passed. His neck felt like it was burning just thinking about it.

The attack on Danny and his parents, Kakinouchi bypassing hospital defences to threaten Sam, and the warning he got from the same fallen samurai … God … How could that have happened?

Jazz had been devastated with the news, only finding some comfort with Grandma Manson and Sam as Mrs. and Mr. Manson bumped up security during Sam’s supposed final week at the hospital.

In their free time, he and Jazz worked on installing a ghost shield at the Manson home. They couldn’t really start until Tuesday, having needed two days to get their bearings. Honestly, Tucker had been impressed with Jazz’s ability to bounce back as fast as she did. Having to improvise and cover for Danny on a daily basis, Tucker had gotten pretty good at putting up a front. What Jazz had been through to give her that same kind of advantage, he wasn’t quite sure he wanted to know; then again, she was pretty talented to begin with.

The installation process had progressed slowly, more so than what had been initially estimated, Jack and Maddie’s absence being the obvious reason why. No one could really blame the two ghost hunters though, being mauled by a swarm of spectres and all. Jazz being the prodigy child of the two scientists and Tucker being a close family friend with a large understanding of technology seemed to be the best candidates to install the ghost shield on such short notice.

Danny would have been a much appreciated third party, but the encounter with Kakinouchi had thrown those chances out the window. Tucker fought against the mental image of Danny lying on his back in an empty hospital room with a blood-soaked shirt. Instead, the teen turned his attention to the deep tenor of Pastor Dean Reeves. It was not so much the words that Tucker paid attention to but their sound; they were low in tone and lethargic, not sleepy-lethargic, but the patien- lethargic, as if they were waiting for those following behind to catch up.

Tucker felt his neck itch. He wondered if this lax atmosphere was just an escape for him, a false sense of safety, of normalcy. He scrapped a part of his scabbing wound off and winced as it reopened.

000

Sam stared at the empty chair beside her hospital bed. She was supposed to have been released yesterday but her parents had postponed her discharge until a ghost shield could be erected over the Manson home and installation was going slow. She knew how difficult it was for Jazz and Tucker to build something they were not familiar with. Being as close as she was to the two, she was aware that they only knew how to mess with the equipment and machinery that Jack and Maddie used, but not how to build it.

As smart as Jazz was, she was never an advocate of her parents’ ghost obsession, even more so of their technological advances in the paranormal field. Tucker on the other hand was a whiz with software, hacking, and code, but the actual physical aspects? Sam only hoped Jazz would keep Tucker from burning down her house with either a blow torch or soldering gun or something to that degree. And she prayed they would hurry up and finish so she could finally get out of this Hell hole, no offense to the hospital and its staff, it was just that she was getting severely restless … and worried, but she wouldn’t let anyone know that.

She had been on edge since last Saturday. As if it wasn’t enough to know that Yamashiro Kakinouchi had gotten past security just to threaten/warn her, the fallen samurai had attacked Danny and his parents (the latter indirectly, but still all his fault). He had taken them down so easily and that frightened her. Jack and Maddie had been more or less beaten to two large masses of bloody pulp and she could only listen to Jazz’s quavering voice as she talked about their injuries, her stomach sinking and churning with each bruise, laceration, sprain, twist, and broken bone listed.

Then there was Danny.

Sam hugged herself and drove the thought away from the forefront of her mind. She had cried and worried over him more than she would like to admit and quite frankly, she was sick of it. So as there would be no confusion, she didn’t blame him for getting into the trouble that he had; she was just tired of herself being the cause of so much grief and suffering. And it pissed her off to no end.

“I need to get out of here,” the Goth seethed, glaring at the IV connected to her arm while considering whether or not to tear it out.

“Not until Jazz and Tucker finish the ghost shield generator at your house,” the door closed with an audible click.

Amethyst eyes closed and pale lips curled into something that resembled something between a sneer and a smile—something raw, strained, and conveying her every tired nerve. “I told you to leave me alone. There are other people who need you more than I do.”

The empty chair beside the bed screeched and a squeak of sneakers sounded as both were moved closer towards her.

“There’s not much I can do for my parents other than make sure they don’t try to sneak out of the hospital to work. Knowing my dad, he’d probably just fall out of his bed and injure himself more.”

A real smile graced Sam’s lips, but vanished as she opened her eyes and glared at the person sitting beside her. “Danny, you need to--”

“I need to be here,” his voice thin and wavering, but never cracking.

“Well I don’t need you here! Can’t you get that through your thick skull?” Her throat felt like it was closing and her eyes pricked with angry, frustrated tears, but she forced them both down. “You think you have to take care of me and that what’s happening is your problem, but it isn’t. What the Hell do you plan on accomplishing by sitting there in that chair looking like a ghost than Danny Phantom? What? Are you going to pass out like you did when Kakinouchi could have cut you in half last week?”

She looked at him, actually looked and took in the state he was in as he sat hunched over in his seat. Danny Fenton sat beside her with dark circles under his bloodshot eyes, cheeks slightly hallowed, hair limp and frazzled, complexion pasty, and stature wavering even though he was sitting down. “You’re not doing anyone any favours by impersonating the undead, Danny. You need to go back to Tucker’s and rest.”

Danny blinked slowly, his lips set in a grim line. “Sam, you know I can’t--”

“Yes you can! Amity Park will not burn to the ground if you take a day off.”

“No. No it won’t.” He stood and the temperature in the room dropped to freezing, Danny’s eyes a violent shade of emerald green. “But the last time I decided to relax, my parents were wheeled into the ER and the ghost who almost killed you had the opportunity to finish the job.”

Sam remained unfazed. “And you couldn’t do a thing about it. You still can’t and you won’t unless you regain enough strength to do so.”

The halfa placed a hand to his chest, over the shirt that lay above the bandages he had just recently replaced. “It was a shallow cut and I didn’t loose as much blood as everyone thinks. I’m fine now.”

“You’re the only one that seems to believe that.”

~

There was a retort to that statement, but Danny never delivered it as the headache that had been pulsing at the back of his skull all morning long decided to increase its intensity. He swayed where he stood and had to grab onto the rail guards along the sides of Sam’s bed to support his weight, his own legs seeming to have lost their strength. Somewhere, amongst the white noise that assaulted his mind, Danny heard his name being called, but it did little to ease the pain. Taking a deep breath, the young ghost hunter tried to right himself and force the throbbing pain away, only successful for that brief moment before he was consumed by it once more.

The room was fading from out of his vision, enveloped by black spots and blurring shapes. A pang of something—pain, nerves, dizziness, he wasn’t quite sure—hit the young teen at the sides of his ribs, burning where he had been injured and churning his stomach. Nausea rocked the insides of his body as he tried to remain physically stationary, but the ground continued to lurch beneath him.

He stumbled back, letting go of the cool metal that had once been clutched in his grip, and fell over the uncomfortable chair he had sat in earlier, nothing but a dark smear in his vision. His name, again, rang faintly in his ears, the rest of him struggling to regain an upright position.

Then cool hands were on his skin, which he hadn’t realized was burning, and led him in a direction—forward, backwards, left, right—his feet couldn’t remember how to define. The relief of cool water met his heated face and the inky blurs that clouded his eyes began to dissipate, that is, until the pain twisted his gut, pushing forth the bitter bile up through his dry throat and out by way of his slackened mouth.

He dry-heaved until his vision cleared, but his skull continued to split under his skin and his flesh wound burn as if being torn open.

The only comfort he found was the softness that pillowed his aching head and the sight of Sam watching over him.

Darkness was all he knew afterwards. [1]

000

As much as Jazz detested her parents’ unhealthy obsession with ghosts and their work revolving around the paranormal, she did respect their drive to protect others and their efforts to do so. She couldn’t fathom how they could be as crazy as they were and be so capable of building all of the inventions that they had, especially now as she stared between the blueprints in her hands and the heap of metal that was suppose to be some kind of generator.

“Ugh!” she cried, throwing the plans on ground and giving the ‘generator’ a good, solid kick. Jazz was smart and everyone knew that, including herself, but the schematics for the ghost shield were more complex than she could ever hope to imagine. It was not as if Jazz couldn’t read the plans, it was just she had distanced herself from her parents’ work so much and denied it for so long that comprehending what was written down was a task she was unable to fulfill unless someone in their ‘right’ mind could help her understand it. Though, by her standards, Tucker was no where near to being in his ‘right’ mind, Jazz desperately needed his cooperation.

The young scholar glanced at her wristwatch and breathed a frustrated sigh at how close the hour hand was to the Roman numeral for one. A good portion of her Sunday morning had been spent in the basement/movie theater/bowling alley of the Manson home trying to piece together the ghost shield generator. Her parents had moved all the supplies needed for the installment of the ghost shield a week prior, before their attack. It was Jazz’s guess that Jack and Maddie had thought of assembling the ghost shield the weekend of Sam’s initial early release from the hospital. Her parents were far from lazy, but they did have a knack for procrastination. She just wished that they had finished their work earlier so that she could focus on her part time job at the chiropractic clinic.

For a brief moment she thought about calling her parents for help, but dismissed the idea immediately. If she called them, they wouldn’t hang up until they talked her ear off and somehow convince her to have them discharged early so they could work. Knowing her father the way she did, he’d probably just blow something up and send himself back to the hospital the same day he got out.

The past week had been hard and Jazz only foresaw it getting worse before it would get better. She wasn’t really sure how much more her already frayed nerves could take.

Settling down on one of the many plush seats in front of the massive flat-screen television, Jazz rubbed at her temples. “I need help. What is taking Tucker so long?”

As if on cue, the aforementioned teen walked down the steps into the basement. “Sorry I’m late. Pastor Reeves was on a roll today and service ended up taking longer than usu … al … Jazz, did you kick the generator again?”

Jazz wisely remained silent as Tucker inspected the dented metal of the machinery.

“You did, didn’t you?” accused the techie, fingering the new scuff mark on the one of the metal plates and using his other hand to point towards Jazz’s own scuffed shoe. “I don’t know why Sam is all worried that I’ll blow up her house when you’re the one that keeps beating up the generator every time you’re in a rut.”

“At least I don’t set chairs on fire,” shot back the honour student.

“That only happened once and it that has nothing to do with working on the generator.”

“Yes,” sarcasm dripping with her every word, “because playing with Sam’s Zippo lighter when you should have been working on the generator has nothing do with actually working on the generator.”

“Well, it doesn’t!” Arms flailed in exasperation.

“That’s not the point.” Jazz rose from her seat. “You’re more of a hazard than me.”

“That’s not the point either. The way you abuse the generator while we’re working on it before it’s even complete is only going to make the whole process take longer. Seriously,” Tucker crossed his arms and glared at then older girl, “it’s like you’re sabotaging it or something.”

Jazz stalked over to where Tucker stood, visibly steaming at the boy’s comment. “I am doing no such thing. If the completion of this ghost shield generator is taking so long, it’s only because you are incapable of finishing it yourself.”

“Look who’s talking, Miss I’m-gonna-kick-the-generator-because-I-can’t-figure-out-how-to-build-it-without-someone-to-help-me. I don’t know how Danny can stand having a sister like you.”

“And I wonder how Danny can possibly have you as a best friend.”

“If you hate me so much, why don’t you ask Danny for help?”

“That’s a wonderful idea, but you know why he can’t.”

“I’m not stupid. Of course I know.”

“Then why did you bring it up?”

“Because you won’t shut up.”

“And you won’t?”

R~ING!

The two teenagers snapped their attention towards the snack bar, their green eyes set in sharp glares. “WHAT NOW?!”

A light blue cellphone sat fixed by their menacing looks, only answering them with a

R~ING!

Jazz was the first to come to her senses and hurried across the room to pick up her phone. “Hello?”

A crisp, clean and very professional voice met the young woman’s ears and she felt the blood drain from her face. Across from her, Tucker’s glare shifted to a look of concern, then outright fear when the phone slipped from her grasp. Jazz didn’t even stay long enough for the cellphone to hit the carpeted ground before she started sprinting up the stairs, out of the house and towards her car. The only time she paused for longer than a second was when she acknowledged Tucker’s knock on her window and unlocked the passenger door for him.

“Who was that?” He had barely buckled himself in before Jazz slammed on the gas pedal. “What happened?”

“The hospital,” she rasped out. “Danny collapsed.”

~

Tucker bit his tongue, and hard, hard enough that he could taste the metallic flavour of blood fill his mouth. He wanted to cuss and damn Danny for being a complete and utter moron with a severe Hero Complex, but he was raised better than that and Jazz certainly wouldn’t appreciate anyone badmouthing her little brother, best friend or not.

It was just that Danny had gone far beyond the call the past week, more so than he had the weeks prior. Not only had the idiot tried to take on a skilled samurai with only about three hours worth of rest (he wasn’t able to go back to sleep after Tucker woke him up), he extended the hours and range of his daily patrol. Apparently, the thirty-two stitches [2] it took to close the wound Kakinouchi had given him were not enough to keep him off his feet, but certainly strengthened his resolve and at the same time weakened Danny far more than anyone had seen before.

000

“I’m going out.”

Tucker paused a moment in his reading of the ghost shield generator schematics to check the Crimson Chin alarm clock on his nightstand from his position on top of his bed. “It’s half past midnight.”

For a split second, the room filled with a blinding white light. “I need to make my rounds.”

“You’ve been suffering from slight anaemia and sleep deprivation. Also, if you haven’t noticed, your usual remarkably fast healing capabilities have gone MIA. That cut on your chest isn’t healing at all; it’s already been four days.” The African-American glared at the blue sheets of paper laid out before him on his bed. “Sam, Jazz, and even the doctors say that you should be resting. And I’m sure that if your parents were conscious right now, they would agree with the rest of us.”

“You’re the only person that knows I’m hunting ghosts almost literally 24/7, much less hunting down Kakinouchi.”

“Sam’s gonna find out if she doesn’t know by now.” A certain equation regarding voltage input wrinkled Tucker’s brow.

“She doesn’t want to see me and you’ll be too busy with your job at the Nasty Burger and working on the ghost shield generator to tell her.”

Biting his lip, the darker teen circled the problematic equation to ask Jazz about later. “I don’t see how that matters since you’re going to visit her anyway.”

Danny didn’t say anything for moment. “Why won’t you and Jazz let me help with the ghost shield?”

Tucker straightened the blueprints, allowing his friend the change in topic. “Like I said, everyone says you should be resting and they know that you’re being obsessive about the whole Yamashiro Kakinouchi ordeal, so that last comment of yours is null in void. We all want you to just take it easy.”

“I can’t do that.”

“‘Won’t’ is more like it,” was the rather fresh response Tucker gave, immediately trying to figure out how to take it back.

The temperature dropped several degrees. “No. It’s ‘can’t.’ If I’m not patrolling Amity Park, who will? My parents are both in comas and I’m the only other ghost hunter in town.”

It got colder.

“I’m the only one who can stop Kakinouchi.”

Teal eyes glared at glowing emerald from behind thick framed glasses, thoughts of redeeming himself gone. “You can’t stop anything if you run yourself down into the ground the way you are. You won’t stand any more of a chance against that crazy samurai than when he took you down on Saturday!

“Why can’t you just take Yamashiro’s word for it and be grateful that Sam’s safe in the hospital?”

The windows began to frost.

“Because she isn’t.”

White scribbles on blue paper were long forgotten. Instead, Tucker’s focus was upon the young man that hovered before him at the foot of his bed, mere inches off the ground, pale and ethereal, dark and brooding, withdrawn and angry, worn and determined. There was so much strength in the spirit that was both Danny Phantom and Danny Fenton, but so much frailty that frayed at his mind and body. It was there, even as he  floated above the carpeted floor, in how his shoulders drooped just so, the way the skin under his eyes sagged and discoloured, how small red veins laced through and bled into the whites of his glowing green eyes, the strained nerve at the base of his neck, and the faint crackling of green ectoplasmic energy around his tightly clenched fists. He was on edge and paranoid, and despite his bravado, there wasn’t nearly as much fight in his body as much as there was in his heart.

“As long as you think that, as long as you’re pushing yourself because of that, neither are you.”

Silence stretched out between the two friends, gazes locked and unwavering. It was a moment later when bloodshot green eyes were cast down and disappeared all together that the room returned to an uncomfortable summer heat.

000

Tucker hadn’t seen much of Danny since that night and when he did, the halfa was either just passing through or, on the rare occasion, sleeping. Words were few and far between during those moments and it was Tucker who ended up talking, if at all. The techno-geek said nothing of this to Jazz, not like he could anyway; telling your best friend’s sister that her little brother’s health and, most likely, sanity were declining because he was acting as sole ghost hunter of the town under the guise of his own ghostly alter-ego when it was suppose to be a secret wasn’t something he could actually do, not unless he wanted said ghost hunter after his hide.

But this was important.

The last time Tucker had seen Danny was right when he was coming back home from working on the ghost shield generator at the Mansons’ the night before and Danny was just leaving for his nightly rounds. Truth be told, the younger Fenton looked like absolute shit. It was like seeing a zombie version of Danny Phantom take flight. If it wasn’t for the severity of the whole situation, Tucker would have had a good laugh at the idea.

Danny wasn’t talking to him any more and the bespectacled teen was getting further and further out of the loop in what his superhero friend was doing since visiting Sam wasn’t a priority, not with the ghost shield so far behind schedule. Heck, he didn’t even know that Jack and Maddie Fenton had both regained consciousness until Friday evening from Jazz, though they had been awake since the wee hours of that morning and he had run across Danny in the early afternoon.

Jazz had more information on what was happening and it became even more apparent with the recent phone call. She was in the loop because she was directly connected to what was going on even though Tucker was the one sharing his room with Danny, who for some strange reason thought it was his sole responsibility for the safety of the town and Sam, especially Sam. No doubt the honour student had more verbal contact with Danny than Tucker did in the past week either. There was no way she could have not noticed Danny’s withering away, no way with how fast and recklessly she was driving towards the hospital.

Of course Jazz would help him talk some sense into Danny if he told her about Danny Phantom.

Tucker knew Danny was becoming more and more of a danger to himself and, if no one stopped his dangerous downward spiral, a danger to those around him. Jazz would know what to do. She could help. But only if he told her Danny’s secret. It would cost him Danny’s trust, but the halfa would be subdued, hopefully.

“Jazz?”

The redhead didn’t spare a glance in Tucker’s direction as she made a sharp left turn onto Commodore Way, barely avoiding a collision with a crossing moped. “Yes?”

Red, black and white flashed through Tucker’s mind, colors adorning green and framing dark irises and gleaming teeth. All of these, pale and ethereal, dark and brooding, withdrawn and angry, worn and determined; but most of all, lost, lonesome, and reminiscent. Something had been ripped away from this image and Tucker felt sick as another figure superimposed it, filled where the other was empty. He gripped the armrest and forced down the bile that crept up his throat.

Damned if he did, and damned if he didn’t.

And neither seemed to be a lesser evil than the other.

“Drive faster.”


[1] This whole scene is based off of personal experience. Listen well kiddies: This is what happens to you when you don’t take care of you body by severe lack of sleep, skipping regular meals, and just running yourself ragged both physically and mentally. It is painful and not at all fun.
[2] I honestly don’t know how many stitches it would have taken to close his wound, so sorry if it’s completely inaccurate.