Chapter Text
His alarm blared, and Danny gave a loud groan of defeat. He immediately slapped his phone, the alarm snoozed. Honestly, he was already awake anyway. A jolt of pain reminded him of this, and he hissed.
He rolled onto his left side, purposefully pushing his weight into the bed and onto his arm. For some reason, this sometimes soothed the weird sensations that shot through his nerves, but unfortunately this was not one of those times. It pulsed through the Lichtenberg scars, and he clenched his fist.
Danny's eyes gazed over to his phone. It was nearly nine am. School started well over an hour ago. Right now, he should be preparing for second period to start, but he thanked his luck that his mom had told him he could sleep in a little when she caught him still awake at three am last night.
It was kinda weird. Barely three months ago, before the accident, his mom would have chewed him out for still being awake and watching TV. But now that he was going through all this? She babied him. He was lucky that, while she was just as puzzled as him about these mysterious symptoms, his mom was so loving and understanding. He wasn't downstairs and awake at three am on a school night because he was irresponsible; he just was suffering another sleepless night as jolts of electricity shot through his injured arm and leg, as his legs would randomly grow numb, as his body seemed to drop to a concerningly low temperature that made him feel so cold it was painful.
His alarm blared again, and Danny slammed his fist on the device for another snooze. Shut up, shut up, shut up.
"Danny, honey? Get up and get ready! We have to leave by nine-twenty if we wanna make it on time!" his mom's voice called out to him from downstairs.
"I'm awake!" he shouted back before exhaling a deep sigh. He curled into his covers more. He felt so cold, and he could feel that his left leg was going to be having a bad day. It felt numb and colder than the rest of his body.
But they had scheduled this specialist appointment weeks ago. He couldn't risk missing it. He desperately wanted to join the baseball team later that year, and that meant fixing the problem now.
Danny used his good leg, the right one, to kick his covers off. Even though it was his good leg, he still struggled for a moment before they finally flew off. Taking a deep breath, he exhaled hard as he pulled himself into a sitting position. Dear god. He was so dizzy, and his toes were so cold they almost burned. He grabbed the compression socks he left on his mini fridge nightstand, pulling them on. It gave some relief to his left foot, but he was still a bit cold.
He dumped the Monday pills out of his weekly into his hand. Ten different pills, just for Monday morning, between prescriptions and his daily vitamins. Gross. But he was practically a pro at this by now. He popped them all into his mouth at once, grabbing his water bottle and taking a long drink. God, once he started, he began chugging. He didn't realize how thirsty he was until he drank nearly the entire bottle. He exhaled deeply when finished, setting it back down before flexing his hands. They felt cold and stiff.
He stood up, using his nightstand to steady himself. His crutches rested against the wall closeby, and he reached for them. It took a moment to adjust himself, but he swung himself towards his dresser. His reflection reflected how he felt: messy and awful. He had worn his space t-shirt to bed and sweatpants, and his hair was messy and unkempt. The idea of getting dressed into day clothes made him want to die. Shuffling into the bathroom, just to brush his hair and teeth? Ugh, his bathroom was so far away.
…Who cared how he looked? And he brushed his teeth last night. That was good enough for now.
Danny left his room, and he hopped downstairs with the crutches. The faint smell of the coffee his parents brewed earlier that morning and leftover breakfast was enough to make him nauseous. No breakfast for him today.
He swung over to the front door, slipping his crocs on. His backpack was in the same place he had left it, and he swung it onto his back, swearing under his breath as he dropped his crutches in the process. Great start to the day. The effort left him out of breath, and he sat down on the chair next to their shoe rack.
"I'm ready!" Danny called out. His mom poked her head around the corner from the kitchen. She frowned at him.
"Honey, you're not going to school looking like that," she lightly scolded. Danny gave a small whine.
"I don't feel good," he complained.
"You don't even have your binder on," she pointed out. He made a face.
"My chest hurts too much today," he replied.
"Then you need to at least wear a bra. Oh don't give me that look. Sports bras are a decent compromise."
"Mom, please. I just wanna get through the day."
Maddie hummed softly. She disappeared behind the corner before reappearing with a brush and a conditioner spray. He didn't complain as she sprayed his hair down and brushed it.
"I know it's hard, but taking care of yourself will help you feel better mentally," she told him. Danny made a noise of acknowledgement, but he didn't say anything. When she finished, she kissed his forehead, and she glanced at the crutches. "Oh, that reminds me. We finished the Fenton Anti-Ghost Crutches for you."
Danny gave a dramatic groan.
"Mom, please," he began.
"Oh I don't want to hear a word of it," Maddie frowned. She walked away; he presumed to get the new crutches. "I don't know what's going on with you, but I know that you're definitely a lot more vulnerable, and the ghost activity has dramatically increased. You need protection for when your father and I aren't there."
"Yeah, protect me from having a social life," he muttered under his breath. Indeed, his mom returned with the softly glowing crutches, metallic-looking with an ugly shade of green, and, of course, with the FentonWorks logo slapped on them. Like he wasn't enough of a social pariah. She also had her purse with her. "Mooom-"
"I don't want to hear it," she repeated herself. It didn't stop him from making another face as she handed it to him. He reluctantly reached out for them, grasping them in his hands and ignoring the small static shock from them. They were cool to the touch, cold even against his cold stiff hands, and he knew from immediate looks that it was the wrong height for him.
He put his old ones off to the side, but eyed them as a reference as he adjusted the height of the new one. Danny didn't have the energy to fight her today. He also held out hope that by playing along, she would let him just go home after the appointment instead of to school.
A harsh jolt of pain shot through his left arm. Painful enough that he gasped without a breath, dropping the crutch. His mom immediately flooded him with questions.
"Are you okay? What's wrong? Do you need help?"
Danny shook his head, going temporarily mute as he took a moment to process. He tried to reach for the fallen crutch, but his mom snatched it up for him. She held it patiently until he was ready to grasp it himself again.
"I'm okay. Just had some nerve pain moment," he explained. His mom was concerned, but she knew there wasn't much she could do for him. She had to settle for kissing the top of his head as he finished adjusting.
"Well, let's get rolling," she suggested. He nodded in agreement.
She opened the door for him, and he used the crutches to stand.
It was so weird. His left arm ached hard, this much was normal, but what wasn't normal was how odd it felt. He couldn't describe it, but it made his stomach drop in anxiety. Not another new symptom…
He tucked it into the back of his mind as he hobbled to the car. Least his dad took the Fenton RV to his class, and thus, they could drive to school in their actual normal car (despite his parents' insistence on it being the Fenton Ectomobile).
His mom stayed behind, seemingly returning inside to fetch something before she began to lock the door and set their ghost alarms, giving Danny the time to open the back seat. He moved to toss the crutches onto the floorboard, on top of his baseball bag, but hesitated. Seeing it made his heart sink. After finally throwing them in, he could feel a sudden rush of nervous hope flowing through. This had to be The Appointment. The appointment that would fix everything. It had to be.
His dad was a wrestler and football player in high school, continuing playing football on a full ride scholarship to college. His mom played basketball and was also a college athlete. Not a full ride scholarship, but a scholarship on top of her academic ones. Jazz was a swimmer and did volleyball. Too early to tell for scholarships, but she hoped for one. Danny did swim too, he and Jazz did their lessons and practices together for years, but he loved doing softball. Until he stopped due to dysphoria.
"Awe, come on ladybug! What's going on? Your grades are slipping, you barely see your friends anymore, and now you're wanting to quit softball? Something's wrong. Softball means everything to you." His dad's voice echoed in his mind.
Danny put his backpack on the floorboard near the door before shutting it. He got into the passenger's seat, his mom quickly copying him. She put her purse in the backseat before getting into the driver's seat. Danny buckled his seat belt, and his mom handed him something.
A few slices of bacon! And a soda. Despite the smell of leftover breakfast making him nauseous earlier, he now felt starved, and he happily took it.
"Thank you!" he said.
"You're welcome, baby," she replied, starting the car and starting to head out. "Jazz said that she'd drive you to therapy after school, but don't forget to tell her to resend your dysphoria diagnosis to the doctor. If not, they won't refill the blockers at the pharmacy."
"I know, I know," Danny half-waved her off as he shoved some of the bacon into his mouth, cracking open the soda.
It's weird. It was so hard finally telling his parents, but now, it's hard to think about why he was so anxious about saying it.
"Honey, you will always be our baby. You're a Fenton. And Fentons get As, though in your father's case a B-, but they're also athletes and people who look out for their community." He could remember his mom telling him immediately afterwards.
His grades were already back on track, despite the illness, and he did his best to be a good person. But getting into baseball…
Swimming again was out of the question until he could get his top surgery. He refused to swim until then. With any luck, his therapist would recommend for him to be able to get it in two years instead of it becoming his high school graduation gift. The sooner the better. And he didn't really care about trying other sports either. His heart belonged to baseball.
Danny chugged the soda, choking on it as he felt an intense cold rush overtake him. So cold it felt like he got dunked in ice cold water, so cold that his fingers and toes felt numb, so cold that he could have sworn he saw his breath.
"Are you okay? Don't drink too fast," Maddie lightly scolded.
"I just got hit with the weirdest coldness," he complained, gasping as he coughed. He could still swear that his breath was visible, he felt so cold. "I'm freezing!"
He put his hand on his mom's cheek, and she flinched.
"My god, you are!" she exclaimed. Her eyes glanced at the car's temperature. "It's not nearly that cold out, or in the car. Hm."
She cranked the heat up before turning the fan speed up, and Danny pressed his hands against the vents. The hot stuffy air almost burned against his frozen fingers, but in a good way. He shivered, adjusting all the vents to be on him as he tried to wait out this odd cold wave.
"I was so cold all night," Danny complained. "I actually took one of Jazz's blankets from her room, and one of the ones downstairs, but that just now felt like something else."
"Are you still cold?" she asked. She pressed her hand against his forehead.
"A little, but it's not nearly as bad as it was just now," he said. He turned the air down, and the heat down a bit. "It's just. It's so." He struggled to find the words. "I don't know what's happening to me."
"...I don't know either, honey."
Danny exhaled deeply, and he pulled out his phone so he could mindlessly finish his bacon. He couldn't let his nerves get the best of him. This had to be The Appointment.