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The cool sensation of dye on her hair soothed Dani as Sam painted the last of her bangs and rolled it up in foil.
“And… done,” Sam announced, lowering her gloved hands as Dani looked at the mirror and the nest of foils on top of her head, the foils crinkling as she did, a smile growing on her face.
“Thanks, Sam,” she said, resisting the urge to touch the ones hanging in front of her eyes.
“No problem, Dani. Do you want to finish off those piercings?” Sam questioned, taking off her gloves and holding up a new needle and a second pair of sleeper earrings.
Dani touched the earrings already in her ears, the areas still sore around the studs and small silver hoops but not as sore as before, and nodded. “Yeah, let’s—“
A jolt of pain cut Dani off, electricity needling through her system, exacerbating the slow decay of her cells, her body liquefying at the molecules, and oh Ancients it was painful, she wanted it to end, but she didn’t want to die, make it stop, make it STOP—
“… ni… ani… Dani… DANI!”
Dani jolted again, hand pressed to her chest, panting with sharp, short breaths, vision hazed green, the pain a lingering ache instead of wholly consuming her.
And letting her see that not only was Sam still with her, but Danny was also there, concern and understanding on his face. At the door were Tucker, Jazz and Valerie, their concern reverberating through the fraid bonds she had with them.
“You okay, Elle?” Tucker asked.
“Y-yeah. Just an echo,” Dani answered, getting her breathing under control and ignoring the prickling pain underneath her skin.
Sam reached out for her and Dani recoiled. Immediately she winced, guilt on her face. “Sorry, Sam. I… I don’t really want to be touched right now.”
Understanding dawned on Sam’s face and she immediately moved away from Dani, Danny doing the same. From the door, Jazz asked, “Do you want to do something as a distraction, Dani? Maybe bake some more cookies?”
“Or do you want to play another round of Mario Kart? I promise I’ll go easy on you this time,” Tucker offered, as Valerie gave him a look and said, “As if she didn’t kick your ass earlier.”
Tucker glared at her as Dani shook her head. “No, to both. Thank you, though. I… I would really like to be alone right now.”
“Of course,” Jazz said. “Just let us know if that changes, little sister.”
Dani smiled. “Thanks, Jazz.”
Her older sister returned the smile before she walked away along with Tucker. Valerie lingered as she looked at Dani, a mix of emotions on her face and passed through the fraid bond that Dani couldn’t really parse before she left too.
Danny and Sam made to do the same, but Dani grabbed Danny’s hand. “Wait. Danny, could… could you stay? Please?”
Danny looked at her, then nodded. “Of course, Elle.”
Turning back to Sam, he pressed a kiss to her cheek before the Goth left, leaving the twins in the room alone.
Sitting down beside Dani, Danny looked at her and asked, “How are you feeling, Elle? Really.”
“Like I’m about to be ripped apart and liquified at once,” Dani muttered.
Danny let out a bitter laugh. “Yeah, that’s always how it feels on my death day too. Minus the liquefaction.”
Dani wrapped her arms around her knees, hugging them close to her for both comfort and to hide her trembling. “I hate this.”
“Yeah, death days suck. They—“ Danny said, but Dani interrupted, “That’s not what I meant. I mean, they do, they’re freaking horrible, but I hate that I can’t tell when it will actually happen and the… memories it brings.”
A heavy pause lingered between the twins, before Danny asked softly, “Do you want to talk about it, Elle?”
Dani hesitated, her knee-jerk reaction to bottle it up kicking in. But… this was Danny. If anyone could understand, it would be him.
“I… don’t really remember much before I died,” Dani murmured. “Half-died. Whatever. But what I do remember is this… feeling of panic. That I had to take in as much of the world as I could because no matter how hard I tried to conserve energy, I was slowly dying, that I couldn’t sleep because I was terrified I’d wake up the next day half-melted or not at all. That it felt like I was slowly… decaying day by day, my very molecules disintegrating.”
Tears pricked at her eyes and Dani rubbed them away as she continued, “And it didn’t stop after you saved me! For months, that feeling chased me, that I was still a day or overusing my powers away from melting into a puddle of ectoplasm. That this was all a dream and I’d wake up and see that I was dead all along, that you and Val didn’t save me. That I’m just a dead girl walking who’s decaying on the inside before I start to rot on the outside.”
She roughly rubbed the tears away, ignoring how it seemed like she was wiping away drops of ectoplasm, as she whispered, “That’s what I hate the most about my death days. That it brings back not just the pain of dying, but all of those memories before I did. The fear that I still am, that this is all a dream and I’m about to fall apart. That even though I know I’m alive, it feels like I’m all the way dead, and it’s only a matter of time before the decay catches up.”
Another heavy pause, before Danny asked, “Can I hug you?”
Dani nodded, just before her brother pulled her into a tight hug.
“I’m sorry, Dani,” he murmured, his core rumbling and conveying sorrycomfort to her. “I wished you didn’t have to go through it.”
“It’s okay. I know that I’m partially alive, that it’s just my death day,” Dani assured, her core letting out a comforting trill.
“It doesn’t change that you still felt that way,” Danny mumbled, squeezing her tighter. “That I should have been there for you. That I should have stabilised you before it was almost too late.”
Dani was quiet, before she leaned into her brother’s hold, her core purring softly as she murmured, “You’re here now, Danny. You’re always there for me when I need you. And I’m… really glad you’re here, today.”
An answering purr rumbled from Danny’s chest, her brother giving her a soft kiss on the forehead as he replied softly, “And I’ll always will be, Dani. No matter what.”
Warmth and love for her brother bloomed in Dani, the purring growing louder as she relaxed in her brother’s hold. However, it didn’t last long as a wave of pain struck, a whimper slipping out of Dani as she trembled, the agonising pain of her body disintegrating ripping through her.
Danny noticed, concern on his face as he asked, “Do you want me to let you go or—“
Dani shook her head, wrapping her arms around Danny in a tight grip as she managed to whisper, “Just keep hugging me, Danny.”
Danny did so, one of his hands moving in slow, rhythmic strokes as his core let out comforting purrs and chirps, reassuring the ghostly part of Dani that she was safe, she was with her brother, that the rest of their fraid was close by. That she wasn’t alone, melting away into nothing but ectoplasm, slowly decaying by the second.
That she was still here.
When the wave passed, Danny looked at her and confessed, “If it helps, I felt the same way.”
Dani’s head jerked up, shock and surprise radiating through the bond they shared. “Really?”
Danny nodded. “Right after my accident, I didn’t really understand what was going on. I knew I was alive, told myself that I was and I’d gotten lucky, that the powers were side-effects that would eventually go away, even… even though I also knew a part of me had died in the portal, that I would never be fully alive again. Even after I realised I was half-ghost, that I was still alive, I was terrified I wasn’t actually alive, that it was just my ghost puppeteering my body and that one day, the proof would show.”
Danny laughed bitterly. “Going through my first death day didn’t help that, nor did my first birthday after the accident came and I didn’t look like I’d aged. That it was more proof of that secret fear I had.”
Her brother rubbed the back of his neck and finished, “But I’ve accepted now that I am still alive, even if it’s partially so, and I am ageing, in both forms, that I’m not some sort of corpse inhabited by my ghost pretending to still be alive. Still, I know how that feels, and while it sucks, you’re not alone, Dani. Like I said, I’m there for you, always.”
“It… actually does make me feel a little better, knowing you also went through that,” Dani admitted, pressing a hand against her chest and feeling the dual pulses of her heartbeat and core. “Guess it must be a halfa thing, doubting that we’re still alive. Somewhat.”
“I mean, we’re already an existential crisis and also half-living examples of Schrödinger’s cat. Seems par for the course of us doubting we’re still alive,” Danny commented sarcastically.
Dani laughed, before it cut into a hiss as excruciating pain struck, clutching her chest as her core squeezed into itself, the phantom feeling of her skin softening and her skeleton turning gelatinous striking her before it passed, nausea churning in her stomach. Danny rubbed her back in soothing circles, his core chirping and rumbling softly, comforting her.
A minute of silence ticked past before Danny asked, “Do you want to rejoin the others, or stay up here?”
Dani bit her lip, before she answered, “I… want to be with the others. Sam still needs to pierce my ears, and I want to beat Tucker at Mario Kart again. Maybe at another video game.”
Danny chuckled. “I’ll be rooting for you.”
“As you should,” Dani replied, a small smile on her face.
Danny returned the smile, squeezing her shoulder once before he stood up, Dani following. Together, they left the room and headed downstairs, making their way to the spacious media room in Sam’s basement.
Jazz, Tucker, Sam and Valerie were already down there, turning around as the twins entered.
“Feeling a little better, Dani?” Jazz asked.
“A little,” Dani answered honestly, looking at Sam. “Can you pierce my ears again, Sam? And Tucker, I’m taking you up on that offer. Get ready to be crushed again.”
“Challenge accepted!” Tucker exclaimed, tossing her the controller. Dani caught it as she sat down in front of Sam, who held up the needle over the ball of ecto-energy Danny had summoned to sterilise it.
As Tucker started up the game and Sam got ready to pierce her ears again, Dani was already grinning, her core letting out soft, content purrs. She glanced over at Valerie and looked away hurriedly when Valerie noticed her, suddenly glad she was already purring as she tried to ignore the redness in her cheeks and the swooping in her stomach, suddenly grateful that she was playing a video game to distract herself from it, oblivious to the knowing looks Danny and Sam shared at noticing it.
It proved to be as good a distraction as she hoped, as all thoughts of Valerie disappeared in favour of Dani’s desire to crush Tucker in Mario Kart, trash talking him as Danny, Sam and Valerie cheered for either her or Tucker. A wide grin grew on her face when she inevitably won against him and Tucker let out a dramatic moan, feeling so happy and content she almost didn’t feel the echo of her death washing over her, a wide, fanged grin on her face, core purring louder.
Because while Dani’s death days would always be horrible, always bring up those buried memories and fear that she was still destabilising, that she was decaying, as long as she was with her brother, with Valerie, with all of her fraid, then it would be okay, and she could forget it all for just a few moments.
She just hoped all her death days would be like this.