A/N: Please go read wash away the darkest days before you set your teeth into this fic! Otherwise you'll be at a serious disadvantage and that's just no fun at all.

Those who know this 'verse, welcome back! I hope you took a gander at the second chapter of wash away the darkest days. It's not necessary to read before jumping into this, but I think a fair number of folk who like that fic will appreciate the glimpse into Danny's POV.

Whether or not you've never read part one of this series, let me say this now. This is a deadfic. Everything here was roughed out in 2015 and tidied up in 2019 in the interest of sharing after I did a little poll over on my Tumblr (anthropwashere) to see if anybody would want to see where I once wanted to go with this. You can expect 16 proper chapters followed by a meandering outline (wherein I try and piece together What The Hell past!me was aiming for, as the outline I've got is Shit Tier), and a writing playlist. I hope you all enjoy what I have of this 'verse as I enjoyed the hell out of writing it in the first place, not to mention tidying it up years later!

Title-wise, as is my wont and weakness for naming fic after songs, you can thank The Mountain Goats' "Dilaudid" for this. Extremely close competitors were Mother Mother's "Reaper Man" and the Editors' "Eat Raw Meat = Blood Drool". Especially the latter. Just check out that music video! Friggin' oof, y'all.

Maddie bites back a groan as Jack takes the last turn home too sharply. She hears the RV's treads grind across the asphalt and a car horn blare. Her hand instinctively jumps to her aching side; no broken ribs, thankfully, but she still took quite a hit from Skulker. She'll be sore for a few days and bruised for longer, but it's fine. She's had worse. They both have.

"Sorry about that," Jack says, throwing her an apologetic smile as he lines the RV up along the curb outside FentonWorks. She waves his concern aside, schooling her grimace into a tight smile. But he isn't fooled one bit, hurrying to help her despite her protests. He neatly scoops her out of the passenger seat and deposits her gently at the front door in a few long strides. "You just set yourself down on the couch and leave all the heavy lifting to me for tonight, alright? I'll get this gear sorted out quick as a whip and then we can see about dinner."

"Jack, I can at least help with the—"

"I won't hear of it!" He interrupts with a grin. "Go on, Mads, I've got it."

"Oh, for—" She swats his arm, laughing. "Twist my arm, why don't you?"

He presses a kiss to her temple and the keys into her gloved hand before jogging back to the RV with its blinking payload of containment units and spent weaponry. Maddie shakes her head fondly, letting herself in.

It's pitch-black in the house. They hadn't expected to be out so late when they'd gotten called out. Or the second and third call that came down while they were out, for that matter. They really ought to know better by now. Ghost hunting is a 24/7 ob. A few years ago it had seemed so much simpler, so much easier despite the chaos and property damage, but then a few years ago there had been—

No. Stop.

She shuts away her grief and limps to the kitchen, flicking light switches on as she goes. The porch, the basement stairway, the upstairs hall, the kitchen. Warm yellows and harsh whites that leave her blinking away spots. She's tempted to pull her hood back on, but one of the lenses is badly cracked. No sense to risk getting glass in her eye over a moment's discomfort.

From the freezer she pulls out one of the many ice packs they've collected over the years; a fat oval full of pink gel that's a perfect fit for her aching side. She drops it on the counter, fetching a glass of water and a handful of ibuprofen form the big bottle by the coffee pot. The bottle's nearly empty, she notes absently. They'll need to buy more the next time they make it to the grocery store. She swallows the pills, downs the water, then unzips her jumpsuit to the waist and looping its sleeves in a loose knot at her sips so they won't dangle. She doesn't bother untucking her sweat-sticky tank top, slapping the ice pack to her side. She hisses relief through her teeth, sagging against the counter.

Still, she can hear the siren call of the couch. Kicking her boots off and putting her sore feet up sounds like step one of a brilliant plan. She limps out of the kitchen, not bothering to kill the light. Jack will surely start foraging in there as soon as he's finished downstairs. Speaking of, she hears movement at the foot of the basement stairs and what is certainly not a breathless rush of pained curses. "Jack? Are you sure you don't need a hand?"

"No!" Immediately there's a hazardous-sounding crash. The floor shakes underfoot. "Everything's fine, don't worry!"

She laughs, wincing through the jolt of pain it rewards her. Whatever broke she'll be mad about in the morning. Right now she's exhausted. All she wants is a hot shower, something to calm the gnawing in her stomach, and a minimum of eight uninterrupted hours of sleep. She'll settle on the couch for now.

But someone else is already there.

She freezes in the entryway. Striped by the orange streetlight spilling in through the blinds she can just make out the silhouette of someone with short, flyaway hair and broad shoulders. For all the lights she turned on the living room is still in shadow. She drops her hand from the ice pack, drawing an ectotaser and switching it on in one smooth motion. Neon green crackles between its prongs as the ice pack slouches into the folds of her jumpsuit. The silhouette doesn't move. A burglar? A ghost?

She barks out, "Who's there?"

The silhouette stiffens. "Uh," it says. Masculine voice. Young. A teenager, most likely. Or at least a convincing approximation of one.

"Step away from the couch with your hands up and empty, buster, or I'll be forced to take the defensive measures I normally reserve for the malevolent specters that haunt this fair city!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, stop." The couch creaks as the silhouette hastily complies with her order. "Mom, it's me."

He—

She misheard.

Surely she's imagining it. This voice, the familiarity of it—it's her imagination. She has to swallow before speaking anyway to keep the tremble out of her words. "I beg your pardon?"

"It's me. It's Danny."

Very, very carefully, Maddie takes three sidesteps over to the end table and its cheerful little lamp. Her hand bumps the light shade, fumbles for the switch. Warm yellow light spills across the living room. She swallows again, taking in the details of this—this intruder—now that she can see him. She takes in scruffy black hair. The stretched-tight features of someone who's missed too many meals. Skin with a sickly, almost grayish, pallor. White scars across his lip, jaw, temple. Multiple piercings glittering in his ears. Reflective sunglasses. A studded leather jacket, well-worn. A plain black hoodie, faded. Skinny black jeans, torn at the knees. Black combat boots, unlaced and badly scuffed. A black backpack set by the couch, held together with duct tape.

At a glance this—this boy looks like somebody who fell down past desperate a long while back. Three years. Three years. She scarcely recognizes him, but who else could he be?

"Danny," she breathes out. An afterthought pockets the ectotaser before she rushes him, her aching side forgotten. She barks one shin against the coffee table but can't care a whit because this is her boy, her son, home at last. She hugs him and does not let go. Danny flinches, a gasp hissing through his teeth. But he relaxes by inches, by centimeters, enough to press his cold hands to her back. Oh, oh, she can feel him shaking against her. He's freezing. He's so cold under all those black layers but she can feel his pulse racing in his neck against her cheek. He's here. He's home. He's alive. This is real. Maddie's face is hot with unshed tears as she says, over and over again, "Oh Danny, my Danny, you're here, you're home, I missed you so much, oh my baby, it's you."

"I missed you too," he whispers in her ear. His breath, at least, is warm.

"What'd you say, hun?" Jack asks as he crests the basement stairs. Maddie hears his breath hitch, his footsteps freeze. "Who—is that—my god. Is that—Danny?"

"Hi, Dad."

"I—you. Ha. You're home. You're—Danny!" And then Jack is there, all but kicking the coffee table aside and smothering them both with his big arms and warm weight. Danny's knees buckle just before her own do, and they all fall in a heap to the couch.

For a while there aren't any words, not really. Maddie doesn't know how long they sit on the couch just holding each other. Cradling each another. Shaking in each other's arms. Telling each other "I'm sorry," and "I missed you," and "I love you," so many times the words stop meaning anything. Three years is so long. Three years is forever. She wants to hold Danny tight and never let go again.

Eventually, however, they quiet. They calm. Eventually Maddie can let go and not fear she'll wake up. How many times can a mother dream of this exact moment? How many times can bleak disappointment outweigh the glad reality she's now faced with? She sits back to get a good look at her boy, remembering too late her bruised side. Danny's face twists at the pained noise that escapes her.

"Mom? Oh god, are you okay?" His hand finds her knees, squeezing it almost painfully. Even through her jumpsuit he's still shockingly cold.

"I'm fine," she insists at the same time Jack says, "She took a bad hit today." That only makes Danny's face twist more. She shoots Jack a dirty look. His own face is a soggy mess but he still manages to raise his eyebrows as if to ask, Am I wrong?

"It's just a bad bruise, sweetie," she says. "Don't worry about me."

"But—"

She plucks his sunglasses off his face to hush him. She doesn't want him to worry. She just wants to see him, here and alive, every inch of him safe and sound. He flinches, ducking his head as she sets them aside. He curls his hands in his lap and hunches his shoulders as if he—as if—

"Oh, sweetie," she says, dismayed.

She remembers that guilty, wincing expression. When he was little, in that nebulous time between diapers and kindergarten, when she would catch him being naughty. Broken toys and pilfered cookies. Little things. Learning things. The look he'd get when she'd scold him back then is the same as how he looks now. He looks like he expects to be punished. He looks like he knows he's the reason she's upset and now the world is ending for it. He looks like he expects them to hurt him for—what? For leaving? For coming back?

He looks shattered.

"I'm sorry," he blurts. "Oh, Christ. I—I'm so sorry. I never wanted to leave, but I couldn't stop him. I couldn't fight it—"

"Shh," Jack interrupts, pressing one huge hand atop Danny's choppy hair. "Hush, Danno, hush now. It's alright. You're home now. That's all that matters."

But Danny shies away from his touch, the misery in his face only deepening. "No. No, it's—please. I—I have to tell you the truth. Something I should've told you years ago. I should've told you right after it happened, I know I should've, but I was—I was scared. I'm sorry."

Over his bowed head she and Jack share a meaningful look. Carefully, carefully, Maddie presses her fingertips to Danny's shoulder. He flinches anyway. "It's okay," she tells him. "We know."

"You—you do?" He looks up briefly, shock stretching his gaunt features. Maddie can just make out blurry white smears around his eyes, startling pale even against his sickly color. Maybe it's just how the lamplight touches the bruised, sleepless skin. He looks like he hasn't had a good night's sleep in—in ages. But he ducks his head again before she can get a better look, hunching tightly again like he can't bear to meet their eyes. "How... how did you...?"

"Sam and Tucker told us," Jack replies gently. "About a month after you went missing."

"I... oh."

"Sweetie, it's alright," Maddie says quickly. "We love you. We always have and nothing could ever change that. Not even you being half ghost."

A harsh bark of noise, more a sob than laughter, hiccups out of him. He presses a hand to his face, swallowing the hideous noise. "Yeah. Yeah. Okay."

Maddie and Jack share another look. How much do they press him? How much do they demand of him? Three years. Three years. They need to know, but is now the time to ask the how and why? Jack nods, and that's enough for her. "Danny boy," he asks, smoothing his hand down Danny's tensely curled spine. "Where—what happened?"

"I—" Danny shudders, pulls away from their touch and off the couch entirely. He finds the coffee table and folds himself up on it without once raising his gaze from the carpet. He takes one shaky breath, then another, then slots his fingers together so tightly his knuckles burn white. Now that Maddie can see his hands she can't help but see the damage done to them. One pinkie is a joint too short, the thumb on the same hand half the width it should be. A wounded, miserable noise escapes her, but he recoils when she tries to touch him.

"Please," he begs. So she stops. Retreats. Gives him the space she can hardly bear to give. She and Jack wait, scarcely breathing, for Danny to speak. He looks so swallowed up, so small, in all that bulky black clothing. He's her son, he's their son, but he looks like a stranger still.

Danny's throat clicks when he swallows. "Do... do you remember the circus that came through town a few years ago? And the ghost robberies that—that Phantom—that I—was a part of?"

"Well sure," Jack answers. "But we know that wasn't your fault. Sam and Tucker told us all about how that Freakshow fella controlled... you..."

Oh, god.

"Danny," Maddie whispers weakly. His reluctant nod is all the answer she never wanted.

"Yeah," he says. "I broke the staff he used to control ghosts back then, but he—he found another way to control me."

She covers her mouth to hide the furious twist of her lips. Sam and Tucker had guessed as much, but there'd never been any proof. There'd been nothing. No calling card, no ransom, no threats. All they had to go on was a confirmed prison break for one Frederich Isak Showenhower, one witness to the fight that had left Phantom—Danny—a limp body in the arms of a red-cloaked ghost Sam had identified as Lydia, and one grainy recording filmed by another high school freshman who had admitted he'd been there trying to play a prank on the ghost kid. There hadn't been enough to go on. After that night Danny had vanished without a trace. The man calling himself Freakshow had never once made an appearance or tried to contact them at all. She swallows again. "That—that man. He kidnapped you?"

"Yeah. He—he wasn't real pleased with how I got him arrested." Danny bites his uninjured thumb, his grin unnatural and cruel. "He wanted revenge. I'd say he got more than enough of that."

"All this time," Jack murmurs. "Oh, Danny, I'm sorry. We' looked. We did, I swear—"

"Nearly," Danny corrects. "I've been free, mm, three months now? Ish? I would've come home sooner, but—" He laughs. "I was pretty messed up. It's a good thing I'm so sturdy, else I probably shoulda been hospitalized."

"Hospitalized?" Maddie and Jack echo.

"Yeah." Another laugh, as colorless as the first. "But that would've raised way more questions than any of us wanted to answer."

"What did he do to you?" Jack asks before she can.

"He didn't, like, torture me or anything," Danny says quickly. Too quickly? Maddie isn't sure. She's not sure she wants to be sure. "I mean, I know I look pretty bad, but that—this wasn't him. Not really. It's from working. At the circuses and with animals and stuff. He was getting revenge on Phantom, not on me. He never knew I was half human, that's all."

"How did he—" Jack breaks off with a grimace. "No, I'm sorry, I shouldn't—"

"It's okay." Danny holds up his left hand, the one with pieces of his fingers missing. It hurts to look at. It wounds to wonder how he was hurt. "I want to tell you guys. I do. I want to tell you everything. You deserve to know. It's just—I didn't..." He drops his hands, knots them in his lap. Joints pop, too loudly in the ringing silence. "This is a lot harder than I thought it'd be."

"It's okay," Maddie assures him. "It's late. We can talk about it all in the morning, if you like."

"Is it?" He twists to toss a glance at the wall clock by the bookshelf. "Damn, yeah. I guess it is. You guys must be exhausted. Long day of ghost hunting?"

"Oh you betcha," Jack says eagerly. "I tell ya, Danny, it's like these ghosts don't know how to take, 'get outta my town or I'll raze ya down to your plasmid byproducts' for an answer!"

"Jack!" Maddie exclaims.

"Uh—I mean—" Jack chuckles feebly. "It's, ah, just a figure of speech. We don't actually raze ghosts. Not anymore."

Danny smiles. "Okay, Dad."

"Honest, we—"

Danny stands up—floats up, right over the coffee table, landing gently on the far side of it. Jack gasps, an astonished grin chasing away his guilt. Danny shoves his hands into his pockets, shoulders hunched up to his glittering ears, still refusing to look them in the eye. She thinks of how much he flinched every time they touched him. He asks, "Guess I'll take the couch, yeah?"

"What? No! Nonsense!" Jack bounds up, trips over the black backpack and hastily picks it up by one strap. "You—you've still got your room, Danno. We kept it just about as you, uh, um, as you left it. Once the cops went through it top to bottom we made sure it was all back to rights!"

Danny tenses; his knuckles burn white and the cords in his neck stand out taut as steel cables. "The police?" His voice is suddenly thin with a high, trembling not of fear. Oh god, Maddie thinks, standing as well. What did that monster make him do to make him fear the police so badly?

"It's alright," she says. "We opened an investigation after—after you went missing. They were just doing their job."

"That's right," Jack says, holding out Danny's backpack. Danny doesn't take it.

"Where are my sunglasses?"

What does it matter? Maddie doesn't ask that, though she wants to. Danny reminds her too much of a deer right now, tense and wide-eyed, ready to bolt at the first sign of trouble. She won't push him any more tonight. "Here," she says, plucking the sunglasses from where she'd set them on the coffee table and holding them out.

Danny doesn't take them. Instead he pops his tongue; a loud and jarring burst of noise that makes her and Jack both jump. Only after does he take his sunglasses from her and his backpack from Jack, slipping them both on without explanation or apology. "Lead the way," he says.

Maddie—Maddie leads. She doesn't want to. It's nearly a physical pain to take her eyes off her boy, as sharp and aching as her bruised ribs. On the second floor landing she asks—she has to ask, "Do you need anything? Have you eaten? Extra blankets?"

Danny chuckles. "I'm okay. Honest. You're the one who ought to take it easy." He holds out his right hand, the palm of it dark and lumpy—a spider web of scar tissue, and how on earth could he have gotten that? Maddie hesitates, but forces herself to grasp his outstretched hand. His calluses are as rough as sandpaper.

He smiles. "I promise I'll be here in the morning."

A sob hiccups out of her. She can't help but pull him in for one more hug. He doesn't resist. He grips her shoulders and hugs her back. Hugs her, instead of endures her grip. She presses a kiss to his temple before she parts, whispering fiercely, "I'm so glad you're home."

"Me too," he says. He lets go first.