Chapter 5

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It has been a surprisingly uneventful couple of days since the half-ghost passed out in his home of the past seven years, 3 months, 1 week, 6 days, 14 hours and woke up in the sterile infirmary of the Young Justice Headquarters. After Danny had met the group of junior heroes (plus one senior hero), and they explained what happened because they were apparently unaware that he was there and therefore knew what happened and then they proceeded to ask a few questions that he didn't answer, and finally they gave up trying to get him to cooperate (never let it be said that Danny couldn't be stubborn) had left him alone to sleep.

But the thing was, Danny didn't sleep all that often. Some might call him an insomniac but he can sleep, if he had wanted to, he just chose not to. It was easier that way, sleeping was a hassle and it made him at his most vulnerable, not to mention he would probably wake up panicked more often than not from nightmares. But, every now and then, even while awake, he was haunted by his past. He would think about where his life took a turn for the worse, and he would remember all the traumas he's been forced to face in vivid detail as if his mind was projecting a movie on repeat in his subconscious. He hated the sleepless nights because there was nothing to distract him from getting sucked into his past, but facing it while awake was better than having to face it asleep, at least then he won't be as trapped in memories and he can also react to threats quicker. The beeping of the heart monitor and the humming of the various machines that he allowed the strangers to hook up to him slowly melted into the voices of his past and Danny got stuck in the faces of his former life.

"MOMMY! DADDY!" The two year old Danny shrieked as he watched the life drain out of his parents and they turned into nothing but cold, mangled flesh and bone crumpled on the dirt floor. A pair of hands were holding him from running to the corpses of his family. The young boy's world turned into blurs of color and the screams and voices surrounding him turned into nothing but white noise and the only thing he could focus on were the two cadavers in front of him, bones broken and twisted in inhuman ways and blood pooling around the bodies. The warm eyes of his parents turned cold, staring lifelessly up to the heavens. A small trail of blood dripping down his mother's pale face and the salt and pepper hair of his father became greased with blood.

The hands restricting him from rushing forward in hysterics suddenly were gone, leaving his skin cold in the absence of the external heat from the unknown source of restraints. His young mind was running around in circles as he desperately tried to analyze and process the events that just occured, that he just witnessed. People around him in the--

--Where was he again? Doesn't matter, nothing mattered when his parents were--

--were screaming and rushing around him, some tripping over his small form but not acknowledging him as he stumbled forward slowly. His intense gaze was focused on the bodies of his parents through the blur of movement.

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"Hi, sweetie. My name is Maddie Fenton. My family and I would love for you to join our family." A woman with auburn hair that fell just short of her shoulders. She had violet eyes and was wearing a protective teal and black one piece suit that was made out of some kind of rubber-like material. Standing next to her were two people. On her left was a large, intimidating man with greying black hair and azule eyes that held a warmth and inherent kindness that made him less frightening to the grief-stricken toddler. His face held a large, yet sad smile that he directed towards Danny. On Maddie's right, there was a girl who looked to be thirteen or fourteen and she had teal eyes that gazed sadly at Danny. Unlike her parents, she had fiery orange hair that reached her waist and wore a black t-shirt with blue jeans. Danny studied each of them carefully but was startled out of his thoughts when the social worker came up behind the younger girl.

Not an hour later he was sitting in a large SUV with three strangers that wanted him to be a part of their family.

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A three year old Danny wandered down to the basement lab of his adoptive family's home. The two older Fentons were currently at a ghost convention one town over and Jazz was at a friend's house. Danny managed to trick the sitter that was supposed to be watching him into falling asleep, leaving Danny to explore the house and go into the one place for which he was forbidden to enter: the lab.

Ever since he was brought into the Fenton's home one year ago, Danny had always had the irrational - yet somewhat rational fear of the lab - and he wanted to conquer those fears like the heroes in the movies do, he wanted to prove that he was a big boy and wasn't scared of something as stupid as a room. As he descended the stairs and turned on the fluorescent lights, his gaze wandered over the bright green glowing substance that was smeared over everything and instead focused on the large gaping hole in the far wall of the large room. Without his consent, his feet began to carry him towards the mysterious hole in the wall. The metal floor was cold beneath his sock-clad feet as he stepped inside the darkened machine. His short legs tripped over a stray pipe and he fell hard to the ground, quickly thrusting his arms out in front of him to lessen the no doubt painful impact with the unforgiving floor. His right hand met the smooth surface of the wall, and the surface underneath his left hand shifted slightly with a click.

A cackling of green electricity started to build and grow at the end of the hole and suddenly Danny felt nothing but the melting of his insides and the freezing of his skin.

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Four year old Danny watched helplessly as the large bad men in pristine white suits pulled his mother's hair and slammed her against the wall, the only thing keeping her upright was the hand that gripped her bloody scalp. Her eyes flickered from Danny to the recently deceased body of her husband. The agent broke her neck before emotionlessly turning to the crying boy held tight in his colleague's grip and watched, completely unsympathetic, as he was dragged mercilessly away.

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Danny managed to shake himself out of his thoughts before he relived the worst parts of his life. Despite this, he couldn't help but wonder what ever happened to Jazz, his adopted sister. She wasn't home when the agents came for the Halfa, and Danny never saw her again. He wondered if she was still alive and out there somewhere, believing him to be as dead as her parents. He wondered what she was doing if she was alive, would she be in some prestigious college? Or would she have graduated by now? Despite it being so long, he clearly remembered her gifted intellect; she was actually the one to introduce the boy to some of his favorite subjects: astronomy and science.

Danny blinked away the thoughts once more and slowly became slightly more aware of his surroundings, forcing himself to loosen his bruising grip on his arms as they hugged his knees close to his chest. He focused on the slow droning of the heart monitor next to the cot to avoid getting stuck in his memories again.

Then the door opened.

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