xp_logs | Dani & Forge - The Ghosts of Jerry Springer

Finally reaching not only Okalahoma, but her husband's house things turn very Jerry Springer. Dani gets angrier and Forge quite happily kicks some ass.

Forge pulled the truck into the packed-dirt driveway, squinting in the darkness to see the house in the distance. From the determined stare that Dani was giving the small house, he assumed this was the place.

Didn't look like much. Peeling paint, dust-covered shutters. Few shingles missing on the roof. Nothing different than most of the houses in the area that he'd noticed over the past two hours. "Yay for heritage," he whispered under his breath, pulling in behind an older-model pickup. Letting the engine idle for a bit, he glanced over at Danielle.

"Ready to do this?" he asked.

"No," she whispered, suddenly realizing the enormity of what she was doing. It was real. "Come with me?" she couldn't believe she was asking this.

Blinking, Forge considered a moment, then shrugged. "Yeah, what the hell. This guy gives you any shit, I'll... uh... well, I'll be there, right?" Dramatically, he pantomimed waving his fists in front of his
face. "I'm no stranger to standing up for a girl. Well, fighting about a girl. More accurately, fighting with a girl. Specifically, getting beaten up by a girl. So maybe I'm not going to be a whole lot of
help." With a weak smile, Forge shrugged again, "But hey, came all this way. Might as well."

"Witness," she explained, squaring her shoulders and getting out. It was scary that she thought she may need one, not from Sheldon, but that bottle...never again. Before she could open the front door, another girl opened it, obviously not expecting to see Danielle.

"Danielle...I thought you had left..." she stuttered, eyes wide. "Bye!" she ran down the porch steps past Forge and down the road.

"Sheldon Gilbert!" Danielle screamed, storming into the cluttered house, "Get your red ass out here!"

"Witness. Right." Forge watched the other girl scramble down the road and pretty much figured what was going on. Ducking his hands into the pockets of his fleece vest, he followed Dani into the house.

A teenage boy wandered out of a back room in his boxers, tying his hair back into a ponytail, "Nancy, I thought you were going...Danielle."

"Danielle," she agreed, not introducing Forge. "Forget about me so soon?"

THIS is the evil soon-to-be-ex-husband? Forge thought. The guy didn't look like much. In the brief moment of tense silence, Forge stepped up to Dani's side, half a step behind her. Trying to haul all five feet four inches of himself up as tall as he could, he closed his left hand in his pocket, trying not to shake with nervousness. For whatever reason, Dani wanted him here with her, and that meant that in some little way, someone believed he was good for something, even if it was just to be a 'witness'.

Witness to what, Forge wasn't quite sure yet.

"I forget so soon? Isn't he a little young for you?" Sheldon asked, indicating Forge. "And a little crippled?"

"Forge is a classmate," Dani said stepping towards her husband, "Tsitsistas. And a genius. He's going to change the world and you're going to be living in this shithole!"

"Stop with your Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman bullshit," Sheldon yelled, slapping her, "You're nothing but a mutie-slut and so's he!"

Danielle fell, hitting a broken chair and landing on the floor. Without thinking she slammed herself into his knees. "You never hit me!" she screamed, punching him as hard as she could, "Never!"

"Hey now!" Forge stepped forward between the two, right hand out of his pocket, held up in a palm-out gesture. At the same time, Forge slipped his left hand around the small strap in his pocket and began
clenching his fist rapidly.

"Simmer down there, Sheldon, is it? I think things got off to a bad start here. Your wife's a little confused, a little angry, and probably a little bit irrational right now." He looked back and forth
between the two. "Before this gets all Jerry Springer out of hand, I'm gonna suggest we try a more enlightened approach?"

"What the hell is this bullshit?" Sheldon turned to Forge, looking down at the smaller boy. "You some big super-genius mutant or something? Don't look like much." He turned to Danielle. "Should have stayed up there with your own kind, bitch. I already filed the papers, ain't going to have to deal with some marriage or kid I never wanted anyway."

Forge clenched the device in his left pocket, feeling the buzz through his metal hand. "Dani? You got anything to say to this guy, then?" he said, eyes narrowing.

"Fuck you Shel," she hissed, accepting Forge's flesh hand to climb off Sheldon. "Fuck you and your whiteman papers."

"Well, that's settled," Forge chirped. "I suppose we can just be on our way. Sheldon?" Forge held out his metal hand, the inconspicuous black box of wire and circuits slipped onto the back of his fingers.

"Fucking mutie bitch. Best day of my life's gonna be when I'm done with you." Despite his vehemence, he reached a hand up to clench Forge's. One small blue spark, and Sheldon's eyes suddenly shot open,
and his mouth jerked open. Forge scowled, clenching Sheldon's hand in his own prosthetic one, hearing something pop. Releasing his grip, Forge let Sheldon slump down to the floor, twitching mildly.

Turning to Danielle, he held up the small device in his fingers. "Dynamo-charge taser. Figured someone might need a bit of an equalizer." Turning back to Sheldon, he looked down at the young man and frowned. "Think about this," he said quietly, kneeling down so Sheldon could hear him. "One pregnant mutie bitch and her crippled little friend just put you on your ass pissing yourself. Enjoy the best day of your life." Forge stood up, paused, then reared back and kicked the prone Sheldon directly in the stomach.

"That, however, was for laying your filthy hands on my sister."

Afterwards, things get decidedly creepier as Dani waffles between upset wife and crazy empath. Forge deals with her as best he can without a taser.

Forge steered Danielle to the porch, depositing her on a bench after shooing the dog away. "Stay here," he instructed her, heading back into the house, taking pleasure in Sheldon cringing slightly. Carefully, he picked up the box he'd noticed by a door with Dani's name on it.

"That's trash." Forge turned to see a young girl standing in the kitchen doorway, maybe seven or eight years old. Forge lifted the lid to look inside. Some clothes, a few piles of photographs, some books that looked like scrapbooks. Closing the box, he looked over at the little girl. Definite resemblance to Sheldon. Little sister?

"Then I'm doing you a favor, aren't I?" Forge replied. "I'm taking away what you don't want."

"Mama says she don't belong here," the little girl chirped. Forge bit back a scathing reply, then looked down at Sheldon, curled into a fetal ball. He took in the chipped and broken furniture, the dirty plates, the peeling wallpaper. With a smile and nod, he answered the girl.

"Your mama's right. She belongs with her family. We're going home, won't be bothering you no more."

Outside, Danielle sat, staring at the stars. She couldn't think, nothing made sense. Forge took her arm, shifting the box. Together, they headed back to the truck, Forge making sure she was buckled in the passenger seat.

"Nâhtataneme?" she said, looking at him. "Nea'êšemeno.*"

*brother, thank you

"I got no idea what you just said, but we are so out of here." Forge whipped the truck in a smooth turn back onto the dirt road. He looked down at his PDA for the directions. "Your grandfather's place is about twenty miles from here, you said? Want to give him a call, let him know we're coming?"

"Call?" Dani parroted, not understanding. She had withdrawn back from reality once more, "Is no phone, Forge. No phone! Only smoke signals!"

"Smoke what?" Forge swerved smoothly to avoid a snake on the road. "You're not making any... aw crap," he moaned, noticing Danielle rocking back and forth in her seat. "Dani! Snap out of it, I need to know where we're going here. Come on, work with me."

Danielle started humming a tune Forge thought he may have heard before somewhere, but before he could think about it too much, she unbuckled her seatbelt and was working on rolling down the window. "Mémééhe!" she yelled, "I'm coming!"

*grandfather

"Hey! Whoa! Seat belt! None of that!" Forge reached over for Dani, which made the truck swerve even more. Gripping the steering wheel with both hands, he jammed on the brakes and slid the vehicle to a stop in the gravel on the shoulder of the road. "The HELL are you doing?" he hollered, trying to see what was going on.

As soon as the truck was mostly stopped, Danielle was out, running down the road into the night, her hair flying behind her. Forge followed her slowly in the truck, unsure exactly where she was going. After a while, she slowed, breathing heavily by a tree. With the headlights Forge could see a burned patch on the ground a little farther ahead.

"Jesus CHRIST, Dani!" Forge grumbled, pulling the truck to a stop and hopping out, leaving the lights on. Loping over to where Danielle stood leaning against the tree, Forge stopped. "Hey," he called, "you
gonna tell me what that stunt was all about, or what?"

"You wanted to meet my grandfather," Dani explained sitting under the tree, surprisingly lucid, "Say 'Haaahe seo'ôtse'" she instructed.

"Say what?" Forge turned around slowly. Then realization sunk in. "Okay, you've gone around the bend from wacky to creepy as hell. And I've spent the last three months living with people who see the future, read minds, and turn into cats. You've officially redlined the creepy-shit-o-meter."

"But you know," Forge corrected himself, "what the hell." Taking off his everpresent ballcap and tucking it in the back of his jeans, he walked over to take a seat next to Danielle. "Hey hey say oopsy, grandpa."

She smiled, leaning against him. "Now you're getting it. Tomorrow we go see people. Let them know I'm not dead too."

"More people?" Forge asked, then shrugged. "Hey, why not. Beats sitting through another boring day of history class. Did I mention that I wound up in Mr. Dayspring's class instead of Miss Monroe's this
semester? Totally unfair, by the way. Speaking of which..." Forge checked his watch, "I'd better email Mr. Summers, let him know we're in okay and haven't run off the road or been kidnapped by space aliens. So," he said as he watched his breath begin to fog in the cold prairie air, "where are we supposed to sleep tonight?"

Dani hadn't thought that far ahead. She hadn't thought at all. "Not here?" she suggested, thinking. She tried to remember if their was a motel around. There seemed like there was. "There's something back on the highway?" she guessed as they hiked back to the truck. "By the Denny's."

She was quiet as Forge drove back to the highway, staring at the dark. As quickly as everything had happened, it had ended. All her rage, all her confusion, it all seemed to go away. And all she felt was empty. Sniffling, she rubbed at her eyes with her sweater.

Great, crying girl, Forge noted. What do I do? The taser! Damn, already used it. Hmm. Gritting his teeth, Forge reached out his right arm, putting it across Danielle's shoulders and giving her a
quick hug. "Hey, it's... um, going to be all right. We'll find a place, then go see your people tomorrow, right?"

Dani nodded, sniffling some more before turning back to the window.

The motel was by the Denny's like Danielle had said, a small family-owned place circa 1950. Forge would've been surprised if they had cable TV, much less wifi, although it seemed clean. Opening the door to their room, he stopped at the queen bed, turning to go back and request separate beds.

Dani brushed past him, heading straight for the bathroom and locking the door. A few seconds later he heard the bathwater start.

"Craaaaap..." he moaned. No wonder the clerk had given him the nod and wink when he'd put the room on his credit card. "Kyle never finds out. Kyle never finds out. Kyle NEVER finds out." Looking around, he saw
the padded chair by the small table. If he pulled the nightstand over...

When Dani got out of the shower, Forge was already curled up in the chair, feet on the night stand, wrapped in a blanket and dozing.

She looked at him for a minute, arms crossed over her chest. Finally she poked him and helped him out of the chair and into the bed, covering him with the quilt as well as his blanket. Nodding, she rifled through his tool kit, finding his knife.

Checking to make sure Forge was still asleep, she put the knife back and climbed into bed, crying herself to sleep softly.