Chapter Text
I'm Sure There's A Lesson Here Somewhere
—
If someone was trying to teach him a lesson, they were doing a pretty poor job of it.
Danny woke, for the sixth time in a row, to the ringing of his alarm clock and a phone that told him it was Tuesday, March 16th, 7:15 am. Sighing, he squeezed his eyes shut.
“Danny,” he whispered to himself, in an almost mocking tone. “Break~fast.”
On cue, seconds later, his mother called up from downstairs.
“Danny!” she called, voice bright. “Breakfast!”
Groaning, he rolled over on his side and pulled his covers over his head. The sad thing was, because Family breakfasts were usually rare in the Fenton household, it should have been a treat. Instead, it was the first prominent detail that tipped Danny off that, for the past few days, he’d been stuck in a time loop.
Honestly, the fact that he hadn’t noticed the loop right away was a little embarrassing. But! In his defense: Family breakfasts for three days in a row? Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Another Pop Quiz in Lancer’s class Danny didn’t remember was scheduled? Yeah, that tracks. Caught the Box Ghost during Lunchtime four times now? Well, last month when he’d been keeping track, he’d caught Boxy twelve times in one week, so that was just par for the course.
Sure, he’d noticed the weird repetition. Sure, he’d been hit with déjà vu over and over throughout the past few day(s?). Sure, he’d stared at the Pop Quiz and wondered why he knew all the questions, but like. Why was he going to balk at that.
It wasn’t until Saturday rolled around and it was still Tuesday somehow that Danny tried to call foul.
And now, on Sunday - It was still Tuesday.
...
Augh, this was making his head hurt.
Lost in thought, Danny almost missed his next cue; Jazz rapped on Danny’s closed bedroom door, then stuck her head in, her red hair still messy and uncombed.
“Hey Danny,” Jazz said. “Do you want—”
“Scrambled,” Danny answered automatically.
Jazz paused. “Okay. And—”
“Bacon,” he replied.
“Um, oh,” Jazz nodded. “Also,”
“No toast.”
“…”
“Orange juice.” He finished. “Please and thank you.”
Jazz stood awkwardly in the doorway, the same way she had yesterday when he answered all her questions before she’d asked them.
“Danny,” she started, at last. “Did something…”
“Time loop,” he told her flatly.
“…Ah.” Jazz said, the understanding dawning on her face. Danny waited the eight or so seconds it took her to wrap her mind around it, nod to herself, and straighten her spine. “Sooo….”
“Probably a ghost, no I don’t know who, nobody dies today don’t worry, six repetitions, no plans to fix it yet, thanks for your support, and don’t forget your gym clothes in the laundry,” Danny said, trying to remember all the important beats from yesterday’s conversation.
Jazz's head snapped up. “Oh shoot, the laundry, I forgot—!” she said. Jazz spun away from his door and scrambled off. Danny could hear her bare feet pattering down the staircase seconds later.
“Jazzypants?” their father’s booming voice echoed up the stairs.
“Just a second!” she answered him faintly.
Danny groaned again and dragged a hand down the side of his face. He was debating the merits of simply rolling over and going back to bed. Skipping breakfast. Skipping school. It had been Tuesday for six days in a row, surely he could take a day off? Clearly he wasn’t learning anything.
And that was the detail that was kind of bugging him nonstop.
Danny wasn’t learning anything.
Everything Danny knew about time loops, gleaned from movies and comics and even Clockwork himself, was this: time loops didn’t occur willy-nilly. That somebody, somewhere—an enemy, or Clockwork himself, or the universe, or karma, Something—was trying to teach him a lesson, hammering home a truth he needed to learn, apparently by bending the timestream, because obviously, he wouldn’t learn his lessons any other way.
All it was doing, functionally, was stealing his precious, coveted weekends.
Yesterday was supposed to be Saturday, the day he was allowed to sleep in. Today was supposed to be Sunday, the day his friends took off patrol and did something fun together instead.
No, it’s just been straight Tuesday Tuesday Tuesday, Lancer with a pop quiz and grouchy Tetslaff with the rope climb; Mom running to the bank so Dad had free reign to accidentally burn and explode an ectosample to add to Danny’s chores when he got home; hints that Skulker had been poking around Axiom Labs but no way to verify because the only person who saw him was the cashier at Chow Meing’s across the street, and the Chinese restaurant was closed on Tuesdays.
And who knows how long this will last? How many Tuesdays in a row will he be forced to endure?
And for what— Because some all knowing entity decided he needed a lesson hammered in? Couldn’t just approach him and put a hand on his shoulder and go “hey, so cheating is wrong, and here’s why I need you to stop…” – nope, had to go kill his whole family in an alternate timeline, yeah. Clearly the only way Danny could ever learn his lessons.
Just sitting in bed thinking about it was making him mad. And, you know what? Screw this.
He wasn’t going to do it.
He wasn’t. Going. To do it.
Whatever twisted moral he had to learn, whatever sappy lesson his would-be tormentor had in store for him, they could just stuff it, okay?
Today was supposed to be Sunday—or at least Saturday—and he was going to be doing Saturday-Sunday things, the universe be damned.
Grabbing his phone, Danny texted Jazz: Decided I’m skipping school today. Can you bring me breakfast in bed?
And then, not waiting for a response, Danny rolled over, fluffed his pillow, and fell back asleep.
—