Chapter Text
Edward didn’t think he’d actually lost consciousness at any point, but there had definitely been a period of time there where he had no idea what was going on. It had felt like they had been falling both forever and for only a few seconds before his body suddenly hit something hard, making his head spin and knocking the breath out of him. Another impact against his upper back made him swear in pain, his entire left arm going numb, but he did his best to tighten his grip on his students with the strength he had left on his other side. They rolled and collided with a few more surfaces, until Edward didn’t know which way was up or down, or where they were going to end up. All he knew was that he could still feel the warm bodies held in his arms, and he needed to do whatever it took to hang onto them.
Eventually, however, the shaking and the falling and the crashing seemed to stop. Edward’s ears were ringing like a bomb had gone off right next to his head, and his body was so banged up and bruised that he could barely feel anything past the pain, but it slowly hit him that they were no longer falling. He’d come to a stop on a tilted surface, something rough poking into his hip, but he could also feel something pushing and squirming against his chest.
He squinted one eye open and looked down to see Kwan and Danny still pressed against him. Kwan’s eyes were squeezed shut, his expressions pinched, while Danny was trying to get up and shake off the layer of dust coating his head. Edward nearly sobbed in relief when he realized that both of them were miraculously alive, that he was miraculously alive. His head was spinning and he was in more pain than he’d ever experienced in his life, but they were alive. He let out a low groan and let his eyes slip shut once more, exhaustion mixing with relief and making him slump.
But then realized that there were only two students accounted for, and he felt his blood go cold.
His eyes snapped open, and he struggled to push himself upright, despite the agony wracking his entire body. Danny and Kwan fell back, both letting out low groans, but Edward spared them little attention, too focused on locating his missing student.
“Mr. Baxter?” he tried to call, but almost as soon as he started to speak, he was forced to break off into a coughing fit as his lungs filled up with all of the dust in the air. He felt Kwan and Danny push off of him and scramble away to give him some space, but he was too busy trying desperately to clear his airway to see where they’d gone. His lungs burned as he coughed and coughed and coughed, struggling to catch his breath.
Eventually he managed to hack out the worst of it, and he quickly tugged the collar of his shirt up over his nose to hopefully prevent breathing in any more dust. His eyes were streaming with tears, but he looked up to survey the area, desperately hoping that Dash hadn’t gone far.
At once, he noticed that they’d apparently dropped down into some sort of locker room, presumably for the aquarium staff to store their belongings, because a row of them lined the one intact wall that was left standing in the small space they’d landed in. Behind Edward’s back, a chunk of the meeting room’s floor had fallen down into the locker room, creating a slope that Edward was currently resting against. Another piece of the floor had fallen against it at an almost perfect right angle, and that piece of floor acted as the roof over their heads. He was also pretty sure it was the only thing that had kept them alive, because around the edges of their little bubble, Edward could see nothing but broken bits of masonry and twisted rebar in the dim glow of the one emergency light on the wall that hadn’t yet burnt out.
A pained cry drew Edward’s attention away from studying their surroundings, and he whipped his head around to at last find his missing third student. Dash was sprawled out across the uneven floor, his face twisted up in pain as he shoved uselessly at a large chunk of concrete that was currently pinning his leg to the ground.
“Dash!” Kwan cried, rushing over. Thankfully he’d followed Edward’s lead and pulled his shirt up over his nose as well, so he wasn’t sent into a hacking fit as soon as he’d spoken. He dropped to his knees next to Dash and started pushing, trying to lift the concrete away.
Edward coughed one more time, and then achingly pushed himself to his feet, stumbling over towards them to try to take charge of the situation. “Let me help, Mr. Park,” he wheezed. “Mr. Fenton, we’ll need you to drag Mr. Baxter out, can you do that?”
He glanced over towards Danny to find the boy looking shaken, but thankfully unharmed aside from a few scrapes. Edward inspected Kwan next, and found him to be in similar shape, a small cut on his cheek bleeding sluggishly but otherwise no visible major injuries. Looking down at Dash showed that he was the most banged up of the lot, his blond hair matted with blood and his jacket and shirt torn, but he was helping to push along with Kwan so Edward suspected that he was about as well as could be expected after surviving a building collapse.
Edward himself was likely the worst off, but he put those concerns aside as he turned his attention to freeing Dash’s leg. He got down on his knees next to the concrete block on the opposite side from Kwan, bracing his shoulder against the lip of it.
“Alright, Mr. Park, on three you and I are going to lift. Mr. Fenton, as soon as Mr. Baxter tells you that the pressure is gone, you’ll need to drag him free, understand?”
A chorus of ‘yes’s followed, each of his students nodding their confirmation.
“Good. Alright, ready Mr. Park? One. Two. Three!”
He and Kwan started to push with all of their might as Danny reached down and hooked his arms under Dash’s armpits. Edward’s back screamed in protest at the pressure being put on it, but to his surprise Dash almost immediately started to shout, almost before it felt like the concrete had even shifted.
“I don’t feel it anymore!” he declared through his clenched teeth. “Pull!”
Danny didn’t waste any time. He heaved backward, dragging Dash back with unexpected speed and strength until they were well clear of the broken hunk of rock. Edward had thought that stories of hysterical strength and adrenaline-fueled acts of fitness were tall tales, but perhaps there was some truth to them after all.
As soon as Edward saw Dash’s leg was free, he relaxed, Kwan doing the same. All at once, the pain that Edward had been ignoring hit him, and he was forced to curl over for a moment, breathing through his gritted teeth to try to get through the worst of it while across the small space Dash moaned between hacking coughs.
“Here, man, let me look at it,” Edward heard Kwan murmur as he shuffled over to Dash’s side. Dash whimpered something, but Edward couldn’t quite make it out, the sound of his heartbeat pounding in his ears loud enough to drown them out. A moment later, though, Dash yelped, and Kwan hissed through his teeth.
“Yeah, that definitely looks broken,” Kwan reported sadly.
“Shit.” Edward finally managed to look up to see Dash staring down at his leg with a mix of horror and resignation on his face, Danny still supporting him from behind while Kwan braced his calf. The fabric of Dash’s jeans had been torn, either when the concrete had first fallen on him or when he’d been pulled free, revealing that from the knee down his leg was a swollen mess mottled with bruises and cuts. It was hard to tell in the dim light just how bad the damage actually was, but to Edward’s relief he didn’t see any protruding bone, so at the very least the injury wasn’t immediately life-threatening.
“I can’t tell how bad the break is,” Kwan said with surprising calm, before he started looking around. “We should probably splint it, at least, though. Do you guys see anything I could use?”
Danny gently released Dash from his hold, and then jumped up to start searching the area. Edward was relieved to see that he was moving easily, no sign of any major hidden injuries that Edward could detect. Somehow Danny had come through the building collapse in amazing shape; even his cuts looked a little less deep now that he was up and about.
Turning his attention away from checking Danny for injuries, Edward scanned the small bit of room they’d landed in, trying to help with the task at hand. His eyes landed on something near the corner of their little bubble, and he drew in a shaky breath.
“There’s a loose bit of rebar over there,” he suggested in a raspy voice, gesturing towards the long piece of metal that had come free from one of the chunks of wall that had caved into their little space.
“That’ll work,” Kwan agreed grimly, and Danny scurried over to snatch it up and bring it back over. He handed it over to Kwan, who placed it next to Dash’s leg along his outer thigh. “Anyone got anything I can use as bandages?”
Edward coughed and raised one of his hands, while the other worked to undo the buttons of his dress shirt. “My shirt. It’s pretty torn already.”
He managed to get the buttons undone, but when he tried to roll his shoulders back to slip the sleeves off, a fiery bolt of pain suddenly shot up his back again, leaving him hunched over and wheezing.
“Mr. Lancer!” Danny cried, rushing over to catch him before he collapsed.
“I’m fine!” Edward hissed, forcing himself back up until he was sitting on the ground against the slanted chunk of meeting room floor, his head hanging between his knees while Danny hovered over him. “I’m fine, just…a little sore.”
He saw Danny frown before he suddenly disappeared behind Edward’s back. There were a few scraping sounds as Danny tried to get behind him on the slope, but he seemed to find a way to balance, because a moment later Edward felt faint pressure on his one shoulder.
“Oh, man, Mr. Lancer. Your…your back is a mess.”
Kwan’s head jerked up in concern, even as he kept his hands firmly locked around Dash’s leg. “How bad is it?”
“Hard to say,” Danny admitted slowly. “There’s…there’s a lot of blood.”
“Just…take care of Mr. Baxter, and then we’ll worry about me,” Edward told them wearily. He was unsurprised to hear that he was injured — his back had been screaming in pain this whole time — but he also had a feeling it wasn’t as bad as Danny feared. He’d been able to move around, after all, so he doubted anything was broken, and he wasn’t dizzy so he didn’t think blood loss was going to be an issue. The biggest concern was likely infection at this point, but there was nothing they could do about it now, so it was probably better to focus on the problems they could solve.
Still, he felt Danny hesitate. Sighing, he glanced back over his shoulder at the boy, and gave him a gentle smile. “I’m fine, Mr. Fenton. Nothing that can’t be addressed once we’re out of here. But we don’t know how bad Mr. Baxter’s break is, and I’d rather not have it get any worse, so let’s deal with that first, shall we?”
“I guess…” Danny said reluctantly, still looking uncertain. Edward made a point of keeping his expression as calm as possible, and eventually he saw Danny begin to relax. His student even managed to give Edward a quirky smile of his own. “I hate to break it to you, Mr. Lancer, but you didn’t need to deal with all of those buttons. Your shirt’s basically ripped straight up the back, I can pretty much just tug it off at the sleeves.”
“There’s a sliver of good news,” Edward said softly, his smile just a touch more genuine now. “Perhaps you can help me with that.”
Danny nodded, and then slid down the slope until he was resting back on the flat ground of the locker room floor. Once he’d landed, Edward held out his right arm first, then his left, letting Danny grab onto his sleeves at the wrist. He’d thought Danny had been exaggerating when he’d said that Edward’s shirt was all but torn in two from behind, but when Danny pulled back, his shirt came off so easily it almost felt like it had just slipped off straight through Edward’s skin, leaving him just in a plain white undershirt.
The moment the shirt was free, Danny handed it off to Kwan. Kwan immediately started tearing the ruined fabric into bandages to tie the rebar to Dash’s leg, but Danny’s eyes were still locked on Edward. “How are you feeling now, Mr. Lancer?”
“Just fine, Mr. Fenton,” he said reassuringly. “I’ll be able to help you and Mr. Park out in just a moment.”
“No you won’t,” Kwan said firmly, much to Edward’s surprise. “If you’re as injured as Danny says, moving around a bunch could open any cuts and cause you to bleed more. You should stay still.”
Edward’s eyebrows rose. “I wasn’t aware you were so knowledgeable in terms of the medical field,” he admitted, a little bemused. “I take it you’ve picked up some things from your mother?”
“She and my dad both want me to be a doctor like her, yeah,” Kwan said, his expression tense as he finished dealing with Dash’s leg. “She’s been making me do practice quizzes and drilling me on different medical conditions since I was, like, eight. I didn’t really have much of a choice.”
Edward saw Danny blink at Kwan in surprise. “Your mom is a doctor?”
“She works at Amity General,” Dash informed him, his eyes squeezed shut as he tried to block out the pain of his broken leg. Sweat was visibly beading up on his forehead, and his breathing was coming in short pants. “In the ER.”
“Yeah,” Kwan confirmed with a nod, his brow furrowed with concern as he reached out and rested a comforting hand on Dash’s shoulder. “Hey man, I know it would be stupid to ask if you’re okay, so I won’t, but is there anything else wrong? I want to go check on Mr. Lancer, but I need to make sure you don’t have any other injuries first.”
“I can check him over,” Danny offered, dropping down into a crouch next to Dash. He very notably didn’t look at any of them as he added, “I’m familiar with patching up injuries.”
Dash’s already pained expression twisted up into a grimace, and even Edward couldn’t help but flinch a little at the awkward reminder of the history between his two students. Still, Danny showed nothing but calm professionalism as he offered to help Dash remove his jacket so that Danny could better see any other wounds. Dash had just been starting to struggle out of one of his sleeves when Edward’s view of them was cut off by Kwan approaching him.
“Let me take a look at that back, Mr. Lancer,” Kwan offered quietly. “Before we lose our light.”
Edward glanced towards the emergency light overhead with a grim frown. He’d noticed that it was decidedly dimmer than it had been when they’d first landed here as well, though it was hard to say how much longer it would last. It could stay on for another few hours, or it could die any second; it was impossible to tell. Kwan was right; best to take advantage while they could.
But as Edward shifted so that Kwan had easier access to his back, he couldn’t help but clear his throat. “And when will we be checking you for injuries, Mr. Park?”
He couldn’t see Kwan’s face from this angle, but he felt his student’s hands pause in the middle of tugging Edward’s undershirt up to get better access to his back. The tugging resumed after only a second though, the fabric pulling just until the point Edward felt a sharp burning sensation. He hissed and jerked, and Kwan immediately let go.
“Oh shit, sorry Mr. Lancer, are you alright?”
In any other circumstances, Edward would have said something about the language that was being thrown around, but given the situation he quickly suppressed that reflex. “Quite alright, Mr. Park,” Edward forced out through clenched teeth. “That was…a bit painful though.”
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to do it again,” Kwan quickly reassured him. “It looks like your shirt is stuck to your back; it’s probably been worked into the clots. We definitely shouldn’t try to take it off or you’ll start bleeding again.”
“That seems…not ideal.”
“No,” Kwan agreed with a shaky laugh, sounding slightly hysterical. “Yeah, no, that would be really bad.”
“Let’s not do that then, shall we?” Edward suggested calmly, swallowing down his anxiety about his wounds and pushing it to the back of his mind, along with all of his fear and worries about their situation. He needed to stay calm. Panicking would not help them right now. He needed to keep calm and make it seem like he was in control.
Hopefully if he wasn’t freaking out, his students would be able to keep their heads as well.
Thankfully it did seem to be working, at least a little, because Kwan took a shaky breath in, and then spoke in a much more even tone. “Agreed. From what I can tell, it’s not bleeding anymore, so as long as you don’t strain it or reopen it, I think we’ll be okay.”
“That’s good. Thank you Mr. Park,” Edward murmured.
He heard Kwan start to move away, so Edward turned again to face his student. “You still haven’t answered my question, Mr. Park, about your own injuries.”
“Me?” Kwan blinked, before ducking his head and rubbing the back of his neck. “I-I’m fine. I mean, I’m sore, don’t get me wrong, but I’m okay. Pretty sure you took the brunt of it, Mr. Lancer.”
That was when Danny piped up, drawing their attention back towards the other duo in the room. “I think Dash is concussed,” he reported dutifully.
Edward let out a weary sigh. “Unsurprising,” he murmured. “I’d bet good money that all of us are concussed to some degree.”
He took a moment to study the pair. Dash was slumped over, leaning heavily against Danny’s shoulder, seemingly unaware or uncaring of his proximity to his usual victim. His eyes were half-lidded, and looking a little glazed, his lips moving as he muttered something quietly to himself. Danny, in contrast, was wide-eyed and alert, supporting Dash’s larger body as best he could to keep him from slumping over. His expression was pinched with concern, his hold on Dash surprisingly protective.
Kwan looked over, and then back at Edward, visibly torn. It seemed that while his mother might have drilled first aid into him from a young age, she hadn’t yet taught him about triage, and Kwan was visibly growing overwhelmed trying to figure out who needed his attention more. Thankfully Edward had taken a few first aid courses of his own, and he decided it was high time he took charge back of the situation.
“Has he lost consciousness, Mr. Fenton?” Edward asked.
“No,” Danny quickly replied, glancing down at Dash. He seemed to listen to Dash’s mumbling for a moment with deep concentration, and then he looked up again. “He says it hurts his head to talk too loudly, so he’s stuck whispering.”
Ah. And their hearing was still muffled from all of the noise of the building collapse, so none of them could hear Dash speaking. That made sense.
“Anything else?” Kwan prompted when Danny didn’t add anything more.
To Edward’s relief, Danny shook his head. “A bunch of scrapes and bruises, of course, but nothing else major that I could find.”
“That’s good to hear,” Kwan said, some of the tension seeping out of him. “Not great about the concussion — he’s had one before and it’s not good for someone to have multiple — but all things considered, it could be worse.”
Edward had to agree. A broken leg, a torn up back, and a couple of concussions between the four of them, while certainly nothing to sneeze at, was a pretty short list of injuries to incur from surviving being buried alive by a collapsing building. Once again Edward was struck by how lucky they’d been. It could have been worse. It could have been so much worse.
There was a brief pause as they all collectively took a moment to catch their metaphorical breath now that the urgent issues were taken care of. The space around them was stable and no one’s injuries were critical. They had a moment to just stop and think.
Of course, having a moment to think meant that they also had a moment to finally consider their situation. Edward found himself glancing upward at the slab of broken floor that rested over their heads, preventing them from being crushed like bugs under who knew how many tonnes of rubble. While the small pocket of space they’d landed in was by no means tiny — even Edward as the tallest would be able to stand up straight at the highest point of their slanted roof without hitting his head, and it stretched about fifteen feet across at its widest — being surrounded and trapped so utterly was absolutely triggering some claustrophobic feelings. Edward could feel sweat begin to bead at his temples as his heart rate started to pick up, anxiety kicking in.
So naturally, that was when the dreaded question came.
“S-so what do we do now?” Kwan asked, sounding horribly lost. He glanced between his fellow students for a moment, before ultimately looking to Edward. Of course. Edward was the teacher, the adult in this situation. He would be expected to take charge, to know the answers and be able to come up with solutions.
Unfortunately Edward couldn’t say that being buried alive had ever come up as a topic in teacher’s college, nor had they ever covered it in any of his professional development seminars. Aside from reading about characters being trapped by rockslides in various adventure novels he’d consumed over the years, he was in completely uncharted waters.
The longer he hesitated, the more he could see the fear growing in Kwan and Dash’s eyes, but Edward was at a loss. They were buried, with no way to escape until they were rescued. What could they even do but wait and pray?!
As his mind swirled with his own growing panic, he couldn’t help but look over his students, a sense of profound failure looming over him. But then he paused, caught off guard. When his eyes landed on Danny, he couldn’t help but notice that his most troublesome student actually looked more frustrated than anything. The unexpected sight knocked Edward out of his brooding, and he felt a flicker of hope grow in his chest. If Danny was frustrated rather than scared, that meant he was still thinking about ways to escape, ways to survive. He wasn’t panicking yet.
And if Danny wasn’t panicking, neither could Edward. These were his students. He was responsible for taking care of them, and if that meant doing what it took to get them through this, then so be it. If Danny could be strong, so could he.
With renewed resolve, Edward turned his thoughts away from dwelling on their situation, and onto the next steps for their survival. Their injuries were dealt with, the air was stale but fresh enough that something must have been getting through, and the collapsed building seemed to have stabilized for the moment. They wouldn’t be able to escape on their own, so for now their focus would have to be on staying alive until help came. Their biggest priority would be water. Despite being trapped in the remains of an aquarium, they still might not have any available.
Edward’s eyes landed on the row of lockers standing intact along the one surviving wall.
“What do we do now?” Edward murmured, plans finally starting to form in his head. “First things first, let's see what supplies we have to work with. Mr. Park, Mr. Fenton. See if you can break open those lockers, and bring whatever’s inside over here.”
“You want us to steal someone’s stuff?” Kwan squeaked, sounding almost scandalized.
“It’s a matter of life or death, Mr. Park,” Edward told him flatly. “I’m sure the owners of the belongings will understand.”
“Just do it, Kwan,” Dash rasped, his voice only slightly above a whisper. Kwan glanced at his friend, looking uncertain, but Dash just rolled his head to the side, letting it loll against his shoulder. “Come on, man, you’re not going to get in trouble.”
“...okay,” Kwan agreed reluctantly. He glanced at Danny, who nodded back at him before carefully disentangling himself from Dash’s side. Dash slowly slumped back against the ground with a groan as Danny helped him lie back until he was braced on his elbows.
“Do you want a pillow?” Danny asked quietly. “You can use my shirt, if you’d like.”
Dash was silent for a moment, considering Danny’s offer. Uncharacteristically subdued, he eventually made a soft noise of disagreement. “No, you need it to keep the dust out of your lungs.”
Danny twitched. “Oh yeah. I, uh. Forgot about that.”
“Maybe you’ll find something in the lockers,” Dash suggested as an alternative.
“Do you want me to stay here and let Kwan do the searching by himself?” Danny offered. “You seem kind of unsteady, I wouldn’t want you falling over and hitting your head again.”
Dash let out a self-deprecating huff. “Surprised you care. Shouldn’t you be saying I deserve it?”
“What do you mean by that?” Danny asked with a frown.
“Since it’s kind of my fault we’re all down here,” Dash said. His voice choked off just as he finished speaking, his eyes squeezing shut in pain and self-loathing. “If I had just left you the fuck alone — !”
“Mr. Baxter,” Edward cut him off sharply before he could say anything more, and Dash’s eyes flew open to stare at him in surprise, as if he’d forgotten Edward was there.
Once he saw that he had his student’s attention, Edward softened his tone. “Mr. Baxter, it is not your fault that we are trapped here. This is the work of a ghost who attacked the building and caused it to collapse. You had absolutely nothing to do with it, understand?”
“We only got stuck because we got dragged all the way to the security office,” Dash argued angrily. “And that only happened because I was messing with Fenton.”
“While you are correct in that you shouldn’t have tried to push Mr. Fenton into the shark tank,” Edward replied, his voice level in the face of Dash’s frustration. “There was no way that you could have known it would lead to all of this. This is not your fault.”
“But — !”
“No buts!” Edward interrupted Dash’s protests. “You did not cause this. This is not your fault. I need you to understand that.”
Dash looked unconvinced. Sighing, Edward prepared to reiterate his point, when Danny suddenly cut in with a humorless laugh.
“Yeah, don’t worry, Dash. If anyone’s to blame, it’s Phantom for not stopping the ghost in the first place,” he said, his voice strangely bitter.
Edward gave Danny a sharp look, not expecting this turn of events. Why on earth was Danny blaming Phantom of all people for this mess? Yes, the ghost hero was the one who usually dealt with the ghosts who threatened Amity Park, but Danny couldn’t honestly expect that Phantom could have predicted this and somehow gotten here before the ghost destroyed the building and prevented it, could he?
“Mr. Park, why don’t you start searching the lockers?” Edward suggested absently to Kwan, before slowly shuffling over so that he was sitting a bit closer to Danny and Dash. His mind distantly noted as Kwan picked up a fist-sized chunk of broken concrete and started stalking towards the lockers with a determined expression on his face, but most of Edward’s focus was on his two other students.
“Boys,” Edward said softly, making sure that he had their attention. “I know that we are in a very stressful situation right now, and that things are very uncertain and scary at the moment. But none of us are to blame for what happened. We didn’t knock the building down, a ghost did. Whether you had dunked Mr. Fenton in the shark tank or not, Mr. Baxter, the ghost would have still attacked and the aquarium would have still collapsed. Perhaps we wouldn’t have been trapped here, perhaps we would be even worse off. There’s no way to be certain. But this situation is not your fault.”
“And Mr. Fenton.” Edward turned to Danny. “I can understand if you feel let down that Phantom wasn’t able to prevent this disaster from happening and that he didn’t arrive in time to stop us from getting hurt. But Phantom, for all his powers, is not omniscient. He’s a hero, but you need to remember that he’s also a person. While I know it can hurt to find out that your hero is fallible, it’s important not to place him on a pedestal. He saves the day often, but he can’t save everyone all the time.”
Edward had meant his words to be comforting, but to his dismay, Danny only looked more devastated.
“Are you saying that he shouldn’t be saving people, then? That he should just let people get hurt?!”
“Not at all,” Edward calmly replied. “What I’m trying to say is that you shouldn’t blame him for what happened either. I know you may feel disappointed that he hadn’t come in time, but Phantom just can’t be everywhere at once. That doesn’t mean that he’s a bad hero, or he’s to blame for our situation. He just wasn’t able to save us this time.”
“Besides, he might still come,” Dash pointed out hopefully, giving Danny a little nudge with his shoulder. “He’s probably up there right now dealing with the ghost, and once he’s done taking care of it, he’ll come get us.”
“Exactly, Mr. Baxter,” Edward agreed with a nod. “We just need to be patient.”
Danny didn’t respond, but Edward could see from the way his jaw was moving that he was chewing on the inside of his cheek, his whole body tense with frustration. Clearly he wasn’t totally convinced. With a sigh, Edward reached out and rested a hand on Danny’s head.
“Let’s just focus on staying alive for now.” Edward gave Danny a reassuring smile that hopefully his student could see past the shirt collar pulled up over his nose. “Someone will come to rescue us soon, I’m sure. Whether that’s Phantom or emergency services, either way, we want to be ready for them.”
“...I guess,” Danny eventually allowed.
Just then their conversation was interrupted by a loud clang. They all jerked towards the lockers just in time to see Kwan wind up and then once again smash the concrete chunk down on the cheap combination lock holding the first one shut. The lock bent, but didn’t break, so Kwan smashed it again. Then again. The sound of concrete crashing against metal filled the small space, making Edward wince.
The fifth strike was the one to crack it, and with a cry of triumph, Kwan pulled the mangled lock off of the locker and tugged the door open. He started digging the contents out, bundling them up into his arms and then bringing them over to the rest of the group.
“Here, let’s see what we’ve got,” he said with a bit of excitement. He placed the items carefully on the ground in front of them one by one, laying them out side by side. A black puffy jacket was the first item, followed by a lunch bag, a metal water bottle covered in cat stickers, and a small purse. Edward grabbed the water bottle first, giving it a little shake, and was pleased to find it felt almost completely full. While a single water bottle wouldn’t be enough to sustain all four of them for long, it was still more than they’d started off with.
He grabbed the lunch bag next, undoing the zipper and peering inside. There were a few snacks and treats, a tupperware container full of what looked to be some sort of pasta making up the majority of the meal. Edward took note of the contents, and then placed them back inside, setting them next to the water bottle.
The purse was where they really hit the jackpot, however. While most of the items inside wouldn’t be of much use, Edward was pleased to find both a lighter and a small battery powered flashlight tucked away inside. He tested them both, smiling when he saw they were both working, and then placed them alongside the food and water. Now at least they’d have some source of light if the emergency light eventually died on them.
“Here, Dash. We can use the jacket as a pillow,” Danny offered quietly, once Edward had finished picking through the belongings and identifying what would be useful. “You can finally lay down for a bit.”
“Maybe we can find something to elevate his leg as well,” Kwan added, looking back at the lockers. “That might help bring some of the swelling down, at least.”
He started to scoop up his chunk of concrete, but Danny abruptly shot to his feet, waving him off. “That’s okay, Kwan. I, uh. Actually know a trick to breaking into combination locks.”
Edward’s eyebrow rose. “You do, do you?” he asked flatly.
Danny froze like a deer in the headlights. “Uh. I mean…”
Edward let him squirm for a minute, and then let out an amused huff. “It’s all about surviving at the moment, Mr. Fenton. As far as I’m concerned, whatever happens down here, stays down here after we’re freed. Do we all agree?”
“Yeah,” Dash said with a small smile. “Yeah, I can live with that.”
“Me too,” Kwan added.
“Oh…okay, that’s…that’s good,” Danny said weakly, his grin shaky and crooked.
That sorted, he turned his attention to the lockers. Edward couldn’t see exactly what it was he was doing to them, but to his amazement, in no time at all, Danny had the first one opened, almost as if he’d somehow just pulled the lock straight off of it.
“Here, Kwan. You grab the stuff while I open the lockers,” Danny suggested, focused on his task now.
Kwan pushed himself back up to his feet and started over to him. “Got it.”
The pair made quick work of emptying the lockers and bringing over everything inside. Slowly their pile of usable supplies grew, the stack now containing several pieces of clothing they could use for warmth and bandages, as well as a variety of food items. The greatest find, though, actually came from one of the bottom lockers; its owner had apparently bought a case of disposable water bottles to keep at work rather than bring a reusable one, and only three had been taken so far. Having a decent supply of water had gone a long way towards making Edward feel like they might just make it out of this mess in one piece after all.
Kwan and Danny took the time to absolutely strip the lockers bare. Within minutes, they’d gathered everything they could, bringing it all back to Edward for inspection. Danny had even managed to somehow squeeze his arms through whatever tiny gaps in the broken concrete he could find to grab a few things out of the lockers that were partially buried, despite how tight those gaps must have been.
“Who knew those noodle arms would come in handy someday?” Dash had teased when Danny revealed his spoils from the furthest locker he could reach. Danny had looked over at him sharply, but when he saw that Dash was smiling at him, taking the sting out of his words, Danny began to relax. Edward couldn’t help but feel a small amount of pride in the two of them; though it had taken a near-death experience to get them to this point, he had a feeling that they had finally come to something of an understanding. He wouldn’t be surprised if Dash’s days of bullying Danny were finally over, after all of this.
Clearing his throat, Danny brought the last of the goods over to their pile and dropped down to sit on the floor across from Dash. “Alright, it looks like that’s everything.”
Kwan sat between Danny and Dash, across from Edward, completing their little circle. “What do we have?”
“More than I was expecting,” Edward told them honestly, sorting out the last few items. “We have a healthy supply of water, all things considered, and although it would be tough and we’ll have to ration, there’s enough food here to last us at least a few days.”
“Days?!” Danny squawked in alarm. “We can’t be trapped down here for days!”
Dash and Kwan looked equally shocked, but Edward merely sighed. “I have no idea how deeply into the building we’ve fallen, or how much rubble is above us. Best case scenario we’re not too deep, but unless Phantom arrives, it will take some time for the emergency workers to even find us, let alone unbury us. We may be here for a while.”
“But…but…but what if we have to go to the bathroom?!” Dash cried. It was the most animated Edward had seen him since they’d landed here.
“We’ll have to designate an area for waste.”
“I don’t want to shit on the floor!” Dash wailed, his hands coming up to clutch at his face in dismay.
“Especially since we’ll probably have to help you do it, since your leg is broken,” Kwan added weakly.
“Not helping, Mr. Park,” Edward said through his clenched teeth as Dash started to properly panic.
“Dash! Dash, it’s okay!” Kwan quickly reassured his friend, reaching out to rest a comforting hand on his shoulder. “Mr. Lancer said that’ll only happen if Phantom doesn’t come save us first, and I’m sure he’ll come. He always saves the day, right?”
Dash’s anxious fretting cut off as he considered Kwan’s words. “Oh yeah. Good point, Kwan.”
The two began to discuss what it would be like when Phantom inevitably swooped in to save them, but Edward couldn’t help but notice the way Danny had flinched when Phantom had come up again. He had hunched in on himself, growing more and more morose the longer Dash and Kwan gushed, and it slowly occurred to Edward that there might have been more to Danny placing the blame on Phantom for their misfortune than he’d first thought.
Edward had believed that Danny’s bitterness had been due to having to confront the reality that his hero wasn’t as perfect as he’d once believed, but now Edward was starting to wonder if that wasn’t the case at all. To Edward’s knowledge, Danny had never spoken out against Amity’s resident superhero, but the boy’s parents were some of Phantom’s greatest detractors. Had Danny secretly been sharing their views this whole time? Had Danny blamed Phantom not because he was disappointed, but because he actually thought Phantom had somehow caused this? Did the boy think that Phantom was somehow directly responsible?
Deciding that, if Danny really was anti-Phantom, that bringing it up might incite an argument between him and the two others, Edward quickly decided to change the subject.
“Regardless of how we get out of here, I’m sure that we will,” Edward told them, cutting off Dash and Kwan’s discussion. “But for now, perhaps we can try getting some rest. We’ve all been through a very traumatic event, and I’m sure you boys are feeling just as tired as I am.”
“Yeah, good point. Dash for sure should be resting,” Kwan agreed. “Given his concussion.”
“As I suspect all of us may have concussions to some degree, I think that means we should all try to sleep, at least a little.”
“I’m not tired,” Danny said sullenly, curling up to wrap his arms around his knees. “I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep.”
Kwan gave him a rueful smile. “Yeah, I don’t think I’ll be able to either.” He then looked at Dash and Edward. “It’s more important that you guys sleep anyways, you’re more hurt than us.”
“Your health is a higher priority than mine,” Edward told him, his expression pained.
“Yeah, but Danny and I don’t need the rest as much. You guys do,” Kwan argued right back. “Besides, even with all the clothes we stole from the lockers, I don’t think there’s enough for all of us to sleep on. We’ll have to take turns anyways, you guys might as well get the first rest.”
Edward wanted to dispute it, but he had to admit that Kwan had a point. “Oh…very well.”
“Here, Danny. Help me set up the beds.”
“Sure,” Danny said quietly, assisting Kwan in gathering up the pile of clothes.
The two worked for a few minutes, separating out the clothing to create two little bundles to make a set of makeshift beds. While they weren’t much to look at, at least they’d allow Dash and Edward to stretch out with something soft to separate them from the cold, hard floor. It wouldn’t be restful sleep, but at least it would be rest.
“Here, you help Mr. Lancer, I’ll help Dash,” Kwan instructed Danny.
As Danny approached with his arm held out as an offering of support, Edward tried to wave him off. “I’m fine, Mr. Fenton. I can manage on my own.”
“I’m sure you can,” Danny told him, “but you don’t have to. Please let me help. It would make me feel better.”
Well, if he was going to put it like that. “Oh, very well,” Edward grumbled.
He allowed Danny to guide him over to the pile of loose clothing, and then assist him in lying down on his side to keep the pressure off of his back. It was the furthest thing from comfortable, but Edward didn’t exactly have a lot of options at the moment, and he was tired. He did his best to settle down, listening to Kwan helping Dash to curl up on the makeshift bed behind him.
“There you go, bro,” Kwan murmured. “Try to get some sleep. You’ll feel better afterward.”
“Thanks, man,” Dash whispered.
Edward glanced up at Danny, who was still hovering nearby, looking lost. “You’ll wake me if you need anything, won’t you Mr. Fenton?”
Danny startled a little, knocked out of his thoughts, but then he gave Edward a flat look. “You need your rest, Mr. Lancer.”
“It would make me feel better and help me sleep easier to know that you’ll get me if anything happens,” Edward told him, unashamed of laying the guilt on extra thick. He knew he’d successfully hit his mark when Danny’s nose wrinkled, before he let out a quiet sigh.
“Alright, Mr. Lancer. I promise to wake you up if anything happens.”
“Good. Thank you, Mr. Fenton.”
Satisfied that he’d made his point, Edward shuffled and squirmed until he’d managed to make himself a little bit more comfortable, tucking a bulky sweater tighter under his head to act as his pillow. Danny silently got to his feet and moved away to give Edward and Dash some peace, making his way over to where Kwan had taken a seat next to their supplies. Edward heard them start to chat quietly between themselves, though their voices were pitched low enough that he couldn’t really make out what they were saying.
Over Edward’s shoulder, he could already hear Dash starting to snore softly; he must have been exhausted to drop off so quickly. Somehow Edward doubted he’d be far behind. He fluffed his pillow sweater one more time, let out a tired sigh, and then let his eyes drift closed as the weight of the day dragged him off to sleep.