Work Text:
The lab was quiet, with only the hum of machines and the clacking of keys breaking the silence. Jimmy was sitting at his main computer, with Danny sitting next to him on his laptop. Both looked over blueprints for an invention that would benefit them both. As Jimmy continued typing, he absentmindedly scratched his left bicep, catching Danny's eye.
“Do you have a rash or something?” Danny asked. Jimmy looked at Danny with a quirked eyebrow, not understanding the question. “This is like the third time you scratched that area in the last five minutes.”
“Oh, that,” Jimmy said with a sigh. He leaned back in his office chair and closed his eyes briefly, deep in thought. Then, he sat back up and continued, "Have you ever heard of the concept of soulmates?"
“I am familiar. Why?”
“Well, in my world, we have a system that allows us to find our soulmates. Do you have something like that?” Jimmy inquired.
The question made Danny grimace. “Simple answer is no. Complicated answer is yes,” Danny said. Jimmy’s brow scrunched up in confusion, so Danny continued, “Humans don’t have this system, but ghosts do. So, when I was revealed, I shared this with my parents, leading to a new worldwide theory about soulmate connections in the afterlife.”
Jimmy nodded as he processed the information. The more he thought about it, the more questions he had. He decided to put it on the back burner for now.
“Well, the connection is present in the humans in my universe. The connection with our soulmate affects us physically. Any injury my soulmate has will appear on me as a mark,” Jimmy elaborated. Danny leaned forward in interest, the project completely pushed to the side. “Temporary injuries appear like a marker smudge. Permanent injuries, like scars, show up like tattoos. Both usually take on the same shape as the injury on the soulmate.”
Wholly engrossed, Danny asked, “What about internal injuries? Or injuries that lead to the loss of something?”
“Well, that is a bit complicated. For things like lost limbs, a ragged tattoo will circle the limb at the point where the limb is lost. Something more complex, like a kidney, for example, would have a surgical scar from the removal and an X to indicate the loss. If we are looking at the eye being missing, the sclera will become black. If we are talking about a temporary internal injury, a whole block of marker will cover the spot, while a more permanent one will depend on the success of treatment.”
Danny did his best to follow along. He knew he didn’t get everything, but he got the gist. Danny realized how offtopic they had become when he saw Jimmy scratching his arm again.
“Okay. So, what does this have to do with your scratching?” Danny asked, bringing the conversation back to the present.
“When an injury is being made, we get this tingling sensation. The stronger the sensation, the worse the injury,” Jimmy said with a shrug.
“So, an injury is being made on your soulmate as we speak?” Jimmy gave a sharp nod, trying to continue on his work. “And you're not worried at all?”
“It’s not that I’m not worried, but rather that I can’t do anything about it if I don’t know who my soulmate is.” Danny hummed, thinking over the whole situation.
“Why have I never seen these marks on you or your friends before?”
“That’s because they don’t show up until we are about thirteen. It’s believed to be a safety measure in case something drastic happens to our soulmate. Imagine having to tell a three-year-old that their eye is black because a person they probably haven’t met before had lost theirs.” Danny nodded, processing all this information. Danny noticed that Jimmy was itching his arm again, but it seemed closer to his elbow than before.
“Are you not going to look at the kind of injuries being made? It seems like it’s been going on for a long time,” Danny points out with a raised eyebrow. Jimmy surprises Danny by shaking his head “no.”
“No. I’m already aware of what will be there,” Jimmy sighs. His voice seems to contain a mixture of sadness, disappointment, and tiredness. He releases a breath before saying, “I think they were being abused.”
“What?” Danny asked, almost breathless. He looked at the boy genius with scrunched eyebrows, shocked at the admission. Jimmy leaned back, looking at the palms of his hands.
“When I first got the marks, there were so many. I tried brushing it off as the person recently having been in an accident, but then I noticed that all the marks were in place that could be hidden. Bruises on the torse like they had been kicked repeatedly. Marks on legs that look suspiciously like hands,” Jimmy said. He took a deep breath, needing to ground himself before continuing. “There would even be injuries that took on the appearance of words. Always insults, like useless and weak. They never scarred, meaning they were superficial injuries, but it doesn’t change that they were there. It was like the person wanted them to heal to have a fresh canvas later on, like sidewalk chalk.”
Jimmy was practically whispering by the end, but the words sounded loud to the two in the quiet lab. Danny reached over to gently touch Jimmy’s arm. He went slow so that Jimmy could pull away if he were uncomfortable with the act. Since he never did, Danny touched Jimmy’s wrist. It almost seemed like a sign because Jimmy started letting out a slow breath once the two touched.
“I don’t even know if it’s true anymore.”
“What do you mean?” Danny asked, his brow scrunching in confusion.
“When I was about fifteen, it abruptly stopped. Where old marks would cover new marks, there just weren’t any. The old marks faded and disappeared, but no new marks appeared. I thought that my soulmate might have died.” Jimmy paused. He couldn’t handle the thought of losing his other half without at least knowing them first. Once ready, he continued. “But then a new mark showed up. It was small, like a paper cut, but it was there. A sign that they were alive. I was so happy for them—believing that they had escaped their abuser.”
“But?” Danny asked when Jimmy paused for too long. He knew this was hard to admit, but if Jazz taught him anything, sometimes a little nudging is needed to help someone get something off their chest.
“But, a year later, marks started appearing again. This time as scars. They were lines at first across the knees of all places. It seemed like a tactic to stop the person from being able to run. There would be burns on the back of the knees, too, like someone holding a lighter to a single point for a long time. Then there were the words again. Some were the same as before, but there were new ones, like unlovable and selfish. I thought that the abuser had escalated or that there was a different abuser in their life, but the longer it goes on, the more I think it is self-harm.” Jimmy said, his eyes appearing dull. If Danny hadn’t known better, he would have thought that Jimmy was the one to experience all this instead of someone he was connected to. Danny clasped his hand into Jimmy’s in the hope of grounding him. It seemed to work since he looked up.
“We’ll find them someday. And when we do, you will be there with open arms, ready to save and protect them from whatever harm they are in.” Danny gave a reassuring smile. Jimmy gave a nod of determination as a response. They took a moment before returning to work.
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They were in the lab once again. This time, everybody was there, having returned from a fight. Timmy was laid out on a medical table, having taken a direct ecto blast from point-blank to the chest. He was unconscious for the time. Luckily, he wore an ecto-proof vest, meaning he had minor injuries. The rest of the team was scattered all around the room in silence.
Spongebob was in a corner sobbing, trying not to be loud. Danny was sitting on a couch set up near the table. He was looking at the floor, tugging on his hair in frustration. Jimmy had propped himself against a wall next to a monitoring system. His eyes were closed, and he had a hand under his chin like he was thinking, but the others knew he was trying to process the new information they received as much as the other two were.
A groan cut through the silence of the room. The three struggling heroes looked at the medical table and saw Timmy rubbing at his head as he sat up.
“My head,” Timmy groaned out. His eyes clamped shut from both the pain and the blinding lights. He blinked a few times in an attempt to get his vision adjusted. He adjusted the right eye enough to squint, but the left eye stayed closed. He could see Jimmy’s form at the end of the bed. “What happened?”
None of the three said a word. Noticing the silence, Timmy opened his eyes completely and looked around. SpongeBob stopped sobbing, but tears ran down his face in streams. Having let go of his hair, Danny clasped his hands together and looked at the teen distressedly. Jimmy had simply crossed his arms, his expression unreadable.
“What-” Timmy began to ask before cutting himself off. Out of his peripheral, he could see the arm rubbing his head. Or, more precisely, the arm that’s sleeve had been incinerated to shreds, revealing his scarred up forearm. Timmy slowly lowered the arm to his lap, staring at it the whole time. He made sure never to look up at the people around him. He never said a word as he stared, mesmerized by his handy work. The group sat there in silence, waiting for someone else to speak. Not being able to stand it anymore, Danny said one word.
“Why?” The word rang out in the silent room. A question that the heroes wanted answers to.
“Why what? Why do it?” Timmy asked, finishing with a mirthless chuckle. Danny shook his head.
“Why not tell us?” Danny clarified. Timmy’s eyes narrowed, and his posture straightened. The teen looked the ghost straight in the eye.
“Why would I tell you?” Timmy asked, his voice having this strange timber behind it. This startled everyone, but Timmy ignored their reactions and continued.
“Did you assume that we told each other everything? None of us have talked in five years. We don’t know what happened to each other in that time. We only started talking again because of that crisis a few weeks ago. We are all practically strangers again. Suppose you believe you know everything about everybody here; you’re wrong. Things happened—things they may not want to talk about. Much less with people we barely know. So, no. I didn’t tell you because you no longer know me!” Timmy practically shouted, becoming angrier with each sentence. Quickly jumping up, Timmy stormed out of the room. “I’m going home.”
The group didn’t follow. They just stared at the door the pink-loving boy went through.
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A few days had passed since the reveal. The godchild was sitting on the floor beside his bed, practically curled in a ball. Tears streamed down his face as he carved another line into his cacophony of scars—his third one tonight.
Cosmo and Wanda hid in their castle, unable to look at the boy when he was like this. They had tried to stop him in the past, but it just worsened the situation. They didn’t know what to do. They were godparents, not psychologists. Even if they were, they would have studied fairy psychology, not human adolescent psychology.
So, they hid, listening to their child cry his heart out, knowing what he was doing to himself outside those walls. They cried their own tears for the poor soul they knew by heart.
Having finished the new lesion, Timmy watched in wonder as the new rivet of blood joined the puddle at the joint of his elbow. His beloved pink jacket had been put on his bed to avoid getting blood on it. Luckily he was wearing black jeans and a T-shirt. The stains would have been a hassle to get out.
Timmy set the red-stained blade down on his lap. He dipped the pointer finger from his right hand into the puddle. He looked at his newly covered finger as he rubbed it against his thumb. A thought crossed his mind as he stared at the smear.
He dipped his finger into the pool again. Carefully, he turned his left hand around, not wanting to lose any liquid. He slowly moved the bloodied finger around the back of his clean hand. Making beautiful patterns with his disturbing paint choice. He redipped his brush when it ran out of watercolor to continue with his art.
Once done, Timmy stared in amazement at the masterpiece. He wondered if he could have painted this on a canvas, using the same paint choice. Would he be able to sell it? A piece of him literally being in his art. His rumination was stopped by a green glow appearing in the corner of his room.
Out of the portal stepped Jimmy with some sort of metal case. Timmy scootched closer to the wall, not wanting to see Jimmy or, more accurately, not wanting Jimmy to see him like this. Timmy tucked his head between his knees to avoid witnessing the genius’s reaction.
Jimmy, quickly spotting the boy, couldn’t help thinking about how small he looked at the moment. He quickly shook the thought away to focus on the task at hand. He set the case on Timmy’s bed before rushing out of the room. When he returned, he was carrying a bowl of water with a cloth soaking in it.
Jimmy crouched next to the teen, setting the bowl on the floor. The Texan pulled the rag out and twisted it to ring out the excess water. The scientist knew that getting Timmy’s arm to loosen their grip on his legs would be challenging, but that wouldn’t stop him. Jimmy decides to start with the back of his hand after spying the blood painting. He gave the appendage a gentle swipe with the warm towel.
Timmy flinched at the action. He wanted to pull his hand to his chest to protect his art but was too afraid to unfurl, so he froze. Seeing this reaction, Jimmy slowed his movement. He continued his gentle scrubbing until the towel became cold. He dipped the rag into the bowl, making it warm again.
Jimmy, having restarted his scrubbing, took a chance. He slowly moved his other hand to coax the hand he was cleaning to open up gently. It took a while, but Timmy eventually released the grip on his leg, refusing to move anything above the wrist. Jimmy took the small victory as he splayed the hand out to clean it better and start cleaning down the wrist. Jimmy repeated this method until he was able to clean the whole arm. At some point, Timmy looks up and watches as his handiwork is cleared away.
Once cleaned, Jimmy held the rag against the lesions as he grabbed the case off the bed. Opening it revealed that the case was an intense first aid kit. Jimmy slowly worked on caring for the injury.
“How did you know?” A question rang out, cutting through the silence. Jimmy glanced at the teen while humming before continuing his preparation. “How did you know I was like this?”
Jimmy sighed before answering.
“I just did.” A simple answer that doesn’t answer anything.
Jimmy had enough experience with the med kit to know what to do, but that didn’t mean he was great with it. So, when he went to wrap the bandage around the injury, it was sloppy and a bit too loose. Timmy couldn't stand the feeling, so he quickly unwrapped the bandage and reapplied it properly.
“That wasn’t an answer,” Timmy points out as he clips the bandage into place.
“It is an answer. Just not one you want,” Jimmy points out, making Timmy glare at him. Jimmy gives another sigh as he pats Timmy on the back, indicating that he wants him to scoot forward. After a minute, Timmy got the indication and scooted, but it wasn’t enough, so Jimmy kept doing it until it was enough. Jimmy stood to climb into the new space behind Timmy. As he was doing so, he took off his sweater.
Timmy sat in confusion at what was happening. Once he felt the warm weight of Jimmy’s bare chest on his back, he couldn’t help but blush. His face became more red as Jimmy rested his chin on Timmy’s shoulder. Jimmy’s arms wound around Timmy, setting the boy's face ablaze until the pink-loving teen noticed that Jimmy had stopped.
Looking down, the godchild’s widened at what he was seeing. Jimmy’s arms were covered in black marks that looked exactly like his. Timmy lined up his arms to the ones surrounding him, confirming what he already knew. There were even identical blotches to the burn scars he gave himself from a lighter he found. Some lines lined up with the lesions he had just made.
“What is this?” Timmy whispered, practically breathless at the sight. The longer he stared, the more Timmy became mad. Did Jimmy look at his scars and draw them all over himself? But he added the new ones, too. Does he have some way to watch me? “How did you do this?”
“It’s my soulmate marks,” Jimmy answered quickly, knowing Timmy’s thought process was heading down the wrong track. “When your arm was exposed, I noticed all your scars matched my marks. So, when I felt the tingle of a new mark being made, I knew I needed to come here.”
Timmy slowly nodded his head, processing what had just been said. Timmy continued examining all the marks, matching every single one to the one he had. His eyes slowly climbed up Jimmy’s left arm until he saw the most unmistakable mark of Timmy’s work. On Jimmy’s bicep were the words “Don’t Forget.” The exact words Timmy has carved over and over on himself. The scar was raised a centimeter with how much scar tissue was built up there.
A tear streamed down Timmy’s face at the sight, followed by another, until he was just crying. Already feeling the fabric of Timmy’s shirt rub against his chest from shaking, Jimmy wrapped his arms around the distressed teen. Feeling the added pressure, Timmy slowly turns around in Jimmy’s arms and presses his face into the genius’s bare shoulder. Jimmy tucked his nose into Timmy’s beanie-clad head, ignoring the wetness on his shoulder. They sat there like that for a few minutes, just one comforting the other. Once Timmy started to calm down, Jimmy decided to take a chance.
“Promise me. The next time you’re like this, you try talking to someone first,” Jimmy whispered. He never got a response, but that was okay. He knew the message was there. They would talk about it more later, but, for now, he was just going to hold his soulmate as the boy cried himself out.
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It’s been a few days since that night. Jimmy was sleeping in bed when a green light illuminated the room. The light was bright enough to rouse the genius from his slumber. He looked over to the newly opened portal. He couldn’t make out any details without his glasses but didn’t need them to recognize the silhouette that stepped out. Once the portal closed, the room was shrouded in darkness once again. The only light was from the moonlight shining through the slit in the closed curtains. Jimmy watches with blurry eyes as Timmy moves his hands as if he is picking something up, but there isn’t anything there. At least, not that Jimmy can see.
Timmy was looking at a glowing red string. A string that was invisible to Jimmy. A string that had been invisible to Timmy until a little bit ago. This string was wrapped around his left wrist. The wrist that he had hurt hundreds of times. The wrist that he had sliced up just the other night. The same wrist that Jimmy had patched up. Now, it was the wrist that holds his string of fate. A string that is connected to Jimmy’s right wrist.
Timmy grabbed the string between his fingers and tugged on it a bit to confirm its connection to the genius. He slowly wound the string around his finger. The more he wound, the shorter the string got, making Timmy step forward. He did this until he was standing next to the bed. Jimmy watched all this and was staring up at Timmy’s looming form. Only a small amount of string was left between Timmy’s finger and Jimmy’s wrist.
Timmy let go of the string and gently grazed his fingers over Jimmy’s wrist, feeling the luminous string. Jimmy registered the graze and noticed that not all Timmy’s fingers touched him, even though he could sense they were supposed to. Jimmy decided to ignore it. Instead, he grabbed the hand and held it in his own. Timmy gasped at the unexpected action. Jimmy ran his thumb over Timmy’s wrist and could feel that his pink jacket was missing. A shiver runs through Timmy’s body at the action.
To Timmy, Jimmy had rubbed the string, which led to a strange sensation rushing through Timmy’s system. Misunderstanding the action as Timmy being cold, Jimmy gently tugged on his hand. Understanding the gesture, Timmy let a slow breath out his nose as he climbed into the bed with Jimmy. Even though the bed was big enough to hold the both of them comfortably, Timmy decided to lay on Jimmy instead. His head was on the Texan’s stomach, leaving part of his legs dangling off the bed. He used his feet to kick off his shoes.
At this angle, Jimmy could see that Timmy’s eyes were puffy as if he were crying. Jimmy ran his finger through Timmy’s exposed hair using his unoccupied hand. His iconic beanie seems to be missing, too. It’s like he refused to wear any of his colored clothes, leaving him in blacks and whites. The longer they stayed like this, the slower Timmy’s breathing seemed to become. Jimmy decides to break the silence.
“I’m proud of you.” The whispered words ring around the room. As his mind became more aware, the more Jimmy realized that he didn’t feel any new marks. He felt a wet spot start to form on his shirt. The genius knew why. He wasn’t going to say anything about it. He continued brushing through the teen’s hair, trying to calm him again. Jimmy took a glance at his bedside table to look at his clock. The time read 2:04 am. Jimmy laid his head back down.
I’ll tell him happy birthday in the morning.