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reallydumbdannyphantomaus · 6 years ago

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hahahahhaha so this is my extremely super late christmas truce present for @dannyphandump who requested some Danny and Valerie friendship. its set in some nebulous time where valerie has recently learned of danny’s secret and is still adjusting a little and trying to make up for past mistakes. hope you enjoy despite it being super duper extra late!

Valerie’s feet ached.

Every step she took up the stairs to her fourth floor apartment sent waves of pain up to her knees. Still, moving was better than standing still and, while sitting would have been better still, she had two more flights to go. No matter how long she had been working at Nasty Burger, no matter how much padding she had in her shoes, no matter how much exercise she got fighting ghosts, she always ached the same after an eight hour shift--even worse since she’d been pulling extra hours to have money for Christmas.

When she reached her floor, there was a basketball-sized hole in the wall at the end of the hallway. There had been a ghost in Elmerton while she was at work, according to the t-shirt seller outside her apartment building. A nasty one, too, by the looks of things; chunks of buildings gone, trees torn down, ghost-boy-sized dents in the pavement. She hoped Danny was okay.

She would’ve come by to help, but the Nasty Burger was in Amity Park proper, too far for her equipment to pick up on a ghost way back here. Still, it didn’t seem like anyone had been hurt, which was all she could ask of Danny. She’d have to see about requisitioning the Amity Park Reparation Crew to come out here to Elmerton to fix all the structural damage, though. Which… wasn’t likely. People in Amity were somehow more scared of Elmerton than of ghosts now.

She turned her key in the lock and pushed her apartment door open. Her dad would’ve left hours ago and he wouldn’t be back until morning. She was alone to wrap up her Christmas presents and then maybe sleep for a few hours, if she worked fast. She flicked on the light, eyes half-open, and collapsed on the couch, giving her throbbing feet a break.

Something hard poked into her butt and there was a groan to her right. She jumped up, grabbing the lamp on the end table and holding it over her head as a weapon.

“Jeez, Val,” Danny Fenton said with a wheeze. He was laid out on the couch, his right hand gripping his shoulder where a few drops of red were starting to bleed through the yellow top he was wearing. “Warn a guy, will you?”

Valerie sputtered. He was the one bleeding on her couch with no warning, in the middle of the night, after a ghost attack. He should count himself lucky that she didn’t actually hit him.

“What are you doing here, Danny? And… is that my shirt you’re bleeding all over?”

Danny winced. “Yeah, sorry about that. I needed somewhere to lay low… and clean myself up while the Guys in White… are still here with their ghost shield.” Despite his supine position, he was breathless. He gestured over to the kitchen, where her emergency first aid kit was strewn about the table, a pile of bloody gauze stacked at the end and what looked like the remains of Danny’s t-shirt. “I’ll… clean that up later.”

“Jesus, Danny, are you okay?”

Danny waved her off, then flinched at the movement. “I’m fine.”

“Uh-huh,” Valerie said. “I’ll believe that when you’re not staining my favorite shirt.”

“I can get the blood… out for you, Val.”

Valerie smacked herself in the forehead. Danny could be so damn clueless. “Take the shirt off Danny. Let me take a look at where you’re hurt.”

Danny opened his mouth as if to argue, then let it fall closed as she glared at him. He reached down to pull his shirt off, but let out a moan of pain.

“Why don’t you just go intangible?”

“Right, yeah,” he said. He turned his torso intangible and let the shirt fall through to the couch. Valerie reached down and snatched it up.

Danny blinked back into existence, red-soaked gauze now visible on his right shoulder. She pulled the bandages off to see three long claw marks against ashen skin. Some kind of beast ghost, probably. Those could be the worst kind: somewhat powerful, but unable to be reasoned with.

“These need to be stitched up,” she said. “How long have you been sitting here, letting them bleed?”

“Not long… I don’t think. I kinda… dozed off.”

“Why?” she said, pulling over the needle and surgical thread from her first aid and sterilizing the needle.

“Why what?” Danny said with a sharp intake of breath and she started pulling the thread through his wound. She handed him some painkillers that he swallowed dry.

“Why did you stay here, in my apartment, alone, instead of going to Sam or Tucker or Jazz?”

“The Guys in White.”

Her hands stilled for a moment before picking back up. “You mentioned them before. Something about a ghost shield?”

“Yeah,” he said. He grunted. “It’s… invisible. Which is some… bullshit.”

She snorted. “Yeah, that’s a pain. But can’t you just go through it as Fenton?”

“Maybe,” he said, “but I overheard them… saying that it was designed to kick me out of a human if I overshadowed… them. I can’t risk it catching my ghost half… when in human form.”

Valerie pursed her lips. Since their inception, the Guys in White have had full latitude to do whatever they wanted to a ghost. Most people were scared enough to just let it happen (though, ironically, the Guys in White’s biggest supporters didn’t even live in Amity and most Amity Park residents hated the Guys in White). She’d been inside one of their labs when they tried to recruit the Red Huntress; as much as she hated it, Danny was better off bleeding on her couch than risking capture by those bastards.

“Don’t they know it’s Christmas?” she said. Danny grunted in response and let his eyes drift shut.

She worked in silence for a while, tying off one row before moving down to the next claw and stitching that. The third one was shallow enough that she left it alone, wrapping the whole area with gauze. Danny had fallen asleep under her ministrations. The lines of his face had smoothed out and a slight whistle whispered from his nose every time he breathed out.

She rocked back on her still-throbbing heels. Danny wasn’t in danger of bleeding out anymore, but that didn’t solve the larger problem. The Guys in White were still here, somewhere, monitoring their invisible shield. She didn’t know where they were, though, or even where the shield was, and Danny hadn’t given her much to go on.

She did, however, know who she could ask.

------------

“Thanks for getting here so quickly,” she said, waving Tucker into her apartment. He stepped forward, his eyes flicking over the empty walls, with their peeling wallpaper and water stains before landing on Danny, still asleep on the couch. His backpack was slung over his shoulder, zipped three quarters of the way closed.

“Of course,” he said without looking at her. “Danny’s my best friend.” He shuffled over to the sofa and crouched beside Danny, smoothing back his hair. “He’s always getting hurt, isn’t he.”

Valerie sighed. “Yeah,” she said. “Let me see the scanner so we can get him out of here, at least.”

“Oh, right,” he said, unzipping his bag pulling out a modified Fenton Finder. “It should be able to find anything using ecto-energy in a fifty yard radius, even if it’s cloaked.”

“Cool,” she said. Tucker fiddled with the device for a moment, still not looking at her. “Can I… see it?”

Tucker flinched at her question. “Danny trusts you,” he said, gripping the Fenton Finder. “I know I should too. It just… it wasn’t that long ago that you were trying to waste him on the regular.”

“I know,” she said. And she did.

“Sam thought maybe you were working with them. The Guys In White, I mean. Like this was some kind of trap.” Tucker lifted his eyes to meet hers as he handed her the Finder. “Thank you for proving her wrong.”

Tucker and Sam and Jazz could’ve handled this themselves, she realized. They knew what they were doing as much as she did. They could’ve grabbed some ski masks and busted the Guys In White’s hideout all on their own. Tucker chose to give her the Fenton Finder and let her do it herself. Despite what he’d said, he was trusting her.

She grinned and let her suit form around her. “You can count on me,” she said.

--------------

When she got back about an hour later, even more tired and sore, she was hit by the sharp, sweet smell of gingerbread. Danny was sitting up on the couch now, sipping on some orange juice. Christmas lights decorated the walls and there was a fake tree in the corner, still in its box. Tucker was nowhere to be seen, but she could hear him bustling around in the kitchen.

“What the fuck,” Valerie said.

“Hey, Val,” Danny said with a wave. “We went shopping.”

“We did nothing,” Tucker said.

“Fine, Tucker went shopping. And fixed your oven.”

“You had some faulty wiring. It was a fire hazard,” Tucker said.

“And Jazz came over to bake cookies.”

“Wait, your sister’s here?”

“Hi Valerie!” Jazz popped her head out from the kitchen. “Sam’s here too. She’s wrapping your presents for your dad in the back.”

“Sam’s here? I thought she hated me!” The words were out of Valerie’s mouth before she could stop them.

“I don’t hate you,” Sam said, coming out into the den with brightly wrapped presents in her arms. “I just have some trouble trusting you, is all.”

“But why—why are you all here? Why are you wrapping my presents and fixing my appliances and—and—and decorating my living room?”

“I just like spending my parents’ money on things they would disapprove of,” Sam said, but she smiled at Valerie.

The oven beeped. Its door opened with a clang and thud as Jazz and Tucker pulled out the gingerbread cookies.

“It’s Christmas, Val,” Danny said, “and you’re our friend.”

Tears pricked at the edges of her eyes, but she wiped them away. Tucker had started to sing O Christmas Tree in the kitchen with Jazz desperately shushing him. Sam laid the presents down by the still boxed up tree and sat next to Danny on the couch, checking on his dressing. Her father would be home soon and she had no idea how she would even begin to explain this to him but it was okay. For the first time in a long time, she knew things would be okay.

#danny phantom #christmas truce 2018 #this is so late and i'm so sorry #i just had some real life things happen and couldn't finish #dannyphandump

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