#phantom seems more powerful than he should be as a new ghost

[christaspirit]

There was a new ghost in the Infinite Realms.

Now, that alone wasn't that big of news to Vlad. New ghosts showed up all the time, so why had his annoying lackies brought this news in with them?

But then this new ghost started getting into fights.

Also not that big of news, fighting was very common in the Realms.

However, the new ghost was winning.

New ghosts, baby ghosts... they weren't supposed to be strong.

But this new ghost was getting into fights with ghosts, some of whom had been around for at least a century, some a little longer. The new ghost was powerful, and no one knew why.

News stopped coming in from the Realms about this new ghost after a month and a half, and Vlad was glad. It was annoying hearing the birds talk about the ghost all the time.

He had other things to do, like comfort Maddie after the loss of her son, and ignore Jack Fenton. He invited the two of them and their daughter to their college reunion, held at his house.

But they were... different.

He hadn't seen them since the funeral a few weeks ago, but something had changed. The ghost tech they carried around was less... destructive. More self-defense. Jazz carried some too, even though she had vehemently denied the existence of ghosts at the funeral.

That wasn't saying there wasn't offensive stuff, but even that was safer, with safety on them, and only Maddie holding a gun.

But Vlad didn't know what caused the change until that night. His lackies had failed to get Jack, leaving it to him, but he was hit in the shoulder with an ectoblast.

"I don't know who you are, or what you want with Mr. Fenton, but you need to back off."

It was a young ghost, physically no older than 14. Vlad was very surprised that he hadn't been able to sense him. The ghost also looked vaguely familiar, but Vlad couldn't place him.

"And who might you be?" Vlad asked.

"The name's Phantom," the ghost kid said, crossing his arms. Phantom? Why did that ring a bell? "Now what do you want with Mr. Fenton?"

"Revenge," Vlad said. "He ruined my life, I'll end his."

"...you're going to kill him?"

"Ah, caught on, didn't you?" Vlad asked. "Well, you can't do anything to stop me."

Phantom glared and threw the first punch.

The ensuing battle was slightly more difficult than Vlad had expected. Phantom was strong. How long had he been dead?

"Why are you even protecting these humans?" Vlad asked, tossing Phantom into the wall. "Don't you know what they are?"

"Ghost Hunters, yeah," Phantom said, "They're also my friends. And I refuse to let another person die from a ghost attack!"

"You can't befriend these Ghost Hunters," Vlad said, "They act like your friends, then land you in the hospital and never visit! They'll destroy any ghost they come across!"

Phantom pulled his hands together and shot out a powerful ectoblast, catching Vlad off guard, and nailing him in the chest.

He slammed into the wall, and the rings of light surrounded him, switching back to his human form.

Phantom stared at him.

"...what in the Realms are you?" Phantom asked. "You're... you're the guy who owns this place, how are you a ghost?"

"I am Vlad Plasmius," Vlad said, getting to his feet, "Half ghost, half human. And next time, you won't be so lucky."

That's what he was.

Lucky.

"If you try anything again, I won't hesitate to end you," Phantom said. "Maybe you're half human, which means I won't kill you now. But try anything, and I promise you won't be so lucky."

Phantom disappeared.

Vlad took a deep breath.

That ghost was strong. He wasn't sure where...

Why had it taken him so long?

The young upstart in the Realms, the new ghost who was powerful. Phantom his lackeys had said.

How was a ghost so new so powerful?

This required more research.

-

Vlad finally placed why the ghost looked familiar several weeks after the reunion.

Phantom totally hadn't kicked his butt when he tried to get rid of Jack later.

It was the young Fenton boy, who's funeral he had attended.

That was why Jack and Maddie had changed. Their own son was a ghost.

And he didn't have any memories of his life.

Vlad felt bad, but was also intrigued. Daniel had died walking into the new ghost portal Madie and Jack had made. His body should be loaded with ectoplasm, unseen due to the electrical scarring.

Combine that with some of his ghost signature, and he would have something very powerful.

So Vlad drifted into the earth, and stole a little bit of hair from the boy's dead body. The body seemed to be decaying faster than average, but that probably had to do with the ectoplasm.

The clones he made were unstable. The DNA he had taken from Daniel's body was likely unstable due to the ectoplasm contained within, as well as the fact that Daniel had been dead for several months by that point. And he was attempting to combine that with what was potentially ghost DNA, or rather, the ectoplasmic signature.

It was difficult, and there were so many failed clones. Four were stable enough to last outside of the test tubes, but each was wrong in different ways.

One was only a skeleton, and without legs at that. Another appeared more Frankenstein-like. A third was very small. And the last was female.

Vlad tried many times to get them to stabilize, but was having trouble and he couldn't figure out why.

The female clone, Danielle as he'd taken to calling her, was the closest to success. She was even a half-ghost, instead of full like the others had been.

He had, however, successfully made a single clone that looked exactly like Daniel had before death. But he was too unstable to leave the tube.

But what could he possibly need?

Whatever it was, he needed Phantom for it.

-

Phantom didn't know what these ghosts were, but they felt wrong.

He could sense some of the latent emotion on them, as they melted (what the heck...?), and they were panicked, desperate.

They left behind their cores, but their cores were too small, not developed enough...

Mr. and Mrs. Fenton agreed to build a device to incubate the cores in. Two of these ghosts.

Then there was Danielle.

She looked uncannily similar to the late Danny Fenton, Mr. and Mrs. Fenton's son. She claimed no relation, and had instead taken to following him around, and he didn't know why.

And then, during a ghost attack, she turned into a ghost.

Long story short, Phantom didn't know what was going on, but these new ghost were giving him weird vibes.

"Please, I need your help," Danielle said. "My dad said that you could help!"

"What do you need help with?" Phantom asked.

Something about this didn't sit right with him.

"Just come with me, and you'll be able to help," she said.

Phantom couldn't resist.

-

The clones had been a failure.

The perfect clone was gone, the others had all melted, and Danielle was living with the Fentons. Phantom hadn't realized that she was a clone of only him, assuming that he had combined his DNA with that of Daniel's.

And now, neither of the Fenton parents would talk to him.

Phantom had told them what happened. They knew he was half ghost. Maddie was furious he had gone through her son's grave. Jack was upset he had cloned their son.

Vlad hated Phantom!

-

Ellie felt weird living in the Fenton's house.

They had offered it up to her, just as they had to Phantom, and it was safe. They could help her, they were helping the other clones.

But she knew about Phantom. Or rather, she knew he was the ghost of Danny. And Phantom didn't know that.

She didn't know how to tell him.

The Fentons didn't either, it seemed. In fact, it seemed like everyone knew except for Danny himself.

She was due to start middle school soon, while Danny would be forever a high school Freshman.

The other clones, their cores were getting stronger. They'd be stable enough to reform any day now Mr. and Mrs. Fenton said.

They would get to grow up.

Phantom wouldn't.

And she didn't know how to feel.

Except that she felt she was stealing his life.

One of my favourite ideas to poke at is a reverse Nobody Knows AU

As in Everybody but Danny knows that Phantom is Fenton because Danny died all the way and came back as a normal ghost.

Has no clue who he was. Still acts the same, still protects people, thinks bullies and assholes are losers and tries to save the day with the least property damage and civilian injury possible, but has no clue why people get so sad around him. He just assumes he has an aura he doesn't notice.

He spends some the little downtime he has not fighting other ghosts haunting the school when it's empty and hanging out invisibly in the sky when it's not. He hangs out a lot in the observatory and breaks into the Fenton's basement often. Usually just poking around and never actively malicious. He has no clue how he feels like he knows how their stuff works, but he does.

The Fentons themselves are actually pretty nice to him. He thanks them every now and again for shooting at the other guys but not him (even though their aim sucks). To him, they're Ms. Maddie and Mr. Jack. They never had the heart to tell him anything else.

[too-much-tma-stuff]

Finally Getting Help (prt 6)

Masterpost

The Wayne family gathered in the family room once Alfred was done setting up the projector, somehow there was also a plate of cookies and a couple pots of tea on the coffee table. How he’d found the time they didn’t know, he always seemed to be doing just a little more than should be possible but they didn’t question it. 

Jazz seemed nervous as she plugged in her USB and accessed the power point on Ghosts and Liminality. The tidal page had a picture of Danny in his Phantom form standing with a group of others, a boy with gray skin and blond hair, a girl with green hair and skin, and a goth with purple eyes and a dark skinned boy who looked around Danny’s age, and Jazz with the title “Ghosts and Liminals!” 

The next slide had simple text: “What are they and How are they made?”

With each slide she read the text on the screen allowed and then added any context or anecdotes she thought of, or had prepared. 

(Next slide)

Ghosts:

Made of ectoplasmic energy and obsession

Made either:

when someone dies with strong enough desires

An idea gains enough traction to take on a life of its own

Immutable concepts and gods

Must be allowed to indulge in obsessions or they will cease to exist

All have basic abilities such as flight, intangibility, invisibility, and minor shape shifting

On top of basic abilities most will have additional powers based on their obsessions

Immortal unless killed 

Love to fight

Liminals

Made when a human is exposed to high levels of ectoplasm for prolonged periods of time

Have some ghostly traits 

Ghostly traits vary person to person

Less susceptible to human illness and injury

“The ghosts on the picture are Kitty and Johnny, we’ve had problems with them but would consider them friends now. They’re the ghosts of two humans who died, but there are others, Vortext for instance is the ghost of Storms. Those ghosts who come from ideas are called ‘neverborns’. There seem to be almost an infinite number of ghosts, however not all of them are interested in having anything to do with us so we tend to get the same faces showing up a lot in Amity.

“I don’t know how many liminals there are. I thought they might be new with my parents' research but as I look into it more I think there are more natural sources of ectoplasm then my parents thought.” Jazz explained before going to transition to the next slide.

“I have a question-” Bruce started before Jazz hushed him. 

“Wait till the end please! I might answer it without you having to ask,” She scolded, and he felt very much like a schoolboy again as his children snickered.

(Next slide including a image of the glowing green viles in the Fenton’s lab and a glowing green crystal)

Ghost biology 

Ghosts do not have any recognizable organs or bones

The only solid part of their being is their Core which is the source of their ectoplasm 

Any injury to a ghosts form not done directly to their core is considered minor and will heal

A healthy ghost is fully capable of mending any damage including removed limbs in a matter of hours or days depending on extent of the injury

All injuries not including the Core are considered minor 

Ghosts are considered young for at least the first hundred years of their existence and are often not considered adults until nearly 500

A caveat to this is ghosts are heavily driven by emotion and will often be the age they feel they are allowing ghosts to mature much more quickly, or more slowly

When this is the case ghosts are treated as the age they present and behave

Ghosts reproduce by shaping ectoplasm and Wanting a child badly enough

“Believe me it was incredibly scary the first time I saw Danny in his ghost form have something go right through his stomach. It took him a long time to convince me it wasn’t a big deal and it barely hurt. He does have to make sure he repairs the damage Before turning human again though or the damage can transfer over and I don’t need to tell you a hole in the gut is a lot more serious for humans!

“If I’m honest I only know ghosts that have stayed younger then they really are, for instance Youngblood who’s a few hundred years old and could be well on his way to adulthood if he wanted but has remained a child. I assume it can go the other way though, if a ghost is very mature for their age.”

Ectoplasm 

Ectoplasm is the energy that makes up all ghosts and the Ghost Zone itself. All ghosts can feed on the ectoplasm around them as well as produce their own by indulging in obsessions. The ghosts Cores produce the ectoplasm like a brain produces neurochemicals when exposed to the right stimulation.

Ectoplasm is a powerful source of energy but unstable. When it is stabilized into an ecto-crystal it is more stable and can be used as a power source safely by ghosts and liminals.

“Most ectoplasm is green like you see in the pictures. But it isn’t the only colour, some other ghosts produce different colours and it is highly tied to what emotion drives them. When it’s pure it usually smells like petracore but it can get pretty foul.”

(next slide)

What are Obsessions

Every ghost has one or more obsessions

They can be very literal things such as boxes, or ideas and emotions such as Love

In rarer cases they may have dual obsessions

Unlike for humans obsessions are very healthy for ghosts

Ghosts need to indulge their obsessions

Sometimes the way ghosts indulge their obsessions might seem evil, however it is almost always just amoral 

Obsessions shape every part of a ghost from their powers to thier physical appearance, to befriend a ghost you Must understand and aid their obsession

In very extreme circumstances a ghosts obsession may shift, sometimes this is healthy, more often it is a result of extreme trauma

“With my interest in psychology this was sort of hard for me to accept. From the outside the way ghosts obsess seems really unhealthy but it’s what gives them life. When not allowed to indulge in their obsessions ghosts will dysregulate and go to extreme lengths to try and get their obsession, if that doesn’t work they either go dormant if their core is still healthy enough or they will melt. 

“Ghosts change their obsessions very rarely, I’ve heard of it happening as they heal. For instance once a ghost has gotten revenge for themselves, if that was their obsession, their obsession might shift to avenging other people, or even protecting them so they don’t need to be avenged.”

(Next Slide)

Ghost Culture

The Ghosts have a monarchy

The title of the Ghost King is not hereditary but passed through trial by combat

Under the monarch is a council of being known as Observants, and powerful and old ghosts called Ancients 

Ghosts respect strength and value power and cunning in combat a lot

Ghosts bond with each other through combat and play fight with family and friends often

“I have down that the ghosts are a monarchy, and technically that is true but the current Ghost King was a tyrant who was locked away thousands of years ago. I’m sure as soon as someone shows up who’s powerful enough to beat him his court will be happy to pick up where they left off with a better King, or queen, though I don’t think the title has to change based on gender.

“I really can’t stress enough how violent ghosts are! Because nothing short of having their cores shattered can kill them, play fighting for them can look Very Much like a murder attempt to a human. A lot of the issues we’ve had with ghosts have come from them just not understanding quite how fragile humans, and for most of them they feel really bad once they know they actually Hurt someone by shooting them. It’s really best for everyone when they’re kept separate and Ghosts can happily tear each other apart in peace.”

Liminals

The result of long term low level exposure to ectoplasm, sudden high doses are almost always deadly

Liminals Can have almost every trait a ghost can, usually having a combination of a few

Commonalities between liminals include

Minor cosmetic changes such as: glowing eyes, pointed ears, and/or sharp teeth 

Increased stamina, strength, and aggression

Increased obsessive behaviour

Liminals sometimes develop powers shaped by the strength and type of obsession 

“Most of the people Danny and I know are liminals. I don’t want to talk about them in case they don’t want to be outed so I’ll talk about myself and my parents. We all had prolonged exposure after all. My ears are pointed,” She said brushing her hair back so they could see them, “And Danny is a little more then liminal but even in human form he has fangs. 

“My parents didn’t realize it but they could to the point they could subsist on their obsession without needing to eat or sleep as often as a regular human would. About a year ago I started developing the ability to tap into and feel other peoples emotions, I can feed on them a little too but I try not to because the Worst ghost we met did that and I don’t want to be anything like her.”

(Next Slide)

In conclusion

Ghosts are not evil even though sometimes their actions are hard to understand

Never get between ghosts when they’re fighting each other but it’s usually safe to yell at them to remind them not to break anything

Never get between a ghost and their obsession

Don’t drink ectoplasm unless you know you’re already liminal

“I have a feeling the section about liminals will be familiar to a bunch of you. I know Damian is liminal though I don’t know how he was exposed to ectoplasm and some of you,” Her eyes skirted across Tim and Bruce. “Are toeing the line. You’ll probably notice Damian and Danny getting really close, and they might get in some really vicious looking fights. I promise Danny is playing at least.”

The family was left silent for a moment, Bruce knew he was thinking about Jason. Who had died, been exposed to.. What certainly seemed to be something like Lazarus water and come back, obsessive, aggressive, and emotional. He wished he’d had this powerpoint a long time ago. It helped understand Damian too but mostly he was thinking about Jason. He needed to reach out again, maybe meeting Danny would be good for Jason?

“So uhhh, ya, that’s the end of the powerpoint?” Jazz said, shifting from foot to foot in the awkward silence. “Any questions?”

Next

[kizzer55555]

Super Dead Soulmates

In this universe, any injury or scar you sustain appears on your soulmate. However, for as long as he could remember, Danny never gained an injury that wasn’t his own. When he was very young, his parents would always say that he was just a late bloomer and perhaps his soulmate was a few years younger than he was and thus, just wasn’t born yet. As Danny grew older, they got more absorbed in their work and just seemed to forget about the whole ordeal. Danny never asked them about it again, afraid they might think a ghost had ‘cursed’ him or something. It was hard enough to hide the lack of additional scars at school. Luckily, most people don’t get injured very often so it was easy enough to play off some of his injuries as that from a soulmate. The only ones who knew the truth were his sister and his best friends. Danny was just convinced that he didn’t have a soulmate and had accepted that fact, even if it hurt. Then the accident happened and for once, he was thankful his soulmate wouldn’t have to feel his pain. And even more so when he started to fight the other ghosts daily. Danny was content to live like this, but with more ghost fights, his injuries started piling up. Danny excused them saying that they were from his soulmate. It didn’t completely get rid of the scrutiny but most people bought it. Afterall, how else would puny Fenton get those kinds of bruises? So for a while, that excuse worked…until someone realized that Danny and Phantom’s injuries linked up (I vote Wes). Now normally, the natural conclusion would be that Danny and Phantom were the same person. But due to the fact that one of them was dead and the other clearly alive, everyone gained a new theory…that Phantom was Danny’s soulmate. It would explain the recent injuries as Phantom was often seen fighting other ghosts. And to be honest, this was the perfect cover. It’s not like Danny had an actual soulmate who might show up and this added another layer of protection against people thinking he and Phantom were the same person. So Danny remained silent and let the rumors grow. Sure people now thought he and Phantom were dating but that was fiiiiiinnnneee. (But BOY was that an awkward conversation with his parents). 

And then Kon was born.

As a clone, all he knew from the outside was implanted into his mind. He knew the color of the sky, the sound of music, academic equations and a lot of common knowledge such as soulmates. He knew that injuries were shared between a bonded pair and that everyone had a soulmate. But he was different. He wasn't born a baby and grew up alongside another person. He wasn’t even real according to some people. Yet one day, he noticed bruises lining his arms, he was confused. He should have had impenetrable skin like Superman. As far as he could remember, his skin had never been pierced before. And it’s not like he fought a godlike being that day. He shouldn’t have any injuries. Kon decided to ignore them but the injuries kept showing up. It got so bad that his team started to notice and sat him down asking if everything was alright with his powers or if he was exposed to kryptonite somehow. So, very confused, Kon had explained that the injuries just kept showing up. It was only after his team gave him a curious look and explained the concepts of soulmates did everything click with him. Sure, Kon knew about soulmates but surely that couldn't be what this was! He was a clone! He shouldn’t have a soulmate. It was impossible! But after a few more days of observation and a bit of testing, everyone determined that this was, in fact, a soulmate bond. 

To say Kon was ecstatic was an understatement. Actually, it was a mix of excitement, nervousness, worry, and joy all rolled into one. He was elated at the idea that he had someone meant for him. Someone who would accept all of him. Kon had looked at the others and there had always been a slight jealousy when he saw a paper cut bloom on their fingers or see them rub a bruised knee fondly. 

But more than anything. He was happy because this was proof that he was real. Afterall, a soulmate wouldn’t match with him unless his soul was equal to theirs. His body almost melted with relief at that realization. A weight off his shoulders he never fully grasped was still there. 

Of course there was the worry of why exactly his soulmate had so many injuries. For a hero, it was obvious they would get injured (although they tried to have as much protective padding as possible to limit that possibility. But some injuries still got through.) Yet the amount of injuries Kon’s soulmate sustained were far more than that (because Danny lacked proper padding  and didn’t think he had to worry about a soulmate. Most injuries looked worse than they were anyways due to his fast healing). And on the contrary, Kon’s skin was perfectly clear. With his kryptonian biology, even if he got hurt, it never left a mark. So all the injuries and bruises sustained on him were purely from his soulmate. And there was enough for two people. On the bright side, it helped with his cover, on the downside, Kon started to worry about his soulmate. (Meanwhile, Danny didn’t notice a difference. Sure, sometimes he would feel a temporary ache or sharp pain but no mark was left so he just assumed the pain was sore muscles from a previous battle or that one of his rogues were hitting harder than he thought.) 

As for Kon, he and his team used every resource at their disposal to try and track down Kon’s soulmate. They did this for every member of the team as hero soulmates were in more danger than most but they paid special attention to Kon’s soulmate due to the rapid accumulation of injuries. 

Kon would fantasize on what his soulmate would be like. Would they be tall? Short? They would probably be able to fight. Boy or girl? It doesn't really matter. Kon knew opposite gender soulmates were more common but he wouldn’t mind a guy either. His days were filled with dreams of a mystery person. Someone he could hold in his arms and protect. Who would comfort him after patrols and who he could introduce to his friends. 

After a while, Tim finally found a lead. Some doctor records of a boy in a small town called Amity. Apparently he was prescribed pain medicine to help with ‘soulmate injuries’. The lost of injuries were extensive and after looking at some pictures, they realized that his scars and Kon’s scars lined up. A perfect match. So it wasn’t long before they made a quick road trip to Amity. 

This place was already on the Justice League radar. It was a town that appears to have a permanent portal to the afterlife and was attacked often. (Which might explain why Kon’s soulmate was so injured). The Justice League had not interfered yet because the town had a local hero as well. Someone who seemed good at his job and who Tim was even thinking of recruiting. So this was a good opportunity to hit two birds with one stone. Afterall, not much was known about this mysterious Phantom other than he dedicated his afterlife to protecting this one town. Once they got to Amity they would probably need to check in with Phantom before anything. And despite his impatience with finding the person who might be his soulmate, even Kon was excited to meet this hero. Apparently Phantom had vast experience but also a major power set. He might gain another flying buddy or someone he could wrestle with without worrying about his strength. Afterall, Phantom also supposedly had super strength and even if he didn’t, it’s not like you can kill a ghost. Yet no matter how hard they looked, they couldn’t find him. It was only by coincidence that they stumbled upon Danny instead and his group of friends. 

The first time Kon saw Danny, it was like coming home. He wanted to do nothing more than rush to his soulmate and hug him and vow to always keep him safe. He wanted to prove that he would be the best soulmate ever and he wanted to know everything there was to know about him. He was practically vibrating where he stood in his civilian disguise and it was only his friends that held him back from flying over and surprising the poor boy.

But before he could do anything, a ghost attacked. Kon barely had enough time to grab his friends and dodge when some kind of glowing creature crashed into a building. And while normally he would immediately find somewhere to change, Kon’s first instinct was to check on his soulmate, only to see the two people he assumed to be the boy’s friends but no sign of Danny. Frantically looking around, he didn’t notice the glowing creature behind him (was that a dragon?) but before it could reach him, another glowing figure intercepted the attack. They looked almost ethereal with white hair softly floating in the air and a suit that hugged his muscled form tightly. The figure turned around and gave a sheepish smile towards Kon. “You ok?”

And it felt like for the second time that day, Kon was rendered breathless. 

Someone was protecting him.

Someone was protecting him?

Yet it felt…nice. Warm.

Before Kon could gather his thoughts though the battle picked up in earnest. He and his team found cover and changed into their suits. When they came to help, the person Kon assumed to be Phantom looked surprised at their sudden appearance but it wasn’t long before he and everyone else started working together. Unfortunately, actually fighting the ghost seemed to be impossible. Whenever they got close, their hits just passed right through so Phantom quickly regulated them on defense and citizen protection duty. Occasionally getting a hit in when the creature was tangible. Watching Phantom fight was something. Kon could understand why he was elected to join their team. He had this sort of grace and power that couldn’t be explained in words but was clearly from the experience of many battles.

Despite not being able to do much, fighting with Phantom was fun. They seemed to be completely in sync and it wasn’t long before Kon started to enjoy his loud commentary and puns as the two ghosts fought.

However, one particularly hard hit made it so that the dragon’s claws grazed his chest. Leaving three shallow gashes, but Phantom took the close proximity that attack gave him and sucked the creature into…a soup thermos?

But Kon wasn’t focused on that. He was wholly focused on the stinging pain suddenly coming from his chest, underneath his untouched uniform that clearly had not been hit. Kon didn’t know how to process what was happening. Everything suddenly became louder and he vaguely tried to move but it was like his mind became mush as he tried to process what that meant. He managed to get away for a bit and undid his shit, looking down to see three shallow scratches along his chest. Scratches that perfectly mirrored Phantom. In the corner of his eye, Kon saw a head of black hair and witnessed as Danny reunited with his two friends he had been separated from in the chaos. And as Danny twisted to hug them, his shirt flipped up enough to see another identical 3 scratches along the boy's stomach. Perfectly mirroring Phantoms. 

It was only later that Kon and his team did some more research on the town and it’s ghosts and learned the unofficial secret that Phantom and Danny were dating. That Phantom had Likely come back from the afterlife to protect the town his soulmate lived in. On the bright side, at least now he could confirm Danny really was his soulmate. And he knew where all those injuries were coming from.

Kon had found his soulmate.

Correction, he found his soumates

And they were already bonded to each other.

…

….so where did that leave him?

There are now two options. 

1: Kon decided that he just needs to woo both his soulmates and starts doing so both as Superboy and as Conner. Danny is very confused who these people are (because as far as he knows, he doesn’t have a soulmate, and since Kon doesn’t visibly show injury, there is no sign (unless Danny somehow injures himself in a place that is visible but he’s been trying to avoid that to make everyone worry less.)). Kon goes all out. He gets flowers, chocolates, writes poetry (whether good or not doesn’t matter) starts wooing Phantom in hero form, showing off his strength and skill whenever possible. (And unfortunately, also his dork side when he isn’t paying attention while flying) Asking to hang out, insist on paying for everything. Danny sees this tall Hunk who is paying attention to him and he doesn’t know what to do. And there are TWO OF THEM! (Also, in this version it might be funny if people suspect Danny and Phantom are dating but don’t know for sure and since they are never around each other, people might assume they just don’t know. So Sam, Tucker, and Jazz are all for Danny possibly starting a relationship with Kon along with Kon’s team who are cheering them on and trying to help the poor clone boy who has no experience with romance. Meanwhile literally everyone else in the town who likes Phantom is trying to run interference and get Danny and their hero together. 

2: The angst option. Kon decides that the fact that he has two soulmates who are together is likely a result of him being a clone. It’s not that he had someone waiting for him (how could he think someone was waiting their whole life just for him? How stupid was he?!) Kon had just hijacked a different bond. So he tries to stay away. Unfortunately, Tim had talked with Phantom while Kon was out of it so now they have started to team up. This makes avoiding him very difficult as he keeps running into Phantom. Moreover, he runs into Danny because they need him for the ghost hunting equipment. And slowly but surely, Kon falls in love with ‘both’ his soulmates but doesn’t want to get ‘between’ them. And Danny wants to know why one of his new teammates is avoiding him.

[satoshy12]

Yellow Lantern Phantom!

Danny had no idea how he got the Yellow Ring in the first place; at first, he wanted to bring fear to people! But then he learned, he can meet aliens! Well, time to learn how to use fear! Vlad willingly helped him. Go be a Poltergeist on the people who don't want to send money to Amity Park because of "fake ghost attacks".  Danny was having much more fun with that than he should have, but man, that was funny.

It was in Coast City where Danny had been pranking a politician for Vlad, as it seemed to have an invasion!  He can finally use that new power ring of his! It's time to have fun!

Danny had Both Sinestro and Hal Jordan were bewildered by the appearance of a child wearing a yellow lantern ring playing with the Parademons. The notion was utterly baffled as to why a child could even wield the power of fear.

[nerdofspades]

Bruce looked at the pop-up on the Batcomputer's screen.

"Explain," he growled, glancing down at Tim.

"Not much to explain," Tim answered, pulling up lines of code. "It showed up ten seconds ago."

"I'm starting a full diagnostic," Barbara said, voice filtering through the speakers. "So far, I'm not seeing anything."

"And yet..." Time trailed off glancing at the window again. It had a video queued up to play and the words "IMPORTANT: PLEASE WATCH. DO NOT DELETE" in large text at the top.

"There's a new folder labeled 'a gift for Batman,'" Tim said. "Not something any of us made."

"Clearly."

"I'm still not finding any viruses, corrupted files, or spyware," Oracle said. "The new folder was programmed to stay in a hidden partition for a few days after it was placed. Then, obviously, the pop-up to catch our attention."

"Folder also has a text file named 'security notes,'" Tim said. "Maybe our new hacker is friendly?"

"It's starting to look like it," Oracle agreed. "The video is clean. It should be safe to watch."

Bruce sighed. "Then let's see what they've got for us."

-

The video opened with a dark room. The background hidden in shadows, while the foreground was well lit, letting them clearly see the tired teen in the center of the frame as he took a heavy swig from his mug before putting it down.

"Pulling up facial recognition."

He ran a hand through his messy black hair and then down his face, pinching his nose and hiding the bags under his blues eyes for a moment before he dropped his hand and finally looked at the camera.

"I really don't want to do this," he said, "but you need it." He glanced longingly off screen in the direction of the mug he'd put down.

"First of all, I think I should apologize for hacking you. Or asking my friend to, technically. I just. You need to know about this and I didn't know of another way to get it to you that would be secure.

"I did at least make him promise to make a record of how he got in so you can patch that.

"That out of the way... to business? I'm Danny Fenton, for the last year or so I have also been the hero Phantom in Amity Park. My parents are Jack and Maddie Fenton. They are ectobiologists and ghost hunters. While extremely biased and not actually that good at catching ghosts, their tech is easily the best in the business."

"That's a positive match."

"Running a search on Phantom."

"I- fucking shit." Danny put his head in his hands again, running them back through his hair before leaning back, almost collapsing into the chair.

"This kid has... gotten into some shit."

"Everyone knows you're the League's strategist, Batman. And. I'm strong enough. I can handle my problems, that's not what I'm worried about.

"It's been about a year and I've already been mind controlled once." Danny laughed. A dry, broken, almost desperate laugh. "And that was just some lowlife that wanted to rob jewelry stores. I'm still not worried about. It's not why I'm sending you this. The magic relic he used is broken and gone now."

"Well that explains one of his problems."

"The others?"

"An attempted kidnapping and fairly standard property damage. I want to see some footage of those fights before passing judgement."

"Even more standard given he doesn't seem to have a mentor. Batman, he was fourteen."

"No. I. I've seen a version of the future. One where I go mad. Where I snap. And the Justice League can't stop me.

"I don't know if I- he kills everyone. I don't know who, if anyone, makes it out. But it's not anyone that could really do much. I... I saw ten years after he- I snapped. Earth was little more than rubble and ash. Only one city was left holding out and it was about to fall- was falling when I got there.

"I've managed to change the time line. What broke him didn't happen here. But. I can't guarantee nothing ever could.

"So. Yeah. Next best thing is making sure you're prepared. All my powers. All my weaknesses. Everything I know of that could possibly hurt me. Schematics and blue prints for anything you could need to fight me, track me, keep me out, keep me contained. All nice and giftwrapped for your convenience.

"Uh... that's everything. Why is it always so awkward to end a video? Hopefully we never see each other? I guess? Pretty sure us actually meeting is gonna be a bad sign.

"You know what. I'm gonna turn this thing off now before I say something stupid."

-

"Batman, who's 'Phantom'?" Superman asked, glancing up from the Watchtower computer he was working at. "Aren't we supposed to vote on new members?"

Batman grunted. "He's not a member, just someone who understands the need for contingencies."

"You know what, I'm not gonna even ask."

"Probably for the best."

[lunarflux]

x: Thomas Shelby found his match in an information bookie who has eluded the grasp of the Peaky Blinders long enough to crumble their power over Birmingham. But at last, he found you. The ghost he'd been chasing was finally in front of him, but you were trickier than he expected. Dangerous, cunning - and a bit too much like himself. To buy your loyalty, he would have to sell his in equal measure. Loyalty for loyalty - blood for blood - how much were either of you willing to spill before the game changed entirely?

part 1: the new board

word count: 1,412

✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒✒

"What do you want?"

"You're the one who came here, Mr. Shelby. I believe I should be the one asking that question."

It was odd, being seated across from a mirror. Whoever you were, you wouldn't budge. A cigarette dangled from two dainty fingers, wisps of smoke swirling into the air between you.

Tommy didn't know who you were. The Emerald of London to some. The Ghost of Birmingham to others. Your real name never crossed anyone's lips. You were practically a phantom - a meddlesome one at that. Some of the usual gamblers started avoiding certain days, ones that were particularly important to the Blinders, and by the third race with meager winnings, he knew.

There was a new player in the game, and until they were wiped clean from the board, the uneasy feeling that made home in the pit of his stomach would not go away. Gun deals gone awry, exchanges with people he thought would always owe him - all of it was going sour.

It took weeks of dwindling business before Tommy told Finn to find you. What he expected to see - a new information bookie operating from a damp, abandoned warehouse - was anything but. No, you were cunning. Charming, even. You had a certain allure about you. Your face held little expression aside from what could only be described as deceitfully cold, only ever showing the briefest emotion in your eyes. And when you spoke, it was intertwined with a feline-esque hum - almost like every conversation someone tried to work from you was a waste of your time. Finn only said that when he found you in the old bookshop across town that something was off, and though he couldn't articulate what made him uneasy, he knew that you would not easily be burned from the streets of Birmingham.

Tommy sat across from you, his still face hiding the mild headache your presence brought to the front of his mind, and he waited. At first, you two waited in silence.

You sighed, tapping the ash from your cigarette down to the floor. "Very well then. What business do you have here?"

"You've been selling information to the Russians."

"I have."

"What do they have on you?"

The corner of your lip twitched into a grin. "And what makes you think they have something on me?"

Tommy bore his eyes into yours, not willing to admit that this was one of a few conclusions he made about your motives. "What are they paying you then," he said plainly, less of a question and more of an anticipatory retort.

You tilted your hand out, motioning to the air to allude how silly the accusation was. "They pay whatever they think what I have to give them is worth."

"And the Irish, they pay as well."

"The Russians pay, the Irish pay... The Italians pay, the politicians pay... The Blinders can pay, too, if that's where this conversation is going."

You were woven into the system more than he thought - more than any of them thought. It was only whatever you sold that involved them that led him to believe you had a personal stake against them. It seemed now that this wasn't the case. They were just one of the last to find you.

"So, you'll resort to extortion to keep you out of our business."

"People don't pay me to stop, Mr. Shelby. They pay me to keep playing. It'd be bad for business otherwise. Take me out of the picture with the drop of some coins, and my credibility goes out the window."

Tommy hoped that his silence would push you to reveal more, but you continuously proved him wrong. He had to keep asking questions. It was what you wanted. You wanted him to pry as far as his cold composure would allow him to.

"So, where do your loyalties lie then?"

"I have no loyalties," you said, feigning confusion at the notion. "That's what makes me good at what I do."

"What is your loyalty worth then?"

"That's not how this works, Mr. Shelby. If the information someone else buys is at the expense of the Peaky Blinders, I'm afraid you'll find no sympathy from me."

Silence. Just a few more seconds, and maybe your curiosity would peak.

Again, you sighed, not attempting to hide your boredom. "Fine. Humor me. What are you offering?"

"Protection."

"I don't need protection."

"If I could find you, then there's nothing stopping the rest of them from finding you."

"On the contrary, if they wanted to kill me, I'd already be dead."

You knew you were valuable - more than Tommy cared to admit. Your awareness of the situation was your advantage, and it was a benefit not afforded easily. He had to offer you something worth considerably more, and it was not something he could give freely. However, he would not be the one to offer it up. You needed to ask for it, only then would he know what actually mattered to you.

Tommy kept his gaze on you. "Name your price then."

"I have to know what you're trying to purchase before I can tell you what it's worth." You wanted something more. Not something tangible. Money was so easily spent. "Tell me then, what is it you want from me?"

Tommy's eyes narrowed in the slightest to study your face. The cold, icy wall behind your eyes revealed so little. At the mention of payment, you were amused. At the thought of taking sides, you found humor. No, you were alone, and that's how you wanted it. So, what would be more valuable to you, something that didn't cost something physical? The answer came to him slowly, like a the sunrise peaking over the city until it blinded him completely.

"Your loyalty," he finally answered.

Your true smile - the one that only surfaced in the face of something that truly interested you - was more unsettling than he cared to admit. But he knew. Your loyalty would cost him dearly, whether it be from his pocket or something much deeper.

"You want to buy my loyalty?" You chuckled, a low and sinister tone like the monster beneath your grin was daring to reveal itself. "No, my loyalty stays with me, and I would only sell it for -"

"My loyalty."

The words slipped past his lips before he even really knew what he was saying. This had to have been what you were goading him for. An equal share of his respect. He would not have you entangling yourself with the Peaky Blinders with the assumption of your loyalty alone. You had to trust him as much as he forced himself to trust you.

You leaned forward, close enough for him to feel the icy shards trying to reach him from your leer. "And what is your loyalty worth?"

He was at a crossroads. Protection had a price, and people paid it. But loyalty - that was something else entirely. How much did he want you on their side that he was willing to give himself in equal measure? Your dealings with his enemies said enough. You had a pull over every corner of the city, and the longer you remained a black widow on the outskirts of all the chaos that followed, the closer the walls enclosed around him. He hated to admit it, but he needed you. He needed you on their side.

At least long enough to make sure you were hooked without expecting more than he was capable of giving.

You sat back and took a long drag of your cigarette, blowing the smoke out towards the ceiling. The phantom of that smile lingered at the corner of your lips, almost like you were amused - satisfied, even - that he was willing to offer up something with a value only you could determine. It was only a matter of time before you came to your own conclusions about what his loyalty was truly worth to you.

"I appreciate the consideration, Mr. Shelby." The phantom smile lowered until the cold façade reclaimed your face. "I will consider your offer."

Tommy rose slowly and placed his cap back on his head. His jaw tightened as he chose his next words carefully. "The Garrison. After close. Meet me there if we have a deal."

You lifted your chin with a nod. The conversation was far from over, but the new board has been set. Now, he just had to wait.

[smallgodseries]

*We offer this small god for all of you currently baking in the heat of the ever-worsening climate crisis.

Why are there so many divine polar bears?

I mean, really, that seems like the sort of question we ought to be asking.  After all, these hypercarnivorous predators (a real thing—when a creature eats 70% or more animal protein, it’s considered hypercarnivorous rather than just the normal level of carnivorous, and see if that helps you sleep at night) can run up to twenty-five miles per hour, and have a bite force of 1,200 pounds per square inch.  The human skull can be crushed by as little as 520 pounds per square inch.  So it would make sense for humans to fear polar bears, not to deify them.  And yet they keep showing up again and again, predators of the pantheon, stalking their prey from one side of the celestial line to the other.

Which is, quite frankly, bullshit.  We don’t need this many super-predators running around with divine powers!  It’s unsafe, and probably bad for some kind of heavenly ecosystem!  I don’t know!  I’m just the historian!  I’m just—

Right, sir.  Of course, sir.  Please don’t eat me, sir.

No Escape Claus is not as new a god as he might seem, having once driven ice ages across the world, devouring microclimes and driving entire species to extinction.  He grows in power once again, thanks to Anthropocene climate change and the furious ghosts of thousands of slaughtered polar bears hungry for revenge.  They come to take back what was always theirs, what should never have been taken away, and they have little mercy in their hearts.

When a cold wind blows out of season, remember that we put the guns into the hands of poachers, we put the lie of manifest destiny into the hearts of explorers, and we loosed them upon a world that had been doing perfectly fine before they came along.

The phantom polar bears come only to reclaim what’s theirs.

And they have the backing of a god.

[skylersprompts]

DC x DP Prompt *20*

Sometimes life is a bitch. And it seems like death was no different. Jason died and came back to life. At least he always thought that that is what happened. It is was everyone told him, what made sense at the time.

But the more he looked into things, the less certain he was.

He knew something was up, when Bruce called him to the cave. Normally he would have ignored it, but it seemed different then usual. They were still on shaky legs in their relationship, after everything and he had only been at the cave for a handful of times. Maybe he should have known that it couldn’t be good news, as soon as he saw Bat’s sitting at the Bat-Computer with a bunch of files open about him.

As soon as his father Ex-mentor saw him, he just stood up and motioned for Jason to take the seat. He started to read the documents, not really understanding what the Bat wanted from him.

“I put your DNA in our system, the standard procedure. The system found something you should see”, Bruce seemed to bleed a little into Batman, his voice a little to soft, like it was back then.

Maybe the Lazarus Water had messed him up a little bit more than he had thought? It took some time for him to make sense of everything he saw, but it made it really hard to not let the Pit Madness just swallow him, so that he had not to think about it.

“Your still part of this family, if you have us Jay…”, his dads voice was quite, his hand on his shoulder a grounding weight.

Jason was a clone… he wasn’t the boy who died and came back. He was just a cheap copy of the original. Was the real Jason still dead? Or did they resurrect him and he didn’t act like they wanted to? What did they do to him?

It took month to work through all of these thought, even though he couldn’t find any real answers. But he made himself a place in his family. It was easier now, knowing that the memories of the past weren’t really his. It also made it harder. But he started to become his own person again. The dead Robin and the `resurrected` Jason had already been vastly different, so he could just stay mostly the same.

The crisis came back, when there was another world ending event. Some plant villain - that put Poison Ivy to shame – was holding big parts of the world hostage. And none of their powers or weapons seemed to do anything. So in a last ditch attempt the JLD was trying to summon another, stronger being from the place this thing came from. King Phantom – the ghost king - would probably help them, at least that said the rumours that Constantin had heard.

But the being they summoned was a kid, something that already didn’t sit right with Jason. The boy was maybe fifteen, white hair, green eyes and so scrawny that he would fall over because of a soft breeze. Never the less, he didn’t take long to defeat their foe that they had fought for the better end of a month. The young king looked exhausted as he landed before the hero's. Before anyone could really say anything a white light flashed around the boy, before he fell to the ground.

His hair was now black and he looked far to alive for a ghost.

But the thing that rattled him and his family most, was the stark similarity between the second Robin and the boy king.

[anti-the-glitch-bitch]

The Phantom Soldier

@codename-alias Thanks to this beautiful person I've started a new story. It's going to be covering harsh topics such as torture, PTSD, and whatever else I come up with in the future. So, if this isn't for you then just rest assured I'll soon get back to posting about Danny and the Batfam.

Chapter 1- You with those sad eyes

Tensions are still high between Tony and the Rogues after the incident in Siberia. Once Steve had gotten far enough away, he’d given Pepper a call to send someone for Tony, feeling guilty about leaving him stranded in the cold as injured as he was. It’s a couple of months before Tony is healed both physically and mentally from the pain that Steve had wrought upon him, but he does eventually use the phone that Steve had left behind. 

Steve had apologized for what had happened in Siberia but doubles down when anyone says anything bad about Bucky. Tony had realized that both of them had acted in the heat of the moment but ultimately still feels betrayed at the secrets that should have been aired long before that moment, and can’t quite trust Steve to have his back.

Bucky holds such phenomenal guilt at the anguish he had caused that he hides in Steve’s room back at the tower most of the time. Anytime Tony and he are in the same room together, Bucky immediately disappears in the hopes that Tony won’t hate him any more than he does. It helps to soothe some things in Tony, but until they talk it out everyone walks around on eggshells.

While the two teams try to figure out a way to balance this fragile truth, Steve brings to light the Hydra cells that still seem to be in play even after the mass info dump. They’re so well hidden that Steve and Natasha can’t figure out where to go even with her amazing hacking skills. So, they think that maybe Tony might have better luck, and luck he has in spades. 

Tony creates a program that searches for key files by infiltrating the entire net, no matter how deep it has to dig. Anything that had to do with Hydra, the Winter Soldier Program, or the Super Soldier Serum is viciously dug into and scrutinized. They manage to find several active Hydra cells in this way, although, by the time the teams get there, the entire place is always emptied of everything but the office furniture.

It isn’t until they come across a small piece of information about something called The Phantom Soldier that Tony decides that they need to use a different tactic since they are obviously not getting anywhere. When Tony asks Bucky if he’d heard of or seen this “Phantom Soldier Project”, Bucky pales.

“Well, that’s not a good sign. Come on, out with it. What’s got you looking so scared?” Tony asks as he leans up against the kitchen counter.

“The Phantom Soldier was something I was supposed to train,” Bucky says. “My handlers liked to talk about Phantom, and from what I could piece together when I broke free, it was a kid. Or…something that looked like a kid. Hydra made a deal with some government agency called GIW. They believed that ghosts are real and have the ability to mimic human form while only having a more animalistic mind. The GIW captured one who looked like a kid but had more power than the gods.” Bucky looks apprehensive as he continues, his expression darkening. “I don’t know what Hydra gave them in return for this kid but one of the few things I do remember is them hooking up a teenager to the chair. The one that wipes minds. That wiped my mind.” He sits down in one of the chairs at the island, avoiding Tony’s gaze..

“That sounds both insane and horrible. How come you didn’t bring this up before?” Tony asks, crossing his arms.

With his head in his hands, Bucky groans, “Because I thought it was just more nightmares. I can only remember bits and pieces of Phantom and I really thought it was just one of the many things that I’d made up. I mean, who actually believes ghosts exist?”

“I would say no one does but I would be lying. The things we’ve seen make me believe in a lot nowadays.” Tony starts messing with his phone. “Friday, add all this information to the search parameters and see if we can’t find something. Make this a high priority.”

“Sir, it would appear that someone has tried to do a media blackout for anything related to Phantom,” Friday replies. “I’ve started the process of deciphering all information and tracing back to whoever might be placing these orders,” she informs Tony as large files of information are dumped into his phone. It’s going to take him hours to go through everything.

“I don’t care where it leads back to,” Tony says. “Find out what’s going on and who’s doing it. Quietly, if possible. If not, well, they can try and do something about it. See where it gets them.”

~~~                                                           

It takes almost a year before Friday can track down a Hydra cell that still seems to be active. More pieces of information are found about The Phantom Soldier the deeper Friday digs. Like how they acquired the subject when it appeared to be 16. The different ways they tortured the creature. How it seemed to have a weakness to electricity. A few pictures are even found to go along with some of these reports.

The more information Tony goes through, the more sickened he feels.

Tony has to find this kid. 

Thankfully, Friday is able to narrow down the location of the cell and finds it outside a small town in Missouri. The population of the town is only in the hundreds and seems to be isolated enough that the nearest city is two hours away. A perfect place for Hydra to hide.

Tony has both teams meet him in one of the meeting rooms for a debrief.

Natasha, Steve, Bucky, and Sam all sit next to each other while Vision, Wanda, and Pietro sit at the end. Tony stands at the front of the table where a large TV sits on the wall. Rhodey, Bruce, Clint, and Peter sit on the other side. Tony had tried to get Peter to stay behind but the teen had heard about the torture that the Phantom Soldier had gone through and wouldn’t take no for an answer. So, rather than argue with him, Tony let him in on the meeting. Besides, the kid might be able to help in the long run.

“Friday found the base for an active Hydra cell near a small town in Missouri. From the heat signatures, the base is extremely large.” Tony activates a hologram that sits in the middle of the table. It spreads across the table showing off the building and the surrounding areas, including the entire town. 

“From the thermal images Friday has been able to get, there are a large number of Hydra inside. There’s a particularly large cold spot that I think might be where they’re holding Phantom,” Tony says, glancing around the table at everyone. “The security in this place is some of the most high-quality shit. Obviously, it’s still not as good as mine, but some of it is better than what the army has. Friday will be able to hack into it, but someone needs to get her into the system first.”

Natasha clears her throat. “I’ll sneak in to activate her. What kind of security are we looking at?”

Tony flicks his wrist and the hologram changes to show a bunch of different devices. “Their security cameras have both thermal and night vision with very few blind spots. I should be able to give you a jammer that will loop the feed for a few minutes,” he says. “There’s something in the walls that I haven’t figured out what they’re for, but they do have an off switch. They aren’t supposed to inflict harm,  that much I do know. I think it’s some kind of shield, but with an amount of power usage that I’ve never seen.”

He zooms in on a couple of the devices, rotating them so the holograms can be seen from all angles. “Some traps are embedded into the ceiling in case of any subjects escaping, although they only come down if an alarm is sounded. I’ll cook up something that will help you out just in case. You’ve got the typical guards patrolling the place.” Tony zooms back out and surveys his former teammates. “That was all I could find so far. The notes mention something about ‘ectoplasm’, but I haven’t been able to find anything out about it, so I’d just watch out for anything suspicious.”

Natasha nods. “Maybe Bruce can find something out about it from his peers? If it has anything to do with ghosts, then there has to be some kind of information floating about in the scientific field?”

Bruce quickly adjusts his glasses as he speaks up. “I asked around if anyone had heard of anything like ectoplasm and when I mentioned ghosts they laughed at me,” he says. “If it is connected, then the information is so well hidden that the rest of the community has never heard of it.” 

Peter raises his hand as he looks around at the group nervously.

Tony sighs and rolls his eyes. “Kid, this isn’t school. You don’t have to raise your hand.”

“Oh, uh, ok.” Peter looks at Tony before pressing on. “When I was starting middle school, there was this thing going around on Facebook. Some kid from a town called Amity Park was talking about how haunted their town was. The posts continued for a few weeks before it just stopped. When I tried looking into it, all I could find was a deleted account.”

“So, besides talking about how haunted it was, was there other information?” Steve asks. 

Peter nods. “Yeah. This kid would talk about whatever ghost seemed to be attacking the town. After a while, they started talking about this ghost called Phantom that would fight the other ghosts. The kids seemed to like him alright but none of the adults could stand him. The kid even posted a video of one of the attacks but the quality was really bad and it was hard to see what was going on. Something about some ghost called Skuller or Scaller or something. It was like something was interfering with the video.” He shrugs and relaxes back in his seat. 

“Huh. I'm surprised the media didn't pick up on that. Sounds like something that would definitely grab the news attention,” Sam says, leaning forward slightly. 

Wanda stops looking at the hologram to stare down Tony. “It doesn't surprise me that someone shut down any way for this kind of thing to get out. In the world we live in now, it wouldn't surprise us to find out ghosts are out there, but back then? It would cause panic and fear. Not to mention the army trying to figure out how to turn them into weapons if they can.”

“Except Hydra found out about it first and it looks like they turned this ghost kid into a weapon. How much you wanna bet they're the ones behind the blackout?” Sam says. 

Nat scoffs and shakes her head. “That's not a bet I'm willing to take. I'm surprised this wasn't part of the info dump that went out. Otherwise, this news would have been everywhere.”

“Maybe a completely cut-off section of Hydra? One that wasn't part of the rest of the system, but how that’s possible I don't know.” Steve says with a shrug, while the rest of them wonder how something so monumental could have been kept hidden for so long. 

“When are we heading out?” Rhodey asks. “And who's going? A facility this large means you're going to need a lot of backup.”

Pietro scoffs at the assessment and everyone turns to look at him. He shrugs. “I could take out the entire place in seconds. I could do that before your computer even hacks the place.”

“Is that so?” Tony says, crossing his arms. “What are you going to do if you come across this ectoplasm stuff and you can't get past it? Or it hurts you, or it negates your speed? We don't have enough information about this place for you to go in unprepared. Maybe after we get the defenses taken down you could, but it's still dangerous with that Phantom character around.”

Wanda hits her brother's arm lightly. “Think before you speak, brother. Not all problems can be solved with your abilities.”

“Most can,” Pietro mumbles quietly enough that no one comments on it. 

“As for everyone going,” Tony says as he claps his hands together, drawing the attention back to him, “We need Nat to sneak in and get Friday into Hydra’s system. Everyone else hangs back until security is down and their alarms are useless. Then Cap and his bestie can break down the front door while the twins go in the back. I want Vision to hang back until we find out just where and how to help this kid.” 

He shifts his attention to Rhodey and Bruce, who are sitting next to each other. “Sam and I will be air support while Rhodey makes sure the army comes running to sweep up the mess we are definitely going to be making. We don't know what state this kid is gonna be in if we even find him, so I'm going to have Cho stay on the plane with Bruce as her assistant. I don't think we'll need mean and green, but I'd feel better if Cho had someone with her, just to be on the safe side.”

“Mr. Stark, what do you want me to do?” Peter says, looking excited about the prospect of getting to go on an Avengers mission. He’s never gotten to go with the team on these sorts of things, but he really wants to go and help the poor soul that's been tortured. 

“Yeah, no. You are gonna stay here and man the helm. Your aunt would kill me if I let you go,” Tony says as he waggles a finger at the kid. It may be childish but nobody ever said he was mature. 

Peter sputters his protest as he stands up, gesturing wildly as he talks. “I can help! I swear I won't get in anybody's way or get hurt. I can even be backup like Mr. Banner! Mr. Stark, please, please, let me go with you.”

Peter pulls out his ultimate weapon and gives him the puppy eyes. The others look away except for Clint, who has kids and has become immune to that look no matter what his wife says. 

“No. Nu-uh. Nope. Not happening. Absolutely not.” Tony completely avoids the look by staring down at his phone. “There's no telling what this kid can do and I'm not going to be the one to tell May that you got hurt because you wanted to tag along on a mission way above your pay grade. You can monitor the progress from the safety of the tower and that's final.”

With a sigh, Peter drops back into his chair the way only a teenager can. “Fine but I get to meet him once you get him back here and patched up.”

The genius stares at his apprentice for a moment, just long enough to make the teenager squirm in his seat. “We'll see.”

“How long before we're ready to go?” Steve asks as he watches Peter slump in his seat, defeated. 

“I'll leave now and let the higher-ups know to be ready. Let me know when we can move in.” Rhodey says as he stands up and hugs Tony before leaving the room. 

“Be prepared to go by midday tomorrow,” Tony replies “Hopefully, Friday will have even more detailed information for us.”

The groups leave after that, all going their separate ways to get ready for the mission. All except Peter who glumly goes back to Queens to do his evening patrol. 

~~~

“Okay, people! We land in 10. Everyone knows their part, so do your last-minute checks now.” Natasha says from the pilot seat of the Quinjet. 

Everyone adds the last bit of necessary items to their persons as the jet lands. 

Natasha leaves the jet first, quickly and quietly easing herself into the building unseen. Tony had been able to get better pictures of the guards and had made her a matching outfit to go over her Widow outfit. Between that and the face cloaking device she wears, she’s unrecognizable. 

It doesn’t take long for her to find an empty office with a usable computer. After powering up the device, she sticks the flash drive holding Friday in. It only takes five minutes before Tony is on the comm telling her the security system is down and all parties are go for entry.

It doesn't take long for the Hydra agents and staff to start rushing around in a panic. Pietro finds Natasha almost instantly knocking out any guards that come around. 

“Hold your breath. Tony wants me to take you to the lab where the scientists are,” Pietro says, grabbing Natasha’s arm with one hand and bracing her neck and head with the other. 

This isn't the first time he's done this to one of the team members. They've all practiced this maneuver during training so that the motion doesn't catch anyone unaware. So, she does what he says without question. 

It barely takes a second as they zip through halls faster than the eye can see. Thankfully, Natasha’d had the foresight to put her hair up so that the flowing red locks wouldn’t tangle into a horrid mess. The sudden stop unbalances her for a second.

The entire room of scientists are in shock as Natasha and Pietro suddenly appear. The scientists startle as their brains finally kick into gear but before they have the chance to react, Pietro already has them tied up with tape around their mouths.

“Well, that was easy,” Natasha says amusedly. “What’s in here that he wants…” She trails off as she looks around. On one wall are large screens showing off a lot of information on one subject. Hurrying over to them, Natasha takes pictures of each screen so they can be inspected much closer later.

Going through a computer, she finds a file on The Phantom Soldier Project. Not only does it include information about the various ways they tortured the subject, but it also has information on how they’re controlling it. The file also tells her exactly where the kid is now.

“If anyone can hear me, Phantom is in a cell on the Northwest side,” Natasha says into her comm. “His room has those weird shields in the wall preventing him from getting out, so you might have to break down the door. There should also be a collar around his neck that prevents him from using his abilities. Someone try to get to him before Hydra activates him!” As she speaks, Nat pulls out another flash drive and starts downloading all the files she can get her hands on.

“We’re on it,” Steve replies into the comms.

Natasha pulls the flash drive out of the computer and places it in a nearly invisible pocket in her suit. “The lab is secure and I’ve got the flash drive. Anyone need help?”

“I could use-” Clint’s sentence is cut off by a grunt as a Hydra agent manages to kick him in the knee. He’s at a disadvantage as the number of agents overwhelms him. 

Natasha doesn’t have to say anything to Pietro before he’s rushing her to Clint’s side. 

There are small burns all over Clint from the guns that Hydra has, something the two Shield agents have never seen before. The gun barrel glows a bright neon green with the same colored smoke coming off it. Clint grits his teeth from the sharp pain.

Natasha and Pietro make quick work of the agents, taking a few of the guns in the process. 

“What in the hell is this powered with?” Clint grunts as he stands up, grabs a dropped gun, and looks it over. “Is this that ectoplasm that Tony was talking about? It hurts like a bitch.”

Suddenly, a large explosion shakes the entire building and several alarms go off, bathing the hallways in red. A high-pitched scream echoes through the comms along with static and sharp crackling.

“What was that?” Tony shouts, sounding slightly distracted.

“Wasn’t from my end,” Natasha and Wanda say at the exact same time.

Clint and Natasha look at each other with concern on their faces. “Steve.”

~~~

“We’re on it,” Steve says, grunting as he takes a gut punch from an agent.

Bucky appears suddenly and picks the agent up. As if the guy weighs nothing, Bucky throws him at a wall, swings around, and punches another agent in the face with a harsh crunching noise. With a practiced elegance, the two super soldiers dance around each other with ease, each fending off a blow that was aimed at the other. They’d spent so much time together that they knew each other's movements without having to communicate it.

By the time they’ve gotten the agents taken care of, the floor is littered with bodies. Most are unconscious but there are a few who met the wrong end of Bucky’s guns. There are scorch marks mixed in amongst the blood splatters along the walls from these new weapons, but Steve and Bucky’s bodies are already healing, leaving behind red welts instead of burns. 

“We need to hurry, Steve,” Bucky says. “If Hydra has done to this kid even half of what they did to me, then we’re going to be in for a rough time. We have to hope that they haven’t been able to activate him.” Bucky continues in the direction they were headed before they got ambushed.

“What do you remember about this kid, Bucky?” Steve asks as he takes off after him.

“He wasn’t human. They made him wear this thing that prevented him from using his powers. It was a collar but it would inject him with this poison so that he was too weak to escape. They made me train him to fight without any of his abilities so I don’t know what he can actually do.” Bucky grimaces slightly as he continues. “They were still trying to turn him into an obedient little soldier when I left. Something about his physiology prevented the chair from being completely effective.” He sounds regretful. His role in this made him ashamed even if it wasn’t his fault.

“Did they try and add any…accessories to him like they did with you?” Steve asks.

“I don’t know. Well, I don’t remember,” Bucky replies.

They slow down as they come to a section of the building on the northwest side. It’s glowing slightly with the same neon green that came from the Hydra weapons. Steve’s pretty sure that this is the correct area, but he doesn’t want to be wrong and come across another new weapon that Hydra has made. 

The hallway they’re in is filled with steel doors. There must be about fifty doors lining both sides of the hallway with no markings on most of them. Bucky and Steve each cautiously open a door and find that the room inside is an empty cell. 

The rooms are dark, with only the light from the hallway shining in letting them see just how barren it was. The only things in the rooms were a simple toilet, sink, and bed. Leaving the door open, Bucky and Steve move on to the next room.

They check room after room, only to find them all empty. When Bucky gets to a door marked with a number, he whistles to get Steve’s attention.

The room is locked and they don’t have the time to find the keys, so they try to bust down the door. With both of them kicking down the door at the same time, it finally dents inward enough to peel away from the walls. Both of them grab a side and pull, using the entirety of their strength until they’ve ripped the door off the hinges.

Inside is a kid who looks like they’re on their deathbed. They’re lying on the bed with their back to Bucky and Steve. Neither Bucky nor Steve can hear a heartbeat, but the kid doesn’t stop them from coming into the room.

This room is brighter than the others, a soft green light bathing everything in a sickly glow.

“Hello?” Steve walks forward cautiously.

The kid doesn’t move and they still can’t hear a heartbeat. When Steve finally gets over to the kid, he puts two fingers on their neck to check the pulse. There’s no heartbeat and the kid’s skin is cold to the touch. With a sad sigh, Steve leaves the kid where they are and turns to Bucky. Bucky looks upset when Steve shakes his head, but there’s nothing either of them can do, so they move on.

They quickly realize that the doors with no markings are all empty, so they only go after the doors with markings. With each unmoving kid that they find inside, the super soldiers become more and more hopeless. It isn’t until they get to the end of the hallway that they realize that they only have one door left, and with it, all their hope that the person inside is alive.

Steve and Bucky rip the door off its hinges, but before Steve can walk inside, Bucky puts a hand on his chest to stop him.

Inside the center of the room is a glowing boy, kneeling and chained to the floor. He can’t be more than 17 or 18. His hair is pure white and floats as if gravity has no hold on it. His eyes are clenched shut and he looks absolutely terrified. There’s a thick metal collar around his neck that hangs around his neck tightly. Chains hang from his wrists and ankles, leading to several metal loops in the floor, all tightly drawn so that he’s forced to kneel.

The kid has no shirt on and looks malnourished, his ribs practically poking through his skin. Wounds and bruises cover every inch of exposed skin, making it hard to tell if the slight green from his skin is natural or if all the injuries cause it. The poor boy is hunching over as much as he can with the chains attached.

Bucky takes a step forward into the room, but it’s Steve that calls out gently. “Phantom?”

A sharp intake of breath comes from the kid and he flinches. He opens his eyes and his gaze immediately locks on to Bucky. Panic and terror flood through his glowing emerald eyes as Phantom starts jerking viciously on his chains.

“Nononononono.” Phantom cries over and over again, desperately trying to get away from the person in front of him. “I’ll be good. I swear. I’ll do better this time. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. Please don’t hurt me. I swear. I’ll be good. I’ll do it right. Whatever you want.”

Anguish twists Bucky’s expression as he listens to the teen’s frantic pleading. He’s frozen to the spot watching the tortured soul trying to break free of his prison. What did they do to this kid? he thinks. Fuck. What did I do to him?

Steve slowly walks past Bucky, towards the struggling boy. With all his strength, he crushes the collar and rips it off Phantom’s neck. It takes Phantom only a few seconds to realize he no longer has the steel wrapped around his neck, but when he does, it’s like his whole demeanor shifts.

There’s a cunning gleam in his eyes and with a deep breath, Phantom screams loud and clear. The sound is deafening, forcing both Bucky and Steve to cover their ears. Phantom stops and takes an even deeper breath and the scream becomes something more. 

It’s a banshee scream that sends Bucky and Steve flying back through the doorway they’d walked through. They’re sent flying all the way out of the room into the opposite side of the hallway with such force that they dent the wall. The longer the wail goes on, the more the walls start to shake, until the walls are shaking so much that debris rains down onto Bucky and Steve. They’ve just managed to get themselves up when a loud explosion suddenly erupts in front of him, knocking them back into the same wall with such force that they’re knocked unconscious. Their bodies slowly slide down to the floor, and the last thing they hear is someone screaming their names.

[ghostlyglimmer]

Ectoberweek Day 31: He thought he'd been prepared to take off the mask on the hazmat suit and see what he looked like underneath. He couldn't have been more wrong.

Summary:

He thought he'd been prepared to take off the mask on the hazmat suit and see what he looked like underneath. He couldn't have been more wrong. The portal messed him up more than he thought.

Notes:

Finally finished Ectoberhaunt/Ectoberweek! I am SO PROUD OF MYSELF! This is the first time I've ever done an october/danny phantom event and I did EVERY DAY! A huge feat for me aaaaaa ;0;

Danny stood in front of the mirror, his fingers trembling as they hovered over the fasteners of his hazmat suit. His heart pounded in his chest, the rhythm unnatural, more of a low thrum than a proper beat. He had convinced himself that he was ready for this, that after weeks of sleepless nights, of nightmares and flashes of what had happened in the portal, he could finally face the truth.

Just a glance, he told himself. A brief peek to confirm that he was still himself under all of this — under the glowing eyes, the strange strength, and the eerie stillness of his pulse. It was just a precautionary suit, after all, something to contain his energy when he fought ghosts. At least, that’s what he had convinced himself it was. But now, as his fingers slowly undid the clasp, he couldn’t shake the feeling that something terrible awaited him beneath.

The latch clicked open, and Danny felt his breath hitch in his throat. He wasn’t breathing, not really — not since the accident. He was pretending to breathe. The reality of that settled in the pit of his stomach, cold and unyielding, like a stone lodged where his warmth should be.

With a slow, deliberate motion, Danny peeled the suit away from his body. His eyes, glowing a harsh ectoplasmic green, locked onto the mirror.

At first, he saw that he had unusual pale skin, the white hair that had replaced his once-dark locks, and the faint glow that always seemed to cling to him in his ghost form. But as the suit fell away completely, his reflection twisted. Shifted.

His skin… no, it wasn’t skin anymore.

Danny’s breath—or the shallow imitation of it—caught in his throat. His face, his chest, his arms, his entire body, charred and burned, was revealed. Blackened skin, cracked and mottled like the surface of scorched earth, stretched over his bones. Green ectoplasm pulsed through the cracks, like veins of molten fire running just beneath his surface. His fingers twitched, and the motion caused flakes of charred flesh to crumble from his hands, only to be replaced by more seeping ectoplasm.

Oh God.

His eyes widened, horror seizing him as he stumbled back, hitting the bathroom wall. His reflection followed, the sickening reality of what he’d become staring back at him. This wasn’t just a ghost form. This wasn’t just some new transformation.

This was him — his real body.

“What… what the hell…” Danny whispered, though his voice cracked, barely audible. He reached a shaking hand toward his face, his fingers brushing against the charred remains of his cheek. The sensation was numb, like touching something distant, not really his own skin. His heart, that dull thrumming echo of a heartbeat, sped up, each pulse a painful reminder of the accident in the ghost portal.

Memories flooded back in fragmented flashes. The screams, the burning sensation, the searing light that had enveloped him when the portal had torn open and ripped through his body. He had never really seen what he looked like after the accident — he’d never wanted to. He had convinced himself that his ghost form was just another side of him, a reflection of his powers, of the energy that had saved him from the brink of death.

But he hadn’t been saved.

He had died.

The boy who had entered that portal was dead, reduced to ash and embers. What stood before him now was something else entirely—something that only wore Danny Fenton’s face when the hazmat suit was on. But beneath it, there was nothing human left.

Just this… charred, hollow corpse.

Danny’s legs gave out beneath him, and he slid to the floor, his back pressed against the cold tile wall. He clenched his eyes shut, trying to block out the sight of his twisted reflection, but he couldn’t unsee it. The truth had sunk in, deep into his core.

He was no longer the boy who lived. He was the boy who had died. Everything since that accident, everything he had tried to hold onto—his family, his friends, his life—had been a lie. Phantom wasn’t just a mask or a persona. It was all that remained.

He let out a shaky breath, or at least tried to. It caught in his throat, more of a rasp than anything else. What would his parents say if they saw him like this? If they knew the truth of what had happened to their son? Would they even recognize him as Danny, or would they see him as just another ghost — just another monster to be hunted and destroyed?

He pressed his hand to his chest, feeling the unnatural smoothness of his charred skin, the faint vibration of ectoplasm flowing beneath it like blood. It was a grotesque mockery of life. He wasn’t healing, wasn’t recovering from this. This was him now. This was all he had left.

Tears pricked at his eyes, but even they were tinged green, drops of ectoplasm that burned as they rolled down his cheeks. He looked up at his reflection once more, his glowing eyes locking with the hollow, scorched thing staring back at him.

And for the first time since the accident, Danny Phantom understood just how much he had truly lost.

He wasn’t prepared to take off the mask — not now, not ever. Because the mask, the suit, the human skin he hid behind, was all that kept him tethered to the life he so desperately wanted to return to.

But the truth had always been waiting beneath. A truth as blackened and charred as the body he now inhabited.

And now, there was no hiding from it.

[not-my-final-account]

I flew back into the cave with my backpack and stepped out of a shadow, it made Robin flinch and that was worth it “Don’t be sad B, you’re nearly as good as him and you don’t have powers.” Red Hood said

“Do you eat human food?” Nightwing asked

“I can.” I said, Nightwing considered that and I realised it might look like I take blood just because I can. “We’ll let me show you to your room,” Nightwing started walking so I followed him.

-

“I know you hate magic users but he’s definitely something supernatural.” I said

“I know.” B grumbled

“He easily followed Dick and Dick clearly was not going easy on him.” Damian said

“Besides.” Tim cut it “He has that walk, like what he’s doing is too slow for him and there would be an easier way to do this, like with Superman and Clark Kent?”

“How long do you think he’s been alive?” I asked, “You know, if he’s a vampire?”

“Old as heck, he was experienced enough to know B wasn’t a vampire and he’s seen Demons.” Tim said

“That is ridiculous.” Damian scoffed

“Murder child is right, demons are rare and living after you’ve seen one is pretty much zero. Their like ghosts but way more common!” I said

“What if he’s not a vampire?” B asked. Silence.

“He was drinking blood.” I said

“And did you see the way he looked in the first few seconds?” Damian asked

“He is better and phasing from shadow to shadow than you! Better at the night than the Batman!” Tim said, B seemed to sulk a little more and I smiled behind my mask “He switched sides of the room without being seen by us!”

“That would take either years of practice- as in hundreds of years or powers. He probably has both.” Damian said

“Just considering all possibilities.” B replied

-

“Thank you!” I said. Nightwing closed the door and I fell down onto the bed in a belly flop, I changed back to my human form then switched back in a few seconds, now that I could do it for ages and even keep it up while knocked out I figured I should. Gotham was a dangerous city (seriously, both new and old ghosts keep coming to me and I have to let them use me to get to the ghost zone) and I should have my powers ready, also I have a whole vampire thing to keep up now.

What else do vampires do? Vlad certainly looks like one, in ghost form at least, that thought made me sigh. Vampires were hated and distrusted but not hunted down on sight like ghosts were, somehow I doubted Gotham would be any different. Besides even if ghosts were kept safe what would people think about a halfa? I was sent here to live not worry! I can’t wait until I can see Sam and Tucker though, oh well. I yawned, you’d think being a halfa meant needing less sleep because ghosts have this weird relatioinship with sleep, but in reality it just meant I got twice as tired because I use both human and ghost things almost constantly.

-

I drank from my thermos and sat on a high outcropping, I watched as a motor cycle roared in and a delicious Red Hood stumbled off. I wasn’t going to go close when I realised the smell was stronger and his eyes were glowing green. He had too much ecto in his system for a human!

I flew down quickly but Jason jumped me, I held him down and bit his neck cleaning his blood from the ecto. Jason thrashed in my grip then calmed down. I know personally that big changes in ecto levels can have effects so I stopped drinking, this was a slowly take more each time kinda thing.

“P-Phantom?” Jason asked, he slumped down and any human would’ve had trouble carrying him. “The pit rage.” Jason said, I’m going to look into this pit

“Don’t worry, you need rest, ecto- pit stuff can be dangerous.” I said, I cleaned the last ecto off my teeth and Red Robin and Nightwing came running

“Jaso- Did You Bite Him!?” Red Robin yelled

“… no.” I said, Nightwing gave me a look and I remembered the news report about which robins were the most violent, the one which showed him beating up some super villain, and handed him his brother.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

[invis-o-william]

Day 2: Wish

All Amity Parkers knew that “wish” was practically a forbidden word. Years of interactions with Desiree had all but guaranteed that. Younger children weren’t even taught the word anymore out of an abundance of caution, after all nobody wanted a repeat of the “Toddler Wish-mageddon” that had occurred just a year prior. The firemen had been cleaning chocolate syrup out of the streets for weeks afterwards. This left the naive and unassuming newcomers as targets for Desire’s power, many of whom didn’t quite believe the city moniker of “The Most Haunted Place on Earth” yet. One of those newcomers was Thomas Kincade, and one way or another he too would learn the consequences of the word “wish”.

. . .

Thomas had barely lived in Amity Park a week before his coworkers started messing with him. He had just been sitting down in the breakroom for lunch when Craig from accounting had sidled up in the next chair.

“Oh hey Tom,you’re new to town, right?” he asked while grabbing a bowl from his bag.

Thomas hummed an affirmative while digging through the box chock full of leftover lo mein that his wife had left him that morning. “Yeah, just moved from Springfield like a week and a half ago, why? Also, it's Thomas.”

Craig pointed a fork his way, “Well you should probably invest in a lunch bag or something. That box is a prime target for the Box Ghost you know. He’s usually pretty harmless, but he’ll definitely steal that thing in a heartbeat if he sees you with it man.” He accentuated his point by tapping on said box with his fork.

Thomas sighed. Although he’d only lived in the city for under two weeks, he’d already seen more than enough of the “ghost tourist trap” schtick. “You can give the “ghost” thing a rest Craig, I think I’ll be fine.” he said with a roll of his eyes.

Craig shrugged, “Alright Tommy, don’t say I didn’t warn you. You transplants never quite believe it at first anyway.”

“It’s Thomas.” Thomas said pointedly. Craig made a noncommittal noise before digging into his meal.

. . .

The next day it happened again. Thomas was working at his computer when his deskmate Maria leaned over the divider.

“Hey Tim, did you see the news this morning?” she asked excitedly.

Slightly irritated, Thomas looked up. “No, I didn’t. And it’s Thomas.”

Maria didn’t seem to hear him as she waved her hands around, “They got some footage of the fight between Phantom and that big metal ghost last night on the corner of Park Place and Amity Row! It looked so intense, and the big ghost is so cool looking!” She practically squealed the last words.

Thomas groaned and let his head fall back. “Look, I get it, you guys are pulling my leg, ‘ha-ha lets haze the newbie’ kind of stuff, but its getting old.”

Huffing, Maria crossed her arms. “How long have you been here now? Two weeks? You can’t tell me that you haven’t seen one of the ghosts yet! Hell, blob ghosts are so common I’m surprised one hasn’t popped into your yard yet” she said with a roll of her eyes. “Just hope you don’t encounter any big ones, you definitely don’t want to run into the Fenton’s with their tank-on-wheels.”

With a sigh and a shake of his head Thomas turned back to his work as Maria shrugged and did the same.

. . .

Thomas was getting fed up. Everyone kept talking about ghosts. “Phantom’s been seen here” and “The whisps have been really active lately” and all that crap. How long was everyone going to pull this? Not to mention that nobody wanted to call him anything but nicknames. Why was calling him Thomas so hard for them???

The last straw was his boss stopping by his desk an hour before quitting time.

“Hey Timbo, everyone on the floor is going to head over to the Mitty Boulevard Bistro after work for dinner, company’s treat. Want to join?” he said, leaning an arm on the desk divider.

Thomas’ eye twitched. “Yeah, sure that’s fine. And please. It’s Thomas.”

His boss smiled, “Great! Originally we were going to head over to the Mexican place on Park Place, but they’re closed for cleanup from that ghost fight last night.”

“Yeah! You can thank Phantom for that, honestly the Bistro is sooo good. I like Mexican food and all, but you gotta try the Bistro’s fries Tim!” Maria said, perking up from her seat.

Thomas had had it. “Ghosts this, ghosts that! I’m so sick of this! Just give it a rest already! And my name. Is. THOMAS. Not Tim, not Tommy, just Thomas!” he cried as he picked up his coat and lunch box. “If this is how all of you are going to treat me, then count me out of the dinner. Honestly I wish you guys would just cut it out already!”

Everyone in the office went deadly silent and stared at Thomas with wide eyes.

“Thomas,” began Maria, “you shouldn’t say that word. I’m sorry that we were teasing you so much about your name, but you really shouldn’t say that word.”

Thomas scoffed, “What word?”

Everyone looked around nervously, “The “w” word,” his boss said, “there’s a ghost who grants them, usually in the worst ways possible.”

Thomas threw his hands up in the air. “What, wish? Now you’re telling me that there’s a wish-granting ghost? If there was, I'd wish she’d make you all see sense right now because ghosts aren’t real!”

The office was deadly still and many held their breath. There was always a chance Desiree wasn’t around, but some still expected her to appear and grant the wish.

Instead the Box Ghost popped in out of nowhere, grabbed Thomas’ lunch box, shouted “BEWARE!”, and vanished.

Thomas could say he knew better now to pack his lunch in a bag.

[strong-with-the-sarcasm]

Part 7 - running from a crucifixion

Dp x DC AU: Regent!Jazz & Vigilante!Jazz

"Look, to you I'm different- it's 'cause I refuse to listen to all the stupid shit that you include in your opinion. I got enough issues trying to be a human living in a ruined system while I'm running from a crucifixion." -Monster in Me by From Ashes to New

Masterlist Part 6

Jazz felt a shiver run down her spine. 

Currently in her office sorting through another pile of paperwork, the Regent hadn’t been bothered by any denzien for the past few hours thanks to the guard outside her door barring all but a select few. It’d been nice to demolish one of the piles that weighed down her desk.

She had a feeling that Danny was doing something stupid. Or reckless, but she was betting on stupid.  

Her little brother had finally healed enough to transform into Phantom to join her nightly patrols, a welcome addition to her mostly routine nights so far, and Jason’s proto-core was healing at a decent rate. Frostbite’s original timeline for him to wake up probably was on point, if he continued to adjust to the pure ecto in his system as he had been so far. It was good news for the Fentons, soon they would be able to move Jason back to his haunt. And Jazz could get her bed back. 

(She ignored the part of her that would miss his firm presence at her back, the jumble of limbs she had to untangle herself from every time she left the bed.) 

(Jason seemed to gravitate to her proto-core’s warmth.)

(It did not make Jazz happy. Not at all.) 

(Frostbite had only offered her a secretive smirk at her questioning of how attracted attached she was to the once-revenant.)

(Damn Yeti.)

A moment taken to clear her head of such thoughts, Jazz stood up from her desk to stretch her heavy limbs. Life was settling, oddly enough, but when would that change? 

Witching Hours patrol was, admittedly, Jazz’s favorite time of night- Crime Alley was alive while the world outside slept. There were good people who called the Alley their home, their haunt if you will, and the Regent found herself gravitating towards the street walkers when she wanted company during the slow moments. 

They were people doing a job and Jazz had nothing but respect for them. Interwoven as a tight-knit community, a new vigilante hanging about was disconcerting. The Regent was a steadfast presence though and was gradually wearing them down, but Jazz was sure her willingness to beat down the assholes who push their luck helped her case. 

Armored to the teeth with her ecto-sword at her side, she kept a watchful eye during the Alley’s Witching Hours patrol. The big bat himself had refused to cross into the Hood’s territory, but a few of the birds and smaller bats had no such qualm. 

With the King and his Regent’s aid of the Haunt of the Red Hood, the Shades that claimed shelter from larger predators would eagerly warn of approaching intruders, especially those that came with less than neutral intent.

Robin was one such intruder. 

The  youngest of the flock, a fellow sword wielding vigilante, the Robin was a strange bird. 

He felt like Jason did now, but younger, less corrupt than the ecto in the once-Revenant. Perhaps it was due to his age, but there was little doubt that the baby bird would become a powerful baby ghost when it was his time. 

(Lady Gotham had no more of herself left to give, should one of her knights meet an end.) 

(She had given of herself for Jason, the once and Future Hope of Gotham.)

The Regent, brought to attention by a Shade, turned to the Bird in her presence. 

“Good Evening, Robin.” Her voice echoed with a soft cadence. “What brings you to the Hood’s Haunt?” 

The small bird scowled, irritation all but leaking from his very being, “Where is Red Hood?” 

Though he couldn’t see her expression from underneath her helmet, Jazz tried not to let her shock be obvious. 

(What had led the bird to her?)

“Pardon?” 

“Do not waste time, tell me where my brother is and I will not hurt you.” 

(Oh, wasn’t that adorable.) 

Jazz craned her neck farther downward as she stepped closer, not daring to raise her sword from its lowered position at her side. 

The Robin froze as she stood toe to toe with him, the Shades of the Alley surrounding them both as they hissed their displeasure with his threat. 

(Much later, Jazz would soak in the feeling of belonging she received from the Shades.) 

(The Regent was theirs.)

Robin was surely catching the charged energy in the air around them. 

“I do not deal with threats, young bird, when they come from children who should not be heroes.” Jazz hissed, before she softened her tone. “Enough children have died for the sins of their parents.” 

(Danny.) 

(Ellie.) 

(Dan.) 

(Jasmine.) 

“If there is anything I can tell you,” the bird was frozen in shock, perhaps fear, as Jazz continued once more, “Jason will return and he will be free from his corruption, Robin.” 

The Regent did not stick around, instead allowing gravity to bring her down once she jumped from the rooftop. Hopefully Robin would understand something of what she said, but Jazz wasn’t going to get her hopes up. 

Tim did not like mysteries so close to home. 

Home being his siblings, his family, and nothing got his hackles raised more than a mystery that threatened the safety of his people. 

Jason had vanished, no communication in or out prior to his disappearance almost two weeks prior. Usually not a concern, but the Outlaws were all accounted for and had no knowledge of where Red Hood was. 

Or what he had been up to. 

When trying to find a missing person, it usually helped to know what they had been doing beforehand, but Jason was a miser when it came to his personal interests- which included civilian and vigilante activities. Sure, he allowed Oracle to connect him to the main channel, but he had yet to use it. 

Then there were the trackers. 

Tim had three of his own in each of his siblings, one for mask and uniform and two that could be used to record vitals remotely. Bruce had approved of such paranoid foresight, of course he did, and his siblings had only accepted it and moved in, but Jason had adamantly refused Bat-monitoring of any kind- trackers included. 

Though Cass had seen fit to convince their wayward brother otherwise. 

Lo and behold, Tim had been given access to Jason’s only tracker- code withheld by their silent sister until it was clear that Red Hood was missing. 

The best part? 

It was embedded in his chest, in his very body and despite the interference of something making his vital records a rollercoaster of confusing read outs, it proved that Jason had been very much alive on the day of the last Arkham breakout. 

The same breakout that Joker had been abducted and (supposedly) killed during, his head mounted like a grotesque trophy for the world to witness. 

It wasn’t a coincidence that the vitals went haywire within the same timeframe as the Breakout Alarm, was it? 

Tim triple checked the two times and yep, eerily same, though the biggest concern wasn’t that it was during Joker’s abduction, but the fact that the only vital to be recorded thanks to the strange interference was Jason’s heart rate- it’s max number reaching a distressing 230 bpm, before either the tracker finally gave up the ghost or … Jason did. 

It was the sort of thing Tim could only keep to himself for fear of sending Bruce down the path of madness again. 

It was unfortunate that Bruce seemed to come to the worst conclusion possible without Tim’s input.

The incidental meeting with the Ghost Kid, Phantom as he preferred, had thrown everything Tim believed about Death and Not-Death into a depressing tailspin, especially when he finally worked up the courage to sort through the documents and files on the flash drive. 

(And don’t get him started on which was weirder- a ghost having a flash drive or pulling said thing out of his chest like it was normal to have that ability.)

Bruce had not taken Phantom well. 

Not the ghost nor the information he dropped on Batman like a boulder; be it the fact that it was a dead kid he was speaking to, said kid pleading to not send him to war against the living, or an impending war with the Dead thanks to the Government fucking around and finding out. 

(Bruce had been livid.) 

(There were several people immensely grateful that Batman had a no killing rule.) 

(Otherwise heads would be rolling.) 

In all honesty, Tim wasn’t surprised anymore that the dumbasses messed up. 

What he was surprised about, was the lore of the Infinite Realms at his fingertips. It was fascinating that anyone could call these entities non-sapient when they had so many cultures and traditions, the Realms even had a monarchy! 

A powerful being that held several interesting titles according to Phantom’s files: Great One, Defender of The Light, Vanquisher of the Dark, the Once and Future King of Stars….

(Later, a bewildered Constantine would confirm that ‘yes, those are correct and not even close to all of them, how did you get this? Bloody hell, is this color-coded?’) 

(The files were, in fact, color-coded.)

(Green, Teal, Black and Red)

There were so many powerful entities on file, organized by their known power sets, preferred name, and their ‘danger rating’… and they were kept in the green section. 

(Strangely, a small ghost dog with the preferred name ‘Cujo’ was listed with two danger ratings- one for ‘small’ and one for ‘big’.) 

Phantom himself was listed with a mind-boggling power set that included almost the entirety of the Justice League’s own. The only note where it concerned his rating was ‘Spirit of Protection’, which Tim suspected meant that Phantom wasn’t a fighter unless he had to be one, but the power set given made him concerned about what exactly Phantom could be protecting that needed all that. 

The last listed in the high rating category was named only as ‘The Regent’, with the titles of ‘Lady of the Acropolis’ and ‘Death-Claimed Champion’. The picture was of a tall knight in black and teal armor, helmet fully obstructing their face much like the ‘Fright Knight’, bearing a long sword of some intricate design…. And bracelets he’d only seen worn by none other than Wonder Woman. 

Oh yeah, Batman was gonna have a field day.

A/N: Forgot to mention that the song quotes at the beginning are more there for decoration or what songs I was listening to as I wrote. All of them are added to the Jazz/Jason playlist I have.

The idea for the files came from the AO3 fic 'Batman, Meet Team Phantom', this specific chapter. Also, an Anger management ship fic that I've reread several times now. Not a copy, but I really liked the idea.

[kizzer55555]

DP x DC: My Brother’s Ghost

So there are a bunch of fics where Danny and Damian are twins and Danny eventually has to go to Gotham or Damian/another bat interacts with Danny as ghost king. But I do you one better. Danny faked his death because of failing a mission/he actually died and his mother brought him back. (Or maybe he revived on his own after constant Lazarus exposure over time and knew he couldn’t go back). Anyways, Danny knew that he needed to go to Bruce Wayne in Gotham if he ever needed anything but only as a last resort as they would expect him to go there. So he’s been monitoring Bruce from afar and immediately knew when Damian joined the bats. He clocked him as the new Robin and started following his hero career more closely. He was content to watch his family from afar. Even after the accident. Then something happens where Robin was said to go missing and when no news showed up after a few days, Danny got worried so figured it couldn’t hurt to do a quick trip to Gotham.

He dresses in all black and a hood made using an old ninja Halloween costume. Not nearly as much protection as his old league uniform but with his ghost powers he doesn’t really need protection. Just anonymity. He goes to Gotham in phantom form, making sure all his white hair is carefully tucked in the black hood so only his green eyes remain. He uses his old assassin training and finds Robin drugged and captured in an old warehouse by the court of owls. Robin clearly isn’t thinking straight but Danny puts him in a simple choke hold to knock him unconscious anyways. Better safe than sorry. He quickly frees the boy and drops him off in an area he knows the other bats are searching. After watching to make sure Damian is safe and a bat finds him, he leaves.

Damian could barely remember his capture but he thought he saw a figure in black with glowing green eyes. He could have sworn the future was trying to kill him but…he woke up looking at another bat (or maybe even the manor). Did his family save him?

Meanwhile, Danny can’t stop thinking about Damian. Despite his assassin training, he was drugged and hurt. Danny thought his brother could handle himself. He thought he would be safe. But what if this happened again? What if the colony of bats wasn’t enough? So Danny couldn’t help the occasional visit to Gotham to make sure his twin was ok. Most of the time he didn’t do anything, just watched. Sometimes, though, there would be an instance where Damian got out of a dangerous situation and no one knew how. A building collapsed, Damian appeared unharmed outside. A goon was about to get a lucky shot? Somehow the bullet missed or the goon got taken out when no other bats were nearby. Fear gas? Damian faintly remembers warm hands hugging him as he struggled. And while he thought it was weird he heard his brother’s comforting voice when it should be a nightmare, he chalked it up to the fear gas anyways since there was no other explanation.

Yet every time there is a particularly dangerous encounter, he swears he sees the figure in black. Damian sees the figure more and more yet none of his family do. They swore to keep an eye out anyways in case. You never know. Sometimes the figure becomes more clear and Damian has tried to chase them but always loses them quickly. One time the chase lasted at least five minutes and Damian managed to corner the figure in an alleyway only for them to pass through the wall.

The bats suspect that this could either be meta abilities or magic. The funny thing is, there were no traces. No one sees the figure except Damian. No one hears them, and there is nothing to indicate their presence, not even footprints. It’s like they were never there and no matter how hard they try, there is no footage of the figure. Sometimes cameras glitch out and sometimes they only show Robin, sometimes neither or they seem to loop on themselves. So the bats are leaning towards Magic.

They call Constantine to give Damian a thorough check and he declares that Damian shows signs of interacting with a ghost. And that stumps everyone. A ghost? If it was a friendly specter like Deadman then he would help everyone, not just Damian. If it was hostile, it would never help Damian. So why is this ghost only focusing on the youngest bat and why? Is there even someone that would come back from the afterlife to help the demon brat, let alone have the will strong enough to manifest a ghost that can affect the living? Damian was a former assassin after all and he’s hardly the friendliest bat. So who would help him that has already died?

Throughout this, Damian is silent. Because there is one person he knows to have died that might do this. One person skilled enough to avoid the other bats and evade Damian during a chase. One person Damian would acknowledge as having a will stronger than his own. But something was wrong…because he was sure that that person didn’t have green eyes.

So the next time the figure shows himself Damian attacks. Not just a chase but an outright challenge. Hand to hand combat. And as Damian punches and kicks, the figure expertly parries each attack. And as the fight goes on, Damian watches. And he knows those moves. Those dodges. Those blocks. He can read this figure’s fighting stance like the back of his hand because he grew up with it.

And Damian knows without a shadow of a doubt as the figure disappears into he ground, that despite the changed eye color, the tan skin, the increased height, his brother’s ghost has come back to watch over him.

And for the first time in many years, Damian cries. That’s how the bats find him.

[fangirlwriting-stories]

Afterlife Lessons

Summary: Sam’s awareness of ghosts extended to exactly two pieces of knowledge: Danny’s parents are ghost hunters, and ghosts are dangerous and she should stay away from them.

Unfortunately, neither of these things becomes something in her favor when she and Tucker are kidnapped by a ghost and turned into ghosts themselves— or half ghosts, apparently, something clarified to them by Amity Park’s resident hero Phantom, who also promises to stick around and help them figure out their new forms and powers.

But while Sam is certainly grateful for the help, now that she’s regularly spending time with their local ghost protector, she’s noticing things about him that seem a little more familiar than they should. And also that Phantom’s strong confident hero persona might be a bit more of a facade than anyone‘s realized.

Author's Note: I did an invisobang this year! It was a ton of fun to write, and (once the art is posted), I'll post the art in each chapter it matches with! I'm gonna be posting all fifteen chapters in rapid succession, so get ready for a lot of posts from this blog! I'm going to make a masterlist in just a minute, and I'll also tag every post with the title.

Art For This Chapter: @torchturtle link

...

Sam’s awareness of ghosts extended to exactly two pieces of knowledge, and both of those things came from Danny.  The first, that Danny’s parents hunted them, which he’d told them in embarrassment shortly after they met.  The second she’d learned shortly before it had been revealed to everyone that ghosts did, in fact, exist— when Danny had told her ghosts are dangerous, stay away from them.

Sam had admittedly been more than a little surprised when Danny told her this.  Like she’d said, he tended to be more embarrassed by his parents’ work than anything else.  Granted, he’d never said outright that he didn’t believe in them, and there were a couple of times Sam had seen him taking precautions that she knew his parents had recommended.  But she knew he’d just be uncomfortable if she brought it up, so she didn’t.

And then, suddenly, he was very serious in his telling of her that ghosts were dangerous, and she should avoid them at all costs.  Sam hadn’t had the first clue where the shift had come from, but he’d timed it pretty well, because it was around that time that Amity Park started getting regular visits from ghosts.  Luckily for them, one of those ghosts included Phantom.  And while the town in general was split on him and Danny was still just as insistent in telling her and Tucker to stay away from him, Sam saw the things he did.  The ghosts he fought.  The people he saved.  There had never been a doubt in her mind that Phantom was an ally.

She hadn’t ever really expected to count on that fact directly.

But then, she’d also never been directly targeted by a ghost before.  She couldn’t think of much else this one in particular could be doing, though.  The vampire-looking ghost knew her and Tucker’s names, it singled them out specifically on the way to school, and it had grabbed them and tied them up on seats in the back of a plane, of all things.  That was a little difficult to misinterpret.

Tucker was still breathing very quickly across from her in his window seat, and Sam was trying to make sure that he didn’t have a panic attack, while also looking around the plane for anything they could possibly use to help themselves.  She didn’t even know ghosts had planes, much less ones this… fancy.  This thing looked fancier than her parents’ private jet, which made her hate it for two reasons.

“Tucker,” Sam said quietly, drawing his gaze.  “You see that compartment up there labeled with a parachute?”

“No,” Tucker said immediately, looking very intently down at the floor.  “No, I absolutely do not see it.”

“Tucker.”

“Sam, you are insane if you think I’m risking jumping out of a plane!”

“You’d rather get to whatever secondary location this guy is dragging us to?” Sam snapped, still keeping her voice down.

“Right, because obviously the guy who kidnapped us and is dragging us somewhere is going to leave us with perfectly made parachutes that won’t break halfway down to the ground,” Tucker snapped back, which… was actually a decent point, though Sam loathed to admit it.

“Look, do you have a better idea?” she asked instead.

“Try to escape while we’re not several miles in the air?”

“When we’ve made it wherever we’re going so this guy has a home field advantage?”

“I don’t know Sam!  We don’t have a ton of options!” Tucker snapped.  “I still think I’d rather be kidnapped than dead!”

“Are you sure?” Sam asked seriously, giving Tucker a look, and then jerking her head backwards toward the cockpit.  “We don’t know what he wants.”

“I don’t want to die, Sam,” Tucker said desperately.  “I think we have a better chance of not dying if we stay on the plane until we get wherever we’re going.  Plus, you can’t even stand up to reach that compartment anyway.  Let’s just… stay put.”

Sam gave a huff of irritation and a little bit of fear, but gave in to Tucker’s fairly decent points and leaned back in the plush chair.

“Okay,” she said.  “Let’s try and work this out, then.  We’ve been flying for what, an hour now?  Where do you think we’re going?”

“We’re heading north,” Tucker said, with a nod towards the window.  “Based on the way the sun was rising earlier.”

“Great, so that narrows it down to a little less than half the continent,” Sam groaned.  “Do you think he’s staying in the U.S.?”

“Do I think a ghost cares about a country’s borders?  I have no clue if we’re going to Canada.  Maybe he’ll just keep flying north and drop us in the middle of the ocean.”  The second after Tucker said it, he seemed to realize what he’d said, and his face turned a little queasy.  “I hope not.”

“Me too,” Sam muttered, looking out what little of the window she could see from her position, given that she couldn’t shift in the chair at all.  She couldn’t see the sun anymore.  She was glad Tucker had spotted it earlier, even if it didn’t give them a ton of clues as to where they were going.

They didn’t have to wonder for that much longer, however, because it wasn’t more than five minutes later before a disgustingly pleasant voice announced that they’d be beginning their descent, and that they hoped the landing was just as horrible as the takeoff had been.

Sam glared up at the ceiling as if that was where the voice was and tried to come up with a map in her head.  They really hadn’t been flying for more than an hour.  That wasn’t enough time to get them to Canada, was it?  They couldn’t be much further than Wisconsin.

Once they got off the plane itself, they were taken towards some sort of castle that looked like something her parents could afford to build.  Which might not be that far off in terms of expenses, given there was an actual runway in the back.  Maybe this ghost happened to be a friend of theirs, and this was Sam’s parents’ newest way of threatening her into wearing floral print.

The ghost that had kidnapped and brought them here, however, didn’t seem super keen on answering any questions.  Its only comment before it grabbed them both by the arms and dragged them towards a back door was “I hope you two had a terrible experience,” paired with a supervillain smirk so dramatic it was almost ridiculous.

He clearly was not super worried about being gentle about dragging them, if the ache forming in Sam’s wrist was any indication.  But she didn’t have much time to focus on that.  Instead, as soon as her feet were on the ground, she started looking around for escape strategies, but the ghost was holding their arms way too tightly for running to be an option, and she didn’t feel confident in her ability to get both her and Tucker into the forest surrounding the castle.  Especially considering how far away it was.  The grounds for this place weren’t small.

The castle itself was white brick, with gold roofs and absolutely covered in green flags.  The door they were being dragged to looked like an entrance to a basement of some kind.  Sam glanced over at Tucker to find him looking around too, but after a second he glanced at her with a helpless look on his face, meaning he hadn’t noticed anything she hadn’t.

Sam took a deep breath, and mouthed to Tucker, “On three.”

Tucker bit his lip, clearly scared, but nodded.

Sam brushed past her own fear and looked back on the door.  Their smartest option would probably be to try and break for it when he had to shift his grip in order to hold on to them and go for the handle at the same time.  He’d be doing that any second now, she just had to wait for—

A cold feeling swept over Sam just before she reached the door, and before she could question what that meant the ghost dragged her and Tucker right through the solid door and into the castle.

Sam blinked.  Well.  So much for the shifting his grip plan.

“Uh,” Sam said, looking at Tucker.  “Three!”

Tucker started pulling backwards on the ghost’s arm as Sam did the same, but it didn’t even seem to phase the ghost.  In fact, he looked down at them and laughed in obvious amusement.

“Oh yes, that’s sure to work.  He really hasn’t ever let you near ghosts before, has he?”

Before Sam could figure out what the hell that meant, the ghost floated upwards just far enough to lift Sam and Tucker off the ground, robbing them of any force they could have attempted to use to get away.

Sam, in a last desperate attempt, leaned up to try and bite the ghost’s hand, but the ghost did the same thing to just their hands that he’d done to get them all through the door, and Sam’s teeth went right through it.

She turned to Tucker.  “Okay, you have any other ideas?”

Tucker’s only response was a scared look.

They went through a couple more doors the same way as before, and then the ghost pulled them down through the floor, into some kind of lab.  It looked eerily similar to the one in Danny’s basement, right down to the portal over on the wall.

“Well, I think we’ve made excellent time,” the ghost said, flying them straight over to that very portal.  “Let’s set you both up.”

“Or, we could not do that?” Tucker said nervously.

“Who are you?” Sam snapped, glaring at the weird vampire ghost.  If they weren’t going to escape, she might as well get as much information as possible from him.

“Oh, don’t worry about it child, I’m sure you’ll get a much better explanation from Daniel.”

Sam blinked.  “Danny knows you?”

The vampire ghost didn’t reply, and instead flew over closer to the portal.  Sam leaned back away from the swirling green she had no desire to go through, but before he could toss them inside, she heard a whirring sound, and the portal powered down to leave an empty mechanical tunnel.  Sam glanced over to see… the same vampire ghost?  There were two of them?  The second one, however he was there, was pressing buttons on a box next to the portal.

A box that probably wasn’t supposed to be blinking like that.

“Uh,” Sam said, as the vampire ghost holding on to them carried them into the tunnel.  “You wanna fix your box thingy?”

“No thank you, it’ll be more useful like this for now,” the second vampire ghost said, though Sam couldn’t see him anymore.  “Though it’ll be quite a bit of work to fix the portal after using it for something like this.”  He sighed, like their kidnapping was an inconvenience for him.  “Oh well, can’t be helped.”

The second vampire ghost flew in and took Sam from the first, then carried her over to the side of the tunnel, seeming barely even to notice Sam’s struggles.

He and the other one then strapped her and Tucker to the sides of the portal, and flew off unconcerned.  Sam saw the reason why a moment later, the restraints didn’t budge no matter how much she tugged on them, and she could see Tucker doing the same thing across from her.

“Regret not trying for the parachutes yet?” Sam snapped.

Tucker opened his mouth to say something, but before he could, there was a yell of “VLAD!” and a loud crash from the room outside of the portal.

Both of them turned, and in the part of the room that the portal wasn’t blocking, Sam saw Phantom shooting blasts across the room, presumably towards one of the vampire ghosts.

Tucker let out a relieved sigh.  “Nope, I think we have a better shot now,” he said.

Sam couldn’t blame him.  They may not have ever interacted with Phantom personally, but that didn’t mean they didn’t know what he was capable of.  If Phantom was here to rescue them, they were safe.

Phantom, however, didn’t seem to realize that, because the second he turned and spotted them inside the portal, his eyes widened in surprise and what looked like fear.

…Okay, maybe they should be a little nervous?

Tucker seemed to realize the same thing, as a second later they both went back to struggling.

Phantom started right for them, but one of the vampire ghosts— Vlad, he’d said?— instead slammed into him from the side and out of their view.

Sam couldn’t see what was happening anymore, but she could easily hear them.

“Let them go, Plasmius,” Phantom snapped.

“Or you’ll what?  I’m looking for specifics here, my boy.”

“Specifics?   I’ll smash your teeth in, now let them go!”

There’s a loud sigh.  “No, you see, that’s the kind of thing that makes me think this is necessary in the first place.”

Sam glanced across the portal at Tucker, who shrugged, looking just as lost as her.

There was the sound of an ecto blast, and then Plasmius flew across the room.  Phantom started immediately for the portal again, but before he could reach it, the other vampire ghost shot a blast at him that sent him back out of view again.  The second one then flew after him and reappeared a second later, holding Phantom in a tight restraint that seemed much more difficult to hold than Sam and Tucker’s had been.

Sam tugged hard on the restraints, then stopped when she felt her wrist start to strain in a way that couldn’t be good.

“For the record,” she said to Tucker.  “We totally should have tried for the parachutes.”

Tucker gave her a desperate look.

“Sorry it had to be this way, child,” came Vlad’s voice from out of view, “but you really should get better at solving your problems yourself.”

Phantom looked towards Vlad, apparently long enough to not like what he saw, because then he looked wide-eyed back towards Sam and Tucker— and that was the moment Sam knew they were fucked.

Something behind them in the portal lit up, and Sam turned her head towards it in time to see a bright green light.

Phantom screamed “NO!” loud and desperate, and then Sam’s world erupted.

[lexosaurus]

Everything Was White: Part 24

[see all chapters]

read on: [ao3] [ffn] (please read tags)

Summary: After being accidentally revealed to the public and taken away by the government, Danny deals with the aftermath of his time with the GIW.

****

Danny tossed a low-powered ecto-ball between his hands, letting it trail across his flowing aura before pushing it back the way it came. Back and forth, over and over again.

It was exactly the sort of monotonous task he needed while he thought.

The primary issue Danny had with his new partnership with Drew was that he, admittedly, was broke.

Very broke.

He'd spent the last of his measly savings account on Christmas gifts for his family. And even if he asked his parents to reinstitute a chore chart that he could feasibly do now, even then, his $20-per-week allowance wouldn't come close to what buying opioids from Drew was going to cost.

Which, as it turned out, was a lot. Danny had no idea how expensive oxycodone was, but as he found out, it was way more than he thought it would be. 

Thankfully, Drew seemed to be at least a halfway decent guy and informed Danny that hydrocodone or Percocet might be a little more in his budget. And sure, they weren’t as good as oxy, but right now, Danny would take anything.

But considering his current savings of zero dollars and zero cents, even a single hydrocodone pill was too costly.

It would have been so much easier if he could publicly be Phantom. Because then, he could just do what other celebrities did and host an occasional livestream on social media, giving bashful shoutouts when people donated money. With as huge of a celebrity as Phantom was, it wouldn't take long for him to get a month's supply of medication.

But no, Phantom was still a secret, and Fenton was pretty unemployable right now too. And that was a problem. A huge problem. It meant that neither Phantom nor Fenton could get money for drugs.

Which Danny needed. Badly.

He hadn't slept last night. It was his first night without in weeks, and he couldn't sleep. 

Drew had texted him that morning that he could come by anytime today and pick up as much as he wanted. The issue was, all Danny had to pay with was a blossoming headache and the whining of his increasingly angry nerves.

He couldn't just rob a bank. They all had so much anti-ghost security; they probably had ecto-signature readers and shields. Not to mention, if he got caught, he could kiss his freedom goodbye.

He didn't sleep last night. He needed those damn pills. At this rate, his heart was going to beat out of his damn chest.

Tomorrow was his IEP meeting where they planned to talk about switching him to a full school day with regular classes. He was going to be a normal student again, or at least partially.

There was no fucking way he'd be able to get through that meeting without support.

But what could he do? He had no money.

Then, a snake-like voice wormed into the darkest shadow of his mind and hissed, But your parents have money. They're famous now too.

His breathing stopped.

He stared at the glow-in-the-dark stars on his ceiling, the ecto-ball fizzling out in midair.

No. There was no way he'd just thought that.

There was no way he'd even consider it. His parents worked hard for their money, and stealing from them would be a new low Danny didn't think he'd ever be able to come back from.

But why? the voice asked. It sounded innocent in the most insincere way.

It disgusted him.

They were his parents. They were the ones that got him home! They cared about him!

All their money they have now? That's because of you, Danny. That's because you're their son. Why should they get all of it when you were the one who sacrificed his body, his health, everything to the Guys in White? Why do they get to profit off your fame while you get nothing?

No, people were buying their designs. He'd helped them become a recognizable brand, sure, but at the end of the day, people bought their tech because it worked.

And it works because of you. Phantom was their muse. Phantom was the reason they designed half the pieces they did. You deserve compensation for your work.

No.

No.

No.

But I'm right, Danny. You know I'm right.

The voice was right, but that didn't mean that he needed to stoop to that depravity and steal from his fucking parents.

He was a good person. He wouldn’t do something like that.

But did he really have a choice?

They owe you. You wouldn't need to do this if they’d let you be Phantom.

That was true…but still…

Why fight me? You've already made up your mind.

No, he hadn't. The voice was right, he needed to do this, but…but…

What if they caught him? 

They won't notice. You know how they get when they're all wrapped up in a new project.

That was true.

Just this once. Just until you can figure some other way out.

Okay. Just this once.

Danny released a shuddering breath.

Just this once.

He transformed and grabbed hold of his intangibility and invisibility, slinking through the floor into the kitchen. Hovering near the ceiling, he looked down, the knot in his chest only releasing once he saw the coast was clear.

Of course it was clear. His parents were glued to their work.

If they saw him, they'd hate him. They'd send him back to the hospital, or ground him, or do a mix of both. They'd install the new chip in him and never take it out.

He needed to be quick.

He darted to the living room where, on a side table against the wall, there was a fruit bowl containing a few key rings, a mini ecto-gun, and a wallet.

His dad's wallet, to be specific. Jack Fenton had a habit of misplacing his wallet and wasting precious time tearing the house apart to find it just when the family was in a hurry to leave, so this fruit bowl was installed. Now, upon entering the home, Jack always dropped his keys and wallet in the bowl.

It was just sitting there. Waiting for Danny to open it up and glimpse the goodies that lay inside.

He wrapped delicate fingers around the worn leather wallet, unfurled the sides, and almost cried with happiness.

A hundred and fifty dollars now rested in the palm of his hand. It wouldn't buy him much, but it would buy him time. And if he was smart and rationed appropriately, it might buy him enough time to figure out what to do about Phantom.

He was going to be okay.

Breathe.

It was going to be okay.

****

Rain pattered on the roof above him. Around him, voices hushed to a lull.

Danny relaxed into his chair. His head felt light and clear, and his previous nerves had been swept away by the passing breeze of two little white pills on his palm.

Glancing around the conference room, he recognized some faces in the dim light. Mr. Lancer and Ms. Perez settled into their chairs, exchanging pleasantries with his parents and a woman Danny didn't know.

Or maybe, he had met her. He wasn't sure. There was a lot from last fall he didn't remember.

Fatigue edged his vision, and he fought the yawn, losing briefly. He couldn't help it. It was rare that his body was just so relaxed. 

He hoped he wasn't being suspicious. He just needed to be convincing enough for these perceptive adults to place him in a normal classroom again. That meant no nerves, no shaky voice, nothing that could make them doubt for a second that he didn't belong with his peers.

The voices settled in the room, and a few people muted their phones and slipped them into their pockets. The woman Danny didn't recognize with frizzy brown hair and glasses nodded to the group and said, "Thank you."

The last of the wandering attention had snapped onto her now, and she began. “Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for being here for Danny’s IEP meeting. Today, our goal is to review the current plan and Danny’s progress in the learning center, and update his IEP for his transition into the inclusion setting."

Danny glanced around the table, and everyone else seemed to be nodding to her words like this were rehearsed. 

“Why don’t we start with introductions?” the woman said. “I’m Lina Fayed, the special education coordinator.”

“I’m Sam Morin, the school psychologist.”

“I’m William Lancer, Mr. Fenton’s homeroom and English teacher.”

“I’m Jocelyn Hill, the speech-language pathologist,” said a woman Danny had unfortunately become familiar with.

Although, he’d never known her name.

…and just like that, it was gone from his brain.

“I’m Yasmin Perez, Danny’s special education teacher.”

“I’m Maddie Fenton, Danny’s mother.”

“I’m Jack Fenton, Danny’s father.”

It was Danny's turn, but fatigue was pushing at his eyelids, and he didn't feel like speaking. He supposed he should have been embarrassed, but he was too busy enjoying the feeling of his muscles melting into the cushioned seat under him to feel much of anything at all.

"I'm Danny Fenton," he said with a buttery tongue. 

If only it could always be this easy to speak.

“Alright! Thank you, everyone, for the introductions, and thank you, Danny, for being here with us. We always encourage students to attend their IEP meetings when they enter high school. To begin, the purpose of today’s meeting is a reassessment of Danny’s IEP to determine his placements for the next semester. We will review Danny’s current levels of performance, which will also include his evaluation results, strengths, weaknesses, concerns from team members, progress toward goals, proposed goals, placement options, and services for access in the general education classroom. Before we start, are there any time limitations today?”

“None for us,” Maddie said. “And again, thank you all for meeting with us.”

“Of course. As I said, we all want the reintegration process to go as smoothly as possible for Danny. Just a reminder, if the IEP reconvene cannot conclude today, we will schedule another meeting as soon as possible. But with that out of the way, let’s continue the meeting!”

They didn't have to worry about that because they wouldn’t need a second meeting. Everyone was going to see how well he’d progressed, how calm and confident he now was, and they would release him into the normal, general ed classroom.

The coordinator was now discussing legal rights and handing some pieces of paper to Danny’s parents. It was probably a load of word salad, likely said to cover the school’s ass. Maddie had warned Danny that these meetings could get a bit official, and a bit boring.

But again, they didn’t need to stress about any of that. They could just shove him in a classroom, and he was sure he would adapt without any complications.

“…are there any discussion areas you would like to add to the agenda?” the coordinator asked, though more to Danny’s parents than to him.

“None that we can think of.” Maddie shot a questioning look at Jack, then to Danny himself.

It took Danny a second to realize they were looking at him expectantly. He shrugged.

“Alright, continuing, decisions about Danny’s placement and supports are made through a consensus. Although team members may have varying opinions on certain decisions, consensus is built when all team members come together for the final decision. Does everyone agree and support this?”

All heads around the table nodded.

The coordinator gave what Danny assumed was supposed to be a warm nod, though she looked slightly stiff doing it. Perhaps, she was nervous because of what he was. Which, if that was the case, she shouldn't have been.

Phantom was the town's protector. He was the good guy.

See? It was okay.

His core twinged in dissent, and it took him a moment to remember that he hadn’t actually done any protecting lately. But just when his brain began to spiral, the medication took charge, shushing him and lulling his fears back to sleep.

There was no reason to be stressing about that right now.

So, he tuned back into the conversation where the coordinator was now addressing Danny's parents directly.

"Here is a copy of your Parent’s Rights and Procedural Safeguards. Please remember that it is very important that you are actively involved in the educational planning for your child and that the IEP team will make no changes in your child’s program or services without your input, knowledge, and consent. Do you understand your Parents’ Rights? Would you like to review or discuss any part of them?"

She handed some papers to them across the table and said a few more legal buzzwords. Danny's parents responded, though Danny couldn't really hear them. Not because they were being quiet, but just because his brain had decided to take a small break.

They tossed words back and forth, at one point looking at him like they wanted something, though Danny couldn't understand what or why. So he simply said, "Yeah."

There was a pause, and then Maddie supplied, "Danny, you understand that you can provide input too? That since you're in high school, everyone at this table will consider your opinions about your education seriously?"

"Yeah, yeah, of course." He yawned.

He hoped he was conveying exactly how calm he felt about this meeting. He was all better now, he was all healed, he was truly a normal student and could be in a normal classroom.

See? Look at him, all confident and mature. If he were truly drowning in PTSD, could he be sitting here so nonchalantly with all these adults discussing his problems?

“Alright, so now diving into the drafted IEP, I'd like to begin by going over the current Transition Plan and update it with more of Danny’s input. The point of the transition plan is to look at the next one to five years and develop a vision for what Danny would like his life to look like after high school. Danny has begun working on his vision statement in learning center with Ms. Perez. Danny, would you like to share your current vision statement?"

Danny could only vaguely remember working on a vision statement in learning center, and he was pretty sure he hadn't finished it.

Still, he looked down at one of the sheets of paper placed before him, searching until he saw his chicken-scratch handwriting. Although he hadn't noticed it before, his handwriting had definitely improved since last fall. Where before it was barely legible, now at least he could read it without too much squinting.

"Um..." Danny's tongue felt heavy, but his head was light. "I'd like to get better at math. I missed a lot of math this year and I don't want to have to repeat algebra two next year. I'd like to earn my high school diploma and attend either a community college or a regular college after high school. I want to work in a field with space or engineering, but I'm worried that my—my current issues might prevent that from happening." He glanced at his parents, who at least appeared to be listening to him. "I'd like to be in all general education classes by the end of the year."

To his delayed surprise, his mother smoothed his shirt sleeve as she praised him. "Good job, honey."

Something stirred in his stomach, but he was drifting too far from his body to decipher what kind of emotion it was.

It likely wasn't important anyway.

"Thank you for sharing." The coordinator beamed at him. “It's really important for the team to remember, as we continue through this meeting, that ultimately, our decisions regarding Danny's placement next semester and accommodations should all be in service of helping Danny work toward his goals both in and after high school. Danny, we understand your situation and history, and we understand that this has made the transition back to an academic environment tremendously difficult for you. Our goal in both this meeting and through this contract is to help provide the tools necessary to ease some of that stress.

"So, now for the present levels of performance. With Danny's injuries still healing, as well as the benefit to the healing process that his, uh, ghost half gives him"—Danny was impressed that she was able to say it so casually—"much of our assessment data from the fall may now be out of date. Typically, we retest every other year, but because of the nature of Danny's injuries, we will be conducting a full re-eval next fall at the beginning of the school year. So this IEP meeting will be using the evaluations from last fall. However, we do have observational data from the BCBA that she's kindly summarized for us, as well as samples and reports from Mr. Lancer and Ms. Perez."

Danny didn't remember ever being observed. He wasn't even sure what a BCBA was or what she looked like. 

That meant that people were watching him while he didn't know. Hopefully, she had only seen the good things, the times when he'd been doing his work and paying attention and sitting still with a relaxed and calm face, just like he was doing now.

Hopefully, she hadn't seen those other times, like the other day when he took a nap in the middle of the learning center instead of doing his math work. Or that time when one of the footballers had asked him a question about Phantom and he'd been so thrown for a loop that he stuttered nonsense instead of responding like he normally would. 

Well, if she had seen those things, then everyone was probably really confused because his data may have painted him as emotionally unstable, but here he was, the perfect picture of mental health.

At this rate, his parents would have to give him the okay to have full access to his Phantom form.

"Presently," the coordinator continued, eyes glued to the sheets of paper in front of her, "Danny is a very bright young man receiving supports for health, academic, and social-emotional needs. Danny's able to come to school for half of the day to complete his schoolwork in the learning center with Ms. Perez. He's able to access the eleventh-grade core curriculum with significant modifications to his schoolwork, including a reduced workload, modified curriculum, and aide support for executive functioning. He is able to take his tests and quizzes in the learning center with an aide or Ms. Perez proctoring and assisting and redirecting as needed."

Ms. Perez took over, giving him a gentle grin as she did. "Yup, Danny's been working with me in the learning center for most of his current school day, and has been working both on his own, with a para, and with myself and various teachers who have prep and availability to visit our room during those hours. He’s been making steady progress catching up with the curriculum, but since he's only in school for half the day, he is behind on most subjects. Though, we have made some steady progress these last few weeks with the hopes that he will be able to finish out the year in the classroom."

"Yup! We're hoping Danno will be able to finish this year strong too! Right?" Jack turned to Danny, who had to remind himself that he was supposed to be making eye contact with the adults rather than studying how the scratches on the table were disrupting the reflections from the lights above.

"Huh? Yeah."

Jack beamed. "Atta boy!"

"That’s great!” the coordinator said. “And today, we’re going to discuss classroom placements for next semester, so I think a good segue into that would be to go over the current performance data we have on Danny. I'm going to go over both the evaluation scores and the recent data collected from Ms. Perez and the BCBA.

"In the psychoeducational eval, we assessed cognitive, academic, social-emotional, and behavioral functioning. Both Danny's parents and Danny's teachers reported global challenges across all areas of academic, internalization, externalization, and behavioral symptoms. According to the Weschler score summary, Danny's results indicate that verbal comprehension, processing speed, and working memory are all significant areas of weakness, although visual-spatial and fluid reasoning scored below average too. The academic achievement testing results showed that Danny could benefit from direct and explicit instruction across all subject areas, with areas of focus being reading and math..."

The coordinator's voice drifted off, becoming noise with the air vents and the puttering of raindrops against the roof. Danny could see her lips moving, he could see the other adults around nodding at what she was saying, but at this moment, he just couldn't find it in himself to care.

So what if some test results said something about how emotionally unavailable to math he was? Why should it matter? 

Life was short. There was no reason to waste it thinking about what a silly little test said.

And besides, he was Danny Phantom, wasn't he? Getting a job after high school would be a cinch.

He leaned back in his chair and let his head loll. It would have been such a nice day if not for the rain washing away the light dusting of snow they'd gotten the night before. 

It hadn't been a snowy winter. Maybe that would have been odd, but then again, it had been an odd year all around.

The woman was still talking. 

Wow.

It was kind of incredible how long people could talk for.

He wondered if he was supposed to be saying anything. But then, maybe it was better to remain silent because then maybe everyone would forget about those assessment results and his brain injury that was affecting his speech and making him sound more disabled than he was. 

So he sat there. The adults talked. At one point, his parents had looked at him in confirmation, and he'd nodded. They seemed pleased at that, which was great because pleasing his parents meant he was following their instructions, and following their instructions meant that maybe they'd realize he was mentally sound enough to handle having his ghost half back.

"...I've noticed that Danny tends to shut down when he encounters a difficult problem, or when he gets stuck on an assignment and gets frustrated. He does respond relatively well to redirection, although some days are tougher than others," Lancer was saying.

"I can get better at that," Danny interjected.

He must have been sitting in silence for a while because a few of the adults seemed surprised that he spoke. The speech counselor, however, gave him a thumbs up. She was always praising him for what she kept calling "self-advocacy." 

Maddie glanced at Danny. "His doctors believe this to be a side effect." 

A side effect of what? 

"And we agreed as well, which is why we chose to list that as one of the updated IEP goals. Do you agree, Danny?" the school psychologist asked.

"Sure."

See? Easygoing and calm.

"So, Danny will respond to redirection with no more than two prompts eight out of ten times as measured across a six-month period," the coordinator recited. "And to help with this, along with the other listed accommodations and goals, we recommend he receive aide support in his general education courses for the remainder of the semester."

Danny blinked at the coordinator.

He was pretty sure his brain was behaving a little slower than normal because, for a second there, it sounded like the coordinator had just said the words "aide support."

"We completely agree," Maddie said. To Danny's bewilderment, she put her hand on his arm and began lightly stroking his sleeve with her thumb. 

"As do I," Lancer said.

Danny's jaw opened, and he couldn't tell whether he should stare at Lancer in awe or betrayal. His brain was too jumbled to piece together any tangible emotions anyway. 

For a second, he almost wished he weren't high. But then, that was a silly thought. Because if he were sober right now, he might have started yelling.

Perhaps Lancer was worried about these diminished emotions in Danny bubbling to the surface and causing a scene, because he held Danny's gaze as he said, too seriously and compassionately, "This is not a punishment, nor is this a one-on-one. You will still be a normal student. There will be another adult in all your classes. She will help you when you need it, and she’ll leave you alone when you do not."

When Lancer put it like that, it was fine, wasn't it? Maybe that was the denial talking, or the fog shielding his brain from the shadows, but it was okay. 

“There are lots of students who receive inclusion support,” the psychologist added. “You’re not the first, nor the only student in the building.”

Yeah. He was still going to be a normal student attending normal classes. No one would have to know that the aide was there for him. Not if he did all his work in a timely manner and focused and took notes and raised his hand and always paid attention to what the teacher was saying and...and...

"Danny understands," Maddie said. She was still rubbing his arm. "Right?"

"Right."

"See? It's all okay!" Jack said.

And, right. It was all okay. Right now, he had nothing to worry about. 

He would be fine. He was going to be so fine. He was going to do good in classes—great, even! He was Phantom after all, and Phantom was cool, popular, and everything that Fenton had always wanted to be. Aide or no aide, he was going to be fine.

So, he let himself bask in that delusion under the safety of the fog, and he was very calm and behaved appropriately for the rest of the meeting. No outbursts, no crying, because everything was wonderful!

Everything was so wonderful.

If he just let the drugs take the wheel.

****

Danny lay on the roof, staring up at the partially cloud-covered sky above him. The air smelled of rain, earthy and electric, and felt of decaying humidity. He tried to admire the way the stars twinkled, he tried to differentiate the red ones from the white ones to play his old game of which was moving the fastest toward and away from Earth, he tried to find Mars and Saturn, usually visible in the sky.

But everything seemed so…

He didn’t know.

He never, never thought that he would seriously be the student who had to get…this. Whatever this was in that stupid, twenty-thousand-page contract.

Were all IEP documents that many pages? Or was it just Danny’s?

Ms. Perez’s learning center had a para. He remembered there being a para in his history class last year too. This annoying, mousy woman who joined midway through the year and kept harassing Danny to “stay in the classroom, please, don’t leave! Where are you going?”

But he never seriously thought that he would be the sole cause of an aide joining a class. Or all his classes.

Would the other students know? Would the aide always be hovering over his shoulder? Or would it be like last year, where the para walked around the room and spent most of her time with the rowdy boys in the back of the class?

Danny had so many questions. And so many fears. None of which could be solved by a white pill.

Which, judging by the steadily increasing burning in his chest, was just about due.

But that would require getting up. It would require going home. It would require turning back into his human form.

All things Danny didn’t want to do.

So he stayed there, trying to ignore the prickling in his chest, distracting himself with the preview of the night sky he could see through the clouds. He ignored the fact that he didn’t understand why he didn’t want to go home.

And he lay there until a slightly muffled voice, one that drove spikes into Danny’s stomach, piped up from behind him. “Phantom? Danny?”

Shit.

It was just his freaking luck.

He debated turning around and offering his friendly, signature Phantom wave that he used to give back when he was trying to win her over.

But he just didn’t have the energy for that tonight. And besides, there was no point. There was nothing left to win.

“Danny,” Valerie repeated, though not a question this time.

“S’me,” he responded dully.

She landed beside him, retracting her hoverboard, and from the corner of his eye, he watched as she twisted her gloves together and studied her boots.

Good. Let her feel uncomfortable for once.

“Hey. You have your ghost form back?” she tried.

“Yup.”

Despite his internal voice begging him to try a little, he did not sound enthusiastic at all.

“Oh. Um, that’s nice.” She took a hesitant step toward him.

Was she afraid of him?

“Sure is,” he said. If possible, his tone was even blander than before.

His chest was really hurting. And he was tired. Something dark was beginning to crawl in the corners of his eyes. He clearly wasn’t up for this, so maybe they could wrap this conversation up?

“Um…the tail…it’s—it’s—” she stammered.

His eyes narrowed.

“You know, I wasn’t sure—”

“What, if I’d have legs as a ghost? Well, I’m sure it’s really pleasing for you to see that I obviously don’t.”

Danny couldn’t see her expression under the mask, but judging by how she stepped back, he guessed he’d struck a blow to her confidence.

After all the shit he’d been through, she could take one measly little dig.

The silence stretched between them, dark and twisting, pulsing like a wave filling Danny’s hollow body with all the resentment he’d been burying for months and years. His skin prickled while shadows loomed over his eyes, and suddenly, it was too much. Hiding was too much.

He pushed himself upright to mimic a seated position, his glower snapping to her because really? After everything he’d been through, she was going to bring up his paraplegia? That was how she really planned on opening this conversation?

After she’d tried so long to eradicate not just his lower half, but his entire fucking body?

His brain quietly pinged that he needed to leave now. He didn’t feel right. It was going to get too dark soon. 

“I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to say that.” She held her arms up, placating. “I—I never wanted…”

Her voice trailed off, and for good reason. Such a good reason, in fact, that Danny snorted. “You’re such a liar, Val.”

His tone was a deathly sharp dagger slicing whatever clumsy air simmered between them. Raw emotions spilled out, ripping both their histories to the forefront and pouring them all on the ground between them. 

“I know!” Valerie slapped her helmet, her hand trembling as she exclaimed, “I know last year I was trying to…to…ugh!”

She crouched low on the gravel, and her fingers dug into her carbon-fiber head.

Danny didn’t say anything. Just watched. He didn't understand this emotion bubbling in his chest. Why it made him want to snap, lash out, hurt Valerie.

He didn’t understand why he couldn’t leave.

“You never told me who you were,” she said, her voice like sand on stone. “How was I supposed to know? I would never have hunted you if I’d known.”

If anything, her words further deepened the hole that leaked his stock of patience from his body. “If that was supposed to be reassuring, it sucked. Oh, so I’m sup—supposed to be thankful now that I have a human heartbeat, because if I—if I didn’t, then what? You would have no remorse killing me? Well, guess fucking what, Val, I don’t have a heartbeat in this form.”

He wasn’t supposed to say that out loud, but he really didn’t give a shit. Valerie was many things, but a snitch was not one of them.

Valerie dropped her gloves from her helmet screen, and Danny could imagine her dumbstruck face locking eyes with his.

Good.

He spread his arms out wide, giving her the best shot he could. “If you want to fucking blow my brains out, here’s your opportunity!”

But she didn’t move a muscle.

“Well?” he said, after the silence was beginning to turn awkward. “What the hell are you—are you waiting for?”

Another beat, then a quiet, “You were my friend. No, my boyfriend. I broke up with you because…because…”

“Because of Phantom."

“And you let me.”

“What, did you seriously expect me to just—just out myself to you like that?”

What should have been an easy “no” left Valerie in silence.

“Come on, Val, you of all people should know why I couldn’t say anything. You were at my fucking house. You saw…”

Danny couldn’t finish. You saw me, he wanted to say. You saw everything they did to me.

She finally sat on the roof. Not right next to him, of course. They weren’t ready for that yet. She gave him���or herself, Danny couldn’t tell—several feet of space. But she was sitting, where before, she would have been attacking.

“I was so mad when you were revealed. So mad.”

Darkness nipped at his cheeks, and he bit down the urge to snap at her again.

“I had made a whole speech I was going to give you when you got out. Had rehearsed it in the mirror and everything.” Her voice grew weak. “I was so stupid to believe what they were saying. That it was just an imprisonment.”

“You were,” Danny said, not kindly, because really, she should have known. “You'd heard them before. You knew what—what they were going to do to me. You wanted to do that...too, I bet." 

“Nothing like that,” Valerie snapped. “Even in my worst moments, I would never have done anything like that.”

The darkness slithered up his throat, and he didn't fight it when it took control of him and snarled, “Well, I guess I should—I should be flattered, then. You wanted to kill me, but at least you didn’t want to torture me on the way out!”

“You ruined my life, Danny. And your parents always talked about how evil ghosts were. What the hell did you expect?”

Oh, so they were going there. 

“I ruined your life, how—how, exactly? Because now you know—you know that I don’t have a dog, Val. So whose dog was that?”

“Just because he’s not your dog doesn’t mean you don’t babysit him all the time. I’ve seen those TikToks!”

“That weekend? In Axiom? That was the first time I’d ever met Cujo!”

“So he has a name, now?”

Danny wanted to scream. “Of course he has a name! He’s a dog! He’s a dog that your dad killed!”

“Shut up!” Her helmet whipped over to him again. “Don’t you dare talk about my dad!”

“Well, it was! Your dad’s security system replaced Axiom’s last one. Wanna know what the last secure—last security system was? Because it wasn’t a piece of—of technology, Val!”

“Shut up!” Valerie’s voice broke.

Danny should have felt like an asshole, but he didn’t. Instead, he looked numbly as Valerie’s chest moved erratically, and listened as her cries ripped from her throat. And all he could feel was the urge to scream that he needed to leave and go home because it was going to be too dark soon, and he didn't understand what that meant but just that he knew he needed to flee.

“No, no, no. My dad—my dad would never do anything like that,” Valerie said through clenched teeth. She retracted her helmet finally, her hands mopping her eyes and runny nose. “He would never.”

But Danny didn’t stop. “Cujo was just trying to get his squeaky toy back from one of—one of the closets inside. He was looking for it. He wasn’t trying to do—to do anything else. Once he got his toy, he…he left. He went back to the Zone. Whatever happened to your dad, that wasn’t my fault.”

He always fantasized about the moment when he could finally sit Valerie down and explain himself. In all his daydreams, he approached her with empathy and understanding, and they ended their discussion with an embrace.

So what the hell was wrong with him tonight?

Why did he suddenly remember all the months she spent hunting him down, shooting him with every weapon in her arsenal, consequences to his body be damned. More than one night, he’d had to stitch his skin back together because of her.

Sam was always the one angry about that—not Danny. Danny always had excuses for Valerie. She didn’t know he was Phantom, she was going through a hard time, he didn’t figure out what Cujo was after soon enough. 

But deep down inside, had he always been this angry?

“Fuck,” she murmured.

She was right. This—no, they were fucked up. Their relationship was fucked up. Danny was fucked up.

And Valerie had seen that, the day she visited him in his bedroom. Back when he used to trace the cracks in his wall because without that, he couldn’t be sure he existed at all.

“Why did you come visit me that day?” Danny finally asked. “You knew I—I’d just gotten home from the hospital. You knew—”

“I didn’t,” Valerie said, wiping her eyes. “I mean, I knew you’d gotten out of the hospital, but I didn’t know, really. I mean, I didn’t know the extent of…it.”

Danny cocked his head. “I thought I was all over the news? That’s what they told me.”

“Yeah, but not you. Just people talking about you. Or old videos of you. There were rumors online, but nothing substantial.”

“So that—that’s why you thought it was just an imprisonment.” Danny stared down at the foggy mist that was his spectral tail.

“I was in denial," Valerie said.

“Yeah.” 

He wondered if he would ever get his legs back in this form. 

This darkness was beginning to get suffocating.

It was stemming from his chest, he realized.

He heard his voice ask, “Did you like what you saw? That day in my room?” 

“That’s sick, Danny.”

But again, he didn’t care. He didn't know why, but he didn't care. “What? I didn’t put—put on a good enough show for you? All drugged up like that?”

He wanted to stop. He was a good person; why was he saying this? His words didn’t even have any bite left to them. They were just…hollow. Just like the rest of him.

“You know that’s not true. Just stop, please.”

Was he an asshole?

No. No, he wasn’t.

“Sorry,” he conceded with.

He really needed another pill. He should have taken one with him before he left. He was so stupid for leaving all of them behind.

The darkness agreed with him. 

You should take another pill now, a voice said in barely a whisper.

The darkness growled. It sounded like a dog.

“What was the trial like?” he asked, trying to ignore the pain in his chest.

“You mean you haven’t seen it?” She sounded startled.

"No."

"Oh..." Valerie shifted awkwardly. "Um...I don't really know. It's on YouTube, you know?"

"I don't want to see it."

He should have gone home. He should have listened to the darkness.

There's still time for you to save yourself.

"Yeah, I got you. Um, I don't know, though. The legal jargon slipped over my head. And it was pretty fast, you know? There was a big celebration in town when the judge ordered you to be freed."

That was ironic, he realized. That while the town was celebrating, he had been dying from the final incision.

"What did they do to you in there?" her quiet voice said.

The air was getting darker now. Soon, the stars might be gone from view.

And the shadows were beginning to eat his skin.

So instead of answering, Danny turned invisible and flew away.

****

previous / next

****

Thank you to @imekitty for betaing the chapter!