#ectober21

It made sense. If there was a restless spirit in Amity Park, it was Phantom. The cemetery had offered some time ago to offer a spot for ghosts to rest. It had been almost a year since and reportedly, it had been working. Many had been put to rest by the gesture though obviously no body was ever buried.

There was a mausoleum there in the oldest part of the cemetery. The crypt was empty and surrounded by graves dating back hundreds of years. The modest structure was the newest addition there and held the empty tombs of the nameless dead. Where each stone placard inside might have held the name of a beloved family member, there was instead a wish or a prayer of peace for the soul.

Danny had seen the mausoleum once before, had seen ghost activity there on his patrol and stopped by to investigate. What he found was a ghost, a girl maybe 19. She reminded him of Kitty with longer hair and taller but with a ghoulish wound raked down the side of her body ruining the flow of her white gown. He was silent as he watched, withdrew from the scene as she cried in front of a marker that read not her name, but a prayer that she had claimed for herself.

Let those who seek the earth find it comforting and let your final sleep come unto you at last.

That was the first time Danny had seen her and he didn't see her again after that.

It felt invasive to patrol the cemetery at night after that.

The scene, though imagined for everyone else, must have been the inspiration of the upcoming event. Ghosts were slowly becoming less a part of every day life in the town and were hardly ever aggressive. There weren't any more ghost attacks and Phantom was the only ghost regularly seen. Fliers were handed out, the memorial service was talked about every night on the news as if anyone could forget that they talked about it during the day.

Danny had to get up and leave the cafeteria as every conversation he could tune into was about honoring their fallen hero. They were romanticizing it. The idea that Phantom was a tortured and wandering soul and needed them to put him to rest so he can finally be at peace. Phantom's job was done. He was safe they just needed to make him see. The idea was rampant and Danny had no clue how to stop it.

Paulina had cried all week but it never stopped her from openly supporting the event. So many people took her fliers and offered her condolences on losing her ghost boy but Danny could count on one hand how many of them knew his name.

The ones who did had opinions.

Phantom deserves to rest after all he's done for us. It's so sad he's been lost for so long.

Maybe Saturday Danny Phantom can finally rest in peace.

Yeah, as long as Fenton doesn't show up.

Why would he come? His family hates ghosts.

Exactly. He'd probably ruin the whole thing.

It doesn't matter. As long as Phantom finally gets to rest.

He laughed at first. It hurt but he had to laugh or it would hurt more. He could hardly find time to sleep. His work was never done and they wanted him to rest and move on? To where? He wasn't actually dead, only part of him.

Half.

Half of him was dead.

It was so stupid. He was still half alive, that was something right? The living half just happened to be the one that was worth less. He laughed at the idea of honoring his death.

It became harder after a while.

Everyone was so genuine about it. Everyone in school had stories about Phantom. People were interviewed on the local news every night during some kind of countdown special and the overall opinion was that the teen was a hero and he should be remembered.

Why did he have to be remembered? He was active now. People felt happy and peaceful in Amity Park enough to feel safe planning a funeral for ghosts and that was thanks to Phantom who was here and why did they want him to leave? Why didn't they want him anymore?

Every night, Jazz tried to knock on his door asking to talk. Every night, Danny would pretend to be asleep or was already out on patrol. He wasn't avoiding Jazz. He was simply making sure that every night went peacefully. He didn't acknowledge that every night in Amity Park had been peaceful for almost six months. He didn't want to entertain that maybe Amity Park didn't need Danny Phantom anymore after all.

Lancer had taken the chance on Friday to talk about closure. Danny rolled his eyes and doodled on the margins of his notebook but it was so quiet in class, so somber.

Did they really want him to be gone? Remembered in a big ceremony so they could forget him again after? Did Amity Park not want him anymore? For the rest of 5th period he imagined what it would be like to move on. It scared him.

As he patrolled the city the night before his funeral Danny stayed invisible. Thoughts about the afterlife were his only company until he saw the gathering. A vigil was being done for him. There were dozens and dozens of people lighting candles and holding blurry pictures of him. Stuffed animals and flowers all littered the stairs of City Hall in his honor. Camera crews recorded people crying and holding their candles in silence and burning incense that they hoped would appease him.

Danny didn't really have any stuffed animals. He was too old for them. He liked video games and music and horror but there was none of that at the vigil. Why would there be? This could have been honoring anyone.

He didn't know if it was better or worse that he didn't show himself but he barely slept that night, the smell of strange incense burned into his nose.

Breakfast Saturday morning was odd. Jazz kept looking at him, not able to get him alone to talk about the damage that his psyche must be taking or whatever.

His parents kept sniping at each other about whether it was a waste of time or if this might be what finally put Phantom to rest. The question of whether Phantom would react violently to the gesture was brought up by mom and immediately crushed by Jazz and they made sure to dress up anyway. Shockingly, they even wore dress clothes without the jumpsuits, probably predicting the backlash they would receive showing up to a ghost's funeral in ghost hunting gear. He was pretty sure the tasteful gloves on his mother's hands were giving off an ectosignature, but it was still overall a nice thought.

They drove the Fenton RV to the cemetery and, probably for the best, weren't able to park close to the event. Cars lined the street leading to the old graveyard in either direction. They walked for about ten minutes around the iron fence that surrounded Hallowgate but Danny was pretty sure that his parents could jump the fence and make it back to the assault vehicle in two if necessary. It probably gave them peace of mind.

As they passed hundreds of people, many from the vigil last night, Danny couldn't help parrot back the idea that this was in fact a waste of time. Danny Phantom wasn't going to stop roaming the city because the people tried to put him to rest. Phantom might even resent the idea. What happened to a soul after roaming the earth as a ghost for so long? Was Danny's soul the same quality as it was when he was supposed to die? He had done terrible things to this town. If he did move on would he end up in heaven or-

He lowered his gaze and followed his family to his funeral.

It wasn't until they reached the site that Danny's heart skipped a beat. Ghosts had mingled with the crowd, from what he could tell, completely unseen. Dozens of them, most he didn't recognize but others he did.

All of them looked at him as he approached.

He swallowed tightly as the dense group of citizens and the lost alike surrounded one area but it wasn't centered around the white building.

His name wasn't being interred in the ghost mausoleum. The crowd was gathered around a lone headstone set apart from the graves of Amity citizens past and the looming crypt for the nameless.

He was literally set between the living and the dead.

He couldn't see the front of the stone yet, but from the smooth reverse side he could tell it was marble. That was expensive. Why would the cemetery shell out so much money for someone who wasn't even going to be buried? Couldn't be buried?

As they made their way closer, muscling through the crowd that mostly gave way for them with varying degrees of shock, Danny's blood chilled at the smell first. It was the scent of fresh, damp dirt. An empty coffin was prepared in a rig over the open grave. His mouth dried instantly and he took a step back into Jazz who took his arm and squeezed gently.

He wanted to leave, to fly away or sink into the ground-no, not the ground, not when there was his own grave so close as if he could get sucked into it and be trapped inside. Jazz pulled him into her side and wrapped her arm around him in a casual but meaningful hug.

"We'll talk about this as much as you want when we get home." she promised in his ear. He nodded a tiny motion but relaxed just a little as she let go and stayed close.

At 9:30 on the dot, a priest approached the small clearing in front of the grave and began a speech.

It was about what Danny had expected though the language was changed to accommodate the diseased but it felt wrong. He had been to funerals before but being at his own set his teeth on edge. His eyes kept darting around to the people around him but the living and the dead in attendance were so oddly still and subdued with their eyes lowered to the ground or fixed on his grave.

The funeral spiel was quick and generic. There were no friends or family of Phantom to come up and say a few words, no one knew his favorite songs or poems and it didn't feel appropriate to tell stories of his battles. No one knew Phantom as a person, but they knew of him. Why was the idea of him enough to honor Phantom? Why was everyone so sad for something this bland?

The closing remarks started and Danny breathed a little easier knowing it was almost over. The priest looked over the crowd.

"Misguided youth, well-meaning martyr, or something else entirely. The Phantom has proven himself a hero. Now and forever we know this in our hearts. We love you, Phantom. Each and every person here wants you to know that you are important. We may not have known you in life, but we are honored to know of you in death. Whether we have our own stories of your heroics firsthand or simply know of your trials, we honor you today and wish you peace. Whatever that means to you, we, the people of Amity Park, hope you find it."

The crowd murmured an amen after him and as if on cue, two women in black started making their way through the crowd handing out flowers. There were hundreds of them, hydrangeas and roses and lavender, so many types that Danny couldn't keep track and in so many different colors. He wished he knew more about flowers and what they meant but even so they seemed to be given out randomly. It didn't matter what they meant but the gesture was nice.

After the coffin was lowered, the crowd formed a bunched line overseen by the priest. The man ushered them along one at a time and let each person have up to twenty seconds to say their own private prayer before offering them a blessing and a hand wave gesturing them toward the path back to the paved road to take their leave.

Some people stayed only long enough to toss their flower onto the casket while others burst into tears and took their entire twenty seconds to say goodbye.

Some people mumbled sacred words under their breaths and the hair on the back of Danny's neck pricked like he should have heard it, should have swooped in close to take the wishes and prayers but that felt wrong.

Did they all wish him a safe passing to the afterlife? What did he do wrong to make all them want him gone?

He was a hero for them wasn't he?

He bit his cheek and Jazz gently guided him into position behind her.

His parents threw in their flowers, twin daisies and looked at each other before respectfully walking away. Jazz dropped in an orchid and looked over her shoulder at him before turning back, nodding to the priest, and walking away to join her parents.

It was his turn already and he couldn't do anything. Here he was standing numbly at the foot of his own open grave and he didn't have a joke, a prayer, or anything in between for his own memory. What was he supposed to say? You're welcome? Thank you?

He finally read the carved words on the headstone and his mind stood still. Something swelled in his chest, something cold and blinding hot and unwelcome and as the lone white carnation fell from his cold fingers he burst into tears.

A hero is someone who willingly walks into the unknown

Danny Phantom

Gone but not forgotten