#phic phight

Robert, for his part, stiffens momentarily, hand stuttering with a fork halfway to his mouth. He tries to smooth out the motion, eating his bite and nudging his glasses back into place with the back of his hand, but William already saw it.

“He may have asked to go to the bathroom towards the end of the period.”

William nods. “I’m only asking because he had such a hard time last year, and I think we could cut him some slack. If you were going to give him detention for missing the end of class—”

“Oh, no! No,” Robert insists. “I agree with you, actually. We never really know what’s going on in a student’s life outside of school. When someone is having as much trouble as that, I think it’s important we give them the support they need.” He takes a bit of his rice, chewing thoughtfully before he continues. “I’m surprised. I think you gave him more detentions than anyone.”

William can’t hold back his wince. It’s true; he was fairly harsh with Danny Fenton the previous year. He regrets that deeply. Very deeply, knowing what he does now. But there’s little he can do to make up for it beyond being a better teacher going forward, and hopefully convincing some of the other teachers to follow his example. Although it’s refreshing that one of his colleagues has reached the same conclusion.

Although he can’t help but wonder how that came about.

“I had a realization or two over the summer and decided he would benefit from a little more leeway. I wouldn’t want to show favourites,” at least no more than he already had last year, “but some cases deserve a little more slack.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” Robert says.

William finally takes a bite out of his sandwich, although much of his focus is still on Robert. He can’t help eyeing the man, as if staring hard enough will reveal to William the depths of his colleague’s mind, thoughts unfurling beneath his piercing gaze. Robert watches him in return, inclining his head ever so slightly. William raises his eyebrows, asking a question far too heavy for such a gesture. Robert’s eyes slowly widen.

“Bobby, Billy!” Laraine Tetslaff’s gruff voice startles William enough that he breaks the staring contest first. Many people expect Laraine to be a stomper when they first meet her, but her heavy build is complemented by years of experience across various sports, and she strides across the room with surprising grace. Although it’s offset by the gruff personality that suits her looks just fine. “Just the boys I was looking for.”

Laraine grabs a chair from the neighbouring table, the legs squealing as she drags it across the tile, swings it around, and sits down backwards with her arms folded across the back. “We talking about Fenton? Because I’ve got a question for both of you. Do you also know that he’s Ph—”

“Aaah!” William lurches out of his seat to slap a hand over Laraine’s mouth, Robert doing the same. It’s hardly dignified for a vice principal and draws a few stares, but luckily, when they see who William is assaulting, they nod in understanding and go back to their food. Most teachers cannot go a day without wishing they could cover Laraine’s mouth. She knows it, too, and William can feel her grinning beneath his hand.

“Guess I got my answer!” She tips her head back and laughs.

“Maybe.” Robert glances between Laraine and William. “If you—”

“I might,” William says. “And you?”

“Possibly. Since September.”

William isn’t a prideful man, at least he doesn’t try to flaunt it, not unless it relates to teaching in some way. But he swells when he smiles and says to Robert, “Earlier this summer.”

Laraine slaps her hand on the table. “Spring last year.”

William can’t help it. He gapes at her. How? How could she possibly have known for that long? William himself only discovered Danny’s secret by chance, while out at the mall this past July. When a ghost attacked, he ducked into the nearest store to get to safety, and by happenstance, Danny went that way as well. William had already hidden behind a clothing rack, so he was well and truly out of sight when Danny scoured the room for witnesses, and William had full view when the boy suddenly changed.

He spent the next few days trying to convince himself it had been some kind of illusion, or maybe he hadn’t gotten away from the ghost attack in time and suffered some kind of brain damage. But the more he thought about it, the more things fell into place, until he could no longer deny the truth: Danny Phantom is Danny Fenton.

And somehow, at least two of his colleagues also know.

William’s gaze darts about the room. Could anyone else know and simply not have mentioned it for fear of exposing Danny to harm? William swore himself to secrecy to prevent such a thing. But Laraine had approached them without qualms. What if she had been wrong and William and Robert were not already aware? Could she really be that blasé with a life-threatening secret?

“I think we should speak about this after school,” William suggests. Better not to risk it by talking out in the open like this, regardless of if the others might know.

“Agreed.” Robert is already packing his lunch, even though he only ate half of it, and there are still thirty minutes left in the period. He tucks everything into his lunch bag and springs from his chair. “We can meet in my classroom.”

William wants to suggest his office as a meeting place, or his own classroom, but Robert scurries off before William can dispute him. He tries not to let his irritation that Robert beat him to the punch show.

Laraine slaps her hand on the table again. “Guess I’ll see you then, Billy. Enjoy your lunch!” She gets up as well, shoving her chair back toward the correct table, and leaves William alone with his food.

Well, at least this will be interesting.

—

Robert is seated behind his desk when William arrives some time after the final bell. Laraine seems to have brought her own seat, possibly from the class next door, because she sits beside Robert’s desk, swivelling back and forth on the office chair. For a bright, shining moment, William considers doing the same, going to Robert’s other neighbouring classroom to filch that chair for himself. But he closed Robert’s classroom door when he stepped inside, and backtracking now would feel strange. Instead, he settles into one of the desks in the front row. It’s a bit of a squeeze, since William hasn’t been a fit man since well before he hit middle age, and the plastic chair leaves him a couple inches shorter than his compatriots.

He sits up as straight as he can and folds his hands on the desk, but it’s hard to feel dignified.

“So, what’s up?” Laraine asks.

“I should think that’s obvious,” William says.

“Ha, duh. We’re here about Fenton, sure, but I don’t know why. You suggested a private meeting, Billy.”

He grimaces. “Can you not?”

“Sure thing, Willy.”

It takes all his will to hold back a groan.

“I think it would be useful to know how we all know,” Robert says. At least one of them is sensible. “Now that ghost attacks are a more mundane occurrence, and it’s easier not to flee in terror, I noticed Danny’s many absences, visits to the bathroom, and late arrivals coincide with nearby ghost attacks. I’m still not sure how it’s possible, but I quickly concluded that he was either involved with Phantom or somehow Phantom himself. It makes me a little uneasy to think about.”

William hopes his pinched eyebrows read more like understanding than surprise. Robert must have been watching Danny very closely since the start of the school year to put that together.”

Laraine goes next. “Toward the end of school last year, his performance in gym class got way better. That kid’s athletic skills skyrocketed in no time, and I might be a great coach, but he was so hopeless at the start of the year that I didn't expect any improvement. But he’s got this way that he runs where it’s almost like a glide, and I noticed a few clips where Phantom runs the same way. It was pretty obvious after that.”

“Because of the way he runs?” William asks.

Laraine barks out a sharp laugh and rolls her chair over to clap him on the shoulder. Frustratingly, she has an extra two inches on him when they’re seated like this. “Don’t worry about it, Willy. I know you were a cheerleader and all that, but I don’t expect you to notice that kind of nuance in a student’s athleticism. That’s for the experts.”

William scowls and brushes her hand off, frown deepening when he realizes what this means. He's the only one who discovered the truth by accident.

“So, how’d you work it out?” Laraine asks.

William clears his throat and sits up straighter. “Very similar to Robert. I just looked at the activity, and everything seemed to line up.”

“Over the summer?” Robert asks.

“Well, uh, I had a lot of free time to put things together and all that.”

Laraine shakes her head and tsks at him. “We need to get you a life, Willy, if you've got time for that during your vacation.”

William bristles. “I’ll work on that.”

Laraine nods, looking far too satisfied with herself. All of a sudden, William’s free time feels like a precious commodity that she is looking to buy. He would rather not learn what Laraine considers “having a life” and how much bodily assault that involves. William likes having a full mouth of teeth, thank you very much.

“With that out of the way, we should discuss what we’re going to do about this,” William says.

“I don’t know about you chumps, but I’ve for him covered. Dodgeball this week, touch football next week. He’s gonna be moving faster and dodging better than ever,” Laraine says. “And he really needs to get better at dodging.”

That’s not really what William had in mind, but it works. If it works.

“I think it’s obvious Danny’s grades have been suffering because of his activities,” William says. “I’d like to give him an easier time at school, however we can.”

“Do you think…” Robert takes a fortifying breath. “Do you think his parents know?”

The question gives William pause. At the time of discovery, he had been so caught up in his shock, his confusion, that he hadn’t sunk into his thoughts on the matter. He might have wondered, “How did this happen?” sometime soon after, but since he had no answers, there was no use looking deeper. His mind had shifted to accommodate the new truth, that Phantom is a human child he knows, but did he ever consider the flip side of that?

Phantom is actually a human. Or Fenton is actually a ghost.

“The Turn of the Screw,” William curses. “Is our student dead?”

Whether or not the others have already considered that, they both look uncomfortable at the question, even Laraine.

“Should we do something about that?” Robert asks.

“What would we do about that? Last I checked, he still eats in the cafeteria. He’s definitely taller than last year. I don’t think we need to worry about that.” Laraine’s words carry a lot more confidence than her tone. “Just focus on what you can do.”

Saying that is all well and good, but it doesn’t stop the question from lingering in the back of William’s mind as he goes on with his days. It’s obvious that Danny’s parents don’t know the truth, otherwise they wouldn’t go after Phantom with such vigour. At least William hopes so; he doesn’t want to consider the alternative. Unfortunately him, Laraine, and Robert knowing the truth only does so much.

Perhaps if they tell him they know, they can do more? Every once in a while, the idea floats through his mind, but William brushes it off. It sounds nice in theory, but how would he react if he had such a huge secret and found out three people puzzled it out on their own—or accidentally, in William’s case. He might go mad wondering how many other people know the truth and simply aren’t saying anything.

No, better to keep things quiet and help Danny in whatever way they can.

Laraine, at least, is confident in her efforts. One afternoon while walking by the gym, William pauses at the sound of shouts and squeaking shoes. If he remembers right, Laraine has Danny in her current class. They haven’t discussed Danny in private since that first meeting, although Laraine has followed through on her promise to “give William a life.” Luckily, that hasn’t involved anything too sporting, but rather her dragging William and Robert out to a dive bar on Friday nights. A place she frequents, and somewhere William would only have gone in his earliest days as a young adult. It’s been…okay.

But remembering Laraine’s goal to improve Danny physically, William opens the gym door and peeks inside to see how her efforts are going.

Danny is alone on one side of the gym while all the footballers in his class stand on the other, dodgeballs in hand. That must be the rest of Danny’s team slumped on the bench against the wall.

“Come on, Fenton! You'd better move it if you don’t want to get out!” Laraine shouts from the sidelines.

Dash reels back and whips his arm forward. The ball flies across the court, and Danny ducks at the last possible moment, barely avoiding a hit to the face.

Laraine blows her whistle. “Baxter! No head shots! Bench, now.”

Dash gapes at her. “But coach—!”

“I said what I said! Move along.”

Dash sputters, completely baffled, but does as told and trudges off the court. The remaining jocks unleash their barrage all at once, which Danny dodges with surprising fluidity, and he even catches one of them.

“Foley, you’re back in,” Laraine says.

Tucker Foley scampers back onto the court, fist-bumping Danny when he reaches his friend’s side.

“Good work, Fenton,” Laraine adds. To William’s surprise, Danny grins at her, then focuses back on the game. As Laraine paces along the boundary line, she glances William’s way and catches him watching. She winks and gives him a thumbs-up under her crossed arms.

William will readily admit that he doubts Laraine’s usefulness in their efforts. After all, gym class has very little bearing on his overall academics. But perhaps she is helping him in other ways.

Another time, while waiting to use the copier in the staff room, William idly watches Robert at the printer, who gathers a handful of papers, hole-punches them, and clips them into a duotang. It looks like a workbook of math problems, but he only has the one.

“Accidentally printed one short?” William asks.

“Ah, no.” Robert shakes his head. “It’s a little extra credit, for…” He trails off, but he doesn’t need to finish the sentence.

“I’ve been offering the class some short reading assignments on top of their usual homework as a small grade boost. It’s optional, and not many have taken it, but Danny has been one of them,” William says.

“It’s astounding how much we can miss,” Robert says. “Before, I thought he was a slacker who didn’t care about school since he rarely finished his assignments or did poorly on his tests. But”—he glances around the room and lowers his voice—“knowing what’s really happening has changed things.”

William understands. His stomach twists whenever he realizes how much he misjudged Danny the previous year. “He's bright when he has the time to read and understand the material.”

He recalls the big English test last year that Danny had failed the first time around. When William forced him to sit down, study, and think about the material, he seemed genuinely interested in the topic. Of course, William did need to nudge him along with that fake story about his sister. It’s not so surprising that Danny’s identity has stayed hidden for so long, not when putting on a dress and a wig convinces so many students that William is a completely different person. It’s not even a very good wig.

Maybe William needs to work on their critical thinking skills.

A month into their endeavour to improve Danny’s schooling, Principal Ishiyama calls a meeting with William, Robert, and Laraine. It happens before school on a Tuesday morning, before the first buses can arrive, so the teachers don’t need to be out watching the halls quite yet.

Robert and Laraine had arrived first and claimed the two visitor’s chairs in the office, leaving William to stand.

“Good morning, June. I assume this will be a quick meeting?” William asks. Usually, if a meeting will go longer than a few minutes, June will schedule it for after school.

“It is.” She opens her desk and pulls out some papers. Printed off emails, from the looks of it. “I’ve received a handful of complaints about favouritism from you three.”

William’s shoulders droop. He thinks he’s been doing a good job of curbing any favouritism he showed the jocks last year, in his efforts to help Danny, but perhaps it hasn’t been enough. Changing your behaviour like that can be hard. Maybe he’s still doing some things subconsciously.

June passes the papers to Robert, who flicks through them, then hands them off to Laraine. Laraine barely glances at them before holding them up for William to take. To his surprise, the bottom of the email isn’t signed Fenton, but Baxter.

“Apparently, Dash Baxter shared some complaints with his father, who shared them with me, and now I’m passing them on to you,” June says.

William skims the emails. “And?”

“That’s it. I assured Mr. Baxter I would share his concerns, and I have.”

William glances up, surprised at her flippant attitude. They had a one-on-one meeting about this last year, after Danny’s parents sent in an email. June spent quite a few minutes talking about how she agrees that the Fentons are strange, and it’s frustrating when a student obviously isn’t putting effort in, but as teachers, they can’t let that affect how they treat their students, outside reasonable punishments.

“I did notice that Danny has been marked late or absent fewer times in your classes, although I’ve heard from other teachers that his behaviour hasn’t changed much from last year.” June narrows her eyes, fixing her gaze on each of them for a few seconds.

“Ah, that must be some kind of mistake in the attendance,” Robert says. “Oh, well. We’ll have to pay a bit more attention in the future.”

June leans back and grabs a stress ball from her desk, rolling it between her hands. “I think it’s a minor issue, actually.” She tosses the ball up and catches it. “I was only curious about the reasoning behind it.”

William grips the back of Robert’s chair as he leans closer, searching June’s face. Her expression is carefully controlled, flat and almost uninterested, but her eyes keep darting toward them. Like she wants to say something.

Laraine breaks the silence first. “Ha! This kid sucks at keeping secrets.”

“I don’t think I know what you mean,” June lies.

Robert shifts uneasily. “So…you do know?”

June purses her lips and doesn’t respond. William thinks she, like them, doesn’t want to risk saying the wrong thing in case they’re reading too much into this. But the chances of that are getting lower by the second.

“Ah. Did you, maybe, see something by accident? A…transformation,” William asks.

“Is that how it happens? I’ve been curious about that. But no. I’ve had to speak privately to him and his parents a few times due to his past behaviour. Some of the things he said tipped me off. While it sounds impossible, it feels obvious once you know what’s going on.”

“Right? I mean, who else throws a ball like that?” Laraine snorts and shakes her head.

William’s eyebrow twitches. At this point, he wonders if the entire faculty knows. And if he’s the only one who couldn’t put things together for himself. Maybe he needs to work on his own critical thinking skills. Forget the students.

But this is good. While William, as vice principal, does have some administrative sway, June can help even further. Such as now, when she’s blatantly ignoring parent complaints in favour of Danny. William spends the rest of the day pondering how they can combine their efforts even more.

“Uh, Mr. Lancer?” Danny’s voice, full of hesitation, draws William out of his musings.

“How can I help you, Mr. Fenton?” William asks. The final bell went not long ago, so the classroom is empty besides them, although he can see Sam and Tucker lingering just outside the door.

“About that essay we handed in today…” Danny tilts his head toward the in-box on William’s desk. He had the students come up and submit their work at the start of class, but Danny hadn’t moved from his seat. There have been quite a few ghost attacks this week. If William isn’t mistaken, Danny has a few bruises hidden under his sleeves, although the ones under his eyes from lack of sleep are bad enough.

“Yes, thank you for submitting on time,” William says with a nod. “I look forward to reading it.”

“Um, but, I didn’t—”

William grabs the essays from his in-box and shuffles through them. “No, no, I’m sure you did. I have it right here.” When he reaches the bottom of the stack without finding Danny’s name, he forces his eyes to widen. “Oh, my. It looks like I lost your essay.”

He sets the papers down on his desk and folds his hands atop them, meeting Danny’s confused stare. “I’m so sorry for that, Mr. Fenton. Since it’s my mistake, I suppose I’ll have to give you an A. It wouldn’t be fair to make you redo the assignment.”

“Uh, if you’re sure?” Danny says.

“I’m very sure. I can tell you must have stayed up very late working on it, so you deserve a break. Have a good rest tonight.”

“Okay…” Danny heads for the door, but keeps glancing back as if expecting William to say, “Gotcha! Ten pages by tomorrow, please!” But William only smiles and nods. When Danny finally realizes he’s off the hook, he hurries outside.

William swears that he’s limping. Nothing he and the others do will ever be enough if Danny is out there getting hurt every day, but that’s an issue to tackle later. For now, he just has to hope their efforts are doing something for the boy.

—

Danny speeds down the hall, only slowing when the front doors come into view. Sam and Tucker have to jog to catch up to him.

“So, how bad was it? Did he ream you? Or did you have a good enough excuse that he’s giving you a couple days to work on it?” Tucker asks.

“He didn’t,” Danny says.

Sam huffs. “Jerk.”

“No, he didn’t do any of that. I couldn’t even mention that I didn’t finish the assignment. He looked through the essays and said he must have lost it when he didn’t see my name.” Danny stops as he reaches the front door, one hand resting on the push bar. “He gave me an A.”

“Dude, you should go ghost, sneak in there, and take my essay out. Maybe I’ll get an A, too,” Tucker says.

Sam bumps his shoulder with her fist. “Suck it up and take the C you deserve. At least Danny has a real excuse, even if he can’t tell it to anyone.”

“Yeah.” Danny glances back over his shoulder. Lancer’s classroom is well out of sight by now, but he can’t stop picturing that smile the teacher gave as he told Danny to rest. It was soft. Encouraging. The kind of look Lancer gives the good students. A teacher hasn’t looked at Danny like that since middle school.

But things like that have been happening a lot lately, haven’t they? Ms. Tetslaff called Dash out for targeting Danny in gym class. Mr. Falluca has been giving Danny worksheets and study guides with the math problems broken down, so they’re easier to understand; he’s never been better with numbers. Even Principal Ishiyama. He was late to school three times last week, and on the third time, the secretary sent him into Ishiyama’s office, but she just told him to get to class quickly so he wouldn’t miss anything else.

It’s been a good year, so far.

Mr. Lancer raised a doubtful eyebrow and Danny could see the restraint he exerted not to start a semantic discussion then and there about using his role as a name, but he just nodded shortly before leaving.

Danny knew his old teacher had looked forward to this almost as much as he had himself; he'd been the one to inspire Danny to choose this path, after all. 

As soon as he was alone with the class, Danny clapped his hands and started writing on the whiteboard; big letters spelling out his name, punctuated by a smiling blob-ghost. “My name is Danny Fenton, if anyone calls me Daniel they’ll get extra homework.”

When he turned back around to face the class with a smile, a student had their hand high in the air. 

Danny nodded to them to speak. 

“I recognize you,” the student said, “Aren't you one of them?”

“One of who?” Danny asked pleasantly, even if he knew what they were getting at. 

The student rolled their eyes as if he was stupid. “The Fenton, Fentons?”

Danny laughed and admitted, “Yeah, you got me there.”

Several students sat up straighter, and the one who had asked exchanged their exasperated look for a starstruck one. “That's so cool!”

Which was… A bit different to how his name used to be received when he was a student here. Good to know that he didn’t have to start out this new chapter of his life on the defensive, at least. 

Still, he had been spending a lot of time with Mr. Lancer for, so he couldn’t help saying, “Not as cool as classical literature!”

The students' excited looks turned empty and it was all Danny could do not to outwardly cringe. Maybe he had in fact lived long enough to become the monster.

Another student raised their hand and as soon as Danny nodded at them to speak they asked, “If you're a Fenton, can you bring a ghost to class?”

Another student called out, “Can you bring a ectogun?”

“Maybe, and no,” Danny said and then added, “and raise your hands if you wanna say something.”

Five more hands went up.

Danny snorted. “Anyone who wants to ask about something that isn’t related to ghosts?”

All the hands went back down. Danny gave a theatrical sigh, but when he saw the disappointment in their eyes he gave in. “All right. You get three more questions.”

All the hands went back up and he pointed to a girl in the second row, “You. Shoot.”

“You said you can bring a ghost, but you can’t bring an ectogun? Why? Doesn't your family make them?”

“I'm not gonna bring a gun to school! I just started this job, I don't wanna lose it.” She looked like she wanted to argue, but Danny pointed to a small boy in the last row. “You. Go!”

He looked surprised to be picked, even though he had his hand up as high as it went. “If you can bring a… a ghost, can… can you ask Phantom to come?”

“Um…” Danny blinked as he tried to cast about for a plausible excuse. He should have prepared for this! “I think he's busy?”

The boy looked skeptical but Danny nodded to a girl in the middle of the room with wild hair and big glasses before he could ask any follow up questions. So of course she asked, “How would you know that?”

“We… Talk?”

A tall girl in the front exclaimed, “You're friends with Phantom?!”

Danny shifted on his feet. “No comment.”

The class erupted into chaos, kids were standing at their desks, shouting over each other. Danny took a step back, felt the whiteboard at his back and desperately wished he hadn’t told Mr. Lancer that he could leave. 

He’d thought ghosts were full of energy. They had nothing on high schoolers.

He raised his voice and tried to get them to calm down. They didn’t even seem to register that he’d spoken. He cleared his throat and added some ghostly reverberation—just a hint of a wail—and said again, “Okay, settle down.”

The class immediately lapsed into silence and everyone stared at Danny with wide eyes. He smiled wide. “Thank you. Now—”

Apparently his little ghostly show wasn’t enough to deter some of the kids, as the same girl with the wild hair and glasses raised her hand again. Danny didn’t try to hide his exasperation as he nodded to her, “Yes?”

“You know a lot about ghosts, right?”

“I guess so,” he said cautiously.

She nodded. “Can you teach us about them?”

Danny raised both his eyebrows. “This is English class.” 

“So?” She asked, as if learning about the dead was a perfectly normal part of English… Wait a minute. Didn’t he know the perfect candidate that embodied both the English language and the dead? Ghost Writer would no doubt like the chance to talk about literature to an essentially captive audience. It was a bonus that meeting him would probably turn most of the class off from ever wanting to interact with a ghost again.

“If you behave, then I might be able to talk a ghost into visiting next week and talk about some classics.”

The class erupted into an equal amount of cheers and groans.

One kid called out, “Classics? I thought you were going to bring a cool ghost.”

“He's an expert at literature.”

“But can’t you bring someone—”

Danny interrupted them, “I don’t see any hands! Now, let’s go through what we’re gonna cover this semester.”

The class groaned, but finally started to settle down. Danny might not be used to people listening to him as Fenton, but he thought he could get used to this. 

—---

A few days later they were five minutes into quiet reading time when Danny’s stomach reminded him that he’d forgotten to eat lunch that day. His ghost sense had gone off, but then he hadn’t been able to find the ghost in question, so he’d spent the whole lunch period scouring the school and decidedly not eating.

He looked around the classroom, noted with satisfaction that everyone seemed to be concentrating on their books, and then slowly, oh so slowly, took out a thermos filled with snacks from his desk and then very, very carefully placed one in his mouth. He bit down and then he looked up and— And the whole class was looking at him, books forgotten. Damn. 

“Sorry?” he said, lowering the thermos back down, “You can get back to your reading?”

“Mr. Fenton. What is that?” a girl in the front asked. Her name was Olivia if Danny remembered correctly.

Danny grimaced, and decided to try and distract them. “Please don't call me that. My name is Danny.”

“Mr. Danny. What is that?”

Well, it was worth a shot. Danny let out a sigh. “Believe me, you don't want this.” Danny said as he popped another crunchy dried piece of ecto into his mouth.

A boy in the third row—Alex—said, “But you always tell us that if we bring snacks then we have to share them!”

“You can’t eat this.” he held the thermos up, tilting it so they could see inside, “See how green it is? It’s ectoplasm. It’s corrosive. You know what that word means?”

His pathetic attempt to get the class back under control failed as Olivia snorted. “Of course we do. If it’s so bad, then why are you eating it?”

Danny shrugged with a smile. “I needed a snack and this was all I had.”

Her eyebrows drew together into an expression of real worry as she quietly asked, “Do they really pay teachers that little?”

Danny burst out laughing. “Oh, no! I’m sorry, it’s not—I’m okay. I like eating this.”

Alex frowned hard. “But you said it’s car—corrosive?”

Another student spoke up, “You like disgusting things, Mr. Danny?”

A lot of the students laughed.

Danny crossed his arms, “I just want to remind you that I have a zero tolerance for bullying in this class. And that applies to me too.” He let a wide grin spread across his face. “And believe me, Poindexter will know, and he'll tell me. Right Sidney?”

“That’s right,” came the disembodied voice of Sidney Poindexter from the middle of the room.

The class broke out into chaos.

“Holy shit, there’s a ghost in here!”

“Mr. Danny actually knows a ghost?!”

“I thought he was lying about that!”

“We’re gonna die!”

Danny laughed and waited until the panic had died down slightly before assuring them, “Sidney is very nice as long as you’re being nice. He won’t hurt anyone. Besides,” He leaned forward and pitched his voice lower, “Do you guys wanna know a secret?”

All of them quieted down and leaned closer, nodding. Danny congratulated himself on being a master of redirection.

“If you guys finish your reading then I’ll tell you where we’re going for our class trip before class ends.”

That settled the argument and everyone went back to reading with minimal complaining. Danny happily crunched on his snacks and ignored the occasional nasty looks he received for it. 

As the end of the class approached Danny got up from his desk and everyone immediately focused back on him. Which didn’t really imbue him with confidence that they’d focused on reading, but Danny would take what he could get.

He clapped his hands. “So. I've been told I can't take you on a trip to the Ghost Zone for our field trip—” he was interrupted by a chorus of booing and disappointed exclamation “—but! I thought we should do something even more fun!”

The whole class sat up straighter. Several voices called out, “What's that?”

Danny did jazz-hands, smiling wide as he said, “The observatory!”

Several of the students let out groans and protested ‘Awwws’.

“The observatory?”

“We could have gone to the Ghost Zone?!”

“Hey!” Danny broke in, “The observatory is cooler!”

It was the first time he’d ever been booed by an entire room. He didn’t care to repeat it. 

Olivia’s voice sounded out in the room, thoughtful, “I've heard Phantom spends a lot of time here. Maybe we can see him there?”

“O—oh? Really?” Danny said hesitantly. He hadn’t realized he was known for hanging out at the observatory. Not that it wasn’t true, he just hadn’t known that other people had seen him. He would need to be more careful about that.

“Hey,” Alex said, “Isn't it funny that you and Phantom have the same first name?”

Danny said, completely deadpan, “Hilarious. Now. I’ll give you a note to take home and you have to ask your—”

And that was when the ghost that had evaded him during lunch finally showed up.

Skulker burst into the room through the wall—thankfully he was intangible for once and didn’t tank the school’s budget even further—and aimed a gun right at Danny’s face.

Danny sighed and gestured at his class, most of which had thrown themselves onto the floor beneath their desks as per ghost attack protocol, “Can you wait five minutes? I'm working right now.”

Skulker stared at him. “I'm—I’m here to get your—”

Danny shook his head and cracked his knuckles.

Skulker swallowed and drifted towards the back of the room. “I'm just gonna sit right here, then?”

Danny waved him off. “You do that. Just don't scare the kids.” he turned back to face his class, “Alright, what was I saying? The observatory! Bring the slip to your parents and have them sign it before next class. You need a signed slip to come. Any questions?”

Nobody said anything. In fact, nobody was even looking at Danny as all of his students were gaping openly at Skulker, who had crammed himself into a small plastic chair at the back of the room with his flaming hair casting flickering shadows on the walls.

Danny aimed an accusatory glare at him. “What did I tell you? You're scaring them!”

“I'm just sitting here!” Skulker argued, his armor clanking as he huffed in annoyance.

“Do it more quietly,” Danny said with narrowed eyes.

His comment was met with scattered snickers as the students relaxed slightly seeing their English teacher argue with the scary ghost.

Skulker somehow managed to flush green, even across his metal plated outside. “Hey, don’t—”

Danny interrupted him, “If you want to say something then you need to raise your hand like everyone else.”

That seemed to be the last drop and Skulker got up from his chair with a growl and a, “I’ll raise my hand alright!”

And then he tackled Danny through the whiteboard. He did not go intangible this time and Danny could see his next salary fly out the window at the same time as he and Skulker flew across the hallway. 

His class screamed and the sound of their fear made Danny throw caution to the wind as he immediately changed into Phantom, raised the thermos and made short work of Skulker as he mourned the loss of his snacks. At least Skulker would have something to nibble on for the rest of the day before Danny had time to release him back into the Zone.

As he made his way back to his classroom he was ready to see his class huddling and scared. Instead he was met by cheers.

“Phantom!”

“Hey, Phantom!”

No tears in sight. No worrying. “Hey, kids! Where’s your teacher?”

“He went out,” one of the kids said easily as they all got up to gather around him. Went out?! He had just been body-slammed though the wall!

Well, good to see that they would ditch him in a heartbeat.

“Did you defeat the ghost?”

“We’re coming to visit you in the observatory!”

Wait. Maybe he could use this… “I promise to meet you there if you all do your homework.”

“Really?” The class collectively lit up.

“Yes!”

“We’ll do it!”

“Promise”

“What are you talking about?” said Danny, twirling on one foot.  Basketball shorts were much more breathable than jeans, and they were so loose they almost felt like a skirt.  He wouldn’t want to wear them every day, but it wasn’t bad for a change.  “I’m just changing my look.”

“So that you look exactly like Wes?”

“You’re the one who got me the orange hair dye,” pointed out Danny, “and it’s not my fault that his celebrity doppelganger is me.”

“I thought you were going to use it for significantly less nefarious purposes,” said Jazz.  “How long have you been planning this, anyway?  Have you been bringing that outfit with you to school every day?  And the dye?”

“Nah, I stashed it in the walls ages ago.  I’ve got supplies for all sorts of scenarios.”

“As if that isn’t even weirder.”  She sighed.  “This is going to have unintended consequences, and I want it on the record that I told you so.”

“Jazz, if I kept a record of all the times you ‘told me so,’ it’d reach the moon.”

“Yeah, and don’t you think that might mean something?”

Jazz shook her head and pushed away from the wall.  “Break’s about to end.  I’m going back to class.  Try to not get the cops called on you.  Or Wes.”

“No guarantees!”

.

William Lancer could admit, he didn’t always count his students one by one, focusing intently on every face and asking students to remove hoodies and glasses, before taking attendance.  However, after reading that horror story about a woman sneaking into a school by pretending to be her own daughter, and only being found out through social media posts, he did more often than not.  Such a thing would not happen on his watch.  Such a thing would not happen at Casper High.  

He hoped.  The presence of the shapeshifting ghost made actually following through on that much more difficult.  

Even so…

There was a tiny red circle next to Wesley Weston’s name on his attendance sheet for the day, a sign that the office had marked him absent.  William looked up, scanned the classroom, found a red headed student sitting in Wesley Weston’s seat, wearing a basketball jersey and fiddling with a camera and everything.  Just like Wes always did.  

He looked back at the attendance sheet.  Now, it was sometimes wrong.  There was a reason teachers took attendance every period, not just during first.  However…  He looked at a name further up the list.  Daniel Fenton.  There was no red circle next to his name.  William’s eyes slid away from his computer screen, back to the classroom.  Daniel’s usual seat was empty.  However, his friend Sam was sitting next to it, in her seat, staring at the back of Wesley’s head with a great deal of exasperation, and much less hostility than usual.  

Once again, he looked at the red headed student, and noted that the way he held himself was just a little different than usual, that his fingernails were stained orange, and his freckles were out of place.  

Another student approached the imposter.  “Oh, hey, Wes!  I thought you were absent today.”

“Dentist,” said ‘Wes.’  “I’ve got to be at school to go to practice, yeah?”

“Right on.  So…  What d’you think about Fenton being absent?”

“Well,” said ‘Wes,’ equally slyly, “I’ve actually got a brand new theory about that.  Have you ever heard of ley lines?”

William looked back down at his attendance sheet, marked Daniel as ‘present’ and Wesley as ‘absent.’  More and more, he thought he wasn’t paid nearly enough to deal with this.  

.

“Did you hear?  Wes thinks Fenton is a fairy, now.”

“What kind?”

“Really?  He told me he thought Fenton was a half-sasquatch.  I mean, that’s nuts, but if you look at his dad, you can kind of see where he’s coming from.”

“Wes told me that he looked up the Fenton family tree, and apparently they were cursed by witches in Salem, and that’s the real reason Amity Park is haunted.”

“You know all the ‘witches’ there were just, like, normal, falsely accused people?”

“So they say.”

“I heard he thought that Fenton was a mermaid, and that’s why he never showers after PE.”

“I thought that was just because he has a stupid birthmark.”

“That’s got to be someone misshearing something.  Wes told me he had proof Fenton was grown in a lab, to be, like, a perfectly annoying being.”

“What?  Didn’t he say that Fenton was, like, a curly phonograph or something?”

“... Do you mean a Kirlian photograph?”

“Dude, how do you even know about that?”

“How do you know about it?  We live in a haunted town.”

Leaning against her locker and eavesdropping on all the conversations in the hall was Sam Manson.  “A Kirlian photograph?  Really?”

Danny, standing next to her invisibly, snickered, “Okay, that one got warped by the rumor mill, but you’ve got to admit it’s funny.”

“What happens when Wes buys an actual Kirlian photography set or something?”

“He has already, but there’s no way I’m going to stay still for him to hook me up to voltage, so it’s not doing him much good.”

“Huh?”

“Oh, uh, that’s how Kirlian photography works?  You need more than a camera.”

“Huh.  I didn’t know that.  So, what are you going to do, now that everyone in the school thinks Wes is losing his marbles?  Wash up and pretend this didn’t happen?”

“Eventually, yeah, but I figured I’d go to basketball practice.  Don’t want Wes to lose his place on the team.”

“Danny, you’ve never played basketball before.”

“Sure I have, in PE!”

“Doesn’t count.”

Danny laughed again.  “I’ll let the team be the judge of that.  And I’d better head out before people start to think you’re just as crazy as Wes.”

Sam, obviously, didn’t see Danny go, but she felt the air around her get a little… emptier.  

“Oh, man, he’s going to wind up in so much trouble.  I can’t wait to tell Tucker.”

.

Danny didn’t know what Sam was worried about.  Danny knew the rules for basketball.  And, because he was playing someone actually athletic, and not wimpy Fenton, he could actually, like, do well.  As a bonus, it’d help sell the act.

He strode into the locker room and made a beeline for Wes’s locker.  Thanks to Dash, Danny knew all the lockers in the school intimately.  

Okay, not all of them, but he knew whose was which, and he opened up Wes’s locker before making the clothes he was carrying himself visible inside it.  Verisimilitude or not, he wasn’t wearing Wes’s clothing.  That’d be gross.  Who knew when he’d last washed them?

He got dressed and followed the other team members out into the gym, copying them as they started their warm ups.  Ms. Tetslaff was there, with a clipboard, having the dubious honor of coaching almost every sport Casper High had.  She looked at Danny, then at her clipboard, then at Danny again.  She sighed, heavily.  

“Weston, give me fifty.”

“Uh… Situps?” 

“Laps.”

That seemed a little excessive, compared to PE, but the sports teams were supposed to be more athletic in general, so whatever.  Danny took off running.  

The practice continued like that, with Tetslaff shouting out instructions every once in a while.  ‘Wes’ was the target of them more often than not, and Danny had to wonder if Wes had gotten on her bad side last week, or something like that.  It couldn’t’ve been Danny’s fault.  

Eventually, when all the other players had finished their warm ups, Tetslaff called Danny over from where she’d told him to do wall squats.  

“Alright,” she said.  “We’re gonna run a few games.  I’ll count you off, got it?  Two teams play, one rests.”

Everyone bobbed their heads, apparently already exhausted by the warm ups.  

Danny (number two) wound up on a team with Dash (zero), Dale (four), Devonte (eleven), and Delmar (three), squaring off against Derek (five), Dylan (six), Dwight (eight), Dominic (one), and DeShawn (twelve).  

… Did all the kids on the basketball team except Wes have names that started with D?  No, wait, there was Kwan.  Thank goodness.  That could’ve been a bad sign.  

Bleh, he sounded like Sam.  Nothing bad was going to happen!  To him.  Hopefully, Wes would have some kind of breakdown and stop trying to expose him, because that was getting old (not to mention dangerous) really fast.  

It wasn’t the nicest thing to wish on another person, but Wes was trying to expose Danny’s secret identity when there were genuine government agents running around threatening to carry out ‘lots and lots of painful experiments’ (direct quote) on his person.  

But!  Danny wasn’t going to focus on that right now.  He was having fun.  This was, like, an elite prank.  One that he could only do because Wes and he had, like, the exact same face shape.  

But.  Dash.  Dale.  Not the teammates Danny would’ve chosen.  But Wes had, so he’d work on them.  

.

“Alright!  I’m shuffling the teams,” declared Tetslaff, sounding… strangely frustrated.  

“But I like this team,” said Devonte.

“Yeah!  We’re winning,” agreed Delmar.  

“That’s right,” said Derek, “you’re hogging the wins!”

“SHUT UP!  I’m the coach, so what I say goes.  NO WHINING!  Weston!  Switch with Dwight.  Your team is up next.”

“Uh,” said Danny, when no other changes were made, “did I do something wrong?”

“NO WHINING!  PLAY BALL!”

…  Wasn’t that, like, a baseball thing?  Oh, well, whatever.  Not Danny’s problem if she got her sports idioms mixed up.  

.

Danny had just gotten the ball.  Well, he’d gotten the ball a whole bunch, actually.  Compared to ghosts, these basketball players were practically standing still, and even Danny barely believed the sheer variety of things he’d had to steal from ghosts.  A large, bright orange ball was nothing.  

But unlike every other time, there wasn’t an easy pass to another player, which was the main thing he’d been going for so far, because that seemed like something that’d annoy Wes.  Not getting any baskets himself.  

That’d probably be secondary to the identity theft, but Danny was hoping for a matryoshka of annoyance, where Wes would find progressively more to be annoyed about the more he investigated.  

On the other hand… He’d started to get just a little… competitive.  There was no value in winning the game, and Danny felt like the annoyance value would be higher if his team lost a few games…

However.  

It would very easy to win.  

All he had to do was

… toss…

… the…

… ball…

The ball swished through the net.  The gym went silent.  Which was a weird, because the gym was very echoey.  Silence in the gym was practically impossible.  

“Where the hell did you throw that from?” demanded Dash, waving his hands.

“Here?” said Danny.  

“From the other side of the court?  What the f–”

“LANGUAGE, BAXTER.”

.

When Danny got home, he stopped in the bathroom to wash the dye out of his hair and remove the rest of his disguise.  Then, he popped by Jazz’s room to let her know he was home.  

“How was it?”

“Pretty good!” said Danny.  “Kind of wild that no one called me out, though.  It’s almost like Wes’s delusional and repugnant behavior drove away all his friends.”

“I do have to point out that he is right.”

“Sure,” agreed Danny.  “But he’s also a massive jerk.  The delusional part is more about thinking I won’t retaliate.”

“Ah, that’s fair, then.”  Jazz looked at her book.  “Let me know when the unintended consequences of your actions reach you.  I want to add the results to my thesis.”

“Which thesis?”

“The one about the need for effective methods of stress relief for teenagers with unusual responsibilities.  You’re my first case study.”

“I’m, like, your case study for all of your theses.”

“Untrue!  I’m also studying Mom and Dad.”

“Plus, isn’t it super unethical to study your friends and family members?”  He’d read that somewhere recently, but he wasn’t going to tell Jazz that.  She’d make him read even more psychology stuff.

“Has ethical science ever been practiced in this house?” asked Jazz.  

They both thought about it for a while.  “We’ve done some science projects here.  Like, my radiotelescope project.”

“That Mom and Dad launched on a super illegal satellite?”

“Hey, illegal doesn’t mean unethical.”

“Which was powered by ectoplasm sourced from where, exactly.”

Danny made a face.  “You’re not any better with your ant torment nexus.”  It hadn’t really tormented any ants, as far as he could tell, but the intention had been there. 

“I acknowledge my flaws and try to move past them.”

“So stop studying me.”

“Denied.”

Danny rolled his eyes and went back to his room.  Sisters were so annoying.

.

Everything was normal up until he made it to homeroom.  Then, he was surrounded by the basketball team.  

“Fenton,” said Dash, sounding regretful, “you’re joining the basketball team.”

“Uh,” said Danny.  “No?”

“There’s no way we’re letting someone with the talent you showed yesterday scrape by wimping it up as a muscleless nerd.”

“First off, I do have muscles, secondly, I didn’t play any basketball yesterday, so I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Come on, man,” said Kwan.  “You might be able to fool Wes’s…”  He stopped, staring into the air for several seconds.  “Dash, bro, does Wes have any friends?”

“Presumably he has teammates,” said Danny.  

“Not anymore,” sneered Dash.  “He’s getting bumped to JV, now that you’re on the varsity team.”

“I’m not, though.”  Danny looked at Sam, hoping for help.  She shrugged.  He glared at her.  Tucker would back him up.  It sucked that he’d caught the same bug as Wes.  

“You joined practice yesterday, that means you are.  Coach Tetslaff already got your parents to sign the permission forms.”

Danny squaked.  “Since when?”

“Dunno.  Coach is like magic.  She does everything for the team.”  Dash dropped a bundle of papers on Danny’s desk.  “You’ve gotta fill these out, though.  Or else.”

The entire basketball team nodded.  

“Are you guys serious?  Even you, Dwight?”

“Victory is everything,” said Dwight.  

Danny looked at the papers.  His parents had signed them.  Traitors.  

“How did you know, anyway?” said Danny.  His disguise hadn’t been impenetrable, by any means, but he’d thought it was pretty good.  He’d even gotten color contacts!

“If Wes had to do all those warm up exercises before he even got on the court, he would’ve been whining like a baby,” said Dominic.

“Your conspiracy theories were better put together, honestly,” said Dale.  “Way too logical.”

“Also,” piped up Devonte, “you play way better than he does.  You pass the ball a lot more.”

“And I’ve shoved you in lockers so much that I know the exact dimensions of your body.  Wes is half an inch taller than you.”

“Okay, that’s creepy,” said Danny.  

“If it helps, I think, like, most everyone else believed you were Wes,” added Dwight.  

It didn’t help.  “You know I’m not going to sign this.  I’m not going to be on your team.”

“Coach said that us chasing you down can be our warm up.”

They were in the car for a while. He didn’t know how long it had been. But some time later, he could feel the car finally pull over. The car doors sounded again and then he was being pulled out.

“Hey!” Danny shrugged one of them off but they grabbed him again. “What’s the deal?” 

“Quiet, child!” They hissed. 

They shoved him forward by the shoulders. He stumbled and almost fell to the ground before they grabbed him by his arms again. 

He could hear another door opening but this one didn’t sound like a car door. It sounded more like a cellar door. It sounded old and creaky. 

They guided him down the stairs and into what felt like a hallway. He heard another door open and when it closed, cheers erupted in the room he was in. 

Then they cut the rope that was binding his wrists together. Danny took the chance to try to swing at one of them. He felt his fist connect with someone’s face and he was being grabbed and dragged again. 

This time they threw him back onto a table, holding his wrists down and tying more rope around them. They did the same for his ankles. 

Then they finally removed the blindfold. 

It was dark in this room. Torches were light throughout the space and there were many people down there with robes down there. He could see one with a black eye. That must be the one he hit. 

In the center of the room in front of the table Danny was strapped to was another man wearing a robe. He stood on a platform to make him taller than everyone else in the room. 

“We are here to grant Lord Phantom access to the mortal plane!” 

A man in a robe held his arms in the air, speaking in a loud booming voice. 

“We have finally found the perfect sacrifice to bring him to us!” 

Danny snorted. And then it turned into a full on laugh. The cult members stopped to stare at him. 

“Do you guys like, use the internet at all?”

“The Internet is sinful propaganda!” Another member shouted at him. 

“How do you know about Phantom then? Are you even from Amity Park?”

“Lord Phantom has been a legend passed down through generations. He will serve his followers in exchange for a hefty price. Records of him go all the way back to Salem-”

Ah. That explains it. 

They dragged their daggers down the inside of his forearms on both sides. Little did they know, the wounds sealed up almost as soon as they were cut. But they couldn’t see that through the blood that did come out from the injuries. 

“Phantom! Please come and grant us with your presence and take our offering!”

“Phantom! Phantom! Phantom!” 

They cult members chanted around him and Danny smirked as an idea came into his head. 

“Ark! Ugh! Bleh!” 

Danny made over the top dying sounds. He arched his back and fell back down, laying as still as he could. The chanting stopped and the silence that followed was heavy with anticipation. 

Danny went intangible and floated up into the air through his restraints. The cult members gasped and watched as he raised higher. 

Then he let out his ghostly wail and arched his back. 

They covered their ears at the sound. Some of them even clenched their eyes shut. The cult leader was still staring at him. 

Now. 

Danny summoned his transformation as he continued letting out his ghostly wail. He tried to make the rings more sparkly, harder to see through. He let his wail die down as his transformation finished and he could hear the gasps of the cult members as they saw him floating in the air as his ghost half. 

Danny concentrated on making his eyes flood with green and then he sat up. He glanced around the room at them and they kept staring at him. 

“What am I doing here?” 

He put extra echo into his voice and some of them shivered at the sound of it. He let his gaze land on the leader.

“You. Why have you summoned me?”

Now that they had Phantom there, he could tell that some of them were nervous. The leader was still composed. 

“We have sacrificed child, Danny Fenton, in your name! Please, grant us your help and power!” 

Danny frowned at him, furrowing his brows. He let more of his ghostly energy out to make him look more spectral, putting on the facade of fury.

“You sacrificed a child in my name? How dare you!” 

His voice shook the room, just bordering on another ghostly wail. The leader’s eyes widened. 

“But the legends-”

“The legends are wrong!” 

Danny let a bit of his wail into that one. The leader cowered and many of them got as far away from him as he could. 

“Let this be a lesson! Your hubris will be the end of you! You have earned my wrath!” 

“No!” The leader shouted in fear. “Is there anything we can do? We only wanted to-”

“There is nothing to be done! You can only count your days!” 

“Tell me what-”

“The end is near.”

Danny took all of the echo out of his voice with that last sentence and used his ectoblasts to disappear in a black and green ball, activating his invisibility. 

The cult members started scrambling around one another. 

“What do we do?!” 

“We’re all gonna die!” 

Danny covered his mouth to stifle his laugh and flew up and out of the building he was in. Once he was gone, the laughs burst out of him.

“Oh, man! That’ll teach them!” 

He looked at the sky and was shocked to see it was already dark out. He’d have to tell Sam and Tucker about what happened when he saw them tomorrow.

~~~~~~~

“Dude, why’d you bail on us?” 

Tucker shouted the question at Danny from ten feet away. Sam was standing next to him with her arms crossed and her hip cocked. 

“Yeah, what was so important that you couldn’t even tell us you weren’t coming?” 

“You’re not gonna believe this. I-”

Suddenly, he felt like he was being watched. He stopped talking and looked around him. 

Danny made eye contact with someone as he looked over his shoulder. It was one of the cultists that tried sacrificing him to summon him. Their eyes were wide and filled with fear. 

They thought Danny Fenton was dead. For all they knew, Phantom ate him or some shit.

Danny put on the creepiest, sharpest grin he could muster and made his eyes turn green. It must’ve worked. The cult member turned around and ran away down the street. Danny started laughing. 

“What’s so funny?” Sam shot him a look. He no doubt interrupted their conversation they were having. 

Paulina has always considered herself to be a scholar of three subjects: good lip gloss, hallway politics, and gossip. The first two come naturally to her, while the third requires a little bit more discipline. You have to know when to look bored while listening. And to master the slow blink that said I am absolutely not paying attention while your ears vacuumed up every word in a ten-foot area. Then, of course, you have to understand that if you carry three shopping bags and a pink iced drink, people assume nothing is going on behind your ears and eyes. People underestimate Paulina constantly, and that's exactly the way she likes it.

So when she was browsing earrings at Amity Mall on a thursday afternoon and heard the phrase ‘half a’ said like it was one word and about a person, she nearly dropped a rhinestone hoop into a potted ficus. 'Half a' what?

The voice came from the service corridor beside the food court. Low, urgent, male, “…I’m telling you, if the town finds out Phantom's is half human, a... what was it? A 'halfa' as the ghosts call it, there’ll be panic".

And Paulina had frozen behind a kiosk selling scented phone cases. Phantom? Her darling, wonderful Phantom? Defender of Amity Park? Her glowing-eyed ghost prince? Subject of at least six fan edits Paulina had saved for 'research purposes'?

Half human?

Another voice hisses back, "keep your voice down, you fool. We know he has genetic relations to someone here, someone human, but that's all we know”, scoffing, "since this messed up town's hospital won't let us access any further files".

'Genetic relations to someone'... To someone 'from here'. Someone from Amity. Someone human. Paulina slowly lowers her sunglasses despite being indoors.

No.

No no no.

This was not gossip. This was god-grade gossip. Ancient treasure gossip. Nuclear gossip.

She peeks around the corner. There's two men in white suits -G.I.W. agents, clearly, ugh- standing near a door marked AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. One's holding a metallic briefcase, and the other has the haunted expression of someone trying to figure out how to trap someone untouchable.

Briefcase Guy huffs, “…the human genetics must be how the creature can stay in our world for so long, especially without losing any power".

“I know that", responds Haunted Guy, “I’m worried whether or not finding this genetic relation will help us and our cause, or hinder it".

Briefcase Guy waves the other off, "of course it will help us, what person would want to be related to some half-ghost abomination? All we have to do is find them and threaten to tell the press what monstrosity they helped create. Besides, who cares if we upset the feelings of some freak that decided to bang an ectoplasmic manifestation".

Paulina gasps softly, those awful men were planning to try and hurt her wonderful Phantom again! She obviously can't and won't stand for that! But how? Telling him, speaking to her lovely man, would obviously be an option... but how much good what that even do? No, she needs to know the very thing these jerky G.I.W. agents want to, she needs to know Phantom's human parent. Oh mi god, she can barely believe he has human family! So cool! She bets they're really cute or beautiful or handsome -gender depending- Oh, but that's not the point right now, she has to figure this out. Both because she has to get ahead of the gossip, but also to protect her man.

The men turn, and she snaps upright and pretends to inspect a keychain rack with the intensity of a fashion designer. After a tense moment, the door shuts behind them, and Paulina relaxes a fraction. She stands motionless for three full seconds, then she spins on her heel and speed-walks to the bathroom.

Wait! If Phantom is half-human, and has a human parent, then that means she totally could have babies with him! Oh, this is the best mall trip evar.

By four pm, Paulina has convened an emergency summit at Glamour Bean Café with her two best friends, Star and Lindsey. After all, she needed reinforcements for gossip this juicy, especially if she's gonna protect her man!

Star starts fanning herself, shrieking, “he’s WHAT?".

Paulina grins meanly to herself, enjoying the shock she's causing, “half human", leaning back dramatically, "meaning somewhere in this city there is either an unknowing ghosts lover or the weirdest PTA parent alive".

Lindsey stares, “how do you know this isn’t fake?”.

“Because when do those G.I.W. men ever actually whisper secretively about anything? They only whisper like that for three reasons", counting on her manicured fingers, “affairs, the Fenton's getting on over on them, or ghost stuff they need to keep quiet”.

Lindsey hums and nods, “that’s… weirdly solid logic".

Star grabs Paulina's wrist, “do you think he went to high school here?”.

Paulian's eyes widen, “oh mi God".

The table goes entirely silent, then all three scream at once. They! They might be going to the same school that Phantom went to or currently goes to!

The next morning, Paulina arrives at school wearing determination and heels with no practical purpose but just the right amount of sparkle to not clash with her skirt. She surveys the student body, looking for anyone who might seem even slightly ghostly. Slightly like Phantom.

If Phantom was half human, then maybe he had relatives. Maybe he had lived here. Maybe he was younger than people thought. Maybe he was someone in town.

Maybe…

A student.

She marches to the yearbook archives. The librarian eyeing her, “need help?”.

Paulina nodding quickly, “Yes, I need records of every transfer student who seemed emotionally unavailable and constantly dead tired”.

The man blinks at her, “that is… not a searchable category”.

“Then we do this manually”.

By lunch, Paulina’s suspect list included:

Erik, a pale boy who always wore hoodies in summer

The Rowan twins who never blinked enough

Jessie the soccer captain with suspicious cheekbones

Jeremy Pell, because no one could naturally have that jawline

Her chemistry partner Noah Mercer, who once crushed a calculator by accident

Danny, the school freak

She pauses, Danny Fenton… quiet yet very witty (witty like Phantom maybe), weirdly strong (ghost strength?), kinda glowy in fluorescent light (very ghostly), sleeps in lots of classes (sleep deprived from ghost fights?), and Dash has claimed to have seen his eyes flash green before (extremely ghostly)… Danny also had once said ‘your living snacks are mediocre’ after trying some soya fried rice (implying eating dead/ghost food).

Paulina slowly lowers her fork, now that she thinks about it… didn’t she see him literally walk through a trash can!??

No.

No way.

Scanning the room and finding that messy mop of black hair… ink black, yeah definitely too dark to be normal, right? Right. And across the cafeteria, Danny looks up; like he knows someone’s staring specifically at him.

Their eyes meet and he immediately looks very concerned. Interesting… yes it could be purely that she’s the one staring at him, rather than the other way around.

After school, Paulina corners him near the bike racks. “Hiya, Danny”, tone sweet as can be.

Danny blinks and rears back, “Paulina?”.

Paulina tilts her head, “so, quick question”.

He narrows his eyes and leans even further back away from her, “…why are you smiling like that?”.

“Are you half ghost by any chance?”. Sometimes it really was best to be blunt and straightforward, to give people as little wiggle room as possible.

He drops his backpack, stands in silence for a while, then sputtering a little, “I- what, um, I’m sorry?”.

“Don’t play coy with me, Danny. You once caught a falling vending machine”.

“It was tilting”.

“You know three dead languages”.

“My parents literally study all things dead, languages included”.

“You don’t ever seem to sweat”.

“I moisturize”.

Paulina leans in, she’d have a hard time believing Danny wore matching socks, nonetheless actually moisturized… “you called the anti-gravity park a return to normalcy”.

Danny’s face manages to drain of colour, becoming even paler than he always is, “I like a good joke?”.

She quirks an eyebrow at him, “I’ve seen you walk through a trash can”.

For one heartbeat, something flickers behind his pupils, spooky green light. Sure it could be written off as just the ectoplasm that’s in him from the contamination but… she’s betting that it’s ectoplasm from him being half ghost, not some contamination. Heck! That contamination story was probably just a cover up.

He screws his face up, glances around, mutters, “fuck I thought no one saw that shit”, shakes his head and looks back to her, “can we talk somewhere private?”.

Oh she absolutely has caught him. She smirks at him, putting her hands on her hips, “I knew it”.

He rubs his forehead and sighs very loudly, “after all these years, damnit, fuck my life”. She only giggles at him in response as she grabs his wrist and begins dragging the dumb boy off. Next question, is he related to Phantom or is he Phantom.

They sit down on the bleachers, the sky slowly turning a shade of violet. Danny stares out at the field for a long time, “so what do you think you’ve figured out?”.

She smirks a daintily a little, “that you’re half ghost”. When all he does is quirks an eyebrow at her, she rolls her eyes and adds on, “so either you’re Phantom. Or you’re, like, Phantom’s sibling or cousin or something but more human-looking”.

He scrunches his eyebrows, “and why do you think Phantom’s involved either way?”.

She flips her hair and huffs, “because he’s half human, and ‘related’ to someone in town. Add in that you’re definitely half human, either you’re him or related to him and the Fenton’s only adopted you because you look human and he doesn’t”.

“… I’m not adopted”.

She shrugs, he could just not know, it’s not like Danny looked anything like the rest of the Fenton’s, “you look nothing like them. But say you’re not, then one of them fucked a ghost, probably unknowingly. Absolutely scandalous”. That actually makes him choke and start laughing. She taps her chin and looks up to the sky, “and maybe they’re so against Phantom because they’re ashamed of the twins they created, especially the one that looks like a ghost”. He bends over wheezing even more. Is she trying to get him to slip and say something he wouldn’t normally? Yes, yes she is.

He wheezes some more, wiping a tear from his eyes, “Ancients, I could never even imagine them with anyone other than each other, Jesus fucking Chris-”, then blinks very harshly, snaps up straight enough to make her jump a little, and stares at her flat and serious, “why do you think Phantom’s half human”.

That… feels almost like he’s threatening her, which she can understand. The G.I.W. make it super obvious that any info about Phantom that isn’t already public becoming public could be, like, super dangerous. And normally she might hold something juicy over someone’s head, she wouldn’t risk Phantom’s safety like that. Whether Danny’s Phantom or just a sibling. Twirling her hair a little awkwardly, pouting, “over heard some of those G.I.W. jerks saying he was”, tilting her head and making a point to seem less sure, “something something halfa? And related to someone it town?”, huffing and sticking her nose up in the air, “they don’t know who so obviously I had to figure that out first. Get ahead of the drama, you know”, smiling and looking down at her hands, shifting a little, “and… I’d rather them not know, since they’re so mean to him”. One thing about gossip, if you’re in the know and you’re good, you can manipulate the truth. Hide certain parts, make other parts worse, fudge the truth.

Danny… actually growls at her making her jump a little again, before he flops backwards, back smacking into the bleacher seats behind them, and thunking his head down on it, “ugh. This day just keeps getting worse. Fuck me”.

She blushes a little, gotta shoot her shot right? “I mean, if you are Phantom, I wouldn’t be opposed”; and at least she gets him to start laughing again. Him being freaky and serious isn’t super useful to her.

He rubs a hand down his face, sighing loudly, “well… at least they don’t know the who, I guess”, pushing himself to sit back up. Putting his elbows on his knees, watching the empty field, “… Phantom doesn’t have any siblings”.

Paulina absolutely squeals immediately, she knew it! He totally is Phantom! They all go to school with Phantom! He even thinks she’s cute! Phantom thinks she’s cute! Lunging at him, throwing her arms around his neck, and squealing a little more, “I knew it!”, knocking them both sideways. He just lays there glaring at her so she puts her elbows on either side of his chest, and places her chin in her palms. Grinning down at him, “so, you’re Phantom”.

“Yeah”.

“You’re Fenton”.

“Yup”.

Her smirking at him, “you failed gym twice”.

He blinks and huffs a little laugh, “…that did happen, twice”.

She snorts cutely and sits back up, “that is the most shocking part”. Really how does someone that can pick up a bus fail gym??

Danny blushing a little, still laying on the bleachers, “I don’t like sports, and I don’t care enough about gym to put in any actual effort”.

She shakes her head at him, “ridiculous”, fiddling with her hair again, “so…”.

He sighs and pushes himself up onto his hands, leaning back, “the answer’s no, Paulina. I’m really not interested nowadays”, frowning, “and as much as I’m not a fan of someone I’m not even friends with finding out, the G.I.W. is more of a concern”.

She shrugs a little, damn, well, she did rather expect that. Can’t blame a girl for trying. “Well, we could be, friends that is”.

He rolls his eyes, “yeah I’m not super into a ‘friendship’ based on your weird crush on half of me or hero worship”, pointing at her, “and for your information, neither of my parents ‘fucked a ghost’, hilarious mental image though”, looking back out to the field, “though, I suppose I don’t really have to worry about the G.I.W. since I’ve made sure they’ll never suspect Danny Fenton”, frowning slightly, “still though”, shaking his head and eyeing her, “and I guess you’ve gotten questions and if I don’t let you ask them you’re just gonna pester me, so?”.

Huh, sounds like he’s already got the G.I.W. handled, weird to see competence from Danny Fenton of all people. And she can so totally see Phantom in him now. The jawline, muscles hidden under loose clothing, the hairstyle obviously. “Why do you protect everyone? It’s not like anyone treated you well at first”, huffing, “even if I always loved it. So cool”; so hot.

He blinks, “not what I expected but, because I could? Because Amity’s my home?”, rubbing his neck and look back to the field, “because it’s instinctual, to fight”.

Paulina would never stick her neck out for a bunch of ungrateful jerks, hmpf. Crossing her arms, “well if you ask me, none of these dumb people deserved help”.

He rolls his eyes mutter, “self absorbed as ever, I see”.

She shakes her head, really, this town so did not deserve him. She did for sure! The rest of these losers? Definitely not. “At least being territorial, or the instinct whatever, makes more sense. I hate it when people step on my turf too”; like when Dale gets a little too into how the cheerleaders were doing their choreography, or when Delhia snagged a rarer fashion drop than her. Absolutely awful and unacceptable. Frowning a little, because that will have a better affect than seeming vapid, “and if the town knew about this ‘half’ thing, someone would try to stop you or hurt you, and you’d get pestered so much”.

He snorts, “oh like how you’re pestering me now?”. She only rolls her eyes at that, there was no way she wasn’t going to chase a good story. Not a chance. Rolling his eyes, “those men… my parents, they aren’t kidding about the things they want to do to me. I’m not stupid enough to take genuinely dumb chances”, smirking a little, “unless it would be really really funny”.

Paulina’s more than aware that those agents and the Fenton’s wanted to do a bunch of really nasty gross painful things to Phantom… to Danny she supposes. Stupid jerks. No parent would hurt their own kid though, nope not a chance. Parents love and protect their darling kids; way have kids otherwise. So silly. Even if Danny’s were kinda crazy. The G.I.W. though… yeah no, acab. “Well”, smiling slightly, “your secret is safe with me”. He quirks an eyebrow at her so she rolls her eyes, “just because I have the gossip, doesn’t mean I’m gonna go spreading it”, her smiling even more and putting a finger up to her lips, “some secrets are more useful kept close to the chest”.

He blinks, “really?”, shaking his head, “I mean, I’m not too surprised, but still”.

“Obviously”. She absolutely notices him seems to relax slightly, her adding on, “in exchange, you owe me so many details”.

“…Details?”.

Pointing at his face, “ghost gossip, ghost boy”, ticking off on her fingers, “suit fabric. Hair routine. Can you survive in space? Are there hot single ghosts? Why do you always do flying poses; is that instinctive or rehearsed? What are ghost royals like? Can you get drunk? Do ghosts think you’re cute too? Does the Box Ghost really have a kid? Is Plasmius dating the mayor?”.

Danny screws up his face before bursting out into laughter, bending forwards and holding his stomach. “You’re are unbelievable. Vlad!-”.

She rolls her eyes, “I prefer iconic”; going basically entirely ignored.

Danny wheezing, “-Vlad! Dating- Ancients!”, wiping tears from his eyes, muttering, “he would so be self absorbed enough to do that, oh my Ancients”.

Paulina stills and turns her head slowly to stare at him. ‘self absorbed enough’ to date Plasmius? That doesn’t… oh! Oh mi god! Danny and Vlad have an obvious rivalry, and so does Phantom and Vlad! Did the man know about Danny/Phantom? Definitely seems highly likely. And Phantom also clearly has a more personal rivalry with Plasmius too! Would that mean that… if you ignore the echo they do sound similar. Oh mi god. Is Vlad a half ghost too! Is he Plasmius?!?!? And he’s Danny’s uncle right? Does this just run in the family? “Oh mi god just how many half ghosts are in your family!”.

Danny coughs extremely hard, choking a little, “I- what?”, then going a little wide eyed, “fuck”, putting his head in his hands, “he’s so gonna try to beat my ass and I’m gonna feel obligated to let him, I’m a moron”, rubbing his hands down his face and looking at her, “forget I said anything weird about Vlad? Who is not actually related to me, by the way?”.

She blinks at him disbelievingly, “so it’s just by chance you’re both half ghosts? I’m not that stupid, Danny”, and rolls her eyes.

Danny blinks very harshly, “please don’t tell him you know? Or how you do? I don’t want to deal with that?”, dropping his head down and groaning, before looking back to her, “my… parents are not very, uh, safe, with their tech”.

Paulina tilts her head, “I don’t really get it?”.

He glares a bit, “half ghost means half dead, and my parents aren’t very careful with their very dangerous and very temperamental tech. Figure that out yourself”.

She absolutely cringes at that, even she knew not to ask ghosts about the whole ‘how’ crap; and as much as she loves some good gossip, that kind of gossip was super not the fun kind or the kind she’d go spreading around. Talk about a way to make so many enemies. Looking away from him and twirling her hair some, “yeah no, I’m so not gonna push on that one, your parents are, like, super duper reckless”. It was obvious anyways that what he’s saying is that both he and Vlad had some kind of accident with Fenton tech… ouch.

He huffs very bitterly, “tell me about it”.

She just nods, not really sure what else to say now. Also, though, not a chance is she going to confront the mayor or try to get something out of him for her secrecy. She could tell from a mile away that man was dangerous. Even if all of Danny’s spats with him makes the guy seem like more of a joke. Looking up at the sky… the first stars were starting to appear. One of them even winks, or maybe that was just Paulina deciding the universe has excellent taste in drama. “It’s going to be a beautiful night out”.

Danny hums curiously before looking up too, “yeah, yeah it is. Mercury is supposed to be visible tonight”. What a nerd. “And the answer is yes, yes I can breathe on space”.

She absolutely smirks at that, “sweet”.

“Yup”.

End.

The squeeze and nudge go tighter. If he were to define what type of sandwich he is, it'd be PB and J. Half and Half.

And if he were a PB and J, his insides would be all over the god damn floor.

As it is, even though it feels that way, all his insides are—well. He's in his ghost form so does he even have organs?

"Contrary to popular belief, age," another observant drawls in the exact same manner as the one before, "is not exactly relevant to Godhood."

"I feel like it should be relevant though." Tucker cuts in, voice rumbling through his chest and into Danny's shoulder and through him. "Can you be a, uh—"

"Ancient." Sam answers through gritted teeth, which he can also feel from the way she presses her body into his left bicep, "They called him an Ancient."

"Right!" Tucker snaps towards Sam, "I feel like Ancient implies a very long livelihood, no?"

"And for that matter," Sam cuts her gaze towards the eyeballs like a scythe through weeds, "He's even younger in ghost-age. He's like, three. You're telling me you want a toddler for a King?"

"Yeah, like, you just show up here," Tucker frantically flails his arms about at the assembled, what, twenty? Observants standing around them, "No crown, no scepter thing, no—"

Tucker snaps, multiple times, before Sam roles her eyes and provides the missing word, "coronation."

"No coronation!" Tucker throws his hands up, looking to the ceiling as if to say you hear this Big Guy?

Danny huffs a weak laugh at that, because Tuck is hardly religious, but his mom is so he's always talking God as if he's some kind of homie or bro and—

That's when Danny realizes he hasn't really been breathing, and Sam has moved to rub circles into his back and he's hardly felt it.

"There seems to be…" an Observant somewhere in the back left cuts in, "a misunderstanding here."

That brings all of them short, Tucker shutting his mouth and trying to find the source of the words in the small assembled crowd with Sam and Danny tensing as if waiting for an attack.

"We are not appointing Phantom as the Ghost King," another voice in the crowd adds in, somewhere to the right this time, "nor are we indicting him into becoming an Ancient."

There's a long silence where the trio glance at each other, and it's clear what they want to say.

So of course, Sam says it, blunt almost hateful. "Then…what are you doing?"

"Other than freaking Danny out." Tucker mutters mulishly under his breath. As if it's a hate crime being committed.

Danny loves his friends so very much.

A collective sigh blows in staggered tandem, which is a little unfair in his opinion.

"Being an Ancient isn't a club." The Observant at the forefront of the gang carefully says, "It isn't something you are invited or crowned. Only the living require acknowledgement of that—Here, you simply are."

Tucker and Sam sputter, but all Danny can hear is white noise. The static isn't loud enough to drown out the next words though.

"You've been an Ancient, you've been Ruler of the Infinite Realms since almost your inception," the leader Observant continues, gesturing to the rest of them and their surroundings, "and this is your Keep—your first visit since defeating Pariah Dark. It is only natural that we be here to welcome you."

"We were worried," one of the smaller Observants titters, nervously, "that perhaps you were wishing to make your Haunt your Keep instead, which would have…unfortunate repercussions."

"My haunt?" Danny rasps, "What do you mean?"

"Your home, the…human city you claim as your territory outside the Realms." An Observant in the back right points out, which—Danny really does need to ask for their names because he's already dizzy with the content of the conversation, and all this bouncing around with almost identical eyeballs is really doing a number on him.

"You mean Amity Park?" Tucker straightens, at the same time Sam growls out, "What kind of repercussions?"

"A haunt is a place of privacy, comfort, perhaps even a place to socialize depending on the entity," A voice behind the middle attempts to summarize, as voice to the back right tacks on, "but a King's Keep is a place of, hm. Work?"

"A haunt conforms itself to the entity's comfort, their needs." The Observant at the forefront, the leader of the pack, begins to tense, it's one eye bouncing back and forth between the three of them as they continue gravely. "The Keep conforms itself to the Realms at large. A place of stability where a Ruler can receive their people and their problems, before sending them along their way."

A feeling of horrible dawning begins to flush over them, a feeling that Danny can relate to and understand despite there being no helpful body language to denote it.

"So hypothetically speaking…" Danny's voice cracks, "If a place becomes both a haunt and a Keep…"

The leader Observant shuts its one eye, answering as if each word is painful. "It will not know which to conform itself to, and become chaos. It will try to be the middle ground."

Suddenly the past three years of Danny's life is beginning to make sense. Suddenly, a sense of guilt and dread washes over him.

"Oh my God." Tucker intones, at the same time Sam starts swearing, "Holy shit, holy shit."

"This…explains a lot." Danny weakly croaks to the crowd.

"Have a seat, you three." The leader of the Observants opens their eye, sternly and brokenly answering in kind. "I suppose we have a lot to speak about."

The crowd begins to mumble and mutter, staccato beats of indecipherable questions and statements said as everyone migrates to a long table that appears behind them.

Sam, Tucker, and Danny all take a seat at the head. Sam to his right, and Tucker to his left.

Once the murmuring peters off, all eyes on him, Danny takes a deep, deep breath.

At a loss, unsure, and honestly a little terrified, Danny has no choice.

(But both her and Jack know that’s not true. He’d wanted to be an astronaut, apparently. Something they’d found out when snooping on Phantom playing with the child pirate ghost).

“I just…don’t understand where he could’ve got it from.” Jack mumbles, unusually quiet. They’ve got an array of photos of Phantom spread over their workbench. Some of him in mid flight, some blurred beyond recognition.

Maddie picks up a one taken from the local news channel, Amity Angle. Phantom resting casually on the Nasty Burger sign, HAZMAT clearly definable—black with white trim.

Just like theirs.

“I suppose, he could have created it out of his own idea?” Maddie counters, weakly. They’ve seen it before with other ghosts, alternating their appearances over time. Could the same have happened here?

“But he’s always had that HAZMAT suit, Mads.” Jack grimaces. “Maybe he saw that we were ghost hunters and decided to replicate us?”

A ghost, replicating them?

But then…

Maddie remembers when Phantom first started. When she and Jack had been near blasting him, never bothering to pause and think. Phantom had just the same approach with other ghosts, fight first, questions never.

Eventually over time, Phantom’s become known for his way of mediating fights. Adapted, something which ghosts shouldn’t be able to do. Or at least, her and Jack once thought that.

“It makes sense.” She ponders, looking at the photo again. “Our old hunting style, Phantom practically copied us, didn’t he? And now he’s learned I suppose. But would it be a reach to assume he’d copied our costumes too?”

“We should ask him!” Jack replies brightly. “We’ve never had a proper conversation with him, anyways.”

Which is true, because quite frankly, their new approach is merely weeks old. Finally encouraged by Jazz to take “non-confrontational” methods and evaluate its effectiveness compared to their former strategy.

“Yes. We’ll do that.” Maddie nods, turning from the bench to grab a notepad.

She hopes deep down, their theory is right. That maybe Phantom is a child ghost that once idolised them and decided to replicate them.

(Even though that, in itself, makes Maddie sick to the stomach. A ghost idolising the people whose once sought to destroy it)

Because the other alternative?

A child has died in a HAZMAT suit of their making.

—

Maddie sees him the next day in the aftermath of a ghost fight, suit torn, ectoplasm dribbling from a split lip.

“Need help?” She asks, outstretching a hand, holstering her gun to her belt. Not missing the way Phantom nearly doubles over in a flinch. Just showing how fresh their truce really is.

”Uh—thanks.” Phantom mumbles, taking her hand and she hoists him up. His grip much weaker than the strength she’s seen him display. “I’ll be fine. Just a couple of scrapes.”

”I’ll be the judge of that.” She scans him up and down, noting the paler than pallid skin, his face gaunt and knees slightly bent, trembling. And of course, the wounds tearing welts across his HAZMAT suit, sluggishly steeping ectoplasm.

“I’ve had worse.” The ghost looks away, wringing his hands together. No doubt, once caused by them. Maddie remembers a few particular injuries and times where she’d grounded Phantom mid-flight, celebrated for it.

His cheeks are still rounded with baby fat, eyes wide and round, limbs at that awkward stage between baby deer and towering. Just like Danny is now. Phantom can’t have been much older than her son.

She opens her mouth to ask, but then decides against it. One of Jazz’s warnings in their new strategy was to not question a ghost about their past life or any personal questions, only if the ghost had prompted the discussion themselves.

What had made them finally listen? She’s not sure, but it had been going on for a while. Her and Jack had grown tired of the inefficiency of their methods, constantly realising that theories and research weren’t adding up. So here she is.

“Come on.” Maddie beckons the ghost, towards Fentonworks. He obliges, following like a stray dog. Whether it’s out of his own authority, or he’s worried if he doesn’t oblige he’ll be blasted—she doesn’t know.

They eventually get to the house, and Phantom hesitates before stepping over the threshold. Although, he doesn’t look completely uneasy for a ghost stepping into a hunters house.

“Have you been here before?” Maddie questions, instantly feeling a flush on her neck. There’s a ghost portal in the basement, of course he has!

But Phantom looks momentarily stunned.

“Yeah, I guess?” Phantom hovers behind a kitchen chair, jabbing a finger in the direction of the lab. “When I need to put the ghosts back in the zone.”

“Interesting.” Maddie nods, taking the key from her belt. “Would you like a tour? Properly?”

Two weeks ago, she would’ve thought herself absurd. Showing a ghost around the premises like a grocery store.

But Jazz had really really pressed for them to use these methods of non confrontation and communication. And if it’s anything Maddie knows in the past few years, it’s that she’s never listened to the kids enough.

“Why not.” The ghost shrugs.

Taking a breath, Maddie shoves the key in the door and turns the handle. The lights automatically flicker on as she opens the door, the green of the portal swirling reflecting onto the tiles. Machines whirr and beep.

“Welcome to the Fenton lab.” She spreads her arms out, moving down the stairs. “I’m sure you’re well acquainted with it.”

“Very.” Phantom nods. “Glad it's not a dissection or dissolving experience.”

”So…if you don’t mind me asking?”

Phantom looks neutral, shrugging as he glances towards the portal. She observes his fists clenching as he looks at it before turning back to her.

”Go ahead. Just, nothing about my death or personal life.”

“So, why do you hunt ghosts?” She decides to get to the point straightaway. Wanting to understand his motivation.

Why he has that HAZMAT suit.

”Good question.” Phantom nods slowly, pacing around the floor, slightly liked a caged animal, yet free from containment. “Well I, felt responsible, in a way? That all the ghosts were causing havoc in Amity. I have these powers, and realistically, no offence, am the only one who can consistently deal with the attacks. And since it was me who started this.”

”You started this? What on earth do you mean by that?” Unless Phantom’s staged some consistent ghost invasion of Amity in such large swathes, she doesn’t know how he could even be responsible.

”I just…well. Y’know.” The ghost trails off, clenching his left fist. It’s a trait she’s noticed for a while now.

Perhaps it’s misplaced guilt from something else? The idea of ghosts having unsettled and misplaced emotions is certainly prevalent in the research field—anger being the most common. But what about guilt?

She looks at his HAZMAT. His guilty face. Barely Danny’s age.

A child in laboratory outfit. Going where they shouldn’t. A guilt for not listening, paying the price in death.

Acting as a hero to ensure no one does what he did. And certainly, it doesn’t infer well of his parents. Allowing a child, unsupervised. Dead.

Perhaps that is another reason Phantom considers himself a hero? Perhaps as a child, a shadow in his house, he’d read superhero comics as an escape. One day dreaming he’d be like that. Death giving him the freedom to do so.

”Mads, I’m back!” The stairs rattle as Jack thunders down them. Maddie notes the way Phantom flinches.

“Oh, hey ghost kid. Didn’t see you there.”

”You too.” Phantom gives a tight smile.

”We were just having a discussion.” Maddie clarifies, picking her earlier notes off the workbench. Phantom tilts his head, curious.

”Excellent. I quite like this new method, don’t you Mads? Discussion! Who thought it could be this easy.”

”Not me.” Phantom responds.

”And actually, ghost kid, we were wondering about your HAZMAT earlier.”

”My—my HAZMAT?” The ghost is taken aback, looking down at his figure.

”Yeah! It resembles our quite a lot, you see.” Jack continues, progressing towards the cupboard where they store the PPE.

”Oh.” Phantom grasps at his glove, paling. It seems he is aware of the similarities. Interesting.

Maddie watches as Jack brings out one of Danny’s old jumpsuits, a one a few years ago, before the most recent one they’d given to him (that’d disappeared somewhere, and Danny hadn’t asked for a replacement, so they’d not gotten around to it).

”See now,” Jack babbles, the HAZMAT on a hanger at arm’s length, “Our Danno has this one, it’s white and black so not the same but inverted, his went missing…“

Maddie freezes. Jack holds the HAZMAT near to Phantom’s left side. It hangs innocently, glistening in the light.

Jack’s eyes widen, mouth parting. He turns to her.

”Mads…I think we’ve found Danno’s missing HAZMAT.”

Phantom shifts awkwardly, cringing, and points towards the portal.

”I wanted to fix it?”

”Oh Danny.” Maddie feels her heart plummet to the floor.

—

A/N: 2nd phic of the phight, a classic Maddie POV, can never go wrong 😁

Word Count: 1611